Union with God

While I was singing at mass on Sunday, I began thinking about how we are united with God. Some people think of that union as a drop of water falling into an ocean. That image would seem to indicate an obliteration of the individual soul in God. I suppose there are aspects where we are no longer separated from God by our own will and ego. However, I was wondering if perhaps this union is not more like the singing of the congregation. In fact, perhaps Gregorian chant is a good metaphor (and we can only grasp with metaphors, with analogies and the like). Everyone singing in unison, the same melody, different voices and timbres. No one voice stands out, but they all create a beautiful, living, vibrant whole. I think of the new wording of the Nicene Creed which we will recite at mass beginning this Advent where we will speak of Jesus being "consubstantial with the Father." That is, the Son and the Father share one substance, yet they are separate persons. So even in the Trinity, the individual is not obliterated in the divine union.

I don't speak of these things from experience. I've been reading St. Teresa of Avila's Interior Castle, and it is clear to me how far I am from what she is talking about. However, God gives us reason, and he gives us desire, and these can inch us along to greater understanding and deeper experience.

Fr. Sieger Köder

(Sieger Köder, Unexpected-The Closeness of God)

On Holy Saturday I included a painting by Fr. Sieger Köder. I was very taken by that painting.

Here are some places to find out more about Fr. Köder and his art.

Pauline Books has a large selection of posters of his paintings, as well as other media. There you will also find a book by Gemma Simmonds about Fr. Köder's art, Glimpses of the Divine: The Art and Inspiration of Sieger Köder.

Some blog entries about Fr. Köder include sites at Priya and Rev. Nick Helm.

There is an article about Fr. Köder in the November 2010 issue of Catholic Life (article not accessible through this link).

Art can truly help us to meditate on the deep mysteries of our faith, and Fr. Köder's art helps us to do that.

As We Forgive Those Who Trespass Against Us

It is so hard to live the Lord's Prayer.

There is a place near my neighborhood where an off-ramp intersects with another ramp. The ramp I take has a yield sign; the other ramp has the right of way. However, often when I stop to yield for the other car or cars, a car behind me lays on the horn, trying to get me to go. This is how my day starts on my way to work. Fortunately, or unfortunately (depending on the day), this incident is immediately after morning mass. Fortunately, because hopefully I have had an infusion of grace to help me deal with this situation. Unfortunately, if I succumb to the urgent feeling of wanting to indicate to the driver behind me my irritation. This is such a minor thing, and yet it makes me very angry when it happens.

Jesus asked the Father to forgive his executioners for they did not know what they were doing. Jesus tells us to turn the other cheek and to pray for our enemies. Today was the feast of the apostles Philip and James, martyrs. They too, were to forgive their executioners. So I should at least be able to get over being honked at.

And then there is Osama bin Laden. It is truly difficult to pray for such a man to receive mercy from God. His hatred has cost so many lives. However, Jesus was crystal clear. He was not making a suggestion; he was commanding us. We must pray for our enemies, and bin Laden was Public Enemy Number One. This is where grace transcends our natural instincts. Despite our instincts, this forgiveness is for our own good. It just does not feel that way. However, that is why feelings are not our ultimate gauge for determining the rectitude of an action.

Ordination to Transitional Deacon

(Ordination at Cathedral of St. Mary of the Assumption in Trenton, NJ in 2010; picture from http://www.nj.com/mercer/index.ssf/2010/06/five_ordained_into_priesthood.html)

Today is a happy day in our archdiocese. Four men were ordained to the transitional Diaconate by Archbishop Dennis Schnurr for the Archdiocese of Cincinnati: Jon-Paul Bevak from Old St. Mary’s Parish (Cincinnati); Dan Hunt from Old St. Mary’s Parish, Matt Robben from St. Joseph Parish (North Bend); Marc Soellner, St. Andrew Parish (Milford). May God richly bless these men, strengthen them, draw them close to Himself, and fill them with the love of Jesus' Sacred Heart so that they may serve His people faithfully throughout their earthly lives.

Spectacle vs. Sacrament

I caught much of Prince William and Kate Middleton's actual wedding ceremony today. It was a beautiful ceremony, in both its visual beauty and its spiritual beauty. It struck me that the Anglican ceremony has a variety of elements quite similar to a Catholic wedding. The ceremony emphasizes that marriage is intended to be for life. We heard that marriage is intended to be an opportunity for bringing forth children. Furthermore, the ceremony reminds the bride and groom that the purpose of marriage is oriented towards their mutual salvation. Finally, we are told that human marriage reflects the union of Christ and His Church. All of these are critical aspects of what a marriage is.

Unfortunately, these values were utterly lost in the media coverage. All of the emphasis of the coverage was on spectacle. So much spilled ink and blather about "the dress." One would scarcely be aware that there was a religious ceremony involved. This is why the motto for Engaged Encounter is so powerful: "A wedding is for a day. A marriage is for a lifetime. The Nicene Creed calls us to be mindful "of all that is seen and unseen." These are things that William and Kate may very well understand. These are not things, however, that those covering their wedding understand. And unfortunately, they are not things that many couples understand upon entering marriage these days. Those involved in marriage preparation ministry have their work cut out for them.

The Bishop of London gave a beautiful sermon at the wedding. If only the media coverage had picked up on some of his themes. He began by quoting St. Catherine of Siena, whose feast day is today. Then the Bishop said something that no one in the media seemed to find noteworthy, perhaps because it was to them a "dog bites man" story: "As the reality of God has faded from so many lives in the West...." Yes, the sacrament was lost, and only the spectacle seen, like smoke seen from a distance too far to observe the fire itself.

Here is the full text of the Bishop of London's sermon:

"Be who God meant you to be and you will set the world on fire."

So said St Catherine of Siena whose festival day this is. Marriage is intended to be a way in which man and woman help each other to become what God meant each one to be, their deepest and truest selves.

Many people are fearful for the future of today’s world but the message of the celebrations in this country and far beyond its shores is the right one – this is a joyful day! It is good that people in every continent are able to share in these celebrations because this is, as every wedding day should be, a day of hope.

In a sense every wedding is a royal wedding with the bride and groom as king and queen of creation, making a new life together so that life can flow through them into the future.

William and Catherine, you have chosen to be married in the sight of a generous God who so loved the world that he gave himself to us in the person of Jesus Christ.

In the Spirit of this generous God, husband and wife are to give themselves to each other.

The spiritual life grows as love finds its centre beyond ourselves. Faithful and committed relationships offer a door into the mystery of spiritual life in which we discover this: the more we give of self, the richer we become in soul; the more we go beyond ourselves in love, the more we become our true selves and our spiritual beauty is more fully revealed. In marriage we are seeking to bring one another into fuller life.

It is of course very hard to wean ourselves away from self-centredness. People can dream of such a thing but that hope should not be fulfilled without a solemn decision that, whatever the difficulties, we are committed to the way of generous love.

You have both made your decision today – “I will” – and by making this new relationship, you have aligned yourselves with what we believe is the way in which life is spiritually evolving, and which will lead to a creative future for the human race.

We stand looking forward to a century which is full of promise and full of peril. Human beings are confronting the question of how to use wisely the power that has been given to us through the discoveries of the last century. We shall not be converted to the promise of the future by more knowledge, but rather by an increase of loving wisdom and reverence, for life, for the earth and for one another.
Marriage should transform, as husband and wife make one another their work of art. It is possible to transform so long as we do not harbour ambitions to reform our partner. There must be no coercion if the Spirit is to flow; each must give the other space and freedom. Chaucer, the London poet, sums it up in a pithy phrase:

"Whan maistrie [mastery] comth, the God of Love anon,
Beteth his wynges, and farewell, he is gon."

As the reality of God has faded from so many lives in the West, there has been a corresponding inflation of expectations that personal relations alone will supply meaning and happiness in life. This is to load our partner with too great a burden. We are all incomplete: we all need the love which is secure, rather than oppressive. We need mutual forgiveness in order to thrive.

As we move towards our partner in love, following the example of Jesus Christ, the Holy Spirit is quickened within us and can increasingly fill our lives with light. This leads on to a family life which offers the best conditions in which the next generation can receive and exchange those gifts which can overcome fear and division and incubate the coming world of the Spirit, whose fruits are love and joy and peace.

I pray that all of us present and the many millions watching this ceremony and sharing in your joy today will do everything in their power to support and uphold you in your new life. I pray that God will bless you in the way of life you have chosen. That way which is expressed in the prayer that you have composed together in preparation for this day:

God our Father, we thank you for our families; for the love that we share and for the joy of our marriage.
In the busyness of each day keep our eyes fixed on what is real and important in life and help us to be generous with our time and love and energy.
Strengthened by our union help us to serve and comfort those who suffer.
We ask this in the Spirit of Jesus Christ. Amen.

I have to admit, I'm a sucker for a guy who quotes Chaucer in the original Middle English.

The beauty of Catholicism (and in this regard, Anglicanism, too), is that we do not need to choose between spectacle and sacrament. God made us bodily creatures, not incorporeal angels. He made us take in the natural world through the senses, and He makes the supernatural world present to us through the senses as well. That is why sacraments have form and matter, so that we could take in the unseen by way of the seen. That is why we cannot choose one without the other. Spectacle without sacrament is a shell without a nut; sacrament without spectacle is ascending a mountain so high that one suffocates at the summit from lack of oxygen.

This Is Not My Day

Usually when we say "This is not my day" we mean that we are having a bad day. Things are not turning out as we had planned.

However, I have recently tried to say early in my day, "This is not my day" to remind myself that this is God's day, not mine. "This is the day which the LORD has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it" (Psalm 118:24). I should be seeking to fulfill His plans, not mine. The success or failure of my day should be benchmarked against how much my actions conform to His will.

Everything I have is God's, not mine. That includes my time. It is often the distractions and the obstacles that are where we are most closely encountering God in our day. When we appear to be most off course, most off track, it is precisely then that we are often most engaged in doing God's will.

Ironically, it is when I accept the fact that "This is not my day" that my day will be better, not worse.

Catholic Identity

Tonight we watched a documentary film called Barnstorming. It is a wonderful story about two men who fly antique planes and in 1999 set down in a hayfield on a farm in Indiana. They form a friendship with the family who owns the farm, and year after year the pilots return to renew that friendship and spread the love of flight.

One of the interesting aspects of this film to me is the Dirksen family who own the farm. Matt and Paula Dirksen, along with their large family, portray their Catholicism in very quiet but visible ways. I first noticed the crucifix on a bedroom wall. Then there was the sweatshirt of one of the daughters, which read "Seton" (with a cross forming the "T" in the middle of the name). The family said grace at the table, using the common Catholic prayer of "Bless us, oh Lord, and these thy gifts...." There was the size of their family (six or eight children, I didn't get a certain count). And that was it. No more than that. But that was quite a bit. Quite a bit, indeed.

It's the little things that add up to big things.

I remember being at a faculty interview session a number of years ago where a candidate was facilitating an exercise. The exercise was geared to show how race is invisible for some and visible for others, but in this case it revealed something else to me that I never forgot. We were asked to describe ourselves with three words. I was thinking of words like "patient" (I forget the other two adjectives), focusing on descriptors that were pertinent to me and my individuality. However, one of the current faculty members included among his words "Catholic." That descriptor had never occurred to me. He said but a simple word, yet that example of faith and Catholic identity has stuck with me over the years, and I have tried, with varying degrees of success, to live up to his example.

Our Catholic identity is part of our responsibility to bring the Gospel to the world. It helps us to build a community that strengthens each other when challenged by a sometimes very hostile culture. It helps us to give witness to others that our faith permeates every aspect of our lives and is not a mere accessory. The resurrected Christ in His glorified body still bore the marks of the Cross. Those marks caused Thomas to believe. We, who are the Body of Christ, are marked through our baptism and confirmation. Those marks can be a source of faith for others if we just let them.

Easter Sunday

(William Adolphe Bouguereau, The Holy Women at the Tomb, 1893)



But on the first day of the week, at early dawn, they went to the tomb, taking the spices which they had prepared. And they found the stone rolled away from the tomb, but when they went in they did not find the body. While they were perplexed about this, behold, two men stood by them in dazzling apparel; and as they were frightened and bowed their faces to the ground, the men said to them, "Why do you seek the living among the dead? He is not here, but has risen." (Luke 24:1-5)

So he went in to stay with them. When he was at table with them, he took the bread and blessed, and broke it, and gave it to them. And their eyes were opened and they recognized him; and he vanished out of their sight. They said to each other, "Did not our hearts burn within us while he talked to us on the road, while he opened to us the scriptures?" (Luke 24:29-32)

And when he had said this, as they were looking on, he was lifted up, and a cloud took him out of their sight. And while they were gazing into heaven as he went, behold, two men stood by them in white robes, and said, "Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking into heaven? This Jesus, who was taken up from you into heaven, will come in the same way as you saw him go into heaven." (Acts 1:9-11)

So often we are looking for Jesus in all the wrong places. The women went to the tomb looking for a dead man when the One they sought was alive. The two men travelling on the road to Emmaus did not recognize Jesus who was with them on the journey. They only recognized him in the breaking of the bread, in the Eucharist. At the Ascension, the apostles are looking at Jesus leaving them, but He is not really leaving them.


I am reminded of a story that a priest told during a homily about a little boy preparing for his first Communion. This boy knew where to look for Jesus. Another priest was not convinced that the little boy understood enough about the Eucharist to take his first Communion. However, in talking with the priest, the boy pointed to the crucifix in the church and said, "That looks like Jesus but is not Jesus." Then pointing to the tabernacle, the boy said, "That does not look like Jesus but is Jesus." Then, pointing to the priest himself, the boy said, "That does not look like Jesus but is Jesus. Only fatter." The boy understood the crucifix to be only an artistic portrayal of Jesus, the Eucharist to be the Real Presence of Jesus, and the priest when saying mass to be standing in persona Christi.

Echoing Matthew 25:31-46, Mother Teresa said: "I see God in every human being. When I wash the leper's wounds I feel I am nursing the Lord himself. Is it not a beautiful experience?" (Carol Kelly-Gangi, editor, Mother Teresa: Her Essential Wisdom, p. 19). As with the disciples on the road to Emmaus, Jesus is in front of us every day in the people we encounter. We merely need the eyes of the little boy or Mother Teresa to see them and Him.

Jesus is not hiding from us. Yet we seem to look for Him where He isn't and miss Him where He is. May this great Easter season we are embarking upon fill us with the grace we need to seek first the kingdom, and then we will find the King.

Holy Saturday

Tomb by Sieger Köder, found at http://contemplativecottage.com/2010/04/02/holy-saturday/

For us today, Holy Saturday is a time of waiting, of expectation, of longing. For Mary, Mary Magdalene, the Twelve, and Jesus' other disciples, Holy Saturday was when time stood still. They had no expectation, no longing. They had only confusion and grief, disorientation and loss.

However, they also had hope. Their hope was a very different kind than ours. Their hope was that of Abraham's before offering his son, Isaac, as sacrifice. Their hope was that of Job when he had lost everything dear to him. Their hope was Daniel in the lion's den. Their hope was Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego in the furnace. Their hope was the psalmist's in Psalm 22, which begins with "My God, my God, why has thou forsaken me? (1) but ends with "Posterity shall serve him; men shall tell of the Lord to the coming generation, and proclaim his deliverance to a people yet unborn, that he has wrought it" (30-31).


This is the hope that holds out despite the temptation to despair, despite all empirical evidence pointing against hope, because this hope is rooted in trust in God's love for us.


For those of us on this side of the Resurrection, our hope is that of those who have heard the witness of the triumph of Love over Death. The seventeenth-century Carmelite, Brother Lawrence, had a profound epiphany of God's caring for us that led him to a radical trust in that care:


That in the winter, seeing a tree stripped of its leaves, and considering that within a little time the leaves would be renewed, and after that the flowers and fruit would appear, he received a high view of the providence and power of God, which has never since been effaced from his soul. That this view had perfectly set him loose from the world, and kindled in him such a love for God that he could not tell whether it had increased during the more than forty years he had lived since." (The Practice of the Presence of God with Spiritual Maxims, p. 15.)


It is because of the Resurrection that Brother Lawrence could see the return of Spring in terms of God's providence.

Perhaps those who loved Jesus and mourned his death remembered his words as Matthew tells us:

"Therefore I tell you, do not be anxious about your life, what you shall eat or what you shall drink, nor about your body, what you shall put on. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing? Look at the birds of the air: they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they? And which of you by being anxious can add one cubit to his span of life? and why are you anxious about clothing? Consider the lillies of the field, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin; yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which today is alive and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will he not much more clothe you, O men of little faith? Therefore do not be anxious, saying, 'What shall we eat?' or 'What shall we drink?' or 'What shall we wear?' For the Gentiles seek all these things; and your heavenly Father knows that you need them all. But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things shall be yours as well. Therefore, do not be anxious about tomorrow, for tomorrow will be anxious for itself. Let the day's own trouble be sufficient for the day." (Mathew 6:25-34)

Through their hope, those who loved Jesus sought first the kingdom, although many no doubt wondered if that kingdom had been but a beautiful dream, a mirage, an illusion. Yet, they hoped anyway.

Let the day's own trouble be sufficient for the day. Let Holy Saturday be a time when we remember that heart-rending loss. However, let us also dwell in the luxury we have that they did not: we need not be anxious, because we know what tomorrow will bring: Life-giving Love.

Good Friday

(Georges Rouault, Christ on the Cross, 1936)

Since Good Friday was the day I longed for even while I was away from the Church and did not believe in God, it is fitting that I get back to this blog on this most compelling day.

We went to our parish's Good Friday liturgy and veneration of the Cross. My son referred to it as "the strangest mass" he'd ever seen. I told him that was very perceptive. After explaining that it was not a mass, we talked about what had happened and what it meant, and that this liturgy was special because this day is special.

Venerating the Cross has always had a special place in my heart. There is something about that act of humility, of love, that is very physical, very tangible. This whole day is a dramatic reminder that ours is not a religion of the spirit only, but of the body, and that the two are not opposed but enmeshed.

The modern painter, Francis Bacon, was interviewed by David Sylvester, and when discussing Picasso, Bacon spoke of Picasso's "brutality of fact" (David Sylvester, The Brutality of Fact: Interviews with Francis Bacon, p. 182). The Crucifixion is all about the brutality of fact. That is what today is about: the brutality of fact. Sin is a fact that we attempt to rationalize away in the thick fog of ego, therapy, and relativism. Sin is a fact with brutal consequences. A most inconvenient fact, to re-frame Al Gore's famous title.

The late Fr. Richard John Neuhaus takes up a similar theme in his amazing book, Death on a Friday Afternoon: Meditations on the Last Words of Jesus from the Cross:

The gnostic impulse is still very much with us. We draw back from looking long and hard into the heart of darkness; we recoil from the brute facticity of the horror; we are scandalized by the truth that we worship a crucified God. As well we should be. (p. 120)

We see crucifixes every day. They hang in our bedrooms. But we do not truly see them. We do not truly see the dark event that these sanitized versions dimly reflect.

Bacon painted a triptych, Three Studies for a Crucifixion (1962). The right panel appears below:

This figure is so visceral (literally), so repugnant. It captures the emotion of what the Crucifixion actually was, actually is. The reading from Isaiah at today's liturgy points to this revulsion:

He was spurned and avoided by people, a man of suffering, accustomed to infirmity, one of those from whom the people hide their faces, spurned, and we held him in no esteem. (Isaiah 53:3)

As Fr. Neuhaus says in the quotation above, if we understand the Crucifixion, we should be scandalized.

Bacon was inspired by the medieval crucifix of Cimabue (1272-1274):

If you invert the Cimabue painting, you get something of the broad outline of Bacon's figure. The language that Bacon uses to describe Cimabue's portrayal of Christ is significant:

You know the great Cimabue Crucifixion? I always think of that as an image - as a worm crawling down the cross. I did try to make something of the feeling which I've sometimes had from that picture of this image just moving, undulating down the cross. (The Brutality of Fact, p. 14)

Bacon's words may seem distrubing at first. After all, he is comparing the Savior to a worm crawling down the cross; how repulsive! However, Bacon's words should remind us of two types of Christ from the Old Testament. One is from the great messianic Psalm 22:

But I am a worm, and no man; scorned by men, and despised by the people. (Psalm 22:6)

The other type is from Numbers:

And the LORD said to Moses, "Make a fiery serpent, and set it on a pole; and every one who is bitten, when he sees it, shall live." So Moses made a bronze serpent, and set it on a pole; and if a serpent bit any man, he would look at the bronze serpent and live. (Numbers 21:8-9)

In the Gospel of John, Jesus explicitly links himself to the bronze serpent:

"And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of man be lifted up, that whoever believes in him may have eternal life." (John:3:14-15)

Perhaps Bacon's Crucifixion can help us see our crucifixes in a new light, one that helps us to encounter, however tenuously, the brutality of sin. Yet, we do not remain in that brutality. We know that brutality could not defeat love. Not the sentimental love we see in greeting cards or romance novels. This is a love that has a will of steel, because it is a will wholly consonant with the will of God.

Today is a good day to reflect on the line from the "Animus Christi": "Passion of Christ, strengthen us." Strengthen us to endure the pain of Good Friday and the loneliness of Holy Saturday, as we long for the resurrected joy of Easter.

Making Time for God

I often complain about "not having enough time for God" in my day. Apparently, God got a bit weary of hearing that, so he made time in my day this week. Twice. On Friday, I dropped my kids off at school, which means I get to work early. Usually that means I simply start work earlier. But as I neared my usual exit to work off the interstate, there was a huge traffic jam on the off ramp. Annoyed, I decide to go up to the next exit instead. It is the long way around, but it was going to be far shorter than sitting in the long line on the highway. But then a thought came to me. By taking this other exit, I would go right past a nearby church. This church has a Eucharistic adoration chapel which I like to go to, but I usually cannot go there, because they close the chapel at noon during the week. However, at this time it would be open. So I went there for a brief but fruitful period of adoration.

The second instance was Saturday. I was attending a day-long workshop on marriage at our local seminary. It was supposed to end around 3:15 that afternoon. We have confession at our parish on Saturdays at 3:00, and it had been 2 1/2 months since my last confession, so I was far past due to go. However, my son had been at a sleep over at a friend's house, and I didn't want to take too long relieving the parents. To my surprise and delight, the workshop ended before 3:00, and I was able to get to confession and still pick up my son just about on time.

I think this week God was saying, "Ok, this time I'll make the time in your week. But from now on, it's up to you!"

I was reading Pope Benedict's Jesus of Nazareth today and came across the section where he talks about Jesus' temptation in the desert. The Holy Father writes:

At the heart of all temptations, as we see here, is the act of pushing God aside because we perceive him as secondary, if not actually superfluous and annoying, in comparison with all the apparently far more urgent matters that fill our lives (p. 51-Large Print edition).

This is in fact what I do, although I tell myself soothing rationalizations (lies) to make me believe that I am doing something far less grievous than this.

All of which ties in nicely with today's readings at mass. The first reading from Sirach and the Gospel reading from Luke focus on humility. Sirach tells us: "Humble yourself more, the greater you are, and you will find favor with God" (Sirach 3:18). Jesus is our example here. He, Who is God, humbled Himself to become a human and to suffer a death of derision and humiliation. Then in the Gospel, we hear: "For every one who exalts himself will be humbled, but the one who humbles himself will be exalted" (Luke 14:11). Jesus, Who humbled Himself, was exalted in the resurrection. We are told that if we wish to participate in the "resurrection of the righteous" (Luke 14:14), then we must humble ourselves.

It is important for me to remember that pride--the opposite of humility--is making myself more important than God, more important than my neighbor. It is about exalting my time, my will, above the One Who humbled Himself unto death--for me. I pray that I will keep this in mind the next time I wish to sleep in instead of saying morning prayer or turn in at night without praying, even though found the time to watch television.

Quote of the Day - Mother Angelica

"If you're not a thorn in somebody's side, you're not doing Christianity right."

Mother Angelica, Mother Angelica's Little Book of Life Lessons and Everyday Spirituality, edited by Raymond Arroyo, p. 18.

Children of Hope - Fostering Eucharistic Adoration among Children

I was listening to Catholic Answers on the radio and heard Fr. Antoine Thomas of the Community of St. John. I've heard him a number of times, and he does a wonderful job of explaining the faith to young children. He is working on a new project, Children of Hope, which encourages young children to adore Christ in the Eucharist. There are many good things at the website: http://www.childrenofhope.org/index.html. I highly recommend checking out this website and using it to either promote adoration with groups of children, or at least among the children in your life.

Quote of the Day - C.S. Lewis

Those who talk of reading the Bible "as literature" sometimes mean, I think, reading it without attending to the main thing it is about; like reading Burke with no interest in politics, or reading the Aeneid with no interest in Rome. That seems to me to be nonsense. But there is a saner sense in which the Bible, since it is after all literature, cannot properly be read except as literature; and the different parts of it as the different sorts of literature they are. Most emphatically, the Psalms must be read as poems; as lyrics, with all the licenses and all the formalities, the hyperboles, the emotional rather than logical connections, which are proper to lyric poetry.

C.S. Lewis, Reflection on the Psalms, p. 3.

Seeing with God's Eyes

Jacopo Pontormo, Supper in Emmaus, 1525 (Uffizi Gallery, Florence, Italy)

(Note the "eye of God" above Jesus' head.)


What does today's second reading at mass and going to the pool have in common?

Let's start with the pool. My family and I went to a large public pool here in Cincinnati. We become very self-conscious about the bodies of others and our own bodies. We see others and we think that we don't measure up. It can be a blow to our self-esteem and our ego. We see others and we are tempted to turn them into objects for our pleasure. As I've been saying recently, bodies matter in Catholic theology. However, the pool can be a glaring example of how bodies should not be treated.

Our bodies are not for lust, but, unfortunately, going to the pool can be a test of "custody of the eyes." We corrupted sight early on. After the Father of Lies told Eve that God was a liar and that she would not die eating from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, we read: "So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, ... she took of its fruit and ate..." (Genesis 3:6). However, this is not the kind of sight to which God originally called us. We are instead to strive to live the words of Jesus' Sermon on the Mount: "Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God" (Matthew 5:8). If we can see others with the eyes of God, not as something for our gratification, but as children of God, then we can see them with a pure heart. And when we see them as God sees them, then we see God for we are using His eyes.

There is also the flip side of that situation. We can objective ourselves. Walking around in public can be a very humbling experience. At the pool we see many people who are physically attractive as the world preaches it. I'm not exactly the model for a Greek statue, so it is easy to imagine being viewed by others as deficient physically (even if that is not how others actually view me). I was rather heavy when I was young, and it is hard to shed that perception of myself, even though I am not now overweight. But still, I'm rather flabby (which would be helped if I would just exercise like my doctor tells me to do). I was walking around feeling somewhat embarrassed by my appearance, when I went into the pool because my son called to me. It wasn't anything he said. It was how he looked at me. Children, especially young children, have a way of looking at you that just shouts how much they love you. The amazing thing is that they see you. They don't see how much you weigh or whether you have well defined abs. They don't see how much money you make or don't make. They don't see whether you are successful or unsuccessful in the eyes of the world. All they see is the parent who, with the power of God, created them and loves them as bone of my bone, flesh of my flesh. Or, if they are adopted, they see a parent who loved them so much that he or she chose them to be his or her own. They love us despite our flaws. They see us as God sees us. They see us as we are - we who yell at them, get impatient with them, don't always listen to them - and they love us anyway. They see us as we are - we who have the capacity to love, who have the desire to do what is right, who attempt to help others. And they see us as we want to be - heroes and saints.

So what does this have to do with today's second reading from the Letter of Paul to the Galatians (3:26-29):

Brothers and sisters: Through faith you are all children of God in Christ Jesus. For all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free person, there is not male and female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus. And if you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham’s descendant, heirs according to the promise.

God does not make distinctions among people as the world makes distinctions. The things that divide us from each other do not divide us from God. We must seek to see as God sees, and then we will love as God loves.

Ask for Help

Today's readings for mass speak to us of the tendency toward sin of human beings, the initiative of contrition, and the need for God's forgiveness.

The first reading comes from 2 Samuel 12:7-10,13:

Nathan said to David: “Thus says the LORD God of Israel: ‘I anointed you king of Israel. I rescued you from the hand of Saul. I gave you your lord’s house and your lord’s wives for your own. I gave you the house of Israel and of Judah. And if this were not enough, I could count up for you still more. Why have you spurned the Lord and done evil in his sight? You have cut down Uriah the Hittite with the sword; you took his wife as your own,and him you killed with the sword of the Ammonites. Now, therefore, the sword shall never depart from your house, because you have despised me and have taken the wife of Uriah to be your wife.’ Then David said to Nathan, “I have sinned against the LORD.” Nathan answered David: “The LORD on his part has forgiven your sin: you shall not die.”

The Gospel reading comes from Luke 7:36-50:

A Pharisee invited Jesus to dine with him, and he entered the Pharisee’s house and reclined at table. Now there was a sinful woman in the city who learned that he was at table in the house of the Pharisee. Bringing an alabaster flask of ointment, she stood behind him at his feet weeping and began to bathe his feet with her tears. Then she wiped them with her hair, kissed them, and anointed them with the ointment. When the Pharisee who had invited him saw this he said to himself, “If this man were a prophet, he would know who and what sort of woman this is who is touching him, that she is a sinner.” Jesus said to him in reply, “Simon, I have something to say to you.” “Tell me, teacher, ” he said. “Two people were in debt to a certain creditor; one owed five hundred days’ wages and the other owed fifty. Since they were unable to repay the debt, he forgave it for both. Which of them will love him more?” Simon said in reply, “The one, I suppose, whose larger debt was forgiven.” He said to him, “You have judged rightly.” Then he turned to the woman and said to Simon, “Do you see this woman? When I entered your house, you did not give me water for my feet, but she has bathed them with her tears and wiped them with her hair. You did not give me a kiss, but she has not ceased kissing my feet since the time I entered. You did not anoint my head with oil, but she anointed my feet with ointment. So I tell you, her many sins have been forgiven because she has shown great love. But the one to whom little is forgiven, loves little.” He said to her, “Your sins are forgiven.” The others at table said to themselves, “Who is this who even forgives sins?” But he said to the woman, “Your faith has saved you; go in peace.”

Yesterday my daughter and I were going to confession. Today at lunch, I talked about confession with my daughter and my son. I asked them, "Why do we need to go to confession once we've been baptized?" My son gave me a much more profound answer than I would have furnished. He ran over to the refrigerator and pulled off a sign we have there for the kids to remember when they are frustrated because they feel that they can't do things like homework or a game or a sport. My son pointed to the second item on the list: "Ask for help." How true. At confession we are asking God for help. We are saying, "God, I can't do this on my own." (We are acknowledging that we are not Pelagians.)

The only prayer that Jesus taught us (the Our Father) is composed of seven petitions. That is, we ask for God's help seven times.

Sometimes we don't go to confession because we are afraid. Sometimes we don't go to confession because we are proud. In both cases, we are unwilling to ask for God's help, either because we don't want to embarrass ourselves, or because we don't think we need confession. Either way, we are saying that we won't ask for God's help because we choose to elevate our embarrassment or our pride above God's mercy and grace.

Let us all ask God for His help and go to confession regularly.

The Immaculate Heart of Mary, or Sylvia Poggioli Explains It All To You

Today is the Memorial of the Immaculate Heart of Mary. Today's Gospel reading for mass is the finding of Jesus in the Temple when he was a boy:

Each year Jesus’ parents went to Jerusalem for the feast of Passover, and when he was twelve years old, they went up according to festival custom. After they had completed its days, as they were returning, the boy Jesus remained behind in Jerusalem, but his parents did not know it. Thinking that he was in the caravan, they journeyed for a day and looked for him among their relatives and acquaintances, but not finding him, they returned to Jerusalem to look for him. After three days they found him in the temple, sitting in the midst of the teachers, listening to them and asking them questions, and all who heard him were astounded at his understanding and his answers. When his parents saw him, they were astonished, and his mother said to him, “Son, why have you done this to us? Your father and I have been looking for you with great anxiety.” And he said to them, “Why were you looking for me? Did you not know that I must be in my Father’s house?” But they did not understand what he said to them. He went down with them and came to Nazareth, and was obedient to them; and his mother kept all these things in her heart. (Luke 2:41-51)

There are two aspects I want to focus on here regarding Mary. The first is that Mary did not understand what Jesus was telling her. She was at Ground Zero of salvation history, but as a human being, her understanding of what God was doing was limited. The second aspect is that despite (or because) she did not understand, she reflected on these events, on these words and "kept all these things in her heart." Lack of understanding provoked reflection to produce greater understanding.

With these ideas in mind, let us turn to the news reporting of National Public Radio's Sylvia Poggioli. In the last week she has had two reports about Catholicism. The first report was about adult women who had affairs with priests. Her report, "Letter from Priests' Lovers Reignites Celibacy Debate" is laughable as professional journalism. For a good critique, see the June 8, 2010 post at Get Religion. According to Poggioli:

In an unprecedented move, a group of Italian women who have had relationships with priests wrote an open letter to Pope Benedict XVI, saying that priests need to love and be loved.

What is this unprecedented move? A letter signed by...three women. An Italian woman, Stefania Salomone, claims that 40 women contacted her but want to remain anonymous. The Pope called celibacy "a sacred value," but Salomone told Poggioli: "And so we decided to tell people this is not a value, and this is not a sacred value, because sacred is the right of people to get married." This statement is illogical. All men have the ability to get married--instead of becoming a priest. The Catholic Church is not somehow denying anyone a right to be married. But no one has a right to be married and a priest (any more than anyone has a right to be a priest). The illogic continues when Poggioli says, "They [the women who have had affairs with priests] say a priest 'needs to live with his fellow human beings, experience feelings, love and be loved.'" The idea that priests do not live among their fellow human beings, do not experience feelings, do not love and are not loved is simply a denial of reality. I heard the other day about a priest who described his call to priesthood this way: one day he saw a very beautiful woman, and he thought, "I wonder what it would be like to be married to her Creator." Those don't sound like the words of a repressed or oppressed man.

Poggioli goes on to say: "But it's an open secret that priestly celibacy is often violated." The argument that celibacy should end because it is violated is utterly preposterous. With that kind of logic, one could argue with a straight face that marriage should be ended because it is often violated by adultery. Speaking of adultery, Salomone does not seem to grasp the adulterous nature of her relationship with the priest (adulterous on both sides). A vow to fidelity means that violating the vow is adulterous, whether we are talking about marriage or celibacy. Salomone told Poggioli, "'I think I represented a stain on his church dress,' Salomone says. 'He wanted to see me, but after seeing me he was not happy with his decision. He always tried to find a way to go away. I wasn't seen as a woman, I was seen as a danger, as a sin.'" This is always the way people act in an adulterous relationship, because adultery turns us from God, from others, and from ourselves.

Another of Poggioli's reports this week was on June 11, "Pope Begs Forgiveness Over Abuse Scandal." At the end of that report is an attempt to link the sex abuse scandal to celibacy:

Friday's Mass was preceded by a vigil service Thursday night in St. Peter's Square in which the pope responded to pre-selected questions from five priests.‬‪ In one query, Benedict was asked about "the beauty of celibacy."

Benedict called celibacy a great sign of faith and said it represents an act of transcendence that brings the priest closer to God.‬‪‬‪ The Catholic Church has denied that celibacy is one of the causes of child abuse in the priesthood — but even some leading cardinals have begun to question the requirement and are urging an open debate on the topic.‬‪

But the Vatican discouraged reporters from seeking the views of some of the thousands of priests who came to Rome — the Holy See police prevented even Vatican-accredited reporters from interviewing priests in St. Peter's Square.‬

One priest who was willing to speak on the sidelines of the ceremony was the Rev. Jose Vasco of Mozambique.‬‪

"The church first tried to resolve the cases on its own," Vasco said. "But now that they have become so grave, the church must seek the full truth, and to do that we need joint commissions with lay people, with civil society, especially at a time when there is the appearance that the church has protected the guilty ones."

Vasco said he would welcome the idea of a debate on celibacy to determine whether it could be one of the causes of the sex abuse crisis and if it should be mandatory.

Poggioli says: "The Catholic Church has denied that celibacy is one of the causes of child abuse in the priesthood — but even some leading cardinals have begun to question the requirement and are urging an open debate on the topic." The Church doesn't have to deny that celibacy is one of the causes of child abuse in the priesthood because there is absolutely no evidence whatsoever that it is. This, despite remarks made in March by Cardinal Schonborn of Austria.

So what does all of this have to do with the Immaculate Heart of Mary? Let's go back to lack of understanding and reflection. Pope Benedict rightly speaks above about celibacy being "an act of transcendance." It is precisely this point that Poggioli, Salomone, and many others do not understand. Western culture is so saturated with a stunningly debased and reductionist notion of human sexuality that things like celibacy simply do not make sense. In fact, in secular culture, things like "transcendence" do not make sense.

Which brings me to reflection. When things do not make sense, one response is to examine them further, trying to learn what we don't understand, determining if there is more there than we initially thought. This is the kind of reflection that Mary did, the contemplation that keeps things in the heart. Then there is another response, a response that turns a blind eye to anything that does not fit one's own agenda or paradigm, that grinds axes to a sharp edge, that seeks to malign through implication when facts aren't available. This response closes the heart. We all have these two hearts at different times and different settings. This is how Mary differs from us. She has one heart, the first kind, the kind where lack of understanding provokes reflection to produce greater understanding.

Feast of the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus

Image from the Oblates of St. Francis de Sales (http://www.oblates.us/heart.htm)

As the Incarnation and the Resurrection teach, the body matters. Last Sunday's Feast of the Most Holy Body and Blood of Christ reinforced this message. And in case we did not get it through those reminders, today we celebrate the Sacred Heart of Jesus. We reflect that Jesus had a physical heart of flesh and blood. We reflect that he had a spiritual heart that encompasses love for every single human being, from the greatest saint to the most vile sinner. The image of his heart is pierced, reminding us that love requires sacrifice. There is a flame above the heart, showing us that warms us, consumes us, fires us up.

A year ago I was at a funeral mass on the Feast of the Sacred Heart. There I decided that I would receive communion on First Fridays in devotion to the Sacred Heart. I have done that for the next twelve months. I am only scratching the surface of this devotion. I pray that the next year brings me deeper into Jesus' Sacred Heart.

Feast of the Most Holy Body and Blood of Christ

Joos van Wassenhove (active c.1460-80), The Institution of the Eucharist
c.1474; Oil on panel; Gallery of the Marches, Ducal Palace, Urbino, Italy

Today we celebrate the feast the focuses our attention on the Eucharist: The Most Holy Body and Blood of Christ, or Corpus Christi. As my son sat next to me at mass today, periodically pressing his body up against mine or putting his hand on my arm, I thought about how in human experience, bodies matter. Children love to sleep with their parents or with their brothers and sisters for the sense of closeness and belonging. The marital act is all about emotional and physical bonding. In pregnancy, the mother is so close to the child that she carries the child physically within her. Fathers will never know that kind of closeness with their children.

All of this help us to understand the Incarnation and the Eucharist. In the Old Testament God dwelt in the Tabernacle and later in the Temple as the shekinah. God thought, How can I draw closer to these people? And of course, the answer was, By becoming one of them. Hence the Incarnation, where Mary carried Jesus for ten months. As the new English translation of the Nicene Creed will say, Christ "was incarnate of the Virgin Mary," for a man can be born of a woman, but only a god can be incarnate, that is, the divine spirit becomes enfleshed as a human. We remember the beginning of the Gospel of John through our prayers of the Angelus: "And the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us." Matthew quotes Isaiah 7:14 using the term "Emmanuel," meaning, "God with us" (Matthew 1:23).

One might be tempted to think that incarnation was sufficient. However, God thought, How can I continue to live up to the name Emmanuel - "God with us"?

Lessons from the Garden - Coming Up from the Roots

Gardening can teach us many lessons. One of those lessons is resilience. Many plants have the amazing property of coming back from their roots after significant damage. I remember when I was a junior in high school many years ago. One of our neighbors had a maple tree growing in their back yard. I took some of the many seeds from that tree that year and planted six of them in a dirt patch in our back yard. Two of them came up. While they were both quite small, my dad did not see them one weekend and mowed over them. I was quite upset (not thinking that I should have marked them off so dad would clearly see them), and I left them in the ground, despite an impulse to just pull them up. Much to my surprise, they came back from the roots. Both those trees are now in the front yard of my parents' house with double trunks, a visual reminder of that earlier trauma to them which they overcame by regenerating from their roots.

I recently had a repeat of that experience. I have a couple of bronze fennel plants in my garden, and a third one came up outside of the border, in the grass, by our porch. I never told my wife about this plant, never put some border or markings around it, and, sure enough, she mowed over it. I left it in the ground, and, sure enough, it came back from the roots.

These plants can teach us the importance of going back to our roots after a trauma, after a devastating loss. If we are rooted in God, if we go back to the roots of our faith in the Scripture and the teachings of the Church, then we can begin again with new life. I remember when I returned to the Church but still struggled with my faith (not that we ever fully complete struggling in our faith life until we no longer need faith in the company of God). I made my first confession in probably thirteen years, and my confession was that I didn't know if I believed in God. The priest, a wonderful Franciscan, asked me if I wanted to believe in God. I said I didn't know. He did not need to absolve me, but he did, sensing something moving in me that I didn't understand. We were going to mass the next day, and he asked me to really reflect on the Creed when we said it. I was thinking, "But this is my point, I don't believe everything in the Creed." However, he understood that reflecting on the Creed is about going back to our communal and personal roots. The Creed is the foundational statement of what we believe, or at least what we ought to believe. The Creed is what the godparents assent to for the infant at Baptism, and the Creed is what the congregation reaffirms when a child is baptized at a mass. When we struggle in our faith or morals in our lives, we go back to the grace of the Holy Spirit from our Baptism and Confirmation for the strength to overcome those struggles.

If we go back to our roots, we can find the resources to restore the life we had, or perhaps live life more abundantly than before.