R. Thomas Richard's Blog, page 17

Church as Babysitter, in a Culture of Death

It has been said that freedom is the ability to choose among goods.  The Catechism points out that a choice for evil is an abuse of freedom, and leads instead to bondage.

Catechism 1733 The more one does what is good, the freer one becomes. There is no true freedom except in the service of what is good and just. The choice to disobey and do evil is an abuse of freedom and leads to “the slavery of sin.”

With this understanding, it is clear that America – for whom freedom is an important and valued word – is loosing freedom with each passing generation.  Evil has replaced good in American life in countless ways, and the examples continue to multiply.  America has earned a shameful subtitle: the culture of death.

Many Catholics in America can no longer recognize true good, and instead are saturated and drowning in the disvalues of the secular carnal culture.  The New Evangelization was advanced first to address the real need for catechesis and formation among us, so that secondly we can “be Church” and work to evangelize the world.  The very identity of the Church is linked essentially to evangelization, as Paul VI said so clearly: she exists to evangelize.  But has she been faithful to this vocation – this mission given her by Christ?

When the Church neglects her mission, and instead becomes self-preoccupied, what has she become?  Pope Francis, a few days ago, spoke of this anomaly succinctly and poignantly.  To the Argentine Bishops he said,

The typical illness of the shut-in Church is self-reference; to look at herself, to be bent over herself like the woman in the Gospel. It is a kind of narcissism that leads us to spiritual worldliness and to sophisticated clericalism, and then it impedes our experiencing ‘the sweet and comforting joy of evangelizing’.

In a recent homily at the Vatican’s Santa Marta residence, he said,

When we announce the coming of Jesus and give testimony to him with our lives and words, the Church becomes a mother who nurtures her children.  But when we don’t, the Church becomes a babysitter whose job it is to send children to sleep, rather than a mother.

What piercing analogies: the Church as a narcissist closed upon herself, or as a babysitter sending the children to sleep!  Such analogies seem painfully appropriate to many of our self-absorbed and impoverished parishes, devoted ever to maintenance while blind to mission, desensitized to the essentials of an authentic living faith.

The Church in America needs to be awakened to the goods that in freedom deserve to be chosen!  Many of us have become numb to all the evils that ought to stir us to the mission!  The culture of death no longer horrifies us, yet all the while it continues to permeate and deaden us, old and young.  The communion of prayer escapes us, so busy with trivia have we become.  The grace of the sacraments flows through our fingers, so poorly disposed are we as we approach and receive them.  We have become impoverished, in a poverty that is no beatitude.  Where, then, is our freedom in Christ?  It waits for us in Him, while the prison door of slavery threatens to close behind us.  Where then is “Holy Mother Church”?  Blessed Mother Mary, pray for us!

On Knowing Him: On Koinonia with Christ

There are different ways of knowing a person, indeed of knowing Christ.  In the Second Reading of the Mass for Sunday March 17, 2013, Paul writes in Phil 3:8b-11:

For his sake I have accepted the loss of all things

and I consider them so much rubbish,

that I may gain Christ and be found in him,

not having any righteousness of my own based on the law

but that which comes through faith in Christ,

the righteousness from God, depending on faith to know him

and the power of his resurrection and the sharing of his sufferings

by being conformed to his death,

if somehow I may attain the resurrection from the dead.

An important part of this passage – one that spoke to me in the morning reading today – is Paul’s affirmation of the supremely valuable and supernatural relationship with Christ that he possessed and treasured in his Christian life.  These portions of the passage continue to speak:

… that I may gain Christ and be found in him,

… through faith in Christ,

the righteousness from God,

depending on faith to know him and the power of his resurrection

and the sharing of his sufferings by being conformed to his death….

To know Christ, a knowing so dear to Paul, is a process not instantaneous, and not cheap.  To come to know Him is free, universally offered, indeed our common vocation.  Yet His Gospel is not cheap, and one who would follow Him finds a cross waiting to be carried on the journey, as well as the promise of eternal life.  To come to know anyone is a process, and three stages with distinctions can be identified:

to know of a person
to know about a person
to know the person.

To know of a person is merely to accept as fact or belief that he exists.  “You know our new Pope?”  “Yes, of course – Pope Francis.”  I have never even met in person or for that matter seen, this man – yet I “know” him in this sense:  I know of him.  This kind of knowing is not irrelevant to the right hearing of this passage of Scripture, because it is possible for persons – believers – Catholics – to know little more concerning Jesus and His saving Gospel than of Him and of His love for them.  It is possible for a Catholic to know only of Him, and to know very little about Him – and not to have the precious koinonia, personal communion, with Christ that Paul found.  Such a Catholic has found very little of the supernatural treasure that impelled Paul through his life of martyrdom to eternity in beatitude with Christ.

To know about a person implies possessing or accepting some factual information concerning him.  “You know our current President?”  “Yes – President Obama – I’ve heard some of his speeches, and listened to several commentators talk about him.  He seems to be an intelligent man, really concerned for the people.”  Or – “He seems to be a typical politician.  I don’t trust him.”  Some know much about him, some know little about him, but such external information is, after all, external.  External facts could be evidence of who a man is, but not necessarily.  The Pharisees were good on the outside, but Jesus saw within where goodness or evil reside.

Is it enough to know much about Jesus?  To know only about Jesus can be the beginning of what we need, but unless that beginning is headed toward authentic κοινωνία (koinonia) – true communion, fellowship, sharing as persons in real relationship – then the knowledge is as sterile as numbers, as data, as things.  Without knowing Him, as Paul came to know Him, knowing about Him is merely information and not formation – merely instruction and not discipleship – lifeless words falling far short of the living Word who calls us into Him.

Knowing about can be the whole goal of catechesis for children or for adults, or of RCIA, or of a Returning Catholics program or a Marriage Preparation program.  Knowing about Jesus and His Gospel is inadequate.  Knowing about the Catholic Church – her dogmas and doctrines, her sacraments, her structure and history, her moral teachings – all these that flow from her heart – all these are in themselves inadequate if they do not reveal her heart and extend her love to be received in sacred relationship.

Paul came to know him and the power of his resurrection, and the sharing of his sufferings by being conformed to his death.  Paul came to know Him and His saving Gospel.  Paul first knew only of Him, even though wrongly, but then he met Him.  Paul encountered the risen Jesus, and Jesus called him, touched his heart, illuminated his mind with truth.  There began Paul’s knowing Him – and thus began his transformed life.

Catechesis in the Catholic Church

The Catholic Church has many kinds of teaching and formation programs: religious education for children, adult programs of Bible Study, Catechism Studies, RCIA, and so on.  The thing taught depends very much on the teachers – their philosophy of education, their knowledge, their wisdom, their faith, their gifts and more.  There is a radical difference, whatever the program and whoever the teacher, between a program intending to teach facts and one devoted to communicating Christ.  John Paul II wrote of the aim and purpose of catechesis:

…It is therefore to reveal in the Person of Christ the whole of God’s eternal design reaching fulfillment in that Person. It is to seek to understand the meaning of Christ’s actions and words and of the signs worked by Him, for they simultaneously hide and reveal His mystery. Accordingly, the definitive aim of catechesis is to put people not only in touch but in communion, in intimacy, with Jesus Christ: only He can lead us to the love of the Father in the Spirit and make us share in the life of the Holy Trinity. (1)

What is the purpose of an adult Bible Study, for example, in a local parish?  Is it to produce greater knowledge of the books and authors of Scripture, their structure, dates of composition, literary style and cultural setting?  Is it to make amateur Scripture scholars?  Or is it to meet Christ the Word in the words?  Is it to discover Him therein, to hear His voice in the events and narratives and teachings?  Is it not to grow in faith, and come into a share – a participation – koinonia - in the very life of God in Christ?  So also with every program of teaching in the church!  So also with every parish activity, event, presentation and work.

Indeed not only all teaching but all initiatives in the parish ought to be so directed and intended!  John Paul II wrote, “First of all, I have no hesitation in saying that all pastoral initiatives must be set in relation to holiness.” (2)  If we would grade and prioritize all our parish activities according to their immediate application to the call to holiness, I suspect many of our activities would be found unnecessary or even counter-productive, and much of what is essential would be found lacking!

What do we need, really need?  What is the “one thing necessary”?  Must we ask such a thing, even now, today, as Catholics among Catholics?  Have we become so desensitized that we do not know immediately what is lacking in the Church and in our own hearts and minds?  Has the stoney ground so filled our hearts that the seeds cannot become rooted?  Have the thorns of the world so entangled our lives that His Word remains choked?  Is there no space or time or silence in our hearts for His Truth to find room, and grow in us?  Do we seek and ask and knock?  Do we die that He may live in us?  Do we believe, and live?  Do we have His life within us?  Will we even now repent and believe the Good News?

(1) Catechesi Tradendae #5, John Paul II

(2) Novo Millennio Ineunte #30, John Paul II

Watching America Die Before Our Eyes

Is this a nightmare?  If I’m awake, what country and planet am I on?  It seems that here (wherever this is) adults believe that children and teens can decide whichever sexual identity they want.  Teenage boys can decide they are girls and thus free to use the girls locker room and bathrooms – etc.  Such is the “wisdom” of The Massachusetts Department of Education.

BOSTON (AP, 2/15/2013)  The Massachusetts Department of Education on Friday issued directives for handling transgender students, including allowing them to use the bathrooms or play on the sports teams that correspond to the gender with which they identify.

The guidance was issued at the request of state board of education to help schools follow the state’s 2011 anti-discrimination law protecting transgender people.

…….

The document said whether a student identifies as a boy or girl is up to the student or, in the case of younger students, the parents.

In all cases, ‘‘the student may access the restroom, locker room, and changing facility that corresponds to the student’s gender identity,’’ it said.

The guidance said some students may feel uncomfortable sharing those facilities with a transgender student but this ‘‘discomfort is not a reason to deny access to the transgender student.’’ It urges administrators to resolve issues on a case-by-case basis, and recommends sufficient sex-neutral restrooms and changing areas.

The guidance also addresses what to do if other students consistently and intentionally refuse to refer to a transgendered student by the name or sex they identify as: ‘‘It should not be tolerated and can be grounds for student discipline.’’

……

Scott said disciplining students who won’t acknowledge a student’s gender identity is appropriate because it amounts to bullying. He said the directives simply aim to create a safe learning place for a group that’s statistically far more likely to be harassed.

‘‘The reality is that it’s about creating an inclusive environment for all students to learn,’’ he said.

“The reality is,” this is NOT REALITY!  The human body – designed and given by God – determines one’s sexual identity.  This culture is redefining insanity and calling it “normal.”  The Catechism gives the Catholic understanding of this incredibly simple issue:

2333 Everyone, man and woman, should acknowledge and accept his sexual identity. Physical, moral, and spiritual difference and complementarity are oriented toward the goods of marriage and the flourishing of family life. The harmony of the couple and of society depends in part on the way in which the complementarity, needs, and mutual support between the sexes are lived out.

2393 By creating the human being man and woman, God gives personal dignity equally to the one and the other. Each of them, man and woman, should acknowledge and accept his sexual identity.

Church, wake up!  This culture is drunk while driving, and our Church is sleeping in the backseat.  The Church has an identity given by God – and we are called to more than parish suppers and pious platitudes.  ”The Church exists to evangelize,” as the Church affirms again and again.  Jesus sent the Church to “make disciples.”  Will we become what we exist to be, will we do what He made us to do – will we become the voice and the witness of truth and life in this dark culture of death?  When?  The example above of cultural insanity is merely one in a cascade of edicts, laws and policies meant to overturn all common sense in favor of this very dangerous progressive ideology.

Pope Benedict XVI wrote recently and again our call to evangelization:

There is no action more beneficial – and therefore more charitable – towards one’s neighbor than to break the bread of the word of God, to share with him the Good News of the Gospel, to introduce him to a relationship with God: evangelization is the highest and the most integral promotion of the human person. As the Servant of God Pope Paul VI wrote in the Encyclical Populorum Progressio, the proclamation of Christ is the first and principal contributor to development (cf. n. 16). It is the primordial truth of the love of God for us, lived and proclaimed, that opens our lives to receive this love and makes possible the integral development of humanity and of every man.

Essentially, everything proceeds from Love and tends towards Love. God’s gratuitous love is made known to us through the proclamation of the Gospel. If we welcome it with faith, we receive the first and indispensable contact with the Divine, capable of making us “fall in love with Love”, and then we dwell within this Love, we grow in it and we joyfully communicate it to others.

Author George Weigel in a recent presentation(1) said this:

The Church of simple devotional piety will not withstand a Christophobic society. It takes a new way of being Catholic.  Institutional maintenance doesn’t cut it anymore.  The Church must understand herself as a platform of missionary culture.  Everyone is baptized into a missionary culture.

Weigel challenged the audience, The Miscellany reported, “to learn all they can about their Catholic faith and to show the courage to be Catholic in the public square.”

We need a deep and authentic renewal in the Church – a return to faith, living faith, dynamic and courageous faith in the holy Truth of God.  Our culture is bent on defining their own truth – convenient truths, accommodating truths, inclusive truths, immoral and untrue “truths.”  The Church must know, believe, live and proclaim the one saving Truth we have been entrusted with by our Lord.  Catholics – be the man or the woman God created and intended you to be!  Pray, ask God what He would have you stop doing, and reject it for the sake of God.  Pray, ask God what He would have you do, and do it with a full and trusting heart.

1.  The Catholic Miscellany, 2/21/2013, p. 15

Losing One’s Rootedness – or Not

This tree did not abandon it’s roots.  This tree did not grow apart from the ground by intent or neglect – the ground was washed away under it.  The result, however, is the same: death.  The tree must remain rooted in the ground to live!  The tree must be anchored in the source of its life, or it will surely die.

Human persons can do the insane: we can abandon our roots; we can grow apart from the ground of our very being by neglect or even by intent.  The result is the same, however.  If we do not remain rooted and anchored in the Source of our Life, we will surely die.  ”No,” every prudent man or woman would say, “may such insanity never be!”  But when any sober man or woman looks about in these days, they will see what shocks to the core: foolishness is deemed wise; immorality is declared normal and morality is deemed hateful, intolerant and prejudiced to the point of being illegal.  Our culture – our nation – is profoundly, fundamentally confused.  Many have become blind to the light; many have declared light to be our own darkness.   And when men begin to love lies and to hate the truth that judges them, then the wolves are very close, and have come to devour them.

Surely, you would say, there are sober people around!  Surely some see the wolves circling around us and they will sound the alarm!  Surely in the churches is safety!  Surely in church the truth will be proclaimed, the lies exposed, errors condemned and the way to life illuminated for all to see.  Surely in the churches of the West, where men are free, the truth of God will be guarded, and kept safe.  Surely in the Church the truth will be heard.

But something sad has come upon many of the churches of the West – a sleepiness, an apathy, a contentedness with an imagined safe status-quo.  We are not safe!  The danger is near!

In the beginning the Church was given a mission.  The Church was made, in the beginning, missionary in her essence.  She is the continuance of the One who gave Himself that all men might have new life and life in abundance.  She has grown sleepy, however, and her concern has become maintenance and not mission.  She has turned within to guard her own concerns and comforts. The calls to a New Evangelization, heard from the Vatican, disturb her peace.   She has been called to a new Year of Faith, called to be a light of living faith in the growing darkness of militant atheism from some, and a passive practical atheism among many.  The Church has been warned of a dangerous reign of man at the very gates – but such calls to awaken to battle only trouble her schedules, and threaten her budgets.  The warnings remain faint, and from a Vatican very far away.

Jesus left us with a troubling question (one among many!) to ponder as the last days approach us: “When the Son of Man appears, will He find faith upon the earth?”  Will traditional faith in the traditional God, come to us in Jesus Christ, remain in the members of the churches of the last days?  Will His witness persevere on the earth as the arrogant reign of man becomes stronger and decreasingly tolerant of what we now call “traditional values”?  Or – will all ground be washed away from under the tree?  Will her roots be left hanging into nothingness, into where God is not welcomed, into where man is his own god, into where he makes up his own right and wrong, his own sin and salvation, his own beloved lies and fictions?

Another troubling truth from Jesus, recorded in the Gospel of John, while Jesus ministered among us, challenges the heart of men who claim to be religious but who in truth are lovers of the approval of men: “Nevertheless many even of the authorities believed in him, but for fear of the Pharisees they did not confess it, lest they should be put out of the synagogue: for they loved the praise of men more than the praise of God. (Jn 12:42-43)  Can men today do as they did then?  Can religious men today love the approval of other men more than the approval of almighty God?  Can religious men today play to the crowd, become “yes” men to their superiors, value titles and assignments and career advancement more than the quiet assurance of a right conscience seeking Truth and Goodness, in obedience to God?

Let us take a risk, readers.  Let us believe God above the approval or disapproval, the praise or the condemnation, of men.  Let us trust God and His enduring Truth above the very changeable, perishable and faulty opinions of men.  There is good ground near, for us all.  The holy truth of God is near, available, accessible.  Jesus said, “Remain in me!”  In Him we must remain: He is the good ground, no matter the rising tide of godlessness.  It shall not wash away His truth; it shall not leave hanging into nothingness our roots, if we say to them all “No!”  If we remain in Him, He will remain is us, until the very end – and beyond, into eternity.  Praise be to the Lord, forever, brothers and sisters in Christ.

The Sacrament of the Moment

I wrote a book a few years past – The Ordinary Path to Holiness – devoted to presenting and explaining the traditional journey to holiness as lived and experienced by so many of the saints in Catholic salvation history.  The journey is found to be in stages of relationship with God in Christ, or one might say ages of growth and maturity in Christ.  We are to grow in Him, in love-communion with Him, and that process of that supernatural growth is as clearly in stages as is the process of growth in our natural life through stages of childhood, adolescence and finally adulthood.

The process of living, and growing, is given to us one precious day at a time – whether we are talking about the natural human life or the supernatural life as a Christian.  One precious day at a time we can advance toward “spiritual adulthood,” toward maturity in Christ, or we can stagnate – or possibly even regress.  We can see examples in the natural life, troubling to see, of biological adults who still cling to adolescence or even childhood!  Peter-Pan-like, they insist with their attitudes and choices that they just don’t want to grow up!  They want pleasures without consequences, possessions bought on credit, joys with no sufferings, satisfaction and success free of the patient laboring necessary for a fruitful life.  A life of authentic fruitfulness is gained by the investment of righteousness in many days, one moment at a time.

So also the spiritual life.  Growing in blessed communion with God in Christ is an invitation given moment by moment, one moment at a time.  We have a promise, in the spiritual life, that can assure that every moment’s invitation can be received as a saint would receive it: with the fiat of Mary, with the “yes” – “be it done to me” – of the fullness of personal communion with Him.  What gives us such an assurance that allows our ever-ready “yes”?  The promise is given us through St. Paul:

We know that in everything God works for good with those who love him, who are called according to his purpose. (Rom 8:28)

“Everything” is an all-inclusive word!  Every moment of every day, every event of every kind: moments of joy, moments of suffering, moments of gain, moments of loss, moments of our desire, moments of our fear, moments longed-for and moments dreaded – God works for good in everything.  The future lies in darkness and obscurity for us, but God sees plainly the good He is ever working toward!  Every moment offers a “sacrament” of communion with His holy will – He who has allowed whatever He has allowed, in this moment, for good.  There is great peace in this simple realization!

The classic work of spirituality by Fr. Jean-Pierre de Caussade, S.J.,  Abandonment to Divine Providence, expresses this better than I ever could.  Life is a very long train of moments, each a precious encounter with what God has allowed to pass through His hands to our lives: the sacrament of the present moment, offering us again and again a chance to say “yes” to what He has willed for our good in that moment.  How often we live in past moments, or in planning or preparing for future moments, impatiently neglecting the sacrament of this precious present moment!  How long will it take us to learn to trust Him in what He has provided now?  How long, before we can say “yes” as Mary did, not knowing how this would or could work to good, but trusting and holding in our hearts His promise of goodness?  How long before our frequent recitation, “Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven,” be prayed in all earnest sincerity and trust?  How long to really believe Him – to really rest in faith in His works now and His will this moment?

I quote below a portion of de Caussade’s work on Divine Providence:

SECTION IV.—In what Perfection Consists. 6

Perfection consists in doing the will of God, not in understanding His designs. The designs of God, the good pleasure of God, the will of God, the operation of God and the gift of His grace are all one and the same thing in the spiritual life. It is God working in the soul to make it like unto Himself. Perfection is neither more nor less than the faithful co-operation of the soul with this work of God, and is begun, grows, and is consummated in the soul unperceived and in secret.

The science of theology is full of theories and explanations of the wonders of this state in each soul according to its capacity. One may be conversant with all these speculations, speak and write about them admirably, instruct others and guide souls; yet, if these theories are only in the mind, one is, compared with those who, without any knowledge of these theories, receive the meaning of the designs of God and do His holy will, like a sick physician compared to simple people in perfect health.

The designs of God and his divine will accepted by a faithful soul with simplicity produces this divine state in it without its knowledge, just as a medicine taken obediently will produce health, although the sick person neither knows nor wishes to know anything about medicine. As fire gives out heat, and not philosophical discussions about it, nor knowledge of its effects, so the designs of God and His holy will work in the soul for its sanctification, and not speculations of curiosity as to this principle and this state. When one is thirsty one quenches one’s thirst by drinking, not by reading books which treat of this condition. The desire to know does but increase this thirst. Therefore when one thirsts after sanctity, the desire to know about it only drives it further away.

Speculation must be laid aside, and everything arranged by God as regards actions and sufferings must be accepted with simplicity, for those things that happen at each moment by the divine command or permission are always the most holy, the best and the most divine for us.

The unfolding stages of holiness that mark the ordinary path to holiness are filled with moments which, when seen in the divine grace of the moment, present us with concrete examples of God’s providential care, His unwavering love, the holy will that we pray “be done on earth as it is in heaven.”  The unfolding stages of holiness are comprised of increasing union with His will, increasing realization of His love, increasing communion in His mind and heart.  Increasingly, the soul, by the fruits of discipline which commend him, approaches and enters and rests in the blessed peace of the Master – one finally with Him in the will of God.

“Every Day is Newtown in America” – Dcn Ed Peitler

The following is a homily given in the Mass of 1/20/2013, the 2nd Sunday of Ordinary Time, by Dcn Ed Peitler.  I was so moved by the homily that I asked the good Deacon if I could include it in the Blog.  He agreed, and I’m happy to offer it now for you readers:

In many protestant churches, the preacher will post the title and subject of his sermon on one of those roadside boards on the church’s property. We don’t do this in the Catholic Church, probably because, while the homily is important to the Mass, it is not essential to how we worship. But if I had to give a title to my homily this morning it would be this: “Every Day is Newtown in America”. You do realize that I am referring to Newtown CT where last month 19 children, innocent in all respects, and who were simply doing what we expect all children of that age to do – get an education -had their precious lives ended one sad morning in the weeks before Christmas.

I have entitled this homily “Every day is Newtown in America.” Ours is a very interesting country. In fact, it’s not only our country that’s very interesting but human nature itself. You see, we are very adaptable beings. We can become accustomed to almost any condition that life throws at us. We learn to live with it and go on about our business. What am I referring to? Every day in the US 3300 pre-born babies have their lives taken from them through abortion. And the act of abortion is no less violent than what happened to those children in Newtown. And yet most people hardly blink an eye when they hear the statistics about abortion.

For weeks, the media was consumed with the tragedy of Newtown – and rightfully so. But are there any differences between those children killed in Newtown and those still living in their mothers’ wombs? One difference is that some of the children in Newtown were able to run, hide or escape the one who sought to harm them. But children whose development is still taking place inside their mother’s womb have no means of escape, no place to hide. One would think that inside a mother’s womb would be a safe enough environment – as we presume a classroom in a school would be. But sadly, mother’s wombs stopped being a safe place a long time ago.

Other differences? The children in Newtown were older in years but only a few short years removed from having been babies in their mothers’ wombs themselves. Six or seven years earlier those children at Newtown were not unlike the 3300 babies still in their mother’s wombs whose lives are taken away from them daily. In fact, those 1st and 2nd graders attending school in Newtown are closer in age to any preborn baby than they are to most of us here.

The pre-born child is a human person who is simply at an earlier stage of their development. Not yet ready for reading, writing and arithmetic but getting ready for the day when they will take their place in the schoolrooms of America. But for so many of these developing human persons, “Every Day Is Newtown in America.”

Every day, the Newtown experience happens 3300 times in this great land of ours. Not caused by madmen wielding a gun but lives ended by doctors wielding equally as lethal weapons. And it happens so often now, that we barely blink an eye. How frightening to think that we can get used to a Newtown experience happening every single day. In fact, there are even some Catholics who believe that there is nothing morally objectionable about abortion.

Some Catholic politicians openly support taking the lives of children when they are at their most vulnerable time of development. These Catholic politicians believe that they can publicly support abortion and remain a faithful Catholic. They cannot. They try to defend a right to do what – take the life of a defenseless innocent human person? The only right we as Catholics enjoy when it comes to abortion is the right to be outraged. Could you imagine anyone getting up anywhere in America today and defending what happened at Newtown?

For weeks, the media detailed for us the horrible carnage of Newtown. We saw pictures of the traumatized children who survived and were given graphic descriptions of what transpired on that fateful morning in rural Connecticut. And yet, my brothers and sisters, we will never hear descriptions of what actually takes place in abortion clinics all across this country 3300 times every single day of the week. And you also will not hear about the hundreds of thousands of people who will take to the streets of our nation’s capital this week to protest the horror of abortion. No, our country ignores the reality of “Every Day Is Newtown in America.”

This year marks the 40th anniversary of the infamous Roe v Wade decision. The justices of the Supreme Court could not find in our Constitution a right to life. Imagine that! Over these ensuing 40 years, 55 million pre-born have had their lives taken from them. Not by a lone gunman but by a team of professionals who call it healthcare. Given the 19 children whose lives were taken at Newtown, that number of 55 million amounts to almost 3 million Newtowns occurring over these past 40 years.

Think about that: could you imagine the US going through that Newtown experience 3 million times over the past 40 years? And yet, we barely blink an eye when it comes to the issue of abortion. How human beings can adapt. It’s simply amazing.

All of which leads me to today’s scripture reading. God knows exactly the depths of the sin to which all of us can descend. And how easy it is to get used to the sin in our lives and pretend it doesn’t matter. How easy it is to adapt to a life of sinfulness. The scriptures refer to it as a ‘hardness of heart.’

My brothers and sisters, there is an alternative to this specter of “Everyday Is Newtown in America.” God has a different plan for our lives and for our world. God offers us a plan to have a change of heart and turn away from sin. His name is Jesus Christ. He is the one sent by the Father who can save us from our sin and restore us to life. God’s life. He is the one whose name we are called to carry to this Newtown world of ours.

In today’s scripture readings, we learn that Jesus comes to us as the promised lover, as one who will espouse God’s people. In short, he’s the one who intends to marry us by giving his body as an everlasting sacrifice – just as a husband presents his body to his wife as a sign of his love. Isaiah, in our first reading, speaks about the people Israel taken into captivity in Babylon and cut off from their home – Israel. He tells of God’s plan to return them to their rightful home where God will make of them his spouse.

And to fulfill the promise, the Father sends His Son so that God can espouse not just Israel but all mankind. God intends that every person on the face of this earth hear the name of Jesus Christ and take leave of the sin in their lives which divorces them from God. God fully intends that all enter into this spousal union with Him. And the first act of Jesus’ public ministry drives home this point.

Jesus is at a wedding feast with His mother. A feast that celebrates the union of a man and a woman – an occasion for much joy. But something has happened which threatens to ruin it all. The very thing that is used to make the occasion a joyous one, to lift people’s spirits and transcend their everyday existence – the wine – has run dry. Without the wine the wedding is a dud.

Something very central to the celebration of the marriage has gone missing. The wedding feast is now ruined. Mary says to Jesus, “They have no more wine.” Doesn’t that say it all? Isn’t that an adequate description of so many people’s lives today? Isn’t it true that in so many ways our society has ‘run out of wine?’ Don’t those living without God in their lives sense that something at the very core of their lives is missing?

Mary knows the one who came to bring life. Mary turns to the One whose mission it is to make it possible for man to once again live in the spousal relationship that God intends. And Jesus, baptized in the Spirit, moves forward in His mission on earth. Jesus gives a sign that He is the instrument of God who will bring about this spousal union once and for all. Jesus is the one whose sacrifice on the cross will bring about this spousal union. He is the one who does what all husbands are called to do – sacrifice themselves for their spouse – even to the point of giving up their lives if necessary. Jesus fulfills His Father’s will and offers His life in sacrifice – in order to complete the marriage act. And in the resurrection, we see that Jesus’ act of spousal sacrifice brings life –eternal life.

You and I – having been baptized into Christ’s divine life – have found our spouse – He is Jesus. He is the bread and wine become Body and Blood. We have found the One who has loved us into life. And whether you realize it or not, this morning you have come to your wedding feast. For in this Mass, you have come once more to meet your spouse who will offer you his body and blood in a communion of love – the marriage covenant God has made with you through His son Jesus Christ. This is your wedding day when you come to once more meet your spouse. He wants to be everyone’s spouse and it is up to you and me to go out of this place and tell everyone about the One who offers to be their spouse too…who offers them life and not death.

This is what the Lord wants for the entire world – not the world of ‘Everyday is Newtown in America.’ It is Mary, in her last recorded words in Scripture, who tells us the way for us to get the marriage feast back on track – to get the wine flowing once more so that joy and the celebration of the intended marriage can happen – Mary’s words are these: Do whatever He tells you. Christ invites everyone to leave the Babylon of their separation from God – the life of sin – and heed the words of the prophet Isaiah: “As a young man marries a virgin, your Builder shall marry you; and as a bridegroom rejoices in his bride so shall your God rejoice in you.”

The “Munus Regendi” of the Priest and the Vocation of the Laity

The following article is a wonderful exhortation to priests and bishops, written by a soon-to-be-ordained seminarian, on the duty of priests to work for the right and full formation of the laity, that the laity might come into the holiness required in our lay vocation.  It is good for us in the laity to read it, and become reinforced in our sublime calling!  Praise the Lord for priests such as this one soon-to-be!

The “Munus Regendi” of the Priest and the Vocation of the Laity
DECEMBER 11, 2012 BY REV. MR. GAURAV SHROFF 2 COMMENTS

…the priesthood as a whole, but especially in its exercise of the office of governance, is exercised with the full flowering of the vocation of the laity in mind.  The goal of the priesthood is a mature and well-formed laity that embraces its own vocation.

Calling of the Apostles by Domenico Ghirlandaio

Read the entire article at:  The “Munus Regendi” of the Priest and the Vocation of the Laity, at Homiletics and Pastoral Review Magazine website….

Prior to Adult Faith Formation, One Thing Is Necessary

I stress a simple but essential prerequisite (for adult formation) … without which all the formal education in the faith will remain merely on the surface of the person.

In a recent article in HPR, I stressed the need in the Church for adult formation. 1  Of course, the leadership of the Church knows the need very well!  But, the inconvenient truth is that there is widespread neglect in following through on the well-documented magisterial recognition of that need.  The many wonderful documents that teach the rightful priority of adult formation don’t seem to make it down to the pews.  That, however, was the subject of the first article: we need adult formation in the faith!

… for more of this article by Thomas Richard in Homiletic and Pastoral Review, click on:  Prior to Adult Faith Formation, One Thing Is Necessary.

Crying in the Desert for a New Evangelization!

Last February I wrote a blog entry on the New Evangelization, It’s Time to Wake Up!, citing some of the shameful statistics of Church membership: we are hemorrhaging members.  One in ten American adults are former Catholics!  This is staggering, and humiliating, and is a serious indictment: we are failing to live the mission that Jesus sent us to do.  We are shrinking.  We are feeding protestantism with new members, many of them rightfully angry with us for our hypocrisy.  Someone please tell me that somewhere, the New Evangelization is being taken seriously!  That somewhere, we are doing what the Church is sent to do: “make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you.” (Mt 28:19-20)

The many former Catholics who become zealous Protestants prove something important: these people didn’t leave because they were not interested in God and the things of God.  They were not cold-hearted secularists.  They were looking for Christ!  And they could not find Him in His own Church.  How many times I have heard from Protestants who are former Catholics, “I wasn’t being fed.  I wasn’t hearing the Gospel.  I couldn’t find Jesus Christ.”

The Pope is certainly aware of the need!  Thank God that our Pope is aware of the religious ignorance of modern Catholics!  He recently said (to French Bishops in a recent ad limina visit),

… one of the gravest problems of our time is the ignorance of religion on the part of many men and women, also among the Catholic faithful”.

“This is why the new evangelisation, in which the Church is resolutely engaged, … assumes such importance”, the Pope continued. ”One of the most formidable obstacles to our pastoral mission is ignorance of the content of faith. Indeed, this is a dual form of ignorance: the ignorance of Jesus Christ as a person and ignorance of the sublime nature of His teachings, of their universal and permanent value in the search for the meaning of life and happiness. In the new generations this ignorance produces an inability to understand history or to recognize themselves as heirs to this tradition, which has shaped European life, society, art and culture”.

I especially appreciate the Holy Father’s precise and complete observation.  Although he is speaking here to French bishops, the problem is certainly not an exclusively French one.  Our problem – certainly for the modern West – is two-fold; there is “a dual form of ignorance” :

1) we are ignorant of “Christ as a person,” and

2) we are ignorant of “the sublime nature of His teachings.”

This grave, profound problem is not “rocket science”!  It is not as though the Church in the West is incapable of meeting the One who died to meet us!  It is not as though we all need theology degrees to know the beauty of His eternal Truth!  We need only His grace, and our desire!  He gives to all who ask; He is found by all who seek; He opens Himself to all who will knock at the door of His Sacred Heart!

The American bishops also, recently, have acknowledged in specific terms the poverty of our souls.  The new draft of the USCCB on preaching has this:

We also recognize that many Catholics, even those who are devoted to the life of the Church and hunger for a deeper spirituality, seem to be uninformed about the Church’s teaching and are in need of a stronger catechesis. At a time when living an authentic Christian life leads to complex challenges, people need to be nourished all the more by the truth and guidance of their Catholic faith. Aware of this present social context and realizing the need for a deeper evangelization among our Catholic population, with renewed vigor the Church’s preachers must inspire and instruct the faithful in the beauty and truth of Catholic Tradition and practice.

Adult formation is needed, to place Catholic adults in communion with Christ as a Person, and to communicate His teachings as received in His Holy Church.  This is rightly called formation in faith – more than merely education, or training, or exposure to “information” about Christ and His Truth.  Exposure is needed to Jesus Christ, God the Son.  We need to meet Him, to hear Him, to learn from Him – and thus to discover in Him, Truth.  Then it is alive in us, and then we are alive in Him.  We need this.  We need Him.  Not programs, not more episcopal papers, not workbooks and videos.  We need the life of God, and He is so very near.

We need a New Evangelization – we really do – not merely as a project, but as a reality.  The Pope pointed out to us in a recent homily, that the need is dire.  We are languishing in a spiritual desert:

“If today the Church proposes a new Year of Faith and a new evangelisation, it is not to honour an anniversary, but because there is more need of it, even more than there was fifty years ago! … . Recent decades have seen the advance of a spiritual “desertification”. …This, then, is how we can picture the Year of Faith: a pilgrimage in the deserts of today’s world, taking with us only what is necessary: … the Gospel and the faith of the Church, of which the Council documents are a luminous expression, as is the Catechism of the Catholic Church, published twenty years ago.

If we in the West find ourselves in a spiritual desert – a wasteland – then our Church ought to be a place of life in the wilderness.  Our Church ought to be an oasis of His precious living water – in the midst of barren sand, fertile rich soil – in the midst of ignorance of God and Truth, treasures of blessed and holy wisdom.  How is it, that we have come to such poverty as we now have?  And when will we wake up and remember who we are, and what we are called to be?

Counterfeited Catholic Social Justice equals Social Disaster

Many Catholics are knee-jerk Democrats.  Holding tight the Church’s teaching for a “preferential option for the poor,” these loyal Democrats swallow the pills of free abortions, amoral equality in all ways for active homosexuals (I cannot bring myself to use the word “gay” now distorted to its modern meaning), further destruction of marriage and disintegration of families of the poor, the upending of all Catholic notions of subsidiarity, the discarding of the need for personal responsibility among the poor, the strangulation of personal initiative and the massive expansion of a socialized welfare state – and so on – all these poison pills are in the cup with the one that is labeled “social justice” and so many Catholics swallow them all together.

The result is the election, and now the re-election, of the most pro-abortion president in our history.  I remain astounded that this happened.  Even after these weeks since the election, I want to remain in disbelief and denial.  How did it come to this?  If not for the Catholic vote, it would not have happened.  If not for the Catholic silence in the pulpits, I speculate, and if not for the absence of solid Catholic adult formation in the Faith, it would not have happened.  If Catholics were formed in the truth of our responsibilities to society – and if we lived them – Catholics would not have en masse handed all “preferential option for the poor” over to a political party that promised to do it for us, on the cheap: the Democrats.  Of course, nothing true or good is cheap.  There is poison in that easy-in easy-out fast-food party of “social justice,” and the whole country is showing the growing weakness and sickness of heart that leads eventually to death.  There is a fault in the wall, and the wall will fall.  The Church was sent to be a watchman for the city and a light for the nations, and we have become too drunk with the toys and pleasures of secularism to stand our guard.

A major factor in this misguided political philosophy of the Church in America is the widespread misunderstanding of Catholic social teaching, and social justice.  I recently read an excellent article – superbly crafted and written.  It gives a precise and accurate Catholic analysis of the mess we have gotten ourselves into.  Please read it!  The article is in Crisis Magazine on-line:

Catholic Social Teaching: It’s Time to End the Misrepresentations, by Anthony Esolen.

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Here are a few possibly helpful references:

Catholic Social Teaching on Poverty, an Option for the Poor, and the Common Good

The Catechism on Social Justice, #1928-1948

Compendium on the Social Doctrine of the Church