Carl E. Olson's Blog, page 17

The Holy Spirit: Gift, Counselor, Advocate, Helper

On the Readings for May 5, 2013, the Sixth Sunday of Easter | Carl E. Olson

Readings:
• Acts 15:2-2, 22-29
• Ps 67:2-3, 5, 6, 8
• Rev 21:10-14, 22-23
• Jn 14:23:-29

“A gift is freely given,” wrote St. Thomas Aquinas, “and expects no return. Its reason is love. What is first given is love; that is the first gift. The Holy Spirit comes forth as the substance of love, and Gift is his proper name.”

The Holy Spirit is the gift given by the Father, Jesus told the disciples in the Upper Room. This gift given in Jesus’ name is called Parakletos, which is translated in various ways: Counselor, Advocate, Helper. It means, literally, “one called alongside of” to aid, exhort, and encourage. He is, remarked the Jesuit priest and poet, Gerard Manley Hopkins, one “who stirs up, urges forward, who calls on … what a trumpet is to a soldier, that a Paraclete is to the soul…”

The name appears five times in the New Testament: once in 1 John, where it refers to Jesus as the advocate before the Father on the behalf of sinners (1 Jn. 2:1), and four times in the Gospel of John, referring to the Holy Spirit. Those four references are in the Last Supper discourse (Jn. 13-16), during which Jesus prepared his closest companions—the future leaders of his Church—for his death, his Resurrection, and the sending of the Gift. That sending, of course, took place on Pentecost, and today’s readings help prepare us for Pentecost by having us contemplate the work of the third Person of the Trinity.

The Greek word was used in legal settings to refer to an attorney making a defense in court on behalf of someone accused. The Holy Spirit strengthens those who belong to Christ, standing beside them in support as they battle temptation, endure the trials of this world, and rebut the accusations of the devil, “the accuser” (Rev. 12:10).

But the Holy Spirit is not just beside us, but resides within those who have been baptized; he is, as the Creed states, the “giver of life.” The life he gives is the divine life of God, who is perfect love—an eternal exchange of divine love: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. “Whoever loves me,” Jesus told his disciples, “will keep my word, and my Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our dwelling with him.” Filled with the Trinitarian life, we are made temples of the Holy Spirit. “Do you not know,” St. Paul asked the Corinthians, “that you are God's temple and that God's Spirit dwells in you?” (1 Cor. 3:16; cf. CCC 782, 1197)

The Holy Spirit would be sent, Jesus explained, to teach and to remind. This was a specific promise to the apostles, who were granted definite authority from Jesus, including the authority to teach, to govern, and to forgive sins in his name and by his power (cf. Jn. 20:22-23). Today’s reading from the Acts of the Apostles is a significant example of this authority, a description of the Council at Jerusalem, which convened in A.D. 49, some fifteen years or so after the Resurrection. The Council consisted of “the apostles and the elders” who had gathered together to look into the dispute over the necessity of circumcision for Gentile converts, and come to a solution regarding the growing tensions between Jewish and Gentile believers.

The key phrase written by the apostles—in reflecting here on the power and work of the Paraclete—is this: “It is the decision of the Holy Spirit and us…” There was no conflict between the apostles and the Holy Spirit, for they had been given the Paraclete in order to teach, to lead, to guide, and, when necessary, decide.

In making a decision involving the relationship between the old covenant and the new covenant, the Apostles were participating in Christ’s work of love and peace. Granted authority by the head of the Church, they protected the Church from division—not due to their natural abilities, but because of the One who counsels, consoles, and advocates. He is Gift, who comes to guide “into all the truth” (Jn. 16:13).

(This "Opening the Word" column originally appeared in the May 9, 2010, issue of Our Sunday Visitor newspaper.)

In Christ-Haunted California: Dana Gioia’s "99 Poems"

(Left) Dana Gioia (image via danagioia.com); (right) "99 Poems," published by Graywolf Press.

In Christ-Haunted California: Dana Gioia’s 99 Poems | James Matthew Wilson | Catholic World Report

A new collection of poems is a remarkable retrospective on the career of one of America’s most accomplished and controversial poets.

At the heart of Dana Gioia’s 2012 collection, Pity the Beautiful, lies a ghost story. “Haunted” tells the tale of a young man who has gone for a secluded and intimate weekend in an ancestral New England mansion with a woman of great beauty and even greater vanity. Mara, the narrator tells us, “loved having me for an audience,” as she described “her former lovers—imitating them, / cataloguing their signature stupidities.” He, meanwhile, sits in awe. As the story unfolds, we sense the narrator is of humble origins but of a sensibility that has already warmed up to obscene wealth. He describes the mansion’s art as “grand, authentic, second rate,” and while Mara showers, he distracts himself from contemplating her body by exploring the wine cellar, where he recognizes and appreciates the collection of Bordeaux.

Invited into the world of affluence, a quick study in its ways, but held slightly in contempt by its prize beauty, the narrator argues with Mara and storms off to another wing of the mansion. There, disrupting his sulking over a volume of Shakespeare’s sonnets, enters a woman, a housekeeper—no, a ghost:

She seemed at once herself and her own reflection

shimmering on the surface of clear water

where fleeting shadows twisted in the depths.

He tries to address her. She ignores him. But then, turning her face to him, she hisses, “You don’t belong here. No, you don’t belong here.”

Other things happen in the story before its end, but we soon learn that this haunted man has fled the mansion in his socks, leaving his shoes behind, and hitchhiked until he, by chance perhaps, arrives at a monastery. The story begins with him insisting to us that he does not believe in ghosts. It ends with him confessing that he does not even believe in an afterlife. And yet, after this encounter with the “unexplained,” he has become a monk. He relates all this while delivering brandy from the monastery to a local tavern. And he is content indeed, for monastic discipline somehow is the only means of ensuring that this life, this earthly life, will not be wasted.

With the publication of 99 Poems: New and Selected, readers are brought to see with clarity how central the themes of this ghost story are to understanding the career of one of America’s most admired, controversial, and accomplished poets and critics. We see that, for all the great variety of form, style, and subject, Gioia’s poetry reminds us again and again that the world is a mystery where the things of God wait, hidden inside the heart of the world.

Half a century ago, Flannery O’Connor wrote that modern America had grown “hard of hearing” to the voice of grace. We lived in a world disfigured by its unconcern for anything but a life spent in the pursuit of pleasant vanities. And yet, those few persons who sense that something has gone wrong without quite knowing what or why will be “Christ-haunted”; they may not believe in God, but they spend their lives running away from, driven to the edge by, his presence.

To encounter Gioia’s poetry is to discover the superficial brilliancies that make up the lives of modern Californians and New Yorkers and to see how they shine on almost totally unperturbed. We pass through the landscapes of a country of power and splendor falling silently into decline. An early poem, “In Cheever Country,” for instance, captures the landscape along the railway as one travels north from New York City into the wealthy counties just upstate and in Connecticut. What sounds from the title like a minor homage to a great mid-century American story-writer soon reveals itself as a perceptive and precisely imagined landscape poem that stands comparison with any in the long tradition of that form. Gioia writes,

The architecture of each station still preserves

its fantasy beside the sordid tracks—

defiant pergolas, a shuttered summer lodge,

a shadowy pavilion framed by high-arched windows

in this land of northern sun and lingering winter.

Speaking of those “palaces the Robber Barons gave to God,” he continues,

… some are merely left to rot where now

broken stone lions guard a roofless colonnade,

a half-collapsed gazebo bursts with tires,

and each detail warns it is not so difficult

to make a fortune as to pass it on.

Gioia worked in the northeast for decades, but his native home is southern California, and so he also depicts the people of a dry and sunny land of “bright stillness” so in thrall to the little gods of the shopping mall that the pleasures of this world blot out the thought of any other. “Shopping,” another poem from Pity the Beautiful, begins:

Continue reading at www.CatholicWorldReport.com.

Five Serious Problems with Chapter 8 of "Amoris Laetitia"

(CNS Photo)

Five Serious Problems with Chapter 8 of Amoris Laetitia | Dr. E. Christian Brugger | CWR

The most controversial section of Pope Francis' apostolic exhortation is fraught with problematic arguments and dubious moral theology—and gives the German bishops all they want.

For Catholics who feel weary about the abuse that the Christian family has lately suffered at the hands of militant secularism, Pope Francis’s Post-Synodal Apostolic Exhortation Amoris Laetitia (AL) has many encouraging things to say: e.g., its forthright assertion that “no genital act of husband and wife can refuse” the truth that “the conjugal union is ordered to procreation ‘by its very nature’” (AL, 80; cf. 222); its ardent rejection of the killing of the unborn (no. 83); its unapologetic affirmation that every child has “a natural right” to have a mother and a father (no. 172), and its needed treatment—the lengthiest in any papal document of the last 50 years—of the importance of fathers for children (175).

But though the text says many true and beautiful things about “love in the family,” Chapter 8 (entitled “Accompanying, Discerning and Integrating Weakness”) allows—and seems intentionally so—for interpretations thatpose serious problems for Catholic faith and practice.

I focus here on five such problems:

1) The way it presents the role that mitigated culpability should play in pastoral care

2) Its inconsistent notion of “not judging” others

3) Its account of the role of conscience in acquitting persons in objectively sinful situations

4) Its treatment of moral absolutes as “rules” articulating the demands of an “ideal” rather than binding moral duties on everyone in every situation.

5) Its inconsistency with the teaching of Trent

1. AL’s treatment of subjective factors limiting responsibility

Catholic moral theology has spoken about the importance of pastors being sensitive to factors limiting a penitent’s subjective guilt in order to help penitents assess their true guilt retrospectively, i.e., to help them look at what they’ve already done to assist them to judge rightly about their culpability, so they can repent and be forgiven and deal with those factors and begin freely to choose rightly.

Chapter 8 introduces a significant change in the role that mitigating factors play in pastoral care. Pastors are directed to assess subjective culpability as a way of “discerning” what kinds of ecclesial participation, including sacramental participation, are appropriate for people who are going forth from the confessional. It focuses on assessing mitigated guilt for directing prospective action leaving in place the factors that mitigate guilt, so people may continue to sin without ever becoming responsible enough to sin mortally.

Example 1:

300. If we consider the immense variety of concrete situations such as those I have mentioned, it is understandable that neither the Synod nor this Exhortation could be expected to provide a new set of general rules, canonical in nature and applicable to all cases. What is possible is simply a renewed encouragement to undertake a responsible personal and pastoral discernment of particular cases, one which would recognize that, since “the degree of responsibility is not equal in all cases”, the consequences or effects of a rule need not necessarily always be the same. [note 336]”

The term “pastoral discernment” is used throughout chapter 8, but its meaning is not consistent. Here it refers to the “personal discernment” of the divorced and civilly remarried. They are encouraged to assess their own subjective culpability in order to determine what kinds of ecclesial participation are appropriate. The text says that since “the degree of responsibility is not equal in all cases”, the consequences of the “rule”—meaning consequences of violating the rule— may apply differently in different cases. “Rule” is AL’s term of choice for the objective demands of the Gospel for marriage. “Consequences” refer to the moral and ecclesial implications of violating the norm against adultery, namely, that one is guilty of grave sin and should not go to Holy Communion.

The text will be read by many “remarried” spouses as meaning that they themselves can “discern” that, because of the complexity of their “concrete situations” (e.g., it is wrong to leave the kids and/or the new “spouse” and stressful to live as brother and sister, etc.), they themselves lack such a “degree of responsibility” as would have the consequence that they are guilty of grave sin and ought not to communicate.

The text goes on to speak about the ‘accompanying’ role of pastors:

300. Priests have the duty to ‘accompany the divorced and remarried in helping them to understand their situation according to the teaching of the Church and the guidelines of the bishop’.… What we are speaking of is a process of accompaniment and discernment which ‘guides the faithful to an awareness of their situation before God. Conversation with the priest, in the internal forum, contributes to the formation of a correct judgment on what hinders the possibility of a fuller participation in the life of the Church.’ (emphasis added; internal quote from Relatio Synodi, 2014)

Pastors are encouraged to assist individuals, who are objectively committing adultery, to judge what hinders their fuller participation in the sacraments.

Pastors will interpret this in conflicting ways. Those who are committed to traditional Catholic doctrine and practice will interpret it to mean accompanying remarried divorcees in their process of repenting for their sins, ordering their relationships according to the Gospel (at very least, ceasing to engage in non-marital intercourse), and reintegrating into the sacramental life of the Church. Others, however, will interpret it to mean assisting remarried divorcees to arrive at the judgment that since they lack sufficient responsibility, nothing hinders the possibility of fuller participation, provided they go through the formality of getting their pastors to agree with their judgment.

Example 2:

Continue reading at www.CatholicWorldReport.com.

New: "Called to Be the Children of God: The Catholic Theology of Human Deification"

Now available from Ignatius Press:

Called to Be the Children of God: The Catholic Theology of Human Deification

Edited by Fr. David Vincent Meconi, S.J. and Carl E. Olson

The first generations of Christians saw in their new lives in Jesus Christ a way to transcend all the limitations of sin and death and become new creatures. St. Peter expressed this as "participating in the divine nature" (2 Pet 1:4), while St. Athanasius stated it succinctly 300 years later: "God became a human, so humans could become God." This is the heart of the Christian faith and the pledge of the Christian promise: that those baptized in Christ become "divine" through their partaking in God's own life and love. This is why Christians can live forever, this is the source of their charity and their holiness, this is why we do not need to live in a world ruled by fallen instinct and sinful desires. We have been made for more, for infinitely more.

This book gathers more than a dozen Catholic scholars and theologians to examine what this process of "deification" means in their respective areas of study. It offers fifteen chapters showing what "becoming God" meant for the early Church, for St. Thomas Aquinas and the greatest Dominicans, the significance it played in the thinking of St. Francis and the early Franciscans. It shows how such an understanding of salvation played out during the Protestant Reformation and the Council of Trent, as well as in French School of Spirituality, in various Thomist thinkers, in John Henry Newman and John Paul II, at the Vatican Councils, and where such thinking can be found in the Catechism of the Catholic Church today.

No other book has gathered such an array of scholars or provided such a deep study into how humanity's divinized life in Christ has received many rich and various perspectives over the past two thousand years. This book therefore hopes to bring readers into the central mystery of Christianity by allowing the Church's greatest thinkers and texts to speak for themselves, showing how becoming Christ-like, becoming truly the Body of Christ on earth, is the only ultimate purpose of the Christian faith.

"Rescue from sin and death is indeed a wonderful thing—but the salvation won for us by Jesus Christ is incomparably greater. And that is the subject of this book. In all its parts, this book, like Christianity in all its parts, is about salvation. But that means it's about everything that fills our lives, on earth and in heaven."
— Dr. Scott Hahn, Author, Rome Sweet Home

About the Editors:

Fr. David Vincent Meconi, S.J., a professor of theology at Saint Louis University, is the editor of Homiletic and Pastoral Review. He has published widely in early Church theology and broader Catholic issues, most recently the Annotated Confessions of Saint Augustine, andThe One Christ: St. Augustine's Theology of Deification.

Carl E. Olson, MTS, is the editor of Catholic World Report and Ignatius Insight. He is the author of two best-selling books, Will Catholics Be "Left Behind"? and The Da Vinci Hoax, and the author of hundreds of articles on theology, Scripture, current events, and apologetics.

Praise for the book:

"Theologians, pastors, students and laity alike would benefit immensely from reading this book, not only for developing their theological knowledge but also for deepening their love for the divine life they already live here on earth."
— Fr. Thomas G. Weinandy, O.F.M., Cap., Member of the International Theological Commission 

"The richness of Catholicism is on full display in these marvelous essays as they show how Scripture's revelation of theosis is both taught and embodied throughout the Church's history. I loved reading, pondering, and praying with this marvelous book."
— Dr. Timothy Gray, President of the Augustine Institute and Senior Fellow at St. Paul Center for Biblical Theology

"At last, we have an up-to-date, comprehensive, and readable introduction to the classical doctrine of divinization. Called to Be the Children of God is a must read for any serious student of Catholic theology."
— Dr. Brant Pitre, Professor of Sacred Scripture, Notre Dame Seminary, Graduate School of Theology

"This is an important book, full of surprises for the expert yet written in an attractive style that makes it accessible to a broad readership."
— Norman Russell, St. Stephen's House, Oxford; author of The Doctrine of Deification in the Greek Patristic Tradition (Oxford University Press)

"In the explanations of the historical developments of this doctrine, the reader discovers openings into Christian literature that will enrich the spiritual life and theological understanding through deepening our understanding of the effects of God's grace and indwelling, particular through Baptism, the Holy Eucharist and other sacraments."
— Fr. Mitch Pacwa, S.J., EWTN and Ignatius Productions

"To follow the history and meaning of what it means that we exist to be adopted into the trinitarian life of God is the exact purpose of this most welcome and well presented text."
— Fr. James V. Schall, S.J., Professor Emeritus, Georgetown University

"The importance of this publication, which is a major contribution to the study of Catholic soteriology, can hardly be exaggerated."
— Fr. D. Vincent Twomey, S.V.D., Author of Pope Benedict XVI: The Conscience of Our Age

"This is a wonderful collection of essays on an issue that has been largely ignored by Western Christianity, which has focused far too much attention on how you get into heaven rather than how heaven gets into you."
— Dr. Francis J. Beckwith, Professor of Philosophy & Church-State Studies, Baylor University.

And the Two Become One Flesh

by Veronica A. Arntz | Homiletic & Pastoral Review

A Model for Marriage and the Universal Church

The world is facing a crisis: the family, seen as the fundamental unit of society since the days of Cicero and Aristotle, is now crumbling at its very foundations. But this is not only a crisis for the world, as the secularization of the family unit has also entered into the Church, not necessarily in her teachings, but into the young couples who are seeking marriage and even, one might say, into the pastoral praxis within the Church. I do not mean here only in reference to the potential for the divorced and remarried to receive Communion, but also in the way couples understand the sacrament of matrimony, and how it is preached from the pulpit. Therefore, it is clear that we need a renewal in how we, as Catholics, teach the sacrament of matrimony.

How we proceed in that task is a difficult question, for many couples do not even know the basics of the Catholic faith. As a beginning for a resolution, I propose that we need to look to the very root of the problem in our misunderstandings of marriage. While we certainly cannot deny the modern world’s influences on how even Catholics view marriage, where do our misunderstandings originate? I argue that the fundamental reason we misunderstand the sacrament of matrimony lies in our misunderstanding of the Church as the universalChurch, the Mystical Body of Christ. If we can regain a proper understanding of the Church, based upon Christ’s words in the Gospels, and the teachings of our recent popes, then we will also regain a proper understanding of marriage.

To pursue this thesis to its end, we shall look at the first letter to the Corinthians, and the letter to the Ephesians, to ground ourselves in a Scriptural understanding of the Catholic Church. On that basis, we shall look to see what our findings from these letters mean for both the Church herself, and the sacrament of matrimony today. We shall conclude with a practical application for pastors and educators of what we have discussed about the relationship between marriage and the Church.

The Church at Corinth
Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians points to a problem within the Church at Corinth. There is dissension within the Church there, for the people are not “united in the same mind and the same judgment” (1 Corinthians 1:10). He then points to quarreling among the members: “Each one of you says, ‘I belong to Paul,’ or ‘I belong to Apollos,’ or ‘I belong to Cephas,’ or ‘I belong to Christ’” (1 Corinthians 1:12). The problem is that the newly baptized Christians adhere to one particular teacher of the faith as the “only” true teacher, creating division within the people themselves. If a certain group will only listen to Cephas, and another group says they are the ones who listen to Christ directly, then there is no real unity within the body of believers. While it is true that these teachers all teach the same faith, the Christians believed they were receiving a “better” or “truer” form from one teacher as opposed to another.

Moreover, St. Paul notes three major sins that have crept into the Church at Corinth, in addition to the division among the teachers.

Continue reading at HPRweb.com.

Apocalypse How?

The central "Adoration of the Mystic Lamb" panel, painted by Hubert and Jan van Eyck in the early 1400s.

Carl E. Olson | On the Readings for the Fourth Sunday of Easter, April 17, 2016

Readings:
• Acts 13:14, 43-52
• Ps 100:1-2, 3, 5
• Rev 7:9, 14b-17
• Jn 10:27-30

Pop quiz: which book of the Bible describes black helicopters, high-tech warfare involving Russia and China, and computer chips embedded in human flesh?

Hopefully you answered, “None.” But you may know that some Christians believe the Book of Revelation, or The Apocalypse, describes soon-to-transpire, end of the world events in harrowing detail. And most people—even many Catholics—believe that the final book of the Bible is an unremitting work of doom, gloom, and bloodshed.

John the Revelator’s book undoubtedly contains images of doom and gloom, but not for those who stand for and with Christ. And while there is plenty of bloodshed in the Book of Revelation, the good news is that the blood of the Lamb, shed for the sins of the world, cleanses those who faithfully follow the Shepherd.

In other words, today’s reading from The Apocalypse is filled with joy. It proclaims that God will not only overcome evil, He will—at the end of time as we know it—bring together all of those who love Him. The great multitude witnessed by John consists of those who have been saved through suffering, just as Savior, the slain Lamb (Rev. 5:6), brought salvation through suffering and death. “The Church will enter the glory of the kingdom,” explains the Catechism, “only through this final Passover, when she will follow her Lord in his death and Resurrection” (CCC 677).

Those in the great multitude, from every nation, race, people, and tongue, are the Church. They make up the New Israel, which has gone through a New Exodus. While the first Exodus involved the people of Israel being saved from the tyranny of Egyptian slavery, this final Exodus consists of the people of the new covenant being saved eternally from the domination of sin and death. As Jesus states, in the reading from today’s Gospel, “I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish” (Jn. 10:28). The salvation of a multitude too large to be counted is a fulfillment of the great covenant made with Abraham: “I will make of you a great nation … All the communities of the earth shall find blessing in you” (Gen. 12:2, 3; cf. Gal. 3:7, 29).

Overcoming death and establishing eternal life is a constant theme in The Apocalypse. This can be seen in the imagery throughout the book, which is bursting with allusions to the Old Testament, especially the Pentateuch and the Prophets. The idea of being made “white” through perseverance in faith is drawn from Daniel, a book used often by John: “Many shall purify themselves, and makes themselves white, and be refined” (Dan. 12:10). White robes symbolize holiness and endurance. Priests in the time of Christ were examined for purity; if they passed, they were dressed in white robes, as was the High Priest. In the new covenant, those who have been baptized into Christ, the High Priest, and who endure to the end will be saved through the sacrifice of the Lamb on the Cross.

The palm branches allude to the feast of Tabernacles (cf., Lev. 24:39-40), which celebrated the harvest of crops and commemorated God’s divine protection during the Exodus. Palm branches were also used as symbols of victory (1 Macc. 13:51; 2 Macc. 10:7). In The Apocalypse they stand for God’s victory over evil, His protection of the Church throughout the time of tribulation, and the restoration of right relationship with God, as evidenced by the songs of praise before the heavenly throne.

John’s vision is also filled with a liturgical and sacramental perspective. The great multitude worship God in His temple, which ultimately is the Person of Christ (cf., Jn 2:19-22). Being washed and made white suggests the bath of Baptism, and the lack of hunger or thirst is Eucharistic in its promise of complete joy in the presence of the Lamb.

Thus, in the end—The End!—the apocalyptic truths of the Book of Revelation don’t involve helicopters and top secret technology, but the salvation of God’s flock, His people, through the death and Resurrection of the Lamb.

(This "Opening the Word" column originally appeared in the March 30, 2007, issue of Our Sunday Visitor newspaper.)

Fr. C.J. McCloskey: "Behold the Man" is timely, readable, practical, sobering, and recommended

From Fr. McCloskey's recent review in National Catholic Register of Deacon Harold Burke-Sivers book Behold the Man: A Catholic Vision of Male Spirituality (Ignatius Press, 2016):

Deacon Harold Burke-Sivers — a graduate of the University of Notre Dame who holds a graduate degree from the University of Dallas; he is considered by many to be one of the best Catholic preachers from the pulpit, as well as on radio and television, including EWTN — has written a highly readable and very practical book for men seeking an authentically Catholic male spirituality. As a bonus, Archbishop Alexander Sample of the Portland (Ore.) Archdiocese has contributed a long and excellent foreword.

Deacon Burke-Sivers draws from Scripture and the teaching of the Church to encourage men both to “man up” as the heads of their families and share their faith in their households and in their marketplaces. ...

This book should most certainly be read by those approaching marriage, as well as those already married. Women should also want to place this book in the hands of the husbands, brothers and sons in their lives, because it provides them with the roadmap to become the men they should be (and reminds them to stop and ask for directions if they become lost along the way!).

Read the entire review.

More praise for the book:

"This is a theological and anthropological tour de force that champions authentic male spirituality for the men of our times."
— Father Donald Calloway, M.I.C, Author, No Turning Back: A Witness to Mercy

"I know of no better presentation of masculine spirituality that balances authentic theology with practical application for the lives of real Catholic men."
— Tim Staples, Catholic Answers

"A highly readable book. A marvelous work for any man striving to live an authentic spirituality, which also addresses the major hot button issues of today."
— Father Brian Mullady, O.P., Author, Preacher, EWTN Host

"The biggest crisis facing the Church today is the crisis of authentic manhood. This book addresses virtually every issue that a Catholic man will face, especially the interior life."
— Jesse Romero, Catholic Evangelist and Radio Host

"Miracles from Heaven" and the Problem of Theodicy

Jennifer Garner, Queen Latifah and Kylie Rogers star in a scene from the movie "Miracles From Heaven." (CNS photo/Columbia Pictures)

"Miracles from Heaven" and the Problem of Theodicy | Bishop Robert Barron | CWR's The Dispatch

As any apologist worth his/her salt will tell you, the great objection to the proposition that God exists is the fact of innocent suffering. If you want a particularly vivid presentation of this complaint, go on YouTube and look up Stephen Fry's disquisition on why he doesn't believe in God. (Then right afterward, please, do look at my answer to Fry). But the anguished question of an army of non-believers remains: how could an all-loving and all-powerful God possibly allow the horrific suffering endured by those who simply don't deserve it? Say all you want, these critics hold, about God's plan and good coming from evil, but the disproportion between evil and the benefits that might flow from it simply rules out the plausibility of religious faith. The skilled and experienced apologist will also tell you that, in the face of this problem, there is no single, unequivocal "answer," no clinching argument that will leave the doubter stunned into acquiescence. The best approach is to walk slowly around the issue, in the manner of the phenomenologists, illuminating now this aspect, now that.

It is precisely this method that is on display in the surprisingly thoughtful and affecting film Miracles from Heaven. The true story revolves around the devout Beam family from Burleson, Texas: Christy, Kevin, and their three daughters. At the age of ten, their middle child, Annabelle, develops a devastating disease whereby her intestines are no longer able to process food. After consulting local physicians and surgeons to no avail, Christy and her mother make their way to Boston to see a nationally renowned children's doctor. But after many more months of treatment, her condition remains grave. During this horrific ordeal, Christy's faith in God is seriously shaken, since her ardent prayers have remained, it appears, unanswered. In fact, she explicitly voices to her pastor the confounding puzzle referenced above: how can a loving God permit this innocent and God-fearing child to suffer? 

When it seems that things cannot get any worse, Annabelle suffers a freak accident, falling headlong down the trunk of a hollowed-out tree. When she comes around after being unconscious for many hours, she is, against all expectations, cured. Unable to account for the sudden improvement, the Boston specialist declares that she is in "complete remission," just the medical way, he says, of explaining what cannot be explained. Annabelle herself, however, tells of an out of the body experience, a journey to heaven, and God's assurance that she would be fine.

I would like simply to explore a few of the aspects of the problem of suffering—theodicy, to give it its formal title—that are illuminated in the course of this film.

Continue reading on The Dispatch at CWR.

"Amoris Laetitia": A CWR Symposium

"Amoris Laetitia": A CWR Symposium | Catholic World Report

Pope Francis’ post-synodal apostolic exhortation Amoris Laetitia, “On love in the family,” has been one of the most widely anticipated papal documents in recent years, following the closely watched and sometimes controversial Extraordinary Synod of Bishops in 2014 and the Ordinary Synod of Bishops in 2015. It is also one of the longest and wide-ranging papal documents in recent memory, touching on a host of theological, spiritual, practical, moral, and pastoral questions about family, marriage, children, sexuality, and related matters.

In these essays—and in those to be added over the coming days—CWR contributors offer their reflections and analysis of the document, drawing upon their knowledge and experience as married people, priests, theologians, scholars, and journalists.

Francis' sprawling Exhortation a marriage of profound and muddled | Carl E. Olson

In Amoris Laetitia, who is admonishing whom? | James V. Schall, SJ

The Joy of Love in the Hands of the Clergy | Dr. Leroy Huizenga

The Mystery of Matrimony and Amoris Laetitia | Michael J. Miller 

Chapter 8 of Amoris Laetitia and St. John Paul II | Eduardo Echeverria 

Make sure you read these passages from Amoris Laetitia, too | Catherine Harmon

The Trending of the Pope | Mark Brumley

The Two Synods and the Exhortation that Followed Them | Mary Jo Anderson

The Shape of Repentance: Reflections on Amoris Laetitia | Adam G. Cooper

Amoris Laetitia: Another Nail in the "Overpopulation" Coffin | Dr. Samuel Gregg

Accompanying, Discerning, and Integrating—in the Way of the Master | David Paul Deavel

"Amoris Laetitia': The Good, the Disturbing, and the Torturous | Dorothy Cummings McLean

First thoughts on the English version of Pope Francis’ Amoris laetitia | Edward N. Peters

The law before ‘Amoris’ is the law after | Edward N. Peters 

First thoughts on Amoris Laetitia | Bishop Robert Barron

Watch: Ignatius Press editorial staff members discuss "Amoris Laetitia" 

Francis' sprawling Exhortation a marriage of profound and muddled

Copies of Pope Francis' apostolic exhortation on the family, "Amoris Laetitia" ("The Joy of Love"), are seen during the document's release at the Vatican April 8. The exhortation is the concluding document of the 2014 and 2015 synods of bishops on the family. (CNS photo/Paul Haring)

Francis' sprawling Exhortation a marriage of profound and muddled | Carl E. Olson | Catholic World Report

The much anticipated 255-page long post-synodal reflection is surprisingly dogmatic in places and morally incoherent in others

In recently musing about what Amoris Laetitia, Pope Francis' much anticipated post-synodal Apostolic Exhortation, might (or might not) contain, I wrote: 

I don't think Francis is going to try to change doctrine. Even if he wanted to—and I know there is evidence he has been open to a range of possible changes in some way or another—the Final Report of last October's Synod effectively put all of that to rest. I could be wrong. Perhaps the Apostolic Exhortation really is going to be filled with wide-ranging and revolutionary calls for X, Y, and Z. But, again, I think any hopes of that were effectively ended at the Synod. ... Yes, Francis clearly wants to see changes in pastoral approaches, but he and others have surely seen there are limits to all such approaches.

Having now read the document, I think I was about 95% correct. Francis reaffirms (very strongly, in fact) many of the basic tenets of Catholic teaching about marriage: it is between a man and a woman, it is ordered toward procreation, it is an "icon" of the Triune nature of God, it is indissoluble, it must be open to life. There is a strong denunciation of gender ideology: "It is one thing to be understanding of human weakness and the complexities of life, and another to accept ideologies that attempt to sunder what are inseparable aspects of reality. Let us not fall into the sin of trying to replace the Creator. We are creatures, and not omnipotent. Creation is prior to us and must be received as a gift" (#56). 

The dogmatic underpinnings
The opening chapters, which provide a Scriptural and theological reflection on the nature of marriage and family, is often powerful and poetic in equal measure. Francis draws often upon John Paul II, as when he states that the "couple that loves and begets life is a true, living icon - not an idol like those of stone or gold prohibited by the Decalogue - capable of revealing God the Creator and Saviour" (#11). There is a repeated emphasis on the Trinitarian foundations of reality in general and of marriage in particular, as when the Holy Father states "the couple's fruitful relationship becomes an image for understanding and describing the mystery of God himself, for in the Christian vision of the Trinity, God is contemplated as Father, Son and Spirit of love" (#11).

This is taken up again as Francis situates marriage within the drama of salvation history: "Marriage and the family have been redeemed by Christ (cf. Eph 5:21-32) and restored in the image of the Holy Trinity, the mystery from which all true love flows. ... The Gospel of the family spans the history of the world, from the creation of man and woman in the image and likeness of God (cf. Gen 1:26-27), to the fulfilment of the mystery of the covenant in Christ at the end of time with the marriage of the Lamb (cf. Rev 19:9)” (#63). Near the end of the document, Francis writes: "Today we can add that the Trinity is present in the temple of marital communion. Just as God dwells in the praises of his people (cf. Ps 22:3), so he dwells deep within the marital love that gives him glory" (#314).

This is not merely theological shop talk; it is foundational truth. It is, it should be emphasized, dogmatic. Because dogma, as the Catechism notes, are not merely laws and rules, but revealed truth about God, man, and the many relationships that exist in the world: "There is an organic connection between our spiritual life and the dogmas. Dogmas are lights along the path of faith; they illuminate it and make it secure. Conversely, if our life is upright, our intellect and heart will be open to welcome the light shed by the dogmas of faith" (par 89). 

However, the word "dogma" does not appear in the document, and I see that already some secular sophists are penning misleading headlines such as "On Divorce, Contraception, Pope Calls For More Grace, Less Dogma" (NPR). Of course, such folks don't know what dogma is, nor do they really care. For them it is all about changing the Church and her teachings. Which is why the opening line of the NPR piece states: "In a major document released Friday, Pope Francis addressed divisive elements of Catholic doctrine — including how to treat couples who remarry after a divorce that wasn't annulled by the church, and the church's stance on contraception." Funny that the Church's divisive doctrine on the Trinity and the uniqueness of Jesus Christ are not also mentioned; after all, I have it on good account that many Muslims, Hindus, atheists, Buddhists, Jews, and freethinkers reject those particular doctrines. While Francis, NPR opines, has not issued "any new top-down doctrine .... [he says] that priests should focus on providing pastoral care for Catholic couples, rather than sitting in judgment of them, and that individual conscience should be emphasized, rather than dogmatic rules."

Because, you see, dogma is supposedly about rules, and usually have little or nothing to do with reality. Sad, but predictable. "Man can be defined as an animal that makes dogmas," quipped Chesterton in Heretics, "Trees have no dogmas." And, as Dorothy Sayers pointed out many decades ago, dogma is the drama. In Creed or Chaos, she wrote:

Let us, in heaven’s name, drag out the divine drama from under the dreadful accumulation of slipshod thinking and trashy sentiment heaped upon it, and set it on an open stage to startle the world into some sort of vigorous reaction. If the pious are the first to be shocked, so much the worse for the pious––others will enter the kingdom of heaven before them. If all men are offended because of Christ, let them be offended; but where is the sense of their being offended at something that is not Christ and is nothing like him? We do him singularly little honor by watering down till it could not offend a fly. Surely it is not the business of the Church to adapt Christ to men, but to adapt men to Christ.

The fact is, objective truth does exist, and there are real limits to what man can do, or can be.

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