While we're on hats. . .any suggestions on a good pipe tobacco?
Something smooth, sweet that won't smell like burning trash. . .?
03 December 2008
Arrivals & Haircuts (UPDATED)
More books have arrived. . .
Rachael K. (1), Jana (2), Paul & Mary H. (1), Bobby B. (1).
Rachael K. (1), Jana (2), Paul & Mary H. (1), Bobby B. (1).
If I understand the way the post works here in the priory, the friar in charge of mailing letters, etc. takes them to work with him at Vatican Radio and mails them from the post office there. So, your Thank You notes may have the new Pope stamps and Vatican cancellations on them!
I am also looking forward to the arrival of some electric clippers from the U.S. With them I can buzz my own hair and spend the barber portion of my academic budget on books! WooHoo!
Speaking of short hair. . .I think I may end up needing a hat of some sort. Though I am rarely cold, it's possible that I could get sunburned. What kind of hat should I get?
[Update: It's strange. A couple of months ago, I posted a shortish piece on prayer and a much longer piece on religious life "behind the scenes." Both of those pieces got about five comments combined. Now, I have 21 comments about what kind of hat I should be wearing. You people are freaky! :-) ]
Speaking of short hair. . .I think I may end up needing a hat of some sort. Though I am rarely cold, it's possible that I could get sunburned. What kind of hat should I get?
[Update: It's strange. A couple of months ago, I posted a shortish piece on prayer and a much longer piece on religious life "behind the scenes." Both of those pieces got about five comments combined. Now, I have 21 comments about what kind of hat I should be wearing. You people are freaky! :-) ]
02 December 2008
Fr. Philip's Vocation Story
I was born a poor white child. . .in rural Mississippi. Sorry, couldn't resist. Nonetheless, it's true.
Both sides of my family are Mississippi delta cotton farmers. Though no one farms now, both of my grandfathers planted cotton. My mother and all of her sisters "chopped cotton." My dad drove a tractor. All of them went to church. My mother's family went to the Baptist Church and my dad's family went to the Methodist Church.
My first memory of church goes back to the sixth grade when my mom and dad sent me and my little brother to Vacation Bible School. Mostly I remember being the only kid that week who had not "accepted Jesus into his heart as his personal Lord and savior." Come Friday, feeling the pressure, I walked the aisle, said the necessary things, and walked back to my pew complete with Jesus. It didn't take.
For the most part my family back then was not a church-going bunch. We went occasionally, but mostly we spent Sundays working in the gardens, the yards, doing necessary work around the house and farm. Sometime my sophomore year, mom and dad decided to start going to church again. They chose a United Methodist Church in the largest town near us. It was the local "bankers' and doctors'" church. Lots of old money. Lots of nice cars. Lots of snooty glances at the rubes from the woods. I hated it. We stopped going after about six months.
That next year I went to Mexico with my junior Spanish class. We cut and sold firewood from my family's property to pay for the trip. Our teacher, a Catholic woman, helped us with the hard labor and with our Spanish. Up until we got to the National Cathedral and the Shrine of Our Lady of Guadalupe, the trip had been a bust for me. My roommates were jerks. I didn't have much money. And my Spanish was rotten. When we arrived at the plaza in front of the cathedral, one of a hundred tour buses packed full of tourists, I stood up and started to the front of the bus like a robot. One more stop, one more site, snap a pic, get back on the cool bus. Little did I know. . .
The second I stepped off the bus, even before my foot hit the pavement, I notices crowds of older women in black on their knees slowly making their way to the shrine. They were praying with these necklaces in their hands. I turned to my teacher and asked what was going on. While she formulated an answer I was horrified to see that these women had bloodied their knees crawling on the gravel and pavement. What kind of religion was this?! My teacher said something about devotion and praying for sons in the drug world and some other things about Mary. I didn't really hear it all.
When we got inside the cathedral, I was overwhelmed with a sense of familiarity and comfort. Just this energetic boost of being home and welcomed. There was a Mass going on. I pestered my teacher for details. She explained what she could. She showed me how to make the sign of cross using holy water. How to kneel. She told me the names of all the fantastical objects in the church--the crucifix, the statues of Mary and the saints, the fonts and confessionals and altars. I was overwhelmed. It was like someone was reminding me of things I had known all my life.
As I look back on that day what I know now is that God trapped me with the sacramental imagination. He was showing me His presence in all the things of this sacred place. I "recognized" them as holy, as set-aside, because without having the words to articulate the feeling, I felt holy as well, loved, wanted. With this feeling still rattling around inside, we walked over to the newly opened Shrine of Our Lady of Guadalupe. I knew nothing about this. Nothing at all. The story, once I heard it, didn't impress me all that much. Sounded kinda far-fetched to me. The new basilica was ugly. Stark, angular, modern, cold. Nothing like the near primitive wonder of the cathedral. We saw the relic. Big deal. Move on.
With the vision of the bloody old ladies still in my head and the incense still in my nose. And maybe even a bead or two of holy water still clinging to my forehead, I got back on the bus and started in on my teacher. I pestered her some more about why she was Catholic and where I could get more information and could I come to Mass at her Church and did her Church have classes for people who wanted to be Catholics and on and on and on. . .she good-naturedly answered my questions.
We drove over the mountains to a village called Taxco. A silver mining town for tourists. Our hotel perched on the side of the mountain and my room had a balcony looking out over the valley. At midnight the local set off a stream of fireworks. I went to the balcony. It was very breezy and cold for a Mexican March night. Just standing there alone watching the fireworks I had this sudden sense that everything around me was rushing toward me, almost as if I were falling standing straight up. For just a few seconds I didn't hear anything. Going back to bed, I prayed--something I never did!--and simply asked God to tell me what to do.
I woke up the next morning convinced I should be a priest. After that I started having dreams.
I was vested in red and saying Mass in my high school auditorium.
I was teaching a class and a man called me out of the classroom to say Mass.
I was standing in a sacristy and couldn't find the right vestments.
I was in the middle of saying Mass and the sacramentary was all wrong, misprinted. . .
Eventually, I told my grandmother. She gave me a cigar box full of Catholic paraphernalia: a rosary, prayer cards, a small crucifix, and a "question and answer" catechism, which never left my side. I took it to school and embarrassed myself arguing with the Baptists. Even my teachers got in on the arguments! The stuff in that box became a tangible link for me to the Church.
When my parents found out that I wanted to be a priest, they were a little upset. They put up some resistance at first but eventually gave way. By this time I had gone off to college and joined the Episcopal Church. Why the Episcopal Church and not the Catholic? The E.C. in my college town was an old-fashioned brick building built in the 1830's. Stained glass. Brass fixtures. Beautiful hangings. The priests there wore their clerics. The music was thundering, beautifully sung. The services were "churchy." The Catholic Church in town was easily confused with a dentist office. Built in the late 70's, it was a box with those 7-11 glass doors and the whole "stripped bare" vibe. No statues. No tabernacle. No stained glass. No nothing that identified this building as a Catholic Church. The services were informal to the point of being just slightly more organized than a Baptist picnic. The music was folksy guitar, hand-clapping, tamborine banging. The priest wore ugly, ugly, ugly vestments. There was absolutely nothing solemn, nothing transcendent, nothing attractive about any of it. The choice to become Episcopalian was too easy.
I was baptized in the E.C. in 1982 and confirmed later that year. I immediately went to the rector and told him that I wanted to be an Episcoplian priest. I was 18. He told me to finish my undergrad studies, think about getting a masters, and come back when I was around 24 to discuss the whole thing again. 24?! That was middle-aged!! Anyway, I became very active in my parish. After a few years and well into grad school, I had a falling out with the rector. Being a good Protestant, I stopped going to church in protest. In the meantime, all sorts of ideologies, practices, philosophies, and personalities were drawing my attention.
Since the E.C. offered almost nothing in the way of solid teaching on moral deliberation or anything in the way of substantial intellectual formation, I fell prey to one dubious theology after another. Finally, in my last year of PhD studies, I was convinced that God did not exist. Despite this, I was convinced by a British prof teaching in my department that I should move to the U.K. and become a "red priest," that is, an Anglican priest who rejects theism but works in the church for "social justice" using Marxist/socialist categories as guides.
I decided to take a year out and teach English in China. That was a disaster. However, I came back to the States rededicated to my vocation to become an Episcopal priest. I started the formal discernment process in my diocese--a two year procedural grind that worked to discourage many people by its sheer complexity and futility. I served as the guinea pig postulant for my parish "discernment committee." The whole thing was a farce. At the time, I submitted to it out of a sense of wanting to collaborate and a sense that the Spirit would work through the committee to help me discern my vocation.
The details of the process would be book-length so I'll have to summarize: I spent two years meeting nearly weekly with nine lay people from the parish who asked the same questions over and over again. . .eventually they sent a positive recommendation to the vestry of the parish who then met with me to ask me the same questions over and over again. On the night of the vestry vote on whether or not to send my application to the bishop, every single member of the vestry looked me in the eye and told me that I had his/her support and vote. I went home confirmed in my vocation and ready to start seminary. At around 11.30pm, the rector called to tell me that the vestry had rejected my application. The reason: I had the stuff for making a good priest but just not yet mature enough. I was 28 at the time. The rector could not tell me why those voting against my application had lied to me earlier.
This rejection sent me into an anti-religious tailspin. It was during this time that I pursued my interests in the occult and became more and more enamored with Marxism. I spent two years finishing up doctoral coursework and preparing for comprehensive exams. After passing my orals, the prospectus defense, and suffering through several personal traumas, I left the academic world for a job in the psychiatric world. Once in place in my new home, I begain to pursue the priesthood again. This time in another diocese with another parish. At the urging of my parish priest, a woman from Mississippi, I took on a Catholic spiritual director, a Paulist priest in a local parish. Over a year with him I found my Catholic vocation again.
On the national scene, the E.C. was committing suicide with one disastrous lurch away from the historic faith after another. Finally, in 1995, I had had enough and left the E.C. to become a Catholic. I joined the RCC as a liberal High Church Episcopalian, meaning I was formally a Catholic but my theology and church politics were modernist and my liturgical tastes were medieval. I still didn't care for the informal, hippie-dippie Catholic liturgy, but the friendliness and community that the RCC had compared very favorably the chill I felt in the cliquey country club world of the EC.
Once confirmed, I immediately started the process for joining the Paulists. I spent two years in discernment with these guys. On the advice of the vocations director, I quit my excellent job at the hospital and moved home to spend the summer before entering seminary with my parents. I got a job in a local psych hospital and basically spent my free time getting "caught up" on all things Catholic and Paulist. In June of 1998, I came home from work and my mom told me that the Fr. John, the Paulist vocations director, has called and wanted me to call him back. I did. He told me that the president of the Paulists had rejected my application for admission. Fr. John would not tell me why. He said, "They're afraid you will sue us." Apparently, Fr. John should not have encouraged me to quit my job before the final decision about my application was made!
I was devastated. My mom wanted me to drop the whole idea of priesthood. I agreed. I walked around the house that day, saying over and over again, "What am I going to do?" My mom kept crying and telling me to just forget the priesthood, get a job, get an apartment, and be happy doing that. In the meantime, I was injured at work and got a staph infection in the injured site (first lumbar disc). I spent the next seven months in agony--both physical and mental, trying to deal with doctors, hospitals, insurance people. It was during that period of pain, dependence, helplessness, and rebellion that I finally found my niche. Accidently.
I was browsing an internet site that had an alphabetic listing of links to the websites of men's religious orders. Most of them I had never heard of. I spotted one that intrigued me "Discalced Carmelites." As I went to click on the link, I accidently clicked on the link for "Dominicans." I was taken to the order's main webpage and it took me all of three minutes to find the US provinces and the southern province. I contacted the vocation director via email and the next day he called to chat with me for two hours. About a week later he came from New Orleans to my parents' house in Mississippi to interview me. We spent six hours together. He offered me an application at the end of the meeting.
What was special about this discernment? Over the years I've complicated the whole affair into something it isn't. For me, the simple truth is this: the Dominicans wanted me. The Episcopalians didn't want me. The Paulist rejected me. The Dominicans wanted me, and they promised to make use of my gifts. I was accepted into the 1999-2000 novitiate class. My acceptance was contingent on my finishing the PhD before July 1999. I wrote furiously from Feb to July, finishing a first draft by the time my plane left. I graduated with the PhD in May of 2000. I was simply professed in 2000; solemnly professed in 2003; ordained deacon in 2004 and priest in 2005.
Smooth sailing the whole way, you ask. Ohhhhh, no. The novitiate was very hard. My studium years were extremely difficult. I made the move from being an ideological Marixist with religious pretensions to being an orthodox Catholic. The move has not been applauded by all of my brothers and sisters in the Order. Sometimes, I get the impression that there is some "buyer's remorse" about accepting my application! However, I have found many brothers and sisters in the Order (from the whole theological spectrum) who share St Dominic's zeal for preaching the gospel and witnessing to the power of God's mercy.
Plans? The phrase "Dominican plans" is an oxymoron. Of course, we plan. But I've rarely seen these plans actually pan out. If I could simply chose my path I would continue teaching undergraduate philosophy, theology, and literature. I am developing a course that brings all three fields together. The University of Dallas is developing a creative writing program that I would probably be willing to hurt someone to join. The Angelicum has a Templeton Foundation grant for a project called "Science, Theology, and the Ontological Quest." The grant brings in scientists, philosophers, and theologians to teach and research on the intersections of science and faith. I'd love to be a part of this. I am also dedicated to adult lay formation at the level of teaching basic theological/philosophical methods. However, preaching, as always, remains primary and any and all of this stuff I've mentioned here is directed solely to the improvement of the preaching. Without that, there is no reason at all for me to be here.
Fr. Philip, OP
Both sides of my family are Mississippi delta cotton farmers. Though no one farms now, both of my grandfathers planted cotton. My mother and all of her sisters "chopped cotton." My dad drove a tractor. All of them went to church. My mother's family went to the Baptist Church and my dad's family went to the Methodist Church.
My first memory of church goes back to the sixth grade when my mom and dad sent me and my little brother to Vacation Bible School. Mostly I remember being the only kid that week who had not "accepted Jesus into his heart as his personal Lord and savior." Come Friday, feeling the pressure, I walked the aisle, said the necessary things, and walked back to my pew complete with Jesus. It didn't take.
For the most part my family back then was not a church-going bunch. We went occasionally, but mostly we spent Sundays working in the gardens, the yards, doing necessary work around the house and farm. Sometime my sophomore year, mom and dad decided to start going to church again. They chose a United Methodist Church in the largest town near us. It was the local "bankers' and doctors'" church. Lots of old money. Lots of nice cars. Lots of snooty glances at the rubes from the woods. I hated it. We stopped going after about six months.
That next year I went to Mexico with my junior Spanish class. We cut and sold firewood from my family's property to pay for the trip. Our teacher, a Catholic woman, helped us with the hard labor and with our Spanish. Up until we got to the National Cathedral and the Shrine of Our Lady of Guadalupe, the trip had been a bust for me. My roommates were jerks. I didn't have much money. And my Spanish was rotten. When we arrived at the plaza in front of the cathedral, one of a hundred tour buses packed full of tourists, I stood up and started to the front of the bus like a robot. One more stop, one more site, snap a pic, get back on the cool bus. Little did I know. . .
The second I stepped off the bus, even before my foot hit the pavement, I notices crowds of older women in black on their knees slowly making their way to the shrine. They were praying with these necklaces in their hands. I turned to my teacher and asked what was going on. While she formulated an answer I was horrified to see that these women had bloodied their knees crawling on the gravel and pavement. What kind of religion was this?! My teacher said something about devotion and praying for sons in the drug world and some other things about Mary. I didn't really hear it all.
When we got inside the cathedral, I was overwhelmed with a sense of familiarity and comfort. Just this energetic boost of being home and welcomed. There was a Mass going on. I pestered my teacher for details. She explained what she could. She showed me how to make the sign of cross using holy water. How to kneel. She told me the names of all the fantastical objects in the church--the crucifix, the statues of Mary and the saints, the fonts and confessionals and altars. I was overwhelmed. It was like someone was reminding me of things I had known all my life.
As I look back on that day what I know now is that God trapped me with the sacramental imagination. He was showing me His presence in all the things of this sacred place. I "recognized" them as holy, as set-aside, because without having the words to articulate the feeling, I felt holy as well, loved, wanted. With this feeling still rattling around inside, we walked over to the newly opened Shrine of Our Lady of Guadalupe. I knew nothing about this. Nothing at all. The story, once I heard it, didn't impress me all that much. Sounded kinda far-fetched to me. The new basilica was ugly. Stark, angular, modern, cold. Nothing like the near primitive wonder of the cathedral. We saw the relic. Big deal. Move on.
With the vision of the bloody old ladies still in my head and the incense still in my nose. And maybe even a bead or two of holy water still clinging to my forehead, I got back on the bus and started in on my teacher. I pestered her some more about why she was Catholic and where I could get more information and could I come to Mass at her Church and did her Church have classes for people who wanted to be Catholics and on and on and on. . .she good-naturedly answered my questions.
We drove over the mountains to a village called Taxco. A silver mining town for tourists. Our hotel perched on the side of the mountain and my room had a balcony looking out over the valley. At midnight the local set off a stream of fireworks. I went to the balcony. It was very breezy and cold for a Mexican March night. Just standing there alone watching the fireworks I had this sudden sense that everything around me was rushing toward me, almost as if I were falling standing straight up. For just a few seconds I didn't hear anything. Going back to bed, I prayed--something I never did!--and simply asked God to tell me what to do.
I woke up the next morning convinced I should be a priest. After that I started having dreams.
I was vested in red and saying Mass in my high school auditorium.
I was teaching a class and a man called me out of the classroom to say Mass.
I was standing in a sacristy and couldn't find the right vestments.
I was in the middle of saying Mass and the sacramentary was all wrong, misprinted. . .
Eventually, I told my grandmother. She gave me a cigar box full of Catholic paraphernalia: a rosary, prayer cards, a small crucifix, and a "question and answer" catechism, which never left my side. I took it to school and embarrassed myself arguing with the Baptists. Even my teachers got in on the arguments! The stuff in that box became a tangible link for me to the Church.
When my parents found out that I wanted to be a priest, they were a little upset. They put up some resistance at first but eventually gave way. By this time I had gone off to college and joined the Episcopal Church. Why the Episcopal Church and not the Catholic? The E.C. in my college town was an old-fashioned brick building built in the 1830's. Stained glass. Brass fixtures. Beautiful hangings. The priests there wore their clerics. The music was thundering, beautifully sung. The services were "churchy." The Catholic Church in town was easily confused with a dentist office. Built in the late 70's, it was a box with those 7-11 glass doors and the whole "stripped bare" vibe. No statues. No tabernacle. No stained glass. No nothing that identified this building as a Catholic Church. The services were informal to the point of being just slightly more organized than a Baptist picnic. The music was folksy guitar, hand-clapping, tamborine banging. The priest wore ugly, ugly, ugly vestments. There was absolutely nothing solemn, nothing transcendent, nothing attractive about any of it. The choice to become Episcopalian was too easy.
I was baptized in the E.C. in 1982 and confirmed later that year. I immediately went to the rector and told him that I wanted to be an Episcoplian priest. I was 18. He told me to finish my undergrad studies, think about getting a masters, and come back when I was around 24 to discuss the whole thing again. 24?! That was middle-aged!! Anyway, I became very active in my parish. After a few years and well into grad school, I had a falling out with the rector. Being a good Protestant, I stopped going to church in protest. In the meantime, all sorts of ideologies, practices, philosophies, and personalities were drawing my attention.
Since the E.C. offered almost nothing in the way of solid teaching on moral deliberation or anything in the way of substantial intellectual formation, I fell prey to one dubious theology after another. Finally, in my last year of PhD studies, I was convinced that God did not exist. Despite this, I was convinced by a British prof teaching in my department that I should move to the U.K. and become a "red priest," that is, an Anglican priest who rejects theism but works in the church for "social justice" using Marxist/socialist categories as guides.
I decided to take a year out and teach English in China. That was a disaster. However, I came back to the States rededicated to my vocation to become an Episcopal priest. I started the formal discernment process in my diocese--a two year procedural grind that worked to discourage many people by its sheer complexity and futility. I served as the guinea pig postulant for my parish "discernment committee." The whole thing was a farce. At the time, I submitted to it out of a sense of wanting to collaborate and a sense that the Spirit would work through the committee to help me discern my vocation.
The details of the process would be book-length so I'll have to summarize: I spent two years meeting nearly weekly with nine lay people from the parish who asked the same questions over and over again. . .eventually they sent a positive recommendation to the vestry of the parish who then met with me to ask me the same questions over and over again. On the night of the vestry vote on whether or not to send my application to the bishop, every single member of the vestry looked me in the eye and told me that I had his/her support and vote. I went home confirmed in my vocation and ready to start seminary. At around 11.30pm, the rector called to tell me that the vestry had rejected my application. The reason: I had the stuff for making a good priest but just not yet mature enough. I was 28 at the time. The rector could not tell me why those voting against my application had lied to me earlier.
This rejection sent me into an anti-religious tailspin. It was during this time that I pursued my interests in the occult and became more and more enamored with Marxism. I spent two years finishing up doctoral coursework and preparing for comprehensive exams. After passing my orals, the prospectus defense, and suffering through several personal traumas, I left the academic world for a job in the psychiatric world. Once in place in my new home, I begain to pursue the priesthood again. This time in another diocese with another parish. At the urging of my parish priest, a woman from Mississippi, I took on a Catholic spiritual director, a Paulist priest in a local parish. Over a year with him I found my Catholic vocation again.
On the national scene, the E.C. was committing suicide with one disastrous lurch away from the historic faith after another. Finally, in 1995, I had had enough and left the E.C. to become a Catholic. I joined the RCC as a liberal High Church Episcopalian, meaning I was formally a Catholic but my theology and church politics were modernist and my liturgical tastes were medieval. I still didn't care for the informal, hippie-dippie Catholic liturgy, but the friendliness and community that the RCC had compared very favorably the chill I felt in the cliquey country club world of the EC.
Once confirmed, I immediately started the process for joining the Paulists. I spent two years in discernment with these guys. On the advice of the vocations director, I quit my excellent job at the hospital and moved home to spend the summer before entering seminary with my parents. I got a job in a local psych hospital and basically spent my free time getting "caught up" on all things Catholic and Paulist. In June of 1998, I came home from work and my mom told me that the Fr. John, the Paulist vocations director, has called and wanted me to call him back. I did. He told me that the president of the Paulists had rejected my application for admission. Fr. John would not tell me why. He said, "They're afraid you will sue us." Apparently, Fr. John should not have encouraged me to quit my job before the final decision about my application was made!
I was devastated. My mom wanted me to drop the whole idea of priesthood. I agreed. I walked around the house that day, saying over and over again, "What am I going to do?" My mom kept crying and telling me to just forget the priesthood, get a job, get an apartment, and be happy doing that. In the meantime, I was injured at work and got a staph infection in the injured site (first lumbar disc). I spent the next seven months in agony--both physical and mental, trying to deal with doctors, hospitals, insurance people. It was during that period of pain, dependence, helplessness, and rebellion that I finally found my niche. Accidently.
I was browsing an internet site that had an alphabetic listing of links to the websites of men's religious orders. Most of them I had never heard of. I spotted one that intrigued me "Discalced Carmelites." As I went to click on the link, I accidently clicked on the link for "Dominicans." I was taken to the order's main webpage and it took me all of three minutes to find the US provinces and the southern province. I contacted the vocation director via email and the next day he called to chat with me for two hours. About a week later he came from New Orleans to my parents' house in Mississippi to interview me. We spent six hours together. He offered me an application at the end of the meeting.
What was special about this discernment? Over the years I've complicated the whole affair into something it isn't. For me, the simple truth is this: the Dominicans wanted me. The Episcopalians didn't want me. The Paulist rejected me. The Dominicans wanted me, and they promised to make use of my gifts. I was accepted into the 1999-2000 novitiate class. My acceptance was contingent on my finishing the PhD before July 1999. I wrote furiously from Feb to July, finishing a first draft by the time my plane left. I graduated with the PhD in May of 2000. I was simply professed in 2000; solemnly professed in 2003; ordained deacon in 2004 and priest in 2005.
Smooth sailing the whole way, you ask. Ohhhhh, no. The novitiate was very hard. My studium years were extremely difficult. I made the move from being an ideological Marixist with religious pretensions to being an orthodox Catholic. The move has not been applauded by all of my brothers and sisters in the Order. Sometimes, I get the impression that there is some "buyer's remorse" about accepting my application! However, I have found many brothers and sisters in the Order (from the whole theological spectrum) who share St Dominic's zeal for preaching the gospel and witnessing to the power of God's mercy.
Plans? The phrase "Dominican plans" is an oxymoron. Of course, we plan. But I've rarely seen these plans actually pan out. If I could simply chose my path I would continue teaching undergraduate philosophy, theology, and literature. I am developing a course that brings all three fields together. The University of Dallas is developing a creative writing program that I would probably be willing to hurt someone to join. The Angelicum has a Templeton Foundation grant for a project called "Science, Theology, and the Ontological Quest." The grant brings in scientists, philosophers, and theologians to teach and research on the intersections of science and faith. I'd love to be a part of this. I am also dedicated to adult lay formation at the level of teaching basic theological/philosophical methods. However, preaching, as always, remains primary and any and all of this stuff I've mentioned here is directed solely to the improvement of the preaching. Without that, there is no reason at all for me to be here.
Fr. Philip, OP
P.S. I almost completely forgot to mention what happened with my high school Spanish teacher, Mrs. Mary Eddy! I went home to visit my parents right after I got back from Oxford in 2004. I had been ordained a deacon at Blackfriars and was preparing to move to Houston, TX for my internship. I went to Mass at the local parish, which had moved to a newer building. I went in clerics to the 9am Mass. When I got there I asked around for Mrs. Eddy. It didn't take long before she came running up to me to say hello! She was very surprised to see me and more surprised to me in clerics. She told everyone that she was responsible for bringing me into the Church. Yup, I'd say she was. Goes to show you what just a little encouragement for a young man with a vocation can do. . .right?
Cherie Blair invited to the Angelicum
LifeSite News is reporting:
ROME, December, 3, 2008 (LifeSiteNews.com) – One of the most important institutions of higher learning in the Catholic world will host Cherie Blair, the adamantly pro-abortion wife of former U.K. Prime Minister Tony Blair, later this month. The Social Sciences faculty of the Pontifical University of St. Thomas Aquinas in Rome [where I am currently living and studying], known popularly as the Angelicum, is hosting Mrs. Blair at a conference on women’s rights on December 12.
I've received email about this asking for more information. I really don't know anything about it. I sent an email to the dean of the social sciences faculty, Sr. Helen Alford, OP, asking for a little clarification. Let's see what happens.
You can read the website for the conference here. Be sure to check out the "Links" button. I am hoping that the organizations linked in this list are linked for informational purposes only. If they are being endorsed, this is a problem.
I've received email about this asking for more information. I really don't know anything about it. I sent an email to the dean of the social sciences faculty, Sr. Helen Alford, OP, asking for a little clarification. Let's see what happens.
You can read the website for the conference here. Be sure to check out the "Links" button. I am hoping that the organizations linked in this list are linked for informational purposes only. If they are being endorsed, this is a problem.
Being a signal to the nations
First Week of Advent (T): Is 11.1-10; Luke 10.21-24
Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP
Convento SS Domenico e Sisto, Roma
For generations, prophets and kings failed to see and to hear. Though they waited faithfully, straining their eyes and ears against darkness and silence, they saw nothing; they heard nothing. In their anxious waiting they detected not one spark, not one whisper; yet, they waited. For whom did they wait? Isaiah tells God’s people that “on that day,” the day that their long patience will be rewarded; on that day, they will receive from the root of Jesse’s family tree, a sprout and then a blossom, and on that blooming sprout, a son, “the Spirit of the LORD shall rest. . .a Spirit of wisdom and of understanding, a Spirit of counsel and of strength, a Spirit of knowledge and of fear of the LORD.” This is the Son for whom they waited. And this is the Son we have seen and heard. Isaiah says, “On that day, the Gentiles shall seek out the root of Jesse…” That day, my fellow Gentiles, is today. Are you ready to see and hear the coming of the Lord?
Jesus, with his disciples, and in the middle of a crowd, lays claim to his inheritance as a prophesied son of Jesse. He says, “All things have been handed over to me by my Father.” As the inheriting son, the heir of the Father, Jesus lays claim to his father’s kingdom. Not so unusual. What is unusual is the claim immediately after: “No one knows who the Son is except the Father, and who the Father is except the Son and anyone to whom the Son wishes to reveal him.” Now, this is a truly priceless heirloom to inherit—the gift of revealing the Father! And Jesus wastes no time in making use of this gift. In private, he turns to his disciples and says, “Blessed are the eyes that see what you see.” What do they see? The flesh and blood of Isaiah’s promise: the Spirit of wisdom, of counsel, of knowledge, and of strength, the Spirit of the Lord come among them as a man.
Are you ready to see and hear the coming of the Lord? The prophets and kings waited and waited only to end without seeing or hearing. Their efforts gave birth to a hope for the coming of the Messiah but their hopeful waiting bore them no Savior in their lifetime. It would be many generations later that a virgin girl would say yes to the Spirit and give birth to the Word Made Flesh, sending out to creation the very Word Who was spoken over the void, re-creating everything that is fallen, waking in everyone who is fallen that spark of the Father who seduces us back to His glory, so that we might live, against the defeat of death itself, a life everlasting, ever-blest, ever-joyous, a life that will be a signal to the nations that a justice and peace, the Father’s justice and peace, will rule.
Are you ready to wait on the Lord, all the while knowing that the Lord has come, is coming, and will come again? Are you ready to be a revelation of God to world, to one another? Are you ready to be a signal to the nations? You are given the Spirit of wisdom, strength, counsel, understanding, and the fear of the Lord, are you ready to greet him in the flesh? To offer him your life and work as a gift? To come to him like the kings of the east who saw and heard, who came to him, proclaiming him Lord and King? Are you ready? Are you ready?
Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP
Convento SS Domenico e Sisto, Roma
For generations, prophets and kings failed to see and to hear. Though they waited faithfully, straining their eyes and ears against darkness and silence, they saw nothing; they heard nothing. In their anxious waiting they detected not one spark, not one whisper; yet, they waited. For whom did they wait? Isaiah tells God’s people that “on that day,” the day that their long patience will be rewarded; on that day, they will receive from the root of Jesse’s family tree, a sprout and then a blossom, and on that blooming sprout, a son, “the Spirit of the LORD shall rest. . .a Spirit of wisdom and of understanding, a Spirit of counsel and of strength, a Spirit of knowledge and of fear of the LORD.” This is the Son for whom they waited. And this is the Son we have seen and heard. Isaiah says, “On that day, the Gentiles shall seek out the root of Jesse…” That day, my fellow Gentiles, is today. Are you ready to see and hear the coming of the Lord?
Jesus, with his disciples, and in the middle of a crowd, lays claim to his inheritance as a prophesied son of Jesse. He says, “All things have been handed over to me by my Father.” As the inheriting son, the heir of the Father, Jesus lays claim to his father’s kingdom. Not so unusual. What is unusual is the claim immediately after: “No one knows who the Son is except the Father, and who the Father is except the Son and anyone to whom the Son wishes to reveal him.” Now, this is a truly priceless heirloom to inherit—the gift of revealing the Father! And Jesus wastes no time in making use of this gift. In private, he turns to his disciples and says, “Blessed are the eyes that see what you see.” What do they see? The flesh and blood of Isaiah’s promise: the Spirit of wisdom, of counsel, of knowledge, and of strength, the Spirit of the Lord come among them as a man.
Are you ready to see and hear the coming of the Lord? The prophets and kings waited and waited only to end without seeing or hearing. Their efforts gave birth to a hope for the coming of the Messiah but their hopeful waiting bore them no Savior in their lifetime. It would be many generations later that a virgin girl would say yes to the Spirit and give birth to the Word Made Flesh, sending out to creation the very Word Who was spoken over the void, re-creating everything that is fallen, waking in everyone who is fallen that spark of the Father who seduces us back to His glory, so that we might live, against the defeat of death itself, a life everlasting, ever-blest, ever-joyous, a life that will be a signal to the nations that a justice and peace, the Father’s justice and peace, will rule.
Are you ready to wait on the Lord, all the while knowing that the Lord has come, is coming, and will come again? Are you ready to be a revelation of God to world, to one another? Are you ready to be a signal to the nations? You are given the Spirit of wisdom, strength, counsel, understanding, and the fear of the Lord, are you ready to greet him in the flesh? To offer him your life and work as a gift? To come to him like the kings of the east who saw and heard, who came to him, proclaiming him Lord and King? Are you ready? Are you ready?
30 November 2008
Archive: Christ the King & First Advent homilies
Since it looks like I will not finish this year's Christ the King homily anytime soon, here are the ones from the last two years and all three of my First Sunday of Advent homilies:
Who Is King of Your Heart? (2006)
Can a King Rule from a Cross? (2007)
Waiting and Waiting Well (2005)
Advent is Scary (2006)
Do Nothing Special for Advent (2007)
Are you ready? Are you sure?
First Sunday of Advent: Is 63.16-17, 19b; 64.2-7; 1 Cor 1.3-9; Mark 13.33-37
Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP
Convento SS Domenico e Sisto, Roma
Advent is to Christmas what Lent is to Easter: the time right before the arrival of an much anticipated divine revelation, a time when we make ourselves ready to be shown what God has to show us. Both Advent and Lent—though in profoundly different ways—prod us into remembering that not everything we can know about God and His will for us is knowable through argument, experiment, and rational deliberation. Yes, we are naturally graced in His image and likeness with every means we need to fine-tune our understanding of how we come to know, to sharpen the edges of what we know, to apply artfully, scientifically, technically the knowledge that we grow and harvest. But like children with little experience in the world of big things and predatory dangers—too ready to jump, so eager to do it on our own—we have to be shown, we have to be led to the show; however, what we need to know most is too bright, too sharp, so beautifully detailed and wondrously simple that to know it as it is would shock our natural apprehension, our graced comprehension, searing all our gifts of reason and will like food stamp baloney flash-fried in a hot buttered skillet. What we need is immeasurable holiness, Wisdom Himself. What we need to know of Wisdom is shown to us by Wisdom Himself. And like any adventure, like any enlightening quest we must be ready, fully prepared, wholly poised and trigger tight, at attention right on the blade’s edge set to see and hear and taste what Wisdom will expose to us. The days of Advent are the razor’s edge of the Incarnation, the blade against the skin of not-knowing-just-yet who comes to save us.
Though we are a month away from the solemnity of the nativity of our Lord, someone has already died for Christmas; or rather, someone has been killed at the beginning of another consumerist orgy before Christmas morning arrives. A stocker at Wal-Mart in Long Island, NY was trampled to death by shoppers rushing into the store to buy bargains. Every item bought in that Wal-Mart that day is an accessory to murder. What do we need to say about those who trampled him? Those who watched? Those who continued to snatch up the bargains? What a way for us to prepare for the coming of the Lord.
In some ancient pagan city long before the coming of Christ, this kind of human sacrifice might have been the perfect start to a holiday season of feasting and gift-giving, a raucous frolic of wailing and blood while waiting for the coming of a god in the flesh. Today, it is a headline. A link on Drudge. One of those news-of-the-bizarre items that we click on in order to watch the vid from Youtube, and then, bored with the shaky camera work and the lack of decent sound, we move on to the gossip about best-dressed or the least desirable relocation spot or top ten tips for knowing if he’s cheating on you. This man’s death is a passing moment, like a shampoo bottle over the laser-eye of the UPC scanner at the place of his death.
What do we need to know? Ask the question this way: what have we forgotten? We have forgotten too much. We have forgotten this: “You, LORD, are our father, our redeemer you are named forever.” And we are afraid to ask this: “Why do you let us wander, O LORD, from your ways, and harden our hearts so that we fear you not?” Why are we afraid to ask? Because we might hear this: “There is none who calls upon your name, who rouses himself to cling to you; for you have hidden your face from us and have delivered us up to our guilt.” If this doesn’t freeze your blood, you aren’t paying attention. The Lord has something to show us. And we are not ready. What do we need to see? What does the Lord want to show us? Our guilt. Yes, our guilt. Do you think that showing us our guilt is unnecessary? Or maybe you think that showing us our guilt is somehow unloving or unforgiving or mean-spirited? Maybe it is. For now. But we need to see it nonetheless. Why? Because if we see our guilt, if we give a knowing nod to our guilt, we recognize that at our roots, from our deepest selves, we are good people. Have we forgotten this?
If so, Advent is here to remind us. What will you wait for this next month? The opportunity to break out the carols? The tree? The Santa Claus cut-out? Or will you wait to remember that you are a loved creature, wholly prepared and waiting, anxiously anticipating and sitting on the blade’s edge, poised to be shown your perfection? Think: who is coming? Who is it that comes in the name of the Lord to take flesh and bone in the womb of the Blessed Mother to be born and raised as a man and to live as a teacher of the truth of his Father’s mercy to his passion and to his death on the cross and his burial in a fresh tomb and his rising again from the grave? Who comes? For whom do you wait? You say, “I wait for the coming of the Lord!” Really? Do you? Do you really wait for the coming of the Lord? Or do you wait for the coming of Christmas? For the sales? The stampedes? The chaos?
For whom do you watch? We are children too small and too fragile to see and hear what comes. But we must. We must be ready. Having spent at least a month praying for the coming of the Lord, we must be wholly prepared, entirely ready to receive among us the Son in the flesh, our means of becoming all that we were created to be. Our waiting is not simply about doing a duty. Our waiting is about sharpening, polishing, shining, clearing out, and making ready—what?—our heart, our minds, our souls. Making room, creating space and time, shoving aside in order to pull in. He Who Comes to us is the Child of the Spirit of God, the flesh and bone of the Mother, the Word given hands and feet to walk and do among us. This is as much as we can see and hear and taste. And maybe not even this. Maybe with all the preparation, all the time before, all the time we have to make ready for the revelation, even so, even still, we are not wholly still, utterly set to take in, to absorb, to stand under the event—the coming of the Son in the flesh. Emmanuel. He is with us. Our God is with us. For our sake, He is returned.
Now what? Are you different? Have you changed? If not, why not? Why did you wait? Why did you bother? Is your God with you? If so, who are you? Who were you before; who are you now? If for you Advent is about Christmas, about Wal-Mart and the stuff under the tree, don’t bother. Guilt will mean nothing to you anyway. Long ago you accepted that you are bad person. If, however, you feel the guilt, you feel the separation from God, rejoice! Yes, rejoice! Because your guilt means that you have an inkling of He Who Waits with you, for you. You know you need to know him. And He knows that you want to. Advent is not a stepping stone to Christmas any more than Lent is leads naturally to Easter. Advent is that long space before that makes Christmas into a feast about Christ. Without that, without the waiting, Christ’s coming in the flesh is a predictable miracle, a practiced trick of magic and rehearsed belief.
Make ready. The pan is hot. The butter is melted. Are you ready to be fried?
Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP
Convento SS Domenico e Sisto, Roma
Advent is to Christmas what Lent is to Easter: the time right before the arrival of an much anticipated divine revelation, a time when we make ourselves ready to be shown what God has to show us. Both Advent and Lent—though in profoundly different ways—prod us into remembering that not everything we can know about God and His will for us is knowable through argument, experiment, and rational deliberation. Yes, we are naturally graced in His image and likeness with every means we need to fine-tune our understanding of how we come to know, to sharpen the edges of what we know, to apply artfully, scientifically, technically the knowledge that we grow and harvest. But like children with little experience in the world of big things and predatory dangers—too ready to jump, so eager to do it on our own—we have to be shown, we have to be led to the show; however, what we need to know most is too bright, too sharp, so beautifully detailed and wondrously simple that to know it as it is would shock our natural apprehension, our graced comprehension, searing all our gifts of reason and will like food stamp baloney flash-fried in a hot buttered skillet. What we need is immeasurable holiness, Wisdom Himself. What we need to know of Wisdom is shown to us by Wisdom Himself. And like any adventure, like any enlightening quest we must be ready, fully prepared, wholly poised and trigger tight, at attention right on the blade’s edge set to see and hear and taste what Wisdom will expose to us. The days of Advent are the razor’s edge of the Incarnation, the blade against the skin of not-knowing-just-yet who comes to save us.
Though we are a month away from the solemnity of the nativity of our Lord, someone has already died for Christmas; or rather, someone has been killed at the beginning of another consumerist orgy before Christmas morning arrives. A stocker at Wal-Mart in Long Island, NY was trampled to death by shoppers rushing into the store to buy bargains. Every item bought in that Wal-Mart that day is an accessory to murder. What do we need to say about those who trampled him? Those who watched? Those who continued to snatch up the bargains? What a way for us to prepare for the coming of the Lord.
In some ancient pagan city long before the coming of Christ, this kind of human sacrifice might have been the perfect start to a holiday season of feasting and gift-giving, a raucous frolic of wailing and blood while waiting for the coming of a god in the flesh. Today, it is a headline. A link on Drudge. One of those news-of-the-bizarre items that we click on in order to watch the vid from Youtube, and then, bored with the shaky camera work and the lack of decent sound, we move on to the gossip about best-dressed or the least desirable relocation spot or top ten tips for knowing if he’s cheating on you. This man’s death is a passing moment, like a shampoo bottle over the laser-eye of the UPC scanner at the place of his death.
What do we need to know? Ask the question this way: what have we forgotten? We have forgotten too much. We have forgotten this: “You, LORD, are our father, our redeemer you are named forever.” And we are afraid to ask this: “Why do you let us wander, O LORD, from your ways, and harden our hearts so that we fear you not?” Why are we afraid to ask? Because we might hear this: “There is none who calls upon your name, who rouses himself to cling to you; for you have hidden your face from us and have delivered us up to our guilt.” If this doesn’t freeze your blood, you aren’t paying attention. The Lord has something to show us. And we are not ready. What do we need to see? What does the Lord want to show us? Our guilt. Yes, our guilt. Do you think that showing us our guilt is unnecessary? Or maybe you think that showing us our guilt is somehow unloving or unforgiving or mean-spirited? Maybe it is. For now. But we need to see it nonetheless. Why? Because if we see our guilt, if we give a knowing nod to our guilt, we recognize that at our roots, from our deepest selves, we are good people. Have we forgotten this?
If so, Advent is here to remind us. What will you wait for this next month? The opportunity to break out the carols? The tree? The Santa Claus cut-out? Or will you wait to remember that you are a loved creature, wholly prepared and waiting, anxiously anticipating and sitting on the blade’s edge, poised to be shown your perfection? Think: who is coming? Who is it that comes in the name of the Lord to take flesh and bone in the womb of the Blessed Mother to be born and raised as a man and to live as a teacher of the truth of his Father’s mercy to his passion and to his death on the cross and his burial in a fresh tomb and his rising again from the grave? Who comes? For whom do you wait? You say, “I wait for the coming of the Lord!” Really? Do you? Do you really wait for the coming of the Lord? Or do you wait for the coming of Christmas? For the sales? The stampedes? The chaos?
For whom do you watch? We are children too small and too fragile to see and hear what comes. But we must. We must be ready. Having spent at least a month praying for the coming of the Lord, we must be wholly prepared, entirely ready to receive among us the Son in the flesh, our means of becoming all that we were created to be. Our waiting is not simply about doing a duty. Our waiting is about sharpening, polishing, shining, clearing out, and making ready—what?—our heart, our minds, our souls. Making room, creating space and time, shoving aside in order to pull in. He Who Comes to us is the Child of the Spirit of God, the flesh and bone of the Mother, the Word given hands and feet to walk and do among us. This is as much as we can see and hear and taste. And maybe not even this. Maybe with all the preparation, all the time before, all the time we have to make ready for the revelation, even so, even still, we are not wholly still, utterly set to take in, to absorb, to stand under the event—the coming of the Son in the flesh. Emmanuel. He is with us. Our God is with us. For our sake, He is returned.
Now what? Are you different? Have you changed? If not, why not? Why did you wait? Why did you bother? Is your God with you? If so, who are you? Who were you before; who are you now? If for you Advent is about Christmas, about Wal-Mart and the stuff under the tree, don’t bother. Guilt will mean nothing to you anyway. Long ago you accepted that you are bad person. If, however, you feel the guilt, you feel the separation from God, rejoice! Yes, rejoice! Because your guilt means that you have an inkling of He Who Waits with you, for you. You know you need to know him. And He knows that you want to. Advent is not a stepping stone to Christmas any more than Lent is leads naturally to Easter. Advent is that long space before that makes Christmas into a feast about Christ. Without that, without the waiting, Christ’s coming in the flesh is a predictable miracle, a practiced trick of magic and rehearsed belief.
Make ready. The pan is hot. The butter is melted. Are you ready to be fried?
29 November 2008
The Ten-Year Solution to War
We all know some Obama Catholics who would think that this is a splendid idea! In fact, given the published arguments of some Obama Catholics, I'm not sure how they would distinguish their opposition to outlawing abortion in favor of reducing the number of abortions with the solution these folks have come up with.
This solution fits all the moral criteria that any modernist utilitarian Catholic would worship:
1). It's done by consensus of the "womenfolk," so it must be wise.
2). It's done to "reduce the number of killings in the future."
3). It's death--someone elses death--as a quick and easy solution to a complex problem.
4). It's an evil done with the good intention of preventing future inconveniences.
5). It's done in the name of peace and justice.
6). It's done in good conscience, no doubt.
7). We should not judge out of respect for cultural differences (see comments on the article).
8). Something about poverty, women's health, condoms. . .
9). Besides George W. Bush is evil.
10). The Pope is out of touch with mainstream American Catholics, so it's OK to ignore him.
Truly, this is a frightening world we live in. . .
Vampire Queen to Catholic (again)
Called Out of Darkness: A Spiritual Confession, Anne Rice.
It's old news now. Anne Rice--vampire queen, Goth diva, gay icon--has returned to Mother Church. Her book, Called Out of Darkness, chronicles her journey back to the Church after years of wandering low and lower in the wastes of atheism, radical politics, neo-pagan fantasy, and the blackness forest of all--grief.
I won't spoil the book by answering the Big Question--what happened to bring her back? I will tell you how God lured her back. He used the author's sacramental imagination. He used the stuff of creation and the art of His greatest love, man, to seduce our vampire queen back into the fold.
Rice goes into some detail when describing how the last few occult books lingered in her mind as pseudo-Christian tales of redemption. But the spark that lit the fire of the Holy Spirit in her was that human faculty that Augustine and Aquinas argue is vital to art: memory. She remembered her Catholic upbringing. She remembered the sisters. Her high school. The Mass before the Council. She remembered the Baltimore Catechism, the devotionals, the sacramentals, and all the things whose absence now left her without anchor or bearing.
She came back and now professes a love for Christ. And here's where things get muddled for our goth diva. She comes back to the Church but not to the fullness of the faith. She comes back to her pre-Vatican Two Catholic cultural identity but not to the difficult parts of being a Catholic. She embraces confession, the Mass, the Holy Father. She embraces all those parts of being Catholic that make being Catholic something special in the eyes of the world. What she has not embraced quite yet are those parts of the Catholic faith that the make us look like Old World peasants in the eyes of our WASPY neighbors: opposition to abortion, same-sex marriage, all male priesthood, etc. If one wanted to be cynical, one might point out that our vampire queen has embraced just enough of the Catholic faith to seem weird among her NYC cocktail party friends but not enough to get her booted off the circuit list as an intolerant right-wing freak. That would be cynical.
Here's what I'm very happy about: Anne Rice has returned to the Church. Like any of us she will likely spend some time figuring out how to embrace the Whole Truth of the Faith without losing herself in a bizarre kind of Romish fundamentalism. I think this book is the very first step among many steps she will make to come to the fullness of the faith.
I will recommend the book as a great boost for anyone whose faith in God's Self-revelation in His creation is lagging. To anyone who needs to hear that someone from the Bad Ole Days before the Glorious Revolution of 1965 has been saved from the wreck that their generation has made of the Church since 1965. The book is very readable, chatty almost, beautiful in places, and even prayerful. We can't overlook Rice's reluctance to embrace the fullness of the Church's moral teachings, but we can rejoice that now that she's one of us again, she has a much better chance of finding that oh-so-narrow, oh-so-long road to holiness.
I won't spoil the book by answering the Big Question--what happened to bring her back? I will tell you how God lured her back. He used the author's sacramental imagination. He used the stuff of creation and the art of His greatest love, man, to seduce our vampire queen back into the fold.
Rice goes into some detail when describing how the last few occult books lingered in her mind as pseudo-Christian tales of redemption. But the spark that lit the fire of the Holy Spirit in her was that human faculty that Augustine and Aquinas argue is vital to art: memory. She remembered her Catholic upbringing. She remembered the sisters. Her high school. The Mass before the Council. She remembered the Baltimore Catechism, the devotionals, the sacramentals, and all the things whose absence now left her without anchor or bearing.
She came back and now professes a love for Christ. And here's where things get muddled for our goth diva. She comes back to the Church but not to the fullness of the faith. She comes back to her pre-Vatican Two Catholic cultural identity but not to the difficult parts of being a Catholic. She embraces confession, the Mass, the Holy Father. She embraces all those parts of being Catholic that make being Catholic something special in the eyes of the world. What she has not embraced quite yet are those parts of the Catholic faith that the make us look like Old World peasants in the eyes of our WASPY neighbors: opposition to abortion, same-sex marriage, all male priesthood, etc. If one wanted to be cynical, one might point out that our vampire queen has embraced just enough of the Catholic faith to seem weird among her NYC cocktail party friends but not enough to get her booted off the circuit list as an intolerant right-wing freak. That would be cynical.
Here's what I'm very happy about: Anne Rice has returned to the Church. Like any of us she will likely spend some time figuring out how to embrace the Whole Truth of the Faith without losing herself in a bizarre kind of Romish fundamentalism. I think this book is the very first step among many steps she will make to come to the fullness of the faith.
I will recommend the book as a great boost for anyone whose faith in God's Self-revelation in His creation is lagging. To anyone who needs to hear that someone from the Bad Ole Days before the Glorious Revolution of 1965 has been saved from the wreck that their generation has made of the Church since 1965. The book is very readable, chatty almost, beautiful in places, and even prayerful. We can't overlook Rice's reluctance to embrace the fullness of the Church's moral teachings, but we can rejoice that now that she's one of us again, she has a much better chance of finding that oh-so-narrow, oh-so-long road to holiness.
28 November 2008
Questions...
Random questions. . .
1). What is your thesis about?
1). What is your thesis about?
Very, very broadly: I will be researching and writing on the medieval debates about the temporal nature of creation and how these debates might help cosmologists today better understand how to talk about their theories of the origins of the universe in philosophical/theological terms. All cosmologies have philosophical/theological implications. More often than not, the scientists composing these theories have little or no philosophical/theological training, so they fail to grasp how their theories work or do not work when discussing existential or theological questions. Very often, scientists simply assume that the modern western scientific worldview is all-encompassing and omni-explanatory. In other words, they are reductionists, reducing everything to material processes signifed by mathematics. Whatever is not immediately reducible in this way is assumed to be either non-existent or existent in such a way that current technology cannot measure it. Now, this reductionist attitude is widespread but not wholly controlling in the scientific world. Lots of scientists embrace a healthy spiritual view of the universe and struggle to understand all that is with various non-materialistic theories, or theories that do not necessarily exclude the possibility of non-materially existing things. These are the scientists I want to talk to!
2. Did you ever get a response to the email you sent the DLC?
No, I never received a response. This question refers to a post earlier this month about the Dominican Leadership Conference's document on social justice, Call to Action. Evidence surfaced that the OP social justice promoters discussed the inclusion of our opposition to abortion in the document but decided against it for reasons that none too few of us think are dubious.
3. Response to a comment.
Earlier this morning I received a comment on this post via email that I initially deleted b/c it was posted anonymously. I'm posting it here b/c it is a perfect example of what I call "hit and run" commenting.
Posts like this remind me of the reason why I don't read Catholic blogs - of either the left or of the right, for there really isn't anything to choose between. Both are simply given over to the passions.
I have known holy Dominicans, but if this is the future of the Order, then may God have mercy on us all.
Note the following features: 1) the insincere attempt to establish credibility by confessing a lack of editorial bias ("either the left or the right"); 2) the know-nothing leveling of the left and right ("there really isn't anything to choose between"); 3) the stereotyping of all Catholic blogs as unworthy of attention b/c they are passionate (speaking of passions, that's hardly a rational conclusion); 4) another attempt at establishing credibility ("I have known holy Dominicans") and by implication, "You ain't one of them, Fr. Philip!"; and 5) a hasty judgment made based on one post on one blog run by one unholy Dominican ("if this is the future. . .God have mercy. . .").
Really, the interesting part of this for me is the assumption made by the commenter that holiness seems to somehow entail niceness or diplomacy. It certainly entails charity but charity is not charity if it is not also true. Charity is not equivalent to being sweet or polite. Sometimes the most loving thing you can do for someone is kick their rear-end. For a charitable rebuke to be spoiled, it must be shown to have been given out of ill will. Unless this commenter has better access to my motives than I do, I can't think why he/she would find the truth I've expressed in that post at all uncharitable.
The several attempts at establishing credibility to comment are laughable. If you want your observations to be taken seriously, resend the comment with your real name on it. Otherwise, you're just a hit and run ghost wailing "foul!" on the sidelines.
4. What are your summer 2009 plans? Can you come be our chaplain/retreat director/pastor, etc.?
The academic year here ends the last week of June. I will spend a week in St Louis at a preaching conference and then, I hope, head down to Irving to teach second term summer classes at the University of Dallas. This will help my 2009-2010 budget; give me time to work on my dissertation using UD's and SMU's libraries; get my books out of storage and shipped to Rome; and just generally reconnect and relax a little. Then I will spend some time with the Parentals in MS. Visit friends. Go on retreat. I will head back to Rome first week of October. So, yes, there is some time in there where I could give a talk or direct a retreat. But I need to firm up my schedule before committing to anything.
2. Did you ever get a response to the email you sent the DLC?
No, I never received a response. This question refers to a post earlier this month about the Dominican Leadership Conference's document on social justice, Call to Action. Evidence surfaced that the OP social justice promoters discussed the inclusion of our opposition to abortion in the document but decided against it for reasons that none too few of us think are dubious.
3. Response to a comment.
Earlier this morning I received a comment on this post via email that I initially deleted b/c it was posted anonymously. I'm posting it here b/c it is a perfect example of what I call "hit and run" commenting.
Posts like this remind me of the reason why I don't read Catholic blogs - of either the left or of the right, for there really isn't anything to choose between. Both are simply given over to the passions.
I have known holy Dominicans, but if this is the future of the Order, then may God have mercy on us all.
Note the following features: 1) the insincere attempt to establish credibility by confessing a lack of editorial bias ("either the left or the right"); 2) the know-nothing leveling of the left and right ("there really isn't anything to choose between"); 3) the stereotyping of all Catholic blogs as unworthy of attention b/c they are passionate (speaking of passions, that's hardly a rational conclusion); 4) another attempt at establishing credibility ("I have known holy Dominicans") and by implication, "You ain't one of them, Fr. Philip!"; and 5) a hasty judgment made based on one post on one blog run by one unholy Dominican ("if this is the future. . .God have mercy. . .").
Really, the interesting part of this for me is the assumption made by the commenter that holiness seems to somehow entail niceness or diplomacy. It certainly entails charity but charity is not charity if it is not also true. Charity is not equivalent to being sweet or polite. Sometimes the most loving thing you can do for someone is kick their rear-end. For a charitable rebuke to be spoiled, it must be shown to have been given out of ill will. Unless this commenter has better access to my motives than I do, I can't think why he/she would find the truth I've expressed in that post at all uncharitable.
The several attempts at establishing credibility to comment are laughable. If you want your observations to be taken seriously, resend the comment with your real name on it. Otherwise, you're just a hit and run ghost wailing "foul!" on the sidelines.
4. What are your summer 2009 plans? Can you come be our chaplain/retreat director/pastor, etc.?
The academic year here ends the last week of June. I will spend a week in St Louis at a preaching conference and then, I hope, head down to Irving to teach second term summer classes at the University of Dallas. This will help my 2009-2010 budget; give me time to work on my dissertation using UD's and SMU's libraries; get my books out of storage and shipped to Rome; and just generally reconnect and relax a little. Then I will spend some time with the Parentals in MS. Visit friends. Go on retreat. I will head back to Rome first week of October. So, yes, there is some time in there where I could give a talk or direct a retreat. But I need to firm up my schedule before committing to anything.
27 November 2008
New Arrivals...and some news
Some of you have asked whether or not the books you purchased for me have arrived. . .I've received books from the following benefactors in the last two weeks:
Taryn K. (1), William M. (1), Elizabeth R. (1), Anita S. (1), Martha L. (3), Lynn C.(1), Alice B. (1), and Kevin H. (1).
Thank You notes have either been dispatched or will be dispatched today!
I've already been warned by the Roman vets here that postal service around this time of year is dreadful. . .packages get delivered months after they are sent or lost forever.
Over the Christmas break, I will be outlining my license thesis and praying all the while for all my book benefactors. Since study is a form of prayer for Dominicans, you will all be placed before St. Thomas Aquinas in my prayer and his intercession invoked on your behalf.
NEWS: I briefly discussed my thesis topic with the philosophy dean. He nodded approval and noted that the topic is very large for a license thesis. I promised to focus it more. He said, "Use the license thesis as the first chapter of your doctoral dissertation."
Looks like I will be writing another doctoral dissertation. . .
Over the Christmas break, I will be outlining my license thesis and praying all the while for all my book benefactors. Since study is a form of prayer for Dominicans, you will all be placed before St. Thomas Aquinas in my prayer and his intercession invoked on your behalf.
NEWS: I briefly discussed my thesis topic with the philosophy dean. He nodded approval and noted that the topic is very large for a license thesis. I promised to focus it more. He said, "Use the license thesis as the first chapter of your doctoral dissertation."
Looks like I will be writing another doctoral dissertation. . .
26 November 2008
Happy Thanksgiving!!!
A very Happy Thanksgiving to all of my readers in the U.S.A.!
My readers, commenters, critics, book benefactors, prayer warriors (oh-rah!), spiritual mothers/fathers, spiritual son/daughters, all those who help to keep me on the straight and narrow and help to push and pull me through that %$#@ eye of the needle--you are all on the top of my list of those for whom I am deeply grateful!
Also on my list of those for whom I am grateful, all of those professors in my long academic history who have endured my procrastination, my weird mood swings in theory and focus, my often-time inexplicably bizarre writing style, my monkey-mind antics--Ann F.-W., (The Dissertation Director), Ellen G., Doug R., Deborah B., Chris F., Barry H., Michael M., Rick P., Jean DeB., Pat W., Denis M., Simon G., and many others who would probably rather just forget the whole nasty business!
On a list all her own is my Italian language teacher, Sabina! For her good cheer, determination, patience, and her willingness to lie to my face and tell me what a good Italian student I am, I give God thanks!
And on a list all to themselves are Mom & Pop, Andy & Marilyn, Megan & Melanie, Patrick H., Perry S., Michael K., and Rudy B. . . .those who know me and love me in spite of knowing me so well.
Being grateful builds humility.
Humility is necessary for prayer.
Prayer is the best way to God.
God is the Source of our blessings.
Therefore, bless God with your gratitude!
Here's a list of great poems for gratitude. . .
Fr. Philip, OP
Also on my list of those for whom I am grateful, all of those professors in my long academic history who have endured my procrastination, my weird mood swings in theory and focus, my often-time inexplicably bizarre writing style, my monkey-mind antics--Ann F.-W., (The Dissertation Director), Ellen G., Doug R., Deborah B., Chris F., Barry H., Michael M., Rick P., Jean DeB., Pat W., Denis M., Simon G., and many others who would probably rather just forget the whole nasty business!
On a list all her own is my Italian language teacher, Sabina! For her good cheer, determination, patience, and her willingness to lie to my face and tell me what a good Italian student I am, I give God thanks!
And on a list all to themselves are Mom & Pop, Andy & Marilyn, Megan & Melanie, Patrick H., Perry S., Michael K., and Rudy B. . . .those who know me and love me in spite of knowing me so well.
Being grateful builds humility.
Humility is necessary for prayer.
Prayer is the best way to God.
God is the Source of our blessings.
Therefore, bless God with your gratitude!
Here's a list of great poems for gratitude. . .
Fr. Philip, OP
24 November 2008
Dissenters "Leaping Forward" Into Deeper Irrelevance
Aging Hippie Dinosaur Alert!!!
Most of the dissident "Catholic" groups in the U.S. are planning a gathering in 2011 to stamp their feet and publicly pout because the Evil-Phallocentric-Celibate Hierarchy of Roman Catholic Church has repeatedly refused their demands to ignore Christ and turn his Church into the world's largest group-therapy session.
Here's what I found:
from a newsletter sent to ARCC members on Friday Professor Swidler writes:
The Reform Movement of the Catholic Church in America — in the spirit of Vatican II [WARNING!!! This guy is seeing ghosts! The actual Spirit of Vatican Two is the Holy Spirit who founded the Church on the Rock of Peter and his successors, the Popes.]— is on the cusp of a "Great Leap Forward", to borrow a phrase from Mao [Yes. You read that correctly. This "Catholic" is quoting Mao, the genocidal commie dictator of China, a man who destroyed over 5,000 years of Chinese history and culture in a decade, not to mention millions of lives. . .go no further in looking for the spiritual inspiration of this conference.] ARCC has for several years been promoting the idea of all the major Catholic Reform groups in the U.S. joining together in an American Catholic Council to move our common agenda forward. That Great Leap Forward is now being launched! [Google "great leap forward" and read about how Mao's little plan for economic and political reform worked for the Chinese. . .hint: it threw China back into the middles ages, straving millions, ruining whole industries, and collapsing the nation's economy]. The largest of the American Catholic Reform organizations– Call to Action and Voice of the Faithful–are on board, along with, of course, ARCC, and others. [On board and ready to sink the Church in the U.S.!]
Professor Swidler goes on to outline four major points that have been agreed upon in the discussions that have taken place at the leadership levels of the reform organisations. They are:
1. The basic Resources of the American Catholic Council are the documents of Vatican II [interpreted according to the ghost that this guy claims to see on occasion, of course] and the processes and documents of the 1976 Call To Action led by the National Council of Bishops and involving massive numbers of laity, religious, and priests. [CTA persistent citation of the NCCB as support for its dissent is a farce. Yes, initially, the bishops did endorse the 1976 CTA meeting, but quickly withdrew and repudiated the whole thing b/c the process was hijacked by Maoist moonbats like Swindler here. Again, let a google search show you the way.]
2. The major focus will be on church governance. None of the diverse concerns of the various U.S. Catholic reform organizations will be attainable unless there are structural means to work toward their implementation. That means, minimally, striving for Catholic Church decision-making structures that are built on the democratic principles of accountability, transparency, representativeness, and due process of law. [Christ didn't found a democratic church for a reason. . .that reason? Check out the Episcopal Church in its current state and tell me if that's what you want the Catholic Church to look like. The real goal here, of course, is not democratization but the elimination of the RCC as a teacher of the objective truth of the gospel. Once the Nicene Creed is up for majority vote, the Church as Christ found it loses all authority to oppose the pelvic politics of the aging Baby Boomers.]
3. There will be the widest possible solicitation of input from all levels of Catholics around the country [Yea, right. I bet that input will not include orthodox believers. Much like the '76 CTA fiasco, the panels, podiums, polls will be stacked with dissenters and heretics.] Techniques that have already been discussed include national public hearings (as was done in 1976), approaches to parish organizations as well as organizations of laity, religious, and clergy, internet and other electronic means. Concrete suggestions in this area are especially solicited from you! [And we'll even consider them if they neatly fit into our pre-baked notion of what counts as truth from our side of the bonfire!]
4. The initial aim will be the coming together of thousands of chosen delegates and interested Catholics from around the country in an American Catholic Council in the year 2011. [Hold your nose! This one is gonna stink. Of course, I have to wonder how many of these AHD will still be with us in body come 2011.]
Fair Warning: This part is a rant. . .
Go to bed tonight giving God thanks that most of the young men in our nation's seminaries are orthodox Catholics. Give Him thanks for the thriving orders of orthodox sisters and brothers and the up and coming ranks of educated lay folks who have wised up and shown Sr. Moonbat and Fr. Rainbow to the door of their classrooms.
This dissident circus is one of many "last gasps" of a revolutionary generation in the Church that has failed to knock the Church off her Rock. Expect more these public temper tantrums before they finally hang up their felt banners, their tie-dye vestments, and douse the coals of the Spirit of Vatican Two Peace Bong.
Though they have failed to destroy the Church from the root, they have done wonders for the Enemy along the way. They have driven millions out of the Church; vandalized the Mass and the other sacraments; emptied the seminaries and convents; radicalized Catholic universities against the Church; raised at least two generations of Catholics who know next to nothing about their own faith; ushered in a sexualized spirituality that allowed, encouraged, and then covered up the molestation scandal; created a fake shortage of priests by excluding orthodox vocations on ideological grounds; gave us a Catholic electorate so confused morally that they voted in huge numbers for the most extreme supporter of baby killing ever to run for public office in this country.
Rather than gathering to celebrate their alleged "wisdom" these ego-manical clowns should be gathering to offer this country's Catholics an apology for the disaster that their narcissistic experimentation and dissent has left my generation and those younger to clean up. CTA, VOTF, etc. are little more than organized swarms of spiritual leeches, sucking the life from the Church for no other reason than that the Church will not yield to their tantrums.
There is hope, brothers and sister. I give you the Tick-Tick Solution to our Generation Narcissus problem: "ticktockticktockticktock. . . ."
(And please spare me the finger-wagging in the comboxes about how we are supposed to love one another. . .I am well aware of that. . .I am also aware that very often "being polite in matters of politics and religion" is little more than a cowardly excuse for keeping quiet so that the dinner party invitations keep coming. . .not a big concern of mine. Time to speak truth to lies.)
Here's what I found:
from a newsletter sent to ARCC members on Friday Professor Swidler writes:
The Reform Movement of the Catholic Church in America — in the spirit of Vatican II [WARNING!!! This guy is seeing ghosts! The actual Spirit of Vatican Two is the Holy Spirit who founded the Church on the Rock of Peter and his successors, the Popes.]— is on the cusp of a "Great Leap Forward", to borrow a phrase from Mao [Yes. You read that correctly. This "Catholic" is quoting Mao, the genocidal commie dictator of China, a man who destroyed over 5,000 years of Chinese history and culture in a decade, not to mention millions of lives. . .go no further in looking for the spiritual inspiration of this conference.] ARCC has for several years been promoting the idea of all the major Catholic Reform groups in the U.S. joining together in an American Catholic Council to move our common agenda forward. That Great Leap Forward is now being launched! [Google "great leap forward" and read about how Mao's little plan for economic and political reform worked for the Chinese. . .hint: it threw China back into the middles ages, straving millions, ruining whole industries, and collapsing the nation's economy]. The largest of the American Catholic Reform organizations– Call to Action and Voice of the Faithful–are on board, along with, of course, ARCC, and others. [On board and ready to sink the Church in the U.S.!]
Professor Swidler goes on to outline four major points that have been agreed upon in the discussions that have taken place at the leadership levels of the reform organisations. They are:
1. The basic Resources of the American Catholic Council are the documents of Vatican II [interpreted according to the ghost that this guy claims to see on occasion, of course] and the processes and documents of the 1976 Call To Action led by the National Council of Bishops and involving massive numbers of laity, religious, and priests. [CTA persistent citation of the NCCB as support for its dissent is a farce. Yes, initially, the bishops did endorse the 1976 CTA meeting, but quickly withdrew and repudiated the whole thing b/c the process was hijacked by Maoist moonbats like Swindler here. Again, let a google search show you the way.]
2. The major focus will be on church governance. None of the diverse concerns of the various U.S. Catholic reform organizations will be attainable unless there are structural means to work toward their implementation. That means, minimally, striving for Catholic Church decision-making structures that are built on the democratic principles of accountability, transparency, representativeness, and due process of law. [Christ didn't found a democratic church for a reason. . .that reason? Check out the Episcopal Church in its current state and tell me if that's what you want the Catholic Church to look like. The real goal here, of course, is not democratization but the elimination of the RCC as a teacher of the objective truth of the gospel. Once the Nicene Creed is up for majority vote, the Church as Christ found it loses all authority to oppose the pelvic politics of the aging Baby Boomers.]
3. There will be the widest possible solicitation of input from all levels of Catholics around the country [Yea, right. I bet that input will not include orthodox believers. Much like the '76 CTA fiasco, the panels, podiums, polls will be stacked with dissenters and heretics.] Techniques that have already been discussed include national public hearings (as was done in 1976), approaches to parish organizations as well as organizations of laity, religious, and clergy, internet and other electronic means. Concrete suggestions in this area are especially solicited from you! [And we'll even consider them if they neatly fit into our pre-baked notion of what counts as truth from our side of the bonfire!]
4. The initial aim will be the coming together of thousands of chosen delegates and interested Catholics from around the country in an American Catholic Council in the year 2011. [Hold your nose! This one is gonna stink. Of course, I have to wonder how many of these AHD will still be with us in body come 2011.]
Fair Warning: This part is a rant. . .
Go to bed tonight giving God thanks that most of the young men in our nation's seminaries are orthodox Catholics. Give Him thanks for the thriving orders of orthodox sisters and brothers and the up and coming ranks of educated lay folks who have wised up and shown Sr. Moonbat and Fr. Rainbow to the door of their classrooms.
This dissident circus is one of many "last gasps" of a revolutionary generation in the Church that has failed to knock the Church off her Rock. Expect more these public temper tantrums before they finally hang up their felt banners, their tie-dye vestments, and douse the coals of the Spirit of Vatican Two Peace Bong.
Though they have failed to destroy the Church from the root, they have done wonders for the Enemy along the way. They have driven millions out of the Church; vandalized the Mass and the other sacraments; emptied the seminaries and convents; radicalized Catholic universities against the Church; raised at least two generations of Catholics who know next to nothing about their own faith; ushered in a sexualized spirituality that allowed, encouraged, and then covered up the molestation scandal; created a fake shortage of priests by excluding orthodox vocations on ideological grounds; gave us a Catholic electorate so confused morally that they voted in huge numbers for the most extreme supporter of baby killing ever to run for public office in this country.
Rather than gathering to celebrate their alleged "wisdom" these ego-manical clowns should be gathering to offer this country's Catholics an apology for the disaster that their narcissistic experimentation and dissent has left my generation and those younger to clean up. CTA, VOTF, etc. are little more than organized swarms of spiritual leeches, sucking the life from the Church for no other reason than that the Church will not yield to their tantrums.
There is hope, brothers and sister. I give you the Tick-Tick Solution to our Generation Narcissus problem: "ticktockticktockticktock. . . ."
(And please spare me the finger-wagging in the comboxes about how we are supposed to love one another. . .I am well aware of that. . .I am also aware that very often "being polite in matters of politics and religion" is little more than a cowardly excuse for keeping quiet so that the dinner party invitations keep coming. . .not a big concern of mine. Time to speak truth to lies.)
22 November 2008
NEW PODCASTS! (UPDATED)
I've put the last three homilies on Pod-O-Matic. . .scroll down on the right until you find the Roman Homilies player. . .
More coming. . .
More coming. . .
AND. . .Br. Thomas, OP heard your pleas and has now finished recording Dei verbum (Dogmatic Constitution on Divine Revelation) from the documents of the Second Vatican Council. Our Holy Father, BXVI argues that understanding Dei verbum is the key to understanding the whole Council--the intent, spirit, and all the documents!
The thesis thickens...and narrows...
As of yesterday, with the help of one of my former tutors from Blackfriars, Oxford, Dr. Bill Carroll, an expert in the theology and philosophy of creation and the religious world's conversation with science, I have narrowed the broad area of my thesis topic down a bit more.
I am pretty sure I will be focusing on how the medieval debates about the (a)temporality of creation could shed some much needed philosophical/theological light on contemporary cosmologies. The issue at hand is divine action in creation. How we understand God's interaction with creation has everything to do with how we understand time. What I may end up doing is simply showing what sort of interaction is possible given a particular view of time. . .
Fortunately, most of the primary medieval texts are in our library. Some of the secondary texts, however, will have to be bought, found, stolen, or smuggled to me! Most of the texts on contemporary cosmologies are brand new. Also, fortunately, the thesis is usually restricted in length from 50 to 75 pages. So, no worries.
Fr. Philip, OP
Fortunately, most of the primary medieval texts are in our library. Some of the secondary texts, however, will have to be bought, found, stolen, or smuggled to me! Most of the texts on contemporary cosmologies are brand new. Also, fortunately, the thesis is usually restricted in length from 50 to 75 pages. So, no worries.
Fr. Philip, OP
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