7 Quick Takes

— 1 —

What a strange week.  I would say “sad,” but – well, okay, I’ll go ahead and say “sad” – but let me qualify that.     I will miss Pope Benedict.  His resignation is really quite a sobering moment.  This is not a normal transition and I think it says quite a bit about the Church in 2013. I’m really interested to see how the College of Cardinals respond.

So, “sad” on a few different levels, but not a crisis or a tragedy.  It’s not time to wallow, it’s time to listen and look forward.  Eyes on Christ, just as he’s been telling us to do all this time.

THAT SAID – I’m going to fill up most of the rest of this space with a smattering  of some of my favorite quotes.  There are loads, and more to discover as I continue reading his work for years to come, but here are a few:

— 2 —

 But the Lord also knocks with his Cross from the other side:  he knocks at the door of the world, at the doors of our hearts, so many of which are so frequently closed to God. And he says to us something like this:  if the proof that God gives you of his existence in creation does not succeed in opening you to him, if the words of Scripture and the Church’s message leave you indifferent, then look at me – the God who let himself suffer for you, who personally suffers with you – and open yourself to me, your Lord and your God. (source)

— 3 —

To pray is not to step outside history and withdraw to our own private corner of happiness. When we pray properly we undergo a process of inner purification which opens us up to God and thus to our fellow human beings as well. In prayer we must learn what we can truly ask of God—what is worthy of God. We must learn that we cannot pray against others. We must learn that we cannot ask for the superficial and comfortable things that we desire at this moment—that meagre, misplaced hope that leads us away from God. We must learn to purify our desires and our hopes. We must free ourselves from the hidden lies with which we deceive ourselves. God sees through them, and when we come before God, we too are forced to recognize them. “But who can discern his errors? Clear me from hidden faults” prays the Psalmist (Ps 19:12 [18:13]). Failure to recognize my guilt, the illusion of my innocence, does not justify me and does not save me, because I am culpable for the numbness of my conscience and my incapacity to recognize the evil in me for what it is. If God does not exist, perhaps I have to seek refuge in these lies, because there is no one who can forgive me; no one who is the true criterion. Yet my encounter with God awakens my conscience in such a way that it no longer aims at self-justification, and is no longer a mere reflection of me and those of my contemporaries who shape my thinking, but it becomes a capacity for listening to the Good itself. (source)

— 4 —

In the procession we follow this sign and in this way we follow Christ himself. And we ask of him: Guide us on the paths of our history! Show the Church and her Pastors again and again the right path! Look at suffering humanity, cautiously seeking a way through so much doubt; look upon the physical and mental hunger that torments it! Give men and women bread for body and soul! Give them work! Give them light! Give them yourself! Purify and sanctify all of us! Make us understand that only through participation in your Passion, through “yes” to the cross, to self-denial, to the purifications that you impose upon us, our lives can mature and arrive at true fulfilment. Gather us together from all corners of the earth. Unite your Church, unite wounded humanity! Give us your salvation! Amen. (source)

— 5 —

Dear friends, life is not governed by chance; it is not random. Your very existence has been willed by God, blessed and given a purpose  ! Life is not just a succession of events or experiences, helpful though many of them are. It is a search for the true, the good and the beautiful. It is to this end that we make our choices; it is for this that we exercise our freedom; it is in this – in truth, in goodness, and in beauty – that we find happiness and joy. Do not be fooled by those who see you as just another consumer in a market of undifferentiated possibilities, where choice itself becomes the good, novelty usurps beauty, and subjective experience displaces truth.

Christ offers more! Indeed he offers everything! Only he who is the Truth can be the Way and hence also the Life. (source)

— 6 —

Friends, again I ask you, what about today? What are you seeking? What is God whispering to you? The hope which never disappoints is Jesus Christ. (source)

— 7 —

I will simply be a pilgrim who is beginning the last part of his pilgrimage on earth. (source)

For more Quick Takes, visit Conversion Diary!

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Pope Benedict’s last General Audience

Source

Full text at Vatican Radio:

Here allow me to return once again to April 19, 2005. The gravity of the decision was precisely in the fact that from that moment on I was committed always and forever by the Lord. Always – he, who assumes the Petrine ministry no longer has any privacy. He belongs always and totally to everyone, to the whole Church. His life is, so to speak, totally deprived of the private sphere. I have felt, and I feel even in this very moment, that one receives one’s life precisely when he offers it as a gift. I said before that many people who love the Lord also love the Successor of Saint Peter and are fond of him, that the Pope has truly brothers and sisters, sons and daughters all over the world, and that he feels safe in the embrace of their communion, because he no longer belongs to himself, but he belongs to all and all are truly his own.

The “always” is also a “forever” – there is no returning to private life. My decision to forgo the exercise of active ministry, does not revoke this. I do not return to private life, to a life of travel, meetings, receptions, conferences and so on. I do not abandon the cross, but remain in a new way near to the Crucified Lord. I no longer wield the power of the office for the government of the Church, but in the service of prayer I remain, so to speak, within St. Peter’s bounds. St. Benedict, whose name I bear as Pope, shall be a great example in this for me. He showed us the way to a life which, active or passive, belongs wholly to the work of God.

I thank each and every one of you for the respect and understanding with which you have welcomed this important decision. I continue to accompany the Church on her way through prayer and reflection, with the dedication to the Lord and to His Bride, which I have hitherto tried to live daily and that I would live forever. I ask you to remember me before God, and above all to pray for the Cardinals, who are called to so important a task, and for the new Successor of Peter, that the Lord might accompany him with the light and the power of His Spirit.

Let us invoke the maternal intercession of Mary, Mother of God and of the Church, that she might accompany each of us and the whole ecclesial community: to her we entrust ourselves, with deep trust.

Dear friends! God guides His Church, maintains her always, and especially in difficult times. Let us never lose this vision of faith, which is the only true vision of the way of the Church and the world. In our heart, in the heart of each of you, let there be always the joyous certainty that the Lord is near, that He does not abandon us, that He is near to us and that He surrounds us with His love. Thank you! 

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Grazie

Source – BBC

 

 

 

Source: AP

 

 

 

Source: Vatican Radio English Facebook page – go “like” them!

 

 

 

Source: Vatican Radio English Facebook page.

 

 

 

 

Source

Today we contemplate Christ in the desert, fasting, praying, and being tempted. As we begin our Lenten journey, we join him and we ask him to give us strength to fight our weaknesses. Let me also thank you for the prayers and support you have shown me in these days. May God bless all of you!

By the way – you might have missed it, but on February 8, Pope Benedict spoke to the seminarians of Rome – his topic was Peter.  So his thoughts – on Peter, the Petrine ministry – given when he knew he was resigning, but before the rest of us did – are worth a look. 

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On the Council

…well, this will get people talking….

Today Pope Benedict spoke to the priests of Rome.  He spoke extemporaneously.  There will probably be a cleaner copy at some point, but here is Vatican Radio’s summary and transcript.

It’s about the Second Vatican Council – his experience of it, his memories, and his take

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“…looking at our daily reality with His eyes”

From the Holy Father’s last General Audience:

Overcoming the temptation to place God in submission to oneself and one’s own interests or to put Him in a corner and converting oneself to the proper order of priorities, giving God the first place, is a journey that every Christian must undergo. “Conversion”, an invitation that we will hear many times in Lent, means following Jesus in so that his Gospel is a real life guide, it means allowing God transform us, no longer thinking that we are the only protagonists of our existence, recognizing that we are creatures who depend on God, His love, and that only by “losing” our life in Him can we truly have it.

 

Pope Benedict mentioned three individuals in today’s address.  Who were they?

The Russian Orthodox Pavel Florensky.

The Jewish Etty Hillesum

The American Catholic Dorothy Day. 

 

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Book Notes

• A  few years ago I wrote a very basic intro to Pope Benedict’s thought.  It went OOP last year, but if you would like to read or share it, I have it available for free reading online.  Two versions:  You can download a .pdf version here.  You can also read it at Scribd - to read it on the Scribd website is free, but to download will cost you.  It’s called Come Meet Jesus. 
• You can see on the sidebar over there on the right links to two children’s books based on the thought of Pope Benedict.
• One more Lent resources reminder:  I have a Pinterest board with some Lent resources – some of mine, most by others – here. 
• Reconciled to God, a daily devotional is available in a digital version for .99 here.
• The Biblical Stations of the Cross App is also .99 and available here. 
• The Power of the Cross is also available as a free download - here as a pdf and here through Scribd.
• (I see there are a few used copies of it at Amazon - I have only two, which of course I’m keeping – but looks like there are a few used copies under $10 out there.)

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Te Deum

North Carolina coast, 8/2012

 

The “Te Deum” that we raise to the Lord this evening, at the end of a calendar year, is a hymn of thanksgiving that opens with the praise – “We praise you, O God, we proclaim you to be the Lord” – and ends with a profession of faith – “You are our hope, we will not be confounded forever.” For all that came to pass over the course of the year, whether easy or difficult, barren or fruitful, we give thanks to God. The Te Deum, in fact, contains a profound wisdom, the wisdom that makes us say that, despite everything, there is good in the world, and this good is destined to triumph, thanks God, the God of Jesus Christ, who became incarnate, died, and rose again. Certainly, it is difficult, sometimes, to accept this profound reality, since evil makes more noise than the good: a brutal murder, the spread of violence, serious injustices make the news. Gestures of love and service, on the contrary, daily struggles endured with patience and fidelity are often left in the shadows. And this is why we cannot rely solely on the news if we want to understand the world and life. We must be able to remain in silence, in meditation, in calm and prolonged reflection; we must know how to stop and think. In this way, our mind can find healing from the inevitable wounds of daily life, can go deeper into the events that occur in our lives and in the world, and come to the knowledge that allows us to evaluate things with new eyes. Especially in the recollection of conscience, where God speaks to us, we learn to look truthfully at our own actions, even at the evil within us and around us, to begin a journey of conversion that makes us wiser and better, more capable of creating solidarity and communion, of overcoming evil with good. The Christian is a man of hope, even and especially in the face of the darkness that often exists in the world, not as a consequence of God’s plans, but because of the wrong choices of man, because the Christian knows that the power of faith can move mountains ( cf. Mt 17:20): the Lord can brighten even the deepest darkness.

 

-Pope Benedict XVI, homily, Vespers, 12/31/2012

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On painting Popes and Saints

Very nice interview with Ann Engelhart about her work, especially on Be Saints.  Interview is at Catholic World Report. 

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Angelus

Here’s a bit of video from Sunday’s Angelus.  The first is part of the prayer, the second is the Holy Father’s English greeting, and the third is afterwards – one of the three groups from the NeoCatechumenal Way that were singing and dancing in the square afterwards.

The first photo is of the set up – don’t know what the scaffolding is for, but if you look to the left, you can see the big screen with the prayer prompts!

 

Here’s the text of the Holy Father’s remarks. 

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Sunday at St. Peter’s

….guess I should have read the schedule more closely.

Since we’re a five minute walk away, and since it’s Sunday, we thought we’d go to Mass at St. Peter’s Sunday morning, and then stay for the Angelus.  The regular schedule indicates a 10:30 Mass.  So we got there about 10:15, in order to get through the security line, which was quite long….on the screens outside, the Pope was…talking…inside St. Peter’s.  I was thinking that perhaps it was a replay of yesterday’s Consistory, but then we hit the door, and the sounds inside matched the sounds outside (the Credo by that point)…so, um, there we were inside St. Peter’s, halfway through Mass being celebrated by the Pope.

There were no seats of course, so we tried to find various vantage points from which we could see something besides the ceiling – no such luck.  No one was moving from their hard-won SRO positions against the barriers, not even for angelic-looking children.  We wandered to the back, eventually, and stayed there since it occurred to me that from there, we could see the Holy Father as he processed out – well, we could, sort of, although he turned away to go through the curtains before he got to us – the boys saw his face, though.  Following are some photos – next post will be a couple of videos from the Angelus.

Waiting to get into the Basilica

Took this holding the camera over my head I never actually saw the altar with my own eyes.

Waiting at the end of Mass

And…there he goes.

Cardinal Rigali

Many men and women were wearing these, in honor of the new Cardinal from Nigeria

At the end of every church event, someone has to stack the chairs.

 

Texts:

Pope Benedict’s talk at the Consistory

His homily for Sunday’s Mass.

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