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Peace!
Welcome to Volume 3 Number 5 of The Contemporary Catholic.
The seasons change yet we do not perceive ourselves as changing too. If nothing else we grow older and learning from our mistakes and recognizing that it is from these painful experiences we can grow wiser too. Among the things we learn is that we do not struggle not alone and that there are certain guideposts along the way. It is when we choose to ignore these pointers that we loose our way and harm our relationships.
In this issue we explore some of these sign posts and reflect on what we are given to sustain us in our life's journey. Thank you for allowing me to share a few thoughts with you in the hope that our journey together might bring us safely to the end.
May the peace of Christ, the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with us all!
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God's 10 Promises...
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When
God gives these commandments, God makes promises to us. God says:
I
promise to be your God... you shall have no other gods before me.
I
promise to be there for you... you shall not idolize people, wealth or things that take you away from me.
I
promise you a good name... you shall not make wrongful use of the name of
the Lord your God.
I
promise you I will be God and provide you rest... you shall remember the
Sabbath day, and keep it holy.
I
promise you stability... you shall honor your father and your mother.
I
promise you life... you shall not murder.
I
promise you my faithfulness... you shall not commit adultery.
I
promise you my generosity... you shall not steal.
I
promise you truth... you shall not bear false witness against your
neighbor.
I
promise you what you need... you shall not covet.
Rather than a list of "do not's" The
Ten Commandments are really a list of great promises of love that God has for us.
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Did God create evil?
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We are often uncomfortable when people of faith talk about evil in the world. Click here for a reflection on this by one of the more interesting individuals of the 20th century. You'll have to get to the end to find out who.
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Something we all do...
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but nothing we are willing to admit.
After my last e-newsletter I received an email from a friend
of long standing who raised a question about a certain three letter word and
asked me to respond to him. I'm afraid
my response was less than adequate but that's what happens when you try to
cover difficult topics in emails. It
would be virtually impossible to even conceive responding with a twitter (140
characters for neophytes). It is an
issue with which man has struggled for Millennia. Simply put, it is the question of sin.
Sin is essentially a self imposed estrangement from God,
those around us and from all God's creation. We only have to look around us to see the end result of sin yet more difficult to see sin in our own lives. In Moral Theology class we were taught that mankind was basically good with a tendency to do evil. Looking into my own life I can understand that while I want to do good my ego often gets in the way. This can be caused by fear of losing myself, my safety, my livelihood, my future -- whatever, it causes me to set limits and build walls around me.
The most profound story of this was written more than a century ago by Charles Dickens. "A Christmas Carol" is a great example of how love withheld can warp and nearly destroy lives. Scrooge, reacting to the lack of love shown by his parents started off on the road to self centeredness.
To protect himself from hurt he began to build walls around himself that shut out the love that others wished to share with him. His nephew and Tiny Tim are good examples of how God tries to break through our walls offering unconditional love. It takes a series of life changing events to turn Scrooge around so that he can joyfully respond to the love all around him.
The Erosion Caused by Sin
Most of us do not go out of our way to intentionally commit sin. Rather, it becomes a matter of our life style that begins an alienation process from God and one another that in itself is sinful. An unfortunate example is that of an 88 year old man who became so obsessed with hatred that he went to the Holocaust Museum with the intention of killing people. A young guard acting in charity to open the door for this elderly man was the victim of the man's hatred and became a victim of this hatred. While the action of this man was a sin in itself it was really a result of the erosion that sin caused in his life. You can compare it to the insidious damage caused over time by water seeping into the earthen levees holding back the river. This small trickle will over time undermine the entire levee so that it will give way under the pressure of the river.
We too can easily fall victim to the erosion of sin in our lives. It can happen when we want to protect ourselves from embarrassment
or to appear more than who we are. We "enhance" the truth on our resumes or find a scapegoat for our own failures. It is rather easy to do can become a habit leading to more serious failings. "Creative" accounting and an attitude that "we deserve" things because we worked particularly hard or took large risks seem to have resulted in a collapse of the world's economic system.
Sin, however, is not just confined to those actions we take that alienate us from God and one another. It is also allowing evil to happen by not doing the loving thing. Averting our eyes from the hungry man or woman huddled at the park bench or near the train station is equally sinful. The answer to the question. "Am I my brother's keeper?" is a resounding YES! Because we are unconditionally loved and love seeks a resounding response, like an echo, bringing to the author of love that love shared with another.
Personification of Evil
There is little doubt that evil exists in the world, the 20th century graphically demonstrated this. Genocide does not only happen in far away death camps or killing fields. In our own midst our city streets and our prisons have also become places where evil can fester and infect others in the community. We can become frightened and indifferent to those things which cause such evil to grow.
"Be sober, be watchful, the evil one, like a roaring lion goes about seeking someone to devour. Resist him steadfast in the faith." This reminder from St Paul in his letter to Timothy is not as much about gang warfare but our tendency to yield to popular culture and accept what evil holds out to us.
The evil one, Satan, the devil, Beelzebub, Old Nick or whatever appellation you choose is not just some myth to frighten children or the gullible. God's gift of a loving creation includes the gift of free will, a choice as to whether to accept this love and respond or to ignore it. While you may not be able to see the evil one you can and do experience his negative power in the world.
Evil
feeds on complacency and resignation, it builds walls that keep out
love while professing safety. Walls built on fear and distrust which
turns to hatred thus enabling sin in the world and to enter our lives.
We then become caught in a vicious circle. We know evil exists and are
drawn to it like a moth to a flame. In fact there is little we can do
to prevent it alone. We need each other and we need God who like a
loving parent draws us close and leads us safely home.
It is when we align our will with God's will, rather than trying to bend God's will to ours, that we are saved from the flames of egocentricity. So, the next time you say the Lord's Prayer try to make it not just a set of words but a life changing experience. That's something we should all do.
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Let us pray...
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Let us remember all who died this month, those who are suffering and who are in special need. I invite you to pray with me as together we say Our Father...
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A Feast for Us
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June is a month of special feasts, including that of the Body and Blood of Christ formerly known as Corpus Christi. It was created at a time when people lost the belief of the Eucharist as being Christ present among them. During the reformation this belief was challenged and became for many at best a symbolic action. During the early 1930's a movement within the Catholic community began to again look at our Sunday liturgy and recapture the importance of Christ in the Eucharist. The end result was the revision of the Mass as we know it today, hearkening back to an earlier liturgical style yet making it more accessible to 20th century people.
There is a danger, however, that we can get caught up in the rules or go off on making it a multimedia event. Both have their place in making the Eucharistic liturgy meet our needs yet we should always focus on what it is that makes it special. Perhaps the story of Babette's Feast is a good metaphor to help us understand what Eucharist means.
The story concerns two sisters, Martina (named for Martin Luther) and Philippa (named for Luther's friend and biographer Philip Melanchthon) who live in a small village on the remote western coast of Jutland in the 19th century. They are the daughters of the now deceased pastor who founded his own strict Christian
sect. The sect draws
no new converts and the aging sisters preside lovingly over their
dwindling flock of white-haired believers.
Each in their youth was a ravishing beauty courted by an impassioned suitor who fell desperately in love, developing grand plans
both for themselves and their "angels." Each daughter eventually deflects her pursuer,
choosing, instead, a life of quiet piety and Puritanical simplicity following in
their father's footsteps. Their father was of the
belief that marriage and happiness as such is a falsehood.
Many years later Babette Hersant appears at their door. She bears a letter from Philippa's former
suitor, explaining that she is a refugee from revolutionary bloodshed
in Paris, and recommending her as a housekeeper. The sisters take
Babette in, and she spends fourteen years as their cook, a modest but
benign figure who gradually eases their lives and the lives of many in
the remote village. Her only link to her former life is a lottery
ticket that a friend in Paris renews for her every year.
One day, she
wins the lottery of 10,000 francs. Rather than return to her former home she instead
decides to use the money to prepare a delicious dinner for the sisters
and their small congregation on the occasion of the founding pastor's
hundredth birthday. More than just an Epicurean delight, the feast is
an outpouring of Babette's appreciation, an act of self-sacrifice with
eucharistic echoes; though she doesn't tell anyone, Babette is spending
her entire winnings on her gesture of gratitude.
The sisters agree to accept Babette's meal, and her offer to pay for
the creation of a "real French dinner". She leaves the island for a few
days in order to return to Paris where she personally arranges for
supplies to be sent to Jutland. The ingredients are plentiful,
sumptuous and exotic, and their arrival causes much discussion amongst
the group. As the various never-before-seen ingredients arrive, and
preparations commence, the sisters begin to worry that the meal will
be, at best, a great sin of sensual luxury, and at worst some form of
devilry or witchcraft. In a hasty conference, the sisters and the
congregation agree to eat the meal, but to forego any pleasure in it,
and to make no mention of the food during the entire dinner.
The last and most relevant part of the story is the preparation and the serving of an extraordinary banquet
of royal dimensions, lavishly deployed in the unpainted austerity of
the sisters' rustic home.
Although the other celebrants
do their best to reject the earthly pleasures of the food and drink,
Babette's extraordinary gifts as a Chef de Cuisine and a true connoisseur breaks their distrust and superstitions,
elevating them not only physically but spiritually. Old wrongs are
forgotten, ancient loves are rekindled, and a mystical redemption of
the human spirit settles over the table - thanks to the general elation
nurtured by the consumption of so many fine culinary delicacies and
spirits. The Eucharistic celebration around the table portends the grace God has been allotted to them. For them and us it is an ever present hope for the coming of the kingdom we proclaim.
The menu is a true feast with caviar, turtle soup, quail in stuffed pastry shells, a delightful salad and Blue Cheese, papaya, figs, grapes and pineapple.
The grand finale dessert is a rum sponge cake with figs and glacéed fruits). Numerous rare
wines
along with various champagnes and spirits, complete the menu. Babette's
purchase of the finest china, flatware, crystal and linens with which
to set the table ensures that the luxurious food and drink is served in
a style worthy of the famous former Chef of "Café Angalis." Babette's
previous occupation has been unknown to the sisters until she confides
in them after the meal.
The sisters assume that Babette will now return to Paris, and when
she tells them that all of her money is gone and that she is not going
anywhere, the sisters are aghast. Babette then tells them that dinner
for 12 at the Café Anglais has a price of 10,000 francs. Martina
tearfully says, "Now you will be poor the rest of your life", to which
Babette replies, "An artist is never poor."
God has prepared a feast for us too through Jesus who is both the reason for the feast and the feast itself. It is too easy to allow the ritual to become a rote action or to make it into the personal action of the priest and ministers. This is a feast to which we are all invited to taste of the choicest of food and the finest of drink. Jesus tells us "My flesh is real food and my blood is real drink." let us be mindful of what we do, and say and enjoy this feast which the Lord has made for us for when we east this bread and drink this cup we proclaim the Lord's death until he comes in glory.
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The Old Catholic Church
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The Old Catholic Church of the Netherlands
is the mother church related to the Old Catholic Churches. It is sometimes
called Ancient Catholic Church, Church of Utrecht (Ultrajectine
Church) or Dutch Roman Catholic Church of the Old Episcopal Order.
In the past Roman Catholic and Jesuit, critics tended to call it the Jansenist Church of Holland.
Catholicism came to the Netherlands by means of the
proselytising of St. Willibrord in the
7th century. Willibrord had been consecrated by Pope Sergius I in 696 in Rome.
In 1145 Pope Eugene III granted the Cathedral Chapter of Utrecht the right to
elect bishops after such had been requested by the Holy Roman Emperor Conrad III
and Bishop Heribert of Utrecht. The Fourth Lateran Council confirmed this in
1215. Pope Leo X, issued the papal bull Debitum Pastoralis in
1520 giving extraordinary powers to Philip of Burgundy, 57th Bishop of Utrecht,
essentially removing the ability of any external authority to "in the
first instance, have his cause evoked to any external tribunal, not even under
pretense of any apostolic letters whatever; and that all such proceedings
should be, ipso facto, null and void".
Forced
into hiding during the Reformation, the Roman Catholic Church of the
Netherlands continued to thrive, even eventually obtaining a comfortable enough
status with the local authorities so as to allow it to practice Catholicism as
long as this did not take place in public or semi-public buildings and areas.
The popes appointed Apostolic Vicars to Utrecht, while the other sees remained
vacant since the dissolution of diocesan structures due to the reformation.
Strangely, despite the Debitum Pastoralis and the waivers it provided,
in 1692 the Dutch ancient Church came under persecution from counter-reformist Jesuits,
who, despite opposition to this from Rome, accused Petrus Codde, Apostolic
Vicar of Utrecht and the Dutch Republic, of favouring the so-called Jansenist heresy.
Pope Innocent XII appointed a Commission of Cardinals who started an
investigation of Archbishop Codde, ending in exoneration. In 1700 Archbishop
Codde was summoned to Rome and brought before a second commission appointed by Pope
Clement XI. After another acquittal, Clement XI suspended Codde in 1701 and
appointed a successor, Gerard Potcamp, to the See of Utrecht.
This
was not a popular decision in Holland, culminating in a demand by the Dutch for
the return of Codde, and the refusal to accept his successor by a large part of
the clergy. Codde returned to Utrecht in June of 1703 and formally resigned -
protesting the circumstance - in a pastoral letter of March 19, 1704. He died
on December 18, 1710.
Shortly
before the controversy concerning Codde, the Netherlands and its Catholic
clergy had become a refuge for a number of well-known dissenting priests from France
and Belgium, who were persecuted because due to accusations of Jansenism and
because of their anti-Roman views on jurisdiction.
Lacking
an archbishop in partibus infidelium, the Dutch Church was able to arrange for
an Irish bishop, Luke Fagan, Bishop of Meath (later Archbishop of Dublin), to
ordain priests for the See of Utrecht. The canonical matters arising from the
supposed Roman violations of Debitum Pastoralis led to the case being
brought before the Pontifical Roman Catholic University of Leuven (Southern Brabant)
in May of 1717, which found in favor of Utrecht, but was unable to resolve the
matter with Rome; this led to a de facto autonomous Catholic church in the
Netherlands. Finally in 1723 dissatisfied Dutch clergy elected Cornelius van
Steenoven as Archbishop of Utrecht. He was consecrated (without a papal
mandate) by Dominique Marie Varlet, who had been consecrated by the pope as
Coadjutor Bishop of Babylon, (a titular see i.e. a diocese in name only), who
was visiting the Netherlands. Varlet also agreed to confirm children and to
support the Dutch clergy as he was sympathetic to their position. Both
consecrator and consecrated incurred the penalty of suspension and
excommunication for illicit episcopal consecration (only punished by a
suspension at the time and until 1950) and because of illegitimately claiming a
diocesan see of jurisdiction without the permission of the Roman Pontiff
(punished by excommunication). Bishop Varlet was later reconciled to Rome, even
though he subsequently consecrated four bishops for the Independent Ultrajectine
Church, which would become known as 'Old Catholic' after 1853. Van Steenoven
after his consecration autonomously, and from the Roman view point
illegitimately, appointed bishops to the vacant Dutch sees of Deventer, Haarlem
and Groningen.
Most
Dutch Catholics nevertheless continued to follow the pope and accepted his
newly appointed Apostolic Vicars at Utrecht as well as the later official Roman
Catholic hierarchy established in 1853, when Catholicism was allowed in the
public sphere again after two and a half centuries of secret and private
religious worship.
After Pope Pius IX reestablished a
Catholic hierarchy in Holland in 1853, the breakaway Church of Utrecht adopted
the name "Old Catholic Church" to distinguish itself from the newly
created Roman hierarchy by its seniority in Holland. In 1870 Vatican I was
convened, and the bishops of the Church of Utrecht were not invited because
they were not seen as being in communion with the Holy See. At the Vatican I,
papal primacy in jurisdiction and the dogma of papal infallibility were
defined, to the objection of the Old Catholic Church of Utrecht and some
communities in Germany, Austria and Switzerland. Several separate communities
were formed at this time, seeking to practice pre-Vatican I Catholic ideas.
Since no Roman Catholic bishops left over the issues, these communities sought
apostolic succession from the Old Catholic Archbishop of Utrecht, thus leading
to the formation of the Utrecht Union of Churches, and the final adoption of
the name "Old Catholic" by these German speaking communities.
Doctrine
Perhaps
the most fundamental positions of the Old Catholic Church are its claim to apostolic
succession and to being legally separate from the Roman Catholic Church.
The
churches of the Union of Utrecht have been in communion with the Church of
England since 1931. The Polish National Catholic Church was part of the Union
and also in communion with the Episcopal Church in the United States. The PNCC
left the Union of Utrecht and broke communion with the ECUSA over the issues of
the ordination of women and openly gay clergy.
Old
Catholics have celebrated Mass in the vernacular virtually since their
foundation, even if not everywhere, doing so as early as the 18th century in
Utrecht. They reject the Roman Catholic dogmas of the Immaculate Conception and
Assumption of Mary as well as papal infallibility. Their practice of private confession
has fallen into disuse in most areas. Since 1878 Old Catholic clergy have been
allowed to marry at any time. It would also seem that, by the beginning of the 20th
century the Eucharistic fast had been abandoned along with Benediction of the Blessed
Sacrament and the veneration of the
saints; in his declaration of ecclesial independence of December 29, 1910 Arnold
Harris Mathew, wrote to the Old Catholics of Utrecht, deploring the lack of
these practices on the amongst Old Catholics on the European continent.
The
main bodies of the Old Catholics are theologically progressive. The Dutch Old
Catholics since 1998 have allowed women to enter the priesthood, and for a long
time have allowed divorce. Since the beginning of the 20th century, some Roman
Catholic priests who have been unable to accept certain Roman Catholic
disciplines or doctrines have joined the Old Catholic Church, often in order to
marry.
While
the vernacular was introduced at a very early stage, external rites remained
very Catholic, as well as the prayers of Mass, which still
emphasized sacrificial intention. Although distinct from the Roman Catholic
Church, since the 1960s most Old Catholics in communion with Utrecht have
followed the liturgical reforms of the Second Vatican Council, which met
periodically from 1962-1965.
Independent
Old Catholic bodies tend to follow the theological and ecclesiological ideas of
their founders and current leaders, which can vary from ultra conservative to
extremely liberal. Old Catholic bodies and Ultrajectine
thought surpasses the liberal/conservative divide in the Catholic Church today.
(From Wikipedia)
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Sincerely,
Most Rev James Balija
Editor
The Contemporary Catholic
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| Peace! |
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Hi! I'm Fr Jim Balija, editor of The Contemporary Catholic. Our goal is to help you live a richer life. I invite you to take the time to read this e-zine, send us your comments and questions and hopefully share this with your family and friends.
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