What gifts do you bring?

The Epiphany of the Lord

Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP

Our Lady of the Rosary, NOLA

Upon seeing the child with Mary his mother, the three magi prostrated themselves to pay him homage and – in the words of Matthew – “Then they opened their treasures.” Then they opened their treasures. These treasures were gold, frankincense, and myrrh. Gold for a king. Incense for a god. And myrrh for a corpse. Without really knowing what they are doing, the magi give to Jesus gifts that reveal him to be the Son of God, the Christ. And not only do they reveal his true nature, they also reveal his mission. Here's the epiphany, the revelation we celebrate this evening: the newly born Jewish king is king of the Jews and the Gentiles. He is born to rule both the oldest nation under God and the newest. He is born to rule in the hearts and minds of all men and women. Not just those under Abraham's covenant with God, but all those who would bring him gifts and pay him homage as Lord and Savior. The magi came from the east in search of a king. They find a child. They prostrate before him. Then they open their treasures. What treasures do you offer the new born king? Gold, frankincense, and myrrh reveal the Son of God and the Son of Man in one flesh, born to die for us. What do our gifts given to Christ say about who we believe him to be?

The magi believe that the star will lead them to the newly born Jewish king. King Herod believes the magi know their business and ask them to report back to him when they find this new king. It's difficult to imagine that the magi would travel hundred of miles to search for an infant if they did not truly believe that this infant is quite special. It's also difficult to believe that Herod would order the deaths of thousands of baby boys if he didn't believe that this infant posed a threat to his rule. Both Herod and the magi know that the child born under the Bethlehem star is a king. Yet, the magi bring him three gifts that reveal his true nature as the Christ, while Herod would gift him with a sword through his heart. The magi offer Christ the deference due a master. Herod offers a death due a thief. In the end, on the cross, both the magi and Herod are vindicated. Christ dies a king, but he dies like a criminal. The gifts given to Christ by the magi and Herod tell us who they believe him to be. What do your gifts given to Christ say about who you believe him to be?What treasures do we offer the new born king?

Now, when I say “treasures” I mean more than money. More than what you might put in the collection plate. Every gift we have to share is first a gift to us from God. Starting with our very existence and on to all of our talents and treasure, everything we have and are is a gift from God. When the magi offer the Christ Child their royal gifts, they are offering him their material best. Had they stuck around for thirty years or so they might have offered him their talents as well – the loyal service of their knowledge and wisdom. And why wouldn't they? They revealed the King of the Jews as the Savior of the whole world, including their world. Maybe we should back up a bit and find out what gifts we have to give. Not everyone has a nearly bottomless checking account. Nor we do need one to be generous. Not everyone is happily retired and free most of the day to volunteer. Not everyone can sing, write, organize. Some of us are better at comforting the sick and mourning. Some with children and the elderly. A few of us are good teachers; good with helping those in serious trouble; good with machines and tools. The gifts we have are given to us by God to use. For His glory not ours. When we use our gifts we reveal Christ to one another. The magi reveal him to be the King of all nations. Who is he?

He is our king and our savior and our Lord. So, what gifts do we offer Christ? Well, who do you believe he is? What do you believe he does for you? Is he a lucky charm or a friendly ghost? A wise teacher or an enlightened soul? An historical figure who you just like hearing about? Or is he who he says he is: the Son of God, the Messiah come to die for our sins and bring us into the holy family of his Father? Do our gifts to him serve as a confession of faith in him? This is all much more than just a reminder to do good deeds, or an admonition to be nice to one another. What we are talking about here is nothing less than how we decide to reveal Christ to the world. On the shoulders of the Church as a whole and each of her members is the burden of being Christ in the world. Not just saying Christ-like stuff. Not just doing Christian-type stuff at Mass. But actually going out there and showing the world who and what Christ is. When the people of the world look at us, at you, at me do they see who and what Christ is for them? Do they understand that he died for them so that they might live? Do they watch us and see us living lives of sacrificial love for one another and for them? If we are not revealing Christ to the world, then what are we doing? 

 

What I am doing? I don't know. Maybe I'm revealing that Christ is all about the show, all about the noise of morality. Maybe I'm revealing that Christ is all about the technicalities of canon law and liturgical rubrics. Maybe I'm revealing that Christ died on the cross so that I might live in a religious ghetto where no one bothers my delicate sensibilities. I don't think that this is what I am revealing. I hope not! I hope my gifts to Christ reveal him to be the source and summit of the Father's mercy and love; the fount from which all hope and surrender flow. I want my gifts to reveal a Christ who teaches the way back to God and the truth of our eternal lives. Like the magi, I want my gifts to be more than just my material best. I want them to be signs of my homage, my respect, my worship. I want them to show the world that he is who he says he is. But to do that, my gift must be my life given over in sacrificial love. That's what he wants from me, that's what he's ask for. Not gold or incense or myrrh or a bigger collection check or a week of good deeds or a wonderfully sung hymn. He wants your life. Given for another. In sacrificial love. That's the gift to him that reveals him to the world as the Christ. 

 

The magi sought and found a king, bringing him three royal gifts. King Herod sought but never found a threat to his throne. His gift? A bloodied sword. What gifts do you bring to give to Christ? What you bring to give him reveals who and what you believe him to be. Do not for a second believe that Christ needs our money or our time or our talents. He doesn't. He needs nothing from us. In fact, everything we have to give him came from him. It's the giving that matters. It's what the giving reveals about our trust in him, our hope in him, our love for him that matters. You are the best gift to give him b/c everything you have and everything you are was given to his Father on the cross. You already belong to him. So, leave here this evening and reveal Christ to your world. How? By being Christ for those who seek him out. Be their epiphany, their revelation of God's mercy and love.

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On Being Replaced by a More Faithful Generation

Exactly right!

From Renewal: How a New Generation of Faithful Priests and Bishops is Revitalizing the Catholic Church. . .

The infighting continues as the aging generations of progressive Catholics continue to lobby the Church’s leaders to change her teachings on reproductive rights, same-sex marriage, and women’s ordination. Yet they are being replaced with a new generation of young faithful Catholics who are attracted to the Church because of the very timelessness of these teachings. These younger Catholics are attracted to orthodoxy. But it is not a reactionary or backward-looking orthodoxy. Rather, it is an orthodoxy that longs for the noblest ideals and achievements of the Church—the philosophy, the art, the literature, and the theology that make Catholicism countercultural (9).

If this younger generation of faithful priests and bishops can maintain both their theological orthodoxy and their evangelical zeal, then we will see the Church revived in a big way. However, if theological orthodoxy is allowed to become little more than propositional repetition, then we will see something akin to the immediate post-VC2 period -- theological, moral, and liturgical chaos, a return to the Cultural Revolution (a la Maoist China) that left the Church empty, dispirited, and useless.  

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Spiritual Entropy

Drawing your attention to an excellent article over at The Imaginative Conservative, "Daydreams, Nightmares, and Christian Realism."

The opening paragraph (with a few editions):

As we look at our present nihilistic culture, malnourished in the absence of [faith and reason] and living only on a meager diet of [bread and games] it is hard to perceive any sign of true progress, unless we see progress as synonymous with suicide. Whether the homicide, genocide, and infanticide of secular fundamentalism can be seen as its own ultimate suicide, there is no need for the rest of us to follow such self-destructive notions of “progress”. On the contrary, as Chesterton reminds us, “true progress consists in looking for a place where we can stop”, which, in the dark ages in which we now live, means a place where we can stop the rot.

Pearce explores the notion of Original Sin and the myth of human progress (properly understood).

Well worth your time.

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What's Dangerous About Christianity? (Updated)

Insomnia last night. I started thinking again. Happens every time.

So, here's what got me thinking: Christianity's Dangerous Idea.

It took me a few decades to resolve a basic question about myself: who do you want to be?

I didn't say to myself, "Self, be the most dangerous person you can be!" That sort of response strikes me as incredibly pretentious. (I can hear Scuba Mom yelling at me, "GET IN HERE AND PICK UP YOUR DIRTY SOCKS, FATHER! NOW!" So much for pretense).

Anyway, let's assume for a moment that Christianity -- in all of it many forms -- is indeed a Dangerous Idea. Hitchens (in the link above) argues that Christianity is a dangerous idea b/c Christians believe that Jesus is the Son of God and that he rose from the dead. Start with this idea and things get scary quick.

My question to you: as a Christian, what do you think is dangerous about Christianity and why?  

Leave your response in the combox, and I will tack it on the post as an update.

I feel a lot of good homily material coming my way! 

Response from Anon:  Christianity is dangerous because it demands that we conform ourselves to something external, or better, to Someone external. Our lives are not our own to dispose of as we wish. God makes demands of us, and He has the right to do so because He made us. Because He recognizes that we are sinful, in His mercy He has given us the Sacraments as the means to become fortified in grace and to become reconciled with Him. Even so, we squander graces more than we realize and continue to stumble in our sinfulness. Christianity teaches us to tame our wills, probably the most challenging demand ever made, and for many, a demand too radical for the human ego to abide. 

Response from Gregg the Obscure: Christianity is dangerous because it requires us to forgive those who trespass against us. 

Response from Shelly: Truth is always dangerous, and Christianity has the Truth and is not shy about speaking it, which angers those who hope to disregard Truth and "change reality" to fit their own agendas.

Love can also be dangerous, since Christianity speaks of loving as the Lord loves us, even to loving one's enemies - how can you encourage others to be jealous, or hate, or subjugate, or take advantage, of others when love is an over-riding concern?

And Christianity speaks to a Higher Power - the Highest Power - to whom Christians look for guidance...Christianity does not look to the world as the end of all things. There is more. And since that "more" is more important than anything here on this earth, then it is very difficult for an outside power to coerce Christians to follow along if the path being shown does not lead to Heaven.

Dangerous to those who want power, who want to control humanity ....

Response from cmom: It localizes one's existence in God rather than the state.

Response from Keith: In today's America, it is dangerous because it points out that those who are to feed the hungry, clothe the naked, tend the sick and visit the prisoners, are those of us who are Christians. Christ, insofar as I can determine from Sacred Scripture, never enjoined us to petition Caesar (in whatever form is contextually relevant) to take what God has bestowed upon us as individuals and families and establish public structures to see to those duties. If that understanding is correct and were it to be followed there are a large number of people, including but by no means limited to, those who are employed by Caesar's bureaus, departments, etc., to effect the delivery of those goods and services. That alone, if it were followed, would make a substantial number of our fellow citizens extremely unhappy.

Response from Pat: Christianity is dangerous because when you realize that God loves you enough to become human and die on a cross for you, that requires an unconditional response on you part.

Response from Suzanne: Well consider that Christ was crucified for preaching love. God's love. That is what is dangerous. God's love is what messes up everybody's thoughts and plans. And the world is ready to crucify you for it. 

Response from Melissa: Christianity is dangerous because it can devastate one's financial bottom line. Imagine what would happen if a huge corporation actually took Christ's demands to heart! Fair pay, no unnecessary work on Sundays, charity to the poor, love instead of competition . . . No wonder American society is so opposed to Christianity!

Response from Matheus: I find this to be an enormously complex issue, but what comes to my mind right now is that it is dangerous because it definitely sets one apart from a worldly existence. The very concept of God Himself fully becoming a man, and then facing excruciating torture and death for our sake renders not only life itself, but everything even remotely pertaining to it "new" and "special" (for shameful lack of better words), therefore obligatorily changing the way it is lived on every possible level.

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Fat Kid in a Candy Store, or A Dominican in a Bookstore

Just made it back to New Orleans after a two week visit amongst the Squirrels. . .oh, and I said hi a couple of times to the Parentals and Family. . .

Upon entering the cloister of the priory, I was greeted by a stack of Amazon packages from the Wish List. 

I'm not going to say I didn't squeal -- it was very manly -- but I did emit a high-pitched squeak that some might mistake for a delighted squeal.

Here's a pic of me after opening the boxes:

Thanks to Michelle R. and Jenny K. (my two favoritest Book Angels) for making my After Christmas Party a mendicant delight.

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Gonna be a squirrely year. . .

HAPPY NEW YEAR! 

from our Redneck Squirrels

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Mother of Our Freedom!

Solemnity of Mary, the Holy Mother of God
Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP
Our Lady of the Redneck Squirrels, MS

Listen Here (8.00am Mass)
 

We call her "Advocate of Eve," "Seat of Wisdom," "Cause of Our Joy," "Help of Christians," and "Mother of Sorrows." We greet her in prayer, “Hail, Mary! Full of grace!” And we call upon her intercession using a variety of names: Our Lady of Guadalupe, Our Lady of Knock, Queen of the Americas, and Our Lady of Prompt Succor. But all these titles and names are meaningless unless we understand the one title that makes all the others possible: Theotokos, God-bearer, the one who gives birth to God. Mary is who and what she is for us b/c she is first and foremost the Holy Mother of God. This title was settled upon in 431 A.D. by the Church Fathers at the Council of Ephesus. Fighting back a heresy that wanted us to believe that the Christ was actually two different persons—one human and one divine—the Fathers declared that Christ is just one divine person with two natures (human and divine). Mary gave birth to the divine person of Jesus Christ, making her the mother of God Incarnate. And since we never celebrate a Marian feast w/o remembering the One to Whom Mary always points us, we also celebrate her son, Jesus, the Messiah. Given all this, I'd like to propose another title for Mary: Mother of Our Freedom! Why this title? Paul writes to the Galatians, “When the fullness of time had come, God sent his Son, born of a woman. . .so that we might receive adoption as sons. . .So you are no longer a slave but a son, and if a son then also an heir, through God.” 

We are no longer slaves but sons, heirs; and made so by God through the faithful cooperation of Mary. The Mother of Our Freedom cooperated (operated with) the Holy Spirit and received into her womb the seed of the Word, which grew into the divine person of Jesus. His birth into human history and his death into eternal life makes our salvation possible. He cuts a path through the thorny tangle of sin and death and draws us behind him to be taken up, made holy, and seated at our inherited place at the banquet table of God. Our release from the slavery of sin, our escape from the inevitability of death is accomplished by Christ through the cooperation of Mary. She is the Mother of Our Freedom b/c she gave birth to the only means of our freedom. From slaves to heirs, we move ever closer to the perfection of Christ.

Our perfection in Christ is both our work and the work of God. Just like our Blessed Mother cooperated with the work of the Holy Spirit to conceive and give birth to Jesus, we too are vowed to cooperate with the work of the Holy Spirit to conceive and give birth to the Word, making his flesh and blood our flesh and blood; surrendering our hearts and minds, and our hands and voices to the holy work of preaching and teaching the Good News to the world. The longer and harder we work at accomplishing this task, the higher we climb in holiness and the deeper we delve into divine wisdom. Like the shepherds who find the Holy Family in the manger and “made known the message that had been told them about [the Christ],” we too are vowed to finding Christ, following him, and making his message known. After seeing the Christ-child, the shepherds go home, “glorifying and praising God for all they had heard and seen.” And we too will return home, our heavenly home, glorifying and praising God, if we do what we have promised as followers of Christ to do. Mary held on the message of the shepherds, reflecting on it in her heart, remembering Simeon's warning in the temple that her heart would be pierced by the sufferings of her son. While the shepherds adored and the people were amazed, Mary quietly grieved, knowing the destiny of the one sent to redeem us all from the slavery of sin.

Mary's grief must have been nearly unbearable. Having assented to the conception of the Word and given him birth, she is left with the sure knowledge that her son is the long-awaited Messiah, the One who would suffer and die for the sins of men. To gain our freedom, the Mother of Our Freedom had not only to bear the Christ into this world, she had to witness his suffering and death for our sakes. And not only was she a witness to his passion, she suffered along with him as any mother would. Her heart, pierced by the sword of grief, bled out even as Jesus bled out on the cross. As painful as his death and her grief no doubt were, as a result, we rose as a race to be the adopted children of the Father, heirs to His kingdom. Granted the inheritance of the ages, in possession of God's promise of eternal life, and the possibility of perfection through His Christ, what do we do in order to give thanks? How do mere creatures show appreciation to the One who created and re-created them? There is nothing we can do or say that would equal this gift, that would express the enormity of this sacrifice for us. We are left to do only that which we have already vowed to do: bring the message of God's love and mercy to the world in all we do, say, think, and feel. Despite opposition, persecution, ridicule, and violence, we deliver the message that Christ is Lord! When we do as Christ did, and speak as he spoke, we grow closer to our perfection in him.

Some 1,600 years ago, a council of Church Fathers hashed out a theological statement that confirmed what most Christians at the time already believed: that Mary is the Holy Mother of God Incarnate. As the mother of God, she bore into the world the Son who grew up to teach and preach the saving word of his Father's mercy to sinners. Not only did he teach and preach his Father's mercy, he embodied that mercy; he gave that mercy flesh and bone and walked among us as a sign of contradiction, a rock upon which men's hearts and minds would be broken to reveal the truth inside. When confronted with the raw truth that your sins are forgiven and that you are no longer a slave to sin, the truth that dwells secretly within breaks out and flourishes in the light of Christ. The shepherds wandered the desert on the word of an angel until they found Christ. The truth in their hearts dropped them to their knees in adoration. Those near the manger, the ones who heard the shepherds' message, had their hardened hearts softened and exposed. They were left amazed by the Good News. Mary, Mother of Sorrows, had her heart broken on the knowledge that her son would suffer and die. The truth in her heart led her to a life of humble service to the Lord. Within the Body of Christ, his Church, there is a truth that will renew us, a truth that will bring us to remember our vows, and urge us to rededicate ourselves to the hard work that Mary started when she said Yes to God. That truth is this: each of us and all of us together are the flesh and blood of God's Word, not just people who believe or people who do good works, but the People of God who walk out into the world to be—however imperfect—Christs for one another. Mary, Mother of Our Freedom, gave birth to the only means of our freedom, Christ Jesus the Lord. Will you, will we say Yes to God, conceive His Word, and keep in the world the mercy and love that Jesus lived and died to bring to us? Do this holy work and the Lord will bless you and keep you! The Lord will let his face shine upon you. . .The Lord will look upon you kindly and give you peace!

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Does narrative rescue God from metaphysics?

There are contemporary theologians and philosophers of religion who challenge the dominance of what they call "onto-theological thinking," that is, following Nietzsche and Heidegger, these folks argue that it was a big mistake for the Church's earliest theologians to translate the Biblical witness of the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob into the Greek language of substance metaphysics:  "Yahweh" becomes "Being Itself."

The identification of Abraham's God with Plato's One seems natural enough when you consider Exodus 3.14, "I AM that I AM" (or any of the dozens of renditions).  With a name like "I AM," you are inviting metaphysical speculation on the nature of existence and your place in the scheme of things.  If God is not a being like all the others in the world, and yet He somehow manages to exist . . .how exactly are we supposed to understand what it means to exist but not as an existing thing?  Aquinas' answer:  God is not a being; He is Being.  He doesn't exists; He is existence.

Now, we could interpret the last two sentences above in purely metaphysical terms.  "God" and "Being" are two names we give to the persistence of existing.  No bible necessary here.  We could also interpret those same two sentences in a purely Biblical sense, using Exo 3.14 as our text and show that "I AM" is a religious and not a philosophical concept.  But as Gilson argues, this sort of splitting your worldview up into separate parts in order to keep them compartmentalized is dishonest. So, an honest believer's religious, philosophical, theological, etc. worldviews need to be consistent with one another.

Aquinas, wanting to be consistent, uses the first part of his Summa to address the question of who and what God is.  To keep this post within a reasonable word count, I will simply quote Brian Davies on Aquinas' notion of God:  "God. . .is the beginning and end of all thing, the Creator of the world which depends on him for its existence. . .Aquinas also holds that God is alive, perfect, good, eternal, omnipresent, omnipotent, and omniscient. . ."(129).*  Taking up the characteristics usually assigned to The One of Platonic metaphysics, Aquinas attributes them to God and then argues that though we can have some limited knowledge of God, we cannot know God perfectly this side of heaven.**

Skipping over a couple of centuries of development in philosophical theology, we arrive at what is usually called "the Problem of Evil."  In the past this argument has been more or less used by religious skeptics and atheists to poke holes in theism.  For some, it's THE argument against theism and moves them to quit religion entirely.  The classical form of the argument goes something like this:

1. God is omnipresent, omnipotent, and omniscient.
2. Evil exists.
3. Therefore, one or more of the "omni" attributions in #1 must be false.

#3 here is usually taken to mean that God cannot be all-knowing, all-powerful, and everywhere present if evil exists.  He could be a combination of any of the two but not all three.

There are hundreds of different reasonable responses to the Problem of Evil. I'm keen on the Free Will Defense myself:  evil is allowed by God so that human freedom may be maximized; or since God wills that human freedom be maximized, He allows evil, which inevitably results from the abuse of human freedom.  This is basically Aquinas' response, so we know it's the correct one.

This is an example of philosophy helping theology untangle a problem.  However, couldn't we say that philosophy caused this problem in the first place?  There would be no Problem of Evil if we had resisted the temptation to translate Yahweh into Being Itself.  Yahweh is not presented in scripture as possessing the three-omni's of Plato's One.  When Yahweh is addressed as "All-powerful Lord," He is being praised in emotive language and not assigned the philosophical label "omnipotent."  Etc. for the other two-omni's. 

Our Nietzschean and Heideggerian theologians/philosophers would have us abandon the God of Plato's metaphysics and simply stick with the Biblical God of Abraham, etc.  This notion of "forgetting metaphysics" has a number of different names in the academy, but the most common is "narrative theology."  Generally associated with the Yale Divinity School, narrative theologians are impatient with complex metaphysical problems and all the messy philosophical waste that seems to be secreted from the history of onto-theological discourse.  Their goal is to rescue biblical revelation from the clutches of onto-theological-philosophical obfuscation and return it to the center of the Church's communal life.  This strikes me as a important consideration for the development of a Catholic theology of preaching. 

However, in theology more generally, how we go about separating out philosophy from narrative in the biblical witness is beyond me.  We could, I suppose, focus only on metaphysical language (being, cause, essence, etc) and remove it from our theologizing about revelation.  But then that leaves us unable to ask epistemological questions (i.e., how do we know?).  We could just say that philosophy is really about wisdom and telling stories is the best way to disseminate and promote wisdom.  I wouldn't disagree entirely with this, but we are still left with deciding what counts as wisdom and what doesn't.  We also have the problem of interpreting and applying a story's wisdom to concrete situations.  That's called hermeneutics.  And it comes with a whole mule-load of philosophical considerations. . .and so on.

So, our theological enterprise is not doable without philosophy.  We might disagree about which philosophical approach to take, but philosophy as a way of thinking and talking about problems in human discourse is a non-negotiable. It's here to stay.  To paraphrase an old prof of mine:  "Philosophy always seems to be its own undertaker!"

*"Aquinas on What God is Not," in Aquinas's Summa Theologiae:  Critical Essays, ed. Brian Davies, Rowan and Littlefield, 2006, 129-144.

**It is this "divine hiddenness" that causes some sceptical philosophers and theologians to question the possibility of knowing anything at all about God.  Some go so far as to argue that the obscurity of God--intended or not--is sufficient reason to withhold belief in His existence.  The argument goes, if God loves me and wants me to be saved; and if believing in God is all-important to my eternal salvation; then revealing Himself to me would be an act of salvific love, while remaining hidden is an act of cruelty.  I'm skipping over several crucial steps in the argument, of course, but you get the idea: divine hiddenness is an epistemological nightmare.

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Might Makes "Right," or Fascism Kills

The Feast of the Holy Innocents always prompts me to wonder: how do we -- allegedly among the most civilized nations on Earth -- allow the slaughter of our children by the thousands everyday? Part of the answer can be found in exploring how we've allowed Cultural Marxism to infect our nation's politics, and how we've adopted Soft Fascism as a way of life.

 

From a 2011 post:

 

Peter Smith, writing at The Bell Towers, reports on an annual public meeting in the UK called Battle of Ideas. 

One paragraph of his report very nicely sums up a distinction I've been trying to flesh out in my homilies for years now:

John Haldane, a softly-spoken Scots academic from St Andrews. . .and fellow-traveler Catholic, put forward the proposition that the fundamental cultural debate is between one collection of ideas, called ‘the anti-realists’, and another, those of ‘the realists’, and that this cultural tension is manifest in political and social policy. Real ideas (by which I think he also meant realistic) contained at their core the notion that the universe is natural, objectively ‘out there’, knowable but distinct, and informing views on sexuality, sex, marriage, death, etc. Anti-realist ideas, by contrast, consider everything as human constructs, plastic and malleable, which can be bended and altered but which inherently are unknowable. Realism and anti-realism contain fundamentally different understandings about what is knowable and what is not, what can be change and what cannot, and mankind’s place in creation.

The distinction btw Realism and Anti-realism is applicable in all branches of philosophy, especially the philosophy of science (essentially a practical application of epistemology), and used extensively in all the humanities.

Applying the distinction to political discourse is extremely useful b/c it gives us a way of addressing and refuting such contemporary political monsters as "identity politics," "victim culture," and other creations of Gramscian cultural Marxism. 

The basic political move of the anti-realists is this: 

1. Use appeals to perspectivism to undermine objectively knowable truth: "From my perspective, X is oppressive/unjust/wrong." The operative concept to push here is the primacy of "context."

2. Once perspectivism has been absorbed into the engines of culture (media, books, academy), move quickly to promote relativism: "You have your perspective on X and I have mine. There's no way to tell which perspective of X is really true."

3. Now that relativism is established, move to nihilism: "Since there's no way to know whose perspective on X is really 'true,' we can conclude that there is no such thing as 'truth.' about X." 

4. Nihilism leads to eliminativism: "If there is no 'truth' about X, then there's no reason to believe that there is any such thing as 'truth' at all."

5. Eliminativism supports "the will to power" in an attack on any claim that something is True: "Your claim that there is such a thing as 'truth" is just an exercise of your _____ power."  The blank is usually filled with an adjective describing the race, class, gender, an/or sexual orientation of the accused.

6. Once the Will to Power is broadly adopted, it's simply a matter of making sure that Your Side has the strongest will to grab the most power. Since there can be no appeal to an objectively knowable standard of distinguishing truth from error (anti-realism), truth is whatever the most politically powerful say it is:  "The greedy 99% is being exploited by the 1%." 

Anti-realism is the philosophical basis for fascism: the State determines reality/truth.

This is all just a highly simplified summary.  The moves between stages are complex and would require whole books to flesh out. However, nota bene, that the steps I've outlined here are on naked display in our contemporary political arena. 

One example: notice how easily our Cultural Betters throw the use "fact" to describe what it is in reality nothing more than an opinion.  Once everything is "just an opinion," then anything at all can be called a "fact." Challenging the "fact" exposes you to the charge that you are abusing your white, middle-class, heterosexual male power.

H/T: Michael Liccione (from Facebook)

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Squirrels, or I Told Ya. . .

Vicious little rodents are just waiting for me to go outside. . .




Attack of the Squirrels from Gregory Bianchi on Vimeo.

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A primer on the Incarnation

My annual post on the nature of the Incarnation:
 

The Nativity of Christ, or Christmas ("Christ Mass"), celebrates one of the most important events of the Church:  the incarnation of the Son of God.  Like the Trinity, the Virgin Birth, the Resurrection, etc., the Incarnation is one of those rock-bottom Christian beliefs that most Christians assent to but probably don't really understand.  Though Catholics all over the world affirm their belief in the incarnation every Sunday by reciting the Creed, how many could explain this tenet of the faith in the simplest terms?

Let's start with a story. . .

The archangel Gabriel appears to Mary and announces to her that God has chosen her to be the mother of the Christ Child, His Son.  Mary says, "Your will be done" and the Holy Spirit descends on Mary, giving her the child.  Nine months later the Christ is born in Bethlehem.

Simple enough story, right?  If we left the incarnation there, we would still have the basic truth of Christ's arrival into the world.  Things get a little more complicated when we start to think about what it means for the Son of God (who is God) to take on human flesh and live among us.  How does the God of the Old and New Testament become incarnated yet remain sovereign God?  We are immediately confronted by what theologians call "the Christological question":  how is the man Jesus also God?

Before this question was settled by the Council of Nicaea in 325 A.D., a number of answers were offered and rejected:

Jesus is really a man who possesses God-like qualities.

Jesus is really God in the appearance of a man.

Jesus is half-God and half-man.

Jesus' soul is divine but his body is human.

Jesus' body is human but his mind is divine.

Complicating matters even more was the lack of an adequate theological vocabulary with which to think about and write about the incarnation.  Early Christian theologians turned to the available philosophical vocabularies for help.  The most prominent philosophical system in the first few centuries of the Church was a developed form of Platonism.  Borrowing heavily from the Platonists, the Church Fathers crafted a creedal statement that said:  The Father and the Son are the same in substance ("consubstantial"), meaning that they are the same God.:  "God from God, light from light, true God from true God." The Son was not created in time like man but rather begotten from all eternity.  He "became incarnate" through the Virgin Mary--fully human in all but sin. 

This creedal statement defined the orthodox position of the Catholic Church.  However, interpretations of the creed abounded and additional councils had to sort through them all in order to discover the orthodox expression of the true faith.  In the end, the Nicene Creed was taken to mean that Jesus was fully human and fully divine:  one divine person (one body/soul) with two natures (human and divine).  "Person," "essence," "being," "nature" are all terms borrowed from Greek philosophy.  So, as the West discovered new ways of thinking philosophically, these terms took on different meanings and our interpretations of theological expressions of the truth developed as well.  The basic truth of the incarnation does not change; however, how we understand that truth does change.

For example,  the Greek word we translate as "person" is prosopon, or mask.  This term was used in the Greek theater to denote the different characters played by one actor.  A single actor would hold a mask in each hand and shift the masks in front of his face to say his lines, indicating that the lines were being said by different characters.  Applying this term to God, the Blessed Trinity, we arrive at a single actor (God) using three masks (Father, Son, Holy Spirit).  Same actor, different characters.  Ultimately, this metaphor is woefully inadequate for expressing the deepest truth of the Trinity.  Yet, we still say that the Trinity is three divine persons, one God.  "Person" as a philosophical term used to describe a theological truth had to be developed.

Eventually, we came to understand several vital distinctions:  The Church uses the term "substance" (rendered also at times by "essence" or "nature") to designate the divine being in its unity, the term "person" or "hypostasis" to designate the Father, Son and Holy Spirit in the real distinction among them, and the term "relation" to designate the fact that their distinction lies in the relationship of each to the others (CCC 252).

 So, God is one substance; three divine persons; distinguished  from one another not by their natures or persons but by their relations one to another.  The incarnation then is the second divine Person of the one God becoming a divine person with two substances or natures.

You are one person with one nature:  "I am human."
God is three divine persons with one nature: "I am divine."
Christ is one divine person with two natures:  "I am human and divine."

Aquinas, quoting Irenaeus, writes, "God became man so that man might become God."  The incarnation of the Son makes it possible for us to become God (theosis).  This is how Catholics understand salvation.

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The ultimate triumph of Light over darkness

NB. A Christmas homily from 2011. . .

 

Solemnity of the Nativity of the Lord

Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP

St. Dominic Church, New Orleans

In 431 A.D., our Church Fathers gathered in Ephesus for a council and decreed that the Blessed Virgin Mary would be honored with the title, Theotókos, God-bearer or the one who gives birth to God. For a majority of Christians at the time, this decree was yawn-inducing b/c Mary had been known as Theotókos for a couple of centuries. However, one bishop, Patriarch Nestorius of Constantinople, objected to the title because he thought it was irrational to believe that a creature of God—a human woman—could be the mother of the God who had created her. He preferred the title, Christotokos or bearer of the Christ. This title makes it clear that Mary is the mother of Christ, the man, but not the mother of Christ, who is God. Nestorius was credibly accused of dividing Christ into two persons—a human person and a divine person—and thus destroying our means of salvation. After all, we are saved by Christ precisely because he is one person possessing both a human nature and a divine nature. The council fathers declared Nestorius' teachings heretical and supported the teachings of his opponent, the bishop of Alexandria, St. Cyril. In support of his position at the council, Cyril wrote, “I am amazed that there are some who doubt whether or not the Virgin should be called Theotokos. For if our Lord Jesus Christ is God, how is the Virgin who gave him birth, not the one who gives birth to God?” 

Now, you are probably thinking to yourself: Father, we're all stuffed with ham, sweet potatoes, yeast rolls, and pie. . .and we have a big mess to clean up at home. . .what have we ever done to you to deserve a lecture on fourth-century Christological controversies? Well, you've probably done something in the last year to deserve it. . .but that's not really the point. The point is this: the event we celebrate today is not Jesus' birthday. . .this is not a Birthday Party. The event we celebrate is (quoting John's gospel): “And the Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. . .” The Word became flesh. Who is the Word? Again, quoting John, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” Don't miss that last bit: “and the Word was God.” God took on skin and bone and blood, and He dwelt among us as one us. Today, we celebrate the event of our Creator stepping into His creation to become a creature. This is most emphatically NOT a birthday party. . .this is an Incarnation Party! The Word of God, the Christ, who is God, becomes Man so that we might become Christs. 

And that's the answer to my next question: why did the Word of God, the Christ, who is God become Man? So that we might become Christs. John writes, “. . .to those who accept [Christ] he gave power to become children of God.” To be a child of God is to be a co-heir to God's Kingdom, to be a brother or sister to the Son of God. To be one of the Father's children is to be one who sees “[Christ's] glory. . .full of grace and truth.” And to see Christ's glory, full of grace and truth is to see clearly the righteous path back to the Father. When we follow that path—with humility, in obedience; loving, forgiving, showing mercy all along the way—we grow closer to Christ and become more and more like Christ. But the only reason we can even begin to walk this path is because the Word of God, the Christ, became human like one of us; suffered and died like one of us; and rose from the tomb in order to show us how it's done. He had to go first, so that we might follow.

Today, Christ is born to the Virgin Mary. She is Theotókos, God-bearer, Mother of God Incarnate. And if you step onto the narrow way, the path of holiness, you too can bear Christ into the world; and not only bear him into the world, but become him for others in the world. Your words, deeds, thoughts can all reveal God's glory to the world just as Christ himself revealed God to us. When you leave this evening. . .when you go back out there. . .back to your Christmas mess. . .or someone else's mess. . .wherever you go. . .remember that this holy day celebrates the ultimate triumph of Light over darkness. . .and so, as you go, be “the true light, which enlightens everyone.” Be Christ!

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A 4 y.o. me at Christmas

Here's a Christmas pic of part of my family from 1968.  

I'm the only one smiling.

This was taken at my grandparents' house in Lynn, MS.  My maternal grandfather, Clyde Mitchell, is in the center.  He died in March of 2011 at 98 y.o.!

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A Catholic literature?

MERRY CHRISTMAS! HAPPY NEW YEAR! 

BLESSED EPIPHANY! 

The Squirrels have been less than vigilant in their war against my reading regime. They must've heard that I am focusing on spiritual/pleasure reading during this break. When I'm reading in preparation to teach a course, they are merciless in attacking my peace.

A HancAquam post wouldn't be complete w/o a link to some books. . .so, here's a piece from Cosmos The In Lost (yes, that's how he arranges it):

  

G. Wolfe: Eat (Cath-L)it Already!

There's a debate raging amongst Catholic literary critics about whether or not Catholic literature is dead and/or dying. Prof. Rosman denies that "literature of faith" is either dead or dying and defends the existence of a robust Catholic literary scene. The title of the post linked above refers to Greg Wolfe, editor of Image, a journal that trades in the literature of faith. 

Check it out!

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What happens when we surrender. . .?

NB. I'll be traveling toward The Squirrels tomorrow morning. So, here's a Roman homily from Year B that I never got to preach. . .

4th Sunday of Advent: 2 Sm 7:1-5, 8-14, 16; Rom 16:25-27; Luke 1:26-38
Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP
Convento SS Domenico e Sisto, Roma
 

Unless Samuel Beckett is right, and we wait for Nothing when we wait on Godot, then when we wait, we wait in need. There is something or someone we do not know, something or someone we do not have; yet feel, yet know we must have; so, we wait. When we wait, we desire. Waiting is what the body does with unfilled desire. We sit here or walk there, or stand, leaning against someone stronger or more patient, perched right on the edge of bounding up in mock surprise to shout, “Finally!” Exasperated, or relieved in anger. You are here. Finally! I have you. But it is too soon yet to claim victory, to claim our prize for patient waiting. Unlike Estragon and his philosophical friend, Vladmir, both waiting for Godot, our advent clock has many more ticks and tocks before the final gift is dropped, before our longest longing is eased, and our waiting in hope is rewarded with the birth of the Word into the world. What we have to wait with today is Mary’s surrender, the end of her anticipation as she answers the archangel’s call to be the ark of the Lord, His tent in flesh: “Behold, I am the handmaid of the Lord. May it be done to me according to your word.” If and when, in our waiting and in our desiring, if and when we surrender, what happens?

This week of our long wait begins a headlong fall into the celebration of the birth of the Word into the world. In just one week, we sit up and notice one more time that hope is born for us; faith is pushed out from eternity and into our lives; love is gifted with a body, a mind, a soul for our sakes. In just one week, the one John the desert prophet promised arrives and begins his thirty-three year presence to those who have waited for centuries. But today, this last Sunday of our waiting, we party with the angels as they and we hear a young Jewish woman, confronted with a choice by the archangel Gabriel, we all hear her choose life—his, hers, ours, and the world’s. We all hear her choose to be the mother of God, the God- Bearer. “Behold, I am the handmaid of the Lord. May it be done to me according to your word.” Look! I serve the Lord. Let His will be for me as you say it is.

What would happen to your life if, every morning from now on, you awake up and say aloud, “I serve the Lord. Let His will be mine.” First, understand that this is a prayer of priestly sacrifice. All the elements of sacrifice are present in that one prayer: you are a priest offering yourself as victim to a loving God on the altar of your day. Second, once sacrificed with this prayer, this act of human will, you belong body and soul to He Who made you. He made you and his love holds you in being as His creation. Your prayer of sacrifice is an act of gratitude, of giving thanks. Third, if you will do His will you will expend your day in His service as His handmaid, his servant. Every thought you have, every act you do, every passion you feel has already been given over to the fulfillment of His will. Fourth, His will for all His servants is to love Him, love ourselves, and love our neighbors. We are able to love, that is, we are gifted with the capacity for love, to love in virtue of our creation by Love Himself. He loved us first so that we might love. Lastly, as His willing priests, our lives are made new again, reconstituted from the smallest cell out, gifted with the newest possible life available, the life of His Son. We are made Christ for others. We are the walking Word, the talking Word, the feeling, doing, working Word—priests forever now in an entirely sacrificial life of becoming perfectly His will in the flesh.

This young Jewish woman, given a choice by Gabriel, says YES to His will for her, and becomes the first Christian priest and prophet, the template from whom all of us as future priests and prophets will be pressed out. On the cross, dying for our sakes, the Lord himself follows his mother in saying yes. Abandoned by his friends, betrayed by one he loves, despairing, seemingly lost to pain and death, and believing himself to have been forsaken to his enemies, our Lord will cry out to His Father, “Yes! I will all that you will!” His life of perpetual sacrifice begins. This is what we long for. This is what we desire, what we need. Though we are constantly deflected and distracted in our priestly obligations to be love and to love others, we nonetheless know and feel the ineffable hollowness of a life that refuses to love, that wills not to be one for another.

Advent is one long Mass of Thanksgiving and Praise, a month-long prayer of rejoicing and sacrifice as we turn away from sin and toward our perfection in Christ. What must we do? Unclench your fist. Unlock your heart. Fling open wide your mind. Make straight the path of the Lord to your very existence. Say YES! And join Christ at the altar as priest and victim. He is coming. He has come. He will come again. Wait. Need. Desire. And the flood of God as the Gift of Love Himself will overwhelm you and make you Christ.

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