the Great Silence

I'm on retreat until August 7.
Please pray that I will be open, receptive and grateful before the Lord during this time.
You will be in my prayers, too.

Packed and ready...

off to Boston tomorrow! Retreat begins Sunday (to be followed by community updating classes and a two-week recording session). I won't see Chicago again until Labor Day! I do have one more thing to do before I go, however...
The Legion of Mary group that meets at Old St. Mary's parish asked me to give a 15-minute reflection on Papal Infallibility. I put some notes together and, needing a factoid from Google, found that infallibility has been a hot topic of late among more progressive Catholics. It was Pope Benedict's removal of a certain bishop in Australia that caused the flurry of articles and comments--not so much on "infallibility" as on its limits.
But infallibility was just as controversial when it was first (infallibly!) defined in 1870. Back then, rationalism was picking up steam and beginning to dominate intellectual circles. Today, the most common attitude toward truth is relativism: “Well, that may be true for you, but it's not my truth.” Both rationalism and relativism seem to begin and end in the individual's mind. Rationalists, unlike relativists, assume that “their” reasonableness is universal (so some of them claim that faith is “unreasonable”) and relativists think that there is no objective truth (so “your” truth does not hold good for another person).

Infallibility answers both of these tendencies by saying “Truth is not up to us”; we are in front of a reality that surpasses both reason and imagination; that was revealed. And it is God that we're ultimately talking about—revelation is like Holy Communion: it surpasses our ability to put into words.
Truth is a given; we don't choose to make something true.
Truth calls us to account; we are answerable to the truth.
There is moral truth, not just doctrinal/intellectual truth (ideas that are true).

So "infallibility" (which is not simply a Papal prerogative, but a grace given to the Church itself) can be a way of talking about the meaning of truth (truth is always infallible!)

Saying much (when words are limited)

Found this on Google+ (via Tabitha O'Melay).  The "Tell It Your Way" film contest (sponsored by Philips) required filmmakers to produce a movie with only six lines of dialogue: “What is that?,” “It’s a unicorn,” “Never seen one up close before,” “Beautiful,” “Get away, get away,” and “I’m sorry.”
Director Ridley Scott chose the winning entry, by Keegan Wilcox. Are you as dumb-struck by it as I was?

Catholics and Biotech

I learned from my mother how to put off ironing, but eventually it just has to be done. I tend to wait until there's a good hour's worth of ironing waiting for me so I can tackle it while listening to an audio conference and thus make the effort doubly worth my while. And so I did today.

The conference I listened to had a pretty intimidating title ("Theology of the Body and Dignitatis Personae: Reflections on Christian Anthropology as the Foundation of the Culture of Life: Transforming the Culture of Death from the Roots Up")--but don't let that scare you. The talk covers just the sort of issues you find in the newspaper every day: issues in which Catholic Church teaching seems to be summed up as "just say no" and to be represented as totally out of touch with the needs, concerns and rights of people today. The presenter, Dr. Peter Colosi, looks especially at questions related to in-vitro fertilization and why the Church teaches that this technological "answer" to infertility violates the rights of the very children who are brought into being by means of it.

I found the presentation very helpful; the Q&A after the prepared talk also addressed some of the conundrums society presents us with, giving Catholics a different lens from which to analyze the different issues that are contained in a single question or challenge. In fact, I found the whole thing so helpful that I will be looking for similar presentations that I can share with you from time to time. (Save your ironing!)

Balloons for Life

What a charmingly effective way to make a statement in favor of life!

Ongoing education

One of the things our Founder stressed all his life was the need for "study." He didn't just mean book learning: he meant taking every opportunity to broaden one's horizons and acquire new knowledge and awareness that could then be put to the service of evangelization. Today I was leafing through the newsletter of the Lumen Christi Institute for Catholic Thought here in Chicago--I haven't attended a single one of the seminars they offer (they usually fall on the same evenings as choir practice), but I do get a lot of insight out of the summaries they offer in the newsletter, which is a real service in itself.

The summer issue highlighted a set of  conferences on the thought of  20th century philosopher Gertrude Elizabeth Anscombe (Oxford). I'd heard the name, but really didn't know a thing about her contributions to the world of the mind. Well, one of her students (now a Professor Emeritus himself) was in Chicago to talk about Anscombe, and the write-up alone intrigued me.

Among other things, Anscombe didn't write in a vacuum. She applied her philosopher's mind to the questions and issues of the day. As an undergrad student, she protested Oxford's decision to grant President Harry Truman an honorary degree, arguing that the atomic bombs violated the moral teaching that we never do evil that good may come from it. Years later, as a professor,  "she argued [in a series of articles] that acceptance of contraception would have two unintended and socially devastating consequences: (1) it would lead to the gradual acceptance of abortion, and (2) it would leave us with a distorted picture of the true nature of marriage, which is essentially as social institution oriented to the procreation of children and the establishment of the family."  All you have to do is pick up a newspaper to see how on target that prediction was.

Anscombe didn't let philosophers off the hook, either. It was she who kick-started "the movement known as virtue ethics"--"that philosophers ought to return their attention to the concept of the virtues...as the necessary means to achieving a good human life." In other words, philosophers were not to be people with their heads in the clouds, but fully engaged human beings, leaders in a society of good.

You can find audio files of Professor Muller's lectures on the Lumen Christi site.

MIghty Macs are coming

And I don't mean Mac 'n' cheese!

In theaters October 21.

Something about Harry

Yes, I did it. I saw the last (?) of Harry Potter this weekend and glad I am, too. [Spoiler alert for those who didn't read the books!]
I'm one of those who believes that every truly human story is a Christian story: that the Incarnation means that Christ came to inhabit all our stories, too, not just to tell stories of his own. Not that Harry Potter is an allegory--it's just a good (and truly human) story that can't get away from its roots in a Christian culture, even though that culture has long since lost its moorings. Even the Latin-derived spells can't help but sound sacramental and (to those who know some ecclesiastical Latin) make "present" to the mind realities that far exceed the thoughts of the fictional characters who use them.
There are two main directions the stories (and that final movie) lead me. One is the theme of power: it is so prevalent a theme that in Harry's world, magic serves the role that electricity serves in ours. There is no electric power in Hogwarts, and the power that is available in that world (just like in ours) can be used for good or ill. Doesn't the use of power reveal the measure of the person who wields it?
In the "Deathly Hallows" Harry comes to posses the three most powerful objects in his world; in the last scene, he is holding the wand that makes him invincible, the "Master of Death." This wand was the object of the evil Voldemort's lust, and (as with the ring of power in Tolkien's myth), even after Voldemort himself was destroyed, the world really wasn't safe while the wand was intact, not even in Harry's hand.
The other theme that pervades the series is that of community. Harry does not ride into town on a white horse (okay, broomstick), a man without a country. Although he was an orphan, he was "adopted" into his ancestral people and brought up, as we learn finally, to give his life for them. But even that he could not do alone. He is supported every step of the way by friends, teachers, even the departed. He is accompanied through most of his ordeals by Hermione and Ron, who also dispatch a Horcrux for him. And that last crucial encounter with Voldemort would have been a stalemate if not for the contribution of Neville Longbottom. Harry is not a savior; he is a member of a community with a unique vocation, who must depend on every other member of the community if he is to fulfill that vocation.
If I were teaching Sunday School, I would find any number of helpful images from the Harry Potter series, things that may be taken for granted by those who get nervous about possible occult imagery and overlooked by those who see the series as pure and simple fantasy.

Immaculee's movie

Last night Sr Helena and I went to a screening of "If Only We Had Listened," a one-hour documentary of sorts narrated by Immaculee Ilibagiza (author of "Left to Tell," a first-person account of the Rwandan genocide), who was there to greet us. The movie, shot on location in Rwanda, uses Immaculee's experience to tell the story of the little-known (but Vatican-authenticated) apparitions of Mary at Kibeho fourteen years before the genocide that left a million people dead in just three months. Mary had come in plenty of time to call for conversion of heart, genuine love, sincerity in prayer. (In 1982, who could have fathomed what it might mean that the land would be transformed into "a river of blood"? Sadly, even the church in Kibeho was the scene of a massacre when the walls were breached and grenades lobbed in.)

Does that mean that Mary couldn't "do something" to stop the genocide? That not enough people prayed, and so a million people died at the hands of machete-wielding neighbors?

I think Mary's visit did "do something" even if we can't tally up the results. Surely, those who took her message to heart were strengthened by prayer not to succumb to tribal rivalry and incitements to violence, and even those who were carried away by the rampant blood lust would be more likely to repent, take full responsibility for their actions, and begin to make reparation.

If we put love into action and pray "without hypocrisy," we can hope to be so confirmed in faith, hope and love as not to succumb to the temptations that could sweep us away from ourselves. Even wild violence is not all that remote or unreal (what else would you call road rage?). Obviously, Mary's message still holds true.




Immaculee's books:
Left to Tell: Discovering God Amidst the Rwandan Holocaust
Our Lady of Kibeho: Mary Speaks to the World from the Heart of Africa
Led By Faith: Rising from the Ashes of the Rwandan Genocide

The Mystery of Mary Magdalen

Ah, Mary Magdalen! I grew up in a parish by that name in suburban New Orleans, where she was represented in a statue near the huge crucifix on the wall behind the altar. There she stood, mournful, and at her feet her "attributes": a jar of ointment and a skull of repentance. After all, wasn't she the great penitent, a "woman known as a sinner" (of the most recognizable kind) who had washed Jesus' feet with her tears and dried them with her hair, the one "from whom Jesus had cast seven demons," the former black sheep of the family of Martha and Lazarus?
Well, yes and no.
For better or for worse, this image of Mary Magdalen is a composite of three women, two of whom were named Mary. There's the unnamed "woman known as a sinner" who swept through the doors at Simon the Pharisee's dinner and cried all over Jesus' feet (in Luke's account). But the way Mark tells it, Simon's house was in Bethany, and the woman poured outrageously expensive "nard" all over Jesus' head, provoking some to anger--and leading Jesus to take it as a harbinger of his funeral rites. John adds to the confusion by saying it was Mary of Bethany, the sister of Martha and Lazarus, who came to a dinner party and positioned herself at Jesus' feet with precious ointment whose fragrance filled the house and irritated Judas Iscariot no end. Adding to the confusion, the real Mary Magdalen would have had her own jar of ointment when she came to the tomb on Easter morning to give Jesus' body the proper treatment it had not been given during the hasty burial on Good Friday (the scene for today's Gospel).
Feminist theologians suspect that the Magdalen, who was clearly the kind of woman who could command attention, was the subject of an early smear campaign; that having a woman of that stature in the Gospels undermined male clerical authority, and the only way to subdue her was to discredit her influence. It seems to me, though, that the assortment of women who cried over or anointed Jesus at dinner parties (in texts written well before the blanket establishment of male clerical authority!) could render the clerics blameless in that regard--especially when you remember that only in the last fifty years have we begun to sort out the Gospels, following the trajectory of each one, rather than weaving them all together as if they were simply sources of facts about Jesus.
In fact, why don't we take this "composite" Mary as the Fathers of the Church did: an image of the Christian soul who won't be deterred in seeking God, and making him known once he is "found"?

Keeping up with technology (just barely!)

This week I requested (and received) an invitation to the not-quite-fully-public social network from Google, and have been spending a bit of time poking under its hood, trying things out and generally seeing what it is and what role it might play in our mission. I'm still doing that, in between everything else. What I have noticed is how many users are wondering (as I am) how to "be" in so many places at once, using each network according to its own specialized character. Google+ is not Facebook, which is not Twitter, which is not a blog, so it's not exactly one size fits all. Do you simply rework the same material and post it in a variety of places, or give your participation in each network a distinct character? Google+ has the advantage of allowing users access to every other users posts, should they care to follow them. This means I can use Google+ to position myself as the proverbial fly on the wall over the desk of any number of leaders in any number of dimensions of culture...but I don't really have the luxury of doing so!
My primary goal right now is to complete and hand over to Sr Helena the translations of all the interviews that we recorded in Italy last October. It has been a challenge--but also a blessing, because it means I get to "meet" again the wonderful souls who shared their experience of learning from the Founder from the very early days. (One of the priests we interviewed has already departed this life, so our interview is most likely the very last public testimony he was able to give of his years with Bl. James.)
The transcription of the translation did not go well, so now I am parsing those one by one, phrase by phrase. If there is time, I hope to attach my audio translation to the movie files so Sr Helena can pick just the clip she needs for the documentary. (I just may be able to accomplish all this before leaving for my retreat at the end of next week!)

Reading about Paul...

I just finished reading the "Titus" volume in the series "Paul's Social Network: Brothers and Sisters in Faith." (I've also read "Timothy," "Priscilla and Aquila" and "Apollos".) The series looks at Paul and his many collaborators under the lens of the social sciences, as a way of highlighting how Paul's social context and its expectations as a "collectivist" society differ (at times drastically) from the ways we relate in society today, especially in our highly individualized American culture. Each book seems to focus on one dimension of 1st century Mediterranean culture; for example, the volume on Titus especially considered the concept of "honor" and how Paul's writings reflect his concern to demonstrate himself as a person who possessed "honor" even when he seemed to have transgressed the typical codes of honor by leaving his collectivist group of origin.

The need for "honor" wasn't some sort of extrinsic buttress to self-esteem: it was, in a way, one's identity card. Where you got your "honor" indicated the collectivity that stood behind you. If you had "honor," you had a place in society from which to function. (The opposite of a man of honor was a fool.) As an honorable person, Paul could recommend another person, Titus, for reception by the Corinthians; he could vouch for him as another person of honor whom the Corinthians would, in turn, be honored in hosting. When Titus returned to Paul, he "honored" the Corinthians by testifying to their hospitality and fellowship. On the other hand, when Paul's honor was impugned by certain people among the Corinthians, he reacted strongly--not out of personal ego, but out of the urgent need to defend his message (not just himself) as honorable and worthy of reception. Ultimately, of course, Paul claimed that he got his honor and his message from the same "patron": God.

I also have to admit that, not being a social scientist myself and therefore not having a broad handle on the shape of 1st century Judaism, I am not totally convinced by the series' conviction that the "Greeks" Paul preached to were really the diaspora of Israel. For example, the volume on Timothy says that most likely Timothy's father, identified in Acts as "a Greek," was almost certainly a descendent of Israel, but that in the diaspora they did not practice circumcision; that this and other Jewish markers were really characteristic only of the "Judeans." Well, maybe. But I can't see extrapolating from that theory to then claiming that all of Paul's audience of "Greeks" were really non-Judean Israelites. (Paul, after all, did write to the Corinthians that some of them had, until recently, been worshipers of mute idols. Unless the reference is to apostate Israelites, called back to the God of their fathers...) Maybe I just misunderstood the many references to those who "identified as Israel."

There's a lot to recommend the series as a whole, but I have to admit that it tends to be a bit of a slog to get through. The authors are so careful to limit themselves to a strictly "social science" reading that they cross every technical "t" along the way. The reading is hampered by jargonized expressions that protect the scientific objectivity but compromise the very reason a person would most likely read books on the subject of Paul and his social network.

Looking for signs

I don't blame the Pharisees in today's Gospel one bit. "Teacher, we would like to see you work a sign." Herod hoped for the same thing when Jesus was brought to his court. In our day, we might not be so blatant about it, but I suspect there's something in all of us that would like to put God to the test--a test of our own devising. One that leaves us in charge.
But the saints asked for signs, too.
St. Ignatius of Loyola proposed asking God for an external sign or manifestation of his will as a confirmation of the grace of discernment, but he seems to have left the exact form of that sign up to God. Ignatius trusted that when a sign was given, we would also be given the grace to recognize it.
Isn't that how it worked in the Bible, generally? Moses noticing the burning bush; the Ninevites listening to Jonah; the Queen of the South responding to reports about a surpassingly wise king; Elijah in the cave recognizing the whispering breeze... God's signs came unbidden.
How many signs might God put across my path every day without my noticing, wondering, paying attention--and so I come to Jesus and say, naively, "I would like to see you work a sign."

In today's Gospel, Jesus is answering an "unfaithful generation" for seeking signs, when all the signs they needed were right before their eyes, unrecognized. He pointed to the example of the pagan Ninevites, receiving the "sign of Jonah" and responding to his preaching, and to the Queen of Sheba, recognizing the wisdom of Solomon and going out of her way to hear it. Jesus did not only refer to those who listened to Jonah and Solomon and leave it at that. He reminded his hearers then and now: "but you have a greater than Solomon here."
Today in Chicago, he probably would have pointed to the 10,000 who stood patiently in line in the yesterday's heat to listen to the wisdom of the Dalai Lama. The Buddhist leader is a sign for many who do not have faith--and he knows it. Yesterday (in a two hour talk) he reminded his listeners that identifying themselves as "secular" does not mean adopting an attitude of hostility to religion, and (sounding very much like Pope John Paul or Pope Benedict) he reminded the devout that "faith and reason must go together."
We have a greater than the Dalai Lama in Jesus, but it is good to know that the Dalai Lama is a "sign" that people can recognize and heed. Indeed, I hope they do.

Narrative Porn

Two days ago I got a request from a friend to read and "like" a book review submitted to a major site; the reviewer was a friend of hers. The book turned out to be the autobiographical report of Jaycee Dugard's abduction and slavery.   That same day, I was running an errand (I don't remember where) and a TV in the background showed a sympathetic host interviewing Ms. Dugard. (I don't blame Ms. Dugard for wanting to get her story out, and I actually hope she makes a lot of money with which to support the children she bore that sick man.)
Later, I was leafing through a few days' worth of the Chicago Tribune (part of my post-vacation catching up!) and saw a short notice about a forthcoming book that purports to go into the mind of the infamously innocent mother of a dead toddler.

Just because things happen to be true doesn't mean they can't also be a form of porn. You can see something of the same issue in sophisticated TV dramatic series that involve high tech analyses of corpses and torture. Just because science is invoked doesn't mean that prurient interests aren't being entertained.
I call it "narrative porn," as contrasted with the cruder, visual kind.
Paul tells us to "be transformed by the renewal of your mind"; that certain things ought not be even mentioned among believers. I don't think he meant that we should just watch them on TV or read about them privately. But, as I experienced this week, it can be pretty hard to avoid. We have to practice a kind of "custody of the mind" the way the old manuals encouraged "custody of the eyes"!

What a full day!

I'm still unpacking--in more ways than one. While my suitcase lies outside my door  holding a few things I will need to repack in two weeks, I am interiorly "unpacking" the extraordinary readings the liturgy has fed us with between yesterday and today. Basically, all you have to add would be the Passion/Resurrection narratives, and you'd have all the Bible you really need for a lifetime. The first reading and Gospel these days have also connected with each other in that biblically marvelous way that shows that the New is "hidden" in the Old, and the Old fulfilled in the New. In the revelation at the burning bush, "no one knows the Father but the Son and anyone to whom the Son wishes to reveal him." And today, God reveals the divine name: I AM, and tells us even more: "I am meek and humble of heart." The initial revelation had to be gradual: God promised powerful signs and portents to Moses by way of introduction.
Only when we recognize the transcendent God of power can we marvel that he would come among us "meek and humble," bearing a yoke and inviting us to share it.
I'll be  unpacking this a lot longer, I think.

PP predicament

Shortly before I left Chicago, I noticed clipboard-carrying representatives from Planned Parenthood on our block, inviting passers-by to answer a few questions. Turns out that over the past few weeks, they have continued to station themselves in our block--and in front of our doors, at times blocking access. It is awkward enough that several bookstore customers asked what was going on. (Although there's a 50-ft bubble zone around their clinics in Chicago, we won't go so far as to seek a similar injunction.)

Since Planned Parenthood's objectives (to say nothing of their activities) are diametrically opposed to ours, I think we need to respond somehow. Naturally, our response should be one that makes a positive contribution and does not simply consist in a creative way of saying, "can you please stay off our our property?" For instance, we could offer the Planned Parenthood reps a free copy of former clinic manager Abby Johnson's book. Or maybe put a 4' X 3' poster of the cover on our front window. Or station a clipboard-carrying volunteer at our door, offering passers-by a printout from Abby's website, with QR codes to follow her Twitter feed.

Any other ideas?

Picking up where I left off...

Back to Chicago tomorrow! And that means back to blogging with a bit more commitment, at least until I go to the motherhouse for our community formation program and my annual retreat.
With the trip to Texas with Mom and my sisters, I didn't get much reading done on this vacation, but the two books I did read were fantastic. I plan to offer more detailed reviews later, but here's the capsule version:

The Life of Thomas More by Peter Ackroyd. I had borrowed it from the convent library (here in Metairie); I actually neglected to tell anyone, but they'll get it back tomorrow when I drop by on the way to the airport. The book is a phenomenal depiction of Thomas More and his times. My father was a lawyer; we had a picture of St. Thomas More in our den. I have two brothers who are lawyers, and one of them is named Thomas More. I thought "A Man for All Seasons" and his own book, Utopia, were pretty much the only sources we had for knowing St. Thomas More. Wrong!  Ackroyd filled in all the blanks--and also revealed how much of "A Man for All Seasons" was taken from More's own writing.

I was also able to read a newer publication: Jim Forest's biography of Dorothy Day, "All is Grace." If Thomas More was the "man for all seasons," then Dorothy Day is the woman for our season. Maybe the Lord inspired her as he did and when he did so that her life and faithfulness to the Gospel would be our heritage now in the challenges we face as a society. That's my prayer, anyway. (The Libertarians should really love Dorothy; do they know her story?)

A new role for Maria Goretti?

Today's saint has long been claimed as a patron saint of youth, especially of young women, and, more recently, of rape victims. I would like to see her invoked as a special intercessor for victims of domestic violence, because that seems to represent the larger picture of Maria's life and death. After all, her attacker and his father lived on the upper floor of the same farm house as the fatherless Goretti family. They shared a common kitchen. They worked the same land. Maria often stayed at home to babysit and do housework--this was so typically the case that Alessandro, her attacker, frequently took advantage of the situation in his attempts to seduce the eleven-year-old (almost marriageable age in that time and place). He stalked her. He surprised her at work. He threatened her not to tell a soul what was going on.

There must be countless families in similar circumstances: the near-homeless sharing an address; single mothers who include their boyfriends in their children's lives, thinking that they would be a father-figure and ignoring all the signs to the contrary; fatherless girls hoping for a man's affection and protection. Statistics from the Center for Disease Control indicate that one in four women will be a victim of domestic violence (men are the victims in 15% of domestic violence cases). Maria's story can speak to them. Maria herself can interecede for them to take the steps necessary to protect themselves and their children, and to live fully and freely.

By telling Maria's story as a story of domestic violence, we may be able to reach threatened women and children in a setting that strips aways the "traditional" justifications for violence in the home, especially a distorted reading of St. Paul's exhortation about wives "submitting" to husbands (in the context, he tells husbands and wives to submit to one another).

What say ye?

Great Wrestlers of the Bible

It's hard to avoid those over-the-top commercials for staged wrestling events--you know the ones I mean. Unfortunately, these end up being my primary reference point when I hear about Jacob's all-night match against his mysteriously unnamed opponent. I actually started taking mental inventory of the...

Great Wrestlers of the Bible

The God-Fighter (a.k.a. Israel, Jacob): Undefeated! Father of a people with a 3500 year history of perseverance no matter what strategems their opponents have attempted to use against them. The God-Fighter is the archetypal warrior: not even God pinned him down.  Don't let the limp fool you.

Samson (doesn't need a stage name, does he?): The strongest man known to man! Defeated only once, through a treacherous romance. He learned his lesson well. Don't let him bring the house down.

The Giant-Slayer (a.k.a. David): He practiced for the arena while just a boy, wrestling with the lions and bears that threatened his sheep. Goliath didn't stand a chance.

Terror of Demons (a.k.a. Joseph of Nazareth): Surprisingly meek for a champion, he's the Terror of Demons by way of careful listening to his inner Coach. Driven to protect his family, he's still active in the arena of history.

The Cosmic Conqueror (a.k.a. Jesus of Nazareth; Lion of the Tribe of Judah; Alpha and Omega):  No one ever fought like this--in fact, he still bears the wounds from his ultimate battle. The match started on a Thursday night and continued through to Sunday morning with a decisive victory that people are still talking about. The awards ceremony has been delayed in order to include as many as possible in the triumph: don't miss it!

The Rock (a.k.a. Simon, Son of John; Simon Peter): His early matches were unimpressive, to say the least. No rock at all, he was a wimpy warrior who could be cowed by a disapproving glance. But he took coaching from the Cosmic Conqueror and followed him to an enormous victory, completing his final match upside down!