I know, it doesn’t seem like much of an Ash Wednesday topic, but as we’ve covered quite thoroughly here I’m wired a little strangely.  With that out of the way…

On the way to my house I pass a very proper non-denominational church with a very prominently displayed sign right near the road.  They clearly take pride in making sure there are witty statements on broad display – they even left a very fond farewell notice for the previous sign-poster-person (what do you call that position anyway, a Minister of the Signage?).  For the past week or so they have had this statement on display, “One person praying is more effective than ten preaching.”

As Lent has approached I’ve been mulling over that statement quite a bit.  We often see the tension between the “do-ers” and the “pray-ers” in the Church, from the earliest Martha vs. Mary comparisons to present day pro-life discussions about whether it is better to pray for conversion or witness to women on abortuary sidewalks.  Now, this being Lent with our focus on prayer, fasting and abstinence, you’re probably expecting me to go for agreeing with the above sign-statement.  I do.  And I don’t.

First, yes, Catholicism is a religion of “both-and” rather than “either-or” so I recognize the positive value of the “both” approach.  But this statement is clearly positing one over the other, straining towards but not quite completely suggesting that it is better.  With my Dominican leanings I’ve had to wonder, “then what does that say for preaching?”

Rather than continuing to circle around the question, let me put it shortly here.  Prayer is, without a doubt, the most powerful weapon we have in our arsenal against the forces of this world.  Without it we walk naked into the most dangerous battle in history, nearly begging the Enemy to strike us.  But then I’m reminded of Luther’s most hated Epistle, where James tells us “faith without works is dead” (James 2:17).

There are a plethora of quaint sayings I could quote here and I’m sure at least one or two have flitted through your mind if you’ve made it this far.  Let me turn one slightly on its ear:  “We are given two ears and one mouth, that we might listen more than we speak.”  Indeed, I say, let us listen with the ears of our heart, with the ears of faith.  But let us then speak what we have heard and offer words of encouragement.  Let us take this time of Lent to draw nearer to God, but at the same time let us draw others closer to Him as the chances allow.  God does not cease to present to us people with needs merely because it is Lent.

I’m going to leave the commenting on this to Danielle Bean.  Let me only say that the numbers are stark, and there is much the Culture of Death has to answer for starting with this video.  Pray.

At tonight’s RCIA class one of the sponsors spoke up more fully than he has before.  As he spoke strongly and softly about the Scriptures the thought crossed my mind, “he doesn’t sound like a Catholic”.  Then a further thought came, “and how sad a statement is that?”  The Bible is, as a friend loves to say, a Catholic book yet we have ceded controlling interest to our Protestant brethren – to the point even where if someone makes a concerted Scriptural defense of a matter of Catholic doctrine one wonders if he wasn’t Protestant at some point in his life.  That, simply, will not do.

The Scriptures are a gift given by God to the Church and through the Church to the world – let us again look upon the Word in all its glory.  Let us read, rejoice and be filled.  Let the eyes of your soul feast upon the Word, just as the body consumes the Eucharist and the soul is strengthened.  Even as we labor to recover our liturgical heritage, let us at the same time reclaim our literary heritage – that heritage given by God for the salvation of souls.

I am frequently amazed when people are able to put into succinct form what would take me pages of rambling to even begin to approach saying.  Fr. Powell, OP really gives a great explanation of why modernism is so poisonous to religious life and in turn why its spread has done such great damage to that life in the current day and age.  In just a few short paragraphs he condenses much of his background and, if I might wax without a shred of humility, shows just how dangerous a well-formed Dominican can be to heresy.  Normally I hate quoting the summary statement, but in this case he’s done such an excellent job of segmenting the issue that it’s all I can do:

What we must do at every level is re-establish the notion that intellect, will, reason, emotion, etc. are all divine gifts oriented toward our divinization though Christ.  Nothing can stand above faith as the source and summit of our life in Christ, but every gift we have received as well-loved creatures can stand along side faith in order to clarify, enlighten, and distinguish.

Not bad for a guy who is adamantly not involved in liturgical concerns.  You can’t love the Church and not think long and hard about Her Liturgy.

From one man in white to another.  In his General Audience yesterday Pope Benedict discussed, albeit briefly, the life and work of St. Dominic Guzman, the founder of the Order of Preachers, more commonly known as the Dominican Order.  If you don’t follow me on Plurk, let me only say that the life of this great saint has become the subject of considerable interest for me in the past several months.  Starting with, of all things, a childrens’ book, I’ve found myself fascinated by this man who saw the hurt and pain that poor formation and catechesis can cause and set out without a care for himself to preach the Truth.  St Dominic, ora pro nobis!

There was a time not so long ago when the ringing of church bells to mark the major hours of the day was as common as the sunrise.  Now we come to find out that in some places it can get the pastor of that church thrown in jail.  It may well be that this will be overturned on further appeal and will simply blow away as the dust of another silly judicial decision.  Or it may indeed be, as Fr. Zehnle suggests, the beginning of a new level of persecution.

For my part, let me just ask this:  if we as Catholics hadn’t given away this tradition, both in building new churches without bell towers and in a concession to the surrounding culture, would this even be a question of the free exercise of religion?  Put another way, when we decide to drop a tradition en masse, how can we later claim its practice to be an important part of the practice of our faith?  Lesson learned:  be careful when deciding something isn’t important to the faith – you might just have a problem getting it back later.

There’s something about looking at Scripture, turning it a bit sideways and seeing what is there that’s just eminently appealing to my quirky little mind.  Tom at Disputations finds a rather interesting connection in today’s Gospel reading for the Feast of the Presentation of the Lord (Lk 2:22-40) in the roles of Anna and Simeon.  Is he right?  I don’t entirely know, but there is surely something to the thought.

Sometimes questions just hit you, things you’ve blindly accepted without mental bother for years suddenly become a pressing question in your mind.  This weekend clear out of the blue I realized I had absolutely no idea why we Catholics call the Eucharistic bread a “host”.  It seems a word with a host … *ahem* … a plethora of potential meanings, none of which really seem to apply and some of which would lead directly to such heresies as transfiguration (which holds the consecration creates a “figure” of Jesus’s Body) and consubstantiation (holding that Jesus’s Body and Blood co-resides with the bread).  Since teaching heresy didn’t seem to be a decent reason for the word, I had to look it up.

The New Advent Catholic Encyclopedia has this, in part:

According to Ovid the word comes from hostis, enemy: “Hostibus a domitis hostia nomen habet”, because the ancients offered their vanquished enemies as victims to the gods. However, it is possible that hostia is derived from hostire, to strike, as found in Pacuvius. In the West the term became general chiefly because of the use made of it in the Vulgate and the Liturgy (Romans 12:1; Philippians 4:18; Ephesians 5:2; Hebrews 10:12; Mabillon, “Liturg. Gall. vetus”, pp. 235, 237, 257; “Missale Mozarab.”, ed. Leslie, p. 39; “Missale Gothicum”, p. 253). It was applied to Christ, the Immolated Victim, and, by way of anticipation, to the still unconsecrated bread destined to become Christ’s Body. In the Middle Ages it was also known as “hoiste”, “oiste”, “oite”.

In time the word acquired its actual special significance; by reason of its general liturgical use it no longer conveyed the original idea of victim.

Perhaps that’s all there is to it.  But somehow in Catholicism it seems the answer to a question this old never has just one string.  So… does anyone have anything else to add to this?

LifeSiteNews gives us this mortifying news:

A national group that promotes abortion and homosexual rights has deep ties with the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ (USCCB) Department of Justice, Peace and Human Development, according to a report released Monday.

Top USCCB executive John Carr held simultaneous leadership roles, creating a conflict of interest, with the USCCB and the radical Center for Community Change.

…

John Carr’s relationship with the Center for Community Change goes back at least to 1983, serving in leadership roles from 1999 to 2006 – including as chairman of the board.  The Reform CCHD Now report details the organization’s promotion of abortion, “reproductive rights” and homosexuality as among the CCC’s core advocacy focuses.

As one commenter at Patrick Madrid’s blog put it:  “Our bishops are not stupid men; they must have been aware of this for some time.“  One would have thought that after the recent CCHD fiasco the Bishops would have performed a thorough and independent scrubbing of the ties of anyone working for the USCCB that in any fashion could affect funding or policy-making.

I only ask this:  how many women could have been helped, and abortions prevented, with the funds that instead went to CCC?  It may sound harsh, perhaps melodramatic, but when it comes down to it these kinds of decisions cost lives.