St. Thomas More Chicago

10 Virgins and the Importance of Latin

2011-11-07T16:59:00.000-08:00

We are now, this weekend, almost at the end of the group ofordinary Sundays which began back in July. In two weeks, the Feast of Christ the King marks the close of the Churchyear, and on the following Sunday—three weeks from now—we begin again withAdvent. This morning the tone of theliturgical readings becomes increasingly urgent in warning us to be ready andto prepare ourselves…whoever for (wisdom’s) sake keeps vigil shall quickly befree from care…because she makes her own rounds, seeking those worthy ofher….For the Lord Himself…will come down from heaven…and the dead in Christwill rise first….

And in this Sunday's Gospel, we hear the parable of the tenvirgins, five foolish and five wise. The five wise ones have flasks of oil withtheir lamps. The foolish do not. Now, why couldn't the five who had thought ofit simply share some of their oil with the others? Why did they have to make itso complicated? It could all have been so simple. Instead it goes all wrong.While the young girls are off buying more oil, the bridegroom arrives. The dooris being locked, and when they are back, they can't come in. It is one thing to wait for the bridegroom,Who is Christ. But it is not enough towait for the bridegroom with the others if the waiting is not accompanied by aninner faith, represented in the parable by the oil that makes the light of thelamp shine forth. God is not asking usonly to…hang around…waiting for the bridegroom—waiting for Christ toappear. He asks for our personalengagement as a response to His engagement with us. The Church is the institution who has as herprime mission to announce the Gospel of the Lord, leading all people to faithby the sacraments and the liturgy, and through the lives of every Catholic whowitnesses to the mercy of God. It isthrough the Church that the presence of Christ is realized here on earth—andhere is the whole point: the point of Christ’s coming, His death andresurrection, His giving us the Church—we are to make ourselves ready forjudgment: judgment at the moment we die; judgment at the time of His secondcoming on the last day.

For many years—in some ways for more than 30 years—theChurch in the English-speaking world has been preparing for what will takeplace three weeks from today—November 27th—the First Sunday of Advent. On that day the new English version of theLatin Roman Missal will begin to be used in our nation and in most of theEnglish-speaking world (a few places, like Australia, have begin its usealready). What is particularlydistinctive about this missal is that it is, as much as possible, an exacttranslation of the Missale Romanum—the Latin Roman Missal. This is as it should be, because Latin is theChurch’s language. Whenever I hear aremark such as I recently heard…if I wanted to hear Latin, I would go to theLatin Mass…I have to lament that, after nearly 50 years, the intention of theSecond Vatican Council and the popes since the council is still not understoodby so many Catholics, clergy and laity alike. The Second Vatican Council never condemned nor forbade the use of Latinin the liturgy. Unfortunately, after1965 there was a dramatic change in most places that gave this impression: theChurch went from using almost all Latin at Mass, to almost totally excludingit. Yet quite the contrary to beingforbidden, following upon Blessed John Paul II’s final encyclical Ecclesia deEucharistia, the instruction from the Holy See Redemptionis Sacramentum, taughtthat…Priests are always and everywhere permitted to celebrate Mass in Latin…. The Second Vatican Council, while permittingtranslations into the vernacular, taught that…care must be taken to ensure thatthe faithful may also be able to say or sing together in Latin those parts ofthe Ordinary of the Mass which pertain to them…. Not only does the Councilplainly insist on keeping some Latin in the Mass, it goes on emphatically to approvethe use of Gregorian chant; the council taught in these words…The Churchrecognizes Gregorian chant as being especially suited to the Romanliturgy. Therefore…it should be givenpride of place in liturgical services….Latin is the language of Gregorianchant.

What the Council had probably envisioned was gradual changesand a mix of English and Latin. Obviously it is beneficial that the readings,homily and many of the prayers should be in English for ease in understanding.But this in no way meant the Church should forget the Gloria, Creed, Sanctus,Agnus Dei and Pater Noster—all of which the Council says we should still beable to say and sing. In 1974 Pope PaulVI sent to all the world’s bishops a booklet titled Missa Jubilate Deo—abooklet of simple Latin Gregorian chants; the Holy Father asked that allCatholics become familiar with them and use them in the celebration of theMass. These are the Latin chants youfind today in every issue of our missalette.

But what makes Latin so important, why should it be used? First, Latin is still the official language ofthe Church, used whenever the pope issues an encyclical or other officialdocument. Much more so, we have atreasury of sacred music which goes back to the earliest centuries of theChurch—what would we say about an institution which simply forgot the bulk ofits historical character or patrimony? Whatis regrettable about the use of only English at Mass, especially music sungonly in English, is that we are in danger of losing part of the Church's richheritage of thousands of years of Latin chant, dating back to the time of PopeGregory the Great, from whom it derives its name: Gregorian chant. Some of themost theologically accurate and hauntingly beautiful hymns are the great Latinclassics. Perhaps we should ask it thisway: how many of our English glory and praise songs and folk melodies willstill be sung in 1500 years?

When St. Boniface brought Catholicism to Germany in the 8thCentury, he celebrated Mass singing…Sanctus, Sanctus, Sanctus Dominus…not…Heilig,Heilig, Heilig Gott…. When St. Francisof Assisi and St. Catherine of Siena assisted at Mass in Medieval Italy, theyresponded not in Italian, but in Latin…Et cum spiritu tuo…. Ss. Teresa of Avilaand John of the Cross both wrote beautiful Spanish poetry in the 16th century,but at each Mass they sang the Pater Noster, not the Padre Nuestro. Sts.Therese of Lisieux and John Vianney lived in 19th century France, but at eachMass they sang the Agnus Dei, not Agneau de Dieu. No matter from where our ancestors came tothis country, they sang Kyrie eleison, not Lord have mercy…that’s what theEpiscopals sang, and Catholics knew they were Catholic, not Episcopals. Latin gives us a connection with 2000 yearsof history, with millions of Catholics from dozens of generations. Saints fromthe 4th, 12th and 20th centuries have sung these very chants, hundreds ofthousands of priests have said these same words of consecration, billions ofCatholics have sung these same Latin chants.

Being one with the mind of the Church, our use of LatinGregorian chant can be a reminder of the sacredness of what takes place atMass. The Mass is essentially amystery—it takes us out of the things of earth and inserts us into thedimension of heaven. We can never fullycomprehend what takes place in the Eucharist. We are not supposed to understand fully themystery of God, because we cannot. Wenever will. We only can accept and givethanks for that partial understanding of the divine mystery revealed tous. At Mass, we are singing and praying neitherto ourselves nor to each other, but to God, Who is essentially Mystery. The Church’s universal use of Latin keepsthat truth always before us.

One may ask…Why do not most parishes make more, or any, useof Latin in the Mass, especially by using the Latin chants, if that is the mindof the Church? One would have to askthose priests why they do not, since I have tried to explain why parishesshould do so. The use of Latin is morecommon in other countries, especially in many parts of Europe, South America,and Africa. But I can best respond, knowingwhat the Church has taught about the matter from the Second Vatican Councilright up until Pope Benedict XVI a few weeks ago (he is quoted on the subjectin this Sunday’s bulletin) by asking a question my mother often asked me when Iwould complain that I couldn’t do what other kids were allowed to do…Justbecause everybody else is doing it doesn’t make it right….

We are preparing for the use of the new English translationof the Roman Missal beginning in just three weeks. This translation is an exacting translationof the Latin Roman Missal. We will haveto get used to saying…and with your spirit…rather than…and also with you…whenwe hear the priest sing or say…The Lord be with you…and with your spirit…andwith your spirit…practice will make perfect. Clearly the Mass prepares us for the coming of the end—our own end aswell as the world’s end. We will hearthis prayed for clearly in the new translation of the Third Eucharistic Prayer……aswe look forward to His second coming, we offer You in thanksgiving this holyand living sacrifice….May we use the gift of the Mass always to prepareourselves for what is surely to come.

Fr. Robert Behnke

The Thirty-Second Sunday per annum, November 6, 2011

"That’s How I Treat All My Friends"

2011-08-15T12:58:00.000-07:00

The episode in this morning’s Gospel – the meeting of Our Lord with the Canaanite woman – puts me in mind of another conversation Our Lord had with another woman - with St. Teresa of Jesus – Teresa of Avila. There are several versions of this famed conversation, including one involving Teresa’s having fallen into a puddle of mud. But the one I like the best focuses on St. Teresa’s life in her religious community. Teresa was a Carmelite; she was also a mystic; she was sometime in such metaphysical, transcendental, communion and conversation with Our Lord that others at times observed her to be levitating, especially during the offering of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. Now one might think that those fellow sisters, seeing this miraculous occurrence, would have been edified, and perhaps even perceived and even used it as an actual grace sent by God for themselves. And perhaps some did, but others of her sisters evidently did not, instead accusing Teresa of all kinds of mischief; some even saying she was in league with the devil. Much of this accusation took the form of backbiting and gossip; does this at all sound familiar?—gossip was not an invention of the 20th or the 21st centuries. Finally Teresa had had enough, and so, in one of her mystical conversations with Her Best Friend Our Lord, she complained…Do You see how they all treat me. Why do You allow it? Came the answer…Teresa, that’s how I treat all My friends….It’s no wonder You have so few, Teresa replied.

Imagine having the kind of closeness, that deep friendship, the genuine intimacy with Our Lord, that you could say that to Him and get away with it. Yet that is precisely what Our Lord wants for each of us. He doesn’t want us to be strangers, or just acquaintances, or even just on good terms; He wants to be our Best Friend - yours and mine.

The woman in the Gospel this morning is a Canaanite. St. Matthew says Our Lord and his disciples had withdrawn to the region of Tyre and Sidon. This is the only time in the Gospels that speak of Jesus coming close to leaving the borders of the Holy Land. Tyre and Sidon still exist today; they are in Lebanon, north of Israel, and so going beyond the boundaries of the Holy Land is quite significant in Our Lord’s ministry. And in the Bible, over the centuries, the Canaanites are cast in a very bad light. Among their false gods and goddesses were Baal (who was reduced to a laughingstock by the prophet Elijah) and Astarte; the Canaanites practice fertility rites, child sacrifice, and many other abominations. The Book of Leviticus in the Old Testament declares about them… The land itself vomits out its inhabitants…. This helps to explain both Our Lord’s initial and protracted coolness and the disgust of the apostles (…Send her away, Lord….). Yet she calls Our Lord…Son of David…, perceiving in Him His power to cure her daughter of her demonic possession. Her initial approach to Our Lord shows us that God will offer His sufficient grace to everyone, no matter whom, where, or when–even to this daughter of pagan gods, goddesses, and multiple abominations. And she takes that initial actual grace from God in hand, and she persists in it, against all obstacles (even the sting of being referred to as a…dog…). She turns even that around and tells Our Lord that there are…dogs… and then there are…dogs…–there are the unclean scavengers who roam through the garbage, and then there are the domesticated house animals that lie near the dinner tables of the children of Israel. She takes that little initial actual grace and persists in it until it has the effect she desires. One might imagine Our Lord with a look of satisfaction–even perhaps a slight grin–as He tells her…O woman, great is thy faith. Let it be done for you as you wish….

God gives each one created in His image and likeness–which is to say every person, including each one of us–that same grace. It is always there; we don’t need to ask for it. Our Lord wants to be the Best Friend we have–and He is the Best Friend any of us could ever have. But we must persist in that friendship so that grace will have the desired effect in us. But it would seem that, today—in our own day and age—too many Catholics do not have friendship with Our Lord and, even worse, many either have little interest in that kind of relation with Christ or—worst of all—many do not know how to go about allowing Our Lord to be their best friend. They simply do not know how to persist in the life of grace—in God’s life available to every man. This lack—of divine friendship, of interest in divine friendship, of awareness of how to gain an intimate friendship with Our Divine Lord—manifests itself in all kinds of ways today. The large number of Catholics who are so casual about the practice of the Faith—not faithful to Sunday Mass, never going to confession, hardly ever praying; or, once in church, do not genuflect because they have no understanding of toward Whom and toward Where their genuflection should be placed; those who dress inappropriately for Mass; those who see little difference between a church and an amphitheatre; those who during the homily spend a lot of time conversing, texting, or reading the parish bulletin. Or those Catholic politicians of either political party who try to live spiritually schizophrenic lives, by claiming personal opposition to, but yet consistently voting for, abortion, same-sex marriage, contraceptive permissiveness for school-aged children, assisted suicide, or any of the other anti-life issues that is embraced by so much of our culture. These behaviors indicate a deep misunderstanding of what it means to be Catholic, coupled with a tendency to take one’s cues from the prevailing ideas of the culture rather than from the Church herself. For the Church teaches infallibly in matters of faith and morals (commonly called Catholic doctrine, or when formally proclaimed as such, Catholic dogma). Catholic doctrine is guaranteed by God Himself; but when those claiming to be Catholic and claiming to understand what that means assert that doctrine is a matter of opinion, while specific social strategies can be dogmatically approved or rejected, then we are no longer dealing with a Catholic mind, and that person can never have a truly intimate relation in the life of divine grace with Our Lord, because He tells us that He Himself is the Truth. The Catholic whose mind and attachments are primarily formed by the world will then relativize doctrine and absolutize their own opinions, rather than submit to all that the Church teaches must be held as true. They can then never know the Truth Which is Christ; not knowing Him Who is Truth Itself, they can not have an intimate relation with Him.

Likewise, a similar obstacle to intimacy with Our Lord can occur in one’s evaluation of the Church herself, for the Church has both human and Divine elements, both fallible and infallible. For example, if a Catholic is willing to cooperate with grace, Catholic doctrine and the sacraments infallibly then engender holiness; however, the Church’s administrative programs bear fruit only according to their prudential matching of the right action to the right situation, and the behavior of individual churchmen bears fruit according to their own individual personal conformity with Christ. For this reason, when a Catholic says…I am leaving the Church—especially because of this Church teaching, or because Father or Bishop So-and-so did this or that—and so they in effect say…I don’t need the Church to have intimacy or friendship with Christ…because they dislike or react negatively to particular programs and policies or to things that particular churchmen have done, they can never have an intimate friendship with Our Lord, because Our Lord gave us the Church as the sole means of intimate friendship with Himself. A Catholic reacts with a Catholic mindset only if he distinguishes such human things as bad administrative decisions or sinful churchmen from the essential holiness of the Church herself. The tendency to dismiss the Church because, in this or that era, the actions of some Church leaders were either immoral or ill-suited to the needs of the time, is to characterize incorrectly the Church by her human element. This tendency to judge the Church by her human and fallible elements, which are very frequently alleged as reasons for rejecting her infallible teachings, is simply another example of a mind and heart formed not by Christ but by the world—today by instruments like The New York Times. And a mind and heart formed by the world (formed by the Times or The Chicago Tribune) can never be one in mind and heart with Our Lord, Who gives us not the world but the Church as our means of salvation.

And recall that the Canaanite woman came to Our Lord not for herself but for the healing of her daughter. So in our own friendship with Our Lord, we must persist especially in hope and in prayer for those who may have lost their own friendship with Christ; He desires to be their Best Friend too. Intimacy with Christ—having Our Lord as our best friend—cannot ever mean that we exclude others from the relation we have with Our Lord. Again, Our Lord gave us the Church as His chosen means of, not only my salvation or your salvation, but of the salvation of everyone. To speak of Jesus and me to the exclusion of anyone else automatically will exclude Jesus Himself, Who told us over and over again to see Him and find Him in the faces of both our neighbor and the stranger, in both our loved ones and our enemies. Very likely, as in the case of St. Teresa of Jesus, if we face sufferings, especially at the hands of those who should be closest to us, it means our friendship with Our Lord is growing; recall His words to Teresa…I treat all my friends that way…. And if we truly persist in grace by prayer, by our communion with the Church and especially by faithful reception of the sacraments, Our Lord will surely remain our Best Friend; even if, as St. Teresa said…it’s no wonder you have so few…; even if He is the only Friend we have, He really is the only Friend any of us needs absolutely, because He is, always and only, the best.

The Twentieth Sunday of the Year

The New Health and Human Services mandate is wrong on every level...

2011-08-15T12:11:00.000-07:00

Fr. Robert Behnke

Strangerand stranger yet, life ever does seem to get. As I reflected this past week on today’s Gospel and Our Lord’s parable ofthe unjust—but clever and wily and industrious—steward, it was difficult for menot to see certain parallels with the goings-on culminating last week inCongress and in the White House: the master, the steward, and thelaborers. It was hard f0r me to see muchself-abandonment and altruism in the actions of our elected representativesrelating to the raising of the government’s debt limitation; it, at least tome, appeared to be rather strategies in self-interest and politics—especially inelection, or re-election politics—since one important action now is postponeduntil after the November 2012 election. In the Gospel we have a master (whom we should not in this case confusewith God); a master who nobody much likes (he is portrayed as an absenteelandlord). The master’s steward has beencaught with his hand in the till, and so his livelihood as steward is about tocome to an end. The steward, of course,is angry; judging from his performance as steward, he does not have hismaster’s best interests at heart. Now hehas found a way to get even. Debts inPalestine—contrary to the Old Testament prohibition of usury—included interestprefigured into the debt. If 40 barrelswas borrowed, the debtor, as in the first instance in the parable, wouldautomatically owe 100 barrels; it is somewhat like the value-added tax in manyEuropean countries; the price for an item may be 100 euros; the tax of 23 eurosis hidden in that total of 100 euros owed for the purchase, rather than beingadded at the moment of the transaction. So here the steward has found a way to ingratiate himself with themaster’s debtors: ‘you borrowed 40 barrels of oil and so you now owe 100 inrepayment; give the master 50 instead—so he’ll make less; I will get even withhim, and you’ll owe me one.’ The masterpraises the steward for his ingenuity in his facing his personal crisis and sois not so annoyed even though he the master has lost some profit. He still made a little profit, and in thiscase there seems to be honor among thieves. No one has lost anything of what he originally had: the master has hismoney back; the steward has probably skimmed something for himself and now hasa lot of his masters’ former debtors now in his debt—and those who were in debtto the master are now debt free. Ingenuity combined with self-interest—and note, there seems neither any helpnor concern for those in need. Whethermaster, steward, or debtors, it is all about me, me, and me. Would that—Our Lord almost laments—would thatthe children of light were as energetic as promoting the Kingdom of God as arethe children of darkness in promoting their own self-interests. Does it not resemble the way much political,social, economic life operates? And isit not the direction in which promoters of abortion and same-sex marriage want therules to head? Years ago, the well-knowncolumnist for the Chicago Daily News Mike Royko opined that the motto of theChicago City Council should be Ubi est mihi?—Where’s mine? Is that not what secular culture and thereligion of self-success want the world to cry out: Where’s mine?

Beginning in August2012, all private insurers in the US must provide women with coverage forFDA-approved contraception--including sterilization and contraceptives thathave an abortifacient effect--under a mandate announced on last Monday by theUS Department of Health and Human Services. According to the department,insurers must provide this coverage—a quote here—…without charging a copayment,deductible, or coinsurance…. Thedecision was announced in time to take effect for colleges and universitiesthat offer health-care plans for their students. HHS is led by Kathleen Sebelius, a Catholicwhose bishop has exhorted her not to receive Holy Communion. There is in this regulation of thepresident’s administration an exemption for certain religious employers, but theexemption is extremely narrow. TheChurch would have to cease either hiring or serving non-Catholics to qualifyfor the exemption. Plus, the drugs thatAmericans would be forced to subsidize under the new rule include Ella, a drugapproved by the FDA as an emergency contraceptive, but which can act like theabortion drug RU-486—it can abort an established pregnancy weeks afterconception. It is hard to see anything,moral or otherwise, that is not objectionable about this decision. Most importantly, of course, the new mandateforces health insurers to pay for the immoral use of drugs, therefore violatingGod’s law, which ought to be no small consideration. It even forces those insurers who may abhorcontraception to participate. Andfinally, it forces all Americans who pay for health insurance, whetherprivately or through taxes, to subsidize this immorality. But there are also other objections that oughtto be raised as well. Pregnancy is not adisease, and the use of contraception to prevent it is purely elective. It forces health insurance to subsidizeinherently risky behavior—the link between contraception and promiscuity issimple and clear, as is the link between promiscuity and a wide variety ofdiseases. Moreover, contraceptive ‘treatments’carry a significant health risk of their own. Encouraging women married to men (you see how specific we now have to be—womenmarried to men) not to bear children runs completely contrary to our socialinterests. Around the world, countriesafflicted with this mentality face rapidly aging populations demanding support,a support which the smaller younger populations will not be willing to provide,and very likely will not be able to provide. We reap what we sow, and when we sow nothing, there is nothing to reap.

So, the new Healthand Human Services mandate is wrong on every level. This is yet another example of the energeticingenuity of the efforts of today’s parable’s children of darkness. And so what about…the children of light? Perhaps one purpose of Our Lord’s tellingthis story is to compare the enthusiastic response the children of darknessshow in their dealings with other children of darkness to the lacklusterresponse of the disciples—those who can rightly be called the children oflight—to the Kingdom of God. And the childrenof light now? Today’s children oflight? Will they—we—roll over and playdead—we 56 million Catholics in America who, each at our baptism, werepresented with a candle signifying our acceptance of the light of Christ,signifying that on that day each one became one of the children of light? Roll over and pretend not to notice, asCatholics did when Roe v. Wade legalized abortion in 1973; or when so called GayPride parades each year began to take over our streets and, more horribly, theattention of our children; or when Oregon first legalized assisted suicide; orwhen—not states made up of non-Catholics—but when Catholic states likeMassachusetts, and Connecticut, and New York said any two humans could enterinto marriage; or when our own state of Illinois, with its Catholic governorand Catholic senate president and Catholic house speaker, legalized unionsbetween any two humans, making those civil unions “a marriage” in all but the name? When will Catholics in America learn thelesson of this 2000-year-old parable? Will this latest plot of the children of darkness—led I am certain bythe Prince of Darkness—this clever ingenious plot to make each of us pay forcontraception and abortion disguised as emergency contraception—will this bethe final straw that awakens the Catholic sleeping giant in America? Or will that giant look, yawn, and again—rollover?

Last Thursday theChurch observed and celebrated the Feast of St. Jean Marie Vianney—the Cure ofArs—the patron of parish priests. Thereis a lesson to be learned, I think, in the very small number of secular,diocesan, priests like the Cure of Ars, who have been canonized. That small number of canonized secular,diocesan priests could very well be a big reason why the sleeping AmericanCatholic giant continues to sleep in the face of continuous abomination afterabomination. In the Office of Matinslast Thursday, we read these words written by the cure:…the Christian’streasure is not on earth but in heaven. Ourthoughts, then, ought to be directed to where our treasure is… But the cure is not telling us to ignore theevil goings-on here on earth. He tellsus:…this is the glorious duty of man: to pray and to love…. Is it love to ignore these continuing successiveabominations? Is it love to allow ourculture to continue to descend into destructive death? Is ignoring the death of American Christianculture how we will attain our treasure in heaven? Can ignoring this possibly unite us to Godforever? Is this loving our neighbor asourselves? …And still worse, the curecontinues,…there are some who seem to speak to the good God like this: ‘I willonly say a couple of things to You, and then I will be rid of You.’ I often think that when we come to adore the Lord,we would receive everything we ask for, if we would ask with living faith andwith a pure heart…. We, Catholics inAmerica, must learn the lesson of this parable: we have the power, and theopportunity, and now again yet another chance, to end the abominationsinfecting our national life today, if we have the will to do so—having thatwill, having a living faith and having a pure heart, we would receiveeverything we ask for…because all along, God has been on our side.

The Eighth Sunday after Pentecost, August 7th, 2011

The Only Answer to Same-Sex "Marriage" is Caritas in Veritate

2011-07-10T21:43:00.000-07:00

Fr. Robert Behnke

You probably are aware that, at the end of last week, the state senate of New York passed, and the “Catholic” governor of New York signed, legislation which makes same sex “marriage” legal in the state of New York. Early this past week I received a news article by email, the headline of which stated The majority of New York bishops praise state passage of same gender marriage. The article said, in part….At least one…Church bishop in the state of New York has said that clergy in his diocese may solemnize same-gender marriages as soon as the state's recently passed Marriage Equality Act goes into effect…The Bishop…of Rochester said in a statement…that he would soon set up a diocesan task force…to help us chart our course to engage this journey reverently, deliberately and in congruence with church law….(The bishop)....had actively campaigned for at least two years for passage of the law….Bishop Mark Sisk said in a statement that…the legislation, as enacted, appears to be closely aligned with the long standing views of this diocese that the civil rights of all people should be respected equally before the law….Sisk noted in his statement that the new law…does not determine church teaching about the nature of sacraments….That is our continuing work, he said. However, nothing in the unfinished nature of that work should cause us to hesitate to give our most profound thanks for the step that has been taken in affording equal civil rights for our brothers and sisters….Sisk had written to the New York Times in May to note his and the diocese's long-standing support of allowing same-gender couples the right of civil marriage.

You have probably figured, by this time, that these are not Catholic bishops (they are bishops of the Episcopal Church, the USA version of the Anglican Church). The Anglican Church has been fighting within itself for a number of years about this and other issues relating to the nature of human sexuality and of marriage, and they are sharply divided, on these types of issues, into opposing camps.

This Sunday, the ordo for the extraordinary form of the Mass allows for a choice—an unusual situation for the extraordinary form. The priest is free to choose from among three celebrations: the Mass for the Third Sunday after Pentecost, the Mass for the Feast of the Sacred Heart—last Friday’s feast—or the Mass for the Feast of Ss. Peter and Paul—last Wednesday’s feast. I chose Ss. Peter and Paul for several reasons. The feast of Ss. Peter and Paul on June 29th is one of the four universal holydays of obligation which, by indult, have never been observed as days of obligation in the United States (the others being Epiphany, St. Joseph, and Corpus Christi). Ss. Peter and Paul is by far the more ancient of the two feasts. But, more significantly, we here at St. Thomas More have just this past week, in union with the Church throughout the world, had sixty hours of adoration of the Blessed Sacrament in observance of the 60th anniversary of the ordination to the priesthood of Pope Benedict XVI on the very day of this Feast of Ss. Peter and Paul. Today we should—and every day we must—give thanks to God for the gift of the papal office to the Church; likewise, we must give thanks to God for our current Holy Father. We have been blessed in all our lifetimes to have holy popes at the head of the Church, and Pope Benedict continues that succession of holy popes. We can be thankful today, now, here, in the United States, in 2011 and onward, that we will never awaken to a news headline stating, with any accurate meaning, The majority of Catholic bishops praise same gender marriage. In giving the Church this guarantee of faithfulness—this needed authority—Our Lord makes it possible for each of us to know and to believe what is true, in spite of our own sinful inclinations caused by the sin of Adam—our inclination to believe as true what we would like to be true, what would appear to suit our own needs. The essential, the core, the substance, of our Catholic Faith is “apostolic,” meaning it comes from the apostles who received it from Our Lord Himself. The Church’s teaching, its sanctification, and its governance, have been passed on to us in an unbroken Tradition from the apostles over the past 2000 years. On this Independence Day weekend, it is particularly important to observe this, because the United States in its current perilous moral state can only be saved by the truths of Christianity, and all the truths of Christianity have been preserved perfectly and fully taught only by the Catholic Church.

The only answer that will move society away from the acceptance of homosexuality and thus same-sex “marriage” is–caritas in veritate–love in truth; the title of Pope Benedict’s most recent encyclical. And it is up to the Church fearlessly to preach this difficult, but beautiful message. It is not love to allow your children to rampantly misbehave without correcting them. It is often easier to turn the other way and purposely fail to notice misbehavior. But out of love, parents must correct and discipline their children, lest they come to harm. So too the Church, and especially her shepherds–the fathers of souls—must feed the flock, must teach the truths however difficult and politically incorrect. That is true love. The Holy Father has instructed bishops and priests to do exactly this, again and again. Perhaps some priests and some bishops shy away from this because of the reaction they know they are certain to get: from those in the pews, from other priests, from ecclesiastical superiors, from the media. It is easy for me to say these things here; I have found, in only one of my past pastoral assignments, that whenever I would speak about the Church’s teaching on practically any moral issue, opposition would come from a loud vocal minority, but one with some serious powerful connections. So I appreciate the difficulty other priests may have. It believe it was St. John Vianney who said something like…there are no bad priests, only priests for whom not enough people have prayed enough….

The Holy See has specifically warned against silence on the hard truths of homosexuality. The man who is now our pope, while he headed the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, issued a letter directed to the bishops, stating that silence about the Church’s teachings regarding the spiritual harm of homosexual acts stems from a false charity which he states is …neither caring nor pastoral…. There is no real choice but to speak out, with conviction and love, the truths of Christ, especially in these hard areas of human sexuality. Priests will be criticized for it, but they must trust that God will see to it nonetheless. And it is important that Catholic faithful support priests who speak the truth especially in places where that message is opposed or ridiculed. As I said, it is easy to speak thus here; for that and for you, I am grateful. But in every Catholic parish church, love demands it and the future of the Church depends on it, because in this battle of homosexuality, a time of persecution of the Church is near at hand, and indeed, in many parts of our own country it has already arrived.

A few weeks ago, Malawi’s Ambassador to the United Nations said privately that the Obama administration had threatened to withhold $350 million in aid unless Malawi’s government struck down its laws on sodomy. Among Malawi’s roughly 16-million inhabitants, the life expectancy is a paltry 51.7 years, which is the 211th lowest life expectancy in the world. Malawi has the eleventh highest infant mortality rate in the world. And 44 percent of the population does not have safe sanitation, meaning they very well might be peeing where they drink. Malawi is also among the poorest countries in the world. A $350-million aid package goes a long way there, yet here are President Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton holding Malawi hostage to the new U.S. homosexual agenda. Make sodomy legal or your people can twist in the wind. Within days, Malawi’s government committed to changing Malawi’s sodomy laws. President Obama hailed this as a great victory. Yes, you can usually get your way if you are strong by threatening the world’s weak. And take note that this story was characteristically overlooked by the media.

The successor of Peter, Pope Benedict XVI, in an address given only 18 days prior to his election as pope, and one day prior to the death of Pope Blessed John Paul II, then Cardinal Josef Ratzinger said…Very soon it will not be possible to state that homosexuality, as the Catholic Church teaches, is an objective disorder in the structuring of human existence…. As so many of our modern popes—as Paul VI in his encyclical Humanae Vitae—Pope Benedict has proven himself prescient. The time may be coming shortly when we are forbidden to state the basic truths of the Church. Will we then have the courage to proclaim Christ’s truth with the possibility of losing our jobs, our homes, our friends, our freedom, or perhaps even shedding our blood? If we choose silence now because of cultural pressures, the loss of human respect and political calculations, how can we imagine that when the penalties are increased to include imprisonment, and possibly even torment and death, we will dare to speak the truth of Christ? Our Catholic Faith is not a religion that provides a formula for not sinning. Rather, it teaches If you do sin – and you will – repent, get up, and then go on. Our Lord knew we needed doctrine, grace, habit, purpose of amendment, penance, and forgiveness. And He knew we needed certainty and assurance. That’s why He gave us Peter, then Linus, then Cletus, then Clement—all the way down to our own Benedict.

Especially in America, too many ministers and purveyors of religion tell the world in every way that everything is fine, especially themselves – just do what others do. Do not judge. Do not distinguish. If something is wrong, it is not your fault. It’s the system. It’s no one’s fault. You are ok. Don’t worry. Be happy. Who needs God in all that, let alone penance and change of heart? That’s why all this is not the work of God; it is the work of the Enemy, the Devil. The successor of Peter is not pleasing to the Enemy. He speaks caritas in veritate—truth in love... The devil hates all that. That’s precisely why our prayers for the pope must increase in our lives, in the life of the Church. The Enemy just hates Peter and his successors; that’s why we must love him, and never cease to pray for him.

Fr. Robert Behnke

The External Solemnity of Ss. Peter and Paul

Gift of the Body and Blood of Christ

2011-07-04T11:22:00.000-07:00

Fr. Robert Behnke

The Gospel of Christ brings us more than man could ever have conceived or imagined. But in this way -- this higher way – Jesus Christ fulfills man’s basic need and desire: to have union with God. God knows better than man what man needs and how best to fulfill it. In the sacrament of the altar–the Most Blessed Sacrament–God gives us all that we need—God gives us Himself.

This Feast of the Body and Blood of Christ began in the 1200s. It was begun in order for the Church to be able to express a joyful gratitude for the Gift of the Blessed Sacrament in a way that was not possible on Holy Thursday because of the nearness of the horrible events of Our Lord’s passion and death commemorated the following day. The first Holy Thursday, the day Our Lord gave the Church Himself in the Holy Eucharist, was a day steeped in sadness, because the next day was Good Friday–the day of the cross, the day of Our Lord’s atoning death on the cross. The Mass given to the Church on Holy Thursday was an anticipation of the sacrifice of the cross on Good Friday–an anticipation of earth at last being able to touch heaven. The purpose in instituting today’s feast was to focus specifically on the Gift of the Real Presence of the Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity of Our Lord in the Holy Eucharist. The Mass and the Office for Corpus Christi were composed by St. Thomas Aquinas upon the request of Pope Urban IV in the year 1264. It is unquestionably a classic piece of liturgical work, wholly in accord with the best liturgical traditions—Pange Lingua and Tantum Ergo, O Sacrum Convivium, Ecce Panis Angelorum—all these hymns were composed and used first for this feast day. It is a perfect work of art. So on this feast, we are invited to contemplate the Mystery of the Blessed Sacrament in Itself: What It is; what It does – and, what happens to you and me when you and I receive Holy Communion

How many Catholics really expect anything to happen when they receive Holy Communion; how many Catholics really expect to be changed by the Mass they attend? How many expect to hear a Word proclaimed and preached that will powerfully change the way they think and the way they see the entire world? How many expect actually to encounter Jesus Christ and be changed forever by that encounter? How many expect to receive Holy Communion and to be marvelously helped by this reception in ways far beyond what Tylenol or Advil or Prozac or any other medicine could ever achieve in the physical order? On this Feast of Corpus Christi, what do you expect from receiving the Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of Jesus Christ in Holy Communion?

Some people put more faith in Aleve and Tylenol than they do in Holy Communion. That’s because when they take Tylenol they expect something to happen. But many people don’t really expect anything to happen when they receive Holy Communion. But consider this: According to the thought of St. Thomas Aquinas, God did not have to redeem us by assuming a human body. There are bound to be, Thomas opines, other ways in which God could have saved us. The sisters told us in school that, by a simple thought, by a momentary act of His divine will, God could have effected man’s salvation. The humanity of Christ, then, becomes an especially significant instrument of our redemption. The humiliated and then raised and glorified body of Christ becomes a visible sign of redemption that stretches out across time and space to reach all creation, beginning with Adam. Consider the following passage from an ancient sermon read during the Office of Holy Saturday…The Lord goes in to them [in Hades] holding His victorious weapon, His Cross. When Adam, the first created man, sees Him, he strikes his breast in terror and calls out to all: 'May the Lord be with you all.' And Christ in reply says to Adam: ‘And with your spirit.’ And grasping his hand, He raises him up, saying: ‘Awake, O sleeper, and arise from the dead, and Christ shall give you light….

In this passage the hand of Christ, his Body, raises Adam to life. As Catholics we all believe in the true humanity of Christ; the consequences of that belief are even more radical: Christ makes all His followers members of His Body, the Church, and gives us physical, bodily signs: the sacraments. …Take this and eat it, this is My Body; take It and drink It, this is My Blood….. If we believe in something so unimaginable as God Himself becoming one of us for our salvation, if we believe something so astonishing that, imperfect as we are, we are made members of that holy Body, the Church, why would we ever doubt yet another amazing grace which is, through His own promise, Christ is really and truly and substantially present in the Eucharist?

The Body and Blood of Christ in Their sacramental, mystical Form under the appearances of bread and wine are left for us so that our lives as members of the Body of Christ, the Church, may be strengthened and nourished by the Body of Christ, the Eucharist. This again is part of Jesus' promise: …Whoever eats My flesh and drinks My blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up at the last day…. This is the radical consequence of the seemingly simple act of receiving Holy Communion, eating what appears, to the uninformed and to the unbeliever, a tiny small piece of unleavened bread—That Which, when I received my first Holy Communion 56 years ago, we approached, with a simple faith and childlike understanding, What we together called, in our child’s prayer, our Little White Guest. That Little White Guest repeatedly affords us an extraordinary level of intimacy with God Who not only walked on earth 2,000 years ago and established us as members of His Body in the Church but also feeds us with Himself. How can an intimacy greater than any other intimacy we can possibly experience this side of heaven not possibly change us? How can that intimacy not but change the way we think and change the way we see the entire world? How can we not be changed by this, our own personal encounter with the intimacy of God? Only by the mistaken use of the power of our own freedom, a freedom given to us by God which allows every man to reject even the intimacy of an encounter with God. And our own world proves to us the truth of this intimacy with divinity—proven by the many souls who strive to live as God has taught us to live: sins are put to death; they have more joy in the Lord, more confidence and serenity, less anxiety and resentfulness. They love more, are more compassionate and have more understanding. They do not fear most of the things that they used to fear. They are less greedy and more generous. And they do not boast, since it is not they who have done any of this. It is Jesus in them. They are not yet fully what they want to be but they are also not what they used to be. Likewise our world proves to us the truth of the ability to reject this intimacy—proven today by the sins made possible by the misuse of our freedom—so many evils that cry to heaven for justice—all wars: the war of our culture against marriage and the family (late last/Friday night, same sex marriage became legal in New York state by the action of the state legislature and the signature of the “Catholic” governor); the casual approach by many—in the government, some medical providers, some politician and too many citizens—to the elderly, the terminally ill, those challenged mentally or physically; most of all the rejection of divine intimacy no more obvious in our own time than by the continuing evil of the murder of the bodies of the unborn in the wombs of their mothers—the sin of abortion that, with more agony than any other evil in our own time, cries to heaven for justice; an act that is a total rejection of intimacy with God.

Again, St. Thomas Aquinas instructs us: …My dearly beloved, is it not beyond human power to express the ineffable delicacy of this sacrament in which spiritual sweetness is tasted in its very source, in which is brought to mind the remembrance of that all-excelling charity which Christ showed in His sacred passion? Surely it was to impress more profoundly upon the hearts of the faithful the immensity of this charity that our loving Savior instituted this sacrament at the last supper when, having celebrated the Pasch with His disciples. He was about to leave the world and return to the Father. It was to serve as an unending remembrance of His passion, as the fulfillment of ancient types — this the greatest of His miracles….

Today, and always, let us use our freedom to be thankful for the Gift of the Body and Blood of Christ that so perfectly corresponds to our needs as it nourishes our hearts and our spirits, and as It feeds and purifies all our senses: touch and vision, smell, taste and hearing. …He gave Himself, what more could He give? O, how He loves you and me….

Fr. Robert Behnke
Corpus Christi, June 26, 2011

Delving More Deeply Into the Holy Trinity

2011-06-22T10:46:00.000-07:00

Fr. Robert Behnke

Trinity Sunday is, for me and I suspect for many who preach, a particularly challenging Sunday. How can one say anything helpful, nourishing, spiritually significant let alone spiritually challenging, about the Mystery of God the Blessed Trinity, when in the first place man could never have figured out that God is a Trinity? God had to reveal supernaturally the mystery of what theology calls His “Godhead.” Though man can reason to the existence of God and following that, some truths about God, it would be utterly impossible for man on his own to have come to the conclusion that God is Three Divine Persons in one; God had to reveal this truth to man, because our reason cannot adequately wrap our minds even around the idea, let alone the reality. And the great blessing we celebrate, surely every day, especially at every Sacrifice of the Mass, but particularly on Trinity Sunday, is that we don’t have to figure God out on our own. Surely He has not, and will never, reveal to us all there could be to know about Himself; we would need to be God to know God in His fullness. But the blessing is that we who have met and believed in the Son of God Our Lord Jesus Christ have been told by Him all that we need to know about God. Anything that is true—any truth—can be either external or internal in relation to our own lives. We may know and be able to rattle off the names of the capitals of the fifty states, but that information remains really external – peripheral – to our lives until, perhaps, a person may become first a little curious, then mildly interested, and then passionate, about the history of America and her fifty states: how they came to be, how the boundaries were determined, how they were named, when they entered the union. Then that same knowledge that was once external – peripheral – incidental – now has become internal – important – significant – crucial – to the man who has come genuinely to breathe the study of American history. For one man, knowing the fifty capitals is merely incidental to his life; for another, it becomes like the marrow in his bones.

Sadly, I suspect, the truth of the Trinity remains incidental in the lives of so many many Catholics. Catholics may know the doctrine, they may be able to recite it, and give even a basic explanation of what it means (more often, what it does not mean), but were God not a Trinity, many Catholics might not be bothered or disturbed at all; those Catholic should consider that well, because not embracing the mystery of the Trinity can make one very close to being Jewish or Moslem. So many Catholics, after all (I read it and/or hear it from Catholics at least once a week) say …well, we all believe in the same God – Christians, Jews, Moslems, Hindus, Buddhists… (not knowing that ‘orthodox Buddhists’ don’t believe in God at all), overlooking that only Christians acknowledge the Trinity and, at least for Catholics, the Trinity is the foundation of everything else we believe – everything else the Church teaches. The ancient symbols of the faith – the Apostles’ Creed, the Nicene Creed – are extended professions of faith in the Trinity; here I will use the words of the new translation we will begin using at Mass this coming Advent: I believe in one God, the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth….I believe in one Lord Jesus Christ, the Only-Begotten Son of God….I believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the Giver of life, Who proceeds from the Father and the Son…. How tragic for any Christian, especially for any Catholic, to go through life equating the truth of the Blessed Trinity with their knowing the multiplication tables, or their knowing the names of the planets revolving around our sun, or their knowing the names of all the kings and queen of England. Surely Our Lord came to give us knowledge—divine facts about the Mystery of God–but much more importantly, He came for a specific supernatural purpose: to make it possible for every man actually to enter into the life of the Blessed Trinity: to participate in the eternal life of the Godhead. The Catholic who is a genuine disciple of Our Lord may know–and should learn from childhood–facts that we know about God. But it is not knowledge of the facts about God that brings us into supernatural Trinitarian life. An atheist can learn the facts that others believe about God; an atheist can even teach those facts to others without his believing any facts of belief he teaches. But every time we witness the baptism of a baby, we witness a supernatural event: the Divine Life of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit enveloping that baby who has no human knowledge about the God Who at the moment of baptism is adopting him as His very own child. That life of God is the most precious gift that baby has—a human first created in the image and likeness of the one God—and now, because of his baptism, that baby becomes a actual child of God; from the moment that child reaches what we call the age of the use of reason, that child of God’s vocation is preserving God’s supernatural life, increasing that life, by knowing not just things about God, but by knowing God Himself: His will for us, His divine plan – to know God is to love God and so, as Our Lord tells us, …if you love Me, keep My commandments….

Archbishop Francis Chullikatt

This past week, at the United Nations General Assembly, the permanent observer of the Holy See to the U.N., Archbishop Francis Chullikatt, was roundly booed as he made a speech. But that diplomatic representative of the Holy See was not booed and hissed by Moslems or Hindus or Buddhists, but by representatives of some Western nations, of Europe and the Americas. The General Assembly was debating a statement it titled Political Declaration on HIV/AIDS. Here is a sampling of what the Church’s representative said that caused such a rude reaction from so many Western diplomats:

…In providing more than one fourth of all care for those who are suffering from HIV and AIDS, Catholic healthcare institutions know well the importance of access to treatment, care and support for the millions of people living with and affected by HIV and AIDS….The Holy See understands that, when referring to "young people," the definition of which enjoying no international consensus, States must always respect the responsibilities, rights and duties of parents to provide appropriate direction and guidance to their children, which includes having primary responsibility for the upbringing, development, and education of their children….States must acknowledge that the family, based on marriage being the equal partnership between one man and one woman and the natural and fundamental group unit of society, is indispensable in the fight against HIV and AIDS, for the family is where children learn moral values to help them live in a responsible manner and where the greater part of care and support is provided….The Holy See rejects references to terms such as "populations at high risk" because they treat persons as objects and can give the false impression that certain types of irresponsible behavior are somehow morally acceptable. The Holy See does not endorse the use of condoms/commodities including as part of HIV and AIDS prevention programs or classes/programs of education in sex/sexuality. Prevention programs or classes/programs of education in human sexuality should focus not on trying to convince the world that risky and dangerous behavior forms part of an acceptable lifestyle, but rather should focus on risk avoidance, which is ethically and empirically sound. The only safe and completely reliable method of preventing the sexual transmission of HIV is abstinence before marriage and respect and mutual fidelity within marriage, which is and must always be the foundation of any discussion of prevention and support. The Holy See does not accept so-called "harm reduction" efforts related to drug use. Such efforts do not respect the dignity of those who are suffering from drug addiction as they do not treat or cure the sick person, but instead falsely suggest that they cannot break free from the cycle of addiction. Such persons must be provided the necessary spiritual, psychological and familial support to break free from the addictive behavior in order to restore their dignity and encourage social inclusion. The Holy See rejects the characterization of persons who engage in prostitution as "sex workers" as this can give the false impression that prostitution could somehow be a legitimate form of work. Prostitution cannot be separated from the issue of the status and dignity of persons; governments and society must not accept such a dehumanization and objectification of persons. What is needed is a value-based approach to counter the disease of HIV and AIDS, an approach which provides the necessary care and moral support for those infected and which promotes living in conformity with the norms of the natural moral order, an approach which respects fully the inherent dignity of the human person….

It may be true that, on first examination, many Christians think that the Blessed Trinity doesn't connect with anything much in either their life or worship. But our belief in the dignity of every human clearly follows from our belief in the mystery of the Blessed Trinity, and in particular from what we believe about how the Blessed Trinity interacts in the life of the world. Our Lord spells it out clearly and succinctly in speaking to Nicodemus in today’s Gospel: …God so loved the world that He gave His only Son, so that everyone who believes in Him might not perish but might have eternal life. For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world but that the world might be saved through Him….
The action of the Blessed Trinity for us—our creation in God’s image, our salvation by God’s death, our adoption as children of God in the sacrament of baptism—these are the reasons why the Church has always fought—and still fights today—for respect for the dignity of every human person—why the Church fought in the past and still fights today against any power, any culture, any nation, any people, any opinion that diminishes the intrinsic worth of even a single human being. This is why the Church strenuously opposes abortion and opposes anyone who in any way supports abortion or even facilitates abortion; this is why the bishops of the USA just this past week formally reiterated the Church’s opposition to assisted suicide, something now legally allowable in three states, and something that I wouldn’t be surprised to debut soon in the Illinois legislature. This is why the Church has Catholic Charities, hospitals, nursing homes, grade and high schools, senior citizen centers; this is why the Church invented the idea of universities in the Middle Ages; this is why no single institution cares for more HIV/AIDS patients than the Catholic Church—because the mystery of the Blessed Trinity, Which is a mystery of unending, self-sacrificing, eternal, other-centered love—is at the heart of the Church, at the heart of the Catholic Faith. The nations of the West and their UN ambassadors believe that HIV/AIDS can be successfully treated by acting as if narcissistic sexual activity is good but must carry a caution in the form of a condom. The Church knows that HIV/AIDS—as well as every other evil on the planet—can only be fought and defeated with self-sacrificing love—a love that entails both self-respect and respect for the other rather, than by a utilitarian treatment of persons as objects, by passing out free condoms and giving instructions even to children on how to use them. The Church teaches that people have more dignity than the UN or the US government realizes; all people have a dignity that comes directly from their creation by God the Three-in-One—Father, Son, Holy Spirit.

In today’s Second Reading, St. Paul links belief in the Blessed Trinity with the daily practice of Christian living. Being in right relationship with God is the whole point of life as a Catholic:…Mend your ways…writes St. Paul….encourage one another, agree with one another, live in peace, and the God of love and peace will be with you…. In other words, act and live like what you are, as what God created you to be, a human being created in the image and likeness of the God Who is eternal, unending, everlasting love. If we can decide always to try to live as what we have been created to be, we will, on this Feast of the Most Holy Trinity, today have delved very deeply into the mystery of that Blessed Trinity, and in that mystery we will see God ever more clearly.

Trinity Sunday, June 19, 2011

In the Crosshairs

2011-06-22T10:36:00.000-07:00

Fr. Robert Behnke

At times, God the Holy Spirit may seem to be the Neglected Person of the Blessed Trinity. Though we speak of the Holy Spirit every time we make the Sign of the Cross, and also in the doxology Glory be to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Spirit we pray to the Holy Spirit, in our conversations about God many people speak much more often of God the Father, and especially of God the Son, Our Lord Jesus Christ. In a sense this is understandable, since God is essentially a Mystery—not to Himself but to us—revealed in nature as the one true God, but more fully by divine revelation as three divine persons in the one true God. We could not know there is a Trinity of Persons, yet only one God, had God not revealed this truth to us; we absolutely could not have figured this out on our own. You may know that a main objection to Christianity, and particularly to Catholicism, on the part of both Jews and Moslems is that, because we believe the Father is God, the Son is God, and the Holy Spirit is God, Catholics are thus accused of believing in three “Gods.” Also, our own human minds more easily conceptualize the notion of “father” and “son” than “spirit.” Even the Catechism of the Catholic Church says far less about the Holy Spirit than about the Father and the Son. In this, the catechism follows the example of the Church’s ancient creeds–the Apostles Creed; the Nicene Creed which we will recite in a few moments. Likewise, the Catechism refers to the Holy Spirit as the Inexpressible Person, but the Person Whom we know: through the Scriptures which He inspired; in Tradition; in the Magisterium which He assists; in Baptism which makes us temples—dwelling places—of God the Holy Spirit; in the other six sacraments; in prayer; in every aspect of the Church’s life. The Church prays to the Holy Spirit more often than we might think: in the Gloria of the Mass; at the conclusion of prayers; in the Divine Office, especially on Sundays in the hymn Te Deum Laudamus. In the most important part of the Mass, it is God the Holy Spirit Whom the Church asks God the Father to send so that by the power of God the Holy Spirit bread and wine are changed into the Body and Blood of Our Lord. The Holy Spirit is inseparable from the Father and the Son; Our Lord tells us this Himself, assuring us that He and the Father are one – He who sees Me sees the Father—and in promising not to leave us orphans—not alone, not without Him, not without God—but to send the Holy Spirit–His Spirit. The Holy Spirit is the Love between the Father and the Son, a Love so real that That Love is an Eternal Person, without beginning or end, in the triune community that is God.

Perhaps many Catholics connect the coming of God the Holy Spirit into their lives with their reception of the sacrament of Confirmation. True enough, but not the total picture. Recall that St. Paul tells us today, when we were baptized, we were…all given to drink of the one Spirit. In Baptism, God dwells in you; you are filled with sanctifying grace, God adopts you as His child and makes you an heir of heaven. What Baptism begins, Confirmation completes–the baptized person in Confirmation receives the supernatural ability to do what we cannot do under our own power—to be a witness to the truth of Christ found in His One Holy Catholic Apostolic Church. That is exactly the transformation we see in the apostles on the first Pentecost. That word apostle means Spirit-enlightened witness. The disciples truly became apostles on Pentecost, or better said, they now know what it means to be an apostle - they are no longer afraid to witness to Jesus. And that word martyr means witness. Note the color red today, the color of the Holy Spirit. Because red is the color of blood, it is also the color of martyrs. It is the color of agape, the type of love that one has when he is willing to sacrifice everything, including one’s very own life, for Jesus. On the first Easter night, the two disciples on the road to Emmaus—after they recognized Jesus in the Breaking of the Bread and after He then disappears—they say to each other …Were not our hearts burning inside of us…. That is how Jesus loves us, and how He wants us to love Him. That is what Jesus does–His Sacred Heart burns with self-sacrificing love. That is what He wants from us; that is what Scripture means when it tells us God is Love.

Make no mistake; these are not idle, flowery, wispy thoughts and words. The witness of martyrdom has not disappeared; it is the golden thread that binds the Church with Our Lord for these two thousand years of the Church’s history. In the past, there have been times in which it was relatively safe—even comfortable—to be a Catholic (I think the 50s and the very early 60s were such a time in our country, but not in the nations under Communism); many more times in history, being a Catholic has been dangerous. All the martyrs, from St. Stephen to St. Maximilian Kolbe, show us this earthly danger. We now seem to be moving quickly, and deeper and deeper, into a period when in the United States it will inevitably become more and more dangerous to live a faithful practicing Catholic life. For that reason, we should pray every day to the Holy Spirit Who in the sacrament of Confirmation has already given us all we need to be faithful in a public way, that we will use His gifts to be faithful—faithful even to the point of martyrdom—since in so many ways our world is telling us that we really should not be free to be faithful Catholics in public; the culture says there is little or no place for Catholicism in the here and now of the public square—that it is wrong, a bad thing, even a crime, to be a faithful Catholic. We have seen, over just the past few weeks, how the Illinois civil union legislation has impacted the ability of the Illinois Catholic Charities to place children for adoption and foster care according to what the Church teaches about marriage and family. The freedom to be Catholic openly today in Illinois is at great risk.

Tonight's first reading, describing the descent of the Holy Spirit on Our Blessed Mother and the apostles, gives us a clue to the meaning of the experience of the first Pentecost. The reading from The Acts of the Apostles does not dwell on the fire, the wind and the noise, but on the transforming experience of the devout men and women living in Jerusalem from every nation under heaven. They hear these Galileans speaking foreign languages, so that each one of them hears the apostles preaching in their own language about the marvels of God. This miracle is the reversal of the tower of Babel experience, in which man’s language became confused because of man’s attempt to climb, under his own power, right up to heaven—man’s attempt to substitute himself for God. The descent of the Holy Spirit leading to the fearless preaching of the apostles shows forth the seeds of the Church as one holy, catholic and apostolic. The Gift of the Holy Spirit does not rule out difficulty, suffering or human effort. St Paul in today's second reading reminds the Christians in Corinth that the Church is like a human body and that the gifts of the Spirit are not about enthusiasm or special knowledge for an elite group, but a variety of gifts for building up the whole body of Christ, in which each of us has a part assigned to us by God. St. Paul's image of the Church as the mystical Body of Christ reflects the truth of today's Gospel: Our Risen Lord comes on Easter night to His closest followers—those who had deserted Him—to bring them now a peace which is not just a calming of hearts and conscience, but the surety of heart which will enable and embolden them to go out and preach the gospel to the very ends of the earth. Having overcome death, now Our Lord breathes His Spirit into them, to enable them to witness to Him; He gives them the power to withstand and overcome the power of this world—the sins of the world which He bore on Calvary.
For years now, the trend toward liberal dogmatism and political correctness is serving to muzzle religious Christians who are doing nothing else but carrying on the Church’s Pentecost mission. The hateful reaction on the part of homosexual activists and activist promoters of abortion—and the opposition to the Church on the part of many civil authorities, many of whom profess to he Catholic—the hateful reaction and the civic opposition to the Church’s legitimate request to be allowed merely to place children in homes, not according to some sectarian Church teaching, but according to the dictates of the law placed by God in human nature, demonstrates how serious the problem is becoming. And, though we probably don’t think about it too much, our next-door neighbor Canada, a country where homosexual marriage is legal and opposition to abortion meets with unhidden scorn, and often with violence, punitive fines, or even jail time, is less than 300 miles from Chicago–just across the river from Detroit.
The recent and still ongoing health care debate; stem cell research; the absolute secrecy of every confession a priest hears, even for the most horrendous of sins; the Church’s right to control her own structure and finances; the right for a Catholic to refuse to cooperate in any medical procedure the Church teaches is intrinsically evil; the right of priests to preach about doctrine and morality that touch upon political questions; the right of Catholics to defend their faith in the public square without fear or intimidation; the right for me to say what I am saying right now: all these things are right now seriously challenged in some section of our country. One has only to read most journalism in the secular press, a press which admires all kinds of perversion and seriously promotes all sorts of sins that cry to heaven. Most mainstream media, entertainment in movies and TV, all the rest—all have numbed the conscience of America; years and years of Will and Grace have turned perversion into acceptable, fuzzy, warm, cuddly, laudable social behavior. And those who openly object or oppose or even criticize any of this should know: the culture is coming after them next.
And then the rest of us. Then come the laws which will put all of us, five or ten years from now, in the crosshairs of district attorneys and an increasing politically correct legal system which will then judge us guilty: guilty for using forbidden words, guilty for defending forbidden doctrine, guilty for–as the politically correct culture puts it–guilty for promoting hatred.
Yet we should not fear; we can not fear. God keeps every one of His promises: He is with us always; He has sent us His Holy Spirit, the Spirit Whose works are wisdom, understanding, counsel, fortitude, knowledge, piety, and fear–fear not of the police, fear not of the government–fear of the Lord. It is the same Holy Spirit that enabled those first apostles to face even death for the truth of Jesus and His Church. They knew that even death would not, could not, separate them from God–God Who is both Life and Love. No matter how difficult being a devout faithful Catholic may become, all this too will end. Yet God does not—God will never—force us, as we well know. Even God the Holy Spirit will not make us be His witness. God does not make us–but God makes us able. God is all just; God cannot require our doing what is impossible, so God makes us able to do all He requires, even to do what seems most painful, most difficult—even to do what is truly impossible without the help of God. That is what God the Holy Spirit did for the apostles on Pentecost; that is what God the Holy Spirit does for us each time we receive the sacraments worthily—He gives us an increase of grace—an increase of His own life, until, when, our having have remained faithful, our earthly life is complete, over, finished, in us God will be all in all.

Pentecost Sunday

Heaven : Our Life's Goal

2011-06-22T10:32:00.000-07:00

Fr. Robert Behnke

This past week, I read an article from the Our Sunday Visitor on Catholics who home-school their children. If you’re not aware of it, more and more Catholic parents are choosing to home-school their children for a variety of reasons, the chief of which is often dissatisfaction with the religious instruction their children have received in some Catholic schools. The article quoted a number of individuals—parents, priests, bishops, Catholic school officials—and, as might be expected, some were vociferously opposed; many others were adamantly in favor. Those in favor rightly pointed to the teaching of the Second Vatican Council: parents are the first teachers of their children. The matter becomes even more complicated when considering preparation for the sacraments, as canon law gives the pastor the right both to give instruction to and to determine the readiness of candidates for the sacraments of initiation; with children, this would usually concern First Holy Communion and Confirmation. The article did not break any new ground, nor did it reach any certain conclusion. And so what I found most interesting was not the article itself but the readers’ comments following the article. Most of those comments came from Catholics who have had experience with home-schooling. And the shortest comment was the one I also found the most profound: a reader stated …the reason I home-school my children is that I want them to get to heaven….

I wonder how many Catholics ever give serious reflection to this as their life’s goal: to get to heaven; to get the members of my family to heaven; to get my dearest and nearest—family, friends, neighbors—to heaven. I know that, by my listening to Catholics, in this one parish, whether within or outside of the confessional, there are many—perhaps very many—who are concerned, for themselves, and, even more concerned for those whom they love: children, spouses, even parents who seemingly have abandoned the Faith. They pray for them, have Masses offered for them, remember them at the moment of Holy Communion. But all those other Catholics—so many who seem to have lost sight of even the purpose of Our Lord’s incarnation, His coming to earth, His life, His teaching, especially His passion and His death—what do they think the ultimate purpose of all this is, if not for souls to be saved—for souls to get to heaven? This past week, Caritas International, an international charitable agency of the Holy See, meeting the past few days in Rome, unveiled a new video on its website, repeatedly stating its new motto One Human Family, Zero Poverty. The slogan was criticized by the President of the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace, Peter Cardinal Turkson of Ghana. He reminded the Church of Our Lord’s words…the poor you shall always have with you. Cardinal Turkson was not for a second criticizing or diminishing the Church’s consistent and important work of alleviating the suffering of the poor, but he was reminding the Church of its ultimate purpose, and so of the meaning of what Our Lord said…the poor you shall always have with you…; Our Lord did not come as a social reformer, to be an activist or a revolutionary; He came for a supernatural purpose: for redemption, for forgiveness of sins, that each of us might be watchful and ready and prepared for, not the end of the whole world, but for the end of our own world, for that most important moment of our whole life on earth—for the moment of our death and our own particular judgment. If that is not the first purpose of Christ’s death and resurrection, if that is not the first purpose of His giving us the Church, then everything we do here—all the sacraments, all the Masses, all the hours of adoration before the Blessed Sacrament—all this loses its meaning and purpose, and all those—especially all those fallen-away Catholics—who so assuredly claim they can pray to God in their living room or their bedroom or on the front porch or in the woods just as well as they can pray in any Catholic church—if nothing absolutely unique takes place just here—if what happens here can happen everywhere else—well, then they are right. They are then also right about not needing to remain faithful, not needing to keep the commandments and to live one’s life in harmony both with the natural law and with revealed truth. If Our Lord did not come for a supernatural purpose, to achieve a goal that man on his own could never achieve: that we might be saved, to redeem us, and if He did not leave us the Church as His instrument of salvation—then: why did He come, why did He suffer and die, why are we here right now?

But Our Lord had no need to come to earth if His purpose was just to pay us a visit, or to let us know He “cares,” or to give us an example. Because God is everywhere, none of those purposes would necessitate an incarnation—God taking on human flesh, our human nature—nor does any reason other than, as we say each Sunday in the Nicene Creed…for us men and for our salvation…explain and require His suffering and His death. St. Peter states today for us the reason for the coming of Emmanuel—God with us—…Christ suffered for sins once…that He might lead you to God…. And Our Lord, on the very night before He dies—because that night is the moment at which, and the context in which, He speaks the words of today’s Gospel—is telling those first disciples—the apostles—those for whom He is about to suffer and die—what He requires, of them and of us—what He requires of all who want to claim a share in His acts of salvation—what He requires of those who want to go to heaven, to be led to God:…If you love Me, you will keep My commandments….Whoever has My commandments and observes them is the one Who loves Me. And whoever loves Me will be loved by My Father, and I will love him and reveal Myself to Him….

Twice in such a brief space—twice as He is about to be apprehended and brought before the Sanhedrin, before the chief priest, before Pilate—twice at this singular moment, Our Lord teaches…if you love Me, you will keep My commandments…. None of the apostles—cowards though most of them proved to be—none asked Which commandments? All of them? All the time? Can we change some we don’t like? If some prove to be inconvenient, or opposed to popular opinion, may we adapt, or change, or drop some? That, simply put then, and simply put now—if someone wants to get to heaven—changing the intent of Our Lord’s words is simply out of the question. And recall, too, in that group of apostles stood Simon, now Peter, meaning Rock—the rock on which Our Lord said He would build His Church. Peter, for all his cowardice, understood what it would now mean for him to be that rock; at that moment. He might not have liked what it meant, but he understood—because he would soon betray Our Lord—it meant suffering, even eventual death—but Peter, who was so often used to questioning Our Lord, arguing with Him, sometimes even putting his foot right into his mouth—here Peter is silent, for he realizes that he must now be the rock on which the proclamation of the path to heaven—…keep My commandments…—now rests.

If Our Lord makes keeping His commandments the way to heaven, could He be so unloving as not to give us a sure and certain way of knowing precisely what is required of those who want to do as He prescribes? We should be both happy and thankful to know that the successor of Peter, the Holy Father, has the authority to proclaim the truth, so that each individual has not to make up his own mind about what Our Lord means and wants. The infallibility of the pope and of the Church’s magisterium is a gift revealing the great mercy of God, to preserve true faith in the world, and to restrain freedom of opinion from its own suicidal excesses. And this is precisely why polls telling us what “most Catholics” think or believe about this or that issue are of use only in giving us a number, but not at all of any use in determining supernatural truth. Likewise, this is precisely why the prominent issues of the day—same-sex unions, homosexual “marriage,” contraception, abortion, adoption of innocent little babies by two daddies and no mommy or vice versa—why all these must be seen and acted upon with the eyes of faith, and why the truth of these matters must be determined by what Our Lord has given us to be the certain guide to what He requires of His 21st-century disciples—the teaching authority of the Church. Catholic Charities of Illinois has this past week laid off its adoption and foster-care workers because the state legislature refused to give agencies opposed to adoption by same-sex couples an exemption to the requirements of the state’s new civil union law that will take effect this Wednesday; no question: a loss here, in this life on earth, but on earth faithful to Christ, and to the meaning of His words…the poor you shall always have with you…. Loving Our Lord—keeping His commandments—getting to heaven—all three go indivisibly together.

Many—surely not all—but many who, in whole or, especially, in part, abandon the practice of the Catholic Faith do so because they say things such as …following Jesus has nothing to do with all those Catholic teachings and rules…; they want to move down the cafeteria line, choosing what appeals to their spiritual appetite. On the other hand, every single person whom in my 38 years of the priesthood I have seen embrace the practice of the Catholic Faith has done so because they were convinced by the certainty of the Faith; they discovered that making up their own mind about each individual tenet they would believe was getting out of hand; often a convert would say something like I can’t really tell you what my previous church believed, because no one could say for sure. Everyone I have ever known who chose to become Catholic did so because the Catholic Church was certain about what is true and what is required; only the Catholic Church claims for itself its identity as the one true Church of Jesus Christ. No other Christian denomination has even dared apply for that position. If loving Our Lord and getting to heaven means keeping His commandments, only one Church speaks with certainty about exactly what that means. How God finally judges the heart and soul of each person is a mystery known only to Him. But in terms of getting to heaven, I have never heard of an instance of a death-bed conversion to the Lutheran Church, or the Baptist, or Episcopal, or Methodist, or Presbyterian, or Orthodox, or to any other church. I know only of death-bed conversions to the Catholic Church. When it comes down to that final, ultimate, moment of my life, I want to be certain I have been, and am now, in the right pew.

The Sixth Sunday of Easter

Decisions, Decisions.... and Touching the Feet of Christ

2011-06-22T10:01:00.000-07:00

Fr. Robert Behnke

My having been a priest for 38 years last month, I have been preaching, and so preparing, homilies for that same number of years—actually, for 39 years, since I preached for a little more than a year as a deacon before my being ordained a priest. During that year as a deacon, I developed a personal method for homily preparation, and I still use basically the same method over the week, beginning right after the previous Sunday. I won’t bore you with the details, except to say that I have tried consistently to stick to my weekly preparation timetable; the Church teaches in the Second Vatican Council’s decree on the priesthood that preaching is one of a priest’s primary responsibilities. However, since most rules have some occasional exception (not divine law, but human rules), I have had occasionally to interrupt my well-established homily preparation routine: my dad’s sudden death on the Wednesday morning before Father’s Day comes immediately to my mind.

This past week, likewise, events altered my usual method, in that an item in the news so caught my attention that I decided there was a reason to switch the course of my homily theme and remarks. I had intended to address that this day, in the ordinary form of the Roman Rite, logically can only be called Ascension Thursday Sunday, an illogical title for an illogic observance of the Ascension of Our Lord—though this is not an issue in this extraordinary form (though I saw online that today there is an Tridentine observance of what is called an external solemnity of the Ascension at St. John Cantius, a Mass offer by Bishop Morlino of Madison, Wisconsin). I thought when it happened, and experience now confirms my opinion, that the decision on the part of most provinces’ bishops to move the feast to Sunday makes little sense, especially because this particular feast so clearly demands a Thursday observance to be in line with Scripture and the Tradition. So I thought this feast-on-wheels would provide a fitting opportunity to speak about the important difference in the Faith between divinely revealed truth (which comes from God Who can neither deceive nor be deceived) and mere human decision, which can obviously be mistaken, even tragically mistaken, and even mistaken when decided by a priest, a bishop, or even a whole gaggle of bishops. If you have not heard, the Bishops Conference of England and Wales has reinstituted abstinence from meat on every Friday of the year, beginning this coming September; these same bishops are seriously considering moving, from Sundays, the Epiphany back to January 6th, the Ascension back to 40 days after Easter Sunday, and Corpus Christi back to the Thursday after Trinity Sunday. They did not have to admit to a mistake in having moved these feasts from their centuries-old place in the calendar to the nearest Sunday, since their consideration of changing the change speaks for itself. It is important for Catholics, as aggravated as any Catholic might become by a decision of priests or bishops with which one may even vehemently disagrees, to remember that not all decisions taken by the Church are of equal importance (our salvation does not depend, for example, on the date of the Feast of Corpus Christi), and that the Holy Spirit, Whose coming the Church celebrates next Sunday on Pentecost, remains always with the Church, to prevent and impede such decisions that would otherwise prove fatal for the Faith.

That was my plan—that was where my preparation was taking me—until last Friday. The past week was kind of a bad news week for Catholics, and for any genuinely believing Christians. First, civil union licenses on June 1st, then civil union ceremonies on June 2nd—all accompanied by much media fanfare and public falderal, sickening and patronizing speeches by politicians, and plenty of Eli’s cheesecake to go around. And then the announcement that the dioceses of Rockford, Peoria, and Joliet have shut down their foster-care apparatus because of the new civil union law (our archdiocese stopped foster-care services in 2007 because of a similar county ordinance and an insurance issue). Many of the readers’ comments in the Tribune regarding these diocesan shutdowns were nothing but hateful and biased. Then, Friday morning, I saw the news that the Holy Father received Vice-President Biden who was in Rome to observe the 150th anniversary of the Italian nation. It wasn’t that audience which angered me; the Holy Father is the pastor of the whole world, and in his being that pastor, he is charged with correction of any wayward member of his flock. The fact that the audience was not on the pope’s public schedule and was not announced ahead of time by either the Vatican or the White House, and the fact that no comment by either party was made after the audience, leads to a reasonable speculation that perhaps a kind of scolding took place. It wasn’t the vice-president who was doing the scolding. The fact of the meeting came to light only because reporters, who were present to cover the arrival of the president of the Palestinian territories for a papal audience, also recognized the vice-president’s limousine. What got to me was the typical reporting of the secular media. Here is a small sample from Friday’s USA Today:

“Did Pope Benedict take Vice President Biden to school today on abortion? We may not know. Their brief Vatican meeting today was strictly private, diplomatic speak for how we're not going to get photos or a transcript of Pope Benedict XVI's meeting, just like we didn't get them when then-speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi visited Benedict in 2009. What unites the visits of the top American leaders? These are two faithful, Mass-attending Catholics who vote for all the social justice issues that the U.S. bishops stand for on topics like peace, poverty and immigration. But their views favoring abortion rights wipe all that away to the thinking of those for whom abortion is a litmus test….The Associated Press, in covering the Biden/Benedict visit, picked up the Catholic Vote "non-negotiable" lingo that actually never appears in the current U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops policy on Faithful Citizenship. That document, intended to guide voters on Catholic teachings, not to endorse specific candidates, has traditionally been reissued each presidential election cycle. Last time, conservatives, campaigning for stronger public condemnation, and denial of communion for Catholic politicians who support abortion rights, were unhappy with the document. Later this month, when the bishops hold their semiannual meeting, they're set to discuss whether they're going to plunge into the fray again, revising Faithful Citizenship for 2012….”

It is absolutely true, and so the Church teaches, that only God can read the hearts of all men. But it is likewise absolutely true that, because of the gift of free will, no one is forced by God to profess the Catholic Faith, so that anyone who wills to be a Catholic and so to be known by others as a Catholic has a responsibility to be Catholic with honesty and integrity: to profess the Faith correctly and in its entirety. To equate faithful Catholicism with, as this reporter states,…Mass attending...is absurd, since even the most hardened of unrepentant sinners, or any schismatic, or any Lutheran, or even any atheist, is free to attend Mass every Sunday and they are even free, as the modernists would put it,…to get something out of it…. But that something cannot be sanctifying grace if they in any direct way act to make abortion possible, and thus that person who makes abortion possible is not a faithful Catholic, no matter how often they attend Mass or even may—sacrilegiously—receive Holy Communion. The sacraments are not magic; they do not turn sinners into saints unless the sinner chooses repentance for himself as the narrow door to eternal life. Quite frankly, I had had it—had it with all this continuing public intentional misstatement of what the Church believes and teaches and all the intentional miss-definition of what is a faithful Catholic. Then I took another hard look at today’s Gospel—the Sunday after Ascension Thursday—and allowed a little humility to substitute for what I was believing was my entitlement to anger and judgment of what surely are sins of the enemies of life:

…These things I have spoken to you that you may not be scandalized. They will expel you from the synagogues. Yes, the hour is coming for everyone who kills you to think he is offering worship to God. And these things they will do because they have not known the Father nor Me. But these things I have spoken to you, that when the time for them has come you may remember that I told you….

And then I came across this meditation written by Pope Benedict when he was Cardinal Ratzinger:

You are surely familiar with all those precious, naïve images in which only the feet of Jesus are visible, sticking out of the cloud, at the heads of the apostles. The cloud, for its part, is a dark circle on the perimeter; on the inside, however, blazing light. It occurs to me that precisely in the apparent naïveté of this representation something very deep comes into view. All we see of Christ in the time of history are his feet and the cloud. His feet—what are they? We are reminded, first of all, of a peculiar sentence from the Resurrection account in Matthew’s Gospel, where it is said that the women held onto the feet of the Risen Lord and worshipped him. As the Risen One, he towers over earthly proportions. We can still only touch his feet; and we touch them in adoration. Here we could reflect that we come as worshippers, following his trail, close to his footsteps. Praying, we go to him; praying, we touch him, even if in this world, so to speak, always only from below, only from afar, always only on the trail of his earthly steps. At the same time it becomes clear that we do not find the footprints of Christ when we look only below, when we measure only footprints and want to subsume faith in the obvious. The Lord is movement toward above, and only in moving ourselves, in looking up and ascending, do we recognize him. When we read the Church Fathers something important is added. The correct ascent of man occurs precisely where he learns, in humbly turning toward his neighbor, to bow very deeply, down to his feet, down to the gesture of the washing of feet. It is precisely humility, which can bow low, that carries man upward. This is the dynamic of ascent that the feast of the Ascension wants to teach us.

I looked in my hand missal and, sure enough, on the page picturing the Ascension—no head, only the feet, of Our Lord. What is God telling us by all the activities of evil that seem now to be surrounding and enveloping the Church? Surely more penance, and repentance, and charity—on our part—and better use of the gifts of the Holy Spirit—wisdom, understanding, counsel, fortitude, knowledge, piety, and fear of the Lord—gifts we have from our Confirmation—gifts to be activated when we encounter any of the forces of evil—whether they are hot or cold or indifferent. And our faith must always come with humility—a faith that never forgets that God is God, and that I am no and never will be, God; a faith that knows that, neither my own wisdom, nor the forces of evil, but Divine Providence has control of all things. And perhaps most of all, a faith that believes, just as He always has, He still remains with us, guiding the Church now through all this mess—through everything—believing that, at last, He will come again—finally—in glory.

The Evolution of Liturgy

2011-06-05T08:49:00.000-07:00

Fr. Robert Behnke

In case you missed it, last Sunday at this Mass Father Campbell delivered what in my opinion was an excellent homily, using as his touchstone the recently issued instruction of the Congregation of the Faith’s instruction Ecclesiae Universae, which was sent to all the world’s bishops to clarify aspects of the motu proprio of the Holy Father Pope Benedict XVI Summorum Pontificum, in which the Pope extended the use of this ancient form of the Mass to any who desire it. Among the practical issues settled are May one receive Holy Communion in the hand?—No; May altar girls be used?—No; May the vernacular be used for the epistle and gospel?-Only at Low Mass; Must the group requesting the ancient Mass have existed before the issuance of the motu proprio in July of 2007—No. Using the recent instruction clarifying the motu proprio as a starting point, Father Campbell eloquently traced the ups and downs of the history of the Mass from the council until the present. Today I would just like to add a few of my own thoughts and observations.
Father Campbell remarked, I believe, that the decree of the Second Vatican Council on the liturgy, Sacrosanctum Consilium, was the first decree issued by the council. Sacrosanctum Consilium was, in fact, issued in December 1963, only a year and two months from the council’s beginning. This is an important point, because it demonstrates the supreme importance of the liturgy—especially the liturgy of the Mass—in the life of the Church. As you heard last week, there really was nothing revolutionary in that document. Rather than being revolutionary, I think it would be accurate to call the document evolutionary, because it evolved from the continuing evolution of the liturgy—again, especially from the liturgy of the Mass. In the 1950s and 60s, I was growing up in a very traditional parish on the far northwest side of Chicago (St. Francis Borgia was so traditional that, even though the mandate had come down, not from the council as Father Campbell noted last Sunday—not from Rome—but from the Archdiocese of Chicago that by a certain date Mass had to be celebrated facing the people, the pastor Father Stokes had the altar in the new church which opened on Christmas of 1964 firmly cemented facing not the people but facing the large crucifix hanging over that altar—just as we have here); yet, during the 1950s, we ask a parish were singing English hymns at all Sunday Low Masses; at daily school Masses, which were all High Masses, the entire congregation—children and adults—sang all the ordinary parts of the Mass—Kyrie, Gloria, Credo, Sanctus, Agnus Dei—and of course they were sung in Latin. This was the express wish of all the popes throughout the 20th century, beginning with Pope St. Pius X. So my childhood parish—and a number of others (I found this out when I went to Quigley North for high school and compared parishes with other high school seminarians of the time—were doing what the popes had asked; what the council taught about the liturgy simply evolved from what the popes had been saying and what many were already doing in some form.

Another point of importance demonstrating how the liturgy of the Mass was evolving concerns the missal we are using for this Mass. What the 2007 motu proprio of Pope Benedict insists upon is that, for this form of the ancient Mass, the missal to be used is the missal of 1962, sometimes now referred to as the missal of Blessed John XXIII. But that missal contained only two small changes—two small evolutions: the addition of the name of St. Joseph to the Roman canon, and the addition of four optional prefaces. But the missal of 1962 itself followed the missal of just two years earlier—the missal of 1960—and that missal had many changes or evolutions: the second Confiteor just before Holy Communion was eliminated; the whole system of the liturgical rankings of feasts was overhauled (if you have a missal issued in the 1950s or before, the ranks of feasts will be simple, double, double major, double of the second class, double of the first class; in 1960 the ranks became simply first class, second class, third class, fourth class. Before 1960, whenever the Gloria was not said or sung, the Mass ended with the priest saying or singing not Ite, missa est, but Benedicamus Domino; beginning in 1960, Benedicamus Domino was sung only when something liturgical followed immediately after Mass, like a procession. And if you have even older missals, you will find other items that have been since changed or eliminated: the Holy Week liturgies were drastically changed by Pope Pius XII in 1951 and again in 1955. Most major feasts once had octaves—the feast was commemorated in some manner at Mass for eight days. One of the 1950s missals eliminated all octaves except Christmas, Easter, and Pentecost. The point is that the Council recognized this ongoing evolution in the liturgy of the Mass and gave it renewed direction: congregational singing in Latin, the use of the vernacular for the scriptures and the peoples’ sung parts, but the retention of Latin as the universal Church’s liturgical language; all this is what Pope Benedict calls the hermeneutic of continuity. But, as Father Campbell said last Sunday, this is hardly what happened after the council in most places. Pope Benedict recognizes and admits this by his making the ancient form of the Mass readily available to all who want it—their request can now neither be ignored nor refused. The Holy Father also tells the Church that this form of the Mass—the 1962 missal of Blessed John XXIII, being neither a relic nor a museum piece—will continue to evolve in the future, with new prefaces and new saints added to its calendar. The pope admits that the 1970 missal of Paul VI was, the pope says, a new missal, rather than an evolution from the prior missals of 1962, and those coming as a result of the council’s decree on the sacred liturgy—the missals of 1964, 1965, and 1967. There is a well-worn story about Pope Paul VI; the Holy Father enters the sacristy on the day after Pentecost in 1970. On the cabinet, the sacristan has laid out green Mass vestments. The Holy Father asks Why are the vestments not red for the Pentecost octave? The reply is The Pentecost octave is abolished in the new missal? Who did this, asks the pope. Comes the reply: You did, Holy Father?
Dancing in the aisles; drums and banjos and electric guitars; vestments of burlap and drapery and upholstery materials; Michael, row the boat ashore, Kumbaya, and the famous line from Luther’s A Mighty Fortress is Our God:…For still our ancient foe doth seek to work us woe; His might and power are great and armed with cruel fate, On earth is not his equal…referring to the pope; Eagles’ Wings, and hands dirty from holding and grasping, now receiving the very Body of the Risen Lord; standing ‘round the altar, standing for the consecration, standing for Holy Communion—puling, saccharin melodies and self-congratulating lyrics: none of these things was either envisioned nor required by anything the Second Vatican Council said or did. And one of the greatest mysteries to me is the illogical and arrogant opposition on the part of many clerics—especially my age and older—to any use of this ancient and reverent and God-centered form of the Mass; it is a mystery because, for those my age and older, it had to be this very form of the Mass that attracted them to the priesthood, that nourished their vocation in its earliest stages of growth. Likewise, it was this form of the Mass that produced countless saints. So many martyrs died for this form of the Mass. So many were converted by this form of the Mass. So many vocations to the priesthood, to the religious life, to faithful Catholic marriages were inspired by this Mass. Pope St. Gregory the Great, Pope St. Gregory VII, St. Louis IX, St. Joan of Arc, St. Dominic, St. Francis of Assisi and St. Clare of Assisi, Ss. John Fisher and Thomas More, St. John Vianney, St. Elizabeth Seton, St. Katherine Drexel, Pope St. Pius X, St. John Bosco and St. Dominic Savio, St. Maria Goretti, St. Maximilian Kolbe, St. Padre Pio, St. Josemaria Escriva—the list could go on and on: they all met God in this very form of the Mass. So it is a mystery to me why so many denigrate and ridicule and insult this Mass; I pray it is out of gross ignorance rather than out of gross malice. Perhaps the greatest thing about Universae Ecclesiae is the pope’s insistence that that this ancient form of the Mass be given the honor and respect due to the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. Anything less, whether out of ignorance or malice, is truly gross.
St. Thomas Aquinas (who offered this form of the Mass each day his entire life as a priest, and who was inspired by this Mass to write such beautiful liturgical prose and poetry—the Pange Lingua/Tantum Ergo being a single example), when speaking of the variety of religious orders in the Church, liked to cite the psalm which, in the Latin version, describes the Church as circumdata varietate—surrounded by variety. The pains and purgatories of the years after the council have taught us to treat variety with more than a little caution, since variety and pluralism come in two forms: legitimate and anarchic. Pope Benedict wishes a legitimate liturgical variety in the present moment of the Church’s life: he names this the ordinary and the extraordinary forms of the Mass. The Church must not misunderstand the meaning of these words: the Mass of 1970—what is often called the Novus Ordo—for the present moment is the ordinary form in that is continues to be what most Catholics ordinarily experience when they attend Mass. The ancient Mass—the extraordinary form—is called that only because at the present moment its frequency of use is extraordinary when compared to the use of the Novus Ordo. The pope clearly states that he wants both forms to be available for all, and each form to enrich the other. Where God is leading the Church in all this remains yet a mystery. But we have both comfort and the assurance of divine hope from the revealed word of God in today’s epistle of St. James—one of the so-called Catholic epistle: Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of Lights, with Whom there is no change, nor shadow of alteration…. Until Our Lord comes again in glory, the Mass will always be what it has always been: the Mass.
Given The Fourth Sunday after Easter

One Father, One Mother : Not Two Fathers or Two Mothers

2011-05-14T09:17:00.000-07:00

Father Robert Behnke

The Third Sunday of Easter
On this Third Sunday of Easter, today we honor our mothers; our mothers who still live with us on earth, and our mothers who we pray are now in heaven. A blessed and happy Mother’s Day to all the mothers present today; you each will have a special remembrance in this Mass.
It is more than a little ironic that, during this month of May when the Church celebrates the miracle of Easter and during May gives its special veneration to the Mother of God, and when Hallmark, American Greetings, thousands of FTD florists, Macy’s and Target, and myriads of Catholic children and grandchildren, as well as children and grandchildren who profess other beliefs or even no belief, give thanks to mothers and honor to motherhood, at this very same time it became necessary last Wednesday for the Catholic Charities of Illinois to warn that they may have to halt adoption and foster care services if Illinois law requires them to place children with homosexual couples. This news story was in the papers, and I heard it once on the radio early one morning last week, but it certainly has not received much news highlight, as far as I can tell.

The Holy Family, our example

Catholic Charities wants legislation making it clear that, when Illinois' new civil union law takes effect on June 1st—in less than a month—they can refer same sex couples to other organizations instead of servicing them, without risking a lawsuit or loss of state money. So far, that measure has been bottled up in a Senate committee. …There's a real possibility that we will be forced out of foster care and adoption…, Bob Gilligan, executive director of the Catholic Conference of Illinois, said at a statehouse news conference. Naturally, promoters of the homosexual agenda in Illinois (who want us to believe that there is no such thing as a homosexual agenda), are countering that Catholic adoption programs have two choices: either to include everyone in their foster care and adoption services, or to choose to cut ties with state government; …If they do not want to let gay couples adopt or be foster parents, fine. Let them do it on their own dime and not on millions of dollars of Illinois taxpayers…, said Rick Garcia, who helped pass the law establishing civil unions in Illinois. Catholic Charities in Illinois places children only with married couples or single people—not with couples living together without benefit of marriage. They, in keeping with the 2000-year-old teaching of the Church, consider couples in civil unions to be unmarried and therefore not eligible to adopt or provide foster care through their programs. They also say their religious beliefs rule out changing that policy and treating homosexual couples in civil unions as if they were married. Refusing to place children with homosexual couples could open the Catholic Charities to lawsuits, or lead state government to cut off funding. Catholic Charities in Illinois is the key to foster care in some parts of the state; they now might be forced to halt their services and thus leave certain locales completely without access to foster care and adoption services. Twenty percent of adoptions and foster care are handled by Catholic Charities in the state of Illinois. Please consider a practical act of belief, in motherhood, fatherhood, and family, by contacting your state senator and asking him to support SB—Senate Bill—1123—which will, if enacted, exempt religious institutions from having to place children in foster care, or having to place children up for adoption, with same sex couples.
My having been blest to have grown up with one mother and one father, I cannot imagine my having had, instead, two fathers and no mother, or two mothers and no father. A mother’s love in the life of her child is absolutely unique and irreplaceable. Just ask someone who has lost their mother, especially if that loss was premature and unexpected, or recent—even if that mother recently lost was greatly advanced in age. Or ask someone who has had to assume the place of an absent mother in the life of a child—that has to be one of the most difficult challenges on the face of the earth. My own mother died more than ten years ago; I still miss her terribly, especially on days like today, but I thank God daily for my having had her for 54 years. So I believe that those who claim that having two fathers and no mother, or having two mothers and no father, is just as good as having a single, unique father and a single, unique mother, are spouting nonsense. The law of nature—the natural law God has engraved on the heart of every person—the revealed law of God—the example of the Holy Family of Jesus, Mary, and Joseph—and just common sense—all these realities tell us that one father and one mother is God’s unique and definitive plan for all his children. Why else would Our Lord, as His final gift to the Church from the altar of the cross, have given us His own Mother to be our Mother—and to be the Mother of the Church? Why does the Church give such great honor and love to her whom we call Our Blessed Mother, today, and throughout the month of May, in the midst of the season of Easter, the most important and most joyful time in the Church’s liturgical calendar? The uniqueness of motherhood is absolutely essential for the human family; two so-called mothers (without a father) dilute the uniqueness of the place of mother in the human family, and then the essence of motherhood simply evaporates.
For all Our Lord’s careful explanation of the scriptures to the two disciples in today’s Gospel, yet they still fail to recognize Jesus. The evidence is right there before them, but they still cannot make the necessary connection; they lack the clarity of mind and heart that comes from absolute faith. Their minds are so weighed down with the violence of the crucifixion that they cannot imagine how God can bring new life from death. So Our Lord gives them a Sign, the Sign that He had invested with an absolutely unique meaning at the Last Supper...He took bread, said the blessing broke it, and gave it to them… What St. Luke calls The Breaking of Bread (…He was made known to them in the Breaking of Bread…) became the Church’s initial Biblical name for the Holy Eucharist, for the Sacrifice of the Mass. This Breaking of Bread has a powerful effect on the two disciples; we are told that …their eyes were opened and they recognized Him…. The Sign was His Gift of Himself to them, just as it is His Gift of Himself to all of us, raising the imagination of mind and heart so that we see clearly the reality of what lies before us in our future; a future that is immediate, and a future that is everlasting.
What lies before us now, in our immediate future, is, I am afraid, difficult times—times of suffering, criticism, pain, insult, ridicule—the very same realities that lay in the immediate future of the apostles just after Our Lord’s resurrection—the apostles who did come to see their suffering as a privilege; the apostles, who, Scripture tells us, rejoiced…that they had been found worthy to suffer dishonor for the sake of the name…of the Lord Jesus; the apostles, who we hear in the first reading would let nothing stand in the way of their professing publicly their absolute faith in the Lord Jesus, His teaching, His will for us, His Church. The peace and tranquility that many of us are blessed to remember in the life of the Church during the 40s and 50s and the very early 60s—all that has been replaced by disdain for Christ, disdain for His Church and for what it teaches—especially for what it teaches about human life—especially human life in the womb and the human lives of the infirm and the elderly; disdain for what the Church teaches about family, motherhood and fatherhood. Even if some Catholics—even if most Catholics—decide to roll over and play dead—nonetheless, the Church will survive until the end of time: that is the Easter promise of the Risen Lord. But if you and I choose not to play dead (because be certain: this is no game to be played), but if we choose instead to imitate the apostles, who—in the words of Peter, the Rock; Peter, the first pope—must obey God rather than men, we have the same Sign, the same Gift, the very same Breaking of Bread, the same Most Holy Eucharist, to strengthen us, to make us prepared for, and to make us spiritually immune to, the ridicule and suffering that will inevitably come our way, now, in the present, but not to last forever. Before the two disciples in today’s Gospel recognized Our Lord…in the Breaking of Bread…, St. Luke reminds us that they did not understand that it was…necessary that the Christ should suffer these things and enter into His glory…. And we must never lose sight of the truth that, in receiving this Bread of Angels, it is not a corpse we receive; in Holy Communion we receive no dead body, but a Body that is alive forever—the very Body of the Risen Lord, the Pledge of our future glory. Today especially we remember all our mothers who remained faithful to the end and so whom we have lost but for a little while; we pray that we may remain faithful, so that we might see them again, again alive—alive now with the life of the Risen Lord Jesus. For all those who remain faithful, Easter assures us that suffering, ridicule, even imprisonment for the Faith, even bodily death, are necessary, but still only a pause, merely a moment, on the way to the joy that will last forever.

My Lord and My God, Jesus, I Trust in You

2011-05-07T08:49:00.000-07:00

Father Robert Behnke

Low Sunday, May 1st, 2011

This Sunday goes by several liturgical names. It can be called The Second Sunday of Easter. More recently, Pope John Paul II designated this Sunday as Divine Mercy Sunday; for that very reason it was determined that he would be declared Blessed John Paul today, May the 1st, Mercy Sunday of 2011. Significantly, this is the first time in a long time that Mercy Sunday falls during May, the month of Our Lady, to whom Blessed John Paul was totally devoted. The date for this Sunday, as well as the date for all movable feasts, is determined by the yearly date of Easter. As we all know, Easter was very late this year, falling on the next to last possible late date, April 24th. The last time Easter fell on April 24th, Abraham Lincoln had not yet been elected president—1859. The next time Easter will fall on April 24th will be 2095; Easter last fell on the latest possible date—April 25th—in 1943; Easter will next fall on April 25th in the year 2038. So it seems providential that this year Easter fell on such a rare late date that it allowed Mercy Sunday—the date for Blessed John Paul’s beatification—to fall in the month of May—the month of Our Lady. A traditional name for today, but not heard quite as often as in the past, calls this Sunday Low Sunday, to compare it with last Sunday, Easter Sunday. The 1962 Missal refers to today at Dominica in albis, in Octava Paschae—Sunday in white, the Octave of Easter. But no matter by what name this Sunday is called, every year on this Sunday after Easter Sunday, the whole Church in the Latin Rite hears this same Gospel reading which we have just heard. In both the ordinary and extraordinary forms of the Roman Rite, the Gospel reading is the same – which is to say that, if you attended a Mass today in what Pope Benedict has named the ordinary form, you would hear this very same Gospel: St. John’s account of the Lord’s appearance to the disciples on the first Easter night, how that night the apostle Thomas was absent, and then eight days later how Our Lord again appeared, and how this time Thomas was present. From this Gospel, the phrase doubting Thomas has entered our English vocabulary. But each year I cannot help but wonder if perhaps Thomas gets a little bit of a bad rap. Thomas, after all, was not a traitor like Judas or a coward like Peter. It was to Thomas’ honest question Lord, we do not know where You are going; how can we know the way? that Our Lord replied I am the Way, and the Truth, and the Life. When Our Lord is determined to go to the grave of His dead friend Lazarus despite the danger from the Jews who wanted to stone Him, it was Thomas who said to the other disciples Let us also go, that we may die with Him. And when Thomas finally sees Our Lord risen from the dead, he falls to his knees and utters those words of adoration we were taught to say at the elevation of the Sacred Host, My Lord and My God.

Giving such great and well-deserved attention to the character of St. Thomas on what the Gospel today calls the eighth day—and because today is, after all, the eighth day—we might easily miss or overlook the earlier portion of this Gospel—the appearance of the Risen Lord to those apostles hiding in the upper room on the first Easter night. We might therefore miss or overlook the important—the critical truth this Gospel proclaims to the Church and to all the world…whose sins you shall forgive, they are forgiven; whose sins you shall retain, they are retained…. It is clear that the Sunday of Divine Mercy is a day dedicated in a particular way to the sacrament of reconciliation. Today’s Gospel, coinciding with Divine Mercy Sunday, demonstrates the depth and breath of the mystery of divine mercy, as does the witness of adoration of Thomas the Apostle praying the words...My Lord and My God…at its conclusion. This Gospel calls us to be numbered among those who though…have not seen, and yet have believed…. Likewise, this Gospel, The Octave of Easter, and The Feast of the Divine Mercy, each should move us to recall to ourselves how great a gift we have in the most precious sacrament of Penance, by which the blood of Christ is sacramentally poured out upon us and we are washed clean of our sins. Here the Divine Mercy is most evident – for the good God accepts us the prodigals and clothes us as His own son once again! Oh blood and water which gushed forth from the Heart of Jesus as a fount of mercy for us, I trust in You!

Most of us here will probably know the necessity and the requirements of a worthy confession—most, but perhaps not every one here. There may be someone here today who has not approached the sacrament of confession in a long time; what better occasion than on this Sunday of Divine Mercy? But all of us (I dare say, myself included) always have room for great improvement in making a more worthy confession. Today’s feast presents to us—and presents to every one in the Church—the occasion—the opportunity—to ask How might I make a good (or better) confession? How might a good confession today, lead me to an even better confession in the future? There are three essential acts which are necessary to the penitent in the sacrament of Penance: contrition for sin, confession of sin, satisfaction for sin. Without these three elements, the confession will not be valid.

Contrition for sin is the most necessary act of the penitent in approaching the sacrament. The Catechism of the Catholic Church teaches: Among the penitent’s acts contrition occupies first place. Contrition is ‘sorrow of the soul and detestation for the sin committed, together with the resolution not to sin again’. We must have a true sorrow for our sins – not just for some sins, but for all sins. However, we ought not be discouraged if we find that we still retain some attachment to sin; we must simply desire to be free of that attachment, repent of that attachment, and ask the Lord for His mercy. Indeed, it will be enough if only we are sorry that we are not more sorry—if only we wish we were truly sorry; to desire a true sorrow is already an act of true contrition, though that contrition remains imperfect.

It is necessary to confess our sins to the priest. Again, the Catechism teaches: Confession to a priest is an essential part of the sacrament of Penance: ‘All mortal sins of which penitents after a diligent self-examination are conscious must be recounted by them in confession’. Mortal sins must be confessed in kind and number—hence, in a particular case, it would not be enough simply to state, I have murdered; we must state, I have committed abortion five times. Likewise, I have not prayed as I should would not suffice when we should say, I have skipped Mass on three Sundays through my own fault. On the other hand, it is also worth noting that some (at least venial) sin must be confessed for a valid reception of the sacrament. Too often in confession I hear the words I have nothing to confess (I never have been able to say those words myself). If no sin is confessed, absolution cannot be given. Some actual sin must be confessed. Moreover, it is permissible (and even advisable) to confess previously absolved sins either generally (I am sorry for all my sins against charity) or even specifically (I am sorry for having hated my husband, or wife). One must always be honest in confessing one’s sins, though one need not go into unnecessary or extreme detail. You cannot say I was uncharitable to my neighbor—true, but not the whole truth if what you mean is that you murdered your neighbor.

The principal means of satisfaction for sin is the accomplishment of the penance imposed upon us by the priest. This penance must be agreed to by the penitent—and, if the penance seems either too great or too small, the penitent is free to ask the confessor for a different penance (however, the priest is not necessarily obliged to comply with the request). If the penance is not accepted—if the penitent does not resolve to complete the penance—the sacrament will be invalid. If the penance is not completed, this must be confessed during the next confession (which should be sooner rather than later). In addition to the penance given, it is necessary to restore any harm which our sins have caused to others—this applies especially to sins like stealing (where the money or goods must be repaid according to the penitent’s ability) and calumny (where the person’s good reputation must be restored as far as is reasonably possible).

It is no secret that two-thirds of American Catholics are such mostly in name only, perhaps hedging their bets just in the event that the Lord is risen just happens to turn out to be true, engaging themselves in what is called Pascal’s wager, hedging their lives on a wager that Our Lord is truly risen. But quite apart from the question of belief, most American Catholics are non-practicing. Just about every family, mine included, has this kind of Catholic. And some Catholics who are marginally more active seem to have learned about faith and morals from what the late comic Flip Wilson used to call The Church of What’s Happening Now, rather than from the Church of Rome or even from Our Lord Himself, since we cannot know Christ without knowing His Bride the Church, so much are they one body, as we learn from the Apostle Paul. Such people have been catechized, not by the catechism, but by the culture, as if it has always and everywhere been held beyond any dispute that God is love, and so He therefore must accept everything that a postmodern American progressive accepts, and that God is getting really tired of bishops and picky priests and deacons and pushy laity who repeat and insist upon His actual teachings. The dearth of penitents approaching the sacrament of Penance is perhaps the clearest evidence of this.

If Catholics really believe what St. Thomas said when he fell to his knees – My Lord and My God – then the witness of Catholics to Our Lord and their witness to His Church would be identical. If we do not know His Church, we cannot know Him, since the Church is His Body. If we do not love His Church, we cannot love Him, for the Church is His Body. If we take exception to what His Church teaches, then we take exception to Him, for the Church is His Body. In having His Church, you have Him, which means you have everything that ultimately matters. Because Jesus and His Church are one, we may get too used to having Him with us all the time. We may not understand what it would mean if we lost the Church: we would thus lose Our Lord. It is when things seem to be falling apart, when the world seems to be going out the door backwards, and then we remember that, in having the Church, we have Our Risen Lord, and so we become grateful, thankful, for the bedrock that He and His Church are to our entire lives. Our going to bed, out getting up, our eating, our time with friends, our work, our catastrophes, our joys – our entire lives have meaning only because Our Lord is Risen and His Church is His Risen Body. The Church, being His Body, is both the Source and the Instrument of His Divine Mercy. If our faith can at all times be credible – if our lives will simply always witness and deliver to others that message – that in our having His Church we have Jesus – then the world will have reason enough to say to Jesus, in adoration, with St. Thomas, My Lord and My God, and to repeat the message of The Divine Mercy: Jesus, I trust in You.

You To Whom Much Has Been Given...

2011-05-03T21:06:00.000-07:00

Father Robert Behnke

The Nineteenth Sunday of the Year, August 8, 2010
One of the more unusual courses I took in the major seminary was a seminar course titled “Pastoral Music.” At the time, 40 years ago, we had to take a certain number of courses in each of the theological disciplines – Scripture, moral theology, dogmatic theology – but our choices within those disciplines were all electives. “Pastoral music” was a course in what, after the Council, was called “pastoral theology.” The priest who taught the class was the seminary’s director of music (in retirement now, I believe he still resides at the seminary in Mundelein), and the purpose of the class, as well as I can recall it 40 years later, was to train future priests in the importance of music in worship, especially in the Mass. The professor Father Wojcik wanted especially to encourage future priests to sing at Mass – or more properly, to sing the Mass. The distinction between “high” and “low” Mass was effectively done away with in the so-called “new” Mass of the 70s, and many priests no longer were praying the Mass by singing. Anyway, the most challenging part of the seminar was that each seminarian had to compose an original musical piece that could – theoretically, at least – be sung at Mass. None of the pieces composed in that seminar ever made it out of the classroom and into the chapel! But there was one composition that I remember well (not mine), because of the text the composer chose to utilize; it is a line from this evening’s Gospel. We heard it tonight as “…Much will be required of the person entrusted with much, and still more will be demanded of the person entrusted with more.” In the composition, that came out to be sung as “To whom much has been given, much will be expected.” That seminarian, a seminary classmate, a good friend, a priest of the Archdiocese of Chicago for 37 plus years, did me a great favor with his original composition. Both the words and the simple sing-song melody became embedded in my memory bank; they have come to the surface of my memory very often in my 37 plus years of priesthood as events in the Church and in the world have developed and warranted.
“To whom much has been given, much will be expected…” was mentally playing in my mind and heart and soul this past week, after the news broke that a certain Vaughn Walker, a federal judge in California, overturned California Proposition 8, the voter-approved measure that barred legal recognition of same-sex marriages in the state of California. The voters of California had, two years ago, approved Proposition 8 by a 52% majority in response to a court ruling that required state recognition of same-sex unions. Judge Walker essentially told 7 million California voters: “You can’t do that.” Without a doubt, this issue will land before the United States Supreme Court. And, lest anyone believe that this is an issue only in California, back in 2003, Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia saw the handwriting on the wall. In his vigorous dissent from the Court’s majority decision in the Lawrence case—a case which struck down a Texas law against sodomy-- Justice Scalia wrote
If moral disapprobation of homosexual conduct is (as the Supreme Court ruled in this case) "no legitimate state interest" for purposes of proscribing that conduct, and if, as the Court coos (casting aside all pretense of neutrality), "[w]hen sexuality finds overt expression in intimate conduct with another person, the conduct can be but one element in a personal bond that is more enduring," what justification could there possibly be for denying the benefits of marriage to homosexual couples exercising "[t]he liberty protected by the Constitution" (again, as claimed by the Supreme Court)? Surely not the encouragement of procreation, since the sterile and the elderly are allowed to marry. This case (the Supreme Court holds) "does not involve" the issue of homosexual marriage only if one entertains the belief that principle and logic have nothing to do with the decisions of this Court.
Justice Scalia’s accurate prophecy is all the more unsettling because Justice Anthony Kennedy- a Catholic - and —by general consensus, the key “swing vote” when the Proposition 8 case makes it inevitable appearance before the Supreme Court—voted with the majority in Lawrence. We need to brace ourselves.
The restriction of marriage licenses to male-female couples, Judge Vaughn Walker tells us, reflects “an irrational classification on the basis of sexual orientation.” The 7 million California citizens who voted for Proposition 8 presumably thought there was a rational reason to define marriage as a male-female union. But in what has become an increasingly common display of judicial arrogance, Judge Walker substituted his own opinion for the judgment of the people.
How have we gotten to this point, in a nation in which the overwhelming majority of the population claim to be Christian, and in a nation in which 25% of the population call themselves Catholic? How could the accumulated wisdom of countless generations – what G. K. Chesterton once called “the democracy of the dead” – generations of Americans who understood the nature of marriage in a way that the judge, and more and more Americans today, find to be untrue - how could this “accumulated wisdom” now be in danger of extinction?
“Gender no longer forms an essential part of marriage,” Judge Walker asserts, and by his decision he seeks to make it so. But he offers no logical support for that bald assertion. The words “no longer” in the judge’s sentence are critical. Was there a time when gender had been an essential part of marriage, but now that time has passed? If so, what now has changed? Has there been some fundamental change in human nature? Or some fundamental change in our understanding of marriage?
There is, unfortunately, a gaping hole in the arguments that have been advanced by many supporters of traditional marriage. There has been a fundamental change in the popular understanding of marriage: the widespread acceptance of contraception. With the routine use of contraception having severed the link between marital love and procreation—and virtually every institution but the Catholic Church mistakes the perversion of contraceptive behavior for a good—marriage has come to be seen in a very different light. A couple entering into marriage may or may not plan to have children. The presumption of a growing family has been lost. Marriage is widely seen as simply a union between two loving partners. Healthy young couples, to all appearances happy in their marriages, speak openly about “someday” beginning a family—thereby implying that the family did not begin when they exchanged vows. A marriage is seen as a union of two people; the age-old recognition that “baby makes three” is now missing. Child-bearing has become an afterthought: something added on, something inessential.
But if marriage is no more than a loving partnership- if marriage does not involve the acceptance of children according to the will and the mind of God because of the availability and the wide acceptance of artificial contraception-why should marriage be restricted to partners of opposite sex? Because of the wide acceptance of the morality of artificial contraception, defenders of traditional marriage are now forced to rely on weaker arguments. Can they invoke the authority of tradition? Progressives are anxious to dismiss especially authority based on tradition. Or can they worry over the welfare of children? Social scientists are eager to provide some studies suggesting that same-sex couples might be equally good parents. Or can they cite the command of the Almighty? Obviously, secularists insist that God and so religious beliefs have no place in public debate. Can they note that acceptance of same-sex marriage could lead to acceptance of other heretofore illicit relationships: three-way unions, incest, even bestiality? Homosexuals denounce these as “scare tactics,” and sympathetic voices in the media laugh off such concerns as absurd. It is noteworthy that the current governor, as well as a former governor of California who now serves as state attorney general (both Catholics) declined to offer any sort of a vigorous defense of their state’s law; they recognized the weakness of the rhetorical positions they would be forced to advance.
The catechism speaks about children being “granted” to parents by God. Modern society speaks about parents “planning” a family, as one would “plan” a meal or “plan” a vacation trip. God has given to us – we who more and more numerically resemble the “little flock” of which Our Lord speaks in tonight’s Gospel – God has given us His kingdom. That kingdom of God here on earth includes the irreplaceable gift of holy Matrimony – including children, children granted by God, family life informed by God’s grace, parents living “…to see their children’s children…,” the gift of dancing at the wedding of one’s grandchildren. But also “…Much will be required of the person entrusted with much, and still more will be demanded of the person entrusted with more….” What is the response of faithful Catholics to the homosexual agenda in which the goal of same-sex “marriage” is only a step toward the abolition of marriage altogether as a natural and governmentally protected reality? Children have already become completely optional in marriage because of the legality of abortion. Is the response of most Catholics a mere passive response – “Oh, well, what can I do about it?” Is it a practical silence? Do you accept without hesitation the Church’s teaching that contraception is an intrinsic evil? Have you ever written, have you ever emailed, have you ever called, the president, the governor, your Congressional representative, your senators, your state legislators, city officials, making your beliefs about the homosexual agenda known? Do you vote for those who support the homosexual agenda because it seems only one issue of many, just as abortion is falsely portrayed as only one issue of many? Admittedly, at this point, constantly telephoning, emailing, writing, may very well seem like preaching to the chronically hard-of-hearing. But if even half of the 68 million American Catholics did this – if even half of the 25% of Catholics who regularly attend Mass did this - even the hardest-of-hearing and the hardest of heart in Washington, Springfield, city hall – and maybe even in the federal courts in California – would be forced to hear and listen to something vitally important, and something that might very well save their immortal souls. And you and I also will someday hear that simple little ditty followed by a question asked by Our Lord Himself – “You to whom much has been given, you from whom much will be expected; what did you do with the treasure of faith and grace and truth given to you…by Me?”
+In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.

By Father Behnke

To Understand the Word "Love"

2011-05-03T21:04:00.000-07:00

Father Robert Behnke

The Seventeenth Sunday after Pentecost
"Thou shalt love The Lord Thy God…Thou shalt love Thy neighbor as Thyself….” Can there be a word in the English language that is so often misunderstood and thus so often misused as the word “love”? I love…ice cream…my dog or my cat…my job…winter or summer…my mom and my dad…my friends…my wife or my husband…God. The fact that Our Lord commands in another place that we must…love our enemies…bears great significance to understanding that word “love,” as well as the other word…neighbor. The 613 commands of the Law of Moses are distilled in the Old Testament into these two commands found in the books of Leviticus and Deuteronomy; Our Lord repeats them, but as we know from His parable of The Good Samaritan, He gives the word neighbor an enlarged meaning. For me, for many others, that is surely one of the great challenges of this commandment.
To understand the word love, as given in these two commands to love God and love our neighbor, perhaps it is better to figure out what that word love does not mean. After all, we should not compare our love neither of God nor of our neighbor to our love of ice cream.
I am not a particularly rabid fan of prime time entertainment; were I given a test of naming current prime time entertainment TV shows, I would flunk. More to my taste is I Love Lucy or The Honeymooners. But after my father died, I would often stop in to see my mom around suppertime, and she would often enough be watching TV. She introduced me to Everybody Loves Raymond. For those unfamiliar, the Barone family – Raymond, wife Deborah, girl Allie and twin boys Michael and Geoffrey, live across the street from Raymond’s parents Frank and Marie and his older brother Robert. The Barones are all Catholic, and many of the episodes portray especially Raymond and his wife as being certified cafeteria-type Catholics; this portrayal is often subtle, soft, and meant to be inoffensive, and so all the characters come across as good, morally speaking. I am certain that many miss that Catholic Raymond and Deborah and their children demonstrate little apparent knowledge of the Faith; their behavior shows their lack of knowledge. One episode that demonstrates all this quite clearly features Allie asking questions about life. At first Raymond thinks Allie wants to know the facts of life, so he gears himself up for this. But not so. Allie’s question is this: If we all go to heaven when we die, then why does God put us here? Raymond first swallows his tongue and comes up with answers unbelievably goofy (“There is an overcrowding problem in heaven”). But then the adults in the family attempt to figure out a serious answer. They even call their parish priest, Father Hubley, for an answer (Father Hubley never calls back, at least not by the end of the show). The question remains unanswered at the end (there is a kind of unspoken, fuzzy, feely, resolution, but no clear answer); no clear answer can be given, because there is no answer to that question, because the question itself is faulty, assuming facts not in evidence. Allie’s question needs to be corrected by her parents, but it is not. And sadly, this is a question stated in many ways today, all of which end up assuming the same false premise: God’s love is more powerful than anything, and so how can an all-loving God allow people to suffer eternally for their sins? He cannot, and so consequently – as little eight-year-old Catholic Allie states – If we all go to heaven when we die, then why did God put us here? If Allie were to think about her question long enough, and if she knows anything at all substantial about her Catholic Faith, she may be able to figure out that there is a problem with her premise – we all go to heaven when we die. Only when she changes that premise can her question – why did God put us here – be satisfactorily answered. Indeed, if we all go to heaven when we die because God’s love is so powerful that it supersedes His justice and His holiness, then will He not even draw the devil to Himself in the end? If we all go to heaven when we die, if God’s love is unrestricted in the human sense, why did He ever allow hell and the devil and his fallen angels in the first place? Why did He bother to banish Adam and Eve from paradise? Why did He allow them to fall into sin? Why did He banish Cain after Cain murdered Abel? Why did He destroy the earth by flood? Why did Israel end up in Egyptian slavery? Why did He allow His Divine Son to become a man and die a horribly innocent death on the cross? Why do some Christians bother to perform acts of penance or acts of charity? Why did Our Lord bother commanding love if everyone in the end goes to heaven no matter what they do, even if they equate loving God and neighbor with loving Italian food? Why bother with any of this if, in the end, nothing we do or don’t do on earth matters anyway, because, as Allie has obviously been taught, we all go to heaven when we die?
The Church, as we see today from the beatification of Blessed John Henry Newman, is quite cautious in declaring with absolute certainty that any particular individual is in heaven. Compared to just the billions and billions of Catholics who have lived and died over the past 2000 years, only a tiny fraction has been declared to be in heaven. St. Thomas More died a martyr in 1535, but his canonization only took place 400 years later, in 1935. And the Church is infinitely more cautious in declaring that any one certain individual is in hell – that kind of declaration has never happened; the Church has never stated with certainty that any one particular individual is damned, simply because we cannot know a person’s final state of soul at the moment of death. But that is a far cry from what can be called universal reconciliation – the popular belief today that there is no hell, because everybody goes to heaven when they die. The Church has a word for that belief: presumption. One presumes on the mercy of God and so lives his life more or less as he pleases. But even little Allie, were she to reflect on her young life, would see the foolishness of this lie. As all children, Allie at some time misbehaves, and, her parents, being decent parents, punish her for that misbehavior. She may not feel particularly loved as she is punished, but she still in her heart knows that her mom and dad love her. The bromide used by parents punishing their children this hurts me more than it hurts you, spoken in genuine sincerity, is likewise spoken in genuine love. If a parent would let a child do whatever he wants, is that a sign of love or a sign or possible weakness or neglect? God is neither weak nor neglectful; God is no pushover. Rather God – Father, Son, Holy Spirit – is perfect in justice, love, and mercy. And genuine love can neither destroy justice, nor cancel it out.
It is no secret that the apostolic journey of Pope Benedict that took place these past few days stirred no little controversy in Great Britain. The crowds of the faithful, however, seem unperturbed by whatever controversy there was. Now as far as I could tell, the Holy Father did not use the word “hell” even once. But he did not have to; he spoke of conversion, faithfulness to Christ, vocation, penance and shame for child abuse, the Church and all the world finding its own deepest meaning in the meaning of the Blessed Sacrament. What was the point of anything the pope said, or even of his coming, from Rome to England and Scotland – no walk in the park even for an 83-year-old pope – if in the end our choices in life make no difference and so have no meaning? Why bother to beatify Cardinal Newman, why bother to beatify or canonize anybody, if sainthood is assured us all, since going to heaven at the end of life is what it means to be a saint? But Our Lord’s parable of Dives and Lazarus teaches the world that our choices on earth determine our eternal destiny. The Holy Father undertook this “apostolic journey” – the Holy Father “bothered” to make the trip – to “…speak the truth in love…”; because love demands the truth be spoken; because love and truth are two sides of the same coin; because Our Lord Who is love incarnate, is “…the Way, the Truth, and the Life….” The Holy Father continues to “bother,” because so much of the world knows not the Truth and so cannot know the meaning of the command to “…love God…and love Thy neighbor as thyself….” Is it too dramatic, too exaggerated, to warn the world that it may be going to hell in a hand basket?
Believers are rightly shocked by the horrors of human suffering as a result of what the Church rightly calls sin. It is unimaginable for one who believes in God Who is Love, at the same time to believe also that sinners unrepentant at the moment of death of grievous mortal sin can nonetheless reach heaven. But the sufferings of Christ on the cross teach us that one who suffers on this earth does not sin in the suffering, nor endanger his immortal soul; earthly suffering and eternal suffering are not at all the same. To this point, the words of Blessed John Henry Newman are instructive; these are his words from his Apologia pro Vita Sua – a history of his religious opinions – his contrasting the horror of suffering to the gravity of sin ought to lead us to both repentance and frequent, even devotional, confession:
The Catholic Church holds it is better for the sun and moon to drop from heaven, for the earth to fail, and for all the many millions on it to die of starvation in extremist agony, as far as temporal affliction goes, than that one soul, I will not say, should be lost, but should commit one single venial sin, should tell one willful untruth, or should steal one poor farthing without excuse.
The most extreme human suffering on earth does not have eternal consequences. The moral actions of man do. Even an unrepented venial sin is shocking and awful in its effects. When Our Lord taught us to pray, the final petition of His prayer was “…and deliver us from evil.” Why bother to make this prayer for deliverance from evil of there is no evil from which we can be delivered? To love God with all we are, and to love our neighbor as ourselves, means that the evil of sin can have no place, no home in our lives; it means that we know there is a place called hell and know there is nothing good about it; and so it means we know the meaning of life, the meaning of supernatural love we have known from childhood: God made me to know Him, to love Him, and to serve Him in this world, and to be happy with Him forever in heaven.

By Father Behnke

The Disturbing Silence of Catholics

2011-05-03T21:00:00.001-07:00

Father Robert Behnke

You may remember that two days ago the talk of the town was not the mayoral election, nor the events in Egypt, but the weather. There was actually a handful of people here at Masses on Wednesday – the Feast of the Presentation of Our Lord in the Temple, also known as Candlemas, the day on which candles are traditionally blessed – candles which are symbols of Jesus, the Light of the world – candles to be used in church during the coming year as well as in your home when a priest or deacon brings the Blessed Sacrament to the sick – and then a few more people managed to come on the following day, Thursday, the Feast of St. Blase. For the blessing, two blessed candles in a kind of cross-shape are placed around the recipient’s neck; the priest prays Through the intercession of St. Blase, bishop and martyr, may God deliver you from every disease of the throat and from every other illness…and then concludes by making the Sign of the Cross.

Candles, those blessed for use in church and in homes, are for us symbols of our Christian vocation given at our baptism. At baptism, the newly baptized is given a candle and told Receive the light of Christ. Parents and godparents of infants and small children are told …this light is entrusted to you, to be kept always burning brightly…. This powerful symbol of light is mentioned often in Scripture, in both the Old and the New testaments; in Isaiah: the people who walked in darkness have seen a great light; upon those who dwelt in a land of gloom, a light has shone…; we hear this read on Christmas at midnight. Today we hear from Isaiah that…light shall rise for you in the darkness…; the responsorial psalm repeats the refrain…The just man is a light in darkness to the upright. When Mary and Joseph bring Jesus to the temple on the 40th day after His birth, the prophet Simeon hails Him as...a light to reveal you to the nations…. And Our Lord Himself tells His disciples both …I am the light of the world….and in today’s Gospel…you are the light of the world….

Is this mere poetry, or just use of what is sometimes called a primordial symbol – a symbol easily understood by people of every time and place and culture – in this case, light and darkness; who, after all, does not recognize the meaning of darkness and light? Or is the revealed word of God telling us something more: more important, more about God, more about those who want to follow God, possess God, be possessed by God? If you had been able to attend Mass on Thursday, you would have seen that the Mass vestments were red, a symbol of shedding one’s blood for Christ; the ribbon joining the candles today for the blessing of throats is red for the same reason, as well as the stole around the neck of the priest. St. Blase was a martyr – that was his witness; that was how he, by the grace of God, joined together those two truths taught by Our Lord: …I am the light of the world….and…you are the light of the world…. His light was no mere empty symbol; St. Blase shed his blood in imitation of Our Lord Who shed His blood for us. St. Blase configured his life to the life of Our Lord; he could truly say, with St. Paul…I live now, not I, but Christ lives within me….
I hope you will give attention, in today’s bulletin, that Father Campbell, once-a-week for four weeks on the next four Mondays, will offer a course Introduction to the Social Teaching of the Church, a course which I am confident will be most interesting and so well worth your time and effort. Reading materials for the course include Pope John Paul II’s encyclical Centesimus Annus, written to honor the 100th anniversary of the encyclical Rerum Novarum of Pope Leo XIII. Leo XIII is best known for this 1891 encyclical, which was the Catholic Church’s response to industrialization, class conflict, and the growth of capitalism. Famously, Pope Leo defended both private property and the right of the workers, while critiquing both Marxism and unbridled capitalism. Major social encyclicals which followed - Pius XI’s Quadragesimo Anno and also John Paul II’s Centesimus Annus - honor Rerum Novarum not only by commemorating its fortieth and hundredth anniversaries but also by reinforcing and developing its most important teachings.
But Rerum Novarum was not Pope Leo’s first or his only social encyclical. In fact, from the first year of his papacy, 1878, until his last encyclical in 1902, Pope Leo devoted much of his magisterium to social issues. While Rerum Novarum continues to be celebrated today because its wisdom has been proven and its advice put into practice, another social encyclical, Sapientiae Christianae, which Pope Leo issued one year before Rerum Novarum, has largely been ignored, with devastating consequences for the Church and the world.
In Sapientiae Christianae, Pope Leo defines the duties of Catholics in civil society that are more basic and thus even more important than those described in his more famous encyclical. What Pope Leo does is explain how Catholics are to understand what Our Lord, the Light of the world, means – what Christ wants of us, what He wants us to do as Catholics when the Faith is challenged, or denigrated, or ridiculed, or ignored even by some Catholics as often happens today – what Our Lord means when He tells us today …you are the light of the world…. 121 years ago, Pope Leo clearly foresees the difficulties of being a faithful Catholic in modern civil society. He emphasizes that Catholics need to obey God, even if that brings them into conflict with civil authority. Here, 121 years ago, is what Leo XIII wrote if civil law clearly contradicts divine law: …then, truly, to resist becomes a positive duty; to obey, a crime…. Unfortunately, Pope Leo finds, already 121 years ago, societies are more and more frequently instituting exactly the sort of legislation that contradicts divine law. To be able to discern which laws must be resisted, Leo says that Catholics must …make a deep study of Catholic doctrine. Once imbued with this doctrine, it is their duty to defend the truth, publicly….
How can Catholics be …the light of the world….in imitation of The Light of the world if they are ignorant of the teachings of The Light of the world? Both commands – to learn doctrine, and to proclaim it – have too often been ignored by Catholics, especially in the last fifty years. At the very time when the Second Vatican Council provided a detailed blueprint for the Church, many Catholics lost any distinctive sense of Catholic identity; then, in the 1990s, when the Catechism of the Catholic Church provided a detailed and accessible compendium of all that Catholics must believe, many Catholics stopped teaching and learning doctrine. That is precisely why opportunities such as Father Campbell’s once-a-week-for-four-weeks course are so very important. How can we proclaim, and how can we defend, what we don’t know? If you have ever had a Jehovah’s witness come to your door, ask yourself if you felt competent to debate with him the meaning, and to correct his misunderstanding, of what is taught by the Catholic Church.
This might not have been the tragedy that it has been if the past fifty years had been an age of strength of faith and practice of tradition, but clearly it was the very opposite: an era of change and deep challenges to the most basic Catholic moral teaching. We have a Catholic governor applauding civil unions and claiming that, in this, his faith motivates him and supports his action; we have several Catholic candidates for mayor who support laws permitting abortions and same sex marriage; do they not know their Catholic Faith, or do they not care what it clearly teaches? In the face of the sexual revolution and the rise of no-fault divorce, abortion, contraception, and overt homosexuality, indifference and retreat have been the comfort-zone responses of most Catholics who cite “prudence” and “diversity,” masking a desire not to lose credibility with the world around them.
Pope Leo XIII, however, had no patience with silence, with this sort of comfort-zone: again, he writes…To recoil before an enemy, or to keep silence when from all sides such clamors are raised against truth is the part of a man either devoid of character or who entertains doubt as to the truth of what he professes to believe…. 121 years ago, this pope proclaimed that the only ones who win when Christians stay quiet are the enemies of truth. The silence of Catholics is particularly disturbing, the pope says, because frequently a few bold words would have vanquished the false ideas.
And these words of Pope Leo, written 121 years ago, could have been written this very afternoon, so apt they are in describing what it means today to be …the light of the world….: these words: …Christians are born for combat….It is part of their nature to follow Christ by espousing unpopular ideas and by defending the truth at great cost to themselves….One of the main duties of Christians is…professing openly and unflinchingly the Catholic doctrine…; a second is…propagating it to the utmost of their power…. In these dangerous times, it is not enough to preach the Catholic Faith only through personal example. Pope Leo insists that Catholics must preach the Faith…by open and constant profession of the obligations it imposes….A negative reaction from the public, far from being a sign of mistaken ideas, can serve as evidence of exactly the opposite fact….Jesus Christ…, the pope says,…has clearly intimated that the hatred and hostility of men, which He first and foremost experienced, would be shown in like degree toward the work founded by Him….
In short, it is not enough, in being…the light of the world…to be merely what society calls “a good person,” or merely to give good example. Many of the social problems in the West today would not exist if Catholics had taken this encyclical seriously over the past 121 years. But it is not too late. It is never too late, because Jesus, TheLight of the world, has guaranteed that He is with us until the end of time. So when you come forward today, to have your throat blessed, or infinitely more importantly, when you come forward in adoration to receive in Holy Communion the Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity of Him Who is The Light of the world, keep in mind that that Light, the Light of the world, bled for you; that St. Blase shed his blood in total and complete witness to TheLight of the world; and that, indeed, as Pope Leo also wrote 121 years ago, Satan still …prowls about the world, seeking someone to devour….and so we too have been, in Pope Leo’s own prophetic words, …born for combat.

Fr. Behnke

(Given on 2/6/11)

The Lowest Possible Level

2011-05-03T20:56:00.000-07:00

Father Robert Behnke

Once again in the announcements tonight, you will hear about the short course Father Campbell is presently offering. I refer to it as a short course because it is offered on the four Monday evenings in February, and the first of those Mondays has already passed. Nonetheless, I want to encourage you, as I did in my homily last weekend at another Mass, to take advantage of this special opportunity. I can vouch for this being an opportunity, since I attended last Monday’s first session with about ten others; several folks mentioned that, but for the cold and snowy weather, they would have come last Monday. I can understand how difficult it may be to come out again at night after a long and a hard day’s work; nevertheless, actually, I wish the whole parish would come, both because, as I already said, I can vouch that Father Campbell is doing a fine job in his presentation, but also because the topic of the course – the social doctrine of the Church – is so important, yet many Catholics are so unfamiliar with it, and the understanding of its importance is crucial for our times - our times in America and our times in the world. If you think not, reflect for a moment on the major news story of the past several weeks – Egypt: its radical, immediate, change in its government; its effect on the stock market; its effect on the price of oil and so on the prices gasoline and heating fuel and airline fuel and airline ticket prices and thus its effect on transportation and jobs and employment and unemployment; the prominence of what the media refer to as “the Muslim Brotherhood” – and what, in all these effects, are right and just and Christian and loving and pleasing to Our Lord. I have heard it often claimed that the social doctrine of the Church is among the Church’s best-kept secrets. I spoke at Mass last week about how, if the world had paid attention to what Pope Leo XIII wrote 121 years ago in his encyclical Sapientiae Christianae, many of the world’s problems and catastrophes of the last 121 years might have been avoided. To be a faithful Catholic means, as Pope Leo wrote 121 years ago, that each of us must grow in both knowledge and propagation of everything the Church teaches; how can we defend and how can we spread truths we don’t know?

Over the past generation or so, there has been a serious flaw in the implementation of Catholic social teaching in the United States. Many Catholics, including many Catholic leaders, have thought to promote big government solutions to social problems with little thought to the negative consequences of subordinating every aspect of the social order to the power of the State, something which all the popes going back 120+ years to Pope Leo XIII have stated is not what the Church teaches or wants to see practiced. Although this is slowly beginning to change, as our bishops are now finding themselves in an increasingly adversarial relationship with government on strictly moral grounds, it is important to observe that this long-time default position has been derived from a false understanding of the Catholic social principle of solidarity – a principle which Father Campbell explained well last Monday and something which I am certain about which he will speak again.
Many Catholics, especially Catholics and their leaders in the great industrial cities of America which have had such large Catholic populations, have confused solidarity with the adoption of governmental social programs. But right at the beginning of his most recent encyclical Caritas in Veritate – Love in Truth - Pope Benedict identified this as an error when he wrote: Solidarity is first and foremost a sense of responsibility on the part of everyone with regard to everyone, and it cannot therefore be merely delegated to the State. He also discussed the propensity to rely on large, impersonal institutions, which can never be a substitute for solidarity…asense of responsibility on the part of everyone…and to mature into a love that ‘becomes concern and care for the other’…. I hear in those words of Pope Benedict a contemporary echo of the words Our Lord speaks in the Gospel tonight: …whoever breaks one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do the same will be called least in the kingdom of heaven….whoever is angry with his brother is liable to judgment….Settle with your opponent quickly while on the way to court. Otherwise….you will not be released until you have paid the last penny….everyone who looks at a woman with lust has already committed adultery with her in his heart….whoever divorces his wife…causes her to commit adultery….Let your ‘Yes’ mean ‘Yes,’ and your ‘No’ mean ‘No.’ Anything more is from the evil one…. Over and over again, Our Lord – perhaps with more than just a hint of righteous anger coming from His knowledge of how often His commandments are broken, avoided, disregarded, passed over, or minimized in importance – is telling us you and I are responsible for what you and I do; you and I are responsible for what you and I do both for others and to others. Again, in the words of Pope Benedict – the Vicar of Christ - …a sense of responsibility on the part of everyone….
Unfortunately, in America, too much confidence has been placed in those social institutions of government, as if they were able to deliver the desired objective of personal care, personal solidarity, responsibility for the need of every citizen in any and all circumstances automatically. In reality, institutions by themselves are not enough, because personal responsibility for oneself and for others, for the authentic Christian, is primarily a dimension of the vocation received at the moment of baptism: …thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself (not thyselves)….as long as you did it for one of these, the least of my brothers, you did it for me…. But this free assumption of responsibility in solidarity is precisely what is lacking when we always turn to government to implement broad social solutions rather than our doing our personal duty as baptized Christians.
In fact, a free assumption of responsibility in solidarity requires engagement with another key Catholic social principle, namely subsidiarity. The meaning of subsidiarity is that things should be done on the lowest level possible, and that if assistance is needed from higher levels of organization, the higher levels should, whenever possible, assist the lower levels rather than replace them. That is why, for example, most of the experience of the Church for most Catholics takes place in their local parish rather than at archdiocesan headquarters or in Rome, and why the Catholic Church does not, as do some Protestant denominations, have huge massive mega-churches. This is a foundational Catholic social principle which is written into Church law as well as Church practice. Subsidiarity is essential to human dignity because it ensures that people are directly involved in the solutions to their problems, and that these solutions are implemented and controlled at the levels closest to home, where they can be influenced or even managed by those most affected. That is why, for example, in this little parish there is a food pantry on site for those in need.
Subsidiarity encourages both personal responsibility and the creative development of community-level organizations to assist individuals in the resolution of particular problems. These could be neighborhood associations, churches, businesses organized to provide needed services, fraternal organizations, unions, professional associations, and charitable groups, with the involvement of formal government bodies only when the power of law and law enforcement genuinely needs to be invoked.
All of this has an intrinsic supernatural dimension, as we see clearly from the words of Our Lord in tonight’s Gospel. Can we ever expect the government – especially our current government – on its own, to stop, or even to curtail, certain sins and crimes like abortion, euthanasia, same-sex unions, research using human embryos, cloning, if we just sit back and wait and say to ourselves something like…it’s the government’s place to take care of this; it has nothing to do with me…? Is that the straight Yes or No Our Lord requires from me, or is my multiplication of excusing words something that is…from the evil one…?
In most cases, the invocation of the power of the State diminishes personal responsibility. We will like this only if we mistakenly think it gets us off the hook. In other words, the invocation of State power typically means: the State will make things right; therefore, I don’t have to worry about this any longer…. But, of course, in most cases, the State cannot make things right at all. As the Pope writes…institutionsare not enough, for human development…involves a free assumption of responsibility in solidarity on the part of everyone….
Especially if you are a Chicago resident voting next week for mayor and city clerk and city treasurer and alderman, but no matter where you reside, keep in mind two definite truths: The Church’s magisterium – its authority to teach authentic apostolic truths - exercised by the popes especially in their encyclicals, including all the great encyclicals treating social truths and justice - this teaching magisterium operates always under the promised guidance of God the Holy Spirit. Western culture, including our American political system, while seemingly at the present time a greater and a stronger thing, sadly has no such supernatural guarantee. So, whom will you trust, with your life, and with your soul?
Father Robert Behnke

Prayer for the Pope as an Essential Feature of Catholic Spirituality

2011-05-03T20:53:00.000-07:00

Fr. Benjamin Reece, S.T.D. (Cand.)

"So Peter was kept in prison, but prayer was being made to God for him by the Church without ceasing” Acts 12:5
Catholics have prayed for the Pope as the successor of St. Peter since the earliest days of the Church, but the need for this prayer “without ceasing” has never been greater than today.

The Papacy as an institution and the Pope as a person is assailed almost daily from the right and the left, from the east and the west, from inside the Church and from without. Added to this are his extreme frailty and the tenuous state of the Church in a modern, secularized world. We also know that the Pope has powerful enemies, not of this world; that the demons themselves are seeking to destroy the Church. That is why Jesus reassured Peter that the Gates of Hell would not prevail against the Church.

This means however that there is a real and present danger from their malicious influence and and hellish intrigue. Jesus told Peter that “Satan has demanded to sift you like wheat and I have prayed for you that you may turn and strengthen your brethren.” St. Peter himself tells us that “the Devil is prowling around like a roaring lion, looking for someone to devour, stand up to him strong in faith.” Pope Leo XIII was shocked in his famous vision when he saw that the Devil had been give a period of time to tempt the Church and so he composed the famous St. Michael prayer to be recited after low Mass. Finally, Pope Paul VI boldly announced that the smoke of Satan had entered into the Church.

The horrible homosexual scandals of recent years are only the tip of the iceberg of these demonic plots. Widespread dissent and heresy in high places are symptoms of the most malevolent and successful satanic conspiracy in history to destroy the holy Catholic Church. Satan cannot succeed ultimately, but he has seduced many souls and these horrible scandals and the orchestrated media campaign against the Church have weakened her moral authority and undercut the new evangelization. The new springtime of the Church, so longed for at Vatican II, has not yet been realized due to this masterful, demonically organized plan to infiltrate and corrupt the Catholic Church.

The Need for Unceasing Prayer

With the decrease of contemplative orders in the world, the laity must realize their universal call to holiness through a renewed and intense prayer life. This is being realized in many prayers through Eucharistic Adoration and Reparation. It is the laity with their Bishops, parish priests, and consecrated souls who must answer this call to unceasing prayer so as to be sentinels on the walls of the Church, driving back the modern demonic assaults and liberating Mother Church from the devilish intrigues that are occurring even in her bosom.

The Saints are excellent teachers in this battle for souls and they give us an inspiring example of the power of prayer for the Holy Father as the Vicar of Christ. We see how the early Church prayed for St. Peter and the liturgy contains prayers for the Pope as the Bishop of Rome since the 3rd century. However, modern saints have been increasingly attentive to the need of prayer for the Pope especially since the time of St. Catherine of Sienna. St. Catherine lived in a time of great corruption and confusion in the Church, and she offered her life as a victim soul for her own sins and for those of the clergy, including the Pope who was resisting God’s call to move back to Rome:

”This soul then, being purified by the fire of divine love, which she found in the knowledge of herself and of God, and her hunger for the salvation of the whole world, and for the reformation of Holy Church, having grown with her hope of obtaining the same, rose with confidence before the Supreme Father, showing him the leprosy of the Holy Church, and the misery of the world, saying, as if with the words of Moses, ‘My Lord, turn the eyes of thy Mercy upon Thy people and upon the Mystical Body of the Holy Church, for thou wilt be the more glorified if Thou pardonest so many creatures, and givest to them the light of knowledge, since all will render Thee praise when they see themselves escape through Thy infinite goodness from the clouds of mortal sin, and from eternal damnation; and then thou wilt not only be praised by my wretched self, who have so much offended Thee, and who am the cause of instrument of all this evil, for which reason I pray Thy divine and eternal love to take Thy revenge on me, and to do mercy to thy People, and never will I depart from Thy presence until I see that thou grantest them mercy.’” (The Dialogues of St. Catherine of Sienna, A Treatise on Discretion).

What stands out in the prayer of the Saint in comparison to our modern “prophets” is her humility and ardent love for the Church. She doesn’t focus on other people’s sins but on her own, and for this reason her prayer for the Church is heard by the Eternal Father. How many pseudo-prophets, addressing the Bishops after the scandals had even an ounce of such humility or love? And with what arrogance do we see modern Catholics chastising the universal Church and the Papacy, as if sinless themselves.

Yet Our Lord does not hesitate to give advice to his prelates and Bishops though his beloved Catherine, especially about the need to reprove sinners with holy fire and spiritual unction. Our Lord makes the point to her and to the Church of all times,

”That correction is necessary before words of encouragement, neither the civil law, nor the divine law, can be kept in any degree without holy justice, because he who is not corrected, and does not correct others, becomes like a limb which putrefies, and corrupts the whole body, because the bad physician, when it had already begun to corrupt, placed ointment immediately upon it, without having first burnt the wound. So, were the prelate, or any other lord having subjects, on seeing one putrefying from the corruption of mortal sin, to apply to him the ointment of the soft words of encouragement alone, without reproof, he would never cure him, but the putrefaction would rather spread to the other member, who, with him, form one body under the same pastor. But if he were a physician, good and true to those souls, as were the glorious pastors of old, he would not give salving ointment without the fire of reproof. And, were the member still to remain obstinate in his evil doing, he would cut him off from the congregation, in order that he corrupt not the other members with the putrefaction of mortal sin. But they act not so today, but, in cases of evil doing, they even pretend not to see. And knowest thou wherefore? The root of self love is alive in them, wherefore they bear perverted and servile fear. Because they fear to lose their position or their temporal goods, or their prelacy, they do not correct, but act like blind ones, in that they see not the real way in which their position is to be kept. If they would only see that it is by holy justice that they would be able to maintain it. But they do not, because they are deprived of light. but thinking to preserve their position with injustice, they do not reprove the faults of those under them, and they are deluded by their own sensitive self love, or by their defire for lordship and prelacy, and they correct not the faults they should correct in others, because the same or greater ones are their own. They feel themselves comprehended in the guilt, and they therefore lose all ardour and security, and, fettered by servile fear, they make believe not to see. And moreover, if they do see they do not correct, but allow themselves to be bound over with flattering words and with many presents, and they themselves find the excuse for the guilty ones not to be punished. In such as these are fulfilled the words spoken by my Truth, saying: ‘These are blind and leaders of the blind, and if the blind lead the blind, they both fall into the ditch.’” (The Dialogue of St. Catherine of Sienna, ‘A Treatise of Prayer’. p.245-246)

St. Catherine of Sienna was a great mystic, a victim soul, a stigmatist, and the consecrated Bride of Christ. Yet even her efforts were only partially successful: getting the Pope back to Rome, but not really able to cure the Church of her spiritual leprosy.

The Prayer of other great Saints for the Church and the Pope

Most if not all modern Catholic Saints have had a special devotion to the Papacy, and have prayed frequently and ardently for the Vicar of Christ as the successor of St. Peter. Most notable in this group was the redoubtable, soldier saint—St. Ignatius of Loyola, who was a true Trinitarian mystic and a man of the Church whose men took a special vow of obedience to the Papacy. This was not merely some moral or practical arrangement, but an outgrowth of an ecclesial spirituality that saw the Divine founder of the Church choosing Blessed Peter as the foundation of the Church’s faith. St. Ignatius was not merely a converted military man who was not serving a new earthly master, but a mystic whose faith helped him to see the necessary connection between obedience to God and obedience to the papacy. We cannot say that we love Jesus and not love his Bride the Church, even in her human and tainted condition. Hence, love for the Pope and prayer for him are integral to authentic Catholic spirituality. Indeed, this kind of love and loyalty to the Papacy have been universalized by the example of Loyola and his men.

Certainly, since the time of St. Ignatius this practice of prayer for the Papacy has been a normal practice of every canonized Saint. With Luther’s rebellion, the role of the papacy was more and more seen as the stabilizing force in the Church and as a Divine guarantee of her triumph over the gates of Hell. Consequently the Saints of the Counter Reformation, and the survivors of the age of Masonic revolution, looked to the papacy for guidance and found it in a series of holy Popes.

Among these modern saints we can cite St. Don Bosco whose famous vision of the Church as a ship under assault from the forces of evil is resolved when a holy Pope steers her between the two pillars of Marian Devotion and Eucharistic Adoration. The sober English convert, Venerable John Henry Newman, was so devoted to the Mystical reality of Peter as the Vicar of Christ that he walked barefooted between the train station and the Pope’s residence. Saint Jose Maria Escriva made an all night prayer vigil his first time in Rome from a room where he could see the Holy Father’s window. St. Padre Pio, in his final days, sent Pope Paul VI a message assuring him of his prayers during the ecclesial revolt triggered by Humanae Vitae. Finally, we can see the extraordinary closeness of Blessed Theresa of Calcutta with our current Holy Father, and the continuing example of her holy sisters who pray for and sacrifice for the intentions of the Pope.

Less well known, but of great importance in understanding this spiritual principle, is the example of Blessed Jacinta of Fatima. When we read of the Fatima apparitions and the response of these children to the requests of Our Lady and the Angel, we are usually astounded by their intense spiritual life and the Heroic degree of virtue which has been attained by such little children. Constant prayer was accompanied by serious penances such as wearing a rough cord of rope, going without water on very hot days, and giving up food and sleep. In addition to this, the children were subject to incredible pressure to deny their story, through family disbelief, and even harassment by priests and civil officials. At one point, they even were led to believe that they would be boiled in hot oil unless they revealed their secret from Our Lady.

Jacinta was also told that she would suffer greatly in order to enter into heaven, and she accepted such sufferings as from the hand of God and Our Mother. In fact, she would die all alone in a hospital bed in far away Lisbon of the influenza, and this sorrowful, lonely death she offered to the Lord in reparation for the sins of the world and in reparation for the sins committed against the Immaculate Heart of Mary. She also offered these incredible sufferings for the Holy Father and the Church. Indeed, she was given several unique visions of the sufferings of the Holy Father in order to inspire her prayer and sacrifice for him. In Lucia’s account of the Fatima story we read of how little Jacinta learned who the Pope was,

“Two priests who had come to question us, recommended that we pray for the Holy Father. Jacinta asked who the Holy Father was. The good priests explained who he was and how much he needed prayers. This gave Jacinta such love for the Holy Father that, every time she offered her sacrifices to Jesus, she added: ‘and for the Holy Father.’ At the end of the Rosary, she always said three Hail Marys for the Holy Father, and sometimes she would remark: ‘How I’d love to see the Holy Father! So many people come here, but the Holy Father never does!’ In her childish simplicity, she supposed that the Holy Father could make the journey just like anybody else!” (Fatima in Lucia’s own words—p.50-51)

In her extreme simplicity, how could she have ever supposed that the Holy Father would one day journey to Fatima to Beatify, and perhaps one day canonize her. Jacinta’s prayers and sacrifices for the Holy Father were intensified during her time in prison, and especially when she thought that she would die, Her cousin Lucia writes in her memoirs of how a scared, little Jacinta faced death with the intention of offering it for the Holy Father,

“I soon realized that she was crying. I went over and drew her close to me, asking her why she was crying: ’Because we are going to die,’ she replied, ‘without ever seeing our parents again, not even our Mothers!’ With tears running down her cheeks, she added, ’I would like at least to see my mother.’ ‘Do you want, then, to offer this sacrifice for the conversion of sinners?’ ‘ ‘I do want to, I do!’ With her face bathed in tears, she joined her hands, raised her eyes to heaven and made her offering: ‘O My Jesus! This is for love of you, for the conversion of sinners, for the Holy Father, and in reparation for the sins committed against the Immaculate Heart of Mary. ‘” (Fatima in Lucia’s own words, p 52)

Perhaps, when Jesus told us that we must become like little children, this was the type of child he had in mind! How one wishes that some of our modern theologians would read this story and weep for their sins of arrogance, disbelief, and cowardice in the faith.

From Peter to Benedict XVI, the head of the Church has been a special object of the Lord’s predilection, Satan’s scorn, and the Church’s ardent prayer. Throughout history, this prayer has grown more intense during the Pope’s illness or imprisonment or when attacked by the church’s enemies, such as the case of Pope Pius VII who was imprisoned by Napoleon or Blessed Pius IX who was forced to flee from Garibaldi and company. Today, our Pope is physically free to roam the world, but he is encircled by enemies, seen and unseen, who hinder his action and frustrate his plans. Let us add our own feeble prayers to his as this holy Pope finishes his course, to join the Saints and Angels in heaven. If we do so, we too will be in that long line of saints and sinners who offered unceasing prayer for Peter and his successors, the Vicars of Christ on earth. May we especially remember our Pope in our daily Rosary, and follow the example of Blessed Jacinta of Fatima, and the requests of Our Lady of Fatima.

Fr. Benjamin Reece, S.T.D. (Cand.)

Find more information on The Apostles of Jesus Christ, Priest and Victim here : http:/www.apostlesofjesuschrist.org/

"I Have Nothing to Confess..."

2011-05-03T20:49:00.000-07:00

Father Robert Behnke

The First Sunday of Lent, March 13, 2011
During my experience of nearly 38 years of hearing confessions, something that amuses me, saddens me, and puzzles me – all at the same time – is the occasional penitent who begins their confession with words something like …Father, I have nothing to tell you…, or,…Father, I really have nothing to confess…or words to that effect. Apart from the fact that the sacrament cannot take place without the confession of some sin (even a forgiven sin from the past; in one parish I had an older parishioner who came every Saturday to confess an abortion that had taken place years earlier, but this individual confessed it again and again, Saturday after Saturday, so full of sorrow were they), two questions come to me. The first, which I never ask, though I would like to do so, is Then why are you here? The other question, which I often – nearly always – ask is Will you please tell me your secret, because I never have a difficulty in thinking of sins to confess when I go to the sacrament myself? But, on reflection, I sense those who say they have nothing to confess are perhaps saying I want to be a good Catholic, and I know confession is part of that, so I am here–I just don’t know what I can or should say. And that, I sense, is a symptom of the much greater problem of so many Catholics–probably the majority – who never go to confession.
We are faced on this 2011 First Sunday of Lent, as we are each year, with the Gospel’s account of Our Lord’s temptation by Satan. Now it would seem that, if a man could not possibly sin, then he could not be tempted. Indeed, in our fallen condition, we experience temptation as a real choice–when tempted, we really could fall. Moreover, we know that those who are so conformed to God as to be entirely freed from the possibility of sin-the saints and angels in heaven-these are also freed from all temptations. Yet, when it comes to the person of Christ, a doubt perhaps arises. We are inclined to think that Christ could not sin–since, of course, He is fully God. Yet, on the other hand, we know that Jesus was truly and really tempted by Satan; the Gospel tonight tells us so. Thus, the question: could Christ have sinned when tempted by Satan? Moreover, if Our Lord could not sin, how can we say He was truly tempted?
In asking this, we attempt a human understanding of a profound divine mystery: Jesus Christ is an altogether unique Man-a Man Who is God. Our Lord is a Divine Person with two natures, God and Man. Thus, the question really is: Could God sin? The answer, simply and absolutely: no. It is an absolute impossibility for God to sin. God did not make sin, nor could He make sin – for He is perfect Goodness and Love. Plus, to sin is not an ability, but rather an inability. The possibility of sinning is a defect, a weakness, an inability, an imperfection. Precisely because God is perfectly free and all powerful, He is impeccable, unable to sin. And because Our Lord is the Second Person of the Blessed Trinity, He could never sin. Moreover, even Our Lord in his humanity could not sin. From the first moment of His existence, Jesus Christ enjoyed the beatific vision–He enjoyed the knowledge and love of God which is given the blessed in heaven, none of whom can sin. Yet sin and temptation are not the same. Sinning is not somehow a necessary part of human nature and human freedom. Adam’s fall was devastating to human nature; man was not created to be a sinner. The sin of Adam did not liberate man but enslaved him. Therefore, Christ’s freedom from sin in no way makes Him less human, but rather makes Him the perfect Man. But Man He is still, and so as Man He is subject to temptation. The Gospel shows us this today; these temptations were truly waged against Him by His mortal Enemy, Satan, the Father of Lies. Moreover, we may add that Christ’s temptation was even more intense than our own–since He persevered through to the end. He suffered temptation longer and more intensely than has any other man, but He did so without sin (because He had no inclination to sin as do we, as a result of the sin of Adam) and He suffered temptation without even the possibility of sin.
At his excellent first class on the Holy Eucharist this past Thursday, Father Reese reminded us that Our Lord could have redeemed and saved the world with just a thought and by His shedding but a single drop of His blood. Why then the temptations, the agony, the scourging, the crown of thorns, the nails, the cross? Father Reese’s answer was the very same I heard from Sister Adalena when I was in the second grade: our sins were so great, but God’s love was even greater. Greater even than the sin of Adam, who was, when he introduced the world to sin, the perfect man-Adam was man as God originally created and intended man to be. God’s love is greater even than all the sins of all the centuries from Adam to now. Greater even than the sins of all the genocidal holocausts of the 20th century-the Armenian, the Ukrainian, the Jewish, the Rwandan. Greater even than the genocide going on right now in Libya. Greater even than the genocidal holocaust going on right now under our very noses in abortion mills all over the United States and all over the world (just in New York City, last year there were 55,391 deaths from all causes other than abortion; there were from abortion 82,475 deaths). If we but consider for a moment the sheer magnitude of God’s love made incarnate in the life and death and resurrection of Our Lord, a love greater still than all the sins committed since the world’s creation, a love manifested in the drama of His suffering and death because of the greatness of the world’s sins, how could anyone ever say with a straight face…I have nothing to confess?
The sin of many in our time seems to be the sin of self-satisfaction: I am satisfied with myself, with my life, with the way things are going; I have nothing for which to apologize to anyone, including God, and I neither can nor want to get any better because I am pretty much perfect as I am. Whoever may have those sentiments needs to know that they have been placed in their hearts by the Father of Lies and the Prince of Darkness. Father Campbell reminded us at dinner last night of something Pope Benedict has said, more than once: the world acts today as if God makes no difference; He is irrelevant. This, too, was the sin of Adam, who in effect said to God You are irrelevant to my happiness, to what I want, to what I will do. I could easily imagine hearing Adam say to God, I have nothing to confess to You, because I have no need of You. Each time one of God’s human creatures, and especially one of His adopted children, speaks those unfortunate words, the Father of Lies dances with glee.
In the face of a world that thinks God is irrelevant, those who know that God is God and we are not, must witness to an unbelieving, nearly diabolical world, the practice of the presence of God. Practicing this awareness of God’s presence is always a work in progress. How easily are we distracted; how hard it is to be aware of Our Lord’s role in all that we are and do. Because of our tendency to forget, we may make a firm resolution to remember God at the start of our day, and then become so immersed in the requirements of our day’s responsibilities and activities that we emerge at the end of a hectic and taxing day only to realize we have not turned toward God even once. So we should set for ourselves personal reminders-a selection of specific triggers-at intervals during our day to lift us out of our mundane absorptions and awaken us to opportunities to turn to God. For example, that is the purpose of church bells, ringing the Angelus, or the time for Mass, reminding us to pray or to hurry to Mass. Interestingly, church bells are blessed with the Oil of the Sick, as a way of joining those too sick to come to Mass to join their suffering to the offering of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. For some, a reminder might be the ringing of the telephone (always at the worst of times); the ringing could serve as a reminder to say a prayer asking God for patience. When a baby cries, the cry could serve as a reminder to a mother who might ask Our Lady to help her to respond to her little one in union with Mary’s Immaculate Heart, and to place herself before the Infant Jesus at one with her child, and to gaze on Him with love. A plumber is called to a home, he can pray that the grace of baptism will reach and cleanse each member of that household. A loan officer at a local bank may ask God on behalf of each new client for the wisdom to use resources prudently and for God’s glory. A road worker might offer quick petitions for the safety of the motorists who must navigate the work zone. An elderly man or woman could choose to invoke Saint Joseph every time he or she feels their age in the pain of muscle or joint. It really does take practice to make these things work, lest we too frequently fail to observe the signs we have chosen, and so only rarely pause in moments of deeper recognition and simple prayer. Our world has tried its best to remove or ignore reminders of the reality of temptation, sin, and salvation by divine love. But habits which acknowledge God’s enduring presence can be formed with such reminders to which we have chosen to give our attention, and more and more we may be always ready to turn toward the One who made us. And in time the world will notice.
This effort never ends, but it does grow easier as it becomes habitual. Gradually we learn to focus frequently on the Father, the Son, or the Holy Spirit, whether directly or through the intercession of Mary or one of the saints. This is a school of sanctity. In this school, we become ever more perfectly oriented toward God, and ever more finely tuned to His will. In the end, we can become almost continuously aware of God’s presence, providence and love. The distance between earth and heaven grows short. We become ready, at last, for something more-for heaven itself. And we will make the Father of Lies weep and grind his teeth-because the world will notice.
The liturgy tonight reminds us that Our Lord allowed Himself to be tempted as we are; He chose to suffer, more than we ever would or could, because sin is so pervasive, but not more pervasive than the pervasiveness of Our Lord’s love. If much of our world thinks God makes no difference; if the world thinks it owes God no apology; if the world thinks it has nothing to confess; if sin continues rampant in our world; if the world chooses to give in to the Father of Lies, we know better; so we will do otherwise. We know sins are great, but we know His love is greater. He chose to overcome the sin of the world by His love. So He was tempted; so He suffered; so He died. When you’re right, you can’t be wrong. When You’re God, You’re always right. God makes all the difference. And the world cannot help but notice the difference.
Father Behnke

Devotion to the Blessed Virgin Mary leads us into the Mystery of the Holy Eucharist

2011-05-03T20:45:00.000-07:00

Father Benjamin Reece S.T.D. Cand.

The theology of the Blessed Virgin Mary has been an integral part of the Catholic faith—from the Protogospel of Genesis to the most recent Papal Encyclical. Mary, the New Eve has been seen as the complement to Christ, the New Adam[1]. Of course, the distinctive feature of the Catholic religion is the Incarnation—God becoming man in the womb of the Blessed Virgin Mary. Here we see how Mary’s “yes” opened the way for the Son of God’s descent to earth and his taking of her human flesh. As we meditate on the mystery of the Most Holy Eucharist, the parallels between it and the Incarnation readily come to mind since it is Jesus himself who becomes present with the very flesh that he once received from his Mother, Mary.
In a similar way, we learn to offer the Sacrifice of the Mass in union with Christ’s perfect offering at Calvary where Mary herself co-offered her Son for the salvation of the world. Indeed, she was not a priest, but through Him she offered her own flesh and blood and the Divine victim back to the Father. Thus, she remains a kind of exemplar for us as we enter into the sacrifice of the Mass. Finally, it was Mary, according to tradition, who first greeted her Risen Son, and adored her God on Easter Sunday morning. Devotion to the Blessed Virgin Mary, then, correctly understood, helps us to enter most completely into the mystery of the Most Holy Eucharist and hence enhances our actual participation in the Divine Liturgy itself.

The Liturgy of the Word and the Incarnation

Mary becomes a model for our actual participation in the Liturgy of the Word as a hearer of the Word, a hearer that always obeyed the Word of God and meditated on that mystery in her Immaculate Heart. In the Liturgy of the Word, we review the history of salvation and realize how few members of the human race actually took God’s word to heart and gave him a whole hearted “Yes”. The history of the chosen people really begins with Abraham’s submission to God in an heroic faith. But even Abraham’s faith, a faith that made him our father in faith, was, at times, a weak and vacillating one. The subsequent history of the Chosen people is indeed a history of much unfaithfulness, but God would preserve a holy remnant, and this holy remnant would give birth to a daughter of Zion through God’s intervention in the Immaculate Conception. Mary’s faith, then, like Abraham’s, shines out as a model for us. Pope Paul VI comments in his famous Encyclical,Marialis Cultus.

Mary is the attentive Virgin, who receives the word of God with faith, that faith which in her case was the gateway and path to the divine motherhood, for, as St. Augustine realized, “Blessed Mary by believing conceived Him (Jesus) whom believing she brought forth” In fact, when she received from the angel the answer to her doubt (cf. Lk a:34-37), “full of faith and conceiving Christ in her mind before conceiving Him in her Womb, she said, “I am the handmaid of the Lord, let what you have said be done to me” (Lk 1:38). It was faith that was for her cause of blessedness and certainty in the fulfillment of the promise: “Blessed is she who believed that the promise made her by the Lord would be fulfilled” (Lk 1:45). . . The Church also acts in this way, especially in the liturgy, when with faith she listens, accepts, proclaims and venerates the Word of God, distributes it to the faithful as the bread of life, and in the light of that word examines the signs of the times and interprets and lives the events of history.[2]

Thus, Mary becomes a model of actual or interior participation in the Liturgy itself. Certainly, this does not mean that we bring Marian devotions into the Liturgy, but Marian devotions and, especially the practice of True Devotion will help us enter into the spirit of the Liturgy. Mary, the woman of faith and the contemplative virgin can teach us how to listen to the Word of God. St. Louis de Montfort writes,

Be persuaded, then, that the more you look at Mary in your prayers, contemplations, actions, and sufferings, if not with a distinct and definite view, at least with a general and imperceptible one, the more perfectly will you find Jesus Christ, who is always with Mary, great, powerful, active, and incomprehensible – more than in Heaven or in any other creature. Thus, so far from the Divine Mary, all absorbed in God, being an obstacle to the perfect attaining of union with God, there has never been up to this time, and there never will be, any creature who will aid us more efficaciously in this great work; either by the graces that she will communicate to us for this purpose—for as a saint has said, “No one can be filled with the thought of God except by her”[3]

Consequently, the place for Marian devotion is precisely in the time before Mass[4], so that we can prepare our minds and hearts to receive the Word of God as she did. If we approach the Liturgy of the Word in union with her heart will be “filled with the thought of God”.

However, true devotion to the Blessed Virgin not only helps us to prepare for the Liturgy of the Word, and to contemplate that Word during Mass: her intercession also helps us to assent to the Word of God which is directed to us– to say “Yes” to God within the context of that Mass. Indeed, the Liturgy of the Word is proclaimed by the celebrant within the liturgical assembly so that they can give assent to the content of the Church’s teaching and preaching. Just as the people of the nation of Israel consented to the content of the book of the covenant in Exodus 24 before being sprinkled with the Blood of the Covenant, so the people of the new Israel receive the Word of God as preached before drinking of the Blood of the Word made flesh in the New Covenant. TheCatechism of the Catholic Church teaches, “By the saving word of God faith . . . is nourished in the hearts of believers. By faith then the congregation of the faithful begins and grows. The proclamation does not stop with a teaching; it elicits the response of faith as consent and commitment, directed at the covenant between God and his people.”[5] Each member of the assembly should listen and then respond to the Word of God as Mary did so that Christ can become Incarnate in their lives through the power of the Holy Spirit poured out during the Eucharistic sacrifice.

All of this becomes clear as we recite the Creed in which we recall the Incarnation of God the Son. Here, all used to genuflect every Sunday (many still do in Extraordinary form of the Roman Rite) at those words, “Et incarnatus est de Spiritu Sancto ex Maria Virgine, et homo factus est.” So many wonderful musical compositions of the Creed have been written and all of them fall into an awesome and tender hush at this moment. We are finishing the Liturgy of the Word and our hearts are prepared to receive the Word made Flesh who will come very soon in the unbloody sacrifice of the altar so as to be received Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity in Holy Communion by the assembly. In this way, we will become like Mary whose “Yes’ in the Incarnation allowed the Word of God to take flesh from her and become man.

Just before we begin the Liturgy of the Eucharist, we offer the Prayer of the Faithful, and once again the Blessed Virgin Mary is discreetly present in the Liturgy as our intercessor before the Father in heaven. I find it theologically interesting to understand the Prayer of the Faithful as a transition between the Liturgy of the Word and the Liturgy of the Eucharist. Indeed, the Catholic Catechism describes it in the section on the Liturgy of the Word, “After the homily, which is an exhortation to accept this Word as what it truly is, the Word of God, and to put it into practice, come the intercessions for all men, according to the Apostle’s words: “I urge that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and thanksgivings be made for all men, for kings, and all who are in high position”[6]

The Divine Liturgy of St. John Chrystosom contains an ectenia,a prayer of intercession which is contained in the Eucharistic prayer itself. These intercessions fittingly conclude with a Marian prayer which is an integral part of the Liturgy itself, “Commemorating our most, holy, pure, blessed, and glorified Lady, Mother of God and Ever Virgin Mary with all the Saints, let us commend ourselves and one another our whole life to Christ, our God.” [7] It is also interesting to note here the Irish and English Latin Rite custom, approved by their Bishops, of concluding the prayers of the faithful with a Hail Mary “Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death”.

The Liturgy of the Eucharist and Mary’s role at Calvary.

If we first imitate Mary in her contemplative stance in the Liturgy of the Word, we can then imitate her self offering and so join her personal offering of the Divine Victim in the Liturgy of the Eucharist, especially at the moment of the representation of the Sacrifice of Calvary in the Sacrifice of the Mass. Pope John Paul II wrote of Mary’s unfathomable sufferings at Calvary in Redemptoris Mater, “The Council says that this happened ‘not without a divine plan”: by “suffering deeply with her only begotten Son and joining herself with her maternal spirit to his sacrifice, lovingly consenting to the immolation of the victim to whom she had given birth,” in this way Mary “faithfully preserved her union with her Son even to the Cross”[8]

Fr. Dwight Campbell elucidates on Pope John Paul’s Marian/ Eucharistic theology in an article in the Homiletic and Pastoral Review. He sees Pope John Paul’s Marian spirituality of the Cross as a key to his understanding of true participation in the Liturgy of the Eucharist – and especially the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass.

The Blessed Virgin Mary was present on Calvary; she is present at each Mass. At Mass we must invite Mary to be present with us, and strive to imitate her in uniting ourselves to Christ’s sacrifice made present on the altar. We must learn from her, at her “school,” by studying her interior dispositions, especially those she exhibited at the foot of the Cross: her heroic faith and her spirit of self-oblation in accepting the Father’s will that her Son suffer a horrible death to merit our salvation.[9]

Yet, this imitation of Mary is not simply exemplary in a historical sense or merely spiritual in as much as the Blessed Virgin Mary is actually interceding for us from heaven. It is indeed “real” because Mary’s sorrowful and Immaculate Heart is “truly” present in the Sacrifice of the Mass itself. Fr. Campbell cites this remarkable quote from Pope John Paul II,

In this “memorial” of Calvary [i.e., the Mass] all that Christ accomplished by his Passion and his Death is present. Consequently, all that Christ did with regard to his Mother for our sake is also present. To her he gave the beloved disciple and, in him, each of us: “Behold, your Son!” To each of us he also says: “Behold your Mother!” 9cf. Jn. 19.26-27).[10]

Her spiritual Motherhood is consequently real – not only in a generic, heavenly way, but because she is precisely there at each and every Sacrifice of the Mass, showing us how to sacrifice the Divine victim and our lives with her at the Foot of the Cross. Her spiritual Motherhood makes our sacrifice more bearable since she is a sign and a real channel of God’s intimate love for us. When the sacrifice or the suffering can seem beyond our strength- because it is beyond our strength—we need only to ask her to help. She will intercede so that we can complete our offering , joining it to hers at Calvary.

This act of self offering with her in the Mass is a perfection of the True Devotion of St. Louis de Montfort, “to begin, to continue to finish all our actions by her, in her, with her, and for her, in order that we may do them by Jesus Christ, in Jesus Christ, with Jesus Christ and for Jesus Christ, our Last End.”[11] Such is also the very soul of actual participation in the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass where we offer everything “through him, with him, and in him in the unity of the Holy Spirit.” Many Catholics may not yet be spiritually mature enough to participate interiorly in the Liturgy in a full, conscious, and actual manner, but all can and will suffer and in this Our Sorrowful Mother can help them to accept their Crosses with patience and a deep supernatural joy. We need her prayers then to remain standing at the Foot of the Cross and not to give into fear, pain, or discouragement in times of trial, but rather to accept all from the hands of a loving Father. We should above all pray to Our Lady of Sorrows in all our troubles. We should ask her, by the ocean of sorrow she felt during the Passion of Our Lord, to help us. God gave her all the immense graces necessary to make her the perfect Mother of God, but he also gave her all the graces, the tenderness, the love necessary to be our most perfect and loving Mother. No mother on earth ever loved a child as Our Blessed Lady loves us. Therefore, in all our troubles and sorrows, let us go to Our Blessed Lady with unbounded confidence.[12]

In order to remain strong in faith and to truly offer our minor sorrows with the sacrifice of the Mass, it is salutary to meditate profoundly on the immense depth of her sorrow. The English Oratorian, Fr. Frederick Faber wrote, “The first thing, then, which strikes us about our Lady’s dolours is their immensity… It is to her sorrows that the Church applies those words of Jeremias, O all ye that by the way, attend, and see if there be any sorrow like to my sorrow.”[13] Indeed it is the common teaching of the Saints that Mary suffered more than all the Martyrs at the foot of the Cross[14], entering into the abyss of her Son’s abandonment as he cried out to the Father, “My God, My God, Why have you abandoned Me?” This dark night of the soul in which her heart was pierced by a sword of sorrow is the basis of her spiritual motherhood and her tender compassion for us sinners. She entered into this state of abandonment which was due to us as a punishment for our sins. Yet she herself was totally innocent, having had no need to suffer for her sins. In this act of love for God and for us she became our Mother in the order of grace, a New Eve, giving spiritual birth to us in the agony of Calvary. St. Alphonsus de Liguori comments on these immense sorrows,

Indeed, the death of Jesus was more than enough to save the world, and infinity of worlds; but this good Mother, for the love she bore us, wished also to help the cause of our salvation with the merits of her sufferings, which she offered for us on Calvary. Therefore, Blessed(now Saint) Albert the Great says, “that as we are under great obligations to Jesus for his Passion, endured for our love, so also are we under great obligation to Mary for the martyrdom which she voluntarily suffered for our salvation in the death of her Son:”. . . And indeed, we may say that Mary’s only relief in the midst of her great sorrow in the Passion of her Son, was to see the lost world redeemed by his death.[15]

This was one of the greatest gifts of the Sacred Heart of Jesus on the Cross—the gift of the Immaculate Heart of Mary [16] who would remain present in the Church and even at the sacrifice of the Mass as a consolation and co-offerer with us in the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. When we turn in devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary, whether within Mass or outside of it, she will always bring us into a mystical union with the Sacred Heart of Jesus. This is a simple lesson, but one not easily learned by self absorbed modern man, often including us priests and religious. Yet the little children of Fatima were able to live this message of offering all their sacrifices and sufferings for the conversion of sinners through the Immaculate Heart of Mary, inseparably united to his Sacred Heart.

The Second Vatican Council summarizes Mary’s role in the Church thusly and this helps us to understand her role for us in the Liturgy,

The Motherhood of Mary in the order of grace continues from the consent which she loyally gave at the Annunciation and which she sustained without wavering beneath the Cross, until the eternal fulfillment of the elect. Taken up to heaven she did not lay aside this saving office, but by her manifold intercession continues to bring us the gifts of eternal salvation. . . . Therefore, the Blessed Virgin is invoked in the Church under the titles of Advocate, Helper, Benefactress, and Mediatrix. This, however, is so understood that it neither takes away anything form nor adds anything to the dignity and efficacy of Christ the one Mediator.[17]

Our Lady of the Blessed Sacrament and Holy Communion

Mary is also the greatest teacher with regards to devotion to the Blessed Sacrament and hence the most fruitful way of making our Holy Communions. St. Louis de Montfort teaches us some methods of preparing for and devoutly receiving the Most Blessed Sacrament in Holy Communion. He also instructs us how to make a proper thanksgiving, something that is often neglected today. According to this Saint and Marian doctor, the result of such Holy Communions, made with her, will be an increase of the Divine Life of the Holy Trinity within us and a decrease of our selfishness and sin:

My Jesus, You must increase in my soul, and I must decrease (Jn. 3:30); Mary, you must increase within me, and I must be still less than I have been. “O Jesus and Mary, increase in me, and multiply yourselves in others also.” ((cf. Gen. 1:22 ff). There are infinity of other thoughts which the Holy Ghost furnishes, and will furnish you, if you are thoroughly interior, mortified and faithful to this grand and sublime devotion which I have been teaching you. But always remember that the more you allow Mary to act your Communion, the more Jesus will be glorified.”[18]

Hence, we see that Mary can truly help us to participate in the most profound way in her very relationship with her Divine Son in heaven and in the most Holy Eucharist.

The Blessed Virgin and the Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament outside Mass

Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament is one of the best ways to prepare for Mass, and once again Mary can teach us how to better adorers of Christ in spirit and truth. Contrary to the popularized teachings of some liturgists, adoration of the Blessed Sacrament was not discouraged by Vatican II, and, to the contrary, it has been heartily encouraged by all the post-conciliar Popes, both in word and deed. On the subject of adoration of the Blessed Sacrament and authentic Liturgical participation, the Church has this to say,

The same piety which moves the faithful to Eucharistic adoration attracts them to a deeper participation in the Paschal Mystery. It makes them respond gratefully to the gifts of Christ who by his humanity continues to pour the divine life upon the members of his body. Living with Christ the Lord, they achieve a close familiarity with him and in his presence pour out their hearts for themselves and for those dear to them; they pray for peace and for the salvation of the world. Offering their entire lives with Christ to the Father in the Holy Spirit, they draw from this wondrous exchange an increase of faith, hope, and love. Thus, they nourish the proper disposition to celebrate the memorial of the Lord as devoutly as possible and to receive frequently, the bread given to us by the Father.[19]

Adoration itself was a very intimate experience for Mary as the Mother of God who carried the Word made Flesh in her womb. According to tradition, she was the first to greet and adore the Risen Lord, and certainly she participated daily in the Mass of the Apostle John, with whom she lived. Therefore she can be our teacher in the true spirit of adoration in the Spririt and in truth.

If Mary is our Mother in the order of grace and the Mediatrix of all graces, then she is intimately involved in the sacramental economy of the Church in a mysterious and sublime way that goes far beyond the limited scope of this brief reflection: She is indeed “the Woman clothed with the Son”, totally immersed in the very life of the Most Holy Trinity to such a degree that only the mind of God can fathom her ineffable holiness. Yet we poor sinners can invoke her intercession so as to enter more perfectly into the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass and she is always ready to obtain special graces for her children and especially for her priest Sons who offer the Divine Sacrifice. The Holy Catholic Church proclaims this in the Prayer of thanksgiving after Mass which she officially issues with the Roman Missal,

Mary, Holy Virgin Mother

I have received your Son, Jesus Christ,

With love you became His Mother,

gave birth to Him, nursed Him,

and helped Him grow to manhood.

With love I return Him to you,

to hold once more,

to love with all your heart

and to offer to the Holy Trinity

as our supreme act of worship. Amen.[20]

[1] Paul Haffner, The Mystery of Mary. ( Chicago, Illinois :Liturgy Training Publications, 2004)

[2] Pope Paul VI, Marialis Cultus, An Apostolic Exhortation, in Mary in the Church: A Selection of Teaching Documents. (Washington, DC: United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, 2003 )

[3] St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, translated by Fr. Frederick Faber. (Rockford, Illinois: Tan Books and Publishers, 1985).

[4] An example of this is the prayer to the Virgin Mary provided for priests to be said in preparation for a devout and fruitful celebration of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, “Mother of mercy and love, blessed Virgin Mary, I am a poor and unworthy sinner, and I turn to you in confidence and love. You stood by your Son and He hung dying on the Cross. Stand also by me a poor sinner, and by all the priests who are offering Mass today here and throughout the entire Church. Help us to offer a perfect and acceptable sacrifice in the sight of the holy and undivided Trinity, our Most High God. Amen.” Daily Roman Missal, ed. James Socias, (Chicago: Scepter Publishers, Midwest Theological Forum, 1993) 1963.

[5] Catechism of the Catholic Church, Libreria Editrice Vaticana (Bloomingdale, Ohio: Apostolate for Family Consecration, 1994) para 1102

[6] Ibid, para. 1349

[7] The Divine Liturgy of St. John Chrystosom, (New York, New York: Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of North and South America, 1966) p. 55

[8] Pope John Paul II, Redemptoris Mater, in Mary in the Church: A Selection of Teaching Documents. (Washington, DC: United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, 2003 )

[9] Fr. Dwight Campbell, “A Marian Spirituality of the Eucharist,”Homiletic and Pastoral Review, (January, 2006): 9.

[10] ibid., 9

[11] St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, 70

[12] “ A Devotional Prayer Book”, Holy Wounds Apostolate, Wis. Rapids, WI, p. 18

[13] Fr. Frederick William Faber, The Foot of the Cross, the Sorrows of Mary( London: Burns, Oates, and Washbourne LTD, 1857), 7.

[14] St. Alphonsus de Liguori, The Glories of Mary, “ Part III, The Dolors of Mary”, trans. Eugene Grimm,

( Rockford, Illinois: Tan Books and Publishers, 1931), p.463-544.

[15] St. Alphonsus de Liguori, The Glories of Mary, 477

[16] St. John Eudes, The Admirable Heart of Mary, (New York: P.J. Kenedy and Sons, 1948)

[17] Second Vatican Council, “Lumen Gentium,” in Vatican Council II: The Conciliar and Post Conciliar Documents, ed. Austin Flannery (Northport, NY: Costello Publishing Company, 1975), # 62.

[18] St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, nos. 272-73.

[19] Congregation for Divine Worship. “On Holy Communion and the Worship of the Eucharistic Mystery Outside of Mass, quoted in “In the Presence of Our Lord” by Benedict Groeschel, C.F.R. and James Monti,(Huntington, Indiana: Our Sunday Visitor, 1997), 270-271.

[20] Daily Roman Missal, Socias, 1979

God's Ways are Not Man's Ways

2011-05-03T20:42:00.000-07:00

Father Robert Behnke

The Third Sunday of Lent, March 27, 2011
I can’t begin to imagine what all those many, many people who believe everyone automatically goes to heaven do with this episode in the Gospel, in which Our Lord not only casts outs demons and speaks about devils and demons, but speaks about …the last state of that man becomes worse than the first…, referring to a man whose house is invaded by seven times the additional unclean spirit initially present. And Our Lord is quite clear and to the point when He sums up His teaching on casting out demons and devils by stating…He who is not with Me is against Me…; Our Lord’s meaning and intention seems clear—it is possible for people to be against Our Lord. This may seem obvious to you and to me, but I don’t think that it is so obvious to everyone today, judging from some of the actions of especially those who profess belief in Christ—and I believe that lack of belief in hell is responsible for just about every problem and serious difficulty in the life of the Church today.
A few Sundays ago, I spoke about my experience of having people say, both inside and outside of the confessional, say something like …I really don’t have anything to confess…. Of course those who say such things outside of the confessional usually see no need to place themselves inside of the confessional. And then there are those funerals—those funerals that are imitations of either a canonization or a roast—or both. Underlying all this, of course, is a denial of free will, a belief that sufficient grace and efficacious grace are always one and the same. But if you and I don’t have free will—if we are unable to choose freely between the good and the bad—then why are we here, here in this place? How then did we get here right now? Were we driven by some irresistible urge to make the journey to St. Thomas More this morning? And without free will, then I guess heaven would be automatic for everyone; but then why did God give us those Ten Commandments? Why did Our Lord talk so much about sin, the devil, penance, demons, forgiveness? Why especially did He choose to die? From what exactly can His death save us? Why did He give us Himself in the Blessed Sacrament, if even without It, everyone will get to heaven anyway. Years ago, in speaking to a then young adult whom I still know very well, about his lack of attendance at Sunday Mass on most Sundays, I said that I feared for his eternal damnation. Because I cared what could happen to him, I told him the truth. He became very upset—but not because he feared eternity in hell, but because I could speculate that he could land up there. He was convinced hell could not happen to him, so he was genuinely insulted and quite angry with me. I still can’t imagine what runs through the minds and hearts and souls of those who say to themselves God will understand my little un-repented habits of gossip, or lies, or stealing, or marital infidelity, or pride, or murder either within the womb or after birth, or on-again off-again attendance at Mass, because all those little un-repented actions reveal our use and misuse of the freedom we each have from God. And these are not atheists about whom I am speaking; these are people who profess a belief in the Christian God! To believe that God automatically will send everyone to heaven is to believe that God negates or somehow interferes with His gift of free will—which means God does something against His nature as God—which is something God cannot do. God cannot act against His nature as God; if He did, He would not be God.

This past week, I came across this little piece on universalism, which is the belief that God does save everybody, that God does indeed bring all souls to heaven, that no matter what one does on earth, he will automatically go to heaven when he dies. The piece, as you will quickly see, is heavily laden with sarcasm—which is probably what makes it so appealing to me: It is titled: A Non-judgmental Response to Universalism from Gentle Christ-followers:

An armed intruder under the cover of darkness slips into a child’s bedroom and stands over the child’s bed. The intruder, however, is not quite as stealthy as he’d hoped and he wakes the child’s parents sleeping in the next room. Dad and mom rush in to find their child slung over the man’s shoulders and the man preparing to exit through the window. The father pipes up, ‘Why, hello there. Welcome to our home!’ The intruder, startled, freezes in his tracks. ‘Can we help you?’ the mother inquires. ‘Well,’ says the puzzled man, ‘I was just about to take your child for a nice little drive.’ ‘Oh, that’s rather kind of you’ answers the father, ‘You know, traditionally, it has been expected that guests come in through the door and, I suppose, in the past parents have tended to look down on this sort of thing but you seem to be a nice man and we’re a nice family so why not. Have a great time but please be sure to have back him back in time for school in the morning.’ ‘Er, I will’ says the intruder as he steps back out through the open window carrying the child, ‘I will.’ ‘What a nice man’ the child’s mother says as they turn back toward their bedroom. ‘And I’m so proud that you welcomed him in such an open non-judgmental way. Not many fathers would’ve shown that kind of Christ-like maturity.’ ‘Thank you dear. I couldn't help but think the same thing. If only more families were as open to new experiences as we are.’
The first written response following this blog-piece stated …Mr. Intruder; meet Mr. Twelve-gauge….
Some, both in the time of Our Lord and in our own time, think that God…will understand and so overlook...,” or, worse, that…God does not count the actions of the human heart and the human will against us…; in Our Lord’s time, that belief accounted for the profanation of the first court of the temple, the Court of the Gentiles, making it into a market place, believing that God both understood and accepted their un-repented sacrilege; the temple authorities forgot that God’s ways are God’s ways, not man’s. God’s anger is real. Our Lord demonstrated that by driving the merchants out of the temple. Since God is immutable, unchangeable, God’s anger is no less real in our own time than it was then. Last Friday afternoon I was stuck in traffic behind a van; on the van was a sticker that read …pro-faith, pro-family, pro-choice…. Having to follow that van for several miles with my eyes riveted on that sticker, until the van maneuvered away and I lost sight of it, gave me a little taste of what God’s anger must be like toward those who use their freedom to do what they wish, for what they feel is good for themselves, believing that God will…understand…that God will automatically bring everyone to heaven no matter what they have done.
The Church teaches with certainty God’s universal salvific will: God indeed wants everyone to be saved. Likewise, the Church teaches that we cannot know with certainty if a particular individual ends up in hell; we know with certainty there are certain men and women in heaven—the canonized saints. Who may or may not be in hell, we cannot know: God has not revealed that; the certain identity of souls who have died in mortal sin—that’s God’s business, not yours nor mine. But God has revealed that every man has free will, that God does not take back that gift of free will nor will He interfere with it, and that the free and complete rejection of God that we call mortal sin, if not repented at death, will cause an eternity in hell. I heard an interesting story also last week about how God uses people and circumstances to bring men to use their free will to move them to knowledge and love of Him. As March is the month dedicated to St. Joseph, it seems especially appropriate today; this story
…describes one of those experiences that sometimes comes our way—a chance meeting which we might never have had if we'd been just a few minutes earlier or later, but something that ends up changing the course of everything in our lives. Perhaps I should say that these things seemlike chance, but it's all part of God's wonderful plan for us. Here's the story…. I was a young Episcopal cleric just returned to Rhode Island from a stint of serving in the Anglican Diocese of Bristol, England. The parish I had come to was middle-to-high: vestments, occasional incense, a few statues strategically placed. There was a parishioner who wanted us to have a new statue of St. Joseph. The old statue was small and not in terribly good shape. I was deputized to find a new one, but there were a couple of requirements. It had to be two feet tall and it had to be cheap. The only solution was to go to a local religious goods store and look for something that might look half-way acceptable if the lights were dim. I found one. It wasn’t beautiful, but it didn’t look as though it had been dragged behind a truck either. ‘Wrap it up and I’ll take it,’ I told the clerk. ‘Sorry, sir, but this is the last one and we don’t have a box for it,’ was the reply. A dilemma. I was driving a Volkswagen, and the back seat was already fairly full with a child’s car seat and other assorted items. The only option I could see was to stand it up in the passenger’s seat and strap the seat belt around it, which I did. I was just closing the passenger door. St. Joseph was safely strapped in, facing ram-rod straight ahead. I heard a voice behind me. ‘You might want to let him drive.’ I turned around to see a young priest about my age, with a grin on his face. We exchanged quips about the statue with the seat belt, and then began to chat about other things. We quickly discovered that my Episcopal parish and his Catholic parish were located fairly close to one another. We seemed to click, we made lunch plans, and one of the most important friendships of my life began. We got together regularly to talk. It didn’t take long for our discussions to turn into question and answer sessions – me asking the questions, and him giving the answers. I wanted to know about the Catholic faith. And he told me. He was always gentle in his answers, but he never watered down the truth. Even if the issue was a difficult one, he always told me what the Church teaches. I was grateful for that. I would have resented it if I had discovered that he was tailoring what he said to make it fit what he might have thought I wanted to hear. I learned Catholic truth, and when it was presented to me in its fullness and in its beauty, I knew I had to embrace it. I believed it completely. How grateful I always have been to St. Joseph. Without saying a word, he helped bring me into the Catholic Church by introducing me to a faithful Catholic priest. The statue may not have been very beautiful, but everything else in the story is. Our parish has a St. Joseph Shrine, which is the partial fulfillment of a promise I made to the gentle Spouse of the Blessed Virgin and Foster-father of our Lord. The full promise is that we will have a dedicated Chapel in his honor. That will come, but meanwhile my gratitude for the prayers and guidance of St. Joseph are pretty-near boundless, and I've followed the advice given to me by the wonderful priest who befriended me, ‘You might want to let him drive.’
This Episcopal priest became first a Catholic, then a Catholic priest, and with about a dozen other former Episcopalians, founded the Anglican Use Catholic Church of Our Lady of the Atonement in San Antonio; today that Catholic parish has over 500 families and a school with several hundred children. God used the combination of man’s free will and His divine will that all men be saved to enable this accomplishment that gives Him glory. Without this one man’s free will used for God’s glory, not man’s glory, this wonderful Catholic parish would not exist. God’s ways are not the ways of man. God commands us to love our neighbor as ourselves; He never commands us to love everything our neighbor does out of a false sense of human respect, or toleration of evil, or kindness with no guts. God is not forever mocked. Remember the flood in the time of Noah, the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah, the punishment of Israel for worshipping the golden calf, the lost tribes of Israel, the exile into Babylon, the rending of the temple veil from top to bottom. Recall also all the holocausts of the 20th century; recall, especially, the holocaust of abortion, extending from the 2oth century into the 21st. The hand of God’s anger is not forever withheld; God is not forever mocked. If you don’t believe it, when you finally get the chance, ask one of those beaten and bruised money-changers thrown out of the temple by the God of love…by the God of tough love.

Fr. Robert Behnke

Encourage Vocations in Your Family

2011-05-03T20:40:00.000-07:00

Father Charles Fanelli

Talk openly with your children about what it means to follow God’s will. Even young children can understand the concept of “Thy Will be done” when they pray the Our Father. A positive family life with both parents practicing their faith is important in fostering vocations. Attending Mass as a family – especially if you are involved in the same parish for an extended period of time – will give your children the opportunity to meet a variety of people who are living out their vocations to married life, to single life and consecrated life.

If you suspect that one of your children feels drawn toward a vocation, mention it to a priest or sister in your parish. Parental encouragement is not the most important factor in vocations. An invitation from a priest or religious has a much bigger impact.

Catholic Schools – especially high schools – nurture vocations. If that is not an option in your family, get involved as a family in religious education programs, youth ministry, service projects, and youth retreats. Often the idea of vocation gets formed in high school or before.
Look closely at your own attitudes toward priests and religious. If you are negative – even in a moment of frustration or anger over something that happened with a priest – your children will pick up on your negativity and might begin to think that you would not approve of a priestly vocation.
Talk to your teenage children about the difference between a “vocation” and a “career” when discussing colleges and future options. Ask your children whether they have ever considered a vocation.
Be sure to pray for your children. God especially hears the prayers of parents for their children. It is good also for children to see their parents praying, taking time in the day for prayer or reading the Bible or a spiritual book.
Trust God our Father to care for your family and for the Church. Christ said that we would never be alone.

Pope Benedict on Palm Sunday

2011-05-03T20:26:00.000-07:00

Dear Brothers and Sisters,
Dear young people!
It is a moving experience each year on Palm Sunday as we go up the mountain with Jesus, towards the Temple, accompanying him on his ascent. On this day, throughout the world and across the centuries, young people and people of every age acclaim him, crying out: “Hosanna to the Son of David! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord!”

But what are we really doing when we join this procession as part of the throng which went up with Jesus to Jerusalem and hailed him as King of Israel? Is this anything more than a ritual, a quaint custom? Does it have anything to do with the reality of our life and our world? To answer this, we must first be clear about what Jesus himself wished to do and actually did. After Peter’s confession of faith in Caesarea Philippi, in the northernmost part of the Holy Land, Jesus set out as a pilgrim towards Jerusalem for the feast of Passover. He was journeying towards the Temple in the Holy City, towards that place which for Israel ensured in a particular way God’s closeness to his people. He was making his way towards the common feast of Passover, the memorial of Israel’s liberation from Egypt and the sign of its hope of definitive liberation. He knew that what awaited him was a new Passover and that he himself would take the place of the sacrificial lambs by offering himself on the cross. He knew that in the mysterious gifts of bread and wine he would give himself for ever to his own, and that he would open to them the door to a new path of liberation, to fellowship with the living God. He was making his way to the heights of the Cross, to the moment of self-giving love. The ultimate goal of his pilgrimage was the heights of God himself; to those heights he wanted to lift every human being.

Our procession today is meant, then, to be an image of something deeper, to reflect the fact that, together with Jesus, we are setting out on pilgrimage along the high road that leads to the living God. This is the ascent that matters. This is the journey which Jesus invites us to make. But how can we keep pace with this ascent? Isn’t it beyond our ability? Certainly, it is beyond our own possibilities. From the beginning men and women have been filled – and this is as true today as ever – with a desire to “be like God”, to attain the heights of God by their own powers. All the inventions of the human spirit are ultimately an effort to gain wings so as to rise to the heights of Being and to become independent, completely free, as God is free. Mankind has managed to accomplish so many things: we can fly! We can see, hear and speak to one another from the farthest ends of the earth. And yet the force of gravity which draws us down is powerful. With the increase of our abilities there has been an increase not only of good. Our possibilities for evil have increased and appear like menacing storms above history. Our limitations have also remained: we need but think of the disasters which have caused so much suffering for humanity in recent months.

The Fathers of the Church maintained that human beings stand at the point of intersection between two gravitational fields. First, there is the force of gravity which pulls us down – towards selfishness, falsehood and evil; the gravity which diminishes us and distances us from the heights of God. On the other hand there is the gravitational force of God’s love: the fact that we are loved by God and respond in love attracts us upwards. Man finds himself betwixt this twofold gravitational force; everything depends on our escaping the gravitational field of evil and becoming free to be attracted completely by the gravitational force of God, which makes us authentic, elevates us and grants us true freedom.

Following the Liturgy of the Word, at the beginning of the Eucharistic Prayer where the Lord comes into our midst, the Church invites us to lift up our hearts: “Sursum corda!” In the language of the Bible and the thinking of the Fathers, the heart is the centre of man, where understanding, will and feeling, body and soul, all come together. The centre where spirit becomes body and body becomes spirit, where will, feeling and understanding become one in the knowledge and love of God. This is the “heart” which must be lifted up. But to repeat: of ourselves, we are too weak to lift up our hearts to the heights of God. We cannot do it. The very pride of thinking that we are able to do it on our own drags us down and estranges us from God. God himself must draw us up, and this is what Christ began to do on the cross. He descended to the depths of our human existence in order to draw us up to himself, to the living God. He humbled himself, as today’s second reading says. Only in this way could our pride be vanquished: God’s humility is the extreme form of his love, and this humble love draws us upwards.

Psalm 24, which the Church proposes as the “song of ascent” to accompany our procession in today’s liturgy, indicates some concrete elements which are part of our ascent and without which we cannot be lifted upwards: clean hands, a pure heart, the rejection of falsehood, the quest for God’s face. The great achievements of technology are liberating and contribute to the progress of mankind only if they are joined to these attitudes – if our hands become clean and our hearts pure, if we seek truth, if we seek God and let ourselves be touched and challenged by his love. All these means of “ascent” are effective only if we humbly acknowledge that we need to be lifted up; if we abandon the pride of wanting to become God. We need God: he draws us upwards; letting ourselves be upheld by his hands – by faith, in other words – sets us aright and gives us the inner strength that raises us on high. We need the humility of a faith which seeks the face of God and trusts in the truth of his love.

The question of how man can attain the heights, becoming completely himself and completely like God, has always engaged mankind. It was passionately disputed by the Platonic philosophers of the third and fourth centuries. For them, the central issue was finding the means of purification which could free man from the heavy load weighing him down and thus enable him to ascend to the heights of his true being, to the heights of divinity. Saint Augustine, in his search for the right path, long sought guidance from those philosophies. But in the end he had to acknowledge that their answers were insufficient, their methods would not truly lead him to God. To those philosophers he said: recognize that human power and all these purifications are not enough to bring man in truth to the heights of the divine, to his own heights. And he added that he should have despaired of himself and human existence had he not found the One who accomplishes what we of ourselves cannot accomplish; the One who raises us up to the heights of God in spite of our wretchedness: Jesus Christ who from God came down to us and, in his crucified love, takes us by the hand and lifts us on high.

We are on pilgrimage with the Lord to the heights. We are striving for pure hearts and clean hands, we are seeking truth, we are seeking the face of God. Let us show the Lord that we desire to be righteous, and let us ask him: Draw us upwards! Make us pure! Grant that the words which we sang in the processional psalm may also hold true for us; grant that we may be part of the generation which seeks God, “which seeks your face, O God of Jacob” (cf. Ps 24:6). Amen.

http://www.radiovaticana.org/EN1/Articolo.asp?c=479477

Give Us This Day Our Daily (Supersubstantial) Bread

2011-05-03T20:15:00.000-07:00

Father Benjamin Reece S.T.D Cand.

The “Our Father” is the most common and the most important prayer in the Christian world. Yet no matter how often we pray it, there remains a greater spiritual depth to be discovered since its very words come from the Son of God and lead us back to him as our last end. Indeed, the baptized Christian (in a state of grace) is not merely doing what Jesus taught when he prays the “Our Father” but Jesus is praying in him.

The whole prayer, in a sense, can be understood as a summary of the Gospel and as the perfect prayer in which we are instructed to ask for all we need. Furthermore, this perfect prayer was initially prayed by Christians thrice daily according to the Catechism of the Catholic Church and is ideally prayed in a liturgical setting in which we pray in the name of the whole Church – saying “Our” not my “Father”.

Through divine adoption or filiation we enter into the very heart of the prayer of the Man/God Jesus to his Heavenly Father. He is the first born and high priest of a new priestly community so this prayer reaches its peak intensity in the Liturgy and especially in the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass where the priest in persona Christi offers the divine victim to the Father, the priest’s own prayer, and the sacrifices of the faithful in perfect thanksgiving for all the benefits which we, his Church, have received.

In and through the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, we have participated in the great sacrifice of Jesus on Calvary, his resounding yes to the Father which has undone the sin of the disobedience of Adam and Eve. It would seem that only at the Mass, is it truly possible to say, “Thy Kingdom Come Thy Will be Done” because there we are all saying it in union with the re-presentation of the Sacrifice of the Mass, where the “Yes” of Jesus is being re-presented by a priest who has been sacramentally ordained to join his human yes and the “yes” of the assembled community to the perfect obedience of Jesus on the Cross and in heaven. In his justly famous book, The Spirit of the Liturgy, Pope Benedict XVI, then Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger wrote,

“As St. Maximus the Confessor showed so splendidly, the obedience of Jesus’ human will is inserted into the everlasting Yes of the Son to the Father. This ‘giving’ on the part of the Lord, in passivity of his being crucified, draws the passion of human existence into the action of love, and so it embraces all the dimensions of reality—Body, Soul, Spirit, Logos. Just as the pain of the body is drawn into the pathos of the mind and becomes the Yes of obedience, so time is drawn into what reaches beyond time. The real interior act, though it does not exist without the exterior, transcends time, but since it comes from time, time can again and again be brought into it. That is how we can become contemporary with the past events of salvation. Bernard of Clairvaux has this in mind when he says that the true semel (“once”) bears within itself the semper(‘always’). What is perpetual takes in what happens only once. In the Bible the Once for all is emphasized most vigorously in the epistle to the Hebrews, but the careful reader will discover that the point made by St. Bernard expresses its true meaning. The ephapax (’0nce for All’) is bound up with the aionios (‘everlasting’).”[1]

In this way, by participating in the great obedience of Jesus on the Cross, we are joined to his reparation for the great disobedience of Adam and Eve. We are refusing the temptation of the devil to be like God, deciding what is right and wrong for ourselves. Instead, we are offering the whole of our lives with its all its full assent to divinely revealed truth, specifically chosen moral acts, and salvific sacramental graces in union with the perfect offering of Christ in the re-presentation of Calvary at the Sacrifice of the Mass. By this mystical/ sacramental sharing in his obedience to the Father we are thus undeservedly given to eat of the fruit of the supernatural true tree of life, the body and blood of Christ which is the food of everlasting life.

It is no coincidence then that the Our Father is said after the consecration and before Holy Communion in all the ancient Eucharistic Liturgies of the Catholic Church,

“In the Eucharistic Liturgy the Lord’s Prayer appears as the prayer of the whole Church and there reveals its full meaning and efficacy. Placed between the anaphora (the Eucharistic prayer) and the communion, the Lord’s prayer sums up on the one hand all the petitions and intercessions expressed in the movement of the epiclesis and, on the other, knocks at the door of the Banquet of the kingdom which sacramental communion anticipates.” (CCC 2770)

But is the Holy Eucharist of the Eucharistic banquet also the daily bread of the Our Father? If the Our Father is the perfect prayer which is most perfectly prayed in the context of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, then does it not make sense that the daily bread which we most need and so ask for is the supersubstantial bread of the Holy Eucharist?

It may surprise many Catholics to learn that this indeed is the teaching of the Catholic Church as expressed by the Council of Trent and as re-proposed in the Catechism of the Catholic Church. Furthermore, many Protestants who say this prayer daily may be shocked to learn that they are truly praying to receive Holy Communion daily and that this interpretation goes back to very words of Our Lord in the “Our Father” — “Give us This Day, Our Daily Bread”. The Greek word here isepiousion, a hapax or a word that is only used here and nowhere else in the Greek language, and so presupposed to be the Greek equivalent of whatever word Our Lord may have used in Aramaic or Hebrew. Most Protestant commentaries translate it as daily and this goes back to the Latin of St. Jerome who renders “arton epiousion” as “panis quotidianum” or daily bread in Luke. However, he translated it as “panis supersubstantialem” in the Gospel of St. Matthew. In other words, Jerome who realized that this Greek hapax could not be expressed in Latin with both meanings at once, chose to give it one meaning in Matthew – “daily” and a another in Luke–“supersubstantial” so as to preserve both senses of the word for Latin speaking Christians, albeit in two distinct biblical locations. In English, we have lost this second original meaning – supersubstantial, and so are usually unaware of this lost Eucharistic connotation in our recitation of the Our Father.

Since Latin, also failed to express both meaning at once, St. Ambrose faced the same problem of expressing both significations of “epi-ousion” when teaching the “Our Father” to his catechumens in ancient Milan. He asked them why we use the word bread after the consecration since he had previously explained that after the words of the priest it is no longer bread and wine, but the very Body and Blood of Christ. Consequently, Saint Ambrose seized on the Greek, “epiousion” of the Our Father, commenting “He (Jesus) called it bread indeed, but he called it “epiousion”, that is, supersubstantial. It is not the bread that passes into the body but that bread of eternal life, which sustains the substance of our souls. Therefore, in Greek it is called epiousios.”[2]This concept of substance (epiousion) in the Holy Eucharist as applied above by him in De Sacramentis was very similar to the interpretation of St. Cyril of Jerusalem—supersubstantial food for the soul. Yet in a later quote from De Sacramentis (below), we will see how St. Ambrose interprets the concept of substance in a new way which will be crucial for the development of substantial change in the theology of real presence. Remember, too that Ambrose was combating Germanic Arianism in his diocese as he sought to defend the consubstantialityof the Father and the Son against the Arians who denied that Jesus was one in being (homo-ousion) with the Father. Hence, it would seem only natural that the concept of substance or ousia would be in the forefront of his mind as he wrestled with the terminology of the real presence of Christ in the Holy Eucharist.

As Our Lord Jesus Christ is the true Son, not by grace in the manner of men, but as Son of the substance of the Father, so it is true real flesh as he himself said which we receive and his true/ real blood is imbibed. But perhaps you might say what the disciples said when they heard him saying: “Unless one eats my flesh and drinks my Blood, he shall not dwell in me nor have eternal life—perhaps you might say “How is it true? I see the analogy, but I do not see the true/real blood.’ First of all, I (Ambrose) told you of statement of Christ which acts so that it can change and convert the established species of nature (mutare et convertere genera institute naturae). Then when Christ’s statement is not accepted by his disciples but hearing that he gave his flesh to eat and gave his blood to drink they turned away and only Peter said “You have the words of eternal life and how can I turn from you?’ Therefore, so that others could say this without the horror of experiencing blood but dwell in saving grace, you receive the sacrament in an analogous experience, but truly the grace and power of its nature. ‘I am” he declares the bread of life which comes down from heaven. But flesh did not come down from heaven, this flesh he acquired on earth out of the Virgin. How then did bread come down from heaven and be living bread? Our Lord Jesus Christ at the same time shares divinity and corporality, and you who partake in this food receive the flesh of his Divine Substance. (emphasis mine)[3]

The concept of ousia or substance in regard to the Eucharist seems to be used for the first time by St. Ambrose in De Sacramentis. Yet is nothing more than an elaboration of the very term “epi-ousion” of Christ in the “Our Father”, rethinking the concept of “ousia” as it came to him from the Council of Nicea.

This theology of substantial presence and substantial change will continue to develop in the subsequent centuries. The term substance will officially appear in the oath prescribed to Berengar of Tours by the Council of Rome. Meanwhile the term transubstantiation will be used for the first time by a theologian named Roland Bandinelli who later became Pope Alexander III (1140-42), and it will be used again by Innocent III in a papal document. The Fourth Lateran Council will formulate it more precisely and hence it will be demanded of the orthodox by the Profession of Faith at the Council of Lyons. Finally, it will be fully developed by St. Thomas Aquinas and enshrined as Catholic dogma at the Council of Trent. Pope Paul VI will strongly insist on the continuing dogmatic value of this term in his Encyclical,Mysterium Fidei.

The declaration of the Council of Trent about the dogma of transubstantiation seems to be well known, even by many opponents of Catholicism, even if not well understood by them or even by many modern Catholics. Yet what is less well known is that the Council of Trent also insisted that the words “epi-ousion” spoken by Our Lord mean both that the Eucharist is super-substantial bread and that it should be received daily, in other words it taught both senses of the word as understood by St. Jerome and St. Ambrose

Finally, the holy council with true paternal affection enjoins, exhorts, begs, and entreats through the tender mercy of our God (Lk 1:78) that each and all who are marked by the name of Christian should now, at long last, join together and agree in this sign of unity, this bond of love, this symbol of harmony; and that, mindful of the so great majesty and surpassing love of our lord Jesus Christ, who gave his own dear life as the price of our salvation and his own flesh for us to eat(Jn 6:48-59), they should believe and reverence these sacred mysteries of his body and blood with such constancy and firmness of faith, such dedication of mind, such devotion and worship, that they may be able to receive frequently that supersubstantial bread(Mt 6:11), and that it may be for them truly the life of the soul and the unending health of the mind; thus, strengthened by its force, may they be able after the journey of this wretched pilgrimage to reach the heavenly fatherland, there to eat without veil the same bread of angels(Ps 77:25) which they now eat beneath sacred veils. [4]

Indeed, that holy Council encouraged all Catholics to attend Mass frequently (frequenter) and to receive Holy Communion whenever they were well disposed to do so, and even daily. This teaching was long ignored during the dark years of Jansenism but Pope St. Pius X in Sacra Tridentina resurrected this clear teaching of the Council of Trent and forcefully opposed all restrictive theologies of the reception of Holy Communion. Thus, St. Pius X was actually hearkening back to the clear words of Jesus and finally applying the great Eucharistic teaching of the Council of Trent that all the faithful should receive the Holy Eucharist frequently and at each Mass they attend,

This wish of the Council fully conforms to that desire wherewith Christ our Lord was inflamed when He instituted this Divine Sacrament. For He Himself, more than once, and in clarity of word, pointed out the necessity of frequently eating His Flesh and drinking His Blood, especially in these words: “This is the bread that has come down from heaven; not as your fathers ate the manna, and died. He who eats this bread shall live forever.” From this comparison of the Food of angels with bread and with manna, it was easily to be understood by His disciples that, as the body is daily nourished with bread, and as the Hebrews were daily fed with manna in the desert, the Christian soul might daily partake of this heavenly bread and be refreshed thereby. Moreover, we are bidden in the Lord’s Prayer to ask for “our daily bread” · which words, the holy Fathers of the Church all but unanimously teach, must be understood not so much that material bread which is the support of the body as the Eucharistic bread which ought to be our daily food.[5]

St Pius X stressed the necessity of daily Communion for the struggle against sin and human frailty, calling daily communion “the antidote whereby we may be freed from daily faults and be preserved from mortal sin.” According to the Saintly Pope of the Eucharist, the early Christians also daily hastened to the temple and to “the breaking of the bread” (Acts 2: 42 & 46). Such Eucharistic teaching can be found in the Magisterium of his successors and in the new Catechism of the Catholic Church,

“‘Daily’ (epiousios) occurs nowhere else in the New Testament. Taken in a temporal sense, this word is a pedagogical repletion of ‘this day,’ to confirm us in trust ‘without reservation.’ Taken in the qualitative sense, it signifies what is necessary for life, and more broadly every good thing sufficient for subsistence. Taken literally (epi-ousios: ‘super-essential’), it refers directly to the Bread of Life, the Body of Christ, the ‘medicine of immortality,’ without which we have no life within us.’ (CCC 2837)

Conclusion: The Catechism of the Catholic Church goes on to highly recommend the daily celebration of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, and consequently the daily reception of the Most Sacred Body and Blood by the faithful whenever possible. According to St. Pius X this should be done with due reverence and firm faith, but all that is necessary is that the communicant should be free from mortal sin and approach Our Lord with a right and devout intention. He knew that many would approach with venial sin, but he encouraged them by saying that “it is sufficient that they be free from mortal sin, with the purpose of never sinning in the future” And with great pastoral wisdom he adds that “if they have this sincere purpose” they will with time and effort “free themselves from venial sins and from all affection thereto.”

As the Church confronts this new millennium, with its all its challenges and possibilities for a new evangelization, is there any greater hope for the triumph of the faith then can be found in the devout daily celebration of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass?

What greater plan for Christian unity could be conceived than is already expressed in the words, “Give us This Day Our Daily Bread?” If all the baptized Christians in the world really understood and lived out this petition by attending daily Mass and receiving the Body and Blood of our Lord daily, what power would be unleashed? Can we even imagine the power of one billion Holy Communions received devoutly and with a right intention on a daily basis? Not only would mortal sin cease, but even venial sins would gradually be extinguished and the world would see how much we love God and each other. Truly, we would become one with Our Lord and God in Holy Communion and the poor would be fed and world wide peace established, based on universal solidarity. The Church would become once again a school of Saints, and the increase of consecrated vocations and the flourishing of family life would finally usher in the renewal so long desired by the Council of Trent and the Second Vatican Council. This may seem utopian, but God’s Kingdom on earth would be the real result of that mysterious petition of the Our Father, “Give us This Day Our Daily (supersubstantial) Bread.”

[1] Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger, The Spirit of the Liturgy, trans. John Saward (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 2000), 56

[2] St. Ambrose, De Sacramentis, 5. 4. 24; English translation from The Fathers of the Church, Saint Ambrose,(Washington: CUA Press, 1963)

[3] “Ego sum, inquit, panis vivus, qui de caelo descendi. Sed caro non descendit e caelo, hoc est carnem in terries adsumpsit ex virgine. Quomodo ergo desccendit panis et caelo et panis vivus? Quia idem dominus noster Iesus Christus consors est et divinitatis et Corporis, et tu, qui accipis carnem, divinae eius substantiae in illo participaris alimento. St. Ambrose of Milan, De Sacramentis 6:1.1-4

[4] The Council of Trent, “Session 13, Decree on the most Holy Sacrament of the Eucharist” in Decrees of the Ecumenical Councils, Vol. 2, English ed. Norman P. Tanner S.J.(Washington, D.C.: Georgetown University Press, 1990), 697

[5] St Pius X, Sacra tridentina, “On Frequent and Daily Reception of Holy Communion”, Vatican official website at www.Vatican.va (April 5, 2007)

Catholicism and the Full Truth

2011-05-03T19:58:00.000-07:00

Father Robert Behnke

The Fourth Sunday after Epiphany, January 30, 2011

Every year for the past 38 years, two events occur simultaneously toward the end of January: the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity – sometimes called the Chair of Unity Octave – and the anniversary of the U.S. Supreme Court’s Roe v. Wade (along with Doe v. Bolton) ruling. The Week of Prayer for Christian Unity has a much longer history, having been initiated in 1908 by Father Paul Wattson, who was a convert from Anglicanism to the Catholic Faith. During the past 38 years since Roe v. Wade – and that number of years is engraved in my memory, because it coincides exactly with the number of years I have been a priest, Roe coming in January and my ordination the following May – so over 38 years I have become – and here I am not at all certain what precise word to use – perhaps more skeptical, less enthused, less hopeful, more hesitant – about the prospect of the union of the Catholic Church with any of the literally thousands of Protestant ecclesial communities. It is not that I do not pray for it, and hope for it, and in my younger days worked for it by means of engaging in common projects with some Protestants. The Holy Father again this year stressed that the union of all Christians must be the prayer and the work of every Christian, simply because it is the expressed will of Our Lord: …ut unum sint…. But it is what I detect, quite frankly, about contraception and abortion, and more recently now same sex unions, coming from much of the leadership of the mainline Protestant ecclesial communities – the Lutherans and the Methodists and the Presbyterians and the United Church of Christ (and not so much the Baptists) but most especially the Episcopalians (they prefer to be called Episcopals, I have been told) – the American Anglicans – that convinces me that union of these groups with the one, holy, Catholic, apostolic Church is far down the road. What Pope Benedict has started with the ordinariates, making it possible for Anglicans to come into full communion with the Catholic Church, is, I believe, a ray of hope; I believe Pope Benedict is truly the pope of genuine Christian unity. But those seeds are just now planted, and they will take a long time to grow, and their growth is itself as yet undetermined. Meanwhile, most mainline American Protestant ecclesial communities and their leadership are, at very best, wishy-washy about issues of life and marriage and sexuality, and, at worst, some of their leaders have referred to abortion as a “blessing” and even “a sacrament,” so condemnation and disgust of all that, rather than unity, must characterize the true Church’s stance toward those pseudo-Christian “leaders.”

If you saw any of the 400,000 participants in the March for Life last week on EWTN (which, unless you were in Washington last week, was the only way you could view the march, as it was otherwise ignored by the rest of the media), you may have heard a group of young people – probably high school age – chanting over and over as they walked, Hey, Obama, your mama, chose life. What are the chances that those young people were of some faith other than the Catholic Faith? Yet, just in time for the 38th anniversary of Roe v. Wade, the Washington-based Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice (RCRC) pledged to bring its …moral force to bear… to ensure …full coverage of abortion services… through Obamacare's tax-funded state insurance exchanges set to begin in 2014. You must recall that, as part of last year's deal with pro-life congressional Democrats, President Obama signed an executive order that his administration claims will prevent federal funding of abortions. At the time, RCRC denounced that order …an unconscionable deal… they called it, for offering any potential impediment to government-facilitated abortion. Pro-life skeptics doubt that the executive order ultimately will have much legal force. And pro-abortion rights groups like RCRC will determinedly push against it. Mostly mainline Protestant groups founded RCRC (originally less euphemistically called the Religious Coalition for Abortion Rights) in 1973 in the immediate wake of Roe v. Wade, to ensure widespread religious backing for the U.S. Supreme Court's overthrow of state restrictions on abortion. For years RCRC was based in the United Methodist Building on Capitol Hill, which is the headquarters for most mainline Protestant lobbies. The primary author of Roe v. Wade was Justice Harry Blackmun, himself an active United Methodist. RCRC in its early years got funding from the Playboy Foundation and later from philanthropies like the Ford Foundation. The RCRC’s membership primarily includes nearly all white Protestant denominations like the United Methodist Church, the Episcopal Church, the United Church of Christ, and the Presbyterian Church (USA).

The obvious and logical difficulty and trouble with all this for any genuine Christian who hopes and prays for genuine Christian unity is that it all presupposes what C. S. Lewis called, in his book of the same name, mere Christianity – watered-down least-common-denominator Christianity - which in turn presupposes three other principles, all of which are demonstrably false. First, mere Christianity assumes that the beliefs most Christians hold in common are somehow more central or important to Christianity than the beliefs over which they differ, so disagreement of the issues of life and marriage and sex can be overcome by agreement about Bible translations and the sinfulness of racism or terrorism. Second, mere Christianity assumes that it has within itself the means to preserve itself when, in fact, one of the things it leaves out is the very authority principle so essential to self-preservation, the one thing required to prevent any group from claiming whatever it wants to be true, the devastating results of which are easily demonstrated through both logic and history (Luther started what became the first Protestant church, and there was just one Protestant church for about one minute; now there are thousands, none of which hold exactly identical beliefs); Catholics call that essential authority principle the papacy, the Petrine office, and genuine Catholics cling to it like a lifeline in this age of nuttiness and absolute confusion. And third, mere Christianity assumes that the differences among various Christian groups are insufficiently powerful to undermine the effectiveness of Christian witness throughout the world, rendering Christianity not so much a witness to truth as the ultimate witness to the proposition that truth is unknowable (if even Christians cannot agree about it). The illogic of this assumption is obvious to anyone who has studied the secularization of the Western world since the Protestant Revolt.

Now even the Christian tradition in any form - Methodists, Lutherans, Episcopals - carries within it, as the Second Vatican Council taught so luminously, a number of graces provided by God for growth in holiness and salvation, and so by virtue of these graces it remains immensely powerful even when non-Catholic Christianity limps along incomplete. (Here I want to move into a brief personal digression. My dad’s father was Catholic; his mother was Lutheran. They had six kids; numbers 1, 3, & 5 were baptized Catholic; numbers 2, 4, & 6 were baptized Lutheran, but 0ne of these became Catholic as an adult. My grandmother was a good woman, a holy woman, a faithful wife and a faithful Lutheran, and perhaps a better Christian than my grandfather, but she never arrived at the fullness of truth, and I am convinced that served as a handicap throughout her life, an obstacle for her growth in holiness. How could it be otherwise, her lacking the graces of the seven sacraments except for Baptism, and especially lacking throughout her life the graces which come from worthy reception of the Most Blessed Sacrament?) So it is easy to see why, having experienced Christ even through an incomplete tradition, a Methodist or a Lutheran Christian can overlook what may be missing. He may notice it not at all, or regard it as decidedly secondary, or airily dismiss it as false. But as soon as one notices and begins to examine seriously the differences among various Christian bodies, one must surely figure out that mere and watered-down Christianity is insufficient, because it is not the mind of Christ. Mere Christianity simply begs too many questions; the radical departure of mainline Protestantism from the ancient tradition which for nearly 2000 years condemned contraception and abortion and any sexual activity outside of marriage shines a harsh beam of light upon the insufficiency of mere and watered-down Christianity for the one who wants to follow Jesus fully, precisely and exactly. Moreover, these questions are, or ought to be, particularly hard to ignore in the face of the sheer size of the Catholic Church in comparison with all the others. Yet so many Protestants seem unwilling to notice even this elephant in the room. The complacency of Protestant ecclesial communities, and especially of their leadership, evidences a certain complacency also about true unity, a complacency incomprehensible to a committed Catholic who may also be committed to the goal of the reunion of all Christians in one communion—as it was to Blessed John Henry Newman even while he was still an Anglican. Newman understood that Christian unity is founded on the individual’s conversion of mind and heart to all that Our Lord teaches, which is why Newman became a Catholic.

Ecumenism, Christian unity, involves many things, from simple acts of kindness to those in different Christian “communions” to formal explorations of theological differences, in the hope of improving relations and resolving such differences through means which both parties actually accept. Such ecumenical initiatives are important insofar as they remove unnecessary obstacles to unity. But ultimately, ecumenism cannot avoid the question of conversion. At some point, the non-Catholic party in ecumenical activity, in the quest for Christian unity, must learn to recognize the gifts he can receive only from the Catholic Church as not only essential to not a mere watered-down but to a full Christianity, but as unattainable by any means short of union with the institution of the Catholic Church. At some point the Protestant must recognize that Christianity cannot be full and complete without the authority of Peter, without a legitimate priesthood, and without all seven sacraments. Again, the issues surrounding life and marriage and sexuality demonstrate this: which other Christian church teaches without equivocation, and proclaims from the mouth of the one man who stands on earth in the place of Jesus Christ, that artificial contraception and abortion are always intrinsically evil, that marriage is and can only be between a man and a woman? And in recognizing this truth, the Protestant must also recognize that the truth cannot be possessed without institutional unity. Or, to put it another way, the full truth cannot be appropriated without conversion to Catholicism.

The Gospel today shows us that, even in the fiercest of storms, there is only one boat in which it is safe to be; there is no fleet of safe ships on the Sea of Galilee, nor is there a fleet of safe churches. This possession of the certainty of truth is worth conversion, as is every other element of the authentic Catholic tradition, every good in it that has been given to us by God as one more key and critical portion of His plan for our union with Him for all eternity. At some point in the quest for Christian unity, at some point in the ecumenical task, the non-Catholic party must recognize the remarkable weakness of leaders and groups and institutions that equivocate and obfuscate so stubbornly on the greatest moral question of our time: is it right or wrong to murder an unborn baby? Is it not clear that this equivocation and obfuscation – calling abortion an issue of “reproductive health” and “reproductive choice” - misses the full truth revealed in Jesus Christ? Will the sterile amorality of groups like RCRC prevail in their quest to insinuate abortion into every aspect of American life? Or will more and more Protestants care enough about, as Our Lord prayed in His prayer for unity on Holy Thursday night, being …consecrated in the truth… care enough about the truth to be willing to leave the comfort zone of Protestantism with such its of belief such that can even justify the wholesale murder of children? Leaving it all behind is what Blessed John Henry Newman did. There is no other path to unity. The convinced Protestant must “swim the Tiber.” He must embrace Rome. He cannot rest until he converts. That is the unity for which Our Lord prayed. That is the only Christian unity worthy of the name. Christians who seek Christ’s truth must finally come to Rome, led by the tides of history, and by the angels.

Can't Just be a "Good Person"

2011-05-03T19:56:00.000-07:00

Father Robert Behnke

At the conclusion of Mass today you are invited to come forward for the prayerful blessing of throats through the intercession of St. Blase, whose feast day was Thursday, the day before yesterday. You may remember that two days ago the talk of the town was not the mayoral election, nor the events in Egypt, but the weather. There was actually a handful of people here at Masses on Wednesday – the Feast of the Presentation of Our Lord in the Temple, also known as Candlemas, the day on which candles are traditionally blessed – candles which are symbols of Jesus, the Light of the world – candles to be used in church during the coming year as well as in your home when a priest or deacon brings the Blessed Sacrament to the sick – and then a few more people managed to come on the following day, Thursday, the Feast of St. Blase. For the blessing, two blessed candles in a kind of cross-shape are placed around the recipient’s neck; the priest prays Through the intercession of St. Blase, bishop and martyr, may God deliver you from every disease of the throat and from every other illness…and then concludes by making the Sign of the Cross. Candles, those blessed for use in church and in homes, are for us symbols of our Christian vocation given at our baptism. At baptism, the newly baptized is given a candle and told Receive the light of Christ. Parents and godparents of infants and small children are told …this light is entrusted to you, to be kept always burning brightly…. This powerful symbol of light is mentioned often in Scripture, in both the Old and the New testaments; in Isaiah: the people who walked in darkness have seen a great light; upon those who dwelt in a land of gloom, a light has shone…; we hear this read on Christmas at midnight. Today we hear from Isaiah that…light shall rise for you in the darkness…; the responsorial psalm repeats the refrain…The just man is a light in darkness to the upright. When Mary and Joseph bring Jesus to the temple on the 40th day after His birth, the prophet Simeon hails Him as...a light to reveal you to the nations…. And Our Lord Himself tells His disciples both …I am the light of the world….and in today’s Gospel…you are the light of the world….
Is this mere poetry, or just use of what is sometimes called a primordial symbol – a symbol easily understood by people of every time and place and culture – in this case, light and darkness; who, after all, does not recognize the meaning of darkness and light? Or is the revealed word of God telling us something more: more important, more about God, more about those who want to follow God, possess God, be possessed by God? If you had been able to attend Mass on Thursday, you would have seen that the Mass vestments were red, a symbol of shedding one’s blood for Christ; the ribbon joining the candles today for the blessing of throats is red for the same reason, as well as the stole around the neck of the priest. St. Blase was a martyr – that was his witness; that was how he, by the grace of God, joined together those two truths taught by Our Lord: …I am the light of the world….and…you are the light of the world…. His light was no mere empty symbol; St. Blase shed his blood in imitation of Our Lord Who shed His blood for us. St. Blase configured his life to the life of Our Lord; he could truly say, with St. Paul…I live now, not I, but Christ lives within me….
I hope you will give attention, in today’s bulletin, that Father Campbell, once-a-week for four weeks on the next four Mondays, will offer a course Introduction to the Social Teaching of the Church, a course which I am confident will be most interesting and so well worth your time and effort. Reading materials for the course include Pope John Paul II’s encyclical Centesimus Annus, written to honor the 100th anniversary of the encyclical Rerum Novarum of Pope Leo XIII. Leo XIII is best known for this 1891 encyclical, which was the Catholic Church’s response to industrialization, class conflict, and the growth of capitalism. Famously, Pope Leo defended both private property and the right of the workers, while critiquing both Marxism and unbridled capitalism. Major social encyclicals which followed - Pius XI’s Quadragesimo Anno and also John Paul II’s Centesimus Annus - honor Rerum Novarum not only by commemorating its fortieth and hundredth anniversaries but also by reinforcing and developing its most important teachings.
But Rerum Novarum was not Pope Leo’s first or his only social encyclical. In fact, from the first year of his papacy, 1878, until his last encyclical in 1902, Pope Leo devoted much of his magisterium to social issues. While Rerum Novarum continues to be celebrated today because its wisdom has been proven and its advice put into practice, another social encyclical, Sapientiae Christianae, which Pope Leo issued one year before Rerum Novarum, has largely been ignored, with devastating consequences for the Church and the world.
In Sapientiae Christianae, Pope Leo defines the duties of Catholics in civil society that are more basic and thus even more important than those described in his more famous encyclical. What Pope Leo does is explain how Catholics are to understand what Our Lord, the Light of the world, means – what Christ wants of us, what He wants us to do as Catholics when the Faith is challenged, or denigrated, or ridiculed, or ignored even by some Catholics as often happens today – what Our Lord means when He tells us today …you are the light of the world…. 121 years ago, Pope Leo clearly foresees the difficulties of being a faithful Catholic in modern civil society. He emphasizes that Catholics need to obey God, even if that brings them into conflict with civil authority. Here, 121 years ago, is what Leo XIII wrote if civil law clearly contradicts divine law: …then, truly, to resist becomes a positive duty; to obey, a crime…. Unfortunately, Pope Leo finds, already 121 years ago, societies are more and more frequently instituting exactly the sort of legislation that contradicts divine law. To be able to discern which laws must be resisted, Leo says that Catholics must …make a deep study of Catholic doctrine. Once imbued with this doctrine, it is their duty to defend the truth, publicly….
How can Catholics be …the light of the world….in imitation of The Light of the world if they are ignorant of the teachings of The Light of the world? Both commands – to learn doctrine, and to proclaim it – have too often been ignored by Catholics, especially in the last fifty years. At the very time when the Second Vatican Council provided a detailed blueprint for the Church, many Catholics lost any distinctive sense of Catholic identity; then, in the 1990s, when the Catechism of the Catholic Church provided a detailed and accessible compendium of all that Catholics must believe, many Catholics stopped teaching and learning doctrine. That is precisely why opportunities such as Father Campbell’s once-a-week-for-four-weeks course are so very important. How can we proclaim, and how can we defend, what we don’t know? If you have ever had a Jehovah’s witness come to your door, ask yourself if you felt competent to debate with him the meaning, and to correct his misunderstanding, of what is taught by the Catholic Church.
This might not have been the tragedy that it has been if the past fifty years had been an age of strength of faith and practice of tradition, but clearly it was the very opposite: an era of change and deep challenges to the most basic Catholic moral teaching. We have a Catholic governor applauding civil unions and claiming that, in this, his faith motivates him and supports his action; we have several Catholic candidates for mayor who support laws permitting abortions and same sex marriage; do they not know their Catholic Faith, or do they not care what it clearly teaches? In the face of the sexual revolution and the rise of no-fault divorce, abortion, contraception, and overt homosexuality, indifference and retreat have been the comfort-zone responses of most Catholics who cite “prudence” and “diversity,” masking a desire not to lose credibility with the world around them.
Pope Leo XIII, however, had no patience with silence, with this sort of comfort-zone: again, he writes…To recoil before an enemy, or to keep silence when from all sides such clamors are raised against truth is the part of a man either devoid of character or who entertains doubt as to the truth of what he professes to believe…. 121 years ago, this pope proclaimed that the only ones who win when Christians stay quiet are the enemies of truth. The silence of Catholics is particularly disturbing, the pope says, because frequently a few bold words would have vanquished the false ideas.
And these words of Pope Leo, written 121 years ago, could have been written this very afternoon, so apt they are in describing what it means today to be …the light of the world….: these words: …Christians are born for combat….It is part of their nature to follow Christ by espousing unpopular ideas and by defending the truth at great cost to themselves….One of the main duties of Christians is …professing openly and unflinchingly the Catholic doctrine…; a second is…propagating it to the utmost of their power…. In these dangerous times, it is not enough to preach the Catholic Faith only through personal example. Pope Leo insists that Catholics must preach the Faith…by open and constant profession of the obligations it imposes….A negative reaction from the public, far from being a sign of mistaken ideas, can serve as evidence of exactly the opposite fact….Jesus Christ…, the pope says,…has clearly intimated that the hatred and hostility of men, which He first and foremost experienced, would be shown in like degree toward the work founded by Him….
In short, it is not enough, in being…the light of the world…to be merely what society calls “a good person,” or merely to give good example. Many of the social problems in the West today would not exist if Catholics had taken this encyclical seriously over the past 121 years. But it is not too late. It is never too late, because Jesus, The Light of the world, has guaranteed that He is with us until the end of time. So when you come forward today, to have your throat blessed, or infinitely more importantly, when you come forward in adoration to receive in Holy Communion the Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity of Him Who is The Light of the world, keep in mind that that Light, the Light of the world, bled for you; that St. Blase shed his blood in total and complete witness to The Light of the world; and that, indeed, as Pope Leo also wrote 121 years ago, Satan still …prowls about the world, seeking someone to devour….and so we too have been, in Pope Leo’s own prophetic words, …born for combat.

Bad News...

2011-05-03T19:53:00.000-07:00

Father Robert Behnke

Quinquagesima Sunday March 6, 2011

During the past week, the world in general and Christian believers in particular, are having to endure a particularly large amount of bad news. And it all seems, if not pleasant, but rather appropriate, seeing what we hear Our Lord tell …the twelve… on this Quinquagesima Sunday–the Sunday before the start of Quadragesima:...all things…will be accomplished….He will be delivered to the Gentiles, and will be mocked and scourged and spit upon; and after they have scourged Him, they will put Him to death…. We know, because we are believers, that this week’s bad news, and in fact all that the Christian believer knows to be bad news, is responsible for the suffering of Our Lord, since Our Lord’s life and death transcend any one moment of time, and mere earthly history; the passion and death of Our Lord reaches into the realm of the transcendent, the supernatural. Each sin, every offense, each insult to the dignity of human life created in the image and likeness of God-and so, for example, in our own time, particularly each murder of the unborn, murders the world diminishes by calling them something less-choice, or reproductive freedom, or even just abortion, as if abortion were something other than murder-each sin ever committed caused Our Lord’s suffering and death. In grade school, Sister taught us that each of our sins was a hammer pound of the nails in the hands and feet of Our Lord on the cross.

So this past week’s bad news includes the decision of the President of the United States appropriating to himself the competence and the authority of the judiciary by declaring the Defense of Marriage Act to be indefensible because it is unconstitutional, despite that, thus far, every time the issue of marriage between two persons of the same gender has been placed before the voters, the substance of the DOMA has been upheld by the public – thus far 31 times. This fact is ignored by the administration as its definition of marriage continues to evolve. The continuing violence in Libya – especially violence against Christians only because they are Christian – is surely continuing bad news. The many and varied antics of Planned Parenthood supported by everyone’s taxes is quantitatively bad news. The abuse of academic freedom and higher education, as well as the abuse against everyone’s just plain common sense and human decency, here in nearby Evanston, at Northwestern University, is sickeningly bad news.

One piece of bad news you may have missed comes out of Great Britain. This bad news story reads: There is no place in British law for Christian beliefs, despite this country’s long history of religious observance and the traditions of the established Church, two High Court judges said on Monday. Lord Justice Munby and Mr. Justice Beatson made the remarks when ruling on the case of a Christian couple who were told that they could not be foster carers because of their view that homosexuality is wrong. The judges underlined that, in the case of fostering arrangements at least, the right of homosexuals to equality…should take precedence…over the right of Christians to manifest their beliefs and moral values…. In their ruling, the judges complained that it was not yet …well understood… that British society was largely secular and that the law has no place for Christianity:…Although historically this country is part of the Christian West, and although it has an established church which is Christian, there have been enormous changes in the social and religious life of our country over the last century… the judges said. However, when fostering regulations were taken into account, the judges said…the equality provisions concerning sexual orientation should take precedence…over religious rights.

But in what is certainly the most violently bad news incident of the past week, Shahbaz Bhatti, a lay Catholic who served as Pakistan’s federal minister for religious minorities-the only Christian in an otherwise all-Moslem presidential cabinet-was assassinated on March 2nd while traveling to work. He was 42. The gunman who ambushed Bhatti's car and shot down the government leader left a note saying that Bhatti was killed …for speaking out against the blasphemy law…. The assassin claimed credit for the killing in the name of Tehrik-e-Taliban, a coalition of Islamic extremist groups. Mr. Bhatti had received multiple death threats when he questioned the death sentence for blasphemy handed down in the case of Asia Bibi, a Christian housewife whose friends insist that she was convicted on false charges. Three weeks before his assassination, Bhatti had predicted that his reappointment as cabinet minister would …create some protests and resentment by many Islamic extremists. But my struggle will continue, despite the difficulties and threats that I have received. My only aim is to defend fundamental rights, religious freedom and the life of Christians and other religious minorities. I am prepared for any sacrifice for this mission, which I carry out with the spirit of a servant of God…. Many Pakistanis, as well as others, are calling Mr. Bhatti …a martyr….

So there we are, faced squarely with proof of the truth of Our Lord’s prophecy regarding His deliverance: His being …mocked…and scourged…and spit upon….and His being….put to death…. Our Lord’s words to Saul who becomes Paul become verified once again: …I am Jesus, Whom thou art persecuting…. For many years, many practicing Catholics who hold fairly traditional values have been quite reticent to assert themselves in the public square, even as the social order was disintegrating all around them, because each new assault on the natural law has been undertaken in the name of either privacy or freedom for some particular group. The argument has been, and still is, that this or that change-in policy, in education, in law or in rights-doesn’t prevent Catholics or any one individual from living how they want to live; it just ensures that those who make different decisions are not penalized. So (the argument runs) if contraceptive promiscuity is rampant, it doesn’t mean that Catholics have to live that way. If abortion is legal and “safe,” it doesn’t mean any Catholic has to abort. And now, if homosexuals are allowed to “marry,” it doesn’t mean that Catholics can no longer honor marriage in the traditional way. Despite a significant unease at the growing social pressure to accept these evils, a pressure which comes close to brainwashing when applied to children in schools, many believing Catholics have been reluctant to insist that their own moral vision be enshrined in law for the simple reason that this is portrayed as penalizing those with a different point of view. But, ask that married Christian couple in Great Britain whose Christian beliefs have now rendered them ineligible to be foster or adoptive parents, about that reluctance or about penalizing those with…a different point of view…. If a new law or a new right does not prohibit one’s own morality, but merely opens a certain freedom to others, it is made to seem arbitrary to oppose that change. In effect, the response of good people is weakened by a misplaced sense of fair play-until it is too late.

The Gospel, the Catholic Faith, Our Lord’s own suffering and death, demand recognition that the worldviews which are today clashing are mutually exclusive. It is true that good naturally tends to restrict evil, but the opposite is also true. Evil always tends to restrict and even eliminate good, and, unlike good, evil makes no allowance for either principle or prudence, even under the guise of tolerance and inclusiveness (Does all this not sound like the wickedness and snares of someone we know? Is the world not yet familiar with his work?). When I was growing up (saying those words makes me feel terribly ancient), those who wished to live promiscuously, to abort their children, or to engage in a publicly-sanctioned homosexual lifestyle would have argued that they were discriminated against. How is it then that people with Christian beliefs are not seen as the victims of unjust discrimination when they cannot take advantage of most TV or movies today without being subjected to a continuous cheapening of human sexuality, when they have no choice but to permit themselves and their children to be constantly pushed to accept legalized murder, when the taxes they pay are used to support activities that are definitively immoral, and when they cannot even express themselves freely on moral issues without the risk of being indicted for hate-speech? A little over ten or so years ago, homosexual partners would not have been considered as fit parents by most adoption agencies. Now it is those who regard homosexual acts as immoral who are rejected. In many aspects of our public life in Western nations, we have become second class citizens, increasingly forced to assent to false moral propositions in order to be welcomed in elite circles, to be served by government-associated agencies, or to be at peace in government-mandated educational programs.

Pope St. Gregory I-Gregorius Magnus-Pope St. Gregory the Great-who died in 604 A.D.,-who composed and selected the texts for the Mass of Quinquagesima Sunday, as well as those for Septuagesima and Sexagesima-teaches about today’s Gospel that the man born blind represents the whole human race. Our Lord has come to heal, to cure that blindness-the blindness of the whole world; He does so by being …mocked and scourged and spit upon….by being…put to death…. But perceptive listeners and readers may have noted that, in my reading and repeating those words of today’s Gospel earlier in this homily, I cut short the ending:...and on the third day He will rise again…. Though, for even these three Sundays before Lent begins the vestments are purple, and will remain so through all of Lent, the Latin names of these three pre-Lenten Sundays-Septuagesima, Sexagesima, Quinquagesima-as well as the Latin name for Lent itself-Quadragesima-all refer to Our Lord’s final words-His definitively final word:…on the third day He will rise again. In her sacred liturgy, the Church is marking and counting-seventy, sixty, fifty, forty days-before Easter. Easter! The promise, hope, the guarantee of Our Lord’s resurrection gives meaning to His suffering and death; it is what makes it possible for us to live in these crazy times, in this presently secularizing world, with eyes wide open but still with both firm purpose and serene hope. It is what makes it possible for us not to shudder in fearful cowardice before the power of Satan, but to stand straight and tall in defense of the truth of Christ Jesus and His Church-a truth and a Church which is Catholic-meaning a Church which is universal-meant for everyone: the universal truth that the pope is the earthly father of the whole human family, true for everyone, not just true for Catholics; the universal truth that this and every celebration of the Blessed Eucharist brings upon the altar the Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity of Jesus, true God and true Man – true for everyone, not just true for Catholics; the truth that each abortion is a murder of a human being created in the image and likeness of God-true for everyone, not just true for Catholics; the truth that anyone who dies in the state of mortal sin will spend eternity in hell-true for everyone, not just true for Catholics; the truth that sexual activity between two persons of the same gender is nothing but mutual self-abuse-true for everyone, not just true for Catholics. And the truth that…Come to me just as you are, and stay with me just as you are…this is an invitation not from Jesus Our Lord, but a wily lure from Satan. St. Paul reminds us today that, of all the virtues …the greatest of these is charity….Deus es Caritas: God is Caritas…charity…love. The cross proves that truth. Easter affirms and seals that truth, the truth held firmly by the apostles, the martyrs, the confessors, the virgins, all the saints, most of all by the Mother of God. So, no matter how bleak may be the outlook on earth at the moment, the victory is His, is theirs, and it can be ours.

Rejoice, Jerusalem! Be glad for her, you who love her

2011-05-03T17:57:00.001-07:00

Father Robert Behnke

Rejoice, Jerusalem! Be glad for her, you who love her…. We have sung these words at the beginning of this Mass of the Fourth Sunday of Lent, called Laetare Sunday from the Latin for that opening word rejoice – rejoice because Lent is now half-complete; Easter is just three weeks away. These words set the tone for this entire Holy Mass, half-way through Lent. Let us hasten toward Easter with the eagerness of faith and love. But the liturgy does not ask us to rejoice; the liturgy commands it: Rejoice!! The violet, the purple of Lent seems to hear the command, and it for the moment lightens several shades to the color rose in response to Isaiah’s requirement that today we rejoice. Traditionally, the organ is more joyful, a bit of floral decorations can be permitted, all in anticipation of Easter—all on this one Lenten Sunday of rejoicing.
Today’s lengthy Gospel of the healing of the blind man portrays one man’s particular reason for rejoicing…I was blind, and now I see…. This man, born blind, was in absolute, total, complete darkness, until he met Our Lord. This Gospel does not tell of the healing of a man gone blind, as we find in the other Gospels, but of a man blind from his birth. What's the difference? I can imagine losing my sight, although it's hard to begin to appreciate the courage it would require to live with the loss of something as easily taken for granted as eyesight. But how does a person born blind experience the world? How do they imagine things known through the other senses, but never seen, upon which they have never been able to look?
That this man in the Gospel is born blind is no peripheral detail. He has not lost a capacity for light; he did not have it from the beginning. He does not deal with light, darkness, shadow and reflection. He has lived in total darkness all his life. Our Lord does not restore sight to this man: He will grace him with a new gift, with a capacity he has never had. This miracle is not a biblical type of restoration of our human nature; it foretells man’s total re-creation. Without life in Christ, every man--no matter how rich, how poor, how smart or how ignorant, no matter how young or old, sick or healthy, worldly successful or abysmally failing—without Christ, every man is in total darkness, because life without Christ then has no meaning, no ultimate purpose, no final goal. But with life in Christ, whatever darkness may rule over one’s life at this moment is darkness but for a time. Whether a man’s darkness takes the form of sickness, alienation, poverty, loneliness—with life in Christ, those darknesses are but shadows that will ultimately evaporate in the brightness of the illumination that envelopes the life of a man who lives in Christ.
Life in Christ for one who receives Christ’s light is nothing else but the very life of God Himself. Never since the world began has it been heard that anyone opened the eyes of a man born blind…. Life in Christ is altogether and totally unique, because it is the very life of God. That life of God comes to us in the sacraments; the sacraments are the certain and sure channels of God’s life—the means of sanctifying grace. God’s life comes first in baptism. But that very life of God is not a still life. St. Paul reminds us today…for light produces every kind of goodness and righteousness and truth….Take no part in the fruitless works of darkness; rather, expose them…. And in another place, St. Paul says…Be ye, therefore, imitators of God, as very dear children, and walk in love, as Christ also loved us and delivered Himself up for us….
The man born blind owes his new being not to his parental origins, nor to his pedigree in the Law of Moses, but to the sudden unearned gift of his encounter with Our Lord. He recognizes Our Lord not just as the Source of his own sight, but more importantly, as the origin of all light, the Source of everything that there is. Now, knowing Who Jesus really is…he worshipped Him….
Our first parents in the garden had their eyes opened, and with this clear eyesight they saw how far they had fallen from God; they saw their nakedness and were ashamed: those who live still in this complete darkness passed down from Adam and Eve can have their eyes opened in a new way, just as did the man born blind, or just as did the disciples at Emmaus when they recognized Our Lord in the breaking of the bread in the evening of the first Easter. Our world seems often still imprisoned by the darkness of Satan and sin. Satan loves to envelop man with his total darkness because, as each man is created in the image and likeness of God, when man moves from light into darkness by way of his personal sin, man then becomes corrupted once more by the darkness of Satan—the image of God in man is then given the cast and pall of Satan’s ugliness. Satan would love for us to believe that his darkness is forever, and so to give in and give up. His works of darkness—of war, domestic violence, street violence, economic violence, violence aimed at marriage, the violence of abortion—his works and pomps of darkness surround us and can tempt us to throw in the towel and trudge—drag ourselves—onto his train. But the train of Satan is headed in only a single direction—towards hell; that’s where Satan wants us to spend eternity—in his darkness—in total darkness. Let us not be taken in, for at the very start of his Gospel, St. John writes…and the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness grasped it not….
Last week an Indiana PBS television station ran a documentary on how the gangs have taken over the city of Port-au-Prince, the capital of Haiti, since the earthquake a year ago. If you ever wanted evidence of the reality of darkness, you should go to Port-au-Prince; you’d be highly unlikely to leave unscathed by the devil’s darkness. The earthquake destroyed most of the city’s prisons, and so nearly 6,000 hardened criminals simply walked out of jail. There are few records of prisoners, few files, few photographs. The prisoners were, and are again if recaptured, packed 300 to a single cell; they can’t lie down, they can’t even sit. Imagine your frame of mind and state of soul if you had escaped from such a place. There is a team of just seven policemen who drive around the city and pick up men who they think look like prisoners they recall from before the earthquake; most of the time both their memories and whatever official records exist prove faulty, and so most suspects end up being released. And of course no one admits to being an escapee. And also, of course, the police fear for their lives; their personal lives must be secret, because they are hopelessly outnumbered. There is no government structure, and just about every politician has a gang connection. An American official and the police chief both stated that what is needed is jobs, industry, some kind of possibility of work to give Haitians the dignity of self-reliance. But there is no sound governmental structure to make that happen. Millions of dollars to rebuild Haiti have been contributed from all over the world, but much money is being held back because it seems there is no structure of order to handle this money in a responsible manner. It is truly a mess of darkness. Satan has got to be thrilled.
But the very end of this documentary featured a native-born Haitian who has constructed a walled-in and secured power plant which, if it gets operating at full capacity, could supply Port-au-Prince with 15% of its total power requirement. Considering that there’s not really now any reliable source of power, that’s quite a resource. The owner—I did not catch his name—as I said, is a native-born Haitian. In the initial crime wave after the earthquake, his wife was kidnapped; she was returned after ten days and after a payment of a huge ransom; I know this happens often in Port-au-Prince; I have Haitian-American friends some of whose relatives in Haiti have been kidnapped, and ransomed, and never heard from again. The police say…if you see the kidnappers, call us…. The wife of the power-plant owner was lucky; she was returned. Obviously, though, she was traumatized, and so she has gone to New York with their children. But the husband has remained behind for now. When the reporter asked him why, he spoke about his love for his homeland, and then he said the words that I am frankly quite surprised that any public broadcasting station allowed to be broadcast; he said…every day here I have an opportunity to touch Christ…every day here I have an opportunity to touch Christ…. And so…the light shines…now…in the darkness, and the darkness grasped it not…the darkness will ever try, but…the darkness…will have…grasped it not…it never shall.
We have received the capacity for living life in Christ—life in God--at our baptism, when the Lord filled us with the light of His supernatural life. But this capacity in us weakens through sin: we easily may become more accustomed to darkness than to this new divine light, and then it is that Satan does his cartwheels. But this Sunday we rejoice in the nearness of Easter; so each year we pass through this holy season of Lent, when we open ourselves to the healing touch of Our Lord, Who is…the light of the world…, and prepare once more to see the world anew in the blazing furnace of the new fire of Easter—a light lit in the darkness of a tomb two thousand years ago; a light that, even by Satan, is never able to be put out. And that is precisely why, today, in the middle of Lent, the Church rejoices.

Palm Sunday

2011-05-03T17:43:00.000-07:00

Father Robert Behnke

On this day when we have heard read the full account, in the words of St. Matthew, the passion and death of Our Lord, perhaps the most eloquent response to this particular word of God is silence. Even the best of homilies may be a distraction from the deep meditation we should feel at the end of the narration of the suffering and death of Our Lord for us: so I have only a few poor simple words to offer.

The reading of the Passion on this first day of Holy Week turns our minds to the cross of Our Lord, yet it is ironic that the crosses in church, especially that which hangs over the altar of the Lord’s sacrifice, are veiled until Good Friday. But we see crosses and crucifixes so often, not just in church but in art and in jewelry—in the counters of Macy’s and Target—and everywhere we look, that it is very easy to stop giving the cross its deserved attention. So the reading of the Passion directs our hearts and minds and souls to the cross, and the veiled cross helps us not to take the image of the cross for granted; rather, we can allow the image of Our crucified Lord to embed itself in our imagination—in our mind’s eye—and so to allow its meaning to penetrate into the depths of our understanding—and more importantly, that its meaning will find an indelible engraved resting place in our hearts and in our souls.

We are used to looking at the cross, but the death of Our Lord, and the kind of death He died, is so appalling, horrific and grotesque that we ought to be shocked by it. We should be stunned into speechlessness at the thought that the Lord of the Universe, the Creator of the World, Word-made-flesh and Splendor of the Father ended His ministry of love choking out His last agonized words on a Roman cross, and that He did all this – He allowed all this to be done to Him only for us. The image of Our Lord and Our God on the cross is a scandal to non-Christian monotheists—to Jews and Moslems—because the very thought of Almighty God tortured, whipped, pierced with nails—all this is impossible for them to comprehend. And for us Christians—for us Catholic Christians—shocking as is this reality, it is not meant to frighten us but to show us how incredibly much He, God, loves us, and that He has already paid the penalty for our sins. Our Lord dies on the cross not for what He has done, but for what you and I have done, because He loves us. The simple truth of the Catholic Faith: God died for us.

The veiling of the cross helps us to see it properly again, not as a fashion item, nor indeed as a highly successful piece of advertising by the Christian Church, but as the awful—awful in the original meaning of awful—full of awe—the awful reality of the saving love God showed us in His Son.

How can we ever respond to this divine love, infinite, unmerited, and undeserved as it is? In the same way one would respond to anything another does for us – with gratitude. A gratitude that makes us to turn away forever from habits and patterns of sin; a gratitude that never lets a day go by without prayerful thought, oft-spoken thanks, for this infinite action of God’s incredible mercy and forgiveness; gratitude that makes us hate sin and Satan and evil; gratitude that impels us to speak the truth and fight the evils that infect our society and culture today, those evils of today that brought the Lord of all time to the cross.

The Body of Our Lord raised on the cross – the same Body of the same Lord given us in this and every sacrifice of the Mass—is the proof that God’s love for us is absolutely limitless. The only way it can ever be limited – the only barrier erected is done by us—that you or I choose not to accept it. The cross of Our Lord calls forth from each of us a gratitude that will make us hate sin in ourselves, and sin in any other person; a gratitude strong enough to make us translate our love for God into our hatred and elimination of our own sin, so that in us, and in one another, there is only love, only the cross, only God.