Why does the Christ need a herald?

NB. Yesterday's homily took me about five hrs. to wring from my brain.  I think I sprained something. Just wasn't up to the task today. . .so, here's one from 2007. Mea culpa.

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

Zechariah’s tongue is freed to speak. Once he has agreed to name his son “John,” which means “God shows Himself to be gracious,” his tongue is unstuck. Having been punished with silence for failing to believe that God could give him and his wife, Elizabeth, a son so late in his life, Zechariah sees his son for the miracle that he is and blesses God with his first words! But how quickly his words of blessing become words of worry among the people of Judea when it becomes clear that this son is no ordinary child. Luke reports, “All who heard these things took them to heart, saying, ‘What, then, will this child be?’ For surely the hand of the Lord was with him.” What will the child be? Who did he become? John the Baptist is the Harbinger crying for our repentance before the coming of the Lord! 

Why does the Christ need a herald? Here's part of the reason: It's just common sense to say that we receive information about the world based on our natural abilities to receive physical sensations; that is, we see, hear, feel, taste, smell because we have eyes, ears, skin, tongues, and noses. Our first contact with creation is sensual; we are made in a way that makes it possible for us to live and thrive, in a manner that prepares us for living day to day in a world of things and processes. But are we naturally prepared to received the Word Made Flesh? Are we made to see and hear and taste the arrival of the Messiah? Of course, this isn’t a question about our physical readiness to greet the Lord but one about our capacity to think and feel and live with the reality of his coming in the flesh and his staying among us in the Spirit. 

The coming of the Messiah is hardly a secret. The prophets of the Old Covenant have made his coming abundantly evident. God Himself promised that a virgin would conceive and bear a child named “Emmanuel,” “God-is-with-us.” This is not occult science but prophetic art, a clarion call to point the way to the eventual presence of God Himself among His people. So, why do we have John the Herald coming before the Messiah? At the very least, John’s conception, birth, life, and public ministry are all meant to prepare us to receive Christ as the gift he is meant to be. It is one thing for the Father to hand us His Son to us; it is quite another for us to receive His Son as a gift. Clearly, John’s arrival means that we were not ready to say Yes to God’s gift of salvation through His Son. Luke reports in Acts, “John heralded [Jesus’] coming by proclaiming a baptism of repentance to all the people of Israel…” To be ready, we must turn around and face God head on. 

John came out of the desert to preach his gospel of repentance. Out of a barren waste, the dry and weary land of sand and heat, John brings the cool cleansing waters of baptism, the fresh promise of renewal that—once taken in faith—prepares the eyes and ears to see and hear the good news that arrives with the birth of his cousin, Jesus the Christ. With John, our Father shows Himself to be gracious by preparing us for His coming among us; that is, John, God’s sign of grace, precedes God’s act of final mercy, Jesus; and He is with us. That we are to turn around and face this revelation of His gift is perfectly sensible. How, otherwise, would we come to know and love Him Who dies for us? How would we reach out and receive what God desires to give us as gift if we were not facing Him, hands out, pristine and thankful? 

The people of Judea worried, “What, then, will this child be?” John answers, “What do you suppose that I am? I am not [the Christ]…” No, he isn’t. Instead, he comes out of the desert to prepare us to accept—through our repentance of sin—the gift of God among us, our lasting cure, our final healing, the one who comes after him to die so that we might have eternal life.

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New Dominican Priests!

Congratulations to the Rev. Frs. Augustine Dermond, OP and Thomas Schaefgen, OP who were ordained to the priesthood this last Saturday! 

L to R: Fr. Chris Eggleton, OP (Provincial), Fr. Augustine, Bishop Terry Steib, SVD (Memphis), and Fr. Thomas.

Augustine and Thomas were novices in Irving, TX when I was assigned there. Seems like yesterday that they were just Baby Dominicans.  I feel old.

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Heirs according to the promise

12th Sunday OT 2013 
Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP 
St. Dominic, NOLA 

Deny yourself. Take up your cross. Follow Christ. If you will save your life for heaven, you will lose your life for Christ on earth. But if you seek to spare yourself suffering, trial, and persecution while you're alive, you'll just end up losing your eternal life. The choice couldn't be any clearer, or any more depressing. To follow Christ, it seems, is to live a life of mortification, sacrifice, and self-denial; grimly determined to slog through this vale of tears, hoping and praying that our lives after this one will be better. The most we can hope for while trapped in this mortal coil is that we'll be given the chance to die a martyr's death and escape a long sentence in purgatory. Deny yourself. Take up your cross. And follow Christ to your execution in the Valley of Skulls. Of course, what this dreary picture leaves out is the daily reward of following Christ: the peace that comes from detaching ourselves from the weight of impermanent things; the joy that comes from forgiving and being forgiven; the knowledge that our love for others is perfecting God's love in us. It leaves out the part where mortification, sacrifice, and self-denial are our ways of offering God praise, of giving Him thanks. This dismal picture of Christian life forgets to ask, “Who do you say that you are?” 

Paul starts us on the way to an answer. Addressing the Galatians, he writes, “Through faith you are all children of God in Christ Jesus. For all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ.” Who do we say that we are? Let's change Paul's declaration up a bit: “Through faith we are all children of God in Christ Jesus. For all of us who were baptized into Christ have clothed ourselves with Christ.” Who do we say that we are? Children of God in Christ. Dead, buried, and raised with Christ in baptism. We have put on Christ, been clothed with Christ. We belong to Christ. So, when we deny ourselves, we only give away that which is no longer ours to keep. When we take up a cross, it is Christ's cross that we lift up. When we follow after him, it is not our lives that we are spending but his. What is truly dreary, truly dismal is living a life ordered toward the things of this world, the things that will pass away, that will inevitable abandon us. What's truly depressing is spending your life staring at an end where nothing begins, where your only hope is that after you die someone might remember you. Is that who you are? Who you will be? A memory—fond or not—just a memory? 

How do we get to the best answer to the question of who we are? We can start with the questions Jesus asks his disciples. First, he wants to know who the crowds say that he is. They answer. Then, he turns to his friends and students and asks them, “But who do you say that I am?” Peter answers for the disciples. Note that Jesus first asks about the crowds, then he directly questions his friends. What do the disciples know about Jesus that the crowds do not? This is exactly what Jesus wants them to recognize and confess. They know who he is, and those in the crowds do not. Knowing who Jesus truly is means knowing what his purpose is, what he is here to be and do. The crowds think that Jesus is a just another prophet, like Elijah or John the Baptist. So, at most, those in the crowds will see a miracle or two; maybe two or three of them will be healed. But b/c the disciples know and confess Jesus' identity as the Christ of God, they belong to Christ; they are Abraham’s descendants; and “heirs according to the promise.” The best way to answer the question of who we are is to correctly answer the question: who do you say that Jesus is? Who you say Jesus is is who you are. 

And if you say that Jesus is the Christ, then you will deny yourself, take up your cross daily, and follow him. If you will save your life for heaven, you will lose your life for Christ on earth. But if you seek to spare yourself suffering, trial, and persecution by denying Christ while you're alive, you'll just end up losing your eternal life. The reason for this is simple: you belong to Christ. We all belong to Christ. And belonging to Christ has consequences. As heirs to the promise, we have our own promises to keep. To seek holiness through sacrifice and self-denial. To bear witness to the mercy we've received from God. To forgive those who have sinned against us. To enthrone the Holy Spirit in the tabernacles of our hearts and surrender all of our gifts to His service. None of these promises is easy to fulfill. But they are all the more difficult to keep if we shy away from confessing that Jesus is the Christ, if we persist in following the crowds and making him into a latter-day prophet, or a social reformer, or a political revolutionary. He showed us the way to eternal life on his cross—sacrificial love. And it is sacrificial love that will nail each one of us to our own cross. . .if we will follow him; if we deny the Self and all that bloats and rots the Self in this world. 

So, who do you say that Jesus is? Do you follow after a Barbie Doll Jesus, changing his designer outfits whenever the whimsy strikes you? Do you say that he was just a religious leader that died in the first century? Some biblical scholars argue that Jesus was really an early second century literary composite of many different prophets. The gospel writers and editors invented Jesus to help the early church in its PR campaign against the Jews and Romans. Or maybe you would say that Jesus was a peace-nik vegan hippie prototype with serious Daddy issues?Just remember: whoever you say that Jesus is tells you who you are. And what you have promised to do with your life. And what you will be after you are gone. Our Lord isn't a Barbie Doll or a literary composite. And following him isn't always a parade. He tells the disciples what will happen to him: “The Son of Man must suffer greatly and be rejected by the [religious leaders] and be killed and on the third day be raised.” If they follow him, they can expect the same. And so can we. Knowing this, expecting this: who do you say that Jesus is? Not just “who is Jesus to you” but who is he really, truly? If he is the Christ, deny yourself, take up your cross, and follow him. Daily. Daily, seek to spend your life living as a child of God clothed with Christ. You belong to Christ. You are Abraham’s descendants, and heirs according to the promise. 

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O, you of much worry!

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

Jesus tells us that we cannot serve two masters b/c a servant divided in half is no servant at all. Like the child Solomon would split in half to share btw the bickering mothers, a servant with divided loyalties is dead to both masters. So, we either serve God, or we serve Mammon. Never both. We know what happens to us when we set aside the gods of worry and commit ourselves to serving God alone: done sincerely and habitually, a peace that passes all understanding settles into our bones, and we get as close to Happiness as we can while body and soul remain together. But what happens when we choose Mammon? What happens when we dedicate our time, talent, and treasure to the worldly ambitions of Worry? If serving the Prince of Peace brings us peace, then serving the unclean spirit of Worry brings. . .more Worry. More anxiety. Deeper and darker spiritual war. Serving God means serving others in His name, for His glory. Serving Mammon means serving Self, even if, and especially when, serving Self is self-destructive. Can any one of us add a year, a day, an hour to our lives by worrying? “If God so clothes the grass of the field [. . .] will he not much more provide for you, O you of little faith?” 

What's faith got to do with worry? The human brain is nature's most powerful pattern-seeking and pattern-making machines. We take in massive amounts of sensory data and in milliseconds turn it all into a coherent, accurate depiction of the world. Second only to the power of the human intellect is the power of the human will. As we take in billions and billions of pieces of sensory data, and as the brain churns away at building an accurate picture of our world, the will is struggling to decide What To Do About All of This. How do I react? What can I change? Is this dangerous? Is that safe? Left to itself the will will always act to preserve the body, and if that means scaring the snot out of us, so be it. But living in a constant state of life-preserving fear threatens our spiritual lives. We come to believe—falsely—that by will alone we can change that over which we have no control. Faith is the willful act of trusting in God. We set our hearts and minds firmly on the way to eternity, training ourselves to see and hear this world as a passage through to God, back to God. Worry then becomes all about not trusting that God's will and care is sufficient for today. Worry is all about the lie that I am my own god; that I am my own Master. 

And, as Jesus says, we cannot serve two masters. I serve God, or I serve Myself. I live eternally in peace, or I die daily in worry. I place everything I am and have into His hands for His use, or I snatch it all for myself and desperately try to control the uncontrollable. Is there a concrete way to surrender to God? A way to open my hands and let it all fall into His lap? There are many. Here's just one, perhaps the best one: look at your world, your life, everything—family, friends, co-workers, possessions, everything, and consciously, purposefully name it all “Gift.” Nothing and no one is mine by right. Nothing and no one is mine by merit. Everything and everyone is to me and for me a God-given gift. As gifts, everything and everyone comes into my life gratuitously. Without condition or guarantee. Bless it all by naming everyone and everything with its true name: Gift. Food, clothing, job, spouse, education, talent, time, treasure, life itself, everything is a gift. Serve the Gift-giver by becoming His gift to others. Our heavenly Father knows what we need. Seek and serve His kingdom and His righteousness first. And everything you need will be given to you.

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Permanently stored in heaven

St. Aloysius Gonzaga 
Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP 
St. Dominic, NOLA 

“Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth. . .But store up treasures in heaven. . .For where your treasure is, there also will your heart be.” Though it would seem that our Lord is most concerned about where we store our treasures—on earth, or in heaven—he is also daring us to consider what it is that we treasure. So, along with pondering the placement of our valuables, we should also be thinking carefully about what we call “treasure.” Anything that can be lost, stolen, burned, or destroyed by hungry bugs is probably not a candidate for the name Treasure. Anything that can be weighed, exchanged for cash, hidden away, or ransomed is not a Treasure; or at the very least, it's not the sort of thing that we should be treasuring. By admonishing us to store our treasures in heaven, Jesus is telling us that only those sorts of things that can make it to heaven and abide there forever are truly valuable. What sorts of things are these? Good will, graces, a perfected soul, a resurrected body, the light of a well-formed conscience. None of these is perishable; all of these are gifts. 

Indeed, everything we have and are is a gift, not just the imperishable gifts from heaven. Our bodies—their appetites, desires, passions—are gifts as well. Lest you fall into error, never forget: you are a body and a soul divinely created and ordered towards love. So, if my body and soul are both gifts from God, and all gifts from God are valuable, then how can we say that only imperishable gifts are truly valuable? In other words, is Jesus really teaching us that we should only treasure imperishable gifts? No, not at all. He says, “. . .where your treasure is, there also will your heart be.” Where do you store your heart? What functions as the center of your life? From where do you draw the energy you need to love, to forgive, to grow in holiness? If you treasure your career above all else, what happens if your career fails? If you treasure your hobbies or your children or your wealth above all else, what happens when these perish, disappear? If the center of your life is stored in anything perishable, then what happens to you when your storage container is stolen or burned or eaten by hungry bugs? If you will endure forever, you must entrust your heavenly gifts to the Gift Giver. Your heart must rest with God. 

If you think about it, it only makes sense that we should strive to return to God the gifts He gives us. The whole purpose of heavenly gifts—both perishable and imperishable—is to bring us closer to the Gift Giver. But how do we return perishable gifts? How do I give back to God the things He gives me? One way is make sure that I use these gifts for His glory. We talk about time, talent, and treasure—three significant but perishable gifts. I can consecrate these three gifts, thus returning them to God. I can set aside time for merciful deeds, prayer, spiritual reading. I can set aside my talents and use them only for the good of God's people. I can set aside a portion of my earthly treasure to spend on godly works. How then do we return imperishable gifts? How do we store these with the Gift Giver? There is really only one imperishable gift given from heaven: love. We call His love by different names—grace, good will, Christ—but in the end, God is only Love. Not the human passion, not the butterflies of romance. But the awesome power and majesty of the Word that creates and re-creates. We return love to God by loving one another as God loves us—sacrificially, selflessly, without counting the costs. You must be a Gift, freely given, not stored up as a possession or loaned out for gain, but recklessly, boldly handed over. Then, you will rest—imperishable—permanently stored with the treasures of God.

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Can you ask for what you need?

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

Our Father knows what we need before we ask. He knows that we need to acknowledge Him as our Father. He knows that we need to understand the holiness of His name. He knows that we need to hope in the coming of His kingdom; that His will be done in heaven and on earth; that He is the one and only source of all that we are and have. He knows all this before we ask. But do we know what we need? And do we know to ask? When Jesus teaches us to pray—not to babble as the pagans do—he shows us that his Father wants us to be happy. And to be happy, truly turned toward Him and determined to achieve unity with Him, we must be free. So, even though He knows what we need before we ask, and even though He wants us to be happy, He will not ruin our freedom by imposing His will. Rather, He gives us every tool, every chance, all the gifts and graces we need to see Him reaching out to us, to hear Him calling out to us. When we pray as Jesus teaches us to pray, we confess our cardinal needs: to be children of the Most High, to depend fully and solely on Him, and to hope always in His promises. 

Our Father wants us to be happy and free. To be both happy and free, we must be children of the kingdom and grown-ups in the world. As taxing and frustrating as it is, being a grown-up in the world is only possible for us b/c we are children of God's kingdom. Our source of strength, endurance, and courage is found among our brothers and sisters in the holy family; our supply of mercy, love, and hope is stored in the Body of Christ; our best cheerleaders and most accomplished coaches work tirelessly for the King on our behalf. Could we be happy and free grown-ups in the world if we had no access to the kingdom? If we couldn't retreat to the springs of grace found in the Church? Think of how little we would know of God w/o our teachers. How little we would understand the mysteries w/o our saints. How dark the Way would be w/o Christ's light shining back through his people. If we were left in the world all alone to scratch around for happiness or beg for freedom, we might find some measure of both—imitations, temporary imitations. But our Father knows that we need more than transient copies of happiness and freedom. We need the Real Thing, the genuine article. So, our Lord teaches us to ask for what need even though he knows what we need before we ask. 

Can you ask for what you need? Put it this way: when you pray the Our Father do you mean it? Do you really mean “Father, I need your will to be done in the world as it is done in heaven”? Do you really mean “I need just enough bread for today and no more”? Do you really mean “I need for You to forgive my sins in exactly the same way that I forgive those who have sinned against me”? Asking for what we need is often a matter of overcoming pride: I don't need any help from God; I can do this w/o Him. That's heresy. Less often, asking for what we need is a matter of being afraid that we will get exactly what we need. So, instead of praying as Jesus teaches us to pray, we babble like the pagans, hoping that God will hear our wants and ignore what He knows we need. This is why the Our Father is the most courageous prayer that we can offer. It basically says, “Father, You know what I need, give it to me!” Your will be done. A child of the kingdom has no fear of the Father's will. A grown-up trying to live as a child in the kingdom will live in constant fear of losing control of a wild, unpredictable god. However, a child of the kingdom, living as a grown-up in the world can always come home with nothing to fear, nothing to lose, no worries at all. Our Father knows what we need before we ask. True happiness and freedom are always found in the Father's house. 

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The mob has nothing to give you

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

So that we might not confuse our pious behavior for truly contrite hearts, Jesus teaches us to seek approval and reward from God alone. Give alms, pray, and fast in secret, “and your Father who sees what is hidden will repay you.” Always the good psychologist, our Lord knows the motivations and urges of the human heart, and he knows that we are sorely tried by the allure of public applause. The Devil too is an excellent psychologist; he knows how to undermine our confidence in God's promises and then tempt us to chase after the empty blessings of the world. However, if we look to God alone as the only source of our blessings, we will not take the Devil's bait; we not end up flopping around in the dirt hooked by his deceptions. When you perform righteous deeds; when you pray; when you fast, do not be like the hypocrites, like the ones who've snatched up the Devil's bait. Instead, do all that you do for righteousness' sake in secret, so that the Father who sees your truly contrite heart can add grace upon grace and bring you fully, wholly into His perfect love. 

It is out of his perfect love for us that our Lord admonishes us to avoid performing righteous deeds “in order that people may see them.” At the root his warning lies a basic principle for our growth in holiness: God alone can grace a contrite heart; God alone can reward a repentant soul with mercy. Though the world's gifts and rewards can be materially abundant, they are always spiritually empty—adding weight to our pride, while adding nothing to our love. If we seek applause from the mob, the mob gets to decide the difference good and evil, right and wrong. If we chase after the mob's approval, the mob will determine how we live and die, whether we live or die. Remember: it was a mob that sent Christ to the cross. And a public servant who handed him over. So, if we perform our righteous deeds in private, expecting no one and nothing else but God to bless us, then we have done all that we can to avoid the Devil's bait, and we live another day to grow in holiness. As good as this outcome may be—and it is good—there is so much more that we are charged to do. The short time that we've been given here on earth cannot be spent simply avoiding temptation and praying in secret. We are more than private hearts whispering to God in our closets. We are multipliers of His grace! 

Paul writes, “God loves a cheerful giver. Moreover, God is able to make every grace abundant for you. . .The one who supplies seed to the sower and bread for food will supply and multiply your seed and increase the harvest of your righteousness.” Righteous deeds performed in secret yield a public harvest of righteousness. Think of your prayers, your alms, your fasting as seeds—seeds provided by God. Broadcast them or plant them. Whether you throw them wildly or lay them carefully, your seeds of righteousness are multiplied as they fall and the harvest is increased. Paul reminds us, “You are being enriched in every way for all generosity. . .” Why is God enriching us in every way? So that we can be generous, extravagantly gracious in sowing the seeds of His Word, in forgiving one another, in loving one another, in holding one another accountable to the commandments of the Gospel. None of which will earn us the applause of the mob; all of which will sharpen our gratitude, brightly polish our need to give Him praise. Seek the blessings of God alone by performing your righteous deeds for Christ's sake alone. And leave the Devil to bait his hooks in misery.

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In the mail. . .

OP Thanks You's to:

M.R. for Knowing the Love of Christ

and

Anon. for Critics on Trial: An Intro to the Catholic Modernist Crisis.  

I've already read the first 100 pgs of this one and it is fantastic. Msgr. O'Connell gives us a lively historical/biographical account of the personalities and intellectual movements behind the late-19th and early 20th century crisis of modernism in the Church. His writing is superb: clear, engaging, detailed.  Highly, highly recommended!

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Let heaven find you

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

Last week, today, and the rest of this week, we hear Jesus using a familiar phrase: “You have heard it said. . .but I say to you.” Our Lord uses this phrase to set up a contrast btw the Pharisees' understanding of the Mosaic Law and how his own followers are to understand it. While the Pharisees reduce the Law to what amounts to a behavioral code, Jesus teaches us to understand the Law in terms of the First Commandment. All of the behaviors required of us and forbidden to us under the Law are first and foremost ways of loving God, self, and neighbor. The Pharisees teach: Follow all the rules perfectly and you will learn to love perfectly. Jesus teaches: No, love perfectly as God loves you and following the rules will come naturally. Why is Jesus' the superior way? Loving First is more fundamental; that is, the roots of moral behavior are deeply planted in the rich soil of love. Without love providing stability and nourishment, good behavior is just a matter of being a good actor. And as the Pharisees reveal again and again, good behavior w/o real love too often leads to self-righteousness and pride. 

And why are self-righteousness and pride dangerous? Isn't it better to be self-righteous than not at all righteous? Isn't it better to be proud of who and what we are than it is to be ashamed? The problem with self-righteousness isn't the righteousness part; it's the self part. Righteousness is all about Being Right with God. And only He can initiate, empower, and accomplish that gifted-feat. We cooperate, of course, but our role is all about reception of the gift. So, self-righteousness then is the self-satisfying attempt to do that which God alone can do—make us holy. If I am among the unrighteous, how do I lift my up to sit among the righteous? By what authority or power do I accomplish this elevation? This is the point at which pride enters. Pride tells me that I am perfectly good just as I am. Nothing wrong. Nothing needs to be fixed. Complete in my sin and perfectly holy just b/c I'm Me, I can dispense with cooperating with God's little gifts of love, hope, and faith, grab my belt and yank myself up into the sky! Why is my pride dangerous? B/c it is false. Pride gives me a view of the world and God that is untrue. Not only is pride a lie, it's an ugly lie. To combat the allure of the lie, Jesus teaches me humility—not shame—but the humility of one who understands that nothing truly belongs to me. 

If nothing truly belongs to us, and we are commanded to love as God loves us, then it follows that we best obey the Law by going well beyond the minimum behavioral requirements of the Law. Jesus says that we must forgo the vengeance allowed by law. He says that we endure humiliation by inviting more. He says that we give twice as much service as we are required to give. He says that love leads us to give when asked, to lend when someone wants to borrow. None of this makes any sense at all if self-righteousness and pride rule our hearts. Only under the Law of Love can we understand why turning the other cheek and going the extra mile bring us closer to Him. The more and better we understand that everything created—including us—is a gift, the more and better we love. And the easier it is to grow in holiness. Why? We cannot cling to what passes away. We cannot hoard as our own that which never belonged to us. We cannot demand that a gift be given. Nor can we lay claim to the righteousness that is God's alone to bestow. You have heard it said that following the rules will get you into heaven. But our Lord says to you, to all of us, attach yourselves to nothing made, love generously, and let heaven find you.

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How big can your love be?

11th Sunday OT 2013 
Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP 
St. Dominic/Our Lady of the Rosary, NOLA 

Let's get right to it: why does the notoriously sinful woman wash Jesus' feet with her tears, dry them with her hair, and anoint them with oil? But before we tackle that question, let's ask another one: why should we ask that question at all? Why should we ask why she does what she does? Two reasons: 1) her motives for doing what she did tells us a great deal about how and why her sins are forgiven; and 2) the parable Jesus tells Simon is meant to teach him (and us) about the long-term effects of forgiveness. So, why does she do it? She wants Jesus to reward her with absolution. She wants to embarrass the smug Pharisee in his own home. She wants to appear in public with a great prophet and discredit him by association. Or, we can go with Jesus' assessment of her motives, “. . .her many sins have been forgiven because she has shown great love.” The notoriously sinful woman honors Jesus in a way his host did not b/c she wants to show Jesus Great Love. Tying her devotion back to the parable of the generous creditor, Jesus concludes, “. . .the one to whom little is forgiven, loves little.” We are forgiven everything. How big is your love? 

Here's a better question: how big can your love be? The only thing we know for sure is that our love cannot be bigger than God who is Love Himself. So, btw the Nothingness of Evil and the Perfection of God, we have plenty of room to grow and shrink, to expand and contract. When we grow in love, we do so along with God in response to the Great Love that He gives us. When our love shrinks, we do so as well. We become less human, less like the image and likeness of God who made us. Of course, it's sin that causes us to shrink in love, to contract away from God. It's sin that derails us on our Way to God, and sin that staunches the free flow of mercy into our lives. This is why Jesus directly ties the sinful woman's love for him to her forgiveness. Which came first: her love or his forgiveness? Did Jesus forgive her as a reward for loving him? Or does she love him b/c he forgives her? Jesus says, “. . .her many sins have been forgiven because she has shown great love.” So, she loves first, then he forgives. But how does she love in the first place while wallowing in sin? Surely, she must be forgiven before she can love? Can our love ever be big enough to overcome your sin? No. But God's love for us is big enough to make up the difference, big enough to bring us all to repentance through Christ. 

Paul writes to the Galatians, “I have been crucifed with Christ; yet I live, no longer I, but Christ lives in me…” You see the genuis of the Catholic faith is that nothing required of us all is truly required of us alone. We admit from the beginning that we can do nothing without first receiving the grace necessary to complete the task. Even our desire to cooperate with God’s various gifts is itself a gift. Our completed tasks in grace are no more responsible for saving us than any number of goats sacrificed and burned on an altar. We are not made just by our works. In other words, we cannot work our way into holiness apart from the God of grace Who motivates us to do good works. Paul writes, “We who know that a person is not justified by works of the law but through faith in Jesus Christ even we have believed in Christ Jesus…b/c by works of the law no one will be justified.” We are made just when we are crucifed with Christ (in baptism) and when he abides in us (in confession and Eucharist) we remain just. We can proclaim with Paul then, “I live by faith in the Son of God who has loved me and given himself for me.” We can say, “I live by knowing, trusting that Christ loves me away of my sin.” 

Can we, then, be members of the Body of Christ, the Church, who participate in the ministries of the Church not for pragmatic gain, nor the need to “feel something,” nor in the hope of fitting-in, but b/c we long to show Christ a Great Love, the love that he first showed us on the cross and shows us even now on this altar? Can we do what the sinful woman does: freely, openly, purely, and without caring about gossip or any negative consequences, can we express our Great Love for Christ and one another with the gifts of tears—humility, forgiveness, mercy; and the gifts of service—teaching, preaching, healing, feeding? Can you show others—for no other reason or purpose than your Great Love for God—can you show others the Christ Who Lives In You? And can you show them that Christ did not die for nothing but that he died and rose again for everything, everyone everywhere? And can you show them that b/c he died and rose again for everything and everyone everywhere, that they too, saying YES to his gifts of trust, hope, and love, that they too can shine out a Christ-light for all to see, that they too can wash filthy feet with repentant tears and anoint them clean with precious oil? 

Now, you might thinking at this point: “Hmmm. . .I can say that I love God, but I don't really feel like I love God. He loves me, I know, but I don't feel Him loving me.” Let me gently remind you: your feelings on the truth of God's love for you are irrelevant; that is, whether or not you feel God's love is irrevelant to the truth that God does love you. Since at least the middle of the 19th c.,* Christians have been duped into believing that emotions take priority over the intellect in all things theological, that the only worthy human response to reality is emotional. We've replaced “What do you think?” with “How do you feel?” and we've decided that how we feel is more important than what we think. This is not the Catholic faith. We are rational animals not emotive animals. We are human persons composed of a human body and a rational soul. That which makes us most like God is our intellect not our passions. Why am I ranting about this? B/c too often I see otherwise faithful Christians anguishing over their apparently empty spiritual lives b/c they do not feel God's presence. Feelings ebb and flow, come and go. Yes, feelings are spiritually significant, but they do not tell us much about the truth. The truth is: God loves you. He is with you. And how we feel about these truths is irrelevant to whether or not they are true. 

The notoriously sinful woman's sins are forgiven whether she feels forgiven or not. The Pharisee is a hypocrite whether he feels like a hypocrite or not. Jesus did not command us to feel love. He commanded us to love. So, angry, sad, joyful, exhausted, pitiful, happy—does it matter to our obligation to love? No, it doesn't. Do not let fleeting emotions bargain away the triumphs of God's Love. Feel what you feel and Love anyway. Feel angry and love anyway. Feel depressed, exhausted, spiteful, and love anyway. Feel elated, ecstatic, on cloud nine, and nearly uncontrollably happy, and love anyway. Feel bored, isolated, cranky, and mean, and love anyway. Christ did not die for nothing. He died for you. And you are not nothing. You are everything to him. We are everything to him. Yes, our sins betray us. But his Great Love forgives us. Our debt is always canceled, always forgiven. Knowing this, is your love big enough to forgive others? Probably not. But God's love for you is big enough to make up the difference. He loved you first anyway, so allow Him to forgive through you. Allow yourself to be just one small way for His Great Love to be found in this world. Allow yourself to be the greater love of Christ who lives in you. 

*I'm thinking particularly of Friedrich Schleiermacher, who reduced religious faith to feeling and intuition.

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Is Math Real?

There is an on-going debate about the ontological status of math. 

Yes, you read that correctly. People actually wonder about the nature of math's reality. 

And why not? We wonder about the ontological status of all sorts of. . .things?  (Well, that begs the question. . .)

Anyway, the Realist-Antirealist debate is not limited to math. Physicists ask about the ontological status of theoretical objects all the time.  Can you say "quarks"? 

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The soul of godly behavior

10th Week OT (F) 
Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP 
St. Dominic, NOLA 

Though we have just heard the Gospel read aloud, it might be difficult for us to hear the Good News. All this talk of adultery, divorce, cutting off body parts, and getting thrown into Gehenna beg the question: what's so good about this Good News? If yesterday's and today's readings from Matthew were our only glimpse of Jesus, we could easily come away believing that our Lord is a sadistic busy-body bent on making our lives a scrupulous misery. Fortunately, we interpret scripture as a whole, within the whole of God's plan for our salvation and not just in slogan-size pieces. Jesus is doing more here than repeating the text of divine legislation. What's good about this evening's gospel is that our Lord is showing us the spirit of the Law. He's revealing to us the soul of godly behavior. It's one thing to act in a particularly godly way; it's quite another to act this way out of a godly motivation. Over time, it's how we think and feel about our behavior, how we come to decide to be godly people that will mark us as followers of Christ. 

True, as people who hope to follow Christ faithfully, we are obligated to imitate our Lord, but we must be more than good mimics of Jesus, holy mimes. There's no doubt that imitating Christ's behavior is vital to holiness, but physical imitation alone does little more than make us good actors not good Christians. To be a good Christian requires me to motivate my bodily actions with nothing other than a deeply-held desire to give glory to God. I can be secondarily motivated by compassion for the homeless, pity for the sick, sympathy for those in jail, but the motive that matters most is my desire to share in and share out that portion of God's glory that He shines into me. The reason that giving glory to God matters most is simple: my compassion, my pity, my sympathy too easily become mine alone and my motives can quickly turn selfish. Even though I am only able to be compassionate b/c God has shown me compassion, the human tendency to ego-boosting makes it almost impossible for me not to make my good works All About Me. So, to avoid making myself into my own idol, I do the good work I have vowed to do, but I do it only b/c I desire that God's Word, His glory, His mercy be better known to the world. 

When Jesus tells us that our motives for murder, adultery, divorce matter more than the behaviors themselves, he's not telling us that the behaviors are somehow OK. He's telling us that in the long-run, for the long-term benefit our souls, it's most important that we pay attention to why we behave as we do. A murderer who murders out of imitation is in much less danger of spiritual suicide than a alms-giver who gives out of his need for public attention. Why? Because the murderer can be shown that he is doing evil and brought to repentance, while the selfish alms-giver truly believes that b/c she is doing good her motives don't matter. To the world, her motives don't matter. To those who receive her alms, her motives don't matter. But to Christ—who loves her—her motives matter a great deal. It's the condition of her immortal soul that worries the Lord. So, he tells us all that it is better to rip out our eyes than it is to use that eye in a lustful way. Why? Because one act of adultery is far easier to repent of than a lifetime of using one's eyes to indulge a lusting heart. Here's the Good News: we are dead to sin. Paul says it perfectly: “We are afflicted in every way, but not constrained; perplexed, but not driven to despair; persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed. I would add that we are tempted, but not taken. There is no need for us to pluck anything out or to lop anything off. Lust, pride, envy, greed, all the deadly sins are deadly to us only if we ponder on them and deliberately choose to indulge in them. Therefore, choose to hear the Lord and bring your soul to godly behavior. 

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A "Black Pope" in white

For our Lefty Catholic Friends who've been singing hymns of ecclesial democracy and dancing in the new winds of theological reform. . .Sorry, folks, but our Holy Father is not dancing with you. . .

[. . .]

Bergoglio is also a Jesuit, and by now his actions have made it clear that he intends to apply to the papacy the methods of governance typical of the Society of Jesus, where the superior general, nicknamed the “black pope,” has practically absolute power.

His reticence in attributing to himself the name of pope and his preference for calling himself as bishop of Rome have made champions of the democratization of the Church rejoice.

But theirs is a blunder. When Francis, on April 13, appointed eight cardinals “to advise him in the governance of the universal Church and to study a project for the revision of the Roman curia,” he selected them according to his own judgment.

[. . .]

In early October the eight will be gathered around the pope. They will deliver to him a sheaf of proposals. He will be the one to decide. Alone.
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Let the hammer fall!

Linked from New Advent:

"Watch closely, Catholic leaders: Australian Chief of Army demonstrates how you address sex abuse."

BAM!  Exactly right.  Kudos to the Chief for keeping his cool. I would not have been able to do.
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We cannot do this on our own

10th Week OT (Th) 
Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP 
St. Dominic Church, NOLA 

Our Holy Father caused a bit of a stir a few days ago when he reportedly told a group of visiting religious that some traditionalist Catholics tend toward the Pelagian heresy, while some progressive Catholics tend toward the heresy of Gnosticism. Just yesterday, we learned that we don't really know what he said, or even if he said anything at all. Regardless, just the report that the Holy Father may have mentioned these two heresies has been enough to reignite interest in both of these ancient yet enduring theological oddities. Very briefly, Gnosticism is the idea that we are saved by the acquisition of specific, secret knowledge—salvation by knowing. Pelagianism is the idea that, despite the Fall, we are still capable of choosing good over evil without God's help—salvation by works. When Jesus tells the disciples that their righteousness must surpass that of the Pharisees, he's admitting that the Pharisee are righteous and that some part of being righteousness is about obeying the Law. However, to be a follower of Christ is to be surpassingly righteous, to excel in being something more than just a Law-abiding Christian. What is that Something More that we must master? And how do we begin to acquire it? 

The 5th century British monk, Pelagius, denied that Adam and Eve's disobedience tainted human nature with Original Sin. Beyond setting a bad example, the Fall had no real spiritual consequences, no lasting effect on whether or not we to be choose good or evil. Had Pelagius' views won the day instead of Augustine's, we would all be functional pagans with the Church's blessing. How so? Basically, ancient pagans believed that the gods directly interacted with mortals only rarely and usually by invitation only.* Sacrifices were performed not only to assuage divine anger but also to keep the gods from nosing around in one's business. Pelagius' views on the effects of the Fall leave Christians pretty much among their pagan neighbors as de facto pagans themselves: striving to be good while avoiding the notice of God, calling upon His help only when things become dire. Now, this particular idea—God only needs to make an appearance when I need Him—is indeed both ancient and new. How many of us are functional pagans when it comes to our daily interactions with the Divine? How many of us believe that righteousness is a state we ourselves work for by being Good Boys and Girls? 

Jesus wants the disciples (and us) to be Good Boys and Girls, but he wants our righteousness to surpass the merely Pelagian righteousness of the Law-abiding Pharisees. “You have heard that it was said, 'You shall not kill; and whoever kills will be liable to judgment.' But I say to you, whoever is angry with his brother will be liable to judgment. . .” Jesus seems to saying here that anger is spiritually equivalent to murder. No. He's saying that both anger and murder will see us liable to judgment. Under the Law, only murder gets you in trouble. Under the New Covenant, anger—the motive for murder—can hurt you as well. In other words, contra Pelagius, it's not just our deeds that cause us spiritual damage, or grant us benefit. How we think, feel, and choose our deeds goes into the equation as well. If this is true, then we must look to God's grace constantly. Not just when we think we need Him, but every moment of every day, we must persistent in calling upon the Lord for His divine assistance, asking to receive from Him every good gift He has to give us. We can nothing good without Him, so the only way for us to surpass the righteousness of the Pharisees is to turn our heart and minds toward Him; repent our sins, and take in His mercy with thanksgiving. We are not functional pagans. We cannot do this on our own. 

*I realize that the relationship btw ancient pagans and their gods was far more complicated than this, but generally speaking, what I've said here is true.

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