Carl E. Olson's Blog, page 178
December 17, 2012
The Eternal Presence of the House of Nazareth
by Kathleen Curran Sweeney | Homiletic & Pastoral Review
The family life of Jesus, Mary and Joseph in Nazareth is an ever-present revelation of God’s purposes and work in the world, inviting to holiness families of the 21st century.
Does the household of Jesus, Mary and Joseph in the small village of Nazareth, whose historical existence was two millennia ago, bear any relevance to a modern urban family of the third millennium? Considering all the pressures that families are under these days, how can they possibly relate to the quiet and hidden life of the Holy Family?
To claim the continued relevance of the Holy Family for families today can mean more than proposing the Holy Family as a model for families to imitate, although it can be that as well. More profoundly, we can recognize that every moment of Christ’s life—from his conception, to his ascension, and reign at the right hand of the Father—partakes in the divine infinity of the Second Person of the Trinity. Therefore, the efficacy of the particulars of Christ’s life are not limited by either place nor time. They are eternally present to us, inviting us to live his life in our own time and place. Whatever the circumstances in which we find ourselves, we can bring these circumstances into the grace and presence of Christ’s infinite divine life incarnated both historically and in an eternal reality available for us today.
The family life of Jesus, Mary and Joseph in Nazareth, we can say then, is an ever-present revelation of God’s purposes and work in the world, inviting to holiness families of the 21stcentury. The witness of holy Christian families made possible by this infinite fount of grace is especially critical to the evangelization of contemporary culture which is anti-family in so many ways. The particular mission of the Holy Family to guard and nurture the Christ Child as the One who would save his people is also a mission for all families who are called through baptism to spiritually support Christ’s mission in the world. To open up this reality, we can explore several particular aspects of the Holy Family’s life, and its relevance to this deeper Christian vocation for modern families. A few of these are as follows: the centrality of Christ; contemplation and silence; Joseph as “just man” and father; the dignity of work and ordinary life; personal presence among family members; domestic church. ...
December 15, 2012
America Still Has Half a Soul. For Now.
America Still Has Half a Soul. For Now. | Carl E. Olson | Editorial | Catholic World Report
The recent shootings in Connecticut and Oregon reveal the good, the bad, and the unspoken in our nation.
I got a late start yesterday morning and didn't hear the
news until a few hours after it broke. My wife had an appointment, and so I
made breakfast for our three (home schooled) children, ages four, eight, and
twelve. When I first read of the assault and massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary
School in Newtown, Connecticut, I felt ill. It was gut wrenching. I thought for
a bit about our three children: “What if…?” I couldn't fathom the horrible
news, and yet, honestly, it didn't shock me. Just a few days ago, a young man
opened fire in the Clackamas Town Center in Portland, Oregon, just two hours
north of us, where years ago my wife worked when we were first married. Three
people were shot, two of them fatally; the 22-year-old murderer then took his
own life.
I also thought back to May 1998, when a fifteen-year-old
boy, Kip Kinkel, opened fire at Thurston High School, just a few short miles
from where I lived and worked. Two students were killed, and many more injured,
before Kinkel was subdued by seven of his fellow students. The evening prior,
Kinkel had murdered his parents—both of them teachers—with guns his father had
purchased for him, along with a stolen gun he had bought from a friend.
And then I thought back to another young boy, who had been
raised around guns—lots of them. His father was a gunsmith, and there were
numerous guns in his father's shop, as well as guns—mostly hunting rifles—in
the house. The boy assumed everyone had guns and used them for hunting and
target practice, in large part because nearly everyone he knew did exactly
that. There were two fatal shootings in his hometown during his childhood, both
of them suicides by men overwhelmed by alcoholism and other problems. He was
never tempted to shoot anyone with a gun; in fact, the very thought was as
revolting and it was ridiculous, as he and his friends took seriously the
privilege of having and shooting a gun, just as they took seriously the
injunction, “Thou shalt not murder.”
Yes, I was that young
boy. And I thought of my childhood again when, just a few hours after the
shootings in Connecticut, I received an e-mail from the lefty group, Catholics
United, containing the following:
Catholics United Executive Director
James Salt released the following statement in reaction to this morning’s mass
shooting in Newtown, Conn.:
"Today’s shooting is yet another
horrific marker in a seemingly endless cycle of gun violence in America. As we
mourn the dead and send thoughts and prayers to the families of the victims of
this senseless act, we know prayer alone is not enough.
"As Catholics who support the
social justice achievements of this President, we are disappointed in his lack
of action in working to prevent these heinous acts of violence. We call on
President Obama to find the courage to lead our nation and help bring a true
and lasting end to gun violence.
"We need an immediate national
dialogue on preventing yet another American family from having to go through
Christmas without the loved ones they lost to gun violence. When will we stop
setting the price of our freedoms at the blood of innocent children? We pray
our elected leaders have the courage to face up to intransigent special
interests and engage in a serious discussion of how to end--permanently--the
cycle of gun violence in America."
Yes, indeed—when we will have a serious discussion about the
blood of innocent children? When will we face up to the violence that takes
place on a regular basis against the youngest and most vulnerable among us?
When will the cycle of daily violence against young boys and girls cease? When?
Joy! Anticipation! Fire?
A Scriptural Reflection on the Readings for December 16, 2012, the Third
Sunday of Advent | Carl E. Olson
Readings:
• Zep 3:14-18a
• Is 12:2-3, 4, 5-6
• Phil 4:4-7
• Lk 3:10-18
“Great joy,” wrote G. K.
Chesterton, “has in it the sense of immortality…” Joy, like love, hope, and
goodness, cannot be adequately or convincingly explained through material
processes or properties. Joy is a gift pointing to a transcendent giver. And
that giver is the Lord, the giver of both natural and supernatural life.
Gaudette Sunday is a day of joy and rejoicing (the Latin word for “rejoice” is gaudere),
and the readings reflect this theme. The
reading from the prophet Zephaniah contains an exultant call for Israel to
shout and sing for joy. Why? Because the Lord had staved off judgment, rebuffed
Israel’s enemies, and stood as King and Savior in the midst of the chosen
people.
The responsorial Psalm, from
the prophet Isaiah, echoes the same: “Cry out with joy and gladness, for among
you is the great and Holy One of Israel.” And the Epistle, from St. Paul’s
letter to the Philippians, has a hymnic, even rhapsodic, quality: “Rejoice in
the Lord always. I shall say it again: rejoice!” The reason, again, is due to
the immediacy of God’s intimate, life-giving presence: “The Lord is near.”
The Gospel reading does not directly refer to joy, but instead anticipates and
points, through the words of John the Baptist, toward the source of joy. The
anticipation has two different but connected qualities. The first is external
and focuses on the natural moral virtues; it is drawn out through the question asked
by the crowds, the tax collectors, and the soldiers: “What should we do?”
John’s response, in essence, is that they should act justly toward their
neighbors and those in their communities.
Treating others with respect
and acting with justice are, of course, moral and virtuous actions. However,
they are lacking to the degree they are solely human. The need for something
more is hinted at in the raised expectations of the people, who “were asking in
their hearts whether John might be the Christ.” Having recognized the need for
natural goodness, they now hunger for supernatural goodness, that is, for the
Christ. Having tasted the joy that comes from seeking the good for others, they
wish to receive the joy that comes from the good given by God (cf. CCC 1804).
The distinction and
relationship between the human and supernatural virtues is highlighted further
in comparing the baptism of John the Bapist to the baptism of the Messiah. The
first is an external sign, a washing of water symbolizing the need for purity
and the desire for holiness. The second is an efficacious sign, a sacrament,
which accomplishes what it signifies. “By the action of Christ and the power of
the Holy Spirit,” explains the Catechism of the Catholic Church, the sacraments “make present efficaciously the
grace that they signify” (par 1084).
What about the fire mentioned by John? While water symbolizes birth and life,
“fire symbolizes the transforming energy of the Holy Spirit's actions” (CCC,
696). Both water and fire can destroy, but both are also necessary for life.
And in the case of baptism, this life is supernatural, divine, Trinitarian. In
baptism, original sin is destroyed, the chasm between God and man is closed,
and the soul is ignited with divine fire. Joined in the death of the Son (cf.,
Rom. 6), those who are baptized are transformed by the Holy Spirit into sons of
God, made anew for the glory of the Father, and prepared for life in the new
heavens and new earth.
Here, then, is the source
and heart of our Advent joy. The season anticipates the celebration of Christ’s
birth, but it also illuminates the purpose of the Incarnation: to remove
judgment, to destroy sin and death, and to grant intimate, life-giving
communion with God. “All seek joy,” said St. John Chrysostom, “but it is not
found on earth.” It is found instead in the Son, who comes from heaven to
earth—to the crowds, tax collectors, soldiers, and us. Great joy flows from
immortality. Rejoice!
(This "Opening the Word" column originally appeared in the December 13, 2009, edition of Our Sunday Visitor newspaper.)
December 14, 2012
Merit Revisited
Merit Revisited | Fr. Joseph R. Upton | Homiletic & Pastoral Review
One of the most significant themes is the doctrine of merit. This long-forgotten element of Catholic teaching has made a remarkably ostensible reappearance in the new translation.
t seems that the implementation of the new translation of the Roman
Missal has gone over remarkably well, even better than many expected.
Our congregations seem to be adjusting well, despite the occasional “and
also with you.”
Among the most striking changes in the new translation is the
pervasive presence of rich doctrinal themes. It’s not as though these
themes were absent from the liturgy before. They were clearly
articulated in the original Latin text, but were unfortunately obscured
in the previous translation.
One of the most significant themes is the doctrine of merit. This
long-forgotten element of Catholic teaching has made a remarkably
ostensible reappearance in the new translation. It appears regularly
throughout the proper prayers, and is referenced in Eucharistic Prayer
II which prays that “we may merit to be coheirs to eternal life.” It is
a doctrine that has been misunderstood for centuries, and has been the
source of great disagreement and consternation throughout the history of
the Church.
Simply stated, merit makes our actions worthy of reward by God.
Merit is part and parcel of our everyday natural lives: a laborer who
performs his job well merits a proper wage, which has been promised by
his employer pending the fulfillment of his duty.
The difficulty in understanding merit in the supernatural order is
that it seems to place a condition on God, who is all-powerful and
infinitely greater than any human act. While this is true, God himself
has promised believers a just reward for persevering in this life. This
teaching is profoundly scriptural. Jesus continually promises heavenly
rewards to those who follow him faithfully: “Rejoice and be glad for
your reward will be great in heaven” (Mt 5:12). Matthew 25 presents
eternal life as a reward for those who served Christ with good works on
earth. (See also Mt 19:29; 25:21; and Lk 6:38.)
"St. John of the Cross" by Fr. Thomas Dubay, S.M.
St. John of the Cross | Fr. Thomas Dubay, S.M. | From
Fire
Within: St. Teresa of Avila, St. John of the Cross, and the Gospel--On Prayer
When we compare the amount of information available about the person of St.
John of the Cross with what we have for many other saints, such as Teresa and
John Vianney, we may say that we know both more and less. Concerning
biographical data, concrete facts, historical happenings, we know less about
the former than we do about the latter. From the extensive eyewitness accounts
given for the canonization processes for the Curé of Ars and for Teresa of
Jesus, we know a great deal about their daily activities and about how they
appeared in the eyes of others. The latter also tells us much about herself in
her autobiography, her Book of Foundations and the many letters that have survived. St. John of the Cross said nothing
about his activities in his major works, and a mere handful of his letters have
come down to us. However, we do know from other parties enough of his manner
and deeds to form an accurate picture of his personality.
Yet in some ways we know much more about John than about other saints and other
famous men and women. What we know so extremely well about him is what is most
important about anyone: his deepest self. And because his inner life was so
immensely rich, there is far more to know than what we find in the ordinary
heroes and heroines of history. Though this saint seldom used the personal
pronoun I in his writing, he is of course constantly revealing his inner
depths. In this John is incomparable. There are few men or women in history who
have combined in their persons the loftiest sublimity of love experiences with
an extraordinary talent for describing them.
While we have already noted that a man's life activities and written words are
mutual commentaries, we must add that this truth is especially pertinent to St.
John of the Cross. His teaching is the unvarnished Gospel, neither more nor
less, and to understand it rightly with neither exaggeration nor diminution we
need to see in his manner and deeds how he himself applied it to the concrete circumstances
of the daily round. His mode of life is likewise a silent but eloquent
testimony of what is indispensable for deep prayer to be given and received.
What kind of man was this saint who is so seldom well understood? We may say
that he was serene, plain, simple ... fearless of enemies but gentle toward
everyone... intelligent and logical.. . outspoken but soft spoken. . .
powerfully resolute and completely honest. moderate but by no means mediocre..
. uncompromising with principles but compassionate with human failings ...
poetically brilliant but no weaver of euphemisms... hard on himself but tender
with others.
John so loved nature that Peers called it his dominant interest on the natural
plane. He enjoyed going outdoors and praying immediately from the book of
creation lying before his eyes. It is said of him that he would be found in his
cell with elbows on the windowsill, gazing, in absorbed prayer, upon the
flowers during the day or the stars at night. That nature sparked a burning
love for God in this man is shown likewise by the inspired imagery we find in
his works. [87] That the saint also enjoyed a keen appreciation for music
appears, for example, in the verse, "silent music, sounding
solitude", of Spiritual Canticle.
People who know St. John of the Cross only superficially may consider his
spirituality to be predominantly negative. That there is a prominent
sacrificial element is true, just as there is in the Gospel. But what is not
sufficiently understood is that in both John and the Gospel the negative is
never sought for itself, and that the positive overwhelmingly predominates.
That this is so we will consider in its proper place, but it may be well to
note here that this man had an exceptionally affirmative, optimistic vision of both
the human person and the divine plan. Even his nada doctrine was entirely aimed
at reaching an enthralling immersion in God. The sanjuanist optimism can be
seen, for example, in his portrayal of all creation as a resplendent bride
given by the Father to the Son: "I will hold her in My arms and she will
burn with Your love, and with eternal delight she will exalt Your goodness ....
By these words the world was created, a palace for the bride." [88] It
would be difficult to find in all of literature a more jubilant, a more
positively ecstatic outlook on creation and the human person within it. The
critics of John seem not to read this far or else not to absorb what he says. Optimism
is found everywhere in the saint's writings, even in the most stark sections on
detachment and self-denial. Always he invites the reader to an entire
enthrallment, an abiding joy beyond imagining.
St. John of the Cross did not seem to excel in speaking to large groups of
people with the effectiveness of a John Chrysostom or a Francis of Assisi, but
he did have a powerful gift for relating to individuals and small groups in
informal chats. Peers tells us that while he could easily be missed and passed
over in a crowd, "once seen and spoken to alone, [he] could never be
forgotten". [89] This charism, together with his uncommon grasp of the
interior life, readily explains his popularity as a spiritual director. He was
much sought after in this capacity by all sorts of people: laymen and laywomen,
nuns, university students and their professors. His insights into Scripture
were so well known and appreciated that professors at the university in Baeza
consulted him to learn of these "new" explanations of the biblical
word.
On the natural level it appears that John's greatest talent was his poetic genius.
The Spanish scholars I have met and read are agreed that he is probably the
greatest poet in the Spanish language. Kavanaugh and Rodriguez write that the
saint is known as "the loftiest poet of Spain", not because of
volumes upon volumes of verse but because of a mere handful often to twelve
compositions. They add that "these compositions, however, display such
variety that it can almost be affirmed that each of them represents a
completely distinct poetic vision and technique, a singular accomplishment in
Spanish literature". [90] E. Allison Peers considers John "a
supremely skillful artist endowed in the highest measure with natural
ability". Commenting upon the poetic perfection of Spiritual
Canticle, this critic observes that
either his stanzas were kneaded, pulled to pieces and refashioned again and
again in the cell of his mind--"polished and repolished ceaselessly" as
the French preceptionist has it--or he was possessed of the most marvelously
intuitive poetic faculty imaginable and developed what the Catalan Maragall was
later to call the art of the "living word" (paraula viva) to an extent heretofore unknown. [91]
Peers notes the saint's extraordinary achievement of attaining to "the very
highest rank of European poets" by a tiny output of a little over fifty
stanzas. That this friar knew what love is all about can be witnessed even from
the secular world, for he is considered "a poet's poet, whom in these days
of a Spanish lyrical renaissance, contemporary singers revere as perhaps no
other". [92] Citations, some even more superlative, could be multiplied,
but we shall add only that the saint's literary genius was not confined to his
poetry:
St. John of the Cross is also a poet in his prose, and the very abundance of
his talent in this respect throws into sharper relief the austerity of his
doctrine. The sum total of his merits as a writer of prose, of which its
poetical quality is of course only one, constitutes a very remarkable achievement
.... [Up to John's time] there had, in fact, been very little mystical prose at
all, and that little had mainly been concerned with one aspect of mystical
experience--the Prayer of Quiet. St. John of the Cross had therefore to invent
phrases in order to express ideas which previously had had no outlet in
Spanish. [93]
It surely had to be a singular work of divine providence that God would prepare
as the prince of mystics a man who not only experienced abundantly the very
highest gifts of prayer but also was endowed in the natural order with matchless
literary talent and poetic power to express worthily, that is, beyond the
inadequacy of prose, the raison d'être of being human, an intimate immersion in
the indwelling Trinity.
However, as is the case with any man or woman, the most important thing about
St. John of the Cross was not what he did but what he was. Sheer sanctity was
his paramount trait. This man was on fire, utterly absorbed in God. He
experienced ecstatic prayer even though he said almost nothing about the
subject (because "Madre Teresa" had already so well said all that
needed to be said about it), and he reached the transforming union while still
a young man. The saint was capable of an absorption during meals such that he
could not recall what he had eaten-much like St. Thomas Aquinas, who provided
his own anesthetic for bleeding by the simple procedure of going into
contemplative prayer.
As we would expect, John's transformation into the divine (understood, of
course, in a nonpantheistic sense) showed itself in his active caring for
others. The dire poverty of the nuns at the Incarnation convent while he was
their confessor so touched his heart that he went out to beg alms for them, and
he made a point of seeking delicacies for the ill. When his own friars were
sick, the saint gave them exquisite care. If one of them had no appetite, John
would suggest kinds of food he might like and then procure them immediately. He
would rise at night to check on the welfare of an ill confrere even when
another friar had volunteered or been appointed to watch at the bedside. We
know that he had a special love for the nuns at Beas, and he showed it at least
once by walking several miles out of the way to visit them. This affection
appears likewise in letters addressed to them. In one he remarks how they will
know from his coming visit that he has by no means forgotten them, and he
refers to "the beautiful steps you are making in Christ, whose brides are
His delight and crown". [94] Further on he speaks to them as "my
beloved daughters in Christ", [95] and in another he assures them that
their letter to him was a great comfort. [96] In still another he strives to
lighten the burden of pain in one of these Beas nuns: "Do not think,
daughter in Christ, that I have ceased to grieve for you in your trials and for
the others who share in them." [97]
The depth of John's love for his fellowmen can perhaps be best seen in two
incidents the outside world would not have noticed at all. We understand those
incidents adequately only when we recall the saint's uncompromising teaching on
and practice of detachment from every single selfish desire. He had an
extraordinary love for Francisco, his blood brother who was himself a mystic
and remarkably holy. The saint called Francisco his most loved treasure in the
world. When this brother once visited John and had decided to leave after two
or three days, John told him not to be in so much of a hurry and to remain on
for a few more days. [98] The other incident illustrates both the saint's fondness
for St. Teresa and his insistence that no self-centered egoism is to be
permitted in any event, even if another- saint is the object of it. I refer to
John's finally deciding to destroy the letters from her that he had saved. It
is easy to imagine the terrible pull in his sensitive heart. On the one hand he
knew the goodness resulting for both parties from a friendship entirely
immersed in God. He knew, too, that he and Teresa loved each other dearly and
purely. But he also knew that there could be danger, not in their case of any
obvious sin, but of slight, impercep- tible clingings that could result from
retaining a packet of letters. Peers' comment is interesting:
I have always thought, for example, when rereading the letters in which St.
Teresa refers to St. John of the Cross and trying to realize what the two must
have been to each other, that few things he did in his life can have been
harder than the burning of a bundle of her letters to him--probably all he had
ever had from her. [99]
In tracing out the traits of this saint, we may not omit a few words about a
characteristic that we would hardly expect in a man so widely known both in
name and in teaching for devotion to the Cross. I refer to John's gentleness.
Serene, calm, at peace in his own personal life even under harsh, cruel
persecution, John did not retaliate, did not deal brusquely, rudely or severely
with others. He was clement, indulgent, benign and forgiving. Unwittingly he
gave us a portrait of his own manner when he sketched out his counsels on how
all of us are to behave under duress. "A soul enkindled with love is a
gentle, meek, humble, and patient soul", he observed. "A soul that is
hard because of its self-love grows harder." [100] People deeply in love
with God invariably grow in a habit of amiable and compassionate responses to
those whom God Himself loves. "Keep spiritually tranquil in a loving
attentiveness to God," advised John, "and when it is necessary to
speak, let it be with the same calm and peace." [101] Virile and brave
though he was, the saint showed this same humane compassion for others in the
very imagery he chose in his writings:
It should be known, then, that God nurtures and caresses the soul, after it has
been resolutely converted to His service, like a loving mother who warms her child
with the heat of her bosom, nurses it with good milk and tender food, and
carries and caresses it in her arms. [102]
Chrisogono tells us that a young woman wishing to go to confession but knowing
John's reputation for an austere life approached him with a fear bordering on
panic. She drew from the saint the observation that a confessor who is holy
ought not to frighten people. Disclaiming holiness in himself, he nonetheless
went on to remark that "the holier the confessor, the gentler he is, and
the less he is scandalized at other people's faults, because he understands
man's weak condition better". [103]
Perhaps the surest mark of sanctity is the hearing of piercing suffering with
much love, first for God and secondly for those inflicting the pain. It is easy
for most of its to appear humble, patient, modest and loving when the sun
shines, when others commend us, when we succeed, when we are healthy, when the
way is clear of obstacles. What man or woman really is shines forth under
contradiction, failure, illness. Any biography will make plain that John lived
throughout his life the title he bore and the doctrine he taught. One example
must suffice. While he was imprisoned for the second time by the calced friars,
he was verbally abused and whipped on two occasions. He lived in a cell that
was six feet by ten, with boards on the floor as his bed. There was no window,
only a two-inch opening at the top of the wall facing the corridor. It was so
cold during the winter that the skin on his toes came off from frostbite. His
food was bread, water and sardines. He was administered the periodic
"circular discipline", so called because each of the eighty members
of the community took turns in lashing his bare back. He bore through life the
scars of this brutal punishment. During and after these nine months of dark
solitude and torture, John uttered not a single complaint and bore no
resentment toward his captors. [104] One could see the image of the Crucified
in him.
But the saint's affliction and agonies suffered at the hands of others did not
satisfy his thirst to imitate the Master in his Passion. It is worthy of notice
that while John says almost nothing in his writings about external penances, he
practiced a great deal of them in his personal life. While he was prior at El
Calvario monastery, he was first among the friars to set to menial tasks such
as washing dishes. As prior of Los Martires he chose the narrowest and poorest
cell in the monastery as his dwelling. He slept on "handfulls of rosemary
twigs interwoven with vine shoots" and later used bare boards as his bed.
[105] John wore a penitential chain so tightly around his waist that when it
was later pulled away during an illness, the links were found to be embedded in
his flesh. [106] Because the saint loved music so much and because during his
final illness he was suffering intensely, a layman, Pedro de San José, thought
he might soothe John's discomfort by bringing in some musicians. The response
of gentle John was typical both of his kindliness and of his love for the
Cross:
Brother, I am most grateful for the kindness you wished to do me; I appreciate
it very highly; but, if God has given me the great sufferings I am enduring,
why wish to soothe and lessen them by music? For the love of Our Lord, thank
those gentlemen for the kindness they had wished to do me: I look upon it as
having been done. Pay them, and send them away, for I wish to endure without
any relief the gracious gifts which God sends me in order that, thanks to them,
I may the better merit. [107]
The reader who wishes to develop a deeper appreciation for this remarkable man
may consult the three books on John referred to in the footnotes to this
chapter. We may for now be content with the judgment of our other saint. Teresa
puts the whole matter in a nutshell in brief excerpts from two of her letters.
Of Friar Juan de la Cruz she writes that "he is a divine, heavenly man
.... You would never believe how lonely I feel without him .... He is indeed
the father of my soul" [108] "People look upon him as a saint, which,
in my opinion he is and has been all his life." [109]
Endnotes:
[87] See, for example, our Chapter 4, "Creation and Meditation".
[88] Romances 3 and 4, Creation, KR, pp.
726-27.
[89] E. Allison Peers, Spirit of Flame (New York: Morehouse-Gorham, 1945), p.
110.
[90] KR, Complete Works of St. John of the Cross, p. 709.
[91] Spirit of Flame, p. 136.
[92] Ibid., p. 138.
[93] Ibid., p. 139.
[94] Letter 6, p. 687.
[95] Ibid., p. 688.
[96] Letter 7, p. 688.
[97] Letter 8, p. 689.
[98] Crisogono of Jesus, O.C.D., The Life of St. John of the Cross (New York: Harper and Brothers, 1958), p. 268.
[99] Spirit of Flame, pp. 111-12.
[100] Sayings of Light and Love,
nos. 27 and 28, p. 669.
[101] Maxims, no. 3, p. 674.
[102] Dark Night of the Soul, bk.
1, chap. 1, no. 2, p. 298.
[103] Crisogono, p. 128.
[104] See Crisogono, pp 103-5, and Bruno of Jesus and Mary, O.C.D., St.
John of the Cross (New York: Sheed and
Ward, 1932), pp 169-70.
[105] Crisogono, p. 128.
[106] Ibid., p. 239.
[107] Bruno, pp. 347-48.
[108] Letter 261, p. 625.
[109] Letter 240, p. 496.
Related IgnatiusInsight.com Articles:
• Seeking Deep Conversion | From Deep Conversion, Deep Prayer |
Thomas Dubay, S.M.
• The Source of
Certitude | Epilogue to Faith and Certitude | Thomas Dubay, S.M.
• The Confession of the Saints | Adrienne von Speyr
• The Measure of
Literary Giants | An Interview with Joseph Pearce
December 13, 2012
New: "History of the Catholic Church: From the Apostolic Age to the Third Millennium"
Now availabe from Ignatius Press:
History of the Catholic Church: From the Apostolic Age to the Third Millennium
by James Hitchcock
• Also available in Electronic Book Format
The Catholic Church is the longest-enduring institution in the world.
Beginning with the first Christians and continuing in our present day,
the Church has been planted in every nation on earth.
The Catholic Church claims Jesus Christ himself as her founder, and in
spite of heresy from within and hostility from without, she remains in
the twenty-first century the steadfast guardian of belief in his life,
death, and resurrection. The teachings and redemptive works of Jesus as
told in the Gospels are expressed by the Church in a coherent and
consistent body of doctrine, the likes of which cannot be found in any
other Christian body.
The history of the Catholic Church is long, complicated, and
fascinating, and in this book it is expertly and ably told by historian
James Hitchcock. As in the parable of Christ about the weeds that were
sown in a field of wheat, evil and good have grown together in the
Church from the start, as Hitchcock honestly records. He brings before
us the many characters-some noble, some notorious-who have left an
indelible mark on the Church, while never losing sight of the saints,
who have given living testimony to the salvific power of Christ in every
age.
This ambitious work is comprehensive in its scope and in incisive in its
understanding, a valuable addition to any school or home library.
James Hitchcock, Ph.D., is a longtime professor of
history at St. Louis University, which he attended as an undergraduate.
He received his masters and doctorate degrees from Princeton University
and has authored several books, including The Supreme Court and Religion in American Life; The Recovery of the Sacred; What Is Secular Humanism; and Catholicism and Modernity: Confrontation or Capitulation?
"A remarkable achievement that synthesizes a lifetime of learning, James Hitchcock's History of the Catholic Church
is also a signal service to twenty-first century Catholicism, a
religious community in which controversy and contention are often the
by-products of severe amnesia. The Church of the New Evangelization has
to know its own story, and that story is told here in full."
- George Weigel, Distinguished Senior Fellow, Ethics and Public Policy Center, Washington, D.C.
"For years, James Hitchcock has been our premier historian - a dissident
from conventional wisdom, well-armed and solid. Here he pioneers a new
method for presenting a long sweep of history: an orderly and altogether
fascinating series of vignettes - of arguments, movements, distinctive
persons, and concrete events. There is just enough narrative in these
sequences to carry the reader along, but without involving her in
excessive interpretation. This book provides both a great resource for
easy reference, and a stimulating definition of a Christian humanism
that holds in tension the transcendent and the down to earth, the holy
and the sinful. This is a tension which Hitchcock maintains throughout."
- Michael Novak
"James Hitchcock has a well-earned reputation as an outstanding scholar,
insightful commentator and lucid, accessible writer. All of these
skills come together and shine in his History of the Catholic Church.
It's a masterwork: exhilarating in scope and a joy to read. If you
want an unforgettable account of the fullness and drama of the Christian
story, read this book."
+Charles J. Chaput, O.F.M. Cap., Archbishop of Philadelphia
"The gap in knowledge of history and current events sadly extends to us Catholics in our grasp of the Faith and
the rich history of the Church. In his ambitious new work, History of the Catholic Church from the Apostolic Age to the Third Millennium,
James Hitchcock has given us an accessible tool to better our
understanding...and love for the history of the Church. To love the
Church, we must understand her history. As Blessed Pope John XXIII
remarked, ‘History is our best teacher.' Thank you, Dr. Hitchcock, for
this timeless gift to the Church for the Year of Faith."
- Cardinal Timothy Dolan, Archbishop of New York
"James Hitchcock is one of the few historians alive today with the
background and ability to present the two-millenium history of the
Catholic Church. In this remarkable volume Hitchcock brings a lifetime
of insights and research to this important subject. It is a work of
erudition in which the reader will discover not only the importance of
the Catholic Church in past centuries, but in our own time."
- Thomas F. Madden, Ph.D.
Director
of the Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies, Saint Louis
University
"This book, by one of the premier American Catholic historians, is
clearly addressed to a broad audience. It is apologetic in the best
sense, written from the point of view of a practicing Catholic, and
addresses the various questions that would occur to a lay reader
inevitably influenced by views found in the larger culture. The book is
well written. It is not burdened down with details or many footnotes,
but is attached to a strong narrative line centering on meaning. It
would therefore be appropriate to study groups."
- Glenn W. Olsen, emeritus Professor of History, University of Utah
Video trailer for the book:
Dietrich Bonhoeffer, cheap grace, and tough religion
Much has been said lately about how to do evangelization.
I've contributed a bit to that myself. Now I begin to think that, instead of
always stressing niceness, it might be good to give tough religion a try.
That idea was inspired by a reading of Eric Metaxas's
biography of Dietrich Bonhoeffer, the Lutheran theologian and pastor executed
by the Nazis near the end of World War II for involvement in the plot against Hitler. Metaxas's book, Bonhoeffer:
Pastor, Martyr, Prophet, Spy (Thomas
Nelson), is a tad too worshipful for my taste, but it contains a wealth of
information about this iconic religious figure of the 20th century and, best of
all, quotes generously from his writing.
As in this description of what he found while doing
post-doctoral studies in the early 1930s at Union Theological Seminary in New
York: "In New York they preach about virtually everything, only one thing
is not addressed, or is addressed so rarely that I have as yet been unable to
hear it, namely, the gospel of Jesus Christ, the cross, sin and forgiveness,
death and life."
As that suggests, Bonhoeffer, an intellectual from a
well-off, highly cultured family, was no wimp. Welcomed back to New York in
1939 before the outbreak of hostilities, he could have spent the war there safe
and secure. But he chose to return to Germany in the conviction that he
belonged with his people during what he knew would be their darkest hour. For
the Nazis to have killed him with the end of the fighting in sight was an act
of malevolence serving no purpose but revenge.
The Hallowed House and the Secular World
The Hallowed House and the Secular World | Carl E. Olson | Catholic World Report
An interview with Dr. Thomas Howard about the sacred, the secular, and the current state of Church and culture.
Thomas Howard is one of the most erudite and
literate Catholic authors in recent history. He was raised in a prominent
Evangelical home (his sister is well-known author and former missionary
Elisabeth Elliot), became Episcopalian in his mid-20s, then entered the
Catholic Church in 1985, at the age of 50. Dr. Howard was a highly regarded professor
of English and literature for more than 30 years and is the author of
numerous books, including Dove
Descending: T.S. Eliot’s “Four Quartets,” Evangelical Is Not Enough, Chance or the Dance?, Lead Kindly Light, On Being Catholic, and The
Secret of New York Revealed. He recently was interviewed, by email, by Carl
E. Olson, editor of Catholic World Report,
about the new edition of his book Hallowed
Be This House: Finding Signs of Heaven in
Your Home (Ignatius Press, 2012), as well as the state of
American culture, secularism, Anglicanism, and great literature.
CWR: How did the
idea for Hallowed Be This House
originally come about? Do you think there is an even greater need today for a
sense of the hallowed and the sacred than there was when you first wrote the
book in the 1970s?
Thomas Howard: I think the
original idea for the book came to me gradually. It must have been the fruit of
a lifetime of reading and teaching Western literature, where one finds, up
until at least the Enlightenment, the assumption of an ordered, hierarchical,
and blissful Universe. Even the pagans assume this. But in my young adulthood,
I found myself moving from the very faithful and good Protestant Evangelicalism
of my family into the Anglican Church, where at least the notions of hierarchy,
sacrament, and liturgy are remembered. Also, of course, I became soaked in the
works of C.S. Lewis, J.R.R. Tolkien, and their friend Charles Williams. In all
of these writers, one finds the ordinary stuff of quotidian life treated as
though that stuff bespeaks—what shall we say? Glory? Ultimacy? The Truth of
things? Splendor? Yes—all of that. The ordinary is not ordinary. It trumpets
joy, freedom, and virtue to us mortals if we will pay attention.
Is there a greater need today to see things
this way than when I wrote the book in the 1970s? Yes. In the decade of the
1960s, when my wife and I were living in New York, which became the eye of the
storm, Western Civilization as it has been known for millennia collapsed. The
moral order was overthrown with great zest, and this overthrow is always,
inevitably, the prelude to the collapse of any civilization. I myself would see
signs of hope, however, in the papacies of John Paul II and of Benedict XVI,
with, in the latter case, the promulgation of the Year of Faith. This is a
clear call to the Church to reassert, very strongly, the real substance of the
Catholic Faith, which is more, far more, than a matter of “it’s nice to be nice,”
which perhaps has been the impression conveyed to the laity in common parish
homiletics in the wake of what obviously concerns the Holy Father at the moment—namely
the training of seminarians, for perhaps a century, in “the historical critical
method” of reading Scripture.
CWR: Can you give
an example or two of how our houses are, or can become, hallowed? How can we
better develop a sense of sacramentality and an incarnational perspective?
December 12, 2012
Chapter One of "María of Guadalupe: Shaper of History, Shaper of Hearts"
A Delectable Fruit of the Cactus for the Eagle | Paul Badde | Chapter One of
María of Guadalupe: Shaper of History, Shaper of Hearts
With wood from the Santa Marla, Christopher Columbus built the first
house in America. Hernán Cortés conquered Mexico. The growling of dogs on the
beach and the dawn of the modern era lie heavy over the cities of New World and
Old.
On the morning of August 3, 1492, sails
billowing in the first wind, Columbus sailed from Andalusia in the Santa
María, together with the Niña and the Pinta, in order, as he confides in the ship's log, to search for a westerly
sea route to Jerusalem. If the names of his ships had been listed in another
way, they would have made the phrase "Holy Mary (Santa María) paints (pinta) the girl (niña)". In
itself, this would have been striking. However, this was only the beginning of
the incredible story of the dark Lady, who, five hundred years after the
discovery of America, still waits to be discovered by Europe, Asia, Africa and
other parts of the world.
Historians say that, on Christmas night, 1492, the Santa María ran aground on a sandbar off of Haiti. Columbus
decided to dismantle the grounded flagship and "build a fort out of what
was salvaged". However, some years ago on the docks of the port of Barcelona,
I saw an exact reproduction of the caravel Santa María. I doubt that with the planks and masts of this
nutshell anyone could have managed to construct a fort. Two or three huts,
perhaps, or a house—or even a small barricaded chapel. There was not
enough material for more. The one thing that seems sure is that from the
remains of the Santa María the
first European house was raised in the New World. A year later it was pulled
down and reduced to ashes.
Twenty-seven years later Hernán Cortés, a native of the city of Medellin, in
Spain, disembarked from the Santa María de la Concepción onto the shore of the American continent. It was Good
Friday of 1519, in the area of what would later become the port of Veracruz. A
small expeditionary flotilla accompanied the Santa María de la
Concepción . Two days later, Cortés asked
two Franciscans, Diaz and Olmedo, to celebrate Easter with a high Mass on the
beach. "The Spaniards planted a cross in the sandy ground", writes
Francisco López de Gómara in his history of the conquest of Mexico. "They
prayed the rosary and the Angelus as a bell was rung." To anyone familiar
with Catholic liturgy, this seems somewhat confused. But there is no doubt
that, after the liturgical service, Cortés, in a brief speech, took possession
of an immense territory in the name of the Spanish Crown. Needless to say, the
king of Castile was totally ignorant of who Cortés was and what he was doing
there. The "Captain General" had taken on himself the responsibility
of a royal commission.
Thus he resembled the immortal Don Quixote de la Mancha, who in Cervantes'
book, written years later, would assume the fight against the forces of evil
and defend the honor of the pure and lovable Dulcinea, who unfortunately
existed only in the poor knight's addled brain and overheated imagination. But,
unlike Don Quixote, "the Knight of the Woeful Countenance" with his
nag Rocinante and his rusty lance, Cortés set upon his mission with a sharp
sword and well-fed horses. Hernán Cortés' countenance was by no means woeful;
he was an elegant man who dressed in silk and velvet . The natives could not
comprehend what he might represent, and they observed in wonder the solemn
ceremony of the occupation of Mexico. They were baffled as they observed these
pale, well-armed men bow their heads and kneel before a wooden cross.
Along the coast, next to the conqueror's flagship, were anchored three other
caravels and six small brigatines that had transported 530 men in the prime of
their lives. They were natives of Spain, Genoa, Naples, Portugal and France.
Among them were fifty sailors, the two Franciscans already mentioned, thirty
crossbow-men and twelve harquebusmen. Among their armaments the expeditionary
force had many swords and lances, sixteen horses, numerous Irish wolfhounds and
mastiffs, ten long-range cannons, four falconets and various small Lombard
cannons, as the new firearms were named in those days. Some of the men had
mutilated ears—the punishment for those who had been caught robbing and
convicted in Castile. Be that as it may, the gold chain around the neck of the
self-proclaimed Captain General Cortés bore a medal with the Virgin Mary on the
front and Saint John the Baptist on the back. On the mainmast of the flagship
waved a golden pennant with a blue cross and the Latin inscription:
"Amici, sequamur crucem, et si nos fidem habemus, vere in hoc signo
vincemus": Friends, let us follow the cross . If we believe in it, truly
in this sign we will conquer.
In spite of everything, a few weeks later, some of the conquistadors no longer
held such a belief and had lost faith in the leader's good luck; they mutinied
and took over a brigantine in order to sail back to Cuba. Cortés hanged two of
the ringleaders, mutilated the foot of a third and had the rest publicly
flogged. Then he gave orders that, with the whole expeditionary force looking
on, nine ships should be grounded in the bay of Villa Rica, in order that even
the most cowardly among them would have only one way open, through all their
fears: the road to Tenochtitlan, the Aztec capital. In those days it was as
large and as populated as ancient Naples or Constantinople and was even more
beautiful than Venice. Cortés left only one ship in navigable condition, the Santa
María de la Concepción. As all of this was
going on, in far-away Europe Leonardo da Vinci was dying and the seven German
electors were electing Charles I of Castile as Charles V of that Holy Roman
Empire over which, it would later be said, the sun never set. With the addition
of Mexico and the Philippines, this empire would cover the globe.
Within a mere two years of disembarking, Cortés had conquered the mighty Aztec
empire. According to one variant, the word "Mexico" meant the
"Land of the Moon". An actual conquest of the moon would not have come
as a greater surprise. Nothing could have prepared the Europeans for the
discovery of a New World or for the natives, whose human sacrifices terrified
and revolted the Spanish adventurers from the first moment they witnessed the
Aztecs take a flint knife to carve out the heart of a living victim and place
it, still beating, on a black basalt altar as an offering to their god
Quetzalcóatl. They called this the "delectable fruit of the cactus for the
Eagle". Some of these altars of sacrifice to the Eagle still exist. After
the conquest of Mexico, for example, the architects of the royal chapel nearby
in Cholula imported them as holy-water fonts for the entryway.
Generally, before the sacrifice of members of the aristocracy, a drink of
hallucinogenic mushrooms and a ration of obsidian wine would be given
them—something, however, not disdained by many of the onlookers as well,
whose deafening roars of laughter echoed unforgettably through the Spaniards'
heads day and night. Less aristocratic or reluctant victims received nothing
and were dragged up the pyramid by the hair. Because the priests drew blood
from their own ear lobes as additional sacrifices, they were sinister-looking
indeed. This was not all. They dressed in black; their hair was tangled; their faces
ash-gray; their fingernails extravagantly long. Nothing could reconcile the
Spaniards to Aztec sacrificial practices: not gold, not plaintive chants, not
the gorgeous feathered vestments, not even the legendary magnificence of the
Aztec cities. The blood-encrusted temple pyramids seemed to the Spaniards the
very portals of hell.
In turn, to the Aztecs, the Spaniards' horses, which they called deer, seemed
"as tall as the rooftops". The Spaniards entertained themselves by
terrorizing the people with the horses' neighing, which they used tactically
and strategically. This was a clash of cultures for which there was no
precedent: Stone Age versus Iron Age; obsidian and flint versus Toledo steel;
hauling by sled or teams versus the wheel; arrows versus gunpowder and
cannonballs; and finally, the recklessly bold spirit of these Renaissance
Christians versus the proverbial pagan anguish of the Amerindians, who were
subject to an uncountable multitude of gods.
During the conquest of Mexico, from among the 1600 Spaniards, mostly latecomers
to Cortés and his expedition, about one thousand died. But the Amerindian
tribes who joined the conquistadors—the Tlaxcaltecans, for example, whom
the Spaniards stirred up and set against the tyrannical Aztec people—mourned
many more victims. The historian Hugh Thomas concludes about their combatants
and victims as a whole that the Aztecs "had fought like gods" in the
struggle but, in such an unequal contest, had perished by the hundreds of
thousands. There had been prophecies that, in the year 1519, Quetzalcóatl,
their feathered serpent-god, would return. The Aztecs had been waiting for him
for generations. For this reason, some suppose that the Aztecs succumbed, not
so much because of Spanish astuteness and their superior war machine, but
rather because of an overwhelming surprise—and a profound disappointment.
Before and after the conquest of Mexico, not a single native Amerindian living
on the islands of the Caribbean survived the Spanish invasion. For this reason,
after their land was conquered, the situation seemed equally hopeless to the
inhabitants of Mexico—Mexican, Mistecan, Cholulan, Toltecan, Chichimecan,
Tlaxcaltecan, Xochimilcan, Totonacan and others. From here on we will refer to
them simply as Aztecs, the name by which the Europeans identified the
Amerindians who held sway over vast territories in Mexico at the time of the
conquest. First, obviously, no dialogue between the cultures was likely to have
been successful, even before the final victory of the military expedition,
after Cortés kept the powerful ruler of Mexico, Montezuma II, under arrest in
his own palace. Before he died under a rain of stones hurled by Aztec hands, a
rain of stones that would erupt like a volcano against the Spaniards from their
capital—before all this, the adventurer from Spanish Extremadura would
sit for hours at night with the Aztec emperor, who before his accession to the
throne had himself been high priest. He spoke to him not only about his
sovereign, Charles, the sharpest "sword of Christendom" (to whom
Cortés hoped to offer Montezuma's empire as a gift), but also about the
ever-virgin Mother of God; about God: the Father, Son and Holy Spirit; about
the Immaculate Conception; about the Incarnation; and about many other "interesting
things". The sermons of this passionate conquistador and ladies' man were
scarcely less bold than his conquest. This is something that sometimes
surprises his biographers, and they refer to it frequently.
Nevertheless, for the Aztecs these sermons must have sounded more than strange.
For on other days, in the plaza of the Great Pyramid, Cortés permitted the
chained Aztec monarch to preside at the solemn burning of rebel Amerindian
rulers. Montezuma himself did not stop having human sacrifices offered even while
imprisoned. From the apex of the Great Pyramid drums sounded, as did conch
horn, flutes and fifes made from bone. The earth had to keep revolving, and for
this blood was needed. Also the many celebrations had to continue, and these
could not be imagined in ancient Mexico without the human sacrifices that were
"like flowers for the gods". The Aztecs had surrendered to bloodlust.
The Florentine Codex relates that when his daughter reached the age of six or
seven, an Aztec father would say to her: "An obsidian wind is blowing on
us; it brushes us lightly and moves on; the earth is not a place of well-being;
here there is no joy; here there is no happiness." Four hundred years
later, Joseph Hoffner wrote: "A dark and bloody harshness weighed down the
religion, a harshness that had deprived them of any cheerful lightness of
heart." The Aztecs could not imagine life without war.
In the Old World, on the other hand, especially in Spain, not only were many
real or presumptive heretics being burned at the stake, but also, in Germany,
this was the time when the Reformation rose and took its course, which for the
first time broke the Church apart into Catholics and Protestants, so that very
soon eight million Christians had cut themselves off from Rome. No bonfire, no auto-da-fé,
with its flames, could stop this
revolution. In any event, the Emperor Charles V had enough to worry about
without preoccupying himself with the adventures of one of his many foolhardy
subjects in some faraway New World. The dawn of the modern era, with its
attendant terrors, was on the horizon.
Simultaneously something occurred in Mexico that sounds more fantastic than the
most sensational account of the conquest of the Aztec empire by Cortés and his
men. It was the first apparition of the Queen of Heaven in the New World. No
one with any regard for his intelligence would want to put faith in this
phenomenon. Perhaps only now can the scope of this event be truly seen,
because, better than ever before, we can now perceive how greatly this event
has changed the course of history and the balance of the world.
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María of Guadalupe: Shaper of History, Shaper of Hearts
by Paul Badde
Mexico, December 9, 1531. Ten years after the Spaniards conquered this
land, on a hill on the outskirts of the capital, something
inconceivable happens to Juan Diego, a native of the area.
At dawn a heavenly figure comes to meet him, revealing herself as
"Mary, mother of all men". To confirm the first vision, the Lady not
only entrusts him with several messages. But, also, in the
final vision, leaves her portrait mysteriously present on his tilma.
It is the portrait of a young woman looking downward. She is clothed in a
dress figured with roses and a mantle
spangled with stars.
From the time of its occurance this event has moved people. However,
because of the fascination with the image itself, doubts have been
raised, causing some to reject it altogether. This image of
Our Lady of Guadalupe, along with the Shroud of Jesus in Turin, have
possibly become the most mysterious images on earth. The more studies
are made of the image and of the cloth, the more mysterious it
all becomes, for believers and scientists alike.
In a hands-on investigation, Paul Badde has been delving into this
mystery from a historian's point of view, but also with the growing
wonder of a journalist who has stumbled across a fabulous
treasure.
In this heartfelt report, Paul Badde tells the fantastic story of the
apparition that changed the history of the world. Only in light of this
mysterious event, can one explain why the inhabitants of
Central and South American entered the Church so quickly. Mary of
Guadalupe was the person who inserted a whole continent into Western
Culture.
2012 Int'l Prize, "Giuseppe Sciacca" award to young American, Italian senior prelate
Sciacca , named after the architecture student Giuseppe Sciacca (1960-1986) who died young but
lived long enough to be proposed as an exemplary role model to the new
generations, saw the 11-year-old American Cody McCasland as the winner
of the 2102 edition of the prize.
This
ìnternational prize is the culmination of a charity event
that annually awards persons who, in their lives or in their fields of activity, have
distinguished themselves as a commendable role model in society. The award ceremony took place in the Pontifical Urbaniana University on
Saturday evening, November 10th, 2012, and was presided over by its honorary chairman, His Eminence Cardinal Dario Castrillón Hoyos, supported by
the prize president, Rev. Professor Bruno Lima, who is also president of the
Institute of International Juridical Economic and Social Studies, ISGESI.
The
young Cody McCasland is double, above-knee amputee. He was born with a rare
birth defect that caused his legs to form missing both his tibias and knees. He
has been receiving care at Texas Scottish Rite Hospital for Children (TSRHC) since
he was just two months old. After numerous consultations, it was decided that
it was in Cody's best interest to amputate his legs through the knee to give
him a chance at mobility. This surgery was completed when Cody was just 15
months old, and he received his first set of prostheses when he was 17 months
old. At the age of 10, Cody had undergone more than 20 surgeries, has gone
through more than 20 sets of prosthetic legs, and traveled to 14 states for
sports or as a Challenged Athletes Foundation Spokesperson.
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