I had an amazing transition-time dream last night. Like a lot of my dreams it took the form of an adventure. There were curious but telling locations: a dark intersection at night, a celebratory event with friars, a hospital that turned out to be dedicated to St. Francis, Newhallville (a neighborhood near where I grew up), and the home of a high school classmate. Between these there were various means of transportation: walking with the GPS on my phone malfunctioning and a ride each in a soccer-mom van and a dumb waiter. Some of the friars were in the dream, as well as other people I haven't seen or thought about in ages.
In one part of the dream I was cooking. It was like one of the afternoons when it's my turn to prepare the friars' supper. The funny part was that people kept bringing me new ingredients. Since the new items I kept receiving were of very high quality, and also to be polite, I had to keep revising the meal in order to include them in the dish. It got to be very challenging. Isn't that a rich image of the spiritual life? God gives us increasingly rare and beautiful graces, and we are left with the challenge of integrating these into the whole of our journey with all of its weeds and wheat, thereby forever arriving at a new grasp of ourselves and who we are before and in God.
The dream reminded me of some truths about people and places in the journey. Because of God's eternity, and because our spiritual lives are nothing but our participation in the mystery of God, our spirituality is somehow simultaneous over the whole of life. When we enter into a new relationship, for example, we bring into it everyone else to whom we have related. This is why we are all such blessed messes of true love and destructive pathology in all of our relationships. Salvation is the process by which each relationship becomes ever more chaste and charitable, with new ones starting at a better baseline. Places exert a similar influence; the places we have been have formed us, and we bring them into the new places we settle. I guess that's why religious life-options like the monastic vow of stability or the mendicant life of itinerancy are so spiritually potent.
In my prayer today I'm just thanking God for everyone and each place I take with me into this new life.
May 11, 2012
May 10, 2012
Slow Posting
Posting has been slow this week. I guess I'm somewhat preoccupied since hearing that my move and transition is coming up so quickly. There are so many things to think about: all the loose ends I need to tie up here in States before I go, planning my flight, deciding what I need to bring and what I need to get over taking along, trying to communicate with my new community, etc.
Not the least of these preoccupying things has been the last two mornings I've spent at the Italian consulate here in Boston, trying to apply for the visa per motivi religiosi, tipo 'D', per lunga durata. To my surprise, I think I have succeeded in this task as of yesterday afternoon, despite not yet having an original copy of the letter bearing the seal of the Vatican secretariat of state. What the secretary of state of the Holy See has to do with the Republic of Italy allowing the Capuchins to invite me to live and work for the Order in Rome I'm not sure, but I suppose this is exactly the sort of holy mystery that may be revealed to me in this new ministry as secretary for the English language.
If anything, my mornings at the consulate have shown me how simple my life really is. Overhearing the various and often tense conversations between the seekers of visas and the consular staff, I heard about all kinds of elaborate travel, complex international work, intricate finances, bi-continental marriages, the repatriation of mortal remains, etc. Last night I suggested to the formation staff that the student friars could be sent to the consulate on visa application days for the sake of learning multicultural sensitivities. The interactions between American applicants and the Italian staff did not always look to me like successful multicultural encounters, if you ascertain my meaning.
So, thanks for your prayers. More adventures to come.
Not the least of these preoccupying things has been the last two mornings I've spent at the Italian consulate here in Boston, trying to apply for the visa per motivi religiosi, tipo 'D', per lunga durata. To my surprise, I think I have succeeded in this task as of yesterday afternoon, despite not yet having an original copy of the letter bearing the seal of the Vatican secretariat of state. What the secretary of state of the Holy See has to do with the Republic of Italy allowing the Capuchins to invite me to live and work for the Order in Rome I'm not sure, but I suppose this is exactly the sort of holy mystery that may be revealed to me in this new ministry as secretary for the English language.
If anything, my mornings at the consulate have shown me how simple my life really is. Overhearing the various and often tense conversations between the seekers of visas and the consular staff, I heard about all kinds of elaborate travel, complex international work, intricate finances, bi-continental marriages, the repatriation of mortal remains, etc. Last night I suggested to the formation staff that the student friars could be sent to the consulate on visa application days for the sake of learning multicultural sensitivities. The interactions between American applicants and the Italian staff did not always look to me like successful multicultural encounters, if you ascertain my meaning.
So, thanks for your prayers. More adventures to come.
May 7, 2012
Apis Mater
This little candle nub used to be about two feet long.
It was one of the beeswax baptismal candles prepared for the clergy at the Easter Vigil of our cathedral here in Boston. One of the friars brought one back for me that night. I've been burning it as a prayer candle in my room. I was hoping that it would make it to Pentecost, but it wasn't to be.
Prayer consumes. Prayer immolates. In offering the Paschal Candle to God at the Easter Vigil, it was presented as "the work of bees and of your servants' hands." There's the logic of the incarnation; the Word of God having become flesh in Christ renders creation fit to be transformed through immolating sacrifice to God. My little Easter candle was consumed in its work as a symbol accompanying my moments of prayer. The substance of bread and wine, as both created matter and a product of human work, is immolated in the Sacrifice of the Mass so as to re-present the one Sacrifice such that we might receive its victory over sin and death into our bodies and our lives.
This is the paschal mystery. In his own high priestly sacrifice, Jesus Christ carries in himself a disfigured creation that it might be transfigured in his victory. Abandoning ourselves to the immolation of the same Sacrifice, we find ourselves reborn for the great Easter slogan: sursum sunt quaerite, "seek the things that are above."
It was one of the beeswax baptismal candles prepared for the clergy at the Easter Vigil of our cathedral here in Boston. One of the friars brought one back for me that night. I've been burning it as a prayer candle in my room. I was hoping that it would make it to Pentecost, but it wasn't to be.
Prayer consumes. Prayer immolates. In offering the Paschal Candle to God at the Easter Vigil, it was presented as "the work of bees and of your servants' hands." There's the logic of the incarnation; the Word of God having become flesh in Christ renders creation fit to be transformed through immolating sacrifice to God. My little Easter candle was consumed in its work as a symbol accompanying my moments of prayer. The substance of bread and wine, as both created matter and a product of human work, is immolated in the Sacrifice of the Mass so as to re-present the one Sacrifice such that we might receive its victory over sin and death into our bodies and our lives.
This is the paschal mystery. In his own high priestly sacrifice, Jesus Christ carries in himself a disfigured creation that it might be transfigured in his victory. Abandoning ourselves to the immolation of the same Sacrifice, we find ourselves reborn for the great Easter slogan: sursum sunt quaerite, "seek the things that are above."
May 6, 2012
May 4, 2012
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.
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.
May 3, 2012
Is That You, St. James?
Today being the feast of the apostles Philip and James, it's a Roman Canon day according to my 'Plan for the minimum use of Eucharistic Prayer I,' which I recommend to all of my brother priests as a means of recovering this venerable prayer from having been (in some places) marginalized in the modern Roman liturgy.
Thinking about this last night was the occasion of thinking on something I had never noticed. Even after almost twenty years as a Catholic and almost five as a priest, I still make personal discoveries in the liturgy. Some of this comes from the shallowness of my own prayer and spirituality, but it also comes the amazing richness of the liturgy.
Today it was St. James in the Roman Canon. Both the apostles James are commemorated in the Canon, but I had never thought of which was which. It's fairly obvious with just a thoughtful look: the first James comes right before John, suggesting that this one is James the Greater, the brother of John. The second James is next to Philip, matching the liturgical association they have on this feast, and so is James the Less. Of course it's all as easy as the first being James the Greater and the second being James the Less, but my point is that I had never thought about it before. If I had prayed as far as the Jameses, I was probably looking ahead in anxiety as I hoped to get through the tongue-tying middle of Lini, Cleti, Clementis, Xysti, Cornelii, Cypriani, Laurentii, Chrysogoni/Linus, Cletus, Clement, Sixtus, Cornelius, Cyprian, Lawrence, Chrysogonus.
I have always been fascinated by the more or less insoluble question of whether or not James the Less was the same James who was bishop of Jerusalem. Whoever designed the last parish I worked in seemed to think so; the twelve apostles (with Paul replacing Judas, sorry Matthias) were painted at the tops of the columns, and James had a very nice miter on.
There are also two Peters in the Roman Canon.
One can read about the saints of the Canon in lots of places, but because it is such a useful and attractive site, I suggest the article posted at Sancta Missa.
Thinking about this last night was the occasion of thinking on something I had never noticed. Even after almost twenty years as a Catholic and almost five as a priest, I still make personal discoveries in the liturgy. Some of this comes from the shallowness of my own prayer and spirituality, but it also comes the amazing richness of the liturgy.
Today it was St. James in the Roman Canon. Both the apostles James are commemorated in the Canon, but I had never thought of which was which. It's fairly obvious with just a thoughtful look: the first James comes right before John, suggesting that this one is James the Greater, the brother of John. The second James is next to Philip, matching the liturgical association they have on this feast, and so is James the Less. Of course it's all as easy as the first being James the Greater and the second being James the Less, but my point is that I had never thought about it before. If I had prayed as far as the Jameses, I was probably looking ahead in anxiety as I hoped to get through the tongue-tying middle of Lini, Cleti, Clementis, Xysti, Cornelii, Cypriani, Laurentii, Chrysogoni/Linus, Cletus, Clement, Sixtus, Cornelius, Cyprian, Lawrence, Chrysogonus.
I have always been fascinated by the more or less insoluble question of whether or not James the Less was the same James who was bishop of Jerusalem. Whoever designed the last parish I worked in seemed to think so; the twelve apostles (with Paul replacing Judas, sorry Matthias) were painted at the tops of the columns, and James had a very nice miter on.
There are also two Peters in the Roman Canon.
One can read about the saints of the Canon in lots of places, but because it is such a useful and attractive site, I suggest the article posted at Sancta Missa.
May 1, 2012
Baker on Ochino
As I've mentioned a couple of times, one of my delights these days has been finally getting around to reading Dom Augustine Baker. Most recently, I was amused and surprised to find in his Sancta Sophia a take on early Capuchin history. Baker adduces our own Bernard Ochino as a negative example in his discussion of the necessity of prayer in the ministry of being a religious superior. Ochino, of course, is famous for apostatizing to Calvinism during his term as vicar general of the nascent Capuchin reform. After wandering through various Protestantisms and pastorates and starting a family that would eventually die of a plague in Poland, Ochino himself died in obscurity somewhere in Moravia.
"A fearful example of the mischief following the neglect of internal prayer in a superior, we find in Bernardine Ochinus, a superior in a most strict order, who was a famous zealous preacher, and, as might be judged by outward appearance, of more than ordinary sanctity; yet withal, to comply with those outward employments, a great neglecter of internal conventual recollections. And when he was sometimes charitably admonished of such his tepidity, his ordinary answer was: Do you not know that he who is always in a good action is always in prayer? Which saying of his had been true, if such good actions had been performed in virtue of prayer, and by grace obtained thereby, for then they had been virtually prayers; whereas actions, though in themselves never so good, if they want that purity of intention which is only to be had by pure prayer, are in God's esteem of little or no value,--the principal motives of them being no other than such as corrupt nature is likely to suggest. Ochinus, therefore, continuing in the same neglect, was by one of his brethren prophetically warned that he must expect some terrible issue thereof, in these words: Cave ne te ordo evomat, that is, Take heed that our order be not hereafter constrained to vomit thee out of it. The which unhappily fell out; for notwithstanding all his other specious qualities and endowments, he, first forsaking God, was afterwards forsaken by Him, and became a wretched Antitrinitarian apostate. And it is very probable that the greatest part of the apostates of these times (such I mean as have formerly lived in religious orders) do owe their apostasy and perdition to no other cause so much as to such neglect and apostasy first from prayer; the which holy exercise if they had continued, they would never have been weary of their habit first and afterward of their faith."
As an old Jesuit retreat master once said to us, "I used to tell myself that my life was prayer. And it might have been true, had I been praying." As the oft-repeated and variously attributed saying goes, when a priest or religious gets himself into trouble, the first question you ask is, "When did you stop praying your breviary?"
"A fearful example of the mischief following the neglect of internal prayer in a superior, we find in Bernardine Ochinus, a superior in a most strict order, who was a famous zealous preacher, and, as might be judged by outward appearance, of more than ordinary sanctity; yet withal, to comply with those outward employments, a great neglecter of internal conventual recollections. And when he was sometimes charitably admonished of such his tepidity, his ordinary answer was: Do you not know that he who is always in a good action is always in prayer? Which saying of his had been true, if such good actions had been performed in virtue of prayer, and by grace obtained thereby, for then they had been virtually prayers; whereas actions, though in themselves never so good, if they want that purity of intention which is only to be had by pure prayer, are in God's esteem of little or no value,--the principal motives of them being no other than such as corrupt nature is likely to suggest. Ochinus, therefore, continuing in the same neglect, was by one of his brethren prophetically warned that he must expect some terrible issue thereof, in these words: Cave ne te ordo evomat, that is, Take heed that our order be not hereafter constrained to vomit thee out of it. The which unhappily fell out; for notwithstanding all his other specious qualities and endowments, he, first forsaking God, was afterwards forsaken by Him, and became a wretched Antitrinitarian apostate. And it is very probable that the greatest part of the apostates of these times (such I mean as have formerly lived in religious orders) do owe their apostasy and perdition to no other cause so much as to such neglect and apostasy first from prayer; the which holy exercise if they had continued, they would never have been weary of their habit first and afterward of their faith."
As an old Jesuit retreat master once said to us, "I used to tell myself that my life was prayer. And it might have been true, had I been praying." As the oft-repeated and variously attributed saying goes, when a priest or religious gets himself into trouble, the first question you ask is, "When did you stop praying your breviary?"
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