A return to our Catholic inheritance through the Liturgy

We can’t escape the fact that the paradigms of modern society are suffocating the intellect, the heart and the souls of  men and women. What has efficacy for salvation? What conveys grace most authentically? It would be, I have come to believe, is the traditional form of the sacred Liturgy, either the older form of the Roman Rite or the Liturgies of the Eastern Churches (that of the liturgical families of Greece, Armenia, Syria and Egypt). There is Someone and Something that is transmitted the traditional forms of the Liturgy absent, minimized and moralized in the reformed rites of the 1960’s. While there are some good things that came about in some of the liturgical reforms, but there is a mystagogical diminishment therein. In fact, you could argue there has been a significant loss of shared transcendence available to the most humble of people. The Christian mystery, therefore, is highly reduced sense of the sign and symbol of Catholic worship of the Triune God.

In a First Things article, German philosopher Martin Mosebach publishes his thinking on this subject in “Return to Form: A Call for the Restoration of the Roman Rite” (April 2017). Pay close attention to Mosebach’s argument; it is a needed call to renew the Covenant and mark a path of redemption.

As Charity lived in Michael Novak

The funeral rites were prayed last week for theologian Michael Novak in Washington, DC. The Oratorian Fathers in the District offered and preached the Mass. May God give Michael eternal light, happiness and peace!

It is said the Novak was one of the finest Catholic theologians of the USA, indeed for the Church. A man of great intellect AND charity. This fact comes out in a beautiful homily preached by Father Derek Cross, Orat., giving us a wonderful picture of how grace moved man. I urge your reading the homily.

In part,

More and more, as he grew older, Michael gravitated to the theme of caritas. In the Free Society Seminar at Bratislava, he developed a contemporary version of St Augustine’s City of God called Caritapolis. Later, he included a chapter on Caritapolis in The Universal Hunger for Liberty. He introduced the song “Ubi Caritas et Amor” to the daily Masses of the Free Society Seminar. It was his only musical request for today’s Mass, but he asked that it be sung twice. “Little children, love one another,” was said to be the aged Apostle John’s single and constant homily: a simple and profound wisdom that Michael made his own. To those who came to bid farewell before he died, he said repeatedly, “God loves you and you must love one another, that is all that matters.”

 

Lent is a time for change

The Great Fast is a time for change. We try to spend more time focused on how to please God and others. When things take us away from God, we can sin. We need to confess our sins to God and change the things that lead us to sin. This is called “repentance.”

In the Liturgy we pray “that the rest of our lives may be spent in peace and repentance.” We do that by learning more about the ways of God and then putting them into practice in our lives. 

When we think about God’s Commandments we are on the first step to repentance. When we were baptized the priest asked us to renounce Satan and his sinful ways. We promised to serve Christ the Son of God in faith and in truth. When we forget these promises, we sin. But the Lord never forgets His promise to us: “I am with you always, even to the end of the world.”

If we have fallen into sin we can repent and God will raise us up because He is always with us.

QUICK FACTS &THOUGHTS:

• In the Ten Commandments which God gave through Moses the first three concern life with God. Find them in your Bible or prayerbook.
• Do you honor God by praying to Him every day? By not using His name as a swear word? By sharing in the Liturgy every Sunday?
• The rest of the Commandments teach us to respect others. What are these Commandments? • How do you treat your parents? Are you violent with others? Do you take what belongs to others? Do you envy them for what they have?
• In the New Commandment which God gave through Christ we are called to love one another as God loves us. What do you do to show that you love God? That you love others?
• Prepare to go to Confession by loving God and others more during the Great Fast.

(Living with Christ Great Lent at Home)

Benedictine monk preserves Christian history

The word “rescue” doesn’t always connect in people’s monks with the life and work of a Benedictine monk, but when you read a recent article in The Atlantic, you will have a new appreciation of the connection. It is a fact that Father Columba Stewart, monk of St. John’s Abbey (Collegeville, MN) spends a great deal of time rescuing some of the world’s precious manuscripts from possible human destruction –think of ISIS– and natural decay in a project sponsored by Saint John’s Abbey and University —Hill Museum & Manuscript Library (HMML). The HMML project puts on microfilm and in digital format manuscripts the world has a rarely seen.

This is human project with Divine blessing; a true ecumenical and inter-faith project that reaches into the deep for the sake of something greater: Truth. What else could you expect a monk to do as a fruit of his contemplation? This, for me, is crucial consequence of the Incarnation of the Lord.

Orthodox ordain women deacons

The Orthodox Church of Alexandria (Egypt and all of Africa) ordained a few women to the diaconate. His Beatitude Theodoros II, Pope and Patriarch of Alexandria and All Africa, did the ordination on February 17, 2017 in the  Democratic Republic of Congo.

In a slight contrast, The Church of Greece officially “brought back” the female diaconate in 2004, though one Metropolitan had ordained a nun in 1986.

In this picture you see the women being tonsured a reader, which happens outside the altar (iconostasis) leading to being ordained deaconesses. A news brief is here.

Theologically in the Orthodox Church, ordination is not an ontological change. The Roman Church holds to a theology that says at priestly ordination the soul is changed ontologically. There is a hot debate in Roman Church about what happens to the man when ordained to the Order of Deacon (is there a change at the level of the soul?). That change happens when one receives the Mysteries of Initiation (scraments): baptism, chrismation Eucharist —one becomes a “new creation” in Jesus Christ. It may be more accurate to say that Pope Theodoros II consecrated but not ordained the women. In any event, this gesture is very significant and forward thinking and right.

Continuing in the ancient tradition Ordination, rather, is the setting apart for a specific task, for example as a reader, sub-deacon, deacon, priest, or bishop. Hence, the diakonia is lived according to rank: servant, elder, overseer. These women are being set aside for a specific task within the Alexandrian Church of Alexandria, a task which appropriately belongs to the order of deacons –the women were blessed into a minor order (cheirothesia). Yet, the exact nature of their diaconal ministry is unclear except to say they will be working for the mission of the Church. Also, absent from view is the liturgical text and rubrics used by the Alexandrian Pope. Some of the markers of this ordination are the towels and washing of the bishop’s hands, which are clearly pictured.

There is a Pan-Orthodox document (Consultation on Rhodes, 1988) stating that the church had, indeed, ordained females to the diaconate and recognized that, in some places, it had never fallen out of practice.

The Orthodox Church names women who fulfiled the ministry in the Order of Deacon and are saints: St Tatiana (January 12), St Olympias (July 25), and St Foebe (September 3).

Nichols re-consecrated England and Wales to the Mother of God

Nichols crowns the Blessed Virgin Mary

His Eminence, Vincent Cardinal Nichols re-consecrated England and Wales to the Immaculate Heart of Mary at Westminster Cathedral. Today’s Marian consecration renews the original offering made by Cardinal Bernard Griffin on July 16, 1948.

The prayer, in part, read,

“We consecrate ourselves forever to you and to your Immaculate Heart, Our Mother and Queen: that your love and patronage may hasten the triumph of the Kingdom of God and that all nations, at peace with one another and with God, may proclaim you blessed and with you may raise their voices to sing the everlasting Magnificat of glory, love and gratitude to the Heart of Jesus, where alone they can find truth and peace.”

Sadly, across the country there was a Freemasons ceremony held in Canterbury Cathedral to commemorate the 300th anniversary of Freemasonry in the UK with the establishment of the first Grand Lodge in London. Permission was given by Archbishop Justin Welby. The ceremony was granted following the Freemasons gave Welby a $300k gift. The Dean of Canterbury Cathedral, the Very Rev. Robert Willis, presided at the Masonic service. Prince Edward, the Duke of Kent who is the Grand Master of the Freemasons was in attendance.

The truth of the matter is that freemasonry is irreconcilable with Catholicism, that is, Christians in general. The Church has consistently stated that a Catholic cannot belong to Masonry because membership in the organization because contradicts sacred Scripture and it worships man, not the Triune God. No counterfeit Christians are allowed. If the teaching Scripture and theology is true for Catholics it is true for all Christians. As one person said, “Our poor Church reeks of the stench of Satan brought into us by these evil lovers of Satan.” What Welby allowed is clearly wrong.

Why mention this heinous act in the context of such a beautiful gesture of oblation? The Canterbury Cathedral was the Mother-Church of All England from 597 until the death of Cardinal Reginald Pole, in 1558, the last Catholic Archbishop. Canterbury was known as the heart of the Catholic Church in England, a true shrine of Christianity because it housed the shrine of St Thomas Becket (+1170) and other saints, and the home of the now dissolved Abbey of St Augustine.

In a homily Nichols said:

“Devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary is a way for us to say ‘yes’ too, ‘yes’ to an attitude of heart that accords with Our Lady’s, and so opens up pathways, fresh and sure, towards Christ. This is why today we consecrate ourselves, our entire lives, our country to the Immaculate Heart of Mary, so we can always be saying ‘Yes’ to the Lord, with all our heart with all our will, from the centre of our being. Only Mary can teach us how to do this. 

To cultivate such an attitude of heart is, to put it mildly, the work of a lifetime. We need practical support along the way. And that is where another aspect of the message of Fatima can be so helpful. The recitation of the Rosary… I learned to pray the Rosary as a child at home. As a family we prayed the Rosary together. I can still see the pattern of the chairs at which we were kneeling. Concentrating on the prayer was not always easy but we were trying. That’s what counts. How much I wished that every family finds time to pray together. What a difference that would make! And this prayer is needed… ‘The heart open to God… is stronger than guns and weapons of every kind.’ So wrote the future Pope Benedict. They are words that we do well to make our own as, this year, a second century of the story of Fatima begins.

Our Lady, Queen of Peace, pray for us; Our Lady of Fatima, pray for us.” Amen!

Saint’s granddaughter writes: Dorothy Day in a new perspective

kate hennessyKate Hennessy has written about her grandmother, the Servant of God Dorothy Day in a new memoir, Dorothy Day: The World Will Be Saved by Beauty: An Intimate Portrait of My Grandmother.

A look at Kate Hennessy’s book can be read here. You can also listen to the interview in the aforementioned link.

From the article:

From the Is Day a saint then in the final analysis?

“It’s complicated,” Hennessy says. “She is foremost my grandmother, that’s the most important relationship for me. The process for canonization is very much a church process and the church needs to do what it needs to do and I hope it’s not going to become bogged down in proceduralism or conflict.” Hennessy said.

Then she quickly adds, “I absolutely believe she’s a saint, aside from the canonization. Just the way she leads us to change our perception of ourselves and the world around us, I think is so full of grace.”

Me, too. I hope that the sainthood study process does not stall. May the Lord be blessed with Dorothy’s beatification!

Study theology (anyway)

A friend brought my attention to an essay by pulling out this quote:

A good theologian…’has to be a historian, a philosopher, a linguist, a skillful interpreter of texts both ancient and modern, and probably many other things besides.’ In many ways, a course in theology is an ideal synthesis of all other liberal arts: …as Wood terms it, ‘Queen of the Humanities.’ …the absence of theology in our universities is an unfortunate example of blindness—willful or no—to the fact that engagement with the past requires more than mere objective or comparative analysis. It requires a willingness to look outside our own perspectives in order engage with the great questions—and questioners—of history on their own terms.