ASSUMPTION 2022 AND COVID

 This particular post is becoming an annual event during this time when we are all still suffering the effects of the COVID19 pandemic. I've left most of the text unrevised, but have added a couple of ideas.

Certainly we've discovered how many things can be accomplished virtually via various computer apps, and may even prefer that approach in certain circumstances. But now as restrictions have loosened,  many of us have had the pleasure of coming back into personal contact with people -- relatives, friends, colleagues, students -- and have come to truly appreciate the importance of physical presence and gestures like handshakes and hugs. 

As we come to experience the importance of physical presence to one another, we can profit from reflecting once again on the meaning of the feast of the Assumption, August 15..

QUID MIHI? 

The Latin question “Quid mihi?”, “What’s it to me?", was posed by certain non-Catholic theologians in protest when Pius XII declared in 1950 that the Assumption of Mary was a dogma of the Catholic Church: "Mary, having completed the course of her earthly life, was assumed body and soul into heavenly glory.”

When I do my daily lectio divina (reflective reading) with sacred scripture, I always ask myself "Quid mihi?": What does this reading mean for me? What is it saying to me? I think it’s a great question to ask as we celebrate the feast of Mary’s Assumption on August 15, not in protest but in an earnest effort to find some answers.

The following selection is from The Water and the Fire by Gerald Vann, O.P. The paragraph headings and any italics or emphases are mine. I hope you enjoy Father Vann’s answer to the question “What’s the Assumption to me?”

THE IMPORTANCE OF BODILINESS

The gulf between matter and spirit, between material things and the praise of God, is widening at a pace and to an extent hitherto unknown: it would be very easy to despair of this civilization of ours, very easy to despair of the future of our race, very easy to feel that, so far from marching triumphantly forward to a golden age, we are rushing headlong into an abyss; very easy to feel that our world is doomed because all the physical and material side of life must continue to drag man down and degrade him till the heavens are closed to him. But it is just at this moment that the voice of the Church comes to us like a challenge: we are on the contrary to shout aloud our belief in the dignity and holiness of material things; we are to affirm our faith and our hope in the future of man's flesh. The woman who stands in the heavens, the Mother of God, is also the mother of men, and her glory is the guarantee of theirs.
The doctrine of the Assumption is of supreme importance not only to Catholics but to all men and women because it means that there is still in the world, there will always be in the world, a voice to affirm and a power to defend the dignity and the ultimate glory of matter, of material things, of human flesh and blood, of the lovely mystery of human love, of the beauty which is the work of men's hands. There is a voice which affirms, there is a power which defends, all the material things which make life worth while; and they bid us be of good heart because we can hope in the end to achieve our own lives, full, rich, deep, unified, free, not by escaping from the flesh and material things, but by the healing and sanctifying of the flesh and material things.

In the greatest of the Church's definitions of doctrine concerning our Lady, the doctrine that she is the Mother of God, it was her Son that the Church was defending. But she is also the mother of all men; and here, in the doctrine of her Assumption, it is all her sons that the Church is defending. Just as the figure of motherhood is at the very center of the earthly history of every human soul, of the earthly history of the human race, so the figure of this Maiden-Mother is at the very center of the eternal history of individuals and of the race. If she is attacked, later on her Son will be attacked, and in the end her other children will be attacked. Men will begin by denying some part of the God-given greatness and glory; they will go on sooner or later to deny the divinity of her Son; and in the end there will be no defense for the greatness of humanity itself. The Church's voice is a challenge because, while it tells us to hope because in Mary the flesh is sanctified and glorified, material things are sanctified and glorified, it also tells us to beware because the dragon, defeated, went elsewhere to make war on the rest of her children. ...And he stood there waiting on the sea shore.

-- Gerald Vann, O.P. "The Water and the Fire" (New York, Sheed and Ward, 1961), pages 175-176. 

QUID MIHI?

Although we still live in a world of face masks and the avoidance of big crowds, we find ourselves able to "get back together" physically without barriers. May the feast of the Assumption help us to reflect on this experience and appreciate the gift of physical presence.

COVID AND CHRISTMAS

 

"The Numbering at Bethlehem" - Brueghel

This morning I took out my postcard-size version of the above panting, "The Numbering at Bethlehem"  by Peter Brueghel the Elder, intending to meditate on the scene of Mary and Joseph arriving at Bethlehem unnoticed to be inscribed on the census ordered by the emperor. But, instead of being drawn to the figure of Mary in her dark blue cape riding on the donkey, my eye was drawn right away to the cluster of people crowded around the window at the left of the scene. Immediately my imagination transformed that image of a crowd of people waiting to be inscribed in the census into the familiar image of a crowd of people on line waiting for a COVID-19 test.

Switching back to the snowy scene in Bethlehem, I began to wonder about Jesus, Mary and Joseph and Covid. If his mysterious birth at Bethlehem were to happen today, would Jesus have been immune to the virus? Would his mother and foster-father have stood on one of these long lines with him and wait to be tested with the rest of us? Would he have needed to be vaccinated?

I'm sure that the reason that these questions occurred to me was that I've recently started reading "Christology: A Biblical, Historical, and Systematic Study of Jesus" by Gerald O'Collins, S.J. Christology is  that branch of Christian theology that "reflects systematically on the person, being and activity of Jesus of Nazareth" (O'Collins, pg.1), asking such questions as "How could Jesus be both human and divine?" So I'm sure that my reading was what caused me to imagine the Divine Savior in the crowd waiting to be tested for the coronavirus.

Especially in this "Covid Christmas" time we need to remind ourselves of the central message of Bethlehem: God became one of us, like us in everything but sin. He keeps being born in our midst at every moment, we just keep forgetting that fact. Ironically, it seems that we forget that fact most easily at exactly those moments when we need his reassuring presence the most -- in the doctor's office, say, or when we're upset at a loved one, or worried about a very sick friend. 

Instead of meditating on the little Jewish baby lying on the straw in Bethlehem, this Christmas maybe you and I might do better to call upon the incarnate Son of God who is standing on line with us waiting for a Covid test. 

May Emmanuel, "God-With-Us," bless you and me 

with a renewed sense of his constant saving presence at every moment of our lives!

Have a Blessed Christmas!

  

THE ASSUMPTION THIS YEAR

 

This year the feast of Mary's assumption into heaven, August 15, falls on a Sunday, giving more of the faithful a chance to reflect on this mystery. But it also comes at a time when everyone is suffering from the effects of the COVID19 pandemic. 

Certainly we've discovered how many things can be accomplished virtually via various computer apps, and may even prefer that approach in certain circumstances. But as restrictions have loosened a bit in certain places, many of us have had the pleasure of coming back into personal contact with people -- relatives, friends, colleagues, students -- and have come to truly appreciate the importance of physical presence and gestures like handshakes and hugs. 

As we come to experience the importance of physical presence to one another, we can profit from reflecting on the meaning of the feast of the Assumption.

QUID MIHI? 

The Latin question “Quid mihi?”, “What’s it to me?", was posed by certain non-Catholic theologians in protest when Pius XII declared in 1950 that the Assumption of Mary was a dogma of the Catholic Church: "Mary, having completed the course of her earthly life, was assumed body and soul into heavenly glory.”

When I do my daily lectio divina (reflective reading) with sacred scripture, I always ask myself "Quid mihi?": What does this reading mean for me? What is it saying to me? I think it’s a great question to ask as we celebrate the feast of Mary’s Assumption on August 15, not in protest but in an earnest effort to find some answers.

The following selection is from The Water and the Fire by Gerald Vann, O.P. The paragraph headings and any italics or emphases are mine. I hope you enjoy Father Vann’s answer to the question “What’s the Assumption to me?”

THE IMPORTANCE OF BODILINESS

The gulf between matter and spirit, between material things and the praise of God, is widening at a pace and to an extent hitherto unknown: it would be very easy to despair of this civilization of ours, very easy to despair of the future of our race, very easy to feel that, so far from marching triumphantly forward to a golden age, we are rushing headlong into an abyss; very easy to feel that our world is doomed because all the physical and material side of life must continue to drag man down and degrade him till the heavens are closed to him. But it is just at this moment that the voice of the Church comes to us like a challenge: we are on the contrary to shout aloud our belief in the dignity and holiness of material things; we are to affirm our faith and our hope in the future of man's flesh. The woman who stands in the heavens, the Mother of God, is also the mother of men, and her glory is the guarantee of theirs.
The doctrine of the Assumption is of supreme importance not only to Catholics but to all men and women because it means that there is still in the world, there will always be in the world, a voice to affirm and a power to defend the dignity and the ultimate glory of matter, of material things, of human flesh and blood, of the lovely mystery of human love, of the beauty which is the work of men's hands. There is a voice which affirms, there is a power which defends, all the material things which make life worth while; and they bid us be of good heart because we can hope in the end to achieve our own lives, full, rich, deep, unified, free, not by escaping from the flesh and material things, but by the healing and sanctifying of the flesh and material things.

In the greatest of the Church's definitions of doctrine concerning our Lady, the doctrine that she is the Mother of God, it was her Son that the Church was defending. But she is also the mother of all men; and here, in the doctrine of her Assumption, it is all her sons that the Church is defending. Just as the figure of motherhood is at the very center of the earthly history of every human soul, of the earthly history of the human race, so the figure of this Maiden-Mother is at the very center of the eternal history of individuals and of the race. If she is attacked, later on her Son will be attacked, and in the end her other children will be attacked. Men will begin by denying some part of the God-given greatness and glory; they will go on sooner or later to deny the divinity of her Son; and in the end there will be no defense for the greatness of humanity itself. The Church's voice is a challenge because, while it tells us to hope because in Mary the flesh is sanctified and glorified, material things are sanctified and glorified, it also tells us to beware because the dragon, defeated, went elsewhere to make war on the rest of her children. ...And he stood there waiting on the sea shore.

-- Gerald Vann, O.P. "The Water and the Fire" (New York, Sheed and Ward, 1961), pages 175-176. 

QUID MIHI?

In a world of social distancing and face masks and the avoidance of big crowds, as we find ourselves wishing we could just "get back together" physically without barriers, maybe the feast of the Assumption will have something relevant to say to us.

CONVOCATION AND COVID

 Tomorrow, April 25, 2021, is "Good Shepherd Sunday." so named because of the gospel passage for the day, in which Jesus calls himself the "good shepherd" and we, of course, are his flock. As I started to meditate on this image early this morning I realized that the idea of a "flock" seemed awfully limited and closed in. This was a a stark contrast with last week's post that reflected the wide open, infinite perspective of the "Universal Christ."

Convocation Pre-pandemic

The more immediate reason why the idea of a "flock" seems kind of limiting is my experience during the past thirteen months of the way we start each school day here at St. Benedict's Prep. Since the day we reopened in July of 1973, we've met as a school community to take attendance, to pray, listen to scripture, sing songs, and make announcements. In mid-March last year the 600 of us crowded together as usual in the small gym for our usual morning "convocation." None of us knew that this would be our last "convo" for over a year. That afternoon it was announced that due to the pandemic, all classes in our Middle and Prep Divisions would be virtual, starting on Monday(!) 

Covid Convo - now with our girls

In a normal school, that would have meant that there would be no more morning convocation. But, as you may have gathered, ours is no normal school. Over the weekend, our computer technology person, Dexter Lopina, arranged everything so that on Monday morning we held "convo" virtually, with everyone in attendance. We followed the usual format, including songs played by Dr. Lansang. The first couple of weeks of convocation were strange, like everything else at the time, but soon we settled in to a routine that we still follow (with several improvements) as of this writing, over a year later. 

The following article that I wrote for our school newspaper, the "Benedict News," helps explain why I now have a much wider sense of the image of Christ's "flock." I wrote the following for the students, but I think you can fill in most of the missing information.

I like to picture the St. Benedict’s Prep Community as a set of concentric circles, each fitting inside the next larger circle, like a bullseye target. In the center is the monastic community that has been here longer than the school, and of course founded and still acts as the spiritual hub of St. Benedict’s. Moving outward you have the academic community of students, teachers, staff and parents. Then there’s the larger circle of thousands of alumni, friends and supporters. Somewhere inside these circles you have to locate the members of Saint Mary’s Church and the NeoCatechumenal community sponsored by the monks. And the neighbors who come to the Food Pantry, and others who I’m leaving out.

In the center of the bullseye is the monastic community, which has been the least affected by the Covid pandemic. The monks’ routine of daily prayer and mass has continued unchanged, although we do wear masks and sit six feet apart as we pray. The monastic schedule of meals, recreation and meetings has continued as well. Saint Benedict says somewhere in the Rule that “It is by no means good for monks to go about outside of the monastery.” So he would be proud of us Downtown Monks over the past year.

Every time I’m in church praying with my brother monks I sense ripples of grace and blessings and God’s love spreading outward through all those circles to every member of the wider “community,” from Kindergarteners to the oldest alumni.

A few years ago PBS aired a 90-minute documentary about the abbey and school, entitled “The Rule.” Two different friends of mine who saw it made the same remark to me about the school: “What I sensed all during the movie was a lot of love.” These were people who had never visited us, but they caught the spirit of the place, thanks to the Bongiornos who did the documentary. When visitors step into our bustling buildings, many of them feel it right away -- that spirit of love that we all have for one another, expressed in so many ways, such as student leaders caring for younger students, group members building bonds with their brothers in their group, or the way teachers and counselors give themselves selflessly to the students.

You would imagine, then, that the pandemic restrictions and the emptying of the Prep and Middle Division buildings would have put an end to all of that love as we switched to virtual everything. However I, at least, got a pleasant surprise when just the opposite happened to our community. 

Over a year ago, on the first day of virtual learning, the SBP community kept right on praying together at Monday morning convocation with all the students and faculty in attendance. We never missed a day of Scripture readings, Psalms and songs. Then before long, something very special began happening: members from the wider circles of our community began attending convo with us: Alumni of St. Benedict’s and of Benedictine Academy, elders, and friends of all ages. Friends and alumni started to join us from countries around the world including Israel, the Netherlands, Brazil and Mongolia. Many of these visitors, especially alumni, have been participating in convo via the “chat” that streams alongside the video, emphasizing even more the feeling of shared community. 

Did you ever ask yourself what draws these people back every morning at 8:00 a.m.? I would say that it’s the same thing that my two friends saw in the documentary, or that visitors feel when they enter our buildings: Love. The love shows itself at convo in the praying and singing, in the chatter and the chat, in the corny jokes and the sense of family. The members of our extended community know that SBP convo will be there every day at eight o’clock, reflecting, I suppose, the monks’ vow of Stability of Place. Interestingly, none of these people would ever have known about our daily convocation had it not been for Covid-19. They would not have this special little boost to get them started on their day. 

 So, “In the Midst of It All,” as Rev. Winstead’s song puts it so appropriately, our Saint Benedict's community, with the special addition of the new Girls’ Prep Division, has turned the pandemic experience on its head. While others are feeling alienated and separated, the pandemic restrictions have prompted us to create new ways of creating bonds, and of extending those bonds of love until they embrace the entire  globe.

In the midst of the pandemic, the Lord’s grace keeps reaching out through all those circles of community with the message of the Gospel carried in the words of our songs, “You Gotta Love People. You can’t choose who to love!” and, “Stay Up! Don’t let nothin’ get you down!” and of course, our informal pandemic motto, “In the midst of it all.” 

Christ's Idea for Convocation: The Kingdom

PUTTING COVID19 IN ITS PLACE

We can't escape the fact that for the past year we've been experiencing everything in the context of the

Covid Pandemic. From planning the Olympics to practicing high school basketball, from the pandemic's dire effects on airlines and corner bodegas. 

We've grown used to (not to mention fatigued by) the pervasive presence of the coronavirus, and are reminded of it every time we put on our mask, distance ourselves from someone, or attend a meeting or a class over Zoom. And we mustn't forget the over 500,00 Americans who have died; for many of us the statistics are very real, they have names and faces 

This is our world - and it's not a pleasant picture. 

Easter, however, invites us to ask the question: "Which is the bigger reality? The Universal Christ who has conquered death, or the pandemic?" For a Christian, to think of "Easter in a time of Covid" seems to be getting things completely backwards. The background against which we experience the events of our lives is not the pandemic at all, but rather the Easter Event: By dying and rising, Christ has conquered death and has brought us with Him. This Easter Event is the central fact of our existence, of our entire universe, and provides the background, the context, the "wallpaper" against which we experience everything in our lives, whether good or bad, happy or sad, including the Covid19 pandemic and everything about it.

For a Christian, then, the challenge is to experience the pandemic in the light of the Easter mystery, to put the pandemic in its proper context. Maybe the key here is to think in terms of the "Paschal Mystery," an expression that has come up in recent posts. The paschal mystery, which is the central belief of every Christian, refers to Christ's suffering-death-resurrection as a single event, in which the three seemingly separate experiences of Christ are inseparable from one another. And, of course, this is true of or own suffering and dying: they are part of that same Paschal Mystery that always ends in victory over death.

All of the suffering that is connected with the pandemic is, then, somehow, mysteriously, a participation in the sufferings of Christ, and of his death and resurrection. 

In the light of the Paschal Mystery, all of this Covid suffering has meaning. With our limited intellects, we can't understand the meaning yet; but with the eyes of faith we can see that it's all part of God's infinitely mysterious love for each of us.     

PANDEMIC PROCESSION

 

As we celebrate the second Lent and Easter under the cloud of the pandemic, with most of us still not being physically present to one another in church, I suggest that rather than just sit and bemoan the fact that we can't go to church, we might spend some time reflecting on the meaning of these beautiful familiar rituals. The following post from a few years ago will help us do just that.

One Palm Sunday morning a few years ago I watched a pastor being set upon by angry parishioners complaining vehemently that the ushers at the side door of the church were distributing smaller pieces of palm than the ushers at the main door. This outrage threatened to color or even define their whole experience of Holy Week that year. During this pandemic time more than ever we need to dive beneath the surface of the rituals and physical signs of Holy Week and Easter to get at their meaning, and their timely message for our suffering world.

PALMS AND PROCESSIONS 

The idea of a Palm Sunday procession originated, not surprisingly, in Jerusalem where 

people could really have the sense of reenacting various events of Jesus’ passion and death in the very places where they had occurred. It was well established by the fourth century: a large crowd, including lots of children singing “Hosanna,” preceded the bishop on a long walk from the top of the Mount of Olives into and across Jerusalem into a church to celebrate mass. 

It’s easy to see how such a ritual would capture people’s imaginations; and by the ninth century there were Palm Sunday processions in Spain and Gaul. The custom would take root in Rome only in the eleventh century. The actual rituals of the blessing of palms and the procession varied quite widely from place to place. The blessing of the palms could be very elaborate, for example, while in some places the bishop would imitate Christ by riding in procession on a donkey. In 2011 on Palm Sunday I posted some thoughts about the custom in some countries of having a statue of Christ on a donkey that was rolled along in the procession.

MISLEADING RITUALS

The detailed ritual re-enacting of various sacred actions described in the gospel, begun in Jerusalem and spreading throughout the Christian world, while it is appealing to many people, also poses a danger: we can begin to think of each episode as a separate stand-alone event without seeing it as part of the single “paschal mystery” of suffering-death-resurrection.

A good example of this unfortunate splitting up of the paschal mystery is the popular devotion called the fourteen “Stations of the Cross.” These meditations follow Jesus’ passion from his condemnation by Pontius Pilate through his death and burial, and end (incredibly!) with Jesus’ lying dead in the tomb. To stop the story at that point is not only misleading, it’s almost blasphemous. Worse, during this horrible time of Covid-19, it implies that you and I can or should look at our own suffering and pain apart from Jesus’ triumphant victory over suffering and death at Easter. That’s real bad theology! Fortunately, when the stations are celebrated in public at present, the service often ends with a sort of “fifteenth station,” a brief meditation on the resurrection – i.e. the event which gives all of the events of Christ’s suffering and death their ultimate MEANING.

A similar unfortunate separation of the resurrection from the suffering and death of Christ is reflected in the history of the so-called “holy triduum.”

THE SACRED TRIDUUM

The expression “holy triduum” or “sacred triduum” originally referred to the three days of Good Friday, Holy Saturday and Easter Sunday. Easter was an integral and essential part of the “holy week” celebration. 

Saint Augustine, for instance, refers to this triduum in the fifth century. Toward the middle of the seventh century, however, a commemoration of the Last Supper was introduced on Holy Thursday at Rome (where that day had previously been mostly the day for reconciliation of penitents). This new commemoration caused an unfortunate shifting of days: the “triduum” then became Thursday-Friday-Saturday, and Easter was cut completely out of the picture! The triduum became a self-contained unit involving only Jesus’ suffering and death.

This new arrangement is misleading and could very easily distract at least some people from the full MEANING of Christ’s suffering and death (which, after all mean nothing without the resurrection). The church has revised her rituals and her vocabulary in recent years to try to counter that misconception. The official language in the church’s calendar, for example, now refers to “the Easter Triduum of the Lord’s Passion and Resurrection,” which begins only with the evening mass of the Lord’s Supper, thus restoring the original unity of suffering and resurrection.

PALMS AND THE PANDEMIC 

The ceremonies of Palm Sunday can still be misunderstood in that fragmented way mentioned above. 

Try instead to consider Palm Sunday from the original perspective in which the events of Holy Week including Easter were not seen as reenactments of a disjointed series of events but rather as the celebration of a single unity known as the “paschal event.” Here, too, the church since Vatican II has helped us to correct our vision by revising the rituals of Palm Sunday. First, note that its official name is no longer “Palm Sunday” but “Palm Sunday of The Lord's Passion.” The preceding Sunday, formerly called "Passion Sunday" has been given back its original name, “The Fifth Sunday of Lent.” 

Centuries ago the Church began emphasizing Christ's sufferings and so pushed "Passiontide" further back into Lent, usurping the Fifth Sunday and renaming it "Passion Sunday." The Sundays in Lent, however, are clearly intended to prepare us for the resurrection. This idea is obvious when you notice that the gospel for the Fifth Sunday (that we used to call "Passion Sunday") tells the story of Lazarus being raised from the dead. Sounds like a resurrection theme to me!

Secondly, besides the name change, there are the various prayers, blessings and options for the procession that now help us to focus on the more important theme of the Palm Sunday ritual, the procession. The actual blessing of the palms is limited to a brief introduction and a short prayer of blessing, teaching us that “Palm Sunday” is not about the blessing and carrying of palms that are to be brought home as almost magical tokens disconnected from anything about the Paschal mystery.

The true perspective is reflected in the fact that the blessing of the palms should be held someplace besides the sanctuary, preferably outside the church building, so that there can be a procession. There are even a couple of options for the entry into the church so as to encourage the use of a procession even in less convenient circumstances. The emphasis is where it should be: we as the People of God are accompanying the Messiah on his triumphal entry into Jerusalem where he will suffer and die and RISE again.

Thirdly, the sacramentary helps us to focus on the paschal mystery as a whole by opening the ceremonies of Palm Sunday with the priest's saying these words:

“Dear friends in Christ, for five weeks of Lent we have been preparing, by works of charity and self-sacrifice, for the celebration of our Lord’s paschal mystery. Today we come together to begin this solemn celebration in union with the whole Church throughout the word, Christ entered in triumph into his own city, to complete his work as our Messiah: to suffer, to die, and to RISE AGAIN. Let us remember with devotion this entry which began his saving work and follow him with a lively faith. United with him in his suffering on the cross, may we share his resurrection and new life.”

Notice the various emphases:
1. We have been preparing to celebrate the “paschal mystery” (passion-death-resurrection as a single event).
2. We are doing this as a community, in union with the Church throughout the world. (Maybe this is easier to imagine when you're watching it on the worldwide web?)
3. Christ is about to complete his Messianic work “to suffer, to die, and to rise again.”

A fourth help to keeping focused on the unity of Holy Week and Easter is found in the mass readings. During the mass we will listen to the reading of the passion, but this is preceded by the second reading from Philippians that includes these lines that combine the passion and the resurrection:

“he humbled himself, becoming obedient to death, even death on a cross. Because of this, God greatly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bend, of those in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father” (Phil. 2:8-11).

THIS YEAR'S PROCESSION

Normally I preside at the Palm Sunday mass at a church in one of the seedier neighborhoods in Newark. In our procession are many Spanish-speaking immigrants, some suburban white folks who come to help the sisters serve Sunday dinner to the poor, some homeless and hungry people, along with AIDS patients and recovering addicts. It’s these last folks that truly appreciate knowing that we are going with Jesus not just to SUFFER with him on Friday; no, we are very definitely walking with Jesus in order also to RISE again with him on Easter Sunday. 

Since this year's procession will have to be virtual, it will be easy to imagine the countless Christians walking together waving palms: The crowd will be made up of the same vast variety as the one I'm used to, except that this year there will be a lot more people who are suffering: grieving for loved ones lost to Covid-19, suffering from the lack of physical contact with friends and relatives, depressed and discouraged because of all the restrictions during the past year. The procession will be filled with folks who truly need to know that we are walking with Jesus not just to suffer with him on Good Friday but walking with Him to Easter morning when He rises triumphant over sin, suffering and death -- and brings us all with him. 

I hope you'll join your voice to the rest of ours in welcoming our Savior, singing 

Hosanna to the Son of David! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord!

Whether we are in church or at home, may the worldwide experience of suffering and death this year be a time of special grace for all of us, and may the Church's message ring out clearly across the globe: Good Friday is not separate from Easter Sunday, but is only the first step on our journey to salvation.

.

EMMANUEL IN THE PANDEMIC

It seems that everyone was happy to say good bye to 2020 and move on in hopes that 2021 will be better. I guess that to a lot of people it must seem that in 2020 the world slipped beyond God's grasp and is now tumbling in a free fall towards chaos.   

Early this morning (Saturday, Jan. 2, 2021) as I sat in church I opened to the first reading for today's (Saturday's) mass, from the First Letter of John 2:22-28.  I couldn't help noticing that in the space of five verses one word is repeated six times: the verb "remain," which is one of John's favorite words. In Greek, μένω ménō (men'-o) means "to stay, remain, abide". It is often used to describe the deep, intimate and mysterious mutual indwelling of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. In this morning's passage, however, it's used to describe how the Word remains in us and we remain "in the Son and in the Father." 

When I saw this passage I immediately thought of another aspect of the word, namely "to remain permanently, to abide." The Word became incarnate for us and "abides" with us forever. "Emmanuel, God is with us" describes a condition that will last for eternity, not just for the Christmas season.

So, how does this rich verb help us to reflect on the pandemic? Here's what occurred to me: God abides with us and with all of creation, no matter how chaotic, how painful and absurd everything looks to us with our limited intellects. It takes courageous faith the keep insisting the God is somehow still in control of the world, and that God's loving plan for the world is moving forward every day. 

Some of New York's 45 mobile morgues

Emmanuel is with us walking in the corridors if the ICUs, and among the refrigerated trailers filled with corpses of Covid 19 victims for whom there is no longer room in the morgues. Emmanuel. God-with-us, is not only present with us, but comes in mystery "with healing in his wings" to encourage us, to lift us up, to give us the strength and energy to keep moving on. 

The year 2020 was filled, like any other year, with the healing presence of God's love for you and me and all of humanity, indeed of all creation. It's just that 2020 demanded, it would seem, a lot more trust in God's unfailing goodness and infinite love. And we don't do too well with things "infinite" and "mysterious." So, there's one good aspect of the year 2020: It gave us plenty of exercise in the virtues of Faith, Hope and of course Charity toward one another.

May the new year of 2021 offer us many more such opportunities, but maybe in ways that are easier for us humans to understand.

O come, Emmanuel!

IN A TIME OF VISITATION

 

Rosetti's Annunciation

The gospel reading for the Fourth Sunday of Advent presents one of my favorite scenes from the Christmas narrative, the “Annunciation.” You remember it begins this way: In the sixth month the angel Gabriel was sent by God to a town in Galilee called Nazareth, to a virgin betrothed to a man named Joseph, of the house of David. The virgin's name was Mary. And he came to her and said, "Greetings, favored one! The Lord is with you!' But she was much perplexed by his words and pondered what sort of greeting this might be" (Lk 1:26-29). 

It seems to me that Luke’s recounting of the annunciation offers us a couple of lessons that might be helpful during these months of pandemic. What follows is based on a post from several years ago.

Some Background

The Barren woman bears a child. The annunciation to Mary resembles certain other annunciation scenes from the Old Testaments. The most important of these is the announcement of the birth of Samson: 

Manoah and his wife

There was a certain man of Zorah, of the tribe of the Danites, whose name was Manoah. His wife was barren, having borne gel of the Lord appeared to the woman and said to her, ‘Although you are barren, having borne no children, you shall conceive and bear a son. Now be careful not to drink wine or strong drink, or to eat anything unclean, for you shall conceive and bear a son. No razor is to come on his head, for the boy shall be a nazirite to God from birth. It is he who shall begin to deliver Israel from the hand of the Philistines’ (Judges 13:2-5).

Luke’s choice of words points us to a messianic prophecy the Church uses on Palm Sunday: "Rejoice greatly, O daughter Zion! Shout aloud, daughter Jerusalem! Lo, your king comes to you; triumphant and victorious is he." (Zech. 9:9)

There is also a reflection of this shout of messianic joy in Zephaniah 3:14, "Sing aloud, O daughter Zion; shout, O Israel! Rejoice and exult with all your heart, O daughter Jerusalem!."

The image of a barren woman bearing a child and the messianic overtones in the passages that tell the “daughter” Jerusalem to “rejoice” at what is about to happen form just some of the background for Luke’s opening chapter. Let’s not forget the angel’s appearing to Zechariah to announce to him that his old, barren wife would bear a son, John the Baptist (Lk 1:7, etc.) 

"Hail, full of Grace." If you, like me, pray the “Hail Mary” constantly, you might be interested in a quick aside to look at what Luke’s original Greek text reveals about the angel’s greeting.

First, there’s the wonderful alliteration of the three “k” sounds in Gabriel’s “Chaire kecharitomene," (kyray kekahritoh meneh). Chaire is the normal word of greeting, “Hail.” I remember how we First Year Greek students used to exchange chaire with one another in the hallways just for fun. The second word is difficult to translate. It’s actually a verb (the perfect passive participle if you’re interested), charitoo, which means “to bestow favor upon, to favor highly, to bless.” The root of the word, char- means “gift, grace.” The ending on the verb is feminine singular. So we can try translating the two words “Hail, O highly favored one” or “Hail, Gifted Lady.” 

St. Jerome translated it into Latin as “Ave, gratia plena,” “Hail, full of grace.” Although the word “grace” catches the Greek root of the verb, it seems to me to say both too much and too little. Gabriel is not telling Mary that she is filled with grace, but rather that she has been highly favored by God.

“The Lord is with you.” The strange greeting above is followed by “the Lord is with you.” To show just how odd and overwhelming this phrase was, Luke says that the young maiden (aged 12 or 13?) was “troubled” by the angel’s words. Let’s look at that word for a moment. In1:12 when Zechariah sees the angel that appears to him in the temple he is “troubled” (Greek terasso -- the RSV translates it a little strongly as “terrified”). So now when Luke describes this young teenage girl reacting to the appearance and the strange greeting of the angel, he uses not terasso but diaterasso, the dia- is an intensifier that adds the idea of “thoroughly.” The poor girl was “thoroughly terrified” by the angel! Or at least she was “utterly confused” by the words and “wondered what the greeting might mean” (v.29). Gabriel has to calm her down and tell her “Do not be afraid, Mary” (v.31).

John Collier, Annunciation 

We can only try to imagine Mary’s reaction to being told that she has been “highly favored” by God. Luke Timothy Johnson reminds us “She is among the most powerless people in her society: she is young in a world that values age; female in a world ruled by men; poor in a stratified economy. Furthermore she has neither husband nor child to validate her existence. That she should have “found favor with God” and be “highly gifted” shows Luke’s understanding of God’s activity as surprising and often paradoxical, almost always reversing human expectations. ("The Gospel of Luke," Liturgical Press, 1991, p. 39)”

SO WHAT?

As I wrote at the beginning of this post, Luke’s recounting of the annunciation offers us a couple of lessons that we can profit from during these months of pandemic. 

First, “God’s activity is often surprising and paradoxical,” as those barren women in the Old testament can testify and as young Mary found out that day as she was going about her daily work and suddenly and angel from heaven appeared to her. We must try to remember that God works the same way in our lives, that is, using mystery, paradox and surprises in working out the divine, loving plan. 

Second, Mary also experienced something that many of us have been experiencing during the ordeal of the last ten months as we watch the news of spiking death tolls and overwhelmed ICU's: “sometimes God’s plan for us can be overwhelming or even terrifying.” Which is why we hear so often in the bible the words that Gabriel uses at the annunciation: "Do not be afraid!" During this frightening time, we can hear with the ears of faith those same words from haven addressed to us:  "Do not be afraid!" If you haven't gotten that message yet, listen harder.

Third, although our Prep Division students haven't been on campus for months, I can think of a couple of them in particular who would really be comforted to learn this lesson from the annunciation: God often uses the young, the powerless and the minority person to further the divine plan. If you find yourself in one or more of those categories, as Mary did, then you better stay on your toes: God probably has something special for you to do.

Finally, in reply to Mary's question about how all this was to take place since shoe had no relations with a man, Gabriel offers this reminder: “Nothing is impossible for God.” Let that belief be behind every prayer we utter.

May the Lord of the Impossible, the Lord of Surprises, bless all of us and keep us safe during this time of mysterious "visitation!"

.

Henry Owassa Tanner, Annunciation 

THE ASSUMPTION AND "DISTANCING"

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I don't know about you, but this business of physical distancing during the pandemic is making me realize how much I enjoy physical contact such as shaking hands or hugging. An angel would have no trouble with physical distancing, right? But not me! Among the dozens of lessons that covid-19 is teaching me, this appreciation of the importance of my "bodiedness" is up near the top. 

Today, August 15, the Church celebrates the Solemnity of the Assumption of Mary into heaven. This ancient non-scriptural tradition that holds that Mary, because she had given birth to the Messiah, was spared  from bodily corruption and instead was "assumed" directly into heaven. A little reflection on the meaning of this feast can perhaps shed a little light on our pandemic experience of physical distancing. 

The following selection is from The Water and the Fire by Gerald Vann, O.P. The paragraph headings and any italics or emphases are mine. Don't be distracted by Fr. Vann's 1961 approach to the use of masculine pronouns throughout. I hope you find his treatment timely and helpful:

THE IMPORTANCE OF BODILINESS

The gulf between matter and spirit, between material things and the praise of God, is widening at a pace and to an extent hitherto unknown: it would be very easy to despair of this civilization of ours, very easy to despair of the future of our race, very easy to feel that, so far from marching triumphantly forward to a golden age, we are rushing headlong into an abyss; very easy to feel that our world is doomed because all the physical and material side of life must continue to drag man down and degrade him till the heavens are closed to him. But it is just at this moment that the voice of the Church comes to us like a challenge: we are on the contrary to shout aloud our belief in the dignity and holiness of material things; we are to affirm our faith and our hope in the future of man's flesh. The woman who stands in the heavens, the Mother of God, is also the mother of men, and her glory is the guarantee of theirs.
The doctrine of the Assumption is of supreme importance not only to Catholics but to all men and women because it means that there is still in the world, there will always be in the world, a voice to affirm and a power to defend the dignity and the ultimate glory of matter, of material things, of human flesh and blood, of the lovely mystery of human love, of the beauty which is the work of men's hands. There is a voice which affirms, there is a power which defends, all the material things which make life worth while; and they bid us be of good heart because we can hope in the end to achieve our own lives, full, rich, deep, unified, free, not by escaping from the flesh and material things, but by the healing and sanctifying of the flesh and material things.

In the greatest of the Church's definitions of doctrine concerning our Lady, the doctrine that she is the Mother of God, it was her Son that the Church was defending. But she is also the mother of all men; and here, in the doctrine of her Assumption, it is all her sons that the Church is defending. Just as the figure of motherhood is at the very center of the earthly history of every human soul, of the earthly history of the human race, so the figure of this Maiden-Mother is at the very center of the eternal history of individuals and of the race. If she is attacked, later on her Son will be attacked, and in the end her other children will be attacked. Men will begin by denying some part of the God-given greatness and glory; they will go on sooner or later to deny the divinity of her Son; and in the end there will be no defense for the greatness of humanity itself. The Church's voice is a challenge because, while it tells us to hope because in Mary the flesh is sanctified and glorified, material things are sanctified and glorified, it also tells us to beware because the dragon, defeated, went elsewhere to make war on the rest of her children. ...And he stood there waiting on the sea shore.

-- Gerald Vann, O.P. "The Water and the Fire" (New York, Sheed and Ward, 1961), pages 175-176. 

As we each continue wrestling with the lack of physical contact, we can at least pray to our Blessed Mother that this period of enforced physical distancing can give us a renewed appreciation of and reverence for our bodies and our material world that God has given into our care.

On this feast of the Assumption let us ask the Blessed Virgin to help us to appreciate the holiness of our material selves.

P.S. Speaking of material selves, you might pray for me on August 18 when I'm having a total replacement of my left knee.

DENIAL: A STRANGE VIRTUE

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Jesus said to his disciples, "Whoever wishes to come after me must deny himself, take up his cross, and follow me (Mt 16:24)

The expression "deny himself" in yesterday's gospel reading has been on my mind for two days now.

What unsettles me is the word "deny." In the context of Matthew 16 it's synonymous with "take up your cross," and every bible translation I looked up, including French and Spanish, translates the phrase as "deny yourself." Fine. Maybe "deny yourself" is one of those phrases that we use unthinkingly, assuming that we know what it means. But the phrase has left me wondering.

I'm sure that part of the problem is that for me, "denial" has become a loaded word, especially because I hear it so often with regard to people in counselling situations. When one of my students is living in denial, for example, and cannot face the reality of his situation, his life becomes unmanageable and starts to unravel. 

What's the opposite of "deny" anyway? Maybe "admit" or "accept" or even "embrace." These words seem to have a more life-giving feel.  

 Am I supposed to "deny" everything about myself? My existence? My bad points? My sinfulness? I'm not playing dumb here, I'm just uneasy with the expression. There must be some better ways of saying this. (After all, no one ever says that Jesus "denied himself.")

I consulted my Greek-English lexicon and found some food for reflection. The verb in Greek that's translated as "deny" is used in passages such as Peter's denying that he knows Jesus, or "One who denies me, the heavenly Father will deny him." But the lexicon offered three suggested synonyms that I found I could put into practical terms for my behavior more easily than the vague phrase "deny yourself."    

Here they are:

"If someone wishes to come after me, let him disregard himself." I can understand that; I've experienced the call to disregard my own wishes (I don't deny that they exist -- that's the point) in favor of someone else's wants or needs.

"If someone wishes to come after me, let him refuse to give thought to himself." I've watched the way a mother can refuse to give thought to herself when her child is in need.

"If someone wishes to come after me, let him not express concern for himself."  I see how much this is

ignored in our self-centered world where people refuse to wear masks or observe social distancing because they find such things uncomfortable. "They express concern for themselves" and have no regard for the safety of others. On a less lethal level, I can see how I can easily express concern for myself and make myself "Number One." 

Okay, so maybe I'm being too fussy and and just arguing about words, but I've found these three equivalent expressions to be helpful substitutes for "deny oneself." So, I'll stay away from every sort of denial and pick up my very real cross and try to follow in the footsteps of Christ on the way to Calvary as he "refuses to give thought to himself" and acts out of pure love.

 

CHRIST ON MY WALL

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After writing last week's post about icons, I took down the one I painted in 1986 and re-hung it where I

Icon I painted in 1986

 can see it all the time, especially when I'm sitting in my chair reading or praying. I'm very glad I did --The image of the Universal Christ keeps revealing more and more about who he is and who I am. You may want to read the previous post, entitled "Icons" before continuing.

The reflections about Christ that I've been sharing in the past few weeks are based for the most part on the thoughts of the Franciscan Fr. Richard Rohr. This week I'm going to let him speak for himself through a few quotations from his book "The Universal Christ."   Page references below are from this book.

[Rohr quotes a long excerpt from Carryll Houselander, a 20th Century mystic, in which she describes an experience she had while riding in a crowded subway. She suddenly saw Christ present in each of her fellow passengers in the most vivid and way, "living in them, dying in them." And not only in them but in every person who ever lived. Then Rohr comments on the long passage.]

The question for me -- and for us -- is, Who is this "Christ" that Caryll Houselander saw permeating and radiating from all her fellow passengers? Christ for her was clearly not just Jesus of Nazareth but something much more immense, even cosmic, in significance. How that is so, and why it matters, is the subject of this book. Once encountered, I believe this vision has the power to radically alter what we believe, how we see others and relate to them, our sense of how big God might be, and our understanding of of what the Creator is doing in our world. (pp 2-3) 

... The revelation of the risen Christ as ubiquitous and eternal was clearly affirmed by the Scriptures (Colossians 1, Ephesians 1, John 1, Hebrews 1) and in the early church, when the euphoria of the Christian faith was still creative and expanding. In our time, however, this deep mode of seeing must be approached as something of a reclamation project. When the Western church separated from the East in the Great Schism of 1054, we gradually lost this profound understanding of how God has been liberating and loving all that is. Instead, we gradually limited the Divine Presence to the single body of Jesus, when perhaps it is as ubiquitous as light itself -- and uncircumscribable by human boundaries. 

We might say that the door of faith closed on the broadest and most beautiful understanding of what

early Christians called the "Manifestation," the Epiphany, or most famously, the "Incarnation" -- and also its final and full form, which we still call the "Resurrection." But the Eastern and Orthodox churches originally had a much broader understanding of both of these, an insight that we in the Western churches, both Catholic and Protestant, are now only beginning to recognize. (p.4)

... 

We cannot overestimate the damage that was done to our Gospel message when the Eastern ("Greek") and Western ("Latin") churches split, beginning with their mutual excommunication of each other's patriarchs in 1054. We have not known the "one, holy, undivided" church for over a thousand years.

But you and I can reopen that ancient door of faith with a key, and that key is the proper understanding of a word that many of us use often, but often too glibly. That word is Christ.

What if Christ is a name for the transcendent within every "thing in the universe

What if Christ is a name for the immense spaciousness of all true Love?

What if Christ refers to an infinite horizon that pulls us from within and pulls us forward too?

What if Christ is another name for everything -- in its fullness? (p.5)

These paragraphs are a sample of the kind of thinking that has been shaping my meditations and reflections since at least April, as you may have noticed if you've been following my recent posts.

So, the icon that's speaking silently and eloquently to me from its new place on the wall has helped me to get some perspective on Covid, racial polarization, presidential tweets and all manner of things. 

May the risen Christ bless all of us and keep us safe!