Venerable Gaetano Tantalo

Some weeks ago I visited an older parishioner in her home. As were were chatting, I noticed pictures of two priests displayed in the room.

The priest on the right I recognized, of course, as our own Padre Pio. But who was the priest on the left?

"Oh, that's Fr. Gaetano Tantalo. He was our parish priest when I was growing up in Italy. He was a very holy priest and he's going to be a saint."

And so I learned about Don Gaetano Tantalo, how he had made friends with Jewish families in his youth, shielded people from deportation, and even looked to the religious needs of the Jews under his protection.

Pope St. John Paul II declared him venerable in 1995, and the cause for beatification remains open. Fr. Tantalo is also a Righteous Among the Nations.

For the article about Fr. Tantalo on Italian Wikipedia, click here.

For the Yad Vashem article, click here.

An Alternate Conversion Story

As I've mentioned various times on this tired old blog, the telling of my conversion story, whether to myself or others, has been a fascinating part of the journey. What I mean is that the story changes; it deepens and develops as time passes and I gain perspective, make new connections, and come to name broader economies of grace.

Recently I've been reflecting on an entirely different account of how I came to be a Christian and a Catholic. I'm fairly certain there's some truth to it.

A few years before my parents were married, my father converted to Judaism. The only religious affiliation I know of before that was with the Unitarians where he grew up. My mother says that the conversion was for a woman he had hoped to marry at the time, and I don't doubt that this is true, but it must have been something more than just that, for when I was a child my father had some Jewish practice about him, if not much. He lit the menorah at Hanukkah and said the prayers. I also remember him looking out the front window and saying prayers of some sort around Passover. But these seemed to be private things; he didn't invite anyone to participate and didn't seem interested in explaining or sharing what he was doing. As I grew up, these practices faded away.

Years later, after I had grown up and been baptized in the Catholic Church, my mother showed me a document my father had signed before a rabbinical tribunal at the time of his conversion. Among other things, the document indicated a promise. If God were to give my father a son, he would bring him into the covenant and raise him as a proper Jew.

A few years I was born and God had given my father that son.

I find it rather surprising that my father, who was a loyal person and someone who very much believed that people ought to do what they said they would, made little to no effort to be faithful to this promise in my regard, to which he had affixed his signature in the presence of those rabbis. Yes, he took me to Hebrew school a couple of times when I was little, but I think he didn't approve of the program himself, so that didn't last. There was no sabbath nor temple or synagogue, and certainly no bar mitzvah in my childhood.

On the contrary, growing up I had a very clear sense that I was a 'none.' Other people seemed to belong to this or that religion, but not me. I did find this curious as a child, and remember asking my parents about it. They said that they believed this was an adult decision someone should make for themselves when they grew up, though I don't think they expected this to actually happen.

All of this leads me to a new account of my own conversion. Our Heavenly Father, seeing my earthly father's negligence with regard to his religious promise concerning me, had pity on me and gave me the grace of an invitation to become that curious sort of eschatological Jew we call a Christian, such that I would be baptized into Jesus Christ and thus made an heir, in Him, of the covenants and a member of the Israel of God. (Galatians 6:16)

The Beard From Head To Heart

Recently I was in an email conversation about an occasional topic on this blog, Capuchin beards and Capuchin beard-growing.

One of the participants offered a link to an interesting Jewish take on the spiritual meaning of beard-growing. Rabbi Aron Moss writes:

One of the greatest struggles in life is to live up to our ideals. ... Between theory and practice there is a huge gulf. It is one thing to have good intentions, but that is far from actually doing good. ... This is what the beard represents. The beard is hair that grows down from the head to the rest of the body. It is the bridge between mind and heart, thoughts and actions, theory and practice, good intentions and good deeds.

Read the whole thing here.

When I was a kid the Chabad-Lubavitchers had a van that they would park in town in order to attract unobservant Jews and therein convert them. People called it the 'Mitzvah Tank.'

Presentation of the Lord

Thus says the Lord God:
Lo, I am sending my messenger
to prepare the way before me;
And suddenly there will come to the temple
the LORD whom you seek,
And the messenger of the covenant whom you desire.
Yes, he is coming, says the LORD of hosts.
But who will endure the day of his coming?
And who can stand when he appears?
For he is like the refiner’s fire,
or like the fuller’s lye.
He will sit refining and purifying silver,
and he will purify the sons of Levi,
Refining them like gold or like silver
that they may offer due sacrifice to the LORD.
Then the sacrifice of Judah and Jerusalem
will please the LORD,
as in the days of old, as in years gone by.
(Malachi 3:1-4)

I love the feast of the Presentation of the Lord. It's one of those days that just seems so mystical. Falling on the cross-quarter between the winter solstice and the vernal equinox, it recalls that the Light, born at Christmas and adored by the wise men, born away from any home, now arrives in his historical home, his Temple.

Overheard: Alleluia

 Overheard at fraternal recreation:

"When he was a member of the Académie française, they asked Cardinal Lustiger what was the most beautiful word in the French language. He said,

'Alléluia.'"

I always remember Cardinal Lustiger because I recall how, when I was first exploring the idea of becoming a Catholic, I asked the priest if being a convert made you a sort of less-than Catholic. He said something like,

'On the contrary; the Archbishop of Paris is a convert.'

Motherhood of Mary

The Martyrology is marvelous today:

The octave of the Nativity of the Lord and the day of his Circumcision, the solemnity of holy Mary, Mother of God, whom the Fathers at the Council of Ephesus acclaimed Theotokos, for from her the Word took flesh and the Son of God lived among human beings, he who is the prince of peace, to whom a Name above all names is given.

It's all in there: the solemnity of Mary, Mother of God, the octave of Christmas, the feast of the Circumcision, (which continues to be celebrated today in the Extraordinary Form), the feast of the Holy Name, of course associated with the circumcision but now having migrated to January 3, and even the the World Day of Peace, given to us by Pope Venerable Paul VI.

I know that the Motherhood of Mary, now today's principal title, is a restoration of something older and more venerable, but I've still sometimes wished that we could have the feast of the Lord's Circumcision. Maybe it's because the circumcision of my older nephew was one of the most interesting rituals I have ever been privileged to attend.

I think about this very bodily ritual by which Jesus of Nazareth was brought into the covenant of Abraham and I'm led to contemplate the mystery of his human body, out of the flesh of Mary, as the hinge that joins the old creation to the new.

I think about this sometimes at Holy Communion. It's clear that the Body of Christ we receive is not the finite, historical body of Jesus of Nazareth. (This is why I consider misled and confused those priests who replace 'behold the Lamb of God' at Communion with 'this is Jesus...') The Body we receive is Christ risen into the Sacraments of his Church. The wonder and marvelous mystery--as well as the stumbling block--of it all is that this Risen Body is continuous with the historical life of Jesus of Nazareth, born of Mary, executed on the Cross.

By our Holy Communion, we too become sharers in this mystery. We are made citizens of the new creation and are offered the grace to become new, renovated creatures, the grace of eyes to see new hope in the midst of the aimlessness and violence of the world. But at the same time we remain, in some sense, children of Adam and Eve, laboring under the confusions, pathologies, and injuries that are the whole human legacy of brutality and sin to which we are the latest heirs. Christianity makes us into very curious beings, blessed messes, weeds and wheat, rejoicing in our newly-granted citizenship in the new creation but still struggling with everything that continues to bind us to the old.


Overheard:

Friar 1: "How's your life, Father?"

Friar 2: "My life? There is no longer 'my life' but Christ who lives in me."

Friar 1: "I think Christ is a little cranky today."


It's cute, but I think it captures something. Despite the dual citizenship of the Christian, member of the 'Israel of God' which nonetheless is still in pilgrimage in history, he is not two people, but one. From the Cross Jesus gave us his mother to be our mother. By our burial into his death in baptism, we are reborn of Mary. We become the offspring of her 'fruitful virginity,' itself the great sign of the dawning new creation.

And yet it is the child of Eve who becomes a child of Mary, and the 'inner child' that was born of Eve remains. Miserable as he necessarily is, I need to treat him like the spoiled, short-sighted, tantrum-throwing brat that original sin has made him. I have to put him in 'time out' when it's time to pray and when I'm called to any kind of delicate and difficult charity for my neighbor. But I also have to look upon him with some fondness, not hating him, and not treating him with the contempt which only makes his wounds fester all the more, for he also is me.

The Veil

A part of the new mosaic reredos in the church here at the International College 'San Lorenzo da Brindisi' by Marko Ivan Rupnik, SJ.

Moses' veil protects him from seeing the the full glory of God, namely the incarnation, the motherhood of Mary in the burning bush.

There seem to be different feelings about the image. One the one hand, it brings forth the mystery of the incarnation in its foreshadowing and inchoate revelation in the old covenants; the burning yet unconsumed bush as a type of the virginity of Mary, the revelation of the divine name in its relation to the procession of the Word from the Father and the human conception of that same word by the Holy Spirit.

On the other hand, it brings up Paul's sometimes uncomfortable interpretation of the veil in 2 Corinthians 13, wherein the veil remains to this day, keeping the Jews from understanding the scripture when Moses is read.

To me, whatever one makes of it, the striking nature of the image invites contemplation of the Mystery who is the hope of our gaze, as we pray for our transformation "into the same image from glory to glory, as from the Lord who is the Spirit." (Cf. 2 Corinthians 3:18)

Updates on my Transition

The latest plan has me moving to Italy toward the end of this month. That's a little sooner that I had most recently anticipated, but I can be ready. After arriving in Rome and having a few things taken care of, I am to go to Assisi to take courses in Italian. Eventually, perhaps with other stops beforehand, I am to take up the ministry of secretary for the English language at our Capuchin general curia.

Right now I'm supposed to wait for a letter of obedience from Rome. Once I receive it, I am to take it to the Italian consulate to apply for a visa for "motivi religiosi". May it be so for everything I do!

Of course I hope to keep blogging through and after this transition, but I'll have to see. One never knows about time, permission, and connectivity going into a new assignment, and of course the things that the brothers have actually asked me to do have to come first. Nevertheless, some of the brothers who work in the general ministry are bloggers: General definitors Br. Mark and Br. Carlos blog at Just a Brother and Artesano de Dios respectively, and Br. Helmut, secretary for the missions, blogs his ministry at Ad Gentes OFMCap. Maybe there are others.

So perhaps I can have some hope that my rants and ramblings here at a minor friar can join this august group. One of my classmates in religion once accused me of joining religious life just for the stories (along the lines of Jerry Seinfeld's dentist Dr. Whatley, who was accused to converting to Judaism "just for the jokes"). No doubt there's some truth in that observation, but grace builds on nature, no?

In any case, thank you for the charity of your prayer.

On Jewishness

Yesterday I followed a link to this fascinating article: Rosalind Moss' Unexpected Journey, and it's been on my mind. Hers is an amazing story indeed; from a good Jewish home in Brooklyn to a meeting with messianic Jews, to Protestantism and then Catholicism, and now foundress of a "contemplative-active teaching and evangelistic community."

Her points of view are very interesting, from what it would mean to take the messianic promises of the scripture seriously to the no-brainer of ad orientem worship and the connection of Gregorian chant to the worship of the Old Covenants. Perhaps the most startling thing she says is this:

"I’ve said many times that the most Jewish thing a Jew can do is to become Catholic"

Read the article to get a sense of just what she means by that. Her sense reminded me of something that's been on my mind from reading the medievals. I can't help but notice that when the medieval theologians talk about Abraham or Moses or the prophets of Old Testament, they do not speak of them (as I think we would) as if they were members of a 'different religion' than themselves.

In fact, I am increasingly convinced that the common idea that there is some genus called 'religion' of which human phenomena like Judaism, Christianity, Islam, Buddhism, etc., are the various species is scripturally and theologically untenable, all your 'coexist' bumper stickers be damned. Nevertheless, I think this conceptual framework about 'religion' and 'religions' is generally presumed, even by religious people.

Rather, it seems to me that the basic issue in this regard is whether one is a Jew or a pagan. Either you are one of those to whom God has given the Promised Land, or not. The good news is that because of Jesus Christ, everyone is free to become the funny kind of eschatological Jew that has come to be called a 'Christian.'

Taking Hold of the Garment of the Jew

Again we have the prophet Zechariah as the first reading for Mass:

"Many peoples and strong nations shall come to seek the LORD of hosts in Jerusalem and to implore the favor of the LORD. Thus says the LORD of hosts: in those days ten men of every nationality, speaking different tongues, shall take hold, yes, take hold of every Jew by the edge of his garment and say, 'Let us go with you, for we have heard that God is with you.'" (8:22-23)

An image, this passage is, of Holy Communion.

Through the consent of Mary, the power of the Holy Spirit conceives the eternal Word of God as the human life of Jesus Christ, who is the Israel of God in person. By his Body broken open and his Blood poured out on the Cross, this divine humanity is offered to us as our saving nourishment in the Eucharist.

In approaching Holy Communion we desire to grasp the Jew by the edge of the garment of his humanity so that he may lead and carry our humanity to the destiny of the New Jerusalem, the Kingdom of God both arriving and fulfilled in the Resurrection.

Edith Stein

All of a sudden it feels like the end of the semester. Next week is the last of classes. All of my term work is in draft. It's rather uneven, and I'm not even sure how good some of it is, but it all represents a kind of groping and clumsy start at finding some direction in the obedience of this doctorate.

So as time opens up, I can get back to other things I either set aside because of the course work or left for later. But it also means I can find some time for personal reading. Various evidence suggests to me that it might be time for me to read Edith Stein. Does anybody who is better acquainted with her work have any advice? Because of the John of the Cross connection I'm curious about the Kreuzeswissenschaft/Science of the Cross, but I don't know if this is the right place to start.

Thanks in advance!

My First Convert

Through further conversations with the parents on other questions, I just realized that I baptized a Jewish baby the other day. Some of the baptism paperwork had been done by someone else and I had not noticed that the mother was Jewish, making the baby a Jew. He's my first convert!

My New Older Brother

Yesterday afternoon I had the honor and joy of attending my new nephew's circumcision ceremony at the home of my brother and sister-in-law. It was an interesting and happy event, on both the natural and spiritual levels.

"You shall circumcise the flesh of your foreskin, and that shall be the sign of the covenant between Me and you. And throughout all generations, every male among you shall be circumcised at the age of eight days." (Genesis 17: 11-12, JPS)

And so it was for my little nephew: Yesterday he was eight days old, and my brother delegated a professional mohel to bring his son into the covenant.

On the natural level, I was happy for the new parents in their gratitude and wonder at their healthy little baby boy. I was happy for him too, having arrived in the world with two bright and gentle parents. It was good to see my family as we received the blessings of new identities and reconfigured relationships; to see my brother as a father and my parents in the beginning of their grandparenthood.

The afternoon was also quite fascinating on the supernatural level. Here's what really blew my mind: I've been on this earth for almost thirty-eight years, but as I looked at this tiny, eight-day-old baby sitting on the throne that had been prepared for Elijah, I saw someone older than me. Here was my senior, not my young nephew but my elder in the faith of Abraham, the Israel of history. For me, as a member of the "Israel of God," (Galatians 6:16) of the New Jerusalem that is the eschatological marriage of heaven and earth (Revelation 21:2), of the Body of Christ which is the Risen Son of Man containing in Himself the destiny that is the End Times already here, this baby will always be my older brother.

In these last days, by the astounding mercy of God I have been grafted into the faith of Abraham. I enjoy by privilege the faith that is my nephew's by right. May I always revere and respect my new little elder.



Here he is with his father, mother, and maternal grandmother, sporting his little skullcap and sucking on some gauze soaked in Manischewitz.

Latest Installment

God to said to Abraham: "I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you; I will make your name great, and you will be a blessing." (Genesis 12: 2, JPS)

In an email from my father this morning, I learn that God has delivered his most recent installment in the fulfillment of this promise, a baby boy to my brother and sister-in-law.

May the Holy One of Israel furnish him every good gift and help him to grow strong in wisdom and grace.

Because I am the brother of the child's father, I am an uncle but not an avunculus. Hence I am under no obligation to be avuncular.

In the Faith of Abraham

An email conversation with my mother regarding the upcoming birth of my Jewish nephew has got me thinking about the relationship of Christianity to non-Christians in the faith of Abraham. I know that there is magisterial teaching on these questions, but I'm just musing this morning.

Perhaps many Jews would object to this, but it seems to me that a Christian is a peculiar sort of Jew. After all, we do what Jews do: we follow the Law and worship at the Temple. For us this is not the historical law or the physical Temple. We keep the Law as it has been received in its prophetic interpretation down to and including the historical Jesus. We worship within the eschatological Temple that is the sacrificed and risen Body of Christ. Therefore, when I meet a Jew, I don't see someone from a different religion but someone of the same religion in a different concept of time. We are both Jews, one a member of the Israel of history, the other a member of the Israel of transcendent time, the end times, the ultimate horizon, the eschaton.

I believe that this is sound and demonstrable Biblical teaching deriving especially from the later prophets, St. John, St. Paul, and Revelation, and if it wasn't two days before Christmas for which three different Sunday-length homilies have to be given in three days, I might have time to point some of this out.


Islam is a lot harder for me, and I admit that I have an unresolved internal tension when I think about it. It seems to me that you have to face the question: Did the angel Gabriel reveal the Qur'an to Muhammad (peace be upon him) or not? If one consents to this proposition, then the only reasonable thing is to surrender to God and become a Muslim right now. If one denies that the Qur'an came from Gabriel, doesn't this invalidate Islam altogether and throw out the faith of nearly a quarter of the people on earth? Is there a way out of this seemingly binary problem?

Of course, if what I say about Christianity being an eschatological religion is accepted in a certain way, then the faith/fulness of Jesus Christ is still a more recent revelation of God than the Qur'an. After all, the Resurrection is the definitive and constitutive sign of the end times, and it has reached back into history and grabbed us.

Overheard in the Refectory

One of the great things about living somewhere like New York is that you can get matzo ball soup in a house of Catholic religious.

"have some matzo ball soup, brother. It's from the Jews, just like salvation."

(cf. John 4:22)

Knowing the Audience

This morning I offered a funeral Mass. There was no wake in advance of today, so I didn't have the opportunity to meet the family, though I did speak with the daughter of the deceased and a deacon, a family friend, who assisted at the Mass.

It was only after the Mass, in the sacristy, that the deacon informed me that some of the folks in the front pew were Jewish. The gospel they had chosen was the raising of Lazarus and I would have preached somewhat differently had I known; perhaps to preach on Martha's faith in the resurrection on the "last day," the Resurrection of the Lord and the recapitulation of Joshua's leadership, the inbreaking of the final destiny of the world in the temple-less New Jerusalem, etc. (They had also chosen this part of Revelation as the second reading.)

Not knowing any of this, I preached up the baptism and eucharistic angle, of being united to Christ in his passing over from death to new life. Not that there's anything wrong with that, but I would have done something different had I known. Oh well.

God Language

Back at the beginning of the summer, I was utterly delighted to hear about the decision of the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments that we are no longer to use or pronounce the divine name during worship.

This made me happy because I have always felt that the pronunciation of the divine name in contemporary songs and alternative psalmodies was disrespectful not only to God but to the whole Scriptural tradition, kept alive by our Jewish brothers and sisters, of not pronouncing the name. A couple of times since this came out, though, I've gotten into conversations with people who don't approve.

Mostly they mourn the loss of Dan Schutte's beloved setting of Psalm 139, "You Are Near." This I understand. It's a laudably Scriptural song, people love it, and it's catchy. Maybe the words can be changed, but otherwise this is a genuine loss. Other alternative liturgical texts, more spurious in origin, will also have to be scrapped, and good riddance.

In any case, when I've been in conversations about this point, I've noticed a real lack of good sense about the nature of the words we use to refer to God, and what sort of words they are. Someone will say, for example, "How come we can say 'Lord' or 'God' but we can't use this particular name for God?"

The reason is, I think, because "Lord" and "God" are not names. To say "Lord," or Adonai or Kyrios for that matter, is to pronounce a title, not a name. These are titles for God that replace the divine name in the case of the Old Testament, and titles that migrate to the Risen Lord in the case of the New.

To say "God" is not to pronounce someone's name, but to point to a concept, an idea. To say "God" is not to address someone by name but to attempt to signify the Deity. This is why it is misguided for missionaries to replace the word "God" in the Scriptures with the proper name of the local deity.

Even to say "The Father" or "The Son," using the signifiers that Jesus reveals for the Holy Trinity is not really to use a name but a description of a relationship. There isn't really such a person as "God the Father," but the relation of Source and paternity within God.

In the end we have to recognize that most of our efforts to refer to the divine Mystery take the form of titles and descriptions, not names. There are really only two proper names for God, the divine name revealed to Moses, which no one may pronounce, and Jesus Christ, the name of the Word of God become human, whom we may and must address by name precisely because of his Incarnation.