Saint Josephine Bakhita

St JosephineI posted this text last year but I thought it was so good that I’d do it again…. Pope Benedict XVI in his encyclical on Hope, Spes Salvi gave Saint Josephine Bakhita as an oustanding example of one who discovered Christian hope.

3. Yet at this point a question arises: in what does this hope consist which, as hope, is “redemption”? The essence of the answer is given in the phrase from the Letter to the Ephesians quoted above: the Ephesians, before their encounter with Christ, were without hope because they were “without God in the world”. To come to know God—the true God—means to receive hope. We who have always lived with the Christian concept of God, and have grown accustomed to it, have almost ceased to notice that we possess the hope that ensues from a real encounter with this God. The example of a saint of our time can to some degree help us understand what it means to have a real encounter with this God for the first time. I am thinking of the African Josephine Bakhita, canonized by Pope John Paul II. She was born around 1869—she herself did not know the precise date—in Darfur in Sudan. At the age of nine, she was kidnapped by slave-traders, beaten till she bled, and sold five times in the slave-markets of Sudan. Eventually she found herself working as a slave for the mother and the wife of a general, and there she was flogged every day till she bled; as a result of this she bore 144 scars throughout her life. Finally, in 1882, she was bought by an Italian merchant for the Italian consul Callisto Legnani, who returned to Italy as the Mahdists advanced. Here, after the terrifying “masters” who had owned her up to that point, Bakhita came to know a totally different kind of “master”—in Venetian dialect, which she was now learning, she used the name “paron” for the living God, the God of Jesus Christ. Up to that time she had known only masters who despised and maltreated her, or at best considered her a useful slave. Now, however, she heard that there is a “paron” above all masters, the Lord of all lords, and that this Lord is good, goodness in person. She came to know that this Lord even knew her, that he had created her—that he actually loved her. She too was loved, and by none other than the supreme “Paron”, before whom all other masters are themselves no more than lowly servants. She was known and loved and she was awaited. What is more, this master had himself accepted the destiny of being flogged and now he was waiting for her “at the Father’s right hand”. Now she had “hope” —no longer simply the modest hope of finding masters who would be less cruel, but the great hope: “I am definitively loved and whatever happens to me—I am awaited by this Love. And so my life is good.” Through the knowledge of this hope she was “redeemed”, no longer a slave, but a free child of God. She understood what Paul meant when he reminded the Ephesians that previously they were without hope and without God in the world—without hope because without God. Hence, when she was about to be taken back to Sudan, Bakhita refused; she did not wish to be separated again from her “Paron”. On 9 January 1890, she was baptized and confirmed and received her first Holy Communion from the hands of the Patriarch of Venice. On 8 December 1896, in Verona, she took her vows in the Congregation of the Canossian Sisters and from that time onwards, besides her work in the sacristy and in the porter’s lodge at the convent, she made several journeys round Italy in order to promote the missions: the liberation that she had received through her encounter with the God of Jesus Christ, she felt she had to extend, it had to be handed on to others, to the greatest possible number of people. The hope born in her which had “redeemed” her she could not keep to herself; this hope had to reach many, to reach everybody.

The concept of faith-based hope in the New Testament and the early Church

4. We have raised the question: can our encounter with the God who in Christ has shown us his face and opened his heart be for us too not just “informative” but “performative”—that is to say, can it change our lives, so that we know we are redeemed through the hope that it expresses? Before attempting to answer the question, let us return once more to the early Church. It is not difficult to realize that the experience of the African slave-girl Bakhita was also the experience of many in the period of nascent Christianity who were beaten and condemned to slavery……

5. We must add a further point of view. The First Letter to the Corinthians (1:18-31) tells us that many of the early Christians belonged to the lower social strata, and precisely for this reason were open to the experience of new hope, as we saw in the example of Bakhita……,

National Marriage Week

images“National Marriage Week (Feb. 7-14) and World Marriage Sunday/Valentine’s Day (Sunday, Feb. 14) provide an opportunity to celebrate the gift and blessing of marriage and to affirm and support engaged and married couples.”

Bishop Richard Malone
Chairman of the USCCB Committee on Laity, Marriage, Family Life,and Youth

“Marriage, both as a natural institution and as a Christian sacrament, is an irreplaceable good for society and all people,” wrote Bishop Richard J. Malone of Buffalo, New York, in a letter to his brother bishops. “Our Committee remains ever grateful for the ongoing efforts in dioceses and parishes to promote, strengthen and defend marriage, and to accompany married couples in their joys and trials.”

A prayer resource is found here.

Put into the deep

Fishers of MenIn the Ordinary Form of the Mass it is the 5th Sunday through the Year. The Gospel is Luke 5:1-11. In the Byzantine Church it is Cheesefare Sunday (also called forgiveness Sunday). The Byzantine Church prepares its faithful to move slowly into the Lenten observance by three weeks of growing more and more into prayer, fasting and giving alms. While the gospel readings for  the various liturgical rites may differ, it is always important to hear the lesson Jesus offers: follow me, watch what I do: put yourself at the mercy of God the Father and the holy desires of your will be made real which in turn will build God’s Kingdom. Lent is almost here. Will we put into the deep?

“The Church is called out into the deep, delving, as it were, into the profound mysteries of the heavens, into that depth concerning which the Apostle says, ‘O the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God!’ For this reason he says to Peter, ‘Put out into the deep,’ – that is to say, into the depths of reflection upon the divine generation. For what is more profound than what Peter says to the Lord, ‘You are the Christ, the Son of the living God?’” –St. Maximus of Turin:

What is meant by “sustainability” by Christians?

We are snowed-in today. The weather is treacherous with the snow and wind outside that I have been able to think about some other things today. Snow days are good for the soul. The recent years have found me thinking more and more about the reasonableness of faith and ecology. The leadership and advocacy for the proper use of the land, air and sea by Patriarch Bartholomew (Constantinople), Pope Benedict XVI and now Pope Francis have raised some good questions about the coherent Christian response to the needs of our environment. These religious leaders have provided good thinking and ways of proceeding without dipping into the reigning ideologies of the political left. For example, Benedict raised the horizons and limitations between human and environmental ecologies. Fast forward, across my computer screen came a very brief note about sustainability by Abbot Tryphon, an abbot in the Orthodox Church living in the Pacific Northwest. For me, the abbot’s words are the beginning of a much larger conversation I am having about the Christian fact of being anointed priest, prophet and king in the Church at baptism, and with Benedictines (monks, nuns and laity) viz. matters of land use, farming, food, as a manner of knowing the Trinity, faith, oneself, and the journey of the self as imago Dei. Benedictines have much to say because their 1500-plus year experiences in these matters of faith and ecology. How do we engage with the land as disciples of Christ in relationship with others?

Abbot Tryphon….

We are, in essence, called to be priests over creation. Sustainability is the current ‘buzzword’ regarding the need for protecting our environment, and is the word being used by environmentalists, governments, businesses, and many average people, as we all face the challenge of saving our world from climate changes, due to the overproduction depletion of the world’s resources. It has been applied to product sourcing, agricultural practices, and technology. It often implies a type of energy that will not—in the foreseeable future—be used up, as some scientists argued was imminent in the case of fossil fuels. It may mean a type of agriculture that doesn’t tax our soil as is being done at the current and alarming rate. The word sustainability is even being applied to waste treatment and water use. These are only a few of the applications that have made use of the phrase ‘sustainable,’ and even in these noted fields the technologies and practices developed have been amazing and immensely beneficial for our culture, humanity in general, and the natural world.

The use of the word “sustainability” is, for us Orthodox Christians, a positive word in relation to our responsibilities as stewards of all that God has given us. It is also a word that people can relate to. Yet despite the laudable achievements within the sustainability movement, there is a dark underside to the usage of the word and the application of the concept. “Sustainable” often means trying to find a “better” way to continue living as we currently do, and often bears within itself an underlying notion of stasis, or remaining the same. For Orthodox Christians, this is unquestionably dangerous.

Imagine a priest upon his deathbed speaking with his confessor about his parish, saying, “Yes, I leave them exactly as I found them; they don’t regularly commit any more sins than when I got to the parish.” Contrast this possibility with, “By the grace of God, they have grown.” All priests are charged with the responsibility of helping their parishioners grow, for there is in fact no such thing in the spiritual life as stasis. If someone is not growing, struggling, and working out his or her salvation, the seeds of degeneration are already planted.

But if we are not ordained priests, we might wonder how this could have anything to do with us. Yet as Orthodox Christians living in the God-created world, we are all, in the deepest sense, priests over creation. His All-Holiness, the Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew, said: “Endowed… from the beginning with ‘the image of God,’ humanity is called to continuous self-transcendence so that, in responsible synergy with God the Creator, each person might sanctify the entire world, thus becoming a faithful ‘minister’ and ‘steward.’” We are, in essence, called to be priests over creation, for as ministers of this created universe it is our responsibility to cease doing harm, for our final goal is the transfiguration of creation. The ultimate transformation that must take place within ourselves ultimately brings transformation to the entire cosmos.

St Rabanus Maurus Magnentius

St Rabanus Maurus presenting his work to Pope Gregory IVSaint Rabanus Maurus Magnentius (c. 780 – 4 February 856), as a Frankish Benedictine monk, the archbishop of Mainz in Germany and a theologian. In his spare time he authored the encyclopaedia De rerum naturis (On the Nature of Things) and treatises on education, grammar and  the Bible.
Rabanus was born of noble parents in Mainz. He was a professed monk having entered the Benedictine abbey at Fulda. He studied there under Alcuin. His academic career included the responsibility of being the “Praeceptor Germaniae,” or “the teacher of Germany.” That is, Rabanus is considered one of the most prominent teachers and writers of the Carolingian age.
The data of his ecclesiastical career shows that in 801 Rabanus was ordained deacon and in 814 ordained priest. After a series of disagreement and complaints about his work, he faced exile but in 822 was elected abbot of his abbey. In 847, Rabanus  succeeded Otgar as the archbishop of Mainz. He died at Winkel on the Rhine in 856.

Andrea Aziani sainthood cause opened

Andrea AzianiOn February 2, during Mass celebrating the 19th anniversary of the Diocese of Carabayllo, in the city of Lima, Peru, Bishop Lino Panizza, announced the opening of the cause of beatification of Andrea Aziani.
 
Andrea Aziani was a born on January 16, 1953 and a member of the Memores Domini. He met Father Luigi Giussani in 1972, and 15 years later, departed for a mission to Peru where he remained until his death on July 30, 2008.
 
PAZ translated from Tracce; image of Andrea Aziani with Saint John Paul II.

Benedictine Martyrs

OSB MartyrsMonks and nuns are prime candidates in being martyrs for the Catholic Faith. Today, the Benedictine Congregation of St Ottilien (a missionary group of missionary monks) collectively honor those who shed their blood for Christ between the years of 1889 and 1954. Laying down one’s own life by accepting death bears witness to faith in Jesus Christ and His Church.

Many of these monks died in Asia and Africa.

Presentation of the Lord

The liturgical life of the Church is a prism which diffuses the blinding light of revelation into the variegated hues that we can perceive and whose colors gladden the hearts of the faithful. The metrical homily of Mar Jacob of Sarug on the Encounter of the Lord sheds light on why the righteous elder Simeon and the aged Anna the prophetess were chosen to greet the new-born Savior. “It was right too that one ancient in days should bear witness to the Elder Who became a Child at the end of the times.” The aged ones are a sign to us the Pre-eternal God-made-man has come at the end of time. In this context we recall the words of another Syriac father, Mar Isaac of Nineveh, “Life is given to us for repentance: let us not squander it in idle pursuits.”

h/t SMRC

Manuel Nin, OSB named Exarch for the Catholics of the Greek Byzantine

Manuel Nin OSBToday, Pope Francis nominated as the new Apostolic Exarch for the Catholics of the Greek Byzantine Church, Reverend Archimandrite Manuel Nin, OSB. This local church has approximately 6000 faithful. Bishop-elect Nin, 59, has served the Church until now as the Rector of the Pontifical Greek College (Rome) and teacher at Pontifical Atheneum of Sant’Anselmo (Rome).

The new exarch is the titular bishop of Carcabia, a professed monk of the Abbey of Montserrat, and has been a priest for 18 years. He is currently a consultor in the Office of Liturgical Celebrations of the Supreme Pontiff, a member of the Liturgical Commission of the Congregation for the Oriental Churches, and first assistant to the president of the Subiaco-Cassinese Congregation. May God grant Bishop Manuel many years!