Eva : Ave

Today's Readings:

• Genesis 3:9-15, 20
• Ephesians 1:3-6, 11-12
• Luke 1:26-38

In the Douay, the RSV, and the NABRE with other Mass texts.

And in the sixth month, the angel Gabriel was sent from God into a city of Galilee, called Nazareth, To a virgin espoused to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David: and the virgin’s name was Mary. 
Luke 1:26-27

Today, in the Western Liturgies (of both the Catholic and Orthodox churches) is celebrated the Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary. Tomorrow (the 9th) is the celebration in the Eastern Rites (both for Eastern Orthodox and for Byzantine Catholics). I'd be curious to know when the two feasts separated, or how - but then I'm a Church Geek. The Byzantines insist that Mary's conception (the 9th) is celebrated on a different day than her birth (September 8th) because Mary is not perfect. But they didn't make their Western Rite communities celebrate on the 9th. The Catholic Church doesn't see the calendar as all that important - because they didn't make their Byzantine communities change their dates either. I suspect that both East and West picked their days for different reasons and, later, decided to make up theological justifications for them. (A given feast is often celebrated on the day a famous church building was consecrated, though without reference to the building which now, often, no longer exists.)

This feast is a stumbling block for many Protestants, for many Orthodox and for some Catholics, who just don't get it. Mary's immaculate conception has nothing to do with the Virgin Birth of Jesus; it has everything to do, rather, with the person of the Blessed Virgin Mary. In the East she is called "immaculate," "pure," or "spotless" (achrantos in Greek). Some Orthodox state that she was free from actual sin, some say she never sinned, and others just say she died sinless. The title Our All-holy, immaculate, most blessed and glorified Lady, the Theotokos and Ever-Virgin Mary (Greek: Τῆς Παναγίας, ἀχράντου, ὑπερευλογημένης, ἐνδόξου, δεσποίνης ἡμῶν Θεοτόκου καὶ ἀειπαρθένου Μαρίας) is used in the Divine Liturgy of St John Chrysostom.

Yet some object to this feast because they say that it sets Mary apart from the rest of Mankind. I don't think so: God, in his grace, gave to Mary all that later Christians would have in Baptism and the descent of the Holy Spirit. That's all. One can debate about Augustinian ideas of "Original Sin" but Byzantine Catholics don't hold to such ideas. They are no less Catholic. Mary is celebrated as being, really, the first and greatest Christian, submitting to God's will and experiencing his grace. Her other feasts are, as well, manifestations of the life of a Christian: her birth, her presentation in the Temple, her death and assumption, her coronation - these are all events in the life of every Christian. They are writ large and rendered miraculous in Mary's life, yes, but they are ones we all share: she in her life, by God's grace, and we in our day by God's sacraments.

Mary's willingness to participate in God's plan for mankind undoes what Eve did, in her decision to step out of that plan. Mary's choice is to fully glory in her willing submission to as Eve attempted to glory in her willful struggle against God's command. The one wrecked us all. The other blessed us all.

A blessed feast and may we all, by Mary's intercession, come to share in her glory!

It's all thanksgiving

This whole city
the culture
the food
the beauty
I offer you because here I feel, fully and finally, always at home

this parish church
of prayer and praise where
Clergy and religious, laity and saints
find themselves in your presence,
I offer you because here i feel, fully and finally, always at home

And yet I'm so broken
aware that too much of my life
is lost, wasted, destroyed.
I can't get it back
and your church doesn't want it.

It's not me.
But is there enough of me left?
Can you be the me I'm not?
I cannot stand to be healed any more
because I can only kneel
half a man, unable to dance
Unwilling to wait
lost.

And knowing here,
on my knees
I may never stand at your altar
but I am fully, finally and always at home
I have thanksgiving to offer.

Even if it's not wanted.
This is my body, broken for you,
this is the chalice of my tears shed.
make it yours.

Not That Song. No!

Today's Readings:

• Isaiah 40:25-41
• Matthew 11:28-30

In the Douay, RSV, or in the NABRE with other Mass Texts

It is he that giveth strength to the weary, and increaseth force and might to them that are not.
Isaiah 40:29

There came this moment in my daily grind where I said, "yeah, I'm not doing this any more." I was partying hard, and working full time. I was also going to college and balancing a relationship on top of that. There was a lot of other stuff going on in my life: a discernment process, financial struggles, my cat was dying. I was pretty pleased to be holding it all together. But, you know: I wasn't getting anywhere.

Another time, Job, Church and Chastity all in balance, now, and still, not getting anywhere.

Another time: monastic life spinning out of balance, becoming a really annoying struggle of "Gosh I hope I don't ever have to do that again." Followed by "Gosh I should go to confession" and then "Gosh this isn't my fault"... it's a terrible cycle that totally plays one out, emotionally and physically, and yet one never gets anywhere.

Before I get to the punch line, I admit: there will be more times like the above. Because it's a lesson I have not learned even now.

But all of these times ended when I prayed. I don't mean when I said "O God, help me here" although that sort of praying played a part. I mean, when I doubled down, cut a bunch of stupid time wasters out of my life, cleared swaths of time for God and said, "Here. I'm going to add the following things to my life: this weekly church service, that 20 minute devotion daily, this other thing before bed, which means no TV after 7PM.

Suddenly there was more time in my life than I knew what to do with. I can't explain it without falling into a sort of prosperity Gospel idea, but when something is important we make time for it. And when God is the thing: he makes time for us and when we let him, it sorts out the other stuff.

Yes I know, no one raises kids like I raise my hypothetical ones. And nothing makes for financial obligations like a family. I don't have an answer for you except I keep seeing it work. It may be that I'm just a lazy fool who, without kids, debt, or property, doesn't have much to worry about anyway. Or it may be that because of all that I'm just a hat trick, and God would love to resolve your actually-complex time-sink situations too. If I'm a lazy fool, imagine how much someone with actual labor could benefit from "Come to me all you that labor and are burdened, and I will refresh you."

My friend and Sunday School teacher, Jeanette, was raising three kids and a husband. She even let me live with her one spring when my parents were moving and I wanted to finish out the school year. What I remember about her is, as she kept house, fed her family, and let me listen to music on the headphones: her prayer life. Her secret was her sewing room. It was tiny - about 3 x 4 feet. It was essentially a closet with a window. Her husband had added a built-in table/desk, and there was a chair. It was warm and sunny. She would go into the room, and shut the door and do her business. The whole family knew not to bother her for that time. And she grew, she raised up her family and friends in prayer, and she had time.

If you give God time, he gives it to you.

To be honest: I know the world does, in fact, fall apart, if I don't hold on to it very well. What I've come to realize is, I was not supposed to be holding it together in the first place. Put your hope on Jesus and do not be distracted by the world, the flesh, or the devil. They that hope in the Lord shall renew their strength, they shall take wings as eagles, they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint.

The Cloud of Witnesses Averts Their Eyes.

Today's Readings:

• Isaiah 40:1-11
• Matthew 18:12-14

In the Douay, RSV or the NABRE with other Mass texts

All flesh is grass, and all the glory thereof as the flower of the field. The grass is withered, and the flower is fallen, because the spirit of the Lord hath blown upon it. Indeed the people is grass: The grass is withered, and the flower is fallen: but the word of our Lord endureth for ever.
Isaiah 40:6b-8

One of the most wonderful readings of Stalin's persecution of the Russian Church was expressed to me thus: "...when because of our sins, God allowed to fall on his church..." To think of the Church withering as the grass in the field, with Stalin being blown through the Church by the Spirit of the Lord is, well, revolutionary. Yet this idea is certainly present in Scriptures, where God uses the Babylonians, Assyrians, and Greeks to punish faithless Israel, to bring him back to the faith of his fathers. We see it too when the invasion of Christian lands by the Muslims results in persecutions for the Church and a rebirth, as in Cordova, or other glorious Martyrdoms, as in our own time under ISIS. Even though the flower (or the Martyrs) has fallen, and even though the grass (of the general Church population) has withered, the Word of Our Lord endureth for ever. The gates of Hell, says Jesus, will not prevail against the Church. What will God use against his withering people in America?

Evangelicals, back in the 70s, following Mr Hal Lindsey, Mr Tim LeHaye, and others, took comfort in this idea of "the Rapture" which would magically suck the "real Christians" out of the way of any real persecution - as if God's ever done that before. But he certainly won't teleport the church out of the way of people who don't want Nativity Scenes on the lawns of court houses. (BTW, seriously, WTF? Unless we're going to get judges who forgive everyone, even those folks who are not sorry, I don't want Jesus associated with our legal system in people's minds.)

Within triple my lifespan, more than 60-75 million Christians have been killed because of their faith. Most of them never saw once a Nativity set on their courthouse lawn or worried what the secular authorities called the holiday on Good Friday. In fact, most of them would not have had a holiday on Good Friday no matter what the name.

To be fair, the Church is only a reflection of the Culture. The people who complain about Target's bathroom policies are are exactly the same as the people who file lawsuits over non-baking of wedding cakes. The people screaming about ten commandments on walls of courthouses or prayers before football games are carbon copies the same people who demand that women be made priests in the name of "justice". The people who sell out to a fascism claiming to support one (and only one) Catholic Doctrine are exactly the same as those who sell out to a liberal sexuality whilst keeping their pretty liturgies. If the Great Cloud of Witnesses is still watchings, it's because they are rubbernecking. We are a whinging people: Americans are rats spoiled rotten on a sinking ship. The Gates of Hell will not ever prevail against Christ's Church but the whining bastages who call themselves Christians may wreck it from the inside. Then the spirit of God would do well to wither the grass and let the flowers fall, because of our sins, really, if you must know.

When reading about the Martyrs of Cordova, England, Japan, China, or the Soviet Union, I cannot help but wonder what shall become of us here in the USA, when something really bad happens. I don't mean when our 501(c)3 status gets revoked and we stop groveling to keep our gov't subsidies. I mean when men with gov't guns follow us around waiting for a quite interlude. I'm worried that I and many of us will not be strengthened and so will fall in that world. I pray to my ancestor, Blessed William Richardson, the last priest killed by Elizabeth I, that I might have some tiny portion of his courage. But seriously, I can't even wait for the bus without getting angry at the driver that won't stop. For my sins, I deserve what I get, as do we all.

Bang. Zoom. Through the roof, Alice.

Today's readings:

• Isaiah 35:1-10
• Luke 5:17-26

This text in the Douay, the RSV, and the NABRE with Mass texts.

Quorum fidem ut vidit, dixit: Homo, remittuntur tibi peccata tua.
Whose faith when he saw, he said: Man, thy sins are forgiven thee.
Luke 5:20

Whose faith did Jesus see? Jesus saw the faith of the men who brought their friend down through the roof. The Greek and the Latin are both plural: Jesus saw their faith and so forgave the sins of the man on the stretcher.

The great Orthodox Saint, Seraphim of Sarov (also venerated by Byzantine Catholics) taught his disciples to "Acquire the Spirit of Peace and thousands around you will be saved."

We do save those around us. - and they save us If you wish to be made fully mindful of your status as a sinner, of your reliance on the prayers of the Church, sing a Byzantine Rite Panikhida. The texts convey the voice of the departed begging the prayers of the living. I am aware that the only way I can be saved is through the prayers and love of this community around me.

As you see me set before you
Mute and without breath
Weep for me, my brethren, family, and all who know me,
For I spoke with you only yesterday,
And suddenly the fearful hour of death came upon me.
Come all those who love me
And give me the last kiss,
For never again shall I journey or talk with you
Until the end of time.
For I go to a Judge Who is impartial,
Where servant and master stand side by side.
King and soldier, rich and poor, are held in equal esteem.
For each will be glorified by his own deeds
Or will be put to shame.
But I ask and implore you all
To pray without ceasing for me to Christ our God,
That I may not be put into the place of torment because of my sins,
But that He may appoint me
To a place where there is the light of life. 

In addition to the living, the Byzantine Catholic and Orthodox rites are filled with invocations like "Holy Mother of God, Save us!" Save, again, does not mean "avoid hell, go to heaven after you die" but rather it means "healed, made whole". We ask the living, the dead, the Saints, our neighbors, our families, and the Holy Souls in Purgatory to pray for us as we pray for them: we are not saved alone.

We are, exactly, saving the world around us by living out our Christian Faith. This is such a marked difference from the Evangelical Idea of "pray the sinner's' prayer or spend eternity in hell". We are answering God's "altar call" every time we approach the altar. We have Jesus with us in the Blessed Sacrament and the praying community of the Church. We can, this Advent, or anytime, drop someone "through the roof" to Jesus. And so, who would you place before Jesus to ask for their salvation? With whom would you join? "If two of you shall consent upon earth, concerning any thing whatsoever they shall ask, it shall be done to them by my Father who is in heaven." Matthew 18:19

Who would you save? Live out your faith. Who would you convert? Live out your faith.

Teaching an Old Dog New Tricks

Today's Readings:

• Isaiah 11:1-10
• Romans 15:4-9
• Matthew 3:1-12

In the Douay, the RSV, and the NABRE with other Mass Texts

Et dicens: Poenitentiam agite: appropinquavit enim regnum caelorum.
Do penance: for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.
Matthew 3:2

After my notes on the readings for the 29th where I celebrated a confusing choice on the part of St Jerome and the Douay translators, it's nice that we have today, another odd choice (in fact, we have the same reading from Isaiah as the OT reading today). Today's is not one, I think, that I like or agree with, but it's there. Most translations render Matthew 3:2 as some version of "Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand." (RSV), the Douay has John saying "Do penance: for the kingdom of heaven is at hand." It renders the Latin correctly. Jerome said this and in his commentary on Matthew makes no note on this verse only to say that John has the privilege of being the Lord's forerunner. Although in Mark 1:15, he said poenitemini which is rather better and get's translated as "repent". See this article: other Latin writers favored the word resipiscite. The latter gets better into the Greek, which is μετανοέω, metanoeo. It means more like "change your mind" or "change your thinking".

Change your thinking: the Kingdom of God is here. What is there for us here? How can we find a way around Jerome's use of "penance"? Do we need to?

In the prayers for the Angelic Warfare Confraternity, the members are asked to pray "For our intellect, that it may be purged of all false beliefs and misunderstandings about human sexuality..." Also members are asked to pray for so many other aspects of our mind to change: our memory, our estimation, our affectivity, our imagination, for our will, and for our conscience. This is only around the area of sexual purity - so very important for us in our world today. Yet how many other parts of our life are, in fact, not so discreet, but rather are spread around our personalities, woven into to so many other parts of our life? My favourite of the 15 intentions in that list is that "no sadness, discouragement, fear, insecurity, or loneliness may afflict us unto sexual sin." How often are all those items factors in our other, non-sexual sins?

As I noted last week, a key aspect of Advent is our Hope. I find myself constantly praying that I may keep my hope set on God and that nothing of the world, the flesh, or the devil may distract me from that hope. That is the essential temptation, I think: to be distracted from the promises of God, to "turn away from higher, more difficult, and more honorable goods for the sake of sinful self-indulgence." I've recently realized that we can have, as it were, positive hopes, when something lures us, saying, "Place your hope here instead." Or we can have negative hopes (fears) of things in the world, the White House, or the next Pope's on a Plane press conference, that invite us to be fearful, or angry. We become negatively attached to hopelessness.

It's all in your mind. Indeed, "sadness, discouragement, fear, insecurity, or loneliness may afflict us unto" any sort of sin against the hope offered to us in Advent. And we need to move beyond that to get a new mind, then we must repent...

But if that's how wide the root system is, for sexual sin or for any other sin, how can we destroy it? We may not be able to, fully, in this life, but Jesus gives us a powerful image when he says (In Matthew 5:30) "if thy right hand scandalize thee, cut it off, and cast it from thee: for it is expedient for thee that one of thy members should perish, rather than that thy whole body be cast into hell."

Jesus says over and over throughout the Gospel that no cost is too high to get this new mind; and "cutting off your hand" even metaphorically, sounds to me a lot like doing penance. How many successful actions of "mental reform" are, in fact, strong-willed penances inflicted on the mind? This is why I'm weak in so many areas: because I cannot perform the simple penance of standing up and praying a decade of the Rosary or the 15 Aves of the Confraternity when I feel certain temptations. Penance is an act of hope: a sign that I can do better.

Getting a new mind - in fact, training a new mind by force if needed - is the process of Getting Saved.

In fact, our modern, merely psychological concept of "say you're sorry" may be the real error, the part that seriously out of step from the historic Christian tradition where saints, to become healed of their sins, ran into the desert and lived for years on roots, locusts and honey. What level of self abasement, of abandonment of political and social ideas of "justice", of stern and painful penance is needed for ripping through all the layers of defence in which we wrap ourselves to protect us from God?

Jesu, Jesu, Jesu, esto mihi Jesus!

Today's Readings:

• Isaiah 26:1-6
• Matthew 7:21, 24-27

In the Douay, RSV, and NABRE with other Mass propers.

Every one therefore that heareth these my words, and doth them, shall be likened to a wise man that built his house upon a rock, And the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and they beat upon that house, and it fell not, for it was founded on a rock.
Matthew 7:24-25

Today's saint truly built his house on the rock. And I have nothing to add to his story other than to repent my time on shifting sands and beg his prayers. I have copied this moving account of his life from the Universalis website. This link expires, however. Here is his Wiki entry.

Edmund Campion was born in London on January 25, 1540, received his early education at Christ’s Hospital, and, as the best of the London scholars, was chosen aged thirteen to make the complimentary speech when Queen Mary visited the city. He then attended St John’s College, Oxford, becoming a fellow in 1557 and taking the Oath of Supremacy on the occasion of his degree in 1564. Two years later he welcomed Queen Elizabeth to the university, and won her lasting regard. He was chosen amongst the scholars to lead a public debate in front of the queen. People were now talking of Campion in terms of being a future Archbishop of Canterbury, in the newly established Church of England. Although holding Catholic doctrines, reinforced by his reading of the early Fathers, he received deacon’s orders in the Anglican Church. Inwardly “he took a remorse of conscience and detestation of mind.” Eventually he went to Douai where he was reconciled to the Catholic Church and received the Eucharist that he had denied himself for the last twelve years. The college was a centre of intellectual excellence and Campion found himself reunited with many of his former Oxford friends. His studies completed he left for Rome, travelling on foot and alone in the guise of a poor pilgrim. He then entered a novitiate with the Jesuits, and spent some years in Vienna and Prague. 

In 1580, the Jesuit mission to England began. Campion entered England in the guise of a jewel merchant, and at once began to preach. His presence soon became known to the authorities, not least because of the challenge he made, known as the “Challenge to the Privy Council” to his allies and as “Campion’s Brag” to his enemies. As a result his position became increasingly difficult. He led a hunted life, preaching and ministering to Catholics in Berkshire, Oxfordshire, Northamptonshire, and Lancashire. On his way to Norfolk, he stopped at Lyford, near Wantage, where he celebrated Mass and preached both on July 14 and on the following day. Here after a long search he was found in hiding above the gateway. He was taken to London with his arms pinioned and bearing on his hat a paper with the inscription, “Campion, the Seditious Jesuit.” Committed to the Tower of London, he was questioned in the presence (it is said) of Elizabeth, who asked him if he acknowledged her to be the true Queen of England. He replied in the affirmative, and she offered him wealth and dignities, but on condition of rejecting his Catholic faith, which he refused to do.

He was kept a long time in prison, where he was twice racked, and every effort was made to shake his defiance. He took part in a number of public debates and reportedly conducted himself so easily and readily that he won the admiration of most of the audience. He was indicted at Westminster on a charge of having conspired, along with others, in Rome and Reims to ‘raise a sedition in the realm’ and dethrone the Queen. He was sentenced to death as a traitor. He answered: “In condemning us, you condemn all your own ancestors, all our ancient bishops and kings, all that was once the glory of England — the island of saints, and the most devoted child of the See of Peter.” After spending his last days in prayer he was led with two companions to Tyburn and hanged, drawn and quartered on December 1, 1581, aged 41.

St Edmund is commemorated with two others who died today, St Ralph Sherwin, and St Alexander Briant. All three were hung on the gallows at Tyburn today by Elizabeth. As he died, St Ralph uttered the line that is the title to this post, Jesu, Jesu, Jesu, esto mihi Jesus! "Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, be to me Jesus." That is "Savior" for that is what his name means.