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Home ⇰ The Current ⇰ Previous Issues ⇰ 2019 Novemeber Reflection
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October 27-Nov 2
THE FOUR LAST THINGS
FATHER MICHAEL BRUNNER
Welcome to November, the month of the four last things: death, judgment, heaven, hell. They show up a lot in the liturgy this month. Appropriately, it begins with death. The cum laude graduates of death are the saints, celebrated on November 1, those who have arrived at heaven. They are followed on November 2, All Souls’ Day, by those who need a little more polishing in that condition we call Purgatory (a place of cleansing). Unsurprisingly, we don’t celebrate hell or anyone there. This procession of the four last things was immediately preceded by Halloween. This day was once supposed to be a cathartic release of the fear of death and the terrible things we tend to associate with death. Since our society does not really wish to think about death anymore (it’s the ultimate downer), Halloween has just been turned into one big party and is now a bigger deal for adults than for children. If one doesn’t believe in the last three of those last four things, then death is the most unwelcome end to the party of life, and those who have left the party are gone forever.
South of the border, in that land where an “army” of “invaders,” armed with their desperate weapons of hope and faith, are marching toward us, they are celebrating the “Día de los Muertos,” or “Day of the Dead.” It is not a Mexican version of Halloween. It differs greatly in traditions and tone. Whereas Halloween began as a dark night of mischief by evil spirits, the Day of the Dead stretches over two days in an explosion of color and life-affirming joy. The theme of both is death, but the point of the “Day of the Dead” is to express love and respect for deceased family members. All throughout Mexico, the people celebrating this day put on makeup and costumes, hold parades and parties, dance and sing. Those who have died are invited to the parties and are believed to be present. This celebration originated several thousand years ago with the Toltec and other Nahuatl people, who regarded mourning the dead as unseemly and disrespectful. For these pre-Hispanic cultures, death was regarded as a natural phase in the continuum of life. The dead were still members of the community, kept alive in memory and spirit – and during “Día de los Muertos,” they temporarily returned to Earth. So the contemporary “Día de los Muertos” celebration is an amalgamation of pre-Hispanic religious rites and Christian feasts. The timing of November 1 and 2 – All Saints’ Day and All Souls’ Day – falls around the time of the autumn maize harvest.
One of the traditions of the “Dia de los Muertos” are brightly colored and decorated candy skulls, which definitely make a counterpoint to the dark symbolism of skulls in our tradition. The Spanish word for skull is Calavera. However the word calavera is also used to describe short, humorous poems, often sarcastic tombstone epitaphs that poked fun at the living. These literary calaveras are a popular part of “Día de los Muertos” celebrations. Here’s an example. “Estaba la maestra Marta fumándose un cigarrillo.Llegó la muerte y le dijo… te acompaño con el humillo pues yo ya no puedo fumar y si sigue así le pasará lo mismo que a mí.” (“There was a teacher, Martha, smoking a cigarette. Death showed up and said to her, “I will accompany you with all humility because I can’t smoke anymore and if you keep it up, it will happen to you, what happened to me.”
Well, we don’t have the custom of inviting our dead to parties. But just like the Aztec and Maya people, we believe that the dead are still part of our community, the Church, the Communion of Saints. They are alive, in the condition of heaven, we hope; in purgatory, perhaps. We trust in the mercy of God that they are not in that other last condition. If in heaven or purgatory, they can pray for and intercede for us. And if they are in purgatory, we can pray for them and help them conclude their process of cleansing. We don’t have to invite them because they are now in the world of spirits, which is in some ways all around us; it is not a physical place. Our beloved dead are souls and are present with us and to us. We don’t call them up with Ouija boards or tarot cards. We communicate through prayer and the movement of spirit.
In 1910, Henry Scott-Holland wrote this:
Death is nothing at all.
It does not count.
I have only slipped away into the next room.
Nothing has happened.
Everything remains exactly as it was.
I am I, and you are you,
and the old life that we lived so fondly together is untouched, unchanged.
Whatever we were to each other, that we are still.
Call me by the old familiar name.
Speak of me in the easy way which you always used.
Put no difference into your tone.
Wear no forced air of solemnity or sorrow.
Laugh as we always laughed at the little jokes that we enjoyed together.
Play, smile, think of me, pray for me.
Let my name be ever the household word that it always was.
Let it be spoken without an effort, without the ghost of a shadow upon it.
Life means all that it ever meant.
It is the same as it ever was.
There is absolute and unbroken continuity.
What is this death but a negligible accident?
Why should I be out of mind because I am out of sight?
I am but waiting for you, for an interval,
somewhere very near,
just round the corner.
All is well.
Nothing is hurt; nothing is lost.
One brief moment and all will be as it was before.
How we shall laugh at the trouble of parting when we meet again!
"ONE MOMENT OF PAIN FOR A LIFETIME OF GLORY
FATHER PASCHAL SCOTTI"This quotation is from Louis Zamperini, a real life hero known from the book Unbroken, which spent four years on the New York Times best seller list, 14 weeks at number one, an impressive tale of survival during World War II. You might think the phrase refers to the time he spent in a raft, 47 weeks, fighting off sharks, starvation, and madness. Or his two and a half years in Japanese prisoner of war camps, being tortured, beaten, and humiliated. You might think it refers to the power of faith in every difficulty, to conquer evils. But that would be incorrect. Actually, it refers to earlier in his life, and the 1936 Olympics in Berlin, where he was running far behind where he should be. He remembered something his brother told him: 'one moment of pain for a lifetime of glory.' It inspired him to run far more quickly. He did run very fast, and impressed everybody, including Adolph Hitler, who asked to see him in person. But this has come to refer also to Christian things, to spiritual things: the book is very Christian, very religious. I think we can take heart from that phrase, and interpret it in our own way. In life, we experience sufferings, difficulties, trials, temptations. They can go on for a short time, or they can go on for a very long time. They may be structural, maybe a life of sickness, maybe a job that is difficult, something you cannot get out of, where there is no opening, no light at the end of the tunnel. And it is good to know that there is an eternal life of glory: it can give great energy, great strength to persevere: Not only hope for the future, but hope for the present. As the life of Luis Zamperini shows so powerfully in that book, God can break through our difficulties. He can set free this world, in His Incarnation and redemption. The power of God is there every day for us, to help us through our difficulties, our fears, our anxieties, our troubles, our sufferings - physical, mental, spiritual. It’s there for us: one moment of pain, for a lifetime of eternal glory."
HALLOWEEN, DRUIDS, AND DEATH
FATHER FRANCIS HEINALL SAINTS' DAY
ABBOT MATTHEW STARKSolanus was a simple priest; he embodied the beatitudes which we just heard read. He was pure of heart. He was merciful. He was poor in spirit and also in possessions. He was a servant to all who came to him. Recently at his shrine in Detroit - he spent most of his working life in Detroit - the archbishop of Newark New Jersey, who grew up in Detroit, gave a talk. The Archbishop said that he was the oldest of thirteen kids, and that growing up his neighborhood was shot through with stories about Father Solanus. He said, “The man across the street, Clarence, swore that he received the gift of his sight because of Fr. Solanus. The man was a working husband and father whose eyesight was failing at a young age. He came to see Fr. Solanus and said, ‘Father, please help me. How can I support my family if I go blind?’ Fr. Solanus looked at him and said, ‘Tomorrow at 7 o’clock, when I celebrate the Eucharist and lift the host, your sight will be restored.’ And it came to pass. We heard a lot of testimonies of people who had been away from the church for decades and came here (to where he lived in Detroit) and found healing and their faith was restored. But probably for me the most impacting and touching testimony was given to me by a woman religious (a nun) from the neighborhood, probably about a half-century older than I was. Her name was Raimunda. She was an Immaculate Heart of Mary sister, and as a young nun she loved to teach. She taught little kids, kindergarten, to third grade. And this was the best thing she thought she could do for God. She lived in a community with a sister who was sick with cancer. The sick sister wanted to come to see Father Solanus and to speak with him. She asked Sister Raimunda to come along for the ride, just to accompany her, on a Sunday afternoon. So they came here, Raimunda just to keep the sister company. Father Solanus came into the parlor, and he had never met either of the sisters. He went right up to the sick sister and said, ‘God has heard your prayer. You’re cured.’ And so she was; the cancer had disappeared. She came to know that when she was examined. Then, he turned to Sr. Raimunda, who was just there for the ride, and said, ‘But Jesus will ask you to suffer with him for a long time.’ She went back to the convent completely puzzled. She didn’t know what he was talking about. She was fine; she was healthy; she was a teacher in Detroit. But within a year she developed a very severe form of rheumatoid arthritis that progressed to the point where her fingers collapsed into her hands and the hands froze into claws. She was brought back to the mother house in Monroe, and she lived in the same room, in the same bed, for thirty years. And as a young priest I used to visit her And I would say Mass at the foot of her bed. And I could see how she had a strap under her chin to keep it from collapsing into her chest. I saw how she couldn’t hold a rosary, so it hung from the bars of her hospital bed, and she would rub her swollen knuckles on each bead as she prayed.” And listen to this: “But she arguably was the happiest woman I have ever met. And she told me why. She said, ‘Joe, I thought my mission in life was to teach, and to teach little kids. And I loved it. But I know now my mission is to suffer with Jesus. And I’m doing what he wants.’ And she came to know that of Fr. Solanus, who revealed God’s plan to her.”
So I leave you with the story of a healing, and the story of a prophecy. We are confronted by mysteries, the mystery of holiness, the mystery of suffering, for and with Jesus, the mystery of God’s plan for each of us, the mystery of life and what it is. If you want to know the meaning of life, in the old catechism I learned it said, “Why did God make you?” Why did God make every one of us here in this church? And the answer is still a good answer: “God made me” – God made you – “to know Him, to love Him, to serve Him, and to be happy with Him in heaven.”ALL SOULS' DAY
FATHER FRANCIS HEINYou never hear about it anymore. In fact, you hear a lot of wrong messages nowadays. A few years ago, during a one-week period, I had three friends undergo personal loses. My first friend wrote an email to all her friends who grow orchids warning them about the risks of new fungicide she had tried and which ended up killing a very rare and valuable orchid she had. A few days later my good friend posted on social media that his 12-year-old, 18-foot-long reticulated python had just died of cancer. And then my cousin’s mother-in-law died. The response to all these tragedies was the same: when giving condolence, the majority of people referred to the plant, the snake or the mother-in-law as "an angel." Even today, at the majority of funerals I attend, the dearly departed is called an angel or a poem with a title like “Heaven’s Newest Angel” is read. It’s a sentiment meant to give comfort – but it is wrong. We will never become angels, because man was made for something greater than them. God became man so man could become God, and it’s important to realize that the faithful departed are on their way to sainthood, that infinitely joyful sharing in God’s love, a journey begun with Baptism when we entered the Church, an entity composed of three parts. We, here on earth, are members of the Church Militant. Yesterday, we celebrated those who have attained our final goal Heaven and they compose the Church Triumphant. Today, we celebrate the souls of the faithful departed who compose the Church Suffering: those souls Purgatory which, on departing from the body, are not perfectly cleansed from venial sins, or have not fully atoned for past transgressions, are debarred from the Beatific vision, and that the faithful on earth can help by prayers, almsgiving and especially by the sacrifice of the Mass.
Our loved ones who are gone, still need us. And through our efforts on earth, we have the ability to help them obtain Heaven; and this done especially during the Mass. In a few minutes at the altar and the veil between heaven and earth fades and we participate in the great sacrifice of Christ Himself to the Father, and we beseech God to bless the Church Suffering and bring them to mansions Jesus has already made for them. In the Eucharistic Prayer used this morning, the Church’s rubrics instruct us to especially to make a pause so we can focus on individuals important to us who are still suffering through the purification being undertaken in Purgatory. Let us daily, and especially at the Mass, remember the souls of our loved ones. Let the souls of the faithful departed rest in peace and may perpetual light shine upon them. -
November 3-9
"KAIROS"
FATHER FRANCIS HEINFather Francis offered the following reflection as part of the Church Assembly series on the Rule of Saint Benedict .
CHAPTER XVI: HOW THE WORK OF GOD IS TO BE CARRIED OUT DURING THE DAY
As says the prophet: “Seven times a day have I offered Thee praise.” The which sacred number of seven we fulfil in this way, if at Lauds Prime, Terce, Sext, None, Vespers and Compline time we discharge the duties of our service. For concerning these hours, the prophet said: “Seven times a day have I offered Thee praise.” For, again, concerning night office the same prophet says: “In the middle of the night am I wont to rise and praise Thee.” Therefore, let us ascribe to our Creator praise for the judgments of His justice at these hours, namely, at Lauds, Prime, Terce, Sext, None, Vespers, Compline; and at night let us rise to praise Him.
The monastic life can look a lot like school: a demanding schedule, little sleep and lofty expectations, but the real reason I picked this rule today is that it discusses time. In school, and life in general, there just seems to be so little of it; and as a teacher I see students not only frequently looking at the clock, but also talking about times for meetings, sports, homework, etc. We can get focused on the clock and our relationship with Time becomes purely chronological. Now, you might think that Time is chronological, and to a certain degree you are correct. But Time is also something much more important. It is also called "Kairos." Kairos (καιρός) is an ancient Greek word meaning the right or opportune moment, the supreme moment. While chronological means sequential time, Kairos signifies a time lapse, a moment of indeterminate time in which everything happens. Kairos is used to describe seasons, and is the time we experience in dreams, memories and those good, cherished times we spend together. This is the aspect of time that we need to enter into when we are here, in a sacred space, in the presence of God and our Portsmouth brothers and sisters. It is in this season that we join in a shared encounter. We had the opportunity to raise our voice in song, be united together in Psalm 85, and praying of kindness and truth, grace and blessings for each other and the world. Soon we will close this, and all Church Assemblies, with the Pater Noster, where we honor God who is not mine, not yours, not theirs but Our Father. We share a special time, a time of peace, good will and community here at Portsmouth. Let’s make it more Kairos.SAINT CHARLES BORROMEO
ABBOT MATTHEW STARKOCCASIONS OF SIN
FATHER PASCHAL SCOTTIAt Mass on November 7, Father Paschal spoke of how we used to hear more often phrases like “occasions of sin,” or “near occasions of sin” – where one is more likely to sin; because of a person, or being in a place or a situation in which one is more likely to fall into sin. Some might be set to sin by something said, even if the speaker is unaware of it. While we would do well to consider whether or not we are beings occasions to sin, Fr. Paschal noted the danger with this: that you may end up being totally immobilized. “In this world, it is hard to not fall into occasions of sin, particularly the way our culture is going. For some people, anything can be scandalous.” Yet we do not want to be immobilized. "Our Lord Himself, in the gospel of the day (Lk 15:1-10; Jesus eats with sinners), gave enormous scandal," massive occasions to sin in an external sense, though anointed by the Holy Spirit, “he can’t truly give scandal, he can’t truly be an occasion to sin.” Even with the saints, one sees that it is stunning how often they gave scandal, how often they themselves were “occasion of sin.” Fr. Paschal noted John Bosco, in particular, in the nineteenth century – the many young people he served in cities, without parents, “unwashed, untethered, dangerous people.” Many people were scandalized by this priest and his work with these young people – “yet he was called to that, and with that great work he saved many thousands, hundreds of thousands souls,” with the Salesians. So, Fr. Paschal noted that we are called by God to do the sort of things that might put us in a situation where we are an occasion to sin, and where we might scandalize some people. We should use our common sense, particularly the supernatural virtue of prudence, to guide us in this endeavor. We are called to serve God. “Perhaps for all the wrong reasons some will be scandalized,” yet we should know our strengths and our limitations. “We are made to be saints, and not to be saints is the greatest tragedy of all.” So, Fr. Paschal concluded that while we must consider the possibility of giving scandal, we should use prudence, not be discouraged, and seek to do the work God has called us to do.
THE DISHONEST STEWARD
FATHER MICHAEL BRUNNER( Homily of November 8 ) We come into the world with nothing. We take nothing with us when we leave. We are like the steward (Lk 16:1-8). He was not the owner, but a manager. He was skilled at his work, but like us he was a sinner. He had a weakness, a thought, a passion to which he gave in. But the consequences of his mismanagement and dishonesty caught up with him. Sometimes that happens to us in this world, but it certainly does in the next. He could have gone off, humiliated, to a new place to try to find a new job with a new owner. And he would have likely done the same things that got him into trouble. But he did not. He gave up his own advantage to protect himself. We have lots of opportunities in life when things go a little or a lot wrong, to respond to the consequences of our own tendencies to give in to our weakness, to our compromises with truth and justice. But they are opportunities only. They only benefit us if we are like the steward and apply the skills we have to the opportunities to our spiritual advantage, to reprioritize our lives, to repent. It would be great if we only had to do that once in our life. But if we are honest with ourselves, not an easy thing to do, we will realize that we need to do it every day. RIGHTEOUS ANGER
FATHER PASCHAL SCOTTI
In his homily of November 9, Fr. Paschal referred to the story of Phineas Gage. On September 13, 1848, Gage, who was a railroad construction foreman, “experienced a horrible accident, when in an explosion an iron rod more than three feet long and over an inch wide went right through his head and landed eight feet beyond him. Surprisingly, he did not die, but his life afterwards was rather shaky and undisciplined. Nothing in his rational faculties was destroyed or significantly damaged - those worked rather well. But it was his emotional faculties, his emotional capacities, that were destroyed.” Fr. Paschal noted that in 1994, the book by American neurologist, Antonio Damasio, called Descartes’ Error, addresses how people really need their emotions to make good decisions. Rationality, logic, etc. was considered essential by Descartes, while emotions were not. “Yet we need our emotions to make a good decisions, and without them we make bad, bad, bad decisions.” Many moderns, he said, believe that emotions are bad, and like Mr. Spock of Star Trek, it is better to have all rationality and no emotion. “But to be happy, satisfied, fulfilled – actively fulfilled – we need our emotional powers. We need our emotions, and among those emotions is anger.” While anger is typically considered bad and we have “anger management” and so forth, Fr. Paschal noted: “And it can be bad: it can be very destructive. But it is also very constructive if it is used properly. There is a place for righteous anger as we see in today’s gospel. Our Lord himself drives out the moneylenders from the temple. He was angry, angry as hell, and it was a righteous anger. A virtuous, holy anger. And we should also manifest on occasion, when called to, when necessary, a righteous and holy anger. And not to do so is not only a deficiency, it is a sin,” and the absence of such emotion can make us spiritually dead. He concluded: “So, we have this enormous power, the emotion of anger. It can be well used, or poorly used, but it is necessary for our proper holiness, our proper virtue. And we are called to manifest a righteous anger in the things of God, and the things of man. We should have times be people who are angry as heck. Let us call to God for the grace to live a truly holy and virtuous life, sanctified and his son Jesus Christ, and to rightly manifest this righteous anger.”
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November 10-16
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"GOOD ZEAL"
FATHER FRANCIS HEIN
Father Francis offered the following reflection as part of the Church Assembly series on the Rule of Saint Benedict .
"Just as there is a wicked zeal which separates from God and leads to hell, so there is a good zeal which separates from vice and leads to God and everlasting life. The monks, therefore, should practice this good zeal with the most fervent love; in fact, they should each try to be the first to show respect to the other, competing with one another in obedience. They should endure one another’s weaknesses—whether of body or mind—with the utmost patience; and no one should follow what he thinks useful to himself; instead, he should do what he thinks will most benefit the others. The monks should fear God and love their abbot with sincere and humble affection. Let them prefer nothing to Christ, and may He lead us all together to life everlasting."
As the term begins to wind down, I thought we’d read from the second to last chapter of the Rule. For sixteen years, I’ve been reading the Rule of Saint Benedict together, and here in the penultimate chapter, we finally see where all this is leading. All the rules and mandates and regulations guide us to this one quintessentially monastic virtue: zeal: great energy or enthusiasm in pursuit of a cause or an objective. The monk must be zealous. He must want heaven the way a rock star wants to be on stage—the way an actor wants to be in the movies. He has to be willing to make the same sacrifices that athletes and soldiers and poets make in pursuit of their dreams. The hunger, the loneliness, the humiliations, failures and sacrifices are all part of realizing that dream. The monk knows this, and when the struggle begins to wear on him, he bears it with the grim, rugged joy of a mountain climber or a triathlete. In his treatise On Virginity, Saint Ambrose wrote, “The Word of God moves swiftly. The lukewarm won’t reach him. The lazy can’t hold on. So pay close attention to his word, and be careful to follow the path God shows you, or He will quickly pass you by” (Ch 12, 74).
It’s all about good zeal.
Saint Augustine had a pretty interesting take on this process, which he drew from the beatitudes (Commentary on the Sermon on the Mount, Chs 1-23). The first three beatitudes, he said, are passive (“Blessed are the poor… mourning…weak”); the last three are active (“Blessed are the merciful…the pure…the peacemakers”). But the central beatitude—the turning point and crux of the spiritual life, the focus of the entire endeavor—is zeal: “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness” (Matt 5). You sometimes hear ambitious athletes or businessmen described as hungry. They are consumed by a sort of restless, savage, dogged enthusiasm that keeps them sprinting from one dream to the next. This is zeal, and it’s what separates the diehard from the mere enthusiast. When others call it a day, the zealous man is just getting started. Setbacks are “tests” and failures are just practice runs.
Zeal is crucial to all success especially for you, now. The term is ending and all those papers, exams and projects so we have to turn it up a notch, but that zeal needs to be good zeal. No matter how busy, stressed or focused we become we must always remember the members of our community. We are called to respect all, bear with tolerance those faults of our brothers and sisters and be willing to help those that need it.
SAINTS OF SAINT BENEDICT
FATHER MICHAEL BRUNNER
At some point in our lives we all have heard about the four marks of the Church: one, holy, catholic, and apostolic. The proof of the Church’s holiness is in the saints, those men and women who have lived within the Church lives of extraordinary holiness. Today (November 13), we celebrate those of the Benedictine order, who prove that following the Rule of Saint Benedict is a genuine path to eternal life with God. There is, of course, St. Benedict himself, whose Rule is the most widely used by religious orders in the Church. There is St. Gregory the Great, the monk who sent to England St. Augustine of Canterbury. There are the holy abbots of Cluny, the most influential men in the Church after the pope, maybe even more so, during their times. There is St. Bede the Venerable, St. Anselm of Canterbury, St. Boniface, the apostle to and patron of Germany. There is St. Bernard of Clairvaux, St. Scholastica, St. Hildegard of Bingen, St. Gertrude. There is St. Arnold of Soissons, patron of brewers (where would we be without him?). In the 20th century: Blessed Columba Marmion, Blessed Cyprian Iwene Tansi, patron saint of Nigeria, and the blessed martyr monks of Tibhirine in Algeria. They are just the tip of the huge iceberg of Benedictine saints that floats in the ocean of the Church. Today, we honor and thank God for them all, and we ask their prayers and intercession for us, that one day we may join them in their eternal holiness and happiness.
ALL SOULS OF PORTSMOUTH ABBEY
FATHER PASCHAL SCOTTI
The whole universe was held in bondage to sin, suffering, evil and death. All of humanity, each of us, was held in bondage to sin, suffering, evil and death. It is for this reason that God sent his only begotten Son, in his love for all that he has made. To set us free, to set the whole universe free, to set everything free, and restore it by a new creation to its true destiny. So he came into this world, he preached the gospel, he suffered, died, and he rose again. And by the power of that resurrection, a new creation, God’s kingdom, has come to this world. It is here. It is among us by the power of the Spirit. It is not incomplete. It is certainly true that in the New Testament literature, in the early Christian literature, we see very powerfully, very palpably, the power of the spirit transforming lives, changing reality, restoring reality to the new creation, the new kingdom that God proclaimed long ago in the prophets. We have a feast like All Souls’ Day, and today’s celebration (November 14), which is for the souls of this monastery – in hope that we fulfill that reality, in the power of baptism, in the Spirit transforming this world, restoring this world to its true reality. But we have not achieved that, which is why we pray for the dead and have a feast for all souls. So we should remind ourselves that this should happen now in our lives, through the power of baptism, that the power of resurrection can be transforming us and the world around us, through us. It may surprise you that we pray for the dead monks of this monastery. You would think that a monastery would be a witness to this power of the Spirit. ...The fact is monks to sin. Abbot Matthew used to say that the purpose of monasteries is to get all of the bad people out of the world, to take them out of circulation. And you might think that was said half humorously, and it was said half humorously. There is an element of truth in that: monks sin like other people, and fail to fulfill our baptismal promises, Fail to manifest the power of God, The power God sent us through his son’s death and resurrection. So let us be inspired by the power that God sent us. Let us remember our true destiny. Let us pray for the dead. Let us pray for the living. And let us live by the model our Lord gave us to live by.
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november 23-30
FOLLOWING GOD'S LAW
FATHER PASCHAL SCOTTIIn today’s first reading, we have such an example. In the Hellenistic kingdoms in the old Persian empire, one of these Hellenistic kings in the Seleucid dynasty was trying to make the Jews into Greeks, to Hellenize the Jews, to get rid of their traditions so they would conform to the norms of these Hellenized peoples. And they had better do it, otherwise persecution would follow. Eleazar, the person we heard of in the first reading (2 Mac 6:18-31), will not conform. He will do what God has asked him to do, and follow the ritual laws and the laws of eating, and other laws. The Jews were asked to break them. And that is a great temptation: to do things privately one way and publicly another, to be a public sinner and a private saint, you might say. And this is not really good for the Christian. Our life should be in conformity externally and internally to the law of God, the way of God, the virtues, the gospel, etc. When we start playing with that, and hiding that, and distorting that, only disaster will follow. So, we want to be liked, we want to be accepted, and we are afraid of what will happen to us if we are not, if we are not part of this herd. But Christ asks us to be very different from the herd. In every age, even “Christian” ages, those who followed Christ were being exceptional, they were being abnormal, they were being anomalous. But you have to accept that fact: if you are to follow Christ faithfully you might be anomalous to the rest of the world. But with Christ, this powerful life and grace come to you, and it is doable and worth the sacrifice. Many of us here have lived a lot of years. It would be a shameful thing if we should not follow the ways of God in our age, should not be faithful to him to the end, as Eleazar was faithful to the end. So let us call upon God in his power, and grace, and majesty: to strengthen us, transform us, transfigure us. And so to follow His law despite what society might say.
EDMUND, KING AND WITNESS
ABBOT MATTHEW STARK
Edmund was king in East Anglia in the ninth century. He was a Christian and he reigned at a time when it was invaded by the pagan Danes. He refused to allow them to take over the kingdom, and for that he was tortured and put to death. His cult became, in the middle ages, very popular and spread widely. Of course, the celebration of any martyr is a reminder that the word “martyr“ means "witness," and that you and I are - or should be - witnesses to the gospel . This, according to that saying, at least attributed to St. Francis: "Always preach the gospel, use words if necessary."
BEAUTY AND SAINT CECILIA
FATHER PASCHAL SCOTTI
This crumbling pageant shall devour,
The trumpet shall be heard on high,
The dead shall live, the living die,
And music shall untune the sky.
These lines are from the Grand Chorus of John Dryden’s poem, “A Song for St. Cecilia’s Day,” a very beautiful poem. The martyr saint, that we honor this day, St. Cecilia, virgin and martyr: we know really nothing about the real Saint Cecilia, except for stories from many centuries later. But we do know that she is the patron of music, and the patron of beauty. And beauty is one of the three transcendentals – the true, the good, and the beautiful – often the more overlooked of the three transcendentals. Yet essential, for as the beautiful is attacked, so is the true and the good. And certainly in this last epoch and in the present, with its ugliness and lack of truth, and its lack of goodness and beauty, you should remember this saint, and be devoted to true beauty, to true music, to excellence in every respect. So we can conquer those evils. Dostoyevsky said, in a most misunderstood saying, that beauty shall save the world. Well, we need more than beauty – but: we do need beauty. (Homily of November 22)
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November 24-30
GIVING THANKS
FATHER MICHAEL BRUNNER
Ten lepers. Only one gives thanks: the unlikely one, the Samaritan. Just like the Good Samaritan was the unlikely source of charity to the robbers victim on the road to Jericho. God is full of surprises.
I have been teaching for twenty-two years. Back when began, now and then a student would say thank you. One student said “Thank you” to every teacher as he left the class room every day. That was pointed out by the school in its official letter of recommendation to the colleges he applied to. His gratitude was unusual and made him stand out. That was then; this is now. Today, everyday, almost every student says thank you as they leave class. Although it takes time, perhaps gratitude is contagious. God gives us time.
I’ve heard some preachers imagine what happened with the other nine lepers. They imagined that as they got closer to the priests to whom they were to show themselves, the sores and rot of leprosy began to reappear on their bodies. They were un-healed because of their lack of gratitude. But I think that is all wrong. If God went around slapping people down immediately for their bad manners, misdeeds and heedlessness, we would all be in bad shape. Gratitude is an attitude, not an event. It is lived, not done. We are very blessed. It is possible to see in our lives, at least in hindsight, that even tragedies are opportunities for which we can be grateful. They certainly move us out of our comfort zones, those artificial areas we create to protect ourselves from the fundamental brokenness of life in this world. They are vivid reminders that our true security, our true home is not in this world. And we do need to be reminded of that from time to time. God slims us down so that we can fit through the eye of the needle. I cannot now think of any misfortune in my own life which was not a door opening to growth and which did not make me a better and stronger person. In every insult has been a grain of truth of which I needed to be aware. The few acute illnesses I have had really made me realize the temporality and fragility of life and made me focus on what was most important. And mysteriously enough even my sins make me truly face up to the facts that I am not so great, nowhere is near perfect, not so holy, and definitely not deserving of all the blessings I have. In a strange way they make me more compassionate to other sinners, and profoundly grateful that God is essentially merciful, and that God so freely bestows such blessings as I have on the undeserving like me. Most of all, I am thankful for the saving work and presence of Jesus Christ, who spiritually feeds me and you, in this sacrament, the Eucharist – which means “thanksgiving” in Greek.
Thanks be to God for all his blessings, not least for the perspective of faith that we have been blessed with, and for the victory over all the brokennesses in life and for the victory over death itself that He has given us through our Lord Jesus Christ, the bread of life. Thanks be to God for leading us to Him and fulfilling our highest need, so that we need never hunger, and never thirst from lack of faith or lack of his ever present grace. On our Thanksgiving Day celebrating with all the good things which the LORD, our God, has given us, may we each recognize many miracles. And may God grant us joy of heart and true peace.ON THE FEAST OF CHRIST THE KING
ABBOT MATTHEW STARKThe feast of Christ the King, one of our newest feasts, was added to the calendar of the church in the late 1920’s by Pius XI. This was said to respond to growing facism in Italy and to the beginning of Nazism in Germany – against the power of facism, that the power of the papacy could endure. This particular gospel, as told in Luke’s gospel , has Christ clearly dying as the King of the Jews. They make fun of him and the claim, “King of the Jews.” And yet we have this wonderful story of the two criminals, that has the one deriding him and the other coming to his defense. And the question is why. Does that other criminal realize through grace that Jesus is the Messiah? Or was he moved in the midst of his own terrible suffering, to realize this man crucified with him, crucified with nails through his feet and hands and a crown of thorns on his head – that this man truly was the messiah? In any case, he asks that when Jesus comes, that Jesus will remember him in His kingdom. He is the only person in the New Testament of whom it is clearly said: you will go to heaven. “You will be with me this day in paradise.” Now this Jesus who dies is this humiliating and terrible fashion is the Second Person of the Trinity, and the King and Creator of the universe. God’s ways are not our ways… This is an interesting story about the Magnificat, which Mary recites when Elizabeth greets her as the mother of the messiah. Mary says: “The Lord God has put down the mighty from their seats; he has exalted the humble and meek. He has filled the hungry with good things, and the rich he has sent empty away.” Already she sees this reversal of the way we think things should go, which is unlike the way things go in God’s arrangement. This prayer is said at Vespers. Now, in Sicily there was a king in the middle ages who, when he went to vespers, would not allow this prayer to be said, because he knew that he did not want to hear it and he was afraid that other people might hear it: “The Lord God has put down the mighty from their seats; he has exalted the humble and meek. He has filled the hungry with good things, and the rich he has sent empty away.”
OUT OF HER POVERTY
ABBOT MATTHEW STARK
( Homily of November 25)
OUR DAY OF VISITATION
FATHER PASCHAL SCOTTITHE KINGDOM OF HEAVEN
ABBOT MATTHEW STARK
We hear our Lord speaks of the Kingdom to come, a Kingdom for which we pray every time we say the Our Father. This is a description of that Kingdom , taken from Scripture, by Carlo Caretto: “The Kingdom of heaven signifies God with us... It is a Kingdom that has been prepared for us ‘since the foundation of the world’ (Matthew 25:34) and which unfolds without signs to be observed (Luke 17:20). It is a Kingdom into which Christ has transferred us, delivering us from the dominion of darkness (Colossians 1:2) and into which ‘it is hard for those who have riches to enter’ (Luke 18:24). It is a Kingdom where ‘he who is least is greater than John [the Baptist]’ (Luke 7:28) and where our names are written in heaven (Luke 10:20). It is a Kingdom which was like a grain of mustard seed at first, and then ‘it grew and became a tree And the birds of the air made nests in its branches’ (Luke 13:19), and where men will come from east and west and from north and south and sit at table’ (Luke 13:29). All this we know from the Gospel. But we also know that the Kingdom is more than a place or a legislative entity; it is a person-Jesus.”
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