Reflection, June 24, 2012AD

Happy B-day, Jack the Dipper

              As we commemorate St  John the Baptist this week, we are reminded of both the similarities and the differences between John and Jesus.

              However, the message of each was, clearly, very  different from each other. Therein lies a wealth of reflection on Jesus’ Gospel.

              The Gospels tell us that Jesus was an early follower of John’s and that Jesus even submitted to John’s baptism. (The irrefutable evidence of Jesus’ baptism embarrassed the Evangelists because John’s baptism was an expression of hope for the forgiveness of sins. Why would Jesus need to be baptized? However, the answer seems to lie in the solidarity of Jesus with the people of Israel who needed forgiveness as a nation.)

John preached about God’s judgment upon Israel and the injustices of the world and warned that soon God would act. His locale for preaching was on the other side of the Jordan, not in Israel proper. The idea was that after the individual confessed his or her sins, he or she would then wade through the river to be immersed in a symbolic re-crossing of the Jordan into the Promised Land, cleansed and renewed. The individual would then return home to await God’s action.

John offered the possibility of forgiveness, not the guarantee of it. If you reform your lives, you may be spared the wrath to come. Strangely, the ethics which John demanded was a radical change of attitude (metanoia  -- beyond the mind – not irrational, but non rational, follow your dream of what God really intends with me and my world!! ).

 The demands of John as far as one’s conduct were rather mild, viz., do your everyday work, don’t cheat, don’t bully anyone, but do so with the proper attitude. A God, angry with how people treated one another, was in control, not Rome and certainly, not you. God would act to restore the balance. One hoped to be on the winning side.

A Jewish collaborator of the Romans, Flavius Josephus, wrote two books, called The Jewish Wars and Jewish Antiquities in the latter part of the first century. He spoke of John’s arrest and murder by Herod. He attributes Herod’s persecution of John to John’s message which Herod saw as subversive to his own power as a client of the patron Rome. People apparently were listening to John and John’s message (with or without Salome and the Dance of the Seven Veils) was considered treasonous by Herod and his friends.

As a result, John had to be silenced. His message that an angry God was about to act was a threat to the powers that be. Gloom and doom was in the offing and the Chosen People has better repent.

Jesus heard all of this! However, his message was different, but subtly it was even more threatening and subversive to the status quo. Jesus said that God was about to act and the Kingdom of the God of Life was to be established. It was a Kingdom of forgiveness and of reconciliation. It was a Kingdom where there was freedom from violence, hunger, cruelty, injustice and inequality.

It was a New World Order, a new Consciousness, an Alternative Vision of Reality which was already present in the world in the ministry which Jesus was fulfilling. It was a New World Order, however, that obviously was still to come.

It was a Alternative view that was the Kingdom incarnate in Jesus. People were starting to listen to Jesus as he proclaimed the message that God was forgiving, not vengeful. God was a God who knows all very well, “To err is human; to forgive is divine”. All who heard the Gospel of Jesus and all who continue to hear his Gospel today hear what is called “the subversive memory of Jesus Christ.”

Both the gloom and doom message of John the Baptist and the Good News message of Jesus Christ saw God’s action about to occur in the world and in the minds of many. Things were about to change. John and Jesus had to go. John did; Jesus is still alive and quite well, thank you!!

John apparently heard about his former disciple who was preaching a similar but radically different message of God. John apparently did not become a follower of Jesus. The 4 Evangelists would have crowed about that.

Thank God that Jesus was right that God is merciful, forgiving and healing. Still, the challenge remains for us to subscribe to the “subversive memory of Jesus”, not of John. The subversive memory of Jesus was about an end to anger, grudges, hatreds, tribalism.  (Why did the System ever crucify Him?)  The Kingdom of the God of Life is here already (in the minds and hearts and actions of Jesus’ people in the world). It provides a process of value clarification which is clearer than anything that anyone in 2010 can offer (overtly or covertly).  It is a vision of a better future which can be implemented when people make decisions today in light of what Jesus would do to construct the New World Order today. Before you change the world, you have to change yourself and your world.

On July 1, annually, Pax Christi USA sponsors a 40 day prayer and penance period in preparation for the Commemoration of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Try to say the Prayer of St Francis five times a day during the 40 day period to intertwine your life with the realization that, as a Catholic, you are committed to a universal call to integrity (or holiness, as we heard in Vatican II) 

On the other hand, recently, talk show demagogues talked about “40 days of prayer to restore our world”. Who is the “our” about whom they speaks?  Call in and ask and then, you, too,  will be denounced.  Ask the birthday boy. Ask Jesus. Who speaks the truth?  062412AD jfq 

Reflection, June 17, 2012AD

Speaking for God is Part of Your Job

The Holy Spirit sent Pope John XXIII into our world in 1958 to unleash again the evolutionary process that had begun in the upper room on Pentecost morning, 30 AD.  In 1959, he called for Vatican Council II, which opened in October, 1962, fifty years ago.   We pray that our church heed the signs of the times and make the aggiornamento  (updating) necessary to thrive anew.

Another buzzword that came into vogue during the days of preparation for Vatican II was the French word, resourcement,  viz., going back to our apostolic roots in the sense of looking to the Apostolic Churches of the New Testament for an idea of what our Christian ancestors had in mind. How do we replicate what the first generations of Christians saw their mission in an authentic modern fashion, in accordance with the authentic Traditions of the Church?  (There were more than a few who said that the concept of resourcement might have been the most radical of the trends at Vatican II. (“Back to one’s roots” is the etymology of the word “radical”)) .

American nuns have re-read the Christian Scriptures and the Documents over and over again in the past 50 years.  So many Sisters became educated in theology and other studies as a result of the impetus of Vatican Council II. 

Sister Sandra Schneiders, a New York Catholic, recently published a book on the role of American Sisters as prophets in the Church, Prophets in Their Own Country: Women Religious Bearing Witness to the Gospel in a Troubled Church. One of her striking arguments is that American religious women in their resourcement have recovered the notion of Jesus the Prophet.  There are several examples in the Gospel (all four Gospels) that Jesus did not resist being addressed as “prophet”. Jesus was a layperson, not a priest, nor monk, nor religious lawyer, but a craftsman (the meaning of the word tektonos, which we might mistranslate as “carpenter”. 

One of the roles of a prophet is to speak the truth to the times in which they live.  They bring the future that God envisions into discussion about where the group is going and where God wants it to go. Frequently, not everyone is willing to listen.  

In addition, in his company there were several others with the 12 who traveled with Him up to Jerusalem. The cryptic reference in Luke 8. 1-3 speaks of the several women who accompanied Jesus up to Jerusalem. The itinerant prophet had an entourage (of women and men) who were with Him and who shared His Vision. 

The American sisters highlight a term from Vatican II, viz., the universal call to holiness. (Around here, recall that we suggest “integrity” as a synonym for holiness.) We are all called to be Catholic people of integrity, no matter what your or my particular calling within the Christian community is.

Pertinent to most Catholics is the Vatican II Decree on the Role of the Laity. It is a short document that can be downloaded from the Vatican website.  It reminds all Catholics that we are called to be “Christ’s Presence in space and time” in the everyday world in which we find ourselves.  Christ cannot be everywhere, so you were commissioned in baptism and confirmation to be His stand-in. You do that by behaving in with and through Him in your everyday world. You are Christ on the job, on the golf course and tennis course, in school, in conversations and actions.  One gift of the American sisters to the all of us is to take our own vocations seriously. Theirs is a prophetic statement to us to take our own role in the Body of Christ more seriously. What can I do, one little old cell in the Body of Christ do to change the world?  As Sen. Robert Kennedy said, one little action makes a difference. “Each time a person stands up for an ideal, or acts to improve the lot of others…that person sends forth a tiny ripple of hope, and crossing each other from a million different centers of energy and daring, those ripples build a current that can sweep down the mightiest walls of oppression and resistance.”

Vatican II was probably the first time the first time that the Church referred to what the vocation of 98% of the Church, viz., the apostolate of the laity.  (1% are clergy; 1% are vowed religious men and women; 98% are the bulk of the church.)

It names the reality for most Catholic people’s vocation.  In Confirmation, each adult Catholic is commissioned (sent) into his or her own life and activate the Christ Quantum within them in every existential situation of the 167 hours that we are not together as the Body of Christ on Sunday. You are sent to be Christ to your spouse, to be Christ to your children, to be Christ to your neighbors and co-workers. Christ lives in you; you live in Christ. Take that seriously at home or at work, because it is true!!  Become a Kingdom person; not a company person. Seek the common good, not the bottom line. It is the Kingdom of God that counts, not the Kingdom of Gold.   

Therefore, on Father’s Day, how incumbent and appropriate it is to hear the parables of the sower and the seeds. Fathers (and mothers) plant seeds in their minds and hearts of their children from infancy.  Psychologists speak now of “value radiation”, viz., kids learn their parents’ values system through osmosis.  Dads, remember that in the example that you set for your children.   If a child sees that it is (or is not) important to you, the child will catch your drift.

Thanx, Sr Sandra Schneider, for naming the reality not only for American sisters, but for the rest of us. We are all called to be prophets in a troubled world. We believe Jesus!! 061712AD jfq     

Reflection, June 10, 2012AD

  Listen to Sister Mary Rose!!

              One mantra that hopefully is well known here at St Patrick’s is Sister Mary Rose’s frequent, “God comes first”. During the summer months, we add-on,  “even on summer Sundays”.

              Ironically, at the beginning of each summer, we celebrate the Feast of Corpus Christi just at the time that so many vacation and are not around for our Sunday Masses.  We hope that no matter where our families are during the summer, that they remember that God comes first – even on summer Sundays, in Florida, California, in Europe.

Getting to Mass in other venues is necessary for several reasons. 1) We see how people in other places celebrate Mass in other milieux and cultures. 2) We still can connect with what our Catholistic sisters and brothers are doing there, even if the Mass is in another language. 3) People on vacation need to see people at home in their own environs make “God come first – even on summer Sundays”. 4) Those at home need to see you and your family on vacation put God first on a summer Sunday. 5) Your children need the value radiation that comes from you that it is important to remember that God comes first – even on summer Sundays, no matter where you are. God’s coming first on summer Sundays is win-win for all.

All of us are born once; all of us eat regular family meals. It is the same with Catholistic people.  We were all baptized once; we all need to eat regularly with our family at our Sunday Eucharist.

Our Eucharist on Sunday is what some call an Arcanum, something that has a meaning on more than one level. ( We Catholistic people have 7 particular arcana called the sacraments, “outward signs instituted by Christ to give grace” .

What happens at our Sunday gathering is that 1) our family gathers, 2) we share our family’s stories, 3) we share our family’s signature meal, 4) we get energized by one another’s company, stories and food for the week ahead. Yet, more than this basic dynamic is happening in what we do.

However, something deeper is going on if you think about it. We are reminded that we are part of a larger family that has been gathering at an appointed time on a particular day to thank God publically and to ask God’s Healing in the week ahead. We are reminded that we are doing what goes all the way to Jesus of Nazareth, Who gathered with anyone who cared to dine with Him in a meal that was counter-cultural in many ways. 

His frequent gatherings for meals broke religious taboos about with whom proper people might share a meal.  His gatherings also overstepped political boundaries as well.  When Jesus fed the 5,000 in John 6 (which Gospel we will hear this summer) then, the oppressive Roman occupiers had to wonder about 5000 people talking about taking Jesus to make Him king. (Remember the words, “Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jews”.) 

Jesus of Nazareth was Someone that both religious and political leaders had to keep an eye on.  People might get the wrong idea if they took Jesus too seriously.  The Establishment did not use the term then, but twentieth century Christians refer to the “subversive memory of Jesus”.

Mass is one of the few events where you are reminded to reconnect with the Transcendent God, the Fourth Dimension of our existence. We need to be reminded that in a culture where violence has been made a national idol, Jesus challenges us to live non-violent lives. We need to be reminded that we are to live the minimum of a Golden Rule life (Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.) We need to be reminded that the Mystery of the Left hand of God in which we experience the painful side of life is the path to Transformation proclaimed and experienced by Jesus of Nazareth in His cross and Resurrection.  (Recently, three area family men in the fifties died unexpectedly leaving behind wives and children. We all need to be ready for any exigency.) We need to be reminded that the system is unfair and that it is skewered against the vulnerable in our midst.  Jesus’ social-economic-political theory was enoughism, viz., that God wants everyone to have enough of the basics that are the birthright of every human person. (Something as simple as the bringing of food to the altar for the food pantries in the area is one way of saying that we are all connected. It is a time for us to question the System non-violently to make enoughism a reality for your children.)     

Sunday church attendance is counter-cultural.  Ever wonder how few people in the NYT column on Sunday about how people spend their Sundays, how few of them go to church?

Around town, many are away each weekend and attend Mass in other places as they remember Sister Mary Rose’s reminder.  Sadly, not everyone is out of town every weekend.  

St Paul, in his Letter to the Romans spoke of the worship that all Christians are to offer to God.  He said, “I appeal to you, brothers and sisters, to present your bodies (24-7-365!!) as a living sacrifice, which is your spiritual worship.  Do not be conformed to this age (the system) but be transformed by the renewal of your mind.”   

Look at Sunday Mass, here in Armonk or elsewhere, as a necessity to get connected with your family through space and time.  We – and our children – need to see others and others need to see you – and your children.  We reconnect with God in Christ Jesus as a group, to hear the Gospel again and again ( The words don’t change, but we do.), to be nourished in our community, in Word, in Sacrament and to be energized to live your life the next week as Jesus empowers you to do.  Jesus asks us to “Do this in memory of Him”.  Do we? Remind your children and your friends that God comes first – on summer Sundays. 061012AD jfq

Reflection, June 3, 2012AD

             A Catholistic Mystery

How do we describe the Mystery of God, One in Three? Catholistic people understand “mystery” as something that can be infinitely knowable in its infinite unknowability. Let’s be honest! All language about God is incomplete and insufficient. We cannot crack the Mystery, but we can reflect on it.  As Moses’ wife said in the epic movie, the Ten Commandments, “God is the One Who cannot be named.”

800 years ago, St Bonaventure said, “Everything is a thumbprint or a footprint of the Trinitarian God”.  Believers, now as ever, look at the beauty of creation, at dawn or at any time, to experience what is called “God’s primordial revelation.”  Each day and the wonders that it brings is God’s Present to us; hence, we call it “The Present.” (Don’t forget to say thanks to the Trinitarian God each morning for the Present.  It is only when you get older that you realize what a gift each day is.)

In the opening verse of the New Testament (1 Thess 1. 1-3) c. 50AD, St Paul mentioned the Father, Son and Spirit in one paragraph, not bothering to explain the terms because all the Thessalonians caught his drift. In the 1st century of the Jesus Movement, they walked by faith.

In the fifth century, St Patrick used the shamrock. St Augustine used the equilateral triangle. St Basil used the Circle Dance. They walked by faith.

In the Middle Ages, Meister Eckhardt said, “the Father loves the Son; the Son loves the Father; the Love is the Holy Spirit.” Again, “the Father gazes on the Son; the Son gazed on the Father; the Divine Gaze is the Holy Spirit. Again, “the Father dances with the Son; the Son dances with the Father; the Dance is the Holy Spirit. He walked by faith.

In our own time, American Catholic theologians speak of the “Father as the architect, the Son as the blueprint, the Spirit as the expressions of the blueprint in a variety of settings”.  Others speak of the “Father as a song composer, the Son as the song as the score, the Spirit as each rendition of the score.” Others yet speak of God the Father as the Sun, the Son as the sunbeam coming from the sun, the Holy Spirit is the suntan you get when the Sunbeam from the sun touches you. They walk by faith.

Probably not a coincidence, other religious systems see the number three as significant when dealing with the Mystery of Life.  In ancient Egypt, people worshipped Isis and Serapis and Horus. In Hindu traditions, the triad is Satay (the Creator), Chat (the Communication) and Ananda ( the Energy, Enthusiasm and Enjoyment of existence.  In the Buddhist traditions, they speak of the silence and the sound and the space between them.

The Christian doctrine of the Trinity speaks of the relationships of God. All three persons of the Trinity are equal; all three Persons of the Trinity are ultimately knowable in their unknowability; all three Persons of the Trinity are relational. The Eastern Church Fathers referred to the Mystery of Perichoresis, viz., the (Circle) Dancing of God.

For the last 10,000 years, sociologists suspect that binary thinking, dualistic thinking has dominated human thought based upon the Agricultural Revolution, c. 8000BC. Now what had been all of ours in a family, tribe or clan became mine and yours, vis a vis property to grow food. People speak of up and down, good and evil, yin and yang, light and darkness. We look at reality in terms of subject-object.  It works, but it doesn’t.  

Deep in human consciousness, there is ternary system, where elements in concert produce a fourth, dynamic element.  For example, for sea travel, one needs the water, the wind and the rudder of the vessel. All together, the three produce motion. To make a braid of hair, three strands of hair are the minimum number required.  A bench can have three legs.  A situation in dispute between two individuals can be thought of in terms of “my side, your side.” In a ternary system, the same situation can be viewed, “How one sees it, how the other sees it, what is really happening here.” There are three ways of analysis, not two. The ternary system can lead to an amicable, win-win scenario  (a fourth element) in which both sides compromise and see things differently than from a “my side, your side” perspective.   

It was Duns Scotus, the Franciscan theologian, in the thirteenth century who spoke of Incarnation of God as something not necessitated by original sin, but because of love.  He reasoned that if the Trinitarian Creator God is Love (as we hear in the New Testament), then, it would only be logical for the Creator to desire to be united with Creation in the closest way possible, the Incarnation of the Creator within the Creation. (The death and Resurrection of Jesus were to transform the effects of original sin.) As a result, an integrated cosmos or universe is created.

           All efforts to explain the Trinity are efforts made in good faith. They are examples of “faith seeking understanding” (fides quaerens intellectum). These are known as kataphatic theology (theology with words). Catholistic people speak of arcana, viz., words and actions that express something that words and actions cannot capture.             

            Ironically, St Paul and the first believers praised the Trinity without any formulae.  They followed the advice of the Psalmist who said, “Be still and know that I am God now.” This is known as apophatic theology (theology without words.) “Taste and see the goodness of the Lord.” As St Thomas Aquinas wrote, “Though the feeble senses fail, faith believes nor questions how.”

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