Per Christum

This post is just a quick note to let you know that former-Southern Baptist and current-”Southern Papist”, Andrew McNutt, will be on the EWTN’s “The Journey Home” with Marcus Grodi tonight (April 14, 2008) at 7pm Central/8pm Eastern time.

Andy’s got a great story and his prayers and emails were very helpful when I was making that same Baptist-to-Papist transition. Say prayer for him and give it a peek if you can.

You may be familiar with the television and radio ministry of evangelist Ray Comfort and Kirk Cameron (aka “Mike Sever” from Growing Pains) called Way of the Master [warning: here there be loud audio , busy flash and dubious theology.] I usually refer to it as “Way of the Ambush” because it’s built around walking up to unsuspecting folks on the street and letting them know how sinful they are and, if they haven’t followed the “Roman’s Road”/Sinner’s Prayer version of conversion, that they are on their way to Hell.

Because there are a lot of Catholics (practicing and non) on this planet, they are often targets for this treatment…all the better if they are poorly catechized or lapsed.

One feature they have on their radio show is “Fish with Trish” where a lady named Trish Ramos goes around with a cellphone finding non-Christians or people who “think they’re good” who will agree to talk on the air with Ray, Kirk and/or radio host Todd Friel to find out how wrong and lost they are.

This time, I think Trish reeled in a fish that wouldn’t fit in their live-well: Fr. Jim McGhee.

Fr. Jim McGhee is a convert to the Catholic faith AND a Catholic priest at St. Elizabeth Ann Seton parish in Forth Worth, Texas. He was raised as a Methodist and was a Methodist minister for about seven years before becaming Episcopalian and serving as a priest in that communion for about 20 years. He entered full-communion with the Catholic Church in 1992. He’s also married (which amazed Trish and caused her to wonder out loud if it was “some sort of liberal thing.”)

Well, Fr. Jim can quote scripture as well as they can and he knows their language. He presents the Catholic faith in way that I think they could understand, even if it wasn’t in a way that they liked. Here’s an excerpt:

Comfort: But, if I’m a Roman Catholic, I’ve been sprinkled as a baby, I’m adult and I’m Catholic by name but I haven’t repented and my faith is not in Jesus am I going to heaven?

McGhee: No.

Comfort: So I’m going to Hell?

McGhee: Because you have to cooperate with the grace of God in knowing the faith, living in hope according to your will and learning how to love the good by presence of the Holy Spirit. There has to be a sanctification, a growing up in the Faith.

Download an mp3 of the Program here
(Fr. Jim’s segment starts at 37 mins and 56 seconds into the mp3*)

Anyway, I think Fr. Jim did a great job of presenting the Catholic faith and traditional, sacramental Christianity in a winsome way to a hostile audience that espouses a more novel version of the Christian faith. He really contrasts the nuances of the Apostolic Faith with the “fits on business card” presentation that seems to be par for the course at Way of the Master.

Trish also posted photos and her account of the encounter on her blog as well this video:

*Note: There are some other Catholic-related jewels earlier in the episode: a recording from a 60 Minutes interview with a Catholic former-hitman talking about confession and an incredibly shallow and ham-fisted review of the statement by Avery Cardinal Dulles about the universal scope of the plan of salvation that gets brought up in Fr. Jim’s segement. That’s why Todd Friel says “it’s not beat up on Catholics hour.” There’s also a clip from a sermon by Reformed Baptist pastor John Piper about making sure Christ is first in your life that I thought was well stated.

Even though I mostly enjoy the interviews on American Public Media’s Speaking of Faith with Krista Tippet, the series is usually a little fuzzy-wuzzy and left-of-center for my taste. Hey, it’s public radio, not EWTN…what do you expect?

That’s why I was pleasantly surprised to see both this topic and interviewee on the show:

The Jaroslav Pelikan on “The Need for Creeds”

Audio of the interview (mp3, 53:27)

Episode webpage

The interview with the late theologian and late-in-life convert to the Orthodox Church from Lutheranism was recorded in 2003. He died on May 13, 2006.

Here’s a transcript of an excerpt I found particularly quotable:

Tippet: So, what is it about Christianity that has needed creeds?

Pelikan: Well, what it is about religious faith that needs creed is that religious faith in general, prayer addressed to “to whom it may concern”, sentiment about some transcendent dimension otherwise undefined does not have any staying power. It’s OK to have that at ten o’clock on a Sunday morning when you’re out with your friends somewhere, but in the darkest hours of life you gotta believe something specific. And that specification is the task of the creed. Because, much as some people may not like it, to believe one thing is also to disbelieve another.

Tippet: *curtly* Huh.

Pelikan: To say yes is also to say no.

(Resurrection by Piero della Francesca)

Christ is risen! Alleluia! Alleluia!

And this will be the last of my Holy Week/Easter reflections, so for those of you who may have been annoyed by them, that’s one more reason to rejoice!

At the Easter Vigil last night I thought back over the accounts of Christ’s triumphant entry into Jerusalem, his passion and his resurrection. I thought about the different people I identified with: the crowds whose shouts of “hosanna” soon turn to cries of “crucify him”, the spineless Pilate who has an innocent man beaten and crucified out of fear of those above and below him, the despairing traitor Judas, the repentant denier Peter, the awed solider who proclaims “surely, this was the Son of God, the hopeless disciples hiding behind locked doors while the Lord is in the tomb and the joyful women who hear the angel say “he is not here for his is risen.”

Placing myself in those scenes, I identify with all of the above. I realized, however, that it’s not any of those people that the Scriptures invite us to walk the road of Holy Week with. We, by grace, are invited to walk this path with Christ himself.

Those of us who are Christians know, as Christ did, that when he enters Jerusalem he is headed for a cross not an earthly throne. With Christ we know which diners at the table in the upper room will deny and betray him. We know the contents of the cup he is about to drink as he enters the garden to pray. We know that he will not receive justice from his own people or from Pilate. We know as he cries “it is finished” that this is not the end. We know what those who come to the tomb on Easter morning will find.

This is what it means to be a Christan: to be made an heir with Christ and to be adopted as sons and daughters of God receiving by grace what Christ has by nature. The first Adam fell into a grave and took us with him, but the second Adam descended into that grave and rose again, bringing us out.

Christ is risen! Alleluia! Alleluia!

The worst has happened. The Shepherd has been struck down and the sheep are scattered.

Now, like the disciples behind locked doors, we wait. We, however, know what we’re waiting for and how this story ends.

See you Sunday.

(photo by Brandi Sims)

I really don’t want to spoil the gravity of this night with too many words, so I’ll be brief.

This Triduum, I’ve been struck by the way Our Lord abandoned himself in total trust to the will of the Father as he began to give his life for the world. From the lips of the perfect man come “let this cup pass” and “my God, my God, why have you forsaken me” while under the crushing weigh of sorrow and dread. But, from the same lips, come “not my will, but thine” and “Father, into your hands I commend my spirit” in perfect trust and faith.

In our own dark nights when our lesser cups of suffering are set before us and we feel abandoned by all, even God, may he grant us the grace to make those latter words of Christ our own.

So, during supper, fully aware that the Father had put everything into his power
and that he had come from God and was returning to God,
he rose from supper and took off his outer garments.
He took a towel and tied it around his waist.
Then he poured water into a basin
and began to wash the disciples’ feet
and dry them with the towel around his waist…

…when he had washed their feet
and put his garments back on and reclined at table again,
he said to them, “Do you realize what I have done for you?
You call me ‘teacher’ and ‘master,’ and rightly so, for indeed I am.
If I, therefore, the master and teacher, have washed your feet, you ought to wash one another’s feet.
I have given you a model to fo
so that as I have done for you, you should also do.”
–from tonight’s reading from the Gospel according to St. John

Here, on the night he was to be betrayed and the night that he gave us the Eucharist, we see the story of Our Lord’s earthly life in microcosm: he leaves his position at the table where he rightfully sits as Lord and sets aside his outer-garments and takes on the role of the lowliest servant…just as he set aside the glory that he had shared with Father since the beginning and came down to earth, taking on the form of a slave. Every day of his earthly life was a stooping down and a condescension in service to the ones he loved.

This is our model. As he has done, we should do: serve, love, forgive, give all, and abandon ourselves in life and death to the will of the Father. I do a really poor job of all of the above, but there is hope for even a sinner like me in this because he still stoops down to ones he loves and makes us clean.

As much as I love hearing the Gospel readings proclaimed in the liturgy, sometimes they are hard to hear. Usually this is because something Our Lord says cuts to the heart of my own self-righteousness and pride. The Passion narrative read today, however, is the hardest reading for me all year. And not just because of what I hear, but for what I and the rest of the congregation say:

“He deserves to die!”

“Prophesy for us, Christ: who is it that struck you?”

“Let him be crucified!”

And as I say these things, I’m wishing that this was the only time I said them…wishing I hadn’t said them with my life and sins many times over.

But, miracles of miracles, after this I am given the grace to stand and confess my faith in the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, and in the Church, the forgiveness of sins and the resurrection. I am invited to call God Father and pray as Jesus taught us. Christ, the betrayed, abused and crucified Lord, does not turn me away, but gives me his peace. He gives Himself, Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity, and dwells with one who is not worthy to receive him.

These gifts make the Passion narrative bearable in the same way Easter Sunday makes Good Friday good.

“Truly, this was the Son of God!”

I met a gentlemen on Paltalk last night who said he was an Iraqi Christian who was now living in the US. He sent me a link to this video being hosted by the Religious Freedom Coalition (a group I know nothing about) that they say was produced by the Chaldean Church in Beirut, Lebanon. I told the gentleman I would watch it and then post a link to it here on Per Christum.

I often suffer from “compassion fatigue” due to the 24-hour news coverage and discussion in the blogosphere of all the violence and atrocities in our world. The senselessness and cruelty of events like the tragic kidnapping and death of Archbishop Paulos Faraj Rahho and persecution of our brothers and sisters have left me feeling sort of numb and distant. Watching the stories of the families in this video has helped break through some of that fog.

The man who gave me the link said he still has family in Iraq who are in harms way because they name the name of Christ. Please pray for them.

The following two points ring especially true during the presidential campaigns that have now begun in earnest here in the United States. Keep these points from the Holy Father’s encyclical in mind during the next year of speeches, recriminations and promises:

a) The right state of human affairs, the moral well-being of the world can never be guaranteed simply through structures alone, however good they are. Such structures are not only important, but necessary; yet they cannot and must not marginalize human freedom. Even the best structures function only when the community is animated by convictions capable of motivating people to assent freely to the social order. Freedom requires conviction; conviction does not exist on its own, but must always be gained anew by the community.

b) Since man always remains free and since his freedom is always fragile, the kingdom of good will never be definitively established in this world. Anyone who promises the better world that is guaranteed to last for ever is making a false promise; he is overlooking human freedom. Freedom must constantly be won over for the cause of good. Free assent to the good never exists simply by itself. If there were structures which could irrevocably guarantee a determined—good—state of the world, man’s freedom would be denied, and hence they would not be good structures at all.

There won’t be a final “free at last, free at last, thank God almighty, I’m free at last” of all things until Christ comes again in glory. There will be no temporal “glorious revolution” or “final solution” from us men that will free us from having to fight the good fight, both in our culture and inside our selves, until the Kingdom which has no end fully comes.

Again and again, the Holy Father reminds us of the necessity of Grace. The only lasting hope in any realm is the pulling up of the temporal into the eternal, the human into the divine. In short, the only lasting hope is Jesus Christ.

I’ll try to refrain from further quoting and commentary until I’ve finished reading and had some time for digestion.

I’m just now getting a chance to give it a look.

Here’s a passage from the introduction that jumped out at me (underling for emphasis mine):

“Only when the future is certain as a positive reality does it become possible to live the present as well. So now we can say: Christianity was not only “good news”—the communication of a hitherto unknown content. In our language we would say: the Christian message was not only “informative” but “performative”. That means: the Gospel is not merely a communication of things that can be known—it is one that makes things happen and is life-changing. The dark door of time, of the future, has been thrown open. The one who has hope lives differently; the one who hopes has been granted the gift of a new life.“

More to come as more jumps out.

“Self-realization is a contradiction and it is too little for us. We have a higher destiny…

The Cross is the definitive revelation of love and divine mercy. To enter into this mystery of love there is no other way than that of losing ourselves, giving ourselves: the Way of the Cross.“

–Pope Benedict XVI, public audience today, Ash Wednesday of 2007

…the whole body of the faithful confess that they believe in God the Father Almighty, and in Jesus Christ, His only Son, our Lord, who was born of the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary. By which three statements the devices of almost all heretics are overthrown. For not only is God believed to be both Almighty and the Father, but the Son is shown to be co-eternal with Him, differing in nothing from the Father because He is God from God, Almighty from Almighty, and being born from the Eternal one is co-eternal with Him; not later in point of time, not lower in power, not unlike in glory, not divided in essence: but at the same time the only begotten of the eternal Father was born eternal of the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary. And this nativity which took place in time took nothing from, and added nothing to that divine and eternal birth, but expended itself wholly on the restoration of man who had been deceived: in order that he might both vanquish death and overthrow by his strength, the Devil who possessed the power of death. For we should not now be able to overcome the author of sin and death unless He took our nature on Him and made it His own, whom neither sin could pollute nor death retain. Doubtless then, He was conceived of the Holy Spirit within the womb of His Virgin Mother, who brought Him forth without the loss of her virginity, even as she conceived Him without its loss.

(Pope St. Leo the Great, Letter 28 (aka “The Tome of Leo“)

I don’t want to be misunderstood in this post. I share the frustration of David and the commenters on his “ Sr. Joan Chittister: The Game is Up?” post. I am with you in often shaking my head at the words and actions of Catholics who dissent from the teachings of the Church yet refuse to go where their views would be welcome.

Having said that, I have to admit that an article is titled “A Woman of Faith and Action” and ran in the August 25, 2006 Faith and Values section of the Huntsville Times inspired in me an odd mix of frustration and humility…and even a little hope for all of us.

She’s a peaceful woman of faith, an earnest seminary student and a fervent anchorhold, a member of an ancient Catholic order of voluntarily sequestered laypeople who dedicate their lives to study and prayer.

Reynolds, in fact, seems harmless - until you glimpse the back of her bumper-stickered car.

“Ordain women,” one of her more prominent stickers reads, “or stop dressing like them.”

Meet one of the new faces of the Catholic Reformation.

Isn’t that precious?

Anyway, most of the article takes a predictable turn from there and paints the picture of a sort of up-and-coming Sr. Chittister Jr right here in my diocese. While I don’t envy the writer for having to tackle a heavy subject like the Catholic ordination at a general interest level and in such a short space, the story does drift into semi-hagiography in some places.

Those frustrations aside, let me get to the two sections the caught my interest.

First:

“The Catholic church has two sets of rules, God-rules and people-rules,” Reynolds said, referring to the church’s statements on the place of scripture and tradition in defining church creed.

God-rules include the divinity of Jesus, the creatorship of God - the sort of beliefs covered by the traditional Apostles’ Creed. The people-rules, the rules built on tradition, include the exclusion of women from the priesthood, Reynolds said.

Hey, there’s dogma here! And some good dogma: deity of Christ, creatorship of God the Apostle’s Creed. Good stuff. Let’s set aside the issue of arbitrarily picking some Church teachings to believe while rejecting others with no apparent basis other than preference and politics. I see some rays of light here.

Next:

Reynolds was raised in a fundamentalist Protestant home. She joined the Catholic church three Easters ago. She’s answered people often about why she doesn’t just leave a denomination that excludes women when so many others now welcome them, including the Episcopal church with its liturgical similarities.

A look of thoughtful sadness passes over Reynolds’ face, and she looks at the heap of soft green yarn tumbling into her lap from her crochet needle before she answers.

“Because the God-rules and the sacraments are that good that I would not leave, despite all the somewhat frustrating people-rules,” Reynolds said. “Because the church can make the invisible visible.”

Then she smiles again.

“It’s like the velveteen rabbit,” she said, referring to the classic children’s story. “It’s really shabby, but the reason it becomes real is because someone out there loved it enough to make it real.

“That’s how I feel.”

Hey, the sacraments! Grace! Theosis! Again, good stuff.

Perhaps sometimes we approach dissidents as if we’re playing a zero-sum game. I don’t think that’s the case with this young lady. Why does she say she stays in the Church: revelation and the sacraments. Those are the same reasons why I’m Catholic.

As I see it, the only issue is the specter of private judgment. If she’s willing to submit to “God things”, the real conversation is how do we establish the difference between God things and man things.

Again, I hope no one misunderstands me. I’m not saying the views of Ms. Reynold’s should be held up as the model. I am saying that this article left me slightly humbled and took a little bit of the my “us v/s them” rip and vinegar out of me.

I could be wrong, but I see evidence of the gift of faith and God’s grace working here. It gives me great hope for Ms. Reynolds and even for sinners like me.

I was pleasantly surprised to see that the recently published “Compedium of the Catechism of the Catholic Church” is now online on the Vatican’s site.

The hard copy is still well worth picking up, but I think this will be a great resource for folks who have questions about the faith and might be intimidated by the “Catechism of the Catholic Church.”