He Speaks to You

Sr Helena's new book!

Who is "He"? That would be the Lord. And who are "you"? For this new book, written by Chicago's own Sr Helena Burns, the addressee of God's daily message (a page a day for a year) is a typical young woman, hovering around college age or just beyond.

Actually, the message or theme written in God's name is very short. The real word of the Lord comes right after, in a snippet of Scripture. Then "Words of Wisdom" from a Sister who draws from her own community's charism, spirituality and experience; a suggestion for living the message in a practical way that day ("for the Martha" types, Sr Helena says), and a brief prayer to sum it all up ("for the Mary" types).

 It's a little late, but not too late, to include "He Speaks to You" as a gift for the Class of 2012; keep it in mind for the young women--and the youth ministers--you meet!

Take a look inside the book!

The Visitation and Evangelization

Detail from a Book of Hours;
Walters Museum of Art
Used under Creative Commons License

In the Pauline Family (and especially among the Daughters of St. Paul), the feast of the Visitation has a bit of prominence. Our Founder saw Mary's "hastening" to Zechariah's house as the model of evangelization, because Mary didn't just go to satisfy her curiosity about Elizabeth's unusual pregnancy: she brought Jesus to that house. Of course, as the story goes, Jesus was recognized (first by the unborn John and then by his mother), Mary herself was acknowledged, and Mary praised the Lord with her Magnificat.

To me, it's that Magnificat that is the heart of evangelization, and I think this is borne out by the way the feastday liturgy was crafted. The Entrance Antiphon is "Come and hear, all who fear God; I will tell what the Lord did for my soul." And in the Collect (opening prayer), the grace we ask above all is "that, faithful to the promptings of the Spirit, we may magnify your greatness with the Virgin Mary at all times."

To "tell what the Lord did for my soul" is to witness with praise. This is the most effective way of sharing the Gospel. (There's a real difference between "telling good news" and "setting people straight"!) But to "tell what the Lord did for my soul," when we recount it to God (or, as Mary did, "before" God), is also a form of prayer: the prayer of praise, which, it is probably safe to say, is the more neglected dimension of the spiritual life.

What does this Feast day say to you?

Eucharistic Reflection

On this Feast of the Visitation, here is a thought from Bl. James Alberione about Eucharistic Adoration, in particular, the holy hour, or "Visit":

"The Visit isn't only a matter of reading, or a succession of prayers; all of this is also prayer, but the Visit is something else. The Visit to Jesus and Mary corresponds more or less to a visit you would make to someone you love, whether because of his or her need (for example, visiting a sick person), or out of our own need, as when you need to ask a favor.

"The Visit should bear three fruits:
1. We offer Jesus the homage of our mind, and we hope to obtain the sanctification of our mind.
2. We offer Jesus the homage of the will, and we ask the grace to correct our shortcomings and acquire virtues.
3. We offer the gift of our love, and we ask the graces necessary for our soul; we ask Him to unite us intimately with Him.

"Do we actually do this in our Visit? Do we do them well? The Visit is an important part of our day, but it can be difficult... Pray to be able to make it really well."

In case we missed the point

Today's Mass readings are like a reprise of Lent: Jesus foretelling his suffering and death in the baldest possible terms, saying he came to "give his life as a ransom," and Peter in the first reading reminding the Christians that they were "redeemed, not with any perishable thing like silver or gold, but with the priceless Blood of Christ."

And in the midst of it all, the clueless sons of Zebedee, so like any one of us, waiting impatiently on the sidelines for Jesus to be done talking already, so they can put in a special request. For themselves.

One of my favorite aspects of the Theology of the Body, the thing that has consistently guided and uplifted me, is the way John Paul defines the human vocation in terms of gift. He even identifies the Holy Spirit as the divine Person-Gift! This is the quality of Jesus that comes through in today's Gospel. He did not come to be served, but to be gift.

And that, as the commercial says, is priceless.

TOB Tuesday

Over the long weekend, I learned of yet another resource for women's health that seems to be consistent with the principles we draw from Theology of the Body: women are treated as complete persons, not simply reduced to a reproductive system; the medical aspects of reproductive health starts with the woman's understanding of her own body, not with a doctor's expertise (though FEMM has a strong formal medical division with specialized materials for doctors): it's just that everything starts by treating the woman as a person, and above all as a person in relationship. THAT's a TOB view of the human  person!

FEMM "demystifies reproductive health and empowers women and girls with the knowledge to chart their own reproductive course." And it doesn't leave out the other half of the fertility equation: a very significant difference from so many approaches to "reproductive health."

A woman involved in the launch explains:

 "Authentic women’s healthcare recognizes that women have a right to know and understand their own bodies, and to receive the knowledge they need to be partners in the management and choices they make for their long-term health. Such knowledge enables women – and men – to work together to achieve the physical and emotional health that women need and deserve."
...
"It is obvious, but worth stating, that men are also persons – subjects with rights – who experience themselves as subjects in relation to other subjects, and who act and self-determine. Further, as with women, men also long for intimacy with another person. Because of this deep longing and capacity to give fully to another, men want to enter into the reality and knowledge of the other person to whom he longs to give himself fully. Thus, men, too, are key partners in the understanding and management of women’s health.

"This ability to interact in a way that respects each person as a subject, and which enables being in relation with another person while respecting his or her freedom, is necessary for authentically personal, or human interactions to take place."

This program is still in its "beta" stage, but is welcoming participants as it attempts to perfect its online charting system.

ExtraOrdinary!

Ordinary Time is back, and with it, an extraordinary pairing of readings for today's Mass. Peter is our guide today in both readings: the first reading is from the 1st letter of Peter, and matches amazingly with the Gospel in which Peter--having just watched the Rich Young Man "go away sad"--speaks up. "We have left everything to follow you," he tells Jesus matter-of-factly. Decades later, he would tell the first generation Christians "set your hopes completely on the grace to be brought to you."

And Jesus will not let Peter and the others (us included) "go away sad." You will, he promises, "receive a hundred times more now in this present age: houses and brothers and sisters and mothers and children and lands, with persecutions, and eternal life in the age to come."

Peter seems to be looking toward that "age to come" when he writes of "the grace to be brought to you
at the revelation of Jesus Christ."

The readings, and their common thrust, reminded me of something Pope John Paul wrote in "Vita Consecrata." He is contemplating the scene of the Transfiguration, another time when Peter speaks up while the others simply stare, wide-eyed. "How good it is to be with you!" he tells Jesus, revealed on the mountain in majesty. John Paul, as it were, continues in Peter's name: "How good it is to be with you, to devote ourselves to you, to make you the one focus of our lives!"

Maybe here, in our "ordinary" life, it doesn't seem possible to truly make the Lord the "one focus of our lives," but Peter still urges us to a practical sort of hope, with confidence that the promise made still holds true: set your hopes--even now, even today--completely on the grace to be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ" who, even now, even today, is completely yours.

The Eighth Gift of the Holy Spirit

I know. The Catechism of the Catholic Church, following a long tradition, names only seven "Gifts of the Holy Spirit," most of these drawn directly from the prophet Isaiah (Is. 11):

The spirit of the LORD shall rest upon him:

a spirit of wisdom and of understanding,

A spirit of counsel and of strength,

a spirit of knowledge and of fear of the LORD,

and his delight shall be the fear of the LORD.

 The only one of the traditional gifts  not in that Messianic prophecy is usually named "piety" (but the "delight" hints at that love of prayer). So what is this "eighth" gift the Catechism seems to have neglected?

As I meditate on the scene of the first Pentecost, what strikes me most is the boldness of the disciples. For over 50 days, they had been prisoners of fear. Suddenly, the dread fear that kept them locked tight in that safe upper room is gone, dissipated to the four winds by that one powerful breath of the Spirit. They weren't afraid anymore.

They were free.

"Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom" (2 Cor. 3:17). 

Delivered from fear, they were also delivered from the most common impediments to happiness. Vanished, the fear of loss, replaced by confidence of possession; the fear of danger, dismissed by the assurance of victory; the fear of death, utterly undone by the recognition that "through death [Jesus] had freed those who through fear of death had been subject to slavery all their life" (see Heb. 2:14-15).

 

The freedom brought by the Holy Spirit became a kind of "platform" for all the other gifts that the disciples manifestly exercised from that day on, and without freedom even the most virtuous actions can't be virtuous.

As the Church in America prepares for a "Fortnight of Freedom,"  perhaps we can pray in a special way this Pentecost for an outpouring of that "first" gift of the Holy Spirit. "For freedom Christ has set us free!" (Gal. 5:1)

The Old Testament Pentecost

Last night at choir practice, a question came up about the Latin word "magnalia," which appears in the Pentecost antiphon we will be singing this Sunday. The antiphon is based on Acts 2, where the witnesses ask one another how it is that they, coming from so many parts of the world, can understand the Spirit-filled disciples "speaking of the marvels (magnalia) of God."

It almost seems that in writing Acts, Luke wanted to evoke an earlier "descent of the Holy Spirit" on God's chosen community.

Back in their desert wanderings, Moses was getting overwhelmed as the sole bearer of the Spirit of God among the people. At God's command, he made a list of seventy of the community elders and called them to the "tabernacle," the traveling tent of God's presence. Lo and behold, the Spirit of the Lord enraptured all of them and they began to prophesy--that is, to speak ecstatically in praise of God. Even two of the men who had not actually gone to the tabernacle were heard prophesying in the midst of the people, outside of the sacred precincts, to the point that young Joshua felt it threatened Moses' unique status. Moses then made his famous declaration, both ardent and humble, "I wish that all the servants of the Lord could be prophets! If only the Lord would bestow His spirit on all of them!"

Through the years, the Spirit singled out judges, prophets and even a king or two for the people, but we begin to see Moses' dreams really come true from the very first pages of the New Testament. Manifestations of the Spirit start popping out all over the place, and not only in Jesus. Look at Joseph, Elizabeth and the unborn John, Zechariah, Simeon... And then the disciples who "cast out demons" in Jesus' name, Peter at Caesarea Philippi... Finally, fifty days after the Resurrection, Moses' dream came true: the Spirit of the Lord was bestowed on all who were gathered there. (Were there still "one hundred and twenty" in the one place, thus representing the 12 tribes times ten?)

Of course, it's no coincidence that images of the first Pentecost seem to be centered on Mary, the first of the children of Eve to be "overshadowed by the Holy Spirit" and the model of prophecy. Isn't her "Magnificat" a perfect summation of the "magnalia Dei" they proclaimed as they streamed from the upper room that Pentecost morning?

And the Magnificat is still a perfect expression of God's marvels for us today, so much so that the Church prays those words of Mary every single day without exception, at Evening Prayer.

Perhaps we need to recover this approach in taking up the New Evangelization: to start (and end!) by proclaiming the marvelous works of God, basking in the ways grace has been manifest through the ages: "Where sin abounds, grace abounds yet more"! That's both proclamation and praise of the one True God.

Eucharistic Reflection

For this Eucharistic Thursday post, here is a kind of poem of thanksgiving for the Mass, written by Bl. James Alberione:

"The Mass! Daystar of prayer, queen of devotions, source of the water of life and of the grace which the sacraments communicate!
The Mass! The most effective suffrage for the souls in Purgatory!
The Mass! Light, sacrifice, the grafting of the precious olive into a wild olive, sinful human beings.
The Mass! The glory of the priest, the strength of martyrs, the nourishment of virgins, the hidden power of apostles, writers and preachers, and the joy of the true Christian!
The Mass, celebrated in eternity by the supreme High Priest in heaven glorifies God and bings joy to the Blessed."

The Ninth Beatitude

Some years ago I was working on a book and included a bit from today's first reading. In it, Paul is quoting something Jesus said--but which never made it into the Gospels, not even in Matthew's long list of Beatitudes, where it would seem to fit best: "It is more blessed to give than to receive."

A consultant (reviewing the manuscript to make sure that it was on target for the age group) expressed some concern. As a therapist, she had too much experience with patients, particularly women, "maxing out" on self-giving to the point of allowing themselves to be exploited. "Is that really in the Bible?" Oddly, her question shows just how counter-intuitive the Gospel can be.

Lately I have been attending a book study on Atheist Delusions: The Christian Revolution and Its Fashionable Enemies. The author answers the popular assumptions of our day about the ruinous effects of religion, noting that most of those who claim that society would be better off without religion seem to assume that society's values (care for the weak and the poor, protection of the vulnerable, defending the victims of crime and violence, etc) are basic human values; a shared heritage of human nature across all boundaries of time and space. Even a few recent newspaper articles should be enough to dismiss that notion (see paragraph 6 here for some examples from a culture that did not arise from Chritianity).

No, fallen human nature does not really consider it "more blessed to give than to receive." We needed to be taught that by the one who "knows what is in the human heart" (see Jn. 2: 25) and who is the "origin and perfecter of our faith" (see Heb. 12:2). His words "consecrate us in the truth" (today's Gospel) about God's creative intention for us.

TOB Tuesday: St Thomas and TOB

TOB Tuesday: Scripture and TOB

A few years ago I had a wonderful conversation with Father William Kurz, SJ  of Marquette University. He had just finished a monograph on the Scriptural Foundations of Theology of the Body, and today I found it online. (Lucky me, he had sent me an advance copy shortly after our conversation, so I have been able to draw on his insights for quite some time!) Download it now [with a right click and "save link as...]

Father Kurz is a Scripture scholar, and offers a pretty accessible summary of Pope John Paul's insights. Where some Bible experts have looked at Theology of the Body and shrugged at its approach to Scripture, Kurz (who can do historical criticism with the best of them--indeed, he teaches it) recognizes that the Pope was doing something that didn't fit in the academic categories. Clearly, John Paul was not offering an exegesis, or an analysis of the various manuscript traditions, or a cultural-anthropological study. Instead, Kurz says, the Theology of the Body fits into the best of the biblical traditions: it is a "wisdom" reading of the Scriptures, such as you find in books like Sirach and Ecclesiastes. This kind of reading takes the divine message as a whole, rather than piece by piece, and sees the unity of God's word as it offers a message for our own times that would not have been needed in former ages (just as we find it hard to read the Bible with the lens of someone from the 3rd or 9th or 13th centuries).

This paper can be helpful especially for biblically-grounded readers to get an overall sense of what the Theology of the Body is, and how its teachings draw from Scripture, applying it to our own culture's concerns, questions and dilemmas.

A nod to NATO

 
Part of the protest that went past us on Friday.

The NATO summit here in Chicago has made things just a little bit more interesting for us, though (so far) only one impromptu march has gone past our doors.  Sr Frances, on a walk by the lake, saw snipers positioned on several of the buildings. More sirens sound throughout the day than even we downtown-dwellers are used to. On Sunday evening, Randolph Street (our side street) was completely blocked to traffic as a diplomatic function was held at the Cultural Center. And then there are the occasional motorcades, some as simple as a white van followed by a simple black sedan (all flashing blue lights), others consisting of five or more of those vans with black sedans in between.

The visibly increased police presence that comes with having so many heads of state in town is a real reminder to pray to the Holy Spirit to guide world leaders--these world leaders in our very neighborhood--in the paths of peace. Not just that minimal (and yet so challenging!) "absence of conflict," but (in the classic definition) a real "tranquility of order" that is not imposed; that instead arises when the conditions for human flourishing are respected.

Pentecost Novena (how timely!)

On this first day of the Pentecost novena, amid the chanting of anti-NATO protesters just below my window, I began started updating a Confirmation program I helped write some years ago. Gratifyingly, it does not need much updating, beyond the liturgical prayers, the addition of some YOUCAT references, and more up-to-date resources. 

Here's a little reflection for the catechist from the second of the six sessions that make up the program (which is not a full-scale Confirmation prep, but more the immediate preparation for the actual sacramental rite). It certainly seems fitting as we begin imploring a new outpouring of the Spirit on the Church!

A study of Confirmation provides the opportunity to deepen and reaffirm our faith in the central doctrine of Christianity, a reality so profound that it could only be known by God’s self-revelation to us.

From all eternity, with no beginning and no interruption, the Son gives himself over in love and gratitude to the Father. And his receiving and giving and the Father’s giving and receiving are total and complete and divine: the Person-Love, Person-Gift we have learned to call “Holy Spirit,” the “Spirit of the Father and the Son.”

The three equal sharers in the one divine nature are always gift to each other. And there is nothing (not even in heaven!) which is more blissful than love.

Creation was God’s utterly free and original invention of a way to share the happiness of living in love. The Father spoke and the original Word was echoed in a totally new way. The Spirit hovered over the chaos and gently ordered it according to the Image, maintaining both similarity and distinction between God and not-God. And in a gift of tender generosity, the Trinity created beings capable of communion, able to freely assume the life of self-gift. Multitudes of angels imaged the Trinitarian Lord’s wisdom and beauty and were invited to accept God’s love as their life. And then came an even deeper condescension, as the Father spoke a new word, a little clay word. The call to communion was written into this nature: they would only exist as a “unity of the two.” The Spirit breathed into it to complete the creature of clay who would be invited to live of God’s own life.

Even after sin, the call to communion among themselves and with God remained—although so great an obstacle had been raised against it that only God could bring about the possibility of a response. The Father made bold promises; the Spirit raised up prophets; the Word was Way and Truth and Life in the Law, until the people were readied and the Virgin was born who would “hear the word of God and keep it.”

In her, by the power of the Holy Spirit, the Son, who had received his Sonship from the Father as an eternal, free and welcome gift in the Spirit, received a created nature. Christ did not “clothe” himself in the clay as if it were a costume: he became clay, without losing his identity as only-Begotten. The eternal, true and equal Image was now expressed in human flesh. God’s self-revelation was offered not through detached concepts, but in person. And in the Father’s plan, this Jesus was “the source of the Spirit for all mankind” (CCC 536).

To the ends of the earth

Pentecost novena starts today! And appropos of that "Spirit sent upon the Church to begin the preaching of the Gospel," every so often it is rather encouraging to see the Lord's desire that we "go out to all the world" coming true! Here you are, Nunblog readers of the past two years:

Eucharistic Reflection

It's Thursday, the weekly reminder of the night the Lord "took bread, said the blessing, broke it and gave it to his disciples saying 'This is my Body, which will be given up for you'." In my community, it is the preferred day of the week for our shared Hour of Adoration (which we make on our own the rest of the week); in the Church, it is also the day to remember to pray for priests.

 Here's a little thought from Pope Benedict's "Sacrament of Charity," n. 67, which refers especially to the dimension of adoration:

"Wherever possible, it would be appropriate, especially in densely populated areas, to set aside specific churches or oratories for perpetual adoration. I also recommend that, in their catechetical training, and especially in their preparation for First Holy Communion, children be taught the meaning and the beauty of spending time with Jesus, and helped to cultivate a sense of awe before his presence in the Eucharist." (Here are some resources for adoration, including my "Come to Jesus!" for children.)

TOB Tuesday: the Law of the Gift

Cardinal Dolan's commencement address for this year's graduating class his alma mater (Catholic University) had one phrase as its refrain: "the Law of the Gift." This just happens to be the "refrain" of Pope John Paul's "Theology of the Body," too, so as I read the Cardinal's talk, I kept looking: I knew TOB would be there in more than an oblique reference.

Sure enough! Here is it, nestled in a bit of context (but be sure to read the whole thing, from the link above!):

...I’m hardly claiming that Catholics have sole “bragging rights” on fostering, protecting, and obeying this Law of the Gift. The exaltation of selfless, sacrificial love and service is at the marrow of every religion, and, as a matter of fact,on the ground floor of most purely humanistic values.

However, even our critics admit that a particularly pointed contribution that religion, that the Church, that faith makes to any enduring culture, society, or nation is that it has a honed talent to foster, protect, and obey the Law of the Gift.

Without the Law of the Gift we have no Marines, fewer effective pediatric oncologists, and no Clara Almazos or Shabaz Bhattis. Religion, faith, the Church promote a culture built on the Law of the Gift....

Now, one final thing: You all had a head-start in learning the Law of the Gift and the importance of faith to sustain it.

For, see, the Law of the Gift is most poetically exemplified in the lifelong, life-giving, faithful, intimate union of a man and woman in marriage, which then leads to the procreation of new life in babies, so that husband and wife, now father and mother, spend their lives sacrificially loving and giving to those children. That union — that sacred rhythm of man/woman/husband/wife/baby/mother/father — is so essential to the order of the common good that its very definition is ingrained into our interior dictionary, that its protection and flourishing is the aim of enlightened culture.

...

That we are at our best when we give ourselves away in love to another — the Law of the Gift — is I’m afraid, “counter-cultural” today, in an era that prefers getting to giving, and entitlement to responsibility; in a society that considers every drive, desire, or urge as a right, and where convenience and privacy can trump even the right to life itself; and in a mindset where freedom is reduced to the liberty to do whatever we want, wherever we want, whenever, however, with whomever we want, rather than the duty to do what we ought . . .well, the Law of the Gift can be as ignored as a yellow traffic light in New York City.

Fr Barron: Seminary is med school for "soul doctors"

Fr Robert Barron (the man behind the Catholicism TV series),  newly appointed rector of Chicago's Mundelein seminary, was interviewed recently about his vision for preparing men for the priesthood "in a new setting that’s become indifferent to the faith, at best, and hostile at worst."

It is, he says, a matter of turning young men into heroic leaders: "In the wake of the sexual abuse scandals, many men have come forward to say it’s a time for greatness in the priesthood and heroic priests." (That word "hero" shows up a striking number of times in the short interview featured in the National Catholic Register.)  "I want people who are well-trained soul doctors and who also understand the culture. We cannot hunker down behind a wall."

Barron says that his goal is "to make Mundelein a powerhouse of the New Evangelization — a place where the New Evangelization is thought about, where it’s practiced and implemented, and where that ethos is placed in the heart of the students." And this means really grasping what the bishops at Vatican II intended fifty years ago: "The Second Vatican Council was a reform council to make the Church a more effective vehicle for evangelization in the modern world. My generation [Barron is 52] received an inadequate interpretation of Vatican II. The reform has to recover a correct interpretation — that is to make the Church at all levels a more effective vehicle for the true evangelization."

Read more: http://www.ncregister.com/daily-news/father-robert-barron-named-rector-of-mundelein-seminary/#ixzz1ux6SJqmg

TeenSTAR in Chicagoland

This Wednesday evening in Oak Park, Dr Hanna Klaus will be at St Giles Parish to present the TeenSTAR curriculum.

Dr. Klaus is a Medical Missionary Sister as well as an Obstetrician/Gynecologist  who has piloted this program “which uses learning one's fertility pattern to teach responsible decision-making and communication skills in the area of sexual behavior and enhances teens' self-understanding and self-esteem.” Klaus is the International Director of TeenSTAR.

The TeenSTAR program (Sexuality Training in the context of Adult Responsibility) is a developmental curriculum for students grades 7-9, and can be adapted for older students and settings.  TeenSTAR emphasizes the physical, emotional, spiritual, emotional and social aspects of sexuality training.  Parents, teachers, physicians and other health professionals, interested adults as well as young adults are welcome to review this program utilized throughout the world. 

The discussion will start at 7 p.m. at McDonough Hall (2^nd Floor), 1101 N. Columbian, at St. Giles Parish, Oak Park, IL. 

RSVP Kathleen Masters kmasters [@ameritech.net] if you plan to attend.

Rewriting history: this week's special!

If "Those who fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it," what is the doom of those who rewrite history?

This week,  among progressively inclined Christians, there have been many knowing winks and nods surrounding the iconographic evidence, and indeed a ceremonial itself, that prove that the Church's current teaching on marriage is inconsistent with her own history. Most of the time, the basis for these headlines and talking-points is a book published some years ago by Yale historian John Boswell.

Boswell's highly interpretive work refers to a practice that goes by the Greek name "adelphopoiesis" (literally"brother-making" or "kinship-making"). Clearly we Westerners don't have much experience or memory of a ritual like that;  an ancient image of two men being "joined" by Christ sure looks like matrimony to us. Obviously, then, the Church should return to its earlier, more tolerant practice.

Unfortunately for those who would like to point to adelphopoiesis as a prototype for the direction of marriage in our day, however, is that we are obliged to understand adelphopoiesis on its own terms, not those of sex-obsessed culture.  Here are two very interesting approaches:

• From an Eastern Orthodox perspective, comparing and contrasting the brotherhood rite and the marriage rite. (Especially pertinent is that this spiritual "kinship" was treated under the Canon Law related to adoption, not the laws connected with marriage.)
• From the scholar with first-person experience of a similar ceremony (in a present-day Syrian Orthodox Church) in which she was joined in sacramental "sisterhood" with a fellow scholar, on the basis of a Syrian bishop's recognition of their friendship. 

Finally, here is early debunking review of Boswell's oft-cited book by the late John Richard Neuhaus.

California relic desecrated

I remember how heartsick I felt several years ago while traveling in Spain on seeing the destruction wrought during the Spanish Civil War on the nation's cultural treasures. The people had set their own ancestral heritage on fire, driven by political fanaticism and a kind...of suicidal hatred of their cultural origins. First they killed the priests, and then they destroyed the churches, or destroyed as far as they could reach (I remember one church were you could see an actual line, about 13 feet above the floor, above which the ancient frescoes remained untouched, while everything below had been scrubbed (or burned) right off the walls). Attempts at restoration were pathetic, even though I am sure they were done at great cost. There are signs of this all over Spain.

Judging from what happened in Santa Cruz, California a few night's ago, it's starting here now. Vandals broke a relic of California history--also a Catholic relic, since it was a baptismal font that had been carried into California by none other than Blessed Junipero Serra, who used to be known as the "founder" of California. The vandals didn't even refrain from targeting a home for needy pregnant women on the property. Read more here. 
Pictures on this site, too.

The Day after (in case you were wondering)

I'll let Cardinal Dolan have the Nunblogger soapbox, adding only my two cents' worth about how ripe the culture is for a new evangelization.

WASHINGTON—Cardinal Timothy Dolan, president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB), issued the following statement:

President Obama’s comments today in support of the redefinition of marriage are deeply saddening. As I stated in my public letter to the President on September 20, 2011, the Catholic Bishops stand ready to affirm every positive measure taken by the President and the Administration to strengthen marriage and the family. However, we cannot be silent in the face of words or actions that would undermine the institution of marriage, the very cornerstone of our society. The people of this country, especially our children, deserve better. Unfortunately, President Obama’s words today are not surprising since they follow upon various actions already taken by his Administration that erode or ignore the unique meaning of marriage. I pray for the President every day, and will continue to pray that he and his Administration act justly to uphold and protect marriage as the union of one man and one woman. May we all work to promote and protect marriage and by so doing serve the true good of all persons.

Eucharistic Reflection

In observance of Thursday's traditionally Eucharistic focus, here's another thought from Pope Benedict's "Sacrament of Charity" (n. 66) on Eucharistic Adoration: "The act of adoration outside Mass prolongs and intensifies all that takes place during the liturgical celebration itself. Indeed, "only in adoration can a profound and genuine reception mature. And it is precisely this personal encounter with the Lord that then strengthens the social mission contained in the Eucharist, which seeks to break down not only the walls that separate the Lord and ourselves, but also and especially the walls that separate us from one another."

Where the Wild Things Went

I have to admit that Sendak's classic book was not a part of my childhood repertoire, though it found its way into my younger brother's life. But yesterday as the Facebook memorials multiplied, one in particular struck me.

Now, I looked for this particular anecdote among the transcripts of Terry Gross' programs, and couldn't find it. Maybe someone even made it up! But it rings so true.

When something we really love comes within our orbit, we are hard-wired for the most intimate possible union with it. This is exactly why Jesus gives himself to us as Bread that can be seen and loved and eaten, so that the one we love is no longer, and never ever will be, outside of us, but will be "in" us, and that it will be "no longer I who live" but this two in one flesh.

If you are the philosophically inclined type, you might appreciate this rather heady, but richly insightful paper that investigates what you could call the reverse of that love-seeking-communion, the vice of "acedia" (also and most unfortunately translated as "sloth").  (The author shows that a culture in the grip of acedia ends up in nihilism.)

TOB Tuesday

I'm sorry I missed this guest post on the CNN blog when it first appeared in the days after the HHS contraception mandate. Valerie Pokorny, a marriage prep mentor in San Antonio, writes, "I’m all for the progress of woman. Let’s just make sure in promoting her progress, we don’t reject something that is inherently part of her in the first place." As someone whose first reaction to the Theology of the Body was how "pro-woman" it was, I think Valerie's comments are especially pertinent. The administration, in effect, doesn't really like women too much.

The [current] administration’s primary talking point on this issue is that 'Every woman should be in control of the decisions that affect her own health.' I agree. 100 percent. But from there, the defense sounds like slick advertising for the contraceptive industry: To be a healthy woman, you need contraception. All the successful women use it. You can’t live without it. Should I so easily accept the implication that I need to alter a part of myself that’s working properly in order to be free or fulfilled? I find this premise tremendously offensive. To me, this exerts pressure tantamount to that felt by women who purge after eating to attain or maintain a particular body image. It encourages women to think that their value is somehow intrinsically tied to how sexually available and desirable they are. I thought the whole moral obligation to fulfill a husband’s sexual needs was a thing of the past... but alas, it’s been repackaged for a new secular generation. Women are still evaluated heavily on the basis of their uninhibited sexual availability, which contraception ensures precisely by severing women from their fertility. (When a woman uses “contraception” for medical reasons other than preventing a pregnancy it's not technically contraception, and the Catholic Church doesn't necessarily prohibit these uses.) My fertility is not a disease. It does not need to be repressed, manipulated, or rejected. It ought to be accepted and respected accordingly, by individuals and by society as a whole.

Read the full post here.

Too Lavish for Liturgy?

One of the sisters found herself put a little bit on the spot in a conversation about art history. After a presentation depicted a lavishly bound Bible or altar missal, complete with inlaid gold, mother of pearl and precious stones, someone made the inevitable comment that something so valuable "could have been sold for two hundred days' wages and the money given to the poor." (Well, those were Judas' words, but it was along those lines.) Even the presenter admitted that it seemed hypocritical for the Church to possess such splendors. The sister there felt put on the spot, and did not know how to respond in a way that was respectful of the presenter, the questioner and the good motives invoked. So we talked about it here. A lot.

First of all, and most obviously, the whole matter was being taken out of context (judging the actions of a different age by the criteria of our own age). But there is so much more involved in this! I think that one of the first things the presenter failed to note (I can't completely fault a non-Christian art historian on this) is that treasures like hand-written books meant for the liturgy belonged to the poor members of the community, who saw and enjoyed and participated in the beauty of the liturgy no less than the wealthy brethren. But even more, the liturgy itself (and not only the wider life of the Church in the first millennium) included provision for the poor. So there is a wider historical context for those splendid liturgical artifacts, and that was when and how they were used.

As the congregation gathered for Mass, they brought bread and wine with them from their own tables, and handed it over to the deacon.  The deacon's job before Mass was to set aside what was needed for the Eucharist, and put aside what remained so that it could be distributed to the poor. That happened Sunday after Sunday. Church storerooms included not only bread and wine, but basic goods like oil and flour and clothing, especially clothing for women (some ancient registers of these goods still exist!). The deacons (and deaconesses) made sure that these provisions reached the needy.  In our day, that diaconal task is largely subsumed under the umbrella of Catholic Charities, but it still goes on.

And even today, I suspect that if we were to make a calculation of the  resources expended on "Church stuff" and those expended on the poor, we would find that each and every day, more is poured out in the care of the needy than in the support of Church structures and personnel.  But those expenditures are invisible, as are the people who benefit from them. And so we can expect to hear the complaint again about how uselessly beautiful our churches are, and how sad it is that we maintain these buildings when there are so many people in need.

Eucharistic Reflection

For Thursday, a thought on Eucharistic Adoration (this from Pope Benedict's "Sacrament of Charity", n. 66): "In the Eucharist, the Son of God comes to meet us and desires to become one with us; eucharistic adoration is simply the natural consequence of the eucharistic celebration, which is itself the Church's supreme act of adoration. Receiving the Eucharist means adoring him whom we receive. Only in this way do we become one with him, and are given, as it were, a foretaste of the beauty of the heavenly liturgy."

Rated "R" for Recommended

Next week I will be going to a preview of "For Greater Glory" (formerly titled "Cristiada"), a film that is being actively marketed to Catholic audiences--with an R rating! Sister Rose, our girl in Hollywood, explains:

"A pastoral associate just asked me if it was proper to post the poster for the film FOR GREATER LOVE opening on June 1. The film is rated R for 'war violence and some disturbing images'. Ratings are information about content to guide parents. Here the 'R' rating is appropriate because the violence, though in context and not exaggerated, is intense. 

"This is the story of a war, the Cristero war, that took place in Mexico between 1926-1929 over religious freedom and persecution of religion, especially the Catholic Church. It is very well acted and sheds light on not only Mexican history but the US part in the story as well. Highlights the lives of two 'Blesseds': Jose Luis Sanchez and Anacleto Gonzalez Flores."

A Vatican  news item explains more: "The film, one of the biggest and most expensive in the history of Mexican cinema, tracks the 1926-29 Cristeros War, when in an attempt to stop the governments’ goal of secularising the nation and stamping out the Catholic faith, ordinary people took up arms in a spontaneous uprising. The revolt was sparked by anti-clerical legislation passed by the Mexican President Plutarco Elías Calles. Under these laws church property was seized, all foreign priests expelled, and the monasteries, convents and religious schools closed. The persecution became so fierce that in 1926 Calles ordered the original statue of Christ the King destroyed."  (During his March visit to Mexico, Pope Benedict celebrated Mass in the statue of the new statue in precisely the same location.)

Producer Pablo Jose Barroso commented about the timeliness of the release: "The movie is very important because it is about ordinary people fighting for religious freedom, which is also a difficult issue in these times, not only in the middle east where Christians are killed for their faith but also for example in the United States were Catholics are being forced to do things that go against their moral values', noted Barroso. 'I think it’s a very relevant story'."  

Sr Rose adds a reminder: "("R" rating does not mean "bad" automatically. It's about age appropriateness but only from the content perspective - the rating does not address what the movie means.)"

 

 

TOB Webinar this Thursday

The Case for Catholic Teaching: 

Seminar on Women, Sexuality & The Church

Webinar May 3 (1-5 pm Eastern Time); all the hot-button issues:

• Non-Marital Sex and Abortion

• Marriage and Contraception

• Reproductive Technologies

• Male Priesthood

Got questions? Get answers--and a rich sense of perspective!

Presentations by the contributors to "Women, Sex and the Church"

Register now!

Healthcare and "the" mandate: testimony from an "unconservative"

For TOB Tuesday, I offer you "the Dutchman." Leave it to this most unconventional of Catholics ("Latin Mass Catholic, National Bolshevik"?) to offer a unique perspective on the issues of the day. I wish I had been more faithful to my Google Reader a few months ago, when this post first appeared of his blog; alas, it was impossible, as I was studiously avoiding anything that didn't relate to the Lenten presentations I was writing at the time. Now, even though it is less newsworthy, his post is still timely:

In 2008 I was at a Christmas party given my one of my ultra-Catholic friends. These are the kind of people who sing Christmas carols in Latin, say Rosaries for the unborn, and hold prayer vigils outside of Planned Parenthood clinics. These are people who do not use contraception, home-school their kids, and would never wear anything so revealing as a sleeveless dress. This was right after Obama was elected, but before he was inaugurated and, naturally, there was a good deal of speculation about what he would do. Healthcare was obviously on the table and I would say that two-thirds of the people there favored socialized medicine. That’s right; more than half the people in that room, people as culturally conservative as it is possible to be, favored a Single-Payer System – but with one proviso: you had to keep abortion out of it. The next day, I wrote President-elect Obama a letter with this simple message: you can sell a single-payer system to conservative Americans if you keep abortion out of it. (I also sent this same letter to David Axelrod, whom I actually know and have done business with.)

Read the rest here.

Chiara Lubich's 4 tips for online apologists

Following up on yesterday's 7 rules for effective apologists from Bl. James Alberione, here are Chiara Lubich's four "guiding principles for communications" which she drew from her Focolare communities' experience of living a spirituality of communion. (These were presented in a talk she gave during the Jubilee Year at a Focolare conference on communication; I present them with some editing for the sake of brevity.)

1. "Communication is essential: the effort to live the Gospel in everyday life...has always been indissolubly united with communicating it. What is not communicated is lost."

2. "When we speak or address some topic, we do not stop at merely relating the content of our thoughts. First we feel the need to know who we have before us...their needs, desires, problems. Likewise, we make ourselves known as well, explaining why we want to give this talk, what has led us to do it, its effects on ourselves, thereby creating a certain mutuality."

3. "Emphasize the positive. It has always been our way to put what is good into light, out of a conviction that it is infintely more constructive to point out what is good, dwelling on the good and positive, than to stop at the negative, even though whoever is in a position of responsiblity has the duty at the proper moment to point out errors, shortcomings and faiures."

4. "The person matters, not the media, which are merely an instrument. Bringing about unity first of all requires the indispensible means, which is the person, St Paul's 'new self,' who has welcomed the mandate of Christ..."

As I ponder these very wise guidelines (there is more substance to each one, but space doesn't permit me to include it all), I am especially struck by the "Theology of the Body" perspective in her second principle: to open oneself to the other, to receive the other in a kind of hospitality of heart before I begin to share what I have in my heart--and then, when I do, to share the "whole" story: not just the points I would like to make, but why those points matter to me, what discovering them or living them has done for me. It makes communication a sharing of life and not merely of ideas.

What especially stands out for you among Lubich's communications principles?