"Who, if I cried out. . .?"

12th Sunday OT: Job 38.1, 8-11; 2 Cor 5.14-17; Mark 4.35-41
Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP
Aquinas Institute of Theology, St Louis, MO

However wise his heart, Job stands before the glory of God and pitches one question after another to his creator. Anguish and hope race one another on the battlefield of his confusion and despair, and all his suffering explodes into a single, bellowed question: “Why?!” Why have I lost? Why am I in pain? Why have those I love most been made to suffer? We may ask along with Job, “I stand under the weight of my cross, trusting that it will not break my back so long as Christ is with me, but why must its load fall so heavily on my family, friends, and neighbors?” Surely it is enough that I labor in hope against the inevitable scores of loss and retreat. Surely my eager willingness to play this game, to fight this battle is proof enough that living well with God is worth the effort. And even as we protest against the cosmic injustice of death and desolation, we know that all of our complaints, all our questions, all our doubts are dissolved on the Cross, dispersed by iron nails, and exhausted not by a cry of “Why?” but by a bloodied surrender, by sacrificial forgiveness. Do we as children of the Father suffer well? What does it take to transform the anguish of our losses, our retreats into joy?

In the first elegy of his Dunio Elegies, the German poet, Rainer Maria Rilke asks, “Who, if I cried out, would hear me among the angels' hierarchies?” Against the background noise of stars giving birth and dying away, against the din of whole galaxies colliding in the void, who “up there” can hear our questions? Who would glance our way? For that matter, who cares enough to bend an ear? Knowing the odds, Rilke notes the smallness of his cry, “Who, if I cried out, would hear me among the angels' hierarchies? and even if one of them pressed me suddenly against his heart: I would be consumed in its overwhelming existence.” In the face of such superabundant Being, do we dare protest our suffering? Do we risk annihilation for the small pleasure of complaint? The risk of asking any question is that the answer itself will be an occasion of suffering. He writes, “For beauty is nothing but the beginning of terror, which we still are just able to endure, and we are so awed because it serenely disdains to annihilate us.” Why? Because “every angel is terrifying.”

Let’s risk the questions and pray that the answering angels are not so beautiful: do we as children of the Father suffer well? What does it take to transform the anguish of our losses, our retreats into joy? First, there is suffering and then there is suffering well. That we will know pain and loss is as inevitable as the tides. So long as we live, we will feel the cuts, the bruises, the breaks. We will mourn and count our defeats. We will betray and be betrayed; sell into slavery and be sold. We will grow bent, blind, deaf, and addled. We will hear NO when YES is the only way to flourish, or to survive. And we will endure injustice, refused our rightful due for no other reason than that someone more powerful, more prominent wants what is ours. Despite our protests, despite our righteous cries, that we will suffer is a cosmic given. There is no question about this. The question for the Father’s children is: will we suffer well? And if we long to suffer well, how do we do it? How do we transform our anguish into joy?

Out of the storm God answers Job: “Who shut within doors the sea, when it burst forth from the womb […]?” Who made the sea? Who fashioned the tides? Who said to the raging waters, “Thus far shall you come but no farther, and here shall your proud waves be stilled!” At the beginning of everything, who was it that took nothing, and with a word, made it all? Including you. Job dared his questions and his answering angel terrified him with the beauty of this truth: you are a creature, a being fashioned from dust and breathed into life. That you exist at all is a gift. Especially loved though you are, before you ever existed there was light and darkness. There was birth and death. There were stars and planets and animals on the land and in the sea and birds in the air and plants by the billions in uncountable varieties. Especially loved though you are, you have come late to this creation, be humble and know your place in the order of things, trusting always that I AM is with you.

In the midst of a violent storm all their own, and like Job, fearful of chance and accident, the disciples cry out to the Lord for rescue: "’Teacher, do you not care that we are perishing?’" Jesus woke up, rebuked the wind, and said to the sea, "Quiet! Be still!" The wind ceased and there was great calm. Then he asked them, "’Why are you terrified? Do you not yet have faith?’" Jesus is not telling them that their faith alone could calm a violent storm. He is not rebuking them for their failure to wield a magical power. Rather he’s telling them that their lack of faith is the source of their terror. The violent storm they have failed to calm is the tempest found in every faithless heart. With the storm calmed “they were filled with great awe and said to one another, "’Who then is this whom even wind and sea obey?’" He is the one who breathed a word over nothing at all and brought everything into being. He is the one who is with us always.

When the violent storms of sickness and mourning crash against our vulnerable bodies, we cannot be faulted for wondering why we are being made to suffer so. As rational creatures gifted with compassion, we naturally question the accidental nature of creation and wonder why it could not have been made differently. When we ask “why?” we want to know the cause of, the reason for. And even though we know that our bodies randomly break down, that our machines often fail, that our loves sometimes go unreturned, we desire purpose; we desire a rationale. To say that this or that disaster was accidental is not enough. It is too much to believe that we suffer by probability, by random chance. It is too much to have our doubts dismissed as wishful thinking. So, we ask why, and we expect an answer. And while we wait, we hope that our answering angel is not too beautiful to bear.

Paul does not answer us. Instead, he teaches us a awesome truth: “[…] whoever is in Christ is a new creation: the old things have passed away; behold, new things have come.” As creatures of dust and divine love destined to be dust again, we live and move and have our being in a newer creation, a newer cosmic order that sets chance and suffering and death against our Father’s promise of eternal life. In the order of things we sit above the angels as sons and daughters of the King, heirs to His dominion. We are wholly loved by Love Himself, created and re-created in His Divine Word, Christ Jesus. When we suffer, we suffer best when we faithfully set our pain and loss among the promises already fulfilled by the dying and rising again of our Lord.

God answered Job by showing him the whirling universe in all its created glory, the material expression of His divine majesty. What pain or loss would not be blinded by His light? As creatures remade in Christ, can we experience a loss that was not offered in sacrifice on the altar of the Cross? Is there a way for us to suffer that Christ himself has not redeemed into joy? Our faith in the Father’s promises is not a talisman that protects us from the vagaries of daily living. Our faith gives suffering a purpose beyond the aches and hurts that come with being embodied souls. With Christ we have died already. And with Christ we will rise again. No loss, no pain, no retreat can stand against a ever living joy. In all humility, suffer. But suffer well, knowing that you are a new creation in Christ Jesus.

Corpus Christi 2007 (repost)

Since I am traveling today, a repost seems in order. . .

11 June 2007

Deep fired Sacramentum Caritatis with pork gravy

Corpus Christi: Gen 14.18-20; 1 Cor 11.23-26; Luke 9.11-17
Fr. Philip N. Powell, OP
Church of the Incarnation, University of Dallas

These are a few of my favorite things: Buttermilk dripped and deep-fried chicken. Butter beans with bacon and onions. Garlic mashed potatoes and chicken gravy. Greens with fatback and vinegar. Squash casserole, green bean casserole, sweet potato casserole with pecans and brown sugar crust. Deviled eggs. Warm biscuits with honey butter. Homemade, cast-iron skillet cornbread with real butter. Fresh yeast rolls. Pecan pie. Chocolate pie. Mississippi Mud Cake. Bread pudding with whiskey sauce. Can you tell I’m a true blood Southerner?!* Each of these and all of them together do more than just expand my waistline and threaten the structural integrity of my belt—each and all of them together make up for me a palette of memories, a buffet (if you will!) of powerful reminders of who I am, where I came from, who I love, who loves me, and where I am going. Second perhaps only to sex, eating is one of the most intimate things we do. Think about it for just a second: when you eat, you take into your body stuff from the world—meat, vegetables, water, tea—you put this stuff in your mouth, you chew, you taste and feel, you smell and swallow, and all of it, every bite, becomes your body. This is extraordinarily intimate! You are made up of, built out of what you eat.

What does it mean then for you, for us to eat the Body of Christ and to drink his Blood?

Thomas Aquinas answers: “Since it was the will of God’s only-begotten Son that men should share in his divinity, he assumed our nature in order that by becoming man he might make men gods.” God became man so that we all might become god. In Christ Jesus, we are made more than holy, more than just, more than righteous; we are made perfect. Wholly joined to Holy Other, divinized as God promised at the moment of creation, we are brought to the divine by the Divine and given our participation in the life of God by God. We are brought and given. Brought to Him by Him and given to Him by Him. We do not go to God uninvited and we do not take from Him what is not first given. Therefore, “take, eat, this is my body, which is given up for you…” And when you take the gift of his body and eat and when you take the gift of his blood and drink, you become what you eat and drink. You become Christ. And together we are Christ for one another—his Body, the church.

Thomas calls the Eucharist the “sacramentum caritatis,” the sacrament of love. The Eucharist is not a family picnic or Sunday dinner. We’re not talking about a community meal or a neighborhood buffet. All of these can and do express genuine love for God, self, and neighbor. But Thomas is teaching us something far more radical about the Eucharist here than the pedestrian notion that eating together makes us better people and a stronger community! The sacramentum caritatis is an efficacious sign of God’s gift of Himself to us for our perfection. In other words, the Eucharist we celebrate this morning is not just a memorial, just a symbol, just a community prayer service, just a familial gathering, just a ritual. In Christ, with him and through him, we effect—make real and produce—the redeeming graces of Calvary and the Empty Tomb: Christ on the cross and Christ risen from the grave. Again, we are not merely being reminded of an important bible story nor are we being taught a lesson about sharing and caring nor are we simply “feeling” Christ’s presence among us. We are doing exactly what Christ tells us to do: we are eating his body and drinking his blood for our perfection, for our eternal lives. And while we wait for his coming again, we walk this earth as Christs! Imperfect now, to be perfected eventually; but right now, radically loved by Love Himself and loved so that we may be changed, converted from our disobedience, brought to repentance and forgiveness, and absolved of all violence against God’s will for us.

Thomas teaches us that God gave us the Eucharist in order “to impress the vastness of [His] love more firmly upon the hearts of the faithful…” How vast is His love for us? He gifted us with His Son. He gave His only child up to death so that we might live. And He gave us the means of our most intimate communion with Him. We take his body into our bodies. His blood into ours. We are made heirs, brothers and sisters, prophets and priests; we are made holy, just, and clean; we are made Christ and being made Christ, we are given his ministries, his holy tasks: teaching, preaching, healing, feeding. This Eucharist tells you who you are, where you came from, where you are going. It tells you why you are here and what you must do. And most importantly, this celebration of thanksgiving, tells you and me who it is that loves us and what being loved by Love Himself means for our sin, our repentance, our conversion, our ministries, our progress in holiness…

Do not fail to hand on what you yourself have received: the gift of the Christ. Walk out those doors this morning and present yourself to the world as a sacramentum caritatis. Walk out of here a sacrament of love—a sign, a witness, a cipher, an icon—walk out of here stamped with the Holy Spirit. Preach, teach, bless, feed, eat, drink, pray, and spread the infectious joy of the children of God!

A Southern blessing: as your waist expands to fill the limits of your belt, so may your spirit grow to hold the limitless love of Him Who loves us always.

*NB. To answer a question asked after Mass about my menu, "Yes, I can cook every dish listed here!" Oh, and I forgot "grits."

Liturgical Abuse: what to do about it

OK, so your pastor, Fr. Hollywood, has decided to co-opt your parish's Sunday Masses as his time to show all of your pew-sitting mouth-breathers what a hip guy he is. He changes the wording of the prayers to fit his political agenda. He writes the prayer intentions to reflect his pet-peeves and social projects. He uses the homily to berate you for not recycling, for opposing illegal immigration, and for standing outside the abortion clinic praying the rosary. Then, just to rub a little salt in the wound, he ends each Mass with the exclamation, "Go be Church!"

Had enough?

Any sensible Catholic would have exploded by now. Unfortunately, most Catholics are either shell-shocked by the inanity of these DIY liturgies or comfortably numb with the monotonous hum of Father's self-serving political haranguing.

Let's say you decide "to do something about it." What do you do?

First, here's what NOT to do: do not fire off an angry letter to the bishop demanding that this heretic be removed from the parish or else. Unless Father is doing something horribly illegal (molesting children, stealing money, selling drugs out of the rectory, etc.), there's almost no chance he's going to be replaced. There's simply not enough priests to go around. Also, firing off an angry letter to the pastor himself will likely end with him filing the letter for further reference in the trash can.* Angry doesn't work.

The next thing to do is to honestly examine your conscience about your motivations for wanting these abuses to stop. Do these abuses cause me serious spiritual problems? Am I wanting to be a cultural warrior and take sides in the battle? Am I being scrupulous about rule-following, or wantonly careless about following the rubrics? Do the abuses seriously damage my understanding of the faith? Am I just being a liturgy Nazi just b/c I can be? Am I pushing my personal political agenda? Am I thinking with the Church on these issues? Keep in mind: you cannot speak for anyone but yourself. You cannot complain that the inclusive pronouns or the exclusive pronouns are hurting other people's faith. It might be true that Father's liturgical goofiness is hurting other people, but you can't know that; therefore, you can't report it. And even if half the parish tells you it's hurting them, you can't speak for them. You can speak for you alone. I am not trying to discourage you from talking to Father about these issues. I'm encouraging you to know your motivations for wanting to do so. Be clear about those motivations lest you are tempted to pride.

Here's what you need to know before you speak up. . .everyday (probably several times a day), Father is besieged by parishioners who know how to run the parish better than he does. They are all self-appointed experts in liturgy, finance, personnel, scripture, theology, canon law, and politics. And all of them together are pulling the pastor in a hundred different directions, all making contradictory or contrasting demands for action. While you loathe the use of inclusive pronouns that reduce God to a Platonic Parent, there are three people in the parish complaining b/c he doesn't throw out the USCCB-approved lectionary for being sexist. While you're outraged that he uses homily time to bark at you about the evils of carbon emissions, five people are complaining b/c his last homily canonizing Al Gore forgot to elevate The One to sainthood as well. If he makes you happy, he adds eight more complaints to his calendar. Also, keep in mind that Father might actually have justifibly good reasons for what he is doing. I have very bad knees from working for five years in a violent adolescent mental hospital. It is very difficult for me to genuflect. A U.D. student respectfully asked me why I didn't genuflect at the consecration. I explained my weird situation, and she was satisfied. Case closed.

Now, if Father thinks it's his job to make everyone happy, well, that's his problem. He's taken on an impossible task and caused himself nothing but misery. If he choses to bow before the loudest voices in the parish and do as he is told, again, his problem. My hope would be that the pastor would lead. Stand up front and follow the Church with his parish supporting him along the way. That happens quite frequently but nearly often enough. Regardless, we are all responsible to one another in this Body, so if you are clear on your motives and well-aware that you might be the lone oppositional voice. . .speak up!

Having persuaded you that Father is haggarded with competing demands and unlikely to be moved by an angry letter, what do you do to persuade him to change his goofy liturgical ways?

Talk to him. Make an appointment and charitably express your concerns. Tell him why his goofiness upsets you. Do so respectfully with every fiber of humility you can muster. Approach him with what you see as abuses by asking open-ended questions. For example, "Father, I've noticed you avoid using male pronouns when speaking about God. Can you tell me why this is important for you to do?" Listen to his answer without judgment. Actually hear his answer over the clamour of your need to correct his interpretation of canon law. When he finishes, see if you can repeat to him what he has said. Then, move on to the next question. Save your objections for a later appointment. If he asks you what you think, tell him that you just want to know why he does the things he does b/c you are unsure of his reasons for making the changes. You will be tempted here to launch into a broadside against liturgical innovation. Resist it!

When you go to Mass next take notice of his "abuses." Is he still doing them? Are you still upset? If so, ask for another appointment. This time go back through your questions and tell him how each abuse upsets you. Again, do so respectfully and without accusation. Just report your feelings and thoughts, leaving canon law and papal documents out of it for now. If he's a good pastor he will pull more out of you than you would imagine there is to pull.

Go back to Mass and take note. The abuses are still happening. Ask for another appointment. This time note your disappointment that the abuses are still going on and ask him what you should do about it. Remind him of your objections and how he responded to them. But honestly ask, "I understand now why you think your changes are necessary, but they are disrupting my prayer in Mass. I find them very distracting. What do I do?" Listen carefully to how he answers and ask appropriate questions. He may tell you to get over it. He may apologize and keep on doing what he's doing. He may suggest some reading to "enlighten" you. Or, he may shrug and say, "I dunno. What do you want to do?" Tell him.

Tell him whatever it is you think you need to do. But don't think for a moment that threatening to leave or withhold donations is going to change his mind. He's got three folks in the outer office waiting to push him even further along the road of liturgical experimentation. Or maybe, you are expressing what dozens have express to him already and the pressure to change is mounting. The one thing that will dissipate all that pressure most effectively is anger. If you get mad and spout off, you're credibility is gone. No one wants to listen to a madman, so the ravings of a madman are ignored. Don't threaten. Don't quote canon law. Or liturgical documents. Don't wave Ratziner's Spirit of the Liturgy in his face. Chances are he knows that what he is doing goes against prevailing law and custom. I've never seen the legalistic approach work. Never. There's simply no way to tell someone that they are violating the rules without sounding like you are accusing them of a crime. In fact, that's exactly what you would be doing. "Father, here are the 37 canonical crimes you have commited in a month of Masses. . ."

At this point, sit down and write a very charitable letter detailing what you see as abuse in the Mass. Whatever you do: NOT NOT QUOTE canon law or papal documents. Pastors who tend to be goofy in the liturgy are constitutionally allergic to rules, so quoting rules to them only reinforces their sense of being "hip" and "edgy." They will simply respond my invoking "pastoral considerations" and keep on truckin'. What these guys will respond to favorably is an honest, personal assessment of what you believe their abuses are doing to your prayer life. If you are sincerely adversely affected by the abuses, say so. And be specific about it. For all their calavier attitude about The Rules, most pastors loathe the idea that anything they would do could hurt someone. You could be the first, the tenth, or the one-hundredth person to tell him that his goofiness is detrimental to your fruitful experience of the Mass.

Tell him in this letter that you feel compelled to write a similar letter to the bishop. As the Pastor of the Diocese, your spiritual health is his responsibility. You are not tattling or going over Father's head. If your letter is motivated by genuine angst, written from a personal experience, and doesn't pretend to teach the bishop his business, you will be heard.

Last but not least, prepare for nothing to be done. Prepare for the fact that no changes will occur. Prepare for hearing nothing back from the bishop. Why? Becasue if Father has 800 people pulling at him about this and that, the bishop has 80,000. Not hearing back from the bishop doesn't mean that nothing was done. All it means is that no one told you that something was done. If your pastor has a history of liturgical abuse, the bishop has a file. Your letter will join others and eventually the weight will tilt the bishop into action. But don't expect the bishop to drop everything he's doing, drive to your parish, and blast the pastor in front of the congregation before Sunday Mass. If that's what you want to happen, then you need to do some seriously soul-searching.

So, let's say that you have done all that I have suggested and you arrive at Mass on Sunday morning confident that Fr. Hollywood has been straightened out. He processes in and begins, "In the Name of the Creator, the Redeemer, and the Sanctifer. . ." What do you do?

Like the shampoo bottle says, "Rinse, lather, repeat." If you tell me that you don't have time for this sort of protracted conversation, I am tempted to say that you aren't serious about the abuses hurting your spiritual life. If Father's goofiness is damaging you spiritually, nothing should stop you from addressing the abuse. It might take years to convince him to change. How important is it to you to have the Mass celebrated with the universal Church?

*When I was a deacon at Holy Rosary Church in Houston, I was unexpectedly recruited by one of my elderly brothers to help him distribute communion. Unfortunately, I was dressed to go on a work project with my U.H. students. We were there for the Mass b/c our project supervisor was running late. I was wearing shorts, a tee-shirts, and sandals. When I objected to the priest that I was not properly dressed, he insisted I help him with the unusually large crowd. He didn't even give me a chance to put on an alb! So, there I was at the very traditional Holy Rosary Church giving communion in shorts and a tee-shirt. A few weeks later the pastor got a thick envelope that he passed on to me. Inside were about thirty pages of copies of canon law, papal and conciliar documents going back to the ninth century! All yellow highlighted and decorated with exclamation points and underlines. The point of the letter: clergy should not participate in the liturgy dressed in anything but proper vestments. Duh? Really? I didn't know that. The author of the package was furious with me for my disrespect, etc. and demanded that I be fired. Had he taken 30 seconds after Mass to talk to me personally, he would have discovered that I agreed with him! Instead, he chose to go home fuming and spend hours collecting and copying documents that fit rather nicely in my trash can.

Error, Heresy, & You

My Dominican service for the day: making distinctions and telling lies. . .

All too often these days we hear that This or That theologian or priest is teaching/preaching heresy. It's been a problem from the beginning (cf Paul's letters) and it will be with us until The End.

Most of time those teaching/preaching heresy draw a heavy line between Evangelization and Doctrine, meaning they separate the Work of the Church from Word of the Church. This separation allows them to do all the "feel-good" Work without being too terribly bothered with the Word. For example, "What does the Dogma of the Immaculate Conception have to do with feeding the hungry, making peace, and helping the poor find affordable health care?" The underlying assumption here is that they can do the Work of the Church without reference to the Word of the Church. This is false.

This last Trinity Sunday, we read in Matthew's gospel Jesus' charge to his disciples to go out into the world and "teach all that I have taught you." Christ irrevocably binds together evangelization, works of mercy, and truth-telling in our teaching and preaching. Strictly speaking, a priest who teaches heresy cannot evangelize the world by doing good works. His works may indeed be good, but an atheist or a Muslim or a Wiccan priestess could do the same work and do so in the absence of Catholic doctrine. The point of helping the poor is to honor God by honoring the creatures whom He made in His image and likeness and remade in Christ. In other words, we help the poor in order to worship the Triune God.

Now, we must draw a sharp distinction between error and heresy. The temptation to charge a fellow Catholic teaching error with the crime of heresy is nearly irresistible. We want it made perfectly clear that this guy is not teaching with the mind of the Church. Though all heresy is erroneous not all error is heresy.

"Error" is exactly that: a mistake, "getting it wrong," flubbing a statement of the truth. You forget to carry the "1" when subtracting. You switch letters when spelling out a word. Error, by definition, is unintentional and therefore blameless. Error can be corrected and instantly forgiven.

"Heresy" is something else entirely. Heresy is error stubbornly taught as truth; it is a mistake one holds as a truth. It's the banking equivalent of forgetting to carry the "1" and then obstinately refusing to admit the mistake, demanding that your calculation be accepted despite having been shown your error. Heresy is insisting that your spelling of a word is correct even after your reader uses several dictionaries to show you your error. Heresy is intentional, obstinate, and arrogant.

Let's say your pastor on Christ the King Sunday preaches a homily in which he says, "Christ our Lord was created by the Father to give us eternal life." The idea that the Son is a creation of the Father is part of the heresy called "Arianism." The Son was not created but rather eternally begotten. The Three Persons of the Trinity are co-eternal; there is no temporal or ontological priority within the Trinity. You point this out to your pastor: "Father, you were teaching heresy this morning!" Strictly speaking, this is true. He did indeed teach the heresy of Arianism. But is Father a heretic? It depends on how he responds.

He responds to you, "I know! I realized it later in the Mass, and I should have corrected myself. I'll put a note in the bulletin. How embarrassing." Though he has taught heresy, he is not a heretic. Let's say he responses, "Oh yes, I know. Basically, I think the idea of the Son as begotten of the Father is baloney. Jesus is one of us, a creature. We shouldn't think of him as God." You, a bit shocked, remind him that the Council of Nicaea condemned Arianism in the Nicene Creed. Again, he says, "I know, I know. But that council was one big political mess. Besides, all that Greek philosophy should have never been allowed into the Church" and so on. Is Father a heretic? Not yet.

So far, no one with magisterial authority has attempted to correct Father. If you contact the bishop and the bishop contacts Father and corrects him and he refuses to budge on the issue, then he compels the bishop to determine his orthodoxy. Maybe Father simply misunderstands what the Creed teaches. Maybe he has a mistaken notion of what "begotten" means. Maybe he is somehow intellectually impaired or in a fit of misplaced compassion, he has given one doctrine (Jesus' humanity) priority over another (his divinity) in a false move to make Christ accessible. The bishop corrects all of these errors. And Father still refuses to budge.

At some point in the exchange it becomes clear that Father is a formal heretic; that is, he actually believes his error to be the truth. By refusing to be corrected by a competent ecclesial authority, Father places himself outside the communion of the Church and remains there until he recants. Even if he faithfully teaches every other doctrine of the Church correctly, he is teaching heresy on this issue. Of course, it's simply impossible to teach just one heresy. Like the game of Jenga, when you remove one support from the structure, the whole thing starts to wobble and eventually it collapses. A heretic who wants to be wrong on one doctrine faces the daunting prospect of either abandoning the faith altogether in an effort to be theologically consistent with his heresy, or figuring out a way to teach his heresy as consistent with all other doctrinal truths. I do not believe the latter is possible. Heresy corrodes one's faith by compelling you to reject one truth after another in order to remain consistent with the initial heresy.

So, feeding the poor as an act of Christian mercy while believing that Jesus is simply a creature just like one of us is not possible. Though the act can be merciful, it is not Christian. We do good works AS Christians. An atheist can do good works, but he does not do them in order to evangelize. A Buddhist can do good works, but she does not do them to honor the poor in their dignity as creatures made and remade in the likeness and image of God. Everything we do as Christians is principally about giving glory to God. Any material good that comes from this spiritual duty is welcomed and wonderful, but it's hardly the point of being a Christian.

Do not let anyone tell you that orthodox belief is irrelevant to orthodox practice. One cannot exist without the other.

Coffee Bowl Browsing time!

Sad but necessary: Australia's adolescent attention-seeking Fr. Hollywood suspended

Don't mess with R.N.'s (Real Nuns)!

HA! And the Catholic Lite Left accuses us of "keeping God in a box"

Lefty media meltdown. . .couldn't happen to a better bunch

Newsweek editor deifies Obama. . .but the MSM has no idea why it is dying. Duh.

Good analysis of last week's center-right victories in E.U. elections

Sticking it to the ACLU's soft-fascism

The inevitable and entirely predictable slippery-slope of same-sex "marriage"

For the grammatically challenged!

Podcasting the Church's saints

What's the Church teaching on the theory of evolution? You might be surprised!

Can we ever say that a particular war is just?

Har-har. . .B.O. meets the Saudi King (a cartoon)

Lots of excellent articles on Catholic theology and science

American postmodern malaise: wanting, getting, and still having nothing

How dead philosophers died (warning: a philosopher attempts humor. . .OY!)

I have met many priests of Dudeism. . .some of them claim to be Catholic priests!

Albert Einstein's "Credo"

I believe that people who talk during movies should be summarily executed.

Answers to all those questions that nag you at 3am

Platonic kiss? Other kinds of philosophical kisses (NB. his definition of an Aristotelian kiss is flat wrong)

"Shut up, brain, or I'll stab you with a Q-tip!" The wisdom of Homer Simpson

Her Majesty and B.O.'s iPod (B.O. gave the Queen of England an iPod a few months ago)

David Mamet (playwright), "Why I am no longer a 'brain dead liberal" (language warning)

Suffering for Mystery

Most Holy Trinity: Deut 4.32-34, 39-40; Rom 8.14-17; Matt 28.16-20
Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP
Convento SS. Domenico e Sisto, Roma

The wooden box just sits there. Closed. Locked tight. Brass hinges tempt the curious with the possibility of discovery, the odd chance that the grained, varnished top might be coaxed into releasing the box’s treasure. A snooping heart wants to know. Must know! But the key hole is a door that will not open; the hinges, like clenched teeth, stubbornly grit against their created purpose. And as if to annoy and frustrate further, an aroma seeps through the only splinter in the box’s safety, pushing an inquisitive mind to the very edge of patience. Rose, cinnamon, a hint of lemon, a little musk and dust. And something unaccountable. Aged paper? Ancient ink? Olive oil and wax? The origin of the box is mentioned in family stories told at Easter and Christmas. It was a wedding gift from a stranger. Never opened because the bride died too soon. No, it was sent from the Middle East by a monk who wanted it kept safe during war time. The key was lost. No, it was purchased at a flea market in Peru from a shaman generations ago by a friend of the family who gave it to a servant in secret, hoping to one day retrieve it. That day never came. The box just sits there. Closed, locked, and decorating the room with its infuriating incense. It is a mystery. Wholly unknowable unless you are willing to force it open and risk destroying what’s inside.

Without the least bit of hesitation or shame, the Church proclaims the Holy Trinity a mystery. Incomprehensible, baffling, and curious. And even as she declares the ineffable nature of the Trinity, the Church exhausts every resource—philosophical, theological, and magisterial—to unlock the puzzle of the Divine Persons and to describe the mystery of the Godhead as Three-in-One. One God, three Persons. Three distinct Persons with one divine nature, one God—Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. What is knowable and known about the Holy Trinity is knowable and known as a gift, freely given to creation by God Himself. Whether we come to know what we know by reason or faith, we know it in virtue of God’s desire that it be known and to the degree that He wishes us to know it. Both reason and faith are gifts. Both lead to His truth. Both operate by His grace. And because we are limited creatures and receive His gifts imperfectly, both reason and faith are misshapen keys that cannot fit the lock that holds the fullness of His mystery tightly away from us. For us to know His mystery perfectly we must be perfected in the mystery; essentially, we must become the mystery in order to see Him face-to-face. This journey will require more than curiosity, more than intellectual prowess, and than pious determination. It requires us to suffer.

Paul writes to Christ’s Church in Rome, no doubt telling them what all Christians at the time already knew by long experience. He writes that if we will become the children of God, joint-heirs of His kingdom with Christ, “we [must] suffer with [Christ] so that we may also be glorified with him.” To look forward to glory with Christ in heaven, we must look no further than how we suffer with Christ right now. If we foolishly believe that heavenly glory comes without earthly suffering, we foolishly believe that we can go to the Father without Christ. We go to the Father with Christ by becoming Christ and to become Christ we must follow him along his suffering way. We bear a cross. We walk the way of sorrow. We are crucified in the flesh. And we cry out in despair even as we are given up for the love of our friends. If we want to know mystery, we must become mystery. Standing aside and away from Christ’s suffering, avoiding at any cost the troubles that come with dying and rising again with him, we return his gift unopened; and not only do we remain in ignorance of the mystery, we tempt an eternal life without his glory.

We may wonder why the promise of eternal life is to be believed. What is the worth of a promise given by an unseen god? Why should we come to understand our pain, our loss, and our mourning as necessary parts of God’s plan to make us His heirs? Moses challenges God’s people, saying: “Ask now of the days of old, […] Did anything so great ever happen before? Was it ever heard of? Did a people ever hear the voice of God speaking from the midst of fire, as you did, and live?” Even as they suffered in the desert on the way to the Promised Land, God spoke in fire and smoke to His people, showing them the way to their salvation. Even as they suffered, God was with them. Even as they suffered, God chose them to be His people, a holy nation, a royal priesthood. As a nation, they were His prophets and kings and for this they suffered. He took them out of slavery and into the desert on a promise, on a covenant-oath never to abandon them, never to forsake them to final godlessness. In response to this gift, Moses acclaims, “This is why you must now know, and fix in your heart, that the Lord is God in the heavens above and on earth below, and that there is no other.” If this piece of the puzzle, this truth of the mystery is fixed in our hearts, a truth we now know, why do we shrink from suffering?

Look at the disciples. Jesus orders them to a high mountain in Galilee. Matthew reports in his gospel that “when they all saw [Christ], they worshiped, but they doubted.” What did they doubt? Did they doubt the veracity of his teachings? Did they doubt their own strength? Their piety, their determination, their intellectual prowess? No! They doubted the true nature of the one who stood before them, freely offering them the Kingdom of his Father. Knowing the reason for their doubtful hearts, Jesus says, “All power in heaven and on earth has been given to me.” With all the power of heaven and earth, Jesus fulfills the covenant as his Father promised He would. With all the power of heaven and earth, Jesus reveals the Father and His Son and promises the coming of the Holy Spirit. With the power of heaven and earth, Jesus sends his disciples out as apostles to baptize, to teach and preach, and to make disciples of the whole world. And these newly anointed apostles are to do all this in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, in the name of the Triune Mystery; and as they preach and teach and baptize, they become more and more fully sons of God. They doubt no longer.

When their Lord is arrested and convicted, scourged, crucified, and raised from the dead, the apostles witness their way to heaven: to glory through suffering, to the fullness of the mystery through earthly trial and persecution. And so they walked behind him with their crosses all the way to heaven. Each one taught, preached, made disciples, and spent his life doing what Christ did so to become like Christ for those who would follow after them. We are those who follow after. And whether we suffer in small ways or grand, in jail or exile, at home or far away, so long as we do all things for the greater glory of God, Christ says to us, “[…]behold, I am with you always, until the end of the age.” Therefore, our suffering can never be useless misery; it brings us nearer to the Triune Mystery we were made to adore, that we were made to become according to His will for us.

Word and images, concepts and logic, ancient wisdoms and new, none approach the unapproachable light that blinds the holiest human eye. The glory of God at once seduces and repels, draws in and pushes out. And whether you are reeled in or run away reeling hangs on the clearest of Christian truths, one key truth: have you suffered as Christ suffered—for the love of your friends in name of the One Who made you? This key fits any lock, opens every door, lifts any lid. This key, the Key of David, the only Son of God, opens the treasure house of the Father’s Kingdom and makes us heirs to the fortunes of heaven. The Good News of salvation is that there is no chain so tight, no cell so strong, no sin so binding that the key of the cross cannot free us. Yes, we must suffer to follow Christ, to join him in his glory. But this no burden. It is a blessing. “[We] did not receive a spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but [we] received a Spirit of adoption, through whom we cry, "Abba, Father!’"

Mortal Sin & Culpability: two case studies

First, I want to say how pleased I am that HancAquam readers did such an excellent job of analyzing the two case studies below! It's encouraging that the fine distinctions were made and the correct conclusions reached.

Here's my take on the case studies. . .

Both Beth and Sue committed an intrinsically morally evil act, acquiring an abortion.

Beth committed a mortal sin b/c her act met all three criteria for mortal sin. As an intrinscially morally evil act, abortion is certainly a grave matter. As a former Catholic with a graduate degree in theology, she certainly knew that abortion is an intrinsically morally evil act. Since she is an adult, in complete possession of her reason, and not in any way temporarily mentally imparied, she deliberately consented to the act. Her apostacy from the Church and subsequent history of fornication is irrelevant to the analysis of this case. An abortion acquired by a rigouously faithful married Catholic woman with no history of fornication would be mortally sinful.

Sue did not commit a mortal sin. Though her abortion is an intrinsically morally evil act, she acquired the abortion without full knowledge of the moral implications of the act and her minority grants her the assumption of the inability to consent. By no fault of her own, Sue is ignorant of the Church's teachings and confronted by a culture of gang violence hostile to learning. That her pregnancy is the result of rape is irrevelant to the intrinscially morally evil nature of the act of abortion, but it does mitigate against the assumption that she is free to consent to the abortion. Rape is devastately traumatic and can severly impair the victim's ability to render culpable judgments.*

Beth is culpable for her mortal sin to the degree that she was truly free to acquire the abortion. Her culpability could be somewhat mitigated if she has a legitimate fear that being pregnant would hurt her in a significant economic fashion--if, for example, her firm had a history of demoting or firing pregnant women. This situation would count as indirect duress. However, the case states that she acquired the abortion in order not to hurt her chances for a promotion not to save her job. Culpability might be somewhat mitigated on the grounds that being a pregnant lawyer in NYC poses a threat to her reputation and the possibility of doing her job at the levels of expected professionalism. Inordinate pressure from her boyfriend, if present, would certainly mitigate culpability.

Since Sue's abortion is not a mortal sin for her, her culpability for the act is zero. The overwhelming pressures of her mother's authority and her violent school life make her little more than a pawn. Poverty and lack of education will almost always mitigate against culpability if culpability is in question. Under duress, she cooperated in committing an intrinsically morally evil act, but she did not sin. Remember: we cannot be forced to sin (venially or mortally) nor can we sin by accident or in ignorance.

In the combox, Annie writes, "So, if the Church did indeed push Beth away through a series of even minor actions or attitudes, those people share in her sin too." To the degree that Beth was deliberately "pushed out," I would agree. But this question needs quite a bit of fleshing out. I am often told by ex-Catholics that they were "driven out" of the Church by an evil pastor or group of hateful parishioners. When pushed for details, these folks almost always reveal that what actually happened was that they were living a publicly sinful life and found the parish's unwillingness to celebrate their sinful lives to be "unwelcoming." In other words, no one pushed them anywhere. They left the Church when they started living publicly sinful lives. The parish's refusal to celebrate their sin was the appropriate medicinal response. Rather than repenting and asking for forgiveness, they chose to leave. Calling this "being pushed out" is false. I've also been told by ex-Catholics that they left the Church b/c they were silenced or harassed or shunned. Again, details are the key! In most cases these folks were pushing dissident theologies, abusive liturgical practices, or causing scandal by stirring up chaos. I also know of cases where orthodox Catholics were "pushed out" of a parish for what they felt were illegitimate reasons. Sometimes the reasons given seemed illegitimate to me. And sometimes the reasons were good. There are, of course, plenty of cases where nothing more than parochial politics, parishioners feuds, and evil pastors get folks booted. To what degree of culpability these folks would be held to if they committed a mortal sin while under this sort of duress is open to debate.

Thanks for playing! We might do this again soon. . .

*My initial phrasing here was ambiguous, so I've amended the paragraph to clarify my point.

Mortal Sin: two case studies

Following on the post below about confession, let's take two test cases and work out the moral implications of both.

Beth is a 45 year old lawyer working in New York City. Before joining the bar she graduated from Notre Dame with an M.A. in theology. Disgusted with the Church's historical ill-treatment of women, she leaves the Catholic Church and becomes a Unitarian. While working in NYC she becomes sexually involved with one of her legal associates and gets pregnant. Knowing that she is soon to be made a partner in her firm, and knowing that her pregnancy might detrimentally influence her promotion, she acquires an abortion.

Sue is a 13 year old schoolgirl living in Chicago. Though very bright and academically accomplished, she must attend the local public school because her unemployed single-mother cannot afford private school tuition. The school she attends is notorious for gang violence. Sue does her best to avoid trouble, but often becomes embroiled in the local gang activity. She has had no religious instruction other than a general introduction to spiritual ideas via the mass media. On her way home from school one day, she is violently raped. She becomes pregnant. Because of her family's poverty and Sue's young age, her mother decides that Sue must have an abortion. Though she doesn't want the abortion, she complies out of deference to her mother. She has the abortion.

Keeping in mind that an act can be considered a mortal sin only if the act is gravely serious, done with the full knowledge that the act is sinful, and done with deliberate consent, can we say that Beth and Sue have committed mortal sins? If so, to what degree is each culpable (guilty) or not? [NB. ALL three conditions mentioned above must be met. The absence of any one of the three renders the act non-mortal.]

Applicable Church teaching:

According to Church teaching some acts are always morally evil by their very nature, meaning that circumstance and intention do not change the intrinsically evil nature of these acts. Abortion is always a morally evil act. But the question here is: are the morally evil acts committed by Beth and Sue mortally sinful? [Bonus question: are all intrinsically morally evil acts sinful--mortal or not?]

Though circumstance and intent may not count in determining whether or not morally evil act is indeed evil, both can be considered in assigning culpability if the evil act counts as a mortal sin.

The evidence you have here is the only relevant evidence. Do not assume any other facts (e.g., the availability of abortion alternatives, etc.).

Your answers. . .? [Lots of excellent answers in the combox. . .keep 'em coming!]

But God loves me anyway, right? (Now with footnotes!)

Recently the "Vatican" (whoever that is) lamented the decline in the use of confession among Catholics.

It should be noted that this decline is directly tied to the lack of preaching against sin from Catholic pulpits. I don't mean screaming tirades bellowed from the ambo, but simple, straightforward declarations that sin is real and deadly to one's growth in holiness (1).

Some theologians and clergy don't see a problem with Catholics letting the Confession Muscle atrophy. They exclaim, "But God loves us where we're at! God accepts us as we are!" Yes, this is true. But confession is not about God loving you more or less. God will love you straight to hell if that's what you want. That's what free-will is all about (2).

Confession is not about how much God loves you but about how much you love God. Confession is our chance to apologize for those sins that have damaged our relationship with God, for those crimes against His love that prevent us from being fully in love with God. God does not need our apologies, our repentance, or our penance. We do.

Does God love you despite your sin? Yes, always. Can you love God despite your sin? No. Your sin is evidence enough of this simple truth. And because God loves and respects you, He will honor your decision to spend eternity without Him. That, brothers and sisters, is what we call Hell.

Update: Father, when should I go to confession? The minimum is once a year. Ideally, you would go to confession for any mortal sin. What's a mortal sin? A mortal sin is any disobedience that "destroys charity in the heart"(3). In the ancient Church, the Big Three were: adultery/fornication, murder, and apostasy. Good start. You want to be aware of two extreme tendencies: making every sin into a mortal sin "just in case" and making mortal sin into "no big deal" b/c you don't want to stop committing the sin. Every sin disrupts your relationship with God. Some sins kill that relationship from your end. The question to ask is: did that sin kill my ability/desire to love God? There is a subjective element here that only you can answer. There is an objective element that does not depend on your perception of the sin. You cannot murder someone and then claim that you don't feel that your relationship with God has been damaged. It has. . .whether you "feel" it or not. Use the Ten Commandments and the Beatitudes to examine your conscience. If you have serious doubt, ask your pastor. Circumstances and intent do make a difference in most cases. If you have access to a priest, regular/frequent confession is not a problem. Just be careful that you are not becoming scrupulous. Ultimately, scrupulosity is the denial of the reality of God's mercy and can quickly become the sin of pride--"Not even God can forgive MY terrible sins." Wanna bet?

Confessing venial sins is perfectly fine (4). But be aware that participating in Mass with a confessing-repentant heart takes care of venial sin. Also, be sure that you are confessing actual sins. "I forgot my morning prayers" is not sin. Sexually explicit dreams are not sinful. For an act to be sinful it must be a deliberate act against God's law and love; meaning, you have to know you are doing it. You cannot sin in ignorance or by accident (5).

Notes from the Catechism of the Catholic Church

(1) CCC 1849: "Sin is an offense against reason, truth, and right conscience; it is failure in genuine love for God and neighbor caused by a perverse attachment to certain goods. It wounds the nature of man and injures human solidarity. It has been defined as 'an utterance, a deed, or a desire contrary to the eternal law.'"

(2) CCC 1861: "Mortal sin is a radical possibility of human freedom, as is love itself. It results in the loss of charity and the privation of sanctifying grace, that is, of the state of grace [...]"

(3) CCC 1855.1: "Mortal sin destroys charity in the heart of man by a grave violation of God's law; it turns man away from God, who is his ultimate end and his beatitude, by preferring an inferior good to him."

(4) CCC 1855.2: "Venial sin allows charity to subsist, even though it offends and wounds it."

(5) CCC 1857: "For a sin to be mortal, three conditions must together be met: 'Mortal sin is sin whose object is grave matter and which is also committed with full knowledge and deliberate consent.'" See CCC 1858-18690 for defintions of grave matter, full knowledge, and deliberate consent. So, if I commit Act X it must be gravely serious (not trivial); and I must know that Act X is sinful; and I must knowingly consent to committing Act X (personally choosing to act). If any of these three conditions is missing, I have not committed a mortal sin. You cannot sin mortally in ignorance, trivially, accidently, or against your will.

Questions and more questions

The Question Box has been full to overflowing lately. I've been pecking away on this post for weeks, here's a stab at trimming the pile a bit:

1). You're a priest! Should you be criticizing President Obama?

As I have noted many, many times before: I did not renounce my American citizenship when I took solemn profession as a Dominican nor when I was ordained a priest. I have exactly the same free speech and exercise of religion rights as any other U.S. citizen. Since I do not believe that Catholics are morons, I am not even a little worried that my political opinions will unduly influence readers. My readers are perfectly capable of making up their minds and will do so.

2). Where do you get ideas for your homilies?

There are a few hard and fast rules that I follow when composing homilies. First among these is a near maniacal adherence to the lectionary readings given for Mass that day; that is, the assigned readings themselves always, always form the foundation of my homilies. I do this not only b/c this is what the Church asks priests to do but also b/c I am convinced that (as a Dominican) my principal task as a preacher is to give the gospel a contemporary life within the long-lived wisdom of the Church. Also, I get ideas from the literature I read, from the daily news, from classes I teach and attend, from readers. Basically, as Catholics we are called to be in the world living our faith openly and eagerly. Anything that happens in the world is fair game for a homily. You may have noticed that I ask a lot of questions in my homilies. This is more than a rhetorical technique. These are questions I am asking myself. . .the homily is one way I am thinking through the answers.

3). My pastor is a good man. He's thoughtful and compassionate. He's a good businessman with the parish money. But he's a horrible preacher. Is there anything we in the parish can do to help him?

Yes. If he knows that he's a bad preacher there's help for him. If he thinks he's a wonderful preacher, then you are going to have problems. It's important for him to figure out exactly how he's a bad preacher, meaning what does he fail to do? If the content is good, is it the delivery? If the delivery is good, is the content superficial or heretical? Or is he just bad all around? I think preachers tend to make three basic content mistakes: 1). the homily is my chance to show these people how wonderful I am by telling jokes, stories, Hallmark scenarios, etc.; 2) the homily is my chance to pound on my pet issues to a captive audience; 3) the homily is my chance to settle scores and nurse grudges against my enemies. And there are three basic mistakes made with delivery: 1) Fr. Oprah chit-chats on nothing in particular; 2) Fr. Hollywood takes the place by storm like Jerry Springer in vestments; 3) Fr. Professor reads his homily like a paper given at the Annual Meeting of Professors of Ancient Greek Prepositional Phrases. Any combination of a content mistake and a delivery mistake is deadly. I would argue that there are a few givens to good preaching:

1). Stick to the assigned readings as your basic content. Use the images and language of the readings in your homily.
2). Keep stories, jokes, antecdotes to a minimum and make them directly, painfully obviously relevant. Don't tell a joke just to get a laugh.
3). Ask questions. Give answers. I have a pet peeve about purely rhetorical questions. The answers you give don't have to be blindingly brilliant, but asking a purely hetorical question always sounds slightly dishonest to me. . .if you have the guts to ask the question, answer it. . .even if only tentatively.
4). Preach and teach what the Church preaches and teaches. Why? Well, beyond the simple fact that this is what you promised to do at your ordination, you might find that consistently preaching and teaching the truth of the faith improves your preaching overall! Nowadays, the really radical preachers are the ones who are dissenting from the Received Wisdom of the Dinosaur Left and preach a counter-cultural gospel.
5). Delivery style is highly specific to the preacher, obviously. You must do what you are most comfortable doing. Delivery should be transparent, that is, how you deliver the homily should not be the point. Running around the church, yelling into a microphone, and acting like an idiot will not improve bad content. Good content, however, can be ruined by bad delivery.
6). If, like me, you write your homilies out, write for the ear not the brain. Academic papers are meant to be read silently. You can go back and refer to sentences or paragraphs. Papers are intensely logical, usually linear from Point A to Z in clearly defined steps. Homilies are heard. You need certain rhetorical devices to help the hearer. Most useful here is the repetition and the alliteration. Make a single point and repeat it. When making important points make them in a way that's memorable: alliteration or a lively metaphor.
7). Finally, ask for honest feedback and be prepared to change. Many Catholics see homilies as necessary evils to be endured. Few Catholics come to a parish Mass just to hear the preacher. This is very common among Protestants.

To those who must endure Catholic homilies: your pastor will not improve his preaching as long as he thinks you're happy with what he's doing. Silence = approval.

4). You haven't said anything about Judge Sotomayor. What do you think? Good choice?

Yes and no. Strictly speaking, she is not the most qualified candidate out there. To the degree that B.O. chose her b/c for gender, ethnic, ideological reasons, he's being predictably irresponsible. I don't think she will be the radical leftist that some are predicting. From a purely political standpoint, I would rather have a mediocre liberal on the Court than a brilliant one. B.O. is not going to appoint a constructionist, so I would rather he appointed a dull liberal than a charismatic leftist like Brennan. Her Catholicism seems to be irrelevant. If she's confirmed, she and the other five Catholics might have plenty of opportunities to defend the faith against B.O.'s determined efforts to undermine religious freedom.

5). A lady in my parish told us recently that we are required by the Church to believe in the revelations of Fatima. Is this true?

No, absolutely not. You are required to believe the revelations of scripture as understood and taught by the magisterium of the Church. Private revelations like Fatima, Medujorge, Lourdes, etc. are strictly optional. Church approval of private revelations means nothing more than that the contents of the revelation do not contradict Church teaching.

6). How much should a family give to their parish? Do Catholics tithe?

Always a difficult question! Protestant churches have long advocated tithing, i.e. "giving ten percent." This is definitely biblical and was even traditional in the Catholic Church for centuries. The problem comes when tithing runs up against your duty to your family. Can I really tithe to my parish if it means not paying my utility bill? I would argue that tithing should be done gradually, that is, start with a fixed amount and slowly increase over time until the ten percent is reached. This gradual approach allows you to adjust other expenses to compensate for the ten percent outlay. I found this lots of good info on Catholic tithing here. One related practice that I have argued against is withholding donations to the parish or diocese as a form of protest. This is profoundly anti-Catholic and smacks of the heresy of "Americanism." Attempting to influence parochial or diocesan politics through donation manipulation is simply vile. The parish should be your Christian family. Do you deny your family support? I understand that pastors and bishops often do and say things that upset the faithful, but voting with your pocketbook is not the Catholic way of settling disputes. I know I'm going to get blasted for this. . .oh well.

7). How public should my acts of charity be? How obvious should I make them?

Two principles apply here: 1) our witness should be readily identifable as Christian and 2) our witness should always, always point to God and His holy work. So, ask yourself before undertaking any public work of charity: am I doing this work for the greater glory of God and will the work point others to God? If the point of the work is show the world how holy you are or what a great person you are, don't do it. If the point of the work is to outdo the Baptists and showup the local Hindus, don't do it. If you can do the work in genuine love with your heart open to channeling God's mercy and care into the world, then go for it! Be very careful of what I call "passive-aggressive charity." This is charity work done to show others what needs to be done and how they aren't doing it. I find this sort of thing all the time on the religious left. There's a deep self-righteousness about how the Church is not "doing enough" for X or Y or Z, so I'm going to go put in a token afternoon so I can crow about the Church's deficiency at the next parish council meeting. Yea, whatever.

8). Aren't priests supposed to be kind and caring and not smart-alecks like you?

Hey! Smart-aleck priests can be kind and caring. We just limit ourselves to being kind and caring to once a month so we don't burn out. I get some variation on this question about once a week. It touches on people's expectations about how priests ought to present themselves as priests. I find it highly amusing that the people asking this sort of question seem to think that all priests should be little more than a religiousy version of a social worker or a therapist. Priests are supposed to be open, non-judgmental, good listeners, and above all, welcoming. Now, all of these are perfectly good characteristics for a priest to possess. However, we all know that words don't mean much these days, so each of these characteristics really hides an agenda that most certainly does not describe a good priest. For example, "non-judgmental" really means "don't tell me that I have sinned." "Welcoming" here really means, um, "don't tell me that I have sinned." And, of course, "good listener' really means. . .ermmm. . ."don't tell me that I have sinned." Basically, when I hear that someone thinks I am not being "pastoral enough," I take that to mean that I am telling the truth and someone doesn't want to hear the truth. Since I believe that the truth is always pastoral, I always tell the truth! Admittedly, I sometimes (only very rarely) throw in a little humor, or perhaps a tiny little smart-alecky comment. I must be forgiven! My whole family is a veritable three-ring circus of smart-alecks. . .I come by it honestly.

9). Catholics drink and smoke and cuss. Is that Christian?

I get this question a lot when I go home and hang around my Baptist family and friends. A lot of evangelical Protestants operate on a quasi-puritanical spirituality that sees the body as corrupting. Prohibitions against smoking, drinking, etc. are usually loosely grounded somewhere in scripture, but for the most part these prohibitions arose in the temperance movements of the 18th-19th centuries. Now, there are certainly puritanical elements in Catholic spirituality, but these tend to be exaggerated and often lead to heresy. For Catholics, the rule of thumb is: all things in moderation unless clearly morally prohibited or illegal. A nightly tumbler of bourbon is fine. It becomes a problem when you can't function without it, or when you are ignoring your responsibilities. Spending your last $10 on beer instead of food might be considered immoral. Failing to provide basic necessities for your children in order to play the ponies. . .big problem.

10). My son/daughter wants to go to the University of Dallas. Do you recommend it?

Absolutely! If they have the high schools grades and the SAT scores, they can't do much better than U.D. for a rigorous Catholic lib arts based education. Some have asked me to distinguish Christendom College and U.D., or Steubenville and U.D. I really can't. I know U.D. but not the others. From what I have gathered from U.D. students, they see the primary difference as one of how Catholic culture is taught and lived. While other small Catholic lib arts colleges and universities have strong Catholic identities, some of them tend to expect students to live rather monastic lives, sometimes downright puritanical lives. Strict dress codes, visitation rules, mandatory Mass attendance, etc. There's nothing wrong with any of this, of course. Some students need this level of structure and it should be available to them. U.D. takes a different tack. The Catholic culture at U.D. tends to be very Aristotelian in a healthy, southern, conservative sort of way. IOW, most of what the other schools impose as moral absolutes, U.D. students tend to discern and follow as a matter of right reason and good conscience. Yes, there are rules. And yes, the students bark and snipe at them like students everywhere do. But this isn't the distinguishing feature of U.D. What makes U.D. standout is the hardcore, kick-butt, take no prisoners academic atmosphere. If your son/daughter is not prepared to work like a cheap mule on a canyon tour, they need to apply somewhere else. The core curriculum is based on the literature, philosophy, theology of classical western culture (Homer, Virgil, Dante, Milton, Augustine, Aquinas, etc.). They will write, write, write. And they will study like they have never studied before. In the first semester, they will see their heads grow by an average of 3%. U.D. students tend to be brilliant, funny, well-mannered, intellectually curious, a tad bit geeky, and highly talented in the creative arts. Most are Catholic, some not. There are non-Catholic Christians on the faculty and non-Christians. And there's a healthy percentage of Virtuous Pagans around too. Everyone--regardless of religious belief--believes in the value of the Core. If your child is looking for a college version of a CCD class, they will need to look elsewhere. U.D. faculty teach the western tradition--warts and all--and eagerly locate the Catholic faith within that tradition--warts and all. This does not mean that faculty dissent from Church teaching or rabble-rouse against the Holy Father. Hardly! It means that students do not get the sanitized P.R. version of Church history or philosophy or theology. They get the Truth as it is best known in the western tradition.

I love teaching at U.D.! (NB. I think they should hire me permanently. I mean, they would get a literature Ph.D. and philosophy Ph.D., a Dominican priest, a decent preacher, and an all-around swell guy! And the being smart-aleck only helps at U.D.)

Burdened to breaking by truth? (UPDATED)

Pentecost Sunday: Acts 2.1-11; 1 Cor 12.3-13; John 15.26-27, 16.12-15
Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP
Convento SS Domenico e Sisto, Roma

How much truth can we bear? How much before we break? Before the scale tips from ecstasy to madness, from joy to hysteria? If you read sci-fi/fantasy novels, you know that one of the constants of these fictional worlds is the notion that there is a truth, a body of knowledge, an arcane stock of wisdom that only a few can access, that only the truly gifted can call upon when necessary. There is always a price to be paid for knowing more than one ought to and for knowing anything at all about what one should not know. The price is sometimes physical, sometimes mental; sometimes the price is paid with one’s humanity. With one’s life. And the sacrifice is not always triumphant. Sometimes knowing more only leads to more confusion, additional puzzles, greater obstacles. How much truth is too much? When does “bearing up under” the truth become a burden worthy of a cross?

To his friends and students, Jesus promises to send an Advocate, the Holy Spirit who will comfort them in their trials and give them a sure defense against malicious persecution. Because his friends and students have been with him from the beginning, he says that they will testify to the truth of his gospel and that the Advocate will testify along with them. Then Jesus says something rather odd; he says, “I have much more to tell you, but you cannot bear it now.” Is Jesus playing Arcane Master here? Occult Guru? Gnostic Wise Man? What truth does he have to tell that the disciples cannot bear? True, the disciples have shown themselves to be less than stellar pupils at times. And true, they have fussed and fumed about petty marks of dignity among themselves. And we know that when the Judas’ plan comes to fruition in the Garden, these best-buds will run squealing into the night. But what truth, what “much more to tell” will break the disciples?

Just after this odd admission that the disciples aren’t ready for the fullness of truth, Jesus adds, “But when he comes, the Spirit of truth, he will guide you to all truth.” Ah, so maybe the issue here is not that the disciples are incapable of bearing under the truth, it’s just that now is not the time to pile on the truth? The disciples are at a fragile stage, or maybe they aren’t spiritually ready to hear all that Jesus has to reveal at the moment. Possibly. But this still presumes that what remains unrevealed is heavier than what a disciple of the Lord can bear. And we are still left with what this great burden is. Details of Jesus’ trial and execution? A prophecy about future persecutions of the apostles? Some apocalyptic end-time scenario? No. When the Spirit comes, he will guide you to all truth. The Spirit has come. What was revealed?

(Imagine a chilly spring night in Jerusalem, the dark is almost total, only a few stars blink at the earth. From the horizon on the east blazes a meteor, a fist of fiery spirit, a knot of tightly bound love, streaking with undeterred purpose toward the upper room. At the moment of deepest despair, greatest regret, the most intense impatience for the disciples, the meteor smashes into the room and explodes in a thunderous clap, piercing the bodies and souls of the men and women in the room, whipping their spirits clean, sending them all into an ecstasy that overwhelms thought, speech, spirit, motion, and leaves them, each one, ablaze like a star stuttering to its full brilliance…).

The Catechism teaches, “On the day of Pentecost, the Spirit of the Promise was poured out on the disciples […] The Spirit who teaches the Church and recalls for her everything that Jesus said was also to form her in the life of prayer” (n. 2623). Perhaps more than any other day of the Church calendar, Pentecost marks our longest distance from fear. Easter comes close. But Pentecost brings us into direct contact with the questions: what do I fear as a follower of Christ? What prison have I locked myself in? What darkness have I protected from the cleansing fire of the Holy Spirit? Pentecost raises these questions for us precisely because it is the coming of the Holy Spirit on Pentecost that gives birth and rebirth to the Church, the Body of Christ on earth. At the most intense moment of persecution, on the cusp of the Church’s birth, the disciples are ruled by terror, steeped in dread. The Holy Spirit explodes in their midst…and everything is changed forever.

They have locked themselves away in fear and by fear they are ruled. The walls of their chosen prison give them comfort. They know where they are, who they are; they know who is outside, and who it is that hunts them and why. To the temple priesthood, they are heretics. To the Roman governor, they are rebels. They have offended God in His sanctuary and Caesar in his court; they are hiding from the clergy of an ancient religious tradition and from the foot soldiers of the world’s only military superpower. They are menaced soul and body.

From within their self-imposed prison—the easy safety of walls and familiar company—the beloved of the crucified Lord tremble in terror, waiting on the wrath of God’s priests and the punishments of Caesar’s troops. Some of them may have remembered a promise Jesus made before his death. And though it has been some several weeks since he died in the garbage dump outside Jerusalem, that promise comes back in a whispered memory, just a hint of hope sprinkled in among the fear and desperation of those who keep themselves prisoner. If they gird themselves, put their eyes to heaven, and remember! They will remember: “When the Advocate comes whom I will send you from the Father, the Spirit of truth that proceeds from the Father, he will testify to me.” When the Advocate, the Spirit of Truth, comes…he will testify to the truth as the Truth. There is nothing to fear in the truth though for now the whole truth may burden you. Turn the key of your cell door and walk away to freedom. Your wait is over. Walk away from fear and toward the Truth—away from loss, toward everlasting gain! What fear guards your cell door? What terror keeps that door locked?

Into the locked room where the disciples hid, the Holy Spirit, like a furious bonfire—ripping through fear and doubt, burning away indecision, cowardice, spiritual torpor, putting to the sacred torch of truth any and all motivation for hesitancy, complacency, and double-mindedness—the Holy Spirit roared in among them, setting to each a flame that unstuck their tongues, that unlocked their imprisoned hearts, and set them free! Is this the heritage of the Spirit that we lay claim to? Are we heirs to this strength, this purpose? They spill into the street, preaching God’s truth in every tongue. Where is their fear? Where is their hesitancy? Their reluctance? They are abandoned in truth and wholly given over to Him! And because of their fervor, their dedication and exuberance, and because they spoke the Word so plainly and without embarrassment, they were killed. Not all of them. But some of them. Those gone so far in the Spirit that nothing of this world was left in them to threaten.

Is this the burden that Jesus did not want to load onto the disciples too early? Is this the truth that he feared might break them? The coming of the Spirit sparked the glory of the Church in the upper room, giving birth to the Body of Christ as the engine of spirited grace in the world. Set ablaze in holy love, the disciples flee into the streets, spreading God’s holy fire everywhere they run, seeding tinder-dried hearts with embers ready to burst into flame. They are contagious. From heart to heart, from mind to mind, they spread out and plant the Word, scattering seed, rowing up fields for the Church! But does “bearing up under” this truth of the gospel, the work of evangelization, does it become a burden for us, a burden worthy of a cross? Yes, it does.

Inevitably, the truth of the gospel will clash with the lies of the world. At first, the world will draw back in astonished amusement, mildly shocked that someone, anyone would challenge its power. Then, when mockery fails to diminish the fervor with which the Church preaches the truth, the world will react with increasing anger and violence. And, like the early persecutions of the Church by the Empire, the Church will be cast as an enemy of the state, a threat to moral freedom, and a tumor on the body of good order. As an intolerant cult that refuses to honor the diversity and difference that makes modern culture so wonderful, we will be found guilty of refusing worship to the postmodern gods of elitist ideology and labeled “domestic terrorists.”

We are charged by the Holy Spirit to finish telling the truth of the gospel. If that truth burdens us to breaking, then we break burdened by the gospel truth: “If we live in the Spirit, let us also follow the Spirit.” And, if necessary, we die preaching the Spirit.

Friday's Coffee Bowl Browsing!

Why do we continue to pathologize the Human Condition?

I'm sad that he is leaving, but at least he's not hanging around whining about celibacy

Roman Catholic "priestess"/reporter dragged kicking and screaming from Barry's sacred view

Supreme Court nominee's life story is not all that compelling. . .he's conservative, after all

Catholic colleges and universities that honored pro-aborts

Ah, the smell of regret in the morning! Kool-aid drinker wakes up. . .too late.

I'm gonna get in trouble for this one: maybe, just maybe this isn't such a bad idea? (ducks)

Cleaning the ecclesial house in Africa: Vatican removes morally lax archbishop

I need one of these for those folks who don't leave their cell phones in the car at Mass!

Fascinating list of people who were killed by their inventions

Rx drugs in our drinking water. . .hey, that stuff doesn't show up in good bourbons

At this point in the flight I would need to be restrained

Elvis leaps babies in a single bound! (Don't try this at home)

Lots more quotes about religion. . .quotes about feminism (most of which are true)

What is space? Are we free? Does God exist? Are numbers real? Ask a philosopher!

Movies reviews from a Catholic perspective

In case of veliocraptor attack. . .vital info here

Your presence reminds one of a blind jackal, eternally dependent upon misguided archbishops to provide instruction in bowling.

Recession/Obama timeline. . .scary.

Theologians doing what Judges do?

In a post below I suggest that judges often do what theologians do when they arrive at legal judgments by applying principle to specific issues within a given set of precedents.

Ed Whelan at NRO offers this run down of Judge Sonia Sotomayor's judical philosophy, quoting her with his own emendations:

Sotomayor argues, “It is our responsibility”—the responsibility of lawyers and judges—“to explain to the public how an often unpredictable system of justice is one that serves a productive, civilized, but always evolving, society.” She identifies—and treats as equally legitimate—four “reasons for the law’s unpredictability”: (a) “laws are written generally and then applied to different factual situations”; (b) “many laws as written give rise to more than one interpretation”; (c) “a given judge (or judges) may develop a novel approach to a specific set of facts or legal framework that pushes the law in a new direction”; and (d) the purpose of a trial is not simply to search for the truth but to do so in a way that protects constitutional rights.

Let's make some changes and see how this might apply to theology:

The theologian argues, “It is our responsibility”—the responsibility of theologians—“to explain to the faithful how an often unpredictable system of thinking about revelation is one that serves a productive, civilized, but always evolving, Church.” The theologian identifies—and treats as equally legitimate—four “reasons for theology's unpredictability”: (a) “revelation is written generally and then applied by theologians to different factual situations”; (b) “many revelations as written give rise to more than one interpretation”; (c) “a given theologian may develop a novel approach to a specific set of facts or interpretative framework that pushes revelation in a new direction”; and (d) the purpose of theological thinking is not simply to search for the truth but to do so in a way that protects fundamental revelation.

This is not entirely wrong, I think. Judges use the Constitution as their "revelation." Theologians use scripture, creation, and the unique revelation of Christ as theirs. Judges produce "ways of thinking about the Constitution" that become binding on lower courts. Theologians have the magisterium. Judges have to apply not only the law but the higher court's reasoning to specific cases. Theologians do the same thing when they apply magisterial interpretation to both settled and novel facts in order to reach the right conclusions.

My only worry here--for both the law and for theology--is the notion of the "novel approach." We've seen the disastrous results of this play out in both the courts and the Church. However, Thomas' use of Aristotle was quite novel and very controversial when he started teaching at the University of Paris. His approach directly challenged and upset the long-settled neo-Platonism of the academy. In fact, his approach was roundly condemned by Church authorities and his academic colleagues. Of course, Thomas' approach never led him to deny any of the truths of revelation nor did he challenge the authority of the Church to teach the faith conclusively.

Perhaps the lesson here is that novel approaches to researching, developing, and teaching the truth of the Constitution/revelation are fine so long as they do not pretend to be the Constitution/revelation itself. There's a big difference between what is revealed and how it is understood. For theologians, revelation is closed. Our understanding of what has been revealed continues to develop because we are limited creatures grasping at divine truth. I'm not sure the same applies to the judges and the Constitution.

The Man Library

Pertinent to my post below on bringing virtue back in order to save our young men from the feministization of postmodern culture. . .I give you The Man Library!

This is a list of literary works that extol "manliness" in all its glory. . .

I would quibble with a few of the selections, but it's an interesting list nonetheless.

St Philip Neri

For your reading pleasure. . .

A cornucopia of St Philip Neri info:

St Philip Romolo Neri

EWTN: Philip Neri

Patron Saint Index with lots of links

Saint of the Day: Philip Neri, saint and joker

The Toronto Oratory

The London Oratory, Brompton

At Catholic Fire: Philip Neri, humorous saint

. . .and the Chiesa Nuova, Philip Neri's church in Rome. Only in Rome can you call a 17th century church a "new church"! Philip is buried in a side chapel there. I've visited frequently, asking for a better sense of humor for dealing with the enemies of the Church.

And today is my 45th birthday. My mother denies it, refusing to believe that she has a 45 year old son!

I am often asked why a Dominican would choose "Philip Neri" as his religious name. I wish there were some mystical, mysterious story to tell. There isn't. When I was going through RCIA, my pastor urged us all to take confirmation names. He suggested that we look at the saints honored on our birthdays for inspiration. He reasoned that picking a name from a saint celebrated on our birthday would help us to remember to imitate that saint. I picked "Philip Neri" for no other reason than that May 26th is his feast day. When I joined the Order, we were told we could use a religious name. One of the brothers asked me my confirmation name and suggested that I make it my religious name. With just a little research into Philip Neri's life, I found quite a lot I wanted to imitate!

Philip knew many of the great Dominicans of his day. He was a renowned preacher and confessor. He worked tirelessly among the spiritually defeated youths of Rome. He was a practical joker and an outrageous spiritual director. When he died, an autopsy revealed that his heart had grown too big for this body. An apt description of this saint of Christ's joy! Philip was canonized along with Theresa of Avila and Ignatius of Loyola.