Not the peace we are longing for

5th Week of Easter (T)

Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP

SS. Domenico e Sisto, Roma

Podcast

Jesus says to his disciples, “Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you.” Reading the Acts of the Apostles and Paul's letters, we might be inclined to return the gift of Christ's peace with a polite “No Thank You” note. If Stephen's execution, Paul's imprisonment, the martyrdom of every apostle except John, and all the other trials, torments, and deaths that befell the merry band of Christians in the first few centuries of the Church are examples of what taking the gift of Christ's peace means, then, yea, we would wise to say, “Thanks, but no thanks.” Living “peacefully” with Christ looks a lot like living in constant turmoil with an ever present threat of injury and death floating nearby. Complaining to Jesus about this apparent misnomer wouldn't do much good. He promised us trial, tribulation, persecution, torture, and death if we took up the cross and followed him. Yet he says that he gives us his peace. It is reasonable to ask then, “Um, Lord, exactly what do you mean by 'peace.' Because frankly, I'm not seeing it.” 

Let's begin to answer this question with a quick philosophy lesson: when dealing with an apparent contradiction in terms, the first move to make is to define your terms and distinguish. “Peace” is usually used to mean something like “a state of non-conflict, the condition of relative calm.” But if we limit ourselves to understanding peace as the absence of conflict, then we will not be able to say much about Christ's peace. Our history of living in the world as preachers of the gospel is stained with the blood of Christian martyrs and with the blood of those we ourselves have killed. So, we need to refine our definition. Peace could also mean, “a state of tranquility; freedom from disquieting thoughts or emotions; external and internal calm.” While peace can indicate that harmony has been achieved between opposing external forces, it can also indicate that internal conflicts have been brought into agreement, a state of interior concord and silence. Given these differences, we must make this distinction: rather than bequeathing to us a perpetual state of non-conflict with our enemies, Jesus gives us the peace of internal silence; the quiet assurance of hope. 

Why does Jesus give his disciples his peace? At this point in John's gospel, Jesus is preparing his friends for Judas' betrayal in the Garden. He is on the brink of being arrested, tortured, and crucified. He knows that his death will shock his students, leaving them dispirited and quite possibly rendering them useless as preachers. Notice how Jesus imparts the peace which passes all understanding: “Peace I leave with you; MY peace I give to you.” The disciples are not given just any old peace, any old garden variety balm for their twitchy nerves. They are given the peace that Christ himself possesses. “MY peace I give to you.” The peace that Christ himself possesses is the sort of peace that comes with surrendering to the Father's providence, His loving-care: surrendering plans, expectations, dreams; surrendering a stubborn heart and a cold mind; surrendering need, want, self, and living wholly in sacrificial love as God has willed us to love one another. And even as we love imperfectly, failing over and over again, we do so out of his gift of peace. 

We are told that if we want peace, we must work for justice. If we want peace, we must confront conflict; or disarm national armies; or eliminate poverty and disease; or take the right medications and see the right therapists; or buy enough stuff and live to our full economic potential; or educate ourselves in the best philosophies. We can purchase the peace of this world if that's what we truly want. But we cannot buy the peace that has already been given to us for free. We peace we need is the peace purchased for us on the cross, the peace of sacrificial love and the certain hope of resurrection.

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Coffee Bowl Browsing

Street preacher in the U.K. is arrested for saying that the Bible opposes homosexual sexual activity.  NB.  the arresting officer is a gay atheist.  Peter Hitchens column following the news report is excellent.

10 Sci-fi/detective novels.  I've only come to enjoy detective novels in the last two years.  I've always read historical fiction, so when I found a series of historical detective novels in our reading room, I dug in.  My favorite author so far is Lindsey Davies, the author of the Marcus Didius Falco novels set in the "Fall of the Republic" era of ancient Rome.

Leftists rioters run riot during an immigration rally.  Let's watch and see if the MSM will worry themselves into fits like they do when grandmas and grandpas in the Tea Party gather together for a peaceful protest.

Stephen Hawking:  We might be able to travel forward in time but not backward.   If time is the subjective measure of objective motion, and everything in the universe is always in motion, then there would be no place in the universe where time doesn't apply, even the "future". . .hmmmm. . .I like the possible worlds theory better.  

Narcissist-in-Chief resorts to predictable passive-aggressive form when tackling opponents. . .NB. in the past Presidents have mostly been self-deprecating at these events.  George W. certainly was.  One of the tell-tale signs of Narcissistic Personality Disorder is the inability to have fun at one's own expense.

Five reasons why the E.U. bailout of Greece has made the situation worse.

The problem with Gaudium et spes. . .we were told over and over again in seminary that this document of Vatican Two was the most important development in Catholic theology since Aquinas was introduced to Aristotle.  Fortunately, few of us believed it. 

A little visual caffeine for your morning wake-up!

Lunch Box of Evil, or Your Mom is Trying to Entice You into a Demonic Pact Using PB&J.

This is what happens when you divide by zero while cleaning your house. 

Our government at "work."  I was once held up in traffic on I-40 for three hours in AR.  I imagined that there must have been some sort of massive accident, something huge!  When I arrived at the site of the delay, I wasn't surprised to find a Dept of Transportation pick-up parked in the left lane with two road workers sitting on the tailgate. . .how they managed to survive is beyond me.

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"Young Dads," or First Five Years of Ordination

For the first five years after ordination, Dominican friars in the U.S. gather together annually for a retreat. This pic was taken in 2007 at San Felipe de Neri in the "Old Town" of Albuquerque, NM.  The retreat master that year was Fr. Allen White, OP, former Provincial of the English Province (first row, fourth from the R). 

One bowl on the way to another

This is what I see every morning on my way down to get my first bowl of coffee:

The Monument, a.k.a. "the Birthday Cake"

The view from the cloister window overlooking the Piazza Venezia.

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Nuns, Sisters, and the Really Real

The National Review Online has up an excellent interview with Sr. Prudence Allen, RSM.  Sister is a philosopher, teaching at St. John Vianney Seminary in the Archdiocese of Denver.  The whole interview is well your time!

In the course of discussing the recent dissenting letter from the LCWR-Network endorsing ObamaCare, the interviewer notes that the women who signed the letter are not nuns but sisters.  The interviewer asks Sister to distinguish between "sisters" and "nuns."  She does so.  The interviewer then asks her why this distinction should matter to anyone in the context of the controversy. 

Sister gives an excellent Catholic answer:

To answer your question about “why it should matter,” we need to consider the deeper question of the relation of truth to language and the relation of reality to the human mind. According to a realistic philosophy, truth is the union of the mind with reality. There are two complementary pathways to the truth: reason and faith, which correspond to philosophy and theology.

For a Christian, language matters a lot. In Genesis 1:1-3, we learn that before God spoke and there was life, the earth was “without form and void.” From John 1:1, 1:4, and 1:14, we learn that the Eternal Word was with God and was God from the beginning, and that “the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, full of grace and truth.” Jesus Christ, this Eternal Word made flesh, leads us to the Truth; He told us that He is the Truth. So, by faith, we believe that Truth and reality are important and that we are created with intelligent minds able to grasp truths.

We do this by apprehending different forms capable of being grasped. However, if reality is simply a void and is without form, truth is not possible for us to know or to live by.

Language is at the heart of Catholic philosophy. In the United States, where pragmatic theories of truth and postmodern approaches to knowledge abound, the relation between truth and reality is undermined. All becomes superficial, and imagination replaces the union of human mind to reality. So the answer to “Why should it matter at all to the world” is embedded in the deeper question of whether a person cares about truth or not, and how much he or she cares.

Go read the whole thing.

A rough and ready way of framing the history of western philosophy is to divide the timeline into three movements/questions:

Ancient/Medieval: What is the world like and how do we come to know it?  (Turn to the Object)

Early Modern: What am I like and how do I come to know myself? (Turn to the Subject)

Late Modern/Postmodern: What is language like and how does it shape reality? (Turn to the Linguistic)

The general movement here is away from the notion that the human mind is capable of grasping The Real; knowing it as it is; and adequately describing what it is like.  IOW, the further away from Aristotle we get historically, the less confident we are that we live in a knowable, explicable world, and closer to holding the idea that language is all we can really know. 

From Plato up to Descartes, philosophers and theologians worried mostly about metaphysical questions:  what's really real?  From Descartes on, they worry mostly about epistemological questions:  what can we know?  For Catholic philosophers and theologians, the two questions are linked by a realist understanding of how creation works:  what we can know is the really real and our language is adequate for describing the real. 

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Coffee Bowl Browsing (in breve)

It's like going on a drunken spending spree with all your credit cards, then giving the bills to your children and telling them that they have to live in poverty in order to pay for your partying.

Citizen journalism is not new. . .before the advent of Professional Journalism we managed to chronicle the human story of adventure and invention w/o too many problems.

Heh, I was wrong.  The NYT violates its pro-B.O. narrative and criticizes The Won for his sloppy response to the oil spill disaster. 

Ten of the dumbest (and false) things said about the new AZ anti-illegal immigrant law. 

Americans are smart enough to properly distinguish between legal and illegal immigration.  By large majorities we support the former not the latter. 

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A new HancAquam sponsor

HancAquam is pleased to announce that Rocky the Squirrel and Starbucks 

have teamed up to sponsor Coffee Bowl Browsing!

Coffee Bowl Browsing

Holy Father urges careful catechesis with the introduction of the new English translation of the missal.   Yea, let's not repeat the huge mistake made with the 1970 translation and drop it on regular Catholics like a millstone.

Two part interview with Dutch Catholic psychologist on the role of his profession in sex abuse scandals.  Good stuff.  Part one and part two.

The Anchoress explores the possibility of suspending the statute of limitations on ALL sex abuse allegations in NY.  Predictably, howls of lamentation and preemptive excuse-making emanate from all the usual suspects.  Apparently, only the Catholic Church should be forced to confront its history of abuse, cover-up, and neglect. 

New non-narcotic pain-killer developed using chili peppers.  This is good news for me as someone who suffers from cluster headaches!  Narcotic pain meds like hydrocodone and morphine really don't work for me.  OTC's are OK, but they cause G-I upset. 

The Closing of the Muslim Mind:  looks like an interesting book.  One of the persistent questions in the history of science is why the modern scientific method/technology happen so successfully in the Christian West but not in the Muslim/Hindu/Buddhist East.  One answer:  the philosophical traditions of the religious east are all anti-materialist, or hostile to the body.  If you think that the material world is evil, you are less likely to study it systematically.  For the Christian West (esp., the Catholic West), God reveals Himself in His creation. . .so, science is the natural companion to theology in discerning God's presence in creation.

On the use of citizen journalists in combating the media narrative that Tea Partiers are violent and racist.  The easy availability of video cameras and the accessibility of the internet have all but rendered our Media Betters useless.  

Will the Gulf of Mexico oil spill be B.O. Katrina?  No.  CNN/NYT/etc. would never allow that to happen.   

Gordon Brown's re-election looks doomed.  I was recently asked by a cheeky friar, "What does 'bigot' stand for?"  Brown is gone on Thursday.  Ha.

Euro Zone under serious threat of collapse.  Note that all of the so-called PIGS nations (Portugal, Ireland, Greece, and Spain) are big government nanny states with massive entitlement budgets. 

Ummmmmmmmm. . .make a wish?

Poster boy for beating adulthood eating disorders.

Exploring your creative side. . .art, design, sculpture, video, etc.  After the philosophy Ph.D. I want to get a M.F.A. in creative writing and then another one in painting.  I'll be 75 by then and ready to retire!  :-)

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I dunno why. . .

I don't know why I think this is funny. . .but I crack up every time I see it.

Two quick updates

Liguori recently informed me that the Beatitude Rosary I wrote for my second prayer book will not only be published as a separate pamphlet but it will also be translated into Spanish! 

Also, many thanks for the recent activity on the WISH LIST.  My father emailed me yesterday to report that one book has already safely arrived in Mississippi. 

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Coffee Bowl Browsing

Without a word of opposition from our Feminist-in-Chief, the U.N. gives Iran a seat on its Commission on the Status of Women.  Next on the U.N. agenda:  giving Mexican drug cartels seats in the AZ, CA, NM, and TX legislatures.  

Jeff Jacoby asks, "Why aren't democratic dissidents as well-known in the free world today as the dissidents who challenged the Soviet empire were in the 1970s and 1980s?"  He wants to make them famous:  CyberDissidents.

Roger Simon notes, "The real reason liberals accuse Tea Partiers of racism is that contemporary American-style liberalism is in rigor mortis. Liberals have nothing else to say or do.  Accusations of racism are their last resort."  Unfortunately for the Libs and the victims of real racism, the left's constant siren call of racism has reduced the accusation to little more than a vigorous sneeze.

Law professor who helped write AZ's new anti-illegal immigration law debunks most of the hysterical nonsense of the opposition.  A hint when discussing the new law with an opponent:  ask him if he has read the law.  I've yet to talk to anyone who has.

NYT is most like the Roman Catholic Church:  "The Times, of course, does not claim to speak infallibly in its judgments on current events. (Neither does the pope.) But to the truly orthodox believers in the Times, its editorials carry the burden of liberal holy writ."

The authors of the vile anti-Catholic memo published by the UK's foreign service are suspended and sent "diversity training."  Oh, the irony.

NJ Court says that bloggers aren't journalists. . .I take that as a compliment.  Thank you.

On the existential beauty of Godzilla. . .in haiku.

How long have you been alive? 

Aight. . .here's your Cute Pic for the day. 

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Insomnia report

My insomnia is starting to make me crazy.  I slept about three hours last night and none of those hours were good.  

I've tried everything short of massive doses of horse tranquilizers.  You name it, I've done it:  herbal, pharmaceutical, behavioral, dietary, psychological/spiritual, mechanical, and mystical.  I wake up around 3.00am and cannot go back to sleep. 

I blame philosophy.

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Coffee Bowl Browsing

Another courageous bishop ousts CCHD from his diocesan coffers.  Why they haven't all done this is beyond me.

WashPost confuses B.O. and Malcolm X. . .or did they?

Final Vatican approval for the new English translation of the Roman Missal has been given.  Now, we wait for a year or so for the bishops' conferences to publish it for general use.  Of course, the new missal will cause much garment rending and teeth gnashing among our Liturgical Betters.  Expect lots of "creative editing" from Fr. Hollywood.

Bizarre claim of the day by Aussie bishop:  priests who molested boys and teens didn't know that they were violating their vows.  OK.  Then why did they keep their molestation a secret?  Do I need to say how beyond stupid this is?

The destructive power of narcissism at work in politicians:  Charlie Crist to run as an independent in FL senate race.  Basically, Crist will lose the GOP nomination b/c he endorsed B.O. porkulus scheme.

The L.A. Times book prizes. 

A video on how seminarians are screened.  This piece focuses on psychological testing.  It's important to keep in mind that testing is not predictive; it is basically a way of detecting serious personality disorders.  Anyone who has survived a novitiate can tell you that testing does nothing to screen out everyday weirdnesses, ordinary and annoying social quirks.

Using pics of sacred persons to deter public urination. . .we need these in Rome!

Anti-Christian pagan Memorial Day celebration. . .note the carnival events. 

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Let's disobey God!

4th Week of Easter (W)

Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP

SS. Domenico e Sisto, Roma

Podcast

Jesus puts to rest any question about the source and summit of our salvation, any question about the only means available for achieving a face-to-face audience with God the Father: “Whoever believes in me…whoever sees me…everyone who believes in me…anyone who hears my words…whoever rejects me…does not accept my words…I did not speak on my own…the Father who sent me commanded me…what I say, I say as the Father told me.” There can be no question that Jesus himself is the exclusive path to our redemption; he is the only salvific show in town. If we want to spend a little more time unpacking this teaching, we can note the passion with which Jesus teaches. John writes that Jesus “cried out and said.” We can note that Jesus explicitly says that he and the Father are one; that believing in him is the same as believing in the Father; that as the Word sent by the Father, accepting or rejecting his words determines one's place in the light or one's condemnation to the darkness. We can note that Jesus says he is teaching nothing more or less than what his Father has told him to teach; and we can note that he makes this startling claim: “I know that [the Father's] commandment is eternal life.” If the Father's commandment is eternal life, why must we believe in Jesus? Isn't it enough that God has commanded us to live with Him in eternity? It would seem that God's commandment can be thwarted by our refusal to believe.

For the sake of argument, let's assume that we want to refuse to obey God's commandment of eternal life. How would we go about about doing this? Jesus points out two ways to be disobedient: 1). we can hear his words, accept them, but fail to observe them, or 2). we can hear his words and reject them. When we hear his word but fail to live them, we are not condemned because, as Jesus says, “. . .I did not come to condemn the world but to save the world.” When we hear his words and reject them, we condemn ourselves according to his word; that is, his words stand as our judge and we are condemned to darkness because the Father, Jesus, and his words are all one. Lest we think that we can hear his words, accept them, fail to obey, and then escape the consequences, we must remember that God commands us to enjoy eternal life. Jesus says that he will not judge our disobedience. Why? Because our refusal to live out the words we have heard and accepted is itself a judgment, and we remain in darkness despite having glimpsed the light. There is nothing more he needs to do than to allow us to live in the eternal night we have chosen for ourselves.

Why would anyone, having heard and accepted his words and knowing that God has commanded us to live eternal lives, why would anyone see the light of Christ and choose the darkness of disobedience? Well, there's the false sense of freedom that comes with making such a choice. There's the inordinate love of the transient things of this world. There's the desire to indulge our destructive passions—anger, revenge, hatred, greed. And then there's the obstinate refusal to believe, the persistence of voluntary doubt—willful disbelief. Like the child who closes her eyes and believes she is invisible because she cannot see, we choose darkness because we believe it hides us, protects us from judgment, nurtures our liberty. In fact, we are never more in danger than when we walk after dark.

Jesus speaks these words of hope: “I came into the world as light, so that everyone who believes in me might not remain in darkness.” Though we may foolishly choose eternal night, we do not have to remain there. His coming among us is the dawn of salvation, our eternal healing from all the wounds that would drive us into hiding. All we need do is accept the medicine of his words and follow behind him, doing right now everything he did back then.