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?
Pope Benedict XVI, Homily. Palm Sunday, 2011.
Photo: Casa Maria Retreat House, Birmingham. April 17, 2011.
You didn’t quote the most interesting part of the sermon where he puts good and evil on equal footing. It’s Manichaean. And he’s wrong about the Neoplatonists or at least imprecise. Plotinus was not a theurgist, although some of his successors were.
Tom, read it again. No he didn’t. You’ve read more than is there.
Beautiful reflection, as usual from the Holy Father.
OK, DN, here’s the quote in full:
“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.”
First, the pope doesn’t tell us who specifically these “Fathers” are. Second, he doesn’t say the gravitational pull of God is greater than that of evil. He doesn’t. All he says is that “everything depends on our escaping the gravitational field of evil.” That’s not the same thing as saying God’s love is greater than evil.
I stand by what I said. What the pope presents is latter day Manichaeanism.
Tom, do you not see a difference between him not saying something and him saying something? And the difficulty with attempting to make a positive statement on someone else’s behalf out of negative evidence? Especially when this sermon is about something else, and not the theological point you bring up?
He’s simply not dealing with that question in this little (and it is quite little) sermon. In fact, the image that bothers you comes at the very least from Augustine. He uses it several times — I believe in the City of God as well as elsewhere. And it’s not an image that has to do with the power of God, but mostly to do with the moral situation of man — inclinations, habits (vices and virtues), moral choices and possibilities. You can bring that image into the question you wish to pursue, but that is not its focus.
Just to leap in between the two of you (and not tipping my hand, though I think one of you has the better of the argument) let me recommend a volume that addresses the relation of Platonism to Augustine, among other things you are discussing, The Mysticism of Saint Augustine: Re-reading the Confessions by John Peter Kenney. Of course, maybe you’ve both read it………
DN,
I don’t think the evidence is negative at all. The pope is usually more precise when he makes statements such as this. In this case, I think he was trying to avoid the usual imagery of darkness/light, which might have made more sense, given the Easter season, but which would be less appropriate given his source, which was Augustine (a former Manichaean). So he substituted the “gravitational pull,” which really isn’t much better since he granted good and evil equal status. And this really cannot be gainsaid. With Augustine still in the background there’s really no way to interpret this passage other than to infer that it is quite Manichaean in character. If the pope does not clarify it, then he leaves himself open to two conclusions: that he’s phoning it in or that he intended the inference.
I found the sermon, as a whole, a less commendable effort from the pope than we’re used to.
Tom, huh? I think you’re demonstrating an obvious self anointed Peter principle here, perhaps though unaware!!
DN … correct assessment.
Thanks for the recommendation, Bruce. I’ve not read that, no.
Tom, you’ll have to do better than an argument from silence. He didn’t delineate how grace works in the soul either, nor how the will and the intellect are different powers in that soul and would respond to grace accordingly, nor that he thinks good is good and bad is bad and the Filioque isn’t heresy. He doesn’t have to. Besides his impressive body of theological work, which is where you’ll find such topics addressed, he should be able to count on the charitable exercise of common sense regarding his speech. (Which speech, remember, was on another topic entirely.)
Moreover, and worth mentioning, Manicheanism is a much odder duck than mere dualism. Frankly, it’s an absurd heresy to accuse the Holy Father of, even in a warmed-over version. There are far easier ones to attempt.
Love that Flanneresque sign for the “Apostolic Tried & Rejected Stone Church of the Lord Jesus”
Amy, Thank you for posting this excerpt. I wouldn’t have seen it otherwise… on a morning when I fought with my husband and wanted to find a way to make peace. I forwarded the link to him, and think he read it (although he didn’t say so). Have a blessed Easter.