Friday, October 31, 2008

Latest Old Books Club discussion...


We've been reading "Hymns on Paradise" by St. Ephrem the Syrian.
This, again, is an ecumenical book club. Some interesting topics covered.
Here's a snapshot of our discussion:

I responded....

(1) Ephrem as a Catholic & Orthodox Father
One thing that I forgot to bring up during our great discussion on Wednesday night was the fact that Ephrem is both part of the Patrimony of the Catholic and Orthodox Churches. When discussing the "intermediate state" theory posited by Ephrem, the discussion seemed to follow a line that this was a great idea and one that was outside the thinking of the Catholic Church. I would simply point out that all of the Fathers we are reading are within both Traditions, respectively.

(2) O Happy Fault (Felix Culpa)
A decent explanation from Wikipedia...

Felix culpa is a Latin phrase that literally translated means a "blessed fault" or "fortunate fall". As a religious term it refers to Adam and Eve's fall and the loss of the Garden of Eden, known theologically as the source of original sin. The phrase is sung annually in the Exsultet of the Easter Vigil: "O felix culpa quae talem et tantum meruit habere redemptorem," "O happy fault that merited such and so great a Redeemer." The medieval theologian Thomas Aquinas cited this line when he explained how the principle that "God allows evils to happen in order to bring a greater good therefrom" (not to say that it ought or needs to happen) underlies the causal relationship between original sin and the Divine Redeemer's Incarnation.

The phrase "Oh happy fault!" is used in colloquial English, especially among literary intellectuals.

In a literary context, the term "felix culpa" can be used to describe how a series of miserable events will eventually lead to a happier outcome. The theological concept is one of the underlying themes of Raphael Carter's science fiction novel The Fortunate Fall; the novel's title is explicitly derived from the Latin phrase. John Milton also invokes ideas of felix culpa in his epic poem Paradise Lost.
Mike chimes in... So, ultimately, the main point is this: felix culpa is from a beautiful song sung during the epic Easter Vigil mass at midnight... it is not any sort of theological maxim or hermeneutic by which Catholics operate. It does however say something profound about the faith that we have in God to transform such a calamity as Original Sin in such a powerful, redemptive manner, renewing the face of the earth.

(3) Intermediate State/Sanctification or 'being clothed in Glory' w/o Original Sin
I would actually like to couple this with a side remark made by Tim yesterday about Marian devotion, specifically the Immaculate Conception. Let me retrace some steps first. Again, Ephrem was positing that Original Sin did not need to occur; the Tree was a 'test' so to speak, and God wanted Adam and Eve to use their radical freedom for the good. If they were to choose righteously and faithfully (not eat the fruit), then they would have (without 'needing' to sin) been 'clothed in Glory' and essentially been given the graces won through Christ on the Cross without all the suffering and death. We all seemed to like and be intrigued by this idea.
Ok, here's the move...
If Adam and Eve were created in an intermediate state (not Glorified, not fallen, yet created in God's image) then couldn't God also create another human (if He so wished) in such an 'intermediate state'? Could He not create, say the Mother of His Divine Son, in this 'intermediate state'? Clearly the roots of the idea behind the Immaculate Conception are within such a doctrine. This is precisely what the Catholic Church teaches on this manner; Mary, set aside for the specific mission of bearing the Son of Man, could not have been born with Original Sin, thus God in all His Omnipotence created her in an 'immaculate state/intermediate state'. She still had radical freedom just like Eve, but not the 'concupiscence' or tendency of fallenness to sin. That's why there's all these Patristic references to Mary as the "new Eve". Hence, when Gabriel announced to her the great task of bearing the Son of God, she was able to answer with a resounding "Let it be done to me according to they will!". Hence, the great Archangel's response: "Hail, full of grace, the Lord is with thee."
The Immaculate Conception, contrary to common belief, is not a new idea. It was discussed even in the time of Thomas Aquinas in the 11th century. The Orthodox, and Aquinas, reject the idea because in those days most believed that the soul did not "quicken" the body at conception, but ensouled the fetus/embryo 40 days later. This was even posited by Augustine in the 4th century. Aquinas openly rejected the theological idea being debated even way back then. Orthodox theology, like Catholicism, developed from Pentecost until around the 10th or 11th century; then, in my interpretation, it became ossified and static, though still quite rich. The Catholic Church, after the schism, still continued the thoughtful, prayerful, and slow 'development of doctrine', for it is like a seed, growing and revealing more to us. Theology is not static. As we know now via science, the embryo is 'kicking' almost at conception, and most would now say that the ancient/medieval idea of 'quickening' was wrong. The body clearly appears to be ensouled at conception, the cornerstone of pro-life teaching.
Thus, it is not extraordinary that 800 years later (after Aquinas et al.) the pope proclaimed it a dogma of Mary, divinely revealed (Immaculate Conception 1854; Assumption of Mary 1950... Orthodox 'dormition' is essentially the same= Matt, correct me on this if necessary!).
Also, the Catholic Church, through the exercise of God given reason and Divine Revelation, thinks about, prays about, and asks God for his assistance in such matters of faith and morals. The Church believes that Peter and his papal successors have the "keys of the Kingdom" to "bind and loose" guided infallibly by the Holy Ghost. God is in fact the authority behind such a declaration. Keep in mind there have really only been 6 major 'infallible statements' made by popes throughout the ages; it is not a power-play as is typically believed.
Here they are:

* "Tome to Flavian", Pope Leo I, 449, on the two natures in Christ, received by the Council of Chalcedon;
* Letter of Pope Agatho, 680, on the two wills of Christ, received by the Third Council of Constantinople;
* Benedictus Deus, Pope Benedict XII, 1336, on the beatific vision of the just prior to final judgment;
* Cum occasione, Pope Innocent X, 1653, condemning five propositions of Jansen as heretical;
* Auctorem fidei, Pope Pius VI, 1794, condemning seven Jansenist propositions of the Synod of Pistoia as heretical;
* Ineffabilis Deus, Pope Pius IX, 1854, defining the immaculate conception; and
* Munificentissimus Deus, Pope Pius XII, 1950, defining the assumption of Mary.

(This is from Wikipedia, and seems correct, so don't take this as 'dogma'... ha, ha, ha.)

In conclusion, the theological groundwork is within Ephrem for such a dogma of Mary via the 'intermediate state' doctrine.

What say you fellas on all these matters?

One fellow, currently attending a High Anglican parish, replied:

Hmmm, on part 3-- that is an interesting move, which I will consider.
This whole "intermediate state" is all new to my thinking, so I'm
still processing it, but you propose an interesting twist. It is
possible that it begins to work toward a resolution of my major
objection--an objection that I thought otherwise could only be dealt
with by a very mystical explanation of the nature of kairos v chronos.
(Are these the right terms?)
I am aware that the germs of some of the modern innovations in Marian
theology have been around for some considerable time, but to my
curmudgeonly anti-modern sensibility, it still seems all too
innovative for me.

On 2, my hesitation is that the phrase could possibly be seen as
trying to make the fall less bad than it was. Maybe this phrase and
the hymn, properly understood, do not do this. But the idea could
easily lead some in that direction. (Similarly--and I don't think you
object to any of this--Death is truly bad, a result of the fall.
Christ's conquest of death does not make death not-bad, but rather
conquered. It is a mistake, then, to think that because of Christ,
death can be a good thing in itself. I think a similar thing could
happen with this fortunate fall idea.)

On 1, yes, of course, pre-schism.


Another friend, newly converted to Orthodoxy, also said he found the connection of Immaculate Conception and St. Ephrem's 'intermediate state' interesting.

Good stuff...

Anne Rice goes from vampires to Jesus biographer


Growing respect for Anne Rice...

I was pretty skeptical, I must admit, about an author, formerly known for vampire novels, writing a life of Christ. It seems I was quite wrong about her. "Christ the Lord out of Egypt" was a solid effort. This is the latest on her conversion bio out today...

It certainly wasn't bad liturgy that brought her back to the Church.



Anne Rice goes from vampires to Jesus biographer


NEW ORLEANS – It's Halloween, and Anne Rice has a new book — a memoir in fact — that's climbing best-seller lists. Everything is normal, then.

Normal if it were 1994 — the height of Rice's megaselling fame as a queen of Southern Gothic pulp.

For those who haven't been paying attention lately to vampire lit, America's most famous chronicler of bloodsuckers doesn't live in New Orleans anymore — and hasn't since before Hurricane Katrina hit — and she's riding new waves of enthusiasm: the memoir and Christian lit.

Her memoir, "Called Out of Darkness: A Spiritual Confession," is the latest piece of evidence that Rice is reinventing herself in an attempt to build a reputation as a serious Christian writer.

In the memoir, the 67-year-old writer doesn't disavow the two decades she spent churning out books on vampires, demons and witches — with a batch of S&M erotica thrown in — following the breakout success of her first novel in 1976, "Interview With the Vampire."

But she's clearly moved on.

In a telephone interview from her mountain home in Rancho Mirage, Calif., Rice laid out her goal:

"To be able to take the tools, the apprenticeship, whatever I learned from being a vampire writer, or whatever I was — to be able to take those tools now and put them in the service of God is a wonderful, wonderful, wonderful opportunity," she said. "And I hope I can redeem myself in that way. I hope that the Lord will accept the books I am writing now."

The memoir follows the release of two books in a planned four-part, first-person chronicle of the life of Jesus.

And in this new 245-page memoir, Rice presents her former life as vampire writer as that of a soul-searching wanderer in the deserts of atheism; as someone akin to her most famous literary creations — Lestat, her "dark search engine," Louis the aristocrat-turned-vampire and Egyptian Queen Akasha, "the mother of all vampires."

"I do think that those dark books were always talking about religion in their own way. They were talking about the grief for a lost faith," she said.

In 2002, Rice broke away completely from atheism — nearly four decades after she gave up her Roman Catholic faith as the 1960s started. It happened when she went off to college and found her peers talking about existentialism — Martin Heidegger, Albert Camus, Jean-Paul Sartre. Religion, she writes, was too restrictive to the young Rice. Too out of step.

Yet, religion had to come back into her life, she writes. For her, it was something she'd have to face up to again like an absent parent or a long-lost love child or Banquo the ghost in Macbeth.

By the late 1990s, when she went back to Mass, Rice — the author whose books sold in the tens of millions and who had recharged Hollywood's appetite for vampire-inspired horror — had fallen on hard times.

Her husband, poet and artist Stan Rice, died of a brain tumor in 2002. And she had become victim to diabetes.

Always over-the-top and beyond the rational, she writes that her return of faith was preceded by a series of epiphanies — many while on travels to Europe's cathedrals, Israel and Brazil. In one episode, when she visited the giant Jesus statue above Rio de Janeiro, she writes that she felt "delirium" as the clouds broke and revealed the statue.

Her professed revelations recall the religious intoxication she describes of her childhood.

When she was 12, she had her father turn a room on the back porch of the family's Uptown home in New Orleans into an oratory modeled after St. Rose of Lima — the saint Catholics believe turned roses into floating crosses. She wanted to be a saint, she writes.

In the memoir, Rice describes a familiar Catholic upbringing imbued with opulence and mystery. The incense. The statuary. The stained glass. The darkness. She learned the world, she writes, through her senses, through a "preliterate" understanding of the world. She writes that she possessed "an internal gallery of pictorial images" that, lamentably, was replaced "by the alphabetic letters" she learned later.

"You might call it the Mozart effect, but it was the Catholic effect on me," she said.

In a sense, the memoir also is a confessional about her struggle as a writer to be a reader, a thinker and an author with a distinct literary style. Her stories often are reveries with no end in sight — and all too often ugly with pedantic unwinding, numbing in detail and overly simplistic, a pastiche of cliches.

Her turn in direction — from vampire fiction to Christian musings — still isn't winning the critics over.

In The New York Times, Christopher Buckley slammed Rice's memoir as "a crashing, mind-numbing bore. This is the literary equivalent of waterboarding." [The Times... Hell's Daily Press]

And the bar is high when it comes to writing about Jesus.

"The best may be Nikos Kazantzakis' 'The Last Temptation of Christ,'" said Jason Berry, a novelist and journalist who has written extensively on the Catholic priest sex abuse scandal. "But also (G.K.) Chesterton, Norman Mailer. ... A lot of narrative artists in both literature and film have taken on Jesus, so to speak."

Rice isn't out to impress the critics, though.

"My objective is simple: It's to write books about our Lord living on Earth that make him real to people who don't believe in him; or people who have never really tried to believe in him," she said.

She pressed the point: "I mean, I've made vampires believable to grown women. Now, if I can do that, I can make our Lord Jesus Christ believable to people who've never believed in him. I hope and pray."

For her devotees, whatever she writes invariably goes down like a smooth bloodbath, that favorite Goth beverage sometimes made with raspberry liqueur, red wine and cranberry juice.

"There are so many people dedicated to her. They want her to write more vampire books," said Marta Acosta, author of the popular "Casa Dracula" series, a "comedy of manners" that plays on vampire themes. She also runs the Vampire Wire, a book blog for fans of gore and the undead.

As for her, Acosta couldn't care less if Rice sinks back into the vampire vein.

"People think it's sexual, but it's not. It's suppressed stuff. Southern Gothic," Acosta said. "How many centuries is Louis (played by Brad Pitt in the movie 'Interview With the Vampire: The Vampire Chronicles') going to whine?"

Never again, it seems.

Rice is busy writing about Jesus as a minister. And that's a tall order, Rice said.

Tuesday, October 28, 2008

Feast of St. Jude - my patron


Today's readings and a nice reflection from Pope Benedict XVI.

Letter to the Ephesians 2,19-22.

So then you are no longer strangers and sojourners, but you are fellow citizens with the holy ones and members of the household of God, built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus himself as the capstone. Through him the whole structure is held together and grows into a temple sacred in the Lord; in him you also are being built together into a dwelling place of God in the Spirit.

Psalms 19(18),2-3.4-5.

The heavens declare the glory of God; the sky proclaims its builder's craft.
One day to the next conveys that message; one night to the next imparts that knowledge.
There is no word or sound; no voice is heard;
Yet their report goes forth through all the earth, their message, to the ends of the world. God has pitched there a tent for the sun;


Holy Gospel according to Saint Luke 6,12-16.

In those days he departed to the mountain to pray, and he spent the night in prayer to God. When day came, he called his disciples to himself, and from them he chose Twelve, whom he also named apostles: Simon, whom he named Peter, and his brother Andrew, James, John, Philip, Bartholomew, Matthew, Thomas, James the son of Alphaeus, Simon who was called a Zealot, and Judas the son of James, and Judas Iscariot, who became a traitor.

Commentary of the day :

Pope Benedict XVI
General Audience of 03/05/2006 (©Libreria Editrice Vaticana)


"He called his disciples to himself, and from them he chose Twelve, whom he also named apostles"


The apostolic Tradition is not a collection of things or words, like a box of dead things. Tradition is the river of new life that flows from the origins, from Christ down to us, and makes us participate in God's history with humanity. This topic of Tradition... is of great importance for the life of the Church. The Second Vatican Council pointed out in this regard that Tradition is primarily apostolic in its origins: "God graciously arranged that the things he had once revealed for the salvation of all peoples should remain in their entirety, throughout the ages, and be transmitted to all generations. Therefore, Christ the Lord, in whom the entire Revelation of the Most High God is summed up (2Cor 1,20; and 3,16-4, 6), commanded the Apostles to preach the Gospel and communicate the gifts of God to all men. This Gospel was to be the source of all saving truth and moral discipline" (Dogmatic Constitution on Divine Revelation 'Dei Verbum', n. 7). The Council noted further that this was faithfully done "by the Apostles who handed on, by the spoken word of their preaching, by the example they gave, by the institutions they established, what they themselves had received - whether from the lips of Christ, from his way of life and his works, or whether they had learned it at the prompting of the Holy Spirit" The Council adds that there were "other men associated with the Apostles, who, under the inspiration of the same Holy Spirit, committed the message of salvation to writing".

As heads of the eschatological Israel, and likewise as Twelve, the number of the tribes of the Chosen People, the Apostles continued the "gathering" begun by the Lord and did so first and foremost by transmitting faithfully the gift received, the Good News of the Kingdom that came to people in Jesus Christ. Their number not only expresses continuity with the holy root, the Israel of the twelve tribes, but also the universal destination of their ministry, which brought salvation to the very ends of the earth. This can be understood from the symbolic value that the numbers have in the Semitic world: twelve results from the multiplication of three, a perfect number, and four, a number that refers to the four cardinal points, hence, to the whole world.

Sunday, October 26, 2008

2008 Synod on Scripture's Closing Message


From Zenit.org.

"Grow and Deepen Your Knowledge and Love for the Word"

VATICAN CITY, OCT. 24, 2008 (Zenit.org).- Here is a summary of the concluding message of the 12th Ordinary General Assembly of the Synod of Bishops. The final message was approved today at the 21st general congregation.

The theme of the assembly was "The Word of God in the Life and Mission of the Church."

* * *

Dear Brothers and Sisters,

“With all those everywhere who call on the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, their Lord as well as ours. Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ” (1 Cor 1:2-3). With the Apostle Paul’s greeting - in this year dedicated to him - we, the Synodal Fathers gathered in Rome for the XII Ordinary General Assembly of the Synod of Bishops, with the Holy Father Benedict XVI, address to you a message full of reflection and proposals on the Word of God that has been the center of our assembly’s work.

It is a message that is entrusted to our pastors in the first place, to the many, generous catechists and to all those who guide you in a loving listening and reading of the Bible. Now, to you, we would like to outline the soul and the substance of this text, so that it may grow and deepen your knowledge and love for the Word of God. There are four cardinal points on the horizon that we invite you to know and that we will express through just as many images.

First of all there is the divine Voice. It echoes in the beginnings of Creation, breaking the silence of nothingness and giving origin to the marvels of the universe. It is a Voice that penetrates in history, wounded by human sin and distressed by suffering and death. It also sees the Lord walking with humanity to offer His grace, His Covenant, His salvation. It is a Voice that enters into the pages of the Holy Scriptures, which we read today in the Church, guided by the Holy Spirit, who was given as the light of truth to it and to its pastors.

Also, as Saint John wrote, “The Word became flesh” (1:14). Here then the Face appears. It is Jesus Christ, who is the Son of the eternal and infinite God, but also the mortal man, tied to an historical era, to a people and to a land. He lives the exhausting existence of humanity till His death, but rises glorious and lives forever. He makes our encounter with the Word of God perfect. He unveils to us “the full meaning” and unity of the Holy Scriptures, therefore Christianity is a religion that has a person at its center, Jesus Christ, the One who reveals the Father. He makes us understand that the Scriptures are “flesh”, that is to say human words to be understood and studied in their way of expressing, but that also preserve the light of divine truth within, which we can only live and contemplate with the Holy Spirit.

It is the same Spirit of God that leads us to the third cardinal point in our itinerary, the Home of the divine word, that is to say the Church, which, as Saint Luke suggested (Ac 2:42), is supported by four ideal columns. There is “teaching”, which is reading and understanding the Bible in the announcement made to all, in catechesis, in the homily, through a proclamation that involves mind and heart. Then there is “the breaking of the bread”, which is the Eucharist, the source and the summit of the life and the mission of the Church. Like what happened that day at Emmaus, the faithful are invited to nourish themselves in the liturgy of the table of the Word of God and Body of Christ. A third column is “prayer” with “psalms and hymns and inspired songs to God” (Col 3:16). It is the Liturgy of the Hours, the Church’s prayer destined to give rhythm to the days and times of the Christian year. There is also the Lectio divina, the prayerful reading of the Holy Scriptures able to lead, in meditation, in prayer, in contemplation, to the encounter with Christ, the living Word of God. And, finally, there is “brotherly communion” because to be true Christians it will not suffice being “those who hear the word of God” but also those who “put it into practice” (Lk 8:21) through love’s labors. In the home of the Word of God we also can meet the brothers and sisters from other Churches and Christian communities who, even in division, live a real unity, if not a full one, through the worship and love for the divine Word.

Thus we reach the last image of the spiritual map. It is the road the Word of God walks upon: Go, therefore, make disciples of all nations [...] and teach them to observe all the commands I gave you...what you hear in whispers, proclaim from the housetops” (Mt 28:19-20; 10:27). The Word of God must run through the world’s streets which today are also those of computer, television and virtual communication. The Bible must enter into families so that parents and children read it, pray with it and that it may be their lamp for the steps on the way to existence (cf. Ps 119:105). The Holy Scriptures must also enter into the schools and in the cultural areas because for centuries they were the main reference for art, literature, music, thinking and the same common moral. Their symbolic, poetic and narrative richness makes them a banner of beauty for faith as well as for culture, in a world often scarred by ugliness and lowliness.

However, the Bible also shows us the breath of pain that rises from the earth, goes towards the cry from the oppressed and the laments of the miserable. At the summit it has the cross where Christ, alone and abandoned, lives the tragedy of the most atrocious suffering and death. Because of this presence of the Son of God, the darkness of evil and death is irradiated by the Paschal light and by the hope of glory. But on the roads of the world, the brothers and sisters of other Churches and Christian communities walk with us also, even while divided, live a real unity if not a full one, through the worship and love for the Word of God. Along the paths of the world we often meet men and women of other religions that listen and faithfully practice the commands of their holy books and who, with us, can build a world of peace and light, because God “wants everyone to be saved and reach full knowledge of the truth” (1 Tim 2:4).

Dear brothers and sisters, guard the Bible in your houses, fully read, study and understand its pages, transform them into prayer and witness of life, listen to it with love and faith in the liturgy. Create the silence to effectively hear the Word of the Lord and hold a silence after the listening, because it will continue to dwell, live and speak to you. Make it resound at the beginning of your day so that God will have the first word and let it echo in you in the evenings so that the last word will be God’s.

“And now I commend you to God and to the word of his grace” (Ac 20:32). With the same expression used by Saint Paul in his farewell speech to the heads of the Church in Ephesus, also the Synodal Fathers entrust the faithful of the communities dispersed throughout the world to the divine word, which is also judgment but above all grace, which cuts like a sword but is sweet as a honeycomb. It is powerful and glorious and guides us on the roads of history with Jesus’ hand, who you like us love with an imperishable love (cf. Eph 6:24).

[Original text: Italian]

Has America Lost Its Way? A bishop reflects...


From Zenit.org.

Bishop Aquila on Returning to Nation's Foundations
FARGO, North Dakota, OCT. 24, 2008 (Zenit.org).- Here is an excerpt of the homily given Sunday by Bishop Samuel Aquila of Fargo at the Cathedral of St. Mary.
* * *

Today, Catholic politicians and individual voters on both sides of the aisle have lost the sense of this fundamental principle that underlies every just and enduring society. Most especially, they have lost the sense of the inalienable right to life for the unborn child. Even without considering God in the equation, human life, for every human being, begins at the moment of conception. That is when human life begins. That is when your life began. And that is when Rep. Pelosi’s life began. That is when Sen. Biden’s life began. That is when Sen. Obama’s life began and Sen. McCain’s life began.

Sadly, the dignity of human life from the moment of conception is lost today. The truth nonetheless exists. Our forefathers recognized it but present day politicians and voters do not.

Furthermore, we have lost too this fundamental principle in what it means to pursue happiness. We see the attempted pursuit of happiness without God and the collapse of this pursuit in Wall Street and the economics of today. Greed has guided the hearts of men and women, in which a 40 million dollar bonus is not enough in one year. When you take God out of the equation and life is lived as if he did not exist, the only thing left to pursue is materialism, because there is no life after death, there is no judgment. And so greed guides the hearts of men and women when we lose that basic essential understanding of the presence of God.

We see that abandonment of God’s presence, too, in the area of human sexuality. Fifty percent of marriages end in divorce. Women are treated as sexual toys and objects. People proclaim a “good” in same sex unions, living promiscuously, and moving from one intimate relationship to the next.

Once we lose God in the pursuit of happiness, and once we lose the sense of the dignity of the human person and the God in whose image and likeness we are truly created, then we lose all sense of any moral compass or any moral standard. Without God, can there be any morality at all? Or is it set by the thinking of the day that can change from generation to generation, rooted in no truths that are valid for every person in every generation?

We as a nation stand at a crossroads. There is a fork in the road between the culture of life and the culture of death. The culture of death made great inroads with activist judges in the 1973 court that created a so-called right to abortion. They, like the pharisees and the Herodians, hid behind lies, they hid behind deceit, they hid behind a lack of reason and the majority said, “It is okay to destroy human life in all nine months of pregnancy.”

Judges, politicians and voters who went so far as to state that human life may be destroyed at the beginning are now attacking human life at its end by support for assisted suicide. The next step will be to deny healthcare for the elderly and handicapped because they are no more of any use to society. Once the right to life is no longer understood as a gift from God, but attributed to people by the state, the road to further atrocities against human life is a spiral downward quite rapidly.

What many Catholic politicians and citizens have done by their actions and votes today is to sell their souls, because what they have done is to say, “We will be created in the image and likeness, not of God, but of a Democratic platform, of a Republican platform -- that’s whose image and likeness we will embrace.” There is neither reason nor logic in their statements, but anything to gain power and this compromise leads only to blindness and darkness.

My sisters and brothers, you and I are not created in the image and likeness of Obama or McCain or a political party. We are created in the image and likeness of God. We must, as our forefathers did, place the God-given inalienable rights first, beginning with the right to life from the moment of conception until natural death. As bad as the economy is, as bad as the war is, the destruction of innocent human life, especially in the womb, is a greater evil, and correction of this grave evil must take place. Each of us has a role in making this correction in our duties as citizens. To say that “the battle is lost” is to condone an intrinsic evil that will only lead to further evils.

A hundred years from now, this election will just be a moment in history. A hundred years from now all of us, or certainly most of us, will be dead. But I assure you, a hundred years from now, if we continue as a society on the course that we are on, embracing a culture of death, our society will no longer exist, because tyranny will have its way, as will atheism.

When there is no recognition of the primacy of God and human beings decide what is good and what is evil, anything can be justified. All we have to do is look at history and the atheism of China, the atheism of Russia, the atheism of Cambodia, and the atheism of Nazi Germany. Countries that embrace atheism reveal the truth -- that is, if we do not embrace, as our forefathers did, the laws of nature and nature’s God, we will eventually collapse as a society.

Patriarch of Constantinople at the Synod on Scripture


From Zenit.org.

Patriarch at the Synod: Unexpected Impact

Interview With Fraternal Delegate From Orthodox Church

By Jesús Colina

VATICAN CITY, OCT. 24, 2008 (Zenit.org).- The intervention from Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew I of Constantinople at the synod of bishops marked an ecumenical milestone, says a representative of the Orthodox Church of Greece.

Archimandrite Ignatios Sotiriadis is a fraternal delegate at the world Synod of Bishops on the Word of God, which ends Sunday.

The Church of Greece representative spoke with ZENIT about the intervention from Bartholomew I, given as a homily Oct. 18 in a celebration of vespers together with Benedict XVI.

Q: You have been participating in the entire synod. What have you heard from the synod fathers about Bartholomew I's homily?

Archimandrite Ignatios: First of all, I feel proud to see His Holiness Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew I in the Sistine Chapel, where popes are elected, also famous worldwide for its artistic value, because I consider the invitation from Pope Benedict to the "primus inter pares" of the Orthodox Church a most great honor.

The event was welcomed by the synod fathers -- all of them were present -- as a true moment of "grace" and in the same way, the Vatican daily L'Osservatore Romano has presented it in a headline on the front page.

The patriarch made reference in his homily to the interpretation of the Word of God-Divine Word, according to the teaching and the writings of the fathers of the Church. It was a magisterial homily, since it presented the position of the Orthodox Church on the discussion, inspired in the richness of Eastern and Orthodox spirituality.

It was a historical event, in which a Pope celebrates vespers before the representatives of the entire Catholic episcopate and on this occasion, doesn't exercise his ministry as teacher, but concedes it to the second bishop of the Church when it was not yet divided.

What most impressed me was what the Pope said when the patriarch's homily, received with long applause, was over: "If we have common fathers, how can we not be brothers?"

Q: The synod fathers have commented on the mediation of the patriarch. In particular, they were impressed by the passage in which he explained how to "see" the Word of God through icons, expression of the incarnation of God, and in creation, highlighting the importance of protecting it, as respect for the divine Logos.

Archimandrite Ignatios: The ecumenical patriarch is known for his passion and his tireless commitment at the ecological level and the synod fathers have much appreciated his contribution to a discussion of maximum importance and current value, in which the Church should be a protagonist.

Q: But the great novelty, perhaps, has not been the patriarch's intervention, but rather the desire of the Pope, expressed at the end of vespers, to include the patriarch's proposals in the synodal proposals. This is an initiative that appears to have been welcomed by the synod fathers. In this way, for the first time in history, the magisterium of an ecumenical patriarch could be taken up by the official magisterium of the Catholic Church in the postsynodal apostolic exhortation.

Archimandrite Ignatios: When we are united in the Word of God, our path inevitably leads us toward a second stage, which is full unity, that is, a common celebration of the Eucharist. But this will not be reached as much with human efforts as with the breath and will of the Holy Spirit.

Q: Yet those who hope for this unity sometimes see it as something far off …

Archimandrite Ignatios: The separation of the Eastern and Western Church occurred over various centuries; it was not an isolated event in the year 1054, but a long cultural, linguistic process. … I think that the re-encounter will happen in the same way, following a gradual path. We separated slowly, and slowly we will unite. But it is not for us to talk of dates.

What is certain is the desire of the Orthodox Church that the Church of Rome parts with its temporal power and dedicates itself totally to its spiritual mission for the transformation of the world.


Here are Barthowlemew's words at Vespers. ==================

Patriarch's Words at Vespers


"Unity of the Church Is Unbreakably Related With Her Mission"

VATICAN CITY, OCT. 19, 2008 (Zenit.org).- Here is the address Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew I delivered Saturday afternoon at the celebration of early vespers in the Sistine Chapel, presided over by Benedict XVI.

The event took place within the context of the world Synod of Bishops, which is under way in the Vatican through Oct. 26. The theme of the assembly is on "The Word of God in the Life and Mission of the Church."

* * *

Your Holiness,
Synodal Fathers,

It is at once humbling and inspiring to be graciously invited by Your Holiness to address the XII Ordinary General Assembly of this auspicious Synod of Bishops, an historical meeting of Bishops of the Roman Catholic Church from throughout the world, gathered in one place to meditate on “the Word of God” and deliberate on the experience and expression of this Word “in the Life and Mission of the Church.”

This gracious invitation of Your Holiness to our Modesty is a gesture full of meaning and significance -- we dare say an historic event in itself. For it is the first time in history that an Ecumenical Patriarch is offered the opportunity to address a Synod of the Bishops of the Roman Catholic Church, and thus be part of the life of this sister Church at such a high level. We regard this as a manifestation of the work of the Holy Spirit leading our Churches to a closer and deeper relationship with each other, an important step towards the restoration of our full communion.

It is well known that the Orthodox Church attaches to the Synodical system fundamental ecclesiogical importance. Together with primacy synodality constitutes the backbone of the Church’s government and organisation. As our Joint International Commission on the Theological Dialogue between our Churches expressed it in the Ravenna document, this interdependence between synodality and primacy runs through all the levels of the Church’s life: local, regional and universal. Therefore, in having today the privilege to address Your Synod our hopes are raised that the day will come when our two Churches will fully converge on the role of primacy and synodality in the Church’s life, to which our common Theological Commission is devoting its study at the present time.

The theme to which this episcopal synod devotes its work is of crucial significance not only for the Roman Catholic Church but also for all those who are called to witness to Christ in our time. Mission and evangelization remain a permanent duty of the Church at all times and places; indeed they form part of the Church’s nature, since she is called “Apostolic” both in the sense of her faithfulness to the original teaching of the Apostles and in that of proclaiming the Word of God in every cultural context every time. The Church needs, therefore, to rediscover the Word of God in every generation and make it head with a renewed vigour and persuation also in our contemporary world, which deep in its heart thirsts for God’s message of peace, hope and charity.

This duty of evangelization would have been, of course, greatly enhanced and strengthened, if all Christians were in a position to perform it with one voice and as a fully united Church. In his prayer to the Father little before His passion our Lord has made it clear that the unity of the Church is unbreakably related with her mission “so that the world may believe” (John 17, 21). It is, therefore, most appropriate that this Synod has opened its doors to ecumenical fraternal delegates so that we may all become aware of our common duty of evangelization as well as of the difficulties and problems of its realization in today’s world.

This Synod has undoubtedly been studying the subject of the Word of God in depth and in all its aspects, theological as well as practical and pastoral. In our modest address to you we shall limit ourselves to sharing with you some thoughts on the theme of your meeting, drawing from the way the Orthodox tradition has approached it throughout the centuries and in the Greek patristic teaching, in particular. More concretely we should like to concentrate on three aspects of the subject, namely: on hearing and speaking the Word of God through the Holy Scriptures; on seeing God’s Word in nature and above all in the beauty of the icons; and finally on touching and sharing God’s Word in the communion of saints and the sacramental life of the Church. For all these are, we think, crucial in the life and mission of the Church.

In so doing, we seek to draw on a rich Patristic tradition, dating to the early third century and expounding a doctrine of five spiritual senses. For listening to God’s Word, beholding God’s Word, and touching God’s Word are all spiritual ways of perceiving the unique divine mystery. Based on Proverbs 2.5 about “the divine faculty of perception (αἴσθησις),” Origen of Alexandria claims:

This sense unfolds as sight for contemplation of immaterial forms, hearing for discernment of voices, taste for savoring the living bread, smell for sweet spiritual fragrance, and touch for handling the Word of God, which is grasped by every faculty of the soul.
The spiritual senses are variously described as “five senses of the soul,” as “divine” or “inner faculties,” and even as “faculties of the heart” or “mind.” This doctrine inspired the theology of the Cappadocians (especially Basil the Great and Gregory of Nyssa) as much as it did the theology of the Desert Fathers (especially Evagrius of Pontus and Macarius the Great).

1. Hearing and Speaking the Word through Scripture

At each celebration of the Divine Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom, the presiding celebrant at the Eucharist entreats “that we may be made worthy to hear the Holy Gospel.” For “hearing, beholding and handling the Word of life” (1 Jn 1.1) are not first and foremost our entitlement or birthright as human beings; they are our privilege and gift as children of the living God. The Christian Church is, above all, a scriptural Church. Although methods of interpretation may have varied from Church Father to Church Father, from “school” to “school,” and from East to West, nevertheless, Scripture was always received as a living reality and not a dead book.

In the context of a living faith, then, Scripture is the living testimony of a lived history about the relationship of a living God with a living people. The Word, “who spoke through the prophets” (Nicene-Constantinopolitan Creed), spoke in order to be heard and take effect. It is primarily an oral and direct communication intended for human beneficiaries. The scriptural text is, therefore, derivative and secondary; the scriptural text always serves the spoken word. It is not conveyed mechanically, but communicated from generation to generation as a living word. Through the Prophet Isaiah, the Lord vows:

As rain and snow descend from heaven, watering the earth … so shall my word go from mouth to mouth, accomplishing that which I purpose. (55.10-11)

Moreover, as St. John Chrysostom explains, the divine Word demonstrates profound considerateness (συγκατάβασις) for the personal diversity and cultural contexts of those hearing and receiving. Adaptation of the divine Word to the specific personal readiness and the particular cultural context defines the missionary dimension of the Church, which is called to transform the world through the Word. In silence as in declaration, in prayer as in action, the divine Word addresses the whole world, “preaching to all nations” (Mt 28.19) without either privilege or prejudice to race, culture, gender and class. When we carry out that divine commission, we are assured: “Behold, I am with you always.” (Mt 28.20) We are called to speak the divine Word in all languages, “becoming all things to all people, that [we] might by all means save some.” (1 Cor. 9.22)

As disciples of God’s Word, then, it is today more imperative than ever that we provide a unique perspective -- beyond the social, political, or economic -- on the need to eradicate poverty, to provide balance in a global world, to combat fundamentalism or racism, and to develop religious tolerance in a world of conflict. In responding to the needs of the world’s poor, vulnerable and marginalized, the Church can prove a defining marker of the space and character of the global community. While the theological language of religion and spirituality differs from the technical vocabulary of economics and politics, the barriers that at first glance appear to separate religious concerns (such as sin, salvation, and spirituality) from pragmatic interests (such as commerce, trade, and politics) are not impenetrable, crumbling before the manifold challenges of social justice and globalization.

Whether dealing with environment or peace, poverty or hunger, education or healthcare, there is today a heightened sense of common concern and common responsibility, which is felt with particular acuteness by people of faith as well as by those whose outlook is expressly secular. Our engagement with such issues does not of course in any way undermine or abolish differences between various disciplines or disagreements with those who look at the world in different ways. Yet the growing signs of a common commitment for the well-being of humanity and the life of the world are encouraging. It is an encounter of individuals and institutions that bodes well for our world. And it is an involvement that highlights the supreme vocation and mission of the disciples and adherents of God’s Word to transcend political or religious differences in order to transform the entire visible world for the glory of the invisible God.

2. Seeing the Word of God -- The Beauty of Icons and Nature

Nowhere is the invisible rendered more visible than in the beauty of iconography and the wonder of creation. In the words of the champion of sacred images, St. John of Damascus: “As maker of heaven and earth, God the Word was Himself the first to paint and portray icons.” Every stroke of an iconographer’s paintbrush – like every word of a theological definition, every musical note chanted in psalmody, and every carved stone of a tiny chapel or magnificent cathedral – articulates the divine Word in creation, which praises God in every living being and every living thing. (cf. Ps. 150.6)

In affirming sacred images, the Seventh Ecumenical Council of Nicaea was not concerned with religious art; it was the continuation and confirmation of earlier definitions about the fullness of the humanity of God’s Word. Icons are a visible reminder of our heavenly vocation; they are invitations to rise beyond our trivial concerns and menial reductions of the world. They encourage us to seek the extraordinary in the very ordinary, to be filled with the same wonder that characterized the divine marvel in Genesis: “God saw everything that He made; and, indeed, it was very good.” (Gn. 1.30-31) The Greek (Septuagint) word for “goodness” is κάλλος, which implies -- etymologically and symbolically -- a sense of “calling.” Icons underline the Church’s fundamental mission to recognize that all people and all things are created and called to be “good” and “beautiful."

Indeed, icons remind us of another way of seeing things, another way of experiencing realities, another way of resolving conflicts. We are asked to assume what the hymnology of Easter Sunday calls “another way of living.” For we have behaved arrogantly and dismissively toward the natural creation. We have refused to behold God’s Word in the oceans of our planet, in the trees of our continents, and in the animals of our earth. We have denied our very own nature, which calls us to stoop low enough to hear God’s Word in creation if we wish to “become participants of divine nature.” (2 Pet 1.4) How could we ignore the wider implications of the divine Word assuming flesh? Why do we fail to perceive created nature as the extended Body of Christ?

Eastern Christian theologians always emphasized the cosmic proportions of divine incarnation. The incarnate Word is intrinsic to creation, which came to be through divine utterance. St. Maximus the Confessor insists on the presence of God’s Word in all things (cf. Col. 3.11); the divine Logos stands at the center of the world, mysteriously revealing its original principle and ultimate purpose (cf. 1 Pet 1.20). This mystery is described by St. Athanasius of Alexandria:

As the Logos [he writes], he is not contained by anything and yet contains everything; He is in everything and yet outside of everything … the first-born of the whole world in its every aspect.

The entire world is a prologue to the Gospel of John. And when the Church fails to recognize the broader, cosmic dimensions of God’s Word, narrowing its concerns to purely spiritual matters, then it neglects its mission to implore God for the transformation -- always and everywhere, “in all places of His dominion” -- of the whole polluted cosmos. It is no wonder that on Easter Sunday, as the Paschal celebration reaches its climax, Orthodox Christians sing:

Now everything is filled with divine light: heaven and earth, and all things beneath the earth. So let all creation rejoice.

All genuine “deep ecology” is, therefore, inextricably linked with deep theology:

“Even a stone,” writes Basil the Great, “bears the mark of God’s Word. This is true of an ant, a bee and a mosquito, the smallest of creatures. For He spread the wide heavens and laid the immense seas; and He created the tiny hollow shaft of the bee’s sting.”

Recalling our minuteness in God’s wide and wonderful creation only underlines our central role in God’s plan for the salvation of the whole world.

3. Touching and Sharing the Word of God -- The Communion of Saints and the Sacraments of Life

The Word of God persistently “moves outside of Himself in ecstasy” (Dionysius the Areopagite), passionately seeking to “dwell in us” (Jn 1.14), that the world may have life in abundance. (Jn 10.10) God’s compassionate mercy is poured and shared “so as to multiply the objects of His beneficence.” (Gregory the Theologian) God assumes all that is ours, “in every respect being tested as we are, yet without sin” (Heb. 4.15), in order to offer us all that is God’s and render us gods by grace. “Though rich, He becomes poor that we might become rich,” writes the great Apostle Paul (2 Cor. 8.9), to whom this year is so aptly dedicated. This is the Word of God; gratitude and glory are due to Him.

The word of God receives His full embodiment in creation, above all in the Sacrament of the Holy Eucharist. It is there that the Word becomes flesh and allows us not simply to hear or see Him but to touch Him with our own hands, as St. John declares (I John 1,1) and make Him part of our own body and blood (σύσσωμοι καί σύναιμοι) in the words of St. John Chrysostom.

In the Holy Eucharist the Word heard is at the same time seen and shared (κοινωνία). It is not accidental that in the early eucharistic documents, such as the book of Revelation and the Didache, the Eucharist was associated with prophesy, and the presiding bishops were regarded as successors of the prophets (e.g. Martyrion Polycarpi). The Eucharist was already by St. Paul (I Cor. 11) described us “proclamation” of Christ’s death and Second Coming. As the purpose of Scripture is essentially the proclamation of the Kingdom and the announcement of eschatological realities, the Eucharist is a foretaste of the Kindom, and in this sense the proclamation of the Word par excellence. In the Eucharist Word and Sacrament become one reality. The word ceases to be “words” and becomes a Person, embodying in Himself all human beings and all creation.

Within the life of the Church, the unfathomable self-emptying (κένωσις) and generous sharing (κοινωνία) of the divine Logos is reflected in the lives of the saints as the tangible experience and human expression of God’s Word in our community. In this way, the Word of God becomes the Body of Christ, crucified and glorified at the same time. As a result, the saint has an organic relationship with heaven and earth, with God and all of creation. In ascetic struggle, the saint reconciles the Word and the world. Through repentance and purification, the saint is filled -- as Abba Isaac the Syrian insists -- with compassion for all creatures, which is the ultimate humility and perfection.

This is why the saint loves with warmth and spaciousness that are both unconditional and irresistible. In the saints, we know God’s very Word, since -- as St. Gregory Palamas claims -- God and His saints share the same glory and splendor.” In the gentle presence of a saint, we learn how theology and action coincide. In the compassionate love of the saint, we experience God as “our father” and God’s mercy as “steadfastly enduring.” (Ps. 135, LXX) The saint is consumed with the fire of God’s love. This is why the saint imparts grace and cannot tolerate the slightest manipulation or exploitation in society or in nature. The saint simply does what is “proper and right” (Divine Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom), always dignifying humanity and honoring creation. “His words have the force of actions and his silence the power of speech” (St. Ignatius of Antioch).

And within the communion of saints, each of us is called to “become like fire” (Sayings of the Desert Fathers), to touch the world with the mystical force of God’s Word, so that -- as the extended Body of Christ -- the world, too, might say: “Someone touched me!” (cf. Mt 9.20) Evil is only eradicated by holiness, not by harshness. And holiness introduces into society a seed that heals and transforms. Imbued with the life of the sacraments and the purity of prayer, we are able to enter the innermost mystery of God’s Word. It is like the tectonic plates of the earth’s crust: the deepest layers need only shift a few millimeters to shatter the world’s surface. Yet for this spiritual revolution to occur, we must experience radical metanoia -- a conversion of attitudes, habits and practices -- for ways that we have misused or abused God’s Word, God’s gifts and God’s creation.

Such a conversion is, of course, impossible without divine grace; it is not achieved simply through greater effort or human willpower. “For mortals, it is impossible; but for God all things are possible.” (Mt 19.26) Spiritual change occurs when our bodies and souls are grafted onto the living Word of God, when our cells contain the life-giving blood-flow of the sacraments, when we are open to sharing all things with all people. As St. John Chrysostom reminds us, the sacrament of “our neighbor” cannot be isolated from the sacrament of “the altar.” Sadly, we have ignored the vocation and obligation to share. Social injustice and inequality, global poverty and war, ecological pollution and degradation result from our inability or unwillingness to share. If we claim to retain the sacrament of the altar, we cannot forgo or forget the sacrament of the neighbor -- a fundamental condition for realizing God’s Word in the world within the life and mission of the Church.

Beloved Brothers in Christ,

We have explored the patristic teaching of the spiritual senses, discerning the power of hearing and speaking God’s Word in Scripture, of seeing God’s Word in icons and nature, as well as of touching and sharing God’s Word in the saints and sacraments. Yet, in order to remain true to the life and mission of the Church, we must personally be changed by this Word. The Church must resemble the mother, who is both sustained by and nourishes through the food she eats. Anything that does not feed and nourish everyone cannot sustain us either. When the world does not share the joy of Christ’s Resurrection, this is an indictment of our own integrity and commitment to the living Word of God. Prior to the celebration of each Divine Liturgy, Orthodox Christians pray that this Word will be “broken and consumed, distributed and shared” in communion. And “we know that we have passed from death to life when we love our brothers” and sisters (1 Jn 3.14).

The challenge before us is the discernment of God’s Word in the face of evil, the transfiguration of every last detail and speck of this world in the light of Resurrection. The victory is already present in the depths of the Church, whenever we experience the grace of reconciliation and communion. As we struggle -- in ourselves and in our world -- to recognize the power of the Cross, we begin to appreciate how every act of justice, every spark of beauty, every word of truth can gradually wear away the crust of evil. However, beyond our own frail efforts, we have the assurance of the Spirit, who “helps us in our weakness” (Rom. 8.26) and stands beside us as advocate and “comforter” (Jn 14-6), penetrating all things and “transforming us -- as St. Symeon the New Theologian says -- into everything that the Word of God says about the heavenly kingdom: pearl, grain of mustard seed, leaven, water, fire, bread, life and mystical wedding chamber.” Such is the power and grace of the Holy Spirit, whom we invoke as we conclude our address, extending to Your Holiness our gratitude and to each of you our blessings:

Heavenly King, Comforter, Spirit of Truth
Present everywhere and filling all things;
Treasury of goodness and giver of life:
Come, and abide in us.

And cleanse us from every impurity;
And save our souls.

For you are good and love humankind.

Amen!

Friday, October 24, 2008

Holy Gospel according to Saint Luke (12:54-59)

He also said to the crowds, "When you see (a) cloud rising in the west you say immediately that it is going to rain--and so it does; and when you notice that the wind is blowing from the south you say that it is going to be hot--and so it is. You hypocrites! You know how to interpret the appearance of the earth and the sky; why do you not know how to interpret the present time? Why do you not judge for yourselves what is right? If you are to go with your opponent before a magistrate, make an effort to settle the matter on the way; otherwise your opponent will turn you over to the judge, and the judge hand you over to the constable, and the constable throw you into prison. I say to you, you will not be released until you have paid the last penny."

Thursday, October 23, 2008

Today's Gospel

Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint Luke (12,49-53)

I have come to set the earth on fire, and how I wish it were already blazing! There is a baptism with which I must be baptized, and how great is my anguish until it is accomplished! Do you think that I have come to establish peace on the earth? No, I tell you, but rather division. From now on a household of five will be divided, three against two and two against three; a father will be divided against his son and a son against his father, a mother against her daughter and a daughter against her mother, a mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law."

Wednesday, October 22, 2008

Voting Pro-Abortion Called Cooperating in Evil

Bishops Resolve Doubts for Faithful Citizens

DALLAS, Texas, OCT. 22, 2008 (Zenit.org).- Voting for a pro-abortion candidate when there is an alternative option is to cooperate in evil, and therefore morally impermissible, clarified two Texas bishops.

In a message made available to the faithful during this Respect Life month, bishops Kevin Farrell of Dallas and Kevin Vann of Fort Worth seek to "dispel any confusion or misunderstanding that may be present among you concerning the teaching contained in" the U.S. bishops document on faithful citizenship.

"'Forming Consciences for Faithful Citizenship' clearly teaches that not all issues have the same moral equivalence," the bishops explained. "Some issues involve 'intrinsic evils'; that is, they can never under any circumstance or condition be morally justified. Preeminent among these intrinsic evils are legalized abortion, the promotion of same-sex unions and 'marriages,' repression of religious liberty, as well as public policies permitting euthanasia, racial discrimination or destructive human embryonic stem cell research."

Thus, bishops Farrell and Vann stated, "we cannot make more clear the seriousness of the overriding issue of abortion -- while not the 'only issue'-- it is the defining moral issue, not only today, but of the last 35 years. […] This electoral cycle affords us an opportunity to promote the culture of life in our nation.

"As Catholics we are morally obligated to pray, to act and to vote to abolish the evil of abortion in America, limiting it as much as we can until it is finally abolished."

Not enough

The prelates acknowledged that there are a number of important issues voters must consider "such as immigration reform, health care, the economy and its solvency, care and concern for the poor, and the war on terror."

"As Catholics we must be concerned about these issues and work to see that just solutions are brought about," they wrote. "There are many possible solutions to these issues and there can be reasonable debate among Catholics on how to best approach and solve them. These are matters of 'prudential judgment.'"

"But," the prelates emphasized, "let us be clear: Issues of prudential judgment are not morally equivalent to issues involving intrinsic evils. No matter how right a given candidate is on any of these issues, it does not outweigh a candidate's unacceptable position in favor of an intrinsic evil such as abortion or the protection of 'abortion rights.'"

Salvation at stake

The Texas bishops, citing the U.S. episcopal conference document, addressed the question of if it is "permissible for a Catholic to vote for a candidate who supports an intrinsic evil -- even when the voter does not agree with the candidate's position on that evil."

They said there are only two conditions when voting for a pro-abortion candidate is permissible: "A. If both candidates running for office support abortion or 'abortion rights,' a Catholic would be forced to then look at the other important issues and through their vote try to limit the evil done; or,

"B. If another intrinsic evil outweighs the evil of abortion. While this is sound moral reasoning, there are no 'truly grave moral' or 'proportionate' reasons, singularly or combined, that could outweigh the millions of innocent human lives that are directly killed by legal abortion each year.

"To vote for a candidate who supports the intrinsic evil of abortion or 'abortion rights' when there is a morally acceptable alternative would be to cooperate in the evil -- and, therefore, morally impermissible."

The bishops concluded affirming that the decisions made on such political and moral issues "may affect each individual's salvation."

"As Catholics, we must treat our political choices with appropriate moral gravity," they wrote, "and in doing so, realize our continuing and unavoidable obligation to be a voice for the voiceless unborn, whose destruction by legal abortion is the preeminent intrinsic evil of our day."

On Paul's Christology


"The Radical Humility of Christ Is the Expression of Divine Love"

VATICAN CITY, OCT. 22, 2008 (Zenit.org).- Here is a translation of the address Benedict XVI delivered during today's general audience in St. Peter's Square.

The Holy Father continued today the cycle of catecheses dedicated to the figure and thought of St. Paul.

* * *

Dear brothers and sisters:

In the catecheses from previous weeks, we have meditated on the "conversion" of St. Paul, fruit of a personal encounter with the crucified and risen Christ, and we have asked ourselves about the reaction of the Apostle to the Gentiles to the earthly Jesus. Today I would like to speak of the teaching St. Paul left us about the centrality of the risen Christ in the mystery of salvation, about his Christology.

In reality, the risen Jesus Christ, "exalted above every name," is at the center of all his reflections. Christ is for the Apostle the standard to evaluate events and things, the purpose of every effort that he makes to announce the Gospel, the great passion that sustains his steps along the paths of the world. And he is a living Christ, concrete: The Christ, Paul says, "who loved me and gave himself up for me" (Galatians 2:20). This person who loves me, with whom I can speak, who listens and responds to me, this is really the principle for understanding the world and for finding the way in history.

Anyone who has read the writings of St. Paul knows well that he does not concern himself with narrating the events that made up the life of Christ, even though we can imagine that in his catecheses, he recounted much more about the pre-Easter Jesus than what he wrote in his letters, which are admonitions for concrete situations. His pastoral and theological work was so directed toward the edification of the nascent communities, that it was natural for him to concentrate everything on the announcement of Jesus Christ as "Lord," alive today and present among his own.

Here we see the essentiality that is characteristic of Pauline Christology, which develops the depths of the mystery with a constant and precise concern: To announce, with certainty, Jesus and his teaching, but to announce above all the central reality of his death and resurrection as the culmination of his earthly existence and the root of the successive development of the whole Christian faith, of the whole reality of the Church.

For the Apostle, the Resurrection is not an event in itself that is separated from the Death. The risen One is the same One who was crucified. The risen One also had his wounds: The Passion is present in him and it can be said with Pascal that he is suffering until the end of the world, though being the risen One and living with us and for us. Paul had understood on the road to Damascus this identification of the risen One with Christ crucified: In that moment, it was revealed with clarity that the Crucified is the risen One and the risen One is the Crucified, who says to Paul, "Why do you persecute me?" (Acts 9:4). Paul was persecuting Christ in the Church and then understood that the cross is "a curse of God" (Deuteronomy 21:23), but a sacrifice for our redemption.

The Apostle contemplates with fascination the hidden secret of the crucified-risen One, and through the sufferings endured by Christ in his humanity (earthly dimension) arrives to this eternal existence in which he is one with the Father (pre-temporal dimension): "But when the fullness of time had come," he writes, "God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under the law, to ransom those under the law, so that we might receive adoption" (Galatians 4:4-5).

These two dimensions -- the eternal pre-existence with the Father and the descent of the Lord in the incarnation -- are already announced in the Old Testament, in the figure of Wisdom. We find in the wisdom literature of the Old Testament certain texts that exalt the role of Wisdom pre-existent to the creation of the world. In this sense, you can see passages such as Psalm 90: "Before the mountains were born, the earth and the world brought forth, from eternity to eternity you are God" (verse 2). Or passages such as those that speak of creating Wisdom: "The Lord begot me, the firstborn of his ways, the forerunner of his prodigies of long ago; From of old I was poured forth, at the first, before the earth" (Proverbs 8:22-23). Indicative as well is the praise of Wisdom, contained in the book by that name: "Indeed, she reaches from end to end mightily and governs all things well" (Wisdom 8:1).

The same wisdom texts that speak of the eternal pre-existence of Wisdom also speak of its descent, of the abasement of this Wisdom, which has made for itself a tent among men. Thus we can already feel resonate the words from the Gospel of John that speak of the tent of the flesh of the Lord. A tent was created in the Old Testament: Here is indicated the temple, worship according to the "Torah"; but from the point of view of the New Testament, we can understand that this was only a pre-figuration of the much more real and significant tent: the tent of the flesh of Christ.

And we already see in the books of the Old Testament that this abasement of Wisdom, its descent into flesh, also implies the possibility of being rejected. St. Paul, developing his Christology, refers precisely to this wisdom perspective: He recognizes in Jesus the eternal Wisdom existing from all time, the Wisdom that descends and creates a tent among us, and thus he can describe Christ as "the power of God and the wisdom of God." He can say that Christ has become for us "wisdom from God, as well as righteousness, sanctification, and redemption" (1 Corinthians 1:24, 30). In the same way, Paul clarifies that Christ, like Wisdom, can be rejected above all by the rulers of this age (cf. 1 Corinthians 2:6-9), such that in the plans of God a paradoxical situation is created: the cross, which will become the path of salvation for the whole human race.

A later development to this wisdom cycle, which sees Wisdom abase itself so as to be later exalted despite rejection, is found in the famous hymn in the Letter to the Philippians (cf. 2:6-11). This involves one of the most elevated texts of the New Testament. Exegetes mainly concur in considering that this pericope was composed prior to the text of the Letter to the Philippians. This is an important piece of information, because it means that Judeo-Christianity, before St. Paul, believed in the divinity of Jesus. In other words, faith in the divinity of Christ is not a Hellenistic invention, arising after the earthly life of Christ, an invention that, forgetting his humanity, had divinized him. We see in reality that the early Judeo-Christianity believed in the divinity of Jesus. Moreover, we can say that the apostles themselves, in the great moments of the life of the Master, had understood that he was the Son of God, as St. Peter says at Caesarea Philippi: "You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God" (Matthew 16:16).

But let us return to the hymn from the Letter to the Philippians. The structure of this text can be articulated in three stanzas, which illustrate the principle moments of the journey undertaken by Christ. His pre-existence is expressed with the words: "though he was in the form of God, [he] did not regard equality with God something to be grasped" (verse 6). Afterward follows the voluntary abasement of the Son in the second stanza: "he emptied himself, taking the form of a slave" (verse 7) "he humbled himself, becoming obedient to death, even death on a cross" (verse 8). The third stanza of the hymn announces the response of the Father to the humiliation of the Son: "Because of this, God greatly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name" (verse 9).

What is impressive is the contrast between the radical abasement and the resulting glorification in the glory of God. It is evident that this second stanza contrasts with the pretension of Adam, who wanted to make himself God, and it contrasts as well with the actions of the builders of the Tower of Babel, who wanted to construct for themselves a bridge to heaven and make themselves divine. But this initiative of pride ended with self-destruction: In this way, one doesn't arrive to heaven, to true happiness, to God. The gesture of the Son of God is exactly the contrary: not pride, but humility, which is the fulfillment of love, and love is divine. The initiative of abasement, of the radical humility of Christ, which contrasts with human pride, is really the expression of divine love; from it follows this elevation to heaven to which God attracts us with his love.

Besides the Letter to the Philippians, there are other places in Pauline literature where the themes of the pre-existence and the descent of the Son of God to earth are united. A reaffirmation of the assimilation between Wisdom and Christ, with all its cosmic and anthropological consequences, is found in the First Letter to Timothy: "[He] was manifested in the flesh, vindicated in the spirit, seen by angels, proclaimed to the Gentiles, believed in throughout the world, taken up in glory" (3:16). It is above all based on these premises that the function of Christ as mediator could be better defined, within the framework of the only God of the Old Testament (cf. 1 Timothy 2:5 in relation to Isaiah 43:10-11; 44:6). Christ is the true bridge who leads us to heaven, to communion with God.

And finally, just a point regarding the last developments of the Christology of St. Paul in the Letters to the Colossians and the Ephesians. In the first, Christ is designated as the "firstborn of all creation" (1:15-20). This word "firstborn" implies that the first among many children, the first among many brothers and sisters, has lowered to draw us and make us brothers and sisters. In the Letter to the Ephesians, we find the beautiful exposition of the divine plan of salvation, when Paul says that in Christ, God wanted to recapitulate all things (cf. Ephesians 1:23). Christ is the recapitulation of everything, he takes up everything and guides us to God. And thus is implied a movement of descent and ascent, inviting us to participate in his humility, that is, in his love for neighbor, so as to thus be participants in his glorification, making ourselves with him into sons in the Son. Let us pray that the Lord helps us to conform ourselves to is humility, to his love, to thus be participants in his divinization.

[Translation by ZENIT]

Cardinal Newman: Doctor of the Church?


Father Ian Ker on the Priest’s Cause, Teachings

BURFORD, England, OCT. 22, 2008 (Zenit.org).- Did Cardinal John Henry Newman pick up where St. Bernard left off?

Father Ian Ker thinks so; he claims that reading Cardinal Newman is like reading the great Church Fathers.

The expert on Cardinal Newman and professor of theology at Oxford University shared with ZENIT how the venerable Oratorian was a pioneer in the renewal of theology, anticipated the Second Vatican Council and was a writer of great faith.

Q: Why has the momentum suddenly increased for Cardinal Newman’s cause for canonization during Benedict XVI’s pontificate? What is the Holy Father’s interest in Cardinal Newman?

Father Ker: Although Newman worked as an ordinary parish priest among the very poor in inner city Birmingham when he began the Oratory there, and later in the more salubrious suburb of Edgbaston where the Oratory was finally established and where he continued to carry out ordinary parish duties, his main work lay in his intellectual apostolate and writings.

So, although known locally to be a holy man, there was never the kind of popular cult that a less intellectual figure -- working, for example, among the poor or the sick or on the foreign missions -- would have inspired.

The momentum for his canonization in fact began some years before the present pontificate. Previously, the people interested in Newman were mainly scholars and theologians, the kind of people who are not necessarily particularly committed to intercessory prayer.

But once the cause was fully launched -- and there had been long delays -- it was possible to undertake a formal examination of his life and writings and conclude that he was indeed a man of heroic sanctity and worthy of being raised to the altars of the Church.

With this verdict the Holy See concurred and in 1991 Pope John Paul II declared Newman to be “Venerable,”’ the first step toward canonization. That development has led more and more people to ask Newman for his intercession and -- assuming Newman is a saint -- was bound sooner or later to lead to a miracle.

Benedict XVI became interested in Newman while at the seminary through the interest of one of his teachers. And, of course, he would have been aware as a theologian that Newman was a great pioneer in the renewal of theology.

Q: Cardinal Newman was certainly a great theologian and Church historian, but what is it about his writings that make him worthy of being elevated to the status of doctor of the Church?

Father Ker: Newman is more than simply a very learned and clever thinker. Indeed, it has been said that he took over where St Bernard left off.

Anyone reading his writings cannot but be aware that reading Newman is like reading the great Church Fathers. In his writings we encounter a writer of profound faith.

Q: Why is Cardinal Newman known as the "father of the Second Vatican Council?"

Father Ker: In the 1830s in Oxford, Newman and his fellow Tractarians launched a forerunner of the movement of “ressourcement,” [which arose] in France a hundred years later.

It was this return to the scriptural and patristic sources that made possible the theology of Vatican II.

Newman most clearly anticipated the Council in his theory of doctrinal development and his personalist understanding of revelation (Constitution on Divine Revelation), his stress on the role of the laity and more fundamentally his understanding of the Church as communion (Constitution on the Church), his sense of the need for the Church to engage with the modern world and to abandon the siege mentality (Constitution on the Modern World), and his cautious support for ecumenism in its early days (Decree on Ecumenism).

Q: Many traditionalists are skeptical of Cardinal Newman and believe he is a stalking horse for modernism because of his ideas regarding the “development of doctrine” and his statements regarding the role of conscience. In his day he was deemed a liberal, but Russell Kirk featured him in a book titled “The Conservative Mind.” Why is Cardinal Newman so controversial and misunderstood?

Father Ker: Cardinal Newman is most obviously misunderstood because of the common misinterpretation of his account of the relation of conscience to Church authority. Newman never envisaged so-called conscientious dissent from Church teachings.

What he did envisage was the possibility of a person conscientiously resisting an order from higher authority. His theory of development is no longer controversial but is part of mainstream theology and indeed is actually echoed in Vatican II’s Constitution on Divine Revelation.

In his own day, Newman was indeed a radical in his thinking because he was ahead of his times as I mentioned earlier in this interview. But he was never a liberal in the sense in which we use the word today, but was always deeply loyal to the tradition and the teachings of the Church.

Q: Cardinal Newman famously said that to be steeped in history is to cease to be Protestant, yet he was not known to be triumphalistic. What counsel might he give to Anglicans today, as well as to Catholics participating in ecumenical conversations with Anglicans?

Father Ker: By the end of his life Newman came to believe that Anglicans were “giving up everything.” That process is now considerably advanced, and my view is that Newman would not regard as Christian in any meaningful sense large swathes of Western Anglicanism.

But long before that he was clear that any kind of corporate reunion with a body as disparate and divided as Anglicanism was totally impossible.

I believe that today he would warmly support any efforts to help disaffected high Anglicans enter the Catholic Church -- the idea that they should stay and try and leaven the lump he would regard as completely fanciful and unrealistic.

I think he would encourage dialogue with Evangelicals generally, not only in Anglicanism, and would not be surprised by the many conversions that have taken place since the reforms of Vatican II.

Q: What does Cardinal Newman’s decision to join the Oratory of St. Philip Neri tell us about his spiritual and devotional life? Why not the Jesuits or Dominicans, both of whom had strong reputations for fostering theological scholarship?

Father Ker: Newman joined the Oratory of St Philip Neri partly in order to remain with his former Anglican community at Littlemore; partly because he did not find himself particularly attracted to any of the orders; partly because being already middle-aged he did not wish to begin again as it were, but rather to pursue continuity of his life as a secular priest living in community; and partly because his life at Oxford had always combined pastoral with academic work, a combination that he saw as typical of the Oratory.

Address of Orthodox Representative at Synod

"Our Society Demands of Us Christians a Unified Voice"

VATICAN CITY, OCT. 12, 2008 (Zenit.org).- Here is a translation of the address given Saturday to the synod of bishops by Archimandrite Ignatios Sotiriadis, fraternal delegate from the Orthodox Church of Greece.
* * *

The Orthodox Church of Greece, Church of apostolic origin, fruit of the preaching of the Apostle of the Gentiles in Europe, and daughter of the Mother Church of Constantinople, cordially greets the synod of Catholic bishops on the Word of God and wishes it every success in its deliberations.

Your Holiness,

Into the profound darkness and desperation of the philosophical thought of the ancient world, the "Unknown God" sent humanity his only-begotten Son, who "by the power of the Holy Spirit became incarnate in the womb of the Virgin Mary and became man ... for our salvation." From that moment history was divided into before Christ and after Christ, the world changed and it was transformed into Church[.] [The] "Magistra" in the path of the Church, sacred Scripture, the Word of God, enlivens in "omni tempore," genuinely interprets according to Sacred Tradition, every faithful and leads him to the Eucharist, that is to say the personal union with God the Logos.

However, the history of Christianity is full of crimes, sins and errors; the problem of the authentic interpretation of the Word of God always presents itself. The pious intention of leading the people of God to the promised kingdom is not enough! There is a need for the "metanoia" and the "metamorphosis" of our weak hearts.

The Church lives from the font of life that is sacred Scripture. It teaches a secularized Europe and a de-christianized world love for the Creation, which is being threatened, forgiveness and reconciliation for those who begin a new life, respect for every human person made in the image of God, and, further, peace, justice, equality between man and woman, Jew or Greek...

Your Holiness,

Our society is tired and sick! It seeks but does not find! It drinks but its thirst is not quenched! Our society demands of us Christians -- Catholics, Orthodox, Protestants, Anglicans -- a common witness, a unified voice! Here lies our responsibility as pastors of the Churches in the 21st Century! Here is the primary mission of the First Bishop of Christianity, of him who presides in charity, and, above all, of a Pope who is Magister Theologiae: to be the visible and paternal sign of unity and to lead under the guidance of the Holy Spirit and according to Sacred Tradition, with wisdom, humility and dynamism, together with all the bishops of the world, fellow successors of the apostles, all humanity to Christ the Redeemer!

This is the profound desire of those who have the painful longing in their heart for the undivided Church, "Una, Sancta, Catholica et Apostolica!" But it is also the desire of those who, again today, in a world without Christ, fervently, but also with filial trust and faith, repeat the words of the apostles: "Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life!"

[Translation by Joseph G. Trabbic]

BXVI homily on Pius XII

Pope's Homily on Pius XII

"Sanctity Was His Ideal"

VATICAN CITY, OCT. 9, 2008 (Zenit.org).- Here is a translation of the homily given by Benedict XVI at a Mass said in St. Peter's today in memory of the death of Pius XII on the 50th anniversary of his death.

* * *

Cardinals,
Venerable Brothers in the Episcopate and Priesthood,
Dear Brothers and Sisters!

The passage from the Book of Syracide and the prologue from the First Letter of Saint Peter, proclaimed as the first and second reading, offer significant points for reflection in this Eucharistic celebration, during which we remember my venerable predecessor, the Servant of God Pius XII. Exactly fifty years have passed since the time of his death, which occurred in the first hours of October 9 1958. The Syracide, as we heard, reminded those who wish to follow the Lord that they must prepare themselves to face new trials, difficulties and suffering. To not be overcome by these -- he admonishes -- one needs a righteous and constant heart, faithfulness to God and patience united to an inflexible determination in continuing on the path of good. Suffering sharpens the heart of the Lord's disciple, just as gold is purified in the furnace. The sacred author writes: "Whatever happens to you, accept it, and in the uncertainties of your humble state, be patient, since gold is tested in the fire, and the chosen in the furnace of humiliation" (2:4).

On his part, Saint Peter in the pericope that was proposed to us, turning to the Christians of the communities of Asia Minor who "bear all sorts of trials", goes beyond this: he asks them to feel, despite all this, "great joy" (1 Pet 1:6). Proof is in fact necessary, he observes, "so that the worth of your faith, more valuable than gold, which is perishable even if it has been tested by fire, may be proved -- to your praise and honour when Jesus Christ is revealed" (1 Pet 1:7). And then, for the second time, he exhorts them to be joyous, rather exult "with a joy so glorious that it cannot be described" (see 1:8). The profound reason of this spiritual joy is the love for Jesus and the certainty of His invisible presence. He makes the believers' faith and hope unshakeable, even when faced with the most complicated and harsh events of existence.

In the light of these Biblical texts we can read about the earthly life of Pope Pacelli and his lengthy service to the Church, which began in 1901 under Leo XIII and continued with Saint Pius X, Benedict XV and Pius XI. These Biblical texts help us, above all, to understand which was the source he drew from for his courage and patience in his pontifical ministry, during the troubled years of World War II and the following ones, no less complex, of reconstruction and difficult international relationship of history called "the Cold War."

"Miserere mei Deus, secundum magnam misericordiam tuam": with this invocation from Psalm 50(51), Pius XII began his testament. And he continued: "These words, conscious of being unworthy and unequal, which I pronounced the moment I gave, trembling, my acceptance of the election as Supreme Pontiff, with greater conviction I repeat now." This was two years before his death. To abandon oneself in the hands of the merciful God: This was the attitude my venerable Predecessor constantly cultivated, the last of the Popes born in Rome and belonging to a family tied to the Holy See for many years.

In Germany, where he was the Apostolic Nuncio, first in Munich of Bavaria and then in Berlin until 1929, he left behind grateful memories, especially for having collaborated with Benedict XV in the attempt to stop the "useless slaughter" of the Great War, and for having realized from the beginning the danger of the monstrous Nazi-Socialist ideology with its pernicious anti-Semitic and anti-Catholic root. He was created a Cardinal in December 1929, and shortly after became the Secretary of State. For nine years he was a faithful collaborator of Pius XI, in a time marked by totalitarianism: Fascist, Nazi and Soviet Communism, all condemned by the encyclicals "Non Abbiamo Bisogno," "Mit Brennenbder Sorge" and "Divini Redemptoris."

"Whoever listens to my words, and believes in the one who sent me, has eternal life" (Jn 5:24). This assurance made by Jesus, which we have heard in the Gospel, makes us think back to the hardest moments of the Pontificate of Pius XII when, realizing the loss of any human security, he felt the need, even through constant ascetic effort, to belong to Christ, the only certainty that never sets. The Word of God thus becomes the light of his path, a path in which Pope Pacelli had to comfort the homeless and persecuted persons, dry the tears of suffering and the crying of so many victims of the war. Only Christ is the true hope of man; only entrusting the human heart to Him can it open up to love that overcomes hate. This knowledge followed Pius XII in his ministry as the Successor of Peter, a ministry that began when the menacing clouds of a new world conflict grew over Europe and the rest of the world, which he tried to avoid in all ways: He called out in his message on the radio on August 24 1939: The danger is imminent, but there is still time. Nothing is lost with peace. Everything can be lost with war" (AAS, XXXI, 1939, p. 334).

The war highlighted the love he felt for his "beloved Rome," a love demonstrated by the intense charitable work he undertook in defense of the persecuted, without any distinction of religion, ethnicity, nationality or political leanings. When, once the city was occupied, he was repeatedly advised to leave the Vatican to safeguard himself, his answer was always the same and decisive: "I will not leave Rome and my place, even at the cost of my life" (cf Summarium, p. 186). His relatives and other witnesses refer furthermore to privations regarding food, heating, clothes and comfort, to which he subjected himself voluntarily in order to share in the extremely trying conditions suffered by the people due to the bombardments and consequences of war (cf A. Tornielli, "Pio XII, Un uomo sul trono di Pietro"). And how can we forget his Christmas radio message of December 1942? In a voice breaking with emotion he deplored the situation of "the hundreds of thousands of persons who, without any fault on their part, sometimes only because of their nationality or race, have been consigned to death or to a slow decline" (AAS, XXXV, 1943, p. 23), a clear reference to the deportation and extermination of the Jews. He often acted secretly and silently because, in the light of the concrete realities of that complex historical moment, he saw that this was the only way to avoid the worst and save the largest possible number of Jews. His interventions, at the end of the war and at the time of his death, received numerous and unanimous expressions of gratitude from the highest authorities of the Jewish world, such as, for example, the Israeli Foreign Minister Golda Meir, who wrote: "During the ten years of Nazi terror, when our people went through the horrors of martyrdom, the Pope raised his voice to condemn the persecutors and commiserate with their victims"; ending emotionally: "We mourn a great servant of peace."

Unfortunately, the historical debate on the figure of the Servant of God Pius XII, which has not always been the calmest, has prevented us shining a light on all the aspects of his multifaceted Pontificate. There was a great multitude of speeches, addresses and messages delivered to scientists, doctors, and representatives of the most varied categories of workers, some of which even today still possess an extraordinary relevance and continue to be a concrete point of reference. Paul VI, who was his faithful collaborator for many years, described him as an erudite man, an attentive scholar, open to modern means of research and culture, with an ever-strong and coherent fidelity both to the principles of human reasoning, as well as to the intangible depository of the truth of faith. He considered him a precursor of Vatican Council II (cf Angelus of 10 March, 1974). From this point of view, many of his writings deserve to be remembered, but I will limit myself to quoting from only a few. With the Encyclical "Mystici Corporis," published on 29 June 1943, while war still raged, he described the spiritual and visible relationships that unite men to the Word Incarnate, and he proposed integrating into this point of view all the principle themes of ecclesiology, offering for the first time a dogmatic and theological synthesis that would provide the basis for the Conciliar Dogmatic Constitution "Lumen Gentium."

A few months later, on 20 September 1943, with the Encyclical "Divino Afflante Spiritu" he laid down the doctrinal norms for the study of Sacred Scripture, highlighting its importance and role in Christian life. This is a document that bears witness to a great opening to scientific research on the Biblical texts. How can we not remember this Encyclical, during the course of the work of this Synod that has as its own theme "The Word of God in the Life and the Mission of the Church"? It is to the prophetic intuition of Pius XII that we owe the launch of a serious study of the characteristics of ancient historiography, in order to better understand the nature of the sacred books, without weakening or negating their historical value. The deeper study of the "literary genres," whose intention is to better understand what the sacred author meant, was viewed with a certain suspicion prior to 1943, in part thanks to the abuse that had been made of it.

The Encyclical recognized that it could be applied correctly, declaring its use legitimate not only for the study of the Old Testament, but also the New. "In the present day indeed this art -- explained the Pope -- which is called textual criticism and which is used with great and praiseworthy results in the editions of profane writings, is also quite rightly employed in the case of the Sacred Books, because of that very reverence which is due to the Divine Oracles." And he added: "For its very purpose is to insure that the sacred text be restored, as perfectly as possible, be purified from the corruptions due to the carelessness of the copyists and be freed, as far as may be done, from glosses and omissions, from the interchange and repetition of words and from all other kinds of mistakes, which are wont to make their way gradually into writings handed down through many centuries" (AAS, XXXV, 1943, p 336).

The third Encyclical I would like to mention is the "Mediator Dei," dedicated to the liturgy, published 20 November 1947. With this document, the Servant of God provided an impulse to the liturgical movement, insisting that "the chief element of divine worship must be interior. For -- he writes -- we must always live in Christ and give ourselves to Him completely, so that in Him, with Him and through Him the heavenly Father may be duly glorified. The sacred liturgy requires, however, that both of these elements be intimately linked with each another. ... Otherwise religion clearly amounts to mere formalism, without meaning and without content."

We cannot do other then than acknowledge the notable impulse this Pontiff gave to the Church's missionary activity with the Encyclicals "Evangelii Praecones" (1951) and "Fidei Donum" (1957), that highlighted the duty of every community to announce the Gospel to the peoples, as Vatican II would go on to do with courageous strength. Pope Pacelli had already shown this love for the missions from the outset of his Pontificate when in October 1939 he had wanted to consecrate personally twelve bishops from mission countries, including an Indian, a Chinese and a Japanese, the first African bishop and the first bishop of Madagascar. One of his constant pastoral concerns, finally, was the promotion of the role of lay people so that the ecclesial community could make use of all its possible energy and resources. For this too the Church and the world are grateful to him.

Dear brothers and sisters, while we pray that the cause of beatification of the Servant of God Pius XII may continue smoothly, it is good to remember that sanctity was his ideal, an ideal he never failed to propose to everyone. This is why he promoted the causes of beatification and canonization for persons from different peoples, representatives of all states of life, roles and professions, and granted substantial space to women. And it was Mary, the Woman of salvation, whom he offered to humanity as a sign of certain hope, proclaiming the dogma of the Assumption, during the Holy Year of 1950. In this world of ours, which, like then, is assailed by worries and anguish about its future; in this world where, perhaps more than then, the distancing of many from truth and virtue allows us to glimpse scenarios without hope, Pius XII invites us to look to Mary assumed into the glory of Heaven. He invites us to invoke her faithfully, so that she will allow us to appreciate ever more the value of life on earth and help us to look to the true aim that is the destiny of all of us: that eternal life that, as Jesus assures us, already belongs to those who hear and follow his word. Amen!