May 28, 2005 - Eight years...



May God sustain in all priests a grateful awareness of the gift they have received; may he also awaken in many young men a ready and generous response to his call to give themselves completely to the cause of the Gospel. The men and women of our time, who have such need of meaning and hope, will greatly benefit from their witness. And the Christian community will rejoice, knowing that it can look forward with confidence to the challenges of the approaching Third Millennium.  -Blessed John Paul II ("Gift and Mystery" 1996)

 

Quicumque vult...

In the old office before the Second Vatican Council, priests and religious would recite the Creed attributed St. Athanasius (d. 373), known as the "Quicumque vult..." (the Latin words beginning the statement of faith mean, "Whoever wishes...")  This creed, as others of the first five hundred years of Christianity, were written to proclaim the authentic faith and dismiss the sub-Christian heresies that arose in various places and times.  The Athanasian creed professes the Trinitarian theology with particular precision beyond the familiar Niceno-Constantapolitan Creed that is recited at Sunday Mass all over the world.  One of the properties of this creed that will sound odd to the contemporary audience is the condemnation against those who refuse to believe. The stakes are high--Trinitarian theology is not simply an academic, esoteric exercise in splitting hairs or counting angels dancing on a pin.  It demands our assent, that we can worship God "in Spirit and in Truth".

   The key to greater belief and understanding is not more study and external consideration of the great mystery of God, but to enter more directly into the reality of God's love through "worship of the one God in Trinity".  In worship, the fire of God's love is revealed--that love shared eternally among Father, Son, and Spirit; Three Persons, One God.  We do this each time we sign ourselves with the cross, "In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit".  We do this each time we pray, to the Father, through the Son, in the Holy Spirit.  Each time we recite the Gloria and the Credo.  We do this every time we offer the Son to the Father, by the power of the Holy Spirit through the Eucharistic prayers.

   The vitrtue of worship feeds and informs a faithful orthodoxy (right belief), which then leads to a strong and healthy Christian life, or as the Latins say, "Lex orandi, lex credendi, lex vivendi"... "the law of prayer is the law of belief is the law of life".

 

   And so, ladies and gentlemen, the Athanasian Creed: 

Whosoever will be saved, before all things it is necessary that he hold the Catholic ('universal') Faith.  Which Faith except everyone do keep whole and undefiled, without doubt he shall perish everlastingly. And the Catholic Faith is this, that we worship one God in Trinity and Trinity in Unity. Neither confounding the Persons, nor dividing the Substance. For there is one Person of the Father, another of the Son, and another of the Holy Ghost. But the Godhead of the Father, of the Son and of the Holy Ghost is all One, the Glory Equal, the Majesty Co-Eternal. Such as the Father is, such is the Son, and such is the Holy Ghost. The Father Uncreated, the Son Uncreated, and the Holy Ghost Uncreated. The Father Incomprehensible, the Son Incomprehensible, and the Holy Ghost Incomprehensible. The Father Eternal, the Son Eternal, and the Holy Ghost Eternal and yet they are not Three Eternals but One Eternal. As also there are not Three Uncreated, nor Three Incomprehensibles, but One Uncreated, and One Uncomprehensible. So likewise the Father is Almighty, the Son Almighty, and the Holy Ghost Almighty. And yet they are not Three Almighties but One Almighty.

So the Father is God, the Son is God, and the Holy Ghost is God. And yet they are not Three Gods, but One God. So likewise the Father is Lord, the Son Lord, and the Holy Ghost Lord. And yet not Three Lords but One Lord. For, like as we are compelled by the Christian verity to acknowledge every Person by Himself to be God and Lord, so are we forbidden by the Catholic Religion to say, there be Three Gods or Three Lords. The Father is made of none, neither created, nor begotten. The Son is of the Father alone; not made, nor created, but begotten. The Holy Ghost is of the Father, and of the Son neither made, nor created, nor begotten, but proceeding.

So there is One Father, not Three Fathers; one Son, not Three Sons; One Holy Ghost, not Three Holy Ghosts. And in this Trinity none is before or after Other, None is greater or less than Another, but the whole Three Persons are Co-eternal together, and Co-equal. So that in all things, as is aforesaid, the Unity in Trinity, and the Trinity in Unity, is to be worshipped. He therefore that will be saved, must thus think of the Trinity.

Furthermore, it is necessary to everlasting Salvation, that he also believe rightly the Incarnation of our Lord Jesus Christ. For the right Faith is, that we believe and confess, that our Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, is God and Man.

God, of the substance of the Father, begotten before the worlds; and Man, of the substance of His mother, born into the world. Perfect God and Perfect Man, of a reasonable Soul and human Flesh subsisting. Equal to the Father as touching His Godhead, and inferior to the Father as touching His Manhood. Who, although He be God and Man, yet He is not two, but One Christ. One, not by conversion of the Godhead into Flesh, but by taking of the Manhood into God. One altogether, not by confusion of substance, but by Unity of Person. For as the reasonable soul and flesh is one Man, so God and Man is one Christ. Who suffered for our salvation, descended into Hell, rose again the third day from the dead. He ascended into Heaven, He sits on the right hand of the Father, God Almighty, from whence he shall come to judge the quick and the dead. At whose coming all men shall rise again with their bodies, and shall give account for their own works. And they that have done good shall go into life everlasting, and they that have done evil into everlasting fire. This is the Catholic Faith, which except a man believe faithfully and firmly, he cannot be saved.

Addendum:  Aha!  The Internet provides!  Here's an explanation of the carefulness we need to have when talking about the Trinity and how the Athanasian Creed is the solution.  Look at this, complements the Lutherans, and with a biretta tip to Sean Dailey:

Notre Dame: Obama (2009) vs. Dolan (2013)

I ran across an article that contained Cardinal Dolan's address to the graduates of Notre Dame University.  Out of some 'vast right-wing conspiracy' operating in the depths of my soul, I thought some random comparisons might be interesting... just for kicks and giggles.  This isn't a scientific survey... I simply leafed through the speeches and picked out some key words to search with my browser's "find" function.  Maybe I counted perfectly (including plurals and singulars of the same word, etc,) maybe I didn't... but I'm fairly close and fairly representative, I think, in my counts.  I'll be happy to make any corrections or include observations that readers might point out.

Oh, FWIW, my parish has already been the subject of a "random" IRS audit... which we passed...  it cost us a bunch of time that would be better-spent doing anything else, a bunch of money in professional fees that would be better-spent on anything else, and unnecessary wear-and-tear on an already-overburdened pastor, but we got through it OK.  (It's a good thing I like to run a 'clean ship'.)  I wouldn't mind seeing some people in the government fired for this, however high it goes, if this can be proven to be an arbitrary attack on us as a church and as Catholics who are not afraid to be Catholic.

 

 

 

 

 

	President Obama, 2009	Timothy Cardinal Dolan, 2013
	Printed in NYT	speech not printed in NYT… See New Advent instead
Total Words	3539	1581
Total Time	30:30	12:30
“I”	52	19
“my” "me"	14 9	5 8
“we”	44	9
“us”	21	7
“them”	4	2
“they”	18	1
“you”/”your”	67	39
“Jesus”	0	5
“God”	7	13
“Mary”	0	12
“Notre Dame”	12	17
“Graduate”	2 (once referring to himself)	1
Interruptions for Applause	24	?
“Alum”	0	3
“abortion”	7	0
“pro-life”	2	0
“Christian”	3	1
“Muslim”/”Islam”	1	0
“Jew”	1	3
“bible”	0	0
“opportunity”	0	0
“job”	2 (once referring to himself and his ‘job’)	0
“contribute”	0	0
“Catholic”	4	4
“poor”	1	1
“Gospel”	1	2
“moral”	3	0
“value”	3	0
“gay”/”homosexual”	1	0
“love”	5	2
“cooperation”	4	0
“2009” or “2013”	5	5
“religion”	2	0
“diversity”	4	0
“(dis)/agree”	4	0

  I don't know if this survey proves anything.  My greatest interest, as you might see, was in the use of pronouns.  I suppose that a speech twice as long as the other will result in twice as much usage of these kinds of words, but what I am detecting is one orator's significantly greater use of "us" vs. "them" kind of language... assigning attributes and attitudes to what "they" do or say or believe.  I was surprised to see that, proportionally, the self-references ("I", "me", "my") between the two orators were pretty close.

   The other thing to consider is the use of 'moral' language... what "should" and "should not" be part of the graduate's life or worldview in the president's speech--content which was mostly lacking in the Cardinal's.  I would be from the school that moralizing is pretty low on the totem pole when it comes to preaching.  Yes, morals need to be taught from the pulpit, but I think there is at least as great a need, if not greater, to inculcate the "Catholic way of thinking"... sound interpretation of scripture, seeing the eschatological horizons, bringing the Good News "home", teaching Catholic culture and liturgy and history and hagiography.  Moralizing tends to be a lot of "you" talk, which tends to turn people's ears off... people have a tendency to say to themselves when they feel themselves in the cross hairs: "this doesn't apply to me" or "the priest doesn't know what he is talking about" or "quit treating talking down to us, you hypocrite"... or worse yet, "yeah, go after those (other people) sinners!"  One cannot ignore morality as a necessary component of preaching, but to simply be fed a steady, indiscriminate diet of moralizing tends to strangle the homiletic imagination and divide crowds.

   Neither speaker had much to say about what the graduates would be doing on Monday morning, i.e., getting a job and contributing to society.  I hope that's OK with all the Notre Dame parents out there and the student loan industry.  Who knows?  Maybe there were some religious vocations lurking about in the crowd?

Bulletin Article: Trinity Sunday

While scripture never explicitly uses the word Trinity to describe the relationship of God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit, the Early Church used this term to describe the essential unity and diversity of the Three Persons of the One God. St. John tells us that above all else, “God is Love”. (1 John 4:8) If God’s true nature is Love, then the reality of God must be relational—and so he is. St. Augustine advanced Trinitarian theology by describing the Trinity as a relationship of three persons: the One who Loves (the Father), the One who is Loved (the Son), and Love itself (the Holy Spirit). This understanding is reflected in our creed as we say that the Son is “eternally begotten of the Father.” God’s perfect and eternal Love is poured out on his eternal Son, which in turn inspires the Holy Spirit, who proceeds eternally from the Father and the Son, With the Father and Son, the Holy Spirit is worshiped and glorified as God himself.

   These words only approximate the mystery we celebrate this weekend on Trinity Sunday. One should remember however, that the Trinity is not simply an abstract theological construct, but it is, instead, a living reality of our faith. Our relationship to the Godhead is through our status as adopted sons and daughters in Christ. Thus, our place within the love of the Trinity is in and through Christ, “who lives and reigns with you [God the Father] and the Holy Spirit, One God forever and ever.” All authentic prayer acknowledges this Triune God, and is directed to him. At Mass, listen carefully to whom the different prayers are directed. The Eucharistic Prayers, for instance, are directed to God the Father, through the power of the Holy Spirit. Through this prayer God the Son is made present.  Other prayers, such as the Sign of the Cross, the Glory to God, and the Creed are Trinitarian prayers. Trinity Sunday is presented to the Church to help us become more conscious of the reality of God and his desire to share his love with us. Love was the reason for creation itself. Love is the reason for God’s work to redeem his people after they fell. Love remains the reason God works within the Church today to unite all men and women in the hope of the Kingdom of Heaven.

On the Comeback Trail (II): On Loss

   Every human being spends his or her life learning how to deal (more-or-less) gracefully with loss.  As young children, we lose our security blankets and our pets.  We grow older and leave mom behind to get on the school bus to begin a new life.  We dream of becoming an astronaut or a professional baseball player, or the president, until we realize that honor doesn't come from great jobs, but by simply being a great person.  We encounter our first loves and our first betrayals.  We grow out of clothes and lose our wristwatches.  Our team loses the soccer tournament and we don't get selected as starters on the basketball team.  We take a "C" in algebra and that cute little guy or girl refuses to go with us to the Homecoming Dance.  We leave the security of school to go to college or a job or the military or something else, realizing that our youth is slipping away into adulthood and adult responsibilities.  We fall in and out of love, with most of us finding Mr. or Ms. "Right", and giving up the independence of our former ways for the good of starting a new family.  A child is born and more freedom is given away to raise and mentor the next generation.  We place these children on the school bus in a few years, and vicariously suffer the same losses we suffered as children.  Over time we may lose one or another of our jobs, our appendixes or gallbladders, loved ones (parents, peers, children) who finish their earthly travails; we make bad picks on the stock market, fail at entrepreneurial ventures, and slowly whittle away the days of our lives until one morning we wake up and we are old.  We retire from our jobs, our body slowly betrays us as we can no longer see or her or run or walk like we used to, we lose more acquaintances to death, we sell the big house needed to raise our families in order to go into a condominium or retirement home.  Skipping to the end, ultimately the only thing left to give up is our very selves in the sleep of death--where we lose even ourselves to the passing nature of this world.

   Our whole life is a dress rehearsal for the 'big loss' at the end.  We have our faith in something more, but that doesn't mitigate the fact that in order to pass into the here-after, we have to give up absolutely everything to embrace it.  Every loss, therefore, can be seen as a 'little death' and another step towards ultimate freedom in belonging to God.  The Christian tradition repeats this insight over and over and over, encouraging us to take to heart the passing nature of this world and to inspire us to look to things that are eternal.  Take the following insights from scripture:

• Mark 8:35 - Whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever will lose his life for my sake and the gospel's will save it.
• Luke 9:23 - If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself, take up his cross, and follow me.
• John 22: 24 -  Amen, amen I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls to the earth and dies, it remains a single grain, but if it dies it bears much fruit.
• Romans 12: 1 -  I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship.
• Philippians 1: 21 - For to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain.
• 2 Corinthians 1: 3-5 - Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our affliction, so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any affliction, with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God. For as we share abundantly in Christ's sufferings, so through Christ we share abundantly in comfort too.
• 2 Corinthians 12: 9 - But he said to me, "My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness."  I therefore boast even more gladly in my weaknesses, so the the power of Christ may rest upon me.
• 1 Peter 4: 1-11 - Since therefore Christ suffered in the flesh, arm yourselves with the same way of thinking, for whoever has suffered in the flesh has ceased from sin, so as to live for the rest of the time in the flesh no longer for human passions but for the will of God. For the time that is past suffices for doing what the Gentiles want to do, living in sensuality, passions, drunkenness, orgies, drinking parties, and lawless idolatry. With respect to this they are surprised when you do not join them in the same flood of debauchery, and they malign you; but they will give account to him who is ready to judge the living and the dead.

How do we respond to loss?  Sadness can be appropriate.  It is honest, for a joy, a gift, a grace has passed from us.  Look at what Job's (1: 21) attitude is:

"Naked I came forth from my mother's womb, and naked I shall go back again.  The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord!"

Came forth... go back.   Gave... taken away.  These verbs help explain that the earthly experience humans share is a net-zero gain round-trip in this world.  Just as we are born and we die, we come into the world with nothing and go back with nothing.  The only thing we leave with is the experience granted us from space and time, and the promise of God's reunion of body and soul in the eternity lying beyond space-time.

   Loss isn't easy, but it is the Christian way.  Christ himself did not see it beneath his dignity to suffer our death at the hands of cruel and mindless men.  He spread his arms upon the cross, not to grasp the world, but to let go.  Indeed, in the physiology of crucifixion, one scientist shows very elegantly (figure to the right) that his body--all he had left--became a weight used against him as he struggled up and down to breathe... to stay alive (paradoxically, to expel air from the lungs), one must scoot 'up' the cross, maneuvering the tortured wrists into something of a grasping configuration, further tormenting arm and shoulder muscles (which as illustrated here include a dislocation of the right shoulder).  When the victim of crucifixion is exhausted, he stops moving, suffocating under his own body weight, pulmonary edema, cardiac tamponade, and with repsiratory and cardiac failure.  Our Lord made his death a "Job moment", returning praise to the Father as he proclaimed, "Father, into your hands I commend my spirit!"  Entering the total God-forsakenness of death, Jesus descended into hell (Sheol) to join and collect up all those awaiting the resurrection of the dead and the life of the world to come.

   Christ's death was not a typical martyr's death... there's more here.  Martyrs are very conscious of God's presence in their actions.  It is the motivation  and inspiration and courage from living faith in God that leads them to their sacrifices in hope and not despair.  Martyr's sacrifices are commendable and their losses in the eyes of the world total, but they do so with an eye to the good that lies beyond, never leaving the loving oversight God's vision.  But there was something very different--even greater--with Jesus' death.  His sacrifice was not simply physical or mental to enable passage into a new realm of being, but it was totally spiritual as well.  His death resulted in God's entry into the farthest depths of death itself.  Unlike a human martyr, letting go of life to embrace something else... God's kingdom, when God died on that day, Jesus freely entered a state of total forsakenness before the Father.  He died not merely in his human nature or divine nature (natures cannot be separated from a person), the Second Person of the Trinity, really, truly experienced in a way that no other human being could the totality of darkness which those who go out from God as created beings could experience.  This total darkness encompasses all the loss we could possibly encounter... loss of our material goods, loss of our name and identity, loss of life itself, but most importantly, the loss of relationship and intimacy with God.  This is why Jesus' victory over death is not only a physical victory for us who fear the dissociation of our bodies and souls and the dis-integration that follows, but it is also a moral victory over the death and separation from God that takes place by way of sin. 

   Ironically, Jesus' "going out" seems to be just the opposite of Job's "coming forth... going back" and "the Lord gave and has taken away".  In 'going out' from God, Jesus is depleted, only to return in glory.  Conversely, we have the illusion of this life away from God being full, only to be emptied out again when we take that last hearse ride.  Does the seeming-backwardness of this pattern in human experience suggest that perhaps our perspective isn't necessarily the best one?

   This reasoning still doesn't make loss easy, but it does reveal a tiny nugget of God's wisdom in allowing loss to be part of the human experience.  Loss prepares us for greater glory.  What else might God have in store for those who are committed to "coming back" to him using the pattern and habit of trust guided by faith?  Of this wisdom, scripture explains, ...eye has not seen, nor ear heard, nor has the human mind conceived of what God has prepared for those who love him, this God has revealed through the Spirit, for the Spirit scrutinizes everything, even the depths of God.  (1 Corinthians 2:9)

  The next "comeback" installment on will be out, probably, on Wednesday.