What, me worry?

There is something seriously wrong with us.

A couple of weeks ago amongst a group of young with whom I am acquainted, we were talking about the various ways the federal government is working to take away our freedoms. Chief on the list was the indefinite detention of United States Citizens suspected of working with terrorist organizations on United States soil.

I have a big problem with this. So should you. I'm going to go right out and say it: if you don't have a big problem with this, you're doing it wrong.

One of the young men made one of the most common - and worst possible - comments on the situation: "What do you have to be worried about? Are you a terrorist?"

WRONG ANSWER.

Why is this the wrong answer? Because peaceful pro-life protesters have been identified in certain documents as "potential terrorists." Because no matter how distasteful I may find the Occupy Wall Street movement, they are exercising their right to free speech, and yet have also been marked as potential terrorists.

Because the President of the United States of America gets to decide what a terrorist is.

Because I am a citizen of the United States of America, entitled to a fair and speedy trial by a jury of my peers under the law of that same country.

Because those who give up freedom for a measure of security deserve neither.

I don't think it will be this president, or the one after him. We may be fine for 20 years, 30 years, 50 years. But wake up, we are laying the foundation for totalitarianism.

Will this be the generation remembered by history as that which saved America from the brink of disaster? Or will they curse our name for not stopping this evil when we had the chance?

Mary: Beloved of the Trinity

Mary may be one of the most controversial topics in Christendom. Catholics of both Western and Eastern Rites love her. Christians of other stripe usually have at least respect for her, though they often deride the Catholic love of this woman as over the top, or as even blasphemous.

What follows are some thoughts that would strike me from time to time regarding the reasonability of the Church's veneration of Mary, which were later confirmed by sources I trust.

First thing we should do is clear up a little terminology here. There are a number of key terms which are not used consistently in any dialog, which cause most of the confusion. They deserve a bit more attention, but for the time being these are the rough working definitions, and comments.

In no particular order:

• Pray
  To ask or beseech
  -Appropriate to Mary (like asking a relative - living or dead - to pray for you)
• Worship
  To assign worth, treat as divinity.
  -Due to God alone. Reverence for God as God.
• Adore Admire [Updated 1/6/2012 12:02 AM]
  To be in wonder of another, or of that-which-is, to be marveled by something.
  -I confusedly wrote adoration in the first release of this, but the concept I was thinking is actually called admiration in my translated copy of Fr. Marie-Dominique Philippe's book Retracing Reality: A Philosophical Itinerary. I apologize for any confusion I may have caused. Adoration is directed to God alone, and is a topic upon which many books could be written.

Now that we have that clear, let me move on to the real thoughts that led me to post this.

It strikes me that for every person, there are three major relationships that are (or at least can/should be) deeper than anything else: parent, spouse, & child. Yes, friendship is important, and I deeply value the intimacy I have with my friends, but there is something special about your parents, your spouse, and your children. For Mary, all three of these are God.

First off is the fatherhood. God is of course the Father of us all, but he is especially that to the Jews, and even moreso to Mary, who tradition tells us was a promised temple virgin. She was dedicated to the "family business." That's fairly obvious.

Similarly the motherhood is obvious, as "to the wonder of creation a creature gave birth to her creator." Mary is Θεοτοκος (Theotokos - literally "God Bearer") - not merely the mother of Christ, or mother of Jesus, but the Mother of God. Anyone accepting that Jesus Christ is the Second Person of God, the Word Incarnate must accept that Mary, as His mother, is therefore mysteriously the Mother of God.

But what about her spouse? Obviously, she was betrothed to Joseph, and we acknowledge him as her spouse, but see how we do it in the Divine Praises - "Blessed be Saint Joseph, her most chaste spouse."

Many people think (mistakenly) that Mary & Joseph's marriage was "ordinary," in the sense that after Jesus was born they had normal marital relations, and at least a few children (the "brothers" of Christ). What bugged me about this was quite simply that Joseph couldn't be Mary's husband, she already had one. Scripture tells us that at the Annunciation, the Archangel Gabriel told her that the Spirit of the Most High would overshadow her as it did the Ark of the Covenant in ancient days, and create life within her.

She's already having a child with God, how could she have children with any mere mortal man?

Joseph's role in salvation history was to be the protector of the Mother of God, and the best way that he could do this was to be her "legal husband" as it were. Tradition tells us that even before the Annunciation there were no plans for them to live as a normal wedded couple, as she was a promised temple virgin. But even moreso afterwards, how could any man dare to take as his wife the woman who had literally given birth to God?

So there she is, Mary, Beloved of the Trinity. She sits at the heart of the ineffable and unfathomable mystery which is the Triune yet Single God, being the Daughter, Spouse, and Mother of God in a way shared by no other mortal. And yet, by the virtue of our humanity, we are connected to her, and she is in fact a prefigurement for us of the desire of God.

Mary's position is the position desired for all mankind by God. Christ said to the crowds, "Who is my Mother? The one who does the will of the one who sent me." Of course, Mary was the most perfectly obedient to that will, but Christ shows us that we are to follow her example that we too may become "the Mother of God," "the Radiant Spouse, the Church," and of course, "Children of the Most High, Heirs to the Kingdom of God."

We love her for we see in her the Love with which she was enveloped. We see her as the most perfect role model of how to accept the Love and the Will of God into our lives, and to make that Love present to the world.

So when you are asked why you pay so much attention to Mary, reply with a smile of joy, "Because God did!"

On the Altar

The Altar.
A block of stone, an ornate table of rare wood?
Temporary, permanent, ancient - what is it?

Look beyond...
the hands of a priest,
a table,
changed forever by oil and hands, a bishop's consecration.
The hands, the table... they are sacred, set apart for a holy purpose.
Set apart for God Himself.

It appears simple, a father leading his family
in a meal of prayer and thanksgiving.
Yet, it is more than a simple meal of bread and wine, shared for to be together.

The priest becomes something more.
Despite his flaws and failings, he is now In Persona Christi.
The bread and wine are now the Body & Blood, Soul & Divinity of Christ,
confected by those anointed hands on the table which has become Calvary - the Cross.

Consummatum est. This is the wedding feast of the Lamb.

Hierarchical Thoughts

He is the image of the invisible God,
the firstborn of all creation.
He is before all things,
and in him all things hold together.

I am absolutely fascinated by the wording of this passage from Colossians in Latin:

Omnia per ipsum et in ipsum creata sunt,
et ipse est ante omnia,
et omnia in ipso constant.

In Latin, the words ipsum, ipso, ipse are all forms of the intensive pronoun, that can be roughly translated as "he himself." Like the difference between saying, "Fred ran an errand," and "Fred himself ran an errand," or "Fred ran an errand himself."

Given that, we can take a stab at the translation of this passage, which is found at the end of verse 16 and beginning of verse 17 in the first chapter of Collosians.

All (things) through he himself and in he himself were created,
and he himself is before all (things),
and all (things) in he himself they last/are known/exist/consist (of)/stand firm.

Again and again this use of ipso, the intensive pronoun with the antecedent of Christ, emphasizing his absolute centrality to creation itself.

His centrality is not just in our worship, or in our own lives, but in fact to everything.

This is why we evangelize.

I recall a homily my pastor gave a couple of months ago, in which he said, "We must live lives which make no sense, if God isn't real." I think he found the heart of what St. Francis meant when he said, "Evangelize always, when necessary use words."

Obviously, not all of us are given to eloquent speech, or deep thought, or graceful prose and poetry. But each and every one of us is called to live a life that makes no sense, that is not logical, that is irrational, to the eyes of the world.

Even more than that, we Catholics have the added challenge that our lives must make no sense unless the Church is true. We should be a walking question mark to all people of faith, so that knowing us, they are brought to the question, "why would they do that if the Church wasn't what it said it was?"

And why do we do all this? For the glory? For the rewards? When Archbishop Fulton Sheen was asked how many souls he had converted, he answered none. God does the conversion, he was simply open to God's call to evangelization.

We do this because it is the will of God that no one suffer the pain of hell, which is the pain of eternal separation from Him.

We do this because in every human soul there is a longing, a thirsting. Every addiction, every false idol, every faulty idealism is a search for the altar of God. Because of our fallen nature, we struggle in finding it, but it is in our very nature to struggle to find it. We evangelize with our whole lives because every person's dignity deserves nothing less that the whole and total truth.

What if today is the day the Lord is going to use your prayer before the noon meal to draw a soul to himself?

What if today is the day when your unabashed joy in the saving power of God will be the conduit of God's love into a lost heart?

Belief in God is not a "different strokes for different folks" deal. No, we do not force our beliefs upon other people, but we must be constantly living lives that reflect our belief, and call others to belief. It is not "imposing our values," it is Living in the Truth.

The First Luminous Mystery

He Who was baptized in the Jordan
The Baptism in the Jordan

Matthew 28:19

Going therefore, teach ye all nations; baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost.

Christ had already followed this example, as we find at the start of his public life in Matthew 3:13-17

Then cometh Jesus from Galilee to the Jordan, unto John, to be baptized by him. But John stayed him, saying: I ought to be baptized by thee, and comest thou to me? And Jesus answering, said to him: Suffer it to be so now. For so it becometh us to fulfill all justice. Then he suffered him. And Jesus bing baptized, forthwith came out of the water: and lo, the heavens were opened to him: and he saw the Spirit of God descending as a dove, and coming upon him. And behold a voice from heaven, saying: This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.

I am reminded of an incident with St. Faustina, to whom was revealed the Divine Mercy. Our Lord told her to ask her superior to allow her to adore at midnight. She did, and was told no. He repeated this request several times, and each time she asked her superior, who denied her request. Finally, St. Faustina's superior told her not to ask her anymore.

The next time Our Lord asked her to adore Him at midnight, she replied in distress that her superior had again said no, and had ordered her not to ask again. Jesus replied that he had done this to make clear to her that he exercises his authority through his church, and that she must be obedient to her superior.

By himself being baptized "to fulfill all justice," Christ shows us the important of this as a sacrament. Though sinless, he accepted cleansing from sin, just as he would later accept their punishment.

Christ was baptized so that we could be baptized with him, anointed with him.

The Luminous Mysteries

The Luminous mysteries tell us of Jesus's earthly ministry, from his baptism to his institution of the Eucharist. They are:

1. The Baptism in the Jordan
   Qui apud Iordanem baptizatus est.
   He Who was baptized in the Jordan.
2. The Wedding at Cana
   Qui ipsum revelavit apud Canense matrimonium.
   He Who revealed Himself at the wedding feast of Cana.
3. The Proclamation of the Kingdom
   Qui Regnum Dei annuntiavit.
   He who announced the Kingdom of God.
4. The Transfiguration
   Qui transfiguratus est.
   He Who was transfigured.
5. The Institution of the Eucharist
   Qui Eucharistiam instituit.
   He Who instituted the Eucharist.

As you probably know, the luminous mysteries are a fairly recent addition to the Rosary. There have been many people in favor of their addition, and many people who believe them to be a great insult to Mary.

What I know is this:

• The Rosary is not Liturgy. While traditional and universally known, it is a devotion, and there are several variants.
• As revealed to St. Dominic, the Rosary is a means of teaching the faith. Blessed John Paul the Great's addition is to the teaching aspect.
• The luminous mysteries are and always will be optional. If you don't like them, don't say them.

What I know is that Bl. JPM said that these are five mysteries of Christ worthy of meditation. That is all I need to know, totus tuus Maria!

Mary, loving mother who tells us to do the will of your Son, pray for us!

Doing some maintenance...

Hey all. Just a heads up that I've started using a lot more custom formatting in recent posts, and I'm going to start working backwards to apply the same internal structure so that my blog is easier for me to maintain. I'm also going to be looking over older posts to make sure they still look good with the new theme for the whole blog.

I have several new posts in the queue, including a start into the Luminous mysteries of the rosary, and some discussion of Hell. Bear with me, those should be out soon. If you see typos/glitches/plain bad formatting, feel free to report it to me, musings@jebwerkz.com.

Thanks!