Advent on my mind

As the Season of Advent is coming to a close, and the season of Christmas begins, I have read a few articles on line recently that struck a chord with me.  Two by George Weigel, and one by Bishop Robert Barron.

First was Bishop Robert Barron who begins by citing the Mass Readings from the Third Sunday of Advent.  He concludes his article:

Such love is a consequence of grace, of the adventus of Christ, of being dipped into the fire of the Holy Spirit.  To welcome this grace that transfigures nature, to pray for it with all our heart, is what the season of Advent is finally about.

Next, George Weigel wrote an article at First Things.  In his first paragraph he writes:

... First Corinthians and Luke-Acts are built on the same deep theological insight: the incarnation of the Son of God, and his birth, ministry, death and resurrection, turned the world upside-down.

Near the end of his article he writes:

Seeing the world with the world's eyes gets the world out of focus.  Seeing the world through the gospels and their unique optic on reality helps bring what the world mistakenly calls "the real world" into clearer focus.  That kind of "seeing" begins at Christmas.

Finally, at National Review Online, Weigel writes an excellent article about Advent, Christmas, and two figures that are the pivot between "God's revelation to Israel and God's revelation in his Son."

Before closing with a hymn attributed to St Ambrose he writes:

Christmas is a richly symbolic, evocative antidote to the ideology of the imperial, autonomous Self: John the Baptist and Mary bear witness to the Law of the Gift inscribed in creation by the Triune God — the moral truth that fulfillment and human flourishing come through the gift of self, not the assertion of self. 

I recommend reading all three articles in this order.

A Poem with many esses

One of the Psalms, ps 119, has a canto for every letter of the Jewish alphabet.  Each strophe in a given canto begins with that letter.  It is a psalm in praise of the Law of God.

A few years ago I wrote poetry for a few letters of the English alphabet.  Many, but not all, of the lines began with that letter.

I wrote one poem for the letter 'S,' and I titled it using a Jeopardy category scheme.  This is pronounced like eschatology (see eschatology).

The readings from Mass for the last few weeks of the Liturgical year focus on the end times, as they do during the early part of Advent when we are reminded of the two comings of Christ.

I was reminded of this poem repeatedly over the last several weeks, and thought today would be a good day to post it on this blog.

Peggy Noonan and the left's response to the San Bernardino assault

Peggy Noonan at the Wall Street Journal writes an excellent article involving the assault in San Bernardino, the response by members of the political left and its' implications for our 1st amendment freedoms.

Near the end of the article she writes:

Why doesn’t some thoughtful candidate on the Republican side address the issue of shaming and silencing? Why doesn’t someone give a deep and complete speech on what the First Amendment means, how it must be protected, how we pay a daily price for it in terms of anger, hurt, misunderstandings and crudity, but it’s worth it. Why doesn’t someone note that you fight bad speech with better speech, you don’t try to tape up the mouths of an entire country.

You should read the entire article.

Archbishop Chaput and The Year of Mercy

Charles Chaput, the archbishop of Philadelphia, has written an article at First Things about The Jubilee Year of Mercy.


He writes:

We should not read Christ’s mercy as a judgment against all judgments. Evil exists. Sin matters. The damage it does can be bitter and not easily undone—adultery being a perfect example. But the story does remind us that, apart from God’s grace, all of us are misshapen by the distorted desires of our hearts. 

Cast All Your Cares on Him

The readings from today's Mass include a parable by Jesus about a dishonest judge.  Our priest today, Fr Dan, spoke about how God desires for us to turn to Him in our needs.  That God would much prefer us to 'pester' Him about what's happening in our lives than that we never turn to Him.

I was reminded of a passage from the first letter of St Peter:

Cast all your worries upon him because he cares for you.

Let us this day and everyday cast our cares upon the Lord, for He has shown us clearly, in his passion, death, and resurrection how very much he cares for us.

Cardinal Dolan and his report on the Synod

In the Newspaper for the Catholic archdiocese of New York, Cardinal Dolan writes a column relating to his experience and insights from the recently concluded Synod on the Family, of which he was a member.

He addresses his experiences with the Holy Father, the universal nature of the Church and the Synod, the witness of Family Life, two challenges from the Synod, as well as several other points.

I was struck by his relating Cardinal Collins' intervention about Emmaus (Luke 24).  Cardinal Dolan writes:

Cardinal Collins takes us through it well. Jesus drew near. He accompanied them with His loving presence. He asked them about their situation. He listened to their experience. He rebuked them for their mistakes. He taught them about the truth of the Scriptures. He revealed Himself in the Eucharist. He thus restored their hope and led them to conversion.

It is a lengthy column, much longer than his blog posts during the Synod, and well worth reading.

Sanders and the Free Exercise of Religion

David Marcus at The Federalist has written an article about Bernie Sanders' debt to Religious Freedom.  After noting Sanders' draft status during the Vietnam war, he writes:

In the 1965 Seeger decision the Supreme Court extended conscientious objector status to pacifists whose beliefs were not based on any orthodox religion.

All this leads to an intriguing question: if Sanders didn't have to fight in Vietnam because of his beliefs, why do business owners have to participate in Gay weddings in spite of theirs?

That is a most serious question to be posed to the rabid advocates for so-called marriage equality.

It also brings us back to my point made several times in this blog:  without the design established by the Creator, there are no human rights.

There's no one here to save -- a song

In my previous post, I wrote about an upside down perspective that is quite common in our culture today.  Specifically the view that God is looking for an opportunity to send us to Hell.

It is coupled with the perspective that "we don't need no saving."  It's often stated as "I'm okay, you're okay."  I think this perspective is captured in this song by Sara Bareilles which was popular about 5 years ago.

Sara Bareilles  -- King of Anything

reflection -- 24 Oct 2015

The GospelAcclamation from today's Mass caught my attention today:

I take no pleasure in the death of the wicked man, says the Lord, but rather in his conversion that he may live.

 I remember this from the prologue to the Rule of St Benedict,
which I first read about 25 years ago.


It is completely upsidedown from the usual perspective.  I can't tell you how many times I've heard people talk about God as though he were a policeman.  For the phrase "God is watching you,"  they seem to think that He's looking for an opportunity to send us to Hell.

It's as though they thought God was saying "Aha!  I've caught you now.  Now you're going to Hell."

But that is the complete opposite of the situation.

Cardinal Dolan from the Synod

I recently read a couple of Cardinal Dolan's blog posts from the synod on the family.  He is the archbishop of New York.

In the first one he remarks on one theme from the Synod: inclusion.

He writes:

A very refreshing consistent theme of the synod has been inclusion.  The church, our spiritual family, welcomes everyone, especially those who may feel excluded.

Reflection -- Gospel Reading 17 Oct 2015

The readings from today's Mass include:

Everyone who speaks a word against the Son of Man will be forgiven, but the one who blasphemes against the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven.

When they take you before synagogues and before rulers and authorities, do not worry about how or what your defense will be or about what you are to say.  For the Holy Spirit will teach you at that moment what you should say.

The Catechism of the Catholic Church discusses "blaspheming the Holy Spirit" in paragraph 1864:

1864 "Whoever blasphemes against the Holy Spirit never has forgiveness, but is guilty of an eternal sin."¹³⁶ There are no limits to the mercy of God, but anyone who deliberately refuses to accept his mercy by repenting, rejects the forgiveness of his sins and the salvation offered by the Holy Spirit.¹³⁷ Such hardness of heart can lead to final impenitence and eternal loss.

Let us always be willing to repent of the evil we have done, clinging to the Cross of Christ, and changing immorality into Immortality.

Poem: Autumn Leaves

The following poem I wrote for my sister's birthday 21 years ago:

                        Autumn Leaves

                        Autumn Leaves have filled the hills

                           With amber, gold, and red

                        Biting breeze nips noses still

                           And blows hair 'bout your head

                        Pumpkins, cornstalks, chilling rain

                           Leaves tumble to the ground

                        Falls upon us once again

                           Each steps a crunching sound

                        Scamp'ring squirr'ls cavort aloft

                           October's in the air

                        Fallen leaves crunch, oh so good

                           But cling within your hair

                        A country walk's a lovely date

                           For couples who have style

                        Across the fields, or by the lake

                           Just walk ... and talk awhile.





American Principles project and Obergefell

The American Principles Project  has published a Statement regarding the recent Supreme Court Decision Obergefell.  It is signed by a number of noted individuals from a wide range of Universities and Law Schools. 

After noting four (4) clear results of Obergefell that stand out, they say:

Any decision that brings about such evils would be questionable. One lacking anything remotely resembling a warrant in the text, logic, structure, or original understanding of the Constitution must be judged anti-constitutional and illegitimate. Obergefell should be declared to be such, and treated as such, by the other branches of government and by citizens of the United States.

That is a very sharp statement.  They then cite Madison and Lincoln, and declare that Obergefell cannot be taken to have settled the law of the United States.

They then call upon office holders to refuse to accept it as binding precedent, and other specific legal actions.

Robert Barron, Pope Francis and Divine Mercy

Bishop Robert Barron writes at The National Catholic Register (and also at RealClearReligion) about Pope Francis and his perception by the American Media.

He takes issue with their impression that Francis is a revolutionary change from his predecessors. He writes:

Often, I heard words such as "revolutionary" and "game-changing" in regard to Pope Francis, and one commentator sighed that she couldn't imagine going back to the Church as it was before the current pontiff. 

Robert Barron, Harvard and Assited Suicide in CA

At Real Clear Religion, Bishop Robert Barron writes concerning two recent developments in the news. 

The first is the statistic about the religious background of incoming freshmen at Harvard.  The second is the passage of legislation permitting assisted suicide in California.  He writes:

Though it might seem strange to suggest as much, I believe that the make-up of the Harvard freshman class and the passing of the suicide law are related.

Kathryn Jean Lopez, Pope Francis, media headlines and abortion

Kathryn Jean Lopez writes at National Review:

This is a heartbreakingly misleading headline: “Pope to allow priests to forgive abortion.” You could go to St. Francis Assisi by Penn Station or St. Agnes by Grand Central in New York and throughout the United States yesterday, today, or tomorrow, and be forgiven for this or other sins you are sorry for.

She links to the letter from Pope Francis.  She quotes an associate professor of systematic theology at the Dominican House of Studies in DC, and from Pope Francis.

In her second to last paragraph she writes:

Pope Francis is like a broken record pleading with people to know God’s mercy. He goes to Confession in the view of cameras and leads with his own identity as a sinner, loved by a merciful Father. He wants others to experience this.


You should read her post.

Robert George, Polyamory and the death of American Culture

Robert George writes at American Interest:

Of course, the case for polyamory and its legal recognition presupposes that marriage is in fact what so-called "marriage equality" advocates have depicted it as being: committed sexual-romantic companionship or domestic partnership.  And this is precisely what has been denied by defenders of what used to be known as "marriage" and is now called "traditional marriage" (i.e. as the union of husband and wife).

CBS reports:

A polygamous family says the landmark US Supreme Court ruling legalizing same-sex marriage shows that laws restricting consensual adult relationships are outdated, even if certain unions are unpopular.

The advocates of so-called "same sex" marriage, polygamy, and polyamory are seriously confused about the central question.  Why does the state recognize and bestow benefits on marriage?

Marriage, as it has been known, provides something that is of inestimable value to society.  Even when it was misunderstood as polygamy this value existed.  Marriage produces children, because the defining act, the most essential act of marriage is sexual intercourse between the husband and his wife.

This defining act is the means by which a future is produced for the society, which is not produced in any other way.  The children, raised by their mother and father learn the value of their society and are prepared to continue that society when adults.

A society that does not value itself, its children or its future is redefining marriage to its own demise.

You should read the article by Prof. George.

Reflection -- 11 Aug 2015, St Clare of Assisi

Today, 11 Aug 2015, is the memorial of St Clare.  She was a contemporary of St Francis.

When I went to Italy a couple of years ago, I went on a tour of Orvieto and Assisi.  One of our stops in Assisi was the Church of St Clare, seen below with its' flying buttresses.

Church of St Clare, Assisi Italy

St Clare's body is entombed in this Church.  St Francis was entombed here as well, before the Basilica of St Francis was completed on the other side of Assisi, and his remains were moved to that church.

There is a community of Franciscan women near where I live who are Poor Clares.



Brandon McGinley, Torture and PP videos

At National Review Online Brandon McGinley writes an article entitled "The Planned Parenthood Videos Expose Our Country's Silent Pact with the Abortion Industry."

He begins by discussing the Senate Intelligence Committee's torture report, and the "Dirty Hands" description posed by Michael Walzer, in 1973.

He likens responses to the torture report and the Planned Parenthood secret videos.  His most important passages are at the end of his piece:

Like the Senate’s torture report, the Planned Parenthood videos explode this convenient arrangement. They compel us to confront the grisly details of the bargain we’ve made. They eliminate our pretense to innocence. They force us to undertake honestly the moral reasoning we have shirked.

In the end, the “dirty hands” theory was always unstable. Evil cannot be neatly contained, even (especially not!) by legal and governmental institutions. We can’t dabble with the demonic. Having heard the frigid voices of the abortion industry, having witnessed the illogic of its inhumanity, having seen the hands and feet and innards of the victims, we face the danger that, knowing nothing else, we will still choose that nightmare. And all our hands will be filthy.

This reminded me of an article  by James Martin, SJ  at America Magazine about the erection of a Satanic statue near Detroit MI.

He begins by discussing the movie The Exorcist, and his own experiences.  He concludes:

In other words, I’m describing not only my belief, but my experience. Evil is real. How Satan fits into this, I’m not exactly sure, but I believe that a personified force is somehow behind this. There is a certain “intelligence,” if you will, and a sameness, as St. Ignatius identified. As C.S. Lewis said about Satan, “I’m not particular about the horns and hooves, but yes I believe.” Me too.

So while the Satanic Temple may smile at their victory, and the mainstream media might chuckle at the “Gotcha” moment vis-à-vis other religious groups (If the Ten Commandments, then why not Satan?) my fear is directed in another place. I recall all those stories I read and heard about Satan, and I think: You have no idea what you’re dealing with.

You are playing with fire.

 So is our society when in dabbles in the Dirty Hands of abortion.

Pete Spiliakos on Planned parenthood and Cecil the Lion -- UPDATED

Pete Spiliokos at First Things writes:

What the Planned Parenthood videos have revealed about liberal elites and the dynamics of American politics is extraordinary. Outside of those who consume conservative media, Americans are more likely to have heard of Cecil, the dead Zimbabwe lion, than of the videos. Those who have heard of both stories know more about Cecil's last moments than about fetuses having their brains destroyed so that their organs—their human organs—could be sold.

The July 30th NBC Nightly News report on the Planned Parenthood videos was, in its own way, a beautiful example of how properly motivated journalists can make an inherently interesting subject incomprehensible and irritating. Imagine if a network had covered Romney's infamous (surreptitiously taped) 47 percent remarks by never quoting Romney, including clips of a hostile interview with the journalists who released the Romney tape, and then had ended the report with the suggestion that the attacks on Romney could lead to declining business investment and job growth.

He begins by discussing the passing interest of Trump, and points to the more enduring and critical story of the Planned parenthood videos, and their lack of coverage by the MSM.

Read his entire article.  And get a lot of information on these videos at The Federalist.

UPDATE:
No sooner had I posted this than I found this article at GetReligion on the NY Times and a correction pointed to by an author at The Federalist.  She has posted many articles on this topic. 

Kathryn Lopez, Dorothy Day and a Culture of Death

At National Review Online, Kathryn Lopez, writes an article entitled "Building a Culture Hospitable to Life."

She begins by quoting from Dorothy Day:

Three little pigs are crowded into a too-small cage, the case is brought to court, the judge’s findings in the case being that pigs should not be crowded the way subway riders are.”

The late Dorothy Day was writing (in House of Hospitality, recently reprinted by Our Sunday Visitor) about the contrast between how we treat animal life and human life sometimes. This certainly rang true last week as the news was dominated by the dual stories of the killing of Cecil the lion and the harvesting and selling of aborted children’s body parts.

Quoting from Day again:

God forgive us the sins of our youth! But as Zachariah sang out, ‘We have knowledge of salvation through forgiveness of our sins.’ I don’t think anyone recognizes the comfort of this text better than I do. 

Then Lopez adds:

She wrote this at 75 years old, in Commonweal. Despite a full life, one devoted to service; despite religious conversion and forgiveness; despite age, she still had a wound that needed tending from the abortion she had had in her youth.

Kathryn closes with:

We have the right instinct, being sensitive to our stewardship of animals. But human beings, especially when most innocent and vulnerable, are part of creation, too. And if we can’t see humanity always, we’ll be lost on all other fronts.

It is a good well written article and you should read it.

George Will, Roe and Planned Parenthood

George Will, at the Washington Post writes an op-ed piece regarding Roe vs Wade, and the barbarity exposed by the Planned Parenthood videos.  He writes:

When life begins is a scientific, not a philosophic or theological, question: Life begins when the chromosomes of the sperm fuse with those of the ovum, forming a distinctive DNA complex that controls the new organism’s growth. This growth process continues unless a natural accident interrupts it or it is ended by the sort of deliberate violence Planned Parenthood sells.

Bishop elect Robert Barron and the Planned Parenthood videos

Robert Barron, recently named by Pope Francis as an Auxiliary Bishop of Los Angeles, has posted an article at RealClearReligion that addresses the issue by examining it as a consequence of the loss of the sense of God's existence.

He writes:

Now it is easy enough to remark and lament the moral coarseness of these women, the particularly repulsive way that they combine violence and greed. But I would like to explore a deeper issue that these videos bring to light, namely, the forgetfulness of the dignity of the human being that is on ever clearer display in our Western culture.

He continues:

When God is removed from the picture, human rights rather rapidly evanesce, which can be seen with clarity in both ancient times and modern. For Cicero, Aristotle, and Plato, a cultural elite enjoyed rights, privileges, and dignity, while the vast majority of people were legitimately relegated to inferior status, some even to the condition of slavery. In the totalitarianisms of the last century -- marked in every case by an aggressive dismissal of God -- untold millions of human beings were treated as little more than vermin.

And some more:

In the measure that people still speak of the irreducible dignity of the individual, they are, whether they know it or not, standing upon Biblical foundations. When those foundations are shaken -- as they increasingly are today -- a culture of death will follow just as surely as night follows day.

I would only add, as I have written elsewhere:

Without "the design established by the Creator," there are no human rights. This perspective is written into the founding documents of our country, but has been abandoned in recent decades.

I encourage you to read Fr Barron's article.

Msgr. Charles Pope and the Prefaces for Mass

Msgr. Charles Pope has a post at his blog which discusses the Preface Dialogue from the Mass.   He writes:

This is a fairly familiar dialogue to be sure. But to some extent, it fails to take wing because of the rather earthbound notion that most moderns have of the Mass. Very few attending Mass today think much of the heavenly liturgy. Rather, they are focused on their parish Church, the priest in front of them, and the people around them.

But this is NOT an adequate vision for the Mass. In the end, there is only one liturgy: the one in Heaven. There is only one altar: the one in Heaven. There is only one High Priest: Jesus in Heaven. In the Mass, we are swept up into the heavenly liturgy. There, with myriad angels and saints we worship the Father through Jesus, with Jesus, and in Jesus.

It is a wonderful piece and you should read it.

Reflection -- 5 July 2015

Today's Readings from Mass include Psalm 123.  The Liturgy of the hours provides this translation:

          To you have I lifted up my eyes,
          you who dwell in the heavens:
          my eyes like the eyes of slaves
          on the hand of their lords.

          Like the eyes of a servant
          on the hand of her mistress,
          so our eyes are on the Lord our God
          till he show us his mercy.

          Have mercy on us, Lord have mercy.
          We are filled with contempt.
          Indeed all too full is our soul
          with the scorn of the rich,
          with the proud man's disdain.

God has shown us His Mercy.  Who is the mercy of God? 
It is the Lord!

Cyril of Jerusalem and the office of the readings

In today's non-biblical reading from the Liturgy of the hours, we are given a part of a catechetical instruction by St Cyril of Jerusalem.  I was struck with how appropriate the opening paragraph was for our country today:

If there is any slave of sin here present, he should at once prepare himself, through faith for the rebirth into freedom that makes us God's adopted children. He should lay aside the wretchedness of slavery to sin and put on the joyful slavery of the Lord, so as to be accounted worthy to inherit the kingdom of heaven.  By acknowledging your sins strip away your former self, seduced as it is by destructive desires, and put on the new self, renewed in the likeness of its creator.  Through faith receive the pledge of the Holy Spirit, so that you may be welcomed into the everlasting dwelling places.

Cathy Ruse and the Gay Marriage Tidal Wave Illusion

Cathy Ruse at the Stream has a piece entitled "Don’t Buy the Same-Sex Marriage Tidal Wave Illusion."  She opens by writing:

If same-sex marriage comes to America, it will not be because Americans asked for it.

 She recalls the history of the people voting, then, more recently, of the Federal Courts rejecting the will of the people:

in 2013 a federal judge struck down the law that Utahns had passed to keep marriage a man-woman institution.

You should read the entire article, it is well worth your time.
 

Reflection -- Gospel reading 23 June 2015

Today's readings from Mass include a segment of the new law, the sermon on the mount.  Jesus says:

Enter through the narrow gate; for the gate is wide and the road broad that leads to destruction, and those who enter through it are many. How narrow the gate and constricted the road that leads to life. And those who find it are few.

One may ask "What is the narrow gate?"
But a more important question is "Who is the narrow gate?"

Jesus says at the last supper:

I am the way and the truth^* and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.

It is Christ who is the narrow gate.  Let us enter through him into the hands of God, where no torment shall touch us.

Fr Barron, Bruce Jenner, love and immorality

On 10 June, Fr Robert Barron wrote an article at RealClearReligion about Bruce Jenner, Gnosticism and a "Shadow Council."

I was studiously avoiding every article and news piece about Bruce Jenner, but was drawn to this because the author was Fr Barron, and the piece addressed a deeper topic.

Fr Barron writes:

The first was the emergence of Bruce Jenner as a "woman" named Caitlyn, and the second was a "shadow council" that took place in Rome and apparently called for the victory of a theology of love over John Paul II's theology of the body.

Let me begin with Irenaeus. Toward the end of the second century, Irenaeus, the bishop of Lyons, wrote a text called Adversus Haereses, and the principle heresy that he identified therein was Gnosticism. Gnosticism was, and is, a multi-headed beast, but one of its major tenets is that matter is a fallen, inferior form of being, produced by a low-level deity. The soul is trapped in matter, and the whole point of the spiritual life is to acquire the gnosis(knowledge) requisite to facilitate an escape of the soul from the body. On the gnostic interpretation, the Yahweh of the Old Testament, who foolishly pronounced the material world good, is none other than the compromised god described in gnostic cosmology, and Jesus is the prophet who came with the saving knowledge of how to rise above the material realm.

What Irenaeus intuited -- and his intuition represented one of the decisive moments in the history of the Church -- is that this point of view is directly repugnant to Biblical Christianity, which insists emphatically upon the goodness of matter. Scan through Irenaeus's voluminous writings, and you will find the word "body" over and over again. Creation, Incarnation, Resurrection, the theology of the Church, Sacraments, redemption, and the Eucharist all involve, he argued, bodiliness and materiality. For Irenaeus, redemption is decidedly not tantamount to the escape of the soul from the body; rather, it is the salvation and perfection of the body. 

He closes his article with:

For Biblical people, human love is never a disembodied reality. Furthermore, love -- which is an act of the will -- does not hover above the body, but rather expresses itself through the body and according to the intelligibility of the body. To set the two in opposition or to maintain that an inner act is somehow more important or comprehensive than the body is to walk the gnostic road -- which is just as dangerous a path as it was in the time of St. Irenaeus.

The following week, on 17 June, he wrote an article on love.

For the mainstream of the Catholic intellectual tradition, love is not primarily an emotion, but an act of the will. To love, Thomas Aquinas says, is to want the good of the other. Consequently, hatred is not primarily a feeling, but desiring evil for another, positively wanting what is bad for someone else. Given this, when is hatred called for? When is hatred morally permissible? The simple answer: never.

God is nothing but love, and Jesus said that we are to be perfect, as our heavenly father is perfect. This is precisely why he told us to love even our enemies, to bless even those who curse us, to pray even for those who maltreat us. Does this mean that our forebears were obliged to love Hitler and that we are obliged to love ISIS murderers? Yes. Period. Does it mean that we are to will the good of those who, we are convinced, are walking a dangerous moral path? Yes. Period. Should everyone love Bruce/Caitlyn Jenner? Absolutely, completely, unconditionally.

But here is where a crucial distinction has to be made: to criticize someone for engaging in immoral activity is not to "hate" that person. In point of fact, it is an act of love, for it is tantamount to willing good for him or her.

It needs to be pointed out that greatest good for anyone is unity with God in heaven.

In this light, I point you to a blog post of mine from the end of August 2014, where I write a little story regarding unity and division:

When they see the people in the gondola, who are clean, and those among the people who have re-entered the oil coated water to tell those who remained of the dangers they live in, the people who love the smell and feel of the olive oil become enraged.

 
They speak of the virtue of unity, that everyone should find joy in being coated in the oil and that those who are in the gondola are divisive and haters.
 
But I ask you, since those covered in the oil are going to be burned, is dividing the people so that some of them can be saved, less than the unity where all will burn eternally?
 
All men are called to the salvation that is in Christ, and God provides sufficient Grace for every man to be saved from the eternal fire. Will you embrace that salvation or will you degrade those who call you out of the fire?

After this,  I offer my more recent post on immorality and immortality.

Verse 4 (Wisdom 3:4) says:

For if to others, indeed, they seem punished, yet is their hope full of immortality;

I remember thinking that when reading this passage, it is very important to clearly enunciate the first 't' in "immortality."

And:

So, let us repent of our immorality, that we may come in the end to immortality.

Robert Barron on St Charles Lwanga and companions

Today, 3 June, is the Memorial of Charles Lwanga and Companions Martyrs.  Charles and his companions were Ugandans who were martyred in the late 1800s.

Fr Robert Barron has a good article about them and a Mass commemorating their martyrdom on this date a few years ago.  He writes about the martyrs:

The most prominent of these were a group of men and boys who served as pages to the court of King Mwanga II. This king had initially been supportive of the missionaries, but his attitude quickly changed when he discovered how seriously his Christian pages took the moral demands of their new faith. Accustomed to getting whatever he wanted, Mwanga solicited sexual favors from several of his courtiers. When they refused, he presented them with a terrible choice: either renounce their Christian faith or die. Though they were new converts and though they were very young, the pages, to a man, refused to deny their Christianity. Joseph Mukasa Balikudembe was killed outright by the king himself, and the rest were led off on a terrible death march to the place of execution, many miles outside the capital city.

American Catholic (http://www.americancatholic.org/Features/Saints/Saint.aspx?id=1403) points out:

When Pope Paul VI canonized these 22 martyrs on October 18, 1964, he referred to the Anglican pages martyred for the same reason.

You should read all of Fr Barron's article.

Immorality

This morning I was an altar server for a funeral Mass in my Parish.
The first reading was from the Book of Wisdom.  I was reminded that this was the reading we chose for my Dad's Funeral Mass as well.  Verse 4 (Wisdom 3:4) says:

For if to others, indeed, they seem punished, yet is their hope full of immortality;

I remember thinking that when reading this passage, it is very important to clearly enunciate the first 't' in "immortality."

 

This led me to think of the similarity between a 't' and a '+' and that in the midst of immorality, it is the cross that saves.  The cross, in the midst of immorality, and clinging to the cross in the midst of immorality, which means repenting of the immoral acts we have engaged in, brings us home to the hands of God, where no torment shall touch us.

 

This is our hope.  Where Christ has gone we hope to follow.  He is seated at the right hand of the Father, interceding on our behalf with the wounds of his suffering.

 

So, let us repent of our immorality, that we may come in the end to immortality.

 

St Hilary and his comments on the Trinity

In the non-biblical reading today, from the Liturgy of the hours, we are given a segment from St Hilary's treatise On The Trinity.  I thought one portion of the reading was very significant:

We receive the Spirit of truth so that we may know the things of God.  In order to grasp this consider how useless the faculties of the human body would become if they were denied their existence.  Our eyes cannot fulfill their task without light, either natural or artificial; our ears cannot react without sound vibrations...

It is the same with the human soul.  Unless it absorbs the gift of the Spirit through faith, the mind has the ability to know God but lacks the light necessary for that knowledge.

The Avengers and Terminator The Sarah Connor Chronicles

Fr Robert Barron recently reviewed the latest MARVEL movie installment, Avengers: Age of Ultron.

Fr Barron sees in Joss Whedon's latest entry what he describes as:

a sort of antidote to Tolkien and Lewis, shaping the imaginations of young people so as to receive a distinctly different message.

and

Although some have seen Biblical themes at work in all of this, I see pretty much the opposite, namely, an affirmation of a Nietzschean view of life.

I do not dispute with Fr Barron about the "Nietzschean view of life," but I have a somewhat different take on the movie.

I was reminded of the folktale of the Golem of Prague when I was watching "Ultron."

The folktale is displayed in the voiceover portion of one episode of the 1st season of Terminator the Sarah Connor Chronicles (TSCC).

In the episode entitled "Heavy Metal," the voiceover occurs in the 1st scene and in the final scene.

 

 

 





Two versions of the Golem story appear in Ultron.  The First is the construction of Ultron, and the second is the making of a "Golem" to help defeat Ultron.

I found the voiceover in the final scene of TSCC Heavy Metal telling.  Sarah says:

        "The Pride of man."

and that is finally what Ultron is about, the pride of man running amok.

Fr Barron brings his review to a close by saying:

What the Christian can seize upon in this film is the frank assertion that the will to power -- even backed up by stunningly sophisticated technology -- never finally solves our difficulties, that it, in point of fact, makes things worse. See the Tower of Babel narrative for the details. And this admission teases the mind to consider the possibility that the human predicament can be addressed finally only through the invasion of grace. 

Once that door is opened, the Gospel can be proclaimed.

Yes, it is only through grace that pride can be overcome.

I very much enjoy watching TSCC, especially season one because of the voiceover that accompanies each episode.

Friday -- 1 May 2015 -- Memorial of St Joseph the Worker

Yesterday, Thursday 30 Apr, would have been my mom's birthday,
and today is the memorial of St Joseph the worker.

Today, at Walsh University, since it was the 1st Friday of the month, there was a prayer service before Mass to Our Lady of Perpetual Help, for which the Chapel is named.  So, we remembered Mary, the mother of God, and St Joseph (her most chaste spouse).  It was in their home that Jesus grew up.  He was taught the psalms and kept the sabbath, as well as Passover and the other Jewish feasts. 

It is important to know that while nailed to His cross, Jesus prayed the psalms.

Anyway, because of my mom's birthday yesterday and the memorial of St Joseph the worker I offer this little poem which I wrote for my folk's 50th wedding anniversary.

                              Joseph and Mary

 

                        Mary, Queen, and mountain tall

                        Hear the voice, the gentle call

                        Wed the man whom God has sent

                        Raising children love is spent

 

                        Joseph, worker, husband, dad

                        Cards and quips and puns make glad

                        Waste not, want not, guide for life

                         Love your children, love your wife.

 

                         Children, sing your parents praise

                         For Jean and Joe your voices raise

                         Thanks to God for such a life

                         Joseph, Mary, man and wife.

 

 

 



Archbishop Chaput on Of Human Dignity

Charles Chaput, the archbishop of Philadelphia, delivered an address at St. Charles Borromeo Seminary on March, 17 2015 on the topic Of Human Dignity.  The text of that speech is available at First Things.

He begins by talking about the Church's teaching about Religious freedom and ties it to the enlightenment and to the Church's early history.  He says:

To put it another way: Early Christians weren't hated because they were religious. They were hated because they weren't religious enough. They weren't killed because they believed in God. They were killed because they didn't believe in the authentic gods of the city and empire. In their impiety, they invited the anger of heaven. They also threatened the well-being of everyone else, including the state. The emperor Marcus Aurelius—one of history’s great men of intellect and character—hated the Christian cult. He persecuted Christians not for their faith, but for what he saw as their blasphemy. In refusing to honor the traditional gods, they attacked the security of the state.

He then begins to talk about the second Vatican Council and its' document (Dignitatis Humanae) on religious freedom saying:

To put it another way, Dignitatis Humanae is not just about freedom from coercion. It’s also about freedom for the truth. The issue of truth is too easily overlooked.

He then talks about the issues of our own time.  He says:

The biggest problem we face as a culture isn’t gay marriage or global warming. It’s not abortion funding or the federal debt. These are vital issues, clearly. But the deeper problem, the one that’s crippling us, is that we use words like justice, rights, freedom and dignity without any commonly shared meaning to their content.

This speech is extremely important in our day.  You should read it.

Barron and Cinderella

Fr Robert Barron  has a review of the recent live-action movie about Cinderella at ChurchPop.

He begins:

Kenneth Branagh’s “Cinderella” is the most surprising Hollywood movie of the year so far. 

I say this because the director manages to tells the familiar fairy tale without irony, hyper-feminist sub-plots, Marxist insinuations, deconstructionist cynicism, or arch condescension. In so doing, he actually allows the spiritual, indeed specifically Christian, character of the tale to emerge.

 It is a review well worth reading.

Cardinal Wuerl on trying to silence the Church

Donald Cardinal Wuerl, the archbishop of Washington, DC, has a blog post regarding new challenges to the Church posed by those who would silence the Church.  He writes:

The Church presents a splendid vision for life. Yet, we also struggle to live it. The tension between what we know we should do and what we actually do is something referred to as the “human condition.” Nonetheless, we are called to strive to reach our potential, to manifest our faith in our actions. This is particularly true for those who minister in the name of the Church and teach and provide charitable and social services on behalf of the Church.

But today there is a new challenge. Some who reject the Church’s teaching – who choose to live by another set of values – not only find the voice of Christian values annoying, they would like to see it silenced or at least muted. Thus we have a whole new upside down version of words like “discrimination,” “freedom” and “human rights,” and laws to enforce the new meaning.

 He points specifically to recent legislation in DC that would:

deprive the Church of its right to ensure that those whom it entrusts to carry out its mission are faithful to its teachings on human life and sexuality.

This action by the government of DC is more egregious than the campaign in the Bay Area against the archbishop of San Francisco because it involves the laws governing the District of Columbia acting against the Church.  It is similar to the move last year or the year before to outlaw circumcision in the Bay Area, essentially outlawing Judaism.

Both situations are very troubling in America.  All Americans, not just Catholics, should be deeply concerned for this turn of events.

Cardinal Wuerl closes by saying:

But there is even more. This Lent we all need to ask ourselves if we are prepared to stand up for our beliefs and to speak up on behalf of our schools, parishes and charities.

Yes, Lent is always a time of renewed conviction and deepened faith. This Lent is also a time when we have to deepen our courage not just to hold to what we believe but to be able to speak up on behalf of that faith.

You'll want to read his entire post.