Happy Birthday

Pentecost is often called the Church's birthday, but a case can be made for the Feast of the Visitation, too.

At Pentecost, the disciples "were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in different tongues, as the Spirit enabled them to proclaim." It is this combination of the presence of the Holy Spirit and the public proclamation of the Gospel that marks the public beginning of the Church.

A few decades before, "Elizabeth, filled with the holy Spirit, cried out in a loud voice," proclaiming as blessed she "who believed that what was spoken to you by the Lord would be fulfilled." The presence of the Holy Spirit, and a proclamation of the Gospel -- though, admittedly, not in public.

But what did happen for the first time at the Visitation is the coming together of a community united by the Spirit of Christ, Emmanuel, Who was present among them.

The Monastery of the Visitation posted a wonderful reflection on how the sisters there experience this feast -- for them, a solemnity -- as a community of Marys and Elizabeths.

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Beati immaculati

Rob's mention of Psalm 119 [118] got me thinking about how much I like that psalm.

If it's true that every human experience is contained in the Psalter, then the human experience contained by Psalm 119 is a writing assignment for a religious poetry class: "Write a poem consisting of 22 stanzas, each stanza comprising eight lines that all begin with the same letter, a different letter for each stanza, and include in each line a word meaning God's instruction to man."

Which makes it an odd psalm to like, and in fact I didn't think much of it when I first looked at it. There's not much movement to it -- or you could say there's far too much, each verse thrashing around in a tight little circle. With the loss of the acrostic key in English translation, the verses could be randomly composed without losing too much, e.g.:

Thy justifications I will never forget: for by them thou hast given me life.
O how have I loved thy law, O Lord! it is my meditation all the day.
They that persecute me have drawn nigh to iniquity; but they are gone far off from the law.
My eyes have failed for thy word, saying: When wilt thou comfort me?
Thou art my helper and my protector: and in thy word I have greatly hoped.
Let thy mercy also come upon me, O Lord: thy salvation according to thy word.
I have had understanding above ancients: because I have sought thy commandments.
I have gone astray like a sheep that is lost: seek thy servant, because I have not forgotten thy commandments.

(This page will randomly order the verse numbers for you.)

All this makes it a rather dull psalm to read.

But to proclaim it! Or chant it, or pray it! Then it becomes an entirely different thing, as different as a stained glass window seen from the outside on a gray afternoon and from the inside on a sunny morning.

To find yourself praying for the grace to know and love God's law, edicts, commands, precepts, words, utterances, ways, decrees, and teachings is a remarkable experience. It is to recognize, insist upon, and celebrate your creatureliness, your dependency on God. It is to say, "Lord, You have something I need to be happy, and You will give it to me, and I will use it, and I will be happy, and You will be happy with me."

Then the repetitions aren't so repetitive. They're variations, riffs on this most basic realization that God is He Who Is and this most astonishing revelation that He loves you who are not. His love takes the form of commandments, and in taking these commandments we find joy:

Your decrees are my heritage forever; they are the joy of my heart.

Easily said, easier read, but when we pray this psalm, the real truth of it can be, if not always grasped, at least sometimes sighted.

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202 Questions and Answers

Paulist Press has come out with two books by Dominican friars of the [Eastern USA] Province of St. Joseph:

• 101 Questions & Answers on The Da Vinci Code and the Catholic Tradition, by Nancy de Flon and Fr. John Vidmar, OP. "De Flon and Vidmar not only show where Brown went wrong, but they also unlock the doors (that Brown ignored) to the treasure rooms of the Catholic tradition and they display for the reader the wealth of people, customs, and events that comprise Catholic identity. Far more than a mere Da Vinci Code 'debunker,' 101 Question and Answers on The Da Vinci Code and the Catholic Tradition serves as celebration of Catholic culture that uses The Da Vinci Code as its springboard."
• 101 Questions & Answers on the Eucharist, by Fr. Giles Dimock, OP. "He starts off with questions on the Jewish background of Eucharist and then examines the Last Supper and its theology in the light of the Paschal Mystery. Some of the other questions deal with transubstantiation, sacrifice, Real Presence, communion, and intercommunion. Fr. Dimock's answers are both practical and ecumenical."

(Via Order of Preachers Vocations.)

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Breathless homilizing

So how many people heard a homily on Deus Caritas Est Sunday?

The homilist I heard worked it in briefly at the end, illuminating the Pope's statement, "God loves, and his love may certainly be called eros, yet it is also totally agape." I'll riff on it this way:

First, we understand Divine agape as the, if you will, ordinary "descending love" of unearned benevolence God has for His creatures. Divine eros, on the other hand, is, in Scriptural terms, God's jealous desire for us, whole and entire, spirit, soul, and body. So how can these two loves, expressed in terms that suggest they operate in opposite directions, be "totally" the same?

Let's try some wordplay. The Holy Spirit is said to be Love, the love of the Father for the Son and of the Son for the Father. That in itself suggests how eros and agape are totally the same in the life of the Trinity.

The Holy Spirit is also the "breath" of God. So we can think of breathing out as sending the Holy Spirit forth as agape, and of breathing in as the Holy Spirit returning to the Godhead as eros. Out, in: it's all breathing.

I'm also reminded of Isaiah 55:10-11:

For just as from the heavens the rain and snow come down And do not return there till they have watered the earth, making it fertile and fruitful, Giving seed to him who sows and bread to him who eats, so shall my word be that goes forth from my mouth; It shall not return to me void, but shall do my will, achieving the end for which I sent it.

What was God's will in sending the Word to earth? "And when I am lifted up from the earth, I will draw everyone to myself." Drawing to yourself is an erotic act.

What remains to be explained is how an unchanging, perfect, and simple God can love His creatures in this way. The short answer (if you'll pardon the presumption) is that, having received the Son and the Holy Spirit, we share in their lovableness. The Trinity doesn't say from eternity, "We love Each Other... ooh, and hey, We also love these creatures here!" It's all the same love. (It has to be. Otherwise, it's not the same Spirit, and that's a Bad Thing.)

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Chuckleheaded Donatists

Dan Jasmin knows my methods:

Whenever I read posts such as this on your blog, I am always thinking, "OK, who screwed up this time?"

My attempt to throw him off the scent --

I do try, you know, to abstract from the concrete to reach some general principle that rises above gossip and tale-bearing, but since you ask, it was chuckleheaded Donatists.

-- was not fully successful:

Abstracts and general principles are all well and good, but give me a concrete example.

There are several reasons I like to avoid concrete examples (not that I always do, but I've gotten better at it than I used to be).

The tactical reasons, so to speak, take into account the direct effects of using concrete examples. In general terms, the discussion gets stuck in concrete. Is that what he really meant? Wouldn't this be a more charitable interpretation? What's the full relevant context in which to read that? Didn't I do the same thing, or worse? People tend to respond to the thing that is easiest to respond to (qv the Law of the Stupidest Argument), and concrete examples are usually easier to respond to than general principles.

Moreover, strategically speaking, I don't much care about concrete examples. Whether or not this particular person acted in this particular manner in this particular instance, acting in that manner is something we can talk about, and possibly benefit from talking about. Introducing a concrete (rather than hypothetical) example bears a real risk of introducing a sin against justice (particularly rash judgment or detraction), and it's usually an unnecessary risk.

On the down side, writing in generalities runs the risk of coyness, as though those in the know will put two and two together and see who I have in mind. That's a failure on my part to write clearly enough. If I don't show my work frankly, from concrete example through general principle, I shouldn't leave hints or clues for people to guess at.

There's also the risk of describing a phenomenon that doesn't actually occur in the real world, or at least that doesn't occur nearly as often as or to the extent that I think. But if I weren't willing to risk being an idiot, I wouldn't blog.

More seriously, and what I suspect Dan may have had in mind, is that, without a concrete example, it can be hard for others to know what I'm really getting at, and therefore whether I'm right about it. Abstractions that aren't understood in the concrete may be easy to reason with, but they aren't always easy to reason about.

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Tasting notes

Things I learned while serving Scotch:

1. People who say, "I never got into Scotch," will never get into Scotch. For them, bring a jug of rum punch and some ice.
2. If someone asks what you recommend, and seems nervous, they want an inoffensive blend like Dewars 12. If they seem brash, they want Laphroaig.
3. When someone says, "What do you have that's very mild?," pour them a Maker's Mark.
4. Some people act as though they believe that Step 1 in all the How to Taste Scotch guides is, "Sip it like you're trying a friend's huckleberry daquiri at Bennigans," and that terms like "volatile," "astringent," and "nose burn" are all associated only with rotgut. These errors will self-correct a few moments after they are provided with a wee dram.
5. Some people believe that adding water to a single malt Scotch is a bad thing to do, while others believe they should apologize as they drop in an ice cube. They will all believe the same thing tomorrow, no matter what you tell them today.
6. Nobody cares how many regions Scotland's distilleries are divided into.

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They who are

Solipsism, as you know, is the belief that nothing actually exists except a single being, which conveniently and necessarily is the solipsist himself. Asolipsism, on the other hand, is a word I just made up that means the belief that solipsists do not exist, at least not outside freshmen dorms and other madhouses.

I am an asolipsist, more or less; I think solipsism, not just as a held belief but as an idea that needs to be taken seriously, is something everyone should outgrow by the age of nineteen. Certainly you don't run into many self-declared solipsists. (Ironically, solipsism doesn't even have to be false for every solipsist to be wrong.)

Still, there are various weaker forms of solipsism that -- though no more valid than the strict, "Mysterious Stranger" version -- do thrive today.

Perhaps the most common form is selfishness. Many people don't believe they are the only existent being, but do believe they are the only existent being that counts, that "what matters" ≡ "what matters to them." ("&equiv.;" is the "identically equals" symbol, which basically means you can freely substitute the one expression for the other in any statement without changing the meaning of the statement.)

Others have a way of projecting themselves in a way that makes them normative of everyone. In their minds, society ought to conform to them, not as the selfish would have it because they are personally so wonderful, but because their own tastes and opinions happen to be an objective improvement over everything else. Such people think others ought to be like them, even if they aren't.

I'm coming to see that habitual hasty generalizers are also solipsists of a sort. The hasty generalization is of course the logical fallacy of "generalizing about a population based upon a sample which is too small to be representative." Committing this fallacy habitually is a sort of solipsism because it acts upon a habitual belief that the sample of one's own experiences is representative of the whole.

In the wild, this often takes the form of thinking one can form a sound judgment on a complex matter based on one or two bits of knowledge (which aren't necessarily true).

Now, judgment almost always has to be reached without knowing everything that might affect it, but prudence dictates that the firmness with which any judgment reached be held is conditioned by both the need to reach judgment and the relative amount of information used to reach the judgment. In other words, how strenuously I defend my judgment should depend on how necessary it is that I reach a judgment and on how much evidence (of all possible evidence) I use to reach it.

The hastily generalizing solipsist will think -- or at least act as though -- the evidence he has is all the evidence required to reach a firm judgment; he may also think that it is important if not absolutely necessary that his judgment be declared. Both are exaltations of self.

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It has come to my attention

In the last twenty-four hours, I have encountered the following:

• A statement of The Law of the Stupidest Argument: "In a discussion among strangers, the least thoughtful controversial position stated will dominate the argument." True enough, in a descriptive sort of way, and still pretty true even without the "among strangers."
• A warning on the back of an incense packet for sale at a gas station: "Beware of incense made with sawdust, dried pig stool, or pork rind and cheap synthetic compound oils." Can there possibly be a less necessary admonition than to beware of something made with dried pig stool? (Though "pork rind and cheap synthetic compound oils" sounds like what I had for dinner most nights in college.)
• The statement, "PayPal makes it easy to send Dominican Nuns money." Yes, I suppose it does, and while we're discussing facts no one denies and no one has ever really thought about, 2,713 * 411 = 1,115,043.

I look forward, in the next twenty-four hours, to seeing how many people visit Disputations after Googling for "dried pig stool." (Hey, I take what I can get. I still get at least one visitor a day from Happy Catholic's "If Jack Bauer was gay, his name would be Chuck Norris." page. (Dried pig stool visitors, Julie. Julie, dried pig stool visitors.))

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Scoping out the term

Disputations has something of a reputation for artless diagrams that add little but visual distraction to the discussion. This post shall, perhaps, shake up that reputation somewhat, since it features, not a diagram, but an HTML table.

What scope should we understand Jesus to have had in mind when He spoke in terms of "whatever you ask"?

Some have proposed a tautological scope along the lines of "requests that God will grant," the idea being that Jesus' promise is given only to those who remain in Him, and by definition those who remain in Jesus wouldn't ask for anything God wouldn't want to give them. But while that may be true -- as I've mentioned, tautologies do tend to be true -- it's not particularly helpful in understanding what Jesus means.

Another approach is by using this set of increasingly-limited scopes:

All Requests          Moral Requests       Pious Requests   P.O.D. Requests "Thy Will Be Done"

"All Requests" is everything that can be asked for: the grace of final perseverance, a pony, the head of John the Baptist. "Moral Requests" is everything good in and of itself that can be desired, including ponies but excluding severed heads of enemies. "Pious Requests" is the subset of moral requests that relate directly to personal sanctification, so ponies are out but spiritual gifts are in. "P.O.D. Requests" [for "pious and overly devotional"] is the set of pious requests only a saint or a showoff would make, things like suffering and humiliation. "Thy Will Be Done" is that single request, with all personal volition removed; note that this isn't a personal request with "but Thy will be done" added at the end, there is nothing being asked for in this specific case.

It's safe to say "All Requests" is not the proper scope. To ask for something evil in Jesus' name is blasphemy, and not something anyone who remains in Him will do.

Let me propose two reasons "Thy Will Be Done" is too limited. First, it would imply that by, "If you ask anything of me in my name, I will do it," Jesus means, "You won't ask anything of me." That's an unnatural interpretation (in English translation, at least), and it's an unnatural interpretation that would need to be applied all four times Jesus makes this promise in John 14-16. While it's certainly true that God will always answer that prayer, the words Jesus uses do not mean God will always answer only that prayer.

Second, the suggestion that "Thy Will Be Done" -- again, in the completely passive sense I'm using it here -- is the one thing that will always be granted if asked also implies that asking for particular things isn't something a good Christian would do. But that implication is certainly untrue, contrary to both Scripture and the lived experience of the Church.

Moreover, the model of a Christian as a passive instrument in the hands of God -- which I'd say is equivalent to the proposal that a Christian ought to pray only "Thy Will Be Done" -- conflicts with the reality that we are called to be, not God's tools, but His children. We are subjects of His love, not merely useful goods but (by His grace) good in ourselves. If we lack all personal will, we lack all eros; God's agape will find nothing to adhere to in us.

This again leads us into the promised participation in the Divine Life of the Trinity, since in a mysterious way the Son is both a subject of the Father's love while sharing in the one Divine will (if I've got it right). They are one, yet remain distinct Persons. In a similar way, we are called to unite our own will to the Divine will, yet in such a way that we remain distinct persons.

Maybe it's not so unsearchable a mystery, if we look to a loving human family rather than directly into the Divine. A loving human family tends to a single will, conceptually speaking. The whole family knows the father personally enjoys an afternoon nap, say, so the whole family wills that the father take an afternoon nap.

Note the trinitarian language that naturally arises: the whole family knows (knowledge is attributed to the Son); the whole family wills (will is attributed to the Holy Spirit). Certainly it's not an exact representation -- the individual human wills are distinct, and the "single will" of the family doesn't actually exist -- but I think it does suggest that a complete self-emptying on the part of any one person isn't the end of the story, either within the Trinity or within the Church united to the Trinity.

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Family news

The Pontifical Faculty of the Immaculate Conception -- or the Dominican House of Studies, when it's at home -- held its 2006 graduation ceremony last Friday. Among the graduates were eight Dominican friars, two of whom -- Fr. Dominic Langevin, OP, and Br. Thomas Petri, OP -- received the Licence in Sacred Theology (STL).


Fr. Reginald Whitt, OP, President of the Pontifical Faculty, with the 2006 graduates

Fr. Richard John Neuhaus of First Things fame was the commencement speaker; his speech can be listened to on line. He also writes a bit today about the Liturgy of the Hours and Magnificat magazine at On the Square:

A student at Columbia told me a couple of weeks ago that his life had been a shambles, to the point of being terrified by serious thoughts of suicide. He dragged himself back to Mass. A friend loaned him her copy of Magnificat. He started to pray. "I wish I could say everything has changed," he said. "But everything is changing." Exactly. Pray as you can, not as you can't. And discover that you can, more and more.

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The man who suddenly got everything he'd always wanted

Did you ever know someone whose parents gave them everything they asked for? Didn't you hate them?

The second question probably makes more sense if you were thinking of someone who asked for pretty much everything they wanted. I hadn't thought about it before, but there's something very on point in calling someone who get everything they want "spoiled;" in such circumstances, fallen human nature does tend to go soft and rotten.

But what would it mean if someone really could get literally anything they might ask for from their parents? It wouldn't be enough for their parents to be rich -- just ask Veruca Salt. They'd need to be magical, like genies granting wish after wish. Or supernatural.

In fact, technically, they'd need to be divine. And not merely lesser gods in a pantheon, but that which all men speak of as God. Why? Because, by assumption, the child will be given literally anything asked for, and that can only be true if the parents are omnipotent, and omnipotence is a characteristic of God.

Moreover, the child himself participates in that omnipotence. He can cause literally anything he desires, not by his own sufficient power, but by directing the sufficient power of his parents. This may also apply to the parents; their omnipotence may be by participation as well, and even based on another's participation. It all works as long as the chain of participation terminates in God. And every link in the chain is in some sense divinized through participating in God's omnipotence.

So it seems when Jesus says, "Whatever you ask the Father in My Name He will give you," it's not merely a promise of answered supplications, but of divinization. The Father is the Father of those who remain in Jesus in a very real and direct and non-metaphorical sense, in a sense that is not true for those who do not remain in Jesus.

If I may extend the cultural reference, Jesus' promise means we get, not just the chocolate, but the chocolate factory. And that -- or rather, the promise of participation in the One Life whose word, "Let there be light," causes light to be is certainly something that bears repeating.

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The view from the tank

A few more observations on the appointment in Washington:

• -Designate. It's "Archbishop-Designate." Not "-Elect." I have corrected my error.
• A-D Wuerl has degrees from the Gregorian and the Angelicum. That's four decades of experience in ecumenism.
• Want a hint about how well Cardinal McCarrick gets along with the local media? The Washington Post reports he "became eligible for retirement last July." None of this New York Timesy "submitted his resignation ... as church policy requires" guff.
• Blog response has been milder than I expected. A few chuckleheaded Donatists have nodded in grim satisfaction, and the hardcore among them shook their heads in satisfied grimness, but on the whole St. Blog's is treating this more as just another change in episcopal leadership than the Bright New Dawn of the Catholic Church some seemed to think Cardinal McCarrick's retirement would mark. Early days yet, I realize.
• As one informal and anecdotal datapoint, I last saw Cardinal McCarrick at a Mass last December, and he looked markedly older and more tired than the [handful of] other times I'd seen him. I was not at all surprised to read subsequent interviews in which he expressed a desire to retire. Even before then, he was telling reporters, "Most people my age are dead."
• I made a joke in a comment below that the one question by which our new archbishop will be measured is, will he let my parish build a parish hall? For all the kibbitzing St. Blog's does while watching the American episcopate, for all the gossip about who is in favor in Rome and whose opinions are sufficiently orthodox to allow them to be repeated to children, I strongly suspect that for the vast majority of Catholics all that really matters is what happens in, and to, their parish. And, on this point, I strongly suspect the vast majority of Catholics have it more right than those of us who use words like "episcopate" and "orthodox."
• Just as an FYI, the proper term is "boot-licking Vatican toady." This should not be confused with a boot-licking Vatican toad:
  A comparatively reclusive member of the family Bufonidae, of which the common toad (Bufo bufo) is perhaps best-known, the boot-licking Vatican toad, B. caligae vaticanensis delingeriscus, is shown above in this rare photograph.

(Idea and caption for final bullet shamelessly stolen from Marion.)

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Repetitive learning

The Gospel reading Saturday included this statement from Jesus' Last Supper Discourse:

And whatever you ask in my name, I will do, so that the Father may be glorified in the Son. If you ask anything of me in my name, I will do it.

Sunday's Gospel included this, from later in the same discourse:

If you remain in me and my words remain in you, ask for whatever you want and it will be done for you.

A few verses later, Jesus says, "It was not you who chose me, but I who chose you and appointed you to go and bear fruit that will remain, so that whatever you ask the Father in my name he may give you." In Chapter 16 comes:

Amen, amen, I say to you, whatever you ask the Father in my name he will give you. Until now you have not asked anything in my name; ask and you will receive, so that your joy may be complete.

When a saying of Jesus is recorded four times in three chapters, it's probably something important.

And yet, don't we sort of have to explain it away? "Ask for whatever you want and it will be done for you" is, as it stands, about as demonstrably false a statement as can be made. And I don't just mean the canonical example of asking for a new bicycle for your birthday. I mean asking for healing, or for a loved one to return to the Faith.

It's been said God answers every prayer of supplication in one of three ways: "Yes"; "Yes, but not yet"; and, "I've got something even better for you!" A careful reader, though, will notice that two of those three answers are not, "Yes," which seems to be the answer Jesus promises those who remain in Him and ask for something in His name.

So we handwave. "Oh, you didn't ask, you didn't ask the Father, you didn't ask in Jesus' name, you didn't recognize that in some unrecognizable sense you were given what you asked for."

But maybe in this case, we should put off the most natural question -- "Why doesn't it work?" -- until we've explored some other questions, like, "Why does Jesus really want us to know it?"

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Yay for Washington!

Yay for Archbishop-Designate Wuerl!

Yay for Cardinal McCarrick!

June 22 is a most auspicious day for an installation.

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Ha ha, black sheep

There's an old joke, usually told about specialists in three different sciences, that I will tell this way:

An American professor of logic is vacationing in Scotland with his wife and young son. The train they're taking passes a field in which a sheep is grazing. The boy says, "Mommy! Daddy! In Scotland, the sheep are black!"

His mother, having lived with her husband long enough to pick up some of his ways, says, "Now, honey, all we really know is that that one sheep is black."

"Actually, my dear," the professor says, "all we know is that that one sheep is black on one side."

If we think of the actions of another as the sheep population of Scotland -- and, really, how can we not? -- then, for the vast majority of others, the one side of that one sheep corresponds to their actions visible to us. What they do that we don't see is as unknown to us as the rest of the Scottish sheep are to the American family.

Obviously, it's reasonable to say that a sheep black on one side is black on the other. It's even reasonable to suppose that, where there's one black sheep, there may be more. But beyond what no one would reasonably deny, and beyond what many would reasonably suppose, there's a great deal that is unknown to us. Even the presumption of charity shouldn't lock us into a firm opinion about the truth of what we don't know.

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Cisterns, wells, and springs

People get their water in all sorts of ways.

A cistern is a storage tank for water. You put water in, then you draw water out. A well draws water up from the water underground. A spring releases water pretty much on its own.

Now let water stand for charity and water sources for Christians.

Some Christians are cisterns of charity. They store up a certain amount, but without regular refills will soon go empty.

Others are wells, tapped into deep and hidden reservoirs. They won't run dry, but they do require maintenance to stay in good working order and continue to offer charity to others.

And some are springs of charity. Not only do they not run dry, their charity comes forth unbidden and inexhaustible.

The metaphor could be extended to include fountains, those whose charity is extravagant, even prodigal, a wonder to behold, and visible from afar.

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The intentions of my associates

Sometimes, during the Prayer of the Faithful, after the general intercessions the priest will ask, "And for whom or what else shall we pray?"

The answers are called out. For a niece preparing for an operation. For a sister-in-law who died overnight. For a son looking for work. For a chronically ill neighbor.

Some intentions are heartbreaking. Some by their very nature, but sometimes by the pain evident in the voice asking for prayers for something that, written down, sounds pretty run-of-the-mill.

Some intentions are too heavy to bear, perhaps especially when they become more general. An end to abortion, peace in the Middle East, the safe return of all our armed forces. Worthy things to pray for, certainly, but difficult to pray from that region between presumption (in the form of shallowness) and despair.

Some are curious. Someone asks for our prayers for her grandson who is traveling that day. Well, but traveling where and by what, that we should make room for him among the dead and the dying who have just been mentioned? Still, it's not for us to judge what weighs on the hearts of our brothers and sisters, but to help them bear the weight.

That's the great gift Christ gives us by giving us each other to love as He loves us. We can always help each other; we can always pray for -- on behalf of -- each other, and ounce for ounce that prayer, it seems to me, is more pleasing to God than our prayers for mercy for ourselves.

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Meet the Blogger

Here's your chance to meet me under ideal circumstances!

WHEN: May 20, 2006, 7 p.m.
WHERE: St. Andrew Apostle Catholic Church, Silver Spring, MD
WHAT: Art Auction, Champagne Reception, and Premium Scotch Tasting
WHY: To benefit St. Andrew Apostle School

I'll be the one in the corner, pouring the Scotch (Macallan 15, Glenmorangie, Glenfiddich 18, Talisker, Auchentoshan, Bowmore 17, and Springbank, and there might be a bottle behind the table for friends of the bartender). Three bucks for a wee dram, five for a full. And, as always, the password is good for a free toot.

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Synchronicity

Saturday was our semi-annual regional meeting of the Dominican Laity. The provincial promoter repeated a distinction that is one of his key messages to us, between ministry, which is service to the Church, and apostolate, which is a mission to the world. While ministry -- serving a congregation, a parish, a diocese -- is a good and noble thing, it is not the Dominican apostolate of giving to others the fruits of our contemplation.

That evening, as I recuperated at home, I came across a comment on a post at open book that drew attention to a webpage on which two priests address "the unique role of the laity and the challenges they face in their ministries." One priest looks to the laity to do what non-ordained members of religious congregations used to do:

So when people ask what will your lay ministry students do, since they won’t be ordained priests? — the answer is the same as it was in the past. They will be the backbone of the wide range of ministries the church needs, alongside the sacramental ministry of priests... They are trained to animate the faithful to engage in the social mission of the church, as well as to sustain its religious spirit.

The other priest looks to the laity to perform a uniquely lay role:

At Vatican Council II the unique role of the laity was tied to the Church’s secular mission: the laity were given a fundamental responsibility both for evangelization and for the renewal of the whole social order. This responsibility is not a delegated one, but something that the laity possess in their own right: they are appointed to the apostolate by Christ himself. Cardinal Ratzinger, now Pope Benedict XVI, proposed that the laity should be thought to have their own office in the Church, distinct from the ordained.

The priest who wrote in terms of apostolate is a Dominican; the priest who wrote in terms of ministry isn't.

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The words He has spoken to us

Yesterday's Gospel reading was John 6:60-69, which begins:

Many of the disciples of Jesus who were listening said, "This saying is hard; who can accept it?"

The homilist pointed out that the reading [i.e., vv. 60-69] never specifies what Jesus says that is hard for many of His disciples to accept; you'd have to remember or look it up to know this is the tail end of the Bread of Life discourse. He, the homilist, suggested that all of Jesus' saying are hard, but that for His disciples that doesn't really matter, since we have come to believe and are convinced that Jesus is the Holy One of God.

Is Jesus' saying hard? Very well, it is hard. But to whom shall we go?

In the Gospel, the disciples who couldn't accept what Jesus said about eating His flesh and drinking His blood "returned to their former way of life and no longer accompanied him." They didn't say, "On a few topics he's nuts, but we'll still accompany him because he says a lot of other things we do agree with." They didn't say, "I just ignore what he says when it doesn't make any sense to me." They didn't say, "His official position on eating his flesh is not important."

I suppose you can't really say such things when your master is right there in front of you, telling you if you don't accept his hard sayings you do not have life within you.

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The company of Apostles praises You, O Lord

There's a curious tension of sorts, in the Church's relationship to the Apostles, between the importance of the Apostles and what you might call their irrelevance.

Their importance is clear and absolute. One of the four marks of the Church is that she is

apostolic because she is founded on the apostles, in three ways:
- she was and remains built on "the foundation of the Apostles," the witnesses chosen and sent on mission by Christ himself;
- with the help of the Spirit dwelling in her, the Church keeps and hands on the teaching, the "good deposit," the salutary words she has heard from the apostles;
- she continues to be taught, sanctified, and guided by the apostles until Christ's return, through their successors in pastoral office: the college of bishops, "assisted by priests, in union with the successor of Peter, the Church's supreme pastor"

If the Church is not built on the foundation of the Apostles, then she's just blowing smoke.

At the same time, though we know almost nothing about the Twelve as individual men -- who they were, what they thought, where they went, how they died -- we get along just fine not knowing. True, there are stories and legends about all of them that are generally accepted as true, by the pious if not by the historians. But in the end, these stories and legends are beside the point, which is that through the Apostles the Church has received... I was going to write "the Gospel and the Sacraments," but it's shorter and truer to simply say "everything she has and is."

Everything the Church has and is, everything she says, depends on these twelve men -- not as abstract symbols of the tribes of Israel, but as particular, specific individuals who lived particular, specific lives. That they lived particular, specific lives is absolutely critical, if Christianity is to be regarded as more than a set of made-up stories, but the particulars and specifics of their lives have been largely wiped away from the Church's perspective, making the Apostles, as the old image has it, near-perfectly transparent windows onto Christ.

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