Faith is the community of the cross, and only on the cross does it become complete. The place of final nondeliverance is the place where redemption really emerges. It seems to me that we have to relearn this piety of the cross in an entirely new way. It had appeared to us as too passive, too pessimistic, sentimental -- but if we do not practice the cross, how will we be able to carry it when it is imposed on us? A friend of mine who was dependent on kidney dialysis for years and had to experience how his life was gradually slipping away from him once told me that as a child he especially loved the stations of the cross and liked to do them later in life as well. When he learned of the awful diagnosis, he was at first stunned, but then it suddenly occurred to him: What you have always prayed is now becoming serious; now you may really accompany him and be taken up into the way of the cross by him. In this way my friend regained his serenity, which radiated from him right up to the end and let the brilliance of faith shine forth for all to see. To express it with [Romano] Guardini's words: We have to relearn "what kind of liberating power lies in overcoming oneself; how suffering which is inwardly accepted transforms a person; and how all essential growth not only depends on work, but also on freely offered sacrifice."
Saturday, April 10, 2010
Carrying the Cross
More words of wisdom from Pope Benedict. This is taken from A New Song for the Lord:
Tuesday, April 6, 2010
'Hierarchy' means 'sacred origin'
In my last post, I quoted Cardinal Ratzinger (as he was then) from his book Salt of the Earth, in which he responds to questions from his interviewer, Peter Seewald. Here is more from the same work.
Seewald poses this question: "Why must the Church continue to operate even today with authoritarian methods and be organized according to "totalitarian" structures? ... You can't go around demanding a sense of fellowship and then operate yourself predominantly with accusations of guilt, laws, and a pointing finger." Ratzinger gives a long, thoughtful response. I won't quote the whole thing, though it is well worth reading, but only pick out the points that particularly struck me.
He starts with this word 'hierarchy', which could be translated either by 'sacred rule' or by 'sacred origin', since the Greek word arche has both meanings. Cardinal Ratzinger holds that the second translation is probably the correct one. So it is not a question of power, but of making present something whose origin is in God; it doesn't come from us. He says: "... the category that corresponds to the priesthood is not that of rule. On the contrary, the priesthood has to be a conduit and a making present of a beginning and has to make itself available for this task. When priesthood, episcopacy, and papacy are understood essentially in terms of rule, then things are truly wrong and distorted....the origin of hierarchy, in any event its true meaning, is not to construct a structure of domination but to keep something present that doesn't come from the individual. No one can forgive sins on his own initiative; no one can communicate the Holy Spirit on his own initiative; no one can transform bread into the presence of Christ or keep Him present on his own initiative. In this sense, one has to perform a service in which the Church doesn't become a self-governing business but draws her life again and again anew from her origin." He concludes: "When it [the priesthood] is lived correctly, it cannot mean finally getting one's hands on the levers of power", as one might construe from the comments of some feminists who argue for women's ordination, "but, rather, renouncing one's own life project in order to give oneself over to service." And the image the Pope uses for this priestly service is the humble gesture of Christ at the Last Supper, when He washed the feet of his disciples.
In response to the last part of Seewald's question, the pontiff has this to say: "Part of that [service] ... is to reprimand and to rebuke and, thereby, to cause problems for oneself. Augustine illustrates this in a homily in the following terms: You want to live badly; you want to perish. I, however, am not allowed to want this; I have to rebuke you, even though it displeases you. He then uses the example of the father with sleeping sickness whose son keeps waking him up, because that is the only chance of his being cured. But the father says: Let me sleep, I'm dead tired. And the son says: No, I'm not allowed to let you sleep. And that, he says, is precisely the function of a bishop. I am not permitted to let you sleep. I know that you would like to sleep, but that is precisely what I may not allow. And in this sense the Church must also raise her index finger and become irksome. But in all this it must remain perceptible that the Church is not interested in harassing people but that she herself is animated by the restless desire for the good. I must not allow you to sleep, because sleep would be deadly. And in the exercise of this authority she must also take Christ's suffering upon herself. What ... gives Christ credibility is, in fact, that he suffered. And that is also the credibility of the Church. For this reason she also becomes most credible where she has martyrs and confessors. And where things go comfortably, she loses credibility."
Seewald poses this question: "Why must the Church continue to operate even today with authoritarian methods and be organized according to "totalitarian" structures? ... You can't go around demanding a sense of fellowship and then operate yourself predominantly with accusations of guilt, laws, and a pointing finger." Ratzinger gives a long, thoughtful response. I won't quote the whole thing, though it is well worth reading, but only pick out the points that particularly struck me.
He starts with this word 'hierarchy', which could be translated either by 'sacred rule' or by 'sacred origin', since the Greek word arche has both meanings. Cardinal Ratzinger holds that the second translation is probably the correct one. So it is not a question of power, but of making present something whose origin is in God; it doesn't come from us. He says: "... the category that corresponds to the priesthood is not that of rule. On the contrary, the priesthood has to be a conduit and a making present of a beginning and has to make itself available for this task. When priesthood, episcopacy, and papacy are understood essentially in terms of rule, then things are truly wrong and distorted....the origin of hierarchy, in any event its true meaning, is not to construct a structure of domination but to keep something present that doesn't come from the individual. No one can forgive sins on his own initiative; no one can communicate the Holy Spirit on his own initiative; no one can transform bread into the presence of Christ or keep Him present on his own initiative. In this sense, one has to perform a service in which the Church doesn't become a self-governing business but draws her life again and again anew from her origin." He concludes: "When it [the priesthood] is lived correctly, it cannot mean finally getting one's hands on the levers of power", as one might construe from the comments of some feminists who argue for women's ordination, "but, rather, renouncing one's own life project in order to give oneself over to service." And the image the Pope uses for this priestly service is the humble gesture of Christ at the Last Supper, when He washed the feet of his disciples.
In response to the last part of Seewald's question, the pontiff has this to say: "Part of that [service] ... is to reprimand and to rebuke and, thereby, to cause problems for oneself. Augustine illustrates this in a homily in the following terms: You want to live badly; you want to perish. I, however, am not allowed to want this; I have to rebuke you, even though it displeases you. He then uses the example of the father with sleeping sickness whose son keeps waking him up, because that is the only chance of his being cured. But the father says: Let me sleep, I'm dead tired. And the son says: No, I'm not allowed to let you sleep. And that, he says, is precisely the function of a bishop. I am not permitted to let you sleep. I know that you would like to sleep, but that is precisely what I may not allow. And in this sense the Church must also raise her index finger and become irksome. But in all this it must remain perceptible that the Church is not interested in harassing people but that she herself is animated by the restless desire for the good. I must not allow you to sleep, because sleep would be deadly. And in the exercise of this authority she must also take Christ's suffering upon herself. What ... gives Christ credibility is, in fact, that he suffered. And that is also the credibility of the Church. For this reason she also becomes most credible where she has martyrs and confessors. And where things go comfortably, she loses credibility."
Thursday, April 1, 2010
Succisa virescit
This Latin phrase is found on the coat of arms of the Benedictine monastery of Monte Cassino, founded by St. Benedict himself circa 529 A.D. It means, in literal translation, "having been cut down, it fluorishes", an apt epigram for an abbey that has been destroyed and rebuilt four times, most recently after the bombardment it suffered in the Battle of Monte Cassino in World War II. The idea is drawn, I believe, from viticulture; that's why 'succisa' is feminine, agreeing with the understood noun 'vitis', 'grapevine', a feminine word in Latin. It's a well-known fact that grapevines must be cut back drastically, even brutally, every year if they are going to produce an abundant harvest of grapes. In the famous parable from the Gospel of John, chapter 15, Jesus applies the same lesson to us: "I am the true vine, and my Father is the vinegrower. He removes every branch in me that bears no fruit. Every branch that bears fruit he prunes to make it bear more fruit. You have already been cleansed by the word that I have spoken to you." It's interesting that the words translated here by 'prunes' and 'cleansed' are in the original Greek text closely related: 'kathairei' and 'katharoi'. Pruning is a form of cleansing, in that it removes superfluous and irrelevant accretions to reveal the pure form beneath. Now vines don't have feelings, but if they did, we can imagine that pruning would be a pretty painful process. We don't usually think of cleansing as painful, but if you are really dirty, so that getting clean involves hard scrubbing, it's not so enjoyable either.
I've been reading "Salt of the Earth", a book based on an interview of Cardinal Ratzinger (now Pope Benedict XVI, of course) by Peter Seewald, a German journalist, back in 1996. This is the relevant passage:
Just imagine if we could accept in this spirit all the suffering that inevitably comes to each of us on our pilgrim way to our true homeland, receiving it even with gratitude, seeing it as the pruning of which our egos stand so much in need. 'Succidi, virescemus', cut back, we will sprout up with even greater spiritual vigour. With an attitude like that, nothing in this world could really hurt us.
I've been reading "Salt of the Earth", a book based on an interview of Cardinal Ratzinger (now Pope Benedict XVI, of course) by Peter Seewald, a German journalist, back in 1996. This is the relevant passage:
"Not long ago I mentioned in a conversation with friends that here in the area around Frascati they are preparing to prune the grapevines and that they bear fruit only if they are pruned once a year, that pruning is a condition of fruitfulness. In the light of the Gospel, of John 15, that's immediately clear to us as a parable of human existence and of the communion of the Church. If the courage to prune is lacking, only leaves still grow. Applied to the Church, there is only paper,whereas no more life is brought forth. But let's say it with the words of Christ, who tells us: At the very moment when you think you have to possess yourself and defend yourself, precisely then you ruin yourself. Because you are not built as an island whose only foundation is itself. Rather, you are built for love, and therefore for giving, for renunciation, for the pruning of yourself. Only if you give yourself, if you lose yourself, as Christ puts it, will you be able to live.
This basic option has to stand out in all its starkness. It is offered to man's freedom. But it should still really be made plain that to live by making one's own claims is a false recipe for life. The refusal of suffering and the refusal of creatureliness, hence, of being held to a standard, is ultimately the refusal of love itself, and that ruins man. For it is precisely his submitting himself to a claim and allowing himself to be pruned that enables him to mature and bear fruit."
Just imagine if we could accept in this spirit all the suffering that inevitably comes to each of us on our pilgrim way to our true homeland, receiving it even with gratitude, seeing it as the pruning of which our egos stand so much in need. 'Succidi, virescemus', cut back, we will sprout up with even greater spiritual vigour. With an attitude like that, nothing in this world could really hurt us.
Friday, October 9, 2009
Words of Wisdom from GKC
Over at The Catholic Thing (www.thecatholicthing.org), James Schall makes the following remark: "No students are more surprised than those who come across Chesterton for the first time. No one ever told them before that the very purpose of the mind is to make dogmas, to state the truth. Generally, they have been told that the mind exists because there is no truth, that truth is 'dangerous'. And I suppose it is in a way."
I just finished reading "The Catholic Church and Conversion", by G.K. Chesterton. If you've ever wondered where GKC's famous line about the Catholic Church being "the only thing which saves a man from the degrading slavery of being a child of his age" comes from, it's the first sentence of Chapter 5 of this book. Here's a rather lengthy quote from near the end:
"... let the convert, or still more the semi-convert, face any one fact that does seem to him to deface the Catholic scheme as a falsehood; and if he faces it long enough he will probably find that it is the greatest truth of all. I have found this myself in that extreme logic of free will which is found in the fallen angels and the possibility of perdition. Such things are altogether beyond my imagination, but the lines of logic go out toward them in my reason. Indeed, I can undertake to justify the whole Catholic theology, if I be granted to start with the supreme sacredness and value of two things: Reason and Liberty. It is an illuminating comment on current anti-Catholic talk that they are the two things which most people imagine to be forbidden to Catholics.
"But the best way of putting what I mean is to repeat what I have already said, in connection with the satisfying scope of Catholic universality. I cannot picture these theological ultimates and I have not the authority or learning to define them. But I still put the matter to myself thus: Supposing I were so miserable as to lose the Faith, could I go back to that cheap charity and crude optimism which says that every sin is a blunder, that evil cannot conquer or does not even exist? I could no more go back to those cushioned chapels than a man who has regained his sanity would willingly go back to a padded cell. I might cease to believe in a God of any kind; but I could not cease to think that a God who had made men and angels free was finer than one who coerced them into comfort. I might cease to believe in a future life of any kind; but I could not cease to think it was a finer doctrine that we choose and make our future life than that it is fitted out for us like an hotel and we are taken there in a celestial omnibus as compulsory as a Black Maria. I know that Catholicism is too large for me, and I have not yet explored its beautiful or terrible truths. But I know that Universalism is too small for me; and I could not creep back into that dull safety, who have looked on the dizzy vision of liberty."
I just finished reading "The Catholic Church and Conversion", by G.K. Chesterton. If you've ever wondered where GKC's famous line about the Catholic Church being "the only thing which saves a man from the degrading slavery of being a child of his age" comes from, it's the first sentence of Chapter 5 of this book. Here's a rather lengthy quote from near the end:
"... let the convert, or still more the semi-convert, face any one fact that does seem to him to deface the Catholic scheme as a falsehood; and if he faces it long enough he will probably find that it is the greatest truth of all. I have found this myself in that extreme logic of free will which is found in the fallen angels and the possibility of perdition. Such things are altogether beyond my imagination, but the lines of logic go out toward them in my reason. Indeed, I can undertake to justify the whole Catholic theology, if I be granted to start with the supreme sacredness and value of two things: Reason and Liberty. It is an illuminating comment on current anti-Catholic talk that they are the two things which most people imagine to be forbidden to Catholics.
"But the best way of putting what I mean is to repeat what I have already said, in connection with the satisfying scope of Catholic universality. I cannot picture these theological ultimates and I have not the authority or learning to define them. But I still put the matter to myself thus: Supposing I were so miserable as to lose the Faith, could I go back to that cheap charity and crude optimism which says that every sin is a blunder, that evil cannot conquer or does not even exist? I could no more go back to those cushioned chapels than a man who has regained his sanity would willingly go back to a padded cell. I might cease to believe in a God of any kind; but I could not cease to think that a God who had made men and angels free was finer than one who coerced them into comfort. I might cease to believe in a future life of any kind; but I could not cease to think it was a finer doctrine that we choose and make our future life than that it is fitted out for us like an hotel and we are taken there in a celestial omnibus as compulsory as a Black Maria. I know that Catholicism is too large for me, and I have not yet explored its beautiful or terrible truths. But I know that Universalism is too small for me; and I could not creep back into that dull safety, who have looked on the dizzy vision of liberty."
Monday, October 5, 2009
Rhinoceritis
More good stuff from Chaput's book, "Render Unto Caesar" (highly recommended, by the way). He quotes Avery Dulles, Jesuit theologian and cardinal: "The greatest danger facing the Church in our country [anywhere in the West, really] is that of an excessive and indiscreet accommodation." Another name for this condition of accommodation, this "kneeling before the world" (Jacques Maritain's phrase), this submission to the spirit of the age, might be rhinoceritis. I'm not a great fan of theater of the absurd, and I've never read Ionesco's play "Rhinoceros", but I am familiar with Thomas Merton's discussion of it in his well-known essay, "Rain and the Rhinoceros."
The play is set in a small French village, where all the citizens contract a disease that causes them to metamorphose into rhinoceroses. All, that is, except Berenger, who witnesses his friend Jean transform before his very eyes. The last words Jean addresses to Berenger, before the mutation is complete and he loses the power of speech, are: "Humanism has expired! You are an old ridiculous sentimentalist." Berenger stands alone at the end of the play, the last human, surrounded by rhinos. And, as Merton comments, "To be the last human in the rhinoceros herd is, in fact, to be a monster."
Reverend John Hugo, an associate of Dorothy Day, described the spiritual state of too many Catholics of his time, in words that are even truer today: "Large areas of their lives are wholly unilluminated by their faith. Their ideas, their attitudes, their views on current affairs, their pleasure and recreations, their tastes in reading and entertainment, their love of luxury, comfort and bodily ease, their devotion to success, their desire of money, their social snobbishness, racial consciousness, nationalistic narrowness and prejudice, their bourgeois complacency and contempt of the poor: In all these things they are indistinguishable from the huge sickly mass of paganism which surrounds them." (Quoted from Chaput, p. 181). In other words, they've joined the herd.
Strong Catholic faith ought to immunize us from infection with rhinoceritis. We follow our Lord and Savior, not the rhinoceros herd. Are we monsters then? (I was going to entitle this post "We Monsters..."). In the world's eyes, maybe so. We certainly have to face the unpleasant fact that we'll often stand alone, and that we'll often fail. When it comes to solitary witness, we have some strong precedents to follow. I particularly like the story of Pope Liberius, who in the 4th Century defied a hostile emperor with the words, "The truth of the faith is not lessened by the fact that I stand alone." To quote Chaput once again:
"In one of their early confrontations, King Henry VIII taunted Bishop John Fisher, the great bishop-martyr of the English Reformation who remained faithful to Rome and opposed Henry's marriage to Anne Boleyn, with this remark: 'Well, well, it shall make no matter ... for you are but one man.' Catholics face the world's same taunting today: the temptation to think that society is too far gone, that our problems are too complex for any of us to make a difference. But one person can always make a difference -- IF that person believes in Jesus Christ and seeks to do his will. We're not called to get results. We're called to be faithful." (p. 196)
The play is set in a small French village, where all the citizens contract a disease that causes them to metamorphose into rhinoceroses. All, that is, except Berenger, who witnesses his friend Jean transform before his very eyes. The last words Jean addresses to Berenger, before the mutation is complete and he loses the power of speech, are: "Humanism has expired! You are an old ridiculous sentimentalist." Berenger stands alone at the end of the play, the last human, surrounded by rhinos. And, as Merton comments, "To be the last human in the rhinoceros herd is, in fact, to be a monster."
Reverend John Hugo, an associate of Dorothy Day, described the spiritual state of too many Catholics of his time, in words that are even truer today: "Large areas of their lives are wholly unilluminated by their faith. Their ideas, their attitudes, their views on current affairs, their pleasure and recreations, their tastes in reading and entertainment, their love of luxury, comfort and bodily ease, their devotion to success, their desire of money, their social snobbishness, racial consciousness, nationalistic narrowness and prejudice, their bourgeois complacency and contempt of the poor: In all these things they are indistinguishable from the huge sickly mass of paganism which surrounds them." (Quoted from Chaput, p. 181). In other words, they've joined the herd.
Strong Catholic faith ought to immunize us from infection with rhinoceritis. We follow our Lord and Savior, not the rhinoceros herd. Are we monsters then? (I was going to entitle this post "We Monsters..."). In the world's eyes, maybe so. We certainly have to face the unpleasant fact that we'll often stand alone, and that we'll often fail. When it comes to solitary witness, we have some strong precedents to follow. I particularly like the story of Pope Liberius, who in the 4th Century defied a hostile emperor with the words, "The truth of the faith is not lessened by the fact that I stand alone." To quote Chaput once again:
"In one of their early confrontations, King Henry VIII taunted Bishop John Fisher, the great bishop-martyr of the English Reformation who remained faithful to Rome and opposed Henry's marriage to Anne Boleyn, with this remark: 'Well, well, it shall make no matter ... for you are but one man.' Catholics face the world's same taunting today: the temptation to think that society is too far gone, that our problems are too complex for any of us to make a difference. But one person can always make a difference -- IF that person believes in Jesus Christ and seeks to do his will. We're not called to get results. We're called to be faithful." (p. 196)
Wednesday, September 30, 2009
Living our Christianity
I came upon a good quote I'd like to share. It's from the Jesuit Henri de Lubac:
"In the last analysis, what is needed is not a Christianity that is more virile, or more efficacious, or more heroic, or stronger; it is that we should live our Christianity with more virility, more efficacy, more strength, and if necessary, more heroism -- but we must live it as it is. There is nothing that should be changed in it, nothing that should be added (which does not mean however, that there is not a continual need to keep its channels from silting up); it is not a case of adapting it to the fashion of the day. [The Christian faith] must come into its own again in our souls. We must give our souls back to it." (Quoted in Archbishop Chaput's book, "Render Unto Caesar", p. 108-109.)
"In the last analysis, what is needed is not a Christianity that is more virile, or more efficacious, or more heroic, or stronger; it is that we should live our Christianity with more virility, more efficacy, more strength, and if necessary, more heroism -- but we must live it as it is. There is nothing that should be changed in it, nothing that should be added (which does not mean however, that there is not a continual need to keep its channels from silting up); it is not a case of adapting it to the fashion of the day. [The Christian faith] must come into its own again in our souls. We must give our souls back to it." (Quoted in Archbishop Chaput's book, "Render Unto Caesar", p. 108-109.)
Wednesday, September 23, 2009
"Julie and Julia" and Narcissism
I saw the film "Julie and Julia" a few nights back. It was very entertaining, especially Meryl Streep's performance as Julia Child. The movie raises an issue that has often troubled me. For those who don't know the story, Julie is a frustrated author and amateur chef who decides to seek fulfillment through blogging about her project to cook her way through Julia Child's "Mastering the Art of French Cooking" in the course of a year, 524 recipes in 365 days. She gets a little too obsessed with it all. At one point her husband accuses her of thinking that she is "the center of the universe", and that the fans of her blog will commit mass suicide if she neglects to post one day. So here I am, blogging away, wondering, "Isn't there something essentially narcissistic in all this?" I mean, I try to avoid the use of the first person singular pronoun as much as possible (this post and the previous one are exceptions!), but even so there is a subtext, sometimes rising to the level of conscious thought, but often not, that says, "See how clever I am! I have such interesting insights, such original ideas!"
As I grow older I become more and more convinced that humility is the key to all the virtues and an unshakable foundation for happiness in this world and the next. By humility I primarily mean forgetfulness of self. The narcissism that infects our culture is a major reason why so many people are so unhappy today. And I'm not immune. Anyway, I struggle with that. Pray for my soul!
As I grow older I become more and more convinced that humility is the key to all the virtues and an unshakable foundation for happiness in this world and the next. By humility I primarily mean forgetfulness of self. The narcissism that infects our culture is a major reason why so many people are so unhappy today. And I'm not immune. Anyway, I struggle with that. Pray for my soul!
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