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.

In the Catholic-Protestant apologetics world somewhere early in every apologist’s career they’re faced with the issue of how to interpret Matthew 16:18 where we find Jesus telling Simon, “[a]nd so I say to you, you are Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church, and the gates of the netherworld shall not prevail against it.” For Catholics it is one of the proofs Jesus intended Peter to be the visible head of the Church. For Protestants it is either ignored or, quite often, worked around by an appeal to the Greek.

In the Greek the words translated above as “Peter” and “rock” are transliterated as “Petros” and “petra” respectively. The masculine “Petros” means effectively “small stone” or “pebble” while the feminine “petra” means “large stone”. Protestant apologists will say this shows that Jesus was not suggesting Peter would be the Rock upon which the Church would be built but rather Jesus Himself. That argument has been answered a plethora of times (a quick search finds at least this, I’m sure you can find more if you want – suffice it to say it’s a rather weak argument at best) and is not what I’m aiming to talk about here.

What I want to do instead is to briefly take advantage of the whole “pebble” thing and look at it from a different perspective. The Protestant perspective would suggest the “small stone” interpretation means Peter was too insubstantial to be the “Rock” upon which the Church was built. But let us think for just a minute about what other time a small stone has played a major role in salvation history:

Then, staff in hand, David selected five smooth stones from the wadi and put them in the pocket of his shepherd’s bag. With his sling also ready to hand, he approached the Philistine.
…
David put his hand into the bag and took out a stone, hurled it with the sling, and struck the Philistine on the forehead. The stone embedded itself in his brow, and he fell prostrate on the ground. (Thus David overcame the Philistine with sling and stone; he struck the Philistine mortally, and did it without a sword.) (1 Sam 17:40,49-50)

David, the great king and patriarch of the line ordained from the beginning of time to lead to the Christ, used a small stone to slay the great enemy of Israel. A small stone, the weapon of a child and a shepherd – not a sword, the weapon of a warrior.

The parallels continue. David hurled the stone and struck the Philistine in the brow – if you will, struck him in his intellectual center, the “nerve center”. If you’ll allow a slight poetic license, Peter was similarly picked up from Israel and “hurled” to the very nerve center of the Roman Empire, Rome itself. God planted him in the very brow of the great Babylon as he hung upon his own inverted cross, as mortal a wound to Rome as the stone with which David struck Goliath.

So yes, maybe the whole “rock”/”small stone” issue is due to a misunderstanding about order of translations. But maybe it’s also providential that this very issue has come to us. If nothing else, it serves to remind us that we too are “hurled” into the center of our modern Babylon and only by doing what we are called to do can God use us as He used Peter. “The blood of Christians is seed.” Be planted, that the Church may grow.

NLM has a full translation of the Osservatore Romano interview with Msgr. Guido Marini, the Pope’s Master of Ceremonies. Do yourself a favor and read the whole thing – it’s densely packed with insights into from where the Pope is coming and to where he is going. As a minor history buff his accent on historical continuity as a proper hermeneutic and as a theological and liturgical key is both critical and intriguing. God has blessed us with this Pope, indeed.

This fine book by Fr. Benedict Groeschel, CFR, and James Monti is well summed-up by Fr. Groeschel in his introduction to his section of the book, speaking of the great mysteries of the Faith:

Your head should now be reeling with the thought of all of these mysteries. If it is not, go back and read the last paragraphs over again slowly because you missed what was being said. You can never sufficiently deal with the mystery of the Eucharist or the particular subject of this book, the devotion to the presence of Christ in this sacrament, unless you have a vibrant sense of mystery and have an awesome awareness of the incredible reality of this sacrament.

The last sentence is absolutely true – if you are not at least the tiniest bit open to the possibility that the Eucharist is Jesus Himself and therefore worthy of praise and adoration this book is not for you. If, however, there is even the slightest opening this may be the book that cracks it open for you. In it you will find a mix of history and theology, fact and lore. Very Catholic, that.

The book is comprised of two sections, one by each of the authors. In Fr. Groeschel’s section there were times I could almost hear his old Brooklyn voice narrating the words – he clearly was clearly putting his whole self into his writing. Given the structure of the book it should not be surprising there was some amount of overlap in parts. While repeated information can be a source of frustration, and I’ll admit there were places where it was more noticeable than others, this overlap was more than offset because each author was coming at the information from different directions; Fr. Groeschel more theological, psychological and to some extent sociological, Monti more historical. The two complement each other well. I am quite glad to have read this book, and I’d be willing to bet just about anyoen else would be as well.

First, Rich Leonardi tells us about both a beginner’s and an advanced course in Latin provided by the U.K.’s National Archives. I simply must find a way to improve my sketchy-at-best Latin skills. After all, it is little use telling people of the value of Latin if I haven’t remotely mastered it myself.

Second, Rorate Caeli lets us all know there is a course being offered on St. Thomas Aquinas. Ite ad Thomam has more details – it looks to be an interactive online course. I can manage to pull out both of these at nearly the same time, as well as another super-secret project I’m just getting started. Sure I can!

Russell Shaw has an excellent article at Inside Catholic on clericalism in the Church. The reason it’s good is that it doesn’t take just one side or the other but explores it and, as one could expect, finds that the truth is “in the middle”. One of my favorite quotes is this:

Not only that, one-dimensional emphasis in official Church circles on “lay ministry” is at the expense of time and energy that might better have been spent forming people for lay apostolate. Lately, the U.S. bishops’ conference has concentrated on setting norms for training people preparing to work for the Church as lay ecclesial ministers. Considering the important role these people often have in liturgy, catechesis, and other areas of Church life, their training certainly merits attention. But not at the cost of ignoring the formation of lay people for apostolate in the world. Yet that’s exactly what happens — and has been happening for a long time.

You see, that’s just the point – there is so much focus on the ad intra role of the laity they have no time or energy for what is, in reality, supposed to be their, if you will, “real” job. Yes, there is a very valid role for the laity working inside the Church. However, when people view having “done their duty” as having served as a lector or EMHC on Sunday you know something is desperately out of balance. And yes, I know people who think those extraordinary liturgical roles necessarily take precedence over non-liturgical apostolic work. I still, however, fail to understand how being an EMHC on Sunday and making Communion take two minutes less time can possibly be more valuable than proper spiritual formation of one’s self or one’s family or even evangelic work. It’s interesting that there is such an intersection between bad liturgical theology and bad ecclesiology, don’t you think?

I was going to blog on the brain-dead article in the Times regarding the Church’s recent statements on bioethics and the environment. But then I saw that Mark Shea beat me to it:

To begin with is the whole “rules based” approach of the author, which is fundamentally tone deaf to the fact that the faith is about relationship, not breaking rules. Off on that wrong footing, the author then makes it sound like the Vatican has added new “mortal sins” to some traditional list in order to keep up with Euro-trendiness. As is often the case, Dante somehow becomes an extension of the Magisterium (and the author even concludes with a list of official looking hellish punishments for the traditional seven deadlies, all derived from the Inferno).

Since he said pretty much everything I was going to, I’ll just leave you to read his post rather than repeating it here.

Well that should make for some interesting hits in the search engines. Sorry folks, this is a Catholic blog, so no raunchy pictures here just a pointer to a great post by Marcel at Aggie Catholic. It’s a nice summation of JPII’s Theology of the Body framed in a style that we’re seeing more and more from the Church these days – talk not about a “negative” theology but rather of the beauty and wonder of God’s creation and our duty to use that creation appropriately. I think his third point nails it:

3 – Sex is about real love. Real love is living for what is best for the other, regardless of the cost to myself. Think about it – what is more powerful than having sex? The greatest power we have is to create and the greatest of all created things is a human being. When a child is created in a mother’s womb, it is because two people have the opportunity to procreate. That is, to create with God. Sex is the most powerful thing humans can participate in.

Catholics do not hate sex, we do not despise the body. We want only for the body to be respected for what it is – an integral part of the whole of man and woman created in God’s image. Smut is not beauty, it is the disrespect of beauty – God is Beauty itself, and we derive our beauty from our proximity to Him in word deed and likeness.

I have something to confess. Something that until now I’ve always kept hidden to the side, tucked away so people won’t either think less of me or scoff at my concern. It’s pretty bad, so be sure you’re ready for it. Okay, here goes. In the past eighteen months I’ve made it to Confession precisely … zero times. Why you ask? That’s a good question.

I have often told myself that it’s because none of the churches anywhere near my home have confession times anything other than early Saturday afternoon and, well, that just doesn’t work because I have family commitments at that time every week. Call and make an appointment? Yeah, but I just can’t get in to face-to-face confession and unless you are very, very lucky and the priest starts behind the screen a scheduled confession will usually become face-to-face by chance if not design. If only those were the only reasons this wouldn’t be much worth a blog post. See, there’s more.

More? Sure. Good? Hah, not exactly. Am I a heretic, a Protestant who doesn’t believe in individual confession? No, but at least that objection would hold some substantive weight. Are the priests in my area incapable of performing the Sacrament due to a defect in form? Nope, and some of them I’m told are wonderful confessors too. Are the albino Opus Dei monks spying on the confessionals in the Diocese? Okay, maybe that’s not too realistic. Unless they are. But no, that’s not why either.

Why then? It’s simple really. To use one of my catch words, it’s stupid, but simple. Remember, of course, that I’m a convert and not a cradle Catholic. So when I went through RCIA lo those many years ago our talk about Confession consisted of showing us the confessional and a brief talk about the Gospel examples of Jesus’ forgiving of sins and his commissioning of the Apostles to do the same and Peter’s receiving the keys, then a generally vague discussion of the form – effectively “you go in, make the sign of the cross, tell the priest your sins, you make an act of contrition and he gives you absolution”. Perfectly simple, innocuous and enough to move on to the other Sacrament of healing. But since this was the time when rote memorization of prayers was verboten ….

I never learned a proper Act of Contrition. I saw it once in a while after that, but never really learned it. Until today. You see, dear old St. Patrick’s in Nashua with good Fr. Kelly as pastor has sustained a brilliant idea from the Church’s past that has by-and-large been shoved to the wayside in favor of task forces and board meetings. The idea is as obvious as it is simple which is perhaps why it is overlooked. Father simply makes sure he (or I imagine another priest if he is unavoidably detained) is in the confessional at least fifteen minutes before every Mass, including the noon-time weekday Masses. In the case of St. Patricks this is doubly good because they are just off of Main Street which means there is ample opportunity for foot traffic and for people to assist at Mass and/or go to confession during their lunch hour. It’s simple – provide a needed service when people can get to it, and they will come.

So, knowing that I’d be in Nashua today I studied up and memorized the simple Act of Contrition and then stuffed a copy of it in my breviary to study again. Let’s just say that I’m a case example of why rote memorization of prayers is sometimes a good thing – without that base, any Act of Contrition I’d contrived on my own would have stuttered and blathered to the point it would have been more embarrassing than many people find Confession itself. So I memorized and repeated it to myself. I muttered it all the way to the church to make sure I didn’t forget. Then I walked in … and almost didn’t see the confessionals. They are done, as pazdziernik puts it, “in the box” at the back of the church. I finally find them after I’m sure spooking some of the elderly ladies while stumbling around like the village drunk only to see its occupied. A glance at my watch and a voice tells me I’ll never get in before Mass starts. But lo! the person exits and I swiftly swoop in a little less like the village drunk than before.

Was it quick? Was it painless? No, and no. And thanks be to God for that. You see, Fr. Kelly was truly paying attention to my confession and asking me questions to make sure he understood what I was saying. Did I feel like he was prying? Absolutely not, what I felt like was he was actually trying to help me out and that’s when I got the distinct understanding that I wasn’t doing this alone. God was there, making sure I did it right, holding my hand as it were and guiding me forward. “Is that all you recall, to the best of your ability?” “Yes, Father, it is.” Penance is assigned. Forgiveness – Absolution!

If I could have reached through the confessional to give him a big ol’ man-hug I’d have done it. I was only microseconds away from bursting into “Gloria in excelsis deo!” when I remembered that not everyone there would have been edified by my singing. So I just knelt down, performed my penance, assisted at Mass and received our Lord in Communion with the lily-whitest soul I’ve had in a long, long time. It was, in a word, euphoric.

If I may be so bold, this tells me two things. Pastors: make confessions available before every Mass, no matter the scheduling conflicts it causes or whether anyone shows up right away. If they don’t come, use St. John Vianney as your model and pray harder, but don’t ever abandon the confessional. Laity: I can’t say this strenuously enough – go to confession! Regularly! Tell your Pastor you need greater availability of the Sacrament of Confession and go. Confessionals have a certain gravity to them – the more they’re around, the more they’re used, and the more people seeing them used the more new people will use them.

Yeah, I’m giddy. And I’m going back too, soon. Wouldn’t you? As I said in the title, Deo gratias!

When you’re as gifted as our good Pope is, sometimes you just can’t help but make a (and often many) insightful theological point. CNA has it (my emphasis):

Vatican City, Oct 11, 2007 / 09:10 am (CNA).- Today Pope Benedict XVI received the letters of credence of South Korea’s new ambassador to the Holy See. The Holy Father took the opportunity to praise the witness of the many Korean martyrs by saying, “Their sacrifice reminds us that no cost is too great for persevering in fidelity to the truth.”

Benedict XVI spoke to the Korean diplomat in English, telling him that, “Regrettably, in our contemporary pluralist world some people question or even deny the importance of truth. Yet objective truth remains the only sure basis for social cohesion. Truth is not dependent upon consensus but precedes it and makes it possible, generating authentic human solidarity.”

The pontiff noted that in the midst of this societal uncertainty about the truth, the bold witness of those Koreans who laid down their lives for the truth has brought “remarkable growth of the Catholic Church in Korea.”

“Their sacrifice,” he added, “reminds us that no cost is too great for persevering in fidelity to the truth.

“The Church – always mindful of the truth’s power to unite people, and ever attentive to mankind’s irrepressible desire for peaceful coexistence – eagerly strives to strengthen concord and social harmony both in ecclesial life and civic life, proclaiming the truth about the human person as known by natural reason and fully manifested through divine revelation.”

To put it bluntly, it’s time to stop living on credit. As we do so often in our “non-church” lives (the fact that so many live as if such a thing even exists is a whole other topic) we often believe we can just pull a Wimpy and constantly say we’ll pay next Tuesday. This is perhaps the single greatest danger of the teaching of Purgatory, that it allows some to form the idea that “I don’t have to be perfect, I just have to manage to get in to Purgatory then it’s all up from there”. It’s the most insidious form of a lie – one formed around a kernel of truth. Certainly you don’t have to be perfect – no one is perfect but God – but that does not provide the built-in excuse to stop trying.

The only difference between this issue and its comparison to moving from credit card to credit card is that, at the end, we don’t get to just declare bankruptcy and start over again or pass our debt on to others. What we earn here stays with us forever. Just as in investing, you have to spend a little capital to gain any. So what do you want, the nick-nack bought on credit or the treasure chest paid for over a life time? Choose now, but “choose wisely”.