Retreat report

Beautiful day yesterday in NOLA area!  Sunny, cool.  

The retreat with the Mt Carmel Academy faculty was a lot of fun.  Good food, good company, great facilities--Solomon Retreat Center in Robert, LA.  No one threw a book at me, so my part of the gig was (at least) not offensive, or not offensive enough to throw a book.

We covered:  reasons for the new translation, the Mass parts, nature of the homily, theology of offering and sacrifice. . .lots of fun.

Yesterday was the first time I've been across the Pontchartrain Bridge since I was about 11 y.o.  My family moved from Belle Chase to Slidell, and I vaguely remember us driving over the bridge.  It's not as scary some 35 yrs. later.

Off today!  See y'all tomorrow.

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Retreat Day

Headed across The Lake this morning to give a retreat to the faculty of Mt. Carmel Academy.

We'll be reading/discussing the Mass. . .line by line.  My fav retreat topic!

Fr. Philip, OP
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Coffee Cup Browsing

Welfare State + Contraception = Demographic/Financial Collapse. . ."Surely, this is the ultimate expression of the suicide cult that is the modern Left. . ."

EU Court:  same-sex "marriage" is not a right; however, if SSM is legalized, churches must comply. 

Like teenie-boppers squealing for the Beatles, EU Nannies welcomed the 2008 election results.  Now, not so much.  I believe the appropriate term is "Rubes."

Jesuit owned America Magazine once again beclowns itself by attacking the bishops' support for religious liberty.  Wonder what they will spend their 30 pieces of silver on?

A predictably dismissive NPR piece on last Friday's Religious Freedom Rally.  NB.  the use of polling to minimize Christian concerns and condescending labels for participants.


Atheists rally in D.C. to show support for non-religious liberty.  Good for them.  The Constitutional right to practice one's religion includes the right to practice no religion at all.  Now, will these folks stand up for our rights when the time comes?  The rational ones will.  Dawkins?  Not so much.
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No Cross, no Throne. . .

NB.  I wrote this homily three years ago while living in Rome.  Since the community Mass on Sunday in the convent was celebrated in Italian, I never got to preach it.  So, I thought I'd give it a hearing this weekend.

Fifth Sunday of Lent (2012)
Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP
St. Dominic Church, NOLA

Jesus is troubled. What should he say? “Father, save me from this hour” or “Father, glorify your name”? He chooses to glorify God’s name. Why? He says, “…it was for this purpose [to glorify God’s name] that I came to this hour.” By glorifying God’s name he fulfills his purpose. Does this glorification of God’s name accomplish any vital tasks other than praising the Father? Yes. Jesus says to the crowd at that time of judgment, “. . .the ruler of this world will be driven out. And when I am lifted up from the earth, I will draw everyone to myself." What Jesus says and does is the mechanism of our salvation; his word and deed makes us sons of the Father. What does he say? “Father, glorify your name.” What does he do? He dies. And then he rises from death to take us with him. So, why is Jesus troubled? To rise with him, we must die with him and our deaths must be in service to him. We cannot hope to escape the betrayal of Judas, the passion in Jerusalem, the nails and wood of the cross, and then expect to be part of a glorious Easter harvest. If we will follow Jesus up from the earth, we must follow him on the earth. This is what troubles our Lord: “. . .unless a grain of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains just a grain of wheat; but if it dies, it produces much fruit.” To rise, we must fall; to produce much fruit, we must die.

So, are you ready to die? I mean, are you ready to follow Christ and produce the fruit he produced by dying on the cross? Most of us hope to avoid the kind of death that Christ died. And most of us will. At least in the particulars. Few of us will be scourged. Or force-marched to a burning landfill and nailed to a cross. Few of us will be subjected to public ridicule and executed to spare the nation the wrath of its foreign military governors. Few of us will be accused of blasphemy, religious sedition. If we are killed for the faith, it will be incrementally. Slowly. Almost invisibly. The proverbial frog boiled by degrees of increasing heat. The Enemy’s strategy this time around is far more subtle. More understated and restrained. This time we will be accused of hating ourselves, our neighbors, and our God; we will be accused of standing against truths the science and progress, against the beauty of Mother Earth, against the innate goodness of our human nature. This time, we will be charged with being inhumane, intolerant, uncompromising, divisive, and ignorant. And like all the other times, we will die. . .for preaching the simple truth of the gospel.

God’s will be done; therefore, we are troubled. So, what do we say: “Father, save us from this hour” or “Father, glorify your name”? We could ask our Lord to save us from this hour. We could. But why should we? Can we honestly claim we didn’t know what was in store for us? Can we look God in the eye and say, “Hey, this wasn’t in the brochure!”? “No one every said anything about suffering for the faith!” No, that would be a lie. If you know what it means to be baptized into his death, then you know what it means to be resurrected into his life. If you will rise, you will die. Why would you beg God to save you from the very thing you signed on for? Yes, we were promised a garden. . .and we will have it! Look for the path marked “Gethsemane.” Ask yourself: why do I deserve a better life and death than Christ? You might say, “Didn’t Christ die so we wouldn’t have to?” No, he didn't. No, he died so that we might have eternal life and have it most abundantly! That path—the Way to an abundant life, an eternal life—cuts straight up and through Gethsemane. And there is no escalator, no detour.

No detour, for sure. But there is hope; and here it is: “…when I am lifted up from the earth, I will draw everyone to myself." Though we may understandably fear the death we have signed up for, part and parcel of that death is the promise—the guarantee—the death is not the end; that is, death is not our end, our purpose. We were not created to die. We do not live to die. Though our bodies fail us, and we cease to live, we do not stop being exactly who God made and remade us to Be. In fact, in Christ, we are made perfectly who were first made to be. And only in Christ—perfect God, perfect Man—can we be perfectly who we are made to be for all time. When Christ dies on the cross, humanity dies with him. When Christ rises from the tomb—dead for three days, three nights—humanity rises with him. If you and I will be among those who rise with Christ, we must be among those who die with Christ. As Christ himself teaches us: “Whoever serves me must follow me, and where I am, there also will my servant be.” If you read any detours in that sentence, you might need to get your eyes checked.

Whose path do you follow? Where are you on that path? Which Way do you go? You, like every man and woman ever created, will be offered, at some point, a bag of thirty silver coins. The Powers of this world want one thing for this price: a simple, easy accommodation, a compromise; an answer from one who has chosen to follow the Way of Truth and Life—“So that the many may avoid persecution or pain or inconvenience or anxiety, tell us what we want to hear; tell us that this Christ is a fraud, a myth; tell us that his good news is simply one message among many equally valuable spiritual options; tell us that we do not have to suffer the Cross and die in order to rise again; tell us that we can make our own lifestyles choices and still have eternal! Tell us, Christian, that God loves us just the way we are and doesn't want us to change.” At this moment, staring down at thirty pieces of silver, who are you? Where are you and where do you hope to end?

Before you answer. . .before you commit. . .hear again: “[Jesus] learned obedience from what he suffered; and when he was made perfect, he became the source of eternal salvation for all who obey him.” If you will learn, if we will be saved. . .we will first suffer—maybe physically, maybe emotionally, maybe socially or spiritually. But we will suffer, and when we suffer for the sake of Christ's name, we obey his commandment to love. He loved us all the way through his Passion, all the way through the garbage of Gehenna, and on to the Cross. Like Christ, to rise, we must fall; to produce much fruit, we must first die.

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The Nawlins' Rally for Religious Freedom

The thunderstorms that rolled through Nawlins' on Thursday night fled Friday morning at the sight of about 300-350 religious believers (mostly Catholics) meeting in front of the Federal Building on Camp St.  

We had our signs.

We had petitions.

We had priests, religious, seminarians, lots of Pro-Life lay folks.

We had moms with babies.  Teens, dads, grandma's and grandpa's.

We had a large group of students from a couple of Catholic schools.

We even had one of the original framers of the Constitution give us a short history lesson!

Most of the people driving by honked horns and gave us the Thumbs Up.  A few shouted obscenities.

As expected, no media.  

Yours truly flubbed his own admonition to take pics.  I'd let the battery die.  After I got home, I remembered that my fancy-pantsy phone can take pics.  Oy. Poet-theologians are not tech-savvy.

When we left the rally, the group was praying the rosary.  

How did the rally turn out in your neck of the woods?

Update:  The Anchoress has some pics from all over, including links to more pics.  Doing the job the media won't do.
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Media Watch

The MSM will send two dozen reporters and cameramen to cover the adolescent antics of four OccuTards in Peoria. . .but they completely ignore 300,000 Pro-Life marchers in B.O. backyard.

I expect today's Stand Up Rally for Religious Freedom will either be ignored completely or portrayed as some sort of clergy led astroturf against the administration.  

Let's keep a watch on the MSM!  Take pics, vids during the rallies, and watch your local news and papers.  When they pull their usual deceptive nonsense, call them on it immediately.  We already know most "journalists" are little more than pipelines from the White House to the public.  Don't let them get away with any anti-religious

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Get caught being Catholic in public!!!

Get caught being Catholic in public!!!

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On being a small but brighter light

4th Week of Lent (Th)
Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP
St. Dominic Church, NOLA

We are all children of the Enlightenment; that is, we were all raised on a daily diet of rational skepticism, the need for scientific proof, and a general suspicion of the supernatural. Add to this mix a uniquely American pragmatism and common good sense, and you have a model for the modern person who strives in live in the real world of things. However, like most children, we've taken bits and pieces of our upbringing and incorporated our own experiences into a worldview that seems coherent to us. Since we are believers, we have rejected the idea that there is no supernatural realm. We've accepted the existence of God; the reality of angels and their fallen kin; the destructive consequences of sin and the free availability of freedom from sin. Though few of us would claim to fully understand how the supernatural world works, most, if not all, of us would agree that there is something like a world beyond the physical world. How did we come to this conclusion? Evidence? Wishful thinking? Just a gamble? Maybe a little of each? If we follow Christ, we do so by choice. We made a decision to believe, a decision to trust the promises of God and to follow His Christ. Evidence plays a supporting role and reason helps us to understand, but ultimately, we choose. We choose to believe the witness of faithful generations.

Jesus confronts his accusers with a radical assertion: I am the Son of God. He shocks the Jews to their religious core by claiming to have the authority to pass judgment on sins, to forgive those sins, and heal the sinner. In effect, he is claiming to be God Himself. So why does he say, “If I testify on my own behalf, my testimony is not true”? First, let's understand what he is saying. He means, “When I testify for myself, you do not believe me.” He's not saying that his self-witness is false, only that his testimony is not heard as the truth by those who will not to believe. Augustine says it perfectly, “For He knew well that His Own witness of Himself was true; but for the sake of the weak, and hard of belief, and [those] without understanding, the Sun looked out for lamps. For their weakness of sight could not bear the dazzling brightness of the Sun.” The sun, our brightest star, looked for lamps. The Son of God looked for smaller lights to reflect his brightness so that those blinded by the brilliance of his witness could see him for who he really is. 

The Church—for 2,000 yrs—has been and continues to be a global collection of those smaller lights, each reflecting a sliver of Christ's light, each shining out a glimpse of his true glory. The accumulated light of 50 generations, 20 centuries, with each new generation adding to the brightness of our corporate witness, this gathered light tells the true but as yet imperfect story of our collective labors toward bearing a final witness to Christ's triumph over death. Evidence supports our claim that the Church is one, holy, catholic, and apostolic, even if individual lights in the Church fail at being one or all of the above. Reason—as a divine gift oriented toward the Gift-giver—supports our incomplete understanding of God's complete Self-revelation. But evidence and reason alone do not constitute faith. Reason and evidence do not suffice as truthful testimony. We choose to trust; we choose to love; we choose to hope. And when we choose to trust, love, and hope, our smaller light is added to the global witness, making the Church's testimony to the glory of God's mercy all the brighter. We can choose to brighten the light of our witness, or we can choose to darken it. Join the faithful generations in bearing witness to the saving power of Christ!

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Coffee Cup Browsing

His frustration with the bishops is understandable. . .but his rhetoric and understanding of canon law are deeply flawed.  

Boys castrated in Dutch Catholic psych wards in the '50's.  This sounds like the sort of thing that trendy scientific "thinkers" of the progressive-wing would do.  Orthodox Catholics know better.

Update:  Yup.  Turns out that those castrating shrinks in the Netherlands were just "following orders" from the All Benevolent State, specifically a mandate to castrate sex offenders.  

Occu-Idiots:  No Chores Strike on May 1st.  Looking at the recent pics of Occupy herding, I'd say not one of them as ever done a chore.  Much less held a real job.

Wow. . .yet another 9-0 Supreme Court Smackdown for B.O.  Maybe appointing all those political hacks to the ranks of the DOJ is turning out to be a really bad idea, uh?

Only the minds of a public service union could come up with something this twisted.

Decades of socialist dreaming and cradle to grave welfare have destroyed Italy's future.

Outrageous salaries for archdiocesan bureaucrats. 

What is going on in China?  Tanks in the street, a reported military coup in Shanghai, ousters of Party officials. 
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Jesus is not equal to God

4th Week of Lent (W)
Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP
St. Dominic Church, NOLA

Jesus heals a crippled man at the Pool of Bethesda, ordering him, “Rise, take up your mat, and walk.” The Jews who persecute the Lord accuse him of breaking the Sabbath Law. When Jesus hears these accusations, he answers them, “Amen, amen, I say to you, the Son cannot do anything on his own, but only what he sees the Father doing; for what he does, the Son will do also.” This is Jesus' answer to persecutors' question, but what is the question? What do the accusing Jews ask of Jesus? Implied in the accusation is the question: just who do you think you are. . .healing on the Sabbath, forgiving sins, and ordering others to break the Law?” Jesus answers, “My Father is at work until now, so I am at work.” This answer only adds to the fury of his accusers “because he not only broke the sabbath but he also called God his own father, making himself equal to God.” The sheer audacity of Jesus' claim to be the Son of God is breathtaking b/c no creature can ever be divine, no mere mortal can embody the glory of the Creator. Breaking the Sabbath Law is crime enough to warrant severe punishment, but to claim divine sonship is beyond the pale, beyond anything these religious folk have ever heard. It violates the First Commandment of the Ten. Of course, as Jesus makes abundantly clear, he is no creature; he is no mere mortal.

Had Jesus' persecutors fully understood what he is claiming about himself, they would've been really, really upset. According to John's Gospel, the accusers charge Jesus with the heresy of proclaiming himself “equal to God.” Jesus does no such thing. He never claims to be equal to God. He claims to be God Himself. Does this seem like a distinction w/o a difference to you? Well, let me ask you: two nickels equal a dime, right? But would you say that those two nickels are the same as one dime? How many of you would say, “I am equal to myself”? Americans claim that men and women are equal, but we do not claim that they are the same. Being equal to someone is not the same as being identical. We can be “equal under the law” while being very different in every other way. The claim that Jesus is making about his person, his mission, and his ultimate destination are all bound together in who he is as the Son of God made flesh. When he acts, speaks, and thinks, we witness the acts, speech, and thoughts of God. It took us a few centuries to wrestle this insight out of revelation, and it matters a great deal that we guard it well. 

Why does it matter how we think about the identity of Christ? We need to get this bit of theology right b/c we place so much of the weight of the faith on the person on Christ. We claim to follow Christ. To do and say all that he did and said. This means following him all the way to the Cross, into death, and on to the resurrection. Imagine how different our understanding of salvation would be if we had concluded (wrongly) some 1,800 yrs. ago that Jesus was just a man with a really deep insight into the divine. He died a criminal and so would we. He didn't rise from the tomb and neither will we. Our whole faith would be limited to being nice to one another, doing a few good works, and sharing a communal meal once a week. Is that worth dying for? Would you give your life to imitate an executed 1st century Jewish heretic? Instead we have this, “. . .whoever hears my word and believes in the one who sent me has eternal life and will not come to condemnation, but has passed from death to life.” That, brothers and sisters, is why any of this matters.

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It's not about your feelings. . .it's about the Truth!

The Soft Tyranny of Sentimentalism

Elizabeth Scalia

If 20th-century atheism rode in on the backs of totalitarian regimes, the 21st-century has delivered unto the world an anti-God, anti-Church movement that fits seamlessly into shallow, postmodern popular culture. Having no need for uprisings and the hardware of destruction, the new fog of faith has crept in on the little cat feet of Sentimentalism and it now sits on its haunches, surveying its splendidly wrought sanctimony.

Sentimentalism is the force of feel-goodism, the means by which we may cast off the conventions of faith and casually dismiss those institutions that refuse to submit to the trending times and morals. The Sentimentalist trusts his feelings over hallowed authority or the urgings of his reason, frequently answering hard religious questions with some noble-sounding phrase like "The God I believe in wouldn't . . . " (fill in the blank). What fits in that blank is typically some tenet of traditional faith that isn't currently fashionable, some moral demand that pop culture considers impossible—and hence, not worth even trying. Thus the Sentimentalist, while believing he follows the inviolate voice of his conscience, is really sniffing after trends, forming his heart according to the sensus fidelium of middlebrow magazines and public radio.

A Sentimentalist cannot reconcile religious convictions—whether rooted in scripture, tradition, or cultural practice—that do not correspond with his own considered feelings, which for him are both weighty and principled. Convinced that the people he loves cannot possibly be denied anything they want by a just God, or that the same just God would not permit deformities, illness, war, childhood abuse, or any of the human sufferings common to us all, he will not participate in a Church so fault-riddled and out-of-step with a generous and enlightened generation as . . . his own.

[. . .]

Sentimentalism nearly reigned supreme in the priestly formation programs of the 70's and 80's, thus producing a generation of pastors who casually dismiss Church teaching in favor of "following one's heart."  This Disneyesque approach to caring for God's children has inevitably bequeathed to us a generation or two of Catholics so sensitive, so imperiled by reason, authority, and tradition that the merest suggestion that Behavior X might be a sin or self-destructive is met with poo-poo's and derisive giggles.  

How often have you heard/read the phrases "out of step with the culture" or "throwback to pre-Vatican Two" or "turning back the clock on reform"?  All of these should be a loud, glaring warning that the speaker/writer is shoveling postmodern dung and calling it Something New.  The whole "Spirit of Vatican Two" project has been a long, disastrous experiment in global sentimentalism and, thankfully, the biological clock tracking this failed agenda is winding down. 

Unfortunately, it will take two generations to completely purge the ectoplasm of the "Spirit" and re-catechize Catholics in the truth of the faith.

Read the whole thing. . .it is WELL worth your time.
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NPR calls BXVI "a famous gay icon"

NPR game show host makes a series of offensive Pope BXVI jokes.  

Your tax dollars at work, folks!  Read the transcript and then contact NPR and let them know what you think. 

You might also consider contacting your Senators and Congressman to suggest that there are better ways to spend your taxes than paying some smug lefty to offend the Pope on public radio.

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Flaming clowning and a little dog too. . .

I'm a big fan of smelling good!  My cologne collection is very modest but stocked with reasonably high quality scents.  Below is a commercial for AXE Body Spray.  Never smelled the stuff. . .and don't plan to.  But the ad is pretty funny.

Got a laugh out of the flaming clown and the little dog.  :-)
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By the numbers: Fat Report and Page Views

Hmmmmm. . .looks like I gained four pounds.  This doesn't sound right.  I've gone down a notch on my habit belt.  Maybe the last weigh-in was a fluke.  Oh well.

Happier number:   1,003,833.   That's the number of page views for HancAquam since Feb. of 2006.  HA averages 557 page views a day. 

Thanks for reading!

Fr. Philip

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The original cell of social life

Solemnity of St. Joseph
Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP
St. Dominic Church, NOLA

If you ask a Catholic pastor how many members he has in his parish, he will say something like, “Oh, about 800 families.” Or 1,000 families, or 2,000 families. The number isn't as important here as the unit of measurement: families. Not individuals but families. Even if a household consists of one individual, it's counted as a family. This may seem odd until you read what the Catechism says about the family, “The family is the original cell of social life”(no. 2207). The most basic unit of our lives together as Christians is not the individual Christian but the Christian embedded in his/her family life. Given this, we can say that the parish then is a family of local families. The diocese is the family of all parochial families, and the Universal Church is the family of all the diocesan families. What is the Universal Church? The Church is the heir to God's promise made to “Abraham and his descendants that he would inherit the world, [not through the law] but through the righteousness that comes from faith.” When we believe on the name of Jesus, we are adopted into the family of God, becoming brothers and sisters to Christ, and co-heirs to the Kingdom. This means that Joseph, husband to Mary and adopted father of Jesus, is the our father in the Church. He is the Pillar of the Family, the Christian model for honoring God as our heavenly Father.

What little we know about Joseph comes from the gospel accounts of his betrothal to the virgin, Mary. Matthew tells us that he was “a righteous man,” a man consistent in his duties to God, following the Law, and keeping closely to the covenant. His personal integrity is demonstrated by the fact that he was unwilling to expose his wife to shame when she became pregnant before their period of betrothal had ended. Having decided to divorce her quietly, an angel came to him in a dream and told him that Mary's child was a gift from the Holy Spirit and that he (Joseph) should take them in and name the child, Emmanuel, “God is with us.” Matthew reports, “. . .[Joseph] did as the angel of the Lord had commanded him. . .” It is precisely Joseph's obedience to the Lord, his unwavering faith in the promises of God that forms the foundation of the Christian family, the original living cell of the Church. Had Joseph stubbornly followed the letter of the Law, Mary might have been a single mother raising a son without a father in the home.*

A recent study in England revealed that 2/3 of failed families there were fatherless. Most households below the poverty line in the U.S. are headed by single mothers and most of the young men serving prison terms in the U.S. were raised w/o a father in their lives. Now, there's nothing magical about having a man living with the family. Fathers can be abusive; a drain on the family finances rather than a help; and a bad example of fidelity to the vows of marriage. But a father who is faithful to God, faithful to his vows, and faithful to his children is a blessing beyond measure. The Catechism notes that “authority, stability, and a life of relationships within the family constitute the foundations for freedom, security, and fraternity within society” (no. 2207). If the original cell of social life, the family, is infected with selfishness, infidelity, uncontrolled addictions, and violence, then society at large is in danger of dying. The cure for these infections is to be found in the holy example of St. Joseph. A selfless life lived with sacrificial love in the service of one's family motivated by an unwavering faith in God. Joseph obeyed the Lord and his family flourishes still 2,000 years later!

* It has become expedient in recent years for Catholics of a particular political bent to claim that Mary was an "unwed mother."  This is patently false.  Mary was betrothed to Joseph.  If this were not so, how could he consider divorcing her?  Another politically expedient myth about Joseph and Mary is that the members of the Holy Family were "illegal immigrants."  This is also patently false.  If they were "illegals," why were they traveling to Jerusalem to participate in the Roman census? 

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Another B.O. blow to our religious liberty

From the NYT:

WASHINGTON — The Obama administration took another step on Friday to enforce a federal mandate for health insurance coverage of contraceptives, announcing how the new requirement would apply to the many Roman Catholic hospitals, universities and social service agencies that insure themselves [. . .]

Some otherwise solid Catholics are claiming that this mandate is not a violation of religious liberty.  I can't follow the logic of their twisted arguments.  If you pay for it, you're complicit. 

What I do know is that progressive social engineering by our Self Anointed Betters is indeed progressive, or rather it is incremental.  If the mandate stands, other mandates will follow until the only thing we're allowed to practice is our choir voices and maybe the occasional baptism. . .using FDA approved luke-warm, organic bottled water, of course.  

That's what B.O.'s whole freedom of worship rhetoric is about--the exclusion of religious voices from the public square. Keep your religion confined to the church. Our Constitution categorically restrains any governmental intrusion in our faith lives, guaranteeing our freedom of religion and not only our freedom to worship as we see fit.

STAND UP for our religious liberty on March 23rd!  And do not buy the lie that this battle is about women's health, contraception, or the right to privacy.  That's just faux political posturing to frighten women and shore up support among secularists.

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Return to Him all that is His. . .

3rd Week of Lent (S)
Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP
St. Dominic Church, NOLA

Hosea prophesies to those who turn from God, "Come, let us return to the LORD, it is he who has rent, but he will heal us; he has struck us, but he will bind our wounds. He will revive us . . . he will raise us up, to live in his presence. . .let us strive to know the Lord. . .” Let us strive to know the Lord! To know the Lord, to hear His Word and live according to His law, is the one sacrifice He will not refuse. To turn our heart and mind to His purpose and surrender our strength to His end is way back to His presence. But what turns us from the Lord in the first place? Hosea accuses God's people of practicing a piety “like a morning cloud, like the dew that early passes away.” Soft, thin, easily evaporated—a piety that collapses under the slightest pressure, that hides itself when threatened. Such a dainty love for God cannot stand along side the demands of righteousness. And it didn't. “For this reason I struck them through the prophets, I slew them by the words of my mouth. . .” If our Lord does want burnt offerings, if He rejects pietistic ritual and empty prayer, what does He want from us? “. . .it is love that I desire, not sacrifice, and knowledge of God rather than burnt offerings.” To be truly righteous, we must love God and come to know Him in that love.

Jesus preaches a parable: a Pharisee and a tax collector approach the temple to pray. The Pharisee is convinced of his own righteousness, while the tax collector is convicted in his sin. The Pharisee cries out, “O God, I thank you that I am not like the rest of humanity—greedy, dishonest, adulterous. . .I fast twice a week, and I pay tithes on my whole income.” The tax collector “would not even raise his eyes to heaven but beat his breast and prayed, 'O God, be merciful to me a sinner.'” The Pharisee believes that fasting twice a week and paying a tithe on his whole income makes him righteous, makes him unlike the rest of us. He believes that his own actions—in following the Law—are the source of his holiness. His prayer is a lie. The tax collector approaches the temple, freely confessing his sin, and throws himself headlong into God's mercy, placing himself squarely and fully into God's hands. He knows that any righteousness he might enjoy is solely the work of the Lord. His prayer is true. Which of these two offers an acceptable sacrifice? Jesus says, “I tell you, the [tax collector] went home justified, not the [Pharisee]. . .” 

To be truly righteous, truly justified, we must love God and come to know Him in that love. And when we love God and come to know Him in that love, we are made righteous by Him whom we love. Hosea tells God's people that they have been humbled by the Lord b/c of their flimsy piety. Rather than humbling themselves like the tax collector, they choose instead to exalt themselves like the Pharisee; so now, they are urged to return to the Lord to be healed, to have their self-inflicted wounds bound by the very one they disobeyed. Hosea prophesies to God's fallen-away, “Let us strive to know the Lord!” And in knowing Him, love Him. He wants our contrite hearts, hearts well and truly turned to Him; He wants our strength, our courage turned to His purpose; He wants all of us, each of us; but He also wants all, everything from each of us. Not our pious gestures, nor our memorized and mumbled prayers. He wants from us all that He gives us: love, mercy, patience, and humility. Everything we have to give was first given. Before it all became ours, it was His. Return to Him all that is His; sacrifice your contrite heart. Know Him and love Him.

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Coffee Cup Browsing

No comment necessary:  local Planned Parenthood CEO arrested for indecent exposure.  

NAACP asks the UN to investigate state voter ID laws. . .in the US!  Given the UN's history as an overpriced but worthless collection of radical blowhards, I'm not worried.

The priest who fell for the Lesbian Buddhist set up finally speaks out. 

Canonist Ed Peters says that the Good Father does not understand the relevant canons.  I agree.

Fantastic vid from a Catholic woman challenging the B.O./MSM meme about the Church's "war on women." 

The woman who wants the Church to pay for her birth control pills vacations in Spain and Italy with her rich boyfriend. Apparently, $9/mo. for condoms will cramp her partying budget.

"You're more awesome than a monkey wearing a tuxedo made out of bacon. . ."  LOL!

Odd.  NYT won't publish "It's Time to Leave Islam" ad b/c it might endanger the troops. . .yet, they regularly argue that publishing leaked military info must be published despite any threat to the troops.
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Stand Up!

The Nationwide Rally for Religious Freedom is being held Friday, March 23 at noon, local time, outside federal buildings, Congressional offices and historic sites across the country. The theme for the Rally is “Stand Up for Religious Freedom—Stop the HHS Mandate!”

Will there be a rally near you?  Check it out.  If not, organize one!

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Can an acorn produce anything but an oak?

3rd Week of Lent (W)
Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP
St. Dominic Church, NOLA

You've probably never thought of Moses as a salesman. But think about it. He sales thousands of Hebrew slaves on the idea of following him out of slavery. He sales them on a plan to follow him through the desert. . .for forty years! He sales them the truth of a number of improbable revelations from God. Perhaps his best sales pitch comes when he delivers the Lord's Ten Commandments. Note this sentence in particular: “Observe [these commandments] carefully, for thus will you give evidence of your wisdom and intelligence to the nations who will hear of all these statutes and say, 'This great nation is truly a wise and intelligent people.'” That's brilliant! Moses knows that the commandments aren't going to be all that popular; they're going to be downright tough to swallow. That these commandments come from God should be enough for the fleeing Jews, but Moses knows his people. So, a little sugar is added to make any bitterness sweeter. Moses isn't fudging the truth. Following God's law is a sign of a wise and intelligent people. But a simple moral code like the Commandments needs to be practiced over time before it can develop into a proper ethical worldview. When Jesus announces that he has come to fulfill the law, he means that his arrival marks the full maturing of the Commandments' potential. At the deepest root of every oak tree is an acorn.

One of the many delusions of failed revolutions in the modern period is the idea that the traditions of a people must be destroyed before the revolution can succeed. The enlightened revolutionaries of 18th century France murdered priests and nuns. Destroyed churches. And set up a temple to reason. Bolivar, Castro, and Chavez all attacked the Church and their cultural heritages. It's no accident that both Stalin and Mao destroyed the religious and cultural heritages of their respective nations in the pursuit of secular, totalitarian utopias. They saw the past as the enemy of the future and (quite literally) bulldozed churches, temples, museums, and burned whole libraries of books. Their socialist utopias had to be built on a foundation of absolute dependence on the state and the party. Faith, tradition, family, individuality, and equality under the law were all named “enemies of the people” and destroyed. For these two murderous dictators, the past was an inconvenient truth, an obstacle to be eliminated. They came to destroy history not to fulfill it. And without a proper foundation, their revolutions collapsed.

The revolution that Christ brings is the fulfillment of his religious heritage, the full actualization of his tradition's potential. Moses handed down a moral code, a code of behavior designed to regulate how God's people behave toward Him and one another. Behind this code of behavior is an ethical imperative, a universal mandate that gives life to those words chiseled on cold stone, a living, breathing spirit that grows in us with time and practice. At the root of the Christian revolution is the Mosaic Law. Jesus says, “. . .until heaven and earth pass away, not the smallest letter or the smallest part of a letter will pass from the law. . .” How can it? Our Lord's commandment to love God and one another rests on the historical foundation of his Father's commandments given to Moses. And Moses' law rests on the spiritual foundation of the Father's love. We cannot love and ignore the law nor can we follow the law without love. Can we grow an oak tree w/o an acorn? Can an acorn produce anything but an oak?

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Monday Fat Report (Dispensed)

I didn't weigh myself on Monday. . .after confessions and Mass, I collapsed into a glorious nap after getting only about one hour's sleep this night before.  

I'll catch up this coming Monday.
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Coffee Cup Browsing

Folks often ask me if God is going to punish America for allowing abortion.  I say, "No.  He's going to allow the natural consequences of this sin to punish us."  Ergo.

B.O.'s The Catholic Church Hates Women Because It Refuses to Subsidize Mortal Sin meme backfires.  Lies never win. . .in the end.

You must have valid I.D. to drive; open a bank account; buy beer, tobacco, Sudafed; but, not to vote.  Well past time for the SupCrt to gut Section Five of the Voting Rights Act. 

Speaking of. . .undercover vid of voter fraud in VT.

Heh.  Pew Poll:  self-described political liberals are the most intolerant of dissenting views.  Told ya.

Some advice from Fr. Z. to orthodox seminarians trying to navigate the death throes of Baby Boomer modernist-progressive "formation teams."  Remember, guys:  tick-tock, tick-tock, tick-tock.

No, Fr Marcel was not suspended for refusing communion to that lesbian Buddhist activist in MD.  He is on administrative leave. . .a very, very different sort of thing altogether.

We're not going to jail. . .yet.  

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Mea culpa, mea culpa, maxima ZZzzzzzzzzzz. . .

What?  No homily, Father?!

Yes, call me a slacker.  I got about one hour of sleep last night.  Not only am I cycling through my quarterly bout with insomnia. . .but we had a wall shaking thunderstorm come through NOLA sometime around 3am.  

I recycled an old homily and took off to hear confessions at St Mary's Academy.

Now.  Naptime!

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Never to be bought, sold, or traded. . .

3rd Sunday of Lent (2012)
Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP
St. Dominic Church, NOLA

How many here have been to a flea market? I went to one for the first time in the early 80's with my paternal grandmother. We drove to Belzoni, MS to the annual Catfish Festival. We had a carload of her crafts to sell—ceramics, painting, knitting. Every item had a small white price sticker. But I learned that that sticker was just a suggestion, the opening bid for the item. Through the day, I watched my grandmother dicker over the prices. Sometimes she came out on top and sometimes she didn't. When the catfish frying started, I wandered around the stalls to see what I could see. It didn't take me long to find the comic book booths. All those wadded up dollar bills in my pocket—all ten of them—started burning and itching to be spent. I returned to my grandmother's booth with a handful of comics and nothing left in my pocket. That day I learned two rules about bargaining for what you want: 1). always assume that the price is too high; 2). be prepared to walk away. Since then, I've learned another rule of the marketplace: some things are too valuable to negotiate over. Jesus clearly demonstrates that there is no place for the marketplace in the business of faith. Our faith is priceless and God never bargains. 

Jesus is angry, very angry. He's angry enough to take a whip to the moneychangers doing business in the temple courtyard. It might not be obvious why he's so angry, so let's look at that for a moment. The moneychangers have a job to do. They are the first century equivalent of our modern currency exchanges. They take a wide variety of currency and change it—for a fee—into currency acceptable to the temple. The faithful visiting the temple then use their new currency to buy sacrificial animals or donate their tithe to the temple coffers. Seems innocent enough, so why does this practical business upset Jesus? He shouts at the moneychangers, “Take these out of here, and stop making my Father's house a marketplace.” He's angry b/c these businessmen have turned his Father's house into a marketplace. OK. But why would that make him angry? The moneychangers are helping the faithful fulfill their legal and ritual obligations. . .for a modest profit, of course. Without the moneychangers, most probably wouldn't be able to offer the required sacrifices or make their tithe donations. They are providing an invaluable service. If CCN or the NYT had been around in those days, the headlines would've read: RELIGIOUS TERRORIST OBSTRUCTS FAITHFULS' WORSHIP! Or something equally inflammatory. Is Jesus just being unreasonable here? Is he pushing an extremist agenda? No. Jesus knows that what his Father truly wants, truly values is the sacrifice of a contrite heart. The moneychangers have turned a deeply religious duty into a flea market negotiation.

Taken on its own, there's nothing inherently wrong with the marketplace. We buy what we want and need; sell what we can no longer use; and trade one thing for another based on mutual agreement. Nothing could be more democratic or fair. No one is forced to buy, sell, or trade and prices are set only after both parties are satisfied. But there are some things so valuable that they cannot be priced, cannot be bought, sold, or traded. There are some things that have worth beyond our ability to negotiate them away. One of those things is our faith, the infused habit of trusting in the loving-care of our Father. How much is the freely given gift of faith worth? What would you trade it for? What amount of money could you spend to buy a gift given only by God? Jesus is angry at the moneychangers because they have turned the faithfuls' love for God, their worship, their adoration into a mercantile exchange, a mechanical transaction from which they benefit by charging a fee. Where is the faithfuls' contrite heart? Where is the sacrifice of praise and thanksgiving? Where is repentance, mercy, and the longing for holiness? Do they believe that the their worship of the Most High is accomplished by jingling a few coins? That their duty to revere the Creator is discharged by slipping a quarter or two into a temple vending machine? Apparently, they do and that's why Jesus grabs a whip, flips over their booths, and drives them out of his Father's house.

Now, what does this raucous gospel episode have to do with us? While Jesus rested in Jerusalem, many came to believe in his name. However, John reports, “Jesus would not trust himself to them because he knew them all, and did not need anyone to testify about human nature. He himself understood it well.” Jesus understands the human heart, its strengths, weaknesses, temptations, and failures. He understands that we are often all too ready, willing, and able to overthrow his Father as Lord of our lives and negotiate away the gift of faith. He understands that we are often tempted to allow the demons of fear and worry to set up shop among the better spirits of joy and trust. That we love a good deal and often fail to see beyond the next bargain, beyond the next chance to get something we want. Jesus hesitates to reveal himself to those who have come to believe on his name b/c he knows that it is our nature to take the easiest path, to lift the lightest burden, and to make the most popular choice. He will not give his revelation to a heart prepared to swap it for money, power, celebrity, or approval. He's waiting to reveal himself to those who will sacrifice a heart made contrite in repentance, a heart made pure by honestly discharging its duty to love. The freely given gift of faith cannot be bought, sold, or traded; it cannot be negotiated away or bargained for. It can only be nurtured and lived, or left to wither and die. 

In the next few months and years, the heart of the faithful in the U.S. will be tested by a variety of moneychangers seeking to buy the faith outright or to at least bargain over its price. We'll be tempted with promises of political influence, protection, increased funding, and all sorts of apparently approving cultural goodies. At the same time, from the other side of the bargaining table, we'll be threatened with political exile, cultural disapproval, de-funding, and even dire legal consequences up to and including jail time. These negotiations are already well underway in the U.K., Canada, and several states in our own country. Why? The well-lived life of faith is an irritating obstacle to those who imagine themselves freed from the slavery of sin. That anyone anywhere would cling to the idea that God's truth is knowable; His goodness obtainable; and His beauty enjoyable is. . .well, it's just ridiculous; or worse, it's oppressive, mean-spirited, hateful. That's what our faith is to some: an oppressive, mean-spirited, and hateful indictment of their rightful choices; thus, they must either negotiate the faith away or destroy it outright. But they cannot do that if we follow Jesus' example and keep the moneychangers out of his Father's house, keep our faith out of the flea market, away from the bargaining table and where it belongs: thriving in a contrite heart ready for loving sacrifice. Some things cannot be bought, sold, or traded. One of those things—the single most important thing—is the free given gift of our faith. Nothing this world's moneychangers have to offer is worth the price of abandoning our God.

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Time for the Liberal/Nominal Catholics to Get Out!!!

From The Gateway Pundit comes this lovely bit of anti-Catholic bigotry:

Of course, many Catholics would be more than happy to see our Lib/Prog/Lefty brothers and sisters hit the door and never look back.  But that bit of wishful-thinking falls right into the hands of those who are seeking to divide the Church against herself.  Let's hope and pray that any "liberal/nominal Catholic" soul who might read this propaganda will see it for what it is and choose instead to reject the discrimination, hatred, and bigotry that this ad represents in favor of tolerance and the right to one's religious liberty.

NB.  Click the Gateway Pundit link above to read the text of the ad. . .if you can stand it.

P.S.  I'm waiting breathlessly for the FFRF to publish a similar ad urging Muslims to leave Islam for all the same reasons that they are urging "liberal Catholics" to leave the Church.  I'm sure the text of that ad is just waiting at the printer's office even as we speak. . .

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Religious Freedom Rally in NOLA

RALLY FOR RELIGIOUS FREEDOM!

From the New Orleans organizer:

Date: Friday, March 23rd

Time: Noon

Location: New Orleans, in the plaza at the corner of Poydras and Camp Streets, next to the US Courthouse and Hale Boggs Federal Building.

This will be a peaceful rally, held in 61 cities nationwide, solely concentrated on the issue of religious freedom - especially as regards the HHS Mandate, which violates our Constitutional right to the free exercise of religion. We are not supporting/endorsing any political candidate(s) or party and there should be no such signage; there should be no Tea Party signs because the media will try to make this into a TP event, which it is not.

The national organizers will send some signs for us to use. We also need to make our own. They should read as follows, or similar language:

RELIGIOUS FREEDOM
1ST AMENDMENT
1ST AMENDMENT - FREEDOM OF RELIGION
CONSCIENCE CLAUSE
HHS MANDATE VIOLATES 1ST AMENDMENT
NO GOV'T MANDATES ON MY FAITH
GOV'T DISCRIMINATES AGAINST CATHOLICS [or insert other faith group]
FREEDOM OF RELIGION
DOWN WITH EXECUTIVE BRANCH POWER GRAB
OBAMA IS NOT MY PASTOR
OBAMA DISCRIMINATES AGAINST CATHOLICS [or insert Christians, Jews, etc.]

We will circulate a petition amongst ourselves and solicit signatures from pedestrians/passers-by. After the rally, we will deliver the petition to Sen. Mary Landrieu's office.

The national organizers have suggested that we sing, pray, and have speakers. I don't think speakers will work for us, because I may run into permitting/disturbing the peace problems. I think we will be more effective with signage, collecting signatures on the petitions, and educating passersby that no one is trying to deny access to birth control (as the media has framed it), we are merely seeking a conscious clause - as is our right under the 1st Amendment. We could sing the Battle Hymn of the Republic, "We Shall Overcome," etc. and we can chant "Conscience Clause Now!" And because the media/Obama administration is trying to frame this as a women's health issue, we want as many women front and center!

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New Document from the ITC

The International Theological Commission has issued a new document titled, "Theology Today: Perspectives, Principles, and Criteria."  

Here are a few excepts from the Introduction and the first chapter:

2. To some extent, the Church clearly needs a common discourse if it is to communicate the one message of Christ to the world, both theologically and pastorally. It is therefore legitimate to speak of the need for a certain unity of theology. However, unity here needs to be carefully understood, so as not to be confused with uniformity or a single style. The unity of theology, like that of the Church, as professed in the Creed, must be closely correlated with the idea of catholicity, and also with those of holiness and apostolicity.

3. . .The present text accordingly consists of three chapters, setting out the following themes: in the rich plurality of its expressions, protagonists, ideas and contexts, theology is Catholic, and therefore fundamentally one, [1] if it arises from an attentive listening to the Word of God; [2] if it situates itself consciously and faithfully in the communion of the Church; [3] and if it is orientated to the service of God in the world, offering divine truth to the men and women of today in an intelligible form. 

5. Theology is scientific reflection on the divine revelation which the Church accepts by faith as universal saving truth. The sheer fulness and richness of that revelation is too great to be grasped by any one theology, and in fact gives rise to multiple theologies as it is received in diverse ways by human beings. In its diversity, nevertheless, theology is united in its service of the one truth of God. The unity of theology, therefore does not require uniformity, but rather a single focus on God’s Word and an explication of its innumerable riches by theologies able to dialogue and communicate with one another. Likewise, the plurality of theologies should not imply fragmentation or discord, but rather the exploration in myriad ways of God’s one saving truth. 

18. The intellectus fidei takes various forms in the life of the Church and in the community of believers in accordance with the different gifts of the faithful (lectio divina, meditation, preaching, theology as a science, etc.). It becomes theology in the strict sense when the believer undertakes to present the content of the Christian mystery in a rational and scientific way. Theology is therefore scientia Dei in as much as it is a rational participation in the knowledge that God has of himself and of all things. 

19. A criterion of Catholic theology is that, precisely as the science of faith, ‘faith seeking understanding [fides quaerens intellectum]’,  it has a rational dimension. Theology strives to understand what the Church believes, why it believes, and what can be known sub specie Dei. As scientia Dei, theology aims to understand in a rational and systematic manner the saving truth of God.

Grab a BIG mug of coffee and read the whole thing!
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I'm on the radio!

If you subscribe to Sirius Radio, tune in to the Catholic Channel on Friday (3/9) at Noon (Central) and listen to me ramble on about this Sunday's readings with Fr. Gabriel Gillen, OP!

Despite my warnings, the Good Friar has invited me on his show, Word of Life, to discuss the Mass readings for the 3rd Sunday of Lent. 

I warned him that I am an associative thinker with a keenly disorganized mind who usually stumbles onto something to preach about after hours of begging the Holy Spirit to throw me a scrap of something, anything to say.

He asked for it.

Oh, and I also promised him that I would cut back on the morning caffeine. . .yeah, right.

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What persuades you to follow Christ?

2nd Week of Lent (Th)
Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP
St. Dominic Church, NOLA

One says, Jesus tells us a story about the evils of wealth. No, insists another, it's a story about collective sin and the need for social justice. Still others shout out their opinions: it's about the existence of purgatory and hell; no, Jesus is teaching us about not ignoring charity. Well, any of these could be part of the purpose of the story. I want to add a spin of my own, one that gives the story something more than a moral lesson: the story of Lazarus and the Rich Man is a story about persuasion; that is, what does it take to convince an incredulous soul that he or she is created for a reason greater than eating, sleeping, reproducing, and dying? Though the story Jesus tells starts with Lazarus, I would start at the end. The Rich Man pleas with Abraham to send someone to warn his brothers to repent so that they might avoid hell. Abraham answers, “If [your brothers] will not listen to Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded if someone should rise from the dead.” If they will not be persuaded by Moses, the prophets, or someone risen from the dead, what will persuade them? What persuaded you to follow Christ, to live a life beyond your basic biological urges?

Think for a moment about what it means to persuade. The word itself simply means to convince or to influence. We are persuaded by reason, emotion, force, authority, deception, and convention. Most of us would like to think we are persuaded by evidence reasonably evaluated. But few of us would radically alter the way we live our lives simply b/c someone gave us a good argument to do so. Emotion and social convention are likely the two most influential elements in our decision-making. For Christians, especially Catholics, authority plays a huge role in persuading us to accept or reject ideas about the faith. It's a bonus if authoritative persuasion is also rational, emotionally satisfying, and socially conventional, but authority alone is usually enough. And there's an excellent reason for saying that authority alone is usually enough to sway us. Simply put, we believe all that we believe b/c we accept the truthfulness of the biblical witnesses and the experiences of God handed on to us by the apostles, their successors, and our ancestors in the Church. Added to these witnesses is the testimony of our experiences with God within that long tradition. Other elements may contribute to the lasting power of our faith, but it is essentially our stubborn refusal to abandon apostolic authority that keeps us persuaded!

Abraham tells the Rich Man that his brothers will not be persuaded to repent even if someone rose from the dead and told them to repent. How does Abraham know this? Because thus far the brothers have refused to listen to the witness of Moses and the prophets; they have rejected the authority of their ancestors in the faith. If they will not leave their heart and mind open to being touched by God through His living Word, they cannot be persuaded in any meaningful way. Rational arguments do not produce faith. Emotion might produce faith but it just as easily destroys it. Social convention produces a trendy faith, one that changes as soon as the conventions do. A lasting faith is built on the solid foundation of the apostles' witness and the Church's Christ-given authority to define what is and is not necessary for salvation. Christ preached the Father's mercy to sinners. He rose from the dead and left us to persuade with our words and deeds that the Father is indeed merciful. So, the question isn't really, “What persuaded you to follow Christ?” but rather, “Are you—by your words and deeds—persuading others to follow him?”

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Coffee Bowl Browsing

Slippery Slope:  contraception --> sterilization --> abortion --> infanticide --> euthanasia.  Next?  Reducing gov't health care costs through "selective elimination of nonproductive, high risk persons."  

This is for all my Lefty Catholics friends who voted for B.O. b/c W. was an Evil War Monger.

A vid of B.O. from his days at Harvard showing him praising race-baiting hack, Derrick Bell.  I'd rather see his transcripts.

The Church of Big Gov't. . .I've said it before:  it's gonna get Ugly, people.  Gird dem loins.

Speaking of "getting Ugly," it's looking more and more like that woman denied communion at her mother's funeral in MD pulled one over on the Good Father.  Brothers, note well: gentle as doves, wily as serpents. 

Here's a wily priest speaking gently about B.O.'s violation of our religious liberty.

Hacker group crashes Vatican website. . .here's an example where the Church's reliance on the latest tech from the 19th century is a good thing.

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Satan says, "Non serviam!"

2nd Week of Lent (W)
Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP
St. Dominic Church, NOLA

Satan and his angels rebel against Heaven. For their punishment, the Lord casts them into Hell. There Satan languishes for nine days in the fiery lake. When he rouses himself, he speaks to his ally, Beelzebub, and the “lost Archangel” boasts of his prison, “Here at least/We shall be free; the Almighty hath not built/Here for his envy, will not drive us hence:/Here we may reign secure; and, in my choice,/To reign is worth ambition, though in Hell:/Better to reign in Hell than serve in Heaven.” Though sprung from the 17th century imagination of the English Protestant, John Milton, this crucial moment in Paradise Lost perfectly captures the voice to an ancient yet still breathing rebellion, the all-too-glib swagger of a sinner boasting aloud his own damnation, Non serviam. Where is this furnance-lake? Where does rebellion rule? In the heart and mind that brags about and revels in the demonic verse, “I will not serve.” Satan and his angels are driven from Heaven b/c they refuse to be great as our Lord is great. Jesus says, “. . .whoever wishes to be great among you shall be your servant; whoever wishes to be first among you shall be your slave.” When we seek to be masters in this world, we are placed in worldly chains. To be great in the Lord, we must be servants in the world. 

In his self-serving speech to Beelzebub, Satan tells an astonishing lie, “Here [in Hell] at least/We shall be free. . .” Only the corrupted mind of a demon could look at the prison of Hell and call himself free. No state of being outranks Hell in the absence of true freedom. Hell is the “state of definitive self-exclusion from communion with God and the blessed. . .”(CCC 1033). When we definitively, finally exclude ourselves from communion with God, we are in Hell. Since God—Who is Love, Truth, Beauty, and Freedom—is our supernatural end, our ultimate goal in this life and the life to come, the choices we make are freest when they bring us closer to our goal. If we have already given up on our goal of being with God forever, then every decision we make thereafter is chained to some other goal, some other end. Lucifer abandons his supernatural goal—one that he has already achieved as an angel—and chains himself to pride, jealousy, and power. To soothe his deeply wounded sense of self-esteem, He boasts that he would rather rule in Hell than serve in Heaven. The lie that he lives is this: even though he imagines himself to be the King of Hell, he is actually a slave to every sort of corruption. He serves while believing himself to be the master. 

All this talk about Lucifer's fall from heaven and his imaginary rise as Satan, King of Hell, serves to make a rather simple point: if we will to be free, we will serve. We will serve God, His creatures, His Church, and we will do so with the same love with which He loves us. This means setting aside willful pride, that entitled sense of self-sufficiency and independence; surrendering jealousy, the dangerous coveting of another's blessings and gifts; and the idolatrous worship of control, popularity, wealth, reputation, and the need to always be right. Loving and humble service given for the greater glory of God brings peace to a raucous mind and troubled heart. And the best way to set yourself on the road to destruction is to declare yourself independent from our only source of true freedom: service in love, service given for no other reason than because God loves you. Satan says it best, “I will not serve. For me, it is better to reign in Hell than serve in Heaven.” Good luck with that.

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Thanks

My thanks to the HA reader who sent me the Denzinger book!

There was no invoice in the package, so I can't pray for you by name.  

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Monday Fat Report (Octave): UPDATED

Come Back Week, baby!  :-)

-3 to 323lbs.  I was afraid that I had plateaued.  

Keep those prayers going. . .they are probably the only thing keeping me from ravaging the local Chinese buffet like a diet-crazed Godzilla.

Fr. Philip Neri, OP

P.S.  I've been informed by some Know-It-All with a calculator that 327-3=324 not 323, meaning I've allegedly lost four lbs instead of three.   This is obviously an accounting trick borrowed from B.O.'s economic advisory council.  I'll stick with the facts, thank you very much.

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Love + Truth = Holiness

NB.  After the 5.30pm Mass yesterday, a parishioner said to me, "Father, you sounded like Savonarola up there!"  Me, "Oh, that didn't end well for him, did it?"  Him, "No.  At least they hung him before setting him on fire."  Me, "Somehow, that's not comforting."  :-)

2nd Sunday of Lent 2012
Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP
St. Dominic Church, NOLA

Amen, I say to you, you have heard it said—by pastors, preachers, confessors, teachers, the Pope, every Hallmark card you have ever received, and your mama—you have heard it said that God loves you. And indeed He does. He can do nothing else for He is Love. Our heavenly Father is not a being that loves us most of the time, or on occasion, or only when we deserve it. Love is Who He is and What He does—eternally, without conditions, and for a single all-encompassing purpose: to change those who will receive His love into a holy people. The question—does God love me?—should never cross your mind. Why? Let's exercise our logic muscles: God is Love. You live and move and have you being in God. Only existing creatures are capable of asking questions. “Does God love me?” is a question, therefore you exist. Therefore, God loves you. To put that a bit more succinctly: that you (an existing creature) can ask the question at all means that God loves you. So, let's retire the question of whether or not God loves us. If He didn't, He would not exist and neither would any of us. There is a question about God and love that must be asked, and asked daily: do I love God? If so, what purpose does my love for God serve? On Mt. Tabor—in the presence of Peter, James, and John—the transfigured Christ gives us the answer. We love God for the same reason He loves us: so that we may be made holy.

Since we've retired the question of whether or not God loves us (He does and can do nothing less), and we already know why He loves us (so that we may be made holy), and we've answered the question about why we love God in turn (so that we may help God make us holy), let's ask a more practical question: how do we help God make us holy? That is, what do we do/think/say/feel on a day to day basis that assists God's love for us so that we are actually growing in holiness? Loving God, yourself, your family and friends, your neighbors, and even loving your enemies is easy in the abstract. It's easy to sit back and radiate an aura of loving care; it's easy to say, “I love my neighbors and all my enemies;” it's easy to think sweet thoughts about the poor, the persecuted, and the sick. It is far more difficult to get out there and perform loving acts; to perform forgiveness; to show mercy; to treat everyone you meet—at WalMart, at the bank, at the office, in traffic—to treat everyone you meet as another soul deeply in love with God and eternally loved by God. This is why the Church has always bound faith and works together: our loving works demonstrate our trust in God and our trust in God is made real in our loving works. When we fail to love, we confess these failures as sins in thought, word, and deed. So, how do we help God make us holy? Well, first, we understand that loving God and those He loves is not simply an abstract, intellectual exercise; next, we understand that love is a behavior—like driving or walking or getting dressed. To love is to see, hear, think about, and treat yourself and everyone else the way God Himself treats us all. With kindness, compassion, dignity, patience, and forgiveness. Do this and you grow in holiness. You become more like Christ. You are transfigured.

Becoming more like Christ is we have vowed to do. But we need to hear this: loving God, self, and everyone else—becoming more like Christ—is dangerous. Dangerous how? Besides Jesus' promises of persecution, trial, and death for those who follow him, we can point to the forty days he spent in the desert being tempted by Satan. We too are tempted by Satan with the lures of popularity, prestige, worldly power, and personal satisfaction. The Devil always takes God's gifts and tweaks them ever-so-slightly and then presents them to us infected with his poison. God's love and His command to us to love is no different. With God's love and His command to love comes His truth and His command to obey the truth. Love and truth cannot be separated. When we love intensely, we dwell intensely in the truth. Note well that the Devil never lied when he tempted Christ in the desert. Everything he said to Jesus was true; however, he was motivated by a desire for worship and power not love. We find ourselves similarly tempted. The Devil plays on our desire to love by pointing out all the ways we appear to fail at love. He accuses the Church of not loving women b/c we truthfully name artificial contraception, abortion, and sterilization evil. He accuses us of hatred b/c we truthfully call sex outside of a sacramental marriage evil. He accuses us of not loving orphans b/c we cannot place them in homes with two fathers or two mothers. He accuses us of not loving non-Christians b/c we truthfully teach that Christ is the only name under heaven through which all are saved. What Satan is tempting us to do, want us to do, is sever truth from love and love without truth. This we cannot do b/c our Christ is the truth, the way, and the life. And we follow him so that we will be transfigured, made holy in love and truth.

Satan and the world he rules teaches that “Love” is to be practiced without Truth. Love w/o truth is nothing more than lukewarm tolerance or indifferent permissiveness, an emotion that feels good to emote but ultimately leaves those who live it living a lie. Godly love is always true. Never a lie. True love is always gives the glory to God. Never to man. Love always carries us to goodness; never to evil. Love always binds us in obedience; it never frees us to be disobedient. Godly love always heals, always cleans, sometimes hurts, sometimes cuts away. Love never winks at sin, shrugs at injustice, or ignores the poor. Love always looks to Christ, his church, and his Mother. Love never uses the bottom-line, the convenient, the practical, or the efficient to destroy God’s creatures, especially His unborn children. Love always encourages spiritual growth from faithful experience. Love never gives hope to novelty for novelty’s sake nor does love trust innovation for the sake of excitement. Love can be a terrible whirlwind, a stone-shattering blow, a heart-ripping loss. But love always builds up in perfection, grows in wisdom and kindness; love attracts questions about eternal things, discourages attachment to impermanent things; and, when necessary, love will kick your butt, take your name, and call your mama! The love that Satan and the world he rules wants to settle for is a passion for indifference, permissiveness, choice w/o consequence, and, ultimately, death.

Will you be made holy? Let's ask that differently: do you will to be made holy? If you will to become a well-oiled, surgical tool for God’s Word, you will love as He loves you. You will speak the truth and only the truth; you will spread goodness and only goodness; you will honor beauty and only beauty; you will correct error, confront sin, expose lies, forgive all offenses; and you will build up his Body with works of mercy and open the doors of your faith to the stranger. And you will remember—if you will to be made holy—that you are not alone. God is with us, who can stand against Him?

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