May, Mary and Books

May, of course, is Mary’s month.  It’s a good time to read a free book on the Blessed Virgin – mine, originally published by Word Among Us, now out of print and available in a pdf version here.

This May is also the centenary of the first Fatima apparition – May 13, 1917. Plenty of books are being published to celebrate, and I want to draw your attention to one in particular that is the work, in part, of my friend and frequent collaborator Ann Kissane Engelhart:

Written by Donna Marie Cooper O’Boyle and published by Sophia, Ann was brought in to do the illustrations, so let’s give her due credit, shall we? Isn’t that a nice cover? I don’t have a copy of the book, nor can I access illustrated pages online, so I don’t know how the interior illustrations were actually used, but here are some samples Ann sent me:

Blurbs for the book have specifically mentioned the illustrations as worthy of note. So if this appears on your radar, remember that the very talented artist involved has other books:

Another recent work to which Ann contributed is this:

Written by Nancy Carpentier Brown, it’s a fictional account of a friendship between G.K. and Frances Chesterton and another family. 

Ann and I aren’t working on anything specific at the moment, but we are tossing around ideas – it’s challenging to find a Catholic publisher willing to invest in quality illustrated children’s books, but we’re trying!

(If you would like a sneak peak at my newest, forthcoming book, check out Instagram Stories – you can only access the “stories” part via the app on a phone, by clicking on my photo.)

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7 Quick Takes

— 1 —

This week has been Exhibit A in “Why I could never lease a car.”  Back and forth to Montgomery on Monday for a talk, then over and back from Atlanta today to pick up some stuff from my oldest’s condo – he moved to NYC in January, has the closing on his Atlanta place on Friday, and had a few things in it that he will probably want someday, but can’t have up in NYC right now, considering he’s renting one room in a house in Brooklyn at the moment.

Plus the usual at least 40-50 miles/day I put on in my rounds to various schools…I can’t imagine a life of only putting 10-15,000 miles/year on a car. I’d like to, but right now…it can’t happen.

— 2 —

Happy St. Patrick’s Day! More about him here, including from two of my books, the Loyola Kids Book of Saints and The Words We Pray. 

Is your diocese dispensing from the Lenten Friday abstinence? Ours is, with a caveat: 

To eat meat on this Friday, Catholics in Diocese of Birmingham must do one of these penances:

1. Pray the rosary for increase of vocations in the Diocese of Birmingham;
2. Participate in public celebration of the Stations of the Cross;
3. Do an act of charity;
4. Read scripture on the Passion of the Lord;
5. Spend time and pray before the Most Blessed Sacrament

May St. Patrick intercede for us to celebrate his memory well and to practice our Lenten penance with contrite heart with prayer, fasting, and almsgiving.

Rocco has a Master List at his place. 

Charles Collins, formerly of Vatican Radio, now writes for Crux – a superb call on Crux’s part – and has thoughts on this patchwork of regulations and dispensations:

Instead we get a hodgepodge of contradictory rules, and people get upset because their bishop didn’t give the dispensation, or they fret that no one really cares about Lent anymore, or they just find the conditions attached to the dispensation confusing.

There is no other day on the Church calendar which causes such a fuss. No scorecards are needed for St. Stanislaus or Saint John of God, which also often fall during Lent, despite the strong devotion of segments of the population to these saints.

Saint Patrick is different. The Church in Ireland has had an outsize influence on the Church in the United States, even when taking into account the large number of Irish immigrants who came to the country. In many ways, American Catholicism grew from an Irish root, and in Ireland, St. Patrick’s Day is a solemnity and meat is allowed.

 

— 3 —

What a glorious anniversary! It’s been a whole week since the BBC Dad explosion, and did you ever? Yes, it’s true that one of the things I hate about writing on the Internet – are questions about what people write about on the Internet.  As in: Why are you writing about that? And not this Important Thing?  Hate it. 

BUT.

Think for a minute about the people who spent a whole lot of time last weekend extrapolating Big Themes from 30 seconds in another family’s life and fighting with each other about said Big Themes.

God almighty, it was not a big deal. It was cute. It was funny. It just happened. It really was not a deeply meaningful leading indicator of Gender Relations. And…there were more interesting things to do last weekend than fight on Facebook about this, I’m pretty sure.

He told the Wall Street Journal: ‘As soon as she opened the door I saw her image on my screen. She was in a hippity-hoppity mood that day because of the school party.’

Prof Kelly, 44, said he gamely tried to continue with the interview but then nine-month-old James tottered into the room. ‘Then I knew it was over,’ he said.

To complete the farce, his wife Jung-a Kim then came skidding through the door.

She grabbed the two youngsters and attempted to drag them out of the door, but one of them could be heard wailing and the baby’s walker got stuck in the door.

More. 

(The WSJ article mentioned is behind a paywall now, but it mentioned that Jung-a Kim was recording the interview airing on the television in the other room – recording it with her phone – and didn’t notice the kids were up to anything until they appeared on the screen.)

— 4 —

Gene Luen Yang is a favorite around here – a great storyteller and graphic novelist. He’s also a Catholic. Christianity Today has a nice article about the McArthur “Genius” grant winner, his art and his faith:

Yang admits these tensions were not always easy for him to navigate, but his perspective on not fitting in has changed over time. “Now, when I look back, I feel really grateful and appreciative of being an outsider,” Yang told me. “When you are in a place of comfort, there are things you end up taking for granted.” While his upbringing and education were privileged in many ways, Yang is familiar with the feeling of cultural discomfort.

Spurred on by the complex tensions between his Chinese-Christian and Western-American heritage, Yang’s work represents an ongoing quest to better understand himself, his faith, and the world around him. He often takes his characters on similar journeys of exploring identity, place, and purpose—something that readers of any cultural and faith background can connect with.

Update:  I didn’t know the CT article was behind a paywall – I don’t subscribe, and somehow I could read it – perhaps because it was in an email link from CT? Anyway…sorry!

— 5 —.

From last December, a local (Atlanta) news feature on the Hawthorne Dominicans’ ministry in the city:

— 6 ––

The Monk who saves manuscripts from ISIS:

Under Stewart’s direction, HMML has expanded its activities to India, where it recently photographed 10,000 palm-leaf manuscripts, and to Ethiopia, where it digitized the Garima Gospels, believed to be the oldest surviving Ethiopian manuscripts. The organization has also worked in Middle Eastern countries like Egypt, Lebanon, and Turkey, photographing thousands of manuscripts of all confessions and languages, from Coptic to Maronite and from Greek to Latin.

In 2013, the organization decided to start digitizing Islamic material as well. In Mali, HMML is currently digitizing more than 300,000 Islamic manuscripts, which risked being destroyed when Islamists associated with al-Qaeda took over the city of Timbuktu in 2012.

With the rise of ISIS, 2,000 out of the 6,000 manuscripts that HMML managed to digitize in Iraq between 2009 and 2014 have been lost or destroyed. Other manuscripts digitized in Syria may have suffered the same fate.

— 7 —

Starting to think about Easter gifts? First Communion? Confirmation Mother’s Day?

Check out my bookstore. It will be closed from 3/25-4/2, so you might want to get on those Easter orders….

For more Quick Takes, visit This Ain’t the Lyceum!

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7 Quick Takes

— 1 —

The following will be rather mindless because I’ve just spend five hours at an academic competition (going on to nationals in June! Joy.) which stressed this introvert out, but I have work to finish up tomorrow morning, so I want to knock this out  tonight….

Yes, I’ve been doing some work this week, and it’s kind of odd and refreshing because the work isn’t a Big Project. It’s a small project that I should be able to knock off in a few days, and I will, but one that still stretches me just a bit because it is, indeed, small.

It’s more challenging to write succinctly and meaningfully than you might think. But it’s my favorite kind of challenge.

— 2 —

The  other project I’m working on involves seeing if  a collection of talks from a conference can be shaped into a book. We’ll see….

Speaking of talks…I have one! Now that everyone is getting older, I’ve started accepting speaking invitations again..the next one will be an inservice/retreat thingy for Catholic school teachers a couple of hours away, and I’m looking forward to it. Also, Ann Engelhart and I will be speaking up on Long Island somewhere in early June…more on that when they finish up the PR materials.

— 3—

Recent reads:

Tuesday night, I read the novel The Risen by Ron Rash. It was the most interesting-looking book on the “fiction new releases” shelf at the library. It was short – really, probably novella-length, and it was a good way to spend a couple of hours. The plot involved two brothers, and an incident that had happened almost fifty years before with a teenaged girl. I kept thinking of Rectify as I read, since a long-ago crime involving a teenage female victim is at the heart of that, too.

The fundamental issue at hand was….how can we even try to compensate for the wrong that we have done? What is the relationship between the wrong things and the good that we do with our lives later? Does one cancel out the other – in either direction? A knotty problem, indeed. Artfully written, yes, and it certainly held my attention for a couple of hours and moved me a bit in the end, but at the same time there was a mannered aspect about it that ultimately left me cold. Well, not cold, but cooler than I feel I should have been left.

— 4 —

Drifting about at the library the other day, I picked up a book of Maugham stories. Took it home, and read On the Internet that the one with the most startling titles, “The Hairless Mexican,” was considered one of Maugham’s best. So I read it, could see the “twist” about 2/3 of the way through, and then felt that the “twist” could have been handled much more subtly. As in…the hammer wasn’t necessary. So that was enough of that.

— 5 —.

This was on the “new releases” shelf, too,  so I had to grab it. As of this writing, I’m only about 60 pages in, but am thoroughly enjoying it, and not just Because Rome. I read a lot of social history and history of pop culture, and so far, this is one of the best. One of the flaws of modern writing on these matters is the authorial voice is usually way too intrusive, presuming that the reason we’re reading this book is that we’re super interested in the author’s relationship to the subject matter, when honestly guys, we’re not. This is free of that narcissism, and is quite enjoyable and briskly, yet solidly written. Full report next week.

— 6 —

Miss McKenzie! She found love! So exciting. Okay, not exciting. But a very satisfying read, even though none of her suitors, even the one she eventually accepted, were worthy of her. I’ve decided to immerse myself in Trollope for a time. What I find interesting and instructive is the forthrightness of the issues at hand – namely the restrictions and limitations in which the characters live, mostly financial in nature. We like to think that in our day, we make our choices freely, constrained only by our own lack of self-worth or society’s failure to accept us as we are. None of this in Trollope: your choices are limited, clearly, by how much money and property you have and by your gender. This is your life, as it is.  What will you make of it? Very thought-provoking.

— 7 —

Forgive me for repeating this Take from last week…but..it still pertains, don’t you think?

Lent is coming! Here’s a post from yesterday with links to all my Lent-related material.

The past two weeks, I’ve seen a spike in hits for  this post – and I’m glad to see it.

It’s a 2015 post on one of the most inexplicable post-Vatican II liturgical changes (and..there’s a lot of competition on that score) – the total obliteration of Septuagesima, Sexagesima, and Quinquagesima Sundays – the three Sundays preceding the First Sunday of Lent. So for those who celebrate the Extraordinary Form and some Anglicans, I understand, February 12 is Septuagesima Sunday. From a Dappled Things article I cite in the post:

In the chapter titled “The History of Septuagesima,” Dom Guéranger added, “The Church, therefore, has instituted a preparation for the holy time of Lent. She gives us the three weeks of Septuagesima, during which she withdraws us, as much as may be, from the noisy distractions of the world, in order that our hearts may be the more readily impressed by the solemn warning she is to give us, at the commencement of Lent, by marking our foreheads with ashes.”

 Also: tomorrow (February 11) is the celebration of Our Lady of Lourdes. Want to read more about Mary? How about this free book – Mary and the Christian Life.  And St. Bernadette? She’s in The Loyola Kids’ Book of Saints. 

Oh and…did you get the mass email from EWTN tying into…the Feast of the Immaculate Conception? Oops.

For more Quick Takes, visit This Ain’t the Lyceum!

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Mother’s Day

Quick! Have you gotten anything yet?!

Well, you can still grab this – perhaps your local Catholic bookstore has it (if they don’t…demand it!), but you can for sure order it online.

I have a few copies here, and if you contact me at amywelborn60 – at – gmail.com  we can talk about non-media mail shipping.

It’s a 365 day daily devotional for Catholic women. Because it was written to be used beyond a single year, the daily devotionals couldn’t be tied to a specific season, except for most feasts (except Easter).  But I did my best to be as reasonably seasonal as possible – so the entries from February-March tend towards themes of penitence, April-May, Eastery-themes and December, Adventish.

It’s also written for women of any state in life. It doesn’t presume that the woman reading and praying along has children, is of a certain age, is married, works outside the home, is a stay-at-home mom, and for sure does not presume that all women are into shopping or shoes. That sort of thing.

So check it out!

 

And don’t forget…First Communion and Graduation! 

 

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Monday Miscellaney

First off, we’re in the thick of First Communion season….get your signed books here.

Friendship  with  Jesus – B16’s dialogue ith First Communion children

Be Saints!  – B16’s dialogue with British children

I don’t have copies of the next two in the bookstore, but you can find them in most Catholic bookstores and online.

Loyola Kids Book of Saints

Loyola Kids Book of Heroes

Also – Mother’s Day isn’t too far away…..how about The Catholic Woman’s Book of Days?

 

• Over the weekend, I blogged on pseudo-culture – the BBC show Happy Valley and the post-war noir In a Lonely Place. 
• Not much going on this past weekend. 11-year old had a piano competition/judging thing on Saturday and they served at Casa Maria on Sunday, so we were tied to home. That’s okay, we’ll be flitting about soon enough.
• We watched Ben-Hur. Over three days. I hadn’t seen it in years. Probably close to forty of them. You know it’s about four hours long, right? You can see how that happened – given the filmmaking conventions of the day and the fact that if you are going to spend a heap of money on a production, you might as well go all-out and give the audience its money’s worth.

  There is a remake of Ben-Hur coming out and I’ve read a bit of well I never online and can’t remake a classic!

  Well, yes you can. The 1959 version was a remake of the classic silent version, and really, don’t make pronouncements about it being impossible to improve on the ’59 film until you actually rewatch it.

  The length is unnecessary. Those long, lingering dialogue scenes are melodramatic and often risible. Charlton Heston is a terrible actor in this thing. I mean…terrible. The best scenes are the famed set-pieces: The galley scenes, the chariot race and the leper-colony material. The chariot race remains spectacular. Everything else is overlong, stiff and too reverent. The score, as per usual with films like this is overwhelming. Shut up.

  The new version doesn’t look particularly good, though – just judging from the trailers and given that the production team is that Roma Downey crew,  we can be sure that the Christian content will remain intact. But it’s also a good guess that an in-your face CGI-enhanced chariot race will have nothing on the Boyd/Heston matchup of ’59.

  And remember that when the snarky protests come about Ben-Hur being “too Christian” the book was subtitled A Tale of the Christ. It’s about forgiveness, a forgiving heart and mercy that was only found through an encounter with Christ. It comes through in the ’59 version of course, since the movie was part and parcel of that late-50’s Biblical epic boom, but it is pretty stilted and dramatically reverent.

  We had watched Gladiator the week before and had good conversations comparing the two (as in – the plot was just lifted and transposed)  and then digging a bit into history, checking the accuracy (not much on Gladiator, of course)  and looking into the history of the filming of both, as well.

• Random bloggy link of the day: Taking class notes by hand is far better than doing so on a computer.   Tech-crazy schools always bragging about being all-digital, take, er, note.  You’re helping no one except tech companies.

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RCIA Stuff

We are in the final weeks before Easter, which means that we are in the final weeks of candidate and catechumen preparing for full initiation at the the Easter Vigil.

(Of course, RCIA is really, properly only for the unbaptized and already baptized Christians can and should be catechized and brought into the Church year-round if it’s appropriate for that person. But, nonetheless…)

The Scrutinies are the 3rd, 4th, and 5th Sundays of Lent and so perhaps this is a good time to share some good instructional material with friends or family members who are revving up for meeting Christ in the Eucharist for the first time in a few weeks.

The How To Book of the Mass has recently undergone a makeover – I had no role in it and was as surprised as anyone. Mike fought hard for the original cover – he didn’t want the normal Catholic-looking cover and wanted something that would really stand out on a bookstore shelf, so for years the left-hand image had been the cover.

 

 

The new cover looks much like any other intro-to-the-Mass book, but rest assured the content is the same. I’m glad it’s still in print, still selling welling, and helping people. And the content does reflect the most recent translation. Here is an excerpt. 

I have a few copies with the original  cover – you can order here. Or get through your local Catholic bookstore or online. 

In addition, I’d recommend my Words We Pray  – which is a collection of essays I wrote on traditional Catholic prayers from the Sign of the Cross to the Lord’s Prayer to the Memorare to the Liturgy of the Hours to Amen.  Each essay ties in some historical material with spiritual reflection, the goal being to help the pray-er link the prayers of his or her own heart with the prayer of the Church.  St. Paul says, In the same way, the Spirit too comes to the aid of our weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we ought, but the Spirit itself intercedes with inexpressible groanings.(Romans 8:26).

One way the Spirit helps us pray as we ought and give voice to our the depths of our hearts is via the Spirit-formed traditional prayer of the Church. It leads us away from solipsism and situates our prayer properly, putting praise and gratitude to God first, and placing our needs in the context of his will, above all.

I have a few copies of that here too, as well as all the picture books.  But you can get The Words We Pray online anywhere as well.  

 

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Barrier Methods: Part I

 

 

Phil Pullella, Reuters: Today, you spoke very eloquently about the problems of immigration. On the other side of the border, there is a very tough electoral battle. One of the candidates for the White House, Republican, Donald Trump, in an interview recently said that you are a political man and he even said that you are a pawn, an instrument of the Mexican government for migration politics. Trump said that if he’s elected, he wants to build 2,500 kilometers of wall along the border. He wants to deport 11 million illegal immigrants, separating families, etcetera. I would like to ask you, what do you think of these accusations against you and if a North American Catholic can vote for a person like this?
 
Pope Francis: Thank God he said I was a politician because Aristotle defined the human person as ‘animal politicus.’ At least I am a human person. As to whether I am a pawn, well, maybe, I don’t know. I’ll leave that up to your judgment and that of the people. And then, a person who thinks only about building walls, wherever they may be, and not building bridges, is not Christian. This is not in the Gospel. As far as what you said about whether I would advise to vote or not to vote, I am not going to get involved in that. I say only that this man is not Christian if he has said things like that. We must see if he said things in that way and in this I give the benefit of the doubt.

Please note: Among the top thing in life in which I am deeply uninterested :  Donald Trump’s spiritual life and any related  protestations.

Put away the shocked face at the Pope supposedly calling another person’s faith into question. It’s true that he was not targeting Trump specifically (that “if”), and who cares anyway, but the language here is completely consistent with Pope Francis’ rhetoric. This is his love language.

It is, in fact, one of his most reliable verbal tics, and one that composes the core of almost every homily he preaches, especially at daily Mass:

1. Read Scriptures
2. Find, in said Scripture, a characteristic that can be held up as either a) emblematic of a Christian or b)not emblematic of a Christian
3. Go with it.

So just today:

Pope Francis went on to make explicit mention of the lines from Matthew’s Gospel, which foretell of the Last Judgment, when God will call men to account for what they have done to the hungry, thirsty, imprisoned, strangers. “This,” said the Holy Father, “is the Christian life: mere talk leads to vanity, to that empty pretense of being Christian – but no, that way one is not a Christian at all.”: “May the Lord give us this wisdom to understand well where lies the difference between saying and doing, and teach us the way of doing and help us to go down that way, because the way of saying brings us to the place where were these teachers of the law, these clerics, who liked dressing up and acting just like if they were so many Majesties – and this is not the reality of the Gospel. May the Lord teach us this way.”

And just a few from the past:

 

 Instead, said Pope Francis, we should all know how to forgive, and forgive “forever” as Jesus invites us to do “seven times in a day” if those who have wronged us ask for it and have repented. Jesus, says Pope Francis, “exaggerates to make us understand the importance of forgiveness” because “a Christian who is not able to forgive causes scandal: he is not a Christian.”

 

And when a little vanity creeps in, when someone believes themselves to be a winner of the ‘Nobel Prize for Holiness,” then memory is also good for us: ‘But … remember where I took you from, the very least of the flock. You were behind, in the flock.’ Memory is a great grace, and when a Christian has no memory – this is a hard thing, but it’s true – he is not a Christian, he is an idolater. Because he is before a God that has no road, that does not know how to move forward on the road. Our God is moving forward on the road with us, He is among us, He walks with us. He saves us. He makes history with us. Be mindful of all that, and life becomes more fruitful, with the grace of memory.

 

God’s mercy, the Pontiff said, reaches even to those who decline the invitation or pretend to accept it but do not truly participate in the feast. Listing the excuses given by those in the parable who were too occupied to attend, Pope Francis said: “They participate in the banquet in name only, but they do not truly accept the invitation”.

“They say yes,” but they really mean no. He likened the invited guests in the Gospel to “Christians who are content to remain on the guest list”. Unfortunately, he said, “being listed as a Christian is not enough… If you do not enter into the banquet, you are not a Christian; you will be on the list, but this does not help your salvation”.

 

A person might have five theology degrees, the Holy Father said, but not have the Spirit of God. “Perhaps you will be a great theologian, but you are not a Christian, because you do not have the Spirit of God! That which gives authority, that which gives you your identity and the Holy Spirit, the anointing of the Holy Spirit.”

 

“Joy, which is like the sign of a Christian. A Christian without joy is either not a Christian or he is sick. There’s no other type! He is not doing well health-wise! A healthy Christian is a joyful Christian. I once said that there are Christians with faces like pickled peppers [sour faces – ed] … Always with these [long] faces! Some souls are also like this, this is bad! These are not Christians. A Christian without joy is not Christian. Joy is like the seal of a Christian. Even in pain, tribulations, even in persecutions”.

 

“If you can’t forgive, you are not a Christian.  You may be a good man, a good woman…. but you are not doing what our Lord did.  What’s more, if you can’t forgive, you cannot receive the peace of the Lord. And every day when we pray the ‘Our Father:’ Forgive us as we have forgiven those……It’s a condition. We are trying to ‘convince’ God that we’re good, that we’re good by forgiving: in reverse.  (It’s just) words, right? As that beautiful song went:   ‘Words, words, words,’ wasn’t it?  I think it was (the Italian singer) Mina who sung it. Words! Forgive one another! Just as the Lord has forgiven us, do likewise.”

 

“So it is always with God’s love,” said Francis, “that, in order to reach us, takes the way of humility.” This was the same way that Jesus walked, a way that humbled itself even unto the Cross. Pope Francis went on to say that, for a Christian, “[T]his is the golden rule,” according to which progress and advancement always come through lowering oneself. “One can take no other road,” he said, adding, “if I do not lower myself, if you do not lower yourself, you are not a Christian.”

 

The Holy Father took his cue from a Confirmation administered during the Mass. The person who receives this Sacrament, Pope Francis said, “manifested the desire to be a Christian. To be Christian means to bear witness to Jesus Christ.” A Christian is a person who “thinks like a Christian, feels like a Christian and acts like a Christian. And this is coherency in the life of a Christian. Someone can be said to have faith, “but if one of these things is missing, he is not a Christian, there’s something wrong, there’s a certain incoherence. And Christians “who ordinarily, commonly live in incoherence, do so much harm”:

 

If you read his homilies and speeches you see the same type of paradigm used over and over – a dividing, if you will, a shadow from light.

(Judgment?)

Some – many – find this type of discourse inspiring and challenging in a good way. Some find it a useful tool with which to judge others. YMMV.

What interests me about it is the role this rhetorical structure plays in his speech in general.

This might seem to be one more meandering, come-at-things-from-the-side post, and perhaps it is, (upon reading the finished mess..I know  it is…sorry)  but I think it’s important to just attempt a broader understanding instead of constantly stabbing at individual statements.

This is what I have said about Pope Francis’ words since the beginning of his pontificate: they are largely untethered from the the depth and breadth of Catholic tradition.  That is not saying he does not believe it.  It’s saying that he apparently has little use for much of it in his public speech. It’s not his point.

I could site many examples, but this “you are not a Christian” tic serves the purpose well. Popesplainers tell me that what he means is that authentic discipleship or deeply dedicated faith or radical faith is characterized by these features: joy, memory, coherence, forgiveness, and that is undoubtedly true.

But the repeated judgment of individuals or types in this way is problematic. It’s theologically inaccurate, and is just not a part of Catholic language. It seems to me an overly simplistic way of articulating the challenges of Christian discipleship. It’s a clean finish, it seems to stick the landing, it gets your attention, but what is it, really?

Every preacher, they say, has one sermon, and they preach that one over and over. The trick though, in preaching or even teaching, is to allow your own interests and priorities to dialogue with the material at hand, not dominate it.

So I, as a teacher, may have a deep interest in the history of women in Catholicism, but if I am teaching a high school church history class and I work that interest into every single lesson, and use the lessons mostly as a hanger for my hobbyhorse,  I’m allowing my priorities to shape the message to an unhelpful extent. What am I trying to do here? Am I really interested in inspiring my students to learn as much about the big picture as possible, or in the end, is my own personal vision limiting theirs?

When I read Pope Francis’ homilies and speeches, for the most part,  I don’t experience an exploration of the Scriptures as they are, or a presentation of a particular facet of Catholic teaching or devotion. I don’t get the Big Catholic Picture. In fact, there is even a sense that the Big Catholic Picture might function as a wall between  a person  and Jesus, rather than the bridge to him.

His habit is to find an angle in the text or moment at hand to make the point he has in mind, and there are in general just a few of those to pick from. The Scripture, the day, the place, the interview question serves as an opportunity to elucidate one or more of his favorite themes: mercy, inclusiveness, accompaniment, hypocrisy, and the plight of the materially poor.

And what’s so bad about that? Who votes against more mercy and justice? Not me!

But the ultimate effect is a bit impoverished. As I said, it is not so much the richness of the Scriptures that are preached, but Pope Francis’ priorities and themes.  It is, to me, another expression of the tendency I previously wrote about: a pope’s priorities shaping the exercise of the papal office rather than humbly dialoguing  with it and all that underlies it.

As I said every preacher does this to a certain extent.  I know a priest who never fails to bring up death. He’s old. It’s on his mind. Another priest homilist, obviously a neat and well-organized fellow, tends to regularly bring up the beauty of God’s plan of salvation and how it all fits together pretty nicely.

The trick is, as I said before, to be careful to let the Scriptures and the Church speak through your own particular charism and yes, priorities.

What I hear in Pope Francis’ words are his favorite themes. What is missing is the broader, deeper context of Catholic life, tradition and teaching. Maybe you don’t miss it. I do. I like for all that stuff to be summed up and reflected and flowing through Catholic-talk.

One might argue, “But it’s pastoral” and “What, you expect a theology dissertation every time a pope opens his mouth? So hard to understand! This line-drawing is so much simpler and easy to apply to everyday life!”

Nope. I don’t expect dissertations in homilies. That would be terrible.  But here’s the thing. Every time I go to Mass in Alabama, I hear homilies that my eleven-year old can understand, homilies that acknowledge and embrace the brokenness of the human condition from a place deep, secure and confidently flowing from Catholic tradition. They are not all great, but they are trying.

I hear homilies that reflect the joyful belief that the gift of faith we meet in Catholicism reflects two things: it reflects life and it reflects God’s answer to life, met in Christ and given to us through his Body, the Church.

That Catholicism is not imposed on life. Is not an extra. Its philosophical and theological ground is simply the ground of life, articulated, written, prayed, sung and even suffered through.

And it for sure – for certain – is not presented as an obstacle to Christ, as something to shrug off, minimize and skirt around, as barriers to the real Christ, the loving, accepting Christ.

So what does this have with the Trump thing? Well, this: Catholicism is no stranger to the issues of movement of peoples; of refugees; of the right of nations to live in security ; of the rights of people to find decent, safe, homes. There are innumerable facets to the immigrant situation as it relates to the US, Mexico and Central America: crime, poverty, exploitation, accommodation and political games.

What Catholicism brings to this table is far more than assertions that building walls is not Gospel teaching and reflexively pulling out the “not a Christian” card.

It’s not really about the Church (insert harrumph here) staying out of politics.  Catholicism is the oldest continually existing political body in the world. Empires, monarchies, city-states, revolutions, nations, republics, warmongering popes, peace-making popes, you name it, we’ve been there.  We have a lot to say about politics and political movements and the movement of peoples.Been there, done that, still doing it.

So, the Trump thing? What was said here and has been in situations like this is predictable. It’s the way the Pope speaks and sees things, evidently.

The fundamental issue, though, is why. What moves the Pope and his people to present his off-the-cuff remarks and answers in this way? Why the insistence that his thoughts on or his reaction to any of this matter? Why the highlighting of his own personal priorities and constant presentation of them through, for example, these daily homilies, as the focus of Catholic interaction with the world today?

Because aren’t we about decentralization?

And isn’t he just the humble Bishop of Rome?

Right?

 

 

 

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Fourth Sunday of Advent

 

2009

Precisely this aspect of the prophecy, that of messianic peace, leads us naturally to emphasize that the city of Bethlehem is also a symbol of peace, in the Holy Land and in the world. Unfortunately, in our day, it does not represent an attained and stable peace, but rather a peace sought with effort and hope. Yet God is never resigned to this state of affairs, so that this year too, in Bethlehem and throughout the world, the mystery of Christmas will be renewed in the Church. A prophecy of peace for every person which obliges Christians to immerse themselves in the closures, tragedies, that are often unknown and hidden, and in the conflicts of the context in which they live, with the sentiments of Jesus so that they may become everywhere instruments and messengers of peace, to sow love where there is hatred, pardon where there is injury, joy where there is sadness and truth where there is error, according to the beautiful words of a well-known Franciscan prayer.

Today, as in the times of Jesus, Christmas is not a fairy-tale for children but God’s response to the drama of humanity in search of true peace. “He shall be peace”, says the Prophet referring to the Messiah. It is up to us to open, to fling open wide the doors to welcome him. Let us learn from Mary and Joseph: let us place ourselves with faith at the service of God’s plan. Even if we do not understand it fully, let us entrust ourselves to his wisdom and goodness. Let us seek first of all the Kingdom of God, and Providence will help us. A Happy Christmas to you all!

2012

On this Fourth Sunday of Advent that comes just before the Nativity of the Lord, the Gospel speaks of Mary’s visit to her kinswoman Elizabeth. This event is not merely a courteous gesture but portrays with great simplicity the encounter of the Old Testament with the New. Indeed the two women, both of them then pregnant, embody expectation and the Expected One. The elderly Elizabeth symbolizes Israel which is awaiting the Messiah, whereas the young Mary bears within her the fulfilment of this expectation for the benefit of the whole of humanity.

First of all in the two women the fruit of their wombs, John and Christ, meet and recognize each other. The Christian poet Prudentius comments: “the child imprisoned in the aged womb greets by his mother’s lips his Lord, the maiden’s son” (Apotheosis,590: pl 59, 970). John’s exultation in Elizabeth’s womb is a sign of the fulfilment of the expectation: God is about to visit his People. In the Annunciation the Archangel Gabriel spoke to Mary of Elizabeth’s pregnancy (cf. 1:36) as proof of God’s power; in spite of her old age her barren state was made fecund.

In her greeting to Mary Elizabeth recognizes that God’s promise to humanity is being fulfilled and exclaims: “Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb! And why is this granted me, that the mother of my Lord should come to me?” (Lk 1:42-43). In the Old Testament, the phrase “blessed are you among women” refers both to Jael (Judg 5:24), and to Judith (Jud 13:18), two women warriors who do their utmost to save Israel.

Instead it is used here to describe Mary, a peaceful young woman who is about to bring the Saviour into the world. Thus John’s leap of joy (cf. Lk 1:44) also calls to mind King David’s dancing when he accompanied the entry of the Ark of the Covenant into Jerusalem (cf. 1 Chron 15:29. The Ark that contained the Tablets of the Law, the manna and Aaron’s rod (cf. Heb 9:4) was the sign of God’s presence among his People. The unborn John exults with joy before Mary, the Ark of the New Covenant, who in her womb is carrying Jesus, the Son of God made man.

The scene of the Visitation also expresses the beauty of the greeting. Wherever there is reciprocal acceptance, listening, making room for another, God is there, as well as the joy that comes from him. At Christmas time let us emulate Mary, visiting all those who are living in hardship, especially the sick, prisoners, the elderly and children. And let us also imitate Elizabeth who welcomes the guest as God himself: without wishing it, we shall never know the Lord, without expecting him we shall not meet him, without looking for him we shall not find him. Let us too go to meet the Lord who comes with the same joy as Mary, who went with haste to Elizabeth (Lk 1:39).

Let us pray that all men and women may seek God, discovering that it is God himself who comes to visit us first. Let us entrust our heart to Mary, Ark of the New and Eternal Covenant, so that she may make it worthy to receive God’s visit in the mystery of his Birth.

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On the way this week….

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School’s coming…

For those of you in more normal parts of the world, you’re thinking, What? That’s not right…we’ve got a month left!

Not the case down here, where school starts well before Labor Day.

My son will be starting high school, and his orientation is a week from today, classes begin on the 10th.

(The satisfaction comes on the other end – his last day of class will be May 20. Some of you were posting “LAST DAY OF SCHOOL” photos when we’d already been out a month. So there.)

Yesterday I pulled the calendar out and started the ritual Marking-Up of Life.  The high school’s calendar, altar serving schedule, homeschool (5th grader) activities, writing deadlines…and I was thinking about all of this and what parts of the uniform are left to buy and if all the textbooks have arrived and what resources I need to order for the homeschooler and then I thought

IT’S STILL JULY!

And I got a little irritated until, once again, I remembered the merry month of May – we were done with school by May 14 this year and managed to do the Wild West Trip (story still to be finished!) before June.

Our travels for the rest of this summer have been mostly regional – well, all regional.  I had thought of doing a road trip to Philadelphia and Boston for, well, right now, but circumstances intervened, and that won’t be happening. So we are just hanging out here, reading, going to the pool, and getting ready for school. So some notes.

• Are you getting ready for school? Catechists, homeschoolers and Catholic school teachers are.  If you are a mind to, please take a look at all the resources I have available for catechesis.
• Do you work in youth ministry? Please check out my books for teens and young adults here.

• Are you planning adult education? Consider these resources.

• Are you teaching First Communion children this year? Take a look at Friendship with Jesus and Be Saints. 
• Are you teaching religion to elementary age students? Friendship with Jesus, Be Saints, Bambinelli Sunday, Adventures in Assisi, The Loyola Kids’ Book of Saints, The Loyola Kids’ Book of Heroes. 
• Can you help catechists, Catholic schools and parish programs?  Consider gifting your parish, school or favorite catechist with copies of these books.  Click on the covers for more information.

I have copies of the picture books on hand – in my bookstore.  In fact, I have a lot of them!  If you are interested in bulk orders, contact me – we can make a deal!

Again – even if catechesis isn’t something you are personally involved in, any catechist, parish school, library or program would welcome a donation as a beginning-of-the-year (no matter when it begins…) gift.

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