Becoming a Catholic: Living in the Centre of the Road

Becoming a Catholic broadens the mind. It especially broadens the mind about the reasons for becoming a Catholic. Standing in the centre where all roads meet, a man can look down each of the roads in turn and realise that they come from all points of the heavens. As long as he is still marching along his own road, that is the only road that can be seen, or sometimes even imagined. For instance, many a man who is not yet a Catholic calls himself a Mediaevalist. But a man who is only a Mediaevalist is very much broadened by becoming a Catholic. I am myself a Mediaevalist, in the sense that I think modern life has a great deal to learn from mediaeval life; that Guilds are a better social system than Capitalism; that friars are far less offensive than philanthropists. But I am a much more reasonable and moderate Mediaevalist than I was when I was only a Mediaevalist. For instance, I felt it necessary to be perpetually pitting Gothic architecture against Greek architecture, because it was necessary to back up Christians against pagans. But now I am in no such fuss and I know what Coventry Patmore meant when he said calmly that it would have been quite as Catholic to decorate his mantelpiece with the Venus of Milo as with the Virgin. As a Mediaevalist I am still proudest of the Gothic; but as a Catholic I am proud of the Baroque. That intensity which seems almost narrow because it comes to the point, like a mediaeval window, is very representative of that last concentration that comes just before conversion. At the last moment of all, the convert often feels as if he were looking through a leper's window. He is looking through a little crack or crooked hole that seems to grow smaller as he stares at it; but it is an opening that looks towards the Altar. Only, when he has entered the Church, he finds that the Church is much larger inside than it is outside. He has left behind him the lop-sidedness of lepers' windows and even in a sense the narrowness of Gothic doors; and he is under vast domes as open as the Renaissance and as universal as the Republic of the world. He can say in a sense unknown to all modern men certain ancient and serene words: Romanus civis sum; I am not a slave.


G.K. Chesterton

Lancelot Andrewes: The Seed of Anglicanorum Coetibus?

I cannot help but think that early C17 thinkers, like Andrewes, are the seeds of what the Holy Father is offering today that could potentially see them reunited to the Catholic Church. One of the most controversial positions of Luther was his outright rejection of the Mass as any sort of a propitiatory offering for the living or the dead. Andrewes, clearly in his own writings and debates, held to the Catholic Church's teaching throughout her history on this position. Why would I say that Andrewes is the 'seed' of Anglicanorum Coetibus? From an earlier post on the blog I write:

Andrewes is quite aware of the C16 debate and rejection of the sacrifice of the Mass. It is his scholarship as a patristic theologian that allowed him to see that the English Church was advancing into novelty by rejecting what he believed the Church held in its undivided history concerning Eucharistic sacrifice. In order to place Andrewes’ teaching on Eucharistic sacrifice in context, it is essential that we understand what the Council of Trent determined as the Catholic Church’s teaching on the sacrifice of the Mass. Andrewes pressed the Roman Catholic theologians of his day (St Cardinal Bellarmine SJ) that they could not read the Tridentine understanding anachronistically into the Fathers. Yet what one finds in a close examination of Andrewes’ theology of sacrifice, relying as he does on the Fathers, is not in many ways contradictory to Trent’s decrees. It is in the finer details of the ‘effects’ provided by the Mass and the ‘manner’ of sacrifice in relationship to what Andrewes defined as a ‘natural’ sacrifice, i.e., ‘re-offering’ of Christ in each Mass where he suffers ‘anew’ that becomes the underlying issue.

There were a number of groups present at Trent that focused on different aspects of the sacrifice and how it was related to the cross. Powers separates these groups into three basic categories. He explains that the apologists related the sacrifice in these ways:

One group related it more directly to the Last Supper, or to the offering which Christ made of himself at the supper, before suffering on the cross. For them, it was this offering that was sacramentally represented in the mass, but because of the real presence it could be said that it was the victim of the sacrifice of the cross that was offered. For another group, it was the offering on the cross itself that was mystically represented on the altar through the action of the priest, so that consecration and offering coincided. For still a third group, it was the heavenly offering of Christ, the eternal high-priest, that was sacramentally represented, that continuous offering which he makes of himself to the Father, in virtue of the once-for-all spilling of his blood on the cross. For the majority of the apologists, therefore, there is no sense in which an oblation or work of the church could be separated from the once-for-all sacrifice of Christ on the cross.

What is very important for us here is to see that in the debate at Trent in 1551/52 there was a tremendous amount of emphasis put on the unity of the sacrifice of the cross and the sacrifice of the Mass. The council set out to show how precisely the ‘effects’ of the cross were applied to the faithful. Rome laboured to protect its priestly offering and the Protestant churches worked to protect their free gift of grace. Hence, the two could not hear what the other was saying. McHugh concluded in his essay that what Trent required from a Catholic was they hold fast to the doctrine that in the Mass a sacrifice is offered. This sacrifice is more than ‘praise and thanksgiving’ and includes an expiation of sins and an abundant source of grace that profited not only the living but the dead. Therefore, this Eucharistic sacrifice is offered primarily by Christ himself and secondarily by the Church in union with him; it is Christ’s one offering of Calvary memorialised by the Church. Christ offers this in his intercessory role as eternal priest. The priest acts in union with Christ who brings the offering to the Father by the instrumental agency of the office. These sacrifices are not two separate offerings but one and the same, which is eternally before the Father in heaven. Where Trent and Andrewes are of one spirit is in the sacrifice of the Mass consisting of the formal liturgical offering given to God (immolatio) as gift and accepted by him for the forgiveness of sins actually committed.

For the desired result of unity, there must be a way for the Church to keep together the ‘propitiatory offering’ and ‘the free gift of grace’ at the centre of the whole worshipping experience. The problem of Eucharistic sacrifice is tied up in the liturgical act of the Church. The main problem stems from multiplicity of views concerning what the Church ‘does’ when it is gathered together. The affirmation, which must first of all be recognised is that neither Rome's nor the reformer's views are in opposition to the gospel, though they may be in opposition to one another. And Rome and the reformers may not necessarily be directly opposed. The uniqueness of what Andrewes was able to accomplish was the ability to see this dilemma in the liturgical act of the Church and respond to an over-correction given by the C16 by not denying the substance of sacrifice. He understood the necessity of holding the liturgical act of ‘praise and thanksgiving’ along with the expiatory qualities of the one offering of Christ united in the Eucharistic offering as a way of maintaining a fuller sense of the gospel.

The majority of the Tridentine fathers showed themselves to be reluctant to excessive definition on issues pertaining to sacrifice. One such open issue was the efficacy for the dead in the sacrifice of the Mass; it was stated but not defined. Trent accommodated a variety of views on many points, even notions like ‘sacraments cause grace’ and allowed for a variety of theories on the nature of this ‘causation.’ This is due to the variety of opinions amongst the council fathers. Some Cardinals were positive towards a number of concerns the reformers had and it is this acknowledgment that allows one to see how closely Andrewes’ theology of Eucharistic sacrifice answers the concerns of the council.

Read Andrewes' theology of sacrifice alongside Pope John Paul II's encyclical and one sees how the seed grew to close the gap of this very important theological/liturgical dogma. The late Holy Father said,

The Church constantly draws her life from the redeeming sacrifice; she approaches it not only through faith-filled remembrance, but also through a real contact, since this sacrifice is made present ever anew, sacramentally perpetuated, in every community which offers it at the hands of the consecrated minister. The Eucharist thus applies to men and women today the reconciliation won once for all by Christ for mankind in every age. “The sacrifice of Christ and the sacrifice of the Eucharist are one single sacrifice”.¹⁴ Saint John Chrysostom put it well: “We always offer the same Lamb, not one today and another tomorrow, but always the same one. For this reason the sacrifice is always only one... Even now we offer that victim who was once offered and who will never be consumed”.¹⁵

The Mass makes present the sacrifice of the Cross; it does not add to that sacrifice nor does it multiply it.¹⁶ What is repeated is its memorial celebration, its “commemorative representation” (memorialis demonstratio),¹⁷ which makes Christ's one, definitive redemptive sacrifice always present in time. The sacrificial nature of the Eucharistic mystery cannot therefore be understood as something separate, independent of the Cross or only indirectly referring to the sacrifice of Calvary.

13. By virtue of its close relationship to the sacrifice of Golgotha, the Eucharist is a sacrifice in the strict sense, and not only in a general way, as if it were simply a matter of Christ's offering himself to the faithful as their spiritual food. The gift of his love and obedience to the point of giving his life (cf. Jn 10:17-18) is in the first place a gift to his Father. Certainly it is a gift given for our sake, and indeed that of all humanity (cf. Mt 26:28; Mk 14:24; Lk 22:20; Jn 10:15), yet it is first and foremost a gift to the Father: “a sacrifice that the Father accepted, giving, in return for this total self-giving by his Son, who 'became obedient unto death' (Phil 2:8), his own paternal gift, that is to say the grant of new immortal life in the resurrection”.¹⁸

In giving his sacrifice to the Church, Christ has also made his own the spiritual sacrifice of the Church, which is called to offer herself in union with the sacrifice of Christ. This is the teaching of the Second Vatican Council concerning all the faithful: “Taking part in the Eucharistic Sacrifice, which is the source and summit of the whole Christian life, they offer the divine victim to God, and offer themselves along with it”.¹⁹

Andrewes' own theology would concur and hence what began as a seed as he returned to the Fathers is now the beginning of Spring and new Resurrection life for the Church. Benedict XVI is the Pope of Christian Unity and we can thank God for early C17 thinkers, like Andrewes, who help to open the door for a return of the prodigal family!

Russian Orthodox and Latin Catholics: Unity in Mission?

On the afternoon of Thursday, May 20, immediately before the concert given for Benedict XVI by the patriarchate of Moscow began in the audience hall, the president of the department of external relations for the patriarchate, Metropolitan Hilarion of Volokolamsk (in the photo), said exactly this to the pope: that the Catholic Church will not be alone in the new evangelization of dechristianized Europe, because it will have at its side the Russian Orthodox Church, "no longer a competitor, but an ally."

The positive relationship that has been established between the Russian Orthodox Church and the Church of Rome is one of the most stunning achievements of Benedict XVI's pontificate. It is also stunning for its rapidity. In fact, it's enough to look back just one decade to note the chill that dominated between the two Churches.

To a question from www.chiesa on the factors that led to this extraordinary change, Metropolitan Hilarion responded by indicating three of these.

The first factor, he said, is the person of the new pope. A pope who receives "the positive regard of the whole of the Russian Orthodox world," even though this is pervaded by age-old anti-Roman sentiments.

The second factor is the common view of the challenge posed to both Churches by the dechristianization of countries that in the past were the heart of Christendom.

And the third reason is their mutual embrace of the grand Christian tradition, as the great highway of the new evangelization.

To the question about a meeting – the first in history – between the heads of the two Churches of Rome and Moscow, Hilarion replied that "this is a desire, a hope, and we must work to make it happen." He added that a few obstacles will have to be smoothed over first, above all the disagreements between the two Churches in Ukraine, but he said that he is confident that the meeting will take place soon: "not between just any patriarch and pope, but between Patriarch Kirill and Pope Benedict."

Chiesa

Pope Benedict's Pentecost Homily

In the homily of the Holy Father, I will highlight some quotations in bold print to encourage discussion on those points for anyone interested.

Dear brothers and sisters,

In the solemn celebration of Pentecost we are invited to profess our faith in the presence and in the action of the Holy Spirit and to invoke his outpouring upon us, upon the Church and upon the whole world. Let us make our own, and with special intensity, the Church’s invocation: “Veni, Sancte Spiritus!”

It is such a simple and immediate invocation, but also extraordinarily profound, which came first of all from the heart of Christ. The Spirit, in fact, is the gift that Jesus asked and continually asks of his Father for his friends; the first and principal gift that he obtained for us through his Resurrection and Ascension in to heaven.

Today’s Gospel passage, which has the Last Supper as its context, speaks to us of this prayer of Christ. The Lord Jesus said to his disciples: “If you love me, follow my commandments; and I will pray to the Father and he will give you another Paraclete who will remain with you forever” (John 14:15-16).

Here the praying heart of Jesus is revealed to us, his filial and fraternal heart. This prayer reaches its apex and its fulfillment on the cross, where Christ’s invocation is one with the total gift that he makes of himself, and thus his prayer becomes, so to speak, the very seal of his self-giving for love of the Father and humanity: Invocation and donation of the Spirit meet, they interpenetrate, they become one reality. “And I will pray to the Father and he will give you another Paraclete who will remain with you forever.” In reality, Jesus’ prayer -- that of the Last Supper and the prayer on the cross -- is a single prayer that continues even in heaven, where Christ sits at the right hand of the Father. Jesus, in fact, always lives his priesthood of intercession on behalf of the people of God and humanity and so prays for all of us, asking the Father for the gift of the Holy Spirit.

The account of Pentecost in the Acts of the Apostles -- we listened to it in the first reading (Acts 2:1-11) -- presents the “new course” of the work that God began with Christ’s resurrection, a work that involves man, history and the cosmos. The Son of God, dead and risen and returned to the Father, now breathes with untold energy the divine breath upon humanity, the Holy Spirit. And what does this new and powerful self-communication of God produce? Where there are divisions and estrangement he creates unity and understanding. The Spirit triggers a process of reunification of the divided and dispersed parts of the human family; persons, often reduced to individuals in competition or in conflict with each other, reached by the Spirit of Christ, open themselves to the experience of communion, can involve them to such an extent as to make of them a new organism, a new subject: the Church. [Think about the welcoming spirit of this Pope to those separated from the Catholic Church but desire reunion.] This is the effect of God’s work: unity; thus unity is the sign of recognition, the “business card” of the Church in the course of her universal history. From the very beginning, from the day of Pentecost, she speaks all languages. The universal Church precedes the particular Churches, and the latter must always conform to the former according to a criterion of unity and universality. The Church never remains a prisoner within political, racial and cultural confines; she cannot be confused with states not with federations of states, because her unity is of a different type and aspires to transcend every human frontier.

From this, dear brothers, there derives a practical criterion of discernment for Christian life: When a person or a community, limits itself to its own way of thinking and acting, it is a sign that it has distanced itself from the Holy Spirit. The path of Christians and of the particular Churches must always confront itself with the path of the one and catholic Church, and harmonize with it. [That is the money quote! What was it he once said when he was at the CDF: "Error has no rights!"] This does not mean that the unity created by the Holy Spirit is a kind of homogenization. On the contrary, that is rather the model of Babel, that is, the imposition of a culture of unity that we could call “technological.” The Bible, in fact, tells us (cf. Genesis 11:1-9) that in Babel everyone spoke the same language. At Pentecost, however, the Apostles speak different languages in such a way that everyone understands the message in his own tongue. The unity of the Spirit is manifested in the plurality of understanding. The Church is one and multiple by her nature, destined as she is to live among all nations, all peoples, and in the most diverse social contexts. She responds to her vocation to be a sign and instrument of unity of the human race (cf. “Lumen Gentium,” 1) only if she remains free from every state and every particular culture. Always and in every place the Church must truly be catholic and universal, the house of all in which each one can find a place.

The account of the Acts of the Apostles offers us another very concrete indication. The universality of the Church is expressed by the list of peoples according to the ancient tradition: “We are Parthians, Medes, Elamites …,” etc. One may note that St. Luke goes beyond the number 12, which always expresses a universality. He looks beyond the horizons of Asia and northwest Africa, and adds three other elements: the “Romans,” that is, the western world; the “Jews and proselytes,” encompass in a new way the unity between Israel and the world; and finally “Cretans and Arabs,” who represent the West and the East, islands and land. This opening of horizons subsequently confirms the newness of Christ in the human space, in the history of the nations: The Holy Spirit involves men and peoples and, through them, it overcomes walls and barriers.

At Pentecost the Holy Spirit manifests himself as fire. His flame descended upon the assembled disciples, it was enkindled in them and gave them the new ardor of God. In this way what Jesus had previously said was realized: “I have come to cast fire upon the earth, and how I long that it already be burning!” (Luke 12:49). The Apostles, together with the faithful of different communities, carried this divine flame to the far corners of the earth; in this way they opened a path for humanity, a luminous path, and they worked with God, who wants to renew the face of the earth with his fire. How different this fire is from that of wars and bombs! How different is the fire of Christ, spread by the Church, compared with those lit by the dictators of every epoch, of last century too, who leave a scorched earth behind them. The fire of God, the fire of the Holy Spirit, is that of the bush that burned without being consumed (cf. Exodus 3:2). It is a flame that burns but does not destroy, that, in burning, brings forth the better and truer part of man, as in a fusion it makes his interior form emerge, his vocation to truth and to love.

A Father of the Church, Origen, in one of his homilies on Jeremiah, reports a saying attributed to Jesus, not contained in the sacred Scriptures but perhaps authentic, which he puts thus: “Whoever is near me, is near the fire” (“Homilies on Jeremiah,” L. I [III]). In Christ, in fact, there is the fullness of God, who in the Bible is compared to fire. We just observed that the flame of the Holy Spirit burns but does not destroy. And nevertheless it causes a transformation, and it must for this reason consume something in man, the waste that corrupts him and hinders his relations with God and neighbor.

This effect of the divine fire, however, frightens us, we are afraid of being “burned,” we prefer to stay just as we are. This is because our life is often formed according to the logic of having, of possessing and not the logic of self-giving. Many people believe in God and admire the person of Jesus Christ, but when they are asked to lose something of themselves, then they retreat, they are afraid of the demands of faith. There is the fear of giving up something nice to which we are attached; the fear that following Christ deprives us of freedom, of certain experiences, of a part of ourselves. On one hand, we want to be with Jesus, follow him closely, and, on the other hand, we are afraid of the consequences that this brings with it.

Dear brothers and sisters, we always need to hear the Lord Jesus tell us what he often repeated to his friends: “Be not afraid.” Like Simon Peter and the others we must allow his presence and his grace to transform our heart, which is always subject to human weakness. We must know how to recognize that losing something, indeed, losing ourselves for the true God, the God of love and of life, is in reality gaining ourselves, finding ourselves more fully. Whoever entrusts himself to Jesus already experiences in this life peace and joy of heart, which the world cannot give, and it cannot even take it away once God has given it to us. [This is the grace of conversion that is written about below. Here is a word to any who may have fears of making the leap of faith to leave Protestantism and become Catholic. In losing we gain!]

So it is worthwhile to let ourselves be touched by the fire of the Holy Spirit! The suffering that it causes us is necessary for our transformation. It is the reality of the cross: It is not for nothing that in the language of Jesus “fire” is above all a representation of the cross, without which Christianity does not exist.

Thus enlightened and comforted by these words of life, let us lift up our invocation: Come, Holy Spirit! Enkindle in us the fire of your love! We know that this is a bold prayer, with which we ask to be touched by the flame of God; but we know above all that this flame -- and only it -- has the power to save us. We do not want, in defending our life, to lose the eternal life that God wants to give us. We need the fire of the Holy Spirit, because only Love redeems. Amen.

[Translation by Joseph G. Trabbic]

Posted at Zenith.

Prayer for a Music Teaching Position for Rhea, My Wife

Rhea has been filling out numerous applications for teaching positions in London. Most of them have not been within Catholic schools for lack of openings. Her heart's desire is to be able to teach in a local Catholic school in London beginning this September. If all the readers could please pray that Rhea would find the place where God wants her to be, where she can have a strong witness for Christ and the Church in addition to teaching young people music, it would be greatly appreciated. Thank you in advance for your prayers and if any readers know of anything, please do not hesitate to let me know in a comment or email. She is a qualified teacher in America but needs Oversees Training Qualifications in the UK still. This is easily done on the job...

Rhea's degree is in Music Education and performance on the clarinet. She can teach all instruments at a basic level and has taught young people up to grade 8 here in the UK. She presently teaches music for a Music Service as a peripatetic teacher.

With much thanks!

The Holy Father on Pentecost: Quote of the Day

When a person or a community, limits itself to its own way of thinking and acting, it is a sign that it has distanced itself from the Holy Spirit. The path of Christians and of the particular Churches must always confront itself with the path of the one and catholic Church, and harmonize with it.

Litaniae Sanctorum

Veni Creator Spiritus

Archbishop Vicent Nichols on Pope Benedict XVI's Visit

'The visit of Pope Benedict to the United Kingdom in September is remarkably historic. It is the first ever State visit by a Pope; the first ever Beatification to take place in this country; Cardinal Newman is the first English ‘confessor of the faith’ to be beatified in over 600 years. These startling perspectives help us to appreciate not only the importance of this visit for our history but also for our future. This visit spells out, in a borrowed phrase, ‘the future of our past’!

When Pope John Paul came to Britain in 1982, he came as the chief Pastor of the Catholic Church, to visit the Catholic community here, to celebrate the Sacraments and to confirm and strengthen our faith.

This visit of Pope Benedict is quite different. He is the guest of our Queen and Government. The first images we will see will be his greeting Her Majesty, her welcome to him and his visit to the people of these nations.

Pope Benedict comes with the delicate task of presenting to our society, in his reasoned and elegant manner, the crucial importance for our world of faith in God and the enrichment it brings. This is a mighty and sensitive task, especially given some of the social tensions and raised voices with which we are familiar today. It is so important that we give him our wholehearted and unstinting support.

We might set out thinking that the Pope has come to see us, the Catholic community. But his principal aim is not exactly that. Rather he has come to offer to our society a witness to the Christian Gospel as a message of hope and love, as a firm and reliable basis for modern living. So our role is to support the Holy Father in his most difficult tasks. We have to get right behind him. The witness of our actions and of our lives must give visible credibility to the message he offers to all.

We can support the Pope in so many different ways. We can pray for him. We can promote the vision and importance of his visit. We can make contact with all our friends and colleagues to help them to see the importance and the possibilities of this moment. We can help to meet the costs of the visit, and the cost of a constructive follow-up.

How will the Pope go about this task?

He will affirm so much of our great heritage and tradition: that of our civil society, its tolerance and robust democracy, and that of our Christian faith, in our culture, our music, and our religious traditions.

He will encourage us in the efforts we are making to be a society which is compassionate, which is committed to justice and which is generous to those most in need.

He will engage in thoughtful discourse, inviting dialogue among us: on the key themes of the work of education; on the importance of sound and lasting values in society, based on an insightful understanding of our human nature; on the role of religious faith and reason in society, in our legal system, in political life.

He will beatify Cardinal John Henry Newman, who will, therefore, occupy a crucial place in the profile of this visit. Cardinal Newman is a man who has a very special place in English cultural history, being such a clear and subtle exponent of the Christian and Catholic faith in literature, poetry, scholarship, debate and service of those in need. And for thirty years Cardinal Newman was a parish priest, much loved by his people as are so many priests today.

He will pray with us and invite us to prayer. Perhaps this is most important of all. He will remind us that we are all spiritual beings; that we are so much more than the sum total of our material achievements; that we are drawn to love and to beauty; that there is a capacity within every person for the things of the spirit, the things of God. In London, for example, on the evening of Saturday 18 September, the Pope will take part in a Vigil of Prayer. In the context of one of the world’s great cities, there will be a place and space of prayer, of silence, and of praise of God. What a moment that will be!

There is no doubt that we are entering into a time of economic austerity. At such times, the quality of relationships between all people becomes so much more central to our shared well-being. This will be the context in which the Pope speaks to us. He will help us to remember that faith in God, that the Christian faith is a major factor in creating and sustaining good-will, compassion, generosity and the spirit of the service of others. This is one of the important roles of faith in our world today. And Pope Benedict is an eloquent and humble proponent of it.

Three major events

Every moment of the visit will be available as an on-line broadcast. Much will be on television. There will be three major outdoor events: one in Scotland, one in London and one in Coventry. Over 400,000 people will be able to be present at these events, following arrangements that will be announced before too long. These are the ways in which we can all participate in this short but intense visit.

I ask you to support this visit generously with your prayers and with your donations. There are considerable costs yet nearly half of them have already been met. But we need every Catholic to play a part. I thank you for your generosity.

Now we prepare in earnest to welcome Pope Benedict on this historic visit. We offer him our full support in this great endeavour. Let us all be protagonists of his historic visit to Britain this September.'

Diocese of Westminster

The Grace Needed For Conversion to the Catholic Church

As one who, by default, thought about conversion to Catholicism from an Anglo-catholic position in an objective apologetical sort of way, via the intellect, I am now convinced that all the great arguments for conversion for me boiled down to one theological ingredient; GRACE. The grace of conversion is coming to grips with one's conscience. Meeting the grace of God, who is rich in goodness and love, allows us to see that we are no longer capable of hiding behind the real fears of making serious breaks in our lives. The GRACE needed in conversion is the grace of the illumined light radiating in our hearts, allowing us to come to terms with who we are and where we need to be. In the face of Jesus, the grace of God has appeared to all and it is in that grace that we are moved to make the decisions we know our conscience is telling us to make. Deep within our hearts God speaks to us and calls us to live out what we know to be true. We cannot always bring everyone we love along with us but when the grace of conversion comes, we act on the illumined love of Christ.

Sometimes it takes time for us to accept this grace. When our dignity and rights are trampled on, when we are not getting what we believe is our fair share, wherever we feel exploited and taken for granted, the grace of conversion calls us to move towards truth and love. I discovered that when I was looking out only for my self-interest, my ecclesial world seemed to be falling apart. I desperately needed the grace of conversion. I needed that prompting of the Holy Spirit to move me in the direction I knew God was calling me. I recall the voice of a Catholic bishop saying to me, 'do not be afraid.' That voice was the voice of Jesus saying, 'Do not be afraid: I have come to bring you the love of the Father, and to show you the way of peace.' The way of peace came when I acted upon the conscience within and the somewhat reluctant step of faith of trying not to be afraid. The grace given in conversion is that added gift that enables us to overcome fear with faith and move towards the light and truth of Christ. The grace of conversion moves us to seek Jesus, to be drawn to his light that dispels the darkness of self-interests and fear from the human heart. The grace of conversion allows us to bow down in humility and adore the Lord in the confidence of his love for us. The grace of conversion allows us not to find "excuses" and "reasons" to move but is simply the quiet movement of the heart to embrace what we know must be if we are to be true to ourselves and to God.

May God give us the grace needed for further conversions in our lives!

What the Holy Father Said in Portugal

"From a wise vision of life and of the world, the just ordering of society follows. Situated within history, the Church is open to cooperating with anyone who does not marginalize or reduce to the private sphere the essential consideration of the human meaning of life. The point at issue is not an ethical confrontation between a secular and a religious system, so much as a question about the meaning that we give to our freedom. What matters is the value attributed to the problem of meaning and its implication in public life. By separating Church and State, the Republican revolution which took place 100 years ago in Portugal, opened up a new area of freedom for the Church, to which the two concordats of 1940 and 2004 would give shape, in cultural settings and ecclesial perspectives profoundly marked by rapid change. For the most part, the sufferings caused by these transformations have been faced with courage. Living amid a plurality of value systems and ethical outlooks requires a journey to the core of one’s being and to the nucleus of Christianity so as to reinforce the quality of one’s witness to the point of sanctity, and to find mission paths that lead even to the radical choice of martyrdom."

On the plane the HF said, "This we have always known, but today we see it in a really terrifying way, that the greatest persecution of the church does not come from the enemies outside but is born from the sin in the church. The church has a profound need to relearn penance, to accept purification, to learn on the one hand forgiveness but also the necessity of justice. And forgiveness does not substitute justice."

"The services you provide, and your educational and charitable activities, must all be crowned by projects of freedom whose goal is human promotion and universal fraternity. Here we can locate the urgent commitment of Christians in defence of human rights, with concern for the totality of the human person in its various dimensions. I express my deep appreciation for all those social and pastoral initiatives aimed at combating the socio-economic and cultural mechanisms which lead to abortion, and are openly concerned to defend life and to promote the reconciliation and healing of those harmed by the tragedy of abortion. Initiatives aimed at protecting the essential and primary values of life, beginning at conception, and of the family based on the indissoluble marriage between a man and a woman,help to respond to some of today’s most insidious and dangerous threats to the common good. Such initiatives represent, alongside numerous other forms of commitment, essential elements in the building of the civilization of love."

Figura transit in veritatem: Benedict XVI

11. Jesus thus brings his own radical novum to the ancient Hebrew sacrificial meal. For us Christians, that meal no longer need be repeated. As the Church Fathers rightly say, figura transit in veritatem: the foreshadowing has given way to the truth itself. The ancient rite has been brought to fulfilment and definitively surpassed by the loving gift of the incarnate Son of God. The food of truth, Christ sacrificed for our sake, dat figuris terminum. (20) By his command to "do this in remembrance of me" (Lk 22:19; 1 Cor 11:25), he asks us to respond to his gift and to make it sacramentally present. In these words the Lord expresses, as it were, his expectation that the Church, born of his sacrifice, will receive this gift, developing under the guidance of the Holy Spirit the liturgical form of the sacrament. The remembrance of his perfect gift consists not in the mere repetition of the Last Supper, but in the Eucharist itself, that is, in the radical newness of Christian worship. In this way, Jesus left us the task of entering into his "hour." "The Eucharist draws us into Jesus' act of self-oblation. More than just statically receiving the incarnate Logos, we enter into the very dynamic of his self-giving." (21) Jesus "draws us into himself." (22) The substantial conversion of bread and wine into his body and blood introduces within creation the principle of a radical change, a sort of "nuclear fission," to use an image familiar to us today, which penetrates to the heart of all being, a change meant to set off a process which transforms reality, a process leading ultimately to the transfiguration of the entire world, to the point where God will be all in all (cf. 1 Cor 15:28).

Sacramentum Caritatis

The Hundred Gates of Conversion to One Catholic Church: Seeking or Saving?

The Church is a house with a hundred gates; and no two men enter at exactly the same angle. Mine was at least as much Agnostic as Anglican, though I accepted for a time the borderland of Anglicanism; but only on the assumption that it could really be Anglo-Catholicism. There is a distinction of ultimate intention there which in the vague English atmosphere is often missed. It is not a difference of degree but of definite aim. There are High Churchmen as much as Low Churchmen who are concerned first and last to save the Church of England. Some of them think it can be saved by calling it Catholic, or making it Catholic, or believing that it is Catholic; but that is what they want to save. But I did not start out with the idea of saving the English Church, but of finding the Catholic Church.

If the two were one, so much the better; but I had never conceived of Catholicism as a sort of showy attribute or attraction to be tacked on to my own national body, but as the inmost soul of the true body, wherever it might be. It might be said that Anglo-Catholicism was simply my own uncompleted conversion to Catholicism. But it was from a position originally much more detached and indefinite that I had been converted, an atmosphere if not agnostic at least pantheistic or unitarian. To this I owe the fact that I find it very difficult to take some of the Protestant propositions even seriously. What is any man who has been in the real outer world, for instance, to make of the everlasting cry that Catholic traditions are condemned by the Bible? It indicates a jumble of topsy-turvy tests and tail-foremost arguments, of which I never could at any time see the sense. The ordinary sensible sceptic or pagan is standing in the street (in the supreme character of the man in the street) and he sees a procession go by of the priests of some strange cult, carrying their object of worship under a canopy, some of them wearing high head-dresses and carrying symbolical staffs, others carrying scrolls and sacred records, others carrying sacred images and lighted candles before them, others sacred relics in caskets or cases, and so on.

G. K. Chesterton

Quotation of the Day

"One who neither acts nor suffers learns nothing. But one who neither thinks nor learns can produce no facts in which knowledge and meaning have their dwelling. It is certain, therefore, that nothing fruitful can be expected where the question of the ecclesial community is separated from the question of a community of truth and is replaced by the autonomous production of facts." --Pope Benedict XVI Principles of Catholic Theology

Thinking About Conscience in Moral Theology

In a recent post by Fr. Tim Finigan at The Hermeneutic of Continuity he takes on the recent article in the Times concerning Newman's road to beatification. This post got me thinking about the primacy of prudence for a virtuous choice. This becomes very practical when thinking about conscience. Some think that conscience is the final arbiter of a good moral choice but conscience is not infallible and according to the Church needs conversion and cannot go against what the Church teaches on moral issues. I think Romanus Cessario, O.P. helps us to think about the tension between subjective conscience and objective law. This is where the rub often meets for people who use their 'conscience' as a guide against the objective teaching of the Church. He writes,

The cardinal virtue of prudence provides, as it were, the locus, for concrete moral decision-making; its proper exercise ensures that our decisions lead to what alone can satisfy a human nature created in the imago Dei. By placing prudence at the centre of moral practice, realist moral theology avoids the anxieties that certain moral theologians cause both themselves and others by accepting a fundamental tension between subjective conscience and objective law. Aquinas, however, recognises the irreducibility of all forms of sheer moral knowledge which, even when elaborated in highly refined moral theories, remain incapable of moving into order of execution or real action. The view that conscience by itself provides the faculty for translating moral knowledge into actual practice also runs counter to the evidentiary fact that, sometimes even over a long period of time, people act against their deepest instincts of conscience.

This is why Aquinas would quote from Corinthians that 'The unspiritual man does not receive the gifts of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned.' This prudence is imparted to us helps us to take moral wisdom and move it to practical action. Aquinas said that 'prudence directs the moral virtues not only in the choice of the means, but also in appointing the end.' The objective law in a realist moral theology does not find it a burden. Conscience is formed and imputed with prudence and therefore the conscience is shaped by love and life in the Spirit. This is how JP II put it in his encyclical Veritatis Splendor.

Those who live "by the flesh" experience God's law as a burden, and indeed as a denial or at least a restriction of their own freedom. On the other hand, those who are impelled by love and "walk by the Spirit" (Gal 5:16), and who desire to serve others, find in God's Law the fundamental and necessary way in which to practise love as something freely chosen and freely lived out. Indeed, they feel an interior urge — a genuine "necessity" and no longer a form of coercion — not to stop at the minimum demands of the Law, but to live them in their "fullness". This is a still uncertain and fragile journey as long as we are on earth, but it is one made possible by grace, which enables us to possess the full freedom of the children of God (cf. Rom 8:21) and thus to live our moral life in a way worthy of our sublime vocation as "sons in the Son".

Prayer for the Pope's Visit to GB: Give Generously

Prayer cards for the visit are being distributed to all parishioners attending Mass on Pentecost Sunday.

Collections will be held to assist in meeting the costs of the visit payable by the Church, which are currently estimated to be at least £7m. Over £3m has already been raised towards this total.

Archbishop Vincent Nichols, Archbishop of Westminster, said “I would urge everyone in the Catholic community to pray for this visit and to support the collection for it as generously as they can.”

“The Holy Father’s visit is a wonderful opportunity for the gentle light of faith to be contemplated afresh by everyone. He will confirm the strong faith of our own community.”

“But my prayer, too, is that the visit will serve to kindle a new spiritual vitality, a questioning of the heart for many in our society who may have no religious affiliation but who are in some way seeking a deeper meaning and purpose to their lives.“

The costs associated with the state aspects of the visit will be paid by the government. The costs payable by the church consist mainly in the organising costs of three major public pastoral gatherings – in Scotland, London and the West Midlands.

The prayer card that will be distributed on Pentecost Sunday is available to download at the bottom of this page.

Archbishop Vincent Nichols has also discussed the papal visit at a Mass and Lecture to mark the 2010 World Communications Day on 4 May 2010. He said: “The last visit of a Pope was the chief pastor of the Catholic Church coming to visit the Catholic community to celebrate its sacraments and strengthen them in faith. This is quite different.”

Never been seen before

“The first images of this visit will be the Queen and Pope Benedict. This has never been seen before, so it is a continuation, if you like, of that healing of an ancient tension.”

“And here, the Pope is invited by the monarch to address the people. He is a Pope with a vision that is so deeply rooted in a clear inspired understanding of humanity that he will know how to speak to a European capital city - a world capital city - in which so many different influences are found, so many different faiths ebb and flow, and so much misunderstanding exists about the possibilities around religious belief. So this visit is being planned and can be unpacked in a way quite different from the last and a way that can engage people.”

An inspiring and inclusive visit

“From some points of view, you find this a bit surprising... But here’s the Pope and he’s here Thursday, Friday, Saturday and a bit of Sunday. One of those days - Friday - he will not celebrate Mass publicly.”

“You think - ‘well popes celebrate Mass’! He will not celebrate Mass publicly on Friday because the Friday of the programme is a day in which he reaches out and wants to be inclusive.”

Interfaith, leadership and dialogue

“So there’s the educational aspect in the morning and then a vitally important interfaith initiative which actually will be focused on leadership in the community, not so much on interfaith dialogue, but how does faith energise these leaders in our society?”

“And that’s what the Catholic Church wants to be seen to do, to bring leaders who are inspired by faith together to explore that dynamic between leadership maybe in the City, in industry, in the health service and wherever it might be; that leadership with the inspiration of faith.”

Historic address

“And then he’ll speak from Westminster Hall in possibly the most important address of the whole visit. In that historic setting, which captures so much of the history of this country, which poignantly is the place where Thomas More was condemned to death, he will address civic society, and I’m quite sure will start at the point at which everybody can enter.

“He will encourage, he’ll invite, he will try to cast a bit of light - but it will not be a proselytising act at all. And then from there he goes to Westminster Abbey, another unbelievably iconic place where you’ve got the two Queens, and he will visit those tombs and stop at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier.

“There will be prayer in the middle of this day in which he’s reaching out right across our society. And then on Saturday it becomes a bit more centred on the Catholic community as he celebrates Mass in Westminster Cathedral and then we hope an open-air evening Vigil of prayer before the Beatification [of Cardinal John Henry Newman at Coventry Airport] on the Sunday.”

Diocese of Westminster

Politics and Caritas in Veritate

One can become aware of many things about the emotional involvement of people when discussing political matters. Sometimes, and we should not be surprised, it can bring out the most unsanctified in people. As we begin to swim in new waters today in the UK with a new Prime Minister and government, I think it would do us good to remember the opening of Pope Benedict's encyclical. I have come up against the misconstrued and empty meaning of love and truth as a result of the recent elections and I would imagine others have as well. Logic often does not have first order when discussing political issues and social doctrine of the Church can be twisted to match a particular "party" that is not helpful. So, when we discuss what is going on in our new government let us be aware of the heart of the matter and the matter of the heart. The Holy Father has rightly said,

I am aware of the ways in which charity has been and continues to be misconstrued and emptied of meaning, with the consequent risk of being misinterpreted, detached from ethical living and, in any event, undervalued. In the social, juridical, cultural, political and economic fields — the contexts, in other words, that are most exposed to this danger — it is easily dismissed as irrelevant for interpreting and giving direction to moral responsibility. Hence the need to link charity with truth not only in the sequence, pointed out by Saint Paul, of veritas in caritate (Eph 4:15), but also in the inverse and complementary sequence of caritas in veritate. Truth needs to be sought, found and expressed within the “economy” of charity, but charity in its turn needs to be understood, confirmed and practised in the light of truth. In this way, not only do we do a service to charity enlightened by truth, but we also help give credibility to truth, demonstrating its persuasive and authenticating power in the practical setting of social living. This is a matter of no small account today, in a social and cultural context which relativizes truth, often paying little heed to it and showing increasing reluctance to acknowledge its existence.

3. Through this close link with truth, charity can be recognized as an authentic expression of humanity and as an element of fundamental importance in human relations, including those of a public nature. Only in truth does charity shine forth, only in truth can charity be authentically lived. Truth is the light that gives meaning and value to charity. That light is both the light of reason and the light of faith, through which the intellect attains to the natural and supernatural truth of charity: it grasps its meaning as gift, acceptance, and communion. Without truth, charity degenerates into sentimentality. Love becomes an empty shell, to be filled in an arbitrary way. In a culture without truth, this is the fatal risk facing love. It falls prey to contingent subjective emotions and opinions, the word “love” is abused and distorted, to the point where it comes to mean the opposite. Truth frees charity from the constraints of an emotionalism that deprives it of relational and social content, and of a fideism that deprives it of human and universal breathing-space. In the truth, charity reflects the personal yet public dimension of faith in the God of the Bible, who is both Agápe and Lógos: Charity and Truth, Love and Word.

Women priests? A Marian Church in a fatherless and motherless culture, by von Balthasar

The proposal of women priests and bishops is not an Anglican question alone. The Catholic Church has proponents who talk of wanting the Church to "catch up to the times and embrace equality and not sexism." Asking the question of "why women cannot be priest is a fair question to ask." It should be asked and solid theological and traditional answers should be offered to the curious. I have found it an interesting discussion with those who want to move in the direction that Protestants in the C of E, for instance have moved, in ordaining women priests and what looks like to be quite soon for the C of E, women bishops. What has been interesting is bringing the discussion to the heart of its theological platform in the area of sacraments and learning that so many have never really thought about the "form" and "matter" question of sacramental symbolism. This point is worthy of a blog entry on its own.

von Balthasar has a very interesting article which the reader will find as the title of this entry. I find his points helpful and I am certain other readers will as well. As I have told a classroom of students, the Church does not base its vocational call to the priesthood on one's ability alone but on the theology of Sacrament and Symbol to communicate the reality of God's grace to his people in the assurance that they are receiving what is indeed promised. von Bathasar adds more insightful comments to the question below. The entire article can be found here.

A woman who would aspire to this office would be aspiring to specifically masculine functions, while forgetting the precedence of the feminine aspect of the Church over the masculine. With this ecclesial feminism we again arrive at the sphere of what we described in the first section, in which the woman, through a tragic misunderstanding, reaches for what is specifically masculine; except that now it is considerably easier to rectify. The right balance need not be arduously sought, for it is already present in the essence of the Church. In order to perceive this, of course, one must have an eye for the fundamental Marian dimension of the Church, the eye possessed by the Church Fathers, the Middle Ages and even the Baroque period and lost only by us--during the period of the rationalistic Enlightenment.

The title "Mother of the Church" represents an attempt to recapture something of the awareness belonging to Christianity for nearly two thousand years. But in this awareness, "Mother" and "Church" were even more closely joined: in the image of the "mantle of grace" for instance, the Church's prototype and the universal Church living within her ambit flow into one another. If one takes an unbiased stance, one has to marvel at how intensely this prototype, precisely in recent times, by means of active testimonies from heaven, has been offered to the world as a reminder and a point of reflection. From Catherine Labour to Bernadette at Lourdes, to Beauraing, Banneux and Fatima (to mention only important and recognized instances), the self-testimony of the Ecclesia immaculata is uninterrupted. She is not allowed to hide herself behind her Son in false humility; she comes uninhibitedly to the fore and manifests her nature: "I am the Immaculate Conception," she insists at Lourdes, and this in connection with the Rosary, which points clearly enough to the divine origin of the Son and of the entire Trinity. The masculine hierarchy was willing enough to recognize the messages of Lourdes and Fatima, and the numerous Marian encyclicals of the popes have underscored the rightful place of woman in the Church's inmost nature. Because of her unique structure, the Catholic Church is perhaps humanity's last bulwark, of -genuine appreciation of the difference between the sexes.

In the dogma of the Trinity, the Persons must be equal in dignity in order to safeguard the distinction that makes the triune God subsistent love; in a similar way the Church stresses the equal dignity of manand woman, so that the extreme oppositeness of their functions may guarantee the spiritual and physical fruitfulness of human nature. Every encroachment of one sex into the role of the other narrows the range and dynamics of humanly possible love, even when this range transcends the sphere of sexuality, birth and death and achieves the level of the virginal relationship between Christ and his Church, a relationship expressed not in isolated individual acts of specific organs, but in the total surrender of one's own being.

The Church's Marian dimension embraces the Petrine dimension, without claiming it as its own. Mary is "Queen of the Apostles" without claiming apostolic powers for herself. She possesses something else and something more. But modern man, who tries to make (machen) something out of every object, can only with difficulty distinguish authority (Vollmacht) such as Jesus bestows and power (macht). The two are, however, basically different. Ecclesial authority is a specific qualification for service to the community. It is appropriation as expropriation; leadership, but from the last place. One must, therefore, guard against exalting the service of the bishop and the priest to a quality fundamentally inaccessible to women.

Like all Christians, women possess this quality eminently in the "universal priesthood" of all the faithful, which allows and basically effects an offering and being-offered of all together with Christ. (In this connection, Cardinal Mercier sowed confusion by proclaiming that the diocesan clergy is the state of perfection.) "Power" is so often unobtrusively behind many contestations and movements, supposedly on behalf of justice, equality and so forth, that, precisely in the case of the theme under consideration here, extreme caution and the most precise discernment of spirits are necessary. Both sexes, each in its own way, aspire to "power" and use the most varied methods to gain it. Power is connected subterraneously with humanity's original sin and concupiscence and, naturally, also makes itself felt as a motive within the Church. It is by no means a prerogative of men.

Beyond 400,000 Visits

I woke up this morning to see that the blog counter has now gone over 400,000 visits. All I can say is thank you to all who take the time to read the blog and visit regularly. In comparison to a number of Catholic blogs out there 400,000 isn't much. But for this blog, that can be a bit dense in the material put forth, to have 400,000 is quite humbling really. So, THANK YOU to all who read de cura animarum. Please continue to visit and comment.

Eucharist and the "Danger of Memory"

The title to this post might seem a bit odd for the reader and give cause for a tightening of the eyebrows but let's have a brief look at what I mean by it. Within the Eucharist we have two sorts of memories taking place at the same time. One is the ritual memory and the other is the existential memory. The existential memory, that is living sacramentally, verifies the ritual memory of Jesus' death and resurrection. We find this clearly within Paul's writings when he discusses baptism and within John's writings at the foot-washing in his Gospel. Jesus is not merely giving us an example when he washes the feet of the disciples, through the Eucharistic gift of himself, he is really giving us the power to act as he did. He gives us the ability to verify the ritual on the altar. This is a gift that is given not simply an example.

The Church is maintained by mutual service to one another as well as worship. There is much liturgical reform discussion that goes on around the blogs presently and I believe this is right and important. But the Church is maintained not only by the renewal of the ritual but of the existential as well. For example, to wash the feet of one another is to live out the memory of Christ that is lived out ritually when the Sacrifice of the Mass is offered. It was Metz who said, 'It is precisely because the ritual memory sends us to the existential memory that the sacraments in general, and the Eucharist in particular, constitute a "dangerous memory."' I really like the way Chauvet has put it when he says,

It is dangerous for the Church and for each believer, not only because the sequela Christi ("following of Christ") leads everyone onto the crucifying path of liberation (as much economic as spiritual, collective as personal), but because this "following of Chirst" is "sacramentally" the location where Christ himself continues to carry out through those who invoke him the liberation for which he gave his life. The ritual story at each Eucharist, retelling why Jesus handed over his life, sends all Christians back to their responsibility to take charge of history in his name; and so they become his living memory in the world because he himself is "sacramentally" engaged in the body of humanity they work at building for him.

It seems to me that the above quotation gets to the heart of the eschatological movement in the Mass where we capture the existential memory of Christ that is the verification of what happened ritually on the altar. Ritual memory without the existential is an unverified memory of Jesus' death and resurrection. It seems to me that the gift of the ritual memory gives us, not only an example, but the power to existentially do as Jesus has done for us. That seems to me to be what the Gospel was about this Easter Sunday 5.

For each of us individually and corporately to become the living memory of Christ in the world is to act in the way Jesus acted ritually. When we connect the ritual and the existential memory we come to see the value of the Church for the world as Sacramentum. Liturgical/ritual reforms alone will not bring to the world what it needs. The reform of ritual memory and existential memory is the evangelisation of the world that verifies the power given to us by Jesus to act in the way that he acted.

Redemptoris Mater: The Inclusivity of Mediation

As we begin the Month of Mary today, I thought a brief post on mediation and her example of motherhood to the Church would be useful. The text below is from JP II's encyclical Redemptoris Mater. What is important for people to understand--especially Protestants who are confused by the Catholic Church's teaching on Marian Mediation--is that what some would define as the uniqueness of Christ is something that is not inclusive but exclusive to him alone. Though we all share in the belief that the uniqueness of Christ is essential to the basic doctrines of the Christian faith, Catholics believe that the mediation aspect of that uniqueness is inclusive and we participate in his uniqueness and mediation. This is because Jesus teaches us that no one believes alone and therefore we can all be mediators for one another with God in community. And so, we seek Mary's prayers for the Church at this time as we struggle with the frailty of human cooperation with God. From the encyclical:

It can be said that from Mary the Church also learns her own motherhood: she recognizes the maternal dimension of her vocation, which is essentially bound to her sacramental nature, in "contemplating Mary's mysterious sanctity, imitating her charity and faithfully fulfilling the Father's will."¹²⁴ If the Church is the sign and instrument of intimate union with God, she is so by reason of her motherhood, because, receiving life from the Spirit, she "generates" sons and daughters of the human race to a new life in Christ. For, just as Mary is at the service of the mystery of the Incarnation, so the Church is always at the service of the mystery of adoption to sonship through grace.

Likewise, following the example of Mary, the Church remains the virgin faithful to her spouse: The Church herself is a virgin who keeps whole and pure the fidelity she has pledged to her Spouse."¹²⁵ For the Church is the spouse of Christ, as is clear from the Pauline Letters (cf. Eph. 5:21-33; 2 Cor. 11:2), and from the title found in John: "bride of the Lamb" (Rev. 21:9). If the Church as spouse "keeps the fidelity she has pledged to Christ," this fidelity, even though in the Apostle's teaching it has become an image of marriage (cf. Eph. 5:23-33), also has value as a model of total self-giving to God in celibacy "for the kingdom of heaven," in virginity consecrated to God (cf. Mt. 19:11-12; 2 Cor. 11:2). Precisely such virginity, after the example of the Virgin of Nazareth, is the source of a special spiritual fruitfulness: it is the source of motherhood in the Holy Spirit.

But the Church also preserves the faith received from Christ. Following the example of Mary, who kept and pondered in her heart everything relating to her divine Son (cf. Lk. 2:19, 51), the Church is committed to preserving the word of God and investigating its riches with discernment and prudence, in order to bear faithful witness to it before all mankind in every age.¹²⁶

44. Given Mary's relationship to the Church as an exemplar, the Church is close to her and seeks to become like her: "Imitating the Mother of her Lord, and by the power of the Holy Spirit, she preserves with virginal purity an integral faith, a firm hope, and a sincere charity."¹²⁷ Mary is thus present in the mystery of the Church as a model. But the Church's mystery also consists in generating people to a new and immortal life: this is her motherhood in the Holy Spirit. And here Mary is not only the model and figure of the Church; she is much more. For, "with maternal love she cooperates in the birth and development" of the sons and daughters of Mother Church. The Church's motherhood is accomplished not only according to the model and figure of the Mother of God but also with her "cooperation." The Church draws abundantly from this cooperation, that is to say from the maternal mediation which is characteristic of Mary, insofar as already on earth she cooperated in the rebirth and development of the Church's sons and daughters, as the Mother of that Son whom the Father "placed as the first-born among many brethren."¹²⁸

She cooperated, as the Second Vatican Council teaches, with a maternal love.¹²⁹ Here we perceive the real value of the words spoken by Jesus to his Mother at the hour of the Cross: "Woman, behold your son" and to the disciple: "Behold your mother" (Jn. 19:26-27). They are words which determine Mary's place in the life of Christ's disciples and they express-as I have already said-the new motherhood of the Mother of the Redeemer: a spiritual motherhood, born from the heart of the Paschal Mystery of the Redeemer of the world. It is a motherhood in the order of grace, for it implores the gift of the Spirit, who raises up the new children of God, redeems through the sacrifice of Christ that Spirit whom Mary too, together with the Church, received on the day of Pentecost.

A Case Against Christian Faith: Let Us Understand!

Below is an article in the Telegraph that is very important for reading and discussion. Do we see what has happened in this case? This is written by the former Anglican Bishop of Rochester, The Rt. Rev Dr Michael Nazir -Ali. Let the readers understand!

Lord Justice Laws's judgment on the Gary McFarlane case in the Court of Appeal – that legislation for the protection of views held purely on religious ground cannot be justified – has driven a coach and horses through the ancient association of the Christian faith with the constitutional and legal basis of British society.

Everything from the Coronation Oath onwards suggests that there is an inextricable link between the Judaeo-Christian tradition of the Bible and the institutions, the values and the virtues of British society. If this judgment is allowed to stand, the aggressive secularists will have had their way.

It also raises a number of fundamental questions to which answers need to be provided. Will there be, once again, a religious bar to holding office? We have already had a rash of cases involving magistrates unable to serve on the bench because of their Christian beliefs, registrars losing their jobs because they cannot, in conscience, officiate at civil partnerships, paediatricians unable to serve on adoption panels… Will this trickle gradually become a flood, so that rather than conforming to the Church of England, the new discrimination tests will involve conforming to the secular religion as promoted by Lord Justice Laws?

Please do read it all here.