New Translation - The Real Deal!

It's often said that the law of prayer is the law of belief. And so it is. What happens in the liturgy really does form us as Christians in how we engage every other aspect of life. Therefore, the new English translation of the not-changing Latin text of Mass is one of the most important things, like, ever to happen in the modern English-speaking world. We don't yet understand just how important this is & how it will form & inform the faith of our children & their children, & so the whole world for years to come.

Part of all that is that the Ordinaries of the Mass - the prayers & responses that are meant for the whole assembly, generally (the Kyrie, Gloria, Credo, Sanctus, Pater Noster, & Agnus Dei) - are all set to very good, but easy to sing chants that are derived from the ancient Latin originals (you should learn those, too!).

To hear a wonderful preview of them, please go to the awesome Corpus Christi Watershed site & have a listen. You should practice them, too. It is the Roman tradition to sing Mass, not just sing stuff at Mass.

It's like when you were a kid & wanted the really rich chocolate milk, but your Mom cheapened out & bought "chocolate drink" instead. Yuck! We want the real deal! Advent can't come soon enough!

A Mini Lesson in Evangelization

I had to take a short trip for work to another facility & a co-worker needed to go there, too, & asked if he could catch a ride. I said jokingly, "As long as you don't mind listening to Palestrina's Lamentations of Jeremiah."

So, we motored out in my still-hanging-together Mini Cooper. Observing the trees down & other damage all alongside the road, we started talking about the weather & all the storms that have hit the area. The I switched on the radio & really did have Palestrina in the CD player, because our Latin Mass choir is practicing to offer Missa Brevis on Pentecost. I played a little of the Kyrie, & explained that this plea for God's mercy at the beginning of the liturgy was the last remaining Greek in the Roman liturgy.

Now, my friend is agnostic, but not anti-religious. He was simply not brought up in a household of faith & didn't know much about religion, even the Christian religion. In our prior conversations, he has always asked intelligent & straightforward questions about what Christians believe & the differences between the various Christian sects. This kind of questioning can be the most difficult to answer because of the lack of common language & presuppositions on which to proceed. It's not like discussing a point of disagreement with another Christian. You have to build your points from ground up & assume very little.

I've said it before, though, that the divisions between Christian groups is a huge scandal to non-believers. It confirms their suspicions. His question was along the lines of, "How can 2 different Christian groups read the same book of the same stories & come to such opposing conclusions about what it means?" A very fair question. I don't think we believers ask ourselves that question enough.

I started by confirming his doubt. In ancient times, there were all kinds of understandings & misunderstandings about who Jesus was, what he did, what it meant, & what we should do in response. Each group who believed something different used the Scriptures to support their position. I also pointed out that what we call the Bible today was really a collection of individual writings that varied among the different communities of the ancient world. I noted that all this points to the need of an authority outside of the Scriptures themselves.

Then I shifted the discussion toward Tradition. Jesus taught some thing; he did some thing; he handed on to his disciples some thing; to Peter, especially, he entrusted this thing & commanded that this thing be preached to all nations. I was so bold as to say that the Catholic Church believes that it has received this thing - this Faith - from Jesus himself; she is its custodian & passes it on to others throughout the ages.

When some people believed Jesus was merely a good teacher, it was the Church reflecting on what she had received that allowed her to declare, "False!" When others said Jesus was just a vision or spirit from God, not a real human being, the Church again was able to say, "False!" based the intimate knowledge she had received from the Lord. When some wanted to add this or that book to the list of biblical books, but toss out these others, it was the Church that was able to say, "No, this is what is true, because it accurately relates what I received from my Lord."

I didn't think to say this at the time, but describing Tradition as a rule of faith in contrast to Scripture is much like the difference looking through a scrap book or photo album of Dear Aunt Polly versus actually talking with Dear Aunt Polly's siblings, relatives, & friends. Later you find out that those same folks put together the photo album to begin with! Which source would you go to to understand some detail of Dear Aunt Polly's life? Not that I'm comparing the Lord of Lords & the King of Kings to Dear Aunt Polly. Jesus is the Second Person of the Holy Trinity, fully God & fully man! And Dear Aunt Polly? Well, I just made her up.

I also mentioned the schism & fractures within Christianity itself. I said that this was never meant to be so, & that I knew this was a huge stumbling block for people. I said no Christian group can be an isolated island unto itself. Among Protestants one often finds the mentality of "church shopping" - keep moving around to you find one that suits you. Your favorite pastor's moved on? Then leave. Find another you like? Go there for a while. And so on. This can happen in Catholic circles, too, but I pointed out that one of the primary jobs of the Pope as the office of Peter is to ensure the unity of Christians, & that the Church is in discussion with virtually every major Christian group at some level to understand the reasons for their disunity & to seek reconciliation. I still hold great hope that I will live to see formal reunification with the Orthodox Churches, though God's will be done in all things.

At the end of our trip, I apologized for rambling so much, & my friend thanked me for answering his questions so thoroughly. I personally have found that whatever the topic or argument, the Catholic Church always has very intelligent & rational reasons for holding the positions that it does. But even beyond that, it has a deep & all-pervasive love for Jesus Christ. I think people who genuinely seek the truth are attracted by that. It has avoided devolving into an ideology or a movement of some kind, as all schisms are ultimately fated to do; she remains herself regardless, because she is only who she is because she has received it from Christ himself & is charged with handing it on to others.

In any case, the lesson here is that you have to be ready to share this Good News whenever, wherever, & with whomever the opportunity arises. Happy Eastertide!

Easter Vigil

Blogging on Easter Sunday? Only if it's Pope Benedict's homily from Easter Vigil Mass. Further, the Holy Father here summarizes & deepens the thoughts he first laid out in his book In The Beginning 30 years ago. Ad multos annos, Papa!

Dear Brothers and Sisters,

The liturgical celebration of the Easter Vigil makes use of two eloquent signs. First there is the fire that becomes light. As the procession makes its way through the church, shrouded in the darkness of the night, the light of the Paschal Candle becomes a wave of lights, and it speaks to us of Christ as the true morning star that never sets – the Risen Lord in whom light has conquered darkness. The second sign is water. On the one hand, it recalls the waters of the Red Sea, decline and death, the mystery of the Cross. But now it is presented to us as spring water, a life-giving element amid the dryness. Thus it becomes the image of the sacrament of baptism, through which we become sharers in the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.

Yet these great signs of creation, light and water, are not the only constituent elements of the liturgy of the Easter Vigil. Another essential feature is the ample encounter with the words of sacred Scripture that it provides. Before the liturgical reform there were twelve Old Testament readings and two from the New Testament. The New Testament readings have been retained. The number of Old Testament readings has been fixed at seven, but depending upon the local situation, they may be reduced to three. The Church wishes to offer us a panoramic view of whole trajectory of salvation history, starting with creation, passing through the election and the liberation of Israel to the testimony of the prophets by which this entire history is directed ever more clearly towards Jesus Christ. In the liturgical tradition all these readings were called prophecies. Even when they are not directly foretelling future events, they have a prophetic character, they show us the inner foundation and orientation of history. They cause creation and history to become transparent to what is essential. In this way they take us by the hand and lead us towards Christ, they show us the true Light.

At the Easter Vigil, the journey along the paths of sacred Scripture begins with the account of creation. This is the liturgy’s way of telling us that the creation story is itself a prophecy. It is not information about the external processes by which the cosmos and man himself came into being. The Fathers of the Church were well aware of this. They did not interpret the story as an account of the process of the origins of things, but rather as a pointer towards the essential, towards the true beginning and end of our being. Now, one might ask: is it really important to speak also of creation during the Easter Vigil? Could we not begin with the events in which God calls man, forms a people for himself and creates his history with men upon the earth? The answer has to be: no. To omit the creation would be to misunderstand the very history of God with men, to diminish it, to lose sight of its true order of greatness. The sweep of history established by God reaches back to the origins, back to creation. Our profession of faith begins with the words: “We believe in God, the Father Almighty, Creator of heaven and earth”. If we omit the beginning of the Credo, the whole history of salvation becomes too limited and too small. The Church is not some kind of association that concerns itself with man’s religious needs but is limited to that objective. No, she brings man into contact with God and thus with the source of all things. Therefore we relate to God as Creator, and so we have a responsibility for creation. Our responsibility extends as far as creation because it comes from the Creator. Only because God created everything can he give us life and direct our lives. Life in the Church’s faith involves more than a set of feelings and sentiments and perhaps moral obligations. It embraces man in his entirety, from his origins to his eternal destiny. Only because creation belongs to God can we place ourselves completely in his hands. And only because he is the Creator can he give us life for ever. Joy over creation, thanksgiving for creation and responsibility for it all belong together.

The central message of the creation account can be defined more precisely still. In the opening words of his Gospel, Saint John sums up the essential meaning of that account in this single statement: “In the beginning was the Word”. In effect, the creation account that we listened to earlier is characterized by the regularly recurring phrase: “And God said …” The world is a product of the Word, of the Logos, as Saint John expresses it, using a key term from the Greek language. “Logos” means “reason”, “sense”, “word”. It is not reason pure and simple, but creative Reason, that speaks and communicates itself. It is Reason that both is and creates sense. The creation account tells us, then, that the world is a product of creative Reason. Hence it tells us that, far from there being an absence of reason and freedom at the origin of all things, the source of everything is creative Reason, love, and freedom. Here we are faced with the ultimate alternative that is at stake in the dispute between faith and unbelief: are irrationality, lack of freedom and pure chance the origin of everything, or are reason, freedom and love at the origin of being? Does the primacy belong to unreason or to reason? This is what everything hinges upon in the final analysis. As believers we answer, with the creation account and with John, that in the beginning is reason. In the beginning is freedom. Hence it is good to be a human person. It is not the case that in the expanding universe, at a late stage, in some tiny corner of the cosmos, there evolved randomly some species of living being capable of reasoning and of trying to find rationality within creation, or to bring rationality into it. If man were merely a random product of evolution in some place on the margins of the universe, then his life would make no sense or might even be a chance of nature. But no, Reason is there at the beginning: creative, divine Reason. And because it is Reason, it also created freedom; and because freedom can be abused, there also exist forces harmful to creation. Hence a thick black line, so to speak, has been drawn across the structure of the universe and across the nature of man. But despite this contradiction, creation itself remains good, life remains good, because at the beginning is good Reason, God’s creative love. Hence the world can be saved. Hence we can and must place ourselves on the side of reason, freedom and love – on the side of God who loves us so much that he suffered for us, that from his death there might emerge a new, definitive and healed life.

The Old Testament account of creation that we listened to clearly indicates this order of realities. But it leads us a further step forward. It has structured the process of creation within the framework of a week leading up to the Sabbath, in which it finds its completion. For Israel, the Sabbath was the day on which all could participate in God’s rest, in which man and animal, master and slave, great and small were united in God’s freedom. Thus the Sabbath was an expression of the Covenant between God and man and creation. In this way, communion between God and man does not appear as something extra, something added later to a world already fully created. The Covenant, communion between God and man, is inbuilt at the deepest level of creation. Yes, the Covenant is the inner ground of creation, just as creation is the external presupposition of the Covenant. God made the world so that there could be a space where he might communicate his love, and from which the response of love might come back to him. From God’s perspective, the heart of the man who responds to him is greater and more important than the whole immense material cosmos, for all that the latter allows us to glimpse something of God’s grandeur.

Easter and the paschal experience of Christians, however, now require us to take a further step. The Sabbath is the seventh day of the week. After six days in which man in some sense participates in God’s work of creation, the Sabbath is the day of rest. But something quite unprecedented happened in the nascent Church: the place of the Sabbath, the seventh day, was taken by the first day. As the day of the liturgical assembly, it is the day for encounter with God through Jesus Christ who as the Risen Lord encountered his followers on the first day, Sunday, after they had found the tomb empty. The structure of the week is overturned. No longer does it point towards the seventh day, as the time to participate in God’s rest. It sets out from the first day as the day of encounter with the Risen Lord. This encounter happens afresh at every celebration of the Eucharist, when the Lord enters anew into the midst of his disciples and gives himself to them, allows himself, so to speak, to be touched by them, sits down at table with them. This change is utterly extraordinary, considering that the Sabbath, the seventh day seen as the day of encounter with God, is so profoundly rooted in the Old Testament. If we also bear in mind how much the movement from work towards the rest-day corresponds to a natural rhythm, the dramatic nature of this change is even more striking. This revolutionary development that occurred at the very the beginning of the Church’s history can be explained only by the fact that something utterly new happened that day. The first day of the week was the third day after Jesus’ death. It was the day when he showed himself to his disciples as the Risen Lord. In truth, this encounter had something unsettling about it. The world had changed. This man who had died was now living with a life that was no longer threatened by any death. A new form of life had been inaugurated, a new dimension of creation. The first day, according to the Genesis account, is the day on which creation begins. Now it was the day of creation in a new way, it had become the day of the new creation. We celebrate the first day. And in so doing we celebrate God the Creator and his creation. Yes, we believe in God, the Creator of heaven and earth. And we celebrate the God who was made man, who suffered, died, was buried and rose again. We celebrate the definitive victory of the Creator and of his creation. We celebrate this day as the origin and the goal of our existence. We celebrate it because now, thanks to the risen Lord, it is definitively established that reason is stronger than unreason, truth stronger than lies, love stronger than death. We celebrate the first day because we know that the black line drawn across creation does not last for ever. We celebrate it because we know that those words from the end of the creation account have now been definitively fulfilled: “God saw everything that he had made, and behold, it was very good” (Gen 1:31). Amen.

Courtesy of Whispers in the Loggia

In the Beginning by Joseph Ratzinger - Homily 2, Part I

Joseph Ratzinger opens his second homily by reviewing two realizations from his first homily: firstly, that Christians read the Scriptures with Christ, who is their guide, “indicating to us in reliable fashion what an image is and where the real, enduring content of a biblical expression may be found. He is freedom from a false slavery to literalism and a guarantee of the… truth of the Bible, which does not dissipate into a cloud of pious pleasantries but remains the sure ground upon which we can stand (p.21).” Secondly, that faith in creation is reasonable.

The early development of the sciences operated on an ancient principle that the heavens were of divine nature & therefore eternal & unchangeable, which the newly-discovered mathematical formulae that described & governed the physical realm seemed to support. As things progressed, however, a messier & more complicated picture of the cosmos emerged. Ratzinger notes science began to see that “the universe is subject to both becoming & destruction… Temporality is inscribed upon it… a passage from a beginning to an end (p.22).”

Indeed, on both the tiniest & the largest scales, science continues to reveal to us many surprising, startling, frightening, & awe-inspiring things. The very complexity of the universe – especially life – seems to render absurd any explanations rooted in inherent necessity or random chance, & frequently the attempts of science to explain things are untenable. One writer noted that what atheistic scientists wish to impose on us is far more unbelievable than anything Christianity has ever taught. But with faith one sees the rational hand of God at work in the cosmos. Ratzinger says, “the natural sciences… have given us a new & unheard-of creation account with vast new images, which let us recognize the face of the Creator and… realize… that at the very beginning & foundation of all being there is a creating Intelligence (p.24).”

Pope Pius XII’s encyclical letter Humani Generis of 1950 set the Church’s rules of engagement with modern science, which I will vainly attempt to sum up as: science never by itself & never for itself, but always in light of Jesus Christ & with the guidance of the Church. Pius spends a lot of time mapping out the role of the Church as a custodian of science, but I will leave that for you to explore. However, the idea of science never in isolation is important to Ratzinger because he knows it can only lead to a false &, ultimately, meaningless view of the cosmos & of man himself. In this overly-rationalistic climate a person is only value insofar as they are productive, & all matter – even human matter – serves merely as raw material to be manipulated & used for the sake of the idol of progress.

But the good news of Christianity (which it shares with the Jewish faith) is that every human being has profound meaning as an image of God & has a noble purpose which is nothing less than union with God himself. Without God, a creation hurtling toward its end is completely devoid of hope. What Christianity proposes is a creation that is a gift from the Creator & is on a journey toward an ultimate destination – a truly unimaginable conclusion that is only known in the mind of God.

In the second part of his homily, Ratzinger will return to the Genesis text again and consider more deeply the imagery within it, what he calls the enduring significance of the symbolic elements in the text.

The Man Who Was Thursday by G.K. Chesterton

I have several literary irons in the fire right now. One is The Man Who Was Thursday by G.K. Chesterton.

Here is an excerpt for anyone who has gotten in way over there head, whose options had run out, who feared for an immanent judgment, though hopefully not in a sword duel in a field of wild flowers...

The Colonel said quietly, "Engage!" and the two blades touched and tingled. When the jar of joined iron ran up Syme's arm, all the fantastic fears that have been the subject of this story fell from him like dreams from a man waking up in bed. He remembered them clearly and in order as mere delusions of the nerves - how the fear of the Professor had been the fear of the tyrannic accidents of nightmare, and how the fear of the Doctor had been the fear of the airless vacuum of science. The first was the old fear that any miracle might happen, the second the more hopeless modern fear that no miracle can ever happen. But he saw that these fears were fancies, for he found himself in the presence of the great fact of the fear of death, with its coarse and pitiless common sense. He felt like a man who had dreamed all night of falling over precipices, and had woke up on the morning when he was to be hanged.... He knew his enemy was a terrible fighter, and that probably his last hour had come.

And for anyone who needs to pour an exquisite insult on another, perhaps you can use this sometime...

You great fat, blasted, blear-eyed, blundering, thundering, brainless, Godforsaken, doddering, damned fool! ...You great silly, pink-faced, towheaded turnip!

I had to look up towheaded.

The Witness of Suffering

"I am Patrick - a sinner - the most unsophisticated and unworthy among all the faithful of God. Indeed, to many I am the most despised." - opening words of the Confession of Patrick

What Patrick accomplished is astounding. In virtually a single generation, he managed to supplant a deeply-entrenched pagan societal system with faith in Jesus Christ. He had few resources - little personnel, no security, no infrastructure, really, nothing. So did he just skip through the land like a fairy tale spreading good cheer & making converts wherever he went? His own words do not say so. His opposition came from within the Church as bitterly as it came from chieftains & druids. But he had two key resources at his disposal: faith & suffering.

A stunning statement from the Pope Benedict XVI's book, Jesus of Nazareth, Part II:

"... the proclamation of the Gospel will always be marked by the sign of the Cross - this is what each generation of Jesus' disciples must learn anew. The Cross is and remains the sign of "the Son of Man": ultimately, in the battle against lies and violence, truth and love have no other weapons than the witness of suffering." p.49

The Virtues

I confess to being a huge fan of Fr. Groeschel. His book The Virtue Driven Life has really helped to smooth out some wild & rough ground in my soul. When I was given the opportunity to lead the opening activity for the Youth Group a few weeks back, I wondered exactly what I should do. Out of the blue, I heard Fr. Groeschel's scratchy, insistent voice in my mind saying, "Teach the virtues!" So I did.

With the help of the other teachers, we presented the 4 cardinal or moral "human" virtues & also the 3 great sources of temptation for man - the world, the flesh, & the devil - in a situational, role-playing exercise. Below is a summary of the material I presented to the kids on the 4 cardinal virtues. Note that Fr. Groeschel makes an important distinction between a natural virtue & its supernatural counterpart. I think we could all use a refresher course in this from time to time. Numbers in italics are Catechism references. My apologies if the fomatting looks a little wonked.

“To live well is nothing other than to love God with all one’s heart, with all one’s soul, & with all one’s efforts; from this it comes about that love is kept whole & uncorrupted (Temperance); no misfortune can disturb it (Fortitude); it obeys only God (Justice); & is careful in discerning things, so as not to be surprised by deceit or trickery (Prudence).” - St. Augustine

Q. What are Virtues?

Virtues are habitual & firm dispositions to do the good. Moral virtues – Prudence, Justice, Temperance, & Fortitude – are acquired through human effort, helped by God’s grace. The theological virtues – Faith, Hope, & Love – are gifts from God. The virtuous person strives toward the good with all his bodily & spiritual powers, becoming in the process the best person he can be. He pursues the good & chooses it in concrete actions. The goal of a virtuous life is to become like God. 1803

Q. What is opposite of virtue?

Vices are habits acquired by repeated sin in violation of the norms of human morality. Vices are often linked to the Capital Sins. Repentance for sin & confession may restore grace to the soul, but removal of the tendency to sin or vice requires much effort & self-denial until the contrary virtue is acquired. Vice & virtue are rooted in man’s freedom: his exercise of intellect, affections, & will. They are not only the actions we do, but the desires we carry in our souls. 1866

Q. So if Virtue is related to Freedom, what is Freedom?

Freedom is the power to choose good or evil, though strickly speaking, there is no true freedom except in the sevice of what is good & just. Choosing good builds man up, makes him freer. Choosing evil is self-destructive, clouds the mind, emotions, & will. Choosing evil takes away man’s freedom & leads him to the slavery of sin. 1733

Q. Are all virtues the same?

No, the Theological are higher than the Moral, or Cardinal, virtues. Also, virtues can be considered as either natural or supernatural. Many people of other religious beliefs - or even no belief at all - have all kinds of naturally good qualities. However, in the light of Christ & in the power of the Spirit, the supernatural virtues always have the desire to please God & to do his will as their primary motive. This drive is simply another name for holiness. 1812

"Seek first the Kingdom of God & his righteousness, & all these things shall be yours as well." - Matthew 6:33

Prudence is using our power of reason to discern the good in every circumstance & choose the right means to achieve it. St. Thomas says it is “right reason in action.” Prudence guides the other virtues & directs our consciences. 1806

Natural prudence helps us order our lives toward security & happiness. Supernatural Prudence helps us & others to obtain eternal life & everlasting joy.

"To everyone who has more will be given; but from him who has not, even what he has will be taken away." – Matthew 25:29

Justice is the firm resolve to give what’s due to God & neighbor. Justice toward God is called religion. Justice toward neighbor respects their innate dignity & seeks to build a fair & peaceful society with regard to each person & the common good. 1807

Natural justice calls us to be fair & honest in our relations with others by following the natural law written on men’s hearts & the rules of decent behavior. Supernatural Justice seeks to realize the equal dignity of every human being out of love for Jesus, especially in caring for poor & disregarded, because he, too, was poor & despised.

"You cannot serve both God & mammon." – Matthew 6:24

Temperance moderates our desires for pleasure, directs our appetites towards what is good, & provides balance in the use of the goods of creation, which is mankind’s common inheritance. 1809

Natural temperance helps us to avoid indulging in things harmful to ourselves & contribute to our legitimate goals in life. Supernatural Temperance helps us to be good & grateful stewards of the wonderful gifts of the Creator. It means using the good things of this world wisely & well for our sanctification & that of others. We cannot choose Jesus Christ & his Kingdom if we overly value the things of this world; our treasure & destination lie elsewhere.

"In this world you will have tribulation, but be of good cheer: I have overcome the world." - John 16:33

Fortitude ensures firmness in difficulties & constancy in pursuing the good; by fortitude we are strengthened against temptations & overcome obstacles in the moral life. Fortitude keeps us strong & sure to the end. It is not caving in our convictions when the situation becomes difficult or painful. 1808

Natural fortitude may be called courage; but Supernatural Fortitude keeps us vigilant & stout-hearted in our spiritual warfare, whether in heroic acts of love or in the struggles of daily life, keeping before us always the goal of eternal life in Christ.