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| 13th Week in Ordinary Time B/I | 1 | 2 |
3 or St Thomas |
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| 14th Week in Ordinary Time B/1 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 |
| 15th Week in Ordinary Time B/1 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 |
| 16th Week in Ordinary Time B/1 | 19 | 20 | 21 |
22 or St Mary Magdalene |
23 | 24 |
25 or St James |
| 17th Week in Ordinary Time B/1 |
26 or
Sun for Indigenous Peoples |
27 | 28 |
29 or Memorial St Martha |
30 | 31 |
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Wednesday of the thirteenth week in Ordinary Time
(July 1) Blessed Junipero Serra (1713-1784)
In 1776, when the American
Revolution was beginning in the east, another part of the future United
States was being born in California. That year a gray-robed Franciscan
founded Mission San Juan Capistrano, now famous for its annually returning
swallows. San Juan was the seventh of nine missions established under the
direction of this indomitable Spaniard. Born in Spain’s island of Mallorca,
Serra entered the Franciscan Order, taking the name of St. Francis’
childlike companion, Brother Juniper. Until he was 35, he spent most of his
time in the classroom—first as a student of theology and then as a
professor. He also became famous for his preaching. Suddenly he gave it all
up and followed the yearning that had begun years before when he heard about
the missionary work of St. Francis Solanus in South America. Junipero’s
desire was to convert native peoples in the New World. Arriving by ship at
Vera Cruz, Mexico, he and a companion walked the 250 miles to Mexico City.
On the way Junipero’s left leg became infected by an insect bite and would
remain a cross — sometimes life-threatening — for the rest of his life. For 18
years he worked in central Mexico and in the Baja Peninsula. He became
president of the missions there. Enter politics: the threat of a Russian
invasion south from Alaska. Charles III of Spain ordered an expedition to
beat Russia to the territory. So the last two
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conquistadors—one military,
one spiritual—began their quest. José de Galvez persuaded Junipero to set
out with him for present-day Monterey, California. The first mission founded
after the 900-mile journey north was San Diego (1769). That year a shortage
of food almost cancelled the expedition. Vowing to stay with the local
people, Junipero and another friar began a novena in preparation for St.
Joseph’s day, March 19, the scheduled day of departure. On that day, the
relief ship arrived. Other missions followed: Monterey/Carmel (1770); San
Antonio and San Gabriel (1771); San Luís Obispo (1772); San Francisco and
San Juan Capistrano (1776); Santa Clara (1777); San Buenaventura (1782).
Twelve more were founded after Serra’s death. Junipero made the long trip to
Mexico City to settle great differences with the military commander. He
arrived at the point of death. The outcome was substantially what Junipero
sought: the famous “Regulation” protecting the Indians and the missions. It
was the basis for the first significant legislation in California, a “Bill
of Rights” for Native Americans. Because the Native Americans were living a
nonhuman life from the Spanish point of view, the friars were made their
legal guardians. The Native Americans were kept at the mission after Baptism
lest they be corrupted in their former haunts—a move that has brought cries
of “injustice” from some moderns. Junipero’s missionary life was a long
battle with cold and hunger, with unsympathetic military commanders and even
with danger of death from non-Christian native peoples. Through it all his
unquenchable zeal was fed by prayer each night, often from midnight till
dawn. He baptized over 6,000 people and confirmed 5,000. His travels would
have circled the globe. He brought the Native Americans not only the gift of
faith but also a decent standard of living. He won their love, as witnessed
especially by their grief at his death. He is buried at Mission San Carlo
Borromeo, Carmel, and was beatified in 1988.
During his homily at Serra’s beatification, Pope John Paul II
said: “Relying on the divine power of the message he proclaimed, Father
Serra led the native peoples to Christ. He was well aware of their heroic
virtues—as exemplified in the life of Blessed Kateri Tekakwitha—and he
sought to further their authentic human development on the basis of their
new-found faith as persons created and redeemed by God. He also had to
admonish the powerful, in the spirit of our second reading from James, not
to abuse and exploit the poor and the weak.” (AmericanCatholic.org)
Scripture today: Genesis 21:5, 8-20a; Psalm
34:7-8, 10-13; Matthew 8:28-34
When Jesus arrived at the other side
in the region of the Gadarenes, two demon-possessed men coming from the
tombs met him.
They were so violent that no-one could pass that way. What do
you want with us, Son of God? they shouted. Have you come here to torture us
before the appointed time? Some distance from them a large herd of pigs was
feeding. The demons begged Jesus, If you drive us out, send us into the herd
of pigs. He said to them, Go! So they came out and went into the pigs, and
the whole herd rushed down the steep bank into the lake and died in the
water. Those tending the pigs ran off, went into the town and reported all
this, including what had happened to the demon-possessed men. Then the whole
town went out to meet Jesus. And when they saw him, they pleaded with him to
leave their region.
(Matthew 8: 28-34)
Christ and the demons There is
one point of comparison between the Old and New Testaments which is
interesting. It is the degree to which Satan features in each. Apart from
the beginning of Genesis, the Book of Job and, say, the Book of Zechariah,
consider how rarely Satan is a formal player in the Old Testament books. He
appears in Genesis 3 when God places the man and the woman in the Garden
with the command not to eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.
He dialogues briefly with the
woman and successfully tempts her to turn from
God and then through her ensnares the man. He also tempts Job through
adversity to give up on God but this time without success. Job is faithful.
Satan appears in the Book of Zachariah the prophet standing at the right of
the high priest as his adversary (3: 1). Apart from these instances one
could, I think, count on one’s hand the times Satan gets a mention in the
Old Testament. There is much more evidence of the angels in the Old Testament
than of the demons. In the New, and in particular in the Gospels, the case
is very different indeed. Satan and the demons are revealed and are shown to
be out in force against the Son of God. At the Last Supper Christ refers to
Satan as the Prince of this world and he tells his disciples that he, this
Prince, is coming. He is coming to end the life of the Messiah. We also have
accounts of conversations between Christ and Satan and his minions. The
first such was at the threshold of our Lord’s public ministry in the desert,
and Satan was bundled off repulsed. He was shown that he had no hold on this
Man. Here in our Gospel today we have a meeting between Christ and some
lesser, though still powerful, demons. The encounter is instructive.
Firstly, the demons are shown to be very strong once they have gained a
footing and their strength is violent. No one could pass the way of the
possessed men, no one. But ah! The tables turn immediately at the arrival of
Christ. Let us consider the conversation that ensues.
The demons appear to be aware of who
Jesus really is. Word is everywhere in the demonic world about this Man, and
they have, as we might say, put two and two together. Their consensus is
that this is the Son of God. They know it and they tremble. Jesus arrives on
the scene and the demons who have mastery over the two men immediately show
a mixture of bravado and deep worry. It has been said that often the reason
why a dog barks is that it is nervous. Notice how the demons bark at Christ:
“What do you want with us, Son of God?” Their situation is hopeless before
this Man. They know immediately that their time is up in his presence. The
only question is when it is to be. “Have you come here to torture us before
the appointed time?” (Matthew 8: 28-34)
Notice that they use the verb, “torture.” Have you come here to torture us,
and to torture us before the appointed time? Perhaps they were baiting
Christ and twisting the situation to accuse him of being cruel, with the
emphasis on the word “torture.” They know that when the appointed time comes
all torture will be the result of their own doing. It will not be just
“torture” but a natural punishment for their chosen course of opposition to
God. God does not “torture” his creatures. The free rejection of him, of
which the demons are guilty, results in the profound self-inflicted torture
of Hell. This opening salvo from the demons shows their hateful and
implacable blindness. But at the same time they plead with Christ not to
send them away. They fear the deep Abyss. It is a plea for consideration and
Christ accords it. They are allowed to go into the pigs. It perhaps
indicates that God shows a degree of mercy even to the damned. Their
punishment, though eternal, may in some sense be open to some mitigation, at
least before the appointed time, possibly even after it. Hell is real and it
is final, but we are not told the precise degree of punishment. The words of
the demons indicate that they know there is an “appointed time” when all
will be settled. The good will be rewarded and the bad punished. All
struggle will be over. We are in the time of struggle, the time when Christ
took on the grand Prince and defeated him.
This putrid Prince knows his days
are numbered, but he wishes to take down with him all he can. Christ is just
as determined not to lose any of those he has been given. Let us join with
Christ in the battle. We are with the strong one, the one who has already
won, so let us we be at our work with sword in hand and with Christ before
us. The sword is the Cross of obedience and suffering and our shield is
Christ himself. By means of the Cross the Redeemer won the victory. There
must be no quarter given to sin and self. There are souls to be saved,
beginning with our own and then those of all mankind. To the work, then! Now
I begin!
(E.J.Tyler)
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Didn't you see the light in Jesus' eyes as the poor widow left her little
alms in the temple? Give him what you can: the merit is not in whether it is
big or small, but in the intention with which you give it.
(The Way, no.829)
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Continuing The Imitation of Christ
BOOK THREE
INTERNAL CONSOLATION
Eighteenth Chapter: TEMPORAL
SUFFERINGS SHOULD BE BORNE PATIENTLY, AFTER THE EXAMPLE OF CHRIST
THE
VOICE OF CHRIST
MY CHILD, I came down from heaven for your salvation and took upon Myself
your miseries, not out of necessity but out of love, that you might learn to
be patient and bear the sufferings of this life without repining. From the
moment of My birth to My death on the cross, suffering did not leave Me. I
suffered great want of temporal goods. Often I heard many complaints against
Me. Disgrace and reviling I bore with patience. For My blessings I received
ingratitude, for My miracles blasphemies, and for My teaching scorn.
(Continuing)
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Theology cannot
always have its own way; it is too hard, too intellectual, too exact, to be
always equitable, or to be always compassionate; and it sometimes has a
conflict or overthrow, or has to consent to a truce or a compromise, in
consequence of the rival force of religious sentiment or ecclesiastical
interests; and that, sometimes in great matters, sometimes in unimportant.
(from ‘Preface to the Third Edition’ of the Lectures on the Prophetical
Office of the Church 1877)
---------------Back to index for this month---------------------------Back to index to Liturgical Days---------
Thursday of the thirteenth week in Ordinary Time
(July 2) St. Oliver Plunkett (1629-1681)
The name of today's saint is especially familiar to the Irish and the
English—and with good reason. The English martyred
Oliver Plunkett
for defending the faith in his native Ireland during a period of severe
persecution. Born in County Meath in 1629, he studied for the priesthood in
Rome and was ordained there in 1654. After some years of teaching and
service to the poor of Rome he was appointed Archbishop of Armagh in
Ireland. Four years later, in 1673, a new wave of anti-Catholic persecution
began, forcing Archbishop Plunkett to do his pastoral work in secrecy and
disguise and to live in hiding. Meanwhile, many of his priests were sent
into exile; schools were closed; Church services had to be held in secret
and convents and seminaries were suppressed. As archbishop, he was viewed as
ultimately responsible for any rebellion or political activity among his
parishioners. Archbishop Plunkett was arrested and imprisoned in Dublin
Castle in 1679, but his trial was moved to London. After deliberating for 15
minutes, a jury found him guilty of fomenting revolt. He was hanged, drawn
and quartered in July 1681. Pope Paul VI canonized Oliver Plunkett in 1975.
(AmericanCatholic.org)
Scripture today: Genesis 22:1b-19; Psalm
115:1-6, 8-9; Matthew 9:1-8
Jesus stepped into a boat, crossed
over and came to his own town. Some men brought to him a paralytic, lying on
a mat. When
Jesus saw their faith, he said to the paralytic, Take heart,
son; your sins are forgiven. At this, some of the teachers of the law said
to themselves, This fellow is blaspheming! Knowing their thoughts, Jesus
said, Why do you entertain evil thoughts in your hearts? Which is easier: to
say, 'Your sins are forgiven,' or to say, 'Get up and walk'? But so that you
may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins. . . .
Then he said to the paralytic, Get up, take your mat and go home. And the
man got up and went home. When the crowd saw this, they were filled with
awe; and they praised God, who had given such authority to men.
(Matthew 9: 1-8)
Christ forgives sins
I have often thought that it would
be a very useful field of research to determine which religions are driven
by a sense of sin and which are not. Undoubtedly there is some sense of sin
present in the practice of most religions even if, in the case of some, it
is present only faintly. Obviously a fundamental need driving all religions
is the need for survival, for life and for security. Man looks to the powers
above for aid in the face of threats. His religion brings that aid to him.
The question is, what
threats does man perceive as most menacing? In the
case of a society that looks on the lack of food as the greatest threat, or
on attacks from neighbours or foreign peoples or any one of many possible
physical threats as their greatest concern, their religion will be shaped
accordingly. Their perception of the kind of evil that menaces will
shape the rituals and myths that give life to their religion. Their religion
is their answer to those threats. But what of the evil that is sin — meaning
by this an offence against the moral law and the will of the gods? This is a
vast question for comparative religion but the religion this immediately
calls to mind is that of the Judaeo-Christian revelation. One might claim
that it took a good deal of time for the sense of sin to develop and to
become a centrepiece of the religion of the Hebrews, and I am not sure that
the Jew would claim that his religion places sin and a full answer to sin at
its centre. But there is no doubt about the Christian religion. In the
Christian revelation man’s own sin is understood as being the greatest of
his threats and it is at the heart of all its Ritual and all its Story. Man
has by nature a sense of his sinfulness which includes a sense of God as
offended. But the Christian revelation includes many things about man’s sin
that are beyond natural experience and discovery — such as that sin is the fruit of an
original Fall. It is the root cause of man’s sufferings and disorder. The
wounded condition it caused is transmitted to all and it leads finally to
total death.
Yes, in the Christian religion sin
is perceived as the greatest problem of the world and it is precisely to
take it away and to replace it with holiness that there is a Christian
religion at all. That is to say that Christ came to take away the sin of the
world and to reconcile man with God by bestowing on him a share in the
divine life. This is the good news. Sin can now be forgiven and taken away and
man can be united to God. It is this which is the work of Christ, and it is
done by means of union with Christ. This is what we see encapsulated in our
Gospel passage today (Matthew 9: 1-8).
Our Lord comes to his own town, which during his public ministry is
Capernaum. Some men bring to him a paralytic, lying on a mat. In that very
image we see many of the religions of man in the sense that many of the
religions of man have as their clear purpose the overcoming of physical need
and physical evil. Man prays and worships and has his ceremonies in order
to gain food, security, health and wealth. These, of course, are truly
legitimate purposes of religion and Christ himself strongly encouraged us to
pray to our heavenly Father for all these obvious needs we have. He assures
us that our Father in heaven will hear our prayers. But if this is all we
are praying for, our deepest need will not be answered and he came to answer
that deepest need. The men who brought the paralytic to Jesus were doing an
excellent thing. But when Jesus saw the paralytic the first thing he did was
to answer the man’s deepest need. That need sprang from his sins. He needed
the forgiveness of God. This is exactly what the Son of God became man to
do, to take away the sin of the world. Accordingly, seeing the faith of the
men and their paralytic friend he proceeded to forgive his sins, an action
only God himself could perform. It caused consternation among our Lord’s
persistent critics, the teachers of the law. Our Lord went to his death in
order, by his death and resurrection, to save mankind from sin. On the
evening of the first day he rose from the dead he gave to his Apostles the
power to forgive the sins of men.
This same power which Christ
exercised on the occasion of our Gospel passage, this same power which he
bestowed on his Apostles on the evening of the day he rose from the dead,
is transmitted to the ordained Catholic priest. He is, by
virtue of the Sacrament of Holy Orders, empowered by Christ to forgive the
sins of Christ’s faithful. By his ministry of forgiving sins the great work
of Christ taking away the sin of the world is brought to the individual
repentant sinner. The sinner is forgiven and endowed with the grace to set
out once again to become holy. So then, let us have a deep appreciation of the
Christian doctrine of the forgiveness of sins.
(E.J.Tyler)
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Give 'all' the glory to God. 'Squeeze' out each one of your actions with
your will aided by grace, so that there remains in them nothing that smacks
of human pride, of self-complacency.
(The Way, no.784)
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Continuing The Imitation of Christ
BOOK THREE
INTERNAL CONSOLATION
Eighteenth Chapter:
TEMPORAL SUFFERINGS SHOULD BE BORNE PATIENTLY, AFTER THE EXAMPLE OF CHRIST
THE DISCIPLE
O
Lord, because You were patient in life, especially in fulfilling the design
of the Father, it is fitting that I, a most miserable sinner, should live
patiently according to Your will, and, as long as You shall wish, bear the
burden of this corruptible body for the welfare of my soul. For though this
present life seems burdensome, yet by Your grace it becomes meritorious, and
it is made brighter and more endurable for the weak by Your example and the
pathways of the saints. But it has also more consolation than formerly under
the old law when the gates of heaven were closed, when the way thereto
seemed darker than now, and when so few cared to seek the eternal kingdom.
The just, the elect, could not enter heaven before Your sufferings and
sacred death had paid the debt.
(Continuing)
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It is true, indeed, that in a certain sense local
differences are unknown in that Religion which comes from God. What it is in
one
place, such it is in
another, and ever must be so. The very name of Catholic is contrasted with
local, and precludes any variation in revealed truth wherever it is found.
This is undeniable; and St. Paul insists upon it. Christianity, he says, has
destroyed all distinction of a national, or family, or party nature. He
reminds us that we are citizens of one city, and partakers of one and the
same new nature; and that, when old things passed away, local interests and
ideas went away among them.
(JHN, from the sermon ‘The Tree beside the Waters’ 1859)
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index to Liturgical Days---------
Feast of Saint Thomas the Apostle
(2009 — Friday of the thirteenth week in Ordinary Time)
(July 3) Saint Thomas, Apostle
Poor Thomas! He made one remark and has been branded as “Doubting Thomas”
ever since. But if he doubted, he also believed.
He made what is certainly
the most explicit statement of faith in the New Testament: “My Lord and My
God!” (see John 20:24-28) and, in so expressing his faith, gave Christians a
prayer that will be said till the end of time. He also occasioned a
compliment from Jesus to all later Christians: “Have you come to believe
because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and have
believed” (John 20:29). Thomas should be equally well known for his courage.
Perhaps what he said was impetuous—since he ran, like the rest, at the
showdown—but he can scarcely have been insincere when he expressed his
willingness to die with Jesus. The occasion was when Jesus proposed to go to
Bethany after Lazarus had died. Since Bethany was near Jerusalem, this meant
walking into the very midst of his enemies and to almost certain death.
Realizing this, Thomas said to the other apostles, “Let us also go to die
with him” (John 11:16b). (AmericanCatholic.org)
Scripture today: Ephesians 2:19-22; Psalm
117:1bc, 2; John 20:24-29
Now Thomas (called Didymus), one of
the Twelve, was not with the disciples when Jesus came. So the other
disciples told him,
We have seen the Lord! But he said to them, Unless I see
the nail marks in his hands and put my finger where the nails were, and put
my hand into his side, I will not believe it. A week later his disciples
were in the house again, and Thomas was with them. Though the doors were
locked, Jesus came and stood among them and said, Peace be with you! Then he
said to Thomas, Put your finger here; see my hands. Reach out your hand and
put it into my side. Stop doubting and believe. Thomas said to him, My Lord
and my God! Then Jesus told him, Because you have seen me, you have
believed; blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.
(John
20:24-29)
Dogma
In 1864 a famous book appeared in
England. It was the Apologia pro Vita Sua of John Henry
Newman. This was a history of his religious opinions and was his answer to
the slur of Charles Kingsley, published earlier that year in his review of
two volumes of J.A. Froude’s History of England. On the fourth
page of his volume Newman describes in terse sentences his first conversion
to formed religious convictions at the age of fifteen. He writes that in the
autumn of 1816 he “fell under the influence of a definite
Creed,” and
received into his intellect “impressions of dogma”. This statement reminds
us of how indebted the Christian is to Creed and to dogma. The Church has
given us a Creed and it has given us dogma, whereby we are able to know
exactly what God has revealed as it is contained in Scripture and in the
Church’s Tradition. The Creed, whether it be the Nicene Creed or the
Apostles Creed, is the product of the Church’s teaching and baptismal
liturgy and it spells out in exact terms the essentials of divine revelation. The
various dogmas of the Church have generally been the Church’s response to
error and they state exactly what divine revelation teaches in respect to the
mystery of Christ. Dogmas also set forth the Church’s teaching in ways that
meet difficulties with certain contested doctrines. For instance, how could
a man be God? When Arius denied that Christ was divine, the Church drew its
formal distinction between person and nature, teaching that Christ was a
divine person with two natures, his divine nature and his assumed human
nature. That is a dogma of the Church and it helps us understand better the
teaching of the inspired writings of the New Testament about Christ. From
the beginning the faithful depended on the living Tradition of the Church to
interpret correctly the New Testament writings as they gradually appeared.
We ourselves have the advantage of the Church’s creeds and dogmas which
express this living Tradition. They help us interpret with exactness and
sureness the teaching of the Gospels and the New Testament.
Knowing the Creed enables us to
recognize instantly the import of many texts in the Gospels. For instance,
there are many instances given by St John of Christ’s allusions to his
divinity during his public ministry. His forgiveness of sins led the
religious leaders to wonder, who can forgive sins but God alone? Our Lord
when challenged over the violation of the Sabbath by his disciples, replied
that the Son of Man is lord of the Sabbath. He said to them that just as his
Father worked constantly, so does he. They could see he was making God his
own natural Father and so making himself equal to God. He challenged the
people to tell him what David meant when, referring to the Messiah, he wrote
in the psalm that the Lord said to my Lord, sit at my right hand. He told
the leaders that he and the Father were one. He said to them that before
Abraham ever was, I am. At his trial he was put on oath to answer whether he
claimed to be the Son of God. To that point silent, he then spoke. I am, he
said, and they would see him coming at the right hand of God in glory and
power. He was putting himself on a par with God himself. His passion and
death was a great act of witness to the truth of who he was. The dogma of
the Incarnation, of one divine person in two distinct natures, has its clear
foundation and illustration in the text of the Gospels. This dogma assists us to recognize
immediately and without ambiguity the meaning of the words of Christ. In our
Gospel passage today (John 20:24-29), in
what we might call the crowning climax of the Gospel of St John, the risen
Jesus appears to the Eleven for a second time. This time the doubting Thomas
is with them. Christ invites him to step forward and feel him in his living
risen manhood. Thomas does so and immediately worships him as his Lord and
God. Thomas identifies Jesus with Yahweh God, not, though, with the Father
and the Holy Spirit both of whom our Lord had often referred to. My Lord and
my God, Thomas exclaims. This man before him is the living God. This
doctrine that the man Jesus is the living God, God the Son made man, is
the fundamental dogma of Christianity. It is the centrepiece of the
Christian Creed and the Church’s Tradition.
Let us join with Thomas in kneeling
before the risen living Jesus, this magnificent Man of the ages, this
sparkling jewel of our race, this wonder of the universe. There is nothing
like him. He is incomparable. He is the pearl of great price, the treasure
of all treasures in the field. It is critical for our salvation that we
cleave to him. Yes, he is man, but, wonder of wonders! he is the Lord God
himself. He is our Redeemer and our Lord, the one who is our life both here
and forever hereafter.
(E.J.Tyler)
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'You are my God, I give you thanks, I extol you, my God'. — Beautiful aims
for an apostle such as you.
(The Way, no.785)
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Continuing The Imitation of Christ
BOOK THREE INTERNAL
CONSOLATION
Eighteenth Chapter:
TEMPORAL SUFFERINGS SHOULD BE BORNE PATIENTLY, AFTER THE EXAMPLE OF CHRIST
THE DISCIPLE
Oh, what great thanks I owe You, Who have shown me and all the faithful the
good and right way to Your everlasting kingdom! Your life is our way and in
Your holy patience we come nearer to You Who are our crown. Had You not gone
before and taught us, who would have cared to follow? Alas, how many would
have remained far behind, had they not before their eyes Your holy example!
Behold, even we who have heard of Your many miracles and teachings are still
lukewarm; what would happen if we did not have such light by which to follow
You?
(Concluded)
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It was prophesied
that God should come upon earth. When the time was now full, how was it
announced? It was announced by the Angel coming to Mary.
(JHN, from Meditations and Devotions 1893)
---------------Back to index for this month---------------------------Back to index to Liturgical Days---------
Friday of the thirteenth week in Ordinary time B-2
Entrance Antiphon Ps 47 (46): 2
All peoples, clap your hands. Cry to God with shouts of joy!
Collect
O God, who through the grace of adoption chose us to be children of light,
grant, we pray, that we may not be wrapped in the darkness of error but always
be seen to stand in the bright light of truth. Through our Lord Jesus Christ,
your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one
God, for ever and ever.
click on centre arrow
Scripture today: Genesis 23: 1-4.19; 24:
1-8.62-67; Psalm 105; Matthew 9: 9-13
As
Jesus went on from there, he saw a man named Matthew sitting at the tax
collector's booth. Follow me, he told him, and Matthew got up and followed him.
While Jesus was having dinner at Matthew's house, many tax collectors and
sinners came and ate with him and his disciples. When the Pharisees saw this,
they asked his disciples, Why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and
'sinners'? On hearing this, Jesus said, It is not the healthy who need a doctor,
but the sick. But go and learn what this means: 'I desire mercy, not sacrifice.'
For I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners.
(Matthew 9: 9-13)
Matthew
The notable point in this Gospel passage is
Christ’s invitation to Matthew to follow him, and Matthew’s immediate response:
he immediately rose from his work desk, and followed him. The significance of
this might be seen by considering the call of others. Matthew narrates Christ’s
invitation to the principal Apostles, Peter, Andrew, James and John at the
beginning of his account of the public ministry. Christ called “Simon who is
called Peter, and Andrew his brother” to follow him, and “immediately they left
their
nets
and followed him.” Then he saw James and John mending their nets and invited
them in similar manner, and “immediately they left the boat and their father,
and followed him” (Matthew 4: 18-22). It indicates their deep love for Jesus
Christ, and a complete detachment from their work, career, possessions and
existing prospects. The Gospel of St John shows us (1: 35-42) that as a matter
of fact, at least Simon and Andrew, and presumably John (and therefore probably
James) had already met and come to know our Lord in Judea. Andrew and John were
disciples of John the Baptist, and at their meeting with Jesus in effect they
became his disciples. It is their formal call later, when back in Galilee, that
Matthew records. The point, though, is that their immediate response to Jesus
Christ in Judea (John) and then in Galilee (Matthew), indicates their first-rate
moral and spiritual quality. It is not unlike the immediate response of Paul
when Jesus revealed himself to him on the road to Damascus. In the Gospel of
Matthew, following the call of the four principal Apostles, Christ launches his
public ministry and then his long Sermon on the Mount is given. With that, the
public ministry is resumed. A little later, Christ, “going along from there saw
a man sitting at the tax table” (Matthew 9:9), just as he had “walked by the Sea
of Galilee” when he called Simon and Andrew. He said to Matthew, “Follow me.”
When he called Simon and Andrew, he promised to make them fishers of men. All he
said to Matthew was, Follow me! Matthew’s response was exactly the same as
theirs ― he got up and followed him (9:9). It indicates that Matthew was in no
sense just a grubby tax collector of the kind widely perceived. He was a great
soul, and Christ knew it.
Not only was Matthew detached from his possessions and career, not only was he
possessed of a deep love and reverence for Jesus Christ, but he was very humble.
He makes a point of telling the reader that he was, yes, a tax collector. It was
when he was at this reviled work that he was called. His companions were
“sinners and tax collectors,” for after he was called and entered the company of
Jesus, he sat with Jesus at table with “many tax collectors and sinners” ― as
they were regarded, especially by the Pharisees (Matthew 9:10-11). When Matthew
writes of the commissioning of “the twelve disciples” and Christ’s bestowing on
them authority to exorcize and to heal, he gives us their names. The only one
whose profession is mentioned is himself: Matthew the tax collector (10:3). He
regards himself in lowly fashion ― there is nothing, he obviously thinks, for
him to boast about. He was a despised tax collector, and Jesus Christ called
him! I cannot help but wonder whether the inspiration for Christ’s parable of
the Pharisee and the Tax Collector was Matthew himself. This parable is not
given by Matthew himself, but by Luke (18:9). The Publican in the parable prays
over and over again his magnificent prayer, which Cardinal Newman once described
as the essence of authentic religion: O God be merciful to me a sinner! I like
to think that this was the prayer of Matthew’s humble soul, before and after his
call by Christ. Matthew would have been guilty of his sins ― we know nothing
concretely of that ― but we can see that he was very humble, and abandoned all
when Christ privileged him with a personal call. Matthew went on to pen his
Gospel, which many ― taking their cue from Augustine and from the common
testimony of early references to Matthew’s Gospel ― consider the first of the
four. In it he strove to show that Jesus is the promised Messiah, fulfilling
beyond all expectations the inspired prophecies before him. Apart from his
apostolic labours during his lifetime, till the end of the world Matthew’s
inspired Gospel will bring the person of Jesus Christ to countless souls
yearning, as he did, for God and his grace.
Our Gospel passage today shows Jesus Christ walking along, stopping in front of
an obscure government official who attracted little more than silent dismissal,
and calling him to the most wondrous life. He was called to be one of the
Twelve, an intimate companion of God made man. In a special way the call of
Matthew can be considered as symbolic of the universal call to holiness directed
to all, no matter how obscure. Matthew’s immediate response shows the depths of
goodness that can be found in the most unregarded hearts. God had been preparing
him for this moment, and he rose to the occasion. God can do great things for
me! Yes, and for each of us.
(E.J.Tyler)
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Saturday of the thirteenth week in Ordinary Time
(July 4) St. Elizabeth of Portugal (1271-1336)
Elizabeth is usually depicted in royal garb with a dove or an olive branch.
At her birth in 1271, her father, Pedro III, future king of Aragon, was
reconciled with his father, James, the reigning monarch. This proved to be a
portent of things to come. Under the healthful influences surrounding her
early years, she quickly learned self-discipline and acquired a taste for
spirituality. Thus fortunately prepared, she was able to meet the challenge
when, at the age of 12, she was given in marriage to Denis, king of
Portugal. She was able to establish for herself a pattern of life conducive
to growth in God’s love, not merely through her exercises of piety,
including daily Mass, but also through her exercise of charity, by which she
was able to befriend and help pilgrims, strangers, the sick, the poor—in a
word, all those whose need came to her notice. At the same time she remained
devoted to her husband, whose infidelity to her was a scandal to the
kingdom. He too was the object of many of her peace endeavours. She long
sought peace for him with God, and was finally rewarded when he gave up his
life of sin. She repeatedly sought and effected peace between the king and
their rebellious son, Alfonso, who thought that he was passed over to favour
the king’s illegitimate children. She acted as peacemaker in the struggle
between Ferdinand, king of Aragon, and his cousin James, who claimed the
crown. And finally from Coimbra, where she had retired as a Franciscan
tertiary to the monastery of the Poor Clares after the death of her husband,
she set out and was able to bring about a lasting peace between her son
Alfonso, now king of Portugal, and his son-in-law, the king of Castile.
(AmericanCatholic.org)
Scripture today: Genesis 27:1-5, 15-29; Psalm 135:1b-6; Matthew 9:14-17
Then John's disciples came and asked
him, How is it that we and the Pharisees fast, but your disciples do not
fast? Jesus answered, How can the guests of the bridegroom mourn while he is
with them? The time will come when the bridegroom will be taken from them;
then they will fast. No-one sews a patch of unshrunken cloth on an old
garment, for the patch will pull away from the garment, making the tear
worse. Neither do men pour new wine into old wineskins. If they do, the
skins will burst, the wine will run out and the wineskins will be ruined.
No, they pour new wine into new wineskins, and both are preserved.
(Matthew 9:14-17)
The uniqueness of Christ
In our Gospel scene today the
disciples of John approach our Lord because they are puzzled at the practice
of his disciples. Without doubt they approach him with deep respect because
of the respect for Jesus which John had constantly manifested. Of course, we
do not know all the circumstances of the testimony that John gave of Jesus.
With at least some of his disciples John had been absolutely explicit: There
is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world, he told at
least two
of them. At this those two left him and followed Jesus, becoming our Lord’s
first Apostles. Moreover, in our Lord’s confrontations with the leaders of
the Jews he appealed to the testimony of John — suggesting that John had
been public in his testimony about Jesus. On the other hand, we read in the
Acts of the Apostles of various disciples of John years later who did not
know that John had testified to Jesus. These disciples of John were
instructed in the Gospel by individuals of the early Church. The point that
I am making is that it is not altogether clear from the New Testament what
individual disciples of John the Baptist had picked up from their master
about Jesus and his mission. And so in our Gospel today some disciples of
John approach Jesus in their perplexity. They and the disciples of the
Pharisees have been taught to fast, but you, they say, do not appear to
teach your disciples to fast. They do not attack our Lord as if he is in
violation of the law of holiness as inculcated by the Scriptures — as the
Pharisees might have done. They simply cannot understand our Lord’s apparent
teaching and practice. Jesus is a holy prophet and great before God and men.
What, then, is going on? In answer our Lord does not dispute the necessity
of fasting, nor does he call into question their good will. Nor, though,
does he agree with a suggestion that his own disciples do not fast at all.
He simply says that he does not intend that at this point fasting be a
notable feature of the religious life of his disciples. That will come
later. What he wants now is that they be in his presence in order to come to
know and love him.
But underlying our Lord’s reply is a
revelation of his absolute uniqueness. One gets the sense that the disciples
of John perceived our Lord as being simply in the line of Old Testament
religion and its prophets. John taught his disciples to fast, and all know
that John is a prophet. The Pharisees teach their disciples to fast, and all
recognize that the Pharisees are most careful practitioners of the Law. Why
are you not then doing likewise? They are putting our Lord in the category
of either the prophets or those who are deemed best in the knowledge and
practice of the Law. His setting, in their minds, is the Law and the
Prophets and in a very real sense this was a correct perception. Our Lord’s
context is the Law and the Prophets, and he himself said that he had come to
fulfil the Law and the Prophets. But our Lord fulfilled the Law and the
Prophets in a way that transcended the understanding possessed even by John
himself and certainly the understanding possessed by the Pharisees. Here in
the person of our Lord was something new. Here was the very object and point
of Old Testament religion. Here was the Bridegroom himself. A new beginning
was being made, and Christ’s disciples were to be allowed to find their
religious foundation in this new beginning, which was himself, the
Bridegroom. His disciples were not simply carrying on what had been lived
before — it being business as usual, as it were. No. In Jesus there was
someone wholly new, a new dispensation with a new beginning. He was new wine
in new wineskins. He was a new garment, and not simply an excellent patch on
an old garment. The Bridegroom had arrived and it was a time of rejoicing
for those who had discovered him in their lives and set out on the path of
discipleship. The guests must needs celebrate. But the time will come when
the Bridegroom would be taken from them — then they will fast, but for the
sake of the Bridegroom. It was a new beginning, a new dispensation, built
upon the Old. Our Gospel today (Matthew 9:14-17)
reminds us, then, of the utter uniqueness of Jesus Christ in the
life of mankind.
Let us place ourselves among
Christ’s disciples, for by baptism Christ himself has called us to be one of
his. Let us gaze upon him who is our Master and Friend. I have not called
you servants, he said to his disciples. I have called you friends. The first
thing we each must do is discover his friendship for us, for me. Jesus
Christ, the Bridegroom of my soul and of the Church, has chosen me to be his
friend. For this reason St Paul writes, Rejoice in the Lord always, again I
say rejoice. Let not anything cloud that fundamental perception. Christ is
my life and on this basis I practise my religion, which is the religion he
revealed and entrusted his Church to bring to each man and woman, including
me.
(E.J.Tyler)
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Don't be a fool! It's true that at most you play the part of a little bolt
in that great undertaking of Christ's.
But do you know what happens when a bolt is not tight enough or when it
works itself out of place? Bigger parts also work loose or the gear-wheels
get damaged and broken.
The work is slowed up. Perhaps the whole machine will be rendered useless.
What a big thing it is to be a little bolt!
(The Way, no.830)
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Continuing The Imitation of Christ
BOOK THREE INTERNAL
CONSOLATION
The Nineteenth Chapter TRUE
PATIENCE IN SUFFERING
THE VOICE OF CHRIST
WHAT
are you saying, My child? Think of My suffering and that of the saints, and
cease complaining. You have not yet resisted to the shedding of blood. What
you suffer is very little compared with the great things they suffered who
were so strongly tempted, so severely troubled, so tried and tormented in
many ways. Well may you remember, therefore, the very painful woes of
others, that you may bear your own little ones the more easily. And if they
do not seem so small to you, examine if perhaps your impatience is not the
cause of their apparent greatness; and whether they are great or small, try
to bear them all patiently. The better you dispose yourself to suffer, the
more wisely you act and the greater is the reward promised you. Thus you
will suffer more easily if your mind and habits are diligently trained to
it.
(Continuing)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
We are told [in
Scripture]… that obedience to God leads on to faith in Christ; that it is
the only recognized way to Christ; and that, therefore, to believe in Him,
ordinarily implies that we are living in obedience to God.. … “He that doeth
truth, cometh to the light.” [John 3: 21]
(JHN, from the sermon ‘Obedience to God the Way to Faith in Christ’ 1830)
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Fourteenth Sunday of Ordinary Time B
Prayers this week:
Within your temple, we ponder your loving kindness, O God. As your name,
so also your praise reaches to the ends of the earth; your right hand is
filled with justice. (Psalm 47: 10-11)
Father,
through the obedience of Jesus, your servant and your Son, you raised a
fallen world. Free us from sin and bring us the joy that lasts forever.
We ask
this through our Lord Jesus Christ your Son in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God for ever and ever.
(July 5) St. Anthony Zaccaria (1502-1539)
At the same time that Martin Luther was attacking abuses in the Church, a
reformation within the Church was already being
attempted. Among the early
movers of the Counter-Reformation was Anthony Zaccaria. His mother became a
widow at 18 and devoted herself to the spiritual education of her son. He
received a medical doctorate at 22 and, while working among the poor of his
native Cremona, was attracted to the religious apostolate. He renounced his
rights to any future inheritance, worked as a catechist, and was ordained a
priest at the age of 26. Called to Milan in a few years, he laid the
foundations of three religious congregations, one for men, one for women and
another for laity. The three foundations met regularly and engaged together
in various forms of apostolic action. Their aim was the reform of the
decadent society of their day, beginning with the clergy and religious. The
Laity of St. Paul died out soon after Anthony's death but experienced a
rebirth in the 1990s. Greatly inspired by St. Paul (his congregation is
named the Barnabites, after the companion of that saint), Anthony preached
with great vigour in church and street, conducted popular missions and was
not ashamed of doing public penance. He encouraged such innovations as the
collaboration of the laity in the apostolate, frequent Communion, the Forty
Hours devotion and the ringing of church bells at 3:00 p.m. on Fridays. His
holiness moved many to reform their lives but, as with all saints, it also
moved many to oppose him. Twice his community had to undergo official
religious investigation, and twice it was exonerated. While on a mission of
peace, he became seriously ill and was brought home for a visit to his
mother. He died at Cremona at the age of 36.
(AmericanCatholic.org)
Scripture today: Ezechiel 2:2-5; Psalm
123:1-4; 2 Corinthians 12:7-10; Mark 6:1-6
Jesus left there and went to his
home town, accompanied by his disciples. When the Sabbath came, he began to
teach in the synagogue, and many who heard him were amazed. Where did this
man get these things? they asked. What's this wisdom that has been given
him, that he even does miracles! Isn't this the carpenter? Isn't this Mary's
son and the brother of James, Joseph, Judas and Simon? Aren't his sisters
here with us? And they took offence at him. Jesus said to them, Only in his
home town, among his relatives and in his own house is a prophet without
honour. He could not do any miracles there, except lay his hands on a few
sick people and heal them. And he was amazed at their lack of faith.
(Mark 6:1-6)
The work and
gift of faith The lack of faith in him by his own
townspeople amazed our Lord (Mark 6:1-6).
Their response reminds us that throughout his public ministry our Lord was
looking for and expecting faith in himself. Repeatedly when asked for some
favour such as a healing he asked, Do you believe I can do this for you?
When Simon Peter started to sink, after having at our Lord’s bidding begun
to walk across the water, the Lord said to him, Man of little faith, why did
you doubt? Christ responded to one request by saying that
unless you see
signs and wonders you will not believe! In the plan of God faith in Jesus is
necessary for salvation. Just as our Lord was about to return to his
heavenly Father he told his Apostles that they were to go to the whole world
and make disciples of all the nations. The one who believes will be saved.
The one who refuses to believe will be condemned. The implication of this is
that we are responsible for our decision to believe, and so for our
salvation. There is a current of Christian thought, usually associated with
John Calvin, that places all the stress on the sovereignty of God and his
eternal choice of us in Christ. In this view, his divine plan in effect
destines a person for salvation or damnation. Whatever in the event happens
must have happened ultimately by decree of God. In this view, so totally is
the life of faith made the work of God that the role of our freedom is lost
sight of. All this introduces us to the Church’s teaching on faith, which is
the supernatural virtue necessary for salvation. Must we be of a certain
intelligence to be saved? No. Must we have done a specified number of good
works to be saved? No. Must we have attained a specified level of
theological and philosophical understanding of the doctrines of the Holy
Trinity and the Incarnation? No. Must we believe in Jesus Christ and on this
basis accept all that he revealed? Yes. There is this proviso, of course,
that those who have lacked a true opportunity to know Jesus Christ and his
teaching will be judged on their fidelity to what they do have, which is
their God-given conscience. Cardinal Newman once called the conscience the
“aboriginal vicar of Christ” which is to say the natural and basic
representative of Christ in the heart of man. So then, what are the
characteristics of that faith which Christ has said we must have to be
saved?
To begin with, faith is a free gift
of God. When our Lord asked his disciples who men said he was, they gave
various answers. But then he asked who they themselves said he was. Simon
Peter answered, You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God. Our Lord
responded by telling him that he was blessed for having this faith and that
it came not from man or anything natural, but from the Father in heaven. It
was God’s gift to him. Simon had been open to the grace of God enabling him
to believe and as a result he was granted saving faith. On this basis our
Lord proceeded to name Simon as the Rock on which he would build his Church.
One implication of this is that all those who would be members of Christ’s
Church founded on this Rock would have the faith that Peter professed. This
faith, just as it was for Simon Peter, would be a free gift from the Father
in heaven. It is conferred at Baptism. At the same time, faith is a
thoroughly human act. It is my own free and conscious act of belief. The
fact that our Lord was amazed that his own townsmen had so little faith
shows that the gift of faith is freely available from God and that I have
plenty of reasons for belief. I am responsible for believing and responsible
for refusing to believe. It is what I choose to do. The action of the Father
bestowing this gift of faith prompts and enables the will to make its free
and truly personal choice. Using my mind — as did Simon Peter — and making
my own choice — as did Simon Peter — I freely assent to divine truth as it
is embodied in Jesus and uttered by him in his teaching. Because I believe
that Jesus is truly God my faith is most certain because it is founded not
just on my own power of reasoning or on the authority of some great
religious mind, but on God himself. My faith in Jesus and in his teaching as
it comes to me in the teaching of his Church is most certain because it is
the word of God himself. My faith in Jesus works and grows through the
exercise of charity and also through prayer and listening to the word of
God. Even here on earth it gives me a faint foretaste of the joys of heaven.
Those of us who have been granted
the gift of faith in Jesus and a readiness to accept his teaching ought
cultivate a profound appreciation of it. It is the foundation of our
Christian life. It comes from God as his free gift. At the same time I am
responsible for the choice I make to believe or not to believe and this
choice has profound consequences for my eternal destiny. I am also
responsible for the work I put in to cultivate and develop this gift of
faith. This is the work of God, our Lord once said, to believe in the one he
has sent. Let us make that our chief work in life and take all the necessary
means to grow in this belief. If we live according to it, it will take us to
heaven.
(E.J.Tyler)
Further reading: The Catechism of the Catholic Church,
nos. 153-165
(On Faith)
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Among
those around you — apostolic soul — you are the stone fallen into the lake.
With your word and your example you produce a first circle... and it
another... and another, and another... Wider each time.
Now do you understand the greatness of your mission?
(The Way, no.831)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Continuing The Imitation of Christ
BOOK THREE INTERNAL
CONSOLATION
The
Nineteenth Chapter
TRUE PATIENCE IN
SUFFERING
THE VOICE OF CHRIST
Do not say: "I cannot bear this from such a man, nor should I suffer things
of this kind, for he has done me a great wrong. He has accused me of many
things of which I never thought. However, from someone else I will gladly
suffer as much as I think I should."
(Continuing)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Endeavour then, my
brethren, to realize that you have souls, and pray God to enable you to do
so. Endeavour to disengage your thoughts and opinions from the things that
are seen; look at things as God looks at them, and judge of them as He
judges.
JHN, from the sermon ‘The Individuality of the Soul’ 1836)
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Sunday for Indigenous Peoples
(In Australia, Aboriginal and Torres Strait
Islander Sunday, generally the first Sunday in July)
click on centre arrow
Possible Scripture reading: Matthew 25: 34-40
Jesus said, Then the King will say to
those on his right, 'Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your
inheritance, the kingdom
prepared
for you since the creation of the world. For I was hungry and you gave me
something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a
stranger and you invited me in, I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick
and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.' Then the
righteous will answer him, 'Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or
thirsty and give you something to drink? When did we see you a stranger and
invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? When did we see you sick or in
prison and go to visit you?' The King will reply, 'I tell you the truth,
whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for
me.' (Matthew 25: 34-40)
The least
When Prince William, Duke of Cambridge, and eldest son
of Prince Charles and Diana, visited Australia in March of 2011, he was received
with delight everywhere. Was it because of his accomplishments or because of
some special interior qualities? No - it was because of who he is, the second in
line to the British throne after his father Charles. Of course, his personality
and manner greatly assisted in ensuring the warmth of his welcome, but
essentially it was because he is a very prominent member of the British royalty.
If
all
goes well, he is destined for the thrones of sixteen independent sovereign
states known as the Commonwealth realms: the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia,
New Zealand, Jamaica, Barbados, the Bahamas, Grenada, Papua New Guinea, the
Solomon Islands, Tuvalu, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Belize,
Antigua and Barbuda, and Saint Kitts and Nevis. Consequently, he is also second
in line, again behind his father, to the position of Head of the Commonwealth
(figurehead of the 54-member Commonwealth of Nations) and, in England (only),
Supreme Governor of the Church of England. These are largely honorific rather
than executive roles, still they all add lustre to his person as he is perceived
by the world. It is in this sense that the honour accorded him is due to who he
is. But of course, when we say that it is due to “who he is,” we are speaking of
extrinsic rather than intrinsic qualities of his person. We are not speaking of
special qualities of his precisely as a member of the human race. Now, the point
of my mentioning him is to illustrate a serious defect of which we are liable in
our perceptions of those who have little social status. While we readily honour
(and with good reason) those who are accorded society’s highest honours, we tend
not to honour those without them. This, I think, is because we do not often
think carefully or deeply. On this day of the Church’s year, we are invited to
think of the indigenous peoples, and especially those who are closest to us in
our national and social life. Commonly, they do not possess social honours, and
commonly they do not command the respect of society, at least in relation to
individuals among them. Historically, they have been despised.
Indigenous peoples have been dispossessed of their traditional lands, though
having occupied them for centuries, perhaps for millennia. Races superior in
material resources, education and armaments have strode in and taken possession,
thinking that the new lands are in effect deserted, and have pulverized the
protests of the native peoples. Across the world the collapse of native peoples
before this unthinking or deliberate aggression has been a common phenomenon.
That is to say, a massive injustice has been perpetrated and the world has been
gradually awakening to this sorry fact. The inherent dignity of the indigenous
person, despite his lack of extrinsic honours, is being rediscovered. The
grandeur and age of his native culture is also being discovered, and this too
assists in according to him the respect that is his due. But what ought be the
foundation of our respect for the least honoured among human beings? The
foundation ought be his very human nature. He or she is a member of the human
race, and possesses just as much inherent dignity and worth as a leading prince
of the realm. Prince William is a man, and so is the indigenous person. More
importantly, Prince William is a child of God the common Father of all. So is
the indigenous person, and so are all the poor and forgotten of the world.
Prince William is a baptized Christian (baptised in Buckingham Palace on 4
August 1982 by the then Archbishop of Canterbury, Robert Runcie). So is the
indigenous Christian. He too is a baptized member of Jesus Christ, with the seed
of holiness within his immortal soul. I am thinking now of a fervent Catholic
native New Guinea man whose love for Jesus Christ, for the virgin Mary, for the
Catholic Church, and for the good and holy life to which he is called, is very
great. I know him and I am very impressed with him. He has a very clear idea of
indigenous culture and native New Guinea religions, and knows what is good and
what is bad in them. I greatly respect him for “who he is” - but these qualities
are not merely extrinsic. They are intrinsic to his person. He is a man, a
Christian, and a very worthy human being - and a member of an indigenous people.
We must learn to view others with the mind of Jesus Christ, who looks with
special regard on the least. Indeed, he personally identifies with them, and
takes as having been done to him what is done to them. “'Lord, when did we see
you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? When did we
see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? When
did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?' The King will reply, 'I
tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of
mine, you did for me'” (Matthew 25: 34-40).
Let Christ’s teaching transform our attitude to the least in society.
(E.J.Tyler)
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Monday of the fourteenth week in Ordinary Time
(July 6) St. Maria Goretti (1890-1902)
One of the largest crowds ever assembled for a canonization—250,000—symbolized
the reaction of millions touched by the simple story of Maria Goretti.
She was the daughter of a poor Italian tenant farmer, had no chance to
go to school, never learned to read or write. When she made her First Communion
not long before her death at age 12, she was one of the larger and somewhat
backward members of the class. On a hot afternoon in July, Maria was sitting
at the top of the stairs of her house, mending a shirt. She was not quite
12 years old, but physically mature. A cart stopped outside, and a neighbour,
Alessandro, 18 years old, ran up the stairs. He seized her and pulled her
into a bedroom. She struggled and tried to call for help, gasping that
she would be killed rather than submit.
“No, God does not wish it. It is a sin. You would go to hell for it.” Alessandro
began striking at her blindly with a long dagger. She was taken to a hospital.
Her last hours were marked by the usual simple compassion of the good—concern
about where her mother would sleep, forgiveness of her murderer (she had
been in fear of him, but did not say anything lest she cause trouble to
his family) and her devout welcoming of Viaticum. She died about 24 hours
after the attack. Her murderer was sentenced to 30 years in prison.
For a long time he was unrepentant and surly. 
One night he had a dream or vision of Maria, gathering flowers and offering
them to him. His life changed. When he was released after 27 years, his
first act was to go to beg the forgiveness of Maria’s mother.
Devotion to the young martyr grew, miracles were worked, and in
less than half a century she was canonized. At her beatification in 1947,
her mother (then 82), two sisters and a brother appeared with Pope Pius
XII on the balcony of St. Peter’s. Three years later, at her canonisation,
a 66-year-old Alessandro Serenelli knelt among the quarter-million people
and cried tears of joy. "Even if she had not been a martyr, she would still
have been a saint, so holy was her everyday life" (Cardinal Salotti). (AmericanCatholic.org)
Scripture today: Genesis
28:10-22a; Psalm 91:1-4, 14-15ab; Matthew 9:18-26
While Jesus was saying
this, a ruler came and knelt before him and said, My daughter has just
died. But come and put your hand
on her, and she will live. Jesus
got up and went with him, and so did his disciples. Just then a woman who
had been subject to bleeding for twelve years came up behind him and touched
the edge of his cloak. She said to herself, If I only touch his cloak,
I will be healed. Jesus turned and saw her. Take heart, daughter, he said,
your faith has healed you. And the woman was healed from that moment. When
Jesus entered the ruler's house and saw the flute players and the noisy
crowd, he said, Go away. The girl is not dead but asleep. But they laughed
at him. After the crowd had been put outside, he went in and took the girl
by the hand, and she got up. News of this spread through all that region.
(Matthew 9:18-26)
God's care for me
Let us notice a detail
or two in our Gospel passage today. The scene opens with our Lord speaking — he was speaking to the disciples of John the Baptist
— when “a ruler”
approached him with profound respect. So our Lord paused to receive him
and hear what he had to ask. The man told him that his daughter had just
died. Despite this sad end he asked our Lord to come and lay his hand on
her and she would live. He had great faith in our Lord’s power — let us
remember that in the Gospel of St John Martha and Mary lamented
the fact that our Lord arrived after their brother had died. It seems they
did not expect a raising from the dead. This man in our passage today does
expect this, if only our Lord would come and lay his hand on her. Notice,
though, that our Lord does get up and go with him — he does not simply
say to the man, go, your daughter will live. That is to say, he accommodates
himself to the precise request. The man had asked of him that he come,
and he did come. He walked with him to the house. He dealt with the person
in a very personal and individual manner. On an earlier occasion in the
same Gospel (ch.8) a centurion approached him to tell him that his servant
was grievously sick. Our Lord offered to go and heal him. But the centurion
said that he was not worthy to have him under his roof — a mere word from
him would be sufficient. After praising the centurion highly for his faith,
our Lord did not visit the house but simply gave the word and the servant
was healed. Again, he accommodated himself to the precise request. In the
scene of our Gospel today (ch.9), our Lord accompanies the ruler to his
home with his disciples following. Then secretly, an ailing woman
touched the hem of his garment expecting from that action a cure. At that,
our Lord turned and saw her, assuring her that her faith in him had brought
her the healing she desired. Again, he accommodated himself to the situation
of the person in need. All this indicates that God knows us personally.
All these are simple
incidents but we ought ponder their significance for us in our relationship
with God. The general danger in a secular age and culture — possibly in
any age and any culture — is to think that God is distant and unconcerned
for me and my particular needs. The danger is of living a religion which
allows for a general providence but not a particular one. We accept that,
if and since there is a God, he rules the world in a general way. I suspect
that many do not even go that far. Rather than looking on God as the world’s
Ruler, they look on him as no more than its Initiator. God created and
then leaves the world to its own laws and devices — indeed it is a common
feature of man’s religions that the high god and creator departs and leaves
the scene to the lesser spirits. Man, I suspect, if he gets beyond pantheism
tends to be a deist or a believer in a general providence. One of the tests
of a personal religion is whether a person believes in a particular providence,
a God who cares for him in particular and who responds to his particular
needs and requests. One of the tests of this belief (in a particular providence)
is whether one asks God for the things one needs, and whether one persists
in asking despite delays. Various details in the Gospels show that God
exercises a particular providence over us — a providence that is very particular
indeed. The details of our Gospel scene (Matthew
9:18-26) which I have been highlighting illustrate this particular
regard and care that God has for us in all our individuality. Christ receives
a request to come, and he gets up and comes. He is secretly approached
by a woman who touches the hem of his garment, and the healing comes in
the way she has expected and desired. He then proceeds to the house of
the ruler and does as has been requested — he extends his hand, takes hold
of the hand of the girl and raises her up. God exercises a very particular
and personal care for us. As St Paul writes, Christ loved me and gave himself
up for me — not just for humanity in general.
Let us place ourselves
in our Gospel scene today among those in our Lord’s company. Perhaps we
do not have a particular request to make of Christ — and perhaps that is
often our situation. We are not among those who only approach Christ if
they have something to request of him. We are in his company and he makes
us feel that we, each of us, is personally known by him and loved by him.
He turns and looks at me personally. It is very evident that he knows me
through and through, He loves me. He smiles. Let us bring to our entire
relationship with the living risen Jesus a real faith in his personal love
for me and his particular providence in my regard.
(E.J.Tyler)
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How anxious people are to get out of place! Think
what would happen if each bone and each muscle of the human body wanted
to occupy some position other than that proper to it.
There is no other reason for the world's discontent. Persevere in your
place, my son; there... what work you can do to establish our Lord's true
kingdom!
(The
Way, no.832)
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Continuing The Imitation of Christ BOOK THREE INTERNAL CONSOLATION
The Nineteenth Chapter TRUE PATIENCE
IN SUFFERING
THE VOICE OF CHRIST
Such a thought is foolish, for it does not consider the virtue of patience
or the One Who will reward it, but rather weighs the person and the offence
committed. The man who will suffer only as much as seems good to him, who
will accept suffering only from those from whom he is pleased
to accept it, is not truly patient. For the truly patient man does not
consider from whom the suffering comes, whether from a superior, an equal,
or an inferior, whether from a good and holy person or from a perverse
and unworthy one; but no matter how great an adversity befalls him, no
matter how often it comes or from whom it comes, he accepts it gratefully
from the hand of God, and counts it a great gain. For with God nothing
that is suffered for His sake, no matter how small, can pass without reward.
Be prepared for the fight, then, if you wish to gain the victory. Without
struggle you cannot obtain the crown of patience, and if you refuse to
suffer you are refusing the crown. But if you desire to be crowned, fight
bravely and bear up patiently. Without labour there is no rest, and without
fighting, no victory.
(Continuing)
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Herein then, first, is St. Paul’s conversion memorable
… When Almighty God would convert the world, opening the door of faith
to the Gentiles, who was the chosen preacher of His mercy? Not one of Christ’s
first followers. To show His power, He put forth His hand into the very
midst of the persecutors of His Son, and seized upon the most strenuous
among them.
(JHN, from the sermon ‘St. Paul’s Conversion
Viewed in reference to His Office’ 1831)
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to index for this month---------------------------Back to
index to Liturgical Days---------
Tuesday of the fourteenth week in Ordinary Time
(July 7) Blessed Emmanuel Ruiz and Companions (1804-1860)
Not much is known of the early life of Emmanuel Ruiz, but details of
his heroic death in defence of the faith have come down to us. Born of humble
parents in Santander, Spain, he became a Franciscan priest and served as
a missionary in Damascus. This was at a time when anti-Christian riots shook
Syria and thousands lost their lives in just a short time. Among these were
Emmanuel, superior of the Franciscan convent, seven other friars and three
laymen. When a menacing crowd came looking for the men, they refused to renounce
their faith and become Muslims. The men were subjected to horrible tortures
before their martyrdom. Emmanuel, his brother Franciscans and the three Maronite
laymen were beatified in 1926 by Pope Pius XI. (AmericanCatholic.org)
Scripture today: Genesis 32:23-33; Psalm 17:1b-3, 6-8b and 15;
Matthew 9:32-38
While they were going out, a man who was demon-possessed and could not talk
was brought to Jesus. And when the demon was
driven out, the man who had
been mute spoke. The crowd was amazed and said, Nothing like this has ever
been seen in Israel. But the Pharisees said, It is by the prince of demons
that he drives out demons. Jesus went through all the towns and villages,
teaching in their synagogues, preaching the good news of the kingdom and
healing every disease and sickness. When he saw the crowds, he had compassion
on them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd.
Then he said to his disciples, The harvest is plentiful but the workers are
few. Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send out workers into his
harvest field. (Matthew 9:32-38)
The incomparable One
Matthew’s Gospel is notable for setting Jesus Christ within the context of
“the Scriptures”. That is to say, because of Matthew’s frequent allusions
to Old Testament texts and how Christ fulfilled the Scriptures, it is clearly
one of his aims to show how Jesus relates to the entirety of revealed religion.
He fulfils the Scriptures and they are to be understood in light of him.
This is one of the reasons why many scholars are of the view that his Gospel
was written above all for those with a Jewish
background. Now, in our passage
today Matthew reports a significant observation made by the crowds, and I
suspect that it is reported by Matthew with approval. Matthew
surely reports it as representing his own teaching on the person and ministry of
Jesus. The crowd, having seen Christ sovereignly expel the demon from the
mute man with the result that the man immediately spoke, marvelled. The crowd
was amazed and said, Nothing like this has ever been seen in Israel. The
people were obviously not simply referring to our Lord’s casting out of a
demon to enable a dumb man to speak. They were referring to the entire range
of supernatural power being so effortlessly wielded by Christ. Nothing seemed
difficult for him when it came to the command of the natural and supernatural
elements. Who in all of Israel’s history could compare with him? The crowds
could think of no one in their past who could, as we would put it, hold a
candle to him. They may have been especially thinking of Christ’s confrontation
with Satan and his minion spirits and of how he dominated them with such
ease. When we think of it, where in the Old Testament is there any parallel
with Christ’s confrontation with and domination of Satan? Eve entered into
dialogue with Satan and it led to her and her husband’s undoing. Job resisted
the wiles of Satan but did not overthrow him. Moses did not formally confront
Satan in any explicit and massive way. The same is to be said of the Prophets.
We do not read of John the Baptist confronting Satan and the demons and scattering
them.
This is one (among many) of the obvious differences between Christ and those
various servants of Yahweh who had gone before him. But it was not the only
way in which nothing like him or what he was doing had been seen before in
Israel. No one had displayed such power on so many distinct fronts. He effortlessly
raised the dead at a mere word. He cured all kinds of illnesses. With a handful
of food he fed thousands of people. He walked on a turbulent sea over a considerable
distance and at a word calmed a powerful storm at sea. What he would not
do is tamper with the freedom of man. If people chose to reject him or harass
him or scheme against him and even betray him — as did one of his very own — then he did not exercise his almighty power to prevent them. He did not
make people love and accept him nor did he prevent people from setting their
faces against him. But of course, his almighty power was, in the event, displayed
precisely in his freely submitting to the machinations of men and in redeeming
the world of its sin precisely in this setting. In Christ’s power, which
was revealed constantly in his mercy and compassion, was seen nothing of
the like in Israel’s history. In Christ’s teaching too there was also something
altogether unique. Though fulfilling the teaching of the Old Testament,
in so many respects it transcended it. I am referring above all to Christ’s
teaching about himself and his mission. The Father and I are one, he said.
Where was the like in all of Israel’s history? Before Abraham ever was, I
am. My Father works, so then do I. The leaders of the Jews took up stones
to stone him because in calling God his own Father in the sense he clearly
meant, he was making himself equal to God. Where was the like in all of Israel’s
history? He who sees me, sees the Father. The Father is in me and I am in
the Father. I shall send you another Advocate, the Spirit of Truth. All he
has will be taken from what is mine. He who believes in me will live forever.
As the crowd said, Nothing like this has ever been seen in Israel
(Matthew
9:32-38).
Despite all this, it is very possible for man to refuse Christ and his unique
claims and teaching. We read that the Pharisees, seeing all he was doing,
accused him of being evil. It was through being in league with Satan that
he was doing these extraordinary things — so they sneered. So our response to Christ will very
much depend on the basic disposition of our will. Our judgment on him will
depend on our own moral choice. Are we disposed to submit to the truth, or
are we disposed to refuse it? Let us make our choice for Christ and follow
him no matter what the cost. Therein lies life everlasting.
(E.J.Tyler)
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Leaders!... Strengthen your will so that God can make a leader of you. —
Consider the tactics of those infamous secret societies. They don't try to
win over the masses. In their dens they form a number of demon-men who set
to work stirring up the multitudes to madness, so that they will follow them
to the precipice of all excess... and to hell. They spread an accursed seed.
If you wish, you will spread God's word, which is a thousand times blessed
and can never fail. If you are generous..., if you respond, with your personal
sanctification you will help to bring about the sanctification of others;
the kingdom of Christ: omnes cum Petro ad Jesum per Mariam — 'all with Peter
to Jesus through Mary.'
(The Way, no.833)
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Continuing The Imitation of Christ
BOOK THREE INTERNAL CONSOLATION
The Nineteenth Chapter
TRUE PATIENCE IN SUFFERING
THE DISCIPLE
O Lord, let that which seems naturally impossible to me become possible through
Your grace. You know that I can suffer very little, and that I am quickly
discouraged when any small adversity arises. Let the torment of tribulation
suffered for Your name be pleasant and desirable to me, since to suffer and
be troubled for Your sake is very beneficial for my soul.
(Concluded)
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Was it confidence or doubt, was it zeal or coldness, was it keenness or irresolution
in action, which distinguished the Martyrs in the first ages of the Church?
Was the religion of Christ propagated by the vehemence of faith and love,
or by a philosophical balance of arguments?
(JHN, from the discourse ‘Illuminating Grace’ 1849)
---------------Back to index for this month---------------------------Back to index to Liturgical Days---------
Wednesday of the fourteenth week in Ordinary Time
(July 8) St. Gregory Grassi and Companions (d.
1900)
Christian missionaries have often gotten caught in the crossfire of wars
against their own countries. When the governments of Britain, Germany,
Russia and France forced substantial territorial concessions from the
Chinese in 1898, anti-foreign sentiment grew very strong among many Chinese
people. Gregory Grassi was born in Italy in 1833, ordained in 1856 and sent
to China five years later. Gregory was later ordained Bishop of North Shanxi.
With 14 other European missionaries and 14 Chinese religious, he was
martyred during the short but bloody Boxer Uprising of 1900. Twenty-six of
these martyrs were arrested on the orders of Yu Hsien, the governor of
Shanxi province. They were hacked to death on July 9, 1900. Five of them
were Friars Minor; seven were Franciscan Missionaries of Mary — the first
martyrs of their congregation. Seven were Chinese seminarians and Secular
Franciscans; four martyrs were Chinese laymen and Secular Franciscans. The
other three Chinese laymen killed in Shanxi simply worked for the
Franciscans and were rounded up with all the others. Three Italian
Franciscans were martyred that same week in the province of Hunan. All these
martyrs were beatified in 1946.
Martyrdom is the occupational hazard of missionaries. Throughout China
during the Boxer Uprising, five bishops, 50 priests, two brothers, 15
sisters and 40,000 Chinese Christians were killed. The 146,575 Catholics
served by the Franciscans in China in 1906 had grown to 303,760 by 1924 and
were served by 282 Franciscans and 174 local priests. Great sacrifices often
bring great results. (AmericanCatholic.org)
Scripture: Genesis 41:55-57; 42:5-7a, 17-24a; Psalm 33:2-3, 10-11, 18-19;
Matthew 10:1-7
Jesus called his twelve disciples to him and gave them authority to drive
out evil spirits and to heal every disease and sickness. These are the names
of the twelve apostles: first, Simon (who is called Peter) and his brother
Andrew; James son of Zebedee, and his brother John; Philip and Bartholomew;
Thomas and Matthew the tax collector; James son of Alphaeus, and Thaddaeus;
Simon the Zealot and Judas Iscariot, who betrayed him. These twelve Jesus
sent out with the following instructions: Do not go among the Gentiles or
enter any town of the Samaritans. Go rather to the lost sheep of Israel. As
you go, preach this message: 'The kingdom of heaven is near.'
(Matthew
10:1-7)
The Twelve
For the Christian, one of the notable advantages of making a study of
comparative religion is that the distinctiveness of Christ and Christianity
is seen in sharper relief. Similarly, if Christ is set (as he should be)
within the context of the entire sweep of the Scriptures, both Old and New
Testaments, we are helped to see his transcendent significance. He exceeds
all that has gone before him. As St John the Baptist explained to his
disciples, Jesus is the Bridegroom now arrived. He, John — representing, we
may say, the Old Testament — is merely the
friend of the
Bridegroom. In our Gospel today the passage opens with our
Lord calling twelve of his disciples to be Apostles. He had many disciples
and we read in one Gospel that he sent out ahead of him seventy-two to
prepare the way before him. In the Gospel of St John when our Lord announced
the doctrine of the Eucharist in the Synagogue many of his disciples left
him. When, in the Acts of the Apostles, the election of a successor to Judas
Iscariot was being arranged, there were about one hundred and twenty
present. Peter pointed out that there were men there who had walked in their
company ever since the beginning of our Lord’s public ministry and who had
remained faithful to Jesus till the Ascension (1:21). Of all these disciples
Christ chose twelve to be the Apostles, the leaders. Why twelve? Our Lord
obviously was thinking of the twelve tribes of Israel and their twelve
patriarchs. In the Old Testament, God was the God of Abraham, Isaac and
Jacob. That was how he introduced himself to Moses in the Burning Bush
(Exodus 3:6). In that encounter, God then refers to his people: I have
witnessed the affliction of my people in Egypt (3:7). When did the God of
Abraham, Isaac and Jacob (Israel) become the God of a people? We may say
that this happened with the emergence of the twelve sons of Jacob (Genesis
35:23) and the prophecies of Jacob over those twelve sons (Genesis 48 and
49). The twelve sons of Israel (Jacob) are the fathers of the twelve tribes of Israel
and they are a people on the basis of the covenant of God with Abraham,
Isaac and Jacob.
Moses placed the twelve tribes of Israel on a new basis, on the basis of the
covenant of Sinai. Following Sinai, over the course of sacred history the
twelve tribes of Israel pass through numerous mishaps and are scattered.
Judah continues to bear with it the special blessing of Jacob. The tribe of
Judah possesses the sceptre “until he comes to whom it belongs. To him shall
be the obedience of the nations” (Genesis 49:10). This prophecy of Jacob
points to the Messiah who will fulfil the ancient promise made by God to
Abraham that through him all the nations will be blessed. In Jesus the one
from the tribe of Judah to whom the sceptre belongs has now arrived, and he
reconstitutes the people of God on a new basis. All the nations would
be blessed and the mission of this new people would be to the world. And so
our Lord selects from his disciples the Twelve. They are to be the
patriarchs of the new Israel. What other prophet before Christ presumed to
gather disciples on such a basis as this, and with such resonant allusions
to the origins of the people of God? A new people was in the making, and
just as the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob had formed his people at the
beginning, so now, in the person of his Messiah, he was forming his people
anew. Here was a new Moses, but one far greater. Moses did not form a new
people, with new patriarchs. There had been only the twelve patriarchs of
the tribes of Israel. At God’s command, he led those tribes out of slavery
to the promised land, but with a new covenant established on Sinai. It had
renewed and taken forward the covenant of God with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.
Here, though, in Jesus, a new people was being formed that did not break
with the old but fulfilled it. There was a new Twelve
(Matthew
10:1-7) and there would be a
new covenant and a new Church, founded not on kinship and ethnicity, but on
sharing the life and spirit of Jesus Christ. Through the gift of grace won
for us by Christ’s death on the cross, this new people would be members of
God’s family through being brothers and sisters of Jesus Christ.
What we are speaking of here is the founding of Christ’s Church on the
Twelve Apostles, with Simon Peter at their head. These twelve he sent out
during his public ministry. It was a foretaste of his great commission given
to them after his rising from the dead. Just before he ascended into heaven
he commanded the Twelve to go to the whole world and make disciples of all
the nations, for all authority in heaven and on earth had been given to him.
The sceptre had passed to the one to whom it belonged. To him was due the
obedience of the nations. By the gift of faith and our baptism we are
members of this Church. Let us play our part in its mission, then!
(E.J.Tyler)
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Is there any greater folly than to scatter the golden wheat on the ground to
let it rot? Without that generous folly there would be no harvest.
Son, how do we stand as regards generosity?
(The Way, no.834)
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Continuing The Imitation of Christ
BOOK THREE INTERNAL CONSOLATION
The Twentieth Chapter CONFESSING OUR WEAKNESS IN THE MISERIES OF LIFE
THE DISCIPLE
I WILL bring witness against myself to my injustice, and to You, O Lord, I
will confess my weakness.
Often it is a small thing that makes me downcast and sad. I propose to act
bravely, but when even a small temptation comes I find myself in great
straits. Sometimes it is the merest trifle which gives rise to grievous
temptations. When I think myself somewhat safe and when I am not expecting
it, I frequently find myself almost overcome by a slight wind. Look,
therefore, Lord, at my lowliness and frailty which You know so well. Have
mercy on me and snatch me out of the mire that I may not be caught in it and
may not remain forever utterly despondent.
(Continuing)
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No man is certain of a truth, who can endure the thought of the fact of its
contradictory existing or occurring.
(JHN, from An Essay in aid of a Grammar of Assent
1870)
---------------Back to index for this month---------------------------Back to index to Liturgical Days---------
Thursday of the fourteenth week in Ordinary Time
(July 9) Saint Augustine Zhao Rong, priest and
martyr, and his companions, martyrs
(17th-20th
centuries) Christianity arrived in China by way of Syria in the 600s.
Depending on China's relations with the outside world, Christianity over the
centuries was free to grow or was forced to operate secretly. The 120
martyrs in this group died between 1648 and 1930. Most of them (87) were
born in China and were children, parents, catechists or laborers, ranging
from nine years of age to 72. This group includes four Chinese diocesan
priests. The 33 foreign-born martyrs were mostly priests or women religious,
especially from the Order of Preachers, the Paris Foreign Mission Society,
the Friars Minor, Jesuits, Salesians and Franciscan Missionaries of Mary.
Augustine Zhao Rong was a Chinese solider who accompanied Bishop John
Gabriel Taurin Dufresse (Paris Foreign Mission Society) to his martyrdom in
Beijing. Augustine was baptized and not long after was ordained as a
diocesan priest. He was martyred in 1815. Beatified in groups at various
times, these 120 martyrs were canonized in Rome on October 1, 2000.
(AmericanCatholic.org)
Scripture today: Genesis 44:18-21, 23b-29;
45:1-5; Psalm 105:16-21; Matthew 10: 7-15
Jesus said to the Twelve, As you go,
preach this message: 'The kingdom of heaven is near.' Heal the sick, raise
the dead, cleanse
those
who have leprosy, drive out demons. Freely you have received, freely give.
Do not take along any gold or silver or copper in your belts; take no bag
for the journey, or extra tunic, or sandals or a staff; for the worker is
worth his keep. Whatever town or village you enter, search for some worthy
person there and stay at his house until you leave. As you enter the home,
give it your greeting. If the home is deserving, let your peace rest on it;
if it is not, let your peace return to you. If anyone will not welcome you
or listen to your words, shake the dust off your feet when you leave that
home or town. I tell you the truth, it will be more bearable for Sodom and
Gomorrah on the day of judgment than for that town
(Matthew 10:7-15).
Acceptance of dogma
Perhaps the most distinguishing
feature of the Oxford Movement which arose in the Anglican Church in England
during 1833 was its emphasis on the dogmatic principle of the Christian
religion. Dogmas, it insisted, were fundamental, non-negotiable and required
of Christian belief. It is in no way enough to be merely sincere if in fact
you are calling into question a required point of Christian doctrine — let
us say, the doctrine of eternal reward and punishment, or the doctrine of
the divinity of Jesus Christ or the necessity
of
the Atonement for our salvation. Salvation requires assent to certain
dogmas. The acknowledged leader of the Oxford Movement was John Henry, later
Cardinal, Newman. One of his close friends prior to the beginning of the
Movement of 1833 was Joseph Blanco White. Blanco White published attacks on
the insistence on dogma, arguing that it is absurd to claim that God would
judge one worthy of damnation because of a wrong opinion. Ultimately he was
arguing that religion is a matter of sincere personal opinion, whereas
Newman was arguing that religion is a matter of objective dogma. Though
Newman was absolutely right and Blanco White wrong, it could be argued that
the view Blanco White represented carried the day. By that I mean that the religion of
modern man is based on the notion that each person is to make up his own
mind on the truth or otherwise of the classic doctrines of revealed
religion. What really matters is not that one be objectively correct but
that one be sincere. Be that as it may, let us consider our Gospel today and our Lord’s
words to the Twelve (Matthew 10:7-15).
They are to proclaim that the kingdom of heaven is near. In respect to any
town which does not welcome or listen to their words, the Twelve are to
shake off the dust of that town from their feet. That is to say, for
refusing to welcome the doctrine of Christ as announced to them by the
Twelve, that town is reprehensible. Its judgement will be more severe than
that of Sodom and Gomorrah. Having a sincere personal opinion is not enough.
The one who refuses to believe will be condemned.
Of course, a person can be sincere
in his rejection of the message of Christ, but that does not mean that he is
not blameworthy. Our Lord repeatedly condemned the leaders of the Jews for
their obstinacy of heart and during his interrogation by Pilate our Lord
said that those who had rejected him and handed him over had the greater
guilt. Yet on the Cross Christ appealed to his heavenly Father that he
forgive them, for, he said, they did not know what they were doing. So, they
were blind yet guilty. When Peter cured the lame man in the Temple he went
on to address the people (Acts 3: 17). He told the people that it was
through ignorance that they had done away with Jesus and rejected his
teaching, “as did also your rulers.” Yet they were to repent and be
converted, that “your sins may be blotted out.” So their blindness which led
them to commit so great a sin was itself morally reprehensible. It required
repentance. Sincerity in opposition to the truth is not enough. It is the
truth which sets us free. Of course, we must immediately go on to say that
there are indeed circumstances which can result in a
person not having heard the message of the Gospel in the first place, or
having had it so obscured that in effect they do not hear it. This mitigates
guilt. To use the
classic expression, a person can be in a state of invincible ignorance which
shows in their confirmed conviction. These allowances having been
made, nevertheless our Lord’s words in the Gospel place the entire weight on
acceptance of the doctrine and dogma of the Church as the path to salvation.
The Twelve are to proclaim the message entrusted to them by Christ, and
those who reject it will suffer condemnation. The destruction of Sodom and
Gomorrah is an image of what issues from the refusal to believe the message
of the Twelve. The Twelve, of course, are the foundations of the Church.
There is no weight given to mere sincerity in the rejection of dogma. If all
that mattered were sincerity, then objective truth would not matter whereas
Christ’s words show that what matters is the acceptance of the truth.
Let us learn to love the Creed and
the teaching of the Church coming from Christ and his revelation. This
objective Creed which summarizes the Scriptures and the Church’s doctrines
is the Truth that comes from God and which if accepted sets a man free.
Christ is the Way and the Life, and he is also the Truth. As the Truth he is
man’s way to God and he brings the life of God. Let us hold fast to the
Truth that Christ revealed and make it the non-negotiable dogmatic basis of
our life.
(E.J.Tyler)
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You long to shine like a star, to shed your
light from high in the heavens?
Better to burn like a hidden torch, setting your fire to all that you touch.
That's your apostolate: that's why you are on earth.
(The Way, no.835)
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Continuing The Imitation of Christ
BOOK THREE
INTERNAL CONSOLATION
The Twentieth Chapter
CONFESSING OUR WEAKNESS IN THE MISERIES OF LIFE
THE DISCIPLE
That I am so prone to fall and so weak in resisting my passions oppresses me
frequently and confounds me in Your sight. While I do not fully consent to
them, still their assault is very troublesome and grievous to me, and it
wearies me exceedingly thus to live in daily strife. Yet from the fact that
abominable fancies rush in upon me much more easily than they leave, my
weakness becomes clear to me.
(Continuing)
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Any
one who believed that the Pope and Church of Rome are the seat of the
infallibility of the Catholic Church, ought to join their communion.
(JHN, from ‘Letter to Dr. Jelf in Explanation of the Remarks’ 1841)
---------------Back to index for this month---------------------------Back to index to Liturgical Days---------
Friday of the fourteenth week in Ordinary Time
(July 10) St. Veronica Giuliani (1660-1727)
Veronica’s desire to be like Christ crucified was answered with the
stigmata. Veronica was born in Mercatelli. It is said that when her mother
Benedetta was dying she called her five daughters to her bedside and
entrusted each of them to one of the five wounds
of
Jesus. Veronica was entrusted to the wound below Christ’s heart. At the age
of 17, Veronica joined the Poor Clares directed by the Capuchins. Her father
had wanted her to marry, but she convinced him to allow her to become a nun.
In her first years in the monastery, she worked in the kitchen, infirmary,
sacristy and served as portress. At the age of 34, she was made novice
mistress, a position she held for 22 years. When she was 37, Veronica
received the stigmata. Life was not the same after that. Church authorities
in Rome wanted to test Veronica’s authenticity and so conducted an
investigation. She lost the office of novice mistress temporarily and was
not allowed to attend Mass except on Sundays or holy days. Through all of
this Veronica did not become bitter, and the investigation eventually
restored her as novice mistress. Though she protested against it, at the age
of 56 she was elected abbess, an office she held for 11 years until her
death. Veronica was very devoted to the Eucharist and to the Sacred Heart.
She offered her sufferings for the missions. Veronica was canonized in 1839.
(AmericanCatholic.org)
Scripture today: Genesis 46:1-7, 28-30;
Psalm 37:3-4, 18-19, 27-28, 39-40; Matthew 10:16-23
Jesus said to the Twelve, I am
sending you out like sheep among wolves. Therefore be as shrewd as snakes
and as innocent as
doves. Be on your guard against men; they will hand you
over to the local councils and flog you in their synagogues. On my account
you will be brought before governors and kings as witnesses to them and to
the Gentiles. But when they arrest you, do not worry about what to say or
how to say it. At that time you will be given what to say, for it will not
be you speaking, but the Spirit of your Father speaking through you. Brother
will betray brother to death, and a father his child; children will rebel
against their parents and have them put to death. All men will hate you
because of me, but he who stands firm to the end will be saved. When you are
persecuted in one place, flee to another. I tell you the truth, you will not
finish going through the cities of Israel before the Son of Man comes.
(Matthew 10:16-23)
The meekness of Christ
If we slowly and meditatively
consider the drift of our Lord’s words to the Twelve in our Gospel passage
today, what comes through is that our Lord does not want his disciples to
respond in kind to violence and oppression. Their response is to be like his
own, one of meekness. He is speaking to the Twelve, to the foundation stones
of his Church — and therefore, through them, to his Church. He is sending them
out to work among “wolves”, and they are to be like “sheep”. That is to say,
they are not to be like
wolves among the wolves, using the manner and the
weapons of “wolves.” They will meet with arrest, imprisonment, trial. They
will meet with betrayal and rebellion and hatred and persecution. Of course,
they are not to be naive and passive. They are to be shrewd yet innocent.
They are to be on guard. They are not to be worrisome and fearful. They are
to be strong in the face of hostility and persecution and when it is
possible they are to flee persecution. But in all of it they are to be “like
sheep among wolves.” Our Lord’s direction bespeaks a mixture of courage,
trust and meekness — especially meekness. Now, to be meek in the face of
hatred and persecution implies a tremendous strength and this is what the
three centuries following our Lord’s ascension show. Through meekness they
triumphed. Very different was, say, Mahomet. When Mahomet received
opposition and persecution from his native city of Mecca where he had been a
preacher he fled to Medina where he became a legislator and, most
significantly, a warrior. Thenceforth his perceived revelations were brought
to the world by the sword in one hand and the Koran in the other. Islam
quickly became a match for any military empire of the day and its spread was an
astonishing show of prowess in war. No “wolf” in the world could regard
Islam as a mere “sheep.” This is not what Christ intended for his disciples.
The “wolves” of this world did indeed view Christians as “sheep” and the
first three centuries of Christianity unfolded exactly as our Lord describes
in our Gospel passage today. It was through meekness amid persecution that
Christianity triumphed.
A Pope great in intellect and
holiness makes a pastoral visit to a war-riven Middle East (May, 2009). He
is insulted and criticized by the secular press of Israel during his visit
to Jerusalem. He responds with calmness, gentleness and meekness. His
profound and penetrating discourses continue as he goes from Arabic to
Israeli to Palestinian communities. His Christian meekness continues to be
the response to uncivil and irritable criticism. He returns to Rome and
continues his pastoral ministry, while the World Jewish Congress lauds his — Pope Benedict XVI’s
— visit to the Holy Land as a milestone. From the
Christian perspective, the visit has been a time of grace but a notable
factor in making it so was the manifest Christian spirit that marked the
Pope’s entire demeanour throughout. He is the embodiment of the meekness of
Christ amid criticism, bigotry and incomprehension. In this way, as with our
Lord’s own course, as with the course of the three centuries following
Christ, and as with all true Christian growth, a true advance has been made
due to the action of the Holy Spirit. Christ does not want the Christian to
strive to do good in the world with the weapons of the world — to be a wolf
among wolves, as it were — but to use his weapons. The weapons of Christ
are those of meekness, moral goodness, prudence and above all reliance on
the action and grace of the Holy Spirit. The Christian has the most powerful
Friend and Guide of all — the Holy Spirit — to help him amid all
difficulties. Our Lord says, But when they arrest you, do not worry about
what to say or how to say it. At that time you will be given what to say,
for it will not be you speaking, but the Spirit of your Father speaking
through you (Matthew 10:16-23). Christ
himself was constantly led by the Holy Spirit throughout his public
ministry, and throughout his Passion on to his redeeming death. Not violence
but meekness and the Cross was the weapon with which he gained the victory.
So too with the Christian.
Let every member of the Church — that Church built upon the Twelve
— take to heart the words of our Lord in
our Gospel passage today. He sends us out to do his work every day. He does
not place in our hands the means which the world uses, but the means he
himself chose and which the Holy Spirit placed in his hands. They are the
weapons of obedience to God and humility amid persecution and difficulty.
Let us ponder on this and on the upshot which will always attend the efforts
of the Christian who walks with Christ and does his work in the way Christ
wishes.
(E.J.Tyler)
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To serve as a loud-speaker for the enemy is
the height of idiocy; and if the enemy is God's enemy, it is a great sin.
That is why, in the professional field, I never praise the knowledge of
those who use it as rostrum from which to attack the Church.
(The Way, no.836)
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Continuing The Imitation of Christ
BOOK THREE INTERNAL
CONSOLATION
The
Twentieth Chapter
CONFESSING OUR
WEAKNESS IN THE MISERIES OF LIFE
THE DISCIPLE
Oh that You, most mighty God of Israel, zealous Lover of faithful souls,
would consider the labour and sorrow of Your servant, and assist him in all
his undertakings! Strengthen me with heavenly courage lest the outer man,
the miserable flesh, against which I shall be obliged to fight so long as I
draw a breath in this wretched life and which is not yet subjected to the
spirit, prevail and dominate me.
(Continuing)
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Many
persons are very sensitive of the difficulties of Religion; I am as
sensitive of them as any one; but I have never been able to see a connexion
between apprehending those difficulties, however keenly … and on the other
hand doubting the doctrines to which they are attached. Ten thousand
difficulties do not make one doubt, as I understand the subject.
(JHN, from the Apologia Pro Vita Sua 1864)
---------------Back to index for this month---------------------------Back to index to Liturgical Days---------
Saturday of the fourteenth week in Ordinary Time
(July 11) Saint Benedict, abbot (480?-543)
It is unfortunate that no contemporary biography was written of a man who
has exercised measureless influence on monasticism in
the
West. Benedict is well recognized in the later Dialogues of St. Gregory, but
these are sketches to illustrate miraculous elements of his career. Benedict
was born of a distinguished family in central Italy, studied at Rome and
early in life was drawn to the monastic life. At first he became a hermit,
leaving a depressing world—pagan armies on the march, the Church torn by
schism, people suffering from war, morality at a low ebb. He soon realized
that he could not live a hidden life in a small town any better than in a
large city, so he withdrew to a cave high in the mountains for three years.
Some monks chose him as their leader for a while, but found his strictness
not to their taste. Still, the shift from hermit to community life had begun
for him. He had an idea of gathering various families of monks into one
“Grand Monastery” to give them the benefit of unity, fraternity, permanent
worship in one house. Finally he began to build what was to become one of
the most famous monasteries in the world—Monte Cassino, commanding three
narrow valleys running toward the mountain. The Rule that gradually
developed prescribed a life of liturgical prayer, study, manual labour and
living together in community under a common father (abbot). Benedictine
asceticism is known for its moderation, and Benedictine charity has always
shown concern for the people in the surrounding countryside. In the course
of the Middle Ages, all monasticism in the West was gradually brought under
the Rule of St. Benedict. Today the Benedictine family is represented by two
branches: the Benedictine Federation and the Cistercians.
(AmericanCatholic.org)
Scripture today: Genesis 49:29-32;
50:15-26a; Psalm 105:1-4, 6-7; Matthew 10:24-33
Jesus said to the Twelve, A student is not above his teacher, nor a servant
above his master. It is enough for the student to be like his teacher, and
the servant like his master. If the head of the house has been called
Beelzebub, how much more the members of
his household! So do not be afraid
of them. There is nothing concealed that will not be disclosed, or hidden
that will not be made known. What I tell you in the dark, speak in the
daylight; what is whispered in your ear, proclaim from the roofs. Do not be
afraid of those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Rather, be
afraid of the One who can destroy both soul and body in hell. Are not two
sparrows sold for a penny? Yet not one of them will fall to the ground apart
from the will of your Father. And even the very hairs of your head are all
numbered. So don't be afraid; you are worth more than many sparrows. Whoever
acknowledges me before men, I will also acknowledge him before my Father in
heaven. But whoever disowns me before men, I will disown him before my
Father in heaven. (Matthew 10:24-33)
Do not be afraid!
It has been said that usually the reason why a dog barks is that it is
nervous. One of the most obvious reactions throughout the animal and
sentient kingdom is fear: while there is aggression, there is also plenty of fear. The smallest insect flees for its life at the approach
of any perceived threat, and so does the largest animal. Fear is an inbuilt
instinct that protects the animal, powering its strength as it outruns the
predator that is in hot pursuit. Fear is everywhere. But now,
observe how in
our Gospel passage today our Lord says, do not be afraid. He says this time
and again during his public ministry. When his disciples are caught in the
midst of the storm at sea, he comes to them across the water. They think
they are seeing a phantom and cry out in fear. Our Lord’s first words are,
Do not be afraid. It is I. Did our Lord experience fear? Undoubtedly so, not
only because he shared our humanity fully with the exception of sin, but the
Gospel shows he instinctively feared his coming Passion, for instance. In
the Garden of Gethsemane he sweated drops of blood, appealing to his Father
that his cup of suffering be taken away from him. In his humanity he
instinctively feared danger and threats, but he was in no way subject to
that fear. He mastered his instinctive fear and one of the notable features
of the accounts of the Passion — especially in the Gospel of St John — is
the sovereign calmness with which our Lord takes his path to Calvary and to
his death. He was never deflected by fear. Here we have a Man who knew
exactly what was coming to him in all its brutal detail — and this
foreknowledge is shown at various times in the Gospel — but who intrepidly
proceeded along the path willed by his Father. As the hour drew ever nearer,
we see in him courage and absence of all bitterness at the vindictiveness of
men. It is in this sense that Christ was fearless. He was fearless not in
that he never experienced fear but in that
no threat was allowed to turn him from the fulfilment of his Father’s will.
In our Gospel passage today our Lord repeats three times his direction to
his disciples not to be afraid. Do not be afraid of them, he says. And
again, Do not be afraid of those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul.
Again a third time, Do not be afraid; you are worth more than many sparrows.
He also tells them why they are not to be afraid. To begin with, he himself
the Master was treated in the worst possible way. They even called him a
devil: Beelzebub. If for following Christ and his way you are vilified in
similar manner, do not be afraid. It is to be expected since they did this
to the Master. Love and follow the Master then. There is a second reason for
not fearing. Whatever evils come upon you in this life cannot compare to the
joy of the next. The only real thing to fear is displeasing God himself. So
then, be afraid, rather, of turning away from the One who can destroy both
soul and body in hell. Put the highest store on the judgment of God. A third
reason for not fearing is the thought that God loves you. He takes account
of the smallest sparrow that falls to the ground and dies. How much more
will he care for you in the way he knows to be best. So do not be afraid.
Let us keep to Christ and his way, and to the mission of bearing witness to
him for this work will bring the highest rewards whatever be the rejection
you endure as its result. Whoever acknowledges me before men, I will also
acknowledge him before my Father in heaven. But whoever disowns me before
men, I will disown him before my Father in heaven
(Matthew 10:24-33). Let us remember that fear can debilitate a
person from the following of Christ, and this fear can be present in various
ways. A person has wealth and he constantly remembers that Christ commanded
love and service of the poor. But he cannot bring himself to part with his
money. He fears the perceived insecurity and cannot take the step of giving
alms. When he does, he gives only what he does not need. He needs to be
liberated from his fear if he is to follow Christ closely. And there are
many other fears.
In 1531 Our Lady of Guadalupe, Mexico, appeared on several occasions to Juan
Diego (now canonized). During her fourth apparition to him, this is what she
said: “Hear me and understand well, my son, that nothing should frighten or
grieve you. Let not your heart be disturbed. Do not fear that sickness, nor
any other sickness or anguish. Am I not here, who is your Mother? Are you
not under my protection? Am I not your health? Are you not happily within my
fold? What else do you wish? Do not grieve nor be disturbed by anything.”
Let us always trust God the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. Let us
trust Mary, our heavenly mother. Let us trust all our heavenly friends, the
angels and the saints. Let not fear ever deflect us from doing God’s will.
(E.J.Tyler)
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Hurrying, hurrying! Working, working! Feverish activity, anxiety to be up
and doing. Marvellous material structures...
Where spiritual things are concerned: broken up boxes, cheap cotton, painted
cardboard, hurrying, working! And many people running here and there.
It is because in their work they think only of 'today'; their vision is
limited to what is 'present'. You must see things with the eyes of eternity,
'keeping present' what has passed and what has yet to come...
Calmness. Peace. Intense life within you. Without that wild hurry, without
that frenzy for change, you can work from your proper place in life. And,
like a powerful generator of spiritual electricity, you will give light and
energy to very many, without losing your own vigour and light.
(The Way, no.837)
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Continuing The Imitation of Christ
BOOK THREE
INTERNAL CONSOLATION
The Twentieth Chapter
CONFESSING OUR WEAKNESS IN THE MISERIES OF LIFE
THE DISCIPLE
Alas! What sort of life is this, from which troubles and miseries are never
absent, where all things are full of snares and enemies? For when one
trouble or temptation leaves, another comes. Indeed, even while the first
conflict is still raging, many others begin unexpectedly. How is it possible
to love a life that has such great bitterness, that is subject to so many
calamities and miseries? Indeed, how can it even be called life when it
begets so many deaths and plagues? And yet, it is loved, and many seek their
delight in it.
(Continuing)
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As speech is the organ of human society, and the means of human
civilization, so is prayer the instrument of divine fellowship and divine
training.
(JHN, from the sermon ‘Moral Effects of Communion with God’ 1837)
---------------Back
to index for this month---------------------------Back to
index to Liturgical Days---------
Fifteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time B
Prayers this week: In my justice I
shall see your face, O Lord; when your glory appears, my joy will be
full. (Psalm 47: 10-11)
God our Father, your light of truth guides us to the way of Christ.
May all who follow him reject what is contrary to the Gospel. We ask this
through our Lord Jesus Christ your Son in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God for ever and ever.
(July 12) Saints John Jones 1530-1598, and John
Wall 1620-1679
These two friars were martyred in England in the 16th and
17th centuries for refusing to deny their faith. John Jones was Welsh. He
was ordained a diocesan priest and was twice imprisoned for administering
the sacraments before leaving England in 1590. He joined the Franciscans at
the age of 60 and returned to England three years later while Queen
Elizabeth I was at the height of her power. John ministered to Catholics in
the English countryside until his imprisonment in 1596. He was condemned to
be hanged, drawn and quartered. John was executed on July 12, 1598.
John
Wall was born in England but was educated at the English College of Douai,
Belgium. Ordained in Rome in 1648, he entered the Franciscans in Douai
several years later. In 1656 he returned to work secretly in England. In
1678 Titus Oates worked many English people into a frenzy over an alleged
papal plot to murder the king and restore Catholicism in that country. In
that year Catholics were legally excluded from Parliament, a law which was
not repealed until 1829. John Wall was arrested and imprisoned in 1678 and
was executed the following year. John Jones and John Wall were canonized in
1970.
"No one is a martyr for a conclusion; no one is a martyr for an
opinion. It is faith that makes martyrs" (John Henry Newman, Discourses
to Mixed Congregations).
(AmericanCatholic.org)
Scripture today: Amos 7:12-15;
Psalm 85:9-14; Eph 1:3-14 or Eph 1:3-10; Mark 6:7-13
Calling the Twelve to him, Jesus sent them out two by two and gave them
authority over evil spirits. These were his instructions: Take nothing for
the journey except a staff— no bread, no bag, no money in your belts. Wear
sandals but not an extra tunic. Whenever you enter a house, stay there until
you leave that town. And if any place will not welcome you or listen to you,
shake the dust off your feet when you leave, as a testimony against them.
They went out and preached that people should repent. They drove out many
demons and anointed many sick people with oil and healed them.
(Mark 6:7-13)
The Church is catholic It is plain from the Gospels that
the mission of the Incarnate Son of God was to save the whole world from
sin. The Angel Gabriel said to the Virgin Mary that her Child would save his
people from their sins. At the threshold of his public ministry, he was
pointed out by John the Baptist as the Lamb of God who would take away the
sin of the world. During his public ministry he told the people that when he
was lifted up he would draw all men to himself. The Samaritans he visited on
one
occasion recognized him as the Saviour of the world. Peter, when he
addressed the Sanhedrin, said of the risen Christ that his was the only name
by which men could be saved. The claim of the Christian religion is clear.
Salvation is possible only through Jesus Christ. This is an exact
reflection of the teaching of Christ himself who said that no one could come
to the Father except through him. And yet there is this to be noticed in the
Gospels — and in our Gospel passage today. Christ associated the Church with
himself as part and parcel of his mission. When Buddha set out on his
journey for enlightenment and gradually gathered disciples, those disciples
were not in some sense necessary for his mission in life. He did not set
them up and confer on them a structure as an essential means whereby he
would conquer the world with his message. One could describe the Buddhism
which Buddha initiated as a movement, and that movement became the
“Buddhism” of history. Not so Christ. He did not begin a mere movement. He
established a very definite Church which he founded on the Twelve. This
Church had a definite fundamental structure which would, of course, develop
under the impetus and guidance of the Holy Spirit. This Church is described
in the New Testament as the mystical body and spouse of Christ. He is its
head and bridegroom. Therefore where Christ is, there is the Church too. If
one is to think in terms of what is revealed, one should not imagine Christ
without his Church.
It has always been understood and is expressed in the Creed that the marks
of the Church are that it is one, holy, catholic and apostolic. Consider the
Church’s catholic character. The Church is catholic fundamentally because
Christ is present in her as her Head and Spouse. Wherever Christ is, there
too is the Catholic Church, as St Ignatius of Antioch wrote. Because of
Christ’s intimate union with the Church, the Church is catholic or universal
in that in her is to be found the totality of the Christian faith. Moreover,
in her there is necessarily contained all of the means of salvation because
the fullness of Christ is present within her. Again, the Church is sent out
by Christ on a mission to the whole of the human race — and this precisely
because of her unbreakable union with Christ whose mission this is. In our
Gospel passage today (Mark 6:7-13) we
see the beginnings of this catholic character which Christ gave to his
Church in the persons of the Twelve. It is a most serious error to think
that the Church is somehow peripheral to the person of Christ, and
unnecessary for his mission and for his message of salvation. All salvation
comes from Christ who is the Head of the Church, and it comes to man through
the Church which is his body. This is symbolized in our Gospel today in
which our Lord sends out the Twelve to prepare the way for him. A person
who, knowing that Jesus was the Messiah and that he had sent out the Twelve
to prepare his way as in our Gospel today, nevertheless refused to listen to
them would be shutting himself off from the Kingdom being announced. Its
parallel would be the person who, knowing that the Church was founded by
Christ and is necessary for salvation, nevertheless refuses to enter her or
remain in her. He is shutting himself off from communion with Christ
himself. At the same time, thanks to Christ, those who through no fault of
their own do not know the Gospel of Christ and his Church but sincerely seek
God and, moved by his grace, try to do his will as it is known through the
dictates of conscience, can attain salvation. But unknown to them, this
salvation will be theirs through Christ who is present in his body the
Church.
Christ is the only saviour of all men and the Church is his mystical body
and spouse. Because of this the Church is catholic and has been called the
Catholic Church from the beginning. We all, all of Christ’s faithful
whatever be our office and calling in the Church, share in Christ’s
universal mission to the world. Life is short and eternity is long. Let us
use the rapidly passing days of life to bring the one thing necessary to all
men and women. That one thing necessary is the person and teaching of Jesus
Christ. By believing in him and freely submitting to his revelation as it
comes through the ministry of the Church, man is saved.
(E.J.Tyler)
Further reading: The Catechism of the Catholic Church,
no.830-856
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Have no enemies. Have only friends: friends on the right — if they have done
or have wished to do you good; and on the left — if they have harmed or
tried to harm you.
(The Way, no.838)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Continuing
The Imitation of Christ
BOOK THREE INTERNAL
CONSOLATION
The Twentieth Chapter
CONFESSING OUR WEAKNESS IN THE MISERIES OF LIFE
THE DISCIPLE
Many persons often blame the world for being false and vain, yet do not
readily give it up because the desires of the flesh have such great power.
Some things draw them to love the world, others make them despise it. The
lust of the flesh, the desire of the eyes, and the pride of life lead to
love, while the pains and miseries, which are the just consequences of those
things, beget hatred and weariness of the world.
(Continuing)
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In this passage from the 1837 sermon ‘The Communion of
Saints’ John Henry Newman describes
who the ‘Saints’ are: Christians on this earth who have become truly holy,
and those who have died, and who now ’sleep in the Lord’. They are united in
the ‘great company of the elect’. Newman adds a new perspective: it can be
difficult for us to realise the existence of this ‘invisible company’, and
so Christ founded a visible Church, so that we can be led by it to what is
invisible, from ’something outward as a guide to what is inward, something
visible as a guide to what is spiritual’:
The Church then, properly considered, is that great company of the elect,
which has been separated by God’s free grace, and His Spirit working in due
season, from this sinful world, regenerated, and vouchsafed perseverance
unto life eternal. Viewed so far as it merely consists of persons now living
in this world, it is of course a visible company; but in its nobler and
truer character it is a
body invisible, or nearly so, as being made up, not
merely of the few who happen still to be on their trial, but of the many who
sleep in the Lord. At first, indeed, in the lifetime of the Apostles, a
great proportion of the whole body was in this world; that is, not taking
into account those Saints, who had lived in Jewish times, and whom Christ,
on His departure, made partakers of the privileges then purchased by His
death for all believers. St. Stephen and St. James the Greater were the
first distinguished Saints of the New Covenant, who were gathered in to
enrich the elder company of Moses, Elias, and their brethren.
But from that time they have flowed in apace; and as years passed away,
greater and greater has become the proportion which the assembly of spirits
made perfect bears to the body militant which is its complement in God’s new
creation. At present, we who live are but one generation out of fifty, which
since its formation have been new born into it, and endowed with spiritual
life and the hope of glory. Fifty times as many Saints are in the invisible
world sealed for immortality, as are now struggling on upon earth towards
it; unless indeed the later generations have a greater measure of Saints
than the former ones. Well then may the Church be called invisible, not only
as regards her vital principle, but in respect to her members. “That which
is born of the Spirit is spirit;” [John 3:6] and since God the Holy Ghost is
invisible, so is His work. The Church is invisible, because the greater
number of her true children have been perfected and removed, and because
those who are still on earth cannot be ascertained by mortal eye; and had
God so willed, she might have had no visible tokens at all of her existence,
and been as entirely and absolutely hidden from us as the Holy Ghost is, her
Lord and Governor.
But seeing that the Holy Ghost is our life, so that to gain life we must
approach Him, in mercy to us, His place of abode, the Church of the Living
God, is not so utterly veiled from our eyes as He is; but He has given us
certain outward signs, as tokens for knowing, and means for entering that
living Shrine in which He dwells. He dwells in the hearts of His Saints, in
that temple of living stones, on earth and in heaven, which is ever showing
the glory of His kingdom, and talking of His power; but since faith and love
and joy and peace cannot be seen, since the company of His people are His
secret ones, He has given us something outward as a guide to what is inward,
something visible as a guide to what is spiritual.
Now, what is that outward visible guide, having the dispensation of what is
unseen, but the Christian Ministry, which directs and leads us to the very
Holy of Holies, in which Christ dwells by His Spirit?
(Reference: John Henry Newman, Parochial and Plain Sermons Vol 4 (1839)
Sermon no. 11, p. 172-73)
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Monday of the fifteenth week in Ordinary Time
(July 13) St. Henry (972-1024)
As German king and Holy Roman Emperor, Henry was a practical man of affairs.
He was energetic in consolidating his rule. He crushed rebellions and feuds.
On all sides he had to deal with drawn-out disputes so as to protect his
frontiers. This involved him in a number of battles, especially in the south
in Italy; he also helped Pope Benedict VIII quell disturbances in Rome.
Always his ultimate purpose was to establish a stable peace in Europe.
According to eleventh-century custom, Henry took advantage of his position
and appointed as bishops men loyal to him. In his case, however, he avoided
the pitfalls of this practice and actually fostered the reform of
ecclesiastical and monastic life.
(AmericanCatholic.org)
Scripture today: Exodus 1:8-14, 22; Psalm
124:1b-8; Matthew 10:34-11:1
Do not suppose that I have come to
bring peace to the earth. I did not come to bring peace, but a sword. For I
have come to turn 'a man against his father, a daughter against her mother,
a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law—a man's enemies will be the
members of his own household.' Anyone who loves his father or mother more
than me is not worthy of me; anyone who loves his son or daughter more than
me is not worthy of me; and anyone who does not take his cross and follow me
is not worthy of me. Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses
his life for my sake will find it. He who receives you receives me, and he
who receives me receives the one who sent me. Anyone who receives a prophet
because he is a prophet will receive a prophet's reward, and anyone who
receives a righteous man because he is a righteous man will receive a
righteous man's reward. And if anyone gives even a cup of cold water to one
of these little ones because he is my disciple, I tell you the truth, he
will certainly not lose his reward. After Jesus had finished instructing his
twelve disciples, he went on from there to teach and preach in the towns of
Galilee. (Matthew 10:34-11:1)
The focus of all religion
The Roman Empire came to attack the
Christians because they were impious. They did not respect the gods. The
Empire did not put down the gods of the peoples they annexed and governed.
Rather, they were all absorbed into the cultural pantheon of the gods of the
Empire. The Christians were an entirely different case. In their own minds
and in their talk the Christians put down all other gods, including all talk
of the Emperor being a god. That is to say, they proclaimed that there was
only one true God and they were prepared to die for this. There was also
this extraordinary feature in their religion. This one God they worshipped
was discovered to be a man who had been executed by the Empire and who, the Christians
thought, had come back from the dead. It was all a revolutionary absurdity
and it was perceived as a threat to the religious foundations of the Empire,
for the Christians were growing. This stark uniqueness of the Christian
religion in the religious context of its time was a reflection of the
uniqueness of Christ himself within the context of the religion of the
children of Abraham. Just as Rome considered Christianity a threat to its
foundations, so Jesus was considered by the religious leaders to be a threat
to their religious order. On one occasion when our Lord worked a dramatic
and effortless exorcism the people said that nothing like this had ever been
seen in Israel. We could say the same thing about the person of Jesus
himself and
his claims. Our Lord was clearly in the line of the prophets, and the people
said of him that a great prophet had arisen, and that God had once again
visited his people. But no prophet did what Christ did. John the Baptist,
despite his greatness, could not compare with him. From the beginning of our
Lord’s public ministry he began to attract more disciples than did John, and
the gospel records John’s disciples saying that to him. The range and power
of Christ’s miracles, the loftiness of his teaching and personal holiness,
and yet his amazing ease of access, placed him at a level that transcended
all who had gone before him.
Most notable in our Lord’s teaching
was the place he himself occupied in it. The prophets back to the greatest
of the patriarchs pointed to God. Jesus points to himself as the Way, the
Truth and the Life. No prophet before him presented himself as Jesus did, as
the very object and focus of revealed religion. The one who sees me sees
the Father, he said. During his public ministry he strove to gain disciples
and those disciples would have as their mission the winning of more
disciples. The “disciples” were disciples of Jesus, looking not merely to
his prophetic teaching, but to him. We read in the Acts of the Apostles that
the party of St Paul at various points came across disciples of John the
Baptist. Those disciples of John would never have thought of John being the
object of their worship. The case was different with Jesus. Jesus had come
to be himself the centre of the lives of his disciples, the love of their
life. Salvation consisted in becoming a disciple of Jesus, such that to love
and worship and follow him brought by that very fact salvation. It is in
this setting that we ought read our Gospel today. Our Lord asks for complete
dedication to his person. He is to be the supreme love of one’s life, a love
exceeding that of one’s own immediate family. “Anyone who loves his father
or mother more than me is not worthy of me; anyone who loves his son or
daughter more than me is not worthy of me; and anyone who does not take his
cross and follow me is not worthy of me” (Matthew
10:34-11:1). He asks that we lose our life for his sake,
promising that we shall gain it if we do this. This love for Jesus himself
is to motivate our assistance to others: “And if anyone gives even a cup of
cold water to one of these little ones because he is my disciple, I tell you
the truth, he will certainly not lose his reward.” Neither Abraham, Isaac,
Jacob, nor Moses nor the prophets asked for this absolute dedication to
their persons. Jesus Christ does and he does so because he is our Redeemer
and our God, the source of all divine life for man.
Let us then be very clear about the
Christian faith. It is not just a body of revealed doctrine to which we
adhere, even though it certainly is a body of revealed doctrine. It is not
just a holy way of life, a sure path through life to heaven. It is the love,
the veneration and the following of a Person. That Person is Jesus Christ,
risen from the dead. The entire purpose of life is to know, love and serve
him here on earth so as to be able to see and enjoy him for ever in heaven.
Jesus Christ is the object of revealed religion and of the natural religion
of mankind.
(E.J.Tyler)
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Never go into details of 'your' apostolate unless it be for someone else's
benefit.
(The Way, no.839)
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Continuing The Imitation of Christ
BOOK THREE INTERNAL
CONSOLATION
The Twentieth Chapter
CONFESSING OUR WEAKNESS IN THE MISERIES OF LIFE
THE DISCIPLE
Vicious pleasure overcomes the soul that is given to the world. She thinks
that there are delights beneath these thorns, because she has never seen or
tasted the sweetness of God or the internal delight of virtue. They, on the
other hand, who entirely despise the world and seek to live for God under
the rule of holy discipline, are not ignorant of the divine sweetness
promised to those who truly renounce the world. They see clearly how gravely
the world errs, and in how many ways it deceives.
(Concluded)
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Christianity has never yet had experience of a world simply irreligious …
But we are now coming to a time when the world does not acknowledge our
first principles.
(JHN, from the sermon ‘The Infidelity of the Future’ 1873)
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Tuesday of the fifteenth week in Ordinary Time
(July 14) Blessed Kateri Tekakwitha, virgin
(1656-1680)
The blood of martyrs is the seed of saints. Nine years after the Jesuits
Isaac Jogues and John de Brébeuf were tortured to death by Huron and
Iroquois Indians, a baby girl was born near the place of their martyrdom,
Auriesville, New York. She was to be the first person
born in North America to be beatified. Her mother was a Christian Algonquin,
taken captive by the Iroquois and given as wife to the chief of the Mohawk
clan, the boldest and fiercest of the Five Nations. When she was four,
Kateri lost her parents and little brother in a smallpox epidemic that left
her disfigured and half blind. She was adopted by an uncle, who succeeded
her father as chief. He hated the coming of the Blackrobes (missionaries),
but could do nothing to them because a peace treaty with the
French required
their presence in villages with Christian captives. She was moved by the
words of three Blackrobes who lodged with her uncle, but fear of him kept
her from seeking instruction. She refused to marry a Mohawk brave and at 19
finally got the courage to take the step of converting. She was baptized
with the name Kateri (Catherine) on Easter Sunday. Now she would be treated
as a slave. Because she would not work on Sunday, she received no food that
day. Her life in grace grew rapidly. She told a missionary that she often
meditated on the great dignity of being baptized. She was powerfully moved
by God’s love for human beings and saw the dignity of each of her people.
She was always in danger, for her conversion and holy life created great
opposition. On the advice of a priest, she stole away one night and began a
200-mile walking journey to a Christian Indian village at Sault St. Louis,
near Montreal. For three years she grew in holiness under the direction of a
priest and an older Iroquois woman, giving herself totally to God in long
hours of prayer, in charity and in strenuous penance. At 23 she took a vow
of virginity, an unprecedented act for an Indian woman, whose future
depended on being married. She found a place in the woods where she could
pray an hour a day—and was accused of meeting a man there! Her dedication to
virginity was instinctive: She did not know about religious life for women
until she visited Montreal. Inspired by this, she and two friends wanted to
start a community, but the local priest dissuaded her. She humbly accepted
an “ordinary” life. She practiced extremely severe fasting as penance for
the conversion of her nation. She died the afternoon before Holy Thursday.
Witnesses said that her emaciated face changed colour and became like that of
a healthy child. The lines of suffering, even the pockmarks, disappeared and
the touch of a smile came upon her lips. She was beatified in 1980.
Kateri said: “I am not my own; I have given
myself to Jesus. He must be my only love. The state of helpless poverty that
may befall me if I do not marry does not frighten me. All I need is a little
food and a few pieces of clothing. With the work of my hands I shall always
earn what is necessary and what is left over I’ll give to my relatives and
to the poor. If I should become sick and unable to work, then I shall be
like the Lord on the cross. He will have mercy on me and help me, I am
sure.” (AmericanCatholic.org)
Scripture today: Exodus 2:1-15a; Psalm 69:3,
14, 30-31, 33-34; Matthew 11:20-24
Then Jesus began to denounce the
cities in which most of his miracles had been performed, because they did
not repent. Woe to you, Korazin! Woe to you, Bethsaida! If the miracles that
were performed in you had been performed in Tyre and Sidon, they would have
repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes. But I tell you, it will be more
bearable for Tyre and Sidon on the day of judgment than for you. And you,
Capernaum, will you be lifted up to the skies? No, you will go down to the
depths. If the miracles that were performed in you had been performed in
Sodom, it would have remained to this day. But I tell you that it will be
more bearable for Sodom on the day of judgment than for you.
(Matthew 11:20-24)
My personal freedom
One of the most powerful of modern
ideas that are concerned with man in society has been socialism. Socialism
is a broad term that embraces various theories of economic organization
advocating general rather than private ownership and administration of the
means of production and distribution of goods. It seeks to build a society
marked by equal opportunities for all with a special emphasis on full
compensation for personal labour expended in production, rather than for,
say,
capital. The greatest impetus given to socialism was the First
International Workingmen’s Association of 1865, with Karl Marx and Johann Eccarius, both living in England, as its mainstays. The purpose of my
mentioning this here is not to reflect on the religious value or otherwise
of socialism, but to refer to the philosophical ideas of one of socialism’s
founders. I refer to Robert Owen the utopian socialist and founder of the
cooperative movement in the early years of the nineteenth century in
England. His master work was A New View of Society, or Essays on the
Principle of the Formation of the Human Character, the first of
these four essays that make up the work appearing in 1813. Owen had
originally been a follower of the utilitarian and agnostic ideas of Jeremy
Bentham, and his thought as expressed in his Essays have as
their cornerstone the lack of responsibility of man for his actions and the
all-important effect of external influences on him. Man is the product of
his environment and not the result of his choices, which includes of course
his failure to choose. Owen’s denial of personal freedom and with it the
denial of religion and a truly personal morality contributed not only to the
character of socialism as it emerged but to modern secular culture. There is
another contributor to this outlook and it comes from certain currents of
Christian thought which stress the total and utter depravity of man as a
result of the original Fall. Grace is the only hope for man. This is true
but it can, if not considered carefully, in effect discount personal
freedom.
My point is that there is a vast web of influences which reduce modern man’s
appreciation of his personal freedom. We sin, and while our sins are the
result of the original Fall and our consequent proneness to sin,
nevertheless they are also due to our own personal choices. We consent to
sin and we are conscious of this. We need God’s grace to resist sin, but
resistance to sin and the pursuit of the good also involve our personal
choice. We are not the mere products of influences external to our power to
choose, whether those influences be quite external to us or internal to us.
We are not merely the product of environment or personal impulses. In a
sense this truth is clear from personal reflection and experience, but it is
also manifest in our Lord’s teaching. In our Gospel today our Lord “began to
denounce the cities in which most of his miracles had been performed,
because they did not repent” (Matthew 11:20-24).
They failed to repent and this was the object of Christ’s condemnation. Our
Lord did not say that they could not help it for their situation, their
background and other factors rendered them incapable of true repentance. Our
Lord was divine and he pronounced on their personal responsibility. They
were personally responsible for their failure to respond to his clear
teaching and the numerous manifestations of his unique prophetic character — indeed far beyond that of the prophets. Because of their responsibility for
this, they would be condemned. “Woe to you, Korazin! Woe to you, Bethsaida!
If the miracles that were performed in you had been performed in Tyre and
Sidon, they would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes. But I tell
you, it will be more bearable for Tyre and Sidon on the day of judgment than
for you.” Christ is saying that they were taking the path to Hell. An
implication of our Lord’s words in today’s Gospel passage is that the power
to choose freely is a fundamental endowment of every man, and with it comes
an unavoidable personal responsibility for which we shall all be held to
account before the judgment of God.
Let us have a deep conviction of the
inestimable gift of personal freedom. What a mystery this power is, because
it can lead a person to the heights of personal sanctity and to the depths
of personal wickedness. Within the ranks of Christ’s Twelve, there were
Peter and John, ardent disciples of Christ, and there was Judas who betrayed
him and went the way prompted by Satan. Let us choose well then! Let us
every day make our choice for Christ and never fail to live it out. This we
can do by the gift of grace. Grace and personal freedom are the linchpins of
human good.
(E.J.Tyler)
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May your dedication pass unnoticed as, for thirty years, did that of Jesus.
(The Way, no.840)
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Continuing The Imitation of Christ
BOOK THREE
INTERNAL CONSOLATION
The Twenty-first Chapter
ABOVE ALL GOODS AND ALL GIFTS WE MUST REST IN GOD
THE DISCIPLE
ABOVE all things and in all things, O my soul, rest
always in God, for He is the everlasting rest of the saints.
Grant, most sweet and loving Jesus, that I may seek my repose in You above
every creature; above all health and beauty; above every honour and glory;
every power and dignity; above all knowledge and cleverness, all riches and
arts, all joy and gladness; above all fame and praise, all sweetness and
consolation; above every hope and promise, every merit and desire; above all
the gifts and favours that You can give or pour down upon me; above all the
joy and exultation that the mind can receive and feel; and finally, above
the angels and archangels and all the heavenly host; above all things
visible and invisible; and may I seek my repose in You above everything that
is not You, my God.
(Continuing)
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From
the day I became a Catholic to this day, now close upon thirty years, I have
never had a moment’s misgiving that the communion of Rome is that Church
which the Apostles set up at Pentecost.
(JHN, from A Letter to the Duke of Norfolk 1875)
---------------Back to index for this month---------------------------Back to index to Liturgical Days---------
Wednesday of the fifteenth week in Ordinary Time
(July 15) Saint Bonaventure, bishop and doctor of the Church (1221-1274)
Bonaventure, Franciscan, theologian, doctor of the Church, was both learned
and holy. Because of the spirit that filled him and his writings, he was at
first called the Devout Doctor; but in more recent centuries he has been
known as the Seraphic Doctor after the “Seraphic Father” Francis because of
the truly Franciscan spirit he possessed. Born in Bagnoregio, a town in
central Italy, he was cured of a serious illness as a boy through the
prayers of Francis of Assisi. Later, he studied the liberal arts in Paris.
Inspired by Francis and the example of the friars, especially of his master
in theology, Alexander of Hales, he entered the Franciscan Order, and became
in turn a teacher of theology in the university. Chosen as minister general
of the Order in 1257, he was God’s instrument in bringing it back to a
deeper love of the way of St. Francis, both through the life of Francis
which he wrote at the behest of the brothers and through other works which
defended the Order or explained its ideals and way of life.
(AmericanCatholic.org)
Scripture today: Exodus 3:1-6, 9-12; Psalm
103:1b-4, 6-7; Matthew 11:25-27
At that time Jesus said, I praise you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth,
because you have hidden these things from the wise and learned, and revealed
them to little children. Yes, Father, for this was your good pleasure. All
things have been committed to me by my Father. No-one knows the Son except
the Father, and no-one knows the Father except the Son and those to whom the
Son chooses to reveal him. (Matthew 11:25-27)
The three divine persons
Consider Abraham, Isaac and
Jacob, the great patriarchs of the chosen people, the ones with whom God
entered into special relations and called to their special mission. God is
looked on as the Father of the special covenant established with the
Patriarchs, but was he addressed by them as “Father”? Not typically.
Consider Moses, David and the Prophets. Did they typically address Yahweh
God as “Father”? Not typically. Rather, he was the Lord our God, the one and
only
Lord, Lord of heaven and earth. But consider Jesus Christ. Did he
typically address the Lord God of heaven and earth as “Father”? Yes indeed.
He referred to Yahweh God as “my Father.” In speaking to him, he used the
word “Father” as his form of address. This is one of the distinctive
features about Jesus Christ in the entire sweep of the Scriptures. I suspect
it is principally — though not of course exclusively — due to Jesus Christ
that the common mode of addressing God as “Father” entered into mankind’s
prayer and religious history. So unique was this that it shocked the leaders
of the Jews, and we read in the Gospel of St John that they took steps to
stone him for it because, they said, in referring to God as his own Father,
Christ was making himself equal to God. They perceived aright. In presuming
the liberty of addressing and referring to God as his very own Father,
Christ was placing himself at the right hand of the great God. At the same
time, while equal to his heavenly Father, he looked up to him as his Father.
But not only was this the practice of Christ himself, but he taught his
disciples to address God in this fashion too. When asked by his disciples to
teach them how to pray, he told them to begin this way, Our Father who art
in heaven. So important was this teaching that St Paul writes in one of his
letters that the Holy Spirit — the gift of Christ and the Father — teaches
us to cry out to God, “Abba!” (which is to say, “my Father, my dearest
Father!”). This extraordinary form of addressing the great and most high God
is the result of our being drawn by Christ into the very life of the Holy
Trinity.
Christ’s prayer to his heavenly Father in our Gospel today reminds us of the
revelation that God is one being but three divine persons and the three
collaborate in ineffable fashion constantly. For instance, the Father is
continually enabling those who are properly disposed to grasp the teaching
of Jesus Christ his Son. On one occasion in the Gospels our Lord, having
asked his disciples what people were saying about him, asked them what they
said of him. Simon Peter gave the right answer, that he was the Messiah, the
Son of the living God. Our Lord responded by telling him that he was
blessed, for the Father in heaven had revealed this to him. In our Gospel
today (Matthew 11:25-27) Christ
addresses his Father, giving praise and thanks to him for the illumination
he has been giving to the “little children” who are his disciples. “I praise
you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because you have hidden these things
from the wise and learned, and revealed them to little children. Yes,
Father, for this was your good pleasure.” That is to say, the Father is very
active in collaborating with the efforts of his divine Son. The two divine
persons are working in tandem. But there is a third great factor at work,
and that is the person of the Spirit. The Father and the Son work in unison
one with the other by the power of the Holy Spirit. It is interesting to see
the enormous veneration our Lord displays not only for the Father, but also
for the person of the Holy Spirit. He says that if a person blasphemes
against the Holy Spirit he is guilty of an eternal sin. I like to think of
this statement as indicative not only of the seriousness of this kind of sin
but of the love and veneration for the person of the Holy Spirit by both the
Father and the Son. Equally with the Father and the Son he is to be
worshipped and glorified as a distinct divine person. At the same time the
Holy Spirit keeps somewhat in the background, and I like to think of this
hiddenness of the Holy Spirit as bespeaking his divine humility. He, the
divine Spirit of God, is exalted and at the same time is profoundly humble.
Our Lord says that the Father has placed everything in his hands. He says
that no one knows the Father except the Son and no one knows the Son except
the Father. He, the Son reveals the Father to those whom he chooses. All
this is done by the power of the Holy Spirit. Let us pray as persons who
have been drawn into the very life of the Holy Trinity, and who are devoted
to each of the three divine persons. It is a doctrine of the Church that the
three divine persons dwell within the soul of the one who is in the state of
grace. Let us go about our duties with a deep faith in this reality,
speaking to the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit as our Lord would have
us speak.
(E.J.Tyler)
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Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus visit Jesus privately when things are
normal and also in the hour of triumph.
But they are courageous in the face of authority, declaring their love for
Christ audacter, boldly, in the hour of cowardice. Learn from them.
(The Way, no.841)
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Continuing The Imitation of Christ
BOOK THREE INTERNAL CONSOLATION
The Twenty-first Chapter
ABOVE ALL GOODS AND ALL GIFTS WE MUST REST IN GOD
THE DISCIPLE
For You, O Lord my God, are above all things the best. You alone are most
high, You alone most powerful. You alone are most sufficient and most
satisfying, You alone most sweet and consoling. You alone are most beautiful
and loving, You alone most noble and glorious above all things. In You is
every perfection that has been or ever will be. Therefore, whatever You give
me besides Yourself, whatever You reveal to me concerning Yourself, and
whatever You promise, is too small and insufficient when I do not see and
fully enjoy You alone. For my heart cannot rest or be fully content until,
rising above all gifts and every created thing, it rests in You.
(Continuing)
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Now, we allow ourselves publicly to canvass the most solemn truths in a
careless or fiercely argumentative way; truths, which it is as useless as it
is unseemly to discuss in public, as being attainable only by the sober and
watchful, by slow degrees, with dependence on the Giver of wisdom, and with
strict obedience to the light which has already been granted.
(JHN, from The Arians of the Fourth Century 1833)
---------------Back to index for this month---------------------------Back to index to Liturgical Days---------
Thursday of the fifteenth week in Ordinary Time
(July 16) Our Lady of Mount Carmel
Hermits lived on Mount Carmel near the Fountain of Elijah (northern Israel)
in the 12th century. They had a chapel dedicated to Our Lady. By the 13th
century they became known as “Brothers of Our Lady of Mount Carmel.” They
soon celebrated a special Mass and Office in honor of Mary. In 1726 it
became a celebration of the universal Church under the title of Our Lady of
Mount Carmel. For centuries the Carmelites have seen themselves as specially
related to Mary. Their great saints and theologians have promoted devotion
to her and often championed the mystery of her Immaculate Conception. St.
Teresa of Avila called Carmel “the Order of the Virgin.” St. John of the
Cross credited Mary with saving him from drowning as a child, leading him to
Carmel and helping him escape from prison. St. Theresa of the Child Jesus
believed that Mary cured her from illness. On her First Communion she
dedicated her life to Mary. During the last days of her life she frequently
spoke of Mary. There is a tradition (which may not be historical) that Mary
appeared to St. Simon Stock, a leader of the Carmelites, and gave him a
scapular, telling him to promote devotion to it. The scapular is a modified
version of Mary’s own garment. It symbolizes her special protection and
calls the wearers to consecrate themselves to her in a special way.
Obviously, no magic way of salvation is intended. Rather, the scapular is a
reminder of the gospel call to prayer and penance—a call that Mary models in
a splendid way.
“The various forms of piety toward the Mother of God,
which the Church has approved within the limits of sound and orthodox
doctrine, according to the dispositions and understanding of the faithful,
ensure that while the mother is honoured, the Son through whom all things
have their being (cf. Colossians 1:15–16) and in whom it has pleased the
Father that all fullness should dwell (cf. Colossians 1:19) is rightly
known, loved and glorified and his commandments are observed” (Vat II,
Dogmatic Constitution on the Church, 66). (AmericanCatholic.org)
Scripture today: Exodus 3:13-20; Psalm 105:1
and 5, 8-9, 24-27; Matthew 11:28-30
Jesus said, Come to me, all you who
are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and
learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest
for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.
(Matthew
11:28-30)
Come to me!
It is almost proverbial that
suffering is the lot of man. This is not to say that life is made up only of
suffering, for there are many wonderful joys in life: the joys of family,
achievement, health, religion and many other things besides. Despite this,
suffering is unavoidable and there is no doubt that many think that
suffering dominates the scene of human life. So much of human culture and
thought is taken up with the question of how to respond to and deal with
human suffering. The response to suffering is also a key to an understanding
of the various religions, for they have their responses to this problem. It
is certainly the case that a key to the understanding of the Christian religion
is found in its response to sin and suffering. Man sinned. He continues to sin
— and in fact this should be
obvious to his conscience. From this sin flowed suffering. As St Paul
writes, Sin entered the world through one man and with sin came death. In
response to the sin of man God became man, redeemed him from his sin and
offered him a share in his divine life. Thus is the end of sin and suffering
in sight. For all those found to be in Christ it will be done away with at
the end. But what of now? Even though through faith and baptism he has
within him the seed of the answer to suffering and sin, man is still
burdened with suffering and sin. What is he to do about it now? The answer to this
practical question comes to us from across the centuries. It arises from the
Gospels and is borne along in the Church’s Tradition and preaching. The
answer is, Come to me! They are the words of Christ to every man and to all
mankind together. Come to me, and trust in me. I will give you rest. The
answer to the evil and suffering of life lies in friendship with and the
following of Jesus.
Consider this. Did Abraham, Isaac or
Jacob — the great patriarchs of historical Revelation — say to their own and
to posterity, Come to me, you who carry the burdens of life? Did Moses,
David or any of the Prophets? Did they put themselves forward as the answer
to the burdens of man? No, of course they did not. They pointed to Yahweh
God as the answer to the sin and the sufferings of man. Did Buddha in his
search for happiness and in his teaching which he bequeathed to his
disciples and posterity say, Come to me and you will find rest? No. Not at
all — he pointed to an Ultimate, an Absolute as the answer to man’s lack of
happiness. He pointed to Enlightenment, to the Nirvana. Did Mahomet say,
Come to me and you will find rest for your souls? No. But what of Jesus
Christ? Now, this is exactly what he did say. “Jesus said, Come to me, all
you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon
you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will
find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light”
(Matthew 11:28-30). It is one of the
many distinctive features of Christ in the history of man and his religions
that Christ points to his own Self, his own Person, as the answer to man’s
need for happiness and wholeness and security. If you are burdened and
weary, come to me, he says across the ages. This is the message that the
Church brings to the world from generation to generation — and when I say “the
Church” I mean all of the Church’s members. It is especially the lay members
of the Church who are charged with the duty to bring this message to the
world, for the world is their proper setting and situation. They have the
mission given to them by Christ at their baptism to bring his person to the
world in which they live, and with his person the message he proclaims in
today’s Gospel passage. Come to me all you who are weary and burdened and I
will give you rest. He adds this important proviso. Coming to me and seeking
rest in me will mean taking upon yourself my yoke. My yoke is easy and it
will be the source of authentic happiness.
The Christian religion is not just a great philosophy or theological system
— which it is, but it is not just this. It is at heart a living person, the
person of Jesus Christ living and risen from the dead. The Christian comes
to Jesus with all his burdens and takes upon himself the yoke of Jesus. This
is what will bring him happiness and rest for his soul. It also constitutes
his mission in life, to bring the living Jesus with his message to the world
around him. As St Paul writes, now not I, but Christ lives in me. And again:
This is the mystery now revealed, Christ in you, your hope of glory.
(E.J.Tyler)
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Don't worry if by your deeds 'they know you.'
It is the good odour of Christ. Besides, since you always work exclusively
for him, you can rejoice that the words of Scripture are being fulfilled:
'May they see your good works and give praise to your Father in heaven.'
(The Way, no.842)
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Continuing The Imitation of Christ
BOOK THREE INTERNAL CONSOLATION
The Twenty-first Chapter
ABOVE ALL GOODS AND ALL GIFTS WE MUST REST IN GOD
THE DISCIPLE
Who, O most
beloved Spouse, Jesus Christ, most pure Lover, Lord of all creation, who
shall give me the wings of true liberty that I may fly to rest in You? When
shall freedom be fully given me to see how sweet You are, O Lord, my God?
When shall I recollect myself entirely in You, so that because of Your love
I may feel, not myself, but You alone above all sense and measure, in a
manner known to none? But now I often lament and grieve over my unhappiness,
for many evils befall me in this vale of miseries, often disturbing me,
making me sad and overshadowing me, often hindering and distracting me,
alluring and entangling me so that I neither have free access to You nor
enjoy the sweet embraces which are ever ready for blessed souls. Let my
sighs and the manifold desolation here on earth move You.
(Continuing)
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Truth
is the guiding principle of theology and theological inquiries; devotion and
edification, of worship; and of government, expedience.
(JHN, from the ‘Preface to the Third Edition’ of the Prophetical Office
of the Church 1877)
---------------Back to index for this month---------------------------Back to index to Liturgical Days---------
Friday of the fifteenth week in Ordinary Time
(July 17) St. Francis Solano (1549-1610)
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Francis came from a leading family in Andalusia, Spain. Perhaps it was his
popularity as a student that enabled Francis in his teens to stop two
duelists. He entered the Friars Minor in 1570, and after ordination
enthusiastically sacrificed himself for others. His care for the sick during
an epidemic drew so much admiration that he became embarrassed and asked to
be sent to the African missions. Instead he was sent to South America in
1589. While working in what is now Argentina, Bolivia and Paraguay, Francis
quickly learned the local languages and was well received by the indigenous
peoples. His visits to the sick often included playing a song on his violin.
Around 1601 he was called to Lima, Peru, where he tried to recall the
Spanish colonists to their baptismal integrity. Francis also worked to
defend the indigenous peoples from oppression. He died in Lima and was
canonized in 1726.
"When Francis Solano was about to die, one of the friars asked him, 'Father,
when God takes you to heaven remember me when you enter the everlasting
kingdom.' With joy Francis answered, 'It is true, I am going to heaven but
this is so because of the merits of the passion and death of Christ; I am
the greatest of sinners. When I reach our homeland, I will be your good
friend'" (contemporary biography of St. Francis Solano).
(AmericanCatholic.org)
Scripture today: Exodus 11:10—12:14; Ps
116:12-13, 15 and 16bc, 17-18; Matthew 12:1-8
At that time Jesus went through the
cornfields on the Sabbath. His disciples were hungry and began to pick some
ears of corn and
eat them. When the Pharisees saw this, they said to him,
Look! Your disciples are doing what is unlawful on the Sabbath. He answered,
Haven't you read what David did when he and his companions were hungry? He
entered the house of God, and he and his companions ate the consecrated
bread— which was not lawful for them to do, but only for the priests. Or
haven't you read in the Law that on the Sabbath the priests in the temple
desecrate the day and yet are innocent? I tell you that one greater than the
temple is here. If you had known what these words mean, 'I desire mercy, not
sacrifice,' you would not have condemned the innocent. For the Son of Man is
Lord of the Sabbath.
(Matthew 12:1-8)
The character of the Ultimate
In science, the hypothesis has a
crucial role. A pattern of activity in physical phenomena is conceived or
imagined, and this theory is tested. Let us take an example. A long-standing
practice of smoking has developed in a society or culture over a few
centuries. It was introduced, say, from the East and it has become a
culturally-accepted recreation. In the twentieth century a connection is
suspected as obtaining between lung cancer and smoking. It is an hypothesis
that is tested over a couple of decades and the statistical evidence for a
connection is very strong. Still more tests are conducted on this hypothesis
and the evidence becomes clear: the connection between smoking and lung
cancer is a causal one. In due course there is no debate over the matter.
Smoking usually causes cancer. Knowledge on the matter was attained by means
of testing an hypothesis. Let us take another issue: the evolution of
natural species. It is received and accepted in the scientific community and
probably in the population at large that the species of living creatures
evolved. The details of this vary among scientific accounts, but broadly
Darwin’s proposal is accepted by the modern world. Now, once again, we are
thinking of an hypothesis which has seemed to the scientific community and
to very many others to fit the data, and the fit has beauty to it. That is,
the theory provides a wondrous order to a vast mass of information and this
itself vindicates its truth. What, though, are we to think of non-empirical
matters, such as the existence and nature of God? I think that for vast
numbers their instinctive belief in the existence of God is borne out by
what they constantly see of life and the universe. They receive the voice of
society that there is a Power above, and this received dictum orders and
gives meaning to an otherwise meaningless universe. The natural “fit”
vindicates the “dogma” of God, just as in the minds of many the fit of
numerous species to the theory of evolution vindicates that hypothesis.
Be this as it
may, there are two aspects of belief in God which will have a bearing on how
the events of life and the world will be interpreted. It is one thing to
accept that there is a Power above whom we call God. It is a further thing
to form an impression of his nature or character. For most people this is
probably the more decisive issue. For example, very many seem to have a view
of God that is very like that of the old philosophy of deism. It looked on
God the creator as distant, uninvolved and withdrawn. This is not only a
notion found among some philosophers but among very many ordinary persons in
the modern western secular culture. Yes, there is a God but he is a remote
God. It also characterizes many indigenous religions. The high god withdraws
and leaves the scene to lesser spirits. At issue here is the question of the
character of God. Does he care? Is he vindictive and punishing? A person’s
answer to this may constitute his starting point, his basic assumption, for
his general thought on God. It may have been unconsciously picked up from
various sources or formed from various experiences. On this basis he may
easily and much too quickly interpret many things in the universe as
confirming what is actually an hypothesis. He can be disposed to accept any
set of data or range of experiences as confirming his fundamental religious
assumption. He sees suffering in the world, great evils, catastrophes of all
kinds, and this confirms his fundamental (and unproved) notion that God is
very distant, or that he does not care, or that he is not very powerful, or
even that he is not a God at all — that he is just a force or a theory. And
so it is that, granted the validity and power of the hypothesis for coming
to know reality better, it can lead to tremendous mistakes. All this goes to
show how much we do need Revelation if we are to know God with clarity and
sureness. God has revealed himself to be one and only one. He has revealed
himself to be not just powerful but all-powerful. Most importantly, he has
revealed himself to be merciful and compassionate. God has revealed himself
to be Love.
It is a wonderful thing that God is
revealed to be a God rich in mercy and compassion. This is what is at the
heart of reality. This is reality at its most absolute and ultimate point.
It is to this that our Lord in our Gospel today emphatically alludes. “If
you had known what these words mean, 'I desire mercy, not sacrifice,' you
would not have condemned the innocent. For the Son of Man is Lord of the
Sabbath” (Matthew 12:1-8). God is
revealed as loving the world. He is merciful and compassionate, and Jesus is
the revelation of the Father. He who sees me sees the Father. Let us then
place our faith in the mercy of God and strive to be always merciful
ourselves.
(E.J.Tyler)
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'Non manifeste, sed quasi in occulto, quite privately, without
drawing attention to himself': So Jesus goes up to the feast of Tabernacles.
So will he go, on the way to Emmaus, with Cleophas and his companion. So is
he seen, after his Resurrection, by Mary Magdalen.
And so will he appear — 'the disciples did not realise that it was Jesus' —
at the miraculous catch of fishes, as Saint John tells us.
And more hidden still, through Love for men, is he in the Host.
(The Way, no.843)
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Continuing The Imitation of Christ
BOOK THREE INTERNAL
CONSOLATION
The Twenty-first Chapter
ABOVE ALL GOODS AND ALL GIFTS WE MUST REST IN GOD
THE DISCIPLE
O Jesus, Splendour of eternal glory, Consolation of the pilgrim soul, with
You my lips utter no sound and to You my silence
speaks. How long will my
Lord delay His coming? Let Him come to His poor servant and make him happy.
Let Him put forth His
hand and take this miserable creature from his
anguish. Come, O come, for without You there will be no happy day or hour,
because You are my happiness and without You my table is empty. I am
wretched, as it were imprisoned and weighted down with fetters, until You
fill me with the light of Your presence, restore me to liberty, and show me
a friendly countenance. Let others seek instead of You whatever they will,
but nothing pleases me or will please me but You, my God, my Hope, my
everlasting Salvation. I will not be silent, I will not cease praying until
Your grace returns to me and You speak inwardly to me, saying: "Behold, I am
here. Lo, I have come to you because you have called Me. Your tears and the
desire of your soul, your humility and contrition of heart have inclined Me
and brought Me to you."
(Continuing)
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What is the peculiarity of our nature, in contrast with the … animals around
us? It is that, though man cannot change what he is born with, he is a being
of progress with relation to his perfection and characteristic good. Other
beings are complete from their first existence, in that line of excellence
which is allotted to them; but man begins with nothing realized … and he has
to make capital for himself by the exercise of those faculties which are his
natural inheritance.
(JHN, from A Grammar of Assent 1870)
---------------Back to index for this month---------------------------Back to index to Liturgical Days---------
Saturday of the fifteenth week in Ordinary Time
(July 18) Blessed Angeline of Marsciano (1374-1435)
Blessed Angeline founded the first community of Franciscan women other than
Poor Clares to receive papal approval. Angeline was born to the Duke of
Marsciano (near Orvieto). She was 12 when her mother died. Three years later
the young woman made a vow of perpetual chastity. That same year, however,
she yielded to her father’s decision that she marry the Duke of Civitella.
Her husband agreed to respect her previous vow. When he died two years
later, Angeline joined the Secular Franciscans and with several other women
dedicated herself to caring for the sick, the poor, widows and orphans. When
many other young women were attracted to Angeline’s community, some people
accused her of condemning the married vocation. Legend has it that when she
came before the King of Naples to answer these charges, she had burning
coals hidden in the folds of her cloak. When she proclaimed her innocence
and showed the king that these coals had not harmed her, he dropped the
case. Angeline and her companions later went to Foligno, where her community
of Third Order sisters received papal approval in 1397. She soon established
15 similar communities of women in other Italian cities. Angeline died on
July 14, 1435, and was beatified in 1825.
(AmericanCatholic.org)
Scripture today: Exodus 12:37-42; Psalm
136:1 and 23-24, 10-15; Matthew 12:14-21
The Pharisees went out and plotted
how they might kill Jesus. Aware of this, Jesus withdrew from that place.
Many followed him, and he healed all their sick, warning them not to tell
who he was. This was to fulfil what was spoken through the prophet Isaiah:
Here is my servant whom I have chosen, the one I love, in whom I delight; I
will put my Spirit on him, and he will proclaim justice to the nations. He
will not quarrel or cry out; no-one will hear his voice in the streets. A
bruised reed he will not break, and a smouldering wick he will not snuff
out, till he leads justice to victory. In his name the nations will put
their hope.
(Matthew 12: 14-21)
The way of obedient suffering
There is a saying coined by Lord Acton in a letter written in April 1887
that absolute power corrupts absolutely. That is a sweeping statement but in
view of the Original Fall of man it is certainly the tendency. If man has
power he tends to use it for his own benefit at the expense of others. If he
has absolute power he will tend to use it in a way that will seriously corrupt. It is
not power itself that is corrupting but rather the sinful tendency in man
that prompts him to use power in a
corrupting fashion. But let us notice the
course that Christ took. He displayed power that seemed to have no limit.
There was nothing he could not do if he chose to do it. He instantly cured
the hopelessly sick and diseased. He raised the dead at a word. He walked on
a turbulent sea and on another occasion calmed it at a word. At a word he
expelled powerful demons. He fed thousands of people with a handful of food.
No one could master him in debate — he left his opponents silenced. He
easily eluded his enemies for as long as he chose. Finally, in obedience to
the will of his Father he placed himself in their hands in order to bear
witness to the truth. But even here, at the point of arrest in the Garden of
Gethsemane he silently, though briefly, repulsed his enemies. They fell back
to the ground before him. The crowning manifestation of his power was not
only that he freely gave his life, but he freely took it up again, having
predicted that on the third day he would rise again. There has been the
occasional person in history who has been raised from the dead. Our Lord
raised people from the dead on several occasions. Elisha in the second book of Kings raised a child
from the dead. The Acts of the Apostles tell us of Peter raising a person
from the dead in the name of Christ. No one did so with such ease and Christ
alone promised
that he would rise from the dead on the third day, and then fulfilled the promise.
Christ showed he had absolute power and he was sinless withal. He was
incorruptible, and yet had absolute power.
In human history when great power comes to certain persons, that power is
normally used to put down enemies. In the 620s Mahomet gradually gained
great power and influence and he used it physically to put down his enemies.
His troops prevailed over all opposition. What was the course pursued by
Christ? He had showed that he possessed immeasurably more natural and
supernatural power than any other person in history, including, it goes
without saying,
Mahomet. He told his disciples in the Garden of Gethsemane when they
attempted to defend him that at a word he could summon from his heavenly
Father twelve legions of angels. But his course — his weapon, we might say — was that of obedience unto death. In our Gospel today following the plotting
of the leaders of the Jews, our Lord withdrew from the district. Many
followed him and he cured their sick, asking that they not blazon forth the
glory of his person. He followed the path of humility and meekness. He
fulfilled the prophecy of Isaiah, “Here is my servant whom I have chosen,
the one I love, in whom I delight; I will put my Spirit on him, and he will
proclaim justice to the nations. He will not quarrel or cry out; no-one will
hear his voice in the streets. A bruised reed he will not break, and a
smouldering wick he will not snuff out, till he leads justice to victory. In
his name the nations will put their hope” (Matthew
12: 14-21). This was the way of God as it is revealed in the
Scriptures. The world was redeemed through obedient suffering, not through
physical force and military victories, however justified at times they may be. Our
Lord did not impose himself by force, though he had all the power to make
this possible. Rather, he delivered himself up into the hands of sinners and
bore witness to the truth by treading the path of obedience in the midst of
unimaginable suffering. This obedience made up for the sin of the world and
in this way the greatest conceivable good was done to a broken world. Man
was once again made whole.
It is important that the Christian understand the way of Christ in achieving
the good which God plans. His way is expressed in his teaching that if
anyone wishes to be a disciple of his, he is to deny himself and take up his
cross every day and follow in his footsteps. If we wish our lives to have
the greatest possible meaning; if we wish to use the gift of life to achieve
the most good; if we wish to appear before the judgment seat of God with a
life well lived, then we must follow Christ’s way and not that of the world.
So then, let us begin!
(E.J.Tyler)
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Raise magnificent buildings? Build sumptuous
palaces? Let others raise them! Let others build them!...
Souls! Let us give life to souls, for those buildings and palaces!
What fine houses are being prepared for us!
(The Way, no.844)
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Continuing The Imitation of Christ
BOOK THREE INTERNAL
CONSOLATION
The Twenty-first Chapter ABOVE
ALL GOODS AND ALL GIFTS WE MUST REST IN GOD
THE DISCIPLE
Lord, I have called You, and have desired You, and have been ready to spurn
all things for Your sake. For You first spurred me on to seek You. May You
be blessed, therefore, O Lord, for having shown this goodness to Your
servant according to the multitude of Your mercies.
(Continuing)
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Deference
to the law of Conscience, indeed, is of the nature of Faith; but it is
easily perverted into a kind of self-confidence, namely, a deference to our
own judgment.
(JHN, from the University sermon ‘Wilfulness, the Sin of Saul’ 1832)
---------------Back to index for this month---------------------------Back to index to Liturgical Days---------
Sixteenth Sunday of Ordinary Time B
Prayers this week:
God himself is
my help. The Lord upholds my life. I will offer you a willing sacrifice; I
will praise your name, O Lord, for its goodness. (Psalm 53: 6.8)
Lord, be merciful to your people. Fill us with your gifts and make us
always eager to serve you in faith, hope and love. We ask this
through our Lord Jesus Christ your Son in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God for ever and ever.
(July 19) Servant of God Francis Garces and
Companions (c. 1781)
Government interference in the missions and landgrabbing sparked the Indian
uprising which cost these friars their lives. A contemporary of the American
Revolution and of Blessed Junipero Serra, Francisco Garcés was born in 1738
in Spain, where he joined the Franciscans. After ordination in 1763, he was
sent to Mexico. Five years later he was assigned to San Xavier del Bac near
Tucson, one of several missions the Jesuits had founded in Arizona and New
Mexico before being expelled in 1767 from all territories controlled by the
Catholic king of Spain. In Arizona, Francisco worked among the Papago, Yuma,
Pima and Apache Native Americans. His missionary travels took him to the
Grand Canyon and to California. Friar Francisco Palou, a contemporary,
writes that Father Garcés was greatly loved by the indigenous peoples, among
whom he lived unharmed for a long time. They regularly gave him food and
referred to him as "Viva Jesus," which was the greeting he taught them to
use. For the sake of their indigenous converts, the Spanish missionaries
wanted to organize settlements away from the Spanish soldiers and colonists.
But the commandant in Mexico insisted that two new missions on the Colorado
River, Misión San Pedro y San Pablo and Misión La Purísima Concepción, be
mixed settlements. A revolt among the Yumas against the Spanish left Friars
Juan Diaz and Matias Moreno dead at Misión San Pedro y San Pablo. Friars
Francisco Garcés and Juan Barreneche were killed at Misión La Purísima
Concepción (the site of Fort Yuma).
(AmericanCatholic.org)
Scripture today: Jeremiah 23:1-6; Psalm 23:1-6; Ephesians 2:13-18; Mark 6:30-34
The
apostles gathered round Jesus and reported to him all they had done and
taught. Then, because so many people were coming and going that they did not
even have a chance to eat, he said to them, Come with me by yourselves to a
quiet place and get some rest. So they went away by themselves in a boat to
a solitary place. But many who saw them leaving recognised them and ran on
foot from all the towns and got there ahead of them. When Jesus landed and
saw a large crowd, he had compassion on them, because they were like sheep
without a shepherd. So he began teaching them many things.
(Mark 6:30-34)
What makes it good
The Christian knows that Jesus
Christ is the supreme revealer of God and his plan and also of the moral
law. He is also the supreme embodiment and exemplar of it. There are
disagreements among Christian bodies as to exactly what our Lord taught in
certain respects, but if a person were not to consider Christ as the
ultimate and sure teacher of religion and morality, that person would not be
counted as a Christian. This is because, by implication, he would not accept
that Christ is God.
Now, granted that Christ is divine, does the mere fact
of his teaching that an action is good give to that action its moral
goodness? Alternatively, does the mere fact that Christ condemns something
as morally reprehensible give to that action its evil character? No, it does
not. By his teaching Christ reveals the goodness or evil of an action, but
his teaching does not of itself make of the action something good or evil as
the case may be. The action has its own objective moral value, which Christ
by his teaching reveals. We count on his revelation because he is God.
Again, Christ by acting in a certain way did not by that mere fact
arbitrarily make the action good. He did it because it was good. What I mean
by saying this is that the truth which Christ revealed and lived is not the
product of what we might call his arbitrary choice. Putting it more
specifically, let us imagine someone absurdly claiming that Christ taught
that some immoral action — say, theft or lying or even murder under certain
circumstances — is objectively moral after all. Would this make that action
moral? No. If in the impossible case of this being proved to be true, it
would only discredit the Christian claim. It would not make the immoral
action moral. God wills the truth and only the truth, but his will does not
arbitrarily create the truth. He cannot by his mere decision make morally
right what is morally wrong, just as he cannot by his mere declaration make
true what is in fact false. Indeed, a being who attempts to do this is shown
by that fact not to be God. A good God utterly respects the truth and the
truth does not depend on the whim of his will.
This is an important point because a
religion can do harm if its teaching on what is right or wrong is deemed to
be the very source of the morality of human acts. It can at times and in
some religions be thought that if the founder of the religion or those who
teach on his behalf declare that something is good when it is not good, then
that declaration makes it good. This is faith going radically against right
reason and such cannot be regarded as characteristic of the divine. No
external declaration of itself makes an action good or evil. It only reveals
its goodness or evil as the case may be. The action has its own goodness or
otherwise. What then are the sources of the morality of human acts? The
morality of human acts involves three elements: the nature or object of the
action itself, the intention of the one so acting, and finally (to an
extent) the
circumstances of the action, which include its consequences. An act is
morally good when it involves simultaneously goodness in these three
components. If what is actually done is itself objectively evil (say,
killing the unborn), even if the intention is good (say, to preserve the
mother from difficulty) the action remains evil and must be avoided.
Alternatively, even if what is done (say, an act of kindness) is objectively
good, an evil intention (say, to gain some personal and even unjust
advantage) corrupts the action. On the other hand a good intention can never
justify an evil means to achieve it. Furthermore, while circumstances can
increase or diminish the responsibility of the one who is acting, they
cannot change the moral quality of the acts themselves. They never make good
an act which is itself intrinsically evil. In fact, there are some acts which, in and of
themselves, are always morally wrong because of their very nature (for
example, blasphemy, homicide, and adultery). They can never be justified by
appealing to some good effect or circumstance which may possibly result from them. Now, in
all this, while disagreement in society over moral issues can make it
difficult to be sure of what is moral, we have an ultimate and sure teacher:
Christ. Christ our God is the teacher of mankind. What he teaches we know to
be right, whatever be the opinion of man and society.
In our Gospel today we read that our
Lord “landed and saw a large crowd. He had compassion on them, because they
were like sheep without a shepherd. So he began teaching them many things”
(Mark 6:30-34). Christ is the teacher of
mankind and the exemplar of all that is true and good. He has entrusted his
revelation to the Church which he founded on the Apostles with Peter at
their head, and he endowed his Church with the divine Spirit to guide her in
all her teaching. Let us look to Christ, abiding in his body the Church, to
know the way that leads to goodness and to heaven.
(E.J.Tyler)
Further reading: The Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.
1750-1756
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How you made me laugh and how you made me think with that trite remark of yours:
I'm all for first things first.
(The Way, no.845)
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Continuing The Imitation of Christ
BOOK THREE INTERNAL
CONSOLATION
The Twenty-first Chapter
ABOVE ALL GOODS AND ALL GIFTS WE MUST REST IN GOD
THE DISCIPLE
What more is there for Your servant to say to You unless, with his iniquity
and vileness always in mind, he humbles himself before You? Nothing among
all the wonders of heaven and earth is like to You. Your works are
exceedingly good, Your judgments true, and Your providence rules the whole
universe. May You be praised and glorified, therefore, O Wisdom of the
Father. Let my lips and my soul and all created things unite to praise and
bless You.
(Continuing)
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In this striking passage from the 1830 sermon ‘Miracles no Remedy
for Unbelief’ John Henry Newman
returns to his common theme of conversion: we must not put off
the change of life to which Christ calls us, but rather open ourselves here
and now to God’s grace:
Let us then put aside vain excuses; and, instead of looking for outward
events to change our course of life, be sure of this, that if our course of
life is to be changed, it must be from within. God’s grace moves us from
within, so does our own will. External
circumstances
have no real power over us. If we do not love God, it is because we have not
wished to love Him, tried to love Him, prayed to love Him. We have not borne
the idea and the wish in our mind day by day, we have not had it before us
in the little matters of the day, we have not lamented that we loved Him
not, we have been too indolent, sluggish, carnal, to attempt to love Him in
little things, and begin at the beginning; we have shrunk from the effort of
moving from within; we have been like persons who cannot get themselves to
rise in the morning; and we have desired and waited for a thing
impossible,—to be changed once and for all, all at once, by some great
excitement from without, or some great event, or some special season;
something or other we go on expecting, which is to change us without our
having the trouble to change ourselves. We covet some miraculous warning, or
we complain that we are not in happier circumstances, that we have so many
cares, or so few religious privileges; or we look forward for a time when
religion will come easy to us as a matter of course. This we used to look
out for as boys; we used to think there was time enough yet to think of
religion, and that it was a natural thing, that it came without trouble or
effort, for men to be religious as life went on; we fancied that all old
persons must be religious; and now even, as grown men, we have not put off
this deceit; but, instead of giving our hearts to God, we are waiting … for
a convenient season.
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Monday of the sixteenth week in Ordinary Time
(July 20) St. Apollinaris (1st century)
According to tradition, St. Peter sent Apollinaris to Ravenna, Italy,
as its first bishop. His preaching of the Good News was so successful that
the pagans there beat him and drove him from the city. He returned, however,
and was exiled a second time. After preaching in the area surrounding
Ravenna, he entered the city again. After being cruelly tortured, he was
put on a ship heading to Greece. Pagans there caused him to be expelled
to Italy, where he went to Ravenna for a fourth time. He died from wounds
received during a savage beating at Classis, a suburb of Ravenna. A beautiful
basilica honouring him was built there in the sixth century. (AmericanCatholic.org)
Scripture today: Exodus
14:5-18; Exodus 15:1bc-6; Matthew 12:38-42
Then some of the Pharisees
and teachers of the law said to Jesus, Teacher, we want to see a miraculous
sign from you. He
answered, A wicked and adulterous
generation asks for a miraculous sign! But none will be given it except
the sign of the prophet Jonah. For as Jonah was three days and three nights
in the belly of a huge fish, so the Son of Man will be three days and three
nights in the heart of the earth. The men of Nineveh will stand up at the
judgment with this generation and condemn it; for they repented at the
preaching of Jonah, and now one greater than Jonah is here. The Queen of
the South will rise at the judgment with this generation and condemn it;
for she came from the ends of the earth to listen to Solomon's wisdom,
and now one greater than Solomon is here. (Matthew
12: 38-42)
Morality needs religion I remember years ago I was good
friends with a shearer — that is, one who sheared sheep on various
properties for his living. He would leave on Monday and return on Friday.
His practice was to drive out to the first sheep property on Monday with
a friend of his who was also a shearer. On one Monday his friend said
to him: “I hear you go to Mass on Sundays. I suppose you think you are
good, do you?” He replied to his friend, “John, I don’t go to Mass because
I think I am good. I go
because I need to go.” His reply in effect said that he went to Mass
because he knew he was not good. He hoped though that by going to Mass
every Sunday he would become good. Many things could be said about that
short conversation, but one is that in it a link is clearly perceived
between religion and morality. People generally understand that a religion
without morality is a spurious religion. Yet these same persons claim that
there are many who believe that by being religious one is therefore moral.
They worship on Sundays and think that by doing that they are themselves
better (i.e., more moral) than those who do not. Moreover, these same persons
often claim that it is not uncommon for a person to be “religious” and
to be immoral. That is to say, they fulfil the requirements of their religion
(say, church on Sundays and daily prayers) and yet in their daily life
they are secretly unjust and knowingly false. Now, setting aside the question
of whether there are indeed many persons who think that by fulfilling religious
practices they are to be counted as moral, it is absolutely correct that
a religion without morality is a spurious religion. This is one of the
great and distinctive teachings of revealed religion and it is perhaps
one of the principal things that revealed religion has taught the world.
Religion requires morality. The prophets inveighed against religious sacrifices
while injustice was practised. Pagan religion was commonly thought to
consist simply in a dutiful observance of religious practices. It was
this that pleased the gods. But not so Yahweh, the God of Israel. He also
required a moral life.
However, a more common
failure in the modern secular culture is the opposite. We tend not so
much to think that by being religious we are by that fact constituted
as moral, but that we can be moral without being religious. We think that
being good does not of itself necessarily involve God and religion. This
has been the prevailing view for a long time now — ever since the rise
of the modern secular culture. While in the contemporary world morality
itself has been somewhat under question, generally it is not disputed
that man must be good. This is deemed to be self-evident, which indeed
it is. It is evident to man’s moral sense that he should be good. The pressing
question for modern secular man is, should he not be religious, recognizing
God and his law? Consider the mythical figures of popular literature over
the past seventy years. Consider the figures of Batman, or The Phantom,
or Superman, or Tarzan. Notice that they are all very moral in the sense
that they fight crime and are themselves moral. There are some modern
exceptions. The Saint in modern movies is not, in certain important respects,
moral. But that reflects very contemporary failures in the norms of morality.
In general the culture heroes are moral but religiously agnostic. They
are moral but in no way religious. This divorce of religion from morality
has been a long time coming and is more or less the product of the rise
of the idea of the secular man and secular society. But it is a profound
mistake. There is a profound lacuna in the moral life of the one who lacks
or rejects belief in God. This is indicated in the very structure of the
Ten Commandments. The first three of them relate to man’s unequivocal acceptance
of God. No other gods are to occupy the place of the one and only God.
He is to be profoundly respected. He is to be worshipped. Then come the
other seven commandments that relate to man’s life in society — what are
normally taken as the requirements of “morality.” The Ten Commandments
show that the foremost element in the moral life is one’s practical recognition
of the being of God and his place in man's life.
In our Gospel today
(Matthew 12:38-42) our Lord condemns
the Pharisees and the teachers of the law for failing to repent. The men
of Nineveh repented, yet in Jesus there is one greater than Jonah! Let us
repent of anything in our lives that is not in accord with the moral law.
More importantly for modern man, let us repent of any notion that we do
not need God in order to be good, and that religion is not an essential
part of morality. More specifically still, let us understand that of ourselves
we are sunk in sin, and Christ is the only one by whom we can be saved.
To be good, we need Christ.
(E.J.Tyler)
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Agreed: you do better work with that friendly chat
or that heart-to-heart conversation than making speeches — 'spectacular'
speeches — in public before thousands of people.
Nevertheless, when speeches have to be made, make them.
(The Way,
no.846)
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Continuing The Imitation of Christ BOOK THREE INTERNAL CONSOLATION
The Twenty-Second Chapter REMEMBER
THE INNUMERABLE GIFTS OF GOD
THE DISCIPLE
OPEN my heart, O Lord, to Your law and teach me to walk in the way of
Your commandments. Let me understand Your will. Let me remember Your blessings
-- all of them and each single one of them -- with great reverence and
care so that henceforth I may return worthy thanks for them. I know that
I am unable to give due thanks for even the least of Your gifts. I am unworthy
of the benefits You have given me, and when I consider Your generosity
my spirit faints away before its greatness. All that we have of soul and
body, whatever we possess interiorly or exteriorly, by nature or by grace,
are Your gifts and they proclaim Your goodness and mercy from which we
have received all good things.
(Continuing)
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As the Christian body was set up in the image of
Christ, which is gradually and in due season to be realized within it,
so in like manner each of us, when made a Christian, is entrusted with
gifts, which centre in eternal salvation.
(JHN, from the sermon ‘The
Glory of the Christian Church’ 1834)
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Tuesday of the sixteenth week in Ordinary Time
(July 21) St. Lawrence of Brindisi (1559-1619)
At first glance perhaps the most remarkable quality
of Lawrence of Brindisi is his outstanding gift of languages. In addition
to a thorough knowledge of his native Italian, he had complete reading and
speaking ability in Latin, Hebrew, Greek, German, Bohemian,
Spanish and
French. He was born on July 22, 1559, and died exactly 60 years later on
his birthday in 1619. His parents William and Elizabeth Russo gave him the
name of Julius Caesar, Caesare in Italian. After the early death of his
parents, he was educated by his uncle at the College of St. Mark in Venice.
When he was just 16 he entered the Capuchin Franciscan Order in Venice and
received the name of Lawrence. He completed his studies of philosophy and
theology at the University of Padua and was ordained a priest at 23. With
his facility for languages he was able to study the Bible in its original
texts. At the request of Pope Clement VIII, he spent much time preaching
to the Jews in Italy. So excellent was his knowledge of Hebrew, the rabbis
felt sure he was a Jew who had become a Christian. In 1956 the Capuchins
completed a 15-volume edition of his writings. Eleven of these 15 contain
his sermons, each of which relies chiefly on scriptural quotations to illustrate
his teaching. Lawrence’s sensitivity to the needs of people—a character
trait perhaps unexpected in such a talented scholar—began to surface. He
was elected major superior of the Capuchin Franciscan province of Tuscany
at the age of 31. He had the combination of brilliance, human compassion
and administrative skill needed to carry out his duties. In rapid succession
he was promoted by his fellow Capuchins and was elected minister general
of the Capuchins in 1602. In this position he was responsible for great growth
and geographical expansion of the Order. Lawrence was appointed papal emissary
and peacemaker, a job which took him to a number of foreign countries. An
effort to achieve peace in his native kingdom of Naples took him on a journey
to Lisbon to visit the king of Spain. Serious illness in Lisbon took his
life in 1619.
“God is love, and all his operations proceed from love.
Once he wills to manifest that goodness by sharing his love outside himself,
then the Incarnation becomes the supreme manifestation of his goodness and
love and glory. So, Christ was intended before all other creatures and for
his own sake. For him all things were created and to him all things must
be subject, and God loves all creatures in and because of Christ. Christ
is the first-born of every creature, and the whole of humanity as well as
the created world finds its foundation and meaning in him. Moreover, this
would have been the case even if Adam had not sinned” (St. Lawrence of Brindisi,
Doctor of the Universal Church, Capuchin Educational Conference, Washington,
D.C.). (AmericanCatholic.org)
Scripture today: Exodus 14:21-15:1;
Exodus 15:8-9, 10 and 12, 17; Matthew 12:46-50
While
Jesus was still talking to the crowd, his mother and brothers stood outside,
wanting to speak to him. Someone told him, Your mother and brothers are
standing outside, wanting to speak to you. He replied to him, Who is my mother,
and who are my brothers? Pointing to his disciples, he said, Here are my
mother and my brothers. For whoever does the will of my Father in heaven
is my brother and sister and mother. (Matthew 12:46-50)
Christ's new family
When we think of Jesus as
portrayed in the Gospels we characteristically think of him engaged in his
public ministry and given over to the service of the House of Israel. He is
travelling all through Galilee and Judaea,
preaching and healing, and also in Jerusalem. Occasionally he even goes
beyond the borders of these territories to pagan settlements. But we can
too easily forget his very human ties to his own family, meaning by that
to his mother and his relatives. Consider that he spend thirty
years
in Nazareth, a small settlement in Galilee, a village that was some four
miles from the commanding city of Sephoris. Sephoris was a bustling and cosmopolitan
centre containing many Greek and Roman elements, and during our Lord’s early
years Herod Antipas was restoring, developing and fortifying it. There is
one tradition that the parents of Mary his mother (Anne and Joachim) dwelt
there. In any case our Lord would undoubtedly have worked with Joseph his
foster-father in Sephoris during its development under Herod and its immediate
aftermath. It was only a short distance from their village. We can imagine
Christ’s family life, living with Mary and Joseph and having many relatives
in the vicinity, perhaps not only in Nazareth itself but also in Sephoris
the nearby city. He grew up in obscurity, wonderfully merged with his family
and community. We do not get the impression that our Lord had the impact
on his clan and community of a great and obvious leader. He was discreet,
altogether holy and altogether normal in the best sense of the word, marvellously
at one with his immediate folk. The true and extraordinary power of his
personality was yet to be revealed. What is noteworthy about these many
years in Nazareth is the immersion of the Son of God made man in the ordinary
life of Everyman, with all its human ties. The Word was made flesh and dwelt
among us.
But the day finally
came and this obscure though obviously profoundly good man was suddenly
revealed to Israel. His striking wisdom, his riveting speech, his commanding
supernatural power, his unparalleled prophetic stature, the moral beauty
of his person, quickly gained on the nation. Presenting himself before the
prophet of the nation — John the Baptist — that prophet deferred before
him and pointed to him as the one long promised. He was the Lamb of God,
John declared, who would take away the sin of the world. The sin of the world,
not just of the nation! And so he began to move the chosen people of Israel.
In our Gospel scene today he has before him truly devoted disciples who
wish to do the will of the heavenly Father, and who are there before him
drinking in his every word. A message comes through the crowd: “Your mother
and brothers are standing outside, wanting to speak to you. He replied to
him, Who is my mother, and who are my brothers? Pointing to his disciples,
he said, Here are my mother and my brothers. For whoever does the will of
my Father in heaven is my brother and sister and mother” (Matthew 12:46-50). Our Lord’s words immediately
imply that a new and far loftier family of his is in the making. It is not,
of course, a family that will involve a rejection of his natural family.
Rather it is a family that, while including all natural ties, far transcends
those ties. His “brothers and sisters and mother” are now those who choose
to do the will of Christ’s Father in heaven. We remember what occurred when
Christ was a boy of twelve. He went with his parents to Jerusalem for the
great feast, perhaps for the first time. We remember the details as Luke
describes them and how he said to his mother — and what a holy mother! — that he had been about his Father’s interests. It was a pointer to the new
family that was to come. That family is the Church of which Mary his mother
is the foremost member, the first and greatest Christian because her entire
soul and life was given over to the will of the heavenly Father.
The Word was made flesh
and dwelt among us. To all who accepted him he gave power to become children
of God. From his fullness we have received, grace upon grace. Through Jesus
Christ grace and truth have come. All this is available to the person who
becomes by baptism a brother or sister of Jesus Christ, and thereby a member
of his Church founded on the Apostles. We are members of Jesus Christ,
his brothers and sisters in the Holy Spirit, children of God his Father!
Let us take as our model the first and best and most perfect of Christians,
his own mother. With her let us follow Christ our Lord and God every day
to the end, and thus to life everlasting.
(E.J.Tyler)
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The isolated efforts of each one of you have little effect.
Let the charity of Christ unite you, and you will be amazed at their effectiveness.
(The Way, no.847)
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Continuing The Imitation of Christ
BOOK THREE INTERNAL CONSOLATION
The Twenty-Second Chapter REMEMBER THE INNUMERABLE
GIFTS OF GOD
THE DISCIPLE
If one receives more and another less, yet all are Yours and without You
nothing can be received. He who receives greater things cannot glory in his
own merit or consider himself above others or behave insolently toward those
who receive less. He who attributes less to himself and is the more humble
and devout in returning thanks is indeed the greater and the better, while
he who considers himself lower than all men and judges himself to be the
least worthy, is the more fit to receive the greater blessing.
(Continuing)
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Logical sequence has been set down above as a fourth test of
fidelity in development, and shall now be briefly illustrated in the history
of Christian doctrine. That is, I mean to give instances of one doctrine
leading to another; so that, if the former be admitted, the latter can hardly
be denied, and the latter can hardly be called a corruption without taking
exception to the former.
(JHN, from An Essay on the
Development of Christian Doctrine 1845)
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Wednesday of the sixteenth week
in Ordinary Time B-2
Entrance Antiphon Ps 54 (53): 6,
8 See, I have God for my help. The
Lord sustains my soul. I will sacrifice to you with willing heart, and
praise your name, O Lord, for it is good.
Collect
Show favour, O Lord, to your servants and mercifully increase the gifts of
your grace, that, made fervent in hope, faith and charity, they may be ever
watchful in keeping your commands. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son,
who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for
ever and ever.
click centre arrow
Scripture today: Jeremiah 1: 1.4-10;
Psalm 70; Matthew 13: 1-9
That
same day Jesus went out of the house and sat by the lake. Such large crowds
gathered round him that he got into a boat and sat in it, while all the
people stood on the shore. Then he told them many things in parables,
saying: A farmer went out to sow his seed. As he was scattering the seed,
some fell along the path, and the birds came and ate it up. Some fell on
rocky places, where it did not have much soil. It sprang up quickly, because
the soil was shallow. But when the sun came up, the plants were scorched,
and they withered because they had no root. Other seed fell among thorns,
which grew up and choked the plants. Still other seed fell on good soil,
where it produced a crop — a hundred, sixty or thirty times what was sown.
He who has ears, let him hear. (Matthew 13: 1-9)
God and the
world John Henry
Newman’s second novel Callista (1855), set in north Africa in
the third century AD, is the story of a Christian convert and martyr. An
important character is Agellius. At his mention of the “Creator” his brother
Juba said, “Creator; that, I consider, is an assumption.... this belief of a
Creator? Who have brought in the belief? the Christians. ‘Tis the Christians
that began it. The world went on very well without it before their rise”
(p.18). I presume that it is Newman’s judgment that the widespread
acceptance
of the doctrine of the Creator, as generally understood, is due to the
Christian revelation. The one God made and sustains everything, and does so
ex nihilo, from nothing. This implies an immeasurable transcendence of God
from all else, and at the same time his immeasurable immanence. The Creator
is completely Other in every respect ― but there are likenesses, to a point,
between the Creator and the work of his hands. So he can be spoken of with
the aid of analogies. For instance, the expression I have just used, “the
work of his hands” involves analogies. There is the analogy of “work” and
the analogy of “hands” ― what God has done and continues to do is like, to a
point, human work, and his creative action is like, to a point, the man who
does work with his hands. So it is that we are able to know the ineffable
God, to a point, by contemplating his works. To a degree, an effect must be
like unto and indicative of its Cause. The case is unique with the First
Cause of all because the First Cause transcends in being all other things.
Still, the effect of his creative action reveals that he exists and
something of what he must be like. In all of this, I am referring to a
natural knowledge of God from his works. I would go a step further and make
the following point. God is not like the world, the work of his hands, even
if we know him in terms of analogies from the world. Rather, the world is ― however remotely
― made in the image of God. God is the archetype. In his
Letter to the Ephesians, St Paul writes that “before the world began God
chose us in Christ to be holy and blameless in his sight” (Ephesians 1: 4).
Christ, the divine Image of the Unseen God, is the Archetype of all.
One of the things we learn from God’s revelation of himself is that there
are patterns in his ways. For instance, he chooses individuals for a mission
to a wider number. He chooses a people for a mission to the world. He
establishes a covenant, and this becomes a pattern, reaching a climax in the
New and final Covenant established in the blood of his divine Son our Lord
Jesus Christ. There are patterns in the ways of God and we who are his
children should strive to know them to the extent that we can. Time and
again our Lord reveals and speaks of these patterns in the ways of God by
recourse to analogies drawn from nature ― the work of God’s hands. Our
Gospel today is a case in point. Our Lord describes a pattern in nature, in
the course of the world. The seed which a farmer sows falls on a variety of
surfaces, having their various effects: “some fell along the path, and the
birds came and ate it up. Some fell on rocky places, where it did not have
much soil. It sprang up quickly, because the soil was shallow. But when the
sun came up, the plants were scorched, and they withered because they had no
root. Other seed fell among thorns, which grew up and choked the plants.
Still other seed fell on good soil, where it produced a crop — a hundred,
sixty or thirty times what was sown” (Matthew 13:
1-9). That is a pattern in nature, and our Lord means it to
illustrate a pattern in the ways of God ― which he goes on to explicate in
the passage following upon this, not given here. In brief, just as the seed
has power to produce its fruit but depends on the quality of the surface
soil on which it falls, so God works with power in the hearts and lives of
men, but is dependent on the quality of their response. The point to which I
am adverting here, though, is that the ineffable, incomprehensible God,
Creator of the world who utterly transcends all that he has made, does have
his ways. To a point God can be known, and to a point his ways can be known.
They are known by God’s own creative work, and by the special revelation he
has made of himself through the prophets, through salvation history, and
supremely through and in his divine Son made man, Jesus Christ. Christ has
told us of the ways of God, and his parables, drawn from ordinary life and
nature, are privileged illustrations of the ways of God. My suggestion is
that, apart from pondering on the teaching of our Lord about God and his
ways in the parables which he employs, we take our cue from them and look on
the world and its course as illustrative and revelatory of the ways of its
ineffable Maker. The world is not just a brute fact. It is the work of God,
and so, to a point, tells us about God and his ways.
It is interesting to notice that in our parable today, all our Lord does
with the crowds is invite them to reflect on the pattern that they see in
nature. He does not explain his real point about God and his ways. We soon
learn that this is because they were not morally ready to receive the point
from him. Our Lord hopes that a reflection on what he has said about the
world will open their hearts to higher things, things suggested by patterns
in nature and the world. Let us take our cue from that. Let us learn to look
on the world not as something we simply use or admire, but as something of a
revelation of the Creator, the echo of his voice. It will raise our minds
and hearts to him from whom it came.
(E.J.Tyler)
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(July 22) St. Mary Magdalene
Except for the mother of Jesus, few women are more honoured in the Bible
than Mary Magdalene. Yet she could well be the patron of the slandered,
since there has been a persistent legend in the Church that she is the
unnamed sinful woman who anointed the feet of Jesus in Luke 7:36-50. Most
Scripture scholars today point out that there is no scriptural basis for
confusing the two women. Mary Magdalene, that is, “of Magdala,” was the one
from whom Christ cast out “seven demons” (Luke 8:2)—an indication, at the
worst, of extreme demonic possession or, possibly, severe illness. Father
W.J. Harrington, O.P., writing in the New Catholic Commentary,
says that “seven demons” “does not mean that Mary had lived an immoral
life—a conclusion reached only by means of a mistaken identification with
the anonymous woman of Luke 7:36.” Father Edward Mally, S.J., writing in the
Jerome Biblical Commentary, agrees that she “is not...the same
as the sinner of Luke 7:37, despite the later Western romantic tradition
about her.” Mary Magdalene was one of the many “who were assisting them
[Jesus and the Twelve] out of their means.” She was one of those who stood
by the cross of Jesus with his mother. And, of all the “official” witnesses
that might have been chosen for the first awareness of the Resurrection, she
was the one to whom that privilege was given. She is known as the "Apostle
to the Apostles." (AmericanCatholic.org)
Scripture today: Exodus 16:1-5, 9-15; Psalm
78:18-19, 23-28; John 20:1-2, 11-18
Early on the first day of the week,
while it was still dark, Mary Magdalene went to the tomb and saw that the
stone had been removed from the entrance. So she came running to Simon Peter
and the other disciple, the one Jesus loved, and said, They have
taken the
Lord out of the tomb, and we don't know where they have put him! But Mary
stood outside the tomb weeping. As she wept, she bent over to look into the
tomb and saw two angels in white, seated where Jesus' body had been, one at
the head and the other at the feet. They asked her, Woman, why are you
weeping? They have taken my Lord away, she said, and I don't know where they
have put him. At this, she turned round and saw Jesus standing there, but
she did not realise that it was Jesus. Woman, he said, why are you weeping?
Who is it you are looking for? Thinking he was the gardener, she said, Sir,
if you have carried him away, tell me where you have put him, and I will get
him. Jesus said to her, Mary. She turned towards him and cried out in
Hebrew, Rabboni! (which means Teacher). Jesus said, Do not hold on to me,
for I have not yet returned to the Father. Go instead to my brothers and
tell them, 'I am returning to my Father and your Father, to my God and your
God.' Mary Magdalene went to the disciples with the news: I have seen the
Lord! And she told them that he had said these things to her.
(John 20:1-2, 11-18)
God is very near
Consider the great religions of the world apart
from Christianity. There is Buddhism with its search for Nirvana, which is
happiness and freedom from the fate of rebirth by the attainment of
enlightenment and utter detachment. Formally speaking, there is no personal
God in Buddhism, no loving Creator. The Nirvana is the great and
transcendent goal of human endeavour. Nirvana transcends — being a state that
is ever ahead, ever above, ever beyond. Then there is Islam, with its goal
of total submission to
Allah who transcends all. Allah is the only God,
creator of the universe, and the judge of humankind. He is unique and
inherently one, all-merciful and omnipotent. He is the God of inaccessible
mystery. Among the 99 names of God, the most famous and most frequent of
these names are "the Merciful" (al-rahman) and "the Compassionate." Now,
what strikes the observer in this lofty Islamic account is the
unutterable transcendence of God. Allah is merciful and compassionate, yes,
but the accent is on his transcendence. According to Francis Edwards Peters,
the Qur'an insists, and Muslims believe, and historians affirm that Muhammad
and his followers worship the same God as the Jews. The Quran's Allah is the
same Creator God who covenanted with Abraham. Significantly, though, Peters
states that the Qur'an portrays Allah as both more powerful and more remote
than Yahweh, and as a universal deity, unlike Yahweh who is closely involved
with the Israelites. So it seems that Allah is not actually the same as Yahweh. As
already suggested, a special characteristic of the Allah of Islam is his
transcendence. More than anything he is beyond. Now, of course, God the
Creator does indeed transcend his creation. How could it be otherwise? If
there is to be a Creator of the world who creates from nothing and who
sustains in existence every element of all there is, then he must transcend
in every respect his creation. However, there is another essential feature
to the divine nature and that is his immanence. God is unimaginably
immanent, so very, very near. Well then, how can this be imagined and drawn
into the practice of religion?
Let us place ourselves in the Gospel scene the Church selects for the
memorial of St Mary Magdalene (John 20:1-2, 11-18).
It is Sunday morning and we are at the tomb of the crucified Jesus where his
body has lain since late Friday afternoon. Mary is at the tomb weeping, for
the body has gone. Her whole being is full of love for the Master who is her
Lord and her Guide. She turns and sees someone nearby whom she takes to be
the gardener. He speaks, asking why she was weeping. Where is the body? she
asks him. Mary! he replies, undoubtedly with a joyous smile and eyes full of
joy. Light and happiness flood her mind, heart, soul and being. Master! she
says and falls before him in a rapture of happiness. He is alive before her
in all his concrete, physical and living reality. There is immediacy, direct
contact, and all of this in a very concrete situation. Now, this is
Christianity. God makes himself immediate, direct, concrete and very near. A
week later — and it is described by St John in this same Gospel — the living
Jesus will meet the doubting Thomas and will evoke from him a magnificent
profession of faith in his divinity. My Lord and my God! Thomas will bow
before this living risen man. He will feel his hands and his side that
contain the marks of the Passion, and he will, from the depths of his spirit
acknowledge him as Yahweh God, the God who spoke to Abraham, Moses and the
Prophets, without of course being the Father. He is the Son, but the same
transcendent God, who gives to us who believe in him the gift of a share in
his own divine Spirit, thus drawing us into the very life of the
transcendent divine Trinity. In Jesus Christ, the transcendent God became
flesh and dwelt among us. He became very concrete, very immediate, very
near, very accessible, very familiar. He is God-with-us. In the Christian
religion, which God himself established, the transcendent God chooses to
emphasise his astonishing immanence. This closeness of God is manifested in
the Gospel scene of today. Mary Magdalene speaks directly to the great God
with utter immediacy, the God who is Jesus Christ.
Mary Magdalene is one who embodies the Christian ideal of a full and
enthusiastic love for Jesus Christ the incarnate God. This is the heart and
soul of the Christian religion. St Paul writes that the Son of God did not
cling to his glory as God — his transcendent state, we might almost say — but gave it up and became as men are, and humbler still, even to death on
the cross. Of course he remains the transcendent God always, but he has
brought to the fore his divine immanence. He is now so, so very accessible
and concrete. We can, indeed, live in him by grace and by grace he lives in
us. Let us give thanks to God for deigning to make us his own friends and
children.
(E.J.Tyler)
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You want to be a martyr. I will place a martyrdom within your reach: to be
an apostle and not to call yourself an apostle, to be a missionary — with a
mission — and not to call yourself a missionary, to be a man of God and to
seem a man of the world: to pass unnoticed!
(The Way, no.848)
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Continuing The Imitation of Christ
BOOK THREE INTERNAL
CONSOLATION
The Twenty-Second Chapter
REMEMBER THE INNUMERABLE GIFTS OF GOD
THE DISCIPLE
He, on the other hand, who has received fewer gifts should not be sad or
impatient or envious of the richer man. Instead he should turn his mind to
You and offer You the greatest praise because You give so bountifully, so
freely and willingly, without regard to persons. All things come from You;
therefore, You are to be praised in all things. You know what is good for
each of us; and why one should receive less and another more is not for us
to judge, but for You Who have marked every man's merits.
(Continuing)
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Our Lord expressly said that the Church was to be like a net, which gathered
of every kind, not only of the good, but of the bad too. Such was His
Church; it does not prove then that we are not His Church, because we are
like His Church … We cannot make His Church better than He made her.
(JHN, from Lectures on the Present Position of Catholics in England
1851)
---------------Back to index for this month---------------------------Back to index to Liturgical Days---------
Thursday of the sixteenth week in Ordinary Time
(July 23) St. Bridget (1303?-1373)
From age seven on, Bridget had visions of Christ crucified. Her visions
formed the basis for her activity—always with the emphasis on charity rather
than spiritual favours. She lived her married life in the court of the
Swedish king Magnus II. Mother of eight children (the second eldest was St.
Catherine of Sweden), she lived the strict life of a penitent after her
husband’s death. Bridget constantly strove to exert her good influence over
Magnus; while never fully reforming, he did give her land and buildings to
found a monastery for men and women. This group eventually expanded into an
Order known as the Bridgetines (still in existence). In 1350, a year of
jubilee, Bridget braved a plague-stricken Europe to make a pilgrimage to
Rome. Although she never returned to Sweden, her years in Rome were far from
happy, being hounded by debts and by opposition to her work against Church
abuses. A final pilgrimage to the Holy Land, marred by shipwreck and the
death of her son, Charles, eventually led to her death in 1373. In 1999,
she, Saints Catherine of Siena and Edith Stein were named co-patronesses of
Europe. Despite the hardships of life and wayward children (not all became
saints), Margery Kempe of Lynn says Bridget was “kind and meek to every
creature” and “she had a laughing face.” (AmericanCatholic.org)
Scripture today: Exodus 19:1-2, 9-11,
16-20b; Daniel 3:52-56; Matthew 13:10-17
The disciples came to Jesus and
asked, Why do you speak to the people in parables? He replied, The knowledge
of the secrets of the
kingdom of heaven has been given to you, but not to
them. Whoever has will be given more, and he will have an abundance. Whoever
does not have, even what he has will be taken from him. This is why I speak
to them in parables: Though seeing, they do not see; though hearing, they do
not hear or understand. In them is fulfilled the prophecy of Isaiah: 'You
will be ever hearing but never understanding; you will be ever seeing but
never perceiving. For this people's heart has become calloused; they hardly
hear with their ears, and they have closed their eyes. Otherwise they might
see with their eyes, hear with their ears, understand with their hearts and
turn, and I would heal them.' But blessed are your eyes because they see,
and your ears because they hear. For I tell you the truth, many prophets and
righteous men longed to see what you see but did not see it, and to hear
what you hear but did not hear it. (Matthew
13:10-17)
The state of the heart
During his public ministry our Lord was commonly addressed as “Teacher”. He
gathered — indeed he sought — disciples, and disciples were persons who had
committed themselves to learning from a master. John the Baptist had
disciples, the Pharisees had disciples, and our Lord had disciples. Many of
our Lord’s disciples left him on hearing some crucial points of his
teaching
— such
as his doctrine on the Eucharist. We read in the sixth chapter of St John’s
Gospel that when our Lord preached the doctrine of the Eucharist at
Capernaum, stating that his flesh must be eaten and his blood must be drunk
in order to have eternal life, many of his disciples left him. That was too
much, they said. They refused to accept his teaching any more. But he was a
Teacher. The final charge
our Lord gave to the Apostles before ascending into heaven was that they
were to go to the whole world and make disciples of all the nations. All the
nations were called to look on him as their common Teacher. Of course, our
Lord did not only come as mankind’s Teacher — he is, more importantly,
mankind’s Saviour. Nevertheless, it is of crucial importance that he be
accepted as Teacher. Now, as a point of interest, let us notice how commonly
he uses the parable as his method of teaching. He does teach in a
direct way without parables, and we see this in the long Sermon on the Mount in
Matthew occupying three chapters. It consists of numerous sayings which may
summarize our Lord’s teaching on numerous occasions. But our Lord also
constantly employs parables and several of them are famous in world
literature. In our Gospel passage today (Matthew
13:10-17) our Lord’s disciples ask him about this. Why is he
speaking so often to the people in parables, and not in a more direct way?
Our Lord’s reply is revealing of the human heart and how it can close to the
grace of God. Let us consider what he says.
Our Lord states plainly that the knowledge of the kingdom of heaven has been
given to his disciples, but not to “them”. The kingdom of heaven is the rule
of God, his lordship, and this is found in the knowledge of, love for and
union with the person of Jesus. Now, in respect to this, our Lord says that
“whoever has will be given more, and he will have an abundance. Whoever does
not have, even what he has will be taken from him.” What is it that the one
whom our Lord is speaking of, has, and of which he will have an abundance?
It is the readiness to believe and be a disciple of Christ. It is the
positive disposition to come to our Lord and accept him as the Master. It is
being a disciple at least in one’s readiness and disposition. The one who
does not have this, which is to say the one who is positively indisposed to
accept Christ, will gradually lose in most serious respects. This warning is
reflected in our Lord’s final warning to his disciples whom he sends out
just before he ascends into heaven. Whoever believes will be saved and
whoever does not believe will be condemned. But then, in our passage today, our Lord speaks at
further length on those who are not disposed to receive him. He quotes from
the Prophet Isaiah and the citation is from Isaiah 6: 9-10, which is
Yahweh’s commission to Isaiah to speak to the people as his messenger. Our
Lord says that the response of so many to his message is a fulfilment of
these words of the Lord to the prophet Isaiah, and the form of his quotation
amounts to an explanation of the citation. The people listen to him and they
see him but to no avail. They do not perceive. The reason? The reason lies
in their state of heart. Their hearts are coarse, dull and blind. That is to say, their
hearts are not able to receive his message and the reason for this is that
they are simply not willing to receive it lest it require of them conversion
and healing by God. They have shut their eyes lest they see... and be
converted. They do not want to change. They prefer sin. This is the reason
for their blindness. This means that hardness and blindness of heart is not
just an accident but is at root a sinful condition due to a perverse though
hidden choice. Thus is grace withheld.
Our Lord is speaking here of the hidden starting points and dispositions of
the will. He spoke in parables to the crowds because he could see that at
root they did not want to accept his teaching, though perhaps they were not
very aware that this was their disposition. Their hearts were hardened
against the Light. They sought from him other things and were unwilling to
change, to “be converted and be healed by me.” Let us ask for the grace to
be open to Jesus Christ from the bottom of our hearts, and thus to be, as
our Lord says, “blessed”, for in Jesus Christ is to be found every heavenly
blessing.
(E.J.Tyler)
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Laugh at him! Tell him he is behind the times: it's incredible that some
people still want to regard the stage— coach as a good means of transport.
This is how I feel about those who persist in unearthing musty and
periwigged 'Voltairianisms' or discredited liberalisms of the nineteenth
century.
(The Way, no.849)
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Continuing The Imitation of Christ
BOOK THREE
INTERNAL CONSOLATION
The Twenty-Second Chapter
REMEMBER THE INNUMERABLE GIFTS OF GOD
THE DISCIPLE
Therefore, O Lord God, I consider it a great blessing not to have many
things which human judgment holds praiseworthy and glorious, for one who
realizes his own poverty and vileness should not be sad or downcast at it,
but rather consoled and happy because You, O God, have chosen the poor, the
humble, and the despised in this world to be Your friends and servants. The
truth of this is witnessed by Your Apostles, whom You made princes over all
the world. Yet they lived in this world without complaining, so humble and
simple, so free from malice and deceit, that they were happy even to suffer
reproach for Your name and to embrace with great affection that which the
world abhors.
(Continuing)
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Miracles … hold a very prominent place in the evidence of the Jewish and
Christian Revelations.
(JHN, from The Miracles of Scripture (1826)
---------------Back to index for this month---------------------------Back to index to Liturgical Days---------
Friday of the sixteenth week in Ordinary Time
(July 24) St. Sharbel Makhlouf (1828-1898)
Although this saint never travelled far from the Lebanese village
of Beka-Kafra, where he was born, his influence has spread
widely.
Joseph Zaroun Maklouf was raised by an uncle because his father, a mule
driver, died when Joseph was only three. At the age of 23, Joseph joined the
Monastery of St. Maron at Annaya, Lebanon, and took the name Sharbel in
honour of a second-century martyr. He professed his final vows in 1853 and
was ordained six years later. Following the example of the fifth-century St.
Maron, Sharbel lived as a hermit from 1875 until his death. His reputation
for holiness prompted people to seek him to receive a blessing and to be
remembered in his prayers. He followed a strict fast and was very devoted to
the Blessed Sacrament. When his superiors occasionally asked him to
administer the sacraments to nearby villages, Sharbel did so gladly. He died
in the late afternoon on Christmas Eve. Christians and non-Christians soon
made his tomb a place of pilgrimage and of cures. Pope Paul VI beatified him
in 1965 and canonized him 12 years later.
When Sharbel was canonized in 1977, Bishop Francis Zayek,
head the U.S. Diocese of St. Maron, wrote a pamphlet entitled “A New Star of
the East.” Bishop Zayek wrote: “St. Sharbel is called the second St. Anthony
of the Desert, the Perfume of Lebanon, the first Confessor of the East to be
raised to the Altars according to the actual procedure of the Catholic
Church, the honor of our Aramaic Antiochian Church, and the model of
spiritual values and renewal. Sharbel is like a Cedar of Lebanon standing in
eternal prayer, on top of a mountain.” The bishop noted that Sharbel's
canonization plus other beatification cases prove “that the Aramaic Maronite
Antiochian Church is indeed a living branch of the Catholic Church and is
intimately connected with the trunk, who is Christ, our Saviour, the
beginning and the end of all things.” (AmericanCatholic.org)
Scripture today: Exodus 20:1-17; Psalm
19:8-11; Matthew 13:18-23
Listen then to what the parable of
the sower means: When anyone hears the message about the kingdom and does
not understand
it, the evil one comes and snatches away what was sown in his
heart. This is the seed sown along the path. The one who received the seed
that fell on rocky places is the man who hears the word and at once receives
it with joy. But since he has no root, he lasts only a short time. When
trouble or persecution comes because of the word, he quickly falls away. The
one who received the seed that fell among the thorns is the man who hears
the word, but the worries of this life and the deceitfulness of wealth choke
it, making it unfruitful. But the one who received the seed that fell on
good soil is the man who hears the word and understands it. He produces a
crop, yielding a hundred, sixty or thirty times what was sown.
(Matthew 13:18-23)
Hearing with understanding
Our Lord’s disciples have asked him why it is that he speaks to the crowds
in parables and he has given a general explanation (Matthew 13:10-15). It is
because the crowds do not understand and will not understand. This is because at
root they do not want to understand. They fulfil the prophecy of Isaiah in
that, sensing that conversion is required of them, they are not prepared to
to take this all-important step. Christ can see this and so he speaks to
them in only in parables. He leaves it to them to
perceive and accept his teaching according to the degree of their
readiness. But now our Lord
turns to his disciples and proceeds to explain the meaning of the parable he has told the
crowds. It has to do with religious understanding and the
lack of it, rendering the word of God fruitful or unfruitful as the case may
be. Let us, then, consider our Lord’s explanation to his disciples. At the
beginning of the parable our Lord takes the case of one who hears the word
of God without understanding it, while at the end of the parable he takes the case
of one who receives the word of God and does understand it. While the seed
sown on the pathway exemplifies one who lacks understanding of "the message
about the kingdom," this lack of understanding is surely a characteristic of the others,
too. There is the one who lacks depth and gives up on the word of God once
difficulty arises. He is the seed on rocky ground. He seeks consolation elsewhere and abandons the word of
God. There is also the one who is consumed with this life’s interests and
the lure of wealth - the seed among the thorns. The word of God has no chance with him. These share a
general lack of understanding. But it is altogether different with the one
who “hears the word and understands it. He produces a crop, yielding a
hundred, sixty or thirty times what was sown”
(Matthew 13:18-23). This element of understanding, then,
is critical for the fruitfulness of the word of God. Like a good seed, great
life will spring from the teaching of Christ. But this seed needs to fall on
good soil, and the issue here is religious understanding.
What then is this understanding that our Lord is referring to?
For instance, it is
possible to have one’s first degree, and one’s second degree, and then a
doctorate in religion — be it Scripture studies or whatever — and not to be
practising the religion in which one is something of an expert. One can know a great deal
about Christ and his teaching, and yet lack faith. That is to say, one can
“understand” religion in one respect and not understand it in another. On the other hand one
can have a deep understanding of religion from an academic point of view and
at the same time have a profound faith. We could put it this way, a person
can understand something as an observer from the outside, and understand it
from within as something that is truly part of oneself. A husband
understands his wife, we might say, if his wife is truly part of his life. There are other
parallels. There is the common distinction between theoretical knowledge and
the knowledge that derives from personal experience. A person can have just
completed an honours degree in civil engineering but, depending on the
program of his course, he might to that point have little direct experience of
engineering work. Would he be likely to be employed over a person who may
not have his academic qualification but who has been a proven and good
engineer over many years? Hardly. The one with the experience understands
the field better than he. What has this to do with our Lord’s parable? Our
Lord states that his word and his revelation will bear fruit in the one who
“understands” it. The understanding he is referring to is that which is born
of a sense of personal need, a sense of personal sin, a sense that the
teaching in question comes from God himself, a sense that this grand and
holy teaching is the answer to all that we desire and need, together with a
sense of Jesus born of prayer. This
understanding is that which is possessed by the humble person who yearns for
God as his only Saviour and who recognizes in Christ and his revelation the
source of eternal life for him. This is why the one who “hears the word and
understands it” may be the simplest and poorest person, while the one who
hears “without understanding it” it may be the most educated of all. The one
is an insider, a true disciple. The other is an observer, and not of the
company.
The understanding our Lord is referring to is not mere intellectual
understanding — even though this to a greater or lesser extent is helpful.
Our Lord is referring to moral and spiritual perception. A mother may have
no formal qualifications as a psychologist, but it is possible that she may
have a much better understanding of the problem of her child than the
trained psychologist. Let us place
ourselves in the company of Christ our Lord and ask for the grace to know
ourselves well, to know our need and to know how we stand in all truth. With
this understanding we shall be in a good position to hear and understand the
word of God as it comes to us in the Scriptures as presented and explained
by the Church Christ founded on Peter and the Apostles. We will perceive
that it is everything to us. So then, let us give
ourselves over to hearing the word of God with understanding and putting it
into practice.
(E.J.Tyler)
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What conversations! What vulgarity and what dirt! And you have to associate
with them, in the office, in the university, in the operating-theatre..., in
the world.
Ask them if they wouldn't mind stopping, and they laugh at you. Look
annoyed, and they get worse. Leave them, and they continue.
This is the solution: first pray for them, and offer up some sacrifice; then
face them like a man and make use of the 'strong language apostolate'. — The
next time we meet I'll tell you — in a whisper — a few useful words.
(The Way, no.850)
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Continuing The Imitation of Christ
BOOK THREE
INTERNAL CONSOLATION
The Twenty-Second Chapter
REMEMBER THE INNUMERABLE GIFTS OF GOD
THE DISCIPLE
A man who loves You and recognizes Your benefits, therefore, should be
gladdened by nothing so much as by Your will, by the good pleasure of Your
eternal decree. With this he should be so contented and consoled that he
would wish to be the least as others wish to be the greatest; that he would
be as peaceful and satisfied in the last place as in the first, and as
willing to be despised, unknown and forgotten, as to be honoured by others
and to have more fame than they. He should prefer Your will and the love of
Your honour to all else, and it should comfort him more than all the
benefits which have been, or will be, given him.
(Concluded)
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All the saints of God, all holy persons, all the faithful have, each in his
measure, purity and love—the two graces go together. What is purity but the
having the heart fixed [on], the loving [for] things unseen? What turns away
the soul from God so much as impurity? What is impurity but loving what is
sinful?
(JHN, from Sermon Notes, published posthumously 1913)
---------------Back to index for this month---------------------------Back to index to Liturgical Days---------
Saturday of the sixteenth week in Ordinary Time B-2
click centre arrow
Scripture today: Jeremiah 7:1-11;
Psalm Ps 84:3-6a and 8a, 11; Matthew 13:24-30
Jesus
told them another parable: The kingdom of heaven is like a man who sowed good
seed in his field. But while everyone was sleeping, his enemy came and sowed
weeds among the wheat, and went away. When the wheat sprouted and formed ears,
then the weeds also appeared. The owner's servants came to him and said, 'Sir,
didn't you sow good seed in your field? Where then did the weeds come from?' 'An
enemy did this,' he replied. The servants asked him, 'Do you want us to go and
pull them up?' 'No,' he answered, 'because while you are pulling the weeds, you
may root up the wheat with them. Let both grow together until the harvest. At
that time I will tell the harvesters: First collect the weeds and tie them in
bundles to be burned; then gather the wheat and bring it into my barn.'
(Matthew 13:24-30)
Wheat and weeds
In July 2011, a Catholic priest of China (Father Paul Lei Shiyin) was ordained a
bishop by an act of the state-approved Catholic Church of China, under orders
from the Chinese civil authorities. This consecration of Father Lei as bishop
proceeded without papal permission, and it incurred his automatic
excommunication by virtue of Canon 1382 of the law of the Catholic Church. This
was then declared publicly to be the case by the Holy See. Excommunication is a
severe penalty in the Church which
excludes
the excommunicated person from visible participation in the life of the
faithful. In the case of Father Lei, it also served to summon the priest to
immediate repentance by approaching the Holy See. At the same time, it
indirectly urged action by the Church in China (namely Bishops, Priests,
Religious, and Laity) to resist any form of illegitimate episcopal ordination. A
question was asked about this excommunication. Did it mean that Father Lei was
expelled from the Church? It did not, it was explained. The Church has both
visible social and invisible mystical dimensions. The excommunicated person is
excluded from active participation in Catholic community life in a visible
social sense, with all its juridical effects (Canon 1331). But the same person
by virtue of his baptism still remains a member of the Church -- the mystical
body of Christ. That is why he can still approach the Holy See for
reconciliation. So there we had a member of the Church who was excluded from
much of the Church’s life: he was a “weed” among the “wheat,” to use the imagery
of our Lord’s parable today (Matthew 13:24-30). He had become a “weed” because
of his (eager) acceptance of episcopal consecration without papal mandate,
indeed in defiance of an express papal prohibition in his case. But he was not
absolutely cast out of the Church, and this might be taken as an illustration of
our Lord’s description of the Kingdom. The owner of the field planted good seed,
and that “seed” we might take to be all those baptized into Christ and his
Church, including the likes of Father Paul Lei. But “weeds” appeared, and an
Enemy had done it. God allows “weeds” to appear in his Church, and he gives them
time before the end. He does not immediately throw them out. They can repent.
A primary instance of this pattern was the Twelve. Christ summoned his
disciples, and chose Twelve. They were privileged with the gift of his personal
friendship and company, as well as a direct share in his redemptive mission. How
select a band it was! Yet immediately following our Lord’s announcement of the
doctrine of the Eucharist in the Synagogue of Capernaum, Christ referred to one
of the Twelve as a devil (John 6:70). He knew who his future betrayer was. He
knew that he had gone bad. But he did not throw him out. An Enemy had done it,
and had won him for his own. But he remained right to the end in our Lord’s
company: our Lord addressed him as Friend precisely when he received the kiss of
betrayal in the Garden. If this was permitted by Jesus Christ, it must have been
the better thing, and certainly according to the plan of God. This is yet
another illustration of the pattern that is present wherever God’s Kingdom is
present in the world. Where Jesus Christ is, there is his Kingdom. Jesus Christ
is present in his body the Church, and one enters his Kingdom by union with
Jesus Christ in faith and baptism. This places one in Christ’s Church ― and
there are both “wheat” and “weeds” in the field of God. Vast numbers enjoy
various degrees and forms of connection with the person of Jesus Christ, and the
field consists not only of the good, but the bad. The good, the not-so-good, and
the bad mingle one among the other as the Church advances Christ’s work of the
Redemption of the world. Then again, apart from the mixed company of the
Church’s children, there is the mixed situation in the heart of every man and
woman. The human heart, the primary arena of the work of the Holy Spirit, is a
field of both “wheat” and “weeds.” St Paul describes the human heart so well: “I
cannot even understand my own actions. I do not do what I want to do but what I
hate.... I know that no good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh; the desire to
do right is there but not the power. What happens is that I do, not the good I
will to do, but the evil I do not intend. But if I do what is against my will,
it is not I who do it, but sin which dwells in me... What a wretched man I am!”
(Romans 7: 15-24).
Life in the Kingdom is essentially a life of struggle. There are two opposing
banners. One is the standard of Christ, the other the standard of Satan. We must
choose. Let our choice be decisive, and let us carry it through to the end. We
must expect to have weeds about us to the very end, and our struggle is to
transform them into wheat while there is time. At the end, as our Lord explains,
he “will tell the harvesters: First collect the weeds and tie them in bundles to
be burned; then gather the wheat and bring it into my barn”
(Matthew 13:24-30). Let us use the time we
have to ensure that the field produces a harvest.
(E.J.Tyler)
---------------Back to index for this month---------------------------Back to index to Liturgical Days---------
Feast of Saint James the Apostle
(July 25) Saint James, Apostle
This James is the brother of John the Evangelist. The two were called by
Jesus as they worked with their father in a fishing boat
on
the Sea of Galilee. Jesus had already called another pair of brothers from a
similar occupation: Peter and Andrew. “He walked along a little farther and
saw James, the son of Zebedee, and his brother John. They too were in a boat
mending their nets. Then he called them. So they left their father Zebedee
in the boat along with the hired men and followed him” (Mark 1:19-20). James
was one of the favoured three who had the privilege of witnessing the
Transfiguration, the raising to life of the daughter of Jairus and the agony
in Gethsemani. Two incidents in the Gospels describe the temperament of this
man and his brother. St. Matthew tells that their mother came (Mark says it
was the brothers themselves) to ask that they have the seats of honour (one
on the right, one on the left of Jesus) in the kingdom. “Jesus said in
reply, ‘You do not know what you are asking. Can you drink the cup that I am
going to drink?’ They said to him, ‘We can’” (Matthew 20:22). Jesus then
told them they would indeed drink the cup and share his baptism of pain and
death, but that sitting at his right hand or left was not his to give—it “is
for those for whom it has been prepared by my Father” (Matthew 20:23b). It
remained to be seen how long it would take to realize the implications of
their confident “We can!” The other disciples became indignant at the
ambition of James and John. Then Jesus taught them all the lesson of humble
service: The purpose of authority is to serve. They are not to impose their
will on others, or lord it over them. This is the position of Jesus himself.
He was the servant of all; the service imposed on him was the supreme
sacrifice of his own life. On another occasion, James and John gave evidence
that the nickname Jesus gave them—“sons of thunder”—was an apt one. The
Samaritans would not welcome Jesus because he was on his way to hated
Jerusalem. “When the disciples James and John saw this they asked, ‘Lord, do
you want us to call down fire from heaven to consume them?’ Jesus turned and
rebuked them...” (Luke 9:54-55). James was apparently the first of the
apostles to be martyred. “About that time King Herod laid hands upon some
members of the church to harm them. He had James, the brother of John,
killed by the sword, and when he saw that this was pleasing to the Jews he
proceeded to arrest Peter also” (Acts 12:1-3a). This James, sometimes called
James the Greater, is not to be confused with James the Lesser (May 3) or
with the author of the Letter of James and the leader of the Jerusalem
community. (AmericanCatholic.org)
Scripture today: 2 Corinthians 4:7-15;
Psalm 126:1bc-6; Matthew 20:20-28
Then the mother of Zebedee's sons
came to Jesus with her sons and, kneeling down, asked a favour of him. What
is it you want?
he asked. She said, Grant that one of these two sons of mine
may sit at your right and the other at your left in your kingdom. You don't
know what you are asking, Jesus said to them. Can you drink the cup I am
going to drink? We can, they answered. Jesus said to them, You will indeed
drink from my cup, but to sit at my right or left is not for me to grant.
These places belong to those for whom they have been prepared by my Father.
When the ten heard about this, they were indignant with the two brothers.
Jesus called them together and said, You know that the rulers of the
Gentiles lord it over them, and their high officials exercise authority over
them. Not so with you. Instead, whoever wants to become great among you must
be your servant, and whoever wants to be first must be your slave — just as
the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life
as a ransom for many. (Matthew 20:20-28)
On difficult requests
There are many observations that could be
made on our Gospel passage today, selected as it is by the Church for the
feast of St James the Apostle, brother of St John the Evangelist. But let us
notice how the scene of the passage opens. The mother of James and John comes
before our Lord with her sons and, kneeling down, asks a favour of him.
Notice our Lord’s interest and desire to grant her request: “What is
it you want? he asks.” Let us notice the profound respect she
shows to our
Lord and the greatness of her faith in him. She clearly believes without any
doubt that Jesus is the Messiah and that the kingdom of God which he and the
Twelve — including her two sons — have been announcing is his kingdom. He is
the king anointed by God. Her greatest ambition is that her two sons be
very, very closely associated with our Lord in his kingdom. She takes the
plunge, we might say, and reveals the greatest desire of her heart,
presenting it before our Lord. Place these two boys of mine one at your
right and the other at your left in your kingdom. She is giving them to him
and she asks that they be at the very forefront with him when he comes as
king. As it turns out, it is a difficult request she has made and in a sense
our Lord has difficulty granting it for the reasons he then gives. But he
answers her prayer in his own way and in a higher sense. They will drink his
cup which will take them with him into his glory, and he is promising his
grace for this. Let our minds drift back to the beginning of our Lord’s
public ministry when he returns to Galilee and takes part in the wedding
feast of Cana. At a certain point he is approached by his mother who simply
says to him, “They have no wine.” She is in effect asking him to do
something extraordinary to meet the crisis even though it is not yet the
moment for it. She was aware that his public ministry had begun. He had been
baptized by his kinsman John. He had received the Spirit launching him on
his mission. He had arrived in Cana with disciples. His mother took the
initiative, even though, as he said to her, it was not yet his hour.
So here at Cana we see a request coming to our Lord that posed a difficulty.
In this case our Lord answered it superabundantly with six huge containers
of the best wine. The point, though, is that prayer is answered even if it
seems to involve problems. Of course, how could our Lord refuse his mother!
The mother of the sons of Zebedee came with a request that posed a
difficulty. She was not turned back. It was answered in our Lord’s own way
(Matthew 20:20-28). How could our Lord
refuse one who loved him so much as she did! One lesson in all this is
surely that we ought in a sense be bold with God in our filial requests of
him. St Alphonsus Ligouri once wrote that the reason why we do not receive
more from God than we do is that we do not ask him for much. This, of
course, is very often because we do not really believe that he is powerful
enough or willing enough to hear our prayer. But consider the little Gospel
incidents we have just seen — they, in a sense, both posed difficulties for
our Lord because (in a certain respect) they did not accord with what God
had originally intended. Of course, we are speaking of this in all-too human
terms and going merely on the face of the Gospel narrative. The point,
though, is that even though our request might seem to us to be difficult
even for God, if before God we feel drawn to present it, and if we see no
reason why it would not accord with God's will, then we ought
boldly and yet very reverently do so. Our Lord says elsewhere, ask and you
will receive, seek and you will find, knock and the door will be opened to
you. Elsewhere he directs us to pray always and never to lose heart. Of
course, we ought also be constantly ready to submit to the divine will
because we may not know what it is that we are asking. In the sixteenth
century in Spain Francis Borgia saw his dearly beloved wife dying. He prayed
to God that she be spared, and somehow an answer came. It was that if he,
Francis, insisted, she would be spared, but it would not be the best course.
Francis submitted, left it to God and she died. He then went on to be a
priest, a Jesuit, the superior general of the Jesuits and a canonized saint.
Let us take our cue from the mother of St James and go to our Lord with our
deepest requests. Let us present them to him as she did. Our Lord answered
her prayer by promising that her sons would both bear witness to him unto death
and they became in the event great Apostles and great saints. We are
reminded of the prayer of Monica the mother of St Augustine. Her prayer was
heard and he became a very great saint. So let us go to Jesus with all our
needs, presenting them to him and all the while entrusting ourselves to his
most holy and all-wise will.
(E.J.Tyler)
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Let us make use of the 'providential imprudences' of youth.
(The Way, no.851)
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Continuing The Imitation of Christ
BOOK THREE INTERNAL CONSOLATION
The Twenty-Third Chapter
FOUR THINGS WHICH BRING GREAT PEACE
THE VOICE OF CHRIST
MY CHILD, I will teach you now the way of peace and true liberty.
Seek, child, to do the will of others rather than your own.
Always choose to have less rather than more.
Look always for the last place and seek to be beneath all others.
Always wish and pray that the will of God be fully carried out in you.
Behold, such will enter into the realm of peace and rest.
(Continuing)
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Surely, then, if the revelations and lessons in Scripture are addressed to
us personally and practically, the presence among us of a formal judge and
standing expositor of its words, is imperative. It is antecedently
unreasonable to suppose that a book so complex, so systematic, in parts so
obscure, the outcome of so many minds, times, and places, should be given us
from above without the safeguard of some authority … Thus we are introduced
to the second dogma in respect to Holy Scripture taught by the Catholic
religion. The first is that Scripture is inspired, the second that the
Church is the infallible interpreter of that inspiration.
(JHN, from On the Inspiration of Scripture 1884)
---------------Back to index for this month---------------------------Back to index to Liturgical Days---------
Seventeenth Sunday of Ordinary Time B
Prayers this week:
God is in his
holy dwelling; he will give a home to the lonely, he gives power and
strength to his people. (Psalm 67: 6-7. 36)
God our Father and protector, without you nothing is holy, nothing has
value. Guide us to everlasting life by helping us to use
wisely the blessings you have given to the world.
We ask this
through our Lord Jesus Christ your Son in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God for ever and ever.
(July 26) Saints Joachim and Ann
In the Scriptures, Matthew and Luke furnish a legal family history of Jesus,
tracing ancestry to show that Jesus is the culmination of great promises.
Not only is his mother’s family neglected, we also know nothing factual
about them except that they existed. Even the names Joachim and Ann come
from a legendary source written more than a century after Jesus died. The
heroism and holiness of these people, however, is inferred from the whole
family atmosphere around Mary in the Scriptures. Whether we rely on the
legends about Mary’s childhood or make guesses from the information in the
Bible, we see in her a fulfilment of many generations of prayerful persons,
herself steeped in the religious traditions of her people. The strong
character of Mary in making decisions, her continuous practice of prayer,
her devotion to the laws of her faith, her steadiness at moments of crisis,
and her devotion to her relatives—all indicate a close-knit, loving family
that looked forward to the next generation even while retaining the best of
the past. Joachim and Ann represent that entire quiet series of generations
who faithfully perform their duties, practice their faith and establish an
atmosphere for the coming of the Messiah, but remain obscure.
(AmericanCatholic.org)
Scripture: 2 Kings 4:42-44;
Psalm 145:10-11, 15-18 ; Ephesians 4:1-6; John
6:1-15
Some time after this, Jesus crossed to the far shore of the Sea of Galilee
(that is, the Sea of Tiberias), and a great crowd of people followed him
because they saw the miraculous signs he had performed on the sick. Then
Jesus went up on a mountainside and sat
down with his disciples. The Jewish
Passover Feast was near. When Jesus looked up and saw a great crowd coming
towards him, he said to Philip, Where shall we buy bread for these people to
eat? He asked this only to test him, for he already had in mind what he was
going to do. Philip answered him, Eight months' wages would not buy enough
bread for each one to have a bite! Another of his disciples, Andrew, Simon
Peter's brother, spoke up, Here is a boy with five small barley loaves and
two small fish, but how far will they go among so many? Jesus said, Make the
people sit down. There was plenty of grass in that place, and the men sat
down, about five thousand of them. Jesus then took the loaves, gave thanks,
and distributed to those who were seated as much as they wanted. He did the
same with the fish. When they had all had enough to eat, he said to his
disciples, Gather the pieces that are left over. Let nothing be wasted. So
they gathered them and filled twelve baskets with the pieces of the five
barley loaves left over by those who had eaten. After the people saw the
miraculous sign that Jesus did, they began to say, Surely this is the
Prophet who is to come into the world. Jesus, knowing that they intended to
come and make him king by force, withdrew again to a mountain by himself.
(John 6: 1-15)
The Eucharist, the new Paschal Meal
It is to be noticed that generally when St John in his
gospel refers to a miracle worked by our Lord he uses the term “sign”. The
first of the miracles that he reports is that of the wedding feast of Cana:
it was the first of the “signs” Jesus did, and it “manifested his glory”
(3:12). In our Gospel passage today our Lord works another “sign” (6:14). In
the first “sign” he provided wine for the wedding feast. In this “sign” he
provides food
for a vast crowd. Now, just prior to his account of this
feeding of the crowds St John provides us with a clue as to what the miracle
was a sign of. It occurred, he tells us, when “the Jewish Passover Feast was
near.” Why would he mention this? The obvious reason why St John tells us
that the miracle of the loaves occurred near the time of the Passover Feast
is because it was a sign of what our Lord would do at his final Passover
Feast. This occurred the night before he died when he instituted the
greatest of the Sacraments, the holy Eucharist. At that Passover meal by his
divine power he changed the bread into his body and the wine into his blood,
and gave it to his disciples. They were to do this in memory of him, and in
this way all his disciples would be fed with this bread from heaven which is
himself. This whole chapter 6 in which is described the miracle of the
loaves may be said to be devoted to Christ’s teaching on the Eucharist. It
begins with Christ feeding multitudes with a few loaves by a great act of
power. It passes on to another proof of divine power when he miraculously
walks on the water to the disciples who are under difficulty on the Sea. He
joins them and in no time they arrive at their destination, despite the
turbulence. Then begins the main and momentous part of the chapter, our
Lord’s lengthy teaching on the holy Eucharist in the synagogue of Capernaum.
It is obvious that the miracle of the loaves is not only a sign of Christ’s
concern for those in need — in this case those who are hungry — but is also
a sign of the Eucharist.
It is a sign of the Eucharist in many respects but especially of the
Eucharist as the new paschal meal. The Paschal Feast of the Jews was the
great family celebration of the Passing Over of the houses of the Hebrews by
the Angel as he made his terrible visits to the houses of the Egyptians.
While the Angel made his visits the Hebrew families ate their meal in haste
and readiness. This was the first Passover Meal. The Pharaoh had refused to
allow the Hebrews to go out into the wilderness to worship God. In
punishment the first-born of every Egyptian family was taken and this
catastrophe forced the Pharaoh to allow the Hebrews to go. The Angel’s
Passing Over was the sign of their deliverance soon to come, and every year
each Hebrew family celebrated the Passover Meal which now was the memorial
of that great deliverance. Our Lord’s feeding of the multitude near the
Passover Feast is a reminder of the new Passover Feast he would institute
during his last celebration of the old. It was the new Passover Meal, the
new Pasch, but this time far more than a reminder of a past deliverance. The
deliverance which Christ, as the new Moses, would effect would be the
definitive deliverance from sin. He, the new Moses of the new people of God
his Church, would take away the sin of the world. He would lead his people
out of the slavery of sin into the promised land of life in God. This he
would do by his death on the cross as the new Paschal Lamb sacrificed on
behalf of all mankind. The Mass — the new Paschal Meal which he instituted
at his last Passover Meal — is not only a constant memorial of this
deliverance brought about by Christ’s sacrifice, but it actually makes it
present. This Passover Meal of Christ is the means whereby he, the Bread of
Life, is fed to the multitudes of the world. By eating of this Heavenly
Bread the believer is united to Christ in his sacrifice as Victim on the
Cross. The miracle of the loaves was a sign of the new Paschal Meal which is
the Sacrament of the Holy Eucharist. This new Paschal Meal, signifying and
making present the new Passover, will be celebrated till the end of the
world.
Let us think of Christ feeding the multitudes with a handful of loaves and a
few fish (John 6: 1-15). It is near the
Feast of the Passover. Let our minds pass to Christ’s final Passover Meal on
the night he was betrayed. The Holy Eucharist is instituted and together
with that the ministerial priesthood by which the Holy Eucharist would be
brought to the peoples. Let us ask our Lord for a deep appreciation of the
mystery of the Eucharist which is the summit and the source of the Christian
life, the greatest means that has been given to us of union with Christ in
whom is every heavenly blessing.
(E.J.Tyler)
Further reading: The Catechism of the Catholic Church,
no.1382-1390
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Try to know the 'way of spiritual childhood' without forcing yourself to
follow this path. Let the holy Spirit work in you.
(The Way, no.852)
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Continuing The Imitation of Christ
BOOK THREE INTERNAL
CONSOLATION
The Twenty-Third Chapter
FOUR
THINGS WHICH BRING GREAT PEACE
THE DISCIPLE
O Lord, this brief discourse of Yours contains much perfection. It is short
in words but full of meaning and abounding in fruit. Certainly if I could
only keep it faithfully, I should not be so easily disturbed. For as often
as I find myself troubled and dejected, I find that I have departed from
this teaching. But You Who can do all things, and Who always love what is
for my soul's welfare, give me increase of grace that I may keep Your words
and accomplish my salvation.
(Continuing)
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In the following passage from the sermon ‘The Eucharistic Presence’
(1838), John Henry Newman reflects
on the miracle of the feeding of the five thousand.
For Newman, Christ’s emphasis on this miracle as a sign of his divine power
shows the profound importance of what it signifies –
the Christian Eucharist. Do we appreciate this great gift,
Newman asks, or rather downplay it?
Our Lord reproves the multitude, for not dwelling on the miracle of the
loaves as a miracle, but only as a means of gaining food for
the
body. Now observe, this is contrary to what He elsewhere says, with a view
of discountenancing the Jews’ desire after signs and wonders. It would seem
then as if there must be something peculiar and singular in what He is here
setting before them. He generally represses their desire for signs, but here
He stimulates it. He finds fault here, because they did not dwell upon the
miracle. “Ye seek Me,” He says, “not because ye saw the miracles, but
because ye did eat of the loaves and were filled.” [John 6: 26] Now
supposing the Eucharistic Gift is a special Sign, the Sign which He meant to
give them for ever of His Divine power, this will account for the difference
between His conduct on this occasion and on others, it being as unbelieving
to overlook signs when given, as to ask for them when withheld. It will
account for His bidding them marvel, when about to promise them Bread from
heaven. They were but imitating their ancestors in the wilderness. Their
ancestors, on the seventh day, went out to gather manna in spite of Moses’
telling them they would not find it. What was this but to look for mere
food, and to forget that it was miraculously given, and as such immediately
dependent on the Giver? Let me ask, is their conduct in this age very
different, who come to the Lord’s Table without awe, admiration, hope;
without that assemblage of feelings which the expectation of so transcendent
a marvel should raise in us? Let us fear, lest a real, though invisible work
of power being vouchsafed to us, greater far than that of the loaves, which
related only to this life’s sustenance, we lose the benefit of it by
disbelieving it. This reflection is strengthened by finding that St. Paul
expressly warns the Corinthians of the great peril of “not discerning the
Lord’s Body.” [1 Cor. 11: 29]
---------------Back to index for this month---------------------------Back to index to Liturgical Days---------
Monday of the seventeenth week in Ordinary Time
(July 27) Blessed Antonio Lucci (1682-1752)
Antonio studied with and was a friend of St. Francesco Antonio Fasani, who
after Antonio Lucci’s death testified at the diocesan hearings regarding the
holiness of Lucci. Born in Agnone in southern Italy, a city famous for
manufacturing bells and copper crafts, he was given the name Angelo at
Baptism. He attended the local school run by the Conventual Franciscans and
joined them at the age of 16. Antonio completed his studies for the
priesthood in Assisi, where he was ordained in 1705. Further studies led to
a doctorate in theology and appointments as a teacher in Agnone, Ravello and
Naples. He also served as guardian in Naples. Elected minister provincial in
1718, the following year he was appointed professor at St. Bonaventure
College in Rome, a position he held until Pope Benedict XIII chose him as
bishop of Bovino (near Foggia) in 1729. The pope explained, "I have chosen
as bishop of Bovino an eminent theologian and a great saint." His 23 years
as bishop were marked by visits to local parishes and a renewal of gospel
living among the people of his diocese. He dedicated his episcopal income to
works of education and charity. At the urging of the Conventual minister
general, Bishop Lucci wrote a major book about the saints and blesseds in
the first 200 years of the Conventual Franciscans. He was beatified in 1989,
three years after his friend Francesco Antonio Fasani was canonized.
(AmericanCatholic.org)
Scripture today: Exodus 32:15-24,
30-34; Psalm 106:19-23; Matthew 13:31-35
He told them another parable: The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed,
which a man took and planted in his field. Though it is the smallest of
seeds, yet when it grows, it is the largest of garden plants and becomes a
tree, so that the birds of the air come and perch in its branches. He told
them still another parable: The kingdom of heaven is like yeast that a woman
took and mixed into a large amount of flour until it worked all through the
dough. Jesus spoke all these things to the crowd in parables; he did not say
anything to them without using a parable. So was fulfilled what was spoken
through the prophet: I will open my mouth in parables, I will utter things
hidden since the creation of the world. (Matthew 13:31-35)
The unseen Kingdom
For the last century or more there has been a
flourishing in the disciplines of archaeology, anthropology and comparative
religion. The gathered data has become, we might almost say, a tidal wave
that any one professional in the field would have little chance of
mastering. Now, one thing we notice is how all take for granted the intimate
connection between religion and culture in past societies, and that religion
is to be regarded as a given in traditional culture. All expect that a society of the past was
religious and that data is to be interpreted with religion constantly in
mind. That is not to say that the professional thinks that the religious
beliefs of the culture he is studying relate to deities that have objective
reality. On the contrary, in typical secular fashion he will normally think
there is no reality to them. It is just that the society in question
believes in those deities or higher powers. But all recognize that mankind
has generally been religious. The exception to this pattern is the modern era
— we are typically
secular. Typically we consider that the supernatural is just a private
subjective opinion. It is not a hard fact. The only true
facts are those of this world, the facts that can be seen, heard, touched,
tasted and smelt — in other words the facts that in some sense can be
positively measured. This world is all there really is, and anything else is
anybody’s guess. Well now, the first thing that our Gospel today insists on
is that this is not so. There is much more to life and reality than, we
might say, the kingdom we can see before us — the kingdom of this very
evident world. There is another kingdom present in the world and we cannot
as yet see it. In that sense the traditional societies and cultures which
are the object of study by anthropology, archaeology and comparative
religion have it all over us. At least they accept the reality of the
supernatural however inadequately it might be imagined by them. In this sense
modern man who is so ill-disposed towards the supernatural can learn from
pre-scientific man.
Throughout the Gospels Christ speaks of another kingdom that is in our
midst, a kingdom that is not of this world but which is in this world
nevertheless. It is a kingdom that cannot be seen and it is God’s kingdom.
God has entrusted this unseen yet ever-present kingdom to his divine Son,
Jesus Christ our Lord. This kingdom consists of Jesus Christ and those who
live in union with him. This is the truest and most fundamental reality that is
constantly before us, a far harder fact and a much more concrete reality
than the very vulnerable world of our immediate sense experience. The
sicknesses we experience and the upheavals that constantly characterize the
world and everyday life all point to the vulnerability and transience of the
entire visible world. Christ and his grace is God-with-us, and this is the surest
reality. This ought give us optimism amid the ebb and tide of evil and
suffering constantly menacing our daily experience. How is this
unseen realm to be imagined? Our Lord provides us with many images and today
he likens it to the mustard seed which is “the smallest of seeds, yet when
it grows, it is the largest of garden plants and becomes a tree, so that the
birds of the air come and perch in its branches”
(Matthew 13:31-35). So while it is small and while it grows but
slowly, it has a mighty future. We ought therefore never be discouraged if
we have placed our faith in Christ and continue to live in him. He is our
sure refuge and our hope whatever be our experience of life and the world.
Or again, “the kingdom of heaven is like yeast that a woman took and mixed
into a large amount of flour until it worked all through the dough.” In all
of this the ultimate future is bright, and this kingdom is the one reason
why we can take a bright view of the future — the ultimate future — of the
world. Christ is God-with-us and because of him and the opportunity we have
of placing ourselves under his lordship we can retain our fundamental
optimism whatever be the course ahead of us.
Let us pray daily that God’s kingdom will come. Let us set out to lay the
foundations of our life in this more secure reality, this kingdom that will
never end, this Source of all that is true and good. This is the kingdom,
the rule of God which is found in the person of Jesus Christ. We were made
to know, love and serve not this world, but God and Christ, and by doing
this to see and enjoy him forever in heaven.
(E.J.Tyler)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Way of childhood. Abandonment. Spiritual infancy. All this is not utter
nonsense, but a sturdy and solid Christian life.
(The Way, no.853)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Continuing The Imitation of Christ
BOOK THREE INTERNAL
CONSOLATION
The Twenty-Third Chapter
FOUR THINGS WHICH BRING GREAT PEACE
A PRAYER AGAINST BAD THOUGHTS
O Lord my God, be not far from me. O my God, hasten to help me, for varied
thoughts and great fears have risen up within me, afflicting my soul. How
shall I escape them unharmed? How shall I dispel them?
"I will go before you," says the Lord, "and will humble the great ones of
earth. I will open the doors of the prison, and will reveal to you hidden
secrets."
Do as You say, Lord, and let all evil thoughts fly from Your face. This is
my hope and my only comfort -- to fly to You in all tribulation, to confide
in You, and to call on You from the depths of my heart and to await
patiently for Your consolation.
(Continuing)
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God is everywhere as absolutely and entirely as if He were nowhere else; and
it seems to be essential to the existence of every creature, rational and
irrational, good and evil, in heaven and hell, that in some sense or other
He should be present with it and be its life.
(JHN, from the Lectures on the Doctrine of Justification 1838)
---------------Back to index for this month---------------------------Back to index to Liturgical Days---------
Tuesday of the seventeenth week in Ordinary Time
(July 28) St. Leopold Mandic (1887-1942)
Western
Christians who are working for greater dialogue with Orthodox Christians may
be reaping the fruits of Father Leopold’s prayers. A native of Croatia,
Leopold joined the Capuchin Franciscans and was ordained several years later
in spite of several health problems. He could not speak loudly enough to
preach publicly. For many years he also suffered from severe arthritis, poor
eyesight and a stomach ailment. Leopold taught patrology, the study of the
Church Fathers, to the clerics of his province for several years, but he is
best known for his work in the confessional, where he sometimes spent 13-15
hours a day. Several bishops sought out his spiritual advice. Leopold’s
dream was to go to the Orthodox Christians and work for the reunion of Roman
Catholicism and Orthodoxy. His health never permitted it. Leopold often
renewed his vow to go to the Eastern Christians; the cause of unity was
constantly in his prayers. At a time when Pope Pius XII said that the
greatest sin of our time is "to have lost all sense of sin," Leopold had a
profound sense of sin and an even firmer sense of God’s grace awaiting human
cooperation. Leopold, who lived most of his life in Padua, died on July 30,
1942, and was canonized in 1982.
Leopold used to repeat to himself:
“Remember that you have been sent for the salvation of people, not because
of your own merits, since it is the Lord Jesus and not you who died for the
salvation of souls.... I must cooperate with the divine goodness of our Lord
who has deigned to choose me so that by my ministry, the divine promise
would be fulfilled: ‘There will be only one flock and one shepherd’” (John
10:16). (AmericanCatholic.org)
Scripture today: Exodus 33:7-11;
34:5b-9, 28; Psalm 103:6-13; Matthew 13:36-43
Then he left the crowd and went into
the house. His disciples came to him and said, Explain to us the parable of
the weeds in the
field. He answered, The one who sowed the good seed is the
Son of Man. The field is the world, and the good seed stands for the sons of
the kingdom. The weeds are the sons of the evil one, and the enemy who sows
them is the devil. The harvest is the end of the age, and the harvesters are
angels. As the weeds are pulled up and burned in the fire, so it will be at
the end of the age. The Son of Man will send out his angels, and they will
weed out of his kingdom everything that causes sin and all who do evil. They
will throw them into the fiery furnace, where there will be weeping and
gnashing of teeth. Then the righteous will shine like the sun in the kingdom
of their Father. He who has ears, let him hear.
(Matthew 13:36-43)
The End There have been numerous attempts to
get at the essential dynamic of human history. What is fundamentally
happening in the ongoing stream of human history and world events? For
instance, Georg Hegel proposed that there is indeed a basic dynamic in human
history: each successive movement
in history emerges as a solution to the clash of contradictions present in the preceding
movement. The factor driving all historical development is the presence of
an antithesis to the present situation (or thesis).
This
antithesis prompts the solution (synthesis) that marks the next stage of history. So history is not
just a blind interplay of chance occurrences but proceeds as a recurring response
(synthesis) to the
clash of thesis and antithesis. This struggle is at the heart of history’s
dynamic. The upshot is that (what Hegel calls) “Spirit” — possibly (he means) the spirit of the age
— is ever unfolding in the process. That was one proposal. Even though it is not hard
to see why Hegel interpreted history as this constant struggle, nevertheless
his proposal is replete with obscurities and
assumptions. As is well known, Hegel had a notable disciple in Karl Marx who
in his Das Kapital (1848) adapted Hegel’s dialectic of antithesis and synthesis away from the unfolding of
“Spirit.” In place of “Spirit” Marx substituted
his own materialism in which economic and social factors determine history’s
unfolding. In the hands of Lenin these philosophical assumptions spawned the great communist
tragedy that lingers still especially now in Asia. The story of communism
shows the power of an idea, and the disillusionment it left in its wake
might leave people profoundly sceptical of all talk of a key to human
history. Is there any such key, then? Indeed there is. There is a pattern at
work in human history and its final upshot is known. The pattern — the
struggle, we might say — and the final issue of it, have been revealed to us
by Christ, and in its essential elements it is revealed to us in today’s
Gospel passage. Christ casts it in terms of a parable of a field and the
harvesting of its produce.
The field is the world, our Lord explains to his disciples. So we are
talking of the world and its history. What is going on in the world, in
fundamental terms? There is the owner of the field who sows his seed, and
this is the Son of God made man. Jesus Christ the incarnate God, the Word
made flesh, the one through whom all things were made, is the centrepiece of
human history. He is the one who sows all that is good in the world and all
that is destined to last. The Church is the arena of his special action and
of his choicest fruits, but of course there is much that God the Son has
sown beyond the visible boundaries of his Church. If we must use Hegel’s
obscure and inaccurate talk, let us say that the world and Christ who is its
Lord is the given situation. He has created and sustains the world and sows
the good seed in it. But an anti-Christ is at work — an antithesis, let us
say — which intervenes to spoil and overturn what God in Christ has done and
is doing. Satan sows many weeds which he wishes to see triumph over the good
seed and dominate the field. He works busily to bring about the triumph of
evil while he has time before the End arrives. And so history consists of the
struggle between these two ultimate factors, Christ and Satan, good and
evil, obedience and sin. But we know what the End will bring and it will be
the overthrow of the dark antithesis to Christ. It will be the triumph of
Christ and all the good that has come from his hand. This has been revealed.
“As the weeds are pulled up and burned in the fire, so it will be at the end
of the age. The Son of Man will send out his angels, and they will weed out
of his kingdom everything that causes sin and all who do evil. They will
throw them into the fiery furnace, where there will be weeping and gnashing
of teeth. Then the righteous will shine like the sun in the kingdom of their
Father” (Matthew 13:36-43). Christ warns
the men and women of history to take note of what he has said. “He who has
ears, let him hear.”
Every day of our lives we ought bear in mind the simple yet dramatic dynamic
that Christ has revealed. There is a struggle to be waged between Christ and
Satan, between obedience to God and sin, between good and evil. Everyone is
caught up in this struggle, and it is impossible to avoid it. If one
attempts to sit by the sidelines, one is taking sides on behalf of Evil.
There is an old saying, that evil flourishes when good people do nothing. Choose for Christ, then! The End is coming and will most surely come. That
End is the Judgment. All will be judged on the good they have done and the
evil they have resisted. Then the good will shine with Christ forever and
the evil will languish with Satan forever. So then, now I begin!
(E.J.Tyler)
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In the spiritual life of childhood the things 'children' say or do are never
puerile or childish.
(The Way, no.854)
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Continuing The Imitation of Christ
BOOK THREE INTERNAL CONSOLATION
The Twenty-Third Chapter
FOUR THINGS WHICH BRING GREAT PEACE
A PRAYER FOR ENLIGHTENING THE MIND
Enlighten me, good Jesus, with the brightness of internal light, and take
away all darkness from the habitation of my heart. Restrain my wandering
thoughts and suppress the temptations which attack me so violently. Fight
strongly for me, and vanquish these evil beasts -- the alluring desires of
the flesh -- so that peace may come through Your power and the fullness of
Your praise resound in the holy courts, which is a pure conscience. Command
the winds and the tempests; say to the sea: "Be still," and to the north
wind, "Do not blow," and there will be a great calm.
Send forth Your light and Your truth to shine on the earth, for I am as
earth, empty and formless until You illumine me. Pour out Your grace from
above. Shower my heart with heavenly dew. Open the springs of devotion to
water the earth, that it may produce the best of good fruits. Lift up my
heart pressed down by the weight of sins, and direct all my desires to
heavenly things, that having tasted the sweetness of supernal happiness, I
may find no pleasure in thinking of earthly things.
Snatch me up and deliver me from all the passing comfort of creatures, for
no created thing can fully quiet and satisfy my desires. Join me to Yourself
in an inseparable bond of love; because You alone can satisfy him who loves
You, and without You all things are worthless.
(Continuing)
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Many a man would be deterred from outstepping the truth, could he see the
end of his course from the beginning.
(JHN, from The Arians of the Fourth Century (1833)
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Wednesday of the seventeenth week in Ordinary Time
lick centre arrow
Scripture today: Jeremiah 15:10, 16-21;
Psalm 59:2- 4, 10-11, 17, 18; Matthew 13:44-46
The
kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field. When a man found it, he
hid it again, and then in his joy went and sold all he had and bought that
field. Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a merchant looking for fine pearls.
When he found one of great value, he went away and sold everything he had and
bought it. (Matthew 13:44-46)
Treasure in the
field In the preface of her book,
Wicca's Charm (2005), Catherine Sanders writes that neo-Paganism (which
includes the modern practice of witchcraft also known as Wicca) is an
overarching term for earth-based spirituality incorporating nature worship,
through a revival of the polytheistic worship of ancient gods and goddesses. It
is, then, a religion enclosed in material nature. Sanders, a practising
Christian, defines Wicca as a polytheistic neo-pagan nature religion inspired by
various pre-Christian Western
European
beliefs. It has as its central deity the Mother Goddess and includes things such
as the use of herbal magic. Sanders’ book on Wicca and its charm for many is
useful for an understanding of this particular form of modern paganism. But
there is a modern paganism which is far more pervasive than the Wicca movement.
What is paganism? In general, paganism can be described as the natural religion
of the fallen human spirit living without grace. In her Introduction, Sanders
recalls St Paul’s confrontation with the paganism of ancient Athens ― as
expressed in his speech before the Areopagus (Acts 17: 19-31). Peter Kreeft has
written that the new paganism places man on the supreme pedestal, rather than
various gods as in ancient paganism. Further, in ancient paganism there was no
scepticism about moral absolutes. But modern paganism has no such absolutes
because man and society are the makers of morality. Ancient paganism worshipped
a variety of gods, but the modern paganism is, at best, pantheistic. The “Force”
of "Star Wars" fame is a kind of pantheistic God, and it is popular. This world
is all there is, and if there is anything akin to worship, it relates to this
world alone. There is certainly no objective supernatural revelation. Movements
such as Wicca ought be placed in this broader context, the context of radical
secularism. Most seriously, this modern form of paganism can infiltrate the
Church’s children. I say all this to emphasize and illustrate the focus of
modern man. He looks to this world, and has little interest in what is revealed
from a purported Source that absolutely transcends this world. Any supposed
“treasure” that cannot be touched and held, and which requires faith, is but a
phantom, and cannot command a respectable enthusiasm.
But of course, it
can. Yes, we can know the world by touching it, seeing it and hearing it. We can
go on to delude ourselves into thinking that this world, or this or that feature
of it, has something of divinity in it. But there is another way of knowing
objective reality ― reality that cannot be touched or seen ― and that is by
faith. Faith in the word of One who knows at first hand what cannot be touched,
seen or heard is the foundation of revealed religion. God has intervened and
come among us. Because he is God become man, we have every reason to believe his
word. By means of his word we come to know realities that absolutely transcend
our world, and which are entirely unseen. In explaining (elsewhere in the
Gospel) his parable of the wheat and the weeds, our Lord says that “The field is
the world, and the good seed stands for the sons of the kingdom” (Matthew
13:38). So let us mix our parables a little, and take the “treasure” that is
“hidden in the field” of today’s parable (Matthew 13:44-46) as the unseen
Kingdom of God that is hidden from sight, in the world of visible things. The
person who gains faith in Jesus Christ discovers a great treasure that is hidden
in the field of the world. It is the Kingdom of God, in the world but not of it.
It is there, but the special kind of paganism of the modern era cannot see it,
for it is conscious of this material world alone. This world of material things
is deemed to be all that there is and it is considered to be even worthy of a
form of worship. But the true treasure is there, and it is the person of Jesus
Christ, risen from the dead in all his glorious humanity and divinity, present
in the Church his body. Modern man can come to know him, and when he does, he is
perceived as the “treasure hidden in the field.” He is the pearl of great price.
He is worthy of everything. Anyone “who loves father or mother more than Me is
not worthy of Me,” Christ said (Matthew 10:37). This is the distinctive trait of
the true Christian ― he gives up all to gain the prize which is Jesus Christ. It
is like “treasure hidden in a field. When a man found it, he hid it again, and
then in his joy went and sold all he had and bought that field” (Matthew
13:44-46). If there is one thing which our modern paganism needs it is the
witness of Christian enthusiasm, the witness of one who has discovered the
treasure, of the one who loves the unseen Jesus Christ.
Once Christ is found, he must be retained. The Christian of faith who has come
to know Jesus Christ must grow in the love of him. This means setting up in
one’s life a regime of daily prayer, spiritual reading, a devout Sacramental
life, and the daily work of service of God and one’s fellow man. The “treasure,”
once found and possessed, must be put to work, as it were. Our Lord said on one
occasion that the one who has will be given more. We must make sure that we
“have” ― and what we must have is Jesus Christ. The one who has not, even what
he has will be taken away from him (Matthew 13:12). God wants us to become rich,
but rich in the “treasure” that is God.
(E.J.Tyler)
---------------Back to index for this month---------------------------Back to index to Liturgical Days---------
(July
29) Saint Martha
Martha, Mary and their brother Lazarus were evidently close friends of
Jesus. He came to their home simply as a welcomed guest, rather than as one
celebrating the conversion of a sinner like Zacchaeus or one unceremoniously
received by a suspicious Pharisee. The sisters feel free to call on Jesus at
their brother’s death, even though a return to Judea at that time seems
almost certain death. No doubt Martha was an active sort of person. On one
occasion (see Luke 10:38-42) she prepares the meal for Jesus and possibly
his fellow guests and forthrightly states the obvious: All hands should
pitch in to help with the dinner. Yet, as biblical scholar Father John
McKenzie points out, she need not be rated as an “unrecollected activist.”
The evangelist is emphasizing what our Lord said on several occasions about
the primacy of the spiritual: “...[D]o not worry about your life, what you
will eat [or drink], or about your body, what you will wear….But seek first
the kingdom [of God] and his righteousness” (Matthew 6:25b, 33a); “One does
not live by bread alone” (Luke 4:4b); “Blessed are they who hunger and
thirst for righteousness…” (Matthew 5:6a). Martha’s great glory is her
simple and strong statement of faith in Jesus after her brother’s death.
“Jesus told her, ‘I am the resurrection and the life; whoever believes in
me, even if he dies, will live, and everyone who lives and believes in me
will never die. Do you believe this?’ She said to him, ‘Yes, Lord. I have
come to believe that you are the Messiah, the Son of God, the one who is
coming into the world’” (John 11:25-27).
(AmericanCatholic.org)
Scripture today: Exodus 34:29-35;
Psalm 99:5, 6, 7, 9; John 11:19-27 or Luke 10:38-42
Many Jews had come to Martha and
Mary to comfort them in the loss of their brother. When Martha heard that
Jesus was coming, she went out to meet him, but Mary stayed at home. Lord,
Martha said to Jesus, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.
But I know that even now God will give you whatever you ask. Jesus said to
her, Your brother will rise again. Martha answered, I know he will rise
again in the resurrection at the last day. Jesus said to her, I am the
resurrection and the life. He who believes in me will live, even though he
dies; and whoever lives and believes in me will never die. Do you believe
this? Yes, Lord, she told him, I believe that you are the Christ, the Son of
God, who was to come into the world. (John
11:19-27)
Love and faith
Throughout the Gospel of St John the author
describes himself as “the disciple Jesus loved.” But he is not
the only one denoted in this way. We notice how John refers to Lazarus and his
two sisters, Martha and Mary: “Jesus loved Martha and her sister, and
Lazarus” (11:5). The sisters themselves sent to Jesus a message saying that
“the one whom you love lies here sick.” Lazarus is the one whom Jesus loves. St Paul
refers to himself in the same terms in one of his Letters. He writes that
“Christ
loved me and gave himself up for me.” We remember the rich young man
who came to our Lord and asked what more he needed to do to gain eternal
life — he had kept God’s commandments ever since his youth. We are told that
our Lord looked on him and loved him. That young man was the object of the
special love of Jesus, and in the event he turned away from it. We are
reminded by these references that the distinctive character of Christian
discipleship is faith in Jesus and being the object of Christ’s personal and
special love. Our Lord said to his disciples, I have not called you servants
but friends. The disciple of Christ places his full faith in Jesus and in
his word, and he has the wonderful privilege of his friendship. All are
called to this. Just before he ascended into heaven Christ charged his
disciples to go to the whole world and make disciples of all the nations.
Everyone is called to believe in Jesus and to be his disciple — which
involves being his personal friend. Our
Gospel passage today shows Martha to be the object of Christ’s love. Loving
him in her turn, she had full faith in him and in his word. The magnificence
of her faith is shown by the fact that it reflects exactly the point of St
John’s Gospel as given to us in the twentieth chapter. That Gospel was
written that we might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the son of the
living God. This, as we read in today’s Gospel passage, is exactly the faith which
Martha professed before our Lord.
But of course the faith and love of Martha serves to glorify Christ.
Anything he asks of God, God will grant, she tells him. Your brother will
rise again, he tells her. Yes, I know he will rise at the last day, she
replies. Our Lord in simple terms then makes claims that have never been
made by any other person who has commanded the respect of the world. “Jesus
said to her, I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in me will
live, even though he dies; and whoever lives and believes in me will never
die” (John 11:19-27). To refer to
himself calmly and explicitly as the resurrection and the life is to speak
of himself as being divine. Only God is the source of life. We read in the
Old Testament the great prophecy of the valley of bones — representing the
House of Israel. The prophet then sees the bones come back to life — a great
army rises from the bones. It is the work of God giving life to the bones.
He is raising the dead to life. Christ speaks of himself in the same terms.
He raises the dead to life and he himself is life. What prophet spoke of
himself in such terms? It is inconceivable that Moses, or Elijah, or Elisha,
or Jeremiah or John the Baptist would have spoken in this fashion. Imagine
Buddha or Mahomet saying such things? It would never have occurred to them
to make such a claim. But Christ unhesitatingly did and this characterized
the teaching of his public ministry. The leaders of the Jews were bent on
destroying him because he made himself equal to God. Moreover, Christ not
only claimed this but also gave to us the key enabling us to receive from
him the inestimable benefits he came to give mankind. Those benefits we may
sum up as “abundant life”: I have come that they may have life and have it
in abundance. The key to receiving these inestimable blessings is faith in
him. As he says to Martha, whoever lives and believes in me will never die.
But the next question is crucial. He solemnly asks her, “Do you believe this?” Martha is our model
in her reply: “Yes, Lord,” she told him, “I believe that you are the Christ,
the Son of God, who was to come into the world.”
Let us look to Christ as the Lord and Master of our life. He is the Way, the
Truth and the Life. In him we have every heavenly blessing. Martha in our
Gospel passage today provides for us our constant example of faith. Her
faith is unhesitating and it is objectively correct. She has grasped the fact and has
believed totally. Let us listen to the Church in all her testimony and
doctrine about Christ and receive it wholeheartedly, resolving to base our
lives upon it. Therein lies the path to life eternal.
(E.J.Tyler)
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Spiritual childhood is not spiritual foolishness or flabbiness; it is a sane
and forceful way which, due to its difficult easiness, the soul must begin
and continue, led by the hand of God.
(The Way, no.855)
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Continuing The Imitation of Christ
BOOK THREE
INTERNAL CONSOLATION
The Twenty-Fourth Chapter
AVOIDING CURIOUS INQUIRY ABOUT THE LIVES OF OTHERS
THE VOICE OF CHRIST
MY CHILD, do not be curious. Do not trouble yourself with idle cares. What
matters this or that to you? Follow Me. What is it to you if a man is such
and such, if another does or says this or that? You will not have to answer
for others, but you will have to give an account of yourself. Why, then, do
you meddle in their affairs?
(Continuing)
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Nothing but charity can enable you to live well or to die well.
(JHN, from the discourse Purity and Love (1849)
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Thursday of the seventeenth week in Ordinary Time
(July 30) St. Peter Chrysologus (406-450?)
A
man who vigorously pursues a goal may produce results far beyond his
expectations and his intentions. Thus it was with Peter of the Golden Words,
as he was called, who as a young man became bishop of Ravenna, the capital
of the empire in the West. At the time there were abuses and vestiges of
paganism evident in his diocese, and these he was determined to battle and
overcome. His principal weapon was the short sermon, and many of them have
come down to us. They do not contain great originality of thought. They are,
however, full of moral applications, sound in doctrine and historically
significant in that they reveal Christian life in fifth-century Ravenna. So
authentic were the contents of his sermons that, some 13 centuries later, he
was declared a doctor of the Church by Pope Benedict XIII. He who had
earnestly sought to teach and motivate his own flock was recognized as a
teacher of the universal Church. In addition to his zeal in the exercise of
his office, Peter Chrysologus was distinguished by a fierce loyalty to the
Church, not only in its teaching, but in its authority as well. He looked
upon learning not as a mere opportunity but as an obligation for all, both
as a development of God-given faculties and as a solid support for the
worship of God. Some time before his death, St. Peter returned to Imola, his
birthplace, where he died around A.D. 450. (AmericanCatholic.org)
Scripture today: Exodus 40:16-21, 34-38;
Psalm 84:3-6a and 8a, 11; Matthew 13:47-53
Jesus said, Once again, the kingdom of heaven is like a net that was let
down into the lake and caught all kinds of fish. When it was full, the
fishermen pulled it up on the shore. Then they sat down and collected the
good fish in baskets, but threw the bad away. This is how it will be at the
end of the age. The angels will come and separate the wicked from the
righteous and throw them into the fiery furnace, where there will be weeping
and gnashing of teeth. Have you understood all these things? Jesus asked.
Yes, they replied. He said to them, Therefore every teacher of the law who
has been instructed about the kingdom of heaven is like the owner of a house
who brings out of his storeroom new treasures as well as old. When Jesus had
finished these parables, he moved on from there.
(Matthew 13:47-53)
Both the good and the bad
One of the features of
the life of any of Christ’s faithful is disillusionment. By that I mean
that any member of the Church, be he lay member or consecrated religious or
in Holy Orders, may well experience serious disappointment in his experience
of others in the Church. He (or she) will expect kindness, justice,
considerable moral probity, spirituality and many other Christ-like virtues
in those with whom he is involved in the life of the Church. In at least
some he will
encounter the very opposite. Not only will this be unedifying to
him, not only will this leave him ashamed of some of his co-religionists,
but it may well involve his being seriously hurt. He himself could left
wounded by injustice and lack of consideration, and his experience of the
Church could leave him disillusioned. He expected much more and received far
less. Further, this evident fact of sin in the Church may well disillusion
those outside the Church. Where it is present it will disfigure the witness
the Church gives to Christ. It makes the Church less credible. One of the
greatest religious minds of the Victorian age in England was Cardinal
Newman. Raised as an Anglican he powered the Oxford Movement of the 1830s
and finally in 1845 entered the Catholic Church. During the heyday of his
prominence as an Anglican one of the many objections he saw in the Catholic
Church was, as he deemed it at the time, its lack of holiness. He required
of it a much greater holiness if it was ever to be considered the true
Church of Christ. As an outsider he saw too much sin in it for its claims to
be convincing. In due course he overcame that objection by other
considerations, nevertheless it is a genuine problem for those both inside
and outside of the Church which Christ founded. So what are we to say of the
bad that is undoubtedly in the Church? Does it discount the good and
invalidate it as the abode of Christ? Is it possible that Christ be the
mystical Head of a body that is partially diseased?
In our Gospel today our Lord describes the kingdom of heaven
— God’s rule
here on earth. Our Lord is describing the Church which is the seed and the
locale here on earth of God’s lordship — the Church consisting of Christ the
head and the faithful who are his members. What does he say of it? It
consists of the good and the bad. “Once again, the kingdom of heaven is like
a net that was let down into the lake and caught all kinds of fish. When it
was full, the fishermen pulled it up on the shore. Then they sat down and
collected the good fish in baskets, but threw the bad away. This is how it
will be at the end of the age” (Matthew 13:47-53).
The Church includes “all kinds of fish” and at the end there will be a
separation of the good and the bad. The “good fish” will be kept and the bad
thrown away. God does not fill up his Church simply with good fish. Our Lord
told another parable elsewhere. This time the image was of a farmer who
sowed good seed but an enemy came by night and sowed lots of weeds with the
good seed. The farmer did not pull up the weeds when they came to light — he
left the separation of good and bad till harvest time. Even during our
Lord’s public ministry we see the good and the bad among his followers, most
spectacularly in the case of Judas. Judas was called by Christ to follow him
closely, but soon after his declaration of the doctrine of the
Eucharist, he referred to Judas as a devil. Among the wider circle of our
Lord’s followers we read that many left him when he taught the doctrine of
the Eucharist. We read all this at the end of the sixth chapter of St John.
Indeed, it was one of the Twelve, Judas Iscariot, who facilitated the
betrayal and passion of Christ. All this is a pointer to the pattern evident
age after age in the history of the Church. There is good and there is bad
among her members. It will be only at the end of time when Christ judges the
good and the bad will the Church be filled with those who are good. Then
there will never be any disillusionment.
Let us remember this. When we are hurt by the bad in the Church, in all
probability others in the Church have been hurt by the bad in us. They too
have probably been disillusioned, and with us. Let us remember another
thing. Every time we think of someone who has hurt us, if he is saved — as
one would hope he will be — then in heaven we shall be glad to be with him
and will delight in his company. By then he will be purified of his sins and
so shall we be. We shall delight to be in one another’s company. If we
refuse this thought, to that extent shall we be delaying our own entry into
heaven because Christ demands forgiveness if we are to be forgiven.
(E.J.Tyler)
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Spiritual childhood demands submission of the mind, more difficult than
submission of the will. In order to subject our mind we need not only God's
grace, but also the continual exercise of our will, which says 'no' again
and again, just as it says 'no' to the flesh. And so we get the paradox that
whoever wants to follow this 'little' way in order to become a child, needs
to add strength and virility to his will.
(The Way, no.856)
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Continuing The Imitation of Christ
BOOK THREE INTERNAL CONSOLATION
The Twenty-Fourth Chapter
AVOIDING CURIOUS INQUIRY ABOUT THE LIVES OF OTHERS
THE VOICE OF CHRIST
Behold, I know all men. I see everything that is done under the sun, and I
know how matters stand with each -- what is in his mind and what in his
heart and the end to which his intention is directed. Commit all things to
Me, therefore, and keep yourself in good peace. Let him who is disturbed be
as restless as he will. Whatever he has said or done will fall upon himself,
for he cannot deceive Me.
(Continuing)
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To impart knowledge is as interesting as to acquire it.
(JHN, from Callista (1855)
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Friday of the seventeenth week in Ordinary Time
(July 31) Saint Ignatius of Loyola, priest
(1491-1556)
The founder of the Jesuits was on his way to military fame and
fortune when a cannon ball shattered his leg. Because there were no books of
romance on hand during his convalescence, he whiled away the time reading a
life of Christ and lives of the
saints.
His conscience was deeply touched, and a long, painful turning to Christ
began. Having seen the Mother of God in a vision, he made a pilgrimage to
her shrine at Montserrat (near Barcelona). He remained for almost a year at
nearby Manresa, sometimes with the Dominicans, sometimes in a pauper’s
hospice, often in a cave in the hills praying. After a period of great peace
of mind, he went through a harrowing trial of scruples. There was no comfort
in anything—prayer, fasting, sacraments, penance. At length, his peace of
mind returned. It was during this year of conversion that he began to write
down material that later became his greatest work, the Spiritual
Exercises. He finally achieved his purpose of going to the Holy
Land, but could not remain, as he planned, because of the hostility of the
Turks. He spent the next 11 years in various European universities, studying
with great difficulty, beginning almost as a child. Like many others, he
fell victim twice to the suspicions of the time, and was twice jailed for
brief periods. In 1534, at the age of 43, he and six others (one of whom was
St. Francis Xavier) vowed to live in poverty and chastity and to go to the
Holy Land. If this became impossible, they vowed to offer themselves to the
apostolic service of the pope. The latter became the only choice. Four years
later Ignatius made the association permanent. The new Society of Jesus was
approved by Paul III, and Ignatius was elected to serve as the first
general. When companions were sent on various missions by the pope,
Ignatius
remained in Rome, consolidating the new venture, but still finding time to
found homes for orphans, catechumens and penitents. He founded the Roman
College, intended to be the model of all other colleges of the Society.
Ignatius was a true mystic. He centred his spiritual life on the essential
foundations of Christianity—the Trinity, Christ, the Eucharist. His
spirituality is expressed in the Jesuit motto, ad majorem Dei gloriam—“for
the greater glory of God.” In his concept, obedience was to be the prominent
virtue, to assure the effectiveness and mobility of his men. All activity
was to be guided by a true love of the Church and unconditional obedience to
the Holy Father, for which reason all professed members took a fourth vow to
go wherever the pope should send them for the salvation of souls. Luther
nailed his theses to the church door at Wittenberg in 1517. Seventeen years
later, Ignatius founded the Society that was to play so prominent a part in
the Catholic Reformation. He was an implacable foe of Protestantism. Yet the
seeds of ecumenism may be found in his words: “Great care must be taken to
show forth orthodox truth in such a way that if any heretics happen to be
present they may have an example of charity and Christian moderation. No
hard words should be used nor any sort of contempt for their errors be
shown.” One of the greatest twentieth-century ecumenists was Cardinal Bea, a
Jesuit.
Ignatius recommended this prayer to penitents: “Receive, Lord, all
my liberty, my memory, my understanding and my whole will. You have given me
all that I have, all that I am, and I surrender all to your divine will,
that you dispose of me. Give me only your love and your grace. With this I
am rich enough, and I have no more to ask.” (AmericanCatholic.org)
Scripture today: Lev 23:1, 4-11, 15-16, 27,
34b-37; Ps 81:3-6, 10-11ab; Matthew 13:54-58
Coming to his home town, Jesus began
teaching the people in their synagogue, and they were amazed. Where did this
man get this wisdom and these miraculous powers? they asked. Isn't this the
carpenter's son? Isn't his mother's name Mary, and aren't his brothers
James, Joseph, Simon and Judas? Aren't all his sisters with us? Where then
did this man get all these things? And they took offence at him. But Jesus
said to them, Only in his home town and in his own house is a prophet
without honour. And he did not do many miracles there because of their lack
of faith. (Matthew 13:54-58)
The
lowliness of God
In April 1887 the English Catholic historian, Lord John Acton, wrote in a private letter to
an another
historian (an Anglican bishop) that “Great men are almost always bad men, even
when they exercise influence and not authority: still more when you
super-add the tendency or certainty of corruption by full authority.” Acton
was attacking the bestowal of great power on individuals. His is a too
sweeping judgment but it does remind us of the profound tendency of man to
seek
personal glory. This natural desire for glory, stemming from man’s
legitimate desire for due respect, tends to far exceed all that is
appropriate if great power falls into his hands. But ah! Man has a model in
One who was all-powerful — though not in a worldly sense. I refer, of
course, to Jesus Christ. He was all-powerful in that he demonstrated that he
could do anything he chose to do. He walked on a turbulent sea. At a word he
calmed a turbulent sea. He fed vast crowds with a handful of food. He raised
people to life from the dead at a mere word. He healed all kinds of
illnesses at a mere word — sick persons who were near to him and persons who
were far from him. He expelled demons and showed that he was the master
Teacher in all that pertained to man’s moral and religious life. Moreover,
he did the greatest thing imaginable. He took away the sin of the world and
made this grand benefit available to anyone who approaches him in faith.
This saving act he achieved by his death, his resurrection and his
ascension. There has never been anyone with the power of Jesus Christ and
for this simple reason that he was God. He is God the Son made man. But when
we set him against the backdrop of mankind’s great people, not only does he
surpass all others in his power but he surpasses them in his lowliness and
humility. The amazing thing about Jesus Christ, almighty God become man, is
the thoroughgoing character of his humanity and with it his humility. He is
fully God, but he is also fully and thoroughly man. So much so was this the
case that many did not and would not accept him as God, and this is still
the case for many.
There was never the slightest doubt that Christ was man and his readiness to
forego all glory was shown, to begin with, precisely in his humanity.
Consider our Gospel passage today. Our Lord is in the full swing of his
public ministry and he returns to his home town to speak in its synagogue,
just as he was speaking in the synagogues of Galilee. The response of his
townspeople indicates the character of his hidden years in Nazareth.
Nazareth — as far as archaeological investigations would indicate — was a
tiny settlement that had a long history. One can imagine the strong village
tradition and culture that characterized it. Christ grew up in this village
with his immense grandeur hidden from sight and we see evidence of this in
the reaction of his townspeople when he returned. “Jesus began teaching the
people in their synagogue, and they were amazed. Where did this man get this
wisdom and these miraculous powers? they asked. Isn't this the carpenter's
son? Isn't his mother's name Mary, and aren't his brothers James, Joseph,
Simon and Judas? Aren't all his sisters with us? Where then did this man get
all these things?” (Matthew 13:54-58).
He was the son of the carpenter. Mary his mother they knew very well, and
his relatives both male and female. They were all very much part of the
village just as he had been. We are speaking here of the wonder of his very
humanity. Every time we see Jesus Christ depicted in some work of art, or
perhaps most especially as shown in the figure on the Shroud of Turin, we
ought stand amazed at the very fact of the Incarnation. There before us is
the figure of God, the Incarnate Son of God. Just think! For thirty years
there dwelt in that tiny and virtually unknown village of Nazareth a youth,
a young man who was God himself. People lived with him and took him for
granted and in our Gospel passage actually rejected him who is God the Son
made man, the Incarnate Son of the Eternal Father. Honour even as a prophet
was refused him. Here we have God accepting the absence of the glory due to
him.
Across the centuries man has sought glory and power. Lord Acton’s dictum
that absolute power corrupts absolutely and that almost all great men are
bad has its striking opposite in Jesus Christ. He possessed absolute power
by nature and not as a gift, and yet he chose to divest himself of the glory
that was his as God and became as men are and humbler still, even to death
on a cross. It was precisely the path of humility that led to true glory.
Let us take our stand with him and choose the lowlier path, knowing that in
him it will lead to a share in his glory.
(E.J.Tyler)
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Be a little child; the greatest daring is always that of children Who cries
for... the moon? Who is blind to dangers in getting what he wants?
To such a child add much grace from God, the desire to do his Will, great
love for Jesus, all the human knowledge he is capable of acquiring, and you
will have a likeness of the apostles of today such as God undoubtedly wants
them.
(The Way, no.857)
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Continuing The Imitation of Christ
BOOK THREE INTERNAL CONSOLATION
The Twenty-Fourth Chapter
AVOIDING CURIOUS INQUIRY ABOUT THE LIVES OF OTHERS
THE VOICE OF CHRIST
Do not be anxious for the shadow of a great name, for the close friendship
of many, or for the particular affection of men. These things cause
distraction and cast great darkness about the heart. I would willingly speak
My word and reveal My secrets to you, if you would watch diligently for My
coming and open your heart to Me. Be prudent, then. Watch in prayer, and in
all things humble yourself.
(Concluded)
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I see and know, O my good Jesus, that the only way in which I can possibly
approach Thee in this world is the way of faith, faith in what Thou hast
told me, and I thankfully follow this only way which Thou hast given me.
(JHN, from Meditations and Devotions 1893)
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