conversion – Communio

reconciling to mother church

A trail is forming of new Catholics in recent times in England. A careful observer will acknowledge that several now former Anglican bishops have reconciled with the Mother Church: the Catholic Church, that is, after a period of discernment that has questioned the increasing secularization of the CofE.

Most Catholics on this side of the pond would not be too aware of these events in the CofE, or even care. But they ought to care. Catholics outside the UK need to be aware of the trends not only in ecclesial polity but also in theological reflection, in particular the reality of Divine Revelation. These recent conversions are good examples of the horizon of faith and reason.

For my money, the point worth exploring further is Ashenden’s point:

“Evangelicals of [Peter] Forster’s generation were always alive to the primacy of the Holy Spirit. They believed in the miraculous conversion of the heart and the rebirth of the soul. But to their dismay, the generation that followed would find progressive identity politics more compelling than repentance and would exchange salvation for social revolution.”

Gavin Ashenden, a recent “convert” himself adroitly explores the phenomenon in the UK in a blog post, “The Conversion of Evangelical Bishops to Rome –A Diagnosis.”

Before the Catholic Church, East and West goes further down the D.I.E (diversity, inclusion and equality) trail, she better come to terms with the radical agenda and consequences of the CofE. It is true, and we have experience here, the CofE is not projected to be serving the Good News and tradition for much longer. The American equivalent, the Episcopal Church, has adopted DIE and is now no more than a social justice group, a club of old elites unconcerned about preaching the liberating word of Jesus Christ and nor is it impacted by the sacramentality of Tradition. When you abandon true, apostolic and one catholicity of faith and reason you become no better than a society of do-gooders.

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

Choose life

The news these past days about bishops being deposed, investigated or admitting to affairs with women is rather distressing. Whether we are in Paraguay, Kansas City, Limburg, or Arundel and Brighton or anywhere else on the globe, or an average Catholic we need to adhere to Christ. To be human is to acknowledge our need for forgiveness; that we are all sinners, that is, redeemed sinners. What do we need to know? How are we to act as Christians?

Precisely because are sinners made in God’s image and likeness and that we receive the sacraments we sinners have a Savior and a Church whose nature is mercy. Too often in parish life or in the broader Church one can recognize the experience that there is too much gossip, faithlessness, nihilism and dysfunctional behavior. No gloating in the sin of another; no putting on aires. But let us pray for the grace of conversion and the grace to sin no more.

Being merciful and just does not mean we do nothing and sit complacent. The Church and all that we are and have are given to us by God Himself. The charitable work we are to do is to educate our hearts and minds and to keep steadfast in building the Body of Christ, the Church.

Lastly, I encourage all of us to go to confession. Examine your own consciences, and not other people’s consciences. we need to do penance. Perhaps even observe the First Friday devotion with sincerity. But we don’t need to be self-righteous and accusatory. The book of Deuteronomy exhorts us to choose life: for the Christian choosing life means to do what Jesus did with the woman at the well. The spiritual life requires our clear attention to the points of sin and grace and to move on the path to a grace-filled life.

Conversion of Saint Paul

With the Church we pray,

O God, who taught the whole world through the preaching of the blessed Apostle Paul, draw us, we pray, nearer to you through the example of him whose conversion we celebrate today, and so make us witnesses to your truth in the world.

As the Mass prayer illustrates for us, Saint Paul, the once persecutor of Christians, is now called by Christ to preach the Good News, to heal people, and to give witness to the Truth of Jesus to the world.

As our first theologian we learn from Saint Paul of the newness generated by the Lord in the heart of each person who places his or her trust in Him.

I am remind today that one of the aims of Pope Benedict in calling for the Year of Faith which Saint Paul indicates with key tools for conversion:

is a summons to an authentic and renewed conversion to the Lord, the one Savior of the world. In the mystery of his death and resurrection, God has revealed in its fullness the Love that saves and calls us to conversion of life through the forgiveness of sins (cf. Acts 5:31). For Saint Paul, this Love ushers us into a new life: “We were buried … with him by baptism into death, so that as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life” (Rom 6:4). Through faith, this new life shapes the whole of human existence according to the radical new reality of the resurrection. To the extent that he freely cooperates, man’s thoughts and affections, mentality and conduct are slowly purified and transformed, on a journey that is never completely finished in this life. “Faith working through love” (Gal 5:6) becomes a new criterion of understanding and action that changes the whole of man’s life (cf. Rom 12:2; Col 3:9-10; Eph 4:20-29; 2 Cor 5:17).

Why Zacchaeus is important for Christians

Do we know about Jesus, or have we met him? If we have met Jesus, where was (is) that?

Do you ever wonder about the small man Zacchaeus, the tax collector, we hear about in the gospel? Is there something important that we ought to hear anew with the biblical narrative of Zacchaeus? What’s the point? Doing lectio divina and working on my spiritual life I have come realize it is not enough to know about Jesus, but like Zacchaeus to want to see the Lord. He wanted to meet Jesus. Little Zacchaeus wanted to meet the Person who answered the needs of his human heart.

The desire to see Jesus of Nazareth moves the heart in a most deep way even to the point of confusing us at times. Even to the point of climbing a tree, a childish behavior, Zacchaeus had to see Jesus pass by.

Obstacles in meeting the Lord are always present: family, friends, church and societal leaders, addictions, sin, a divided heart, ideology, etc. But the obstacles are not the final answer, nor a barrier that is insurmountable. God’s grace is available.

Jesus loved Zacchaeus when virtually no one loved him. Hence, the radical change in life for Zacchaeus; recall that he gave much of his assets away and followed Jesus. We ought to be eager as Zacchaeus was to make amends, to make a conversion of heart (that is, to confess our sin and life differently) and Jesus draws sinners to himself. I think of the Jews who just celebrated on Saturday the feast of Yom Kippur, a day of repentance and the conversion, recognizing the need to draw closer to God and to allow to draw closer to us.

Can we show the same mercy the Lord showed to Zacchaeus to others? In fact, this is the mission we have because of our Baptism and because we profess to be disciples of Him whose gaze upon us by changing us. Do I shield my gaze from the Lord and give it to distractions?

Zacchaeus hears Jesus’s words: TODAY, I must stay with you. In other words, Jesus says to him, and thus to us, can I show you love? Can I give you the words of repentance and new life? Can I walk, build and confess the Lord? The Lord tells us in this narrative that anything, really anything, is possible if you allow Him into your life.

Saint Cyril of Alexandria offers us a keen reflection:

“Zacchaeus was leader of the tax collectors, a man entirely abandoned to greed, whose only goal was the increase of his gains. This was the practice of the tax collectors, although Paul calls it idolatry, possibly as being suitable only for those who have no knowledge of God. Since they shamelessly, openly professed this vice, the Lord very justly joined them with the prostitutes, saying ‘The prostitutes and the tax collectors go before you into the kingdom of God.’ Zacchaeus did not continue to be among them, but he was found worthy of mercy at Christ’s hands. He calls near those who are far away and gives light to those who are in darkness.”

Our Lord teaches us to love and what it means to love; can Jesus be our guest? Is he allowed to enter our house? Can I build with a unified heart a “civilization of love”?

I heard the talk of Christians: why Saint Pelagia once the Harlot is important

At this morning’s Mass we heard from the Prophet Malachi. If you don’t know about this minor prophet, I would spend some time with today’s first reading but also do some research to know more about Malachi. He’s a compelling voice.

Dominican Father Jordan from New Haven’s Priory preached on the life of a favor saint of his, Saint Pelagia once the Harlot. An unknown saint of the Antiochene Church whose life clearly illustrates what Malachi is getting at, and opens up for us in the Mass prayers. The Church puts on our lips these ideas found in the Collect by addressing God the Father: “pour out your mercy upon us,” “pardon what conscience dreads,” and “give what prayer does not dare to ask.”

When the Communion rite is finished, the Prayer after Communion asks God for the grace to be “refreshed and nourished by the Sacrament … so as to be transformed into what we consume.”

Pelagia was dancer and actress known for her beauty. Tradition tells us that her early life was none-too-moral. But her story ends as you would expect: in the arms of the Lord. Let me say up front: Pelagia’s life is a narrative of mercy.

Where the majority of the bishops of the region wouldn’t speak with Pelagia but a bishop known for wisdom and holiness, Saint Nonnus, was willing get out of his comfort zone. Imagine that a bishop would recognize a woman’s natural beauty, and be able to admit it. But I digress. Key for me is what Pelagia said, “I heard the talk of Christians and I want to follow Christ.”

The hagiography reports a letter Pelagia sent to Bishop Nonnus that moved him. She writes,

To Christ’s holy disciple from the devil’s disciple, a sinful woman. I have heard that your God has bowed the heavens and come down to earth, not to save the righteous but sinners. Such was His humility, that He ate with publicans, and He upon Whom the cherubim dare not gaze lived among sinners and spoke with harlots. Therefore, my lord, since you are a true servant of Christ (as I hear from the Christians), do not spurn me who with your help seek to draw near the Savior of the world and to behold His most holy countenance.

[The saint’s biography (at the link above) is taken from The Great Collection of the Lives of the Saints, Volume 2: October, compiled by St. Demetrius of Rostov.]

Pelagia’s story is our story, but in truth, the narrative that all the saints give is our story. Hagiography shows the contours of grace and sin and final redemption (communion) by Christ Jesus and that it is possible to live by what the New Testament (indeed, the whole Bible) reveals. Let me say that Pelagia is a model of recognizing in the witness of others (“heard the talk of Christians”) her own call from the Lord to be His disciple. AND being a student of Jesus’ is our aim, isn’t it? Where Pelagia was in her life so where we might have been, or may end up. Mercy was recognized and given and received and given to others. The text of The Life of St. Pelagia the Harlot is given to monks and nuns to encourage them in their life of conversion. The life of the saints is always formative and it opens a new door in evangelization. If it’s good for the monastics it’s gotta be good for the laity.

The saint’s life was first written by Deacon James who, in his Preface, tells us what we ought to glean from Pelagia’s life:

We should always have in mind the great mercy of our Lord who does not will the death of sinners but rather that all should be converted to repentance and live (1 Tim. 2). So, listen to a wonder that happened in our times. It has seemed good to me, James, to write this to you, holy brothers, so that by hearing or reading it you may gain the greatest possible aid for your souls. For the merciful God, who wills that no one should perish, has given us these days for the forgiveness of our sins, since in the time to come He will judge justly and reward everyone according to his works. Now be silent, and listen to me with all the care of which you are capable because what I have to tell you is very rich in compunction for us all.

Deacon James puts his finger on the matter at hand: to always have in mind the great mercy of God who saves sinners. Does this sound familiar? Pope Francis has emphasized this point of departure. Mercy.

Will I convert someone today by my talk? Will someone recognize me as a Christian by what I say and by what I do???

In Orthodoxy Saint Pelagia is honored on October 8 and in Catholicism she’s liturgically honored on May 4.

The relics are located in the Milan Cathedral and have been there for centuries.

[The Life of Saint Pelagia the Harlot was translated by Sr. Benedicta Ward, S.L.G., “Pelagia, Beauty Riding By” in Harlots of the Desert, a study of repentance in early monastic sources (Cistercian Publications, Inc., Kalamazoo, 1986): Latin Text in PL 73, 663-672).]

Saint Monica

Son, nothing in this world now affords me delight. I do not know what there is now for me to do or why I am still here, all my hopes in this world being now fulfilled.

Saint Monica about the conversion of Augustine

Saint Monica gives hope to mothers (parents and family) that perseverance in prayer and friendship does influence others. Good witness can’t be exchanged for anything else. Monica realized, no doubt, that her son, as bright as he was, had free will and that even God respected that fact. What does that say about praying in singular way, for the conversion of someone for 30+ years? It says that our heart and mind expands and makes room of God’s grace to come in new and unexpected ways.

Saint Monica, pray for us.

Sister Marie-Zita –50 years of Benedictine monastic witness

The 6th century rule of life by Saint Benedict states that a monk (nun) vow stability, obedience and conversatio morum (fidelity to a monastic manner of life). A Benedictines’s “fidelity to a monastic manner of life” frequently spoken of as “conversion” instead of “fidelity,” so as to echo a centuries-long tradition of concept of conversio rather than conversatio. (Scholars have various opinions about the right word conveying what Benedict really meant and what was in the water at the time; conversatio means in our context monastic manner of life.)

Theologically for those who follow the Benedictine charism, conversatio means a person’s ongoing conversion to the Triune God lived in the monastic life which deepens virtue and extroverts grace. Conversatio, conversio, brings to mind that person seeks a return, a moral conversion, an upright moral life, an intense relationship with the Lord. The true conversatio is a recognizable sign of Christian maturity.

A sign of one’s maturity as a Christian is a life of generativity. That is, the adult Christian is going to be a witness to others of that particular union he or she has with the Trinity in a way that fruit is produced. The mature person does not live a life of reductions, but is filled with wonder and awe, and is willing to change even when it is difficult. Moreover, the mature Christian knows that he or she is not defined by the sins of youth, or the sins of the present. Grace in an a mature Christian, therefore, always is extroverted in some way.

The adult Christian comes his or her maturation in fidelity to the gospel, the sacraments, Church teaching and tradition, and mutual obedience by following (listening). The trouble is, most of us are asleep. We are converted when we can say with certitude that we are awake and that in Christ Jesus lives in me.

With outstretched hands the monk or nun sings the Suscipe (Psalm 118:116): Suscipe me, Domine, secundum eloquium tuum et vivam, et non confundas me ab expectatione mea. (Receive (or, sustain) me, O Lord, according to thy word and I shall live, let me not be disappointed in my hope.)

Today, a friend, Benedictine Sister Marie-Zita of the Heart of Jesus celebrated the 50th anniversary of professing her Benedictine vows as a nun of the Benedictines of Jesus Crucified. Her stability is lived at the Monastery of the Glorious Cross, Branford, CT. She gave thanks, we all gave thanks to God for a life of seeking the face of God in community. With hands held up in prayer Sister Zita stated her prayer to be sustained according to the Word.

Mass was offered by Dominican Father Jacob Restrick and the homily preached by Father Damien Schill with concelebrating priests Abbot Caedmon Holmes, OSB, of Portsmouth Abbey, Father David Borino, Father Robert Usenza and Father Gerry Masters. Deacon Sal assisted. About a 100 family and friends were in attendance.

I am grateful for the friendship I share with the nuns of this School of the Lord’s Service; I am elated that God has given Sister Zita the grace to mature in the monastic way of life.

Ut in omnibus glorificetur Deus.

Traditional Latin Mass instrumental in conversions, still

The form of the Mass offered according to the Missal of Blessed John XXIII, the 1962 Missasl (known also as the Extraordinary Form [EF]) is a misunderstood theology, manner of worship and experience. It is this form of the Mass that has been heart of the Church’s prayer and sacramentality for generations, that has produced saints, and that has worshiped the Triune God.

The EF was freed from the shackles of ideology by Pope Benedict XVI in his 2007 motu proprio, Summorum Pontificum. You can read the Pope’s Letter to the Bishops about his motu proprio here. Also of interest is Cardinal William Levada’s Instruction on Summorum Pontificum. These three documents are required reading if you want to know what the Magisterium is teaching.

Let it be said that there are many, even among our clergy and supposedly educated types, who have a profound distrust and one could claim, hatred, for the EF that they act uncharitably toward those who may love the EF. In the ecclesiastical provinces of Hartford, Boston and New York have deacons, priests and bishops who actively work against the laity and clergy who have an affection for the John XXIII’s Missal. Knee-jerk reactionaries is not what you would expect from educated people! Experience tells me that it is not an exaggeration to say that there is still a great prejudice toward the adherents of the EF. I also know of seminarians harassed by seminary formation people and pastors for, and some have been dismissed from seminary formation for wanting to know, serve and pray the 1962 Missal, side-by-side the the Ordinary Form of the Mass.

I have found that attending to the Mass in this form to be beautiful, coherent, faithful, and challenging. The 1962 Missal has expanded my categories of faith and life. I generally attend the Ordinary Form; I do attend the EF regularly for several reasons: the Church in which it is offered is a beautiful place to worship; the Liturgy is often well-done (though not always), I want to know more about this Liturgy as a coherent form of worship, theology and as a way of life; I want to know why people feel the need to discredit and be obstructive of those who have dedicated themselves to this portion of the Church’s liturgical tradition.

The title of this post uses the word “still” because I want to emphasize that the EF can facilitate one’s conversion, even re-version, to Jesus Christ and life in His Church. The Mass of the Ages, as some will call the EF, brought humanity for millennia to Christ, and continues to do so.

Read this article, “Old form of Mass attracts new generation,” citing the experience of a former anti-Catholic and another who was an avowed atheist who are now a practicing Catholic due to grace and the liturgical praxis of the EF.

My purpose in writing on this subject is not to defend the the EF. I hope that the above article will expand your view that conversions to Christ, our own and new ones, is possible through one’s praying of the older form of the Mass. That is, we don’t have to be so rigid to exclude others without good reason. Furthermore, it is my hope that we all act with faith, hope and charity toward others who think a little differently from whatever criteria of the “norm” we happen to utilize. In short, may we be truly Catholic according to the mind of the Church and not our own measure of what it means to be Catholic. My desire is to have a reasonable celebration of both rites of the Mass that’s coherent with what the Church has done, with what the tradition as given to us over the years, and with what the Church hopes to be as a Christian people with eyes set on the Lord. I happen to think we need to continue with vigor the work of the Liturgical Movement and do things in the sacred Liturgy that are truly Catholic and not ape what our Protestant brothers and sisters do. Catholic Liturgy is not Lutheran Liturgy, and we ought to resist blurring the lines.

Saint Benedict, and all Benedictine saints, pray for us.

The unexpected grace of Matushka Magdalena

We need witnesses. This is an idea that I am echoing from the teaching of Paul VI. Who are the witnesses that lead you to a deeper relationship with the Other, with friends, and with oneself?

A friend sent me the story of Matushka Magdalena who faced persecution wreaked by the Khruschev’s regime. What this story gets at, I think, is that nothing is given to us by happenstance. That is, in some strange yet beautiful way we ought to attribute the circumstances of our life to Divine Providence. Nothing is by accident. At least that’s what I think the article “An Amazing Story of Betrayal and Repentance” gets at.

Eastern Christians need our support through prayer and friendship. Let’s pray for the Catholic and Orthodox Churches in lands of the Rus.