November 28, 2009
The Spirit of Vigilance
As the year of our salvation 2010 begins to dawn this weekend, the first Sunday of Advent invites us into a meditation on the in-between-ness of our pilgrim way: we simultaneously look back to the dawn of our salvation in the birth of Christ and look forward to the terrible day of his return in glory. Follow this link for my homily for this weekend.
November 27, 2009
Six Stages in the Threefold Way
Today for the feast of Francis Fasani, the Franciscan breviary offers a reading from Bonaventure's De Triplici Via on the stages of the spiritual life. Since everybody loves such a schema and we all like to diagnose ourselves, I thought I would reproduce it. Some of the English looks a little sketchy to me, so next time I go to the library I'll try to find the passage in the Opera omnia and see if it can't be improved.
Six stages toward perfection through love:
1. Agreeableness. Meditations on the love of God produce sweetness in the heart, and the soul first learns how good God is.
2. Avidity. The soul, having some experience of this sweetness, is overcome with a desire for complete possession of the Beloved.
3. Satiety. No satisfaction or rest is found in anything else.
4. Ebreity. The soul loves God so much that anguish and sufferings for His sake are more delightful than spiritual consolation. Indeed, consolation--because it is a delight that is not God Himself--is loathed.
5. Security. Because it does not matter to the soul whether it is consoled or suffers, all fear is expelled. Nothing can separate the soul from God.
6. Tranquillity. The soul arrives at peace, rest, and silence.
So, as usual, diagnose yourself and the holiest person you know. For me, 2 (on a good day) and 4.
Six stages toward perfection through love:
1. Agreeableness. Meditations on the love of God produce sweetness in the heart, and the soul first learns how good God is.
2. Avidity. The soul, having some experience of this sweetness, is overcome with a desire for complete possession of the Beloved.
3. Satiety. No satisfaction or rest is found in anything else.
4. Ebreity. The soul loves God so much that anguish and sufferings for His sake are more delightful than spiritual consolation. Indeed, consolation--because it is a delight that is not God Himself--is loathed.
5. Security. Because it does not matter to the soul whether it is consoled or suffers, all fear is expelled. Nothing can separate the soul from God.
6. Tranquillity. The soul arrives at peace, rest, and silence.
So, as usual, diagnose yourself and the holiest person you know. For me, 2 (on a good day) and 4.
Charles Laughton Storyteller
Driving home from Thanksgiving dinner with my parents, their old cat, my brother and sister-in-law and unborn nephew, I tuned in this recording on the far left of the FM dial, somewhere around the border of Connecticut and New York.
Somehow I found it all very encouraging in some way that really matters to me.
Somehow I found it all very encouraging in some way that really matters to me.
November 25, 2009
Well, It Finally Happened
It has happened. A parishioner approached me about exercising the right given him by Benedict XVI in Summorum pontificum 6,3 to a funeral Mass in the Extraordinary Form.
At first I was anxious, but after thinking about it for a while, it seemed like something that could be done without too much trouble. We don't have vestments or a funeral pall, but these could be borrowed. I'm not sure if any of our choirs would know the Requiem Mass, but they might be happy to learn. If not, between the music director and myself I'm sure we have enough contacts to make it work. A server could be hired or borrowed, and perhaps there are young friars in my community who know how or are learning to serve the EF, whether they care to admit it or not. We have plenty of kneelers for Holy Communion. The one thing that still has me a little perplexed or concerned is candles...suffice it to say that the "candles" we have now would not be licit for the EF.
So I told the man that I would do my best to prepare and soften some ground so that he might be able to have the funeral he wants for himself.
At first I was anxious, but after thinking about it for a while, it seemed like something that could be done without too much trouble. We don't have vestments or a funeral pall, but these could be borrowed. I'm not sure if any of our choirs would know the Requiem Mass, but they might be happy to learn. If not, between the music director and myself I'm sure we have enough contacts to make it work. A server could be hired or borrowed, and perhaps there are young friars in my community who know how or are learning to serve the EF, whether they care to admit it or not. We have plenty of kneelers for Holy Communion. The one thing that still has me a little perplexed or concerned is candles...suffice it to say that the "candles" we have now would not be licit for the EF.
So I told the man that I would do my best to prepare and soften some ground so that he might be able to have the funeral he wants for himself.
Thanksgiving Rant
Wherein I wish to rant about liturgy and charity, which I find annoying and amusing, respectively.
First, liturgy. This morning someone asked me if Thanksgiving were a holy day of obligation. Of course it isn't, but the question reveals how far we have taken the canonization of the civil holiday into the liturgy. The proper preface that the American sacramentary gives for Thanksgiving Day has to be one of the most theologically inadequate liturgical texts ever foisted upon the People of God. I have never used it, and have tried not to even hear it. NLM has a reprint of an article about it by Fr. Thomas Kocik, and its "distinctively American misconstrual of divine election." No thanks for me too. As far as I'm concerned, in both expressions of the Roman rite, tomorrow is the feast of St. Leonard of Port Maurice.
Second, charity. Now I don't mean to make light of the beautiful efforts to feed the hungry that many people make this time of year. I was just over at our high school watching our students distribute a huge amount of food to the vans of charitable organizations that come by each year. Their joy at the experience of doing good gives glory to God. But this business about churches getting into the free turkey business this time of year, I have to say that it cracks me up. People start to show up at the door of the church to "get their turkey" with a spirit similar to the one that brings out the hordes to "get their ashes" or "get their palms." It cracks me up because turkey is actually very cheap as edible proteins go, and not without hazards and pitfalls when it comes to preparation. It's a symbolic thing, I know, a graced transaction that has more depth of meaning than economic need reveals. But it's still amusing to see all of these people consumed with a need to get a free turkey, probably spending more than the turkey would cost on gas as they drive around to different parish offices all day.
In any case, to all who support and encourage me in this ministry, enjoy your Thanksgiving and the feast of St. Leonard, whether you paid the national average of a dollar or so a pound for your turkey, or got it for free. Peace.
First, liturgy. This morning someone asked me if Thanksgiving were a holy day of obligation. Of course it isn't, but the question reveals how far we have taken the canonization of the civil holiday into the liturgy. The proper preface that the American sacramentary gives for Thanksgiving Day has to be one of the most theologically inadequate liturgical texts ever foisted upon the People of God. I have never used it, and have tried not to even hear it. NLM has a reprint of an article about it by Fr. Thomas Kocik, and its "distinctively American misconstrual of divine election." No thanks for me too. As far as I'm concerned, in both expressions of the Roman rite, tomorrow is the feast of St. Leonard of Port Maurice.
Second, charity. Now I don't mean to make light of the beautiful efforts to feed the hungry that many people make this time of year. I was just over at our high school watching our students distribute a huge amount of food to the vans of charitable organizations that come by each year. Their joy at the experience of doing good gives glory to God. But this business about churches getting into the free turkey business this time of year, I have to say that it cracks me up. People start to show up at the door of the church to "get their turkey" with a spirit similar to the one that brings out the hordes to "get their ashes" or "get their palms." It cracks me up because turkey is actually very cheap as edible proteins go, and not without hazards and pitfalls when it comes to preparation. It's a symbolic thing, I know, a graced transaction that has more depth of meaning than economic need reveals. But it's still amusing to see all of these people consumed with a need to get a free turkey, probably spending more than the turkey would cost on gas as they drive around to different parish offices all day.
In any case, to all who support and encourage me in this ministry, enjoy your Thanksgiving and the feast of St. Leonard, whether you paid the national average of a dollar or so a pound for your turkey, or got it for free. Peace.
November 24, 2009
Encouragements and Dangers
Over the course of the Year of the Priest so far, I've been touched by the gestures of many. I've received medals and holy cards and even a letter from someone who let me know she was praying for me on a particular day. I thank God every day for the charity of so many; as I often say to penitents and visitors to our parlor, it may only be in heaven that we learn how much we were supported by the prayers of others.
I'm grateful for the Year of the Priest because I think the Church at large needs good reflection and catechesis on the priesthood, but I'm also wary because we need to make sure we make these teachings and reflections in the right way.
A couple of examples from my own experience highlight the need for catechesis on the priesthood. When I was younger in the faith I could be a little scrupulous. (I imagine that some of my confreres would say that I still am.) I tried to attend Mass as often as I could, but I didn't always receive Holy Communion if I felt as if there were a good chance I was in a state of mortal sin. I remember how on one of these days I asked myself what it would be like if I were a priest who had to offer Mass each day; what would happen then if I were in a state of mortal sin? Could I offer Mass but not receive Communion? I had never noticed this happening, but I didn't see why it couldn't be done. That I didn't understand that no Mass in fact occurs without the Communion of the priest revealed my lack of understanding and catechetical formation on the priesthood and the Eucharist.
Once when I was in studies a classmate told me about a wonderfully progressive Mass that she attended. Everyone shared in all the prayers, with one person praying the Collect, another the Prayer over the Gifts, etc. The Eucharistic Prayer was similarly shared among the various persons assisting at the "Mass," except for the Institution Narrative itself: Father had to say that part. In this particular abuse those who thought themselves liberal and progressive actually reveal that their thinking about the Eucharist and the priesthood is actually quite shallow and magical; the priest was only required for the hocus pocus.
These sorts of distortions and misunderstandings, as well as false ideas of "active participation" have left many of us with a shallow or impoverished sense of the nature of the priesthood and its relation to the Eucharist.
On the other hand, as we try to lift up the priesthood and restore proper catechesis during this Year of the Priest, we must be very careful. Whenever we say "priest" or "priesthood" or "Year of the Priest" we must always keep in mind that the primary referent of these utterances is Jesus Christ, not any presbyter or bishop. Sometimes when I have a free morning I make the three mile trip to the St. Joseph's Seminary library. As seems right, I always make a visit to the Blessed Sacrament on my way into and out of the building. Their chapel is very beautiful to me: the white of the walls combined with the deep brown of the choirs, the lack of carpet, it just does it for me. The words of psalm 110 ring out from the sanctuary: Te es sacerdos in aeternum. Sometimes I try to imagine what it might be like to pray beneath those words each day. If a young man saw in them the inner delight of the Blessed Trinity, of the Father's joy in the mission of the Incarnate Son, these words might form him in some mighty grace.* But if a young man began to see himself as the primary referent of these words, then there is clerical arrogance on the horizon for sure.
So let us enjoy the Year of the Priest, encouraging and supporting the ordained priests of Jesus Christ and letting them know. But let us be sure that we are deepening our sense of the One and only Priest of the New Covenant, Jesus Christ. Let us deepen our knowledge of his one Sacrifice, so as to avoid superstition, magic, and clericalism.
*Here we might rant a little against those who are fanatic for 'inclusive language' in psalmody for prayer; in their haste to be politically correct, they often remove from our attention the Christological and Trinitarian meanings of the Psalms on which so much classic Christian spirituality is based.
I'm grateful for the Year of the Priest because I think the Church at large needs good reflection and catechesis on the priesthood, but I'm also wary because we need to make sure we make these teachings and reflections in the right way.
A couple of examples from my own experience highlight the need for catechesis on the priesthood. When I was younger in the faith I could be a little scrupulous. (I imagine that some of my confreres would say that I still am.) I tried to attend Mass as often as I could, but I didn't always receive Holy Communion if I felt as if there were a good chance I was in a state of mortal sin. I remember how on one of these days I asked myself what it would be like if I were a priest who had to offer Mass each day; what would happen then if I were in a state of mortal sin? Could I offer Mass but not receive Communion? I had never noticed this happening, but I didn't see why it couldn't be done. That I didn't understand that no Mass in fact occurs without the Communion of the priest revealed my lack of understanding and catechetical formation on the priesthood and the Eucharist.
Once when I was in studies a classmate told me about a wonderfully progressive Mass that she attended. Everyone shared in all the prayers, with one person praying the Collect, another the Prayer over the Gifts, etc. The Eucharistic Prayer was similarly shared among the various persons assisting at the "Mass," except for the Institution Narrative itself: Father had to say that part. In this particular abuse those who thought themselves liberal and progressive actually reveal that their thinking about the Eucharist and the priesthood is actually quite shallow and magical; the priest was only required for the hocus pocus.
These sorts of distortions and misunderstandings, as well as false ideas of "active participation" have left many of us with a shallow or impoverished sense of the nature of the priesthood and its relation to the Eucharist.
On the other hand, as we try to lift up the priesthood and restore proper catechesis during this Year of the Priest, we must be very careful. Whenever we say "priest" or "priesthood" or "Year of the Priest" we must always keep in mind that the primary referent of these utterances is Jesus Christ, not any presbyter or bishop. Sometimes when I have a free morning I make the three mile trip to the St. Joseph's Seminary library. As seems right, I always make a visit to the Blessed Sacrament on my way into and out of the building. Their chapel is very beautiful to me: the white of the walls combined with the deep brown of the choirs, the lack of carpet, it just does it for me. The words of psalm 110 ring out from the sanctuary: Te es sacerdos in aeternum. Sometimes I try to imagine what it might be like to pray beneath those words each day. If a young man saw in them the inner delight of the Blessed Trinity, of the Father's joy in the mission of the Incarnate Son, these words might form him in some mighty grace.* But if a young man began to see himself as the primary referent of these words, then there is clerical arrogance on the horizon for sure.
So let us enjoy the Year of the Priest, encouraging and supporting the ordained priests of Jesus Christ and letting them know. But let us be sure that we are deepening our sense of the One and only Priest of the New Covenant, Jesus Christ. Let us deepen our knowledge of his one Sacrifice, so as to avoid superstition, magic, and clericalism.
*Here we might rant a little against those who are fanatic for 'inclusive language' in psalmody for prayer; in their haste to be politically correct, they often remove from our attention the Christological and Trinitarian meanings of the Psalms on which so much classic Christian spirituality is based.
November 23, 2009
Franciscan Blogroll
Check out New Sandals. Click and spike brother's stats!
Also, I have removed from the roll a couple of apparently dormant blogs. If you become active again, let me know!
Also, I have removed from the roll a couple of apparently dormant blogs. If you become active again, let me know!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)