A Grateful Dad

I have not felt well the past few days, but the silver lining has been the way my kids have expressed their affection and taken care of me.  Getting me this or that, getting themselves this or that so I could rest on the couch - they are extremely generous little souls.

I am a grateful dad in another sense too. I remember attending Mass a couple of Sundays after my oldest, Brennan, was born and as the Eucharistic prayer began, just weeping in a loving awe at the realization that swept over me:  My little boy, the most important person in the world to me, was loved by Jesus. Jesus had stretched out His arms and let nails be driven through them for my child. I was grateful that Jesus had died for me, but now I felt an unspeakably deeper gratitude because He had laid down His Life for my child !  After Lily's birth, that gratitude doubled.

I make the Apostle Paul’s prayer for his readers my own this afternoon:  "I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the Lord’s holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God” (Eph.3:17-19)

ABC's "Zero Hour"

So I watched the first episode online last night - can't resist me an X-Files-ish hour of television.  The show definitely kept me interested, and believe me you will not see the revelation at the end of the first hour coming.  I will tune in again to see where this is going.

Like many historical conspiracy theories of late, Zero Hour, plays fast and loose with history and its writers are clearly not making any attempts at accuracy regarding the beliefs of Catholic Christians or others.  They're simply grabbing religious terms that people have probably heard, filed away in the back of their minds, and the show's writers are able to throw in to add an air of the mysterious/spiritual to the telling of their story.  I'll give you a few examples:

The Rosicrucians are the secret society at the heart of Zero Hour.  They are portrayed as a group within Catholicism, especially interested in mysticism and the End Times, dating back to the second century.  Alright, historically Rosicrucianism dates back to the early 1600's, and it was actually quite anti-Catholic.  

Zero Hour goes on to reveal that during World War II, "the Church ... without the knowledge of the pope," ordained "twelve new apostles," to save the world from the Nazis.  "The Twelve" were entrusted with guarding some relic hidden beneath a Bavarian cathedral that, if discovered by the Nazis, would set in motion the end of the world.  "The Church" in this case seems to refer to the Rosicrucians within the Catholic Church. (As I finished typing that sentence I realized how completely crazy this show sounds; should I give another hour of my life to seeing where it goes?)

Quick theological reality check:  Within Christianity "the Twelve Apostles" is only and ever used to refer to those men who encountered Jesus after His Resurrection and were established by Him as the unrepeatable foundation stones of His Church (Rev. 21:12-14) - and Peter in an utterly unique way (Mt. 16:17-19).  So any talk of a new group of the Twelve is simply an impossibility.  And "the Church" ordaining without the knowledge of the pope?  What does that even mean?  This transformation of the Rosicrucians into an ancient religious order within the Catholic Church makes for some interesting story telling possibilities, but it it also creates a Christianity with only a passing resemblance to the actual Faith.  Keeping all of this in mind, I was still left scratching my head when a Rosicrucian Catholic priest (in Nazi Germany) lamented, "Not even God can save us now ... only the Twelve." Clearly, not a well-catechized guy.  I don't know what they are teaching in that universe's Rosicrucian Catholic seminaries, but it's nothing I would devote my life to.

How Do You Respond to "Have You Been Saved?"

I bet you've been asked that question at least once in your life (and it came from someone who sincerely desired the best for you.)  Depending on which Christian denomination you were raised in, you might have been a bit stymied for an answer.  Considered globally, it's a small minority of Christians who hold that salvation is a one-time event.  They are mistaken, but innocently so; it is what they have been taught, and they have been shown a selection of biblical passages that seem to support the notion.  But those passages are divorced from a multitude of others that give a fuller explanation of Jesus and the Apostles' teaching on salvation - not to mention the Church's uninterrupted historical understanding from the time of Christ until today.

So how do I respond to the question, "Have you been saved?"  Here is the brief, nuanced answer that my youth minister (Paul Masek) shared with me many moons ago:

"Yes, I have ... I am also in the process of being saved right now; and in the future I hope to be saved - to obtain final salvation with Christ in heaven."

I think it is a marvelous answer.  Let me provide a couple of verses of Scripture in support of each its parts:

Yes, I have been saved
"He saved us, not because of deeds done by us in righteousness, but in virtue of his own mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewal in the Holy Spirit" (Titus 3:5)

"Baptism, which corresponds to this, now saves you" (1 Peter 3:21)

I am being saved
"Work out your salvation with fear and trembling for God is at work in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure" (Phil. 2:12-13)


For through the Spirit, by faith, we wait for the hope of righteousness. For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision is of any avail, but faith working through love." (Gal. 5:5-6)


"..but if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus his Son cleanses us from all sin" (1 John 1:7)  
 
I hope to be saved
From Ash Wednesday's second reading, "Brothers and sisters ... We implore you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God ... we appeal to you not to receive the grace of God in vain" (2 Cor. 5:20; 6:1)

"Take care, brethren, lest there be in any of you an evil, unbelieving heart, leading you to fall away from the living God. But exhort one another every day, as long as it is called "today," that none of you may be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin. For we share in Christ, if only we hold our first confidence firm to the end" (Hebrews 3:12-14)
_____________
As I said, these verses can be multiplied.  Chapter 6 of The God Who is Love can provide you with more.  Hope your Ash Wednesday is going well! 

Who Were the Earliest Popes?

With the news of Pope Benedict's resignation at the end of February, it seemed like a good time to recall the names of our earliest popes.  There's this idea out there that the papacy didn't really come together until the 400's, and that's flat out wrong.  Irenaeus, the Bishop of Lyons (France), in his Against the Heresies, put forward the Bishops of Rome from Peter to the time of the work’s composition (c.189 A.D.):

Since it is too long to enumerate in such a volume as this the succession of all the Churches, we shall confound all those who, in whatever manner, whether through self-satisfaction or vainglory, or through blindness and wicked opinion assemble other than where it is proper, by pointing out here the successions of the bishops of the greatest and most ancient church known to all, founded and organized at Rome by the two most glorious Apostles, Peter and Paul, that Church which has the tradition of the faith which comes down to us after having been announced to men by the Apostles. For with this Church, because of its superior origin, all churches must agree, that is, all the faithful in the whole of the world; and it is in her that the faithful everywhere have maintained the Apostolic tradition.

The Blessed Apostles [Peter and Paul] having founded and built up the church [of Rome], they handed over the office of the episcopate to Linus. Paul makes mention of this Linus in the Epistle to Timothy. To him succeeded Anencletus; and after him, in the third place from the Apostles, Clement was chosen for the episcopate. He had seen the Blessed Apostles and was acquainted with them. It might be said that he still heard the echoes of the preaching of the Apostles, and had their traditions before his eyes. And not only he, for there were many still remaining who had been instructed by the Apostles.

. . .To this Clement, Evaristus succeeded; and Alexander succeeded Evaristus. Then, sixth after the Apostles, Sixtus was appointed; after him, Telesphorus, who also was gloriously martyred. Then Hyginus; after him, Pius; and after him, Anicetus. Soter succeeded Anicetus, and now, in the twelfth place after the Apostles, the lot of the episcopate has fallen to Eleutherus. In this order, and by the teaching of the Apostles handed down in the Church, the preaching of the truth has come down to us (Book III, 3:2-3).

So there you go.  Who will be the next man to act as Christ's Prime Minister?  I can't wait to see!

"We're Not Worthy!"

O.K., maybe I shouldn't have quoted Wayne's World on The Journey Home, but it is perfectly apropos with today's readings.  In the first reading we hear Isaiah's reaction to his vision of the Lord, "Woe is me, I am doomed! For I am a man of unclean lips, living among a people of unclean lips; yet my eyes have seen the King, the LORD of hosts!"  Then in the second reading St. Paul states, "I am the least of the apostles, not fit to be called an apostle,
because I persecuted the church of God."  And finally in the Gospel we hear St. Peter, staring at a miraculous catch of fish, tell Jesus, "Depart from me, Lord, for I am a sinful man."  And they're all correct.  When we approach God we should have that same realization of our unworthiness to approach such a magnificent, pure, loving King - given how many times we have failed to love Him as He deserves.

It's a far cry from the general kind of religious sentiment we see in our society.  "I'm a good person.  I've never killed anyone.  I don't cheat on my spouse.  I help out my neighbors when they need it."  That's just being a decent human being, naturally good. (And it totally ignores all the ways we daily slight one another and fail to give our all.)  To draw near to God and spend eternity with Him we need to be supernaturally good.  Jesus calls us to "be perfect" as our heavenly Father is perfect, and that it something completely above us human creatures - at least it is, if we are left to ourselves.

Supernatural goodness comes to us from God.  We hear it in Jesus' response to Peter, "Do not be afraid."  We see it in the angel flying to Isaiah and touching him with a coal from the altar, "now that this has touched your lips, your wickedness is removed, your sin purged." It is St. Paul's "But by the grace of God I am what I am, [an apostle]."  And it is the prayer we make before going forward to receive the Lord in Communion, "I am not worthy that You should enter under my roof, but only say the word and my soul shall be healed!"

There is the Gospel, the Good News - that Jesus came to call the sick, came to call sinners.  Until we recognize that we are sick with sin, we do not believe we need the Physician.  But once we realize how diseased we are, we do not give in to despair - God is the one who will make us clean.  He loves us right where we are - and He loves us so much that He refuses to leave us where we are.

When Our Shepherds Sin ...

I recently wrote a post on why we Catholics continue to profess the holiness of the Church, even amidst sinful decisions by bishops and priests.  We may have another example of that playing itself out in Los Angeles, as more information emerges of Cardinal Mahony’s handling of cases of sexual abuse by priests in the 1980’s.  It is hard to read such things and think about the sins and failures of those given the most sacred of trusts.  Where priests have been guilty of crimes they should of course, like anyone else, be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.   But their actions, as evil as they are, do not cause me to condemn “the Church,” or the offices of presbyter (priest) or bishop that these men held.   What follows is a piece I wrote 15 years ago, focusing on the sinful actions of past popes, that shares some of my reasons why: 

It is common knowledge that the Popes during the Middle Ages were not angels. Several of them lived lives of debauchery. Does that debunk the claim that they possessed the charism of infallibility? Not in the least. It is a scandal, and it damaged the witness of the Church; but it does not damage the integrity of The Faith.

Each Christian reading this can demonstrate the truth of what I am saying for him or herself. We need only think of our own sinfulness, and the many ways in which we have failed to live as Christ commands. Do our sins cause Christ’s Gospel to be any less true? No, not one iota. When we proclaim that Gospel we may sometimes be hypocritical, but what we proclaim is not falsified. Caiaphas, the high priest who along with Pilate condemned Jesus to death, was used by the Holy Spirit to utter prophecy (John 11:49-52). Christ, with perfect foreknowledge, chose Judas to be one of His Twelve Apostles. Why?  Perhaps to prepare us for when the successors of the Apostles,  the bishops, and especially Peter’s Successors, the pope, fall from grace.

Judas’ betrayal did nothing to diminish the office of apostle. Likewise, the personal sinfulness of someone in Peter’s office does not diminish the authority nor function of the Key-Bearer. When we think about atrocities, such as the later Crusades, we have to keep this in mind; they were monstrous, horrendous actions; but they were not instances of the Popes making proclamations as to what constitutes the Deposit of Faith.

Sometimes we have to look at the men sitting in Peter’s Chair as a delinquent parent. We respect them not because of their actions, but solely because of their relation to us (through the Blood of Christ) and the position of authority which God the Father has allowed them to assume. An Old Testament image of this is the relationship between David and King Saul.

Saul was the first King of Israel. His reign started out well, but he eventually fell into disobedience to the Lord’s command. Scripture tells us that because of this, even while Saul reigned, the prophet Samuel was sent by the Lord to secretly anoint a young shepherd, David, as the future king. David eventually killed Goliath, became very close to King Saul and his family, and distinguished himself as a warrior. When David’s popularity in Israel grew greater than even Saul’s, however, the reigning king became jealous and began plotting David’s death. When David caught wind of Saul’s intent he went into hiding. Saul pursued him into the desert. What I want to draw your attention to was David’s reaction: two times the Lord delivered King Saul’s life into David’s hands, but David responded, “The LORD forbid that I should do this thing to my lord, the LORD’s anointed, to put forth my hand against him, seeing he is the LORD’s anointed” (1 Samuel 24:6); “who can lay hands on the LORD’s anointed, and be guiltless? As the Lord lives, the Lord will smite him” (1 Samuel 26:9-10). It was not the man Saul whom David honored but the office which the Lord God had established. Far from being a simpleton, David is the only man whom Scripture calls a man after God’s Own Heart (1 Samuel 13:14). Our attitude in dealing with sinful bishops and Popes must be the same as David’s.

The way God uses sinful human beings to convey His Revelation is one of the truly great surprises in salvation history. It may seem like a tremendous risk on God’s part; perhaps it is simply a commentary on the power of His grace and the Word which He has entrusted to His Church. There is an Old Testament story that gives me a humble chuckle. The Lord “opened the mouth of [an] ass,” a donkey, and gave it the power of speech (Numbers 22:28). I have to laugh at how many other asses He has bestowed the power of speech upon to further the Gospel; I can only hope that when my life comes to an end I will find myself ranked among them.