Prayer and Fasting

Prayer and fasting, worship and adoration, Scripture and sacraments and sacramentals all provide the weapons of our spiritual warfare. With them we go on the offensive against the Evil One. But the virtues provide our defense armor. As Blessed Pope Paul VI once observed, St. Paul ‘used the armor of a soldier as a symbol for the virtues that can make a Christian invulnerable.’ They are our best defense against his attacks, for they guard our minds and hearts from his deceptions and temptations. A lapse in virtue is in fact a chink in our armor that makes us vulnerable.

Paul Thigpen
Manual for Spiritual Warfare,  p. 57-8

Merton’s birthday

Thomas Merton

Today in 1915 Prades, France, Thomas Merton was born. The famous monk of the Cistercian Order of the Strict Observance (the Trappists), was known in his monastery as Father Louis. The Merton genealogy includes an American mother and a father from New Zealand. Artists, both died early; Merton’s mother died of stomach cancer when he was six years old; 10 years later, his father died of a brain tumor. His early life was wild and seemingly of out of control.

Having met the Lord, Thomas Merton converted to Catholicism in 1938, while he was a student at Columbia University, at Corpus Christi Church on 121st, NYC. Perceiving a call to the contemplative life after the Franciscans rejected him, he entered the Trappist Abbey in Kentucky; Thomas initially gave up his writing career yet it was Abbot Frederic Dunne who recognized his talent noting that it was helpful in bringing others to Christ, he missioned Merton to write.

Thomas Merton once wrote: My Lord God, I have no idea where I am going. I do not see the road ahead of me. I cannot know for certain where it will end. Nor do I really know myself, and the fact that I think I am following your will does not mean that I am actually doing so. But I believe that the desire to please you does in fact please you. And I hope I have that desire in all that I am doing. I hope that I will never do anything apart from that desire. And I know that if I do this you will lead me by the right road, though I may know nothing about it. Therefore I will trust you always though I may seem to be lost and in the shadow of death. I will not fear, for you are ever with me, and you will never leave me to face my perils alone.

Thomas Merton
Thoughts in Solitude, p. 83

Conversion is a process

In the Byzantine Church today the gospel passage is that of Zacchaeus. He is re-purposed by the Lord for something great, something new, something never felt before. The newness is that of Grace transforming the darkness of our lives into some thing that God can use for the up-building of His Kingdom, for the bringing of the Hundredfold. As with Zacchaeus, so with us. Here is a brief meditation:

The process of conversion begins with genuine openness to change: openness to the possibility that just as natural life evolves, so too the spiritual life evolves. Our psychological world is the result of natural growth, events over which we had no control in early childhood, and grace.

Grace is the presence and action of Christ in our lives inviting us to let go of where we are now and to be open to the new values that are born every time we penetrate to a new understanding of the Gospel. Moreover, Jesus calls us to repent not just once; it is an invitation that keeps recurring.

In the liturgy it recurs several times a year, especially during Advent and Lent. It may also come at other times through circumstances: disappointments, personal tragedy, or the bursting into consciousness of some compulsion or secret motive. that we were not aware of.

A crisis in our lives is not a reason to run away; it is the voice of Christ inviting us to accept more of the divine light. More of the divine light means more of what the divine light reveals, which is divine life. And the more divine life we receive, the more we perceive that divine life is pure love.

Awakenings
Thomas Keating, OCSO

John Hardon’s case for canonization

John HardonI never met Father John Hardon, SJ, in person. BUT, I was first introduced to him through one of his magnificent volumes on the catechism. Years later when I was when I was in the Society of Jesus the Jesuits would roundly revile him and cast aspersions upon his character. Sadly, the smoke of Satan harden their hearts and minds.

In 1985-1986, my junior year at Notre Dame High School, we used Fr Hardon’s The Catholic Catechism: A Contemporary Catechism of the Teachings of the Catholic Church. Only years later did I realize we used a superior text. As we called it, the “yellow book,” is indeed a serious and passionate book on the faith giving the Truth.

I only wish that DREs and catechists would take up this text and others of Hardon’s. The state of parish catechesis is an dreadful state: too many parish teachers of religious education/formation don’t know the basics and gladly remain in their ignorance. Local parishes are too weak in the practice of the faith and the spiritual life, and they lack the competence to pass on the faith to others in a beautiful, living manner. I vividly remember the troubles trying to get the catechists (and the priest as well) to think about the content and methods of passing on the Catholic faith to the children and parents. Besides their error they would teach a book and not the truth of the experience of person of Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior and the sacrament of the Church. I would say to myself “If they only would read Fr Hardon’s yellow book.” So, I consider Hardon’s The Catholic Catechism as an exceptional text for the basics that we all need.

Father Hardon’s sainthood cause is under way and God-willing, making good headway. In fact, he carries the title of “Servant of God” with the hope that the work being done will lead to the Church granting him the title of “Venerable Servant of God.” I look forward to the Church’s declaration that Hardon is a beatus and saint in the near future.

I offer an article by Jim Graves that speaks to the life and sanctity of Father Hardon, “Fr. John Hardon May Be on His Way to Canonization.”

You may want to visit the Father John A. Hardon, S.J. Archive and Guild will give you an overview of Father’s human, intellectual and spiritual patrimony.

St. Thomas Aquinas

Second Reading from Office of St. Thomas Aquinas
From a conference by Saint Thomas Aquinas, priest
The Cross exemplifies every virtue

AquinasWhy did the Son of God have to suffer for us? There was a great need, and it can be considered in a twofold way: in the first place, as a remedy for sin, and secondly, as an example of how to act.
It is a remedy, for, in the face of all the evils which we incur on account of our sins, we have found relief through the passion of Christ. Yet, it is no less an example, for the passion of Christ completely suffices to fashion our lives. Whoever wishes to live perfectly should do nothing but disdain what Christ disdained on the cross and desire what he desired, for the cross exemplifies every virtue.
If you seek the example of love: Greater love than this no man has, than to lay down his life for his friends. Such a man was Christ on the cross. And if he gave his life for us, then it should not be difficult to bear whatever hardships arise for his sake.

If you seek patience, you will find no better example than the cross. Great patience occurs in two ways: either when one patiently suffers much, or when one suffers things which one is able to avoid and yet does not avoid. Christ endured much on the cross, and did so patiently, because when he suffered he did not threaten; he was led like a sheep to the slaughter and he did not open his mouth. Therefore Christ’s patience on the cross was great. In patience let us run for the prize set before us, looking upon Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith who, for the joy set before him, bore his cross and despised the shame.

If you seek an example of humility, look upon the crucified one, for God wished to be judged by Pontius Pilate and to die.

If you seek an example of obedience, follow him who became obedient to the Father even unto death. For just as by the disobedience of one man, namely, Adam, many were made sinners, so by the obedience of one man, many were made righteous.

If you seek an example of despising earthly things, follow him who is the King of kings and the Lord of lords, in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. Upon the cross he was stripped, mocked, spat upon, struck, crowned with thorns, and given only vinegar and gall to drink.
Do not be attached, therefore, to clothing and riches, because they divided my garments among themselves. Nor to honours, for he experienced harsh words and scourgings. Nor to greatness of rank, for weaving a crown of thorns they placed it on my head. Nor to anything delightful, for in my thirst they gave me vinegar to drink.

Blessed Martyrs of Pratulin

Pratulin_martyrs_in_1874The Byzantine Catholic Church liturgically recalls Blessed Martyrs of Pratulin: men and boys killed on this date in 1874 defending the Byzantine Catholic Church in Russia.  The martyrdom took place when the Tsar destroyed the last Greek Catholic eparchy in the empire, Chelm, in 1873 – 1875.

More can be read here on the Servants of God Wincenty Lewoniuk and 12 Companions.

Opus Dei’s new prelate

Fernando OcárizToday, Monsignor Fernando Ocáriz was elected the new prelate of Opus Dei and his election was confirmed by Pope Francis. He is the third successor of St Josemaria Escriva.
Monsignor Fernando Ocáriz succeeds Bishop Javier Echevarria who died on December 12, 2016. Until now, Ocáriz has been Auxiliary Vicar of Opus Dei. The youngest of 8 children he was born in Paris on October 27, 1944, to a Spanish family exiled in France due to the Civil War.
Monsignor Ocáriz earned academic degrees in Physical Sciences (1966), Theology (1969) with a doctorate in Theology from the University of Navarre in 1971, the year he was ordained a priest. Moreover, Ocáriz has served the Church as a consultor for the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (since 1986), the Congregation for the Clergy (since 2003) and the Pontifical Council for Promoting the New Evangelization (since 2011). He has been a member of the Pontifical Theological Academy since 1989. a fuller biography of Monsignor can be read here.
 
An interesting note, several of the significant religious order and other ecclesial movements have new leadership.
 
God bless Monsignor Ocáriz.