Jesus Cleanses the Temple... With a Vengeance

This is my first foray into video editing. It's something that has been banging around in my head for a while and I hope you like it.

St. Dominic Must be so Proud

      I'm going to be straight up, this scares the life out of me. I'm not really sure what he's trying to accomplish apart from trying to make kids scared of both dogs and Jesus. Here's hoping he's been neutered. 

Exsultate!

      I took my last final of the semester today! No more late nights, no more cramming, and no more fighting for a parking spot. Not for a month at least, then it's back to the grind. I really am very blessed to be able to go to school and receive an education so I shouldn't complain too much. I'm just grateful that I will be able to spend some time with my friends and family this Christmas without having to worry about papers and exams.

Come Apart into a Desert Place and Rest a Little

       Something that I've been thinking about a lot here lately is spiritual dryness. Many of the saints have written about it, from St. John of the Cross to Blessed Teresa of Calcutta. St. John considered it to be a purging of the vain things in life so that the soul could come into a relationship with God that was not contingent on feelings or emotions. While knowing this can give hope, it doesn't make us feel better. Feeling better would defeat the purpose of the dryness, and so it is something that needs to be endured with patience. 


      Oftentimes what seems like dryness is due to sin in our lives, and the solution is as close as the nearest confessional. That has certainly been the case with me on many occasions. Other times though it is God calling us into a deeper union with him. One that doesn't depend on the warm and fuzzies, or kid gloves. The author of Hebrew writes "For every one that is a partaker of milk, is unskillful in the word of justice: for he is a little child. But strong meat is for the perfect; for them who by custom have their senses exercised to the discerning of good and evil." As long as we are immature as Christians then we will want the sweet milk that we receive when we get the chills, and our time in prayer is refreshing, and all the things that go with young love.


       Sadly many Christians never leave this stage of spiritual infatuation and this leads to a Church that is filled with baby Christians who are unable to defend their faith, they are not "...ready always to satisfy everyone that asketh you a reason of that hope that is in you." This troubles me. I am a convert to the Catholic Church, and for those of you who do not know, becoming a Catholic is a very involved process. 


      The first step is usually speaking with a priest who will then direct you to the director of the RCIA*. The person will then go through a process of intense prayer, discernment, and learning before they decide whether or not they want to become Catholic. The whole process ideally takes a year at minimum, but can last much longer. While the process is not perfect, I feel it prepares the person to live a Christian life much better than the "Hallelujah, here's your Bible" approach that is taken by many Christians today in their evangelization. 


      My reason for going into the subject of RCIA is that even then there are periods of dryness. "Am I doing the right thing?" "What if I'm being lied to?" "What will my family and friends think?" The prayer that I grew in during that time sustained me, and still does. I learned how to pray the Scriptures in Lectio Divina, I learned how to meditate on the life of Christ in the Rosary, I learned how to unite myself with the entire Church through the Liturgy of the Hours, and these all helped me grow and get through those dry times. 

      God does not leave us alone. Our Lord tells us "I will not leave you orphans, I will come to you." Even though we feel completely abandoned, he is there and is bringing us through our sufferings so that we can be more closely united to him. The desert may seem lonely and barren, but from the barrenness of our souls God will bring new life; life that is pure, and has him as its focus.

*RCIA: Rite of Christian Initiation for Adults.

Et Homo Factus Est

      I do a lot of thinking in my car. Most of the time my thoughts drift to strange situations that may arise, but most likely won't and these situations are almost invariably theological in nature. For instance, is baptism by water gun valid? (It is.) Is mass baptism via rain valid? (It's not.) Does the disbelief of the priest affect the efficacy of a Sacrament? (Nope.)  Such is the life of a Nerdius Ecclesiasticus. 


      One thing that came to my mind recently though, no doubt due to the closeness of Christmas, was the Incarnation. The Nicean Creed says that "For us men and for our salvation he came down from heaven, and by the Holy Spirit was incarnate of the Virgin Mary, and became man." This section of the Creed is dense with deep theological beauty. God loved us enough that he came for our salvation. This is of course reflected in Our Lords conversation that is recorded with Nicodemus in the third chapter of the Gospel of St. John "For God so loved the world, as to give his only begotten Son; that whosoever believeth in him, may not perish, but may have life everlasting." Not  only was it astounding that he would come for our salvation, but the means by which he came is incredible as well. 


      "Hail full of Grace, the Lord is with thee." These were the words of the Archangel Gabriel to Our Lady at the Annunciation. By the yes of a young woman in Nazareth, the creator of the world entered his creation. He who was not under the limitation of time entered into time, and the one over whom death had no power willingly subjected himself to death. 


      It is almost absurd. Not absurd as in foolish, but absurd like a king living in a mud hut so that a pauper could live in his castle. Even that analogy falls terribly short. God, who created the universe cannot be contained by it and yet he emptied out himself and came among us so that we could possess eternal life. It is an absurdity, but one whose love and beauty is unparalleled. 

Ego Te Absolvo

     
        Advent is a season of anticipation and preparation. We anticipate the birth of Christ at Christmas, and we prepare ourselves by doing penance and good works. Many people avail themselves of the Sacrament of Confession or Reconciliation.


       Tonight there was a Reconciliation service where several priests from the Diocese gathered at my parish to hear peoples confessions. Being a bit of a roamer, I flitted from line to line until I finally decided to sit in a pew and see which one dwindled the fastest. I was at the back of the church so I wasn't able to hear anything, but I did watch the priests and the penitents as the Sacrament was celebrated. Some people cried, some seemed angry or hurt, but they all had the same look as they left the priest. It was a look of relief, as if a great stone had been lifted from their hearts. Not a few of them almost seemed to float out of the church.


       This makes a great deal of sense because the Sacrament of Confession is one of the Sacraments of healing, the other being the Anointing of the Sick. In the Sacrament the priest acts "In persona Christi' or in the person of Christ, and so Christ continues his healing work of forgiveness through the ministry of the priest. Christ conferred this power of forgiveness to his Apostles when he said to them "Receive ye the Holy Ghost, whose sins you shall forgive they are forgiven them; and whose sins you shall retain they are retained." The Apostles passed this authority on to those they ordained, and through that Apostolic succession the ministry remains.

        Another thing that struck me as I watched the confessions was the the look on the faces of the priests. When the penitent first sat there was a look of welcoming, and it was apparent that they were trying to make the person feel at ease. As the confession progressed there was concern and pity, and finally at the act of absolution there was joy. It reminded me of the parable of the prodigal son when the father had his servant prepare a feast "Because this my son was dead, and is come to life again: was lost, and is found." The lost lamb that had left the flock was now home, and the son who was dead is alive again.

     

Ecce Agnus Dei

         

             I have a bit of an unhealthy obsession with tacky religious puppetry. I'm not really sure where it began, but I have my suspicions that it comes from my childhood as a Baptist. The main thing about these videos that strikes me as odd is that they always try to take a rather serious theological principle, and condense it so much that it becomes a parody.

            

             In this video for instance we see an elderly puppet, rightly, making the comparison between the lamb that was sacrificed by the Israelites for the salvation of their first born and Christ who is the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world. We then see an actual, puppet, lamb singing and imploring us to "Eat of my body, drink of my blood too." This is problematic on several levels. 

              

            The first one being the confusion between the symbolism of the Old Covenant, and the Sacramental reality of the new. While the lambs song is obviously not meant to be taken literally, the words Our Lord spoke were certainly meant to be taken that way. The Greek word used in the New Testament is "trogo." This word is never used symbolically, and it literally means to gnaw or to crunch on something the way that an animal would. Christ is in no way being ambiguous in his speech, and that is reflected by many of his disciples leaving him as seen in the Gospel of St. John 6:66. 

               The second problem with the song is when the lamb says that "If you eat and drink of me I will be part of you." Pope Benedict XVI explains "In the normal process of eating, the human is the stronger being. He takes things in, and they are assimilated into him, so that they become part of his own substance. But in the mutual relation with Christ it is the other way around; he is the heart, the truly existent being." In the Holy Eucharist, Christ does not become part of us. We through communion with Christ come into unity with Him. We do not have mastery over God, but God allows us to share in the Divine Life of Love manifested in the Most Holy Sacrament of the Altar. 

                

               I know that I'm being a bit nit picky, especially since the creators of this puppet show never intended to convey any sort of belief in the doctrine of the Real Presence, but this dumbing down of theology really gets my dander up. I'm fully aware that not everyone shares my theological leanings, but if these people want to be taken seriously they need to get their hands out of their puppets and their noses into some books. I recommend the writings of the early Church fathers, and for some fantastic, if deep, Eucharistic theology St. Thomas Aquinas.