November 25, 2012AD

   Who is Our King, Really?

The Feast of Christ the King culminates our church year. To Americans, the title, Christ the King, is quaint and anachronistic. We don’t do kings here! We have gotten used to the idea when you say “king”, most Americans think of Elvis or villainous George III (who was not really that bad, according to David McCulloch’s 1776. We look down upon others in Europe who still have royalty. Really, again, who needs it?

Hopefully, Catholics know who our “king” is. We don’t accept the patriarchal notion of a powerful ruler over us; rather we see Jesus as the paradigm by which each of us is called to live by God.  Some refer to Christ Jesus as the archetype of creation, quoting the hymn of St Paul.  Jesus is what God wants all of us to be.

It is amazing that the basic Easter creed or proclamation, Jesus is Lord, Iesous Kyrios, which we pray or sing so frequently could legitimately — and correctly — by construed as a treasonous motto in the Roman Empire, where Caesar was the Kyrios. Nobody else could claim the title. 

The Gospels do not deny that Jesus was identified and savaged by His enemies because He was seen as someone who, they thought, claimed to be a king. After all, Jesus’ programmatic was The Kingdom of God is in your midst and Thy Kingdom come, spoke of kingly language. He was mocked by His oppressors with the words, “Hail King of the Jews.” He was “crowned with thorns.” The inscription over His head on the Cross was “Jesus of Nazareth, the King of the Jews, viz., INRI.” Jesus was executed on a capital charge by a system that tolerated no deviance working with religious apparatchik maintaining the status quo.

However, what type of King was Jesus? Perhaps, the best way to understand Him would be a the first citizen or model citizen or paradigm of how a Kingdom person would live. His was a life of integrity (w-holiness) because He had His relationships in order. He lives in His Spirit in each of us and empowers us to live in imitation of Him.

In the encounter between Jesus and Pilate in the Gospel today, the Fourth Evangelist deliberately used the Greek as an opportunity to pose a paradox, “Pilate sat Him (Jesus) or himself (Pilate) on the judgment bench.”  Who really was judging whom?  Pilate vs Jesus or Jesus vs Pilate?

The question at hand was the Truth.  Pilate asked “Truth. What does that mean?” Jesus had self-identified as “ The Way, the Truth, & the Life.”

How do our systems measure up to the question, “Truth. What does that mean?” Using the integrity of Jesus as a paradigm, how could we evaluate our recent month of November with the elections and the CIA scandal?

In 1789, George Washington had been approached by John Adams to assume the title “His American Majesty, the President of the United States and Protector of their Liberties.” (Don’t you love it?)  Washington said, “No thanx. Just call me Mr President.” He could have been reelected as many times as he wanted, but he felt that two terms were enough. He died in 1799.

In his Farewell Address, in 1796, President Washington, “Mr President,” warned of the dangers of political parties in our nation, especially parties based on geographical regions.  There was nothing in the Constitution of 1787 that called for political parties.  According to President Washington, political parties were a devolution!

After every presidential election, we hear the de rigeur call for a reform of the process of electing a president.  People are talking of seceding because they did not like the outcome of elections. Some object that their candidates didn’t win.  In a broken system, NY Republicans felt they were not heard and Texas Democrats felt that they were not heard. And, Florida? (What can we say about Florida?) Our society that could become more democratic with an electoral college if each state legislature pledged before the election to cast its votes for the winningest candidate (either “winner take all” or proportionately). Indeed, third and fourth parties could legitimately offer greater political choices.  But do the two major parties want to be more representative?

Indeed, another military leader turned politician offered caveats on at least two occasions about how the nation as going.  President Eisenhower, another “Mr President”,  said in 1948, “A danger arises from too great a concentration of power in the hands of any individual or group. The power of concentrated finance, the power of selfish interest groups, the power of selfish interest groups organized in opposition to the whole, ant one of these, when allowed to dominate, is fully capable of destroying individual freedom. (1948, three years after of World War II?)

In his Farewell Address in 1961, patterned after Washington’s in 1796, Eisenhower said on January 17, 1961, “There is a military-industrial complex running this nation. I should know because they ran me.”

In these days in which we talk about presidential reform and we hear about the System’s judging Jesus or Jesus’ judging the system, we might ask ourselves about whether or not we participate in a broken system that needs reform fast.

Truth. What does that mean?  Jesus’ kingdom is not of this world. Thank God for that.  How would Truth incarnate critique our system, which so many speak of a broken system, which can be changed, but probably won’t be. And are we Catholic Americans or are we American Catholics?  Who really influences our opinions the most? Who is our “King”, our Paradigm, our Template?   Think about it.  112512AD jfq       

November 18, 2012AD

           Everyone’s Portion

           Karl Rahner wrote that there was no difference between the sacred and the secular. Rather he spoke of the profound and the superficial. Everything belongs. If you live superficially, you miss the Holy Presence in your life each moment.

           We are what is called now “transpersonal” by nature. We find our identity and role in our living transpersonally with everyone and everything else. Interestingly, people are seen even by SBNR as physical, psychological, spiritual and ecological in make up. Each is dependent relationships to understand who and what we are. Whatever or Whoever is responsible for reality is called now the Holy Spirit-Mystery, which is present in everything and yet distinct from everything  

Psalm 16 is our responsorial psalm today.  It comes up frequently in the course of our liturgical readings yearly.

O Lord, my allotted portion and my cup, you it is who holds fast my lot. It is the prayer that formerly, young men who were candidates from the presbyteral ministry said these words in a ceremony known as tonsure, where the candidates hair would be snipped in five places in the form of a cross. It is a prayer  that all of us Catholics and all human persons and, indeed, all creation have to say. God holds fast the security of each of us and everything.

It was an attitude of the anavim YHWH, those men and women who knew ultimately that all reality is in God’s Hands. And they were willing to live their lives in that reality.

Since our God is relational, (we speak of the Holy Trinity), it stands to reason that we would be relational.  We are connected to everyone and everything else. It is God’s way of dealing with creation.  

However, dating back to Greek philosopher, Aristotle, we in the West were programmed to see a duality with the world and nature. Humans were different because we were rational creatures that were able to differentiate ourselves from all else.  In our Christian tradition, we hear the proclamation of human superiority on the opening pages of the Book of Genesis. “Humans alone are created in the image and likeness of God. Male and female, God created them”.  Different, yes, but very much a part of creation.  In our own time, we hear the concept of “one dimensional man” (sic). We are seen by many as functionaries who can perform effectively and productively, who can operate machines and manage structures and institutions beginning with the nuclear family and culminating in processes we establish, viz., the economy, the culture, the structures of government, national and international. Most don’t realize it yet, but the power and sway of trans-national corporations which might trump even governments, still are controlled by someone. If we take all of this too seriously, and we frequently do, we might experience what is called counter-codependency, the attitude that I don’t need anyone else. God, who needs God? Others, who needs others? I(we) can take care of ourselves. Sound familiar?

Psalm 16 is an expression that contradicts that “rugged individualism” spawned by Aristotle, misinterpreted by too many with the Genesis Creation Myth. The Holy Spirit-Mystery Which energizes  all reality has plans for each of us and all of us, plans that are life-giving and unifying. God has a plan for you! 

The widow in our Gospel last Sunday was an example at one end of the spectrum where she was willing to make a total act of faith in God through the offering of the two lepta. The Christian Scriptures does not make such a radical act of faith mandatory for all of us.  What Jesus asks us often is to trust that God is in charge of every vicissitude, good or not so good, that comes our way.  As one elderly Catholic emigrant said when he was nearing the end of his life, “God got me this far. God won’t let me down now.” One could see anavim YHWH in his graced words.

Please God, each of us accept the grace of seeing God as the center of my reality. We learn that we are innately relational by God’s Design. We are defined by our capacity to relate. O God, my allotted portion and my cup, you it is who fast my lot.   

St Peter uses Psalm 16 to describe the destiny of Jesus after his death.  The same confidence is encouraged in the minds and hearts of all the cells of Jesus’ Body. His DNA is in us. His destiny is our destiny. Let us give thanx for the gifts of life and faith in Christ Jesus as we given thanx with our family this Thursday.  Everything is connected. Jesus and St Paul have been telling us that now for two thousand years.  111812AD jfq    

    

November 11, 2012AD

It’s Lepta, not Lepton, but Close     

Many recall when we were in school, that we heard that the atom (viz., that which cannot be split) actually could be split.  There were protons and neutrons inside the nucleus and electrons spun around the nucleus. Now we know that even smaller, unimaginable particles exist. Who knows what they are, but we hear terms like quarks, leptons, the Higgs Boson, from last summer? 

One most famous vignette in Jesus’ life is our Gospel today. The depth of this story is so obvious, even after twenty centuries.                                                    St Mark juxtaposed two incidents today when he speaks of the widow in close proximity to the religious functionaries.  Jesus berates those who thrive on the offerings of widows; Jesus salutes the widow’s act of faith.  Jesus’ assessment of functionaries is a challenge to  religious leaders, Catholic, Protestant and Jewish, Islamic .                                                                                         

The actions that Jesus highlighted were their parading around in long robes, their taking the best seats at functions and their devouring the houses of widows.  Jesus has taken the gloves off on this one.  As an outsider, He challenges the religious institution on its own turf, viz., the temple. (However, recent biblical criticism stresses the fact that, by and large, most of the various strains of pluralistic Judaism at the time of Jesus might have been painted with broad strokes that were not totally fair. Remember the friendly teacher of the Law with whom Jesus struck up a rapport in last week’s Gospel?) Institutional religion, like adult life, has two phases, viz., 1) establishing boundaries by which people can a place of self-reference within a blessed tradition and 2) assisting mature people to make leaps of faith into the Holy Mystery (That Catholics call God) as we bear the burdens of life.                                                                                               

First of all, there is a debate over whether the story of the widow’s mite is an actual event in the last week of Jesus’ life or a parable that Jesus told the last week of His life in the Temple. If it were, indeed, an actual event, Jesus was making an observation that was quite obvious.  The worshipers at the Temple, indeed, contributed to its upkeep by their donations.  However, the insight of Jesus challenges much, then as well as now, about conventional religious wisdom.  As a matter of fact, the generosity of the affluent comes out of their affluence and as a result, in terms of finances, the widow’s two lepta, amounting to a quarter of one cent is literally “a drop in the bucket.” The modern term in science today “lepton” is based on the name, in the singular, of this tiny, insignificant coin.  However, there are those who see the story of the widow’s mite as a parable that Jesus told in the temple. (Even in non-Jewish Jewish folklore, there were stories of a similar drift.  The almsgiving of the poor are more valuable, qualitatively, then the almsgiving of the affluent. )                             

In a radical (basic) way, the widow’s action denotes 3 characteristics of disciples. 1) She had received the gift of poverty in spirit. She knew that, ultimately, everything was based on God’s Presence in our lives.  (How about us?)  One may not see it as such, but that was the bottom line, if we are  honest with ourselves.  2) She viewed her life as a totality ultimately under God’s Sovereign Sway. (How about us?)  3) Her offering was an act of faith that though she had nothing, she believed that God would provide.(How about us?)                                                                

The widow demonstrates poverty in spirit, viz., what Jesus spoke about on All Saints Day  in the First Beatitude.  “Blessed is that person who acknowledges, when all is said and done, with God’s Help, that God is the Centre of that person’s life because that person is moving in the right direction.” She believed that  everything is based on God’s Presence in our lives.                                                                           

750 years ago, St Thomas Aquinas spoke of the principle of causality.  God ultimately is the First Cause of all things. God is the Reason why all things exist.  However, God, the First Cause, works frequently (if not usually) through secondary causes. Our world does not see God’s Hand at work in the vicissitudes of life; Hurricane Sandy is just one cataclysmic example. Somehow, the widow intuited this in faith. The widow would be one of the Anavim YHWH (the Poor Ones of YHWH); she felt that God would provide for her.  

                          However, when St Mark wrote His Gospel, c.70AD, the temple that the widow was supporting had recently been destroyed by the marauding Roman army.  In effect, St Mark knew what Jesus might have intuited.  A few days later that week, on Good Friday, St Mark tells us that the veil in the temple was torn in two from top to bottom.  God was with God’s People, including the widow, in a new way. Whatever happened, the fact that the story has been preserved means that God vindicated the widow and all who acknowledge God, with God’s Help, as the Centre of their lives.  She and they move in the right direction.  How about us?   111112AD jfq     

Sunday, November 4, 2012AD

           A Meeting of Minds!!!!     

           As we conclude our triennial recitation of St Mark’s Gospel on Sundays this year, Jesus meets a Jewish official in Jerusalem with whom He has a rapport.  The two agree that love of neighbor is concomitant with the love of God.  “You can’t have one without the other.”   Usually, Himself sees things differently than the system. However, in this case, Jesus agrees with the system man.

It is important to remember the Jesus was a Jewish layman. He did not go to “rabbi school” which raised the hackles of some (though, not all, as we hear today) of religious officialdom.  He went to synagogue weekly.  He was a Lector in His local synagogue so that He did the occasional biblical readings.  This fact indicates that Jesus could read.  It probably also indicates that Joseph and Mary were a little more well-off financially than most back then, because estimates are that 95% of the people were illiterate.

Jesus and the amenable scribe agree on the integration of ethical monotheism, viz., ‘if there is, indeed, one God, all folks are God’s children.  We show our love for God our Father by our kindness, compassion and efforts to forgive God’s other children, with God’s Help.”  After all, they are our sisters and brothers.  How much we have to learn; how much governments have to learn? 

As we near Election Day this Tuesday, all disciples of Jesus are urged to view issues from the perspective of Jesus, ethical monotheism. With God’s Help, we do what we have to do.  We recall Jesus’ teaching today as well as His inaugural address recorded in Luke 4 (which Gospel we will hear early in 2013AD), “The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me because He has anointed Me to bring Good news (Gospel) to the poor.” 

As one American theologian said recently, “Any news that was not good news to the poor simply was not the Gospel of Jesus Christ.” All the issues about which we are concerned involve ethical monotheism and good news to the poor in one way or another.  As Cardinal Dolan recently said to both major presidential candidates in October, we must always be mindful of the UNS , viz., the unwanted, the unborn, the uneducated, the unwell, the unemployed, the uninsured, the undocumented, the unwelcome. In addition, we need to weigh the implications of these moral issues on future generations (Think of your children’s grandchildren.)

Three new terms have developed in American Catholic thought which sum up today’s friendly encounter between  a religious insider (the scribe) and a religious outsider (Jesus).  The Gospel calls us to live (kindom (sic) ethics), viz., how we act has ramifications for all our kin (our human family, now and in the future).  The Gospel calls us to live a life of xenophilia (solidarity with those whom we quickly label as other or alien).  The Gospel calls us to live with compassionate empathy, what is good for all, not just some).

An ancient way in which our Christian ancestors saw the connection in the great commandment was known as “The Circle of Dorotheus.” Imagine your life as a circle in which God the focal point and you and your neighbor are around the circumference.  The close you move to the focal point of the circle, the closer you move the other radii of the circle. Closer to God, closer to neighbor; closer to neighbor, closer to God. As quantum physicists and/or quantum theologians stress, “everything is inter-related.” What’s your problem? Maybe, some have to rethink what we mean by God and/our neighbor? 

Before he died in 1984, Karl Rahner, SJ, probably the most prominent Catholic theologian in the twentieth century said, “The question of the integration of God's love, and our love of God and our love of neighbor is superfluous. As a primal occurrence, radical (basic) love of neighbor always attains and must attain God. But obviously the reverse is true. I must love God who loves both me and my neighbor. With respect to the specific fulfillment of the great commandment of love of God and love of neighbor, we have seen a mutual conditioning of both elements. Then, I must also say that, at least theoretically, that God’s love is more important than love of neighbor, because love of God for me is the starting point for my loving God and neighbor as God has loved my neighbor and me both! I must love what God loves”... no exceptions.

Is it the bottom line or the common good that counts? Jesus would say that the bottom line is the common good and the common good is the bottom line.

Where are we in all this?  Where will the children be?  110412AD  jfq