2011 January archive at Being Frank

Archive for January, 2011

Jan

Blessed Pope John Paul II

By Kereopa 25 Comments

Categories: Being Frank...

I’m unsure whether my fellow BF’ers have posted on this or not, as some time has passed since the news broke but I wanted to touch on the beatification of Pope John Paul II.

Earlier in the month, Pope Benedict XVI approved a miracle attributed to Pope John Paul II’s intercession, clearing the way for his beatification on May 1 (which happens to be Divine Mercy Sunday – a feast day instituted by John Paul II).

The announcement followed more than five years of investigation into the life and writings of the Polish pontiff, who died in April 2005 after more than 26 years as pope.

The Vatican, quite rightly, took special care with verification of the miracle, the spontaneous cure of a French nun from Parkinson’s disease. Its worth noting that Pope JP II was affected by Parkinson’s in his latter years. A total of three separate Vatican panels approved the miracle of the nun, including medical and theological experts, before the official decree was signed by Pope Benedict.

The congregation noted that its experts, “having studied the depositions and the entire documentation with their customary scrupulousness, expressed their agreement concerning the scientifically inexplicable nature of the healing.”

Thus, on Dec. 14, the theological consulters began an evaluation of the case, and “unanimously recognized the unicity, antecedence and choral nature of the invocation made to Servant of God John Paul II, whose intercession was effective in this prodigious healing.”

It’s quite extraordinary that miracles are already being attributed to JP II and accepted by the Vatican. Usually these things take great lengths of time and an exhaustive amount of time and resource.

Back in 2005, Pope Benedict set JP II’s canonization on the fast track by waiving the normal five-year waiting period for the introduction of his sainthood cause.

Six years and one month from death to beatification is pretty extraordinary. Few have been so quick. Blessed Mother Teresa of Calcutta, described by many as a “living saint”, also took six years (and one and a half months) to be beatified.

The beatification of Pope John Paul II is truly a historic moment. Never has a Pope been so quickly beatified. Never has a miracle (which often taken decades to verify) been so quickly identified and validated.

It’s the first time in more than a thousand years that a pope will have beatified his immediate predecessor, and even then those examples don’t truly compare. In the history of the Church and her Saints, never has the Vatican been so adamant or so sure about the holiness of a mortal man.

Pope John Paul II

Truly, an authentic servant of God.

St Peter, pray for us.

Jan

Some light pondering

By Joan of Arc 1 Comment

Categories: Being Frank...

I have recently finished reading a book called ‘The Foundations of Religious Life: Revisiting the Vision’ written by the Council of Major Superiors of Women Religious in the U.S (which I highly recommend whether you’re a religious, discerning a religious vocation, or neither). As I read the final chapter ‘Evangelical Mission’ one subsection stood out, possibly because it appealed to the anthropologist in me, possibly because I simply had never really considered its question before. So I thought I’d share it…

It begins with the statement: “The collective attitude of post-modern culture is embodied in the pervasive conviction that the fulfillment of the human person lies in the exaltation of self”. The author goes on to talk about the false conception of human autonomy being exaggerated to the point of refusing any dependence on God. Generally we put this down to pride. But the author urges that we have to look deeper to find the source of the pride which she suggests is fear: “Fear that he will no longer receive what he needs from the hand of the Provident Father”. She talks about how ‘man possesses everything as given and received’ including his very being, and therefore, in pride, he loses the very truth of himself. She continues:

Hence the decision to eradicate belief in God is based upon his understanding of the situation in which an allegedly all-powerful God stands over, against, and above man and his world… [such that creaturehood cannot but be] a radical humiliation…From a Christian perspective we discern that this [viewpoint]…operates out of an erroneous and distorted conception of God as tyrant.

Does this radical viewpoint aptly represent the stance of contemporary Western culture? Although it is rarely explicitly articulated, an underlying suspicion of God’s otherness and the fear of being overcome by him inform many of our social attitudes. In contemporary Western culture, the patrimony of this way of living and thinking is held not under the guise of the “unknown God” or even the “unwanted God”, but simply the “irrelevant God”; the fact that God exists has become inconsequential to daily life.

I find the questions interesting – where do the attitudes of post-modern culture come from? What are the deeper roots? Fear? And are these different to any other time in history? Of course there is much more explained in the book but this is just a little blog post to let you know what’s going around in my head – not an academic thesis.

Happy pondering.

Have a great week.

Jan

“The Church needs to…”

By Voice in the wilderness 6 Comments

Categories: Being Frank...

I don’t know what most Catholics think the church is, or how they think it operates. I think it would be interesting for catholics in parishes to sit down together and work through questions like this. Other examples of questions to be discussed could be…

1. Whose responsibility is it to welcome new people?

2. What is the liturgy?

3. Whose job is it to promote church teachings?

As a body is one though it has many parts, and all the parts of the body, though many, are one body, so also Christ.

For in one Spirit we were all baptized into one body, whether Jews or Greeks, slaves or free persons, and we were all given to drink of one Spirit.

Now the body is not a single part, but many.

If a foot should say, “Because I am not a hand I do not belong to the body,” it does not for this reason belong any less to the body.

Or if an ear should say, “Because I am not an eye I do not belong to the body,” it does not for this reason belong any less to the body.

If the whole body were an eye, where would the hearing be? If the whole body were hearing, where would the sense of smell be?

But as it is, God placed the parts, each one of them, in the body as he intended.

In a lot of conversations it seems that Catholics put the responsibility on “the Church”.

The Church needs to welcome people more, the church needs to clearly explain the faith, the church needs to reach out to those prostitutes down the road, the church should be helping that solo dad who has no support etc etc.

Hello people, who is the Church?!?! WE are, and until individual catholics stand up, or band together, whether you are priest, religious or lay, not much is going to happen.

Sorry for being so frank

Jan

“I’m not a bad guy… So why should I spend half my Sunday hearing about how I’m going to hell?”

By Methuselah's Beard 44 Comments

Categories: Being Frank...

I consider myself somewhat decent at sports. I can catch, swim, throw, run, dribble, bowl, slog, shoot, jump, block, drive, putt, swing, and sometimes hit. However I’m not really extremely good at any one sport. In my younger years whilst sporting, I was always painfully aware that there was someone better than me out there, and usually he or she was on the other team. Maybe this was due to a lack of application as a child, or lack of confidence to really excel at one thig. Who knows? I’m happy with my sporting prowess now of course but who knows what might have been. I could be as famous as Tiger Woods right now. At golf.

Anyway, reading through this blog sometimes leaves me with feelings of inadequacy. I don’t engage my co-workers in lunchtime religious conversations. Heck only a few of them know I’m religious. Do I need to advertise it? They tell me about what they get up to on the weekends and all sorts of other things I should be loudly putting them right on. Do I have the right to impose my beliefs on people that don’t hold the same? I don’t neccessarily agree with what Hell Pizza are doing with their advertising but hey I’m not going to boycott the pizzas. It’s just a name right? I stopped thinking about P&W songs at least a decade ago and I sometimes I start thinking about computer games during the Sunday homily. I started reading the bible cover to cover and stopped at Numbers. Maccabees is my favourite book because of the violence. I laugh at some of the Proverbs or the book of Sirach because they sound so over the top sexist.

I watch what I want to watch with nary a second thought unless it is really objectionable or just lame like Seinfeld, Friends, Two and a Half Men and all these other sitcoms we have these days. Bring back ‘Married with Children’ I say (can I even type those words on this site). I think ‘Boogie Nights’ was a great movie despite the prevalence of, well we all know what was in that movie. I enjoy ‘Terminator’ and ‘Aliens’ although I’m sure James Cameron is probably not very pro-life. I eat cornflakes and McDonalds even though they most likely indirectly fund stem cell research. I believe that Science and Religion can co-exist and that both sides make mistakes.

Maybe I just need to try harder at being a good Catholic eh?

Jan

Watching what we watch

By Inkling 15 Comments

Categories: Being Frank...

I was unfortunate enough to see Russell Brand’s film, ‘Get Him to the Greek’ the other night. The synopsis was deceptively innocent; we thought we were in for a light comedy with an intriguing and potentially riotous setup – however it turned out to be one of those films that you keep hoping will pull itself out of the gutter, but only squirms itself deeper into the muck.

While I appreciate (and hope) that it was a somewhat exaggerated representation of the world of the rock star, it showed a decadence that I’ve only seen equalled in accounts of the declining years of the Roman Empire.

Why did we bother watching it? At a certain point in the film, we debated whether or not we should continue watching it; and our discussion around the issue of what we should and shouldn’t be watching raise some interesting points I thought would be well worth raising here. I’m interested in your opinion.

On one hand, we do have to be careful and selective about what we watch. There is so much ugliness in films these days, and it’s often hard to know which films are ‘good’ to watch or not before you watch them. Certainly one should distance oneself from things that are not healthy or wholesome, and things that will not help us grow as a person. We should not watch ugly and evil things to gain enjoyment from it or for entertainment – definitely not.

However, should we also try to remain completely innocent to these things? Is it a case of see/hear/speak no evil, or can we not afford to do this if we are to understand the world we live in, and know what sort of action we need to take to change it? There is a difference in watching something with an informed mind, and watching with an uninformed mind that can be influenced by things it takes to be popular and entertaining. But can an informed mind still be influenced by the things it feeds itself with?

I saw ‘Cabaret’ a while ago; the same issue arose there; it was worth watching to know what the Weimar Republic was like, what society at the time was getting into, and it had, at least, a good message linked to the rise of Nazism. But for all the rest of it, ought we to watch this sort of thing at all? Do we need to know the reality of things, or do we need to shut ourselves out from it? In one sense, it’s good to watch war movies to understand what war is like, and appreciate the sacrifice men have made for our freedom. But, should we fill our minds with scenes of terrifying violence and other things that are not necessary for us to see or know in all their gory detail?

Perhaps it’s all in the approach; Obviously it’s not right for someone to enjoy watching death, horror, violence, moral depravity. But for the purposes of understanding, education, wisdom, knowledge… even then, is it right?

Jan

The Divine Office and probably more nonsense about the ‘Spirit of Vatican II’

By Marty Rethul 21 Comments

Categories: Being Frank...

I’ll allow Sacrosanctum Concilium to say it for me:

99. …the divine office is the voice of the Church, that is of the whole mystical body publicly praising God…all who pray the divine office, whether in choir or in common, should fulfill the task entrusted to them as perfectly as possible: this refers not only to the internal devotion of their minds but also their external manner of celebration.

It is, moreover, fitting that the office, both in choir and in common, be sung whenever possible.

Interesting, really. Priests singing the office? And even perhaps in choir? Wow.

Oh, but it gets better! I’ll allow Sacrosanctum Concilium to say it for me:

100. Pastors of souls should see to it that the chief hours, especially Vespers, are celebrated in common in Church on Sundays and on the more solemn feasts. And the laity, too, are encouraged to recite the divine office, either with the priests, or among themselves, or even individually.

Interesting, really. Vespers celebrated in common on Sundays? And on the more solemn feasts? Wow. I’d encourage everybody to head off to their Cathedral when they can - so that they may hear the priests of their diocese singing the major hours together in choir. A beautiful public testimony to the richness of our faith.

You’re probably thinking it couldn’t get better? It can, and it does! I’ll allow Sacrosanctum Concilium to say it for me:

101.1.In accordance with the centuries-old tradition of the Latin [Roman] rite, the Latin language is to be retained by clerics in the divine office. But in individual cases the ordinary has the power of granting the use of a vernacular translation to those clerics for whom the use of Latin constitutes a grave obstacle to their praying the office properly.

Interesting, really. Latin is to be retained in the divine office? By clerics no less? Wow. Impressive, as Darth Vader once said about something else. Most impressive.

So to summarise: we have the divine office sung by our clergy whenever possible; we have public (and most likely solemn) offices sung in common or even in choir especially on Sundays and the more solemn feasts, and Latin (the language of our rite) is expected of our clergy (at the very least).

How can this be, since we have systematically destroyed Latin in our schools, not to mention our liturgy. I wonder how our seminarians get on with their Latin (and Greek for that matter). Certainly there hasn’t been much Latin studied by any of them in the years since Holy Cross Seminary came to Auckland.

Isn’t it amazing, nay alarming, that priests (let alone seminarians) of the Latin rite don’t even know their own language?

Here’s what Canon Law has to say about seminarians and Latin:

Can. 249 — Institutionis sacerdotalis Ratione provideatur ut alumni non tantum accurate linguam patriam edoceantur, sed etiam linguam latinam bene calleant …

…[or, for those priests and seminarians reading who do not understand Latin]…

Can. 249 The program of priestly formation is to provide that students not only are carefully taught their native language but also understand Latin well…

So, how many of you have attended Vespers sung in your parish, for example?

I’d like to publicly thank the pastors of souls for making so many genuine efforts in this regard.

I’d also like to thank the pastors of souls for their love and preservation of the liturgical langauge of our rite.

See you at Solemn Vespers this Sunday.

Jan

Mary helping unite Christianity and Islam

By Kereopa 32 Comments

Categories: Being Frank...

In the Middle East, Mary is helping unite Christians and Muslims amid chronic violence.

There have been numerous occurrences where Muslims and Catholics are discovering they have more in common than they thought. Strangely this doesn’t come from neither Jesus nor Muhammad, but Mary, the Mother of God.

According to Father Joseph Saghbini, a priest of the Greek Catholic Melkite Patriarchate of Jerusalem, the Mother of Christ united Christians and Muslims at a conference in Damascus last year.

“Christians and Muslims might lack a common dogmatic base from which to discuss theology, but they share devotion and esteem for a woman who brings them together: Mary, mother of Jesus.”

Furthermore, Christians and Muslims in Lebanon reportedly shared the Feast of the Annunciation as a national holiday in March last year.

Muslims respect and love Mary, calling her Maryam, or sinless mother. They see Mary as the perfect mother and, while they disagree with many aspects of Catholicism (largely based around Jesus being the Son of God, as opposed to being one of many), they believe that Jesus is the Messiah; that he is son of Mary; that Jesus did not have a biological father; that he is in heaven; that he was prophet of God; that he performed miracles and he is coming again; above all they believe that Mary was a holy woman and that Mary was a virgin when she conceived him.

This in contrast to many Protestant faiths that claim the Catholic veneration of Mary is a form of goddess worship. Most Protestants have little or no regard for Mary at all, seeing her as more of a weird Catholic obsession than the holy woman she was.

In fact, Mary is revered more in Islam than she is in many other non-denominational Christian faiths. Ironic isn’t it?

With regards to Mary, how is it that we have more in common with Islam than we do with Anglicans?

Mary, Our Blessed Lady, pray for us.