John Janaro's Blog, page 117

The Wisdom of Saint Bernard of Clairvaux

HAPPY FEAST OF SAINT BERNARD OF CLAIRVAUX!

Bernard lived from 1090-1153. This energetic monastic reformer, theologian, advisor to popes and kings, prolific writer, contemplative, witness to the love of God, and Doctor of the Church is one of the giants of early medieval history. The first half of the 12th century saw the continuation of movements of ecclesiastical renewal as well as the growth of new and complex problems that had emerged in the Second Millennium after the birth of Jesus. While Christians from the West held the Holy Land for the first time, the breach between Eastern and Western Christendom continued to widen. Meanwhile the first sparks of rationalism flashed through the minds of European philosophers (e.g. Abelard) as Aristotle and other Greek philosophers were "rediscovered" through Arabic sources.

Amidst the many affairs of Church and society in his days, Bernard stood larger than anyone else because of his holiness, wisdom, and fairness. But more important than any of these things, he was a monk of Clairvaux, dedicated to prayer, lectio divina, labor according to the primitive ideal of Saint Benedict, and above all caritas, the love that God empowers us to have for Him because He has loved us first. Bernard represents the golden age of the Cistercian reform, and for me personally - nine centuries later - he evokes memories especially of my many visits over the years to the monastery "down the Valley" in Berryville, Virginia. Like the brightness of the "sparse" spaces in the Abbey church on a sunny morning, he "lights up" Cistercian simplicity with the ardor and warmth of Christ's incarnate love.

Here are some quotations from the Saint Bernard:

"For when God loves, all He desires is to be loved in return; the sole purpose of His love is to be loved, in the knowledge that those who love Him are made happy by their love of Him."

"He who will not submit to God’s sweet rule shall suffer the bitter tyranny of self; but he who wears the easy yoke and light burden of love will escape the intolerable weight of his own self-will."

If human beings could become "masters of all in heaven and on earth, they would soon find all insufficient, and discover that they were forced to seek Him who is wanting still. They must seek God Himself... the soul must cry out...'What besides Thee have I in heaven, and besides Thee what do I desire upon earth?'"

“If we wish to have Christ for a guest often, we must keep our hearts fortified by the testimony of our faith in the mercy of him who died for us, and in the power of him who rose from the dead... Christ died for our sins and rose again from the dead for our justification. He ascended to heaven for our protection, sent the Spirit for our consolation, and will someday return for our fulfillment.”

"In dangers, in doubts, in difficulties, think of Mary, call upon Mary. Let not her name depart from your lips, never suffer it to leave your heart. And that you may obtain the assistance of her prayer, neglect not to walk in her footsteps.... While she holds your hand, you cannot fall; under her protection you have nothing to fear; if she walks before you, you shall not grow weary; if she shows you favor, you shall reach the goal."

August Summer Scenery

Some Valley scenes from the middle of August 2020.

How Can We Be Inspired By "Good Example" in Strange Times?

Ideas, by themselves, are not enough to change our humanity.

We really learn how to be different and more profound human beings when we encounter other human persons who are already living this difference, right before our eyes.

What I'm referring to here, generally speaking, is the importance of "good example" in the development of human life. I want to suggest, from an interpersonal and relational perspective, some aspects of how we grow through the good example of others.

Of course, we should note that "bad example" subverts our humanity by hijacking the dynamic of interpersonal relationships under false pretenses, distracting and manipulating it in distorted ways that violate and enslave the human person. As is usually the case with evils, the decadence and corruption of persons through "bad example" and toxic pseudo-relationships require a more complex treatment, even if we're only trying to outline their dynamics in broad terms. I will address these problems in another post. In this post, however, I want to focus on the good example of persons and the ways it can "reach" us.

We need examples of people who live rightly and well, but also (and this is important) such people will have an impact on us to the degree that their actions move us and engage our lives in a concrete way.

The full measure of human engagement, of course, calls for humans to be present to one another in time and proximity, in the immediate physicality of literal "elbow-to-elbow" companionship that characterizes the sharing of deep friendship, healthy family life, and the local "togetherness" of community. Even here, there are different degrees and different ways of this kind of concrete sharing of life.

Moreover, external proximity to a beautiful and inspiring person is not enough; in order to learn from them and grow from their example, we need to see them with our hearts. We need to be awakened and drawn by their remarkable actions, and by the "resonance" of their goodness with the fundamental needs and questions of our own humanity, so as to enter into the more profound and convincing perception of reality they possess, from which they draw motivation.

Ordinary circumstances provide the paradigm for the environment in which these constructive encounters can (and should) take place. The immediate, physical conditions of human life are foundational and irreplaceable for full, healthy human relationships. But we can still encounter human persons, be engaged by them, and be moved and changed by the goodness and beauty of their lives even when they are not "with us" directly, or even if we have never "met them" in a proximate physical way. Humans engage one another through communication, and real communication is one of the ways that the impact of a human life can be "extended" beyond their immediate place and even down through the generations who come after them.

People who lived hundreds, thousands of years ago can still touch us profoundly through communication: that is, through their words or other modes of expressing themselves, and by the fruits of their actions that continue to shape history. We also "meet" them through stories of their lives that are rooted in what has been handed down about who they were and how they lived.

In these current days, our ordinary circumstances have been shaken up in so many unexpected and unpredictable ways, and we have been thrust into awkward and peculiar situations and strained experiences of both proximity and distance from one another. Old and new forms of communications media (from reading classic books to ZOOM) have been both a source of sustenance and a context for frustration as we try to find provisional ways to stay connected, navigate "spaces," and find a healthy solitude that is not swallowed by loneliness or anxiety.

Whatever restrictions we face, and what means are available to us, we can grow by encountering the good example of others. Communications media can help us "meet" one another, in normal circumstances and in times of crisis, if we stay faithful to our own humanity as our hearts reveal it to us, and if we remember the real person who is at the origin of every kind of expression in every form of media.

Giving good example, and following good example, are always necessary, but we can and will find ways to help one another even in the midst of the greatest trials.

"You Are Worth SO Much More"

This is a "verbal hug" from Christina Grimmie. She posted this on her Facebook page eight years ago.

Love "Stretches Out a Hand" To All

Maximilian Kolbe offered to take the place of another prisoner designated for reprisal execution in Auschwitz concentration camp.

He gave his life on August 14, 1941, as a witness to the Love that is greater than the most hideous violence, the Love that redeems and saves the world.

The Unassuming Heroism of Hong Kong's Agnes Chow

Earlier this week, the People's Republic of China's enormous Communist Party moved the forces of its unfettered power against someone it perceives to be a threat to the "security" of a nation of one and a half billion people. This dangerous secessionist revolutionary, plotter with foreign enemies, and instigator of disharmony between Hong Kong and the Motherland is "disguised" as a university student barely beyond her girlhood years, who would rather be reading, studying, or spending time with her friends.

The Party, however, knows better. Thus a special police unit arrested 23-year-old Agnes Chow Ting on August 10th, implementing the procedures of the infamous new 'National Security Law.' She has since been released on bail, and it's not clear whether any charges have been filed against her... yet.

Agnes Chow is a danger to China's "national security"? Really?

Agnes may be young and soft spoken, but she is very articulate about her convictions. She cannot be silent in front of the CCP's efforts to swallow Hong Kong and erase its identity and civil liberties. She has been active since the age of 15, when she joined up with fellow high school students led by Joshua Wong to resist the attempt by the mainland to impose a "moral and patriotic education" program in their schools. They argued that it was really a program of brainwashing and propaganda. Actually, they didn't just argue. They made a student "strike," and gathered by the thousands outside the government offices and held a continual demonstration. The government withdrew the mandate for the program.

It was a victory for education, for truth... and it was won by the kids.

No, their parents didn't put them up to it. Agnes's parents have worried about her (and I don't blame them). They are not political activists. They are devout Catholics, and they raised their daughter to care about justice, the common good, and helping those in need. They taught her not to live by lies.

That's enough to turn your kid into a radical in today's Hong Kong.

Agnes continued to work with Joshua Wong, Ivan Lam, Nathan Law, and other Hong Kong young people during the protests of 2014, and she co-founded a political group called Demosisto. She ran for the Legislative Council, but was disqualified by election officers because of Demosisto's position that Hong Kong people have a right to "self-determination." Then she traveled to educate others about Hong Kong, and gained supporters especially in Japan (Agnes speaks Yue Chinese, English, Japanese, and Korean).

Now she's been arrested, and may well be rearrested once some remotely plausible "charges" against her can be invented. They want to make her disappear. Indeed, they are right to consider her a threat... not to "the people," but to themselves. Agnes Chow is a talented, dedicated, courageous young woman who is speaking truth to power.

Dear blog readers, you know me. If great events are in the making, I always want to know "who is the heroine in this story?" Inevitably there is at least one, and often there are many. Certainly heroes - heroic men - interest me very much, but I still find that I'm drawn in a particular way to the heroic women of history.

I'm not sure why.

Maybe it's because they're underestimated and their significance is too often underappreciated. Maybe it's because they're particularly eloquent about the impact of historical events on their personal interiority. They illuminate the personal dimension of history, articulating through their own experience how events involve the drama of persons, relationships, families, and communities.

Maybe it's because I was raised by a heroic woman, I married a heroic woman, and I have four daughters (and now a daughter-in-law) who are heroines-in-the-making (each in their own way). They have already proven to be quite tenacious and impressive in their aspirations and achievements.

Now let me be clear; I am not "expecting" giant-sized accomplishments or imposing preconceived notions of greatness on anyone: I'm not pushing my girls to climb Mount Everest or fly a spaceship or become President - if they want to, that's fine, but what matters (for women and men) is to be faithful to one's vocation, to seek God's will, to worship Him, adhere to Him, and find one's fulfillment in Him.

This usually involves the hidden, apparently ordinary fidelity in daily life that forms the foundation of the uniquely Christian heroism called sanctity.

We are all called to become saints, by the grace of the Spirit, following Jesus, loving God and our neighbor. Sometimes we are also called to take on outwardly heroic roles on different levels of historical action. And although they undoubtedly need saints (and they may have some new martyrs before this ends), our discussion of the drama of Hong Kong right now primarily concerns terrestrial affairs. The greatness we mark as beginning to emerge here is temporal, political, and social. It is also incipient. It is still mostly in the realm of aspirations, initial efforts, possibilities, and the willingness to take big risks. It is not without flaws and pitfalls, and it needs much clarification and purification. It calls for not only courage, but also wisdom, patience, flexibility, and more than a little luck. Here I suppose the old adage could be applied: "Some are born for greatness, some achieve greatness, and some have greatness thrust upon them."

One of the signs that a social movement is driven by genuine, healthy, sincere aspirations for human dignity and freedom (as opposed to "tribalism," ideology, the lust for power, or the seeking of revenge) is the degree to which it finds itself being carried along by "unlikely" heroes and heroines. There may be gifted leaders and visionary thinkers in such movements, of course, but it's reassuring to find at the heart of it all that there are many people who are shaping events - great events - simply as a consequence of their decision to do the right thing. They make a commitment to something that they recognize to be good, they stick with it, and then - often without even realizing it - their own stature grows.

One of the reasons I hold real hopes that something good will come from the Hong Kong Revolution is that it involves so many people who are just trying to do the right thing. They are not troublemakers, thugs, egoists, or ideologues who want to change the foundations of reality or engineer a new kind of human being. They just want respect for basic human dignity, for themselves and for everyone in their society.

This is a "revolution" that was literally started by high school kids... and not primarily the rebellious, psychologically traumatized kids, but precisely the "good kids." They have everything to gain in terms of wealth, social status, and opportunities for themselves by playing along with (or at least ignoring) the emerging system that is taking over Hong Kong. But they refuse to play along with the system. They have been challenging the system for eight years, and are now putting their young lives in iminent danger. And there is clearly only one reason why they continue to do this.

They know that this emerging Communist PartyState-dominated system is wrong. What it's trying to do to their people is wrong.

In the end, the young people of Hong Kong may have to endure the system's oppression, but right now, they have a chance to make a difference. They have a chance to take a stand that will write an indellible chapter in the history of their people. These are the circumstances that shape the history of a people, even if - at the time, for all we can see - their protagonists "fail" to attain an immediately quantifiable objective.

Ordinary people will make sacrifices and take risks in order to sow seeds that will bear fruit in time.

This is the hope of Agnes Chow Ting. She hopes for "the dawn" that will come after a long long night. She expressed this in poetic form on Instagram during last Summer's protests:


A very rough English translation conveys something of the sense of her words:

"In this city where bullets fly, 
how extravagant is a smile.
The breeze smelled like tear gas,
blowing the untied hair frizzy and curly, 
and the neatly combed bangs became messy. 
Holding the black helmet recently picked up on the street, 
with a gas mask around the neck, 
putting the eye mask on the forehead temporarily, 
preparing for an unknown nightmare. 
We have been looking forward to the coming of the morning dawn. 
Look, the orange sun illuminates our faces in beautiful and warm colors.  
It is not dazzling; we can remove the helmet 
and look at the beautiful morning light with hope. 
In this city where bullets fly, 
I hope we can continue to remember the warmth of the dawn."

When I read this, I wrote her a message of support. But I wanted to support more than just the political struggle. I wanted to reach out to her as a person, and help her to remember what makes these efforts (and everything else) ultimately worthwhile:

"Agnes Chow, your reflections move me deeply. You are so young for so much suffering (my children are your age), but God will lead you.

"Your patron Saint Agnes was a girl who stood up against the power of Ancient Rome, and Jesus gave her strength to be faithful to the end. Today the people in Rome still love her. She will help you too, and all the brave girl saints of history (think of Joan of Arc), and the beautiful Chinese martyrs.

"I know we never feel as brave as these saints and heroes, but they are here for us. They understand you and all your fears and they will help you to be the person God wants you to be in the place He has given to you: your beloved Hong Kong, the terrible evils you face, your own struggles, your friends’ needs.

"Jesus will never abandon you. He is always there to give you the strength you need and to forgive you, so that you need not condemn yourself. Go to Him with everything.

"Pray. This is the revolution.

"We are praying with you and for you. I pray for Hong Kong, but not only for that, but for you as a person. Jesus has placed you in this movement for freedom, and He wills that it will have enduring value (even if you don’t “win”) - but He loves you first for yourself, always, whatever may come, whatever your own failures too.

"He loves you. Trust in Him for everything!"

Christina Grimmie's Embrace of Life

Once again I have taken time to remember Christina Grimmie, after four years and two months. It's fitting, because — as I have said before — she too has "become family" to us. I know she shares our joy in this past weekend.

This picture is titled, simply, The Hug.

I put care and the use of many tools and techniques into this unusual piece of digital artwork (based originally on a photo found long ago — credit to owner — I think it was in the Philippines). Perhaps it's not very accessible. I don't know if it expresses everything I wanted, but it catches something.

Christina was the one who said she felt "like a mother" to all her frands, and that each of us had been entrusted to her by God for a special reason. She probably had the teenagers in mind, of course... but she didn't put limits on God's will, or preconditions to her welcoming embrace of all those God sent to her.

I have come to realize the extensive, vast, encouraging strength of the heart that was the source of so many hugs like this, and I too have been welcomed and affirmed (mysteriously) in this great embrace.

"Full Meaning and Firm Hope"

"The center of existence, what gives full meaning and firm hope to our often difficult journey, is faith in Jesus, is our encounter with Christ. This does not mean following an idea, a project, but encountering Him as a living Person, to be fully involved by Him and His Gospel" (Benedict XVI).

John Paul and Emily are MARRIED!

Here are a few pictures from yesterday's happy day (I didn't take many, since there were real photographers on hand for that).

The wedding went as well as anything could go in this crazy year. Requirements, recommendations, modifications, etc. in both the State of Virginia and the Diocese of Arlington are sufficiently "open" at this time that we were able to have a nice gathering for the ceremony and a reception too. It's still an unpredictable world, but Virginia has been better off than many other places, and God willing it'll stay that way and other places will improve. As for the world, it never has "guaranteed" anything regarding easy circumstances and it never will. The joy of this day was a gift for which we are deeply grateful.
We continue to pray and do our best and trust in God's goodness moving forward.
But I have so many impressions and thoughts that I still have to sort through and ponder before writing more about this day. So for now we'll stick to pictures. First of all, I'm so happy to present Mr and Mrs John Paul and Emily Janaro:

Here are John Paul and his four sisters (they have all "grown up" on this blog, but just in case you haven't seen them lately, they are - from the left - Lucia, Teresa, Josefina, and Agnese):

And here is the most recent, up-to-date, and complete picture of the Janaro family:

We haven't had many chances to "dress up" in 2020. My role as "Father of the Groom" was relatively easy. In any case, I rose to the challenge... of putting on a suit!

"Lord, It Is Good For Us To Be Here"

August 6: The Transfiguration.
Here is a selection from a sermon of the great twentieth century Russian Orthodox priest and theologian Father Alexander Schmemann. This exhortation, drawn from the richness of the Russian spiritual tradition, draws on the mystical depth of the Gospel that shines as the 'hidden light' of East and West.
"Jesus knows that in the hour of his ultimate sacrifice, ultimate self-giving, everyone will flee in fear and forsake him. But right now — so that afterwards, when everything is finished, the world would still have some evidence of where He is inviting people to come, what He is offering us as a gift, as life, as the fullness of meaning and joy — now, therefore, hidden from the world and from the people, He reveals to three of his own disciples that glory, that light, that victorious celebration to which man is called from eternity.

"The divine light, permeating the entire world. The divine light, transfiguring man. The divine light in which everything acquires its ultimate and eternal meaning. 'It is good for us to be here,' cried the apostle Peter seeing this light and this glory. And from that time, Christianity, the Church, faith is one continuous, joyful repetition of this 'it is good for us to be here.' But faith is also a plea for the everlasting light, a thirst for this illumination and transfiguration. This light continues to shine, through the darkness and evil, through the drab grayness and dull routine of this world, like a ray of sun piercing through the clouds. It is recognized by the soul, it comforts the heart, it makes us feel alive, and it transfigures us from within.

"'Lord! It is good for us to be here!' If only these words might become ours, if only they might become our soul’s answer to the gift of divine light, if only our prayer might become the prayer for transfiguration, for the victory of light! 'Let your everlasting light shine also upon us sinners!'"