Faith, heart and reason

Two things about today have prompted me to comment on this piece from a parish newsletter. It was published a week or two ago, and one should recognise that it is intended as a comment on the Gospel of that particular Sunday. I reproduce it in its entirety, but will be discreet about its provenance to spare any blushes!.

Six years I studied in Rome. Magnificent, but demanding. Academics, books, papers, theologies, philosophies, journals, doctrines – it goes on. Heads crammed with knowledge. Being brainy. All good stuff, but isn’t Christianity more?

Maybe years of working with people with disabilities, mental health issues, and in prison allows for a bigger understanding about what genuine Christianity is.

It seems that to be a Christian, you have to have met someone who is already -"Christian". It is based on experience. To experience Christianity for ourselves. Christ is passed on "personally". To become a genuine follower of Christ is to have met someone who shines with a Christ-like freedom, a joy, an inner energy, a vitality – and let them rub off on you. Let it be contagious. You catch on to it, and soon yours will rub off on to someone else.

This stuff cannot be "theologised", intellectualised or made into sermons. It is simply a way of living. Way bigger and beyond Rome’s academics. It’s personal, always "relational", and never something private.

Once we see people like this who "get it", who have "caught on" to this bigger Christianity, once we draw close to them and let their ways rub off on us, why would we settle for anything less? It’s just so good, so right, so true.

Christ challenges his first disciples to come and see - for themselves. Come and experience so that his ways may catch-on in them. And their ways on to others, and on to others – and on to others...right down the centuries, and finally to us.

Do we know anyone with these Christ-like ways? Do we have the humility to let their Christianity catch-on in us? Or does pride get in the way? To let it catch on in humility, truth and integrity could transform ours, and others lives - forever.

This weekend the Venerable English College in Rome is celebrating the 650th anniversary of its first founding as a hospice for English pilgrims visiting Rome. Certainly with hindsight, I value the academic opportunities I had as a student in Rome too many years ago now for me to wish to number them. If anything, I now wish I had recognised better the opportuntities that were there.

Today is also the feast of St Thomas Aquinas, whose life reminds us of the role that study plays in the life of the Church, both past and present. The duty to study the content of the faith, in so far as one's circumstances permit, is a commonplace of what used to be termed the lay apostolate.

Whilst Father is correct in identifying the part played by personal contact in evangelisation, and this is the context of the Gospel of that particular Sunday, he is surely wrong in suggesting that the intellectual life of faith is opposed to this in some way. On the contrary, the intelligent is part of an evangelising personal encounter, and to deny its role in that encounter is to reduce the substance of the encounter. For those familiar with the writings of Luigi Giussani, founder of Communion and Liberation, whose charism is founded on an idea of Christian experience, this appears somewhat ironic. The second chapter of his seminal The Religious Sense addresses the necessity of a premise of "reasonableness" with regard to an examination of Christian experience. And part of the weekly task of a parish priest is precisely to express the vitality of Christian life in a sermon!

The forthcoming Year of Faith is going to ask of us a greater attention to the intellectual content of faith, both as what is believed and as an act of consent to that belief. This greater attention to the content of the faith runs throughout Pope Benedict's Apostolic Letter Porta Fidei.

Can't read: Won't read - a follow up

The following notice is from the newsletter of a nearby parish. It appears in the Easter Sunday issue of the newsletter.

Exposition of the Blessed Sacrament on Fridays
In response to the Pope's letter to the people of Ireland, there will be Exposition on Fridays as an act of reparation for th sins of those who have abused children and vulnerable adults. Since it has also happened in this country, it would be very good for us to do that too. We will begin every Friday from 16th April onwards. Jesus says, "Can you watch one hour with me".

Yet another parish newsletter notice

THE NEW MISSAL is causing confusion among some of the faithful e.g. instead of saying, "And also with you", you will say, "And with your spirit". The idea is to get as close to the literal meaning of Latin as possible. In the opinion of many these alterations are clumsy and in some cases theologically suspect. If you have strong feelings about it, you can voice your opinion on http://www.whatifwejustsaidwait.org/.

[If you wish to voice a strong view in favour of a prompt implementation of the new translations, there is another petition to sign instead: Fr Tim posted about it here.]

How many typical/ordinary parishioners will know what "Father" is referring to here, let alone know enough about it to be "confused"? Of them, how many will have had sufficient sight of the new texts to be able to have any formed opinion one way or another about them? And, of them, how many will just go along with things as they happen? An image of a wooden spoon being moved in a circular fashion comes to mind here ...

The coverage of the same issue in this week's Tablet (I believe there was coverage last week, too, which is probably where dear Father got the prompt for his newsletter notice above) has a couple of interesting aspects. And that's in addition to its regular "Listen to the Word" feature, where "study" translations of the prayers of the Mass are used rather than the translations from the Missal itself, thereby illustrating vividly the whole question of the liturgical translations.

The Letters Page

A photograph showing parishioners "returning the peace greeting during Mass in Cape Town, South Africa". It shows the parishioners with hands extended forwards, presumably towards the altar. Now, in my recent reflection on the sign of peace I have thought that what is needed is a clearly sacred sign of greeting/response - and that a handshake is not a sign with such a sacred character, rather the contrary. Perhaps our bishops could consider changing the form of the sign that they expect to that of a mutual extending of hands similar to that shown in the Tablet's photograph. This seems quite a practical way of doing things, and it reflects a liturgical sign already present in the Liturgy in the extension of the priest's hands during the greeting "The Lord be with you".

"Our liturgical life is too important for rushed decisions taken without consultation".

"The imposition of a new translation of the Missal, without dialogue or consultation ...".

Date of publication of the 3rd editio typica of the Roman Missal: 2000. Date of finalisation of the English translation of that 3rd edition: 2009. Rushed? Hardly! Others will know better than I the number of meetings, drafts, re-drafts etc that have been undertaken during that nine years by ICEL and the relevant Bishops Conferences. This does sound rather like "consultation" to me.

And a rather ironic decrying of "persistent disobedience" in the Church by one who would have us "just say wait"!

Clifford Longley

This column appears much more supportive of the idea of the new translation of the Missal than one might have expected. The comment that the prospective changes in wording at Mass are "already causing nervous breakdowns all over the country" seems far fetched to me. I suspect that the impact so far in most parishes is the same as that of Summorum Pontificum - and that is "not a lot". One should be careful about reading the headline to Clifford's piece - it refers to the current translation that is due for replacement - and is followed by one or two further specific criticisms of that translation:

It has 1969 stamped all over it - except even the Beatles were writing better English.

And Clifford ends up by appearing to suggest that English is not a suitable language for the Liturgy ... is Latin the more suitable alternative then?

The heart of the problem is that the English language has lost its solemn and cermonial register - a victim of the First World War, I've seen it argued - and hasn't found an alternative. I've never found a modern liturgy, in any denomination, that sounded just right. They all seem synthetic and self-conscious. English is not a good liturgical language, just as it is not a good operatic language. The latest translation is bound to be defective. Just like all the possible options.

But, perhaps the point is that our Liturgy is not a "modern liturgy" - in the sense of being something that we write from scratch ourselves - but a renewal of an ancient liturgy. The Church of England's choral tradition might also be an exemplification of a successful use of English as a liturgical language, it too having something of a heritage behind it. The principle of a translation into English that is as faithful as possible to the Latin original ... seems quite reasonable to me.

From a parish newsletter: "Maybe we need an Obama to shake us out of our complacency"

The "we" referred to here is the Church. The comment is taken from a parish priest writing in a parish newsletter (not my own parish).

This week I listened intently to the inaugural speech of President Barak Obama. It was powerful oratory but it was also shot through with gospel content and it was challenging to say the least. I'm sure what he had to say did not appeal to a certain section of Americans especially when he said there must be "an end to petty grievances and false promises, the recriminations and worn out dogmas, that for too long have strangled our politics". I couldn't help drawing a comparison with the church. Maybe we need an Obama to shake us out of our complacency.

Let's try to "read behind the lines" and to identify the "false promises" and "worn-out dogmas". Presumably they refer to the policies of the previous administration, now about to be reversed by the new one. But, of course, a politician of the previous administration could quite easily take exactly the same words and apply them to the policies of the new administration. The oratory is certainly powerful, but it is hiding what is nothing surprising or special - that President Obama is not President Bush and wishes to overturn some key aspects of his predecessors policies.

There is another point in the inauguration speech where one can do some "reading behind the lines". "As for our common defense, we reject as false the choice between our safety and our ideals.....Those ideals still light the world, and we will not give them up for expedience sake". President Obama explicitly relates this to the Founding Fathers assertion of "the rule of law and the rights of man". I think we are intended to "read behind this" a reference to the detention centre at Guantanomo Bay which is widely seen, and with justification, as an abandoning of the normal rule of legal process to facilitate the imprisonment of those seen as a threat to the United States.

Compare this assertion of faithfulness to American ideals with: "The question we ask today is not whether our government is too big or too small, but whether it works - whether it helps families find jobs at a decent wage, care they can afford, a retirement that is dignified." This is interesting because the political/ethical question about the balance between the role of the state and the role of the individual or family is put on one side, in the interests of an essentially pragmatic principle. Or, dare one say, in favour of a principle of expediency?

The final measure of President Obama will not be just the content of his inaugural speech, but of his actions. See here and here, for example, and the intention expressed by President Obama to work with the US Congress to restore American funding to the UN Population Fund, funding that was first removed in response to concern about that Fund's involvement with population control in China. President Obama's support for legalised abortion is very clear - and though he might decry the "politicisation" of abortion he nevertheless has a stance on the issue that is profoundly political. Independent Catholic News here reports the reaction from the Vatican to President Obama's first actions in office.

One can find passages in President Obama's inauguration speech that echo the values of the Gospel, perhaps particularly the suggestion that resistance to evil is as much a matter of a moral and spiritual resistance as it is a resistance based on the exercise of power.

But to suggest that we "need an Obama to shake the Church out of its complacency" ..... A bit naive to say the least ....

From the Parish Newsletter

These two extracts are from the parish newsletter of a nearby parish (not my home parish). My commenting on them might appear that I am being critical of the priest involved - though I am doing my best to keep him anonymous unless you have seen the original newsletter. In some ways I try not to have a "critical blog". But, on the other hand, I feel that lay people are entitled to engage in a dialogue with their clergy. It is not fair, I think, to have a position that the clerical status of a parish priest means that they are in some way immune from or exempt from lay people responding to their pronouncements; and, if their statements are in the public arena, they cannot expect to be immune from response in the public arena. The obligation of charity is observed, I think, by focussing on the content, and not attacking the individual.

The first extract is from last week's newsletter, commenting on the election of Barack Obama as the next President of the United States.

Unlike the ordinary American, the people of God have no say in those who are supposedly "elected" to lead them. There is a "so-called" process of consultation but nobody knows what it is. In 1970, the Council of Priests of the diocese of Brentwood, authorised a survey among all the priests of the diocese about what kind of bishop we wanted. It was for the most part ignored. Instead of getting a bishop with vision, we got a kind, holy man who couldn't make a decision without phoning Cardinal Heenan first! One priest writing in the "Brentwood Survey" wrote the problem with the church is we have a "self perpetuating" system. Is it any wonder then that the young and not so young feel there is little they can do to bring about change. This is a sobering thought as we celebrate the Dedication of the Cathedral church of the Diocese of Rome, St John Lateran.

In one sense, it is quite right to see the Church as a self perpetuating system - in one aspect we might call it the Apostolic Succession, in another aspect it is the handing on of the tradition received from Christ himself, particularly in catechesis. However, it would be better expressed as saying that it is a God-sustained system - it is the action of the Holy Spirit that keeps the Church in faithfulness to its founder, Christ. It might also be better to refer to a life rather than a system. So the Church is a Spirit sustained life - a life that is the same now as it was in the past.

The reference to changing reminds me of the story a bishop told during a catechesis at the 2005 World Youth Day. His punchline was to refer to a young pilgrim in Cologne who, interviewed on television, observed that, no, it wasn't for the Church to change its teaching. It was us who needed to change, to live up to that teaching, so that we would therefore become more true to Christ. In this sense, there is everything we can do to bring about the change that we need, whether we are young, not so young, lay person or priest.

Now, is this really the sort of change that is implied or hinted at in this extract? [The bishop being referred to is not, I think, the present incumbent!]

In this week's newsletter, we have a story about two mountaineers in Peru. One of them fell and was injured. His friend did not leave him on the mountain, but helped him down the mountain. Part way down, a second accident happened and the uninjured climber then had to cut the rope supporting his injured friend in order to save himself. It would appear both survived, but the parish priest asks whether or not the two remained friends.

What a moral dilemma? What would you have done in the circumstances? I'm always suspicious of moral theologians who have clear cut solutions to every moral problem. Human beings are very complicated and, like my golf swing, there are so many variables that every set of circumstances needs looking at with the greatest of care.

I do think you can look at this paragraph and find no fault with its strictly expressed content. I do not think that any of us know for sure what we would do in a particular situation - we can only hope that we will act in a morally right way, in accordance with Catholic teaching, when we are put to the test. I doubt that any individual moral theologian has a clear cut solution to every moral problem, just as a matter of academic common sense; suspicion of a moral theologian who does claim that is probably quite justified! But (see below) that is not really to the point. Human beings are very complicated and each circumstance does need to be looked at carefully - my post today about Hannah Jones, for example, shows how characterising her choice as a "choosing to die rather than have a transplant" is to ignore a number of aspects of her case that alter one's judgement of her case. It is a truism - a statement of the obvious - so it doesn't move the argument forward.

So, it is not in the form of words themselves, but exactly what message is being communicated in this extract?

Is there a suggestion that, rather than there being objective moral absolutes, everything depends on the situation? One could certainly be forgiven for taking away from these remarks a certain hesitation about there being absolute rights and wrongs in our lives.

Pope John Paul II addressed precisely this question in his encyclical Veritatis Splendor. There he clearly teaches that there are some actions that are always morally wrong, of their very nature, because of the way in which the go against the good of the human person. The deliberate and directly intended killing of another innocent person would be an example of one such action.

In all likelihood, there was no deliberately intended killing on the part of the uninjured climber in the story told in the newsletter. But that does not provide a ground for suggesting that there are no actions that are, of their nature, always morally wrong.

Tongue in cheek

I am unable to resist sharing this, seen in a parish newsletter this weekend.

As the Church continues on pilgrimage, growing, dying and rising, it meets the challenges of mission in every level. Just as with the early church so too for us today. I will be visiting the United States on Sunday, following in the footsteps of the Holy Father, attending a Summit of the Church where priest and people will be in dialogue addressing such issues as the Catholic population, fewer priests and new models of ministry. Sounds familiar! I hope and pray that the task I have been given in representing the priests of our country across 'the pond' will bear fruit with ideas, concerns, joys and vision for an ever changing church.

A Newsletter Notice

I am having difficulty understanding the following notice which I saw in a parish newsletter this weekend, and was wondering whether anyone could help shed some light on it.

Friday 15th February is Family Fast Day when we are encouraged to FAST [I can understand what this means, though I am not very good at it] and PRAY [I can understand this as well, and might be a bit better at it than I am at fasting, because I try it more often] and think about our relationship with creation. [This is the bit that defeats me.] A retiring collection will be taken up at all Masses next weekend for CAFOD. [I can understand this sentence in isolation, but am struggling to see its connection with thinking about my relationship to creation.]