A Thing of Beauty Is a Joy Forever

As I have shared before, the most beautiful, memorable, & life-changing Mass I recall ever attending was the votive Mass of Blessed Virgin Mary celebrated in the Extraordinary From at the chant workshop in September 2009 in the crypt church of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception in Washington, D.C. Here is Fr. McAfee's homily from that Mass...

A thing of beauty is a joy forever
Its loveliness increases;
It will never pass into nothingness.
–John Keats

When the envoys of Vladimir, Prince of Kiev returned from attending the Divine Liturgy at the in Hagia Sophia Cathedral in Constantinople in the late tenth century, they gave this report; “we knew not whether we were in heaven or on earth, for surely there is no such splendor or beauty anywhere on earth. We cannot describe it to you; only this we know, that God dwells there among men, and that their service surpasses the worship of all other places. For we cannot forget the beauty!”

President John Adams, in a letter to his wife Abigail, told of a visit to a “Romish Chapel”, it said it part; “The music was consisting of an organ and a choir of singers, went all the afternoon, excepting sermon time, and the assembly chanted-most sweetly and exquisitely. Here is every thing which can lay hold of the eye, ear, and imagination. Everything which can charm and bewitch the simple and ignorant. I wonder how Luther ever broke the spell”.

St. Teresa of Avilla declared, “I am always shaken by the grandeur of the ceremonies of the Church.” The love of beauty and its expression for the work of art is not itself beauty but its expression is homage to God because, according to St. Thomas Aquinas, “beauty is one of the names of God”. Thus the church, when she is summoned to celebrate the Divine Mysteries, utilizes all of the arts appealing to the senses because the beautiful is “id quod visum placet” ‘vision of which’ when beheld is pleasing. The soberness of the chant, the splendor of the instruments, the festivity of the vestments, the pageantry of the incense, the candles, the vessels, the holy water – all of these aid us in our worship of the Triune God who created beauty, sustains beauty, redeemed beauty and is Beauty itself.

The Church has traditionally clothed the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass with mystery. Using the goods of creation, the Church in her transcendent earthiness leads her children to God and God through the same means descends to them. The Church at times has forgotten this. Pope Benedict XVI (as Cardinal Ratzinger) lamented, “Since the [Second] Vatican Council the Church has turned its back on beauty.” Just a few years ago the Pontifical council of culture in Rome issued this plea “give beauty back to ecclesiastical buildings, give beauty back to the liturgical objects!” Not only has the Church turned her back on beauty, she seems to be embarrassed by it. She who was once the patroness of the arts.

We have been impoverished. We are, to use a phrase of Paul Claudel’s, “we live in an age of starved imagination”. According to the philosopher Plotinus “the soul must climb the ladder of the beautiful before it can encounter the vision of First Beauty. But what happens when they remove the rungs of the ladder?

Scientists tell us that the left side of the brain specializes in mathematics, analysis, science and so on. It is the right side of the brain is incurably romantic its province is poetry, love, art, music. It is the right side of the brain that is called into play by a high form of Liturgy. One author has said, “During a more de-ritualized example of the vernacular Mass, the right brain, that miniature Homer or Shakespeare in all of us, is smothered to death”.

H. L. Menken who wrote for a Baltimore paper, and was no friend of religion, found himself admiring the Catholic Church as he said in 1923; “The Latin Church, which I constantly find myself admiring, despite its frequent astounding imbecilities, has always kept clearly before it the fact that religion is not a syllogism, but a poem…. Rome, indeed, has not only preserved the original poetry of Christianity; it has also made capital additions to that poetry—for example, the poetry of the saints, of Mary, of the liturgy itself.” “A solemn High Mass,” he concluded, “must be a thousand times as impressive as the most powerful sermon ever roared under the big-top… in the face of such overwhelming beauty it is not necessary to belabor the faithful with logic; they are better convinced by letting them alone.”

Listen to the enemies of the Church. They tremble at every swing of incense and each and every genuflection. In 1888 a Seventh Day Adventist published a book about the Whore of Babylon. When Judge Clarence Thomas was named to the Supreme Court the book was reissued. Here the author remarks about Catholic Worship…remember this was in the 19th century: “Many Protestants suppose that the Catholic religion is unattractive and that its worship is a dull, meaningless round of ceremony. Here they mistake. While Romanism is based upon deception, it is not a coarse and clumsy imposture. The religious service of the Roman Church is a most impressive ceremonial. Its gorgeous display and solemn rites fascinate the senses of the people and silence the voice of reason and of conscience. The eye is charmed. Magnificent churches, imposing processions, golden altars, jeweled shrines, choice paintings, and exquisite sculpture appeal to the love of beauty. The ear also is captivated. The music is unsurpassed. The rich notes of the deep-toned organ, blending with the melody of many voices as it swells through the lofty domes and pillared aisles of her grand cathedrals, cannot fail to impress the mind with awe and reverence. The pomp and ceremony of the Catholic Worship has the seductive, bewitching power by which many are deceived; and they come to look upon the Roman Church as the very gate of Heaven.”

In this way, many hearts hardened to the Church and her teachings, have been melted; as was the case of the “decadents”—Baudelaire, Verlaine, Aubrey, Oscar Wilde and others. “Beauty can then be fittingly called evangelical, evangelical beauty, via pulchritudinis, can open the pathway for the search for God and “dispose the heart and spirit to meet Christ who is the beauty of Holiness Incarnate offered by God to man for their salvation.”

According to St. Thomas Aquinas, for something to be considered beautiful it must have three qualities, integrity, harmony, clarity or radiance. When the radiance breaks through and the teachings of the Church are made manifest and the Catholic Church is recognized as the place where the truth abides and the home of beauty. This was the case with the decadents. Hans Urs von Balthasar has written that when “the good has lost its power of attraction, when proofs have lost their conclusive character; then the beautiful will empower”.

Pope Benedict XVI, in his telling of the visit of the delegates of Prince Vladimir of Kiev to Constantinople said that the delegation and the prince accepted the truth of Christianity not by the cogency of its theological augmentations but by the beauty of the mystery of its Liturgy.

The poet Baudelaire wrote; “It is at once through poetry and across poetry, through and across music, that the soul glimpses the splendor situated beyond the grave; and when an exquisite poem brings tears to the eyes these tears are not proof of excessive joy. They are the testimony of an irritated melancholy, a demand of the nerves, of a nature exiled in the imperfect, and now desiring to take possession of his world.”

Baudelaire was significantly influenced on his idea of beauty by an American writer he much admired, Edgar Allan Poe. Poe states of beauty: “We still have a thirst unquenchable, the thirst belonging to the immortality of man. He is at once a consequence and an indication of this perennial nature. It is the desire of the moth for the stars. It is no mere appreciation of the beauty before us, but veiled effort to reach the beauty above.”

Why then must the Liturgy be beautiful? Because beauty provides a vehicle to transcend our present lives and to touch the skirts of heaven. When we encounter finite beauty there is engendered a more passionate longing for absolute immortal beauty of which the earthly temporal beauty is but an ephemeral epiphany.

In the Epistle to the Hebrews, Christ is called the leiturgos, the Liturgist who presides over all our rituals, who Himself offers the Liturgy. Since Christ is the leiturgos and Christ is Beauty Incarnate, all beauty must reflect him and all beauty must flow from Him in the Liturgy.

Christ the Word Made Flesh is the greatest masterpiece. Christ is the most perfect symphony. Christ is the loveliest painting. Christ is the cosmic beat in the everlasting poem.

St. John of the Cross said; “God passes through the thickets of the world and wherever His glance falls, he turns all things to beauty”.

St. Paul wrote to Timothy; “He is King of Kings and Lord of Lords. He does possess immortality dwelling in unapproachable light”. Yet in the Divine Liturgy of the Mass we make bold to approach Him who lives in unapproachable light.

How can I describe the Liturgy? I can describe the Liturgy with one word. In the courts of heaven, amid the chorus of angels, there is but one word spoken, one solitary word which the cherubim and seraphim utter before the majesty of the cosmic liturgy of the glorified Lamb once slain but now risen, and that word is…

That simple word…

That glorious, triumphant word is…

AHHH!

What time is it?

I've been practicing the Gregorian chant Mass propers for Christmas Day. One way that chant is different from modern music is that the "beat" is irregular. There isn't a steady downbeat every measure of music to ground the melody. Chant is built out of notes in groups of 2 or 3 with a regular, pulsating rhythm. Sometimes a phrase is written 1 note per syllable. Sometimes a single syllable lasts a half a page. You might say chant is timeless.

This is not the result of medieval ignorance, though. No, it is a carefully thought-out theological statement; it is a participation in the timelessness on the other side of the veil. Remember that chant's proper place is in the liturgy & that the earthly liturgy is a reflection of, a participation in the heavenly liturgy. The timelessness of chant reflects the timelessness of heaven.

If you've been paying attention to the readings & prayers of the Mass & the Liturgy of the Hours, you may be a little confused at what time it is right now. All Advent we have been preparing for the coming of the Christ child, right? Yet we know that Jesus already came as a child over 2,000 years ago. We don't expect him to come back again as a child, do we? Further, many of the prayers & readings refer to Christ's return in glory to judge the world at the end of time. This is especially confusing at Mass when Christ Jesus is present with us in the Eucharist & we say he has dies, he has risen, & he will come again. How can we square all this up?

Gloria Patri et Filio et Spiritui Sancto, sicut erat in principio et nunc et semper et in saecula saeculorum.

Peter reminds us that for God a thousand years is like a day & a day like a thousand years. God is not subject to time; it is a creation of his on behalf of man. Eternity is not a really long time, it is no time. It is also called all time present before God. This is the "as it was in the beginning, is now, & shall be forever unto ages of ages." Of course, we can scarcely comprehend a life apart from time, so entrenched in it are we. But time is belongs with the changeable, & the changeable belongs to the corruptible. And death has no part with God.

Further, the Church prays like it is the first coming of Christ Jesus because - as the LOH tells us - we should adopt the spirit of Mary, to give ourselves fully to God & patiently & joyfully await his coming into our lives & into the world. This attitude, this closeness to the Immaculate Heart of Mary, will keep us properly focused to hear the Word of God spoken to us & respond, both now & and at the end.

So, even though this time of "yesterday, today, & forever" can bewilder us a bit, don't resist - let yourself enter its whirlwind. We are like the Jews who even today participate in the events of the Passover & Exodus even as they ritually remember it. This holy remembering is how God saves his people. It is foundational to the Church's sacraments. Jesus told us to "Do this in remembrance of me," & we are made present not only to his Crucifixion & Death, but also his Resurrection from the Dead in the Eucharist. This "making present now" is how the sacraments - especially the Eucharist - are a foretaste of sharing in Christ's eternal life.

Perhaps we forget that our destiny is a timeless one. This is why the Church presents us with so many clues. Even if this remains cloaked in mystery, we can be sure of Christ's presence in his Church, today, tomorrow, even unto the consummation of the world. Gaudete! Dominus prope est.

Ringing that bell...

In case you didn't know, the Salvation Army is not a charity per se, but a Protestant denomination, founded by William Booth in London, England around 1878, currently claiming about a half-million adherents ("soldiers") in the U.S.

It is one of a slew of renewal movements that sprouted up in the late 1800's, particularly in England, but also in the U.S. The Army holds for the Catholic view of God (that is, Trinitarian), a very Protestant view of the Church (useful but optional), & a very traditional Protestant moral code (that is, loving but rigid). They hold for the Protestant Bible as God's exclusive revelation & rule of faith (despite the Bible as we know it not existing until the Catholic Church declared it to be so in 395 or so). They hold for total abstinence from alcohol (despite this being contrary to the Bible - Ps 104:15 as one example of so many) & recreational drugs, partly because their Franciscan-like ministry to the destitute in the streets has shown them the destructive power of such substances abused.

The S.A.'s Position Statements reveal that they have been skimming the Catechism for the wording of many of their positions. They hold for the sanctity of life from birth to natural death, calling abortion "deplorable," yet include some curious language about recognizing the difficult decisions mothers may face. They are essentially silent on the flip side of abortion coin - contraception - mentioning only that it is opposed to abortion as a means of birth control. They are against euthanasia, giving an insightful statement into the value of the process of death.

They correctly uphold marriage as an exclusive & permanent bond established by God between a man & a woman, yet are silent on the evil of divorce. They encourage respect for the dignity of homosexuals, even as they encourage them in a life of chastity, indeed, as they do for all the unmarried. In a great number of moral issues, the Salvation Army stands shoulder-to-shoulder with the Catholic Church as being a sign of contradiction in a very permissive & suicidal world.

I only mention these things because, being curious, I couldn't find anything on their site about how their vast collections are spent. There's verbiage about their programs, but nothing about disclosure & accountability. Not that I harbor any special distrust of them, but because their presence is so pervasive, I thought it a curious omission. Also, I think of how different the reaction would be if it were Catholics taking collections outside of stores (maybe habited religious sisters would get a pass). People just give to the S.A. with complete trust. Does that say something about people, the Salvation Army, or about the Catholic Church? All three, I suppose.

Now, I am in no way discouraging anyone contributing to the Salvation Army - I do myself when I pass their bell-ringing volunteers - but don't forget about the multitudes of Catholic missionaries hitting the streets, or the jungles, bringing the succor of Jesus Christ to the world's crushed & abandoned. Take a look at the Franciscan Friars of the Renewal , Franciscan Missions, or countless others, to be sure, including the cloistered religious who pray for the salvation of souls - including yours & mine.

Remember, co-conspirators, this Advent... Spend less. Give more. Worship fully. Love all.

And that really does count as a conspiracy these days.

Spotted! Inner Goddess!

Well, I haven't had an inner goddess spotting in a while. It's amazing where they turn up. This time it blindsided me at an otherwise lovely Mass for the Solemnity of the Immaculate Conception of Our Lady.

I think the OCP composers - you know, the same 6 people who wrote the same 24 songs we've been strumming on guitars for 40 years now? - are probably geniuses. Let's write a series of dreadful, nearly impossible to sing accompaniments to the Psalms of the Sunday Masses & they'll have to sing them; we'll be nearly immortal! We'll be more popular than the Beatles! We'll be more popular than Jes... er, never mind.

And so we have Psalm 98 with the oh-so-familiar melody "All the ends of the earth (I hope you're all swaying side-to-side) have seen the glory of God; all the ends of the earth have seen (go down here instead of up) the glory of God."

Well, I thought I just had wax in my ears again, but I was sure I had heard the cantor skip a word here or there or use different words in the verses of the psalm.

Sing to the Lord a new song, for God has done wondrous deeds; God's right hand has won the vic-tory; God's holy arm... Then the cantor signals "Touchdown!" & everyone joins in the refrain.

The Lord has made salvation known... Revealing justice to the nations (or something like that)... Remember your kindness & faithfulness to Israel...

OK, so what are my problems with that, you ask? Well, a few. First, this little ditty doesn't follow the approved text of the Psalm. Hopefully, the new translation will fix that.

Further, the version we sang last night didn't even match the same one we've been singing forever. What was different? Every reference to God as masculine was eliminated. The Psalm for Mass was hijacked by someone with a feminist agenda. They want God castrated. The psalm actually goes:

Sing to the Lord a new song, for he has done wondrous deeds His right hand has won victory for him; his holy arm.

The Lord has made his salvation known; in the sign of the nations he has revealed his justice. He has remembered his kindness and his faithfulness toward the house of Israel.

The psalmist was pretty careful to include those masculine references. I'm not sure by what authority someone would arbitrarily eliminate them. I guess by Luther's.

Why all the fuss, you ask? God is neither male nor female, right? Well... There are libraries full of theological explanations of why God is "father" & not "mother" or simply "it." But consider this: the Second Person of the Trinity took on human nature & flesh by way of the Blessed Mother. Jesus was a man & Jesus was God. Jesus called the First Person Father. It is unequivocal that God & the masculine, even maleness, are related in a special way.

Look, I know when I'm being played, & last night someone decided that the Sacred Liturgy was the place to air out their radical feminist ideology. Since this was not my parish, I tried to put it aside & focus on the more important aspects of the liturgy. But, I hope the pastor intervenes. I hope this miserable arrangement is never played again. I hope people holding & publicly forwarding heretical notions either repent or formally leave the Church; the scandal they give is awful. Hasn't enough damage been done?

Holy Mary, vanquisher of heretics, pray for us.

Breaking the Bonds of Charity

Ever wonder what goes on in the head of someone who leaves Mass early, say just after Holy Communion? Well, we must not be too judgmental, because as the saying goes, everyone's dealing with something. Perhaps they're doing the best they can.

Yet, we can't help but notice when folks come down the line for the Eucharist with their coat & cap on, keys already in hand. We know they're going to head straight up the aisle & slip out the door. They will miss the most precious & fragile time of prayer - physical communion with the Lord, they will miss the post-Communion prayer, they will likely miss announcements about the various activities of parish life - the life in Christ that we are meant to live in service of God & others, & they will miss the final blessing. In the more fortunate parishes, they may also miss an appropriate & well-sung closing hymn.

In my parish, the Saturday vigil Mass is where these people are prominent. Many times I have been present at a sign-up table or ready to distribute Little Blue Books or something else & watched these folks leave in droves after Communion, sometimes what seems to be the entire back third of the congregation! And, man, is it difficult to catch their attention! Eye-contact is avoided at all cost. On some occasions, I felt compelled to literally chase someone down in the parking lot to hand them their prayer book.

But we know that an action of one member of the Body of Christ is never a matter private to them alone - it affects the entire Body. So, I think deeper down we feel a little betrayed & hurt by those who seem to want "a minimal experience of the Faith" as one pastor of souls said about "down-n-outers." What is betrayed is our understanding of ourselves as the Body of Christ, indivisible under Jesus himself. It is a tacit denial or at least a diminishing of the reality that is the Church & of the bonds of spiritual communion that exist among the members of said Church. In fact, one of the primary fruits of the sacrament of the Eucharist is an increase in those bonds of charity.

With all this in mind, I was taken back a bit by this passage of the Didascalia, a 3rd century liturgical manual presented in Mike Aquillina's book, The Mass of the Early Christians:

"When you teach the people, O bishop, command and exhort them to come faithfully to church , and never forsake it for any reason, but gather together continuously. Let no one diminish the Church by withdrawing themselves. If they do, they deprive the body of Christ of one of its members."

My Peace I Give You

I was troubled, pouring over in my head so many things. Then a voice spoke to me saying,

"Those things that trouble you, they are of no consequence; they are nothing. They cannot bring peace. Even if all your difficulties were resolved now, you would still not be a peace. I know you long for peace. But you could have peace now, if only you would truly desire it. If you turn to me to all your heart, I will give you peace."

Stained glass window photo taken in St. Joseph Cathedral in Columbus, Ohio.

Father, forgive me for I have sinned...

Here is a posting I made on my classroom blogsite. Perhaps remembering the kid's first confessions will help a few adults remember their need for it, too.
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I know a lot of my students this year are making their 1st Holy Communion with our Lord Jesus in the Eucharist, but some of you are wondering why you also have to make your 1st confession.

Remember when we discussed that only perfectly pure souls can stand before God? Well, it's the very similar when receiving Christ God in the Eucharist: only souls in a state of grace can receive him, that is, souls with no serious, mortal sins.

Let's look at a story Jesus told about a king who threw a marriage banquet for his son (found in Matthew 22). Now, Jesus called himself the Bridegroom (we usually just say "groom" today). So, the story is really Jesus' wedding banquet! Who is the bride, then? The Church! And through your baptism, you are part of the Church. That's how intimate a connection you are called to have with Christ Jesus in the Eucharist: as close - even closer - than husband & wife.

Back to the story: The king notices a man who tried to sneak into the wedding celebration who was not wearing the usual wedding clothes, & he says to him, "Friend, how did you come in here not wearing a wedding garment?" You see, back then all of the guests were given a lovely, white robe to wear for the wedding. So, someone wearing just their dirty street clothes was probably a party-crasher, or just bad mannered. The king had him thrown out.

We, too, were dressed in a beautiful white robe at our baptism, when all of our sins were wiped away & our souls were made perfectly clean. But as our lives wore on, we did selfish things that smudged up our clean soul. Perhaps we did some really bad things that made it so dirty, it wasn't even recognizable anymore. If we showed up wearing that to a wedding banquet, we'd be thrown out, too!

But Jesus gave his apostles his own power to forgive sins, because he doesn't want anyone separated from him; his entire mission on earth was to restore the relation between sinners & God & one another. The power of the priests to forgive sins happens in the Sacrament of Reconciliation.

So what is the difference between "ordinary" sins & serious sins? Venial sins are everyday faults we have of selfishness & uncharity. These things damage our relation to God & each other, but we can heal it through prayer, fasting, & alms-giving.

However, when we've done something really wrong, we destroy our connection to God altogether - things like fighting, lying, swearing, stealing, bullying, gossiping, unforgiveness, or sins against sexual purity. It is also a very serious sin to skip Mass or to receive Communion with serious sin on your soul. These sins are also called mortal because they kill us spiritually until we go to confession.

It's like saying, "No, God, I don't want you in my life. I can get on fine without you." And God respects your decision & will patiently wait until you discover that you really do need him & come back to him in the Sacrament of Reconciliation. If someone died having said "No" to God without being sorry, God will respect that decision, too; unfortunately, this time the decision is final. We call eternal separation from God & one another hell.

Remember, the Sacrament has 5 steps...

1) You must honestly & prayerfully Examine your Conscience to see where you have failed in your walk with God. Be honest - there's no fooling God.

2) You must Be Sorry for your Sins, because sins, even minor ones, are horrible compared to God's perfect holiness. If you are not sorry for what you've done, you cannot be forgiven.

3) You must Confess your Sins to the Priest, whether behind a screen or face-to-face. You have to tell EVERY serious sin you've done, no matter how difficult or embarrassing. If you hold back anything, your confession is invalid & your sins are not forgiven. The priest will not & can not ever tell anyone what was said during Confession.

4) You must Firmly Resolve not to commit those sins again. Your sorrow for having sinned against God & your desire to live rightly afterward is expressed when you say an Act of Contrition.

5) You must Do the Penance the priest gives you to help repair the harm you've done to the Church, the Body of Christ. Whether it's as easy as saying prayers or as difficult as apologizing to someone you've offended, do your penance as soon as you can.

The priest will then give you absolution by saying the Church's prayer of forgiveness over you, invoking the name of God the Holy Trinity. You are now as free of sin as the day you were baptized, so rejoice!

- Mr. Mark

BTW, the photo at the top is a painting of the story from the Gospel of Luke, chapter 15 about the son who returns home to beg forgiveness from his father.
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What is Truth?

There is only 1 cardinal sin in this modern era: claiming to hold an absolute truth.

"There shall be a time when they shall not endure sound doctrine but, according to their own desires, they will heap to themselves teachers with itching ears, and will indeed turn away from the hearing of the truth... " - 2 Timothy 4:3-4

You can hold any opinion under the sun, & under this new dispensation, everyone of them must be held as absolutely equal, even sacrosanct - beyond questioning or criticism. What you cannot do, ever, is state that you are right & someone else is wrong.

I was flipping channels before heading out to Mass & I came across a catchy headline on a CNN news program: "Gay bishop speaks out," or something to that effect, apparently about Gene Robinson running his mouth about something. Always curious to see how legion are the misinterpretations & mis-presentations of Christian faith in the media, I stuck around long enough to hear Joy Berhar say to an openly-gay pastor she was interviewing, "What part of 'Love one another' do these people not get?"

This nerf dart of error is apparently aimed at mainstream Christians who take God - speaking through St. Paul - seriously when he says:

"Know you not that the unjust shall not possess the kingdom of God? Neither fornicators not idolaters nor adulterers; nor the effeminate nor liers with mankind nor thieves nor covetous nor drunkards nor railers nor extortioners shall possess the kingdom of God. And such some of you were..." - 1 Corinthians 6:9-11

This is really a classic case of taking something you want to do - say, openly practice a sexual deviancy - & then use a fan dance of vague religious language & scriptural references to convince yourself & everyone else that God not only tolerates your sin, but that Jesus actually taught approval of it. Further, any church that does not embrace your deviancy is archaic & backwards & any person who does not support your cause is at best ignorant & prejudiced or at worst a hate-monger.

Note that it's not enough that these things be tolerated. We are required to approve of them. One doesn't have to have a very keen eye or razor-sharp insight to recognize the tremendous increase in overt sexual imagery in the media over the past 30 years or so. It should be clear that pornography has basically gone mainstream, & along with this culture of sexual license is the huge push for homosexuals & other sexual deviants to demand their "rights."

The problem is, you can't grant equality of truth to something that is false. St. Thomas tells us that truth is Nature in accord with right reason. Homosexuality is false prima facia. One cannot create their own reality. There is not, has never been, & will never be a child on this earth with 2 fathers or 2 mothers. It is simply not possible. If one brings up that male-female sex is no longer required in this age of test-tube babies, I refer you back to St. Thomas: you're barking up the wrong tree again.

Now consider this in the context of theology, where Christ is the bridegroom & the Church is his bride. In what sense can a priest - the tangible presence of Christ within the sacred assembly - be homosexual? What are we to make of the Bride receiving the Bridegroom in the consummation that is the Eucharist? Further, it is not even possible without overt blasphemy to discuss homosexuality in regards to the sacrament of Matrimony. Do you see how far reaching this issues goes into the life & nature of the Church, who she is before Christ Jesus? This is far beyond a matter of being "nice" or "fair" to a certain group. In a word, caving into our perverted society's pressure to accept homosexuality as some kind of state equal to the natural state between man & woman is really to deny the Christian Faith, to deny Christ himself. The Holy Faith is interlinked in such a way that denial of one truth of the Faith will inevitably lead to a collapse of all of them.

After saying all this, I, with the Church itself, advocate tolerance in the proper sense of the word - to deal with a known disorder by peaceful means, by persuading instead of coercing. The Church acknowledges that people are afflicted with same-sex attraction, but sees it as a symptom of our fallen nature & urges them to embrace continence - as all Christians are in their state of life - as the cross they must bear, but also as their path to holiness. We are all called to sainthood despite our brokenness. Paul continues his above statement with:

"But you are washed; you are sanctified; you are justified; in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ and the Spirit of God." - 1 Corinthians 6:11

The real key here is embracing Christ, not one's bodily urges, to be defined by the Man, the Risen Man, the Glorified Man, not by the craven desires of fallen man. It is a quest for holiness; the waging of a war against all that would keep us from God. Throwing out the stale canard of pedophile priests is not very helpful here; the Church sees this, too, as a grave disorder, the worst of which - mercifully - is in the past.

So, to paraphrase a famous saying, everyone is entitled their own belief, but not their own truth. There is only one truth & that is the One who is the Way, the Truth, & the Life. There really are no new heresies, just old ones dressed in today's fashions. When faced with a dilemma of how to handle them when they pop up, one should not try to rationalize them with today's woolly spiritualities, but instead return to the source: to Christ Jesus, to the Scriptures, to the sure teachings of the Church, & to penance & prayer. In the light of Christ's truth, all error evaporates.

The Ying-Yang of Happiness

One of my Chinese business colleagues was in town for a visit this weekend. She was out to dinner last night at one of Knoxville's most authentic Chinese restaurants with another workmate, and relayed this story to me.

Apparently, it was the birthday of one of the waiters, who was perhaps a University of Tennessee student. The manager brought him a big bowl of noodles - a Chinese custom, because noodles are very long, which symbolizes a long life.

The young man said he didn't want it because he didn't want to live a long life.

So the manager then said he would bring out the birthday cake. The young man then said he didn't like birthday cake.

Talk about the arrogance, cowardliness - though ultimately, ignorance - of today's lost & self-serving youth!

I mean, who doesn't like birthday cake!

A word on "Active Participation" by St. Pius X...

"The Holy Mass is a prayer itself, even the highest prayer that exists. It is the Sacrifice, dedicated by our Redeemer at the Cross, and repeated every day on the Altar. If you wish to hear Mass as it should be heard, you must follow with your eye, heart and mouth all that happens at the Altar. Further, you must pray with the Priest the holy words said by him in the Name of Christ and which Christ says by him. You have to associate your heart with the holy feelings which are contained in these words and in this manner you ought to follow all that happens on the Altar. When acting in this way you have prayed Holy Mass."

In the Beginning by Joseph Ratzinger, Homily 1, Part II

However, because God is the true author of the Scriptures, we can understand the spiritual meanings of them when we read them in the light of Christ, who is their true object, as the human authors of the New Testament well understood. Thus, St. John’s 1st Letter & his Gospel open with words that mirror the first verses of Genesis. We now see that Scripture is not closed in on itself, because God’s revelation of himself in Christ, & his people’s understanding of it & their reflecting it in their writings, unfolds throughout history. So we must not read the Genesis test complete by itself & purely within itself – we must look toward its end, which is Christ. Ratzinger says, “Christ frees us from the slavery of the letter, & precisely thus does he give back to us, renewed, the truth of the images (p.16).”

Only recently was this dynamic forgotten, that all Scripture is a living unity. Scholars seemed far more interested in researching Scripture like a puzzle to solve with an eye toward “explaining” it rather than understanding it with a view toward Christ. Ratzinger says that they became obsessed with the “particulars, but meanwhile it forgot the Bible as a whole. [They] no longer read the texts forward but backward – that is, with a view not to Christ but to the probably origins of the text…(p.17).” Thus began the altogether unnecessary - & ultimately false - enmity between faith & science.

In conclusion of his first homily, Ratzinger argues that faith in creation as a gift of God is reasonable, in fact, the better hypothesis. The very reasonableness of the universe confirms the God who is Reason, Truth, & Love. In God’s freedom as Creator, creation itself becomes a gift for man, a sharing with him of God’s own freedom, reason, & love. In responding to this gift in faith, man is able to call upon God in prayer.

Church attack in Baghdad

Please read this aticle on the attack on the Syriac Catholic cathedral of Baghdad & pray for the souls of the dead, comfort for their families, & healing for the wounded. Pray for Christ's peace to rest upon both the victims & the attackers.

You may also want to pray for the intercession of some of the martyr-saints that surely comprised this congregation for the conversion of hearts to Christ & peace in the region.

Here is a comment on the tragedy from Pope Benedict.

Agnus Dei, qui tolis peccata mundi, miserere nobis.
Agnus Dei, qui tolis peccata mundi, miserere nobis.
Agnus Dei, qui tolis peccata mundi, dona eis requiem.
...
P.S.: Various updates & links to other sources can be found at New Advent.

In The Beginning by Joseph Ratzinger, Homily 1, Part 1

About 30 years ago now, the future Pope Benedict XVI wrote a very important book, a collection of 4 homilies given in Our Lady's Church in Munich, Germany on the meanings of the opening chapters of Genesis in light of the discoveries of science, & how we can reclaim our own Christian heritage in these words.

It is one of those books where, when you wish to highlight the important passages, you end up highlighting nearly every line. What follows is a kind of "book report," where I try bring out some of the key points. I have broken the 1st homily into 2 pieces.

This short book, authored by one of the world's great Scripture scholars, is not only profound exegetical search into the truths that God has inspired in the Genesis story, but also a great model of Catholic Scripture scholarship. It is a must read.


Homily 1, Part I

“In the beginning…” These opening words of the Scriptures are beautiful & profound, stirring in our hearts an awe of the mystery of creation & its Creator. Yet modern man has largely dismissed these words of Scripture as a myth or perhaps a fairy tale. Recent catechesis, too, has largely ignored or side-stepped the Church’s teaching of creation, overwhelmed & silenced by the alternative creation story proposed by modern science. The question arises: If we cannot accept the truth of the Scriptures regarding creation, then perhaps we cannot trust them regarding other articles of faith, even perhaps the Resurrection. Further, if Catholics disbelieve their own Scriptures, how can we expect others to be convinced of the Faith?

While Ratzinger affirms the Church's position that the message of the creation narrative is primarily a religious one not intended to give a scientific account of how the universe arose – a message that God created all that is out of His love for man, freeing him from the gods, demons, & other hostile powers that ruled ancient belief so that he may know & live toward God - he also says that is not enough; we must rediscover the truths in the text itself if we are to affirm our belief in creation &, further, the other articles of our Faith.

Following Dei Verbum, Ratzinger sees the unity of Scripture from beginning to end as the interpretive key. First, we must see that there are many other Old Testament texts that speak of creation: Job 38-39, Psalm 104, Isaiah 40, etc. Even chapter 2 of Genesis gives an alternative account of creation. Scholars now recognize that Chapter 1 of Genesis was not written first; in fact, it may have been written as late as the return from Exile in Babylon in 528 B.C. Understanding who wrote the creation account, when they wrote it, & under what circumstances helps us to grasp the literal meaning of the passage, that is, what the human author intended.

The Jews had lost their land, the people enslaved, & the Temple destroyed – all signs of the covenant between God & his people. God used these desperate circumstances of the Jews to begin a new revelation. The Jews in captivity would have witnessed the celebration of the Babylonian New Year, which recalled the victory of the god of light Marduk over the dragon of chaos Tiamat. Marduk would go on to build the cosmos of the dragon’s body & build man from the dragon’s blood. The Jewish scribes would reject this false, sinister picture of the nature of man & the universe & reaffirm in the Genesis text the origin of man & the cosmos in God’s acts of loving Reason. From here, God could reveal to the Jews something new: He was not just the God of the Hebrews, but of every people & nation.

Confucius says...

"I have no hopes of meeting a sage. I would be content if I met someone who is a gentleman.

I have no hopes of meeting a good man. I would be content if I met someone who has constancy.

It is hard for a man to have constancy who claims to have when he is wanting, to be full when he is empty and to be comfortable when he is in straitened circumstances."

- Book VII, 26.

And now a few words on "Active Participation"

"In order to join in Holy Communion rightly, you must give heed to several things:

In the beginning, and before the priest goes up to the Altar, make your preparation with his - placing yourself in God's Presence, confessing your unworthiness, and asking for forgiveness;

Until the Gospel, dwell upon the Coming and the Life of our Lord in this world;

From the Gospel to the end of the Creed, dwell upon our Dear Lord's teaching, and renew your resolution to live and die in the faith of the Holy Catholic Church;

From thence, fix you heart on the mysteries of the Word, and unite yourself to the Death and Passion of our Redeemer, now actually and essentially set forth in this Holy Sacrifice, which, together with the Priest and all the congregation, you offer to God the Father, to His Glory and your own salvation;

Up to the moment of communicating, offer all the longings and desires of your heart, above all desiring most earnestly to be united forever to our Saviour by His Eternal Love;

From the time of Communion to the end, thank His Gracious Majesty for His Incarnation, His Life, Death, Passion, and the Love which He set forth in this Holy Sacrifice, entreating through it His favor for yourself, your relations and friends, and the whole Church; and humbling yourself sincerely, devoutly receive the blessing which our Dear Lord give you through the channel of His Minister."

- St. Fracis de Sales, Introduction to the Devout Life, Ch. XIV, 5.

Port or Starboard

I was looking for some good sources on the ordinary Magisterium of the Church & came across the sites of 2 groups that I found interesting, if somewhat sad. What was interesting was that, as different as they appear, there's something quite kindred between them, I'd say. I'll speak about one now & the other in a different post.

First up is a group of uber-Trads known as sedevacantists. I don't feel inclined to give their name & address - you can find them if you want. It doesn't take a Latin scholar to figure out their core belief - that the "See is vacant," meaning that the current pope is really a Modernist heretic, thus no pope at all - just an impostor - & further that the visible Catholic Church defected from the true faith (which, of course, they alone hold) with the 2nd Vatican Council. & is in the grip of Satan. Their big sticking points are the Novus Ordo Mass, ecumenism, & religious liberty, amongst a hoary host of attendant issues.

The New Mass is invalid, they say, because form, matter, & intention have all changed. They claim that the language of sacrifice was specifically culled out & that the vernacular translations are an abomination of errors. Besides, they hold all of the New Rite of sacraments invalid, including Holy Orders, so they would not recognize the New Mass as valid, anyway. They like to point out the innumerable abuses observed in celebrating the New Rite. They hold exclusively for the Mass of the Council of Trent.

Regarding ecumenism, they see the outreach of the "Church of Vatican II" to other religions & Christian groups as consorting with the enemy, something a Church holding the pure Faith would never do, mainly because it implicitly gives legitimacy to whatever errors the groups hold. They point to Pope John Paul II's numerous ecumenical prayer services with Buddhists & such as well as the now-permitted reception of the Sacraments by those in schism under certain circumstances are evidence supporting their arguments.

Regarding religious liberty, they equate the idea that no one should be coerced in matters of faith with admitting that there is another way to heaven besides Jesus Christ & the one, true (& indefectable) Church, because the phrase "Outside the Church there is no salvation," tenders no nuance. They see shaky theology, fuzzy preaching, diminishing vocations, & lack of vigor in evangelization as evidence of their position.

Now, I'm actually sympathetic toward these folks. I abhor when the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass is replaced by the Father O'Reilly Variety Hour. I'm somewhat troubled that certain authoritative statements from the Council & subsequent teaching seem to be in conflict with prior teaching. I'm dismayed, too, by lack of vocations, bad preaching, & a certain coziness of the Church with the world in some ways & un-surety of what it believes in others.

The Seds, though, back up their claims mostly with mudslinging against the Pope & the bishops & by quoting select bits from a myriad of Church documents, mostly obscure papal bulls & councils from a long time ago. Not that the latter are bad - what's true is always true (don't we recite a Credo formed at the ancient councils of Nicea & Constantinople at every Sunday Mass?) - yet, if the Gospel is to be preached to the ends of the earth & every believing person is to be baptized, don't you suppose that the Church would be, ya know, findable? I mean, without reading, analyzing, & comparing every Church document ever written, how was little ol' Ms. Maple in the 3rd pew on the left supposed to know she became a heretic adhering to schism on 28 October 1958 (the day Pope John XXIII was elected)?

To hold to their position is basically to admit that the prayer of Jesus that Peter's faith would not fail has failed. And this cannot be. They do not hold that there is a secret line of real popes, though I'm sure somebody somewhere holds for that. They hold that the See of Peter, that is, the Papacy itself is vacant & they pray that in God's good time, he will raise up a true pope. From where? To what? It seems they are so laser-focused in on historical documents that they can't read plain history. The Church has always been a mess. There have always been very good & very bad people within it, even in the highest positions. The Mass has been ever-changing. Even the saintly Pope Pius XII, the last Pope they recognized, made changes to the Tridentine Mass. Plus, now one of the biggest legs of their stool is taken out from under them since Benedict XVI has "liberated" the Old Mass (though they surely quelp, "Ah-ha!" over the altered Good Friday prayers). But, in spite of us, Christ guides his Bride through dark nights & rough waters. He promised us he would see us through.

The Sedes want a perfect Church that will never exist on this side of the veil. Are some of the things they protest silly, infuriating, or difficult to reconcile? Absolutely. Does that mean the Church & the Pope have defected & Christ has abandoned his Church? Not a bit. A thousand difficulties do not one doubt make. Without elaborating further, the key seems to be a true belief in the Holy Spirit present & at work in the Church, leading it toward Truth. You'd almost have to be a madman to believe that Pope Benedict XVI is a Modernist heretic. He is actually working to clarify many of the issues that vex this group, if they weren't so crazy-eyed & frothing-at-the-mouth to see.

So what to do with this crew? Sadly, there's not much to do except to leave them to themselves - for they will eventually just fade away as a renewed Catholic Church regains its strength. Pray for us all to repent & be converted to Christ. Commit to being an informed & faithful Catholic, living the Faith we profess & loyal to Peter - the Rock upon which Christ Jesus has built his Church.

As Father Corapi has frequently & famously said, "You can fall of the boat port or starboard."

Sunrise

No deep thoughts today, just a photo of a lovely sunrise.

Book Review: ManAlive! by G.K. Chesterton

In a world of walking zombies, being alive may mean more than simply being ambulatory. It may mean being alive by way of something, to something, for something.

In ManAlive!, Chesterton immerses us in a kind of dream world that has us circling the entire globe (literally!) while remaining in the comfortable confines of an English boarding house drawing room. We are presented with a menagerie of characters, each an aspect or image of the Modern Man, who reveal the absurdity living life without a purpose, & without even trying to discover the purpose. In the end, we remain with a question: Are we alive?

Part of Chesterton’s genius is the reverse play: the only one who is truly alive in this very tall tale appears at first to be a buffoonish, murderous, philandering thief doing business under the name Innocent. Naturally, there’s more to the story than first appears. Sometimes a fellow really does have to hoof it around the whole world just to come back around to his house (Believe me! I know a thing or two about that!). Perhaps there is a lesson here regarding what a truly Christian life would look like. As was famously said, “Holiness always looks mad by earthly standards.”

Blowing in with the westerly wind are a host of classic Chesterton quotes, each a jewel in itself, but even more precious when positioned within their proper place in the story...

“I mean,” he said with increasing vehemence, “that if there is a house for me in heaven it will either have a green lamp post and a hedge, or something quite as positive and personal as a green lamp post and a hedge. I mean God bade me love one spot and serve it, and do all things however wild in praises of it, so that this one spot might be a witness against all the infinities and sophistries, that Paradise is somewhere and not anywhere, is something and not anything. And I would not be so very much surprised if the house in heaven had a real green lamp post after all.” – Innocent Smith

“Nothing brings down more curses than a real benediction.” – Michael Moon

“As too many British officers treat the Army as a review, so I had treated the Church Militant as if it were the Church Pageant… Then I realized that for 1,800 years the Church Militant had not been a pageant, but a riot – and a suppressed riot… In the face of that I had to become revolutionary if I was to continue to be religious.” – Curate Percy

“Do you, perhaps,” inquired Pym with austere irony, “maintain that your client was a bird of some sort – say, a flamingo?”

“In the matter of his being a flamingo,” said Mood with sudden serverity, “my client reserves his defence.”

People talk of the pathos and failure of plain women; but it is a more terrible thing that a beautiful woman may succeed in everything but womanhood.

“I will not be so uncivil as to suggest that Dr. Pym has no common sense; I confine myself to recording the chronological accident that he has not shown us any so far.” – Michael Moon

“If it be true that there is a kind of man who has a natural tendency to murder, is it not equally true -” here he lowered his voice and spoke with crushing quietude and earnestness, “is it not equally true that there is a kind of man who has a natural tendency to get murdered?” – Michael Moon

“There is something pleasing to a mystic in such a land of mirrors. For a mystic is one who holds that two worlds are better than one. In the highest sense indeed, all thought is reflection... This is the real truth in the saying that second thoughts are best. Animals have no second thoughts; man alone is able to see his own thought double, as a drunkard sees a lamp post. Man alone is able to see his own thought upside down as one sees a house in a puddle. This duplication of mentality, as in a mirror, is (we repeat) the inmost thing of human philosophy. There is a mystical, even a monstrous truth in the statement that two heads are better than one. But they ought both to grow on the same body.” - Curate Percy

Will you kindly tell me what the deuce is the good of a jewel except that it looks like a jewel? You can’t fight with golden swords or eat golden biscuits; you can only look at it.

Things look so bright just before they burst.

Only saints and sages ought to be robbed. They may be stripped and pillaged; but not the poor little worldly people of the things that are their poor little pride.

"There should be priests to remind men that they will one day die. I only say that at certain epochs it is necessary to have another kind of priests, called poets, actually to remind men that they are not dead yet." - Curate Percy

H.E. Rating: 4 aspergillum shakes

Top Eleven Reasons to Speak Latin, esp. at Mass

Most people, after discovering I am an adherent to the Extraordinary Form of the Roman Rite, complain, "Why would I want a liturgy in a language I can't understand?" or "Why would I want to speak a dead language?" Below are some of my responses, some of which are quite snarky & others I just say quietly in my head...

11. That's surprising, since your obvious mastery of the English language led me to believe you were quite the language scholar! While English descends most directly from German, over half of the words in English are derived from Latin. Learn one & you learn something of the other.

10. I'm sorry, I didn't know about your learning disability. After you've prayed & sung them a thousand times, you do know them, even if you can't converse with your friends in Latin on street corners (though wouldn't that be fun!). I teach my 6th grade catechism students a few standard prayers & sayings in Latin each year, & it only takes a few classes before they don't really need their guide sheets anymore.

9. Where exactly did you go to school? America is one of the most affluent & educated countries in the world. I hold it to be a failure of the educational system - along with a big dose of cultivated personal laziness - that Latin isn't better known by anyone with a high school diploma & especially a college degree.

8. You're right - all that Cicero, Caesar, Augustine stuff is probably just a load of crap anyway. In a day when people are supposedly smarter than ever before, why in the world would we consign all the foundational writings of western civilization to the pyre! At work just last week I was asked by a whole group of engineers & technicians what "E Pluribus Unum" on our coinage means!

7. I don't like to pray together with those "other" people either! Why don't we all just fragment into our own little social-racial-linguistic factions, which I'm sure is what the Lord & his Church intends. I hear all the time that this was a big problem in the Old Days - Irish, Germans, Italians, & Polish all had their own ethnic parishes & ne'er shall they meet. This kind of Euro-factionalism isn't so common today, but often Spanish or Philippino speakers get the shaft on Mass times & run the risk of becoming a parish-within-a-parish. Can't we just pray Mass together? Plus, why would we want to lose a connection with Catholics around the world?

6. Latin is a fun to speak. It's true! The vowels are all very rich & deep. A's are always "ahhhh" as in father. O's are always "ohhhh" as in boat. U's are always "oooo", like in moose. Give your R's a little roll or flip. See how often you actually make your H's silent (nearly impossible for English speakers). All very My Fair Lady-like, if you ask me. My 6th graders eat it up, for the most part.

5. Latin is easy to sing. It is very metrical & very easy to rhyme because of the standard endings on the various noun & adjective declensions & verb conjugations, such as "Resurrexit sicut dixit..." from the Regina Caeli hymn. Which brings me to another point - there is a vast & deep ocean of beautiful liturgical chants & hymns that have lain untouched for decades now, some of which go back to antiquity. And they are soooo beautiful & prayerful!

4. Latin ain't dead; it ain't even sick. There is a rediscovery of this most beautiful tongue underway. Many students are finding themselves woefully ignorant compared to their predecessors, sensing that they are missing out on something very valuable. Here's an interesting article on the situation in Ol' Blighty (England) from our friends at the Daily Telegraph. I was very surprised at the depth of study into Greek & Latin at my son's Protestant high school!

3. Yes, the Church's ancient liturgical traditions are soooo cumbersome! Yes, tradition with a little T, but some of those point to big T's. We don't manufacture our Catholic Faith. It's not a product of our times. It's been handed on from the Apostles who received it directly from the hands of Christ. I hold strongly that the Ordinaries (Kyrie, Gloria, Sanctus et Benedictus, Credo & Agnus Dei) should always be sung in the ancient languages to reinforce this. There still seems to be a lot of confusion about this & plenty of people eager to cast off the lines from the Rock & set sail into the abyss of "what's happenin' now!" Latin helps to keep us grounded in the ancient Faith.

2. The Church asked us to. Throughout the conciliar documents, esp. on the liturgy & the formation of priests, there are statements reaffirming the primacy of Latin as the liturgical & theological language of the Roman Rite of the Catholic Church. Why? Probably because the Church's theology, liturgy, & laws were hammered out in Latin; it says what the Church wants to say in exactly the way she wants to say it. However, every translation, even the best, runs the danger of losing the fine shades of meaning of the original. Others may be outright wrong or corrupted - witness the need for our upcoming revised Missal. The Church requires clergy to know Latin. The Church encourages the preservation & cultivation of sacred music, especially Gregorian Chant & polyphonic music, which are in Latin by definition. Shall I go on? As I see it, at some point, it is actually a question of obedience rather than style or preference.

And now, the No. 1 response to those who can't stand Latin...

1. You're right - now that Mass is in English, I sooooo get the Mysteries of God! News flash! YOU WILL NEVER UNDERSTAND. Thank you Father Christian for pointing this out! (see here) People these days seemed trained to be so shallow & impatient in their search for knowledge that things that aren't immediately apparent at face-value are simply bypassed for something more "accessible" or "relevant" or "inculturated" or whatever. Sorry, Amica, that simply isn't possible when approaching God. You have to let go of what you need, to receive instead of do, to learn to dwell in God's time, to be content with God's Mystery. We will never understand; but we are invited in nevertheless, because this is the only way we can be truly happy. And God wants us to be happy.

Now, I could go on & on with all kinds of things I hear all the time... "I didn't understand it then, why would I want it now?" Uh, I think you were 15 years old then. Mostly, Latin is a kind of symbol that people of a certain age & hair color used to rage against in their rebellion against all things ancient, steady, & authoritative - dare I say, things bigger than they were? Or at least their ideas. Well, the Age of Aquarius is glady over, Starflower. And while younger folks may be saddled with a lot of bad catechesis, fortunately they aren't really burdened with the radical baggage of that generation. Many are looking for stability in a rapidly changing world (some might say a world their elders send rolling downhill with a whoop & a kick). Ultimately, whether they know if or not, people are looking for God. The Church has seen age after age dawn, rage, & fade; she knows what people are looking for & how to lead them to it. In the liturgy of the Roman Church, a little Latin does nicely.