Per Christum

Saint Josephine Bakhita
(ca. 1869-1947) (February 8)

Taken directly from Spe Salvi written by His Holiness Pope Benedict XVI:

“I am thinking of the African Josephine Bakhita, canonized by Pope John Paul II. She was born around 1869—she herself did not know the precise date—in Darfur in Sudan. At the age of nine, she was kidnapped by slave-traders, beaten till she bled, and sold five times in the slave-markets of Sudan. Eventually she found herself working as a slave for the mother and the wife of a general, and there she was flogged every day till she bled; as a result of this she bore 144 scars throughout her life. Finally, in 1882, she was bought by an Italian merchant for the Italian consul Callisto Legnani, who returned to Italy as the Mahdists advanced. Here, after the terrifying “masters” who had owned her up to that point, Bakhita came to know a totally different kind of “master”—in Venetian dialect, which she was now learning, she used the name “paron” for the living God, the God of Jesus Christ. Up to that time she had known only masters who despised and maltreated her, or at best considered her a useful slave. Now, however, she heard that there is a “paron” above all masters, the Lord of all lords, and that this Lord is good, goodness in person. She came to know that this Lord even knew her, that he had created her—that he actually loved her. She too was loved, and by none other than the supreme “Paron”, before whom all other masters are themselves no more than lowly servants. She was known and loved and she was awaited. What is more, this master had himself accepted the destiny of being flogged and now he was waiting for her “at the Father’s right hand”. Now she had “hope” —no longer simply the modest hope of finding masters who would be less cruel, but the great hope: “I am definitively loved and whatever happens to me—I am awaited by this Love. And so my life is good.” Through the knowledge of this hope she was “redeemed”, no longer a slave, but a free child of God. She understood what Paul meant when he reminded the Ephesians that previously they were without hope and without God in the world—without hope because without God. Hence, when she was about to be taken back to Sudan, Bakhita refused; she did not wish to be separated again from her “Paron”. On 9 January 1890, she was baptized and confirmed and received her first Holy Communion from the hands of the Patriarch of Venice. On 8 December 1896, in Verona, she took her vows in the Congregation of the Canossian Sisters and from that time onwards, besides her work in the sacristy and in the porter’s lodge at the convent, she made several journeys round Italy in order to promote the missions: the liberation that she had received through her encounter with the God of Jesus Christ, she felt she had to extend, it had to be handed on to others, to the greatest possible number of people. The hope born in her which had “redeemed” her she could not keep to herself; this hope had to reach many, to reach everybody. “

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.

Ok so it’s an awkward title, but the veritable forest of olive branches that il Papa has been extending in so many directions has given me the impression of a pope laboring to draw together once again the broken church of history perhaps in a conscious effort to prepare us for the ultimate re-gathering that only Christ himself can achieve. Besides, it’s Advent and things apocalyptic fill the Catholic spirit and mind.

Spes Salvi is masterful in so many ways, it is difficult to appreciate it all just now. But many facets of this magisterial document are coming into focus. Its lack of all reference to the Second Vatican Council is perhaps a strong indication that we are now past the post-conciliar age and entering a wholly new epoch in the life of the Church. This is an invitation, even an insistence that we look wide eyed at the present state of affairs and plan for the future. And the future which Benedict is preparing for us in various acts this year is a brave one indeed.

 

• The allusion to a new conception of Purgatory as a purification at the moment of Judgment, Christ’s divine and holy love burning away one’s imperfections due to sin, is clearly Eastern in spirit. Western conceptions of purgatory form just one item on the laundry list of Eastern complaints against the West, but an important one. Taken together with the considerable achievements of the recent Ravenna Document, the turn to the East is advanced now again one step with this generous olive branch. Eastern complaints of Latinization are met with a small but significant dose of Western Hellenization. If only by a toe, the once firm frontier is crossed.

   

   

• In Liberation Theologized South America, evangelical Christians and Pentecostals are having a field day. One of their most potent charges is that the Catholic Church has abandoned the pursuit of Heaven. Not only the Bible but salvation itself they can claim as their proper domain when the popular perception prevails that Catholic clergy only talk about social analysis and the transformation of sinful political and economic structures. While not abandoning the demands of Christian charity and justice, in Spes Salvi we find the clearest articulation of the Church’s fundamental orientation toward Salvation through Christ since before the Council. As articulated in Antonio Socci’s commentary partially translated on the Catholic blog, Rorate Caeli, Spes Salvi may be seen as a correction to Gaudim et Spes’s more earthbound image of God’s Kingdom. One may hear in Benedict’s words a call to ex-Catholic evangelicals and pentecostals to be reconciled to the Church whose aim is the Heavenly Jerusalem.

   

• Catholic traditionalists have certainly had their share of olive branches this year. Summorum Pontificum was perhaps the first of several gifts which may lead to a reg-athering of that corner of the Church.

   

• The 400,000 members of the world wide Traditional Anglican Communion, an Anglican splinter group formed in protest to the ordination of women, were given hope of reunion en masse with Rome this fall when their petition written with the reported assistance of Vatican officials was formally submitted and received.

   

• The Church’s Chinese mission was advanced earlier this year with the long awaited letter to the Chinese Church which was full of conciliatory sentiment and affirmed that for the Church to be herself she must be fully Chinese and fully Catholic. The first fruit of this olive branch was the appointment by the Chinese government of a new bishop of Beijing acceptable to Rome. A formidable achievement, détente is in the air.

   

Pope Benedict has clearly been working overtime in 2007. May all his efforts be blessed.

There is a lot to digest in Pope Benedict’s newest encyclical, Spe Salvi. However, one theme I think permeates the text is the failure of modern progress, including all sorts of academic and pseudo-academic “isms” and movements, to actually make life more hope filled. Benedict urges a critique of modernity, and a self-critique of modern Christianity. The pope is not suggesting progress is a bad thing, or that we can’t find glimpses of hope in things besides God. Yet these “are not enough without the great hope, which must surpass everything else.” In the end, putting our faith in the kingdom of men is insufficient, because the kingdom of men is run by just that, men. We all know how even well-meaning humans are able to completely foul things up. Witnessing the 20th century, supposedly the most enlightened, yet most brutal, century of all time, probably deeply influenced this pope to be wary of putting one’s trust in mortals, and their efforts at progress. Unfortunately, Benedict is speaking to generations that have been taught that the self is what ultimately matters, and when he challenges us to critically examine our ideas of progress vested in human achievement, many are going to react negatively. The pope is being called “out-of-date” and so forth, but how many who accuse him of this have ever stopped to critically examine their understanding of progress and happiness, and what this is doing to western civilization? The pope challenges us to look at hope, and what brings it, and what does not. He reminds us that the only hope that holds firm in spite of all disappointments is God.

Of course, the pope, aware that modernism has infiltrated Christianity to a large degree, reminds us that we shouldn’t fall back on an individualistic understanding of salvation for our hope, because that, like believing mankind will save us, is a modernist way of looking at salvation. We cannot achieve communion with Jesus alone or from our own resources alone. Here the pope challenges us to avoid two pitfalls of modernity’s influence on religion: the belief that we can save ourselves (as held by those promoting “social gospel”), or an individualism in which we are saved in a personal vacuum (held by many evangelicals and fundamentalists). Unfortunately we see modernity’s influence in the Catholic Church, where the self is placed higher than Christ and the Church, and we demand the Church conform to us rather than we conforming to the Christ and the Church. Some denominations have even made become very good at shaping their particular churches in the image of the trends and “isms” of modernity.

At the end of the encyclical, to counteract this hopeless age, the pope explains ways to learn hope (suggesting hope is not simply an emotional feeling that comes and goes, but like other virtues, a habit).

The first way is prayer. In a world where people have many acquaintances, but live far from family and friends, God is always there to listen even when people are not. Prayer directs us to our ultimate hope, God, and away from the things in our lives that are either limited sources of hope, or detract from hope altogether. Next, the pope discusses serious and upright human conduct as “hope in action.” Particularly Benedict emphasizes suffering. The true measure of humanity is determined by suffering, and individuals and societies that cannot accept suffering and are incapable of bearing it, are in a sense, “inhuman.” It seems as if our society has no good philosophy to deal with suffering or sacrifice, both which are inevitable, and the result is either despair and depression, or a sense of entitlement in which a person exhausts all material efforts to avoid any kind of suffering. Third, the pope emphasizes God’s last judgment as a way to learn hope. This theme has been downplayed recently, but essentially without a last judgment we are left in a world without hope, a world in which injustice and evil win the day. A professor and friend of mine told the story of an eight year old boy who was killed by his father because of child abuse. My professor suggested something to the effect that if this is the end of this matter, and the universe is no more just than this, than “to hell with this universe.” However, with a Catholic understanding God’s judgment and purification, we know that this unjust world isn’t all there is, and what hope this offers! Finally Benedict provides Mary as an example of hope, a woman whose role in God’s plan developed from her acceptance of God’s will as a young virgin, to her role as mother of all believers in the Church today. Mary shows us the way to hope.

As a (post)modern Catholic highly critical of many of the claims of modernist philosophical and theological movements, I welcome this encyclical. I agree with the pope that the “progress” offered in modernity has been mixed, offering us some hope, but also distracting us from our ultimate hope. Only God offers us final hope, hope at such a level the various “isms” and secular trends of modernity cannot offer.

Spe Salvum… in reading it, I have but one comment come to the fore… “Duh!”

It is a charge to maintain Faith as part of Hope, and as part of Justice, and as part of Life.

It is a call to be socially active so that the system does not fall to evil.

If one reads the Gospels and the Epistles, one should be able to see that call clearly therein. This encyclical is a codification, and a reminder… not anything really new.

If anything, it feels like a Dominican’s sermon. Not that that’s a bad thing.

Life brings us many chances to go forth and LIVE the gospel message, to be that spark that gets people to examine faith and hope, and to find Chist and his Church. Now, as the Pope calls, we need to rise to this challenge, and go beyond just living a good life, to seeing to it that such a life is allowed to be lived, and stays allowed to be lived.

One of the dangers in modern society is the rejection of majority values. Christianity suffers now for being the majority. Catholicism suffers for being the largest organization within Christianity. Answer the call, brethren, and keep it safe to be unabashedly Catholic. For, at the moment, that is in peril. People clamor for allowing sin to be legitimized, and those who decry it to be arrested. This is a small part of the modernism Pope Benedict is warning against, but one that could rapidly deplete our priests if the agenda progresses.

I can’t even put a blame towards any one party or group. We, as a society,need to decide to be a Christian society that, while not intolerant of dissent nor difference, does not tolerate immorality, and does not legislate required acceptance of same: gay “marriage”, abortion, extramarital sex, rampant sexuality, euthanasia, bigotry.

I want to touch on the last of these: Bigotry. Affirmative action is bigotry. Calling Barak Obama “Not Black Enough” is bigotry. Calling for special priveleges because your ancestors were oppressed is bigotry. Forcing employers to hire less qualified individuals due to special statuses is bigotry. We have institutionalized it. It served a short term purpose; now, affirmative actionserves to keep us divided. In Christ, all are one people, no matter their heritage or ethnicity. We should be genuinely blind to ethnicity. But our society is not. Time to take up our crosses, and use them to rebuild the system to be blind to ethnicity.

As I read through the Holy Father’s recent encyclical, my thoughts kept returning to the connection between hope and humility. Benedict consistently contrasts the philosophers, scientists, and activists who want to build the kingdom of God through technology and human progress with the humble saints of the Church who succeeded, in their lives and in their deaths, as a witness to the real meaning of hope. Outcasts know hopelessness so well that they are uniquely disposed to zealously embrace hope and just as eagerly share it with the world. Even those who are in positions of power and wealth and status need hope too, as Benedict points out, but it requires us to recognize that we are “living without hope and without God in the world.” Sometimes those of us who are rich or even “comfortable” have just the right number of toys, institutional affiliations, and reasons for optimism that we can put aside that nagging voice telling us that maybe something greater exists: the love of God and the coming of a life that is “truly” life. This is the great hope that we have as Christians, but are we humble enough to truly embrace it?

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.

Dropped the thing into MS Word.

Including title and footnotes:

Words: 19,358

I asked Word to create a summary with only 10 sentences.

Faith is Hope.
To come to know God—the true God—means to receive hope.
Answer: “Faith”.
“Eternal life”.
Faith is the substance of hope.
Is Christian hope individualistic?
A world without God is a world without hope (cf. Eph 2:12).
Only God can create justice.
Mary, Star of Hope.
Did hope die?

According the The Blog Readability Test, the Encyclical comes in as: