Gamble on mercy instead

12th Week OT (M)
Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP
St. Dominic Church, NOLA

Let's get to the nitty-gritty of Jesus' admonition against being judgmental by making an essential distinction: there is a difference btw “judging an act to be immoral” and “judging to person to be immoral.” For example, the Church has always believed that the direct killing of innocent life is an intrinsically morally evil act; therefore, regardless of intent or circumstance, abortion may never be called good. Now, let's say a Catholic female friend of yours procures an abortion and tells you about it. You respond, “Abortion is a mortal sin.” She yells at you, “Get the splinters out of your own eye before you judge me!” How do you answer her? You can take the easy way out and back off immediately, allowing her judgment of you to shut you up. Or, if you're feeling the Spirit's courage, you might say, “I'm not judging you. I'm judging the act of procuring an abortion.” If you want to violate the Lord's admonition not to judge, you could respond, “You are guilty of murder and need to go to confession immediately!” Just know: “. . .as you judge, so will you be judged, and the measure with which you measure will be measured out to you.” 

 Now that we've made the distinction between judging an act and judging a person, let's look carefully at what Jesus teaches about making judgments. First, as Christians, are we forbidden from judging acts? No, we're not. In fact, we are often required to judge the morality of an act before we do it. Is it moral for me to deceive this person under these circumstances? The cashier gave me too much change: is it moral for me to keep it? Is smacking this person up side the head moral? I'm late for work: may I speed? We are free to deliberate on the morality of acts b/c we are obligated as Christians to behave morally. Are we forbidden from judging persons? No, we're not. But there's a catch. A big catch. Jesus says to remove the splinter from your eye first; then you will see clearly to remove the splinter from mine. If your eye is free of splinters, then start removing splinters from mine! Here's the catch: you will be judged as you judge, and the measure you use to measure me will be used to measure you. So, make sure that the standard you use to judge me is one that you yourself can live up to. Hypocrisy is the art of applying one standard to yourself and a completely different standard to others. And we all know what Jesus thinks of hypocrites! 

Why do we so consistently ignore or twist Jesus' teaching on hypocrisy? He asks, “Why do you notice the splinter in your brother's eye, but do not perceive the wooden beam in your own eye?” Well, it's certainly easier for me to worry about your faults than my own. If I pay too much attention to my sins, I might actually have to think about confessing them, and that's no fun. It's also easier for me to accuse you falsely of being judgmental if I don't want to repent of my favorite sin. Judge not lest ye be judged! That's part of the teaching. . .the part that supposedly lets me off the hook for sinning when you bring the sin to my attention. You might have several yards of lumber in your eye when you point out the toothpick in mine. The fact that you're a sinner too doesn't mean I'm a saint. It just means that we are both sinners. So, what's a good Christian to do when a friend is sinning? Take a careful inventory of your own moral life. Pay very, very careful attention to your motivations for wanting to point out a friend's sin. And then decide if you are willing to be judged by the standard you think proper for your friend. No one is perfect. But no one is purely evil either. Gamble on mercy—that's the measure Christ uses, whether we deserve it or not. 

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Remember John and unstick your tongue (UPDATED)

Nativity of John the Baptist
Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP
St. Dominic Church, NOLA

Audio File Link

Elizabeth, a woman advanced in years, gives birth to a son. After wrangling with family and friends over what to name him, Elizabeth's husband, Zechariah, approves (in writing) the name she has chosen, and the boy is named John. With the child properly named, two events immediately follow: 1) Zechariah's punishment for doubting the word of God's angel about Elizabeth's pregnancy is lifted—his tongue is unstuck; and 2) “fear came upon all their neighbors.” These two events, following as they do upon the naming of this child, reveal to us the significance of the birth of Christ's herald: the name John means “God shows Himself to be gracious.” God, through the ministry of John the Baptist, reveals Himself to merciful, ready to forgive the transgressions of those who repent. Zechariah's tongue is freed so that he might pour blessings and praise upon the Lord. And the neighbors are filled with fear b/c everything they have ever believed, everyone they have ever known is about to change, radically, irrevocably change. John arrives among God's people to announce the coming of the Christ, the one who will break our chains and pierce our hearts. 

Zechariah, Elizabeth, their family, friends, and neighbors all know that the long-promised Messiah is coming. More than 800 years before, the prophet, Isiah, sang one of his four Servant Songs, foretelling the coming Christ: “Listen, O distant peoples. The Lord called me from birth, from my mother's womb he gave me my name. He made of me a sharp edged sword [. . .] He made me a polished arrow [. . .] You are my servant, he said to me [. . .] through whom I show my glory.” The Christ will arrive as a sharp edged sword to cut the bonds of sin. He will fly to God's people as a polished arrow to pierce their hearts so that they might die and rise with him. But freeing the people from sin and taking them into death and new life is not the end of Christ's purpose. Isiah continues to sing, “It is too little, he says, for you to be my servant, [. . .] I will make you a light to the nations, that my salvation may reach to the ends of the earth.” Christ's mission will not limited to those chosen in the covenant with Abraham. Christ comes as a light to all the nations so that the offer of the Father's mercy might be heard to the ends of the earth. John, he through whom “God shows Himself to be gracious” is just the beginning. 

For what exactly is John just the beginning? John's birth presages the birth of Christ, and the birth of Christ signals a new birth for all of creation. When Zechariah doubts the word of God's angel about his wife's miraculous pregnancy he is doing more than just questioning the integrity of a divine messenger. No doubt believing himself to be just an average senior citizen doing average senior citizen stuff day after day, Zechariah is told that his elderly wife, known to be barren, is to bear him a son, a son named John who “will be filled with the holy Spirit [. . .] turn the [. . .] disobedient to the understanding of the righteous, to prepare a people fit for the Lord.” And like any guy anywhere in the world in these circumstances, he balks at the news and asks, “Are you kidding me? My wife's an old lady!” And because he fails to remember who he is—a priest of God in God's temple—and b/c he flagrantly casts doubt on the entire prophetic heritage of his people, Zechariah is stuck speechless so that his doubt may not be spoken again. It is not until he names his son, John, “God shows Himself to be gracious,” that his tongue is freed to give God thanks and praise. 

We know that John's birth presages the birth of Christ, and the birth of Christ signals a new birth for all of creation. And we know that Zechariah's tongue is freed once he confesses God's abounding mercy. But why are the neighbors afraid? Luke tells us that Zechariah immediately begins blessing God when his tongue is unstuck, and “then fear came upon all their neighbors. . .” As neighbors will do, they spread the news of John's birth, and “all who heard these things took them to heart, saying, 'What, then, will this child be?'” What will John be? If “John” means “God shows Himself to be gracious,” who will he become? If they remember their ancient prophetic heritage, they know all too well that John is the one who sharpens the sword of Christ and polishes his arrows. He is the one who warns that the light of righteousness is about to shine; the one who come before the salvation of the world. They are afraid b/c John is now among them to preach repentance and to baptize those who repent with the waters of mercy. For them, in their disobedience, John is an angel and a monster—a messenger of light from God and a beast sent to tear their world apart. Everything they believe and everyone they know is radically changed. 

Here we are 2,000 years after the death and resurrection of Christ, celebrating the birth of God's monstrous angel, John the Baptist. Luke tells us in Acts that John would conclude his preaching by saying, “'What do you suppose that I am. I am not [the Christ]. Behold, one is coming after me; I am not worthy to unfasten the sandals of his feet.'” John knew his ministry. He knew his mission. From the first moment that he met Jesus while both were still in their mothers' wombs, John knew that it was his task to run before the Christ, announcing the Good News of his advent. Why celebrate his birth in 2012? His mission is accomplished. Christ is born. The light of the nations has dawned and salvation is freely received by anyone who repents. We celebrate John's birth b/c it is all too easy to forget our prophetic heritage; to set aside the ancient voice of God and misremember the promises He made ages ago. If we forget, our tongues become stuck in ignorance and we cannot offer Him thanks and praise for His gifts. We cannot bear witness to His goodness in our lives. We cannot ask for what we need, nor receive what He has given us. If we forget John, we forget that God shows Himself to be gracious to us, and we cannot show His graciousness to others. If we forget John, we forget that we ourselves are heralds of the Christ, and we forget that we too were born to bear his banner to the world. 

When you bear Christ's banner to the world, your family, friends, and neighbors may stare at you in fear and ask, “What, then, will this child be?” Who is this person claiming to be a follower of Christ? If you will bear his banner as a herald, you must unstick your tongue and pour out blessings and praise on God. John was imprisoned, tortured, and eventually executed for his righteousness. Expect no less if you will be a herald of Christ. If you will be a herald of Christ, you will tell the truth; always do the right thing; preach the Father's boundless mercy; and love, with great abandon, you will love. Expect defiance, argument, ridicule, insults, even violence. Expect the powers of this world to name you a criminal, a rebel, a bigot. At every moment, expect the darkness to come and tempt you with its easy oblivion. Just remember John, he through whom God shows Himself to be gracious. And while you remember, never forget to unstick your tongue and give your voice to the Word of salvation: Christ has come to right the world with his love. He has come to cut our bonds to sin and to pierce our hearts with his mercy.

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Leave tomorrow to God

11th Week OT (S)
Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP
St. Dominic Church, NOLA

Back in the 90's—my grad school days—a popular theme developed among social and literary theorists: the rise of “panic culture.” Innovative technology was evolving so fast that theorists imagined us to be a nation on the verge of a nervous breakdown! Unable to keep up with the dizzying changes in the rules of the game, we were running ourselves ragged in a panic just to survive. While simultaneously gulping venti espressos and calming herbal teas, we watched Prozac start the psychotropic medications revolution. Our despair became a mental illness rather than a spiritual deficit. Drug abuse, addictions, sexual experimentation, and extremist identity-politics were just the side effects of our national panic. If your life wasn't swirling in chaos, you weren't adapting; and if you weren't adapting, your were dying. Having rejected the ordering principles of right reason and legit moral authority, we were left with nothing but our unfettered passions and our socially constructed truths. No one stopped to ask the one question that might've focused our panic and calmed it: “Can you add a single moment to your life-span by worrying?” No. So, seek first the Kingdom of God and his righteousness. 

What causes us to worry? In his book, The Face of God, Roger Scruton describes the scientific worldview, “We are by-products of a process that is entirely indifferent to our well-being, machines developed by our genetic material and adapted by natural selection to the task of propagation”(2). According to the evangelical atheists who preach materialist science as religious dogma, we are nothing more than “survival machines in the service of our genes”(2). If this is true, or if we believe it to be true, then our panic is more than justified; it's a natural survival response to a chaotic environment. But if the worldview that Scruton describes is false, or only a part of the truth, then our cultural anxiety betrays an astonishing lack of faith in not only our own ability to survive as moral creatures but also in God's providential care for us. Jesus goes straight to the heart of the problem when he asks, “Can you add a single moment to your life-span by worrying?” Why are you worrying about food, drink, clothes? “All these things the pagans seek,” he says. “Your heavenly Father knows that you need them all. But seek first the Kingdom of God and his righteousness. . .” 

We are not by-products of a process that is entirely indifferent to our well-being. We are loved creatures created by a loving Creator who built into our genes a desire to seek Him out and live according to His love. If you choose to live your life as a day-to-day struggle to survive in order to pass on your genes, then worry is an excellent survival skill. Fear will increase your chances of survival by making you averse to taking dangerous risks. However, if you choose to live your life as a day-to-day quest for righteousness, then worry is a deadly affliction. Fear will rot your trust in God and encourage you to gather earthly treasures as insurance against God's possible failures. If the god you worship can fail, then he/she is unworthy of your worship. Why attach yourself to a deity, an idol that can falter? And more importantly, why lay claim to the name Child of God if you have no intention of trusting in His loving-care? We cannot serve God the Father and our worry. Two masters of a single soul leaves that soul confused, chaotic, panicked. Seek the Kingdom and God's righteousness, and abandon all your anxieties. They are parasites, deadly distractions from your quest. Leave tomorrow to take care of itself. And God the Father will take care of you. 

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Dare the darkness with faith and reason!

11th Week OT (F)
Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP
St. Dominic Church, NOLA

Coming as they do immediately after the Beatitudes, Jesus' short lessons on hypocrisy and sincerity teach us the difference btw a well-formed and a malformed conscience. He says, “The eye is the lamp of the body. If your eye is sound, your whole body will be filled with light. . .” What is a “sound eye”? Other translations of this verse read, “If your eye is single,” “If your eye is healthy,” unclouded, clear, good. Perhaps the best translation for the Greek here is: “If your eye is simple,” that is, uncomplicated, true. Think in terms of how one's heart and mind must not hold a doubled allegiance—one to Christ and one to the world. Just as your will is sworn to Christ in love; and just as your intellect is sworn to him in truth, so your eye—your conscience—must be aligned with his saving light. “If your eye is bad [doubled, complicated, clouded] your whole body will be in darkness.” The well-formed conscience enlightens not the body of the believer but the whole Body of the Church as well. The flame of one candle joins the flames of a thousand, a million, a billion more, bringing more light to the Church to enlighten the whole world. However, “if the light in you is darkness,” greater for the Church and the world will the darkness be. 

I don't have to tell you what dangers hide in the darkness. Some are a threat to you and you alone. Some threaten your family. Others harass the nation and the Church so that we will look away while evil does its dirty work. In times past, we have rationalized, psychologized, and pathologized away these dangers so that we might remain prominent in the eyes of the eyes of the world. We've dismissed small daily raids on truth and goodness, calling evil's victories “accommodations to the popular will.” We've minimized full-scale cultural wars against the integrity of the family, calling evil's victories “civil rights advances for the oppressed.” And, of course, we've been busy with internal church battles against our own demons—dissent, abuse, outright rebellion. Now we must deal with not only with our self-inflicted wounds but with the secular powers as well—a gov't pushing us into the sanctuary and ordering us to shut up. “If the light in you is darkness, the darkness will be great.” How great will the darkness be? Exactly as great as the followers of Christ, all men and women of good will, allow it to be. 

 “If your eye is sound, your whole body will be filled with light. . .” Your body. The body of your family. Your parish, your diocese, your nation, and your Church—the whole Body of Christ. The well-formed conscience of a follower of Christ is not a prudish, squeamish, finger-wagging nag. And the light of Christ is not a blinding burst or a deafening clap. The light that enlightens the human soul is the same light that brought everything out of nothing and gifted each of us with reason and faith. That light is God's love. When tempted by darkness to fudge the truth, we shine that light. When tempted to call evil good, we shine that light. When tempted by the darkness to shine that light elsewhere, we shine it nonetheless and suffer the consequences. The light of Christ that brightens you body and soul is not yours to withhold. Don't wait for me, Fr. Mike, Bishop Gregory, even Pope Benedict to tell you where to shine the light of Christ. Shine out God's love where you are, everywhere you go. Dare the darkness with faith and reason! Just be sure that your eye is simple, wholly aligned with Christ, unclouded by sin, and sharply focused on loving even the unlovable. One flame joined to another. . .becomes a beacon. When the storm hits, the lost among us will need a light to guide them. If the Church is going to be that beacon, she will need your brightest light. 

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Fortnight for Religious Freedom: dispatches from the field!

Archbishop Charles Chaput, OFM:  "First, religious freedom is a cornerstone of the American experience [. . .] Second point: Freedom of religion is more than freedom of worship [. . .]Third point: Threats against religious freedom in our country are not imaginary. They’re happening right now. They’re immediate, serious, and real [. . .] Fourth point: Unless we work hard to keep our religious liberty, we’ll lose it [. . .] Fifth and final point: Politics and the courts are important. But our religious freedom ultimately depends on the vividness of our own Christian faith–in other words, how deeply we believe it, and how honestly we live it [. . .]

George Weigel:  "As the Catholic Church in the United States begins a Fortnight for Freedom to strengthen Catholics’ resolve to defend religious freedom for all, it’s good to remember that, from the Founding, the Catholic embrace of the First Amendment’s guarantee of the 'free exercise of religion' has been unhesitating—and it has been principled" [. . .]

Time Drake:  "To fire people up, CatholicVote created the attached video for the Fortnight. Take a look at the listing of dioceses at the USCCB web page or the EWTN resource page to find out what is happening near you, and make plans for you and your family to attend. Use it as a teachable moment to talk about the founding of our nation and the unique freedoms we possess [. . .]

Archbishop William Lori: “Across America, our right to live out our faith is being threatened — from Washington’s forcing Catholic institutions to provide services that contradict their beliefs, to state governments’ prohibiting religious charities from serving the most vulnerable [. . .] We encourage all supporters around the country to text the simple, meaningful word ‘Freedom’ (for English) or ‘Libertad’ (for Spanish) to 377377 to join the movement.”

Archbishop Jose Gomez:  "In recent years, many have observed that our American consensus on religious liberty, conscience protection, and religion’s public role has been eroding. There are many causes for this. The first is the reality of religious indifferentism or 'practical atheism'—the fact that growing numbers of people in our society are living as if God doesn’t exist or doesn’t matter. There’s no reason to care about religious freedom if you don’t care about being religious.

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Dominican friars spotted in the wild!

Two pics from the Corpus Christi Mass and procession in Rome:

Above:  Rev. Frs. Alan Moran, OP (Eastern Province, USA) and Michael Monshau, OP (Central Province, USA). Fr. Moran teaches social science at the Angelicum and Fr. Monshau teaches theology.

Above:  Rev. Frs. Walter Senner, OP (Province of Teutonia) and Dominic Holtz, OP (Central Province, USA).  Both friars teach philosophy at the Angelicum.  These two are probably among a couple of dozen of folks in the world who can actually read Thomas Aquinas' chicken scratch Latin manuscripts!

Pic credits:  Province of St. Joseph (Eastern, USA)

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Religious liberty IS under attack. . .

So, you think religious liberty isn't under attack.  Here are six cases that might change your mind:

1) EEOC – The Ministerial Exemption

[. . .] "We might expect that the EEOC would side with the employee. But the Solicitor General of the United States argued that churches had no more rights in cases like this than would a labor union or a social club.”  B.O. wants to be your bishop so he can decide who's fit to be your pastor.  Catholic progs supported his strategy b/c they saw if as an opportunity to force the Church to "ordain" women.

2) NLRB – Collective Bargaining Exemption

[. . .] College teachers and students live in an environment of academic freedom. Students don’t have to attend mass. Schools may hire non-Catholic faculty. Boards of trustees are dominated by lay people, not clergy and members of religious orders. This openness “means (to the NLRB) that these institutions should be subject to regulation. So, if the Church-related institutions were decide to hire only practicing Catholics, she'd be sued for employment discrimination.  But b/c these institutions hire non-Catholics, she's subject to Mammon.

 3) The HHS Mandate.

The mandate would, of course, force Catholic colleges and universities to provide coverage for surgical sterilizations and all FDA approved contraceptives (including those that may induce abortions early in pregnancy) [. . .] All about getting Christians out of health care.  Mammon doesn't like competition.

4) Conscience Protections

In 2008 HHS issued a rule to protect doctors and hospitals that counsel pregnant women from being sued for not presenting abortion as a medical alternative. Last spring HHS repealed the regulation putting doctors at risk for not counseling abortions.  Why?  Because abortion is the Most Holy Sacrament of the Left.

5) HHS – Human Trafficking

The National Human Trafficking Victim Assistance Program now asks participating organizations to provide the “full range of reproductive services” to trafficking victims and unaccompanied minors in its cooperative agreements and government contracts, thus ruling out the USCCB’s Migration and Refugee Services [. . .] B.O. will not help the Church fight slavery unless the Church pays for abortions!

6) D.C. City Council – Gay “Marriage”

When the District of Columbia began considering a same-sex “marriage” law in November 2009, the Archdiocese of Washington asked for an exemption from rules that would force it to support gay “marriage” by doing such things as paying spousal insurance benefits and placing foster children with same-sex couples. The City Council refused.  [. . .] Why?  Because same-sex "marriage" isn't about equality; it's about forcing the Church out of the public square and public service.  UPDATE:  told ya.

Read the whole article here.
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Fortnight for Religious Freedom

FORTNIGHT FOR FREEDOM!

 

Two weeks of prayer in support of our sacred and civil right 

to practice our religious beliefs!

Why pray for what we need?

St. Alyosius Gonzaga
Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP
St. Dominic Church, NOLA

Hypocrites pray loudly and at length in the synagogues and on street corners so that they can be heard and admired. When their piety is praised, Jesus say, “They have received their reward;” that is, the praise of men is all these phonies really want, and they get it. If we're to avoid praying like the hypocrites, we must go into our inner room to pray. Why secret ourselves away while praying? Jesus says, “. . .[b/c] your Father who sees in secret will repay you.” Thus, our lives in Christ cannot be double-hearted or double-minded. Only with the clarity and focus of the mind of Christ can we live lives of sacrificial love. Christian prayer then has an overriding purpose: to nurture the humble heart and eager mind of a person who knows and loves God as the source and summit of his/her very existence. Jesus tells us not to babble on like the pagans but rather to ask for what we need b/c the Father knows our needs before we ask. If this is true, then why pray at all? Why ask God for what we need if He already knows what we need? By asking for what we need, we acknowledge that we need and that God is the source of our fulfillment. 

 Why ask God for what we need if He already knows what we need? Asked this way, the question assumes that the only purpose of prayer is to get something that we need. Since God already knows our needs, and yet we are taught to pray for what we need anyway, there must be some other purpose to praying. There is: we pray so that we might grow in humility—that is, we pray so that the reality of our total dependence on God for everything we are and everything we have might free us from selfishness and make sacrificial love a joyous feature of our daily lives. In other words, the act of asking for what need is itself an admission that we have needs that we cannot provide for ourselves. By asking, we confess our dependence on God and recognize that He is the source of all that we call Good. How much easier is it to sacrifice when you know that nothing you have is truly yours? When everything you have and everything you are is a freely given gift given to you so that you might give it away in turn? Prayer provides us with the practice we need to perfect a life lived for others in sacrifice. So, we don't pray in order to get the stuff we need. We pray in order to build up the humility necessary to excel as instruments of God's love on earth.

How can the prayer that Jesus teaches his disciples lead us deeper into humility and thus prepare us to live in sacrificial love? Our Lord instructs us how to pray in a series of petitions: give us, forgive us, lead us, deliver us. All of these petitions come after we acknowledge that the Father's name is holy, and that we long for His will to be done here among us as it is done in heaven. Everything we say in this prayer and believe as a result of this prayer makes it absolutely clear that we are totally dependent on God, completely reliant on His providential care. We need Him for our daily existence; for the forgiveness of our sins; so that we might forgive the sins of others; as a defense against temptation; and we need Him to rescue us from evil. The difference between thriving in creation and dissolving into an abyss is the compassionate care our Creator gives to His creatures. The sooner we acknowledge this truth and begin to live our lives with this truth front and center, the sooner we begin to flourish in humility, and to practice the holy art of loving through surrender and sacrifice. Ask for all that you think you need and then receive the only One you truly need.

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Feedback is always welcomed and appreciated!

Wed Fat Report

Sigh.

326lbs.  No loss, no gain.

I'm stuck.  Guess I'm gonna have to cut that before bed Ice Cream Cake snack.  Drats!
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Thanks!

My thanks to Michelle for the Wish List book, The Last Superstition:  A Refutation of the New Atheism.

I've already read the first fifty pages and it's excellent. 

Fr. Philip
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Don't waste your time hiding from God

11th Week OT (W)
Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP
St. Dominic Church, NOLA

Jesus is giving his poor disciples whiplash! He appears to be jerking them around, intellectually and spiritually. One day, he tells them to let their good works shine—don't hide your light under a bushel basket, he says. The next day, he tells them not to stand around praying on the street corners like hypocrites—go pray in your inner room, out of sight, he admonishes. He tells us to go out into the world and preach the Good News. Then he tells us to hide away so that only God knows our faith in Him. Are we supposed to be evangelical extroverts or monastic introverts? Should we be shouting the glory of God to the rooftops, or whispering our thanks and praise inside a closet? We could say that both options are legit, depending on one's personality. The boisterous Christian is called to preach and pray on the corners. While the shy soul is called to a much quieter, contemplative witness. However, Jesus doesn't divide his disciples this way. When he teaches, he teaches to all his students. He expects each of us to be both a public and private witness, both a shouter and a whisperer.  The key to a consistent witness is spiritual sincerity—the earnest desire to belong wholly to God. 

One of the most spiritually damaging hypocrisies for a follower of Christ is double-mindedness, or double-heartedness. Jesus refers to this malicious condition as “serving two masters.” When the CIA discovers an agent selling U.S. secrets to an enemy, they label this person a “traitor.” When a husband or wife discovers that his/her spouse is carrying on an affair, the offender is named an “adulterer.” In religious terms, a believer who works for the mission of two gods is called an “idolater.” We give our heart and mind—that is, our whole selves—to Christ and to Christ alone. If Christ reigns from the throne of your heart and teaches from the lectern of your mind, then nothing else, no one else may rule your will or shape your intellect. Others may influence, help to guide, but “taking on the mind of Christ” means adopting and installing—for all practical and educational purposes—the comprehensive worldview of God's sacrificial love. How we pray in private shapes our public witness. How we publicly witness guides our private prayer. To preach Christ's love in public, for example, and then seethe with vengeance in private is treasonous, adulterous. Our Lord demands the loyalty of our private souls and our public face. Anything less is idolatrous. 

Achieving a workable harmony between the private soul and the public face is no easy task. Most of us probably find it much simpler, less strenuous to slap on a Happy Face for the market and quietly roll our anger and spite around inside. Unfortunately, such a strategy is dangerous—beyond dangerous—b/c what our neighbors cannot see, the Father most certainly does see. In other words, there's not much point in hiding the ugliness we enjoy nurturing. Even if the neighbors can't see the full extent of our illness, eventually something of it will ooze out; it will show itself in the unguarded moment, a moment of stress or panic. Living a double life of external holiness and internal damnation (or vice-versa) is exhausting; such a life burns away trust, hope, mercy, all the fruitful virtues that bring us closer to God. The cure is painful, messy: bring your whole heart/mind to the altar and sacrifice yourself—that is, by surrender make holy—your entirety of your person. Give it all—your public face and your private soul—to Christ. Mend your double-heart and double-mind in the One Love who died so that you might find peace. 

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On cheek turning. . .

11th Week OT (M)
Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP
St. Dominic Church, NOLA

Given this morning's gospel reading, we can conclude that Jesus wouldn't have much of a future in modern American politics. Can we imagine a U.S. commander-in-chief who orders our military to turn the other cheek, one who cites scripture to forgive our nation's enemies? It's passages like this one from Matthew that make it more than just difficult for faithful Christians to serve as political leaders of a world power. Jesus' moral attitude towards an enemy, if adopted, would leave our leaders with few attractive solutions to international problems. Even for us as individual Christians, the idea that our enemies are not to be fought against seems nonsensical. It's an assault on common sense. Well, who told you that following Christ was attractive, that following Christ made sense? Jesus tells us to ignore the law of vengeance, “. . .offer no resistance to one who is evil. When someone strikes you on your right cheek, turn the other one to him as well.” Turning the other cheek is not a surrender to evil; it's Christ's method of fighting evil even as he evangelizes the evil-doer. 

A fifth-century text called, The Apostolic Constitutions, offers us a succinct view of this teaching, quoting Old and New Testament sources, the authors distinguish between evil per se and evil-doers, “'. . .love those who hate you, and you shall have no enemy.' For Chirst says, 'You will not hate any man [. . .]' for they are all the workmanship of God. Avoid not the persons, but the sentiments, of the wicked”(7.2). Those who hate us may see an enemy in us, but we cannot follow Christ's commandment to love and at the same time call anyone an enemy. They may hate us, but even as they do, they do so as children of God. And the whole purpose of the Church, the only reason the Church exists is to give the Father's love a body on earth. If there are children of God who deserve to be hated for their evil, then let them hate themselves as a consequence of evil. Our job is to love them despite their evil, in spite of their evil. We can go even further and say that we are obligated to love them b/c of their evil. Who needs to see and hear and feel the love of their Maker more than those poisoned by hatred, violence, and the love of death? Evil will never conquer evil, so hating those who hate us only strengthens the spirit of hatred. 

The Apostolic Constitutions puts it neatly, “Avoid not the persons, but the sentiments, of the wicked.” Wickedness, as a pervasive spirit of disobedience, can only be defeated soul by soul; that is, a wicked person can be loved into holy obedience but the unholy spirit moves on, lives on to infect over and again. What Jesus is teaching us this morning is a moral strategy for rescuing the world soul by soul. First, we must never hate a person b/c all persons are the “workmanship of God.” Second, evil never defeats evil, thus we cannot use the tools of evil to fight evil. Third, by loving the wicked person and challenging evil with love, we strengthen our own love for God. As difficult as it is to separate the wickedness of a person from the person, it is imperative that we do so. If we struggle with holiness as lovers of Christ, and we do, how much more do the wicked struggle with living while knowing that they are loved despite their wickedness? When they first see and hear a way out of evil, do they also see and hear the love that comes with their rescue? Or do they hear a condemnation disguised as concern? The trap for us is set: condemn the person and be condemned in turn. Love the person, in spite of their evil, and be loved for giving God's mercy a voice. 

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Where's your courage? (2.0)

[NB.  This is a tweaked version of yesterday's first draft.]

11th Sunday OT (2)
Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP
St. Dominic Church, NOLA

Audio file download

Are we courageous? Do we possess the strength of heart necessary to speak the truth, walk by faith, and live in hope; to speak, walk, and live righteously with our God; to do always and in every circumstance the right thing? Paul writes to the Corinthians, “We are always courageous, brothers and sisters, although. . .we are away from the Lord, for we walk by faith, not by sight. Yet we are courageous. . .” Do we walk by faith? Live in hope? Do we aspire to please the Lord? Why should we aspire to please the Lord? “For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each may receive recompense,” correction, and repair. Christ will sit in judgment of our actions, whether good or evil, and so it is Christ we must work to please. But b/c “we are away from the Lord” and caught in the world of men, the temptation to work for man's approval is nearly overwhelming. And so, we desperately need courage: the strength of heart necessary to speak the truth, to walk by faith, and to live in hope; the righteous spirit required to turn the temptation of disastrous compromise and to seed the world with the Good News so that the Lord's harvest may yield abundant and excellent fruit. 

Paul says that we are always courageous, that our hearts are always strong in the faith. But we might rightly suspect that he's flattering us, shining us on, so that we will hear and obey his call to faithfulness. You and I both know that fighting the temptation to please the world with the weapons of Christian courage is a day-to-day accounting. Some days we barely hold our own. Once and a while, we eek out a small win. One, maybe two days in a lifetime, we are truly pressed against a wall, and through sheer, muscular courage face down the temptation and declare victory. But most days, most weeks and years, the fight seems hardly worth the blood and sweat of a win. Hardly worth the time it would take to muster a defense. It's a tiny compromise in principle to keep the peace. We will gain so much in exchange for something so small. How do I know that this is the right thing to do? We all have different ideas of what's right. I don't want to lose my job, my friends; anger my neighbors, my spouse, my kids. Everyone else thinks this is OK; who am I to say otherwise? I feel like this is right, so it must be right. We have the right to do this, so doing it must be right, right? These are the small, daily challenges to your courage that probe your heart, poking and prodding for weaknesses so that the grand challenge to come might see you defeated. The smallest seed—of cowardice, of bravery—can produce abundant fruit, whether good or evil. 

Jesus grasps for a parable, an image that will help him to explain the Kingdom of God. He settles on the image of a tiny mustard seed that grows into an enormous tree. In his parable, the Kingdom of God is “the largest of plants and puts forth large branches, so that the birds of the sky can dwell in its shade.” This enormous tree, deeply rooted and supporting many large branches, springs up from a single, flyspeck of a seed. All those leaves, all those branches, the weight of its trunk, the depth of its roots, its resting shade, all of it comes out of the smallest of seeds. The smallest act of faith, the tiniest word of hope, no matter how small, how apparently insignificant the seed, properly sown and nurtured can spring up and grow into a heart courageous enough to withstand the most savage temptations wrought by the world of men. Jesus says that a farmer sows his seed-wheat and overnight his harvest is ripe, ready for reaping. When we sow the seeds of faith, hope, and love, the Kingdom of God sprouts in our hearts—growing and growing and growing—just waiting for the final reaping, waiting for the Christ to come so that we might go before his judgment seat and have him weigh our harvest, our words and deeds, whether good or evil. But before the harvest, before our judgment, we are tested; probed, prodded, and poked, in small ways and large, so that our courage might be measured. 

Writing to the Church in Thibaris in northeast Africa, in the first century, St. Cyprian of Carthage warns the faithful there: “. . .the day of affliction has begun to hang over our heads. . .so we must all stand prepared for the battle.”* Like most of his contemporaries, Cyprian believed that the Anti-Christ roamed the world in his day and that the Last Days were only weeks or months away; thus, he warns his brothers and sisters in Christ that their martyrdom for the faith was imminent. So, he exhorts them, “. . .a fiercer fight is now threatening, for which the soldiers of Christ ought to prepare themselves with uncorrupted faith and robust courage. . .” Our own battles threaten, so we too are rightly exhorted to prepare ourselves with an uncorrupted faith and a robust courage! It is unlikely that our battles will end in violence and bloodshed, but this actually makes the fight more dangerous for us. Threatened with a gun or a knife, we would fight with all our physical strength and all our determination to survive and win. But what if the faith is threatened by a piece of legislation, an executive order, a court decision, or the possibility of being ostracized for following Christ? What are our weapons then? 

Cyprian tells the Christians in Thibaris, “Let us be armed, beloved brethren, with our whole strength, and let us be prepared for the struggle with an uncorrupted mind, with a sound faith, with a devoted courage.” When we are tempted to please the world of men, to compromise in the smallest way against the faith, we are to arm ourselves with all the strength given to the children of God: a mind uncorrupted by inordinate desires, base passions, and irrational prejudices; a sound faith solidly rooted in the apostolic tradition, guided by the Church's authentic teachers, and lived with wholehearted charity; and a devoted courage, a heart strengthened by a true love for God and an eagerness to see God loved by all. When threatened, are we courageous? Do we reach up to Christ and down into our spirit for the strength of heart necessary to speak the truth, walk by faith, and live in hope; to speak, walk, and live righteously with our God; to do always and in every circumstance the right thing? Even when the right thing will take us to court, to jail, to the unemployment line, the hospital, away from family and friends? 

Every act of faith, every word of hope sows a tiny seed, a miniscule germ of love from which the mighty tree of God's kingdom can take root and grow. But the sower of these seeds must be courageous, stout-hearted, and bravely immune to any temptation to worry about the approval and applause of the world of men. It is Christ himself who will sit in judgment of our words and deeds, whether good or evil; it is Christ himself who will weigh our hearts, measure our trust, and sift from us the wheat from the chafe. If you are courageous, go out and sow the seeds that will bring about the Kingdom. If you live with a spirit of cowardice, pray for strength and then go be strong anyway. The battle against corruption in our faith is has always been with us, is with us now, and will be with us until judgment day dawns. Arm yourselves with the best weapons Christ and his Church have to offer, and prepare to repel—with faith, reason, and love—the darker spirits of this corrupting age.

*Epistle 55

___________________

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Where's your courage?

11th Sunday OT
Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP
St. Dominic Church, NOLA

Think of courage: the strength of heart necessary to speak the truth, walk by faith, and live in hope; to speak, walk, and live righteously with your God; to do always and in every circumstance the right thing. Paul writes to the Corinthians, “We are always courageous, brothers and sisters, although. . .we are away from the Lord, for we walk by faith, not by sight. Yet we are courageous. . .” We walk by faith, and yet we are courageous. We walk by faith, and yet we live in hope. We walk by faith, therefore, we aspire to please the Lord. Why? Why do we aspire to please the Lord? “For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each may receive recompense,” correction, and repair. Christ will sit in judgment of our actions, whether good or evil, and so it is Christ we must work to please. But b/c “we are away from the Lord” and caught in the world of men, the temptation to work for man's approval is nearly overwhelming. And so, think of courage, pray for courage: the strength of heart necessary to speak the truth, to walk by faith, and to live in hope; the righteous spirit required to seed the world with the Good News so that the Lord's harvest may yield abundant and excellent fruit. 

Paul says that we are always courageous, that our hearts are always strong in the faith. But we might rightly suspect that he's flattering us, shining us on, so that we will hear and obey his call to faithfulness. You and I both know that fighting the temptation to please the world with the weapons of Christian courage is a day-to-day accounting. Some days we barely hold our own. Once and a while, we eek out a small win. One, maybe two days in a lifetime, we are truly pressed against a wall, and through sheer, muscular courage face down the temptation and declare victory. But most days, most weeks and years, the fight seems hardly worth the blood and sweat of a win. Hardly worth the time it would take to muster a defense. It's a tiny compromise to keep the peace. We will gain so much in exchange for something so small. How do I know that this is the right thing to do? We all have different ideas of what's right. I don't want to lose my job, my friends; anger my neighbors, my spouse, my kids. Everyone else thinks this is OK; who am I to say otherwise? I feel like this is right, so it must be right. We have the right to do this, so doing it must be right, right? These are the small challenges to your daily courage that probe your heart, poking and prodding for weaknesses so that the grand challenge to come might see you defeated.

 Jesus grasps for a parable, an image that will help him to explain the Kingdom of God. He settles on the image of a tiny mustard seed that grows into an enormous tree. In his parable, the Kingdom of God is “the largest of plants and puts forth large branches, so that the birds of the sky can dwell in its shade.” This enormous tree, deeply rooted and supporting many large branches, springs up from a single, flyspeck of a seed. All those leaves, all those branches, the weight of its trunk, the depth of its roots, its resting shade, all of it comes out of the smallest of seeds. The smallest act of faith, the tiniest word of hope, no matter how small, how apparently insignificant the seed, properly sown and nurtured can spring up and grow into a heart courageous enough to withstand the most savage temptations wrought by the world of men. Jesus says that a farmer sows his seed-wheat and overnight his harvest is ripe, ready for reaping. When we sow the seeds of faith, hope, and love, the Kingdom of God sprouts in our hearts—growing and growing and growing—just waiting for the final reaping, waiting for the Christ to come so that we might go before his judgment seat and have him weigh our harvest, our words and deeds, whether good or evil. 

But before the harvest, before our judgment, we are tested; probed, prodded, and poked, in small ways and large, so that our courage might be measured. Writing to the people of Thibaris in northeast Africa, in the first century, St. Cyprian of Carthage warns the faithful there: “. . .the day of affliction has begun to hang over our heads. . .so we must all stand prepared for the battle.” Like most of his contemporaries, Cyprian believed that the Anti-Christ roamed the world in his day and that the Last Days were only weeks or months away; thus, he warns his brothers and sisters in Christ that their martyrdom for the faith was imminent. So, he exhorts them, “. . .a fiercer fight is now threatening, for which the soldiers of Christ ought to prepare themselves with uncorrupted faith and robust courage. . .” Threatened by our own looming battles, we too are rightly exhorted to prepare ourselves with an uncorrupted faith and a robust courage! It is unlikely that our battles will end in violence and bloodshed, but this actually make the fight more dangerous for us. Threatened with a gun or a knife, we would fight with all our physical strength and all our determination to survive and win. But what if the faith is threatened by a piece of legislation, an executive order, or the possibility of being ostracized for following Christ? What are our weapons then? 

Cyprian tells the Christians in Thibaris, “Let us be armed, beloved brethren, with our whole strength, and let us be prepared for the struggle with an uncorrupted mind, with a sound faith, with a devoted courage.” When we are tempted to please the world of men, to compromise in the smallest way against the faith, we are to arm ourselves with all the strength given to the children of God: a mind uncorrupted by inordinate desires, base passions, and irrational prejudices; a sound faith solidly rooted in the apostolic tradition, guided by the Church's authentic teachers, and lived with wholehearted charity; and a devoted courage, a heart strengthened by a true love for God and an eagerness to see God loved by all. When threatened, we are courageous, we reach up to Christ and down into our spirit for the strength of heart necessary to speak the truth, walk by faith, and live in hope; to speak, walk, and live righteously with our God; to do always and in every circumstance the right thing, even when the right thing to do will take us to court, to jail, to the unemployment line, or away from family and friends. 

Every act of faith, every word of hope sows a tiny seed, a miniscule germ of love from which the mighty tree of God's kingdom can take root and grow. But the sower of these seeds must be courageous, stout-hearted, and bravely immune to any temptation to worry about the approval and applause of the world of men. It is Christ himself who will sit in judgment of our words and deeds, whether good or evil; it is Christ himself who will weigh our hearts, measure our trust, and sift from us the wheat from the chafe. If you are courageous, go out and sow the seeds that will bring about the Kingdom. If you live with a spirit of cowardice, pray for strength and then go be strong. The battle against corruption is has always been with us, is with us now, and will be with us until judgment day dawns. Arm yourselves with the best weapons Christ and his Church have to offer, and prepare to repel the darker spirits of this corrupting age. 

____________________

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Click on St. Martin and donate to the Dominicans! ----->