July 5, 2015AD

What Do Prophets Do?

With so much of the English language, we throw terms back and forth at one another. We presume that everyone agrees on what the words mean! Clear examples are words like "nice", and " interesting". Each word means different things to different people. There are more serious words. The presumption is that everyone knows and agrees on what something means. Not so! One of the clearest examples is GOD. Meister Eckhardt said, 750  years ago, the word “GOD” is idolatrous because we think we know the meaning of the word and so, know who GOD is.!

In our readings this weekend, the word that is bantered about, but needs clarification is the word "prophet". The Hebrew word for prophet is Nabi. What the biblical term means probably are not what conventional wisdom and usage mean when we use the term. Today, in English, the word prophet has morphed to a synonym for a seer of the future, one who predicts what is yet to be. The Jesus Movement begs to differ!

The Hebrew concept of Nabi is based etymologically on the image of someone standing on a mountain and describing what he or she sees, viz., an overseer and overlooker. He is not looking at the same reality as people see it from ground level. However, the presumption is that the Nabi is speaking what YHWH sees when GOD, the Silent Witness, looks on a situation from a different vantage point. On the one hand, Ezekiel speaks today that the people will know that a Nabi has appeared among them. On the other hand, Jesus says that no Nabi is without honor except in his native place among his own people.

People are already describing Pope Francis as a “prophetic pope”. He names reality clearly from a different point of view. The Jesus Movement (at least, a sizable number thereof) believes it is the viewpoint of the Father of Christ Jesus.

His one liners have become classics in two years’ time. His statement when he became pope, Evangelii Gaudium, the Gospel of Joy, was used in some parishes as a real introduction into the mind and heart or our Argentine shepherd.

If there were no other encyclical that Pope Francis publishes, Laudato Si, will certainly be seen as a watershed statement about Catholics' responsibility for the moral question of the environment. Everyone should read the encyclical. It is 80 pages long, easy to understand and logical, no matter what TV spinmeisters say to play it down, even in a fair and balanced presentation.

The evolution of the socio-economic teaching of the Catholic Church began with Pope Leo XIII and his 1891 encyclical Rerum Novarum, a statement about the abuses of the industrialization impetus in Europe and North America in the late nineteenth century. Rerum Novarum addresses in 14 pages the new situation in an industrialized system. He spoke of such things as the rights of labor to organize, the right to a decent wage, as well as the right of private property. Many reacted at the time with the question, "Why is the Pope speaking about things that are not his concern?" (Sound familiar?)

In the introduction to Laudato Si, Pope Francis mentions earlier, modern successors of St Peter, since the days of Pope Leo. Among those whom Pope Francis quotes on the transformation of the Catholic Church's socio-economic teaching, he mentions Pope John XXIII with his great letter after Cuban Missile Crisis, Pacem in Terris, Pope Paul VI with his great letter, Populorum Progressio,  Pope John Paul II with several quotes from encyclicals  such as Laborem Exercens (1981), Solicitudo Rei Socialis, (1989) and Centisimus Annus, his great encyclical in 1991 on the 100^th anniversary of Rerum Novarum, Pope Benedict who proposed  in his encyclical Deus Caritas Est "eliminating the structural causes of the dysfunctions of the   economy and  reacting to models of growth which have proved incapable of ensuring respect for the environment. The book of nature is one and includes the environment, life, sexuality, the family, social relations and so forth. It follows that the deterioration of nature is closely connected to the culture which shapes human coexistence”.

Critics challenged Pope John XXIII ( remember the statement “Mater Si, Magistra No”, by a very prominent USA Catholic).They also challenged and accused Pope Paul, Pope John Paul and Pope Benedict of naïveté that made the Popes incapable of commenting on the state of the world. Note the arrogance.

It will be very interesting when Pope Francis visits us in September. His speeches at the Capitol to Congress (Will the lobbies and PAC’s be listening?) and at the United Nations, here in NYC, will certainly have some telling statement to make.

In short, the encyclical Laudato Si, at first read, calls for serious efforts to make the world equitable for all, economically fair to all, ethically sound for all, environmentally safe for all, and efficient for the good of all the sisters and brothers in God's family. Any takers?

The question is whether or not, Pope Francis is a prophet. Will the reaction be to that of Ezekiel, there is a prophet in their midst or the reaction that Jesus received, no prophet is without honor except in his native place and among his own people.

Please download or get a copy of the new papal encyclical. Read it. You'll get it. He is a brilliant writer. Think about encouraging your parishes and networks to organize discussion groups on all age levels to discuss a multigenerational, global issue. It is not enough to teach kids not to waste food. We all need a refresher on that one and many other basic realities that we tend to take for granted. 070515AD jfq

September 13, 2015AD

The Water, the Poor, the Plastic

Expect only Pope Francis to link up the realities of bottled water, the poor and the environmental pollution of plastics now and in the years ahead. In the encyclical, Laudato si, actually, Pope Francis continues to break down the dichotomy between Jesus’ gospel and the rest of human life.

Jesus wasn't crucified for telling everyone to be nice to each other and maybe, they might get to heaven. Jesus' campaign slogan is “the commonwealth (kingdom) of God is coming, and yet, paradoxically, the commonwealth (kingdom) is already among us. The paradox of Jesus’ statements continue to confuse many folks when He talks about an alternative view or interpretation of reality (as opposed to the System back then, the Roman Empire). The Commonwealth is yet to come, but it is already in your heart when you accept the alternative worldview, promoted by the Holy Spirit.

(Interestingly, many years ago, Jamaican singer, Bob Marley, sang a song about alternative visions of reality. He was singing of slaves in old British Empire. The idea that he expressed was basically, the moment you realize that the system is not what GOD intends is the beginning of your transformation as a human person.)

Everything is connected to everything else as scientists tell us today. Some East Asian religions speak of existence as “being with”. Africans have a term Ubuntu, which means, “I am because we are”. Catholic scientists and Catholic theologians speak of “inter-relatedness.”

That is what St James is alluding to in the excerpt from his encyclical that is our second reading today. Today's reading contains the famous quote, “what good is it to say, be warm and well fed if the person is cold and hungry. The point is what are we to do about the situation?

The crisis in Europe over the exile of folks from the Near East is a case in point. (Here, in this country, there is a parallel situation with exiles from Central America. Some want to build walls to keep them out!) Some European governments are trying to be humanitarian in the quota system of admitting exiles. Politicians and “fair and balanced talking heads on TV” might learn something from what some leaders are trying to do in Europe!

Since the publication of his encyclical on Pentecost Sunday, Pope Francis has even urged each European parish to adopt an exile family. Even the Vatican Palace is to be home to exile family. Imagine if American parishes were challenged to do the same with exiles here!

In the papal encyclical, he speaks of “Justice between the generations”. The question of potable water and the poor and plastic pollution concerns not only today's generation, but the generations to whom we pass on the inheritance passed on to us. (NY’s Iroquois Indian Confederacy maintained a practice in which any changes in lifestyle among them had to consider the implications of such a move on the seventh generation yet to come.    This apparently was their custom hundreds of years ago. Would we know where to begin such a thing ourselves?

Quoting Vatican II, the Pope writes, “Human ecology is inseparable from the notion of the common good, not the bottom line, a central and unifying principle of social ethics. The  sum of those conditions of social life which allow social groups and their individual members relatively thorough and ready access to their own fulfillment".

We need to realize that the nation state is a dinosaur, viz., too big to handle local problems and too small to handle global problems. Some people speak of "apocalypse soon". The Dalai Lama names the following threats: terrorism, nuclear weapons, unchecked and uncontrolled globalization, the air and water and environmental pollution.

Much of Western society is infected with the N-syndrome, viz., pathologies that begin with letter "n”. Some symptoms include a numbness to what is happening in other parts of the world. Another is noise, so many are threatened by quiet time. (Blaise Pascal said, “There would be peace in the world if people could sit still for thirty minutes each day. ) Another is the nonstop nature of life. (This challenges the Puritan adage, An idle mind is the devil’s workshop. The reverse might be true today!) Pope Francis calls it rapidication. Fifty years ago, Alvin Toffler called it Future Shock. (Toffler said that the rate of change was accelerating so quickly that eventually, people and institutions could implode because they couldn’t cope with rapidity of change!) Another is a nervousness about how fast time is going by. Finally, another is narcissism. (Remember looking out for número uno. Has it gone away?) As one local theologian put it, “the takers have to learn to become givers as well.”

In his encyclical, St James tells his readers that it is not enough to say stay warm and well fed. (Read it, by the way, because it will take you fifteen minutes and you will catch his drift quickly).  In his encyclical, Pope Francis says basically the same thing. The only difference is the stakes are higher in the twenty-first century than in the first century. We need some new, selfless ideas from floundering nation-states and from trans-national organizations.

When will we learn to apply the seventh generation process in our culture? One seriously wonders if the system ever gets the message.

Imagine a world in which students would study critically the connections between this generation and those yet to come. What changes in lifestyle would they advocate? As we await such a day, with GOD’s Help, let us behave as if the water, the poor and the plastic are inter-related. 21^st century scientists, the Iroquois Indians, Pope Francis and Jesus tell us that they are very connected, indeed.             091315AD jfq

September 6, 2015AD

Sit Wherever You Want!!

During this month, our second reading on Sunday will be excerpts from the Letter of St James.  As mentioned last week, this letter has come into the fore recently for many reasons.  Probably dated in the early 60’s AD, before the earliest Gospel (St Mark, c.70AD) was written, the inspired author gives us a picture of a Jewish-based Jesus Movement which probably considered itself a “Catholistic(?) synagogue”.

While the group was an early community gathering of the Jesus Movement, the group had lots of flaws about which the inspired author was concerned. Some still have relevance in the Jesus Movement today. The problem addressed in our reading this morning was favoritism in gatherings of the Jesus Movement synagogue.  Surprised we are to hear this at such an early date. Recall St Paul’s baptismal hymn, “in Christ there is no Jew or Gentile, slaves or free, male or female.  All are one in Christ Jesus.” How could a Christian group misread the obvious so soon?  (St Paul’s hymn is dated approximately 8-9 years earlier, in c. 55AD)  After all, Jesus fed everyone who gathered for his outdoor gatherings and did not discriminate between classes. (That was, indeed, one of the problems that people had with Jesus’ strategy.)  God cares about all God’s children.

Who are we, contemporary Christians, to look askance at our Christian ancestors? In many ways, people have said that we might do the same thing in many ways, some subtle, some, not so subtle. A commentator said that, up until recently, some Churches discriminated between various ethnic groups (it was what most groups desired at the time!) , but also between Black and White folks, so that slave and free (in St Paul’s baptismal hymn, no Jew or Greek, no slave or free, no male or female, could have been understood as Black and White. Some hint we still do discriminate through zipcodes.

St James stresses, “Show no partiality!” Yet, again and again, Christians have been challenged that that is exactly what we do in so many ways, many of which we do subconsciously. 

Indeed, in his historic “Sermon on the Mound” at Yankee Stadium in Oct, 1979, Pope John Paul said, “in our world today the rich represent countries (the First and Second Worlds then, now the Northern Hemisphere nations) and the poor represent the Third World (the underdeveloped nations throughout the world).”

(Interestingly, the American bishops wrote in 1986 that there was a third world developing in our midst in the inner cities of the USA.) God loves all, but God has a special concern for those less fortunate than others.  So should God’s daughters and sons! (These days, we call the traditional notion, the Preferential Option for the Poor. Some push it further into the superlative, the Preferential Option for the Poorest, because it makes it less of a slogan.)

           In the world-system in which we live in, frequently, some claim the poor have to blame themselves for the poverty of their lives.  Does blaming people for their own poverty obviate the need to help the poor in our midst? Does private philanthropy suffice to tend to systemic problems?  Does abandonment of the needy in our midst, for whatever reason, betray our heritage as a people? Jesus knows.

However, we heard last week in our reading from James, true religion is keeping oneself pure from the world (system, as it is) and to be mindful of widows and orphans.  (The traditional biblical triad of the poor was the widows, the orphans and the aliens (imagine that these days!!!!) Who are these people today?)  Recently, Cardinal Dolan said it was the Catholic thing “to love the un’s, viz., the unwanted, unborn, uneducated, unwell, unemployed, uninsured, undocumented and unwelcome.”

Recently, Pope Benedict (who resigned to pave the way for the election of Pope Francis) continued this line of thinking as he wrote in his third encyclical, Caritas in Veritate, that we need to understand the connection between so many issues that confront us. Pope Benedict said that “rather than think of the human person as a monad, we should self-define as relational (with God, with one another, with our environment.  We are to be understood neither as the economic ones, nor the sociological ones, nor the psychological ones, nor the political ones. Rather, we should understand that we are relational ones.  All of us connected with everyone and everything else, including our environment.  This is the way we should face common problems.”  (Talk about Catholic quantum theology!!) Jesus has been proclaiming that in essence for 2000 years already.  However, as St John XXIII put it, “we know more now!”

In essence, the biblical prophets, including Jesus, answered Cain’s question with “Yes, we are our brother’s and sister’s keepers, whether we care to admit it or not.” James’ language emphasizes that autonomy is an illusion. We are all dependent upon God. Life is not about individualism, but solidarity, about the common good, not the bottom line.   Deal with it!         090912ADjfq

September 20, 2015AD

Jesus, James, the Mahatma and Francis

Many have said it before but, it was Mohandas Gandhi who said that the only religion that does not see that Christianity is a non-violent religion is Christianity itself. Gandhi and his method of non-violent resistance became one of the motivators of Dr. Martin Luther King. Gandhi was very drawn to Christ Jesus and, in particular, the Sermon on the Mount. Still, he never was baptized when he said that most Christians did not take our baptisms seriously. So, why should he?

St James, in his encyclical,  speaks in our second reading today about the loss of connection between the Message of Jesus and the patterns of everyday life for the Jesus Movement. What of the Message is lost “when there are jealousy and strife, there also are inconstancy and all kinds of vile behavior”.

Obviously, some of the Jewish-Christian synagogue of the Jesus Movement addressed by St James already missed the point. Their attitudes needed to be adjusted. Also, that the encyclical letter of St James has been included in the Christian Bible indicates that people listened to it.

On the one hand, 2000 years separate us from the physical Presence of Jesus in Palestine. On the other hand, when one considers the amount of years that our human ancestors have inhabited the earth, successfully, too, 2000 years are a drop in the bucket.

What happened? Many would say that the Emperor Constantine, in the fourth century, highjacked the non-violent Gospel of Jesus, as the Emperor began the process that made Christianity the state religion by 395AD. As more and more the Christian religion was tempered by its collusion with the Systemic view of reality, so much of Jesus's Words were explained away by "it was different back then. We are a Christian people. God is on own side!" Sound familiar?

California biblical theologian, Fr John McKenzie, famously wrote a half a century ago, "For the first four centuries, Christ was locked in mortal combat with Caesar. In the fourth century, Caesar won!"

Since the fourth century, Christianity has become the civil religion. If you were a good Roman, you were a good Christian. If you were a good Christian, you were a good Roman! It is not for nothing that terms like Christendom and caesaropapism were coined in that world.

However, in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, we entered what honestly is called the “Post-Christian era”. Now you could be whatever you wanted, anything! Previously, people could not imagine terms like the SBNR (spiritual, but not religious), nor Nones, (no religion), or TMD ( Therapeutic Moralistic Deists, viz., there is a God or something who wants you to be happy and nice!)). We are on a different playing field now.

In this post Christian Era, the Jesus Movement has lost much more of our Oomph! Perhaps, Gandhi might have had it right when he said that Christians don't take the message seriously.

But was it our fault? The System from the beginning brainwashed good people into Pavlovian stances. (Someone commented that at the start of WWI, French mothers were sewing Miraculous Medals into their son's uniform, while German mothers were sewing crosses in their son's uniforms. Czar Nicholas II had the Patriarch of Moscow bless the Russian army after WWI began.)

The “right wing dominated media, part of the System” stresses tribalistic thought into the minds of good people. Recall expressions like the “Evil Axis and manifest destiny and Zion on the Hill and American exceptionalism” that we still hear as givens. Recall in 2003, when a majority of US Catholics polled said that they trusted Donald Rumfeld on Iraq that they trusted Pope John Paul II. To whom were they listening?

We live more than ever in a world of uncertainty, messiness, ambiguity.

Hopefully, as the Jesus Movement experiences a new Gestalt in the 21st century, the voice of people like the inspired St James, which we hear at the “weekly attitude adjustment hour”, that we call Mass, will clarify for us that whatever GOD intends for us, we are not living in it yet! Still, Jesus says the commonwealth of God is coming, and paradoxically, if you believe Jesus, it is already in our midst. We need more examples of people who take the Gospel of Jesus more seriously, even if they hold a minority viewpoint.  

Gandhi's remark about how so many Christians miss the point on so much of what the Gospel addresses is both stinging and poignant. How do we respond as followers of Christ Jesus in the twenty-first century?

Theologians make a distinction speak of conventional (nice) wisdom and alternative (challenging) wisdom that sometimes, we don't like to hear because we find it rocks my boat and challenges our givens.

Interestingly, this week, we welcome Pope Francis to our midst as he prepares to speak to the General Assembly of the UN on Friday. In such a clear way, Pope Francis represents what Jesus is talking about today, whoever wishes to rank first must remain the last one of all and the servant of all. He clearly has gotten other parts of the Gospel correctly. In so many ways in the week ahead, himself will try to get us back to basics. With so much racism, violence and greed just barely below the surface on the contemporary scene, it will be refreshing to hear the Gospel again, maybe for the first time. To whom do we pay attention? 092015AD jfq 

September 27, 2015AD

A Whirlwind Weekend

What a great weekend we have celebrated here. No doubt that the publication of his encyclical Laudato si is a big item on his agenda. In Washington on Thursday, he brought down the Congress with his “no holds barred” speech, in which he alluded to so many of his most important topics, viz., immigration, poverty, extremism in religion, the environment are four of his hot button items. As people see now, everything is connected, all as a quantum seamless garment.

In the beginning of the encyclical which he invites all of us to read, Pope Francis places us in the context of the growing development of Catholic social and economic thought. Now he is adding officially the environmental component to the mix.

He alludes to his predecessors, St John XXIII, Pope Paul VI, Pope John Paul II, and Pope Benedict and their encyclicals on these socio-economic-political-cultural teachings. In addition, back in the days after Vatican II, when the national conferences of bishops were taken seriously by the Vatican, the USA Catholic bishops had published several statements on the role of the Gospel in the analysis of such policies.  One was, in 1986, when they published Economic Justice for All, which barely got any coverage from the right wing dominated media. In Laudato Si, Pope Francis quoted several key ideas from United States bishops. He obviously took seriously what he read.

Every year, around now, Manhattan is again seen as the “Island at the Center of the World” with the General Assembly gathering right now. Angela Merkle is here this weekend and Vladimir Putin will be in NYC next week, as is Michael O’Higgins, the President of Ireland. Now for the fifth time, a Pope has come to speak in our midst. New Yorkers are thrilled and excited that he is here.

In his words to Congress, Pope Francis startled and delighted many when he spoke of two glories of New York Catholicism, viz., Dorothy Day and Thomas Merton.  He stressed Dorothy Day’s social activism, “her passion for justice and for the cause of the oppressed, that were inspired by the Gospel, her faith and the example of the saints.” With Dorothy Day in mind, he then cites a line from his encyclical, about the implementation of a “culture of care , an integrated approach to combatting poverty, restoring dignity to the oppressed, restoring dignity to restore dignity to the excluded (called the Un’s by Cardinal Dolan, aside) and at the same time, protecting nature.” Obviously, he was encouraging Congress (and all of us) to get on board.

He then quotes Thomas Merton, “In the image of God, I was nevertheless the prisoner of my own violence and my own selfishness, in the image of the world into which I was born. That would was a picture of Hell, full of men like myself, loving God and yet hating God; born to love God, living instead in fear of hopeless self-contradictory hungers.” Pope Francis calls Thomas Merton “a man of dialogue, a promoter of peace between people and religions.” He implies that we should be as well, with God’s Help.  

With regard to the immigrant and refugee crisis (both in Europe and the USA), he said, “On this continent, thousands of persons are led to travel north in search of a better life for themselves and for their loved ones, in search of greater opportunities. Is this not what we want for our own children? We must not be taken aback by their numbers, but rather view them as persons, seeing their faces and listening to their stories, trying to respond to them as best we can to their situation. To respond in a way that is always humane, just and fraternal. We need to avoid a common temptation these days: to discard whatever proves troublesome. Let us remember the Golden Rule. Do unto others as you would have them do unto you”.    

He also added his call for the global abolition of the death penalty. “Since every human life is sacred, every human person is endowed with an inalienable dignity and society can only benefit from the rehabilitation of those convicted of crimes. “

In the latest installment of his encyclical, St James speaks about a question relevant then, and relevant today. The connection between poverty, migrant workers, immigration, and their environment are all connected then and now.  It is the same question that the USA bishops addressed and many recent pope's, including Pope Francis, both in his encyclical and his address to Congress on Thursday has entered into the ongoing dialogue between the Jesus Movement and socio-economic-(and now, environmental) problems. No doubt the question of just pay for a just day’s labor is as pertinent now as ever.

There is little doubt that Pope Francis hit several nails on the head this past weekend. With his encyclical, his statements here in the USA (particularly at the Capitol) clearly add him to the ongoing development of our Catholic socio-economic-cultural-psychological (and now –environmental).  The tradition goes back to the biblical prophets, especially the greatest of the prophets, Jesus of Nazareth, and continued in the tradition of such as St James. With the Pope’s encyclical and visit to us this weekend, the tradition continues. How, with God’s Help, do we respond?                     092715ADjfq