Because, you know, in a way it does.  Certainly we can live without prayer, but as for me, life without talking to God and doing my best to listen to Him just doesn’t quite measure up.  I’ve been reading through Pope Benedict’s The Church Fathers: From Clement of Rome to Augustine, the collation of his addresses on the early Fathers of the Church and came across a quote so good that I’m not going to wait until I write up a review of the book for it.  In his address on St. Gregory Nazianzen, we find:

Gregory teaches us first and foremost the importance and necessity of prayer.  He says:  “It is necessary to remember God more often than one breathes” (Orationes 27, 4: PG 250, 78), because prayer is the encounter of God’s thirst with our thirst.  God is thirsting for us to thirst for him (cf. Orationes 40, 27: SC 358, 260).  In prayer, we must turn our hearts to God, to consign ourselves to him as an offering to be purified and transformed.  In prayer we see all things in the light of Christ; we let our masks fall and immerse ourselves in the truth and in listening to God, feeding the fire of love.

I just love those twin images – “let our masks fall” and “feeding the fire of love.”  It’s like drawing a picture with words.

Some random patristic reflections on today’s Feast of the Baptism of the Lord:

Saint Ambrose of Milan:

Neither repentance avails without grace, nor grace without repentance; for repentance must first condemn sin, that grace may blot it out.  So then John, who was a type of the law, came baptizing for repentance, while Christ came to offer grace.

Saint John Chrysostom

John was setting forth the anticipatory and ancillary value of his won baptism, showing that it had no other purpose than to lead to repentance.  He pointed toward Christ’s baptism, full of inexpressible gifts.  John seems to be saying:  “On being told that he comes after me, you must not think lightly of him because he comes later.  When you understand the power of Christ’s gift, you will see that I said nothing lofty or noble when I said ‘I am unworthy to untie the thong of his sandal.’  When you hear, ‘He is mightier than I,’ do not imagine that I said this by way of comparison.  For I am not worthy to be ranked so much as among Christ’s servants, no, not even the lowest of his servants, nor to receive the least honored portion of his ministry.”  Therefore John did not simply say “his sandals,” he said “the thong of his sandals,” the part counted the least of all.

Saint Hippolytus

Do you see, beloved, how many and how great blessings we would have lost if the Lord had yielded to the exhortation of John and declined baptism?  For the heavens had been shut before this.  The region above was inaccessible.  We might descend to the lower parts, but not ascend to the upper.  So it happened not only that the Lord was being baptized – he also was making new the old creation.  He was bringing the alienated under the scepter of adoption.  For straightway “the heavens were opened to him.”  A reconciliation took place between the visible and the invisible.  The celestial orders were filled with joy, the diseases of earth were healed, secret things made known, those at enmity restored to amity.  For you have herd the word of the Evangelist, saying, “The heavens were opened to him,” on account of three wonders.  At the baptism of Christ the Bridegroom, it was fitting that the heavenly chamber should open its glorious gates.  So when the Holy Spirit descended in the form of a dove, and the Father’s voice spread everywhere, it was fitting that “the gates of heaven should be lifted up.

Saint Augustine

In the Scripture many details are mentioned distinguishably of each of the triune Persons individually, such as cannot be said of them jointly, even though they are inseparably together, as when they are made manifest by corporeal sounds.  So in certain passages of Scripture and through certain created beings they are shown separately and successively, as the Father in the voice which is heard:  “Thou art my Son,” and the Son in the human nature which he took from the Virgin, and the Holy Spirit in the physical appearance of a dove.  These are mentioned distinguishably, it is true, but they do not prove that the Three are separated.  To explicate this, we take as an example the unity of our memory, our understanding, our will.  Although we list these distinguishably, individually and in their various functions, there is nothing we do or say which proceeds from one of them without the other two.  However, we are not to think that these three faculties are compared to the Trinity so as to resemble it at every point, for a comparison is never given such importance in an argument that it exactly fits the thing to which it is compared.  Besides, when can any likeness in a created being be applied to the Creator?

Saint Gregory Nazianzen

As man he was baptized, but he absolved sins as God.  He needed no purifying rites himself – his purpose was to hallow water.

It’s interesting how life comes at you from multiple directions sometimes. This weekend in our RCIA class the fiancee of one of the inquirers suggested that he had been taught that the soul exists before the body, quoting Jeremiah 1:5 “before you were formed in the womb I knew you” as a basis for his understanding. Trying to explain God’s existence outside of time became a rather interesting experience in explaining something one knows he cannot ever fully understand himself.

Now, and if you know me you won’t be surprised, that poor attempt at an answer has been gnawing at me ever since. So tonight I sat down with my Logos and determined to read up on the whole issue. After digging through Origen, Tertullian and Irenaeus I came across the following from St. Gregory of Nyssa, from his On the Making of Man. It’s amazing how well it contrasts with Nancy Pelosi’s recent attempt at patristic research.

But just as we say that in wheat, or in any other grain, the whole form of the plant is potentially included—the leaves, the stalk, the joints, the grain, the beard—and do not say in our account of its nature that any of these things has pre-existence, or comes into being before the others, but that the power abiding in the seed is manifested in a certain natural order, not by any means that another nature is infused into it—in the same way we suppose the human germ to possess the potentiality of its nature, sown with it at the first start of its existence, and that it is unfolded and manifested by a natural sequence as it proceeds to its perfect state, not employing anything external to itself as a stepping-stone to perfection, but itself advancing its own self in due course to the perfect state; so that it is not true to say either that the soul exists before the body, or that the body exists without the soul, but that there is one beginning of both, which according to the heavenly view was laid as their foundation in the original will of God; according to the other, came into existence on the occasion of generation.

He says it, without surprise, far better than I ever did.

Okay, I admit it. When I saw this book on the list of possible books for review from Catholic Company I just about jumped out of my seat. I haven’t met a book by Mike Aquilina yet that I haven’t found both intellectually and spiritually stimulating. This one was no different.

It’s a fairly slim volume, tipping the scales at 188 pages including references. A good number of these pages are accented by beautiful artwork by Lea Marie Ravotti; a book on symbols cannot survive without good artwork and this work does not disappoint. I’ve seen a couple of quibbles over the use of a relatively fine font combined with a medium brown ink. When I first opened the book I said, “oh yeah, I see what they’re talking about”. Then I started to read it. In the end analysis I’ll say this: it may take a couple of pages to get used to it, but as long as you’re not trying to read it by candle light by the time you’re out of the Introduction you won’t even notice it. And that’s from someone who is destroying his eyesight by staring at a computer screen for eight to twelve hours a day for a living.

As important as the aesthetic of the book may be, without content it would be a niche intellectual object. Content, however, is not a problem for this book. In fact, I am in complete agreement with the author’s plaintive cry in Chapter 1:

Few of us today, however, can even begin to understand the messages left for us by our ancestors. We have lost our Christian mother tongue – the code of the martyrs – and we are impoverished by the loss. They have become like hieroglyphics, a language that only academic specialists understand. What is worse is that we have forgotten how to think the way these distant ancestors thought, and this has rendered them even more remote from us. Their symbols seem incomprehensible now.

Yet delivering the message was, for them, clearly an urgent matter, a matter of ultimate consequence. To carve or paint or scratch these symbols, they burrowed into the ground and breathed foul air while laboring in dim lamplight. Our ancestors did this so that their message might reach us. We owe them at least the effort of a sympathetic study.

We do indeed, and this volume is an excellent start. By turns intellectual, historical, philosophical, academic and spiritual it lays out for us a world all together too many of us take for granted when we even acknowledge its existence at all. We have, by and large, lost the use of this language and that is only to our detriment.

I can say that within only a page or so of the first symbol explored in this book I was thinking “now there is something I can use with our RCIA class”. The book is not so simple as to be redundant for all but the true patrologists out there, nor is it so complicated as to be over the heads of those with a thinner Christian formation. It is clear that Aquilina is not only comfortable with his subject matter but fluent in it. There is a point at which one becomes sufficiently steeped in a topic that conversing about it no longer requires complex explanations and stiff wording. No, in this topic the author is closer to conversational in tone which makes for a very comfortable reading even as the reader works his way from the author’s words to a quote from a Church Father to a quote from the Bible and back again. It is a rare treat to read a book this informative that is simultaneously this fluid.

In my last review I said I was going to buy a copy of the book for myself since I had received an unbound galley copy; this copy was “the real thing”. This time, though, I’m going one better than before. I’m not buying another copy for myself, I’m buying one for our RCIA director. If you know me, you know it’s a rare thing indeed for me to buy a book for someone else; the last time I did that it was Pope Benedict’s Jesus of Nazareth so Mike Aquilina is in good company here. Does this mean I’d recommend this book to someone else? Absolutely, and for this price it’s an absolute steal given how much you will learn. Buy it, read it, learn something about your faith. Then read it again and learn something else. Yeah, it’s that kind of a book.

This review was written as part of The Catholic Company product reviewer program. Visit The Catholic Company to find more information on Signs and Mysteries-Revealing Ancient Christian Symbols .

I recently finished Mike Aquilina‘s book, The Mass of the Early Christians. I’ve been sufficiently busy that I haven’t had a chance to write even this short review until now, much to my chagrin. Suffice it to say, Mike has done it again – the book is fantastic.

If you’re looking for an exhaustive source review of every single patristic source, this slim volume won’t give you what you want. If, however, you want a good, solid overview of the writings of many of the Church Fathers on the Mass – and even some heretical and pagan writings – this is the book for you. Unlike some of Mike’s other books he doesn’t just let the Fathers do the talking in this tome, he also takes up the opportunity to do some instruction of his own. I simply can’t say how necessary that is if in no other area than that surrounding the Discipline of the Secret whereby the early Fathers would be (at best) elliptical in their remarks on what happened during the Mass. Without Mike’s most helpful commentary the reader would feel lost reading the early writers’ statements and could easily conclude that they really didn’t see the Mass in the same fashion we do today, and a horrible mistake that would be.

One other tribute to this book is Mike’s foresight to include not just the Church Fathers but also heretics and pagans. We so often know, or at least have an inkling, what the Church has believed and said, but yet we rarely it seems look to see what others said about the Church. That insularity was hardly a mark of the early Church, even during the persecutions. Since this dialog necessarily had two sides it is critical to know what the “other” side had to say in order to understand the Fathers’ responses. It would be, in a way, like trying to explain the transition from the Apostles’ Creed to the Nicene Creed without mentioning Arianism – possible, but so desperately much more shallow.

I can virtually guarantee I didn’t get the full depths of what I read in this book the first time. That first time, however, will not be the last. If you like patristics or liturgy or history or just the Church herself buy the book. If you don’t like patristics when you start the book, you’re likely to by the time you’re done.

I know I should have had this post up earlier today, but this has just been one of those days. If nothing else, it’s not that late yet on the West Coast. That said, I wanted to make sure I didn’t rush this any more than necessary since I’m also taking this opportunity to note that Saint Ambrose is as of now officially the patron Saint of this blog. I’m sure it could be said that his assistance could have been useful a long time ago. But enough about this blog.

Saint Ambrose is certainly most well-known as the Bishop who most helped to convert Saint Augustine, following all the way to his baptism by Ambrose. Perhaps my favorite quote from Augustine about Ambrose is how he mentions his astonishment that Ambrose would read the Scriptures without moving his lips. To us it seems strange, but to him a revelation. Ambrose, however, was far more than just a bookworm.

His father having died while he was young, Ambrose’s mother returned to Rome to raise her family. The young Ambrose, named after his father, learned Greek and became a notable poet and orator. He was named Assessor by the praetorian prefect Anicius Probus and then the emperor Valentian made him governor of Liguria and Aemilia. For this post he took up residence in Milan.

It was during this time that the Arian bishop of Milan, Auxentius, died. As episcopal appointments were directed by popular acclaim at this point in history there was much strife between the Arian and Catholic parties. When Ambrose went to the church to plead for calm and for the choice to be made in a spirit of peace without tumult a voice cried out ‘Ambrose, bishop!’ The cry was quickly echoed through the assembly, stunning Ambrose who was still only a catechumen. The decision was relayed to the emperor with Ambrose pleading to be excused; Valentian considered it a great honor that his appointed governor should be seen fit for episcopal office and ordered that the election take place. Ambrose went so far as to attempt to hide in the house of a senator, but when word arrived of the emperor’s decision Ambrose was handed over and received episcopal consecration a week later – today, December 7, 374. We celebrate thus, not his birth into Heaven but his ordination to the episcopacy.

Ambrose set himself to deep study, feeling himself ignorant of theology. He was known for always being available to anyone who needed him and for his strict simplicity. Ambrose had affection for the vocation of consecrated virgins and, at the request of his sister St. Marcellina he collected his sermons on this subject thereby making a famous treatise. So effective were his sermons that mothers tried to keep their daughters away – so effective in fact he was charged with attempting to depopulate the empire. His response? Wars, not maidens, are the destroyers of the human race.

The statesman Symmachus attempted to have the altar of the ancient goddess of Victory re-established in the senate-house. In his request to Valentian he made suggestions which would seem eerily similar to those we hear today, including: “What does it matter the way in which each seeks for truth? Ther emust be more than one road to the great mystery.” Wikipedia describes Ambrose’s response thus:

To this petition Ambrose replied in a letter to Valentinian, arguing that the devoted worshipers of idols had often been forsaken by their deities; that the native valour of the Roman soldiers had gained their victories, and not the pretended influence of pagan priests; that these idolatrous worshipers requested for themselves what they refused to Christians; that voluntary was more honourable than constrained virginity; that as the Christian ministers declined to receive temporal emoluments, they should also be denied to pagan priests; that it was absurd to suppose that God would inflict a famine upon the empire for neglecting to support a religious system contrary to His will as revealed in the Holy Scriptures; that the whole process of nature encouraged innovations, and that all nations had permitted them even in religion; that heathen sacrifices were offensive to Christians; and that it was the duty of a Christian prince to suppress pagan ceremonies.

In further conflicts with the Arian Empress Justina Ambrose wielded the office of Bishop with both great bravado and great effect. When ordered to hand over churches for Arian worship he refused, and after preaching on Palm Sunday against handing over churches the people barricaded themselves in the basilica with their pastor as troops approached, intending to starve them out. As they waited, Ambrose taught the people Psalms and hymns of his own hand. Finally, when asked to appoint lay judges to decide his case Ambrose reminded Valentian that laymen could not judge bishops or make ecclesiastical laws. It was at this time he ascended his cathedra and in explaining the situation uttered the memorable phrase, “the emperor is in the Church, not over it.”

In these always exciting times, Ambrose was never too long to find conflict coming his way. There was a case where he defended a bishop from having to pay restitution to rebuild a Jewish temple which had been torn down, suggesting that a bishop should never be constrained to pay for the erection of a temple to be used for false worship. Modern sensibilities may find this rather unsettling, but times then were far more polemical than they are now or rather than we would like to think they are now.

After a brutal massacre at the order of the emperor Theodosius Ambrose declared him excommunicated until he properly repented and made proper penance. Even though the massacre was well-known at the time it is related that Theodosius removed every sign of royalty and publicly begged forgiveness. In this we see an interesting foreshadowing of St. Thomas Beckett and Henry II, although this did not end in further bloodshed.

We read of his last days:

When he fell sick he foretold his death, but said he should live till Easter. On the day of his death he lay with his hands extended in the form of a cross for several hours, moving his lips in constant prayer. St. Honoratus of Vercelli was there, resting in another room, when he seemed to hear a voice crying three times to him, ‘Arise Make haste! He is going’. He went down and gave him the Body of the Lord, and soon after St. Ambrose was dead. It was Good Friday, April 4, 397, and he was about fifty-seven years old. He was buried on Easter day, and his relics rest under the high altar of the basilica, where they were buried in 835.

St. Ambrose was declared a Doctor of the Church in 1298 by Pope Boniface VIII, making him one of the four Great Doctors of the Western Church. He is the patron saint of, inter alia, learning, students, schoolchildren and Milan, Italy. He is also the patron saint of bees and beekeepers owing to his appellation of “The Honey Tongued Doctor”. There is indeed much the modern Church can learn from this ancient Father.

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Most of the above information is taken from Butler’s Lives of the Saints, except where otherwise noted. I have also spliced in other information which does not appear in Butler’s work.

Zadok has a very interesting post gleaned from his reading of Origen’s treatise On Prayer. Reading the excerpts Zadok has provided does make one think that then-Cardinal Ratzinger had much of this treatise fresh in his memory when he wrote his The Spirit of the Liturgy. If you haven’t read that book yet, do yourself a favor and do so soon – your experience of prayer and at Mass will never be the same.

I’m going to put out a bleg to see if anyone can point me to a complete version of Gregory of Nyssa‘s Catechetical Oration, also known as his Great Catechetical Discourse. My very busy day yesterday included a kick-off meeting of our RCIA team to assign topics and the Pope’s recent discussion of Gregory made me want to read this historic work as he says it “laid out the fundamental points of theology, not for an academic theology closed in on itself, but to offer catechists a system of reference to keep in mind in their teaching, a sort of framework within which a pedagogic interpretation of the faith could move.” What better place to start?

If my wife reads this post, she’ll probably sprain an eye socket rolling her eyes. That said, I was quite excited to see that the Corpus Scriptorum Historiae Byzantinae, the Patrologia Graeca, and the Patrologia Latina have been scanned into Google Books. Even better than that, Mischa Hooker has cataloged the lot of them, along with a whole bunch more. It’s a veritable playground! Okay, now I’m probably scaring more than just my wife …

H/T to Mike Aquilina and Bread and Circuses.

Or, as I’m reminded by my friends from the southern States, “all y’all” (I need to spend some quality time south of the Mason-Dixon just to learn the lingo … and maybe eat the food!). Mike Aquilina has referred some of you here, so welcome – please do look around. I hope I got all the dirt swept under the carpets in time…

I must offer a public thanks to Mike for his generous compliment for which I am entirely unworthy. He’s a great guy, a true gentleman and a fantastic author. Plus, he has the day job I’ve always wanted, the lucky bugger…