CULTURE & POLITICS, ODDS & ENDS

I am so happy he did!...All week I had been saying in the Judas posts that I hoped he would, on Maundy Thursday, as when else would be a more opportune time?

P.S. On 4/14/06
The translation of the Pope's homily is now in HOMILIES, MESSAGES, DISCOURSES.

Meanwhile, although news reports about the homily are in NEWS ABOUT BENEDICT, here is ZENIT's report on the Judas homily:

Pope Focuses on Mystery of Judas' Betrayal
Apostle Rejected God's Love, Says Benedict XVI

VATICAN CITY, APRIL 13, 2006 (Zenit.org).- In his homily at the Mass of the Lord's Supper, Benedict XVI assured the faithful that the mystery of Judas consists precisely in his rejection of God's love.

Judas Iscariot personifies "treacherous man," for whom money, power and success are more important than love and he does not hesitate to sell Jesus, the Pope said at the Mass on the evening of Holy Thursday.

The Holy Father's comments came in the wake of the recently divulged "Gospel of Judas," an ancient document that puts the apostle and his betrayal of Christ in a positive light. It describes Judas, in fact, as obeying a divine ordinance in handing over Jesus to the authorities.

In his homily, Benedict XVI, on the contrary, stressed the freedom of the apostle who betrayed Jesus for 30 denarii, as the canonical Gospels explain.

"The dark mystery exists of the rejection, made present with what happened to Judas and, precisely on Holy Thursday, on the day that Jesus gives himself up, should make us reflect," said the Pontiff. "The Lord's love knows no limits, but man can put a limit."

Benedict XVI then asked: "What does this do to treacherous man?" And he responded: "The rejection of love, not wanting to be loved, not loving. Pride which thinks it has no need of purification, which closes itself to the saving goodness of God."

"In Judas," he said, "we see the nature of this rejection still more clearly. He judges Jesus according to the categories of power and success: For him, power and success alone are the reality, love does not count.

"And he is avid: Money is more important than communion with Jesus, it is more important than God and his love."

"In this way," the Holy Father explained, "he also becomes a liar, who plays a game of double jeopardy, and breaks with truth, someone who lives in lies, thus losing the sense of the highest truth, of God."

"In this way, he becomes hard and incapable of conversion, of the confident return of the prodigal son, and throws away his destroyed life."

[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 14/04/2006 16.09]

I'm also very happy to hear it. As incomprehensive as it may seem to us, this Judas-issue is confusing some innocent people.

ZENIT's English service this week ran the following interview in two parts on
www.zenit.org/english/visualizza.phtml?sid=87565 and
www.zenit.org/english/visualizza.phtml?sid=87632
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Fordham's Father Koterski
Unpacks an Ongoing Debate

NEW YORK, APRIL 11, 2006 (Zenit.org).- A recent "statement of principles" by 55 Catholic Democrats in the U.S. House of Representatives has rekindled the debate over the responsibilities of Catholic politicians.

The signatories of the letter stated that "we seek the Church's guidance and assistance but believe also in the primacy of conscience."

But, according to Jesuit Father Joseph Koterski, professor of philosophy at Fordham University, the Catholic understanding of conscience requires a distinction. The crucial factor is not fidelity to one's chosen moral principles, but rather fidelity to moral principles given to us by God.

Father Koterski explained to ZENIT the importance for Catholic politicians to inform their conscience in accord with divine moral principles as mediated by the magisterium of the Church.

Can you describe the historical context that has created the perception that politicians may disagree with, or work against, Church teaching through appeals to "conscience" and their responsibility to constituents and the Constitution?
It seems to me that it is only because the Church is such a stalwart defender of the genuine rights of conscience, properly understood, that the situation you describe could have come about.

The Catechism of the Catholic Church, No. 1782, reflects a long-standing tradition in Catholic moral teaching that every person has the right to act in conscience and that no one must be prevented from acting according to one's conscience.

In the sections that follow, the Catechism reviews the importance of a proper formation of one's conscience, including the duty and right of the Church through her bishops to be the authoritative interpreter of moral principles for this formation of conscience.

Unfortunately, a common misunderstanding has grown up in modern culture about the notion of conscience. And I think that this misunderstanding is at the root of the notion that politicians may disagree with and even work against Church teaching through an appeal to conscience.

The misunderstanding occurs when one thinks of conscience in terms of fidelity to one's chosen moral principles.

Clearly, acting in good conscience does mean fidelity to moral principles. But in the Catholic understanding of conscience, we are not simply permitted to choose some set of moral principles to which we want to be faithful. God chooses the moral principles we must use in our moral deliberations for us.

God has revealed them to us, and we can find them in the Scriptures. Likewise, we can find them in the natural moral law that God has implanted in human nature.

It is one of the duties of the Church to make clear just what those moral principles are where there is any doubt about them.

In the situation that you describe, it seems that some politicians hold that they may choose other principles than those that God has chosen for us as their basis for making moral decisions.

Sometimes they articulate their reasoning in terms of what their constituents accept as moral values. But in doing so, they risk doing precisely what one may not do as a Catholic, namely, acting as if one were permitted to choose which moral principles one will use for one's moral deliberation.

Is there such a thing as the "primacy of conscience"?
Yes, the Church has long recognized the primacy of conscience, so long as one understands the term properly. It is not just that one may obey one's conscience, but that one must do so -- but, first, one must form one's conscience correctly.

Pope John Paul II's encyclical Veritatis Splendor gives a fine treatment of this question within the section on "Conscience and Truth" in Chapter 2.

In that section he criticizes those theologians who have misunderstood conscience as if it were what creates moral values. Rather, he takes the authentic understanding of conscience to be the inner witness of our fidelity or infidelity to the divinely given moral law. It is for this reason that Pope John Paul II often speaks of conscience as the very witness of God himself within us.

In the correct sense of the term, conscience is the judgment that we make about whether an action we have done or are about to do is in conformity with the objective and universal moral law that comes from God and that can be known by us as the natural law.

But we must note that conscience is not an infallible judge, as Veritatis Splendor says in No. 62. Since it is subject to error, we must constantly work to form the conscience truthfully. The magisterium of the Church is at the service of this formation.

To what extent are Catholic politicians and public officials bound by their individual consciences, even when they conflict with Church teaching?
The issue here, I think, concerns the meaning of the term "conflict with Church teaching."

The term "Church teaching" is a broad term by which people group together various things that need to be carefully distinguished. The term can easily run the range from "universal moral precepts that bind always and everywhere" to recommendations of a practical nature made by one's local pastor on a particular question.

Catholic politicians and public officials are bound just like the rest of us to conform to Catholic teaching on matters of moral principle. In fact, they have a special duty in this regard, precisely by reason of the office they hold and their obligation to work for the common good.

They have a special obligation to know various things about the Church's teaching on any number of matters, precisely because they may need to vote on these matters, or to make policy, or to enforce the law.

If Catholic politicians or public officials find themselves at odds with the Church's teaching, they have a very strong duty in conscience to form their consciences better by careful study of the Church's teaching on moral principles and their proper application.

In saying this, I want again to emphasize that not everything that is said by a Vatican document or by a particular bishop or in a particular sermon is at the same level.

To the extent that we are dealing with a practical judgment made by someone in the Church and not with a moral principle, there is more room for possible disagreement, and hence greater need for clarity about what the facts of the situation are, so that we can ascertain the correct application of moral principles to particular cases.

Even so, it is crucial for everyone involved in such discussions to root their thinking on moral matters in divine revelation and in good discernment about the natural law.

And it is crucial that everyone in such a situation should have the humility to admit that our own individual reasoning in matters of conscience is not infallible. It is precisely for this reason that we need the guidance of the Church on controversial matters.

Is a "properly formed conscience" just another way of saying one who is in total agreement with Church teaching? If that is the case, what is left of conscience?
In addition to the distinction that I have been making between moral principles and judgments of fact on practical matters, I would like to make an additional distinction: To speak about being in "total agreement with Church teaching" does not imply that the Church has already spoken on every possible issue and on every particular practical question.

Having a properly formed conscience certainly does mean that one will intend to be in total agreement with the moral principles that the Church teaches.

Catholicism is not a moral supermarket in which one can pick the stances that seem best to any individual. Rather, it is a religion that has the promise of divine guidance for its magisterium in moral matters, and that, after all, is a better guarantee than the rest of us can claim as individuals.

But even when we are committed to be in total agreement with Church teaching, we still face the need to work out a solution to new problems that come along on which the Church has not yet definitively spoken.

Further, each of us needs to face various questions of a factual nature, on which we will need to work at applying the principles of divine morality correctly.

For example, one could take up particular moral topics such as the question of law and public policy on immigrants, or the morality of a given war, or countless other questions that turn on questions of fact.

Lawmakers will have to wrestle with the distribution of the revenues at hand, and they will have to ascertain how to state the language in a bill they are trying to enact, so that it will garner enough support to become law. Their task is to craft legislation that will truly respect the moral law in what their legislation requires, permits, or forbids.

It seems to me that there are all sorts of things left for conscience to do even when one is completely committed to Catholic teaching.

Is there a distinction between a conscientious disagreement with the Church on immigration reform and disagreement on abortion?
On both these questions, it seems to me, one can identify some matters of moral principle and other matters of practical judgments about the facts.

No Catholic legislator could support legislation on immigration reform that violated the moral principle that requires respect for human dignity.

But determining precisely what our immigration policies should be in order to respect human dignity turns on all sorts of practical questions, such as how many immigrants a region can really handle in any one period of time, or what the appropriate level of health care or welfare support for new immigrants should be.

There are some practical recommendations on these subjects by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, and Catholic legislators should definitely give these careful study.

I think that there is some latitude on the specific answers to these questions, whereas there is no room at all for a Catholic legislator to claim reasons on conscience as allowing support for policies that would treat immigrants, even illegal immigrants, inhumanely.

In regard to abortion, there is a similar distinction between principles and their practical application.

The Church has clearly taught that we must be opposed to procured abortion always and everywhere -- this is a universal moral principle, and on this point there are no possible grounds for disagreement with the Church based on some claims about reasons of one's own conscience.

But there remain various questions about how best to proceed on practical questions, such as on the recent initiatives to outlaw partial-birth abortion.

Here it is important to take note of the directives of Evangelium Vitae, No. 73, on how a Catholic legislator whose unequivocal opposition to abortion is well known may still vote for legislation that does restrict some types of abortion even if it is not possible at that time completely to forbid the practice of all induced abortion.

In contrast with this careful vision of the relation of moral principles and their proper application, stands the sorry track-record of most of the individuals who signed on to the recent statement by Catholic Democrats in the House of Representatives. For many of them have voting records that the National Abortion Rights Action League considers "perfect" by virtue of their support for the pro-abortion agenda.

The assertions of that document about a commitment to protect the most vulnerable members of our society ring hollow by a comparison with the actual voting records of many of the signers.

The document's references to the "undesirability of abortion" might be thought a hopeful sign. But it is distressing to see that the farthest the signers of the document were willing to go in regard to real opposition to abortion is the document's statement that each of the signers "is committed to reducing the number of unwanted pregnancies and creating an environment with policies that encourage pregnancies to be carried to term."

From the pro-abortion voting records of many of the signers it could appear that their commitment to "reducing the number of unwanted pregnancies" includes keeping abortion legally permissible.

In what way is the Church's teaching on abortion binding on the individual believer in a way that the Holy Father's views on an issue such as a particular war are not?
It is important to remain mindful of the distinction between: 1) universal moral precepts that bind always and everywhere and 2) judgments that one makes about the facts of a given situation.

The Church has a clear teaching on the topic of procured abortion that has been constantly affirmed and reaffirmed as a principle of morality.

The principle in question here is a universal negative precept that applies always, everywhere, and to everyone, namely, that it is never permissible to procure an abortion -- see Evangelium Vitae, No. 62 -- because innocent human life is sacred to God and may never be deliberately attacked.

By contrast, the views of the Holy Father on an issue such as the morality of a particular war are not uttered at the level of principle but at the level of a judgment about the facts of a given situation, in light of certain principles -- here, the principles of just war.

If the Holy Father were making a comment about what the principles of just war are, he could well be articulating some universal precept, such as the precept that the aggrieved party may not go to war unless it has exhausted all other avenues to address the injustice, or the precept that even in a just war one may not directly attack the innocent.

But the question of whether a given war is just or not depends not only on adherence to the moral principles dealing with the conditions for just war, but also on all sorts of factual questions.

Because there are so many factual issues that enter into such a judgment, anyone's judgment about the matter can be considered debatable in a way that a statement of moral principles is not debatable.

The Holy Father's judgment on any such matters deserves great reverence from Catholics, but it should not be considered to be at the same level of authority as a statement that he might make on the universal moral principles.

I would go so far as to say that we should even presume that the Holy Father has better access to the facts than we do, and that this would make his judgment on factual questions likely to be better than ours.

But questions of fact are crucial for making the correct application of moral principles, and questions of the application of moral principles to the facts are debatable in a way that moral principles in and of themselves are not.

If a Catholic politician, as a matter of conscience, finds herself in disagreement with the Church on a particular issue, how should she respond?
Mindful of all that we have said above about the differences in the level of Church pronouncements on moral matters, I would urge that a Catholic politician be first of all ready to become better informed in conscience by further study and discussion of what the Church's moral principles are and what the magisterium has taught about their proper application.

When there is no more time for study and one must act, for example, by casting their votes in their roles as legislators, they need to observe the principles of divine law as superior to their own theories and opinions in matters of moral principle.

When it comes to disagreement over an application of the moral principles because of a disagreement over the facts, legislators certainly must try to ascertain the truth about those questions of fact and obey a conscience well formed by knowledge of true principles.

Italian Press: Benedict XVI In Polemic with "Gospel According to Judas"

Vatican 2006-04-14 19:35:16

A Vatican specialist of the "La Repubblica" daily, Marco Politi, is confident that in his homily during yesterday’s Mass of the Lord’s Super in the Lateran Benedict XVI consciously entered into a polemic with the "gospel according to Judas," an apocryphal text announced recently by a US periodical, containing an interpretation of the act of the apostle who betrayed Jesus which differs from the canonical one.

"Pope Ratzinger is not in the habit of taking part in polemics by means of the media. Since, however, the story related to the Last Supper, the Pope decided to touch upon the very essence of the biblical account," wrote Politi. In his judgement, "Benedict XVI refuted all revisionist hypotheses on the role of the traitor."

Luigi Accattoli, a specialist on Vatican issues of "Corriere della sera," is more cautious. He suspects that "Pope Ratzinger must have been made aware of the announcement of the apocrypha" and "it is highly likely that he endeavoured to recall the traditional interpretation of the figure of the traitor." Accattoli emphasises that "according to Benedict XVI there are absolutely no extenuating circumstances for Judas." The commentator of the Milan daily recalls that in his book "Crossing the Threshold of Hope" John Paul II maintains that the words addressed by Jesus to Judas, when the former tells him that it would have been better if he had not been born, "do not mean eternal damnation."

All the speculations about the Pope’s yesterday’s sermon are decisively opposed by Vittorio Messori. The Catholic writer expresses an opinion that "in his commentary Benedict XVI showed that he shares one of the three hypotheses as to which there is no unanimity among Christian theologians and exegetes. The Holy Father said that Judas «assesses Jesus in terms of power and success: the only reality for him is that of authority and success; love does not count»." Messori concurs that the papal interpretation of the mystery of treason is the strictest one possible, but indicates that he has every right to it since what counts is "both the historical and metahistorical consequences of Iscariot’s gesture."

Personally, I think that it was a conscious move on the part of the Pope to speak about Judas and re-state the traditional Catholic-Christian view of him because Maundy Thursday was a very opportune time to tackle the apocryphal onslaught about Judas head-on. Without geting into polemics, the Church re-states its stand in clear absolute terms. No relativism here!

So Judas having been dealt with, it remained for the preacher of the Pontifical Household, charged with giving the Good Friday homily at St. Peter's Basilica, to state in similarly clear terms the Church's opposition to all the anti-Christ and anti-Christian myths flooding the market today.

Surely, the good father would not have dared mention such an unconventional topic on such an occasion in such a setting, if he had not been asked or authorized to.

Here is what I was all set to post when I read Benefan's post above-

I don't know if it has been done before, but one of the surprises at the Good Friday rites in St. Peter's Basilica today was that the Pope did not deliver the homily. Instead, it was preached by Capuchin Father Raniero Cantalamessa, preacher to the Pontifical Household.

It is even more interesting and unusual that Fr. Cantalamessa devotes the start of the homily to decry the currently flourishing and highly profitable industry intent on peddling and perpetrating all sorts of anti-Christian myths as 'historical or scientific fact.'

So unusual that even the preacher himself notes: "These are issues that would not merit being addressed in this place and on this day, but we cannot allow the silence of believers to be mistaken for embarrassment... and that the good faith (or foolishness?) of millions of people be crassly manipulated by the media, without raising a cry of protest, not only in the name of the faith, but also of common sense and healthy reason."

From ZENIT, here is a translation-
--------------------------------------------------------------

Father Cantalamessa's Good Friday Homily
"God Manifests His Love for Us"

1. Christians, be serious in taking action!

"The time is sure to come when people will not accept sound teaching, but their ears will be itching for anything new and they will collect themselves a whole series of teachers according to their own tastes; and then they will shut their ears to the truth and will turn to myths" (2 Timothy 4:3-4).

This word of Scripture -- and in a special way the reference to the itching for anything new -- is being realized in a new and impressive way in our days. While we celebrate here the memory of the passion and death of the Savior, millions of people are seduced by the clever rewriting of ancient legends to believe that Jesus of Nazareth was never crucified.

In the United States a best-seller at present is an edition of The Gospel of Thomas, presented as the Gospel that "spares us the crucifixion, makes the resurrection unnecessary, and does not present us with a God named Jesus."[1]

Some years ago, Raymond Brown, the greatest biblical scholar of the Passion, wrote: "It is an embarrassing insight into human nature that the more fantastic the scenario, the more sensational is the promotion it receives and the more intense the faddish interest it attracts. People who would never bother reading a responsible analysis of the traditions about how Jesus was crucified, died, was buried, and rose from the dead are fascinated by the report of some 'new insight' to the effect that he was not crucified or did not die, especially if the subsequent career involved running off with Mary Magdalene to India … These theories demonstrate that in relation to the passion of Jesus, despite the popular maxim, fiction is stranger than fact, and often, intentionally or not, more profitable."[2]

There is much talk about Judas' betrayal, without realizing that it is being repeated. Christ is being sold again, no longer to the leaders of the Sanhedrin for thirty denarii, but to editors and booksellers for billions of denarii. No one will succeed in halting this speculative wave, which instead will flare up with the imminent release of a certain film, but being concerned for years with the history of Ancient Christianity, I feel the duty to call attention to a huge misunderstanding which is at the bottom of all this pseudo-historical literature.

The apocryphal gospels on which they lean are texts that have always been known, in whole or in part, but with which not even the most critical and hostile historians of Christianity ever thought, before today, that history could be made. It would be as if within two centuries an attempt were made to reconstruct a present-day history based on novels written in our age.

The huge misunderstanding is the fact that they use these writings to make them say exactly the opposite of what they intended. They are part of the gnostic literature of the 2nd and 3rd centuries. The gnostic vision -- a mixture of Platonic dualism and Eastern doctrines, cloaked in biblical ideas -- holds that the material world is an illusion, the work of the God of the Old Testament, who is an evil god, or at least inferior; Christ did not die on the cross, because he never assumed, except in appearance, a human body, the latter being unworthy of God (Docetism).

If, according to The Gospel of Judas, of which there has been much talk in recent days, Jesus himself orders the apostle to betray him, it is because, by dying, the divine spirit which was in him would finally be able to liberate itself from involvement of the flesh and re-ascend to heaven. Marriage oriented to births is to be avoided; woman will be saved only if the "feminine principle" (thelus) personified by her, is transformed into the masculine principle, that is, if she ceases to be woman.[3]

The funny thing is that today there are those who believe they see in these writings the exaltation of the feminine principle, of sexuality, of the full and uninhibited enjoyment of this material world, contrary to the official Church which would always have frustrated all this! The same mistake is noted in regard to the doctrine of reincarnation. Present in the Eastern religions as a punishment due to previous faults and as something to which one longs to put an end with all one's might, it is accepted in the West as a wonderful possibility to live and enjoy this world indefinitely.

These are issues that would not merit being addressed in this place and on this day, but we cannot allow the silence of believers to be mistaken for embarrassment and that the good faith (or foolishness?) of millions of people be crassly manipulated by the media, without raising a cry of protest, not only in the name of the faith, but also of common sense and healthy reason. It is the moment, I believe, to hear again the admonishment of Dante Alighieri:

Christians, be serious in taking action:
Do not be like a feather to every wind,
Nor think that every water cleanses you.
You have the New and the Old Testament
And the Shepherd of the Church to guide you;
Let this be all you need for your salvation …
Be men, do not be senseless sheep.[4]

2. The Passion Preceded the Incarnation!

But let us leave these fantasies to one side. They have a common explanation: We are in the age of the media and the media are more interested in novelty than in truth. Let us concentrate on the mystery that we are celebrating.

The best way to reflect this year on the mystery of Good Friday would be to re-read the entire first part of the Pope's encyclical Deus Caritas Est. Not being able to do so here, I would like at least to comment on some passages that refer more directly to the mystery of this day. We read in the encyclical:

"To fix one's gaze on the pierced side of Christ, of which John speaks, helps to understand what has been the point of departure of this encyclical letter: 'God is love.' It is there, on the cross, where this truth can be contemplated. And, beginning from there, we must now define what love is. And, from that gaze, the Christian finds the orientation of his living and loving."[5]

Yes, God is love! It has been said that, if all the Bibles of the world were to be destroyed by some cataclysm or iconoclastic rage and only one copy remained; and if this copy was also so damaged that only one page was still whole, and likewise if this page was so wrinkled that only one line could still be read: if that line was the line of the First Letter of John where it is written that "God is love!" the whole Bible would have been saved, because the whole content is there.

I lived my childhood in a cottage only a few meters from a high-tension electrical wire, but we lived in darkness, or with the light of candles. Between us and the electrical wire was a railway, and with the war going on, nobody thought of overcoming the small obstacle. This is what happens with the love of God: It is there, within our grasp, capable of illuminating and warming everything in our life, but we live out our existence in darkness and cold. This is the only true reason for sadness in life.

God is love, and the cross of Christ is the supreme proof, the historical demonstration. There are two ways of manifesting one's love towards someone, said Nicholas Cabasilas, an author of the Byzantine East. The first consists of doing good to the person loved, of giving gifts; the second, much more demanding, consists of suffering for him.

God has loved us in the first way, that is, with a munificent love, in creation, when he filled us with gifts, within and outside us; he has loved us with a suffering love in the redemption, when he invented his own annihilation, suffering for us the most terrible torments, for the purpose of convincing us of his love.[6] Therefore, it is on the cross that one must now contemplate the truth that "God is love."

The word "passion" has two meanings: It can indicate a vehement love, "passionate," or a mortal suffering. There is continuity between the two things and daily experience shows how easily one passes from one to the other. It was also like this, and first of all, in God. There is a passion, Origen wrote, that precedes the incarnation. This is "the passion of love" that God has always nourished towards the human race and that, in the fullness of time, led him to come on earth and suffer for us.[7]

3. Three Orders of Greatness

The encyclical Deus Caritas Est indicates a new way of engaging in the apologetics of the Christian faith, perhaps the only way possible today and certainly the most effective. It does not pit supernatural values against natural values, divine love against human love, eros against agape, but shows the original harmony, that must be continually discovered... healed, due to human sin and frailty.

The Gospel not only coincides with human ideals, but in the literal sense of realizing them, the Gospel restores, elevates and protects them. It does not exclude eros from life, but rather excludes the poison of egoism from eros.

There are three orders of greatness, Pascal said in his famous "Pensées."[8] The first is the material order or of bodies: in it excels one who has many properties, who is gifted with athletic strength or physical beauty. It is a value that should not be disparaged, but it is the lowest. Above it is the order of genius and intelligence in which thinkers, inventors, scientists, artists, and poets are distinguished. This is an order of a different quality. To be rich or poor, beautiful or ugly does not add or subtract anything from genius. The physical deformity attributed to their person, does not take anything away from the beauty of Socrates' thought or Leopardi's poetry.

The value of genius is certainly higher than the preceding, but it is not yet the highest. Above it is another order of greatness, and it is the order of love, of goodness. (Pascal calls it the order of holiness and grace). A drop of holiness, Gounod said, is worth more than an ocean of genius. To be beautiful or ugly, learned or illiterate, does not add or take anything away from a saint. His greatness is of a different order.

Christianity belongs to this third level. In the novel Quo Vadis, a pagan asks the Apostle Peter who had just arrived in Rome: Athens has given us wisdom, Rome power, and what does your religion offer us? Peter responds: Love!

Love is the most fragile thing that exists in the world; it is represented, and it is, as a child. It can be killed with very little, as we have seen with horror these days that very little is needed to kill a child. But what do power and wisdom become, that is strength and genius, without love and goodness? They become Auschwitz, Hiroshima and Nagasaki and all the rest that we know well.

4. Forgiving love

"God's eros for man," continues the encyclical, "is also totally agape. This is not only because it is bestowed in a completely gratuitous manner, without any previous merit, but also because it is love which forgives" (no. 10).

This quality also shines in the highest degree in the mystery of the cross. "Greater love has no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends," Jesus said in the Cenacle (John 15:13).

One could exclaim: a love does exist, O Christ, which is greater than giving one's life for one's friends. Yours! You did not give your life for your friends, but for your enemies! Paul says "one will hardly die for the righteous man -- though perhaps for a good man one will dare even to die. But God shows his love for us in that while we were yet sinners Christ died for us" (Romans 5:6-8).

However, it does not take long to discover that the contrast is only apparent. The word "friends" in the active sense indicates those who love you, but in the passive sense it indicates those who are loved by you. Jesus calls Judas "friend" (Matthew 26:50) not because Judas loved him, but because He loved Judas! There is no greater love than to give one's life for enemies, considering them friends: this is the meaning of Jesus' phrase. Men can be enemies of God, but God will never be able to be an enemy of man. It is the terrible advantage of children over fathers (and mothers).

We must reflect in what way, specifically, the love of Christ on the cross can help the man of today to find, as the encyclical says, "the orientation of his living and loving." It is a love of mercy, that excuses and forgives, which does not wish to destroy the enemy, but, if anything, enmity (cf. Ephesians 2:16). Jeremiah, the closest among men to the Christ of the Passion, prays to God saying: "let me see the vengeance upon them" (Jeremiah 11:20); Jesus dies saying: "Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do" (Luke 23:34).

It is precisely this mercy and capacity for forgiveness of which we are in need today, so as not to slide ever more into the abyss of globalized violence. The Apostle wrote to the Colossians: "Put on then, as God's chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassion, kindness, lowliness, meekness, and patience, forbearing one another and, if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other; as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive" (Colossians 3:12-13).

To have mercy means to be moved to pity (misereor) in the heart (cordis) in regard to one's enemy, to understand of what fabric we are all made and hence to forgive. What might happen if, by a miracle of history, in the Near East, the two peoples at war for decades, rather than blaming one another were to begin to think of the suffering of others, to be moved to pity for one another. A wall of division between them would no longer be necessary. The same thing must be said of so many other ongoing conflicts in the world, including those between the different religious confessions and Christian Churches.

How much truth there is in the verse of Pascoli: "Men, peace! In the prostrate earth, too great is the mystery."[10] A common fate of death looms over all. Humanity is enveloped in so much darkness and bowed under so much suffering that we must have some compassion and solidarity for one another.

5. The duty to love
There is another teaching that comes to us from the love of God manifested on the cross of Christ. God's love for man is faithful and eternal: "I have loved you with an everlasting love," says God to man in the prophets (Jeremiah 31:3); and again, "I will not be false to my faithfulness" (Psalm 89:34).

God has bound himself to love forever; he has deprived himself of the freedom to turn back. This is the profound meaning of the Covenant that in Christ became "new and eternal."

Questioned ever more frequently in our society is what relationship there might exist between the love of two young people and the law of marriage; what need love has, which is impulsive and spontaneous, to be "bound." Ever more numerous therefore are those who refuse the institution of marriage and choose so-called free love or simple, de facto, living together.

Only if one discovers the profound and vital relationship that exists between law and love, decision and institution, can one respond correctly to those questions and give young people a convincing reason to be "bound" to love forever and not to be afraid to make love a "duty."

"Only when the duty to love exists," wrote the philosopher who, after Plato, has written the most beautiful things about love, "only then is love guaranteed for ever against any alteration; eternally liberated in blessed independence; assured in eternal blessedness against any desperation."[11]

The meaning of these words is that the person who loves, the more intensely he loves, the more he perceives with anguish the danger his love runs. A danger that does not come from others, but from himself.

He knows well in fact that he is inconstant and that tomorrow, alas, he might get tired and no longer love or change the object of his love. And, now that he is in the light of love, he sees clearly what an irreparable loss this would entail, so he protects himself by "binding" himself to love with the bond of duty, thus anchoring in eternity his act of love in time.

Ulysses wanted to return to see his homeland and wife again, but he had to pass through the place of the Sirens that lured mariners with their singing and lead them to crash against the rocks. What did he do? He had himself tied to the vessel's mast, after having plugged the ears of companions with wax. Arriving at the spot, charmed, he cried out to be loosed to reach the Sirens, but his companions could not hear him and so he was able to see his homeland and embrace his wife and son again.[12] It is a myth, but it helps to understand the reason for "indissoluble" marriage and, on a different plane, for religious vows.

The duty to love protects love from "desperation" and renders it "blessed and independent" in the sense that it protects from the desperation of not being able to love forever. Show me some one who is really in love -- said the same thinker -- and he will tell you if, in love, there is opposition between pleasure and duty; if the thought of "having" to love for the whole of life brings fear and anguish to the lover, or, rather, supreme joy and happiness.

Appearing one day in Holy Week to Blessed Angela of Foligno, Christ said a word to her that has become famous: "I have not loved you for fun!"[13] Christ, indeed, has not loved us for fun. There is a gamesome and playful dimension in love, but it itself is not a game; it is the most serious thing and most charged with consequences that exists in the world; human life depends on it. Aeschylus compares love to a lion cub that is raised at home, "docile and tender at first even more than a child," with which one can even play but then growing up, is capable of slaughter and of staining the house with blood.[14]

These considerations are not enough to change the present culture that exalts the freedom to change and the spontaneity of the moment, the practice of "use and discard" applied even to love. (Life, unfortunately, will do so when at the end we find ourselves with ashes in hand and the sadness of not having built anything lasting with love). But that they at least serve to confirm the goodness and beauty of the choice of those who have decided to live love between man and woman according to God's plan and to attract many young people to make the same choice.

Nothing more remains for us but to intone with Paul the hymn to the victorious love of God. He invites us to attain with him a marvelous experience of interior healing. He thinks about all the negative things and critical moments of his life: tribulation, anguish, persecution, hunger, nakedness, danger and the sword. He contemplates them in the light of the certainty of the love of God and shouts: "But in all this we emerge triumphant thanks to him who loves us!"

Lift up your gaze; from your personal life move to consider the world that surrounds you and the universal human destination, and again the same joyous certainty: "I am convinced that neither death nor life...nor present things nor future things, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord" (Romans 8:37-39).

We reclaim his invitation, this Friday of the Passion, and we repeat his words for us while, before long, we adore the cross of Christ.

----------------------------------------

[1] H. Bloom, in the interpretative essay that accompanies M. Meyer's edition, The Gospel of Thomas, Harper, San Francisco, s.d., p. 125.
[2] R. Brown, The Death of the Messiah, II, New York, 1998, pp. 1092-1096
[3] See logion 114 in The Gospel of Thomas, ed, Mayer, p. 63); in the Gospel of the Egyptians, Jesus says: "I have come to destroy woman's work" (cf. Clemens of Al., Stromata, III, 63). This explains why The Gospel of Thomas became the gospel of the Manicheans, while it was severely combated by ecclesiastical authors (for example, by Hippolytus of Rome), who defended the goodness of marriage and of creation in general.
[4] Paradiso, V, 73-80.

[5] Benedict XVI, Enc. "Deus Caritas Est," 12.
[6] Cf. N. Cabasilas, Life in Christ, VI, 2 (PG 150, 645).
[7] Cf. Origen, Homilies on Ezekiel, 6,6 (GCS, 1925, p. 384 f).
[8] Cf. B. Pascal, "Pensées," 793, ed. Brunschvicg.
[9] Henryk Sienkiewicz, Quo Vadis, chapt. 33.

[10] Giovanni Pascoli, "I due fanciulli."
[11] S. Kierkegaard, Acts of Love, I, 2, 40, ed. by C. Fabro, Milan, 1983, p. 177 ff.
[12] Cf. Odyssey, XII.
[13] The Book of Blessed Angela of Foligno, Instructio 23 (ed. Quaracchi, Grottaferrata, 1985, p. 612).
[14] Aeschylus, Agamemnon, vv. 717 ff.

Excellent post. Warm thanks to Teresa. I've printed out the homily of Father Cantalamessa to push in the hands of the first person who confronts me (again!) with the "gospel" of Judas, Dan Brown and companies, "new reformation theologies" etc.

This does not come under the category of anti-Christian publications that Fr. Cantalamessa denounced in his Good Friday homily, but it is just as anti-Christian, and may sell as much as the anti-Jesus books. I am sure there is nothing this 19-year-old author can say that Cardinal Ruini or a good confessor cannot easily set straight. She is supported by a party of the Italian left that has been pushing an anti-Catholic agenda. Trust the media to make a big deal about her, as this Reuters story shows!
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Italian author on teen sex
takes on the Vatican
By Robin Pomeroy

ROME, 14 April 2006 (Reuters) - Italian author Melissa Panarello, who hit best-selling lists across the world with graphic stories of teenage sex, published a new book on Friday in which she said the Roman Catholic Church's code of morality was all wrong.

After "100 Strokes Of The Brush Before Bed", in which she described losing her virginity at 14, Melissa P. -- as she is known -- brought out her latest book on Good Friday, a major day in the Christian calendar marking the crucifixion of Jesus.

"In The Name Of Love", a treatise against the Church's preaching on sex, was written by the petite 20-year-old Sicilian in the form of an open letter to Italy's most senior cardinal, Camillo Ruini, defending abortion, divorce and homosexuality.

"This book was born of rage, a rage that was born about a year ago when the death of John Paul II and the election of Benedict XVI accentuated a religious fundamentalism which I thought only existed in the history books," she said.

Panarello, who has rejected criticism from politicians who say she has no right to preach to the Church, accused the Vatican of a narrow view of sex.

"Bishops talk a lot about life, but it doesn't seem to me that they know much about fundamental elements of life like sexuality," Panarello, who has sold more than 3 million books in 42 countries, told reporters. [Melissa, why don't you read Deus caritas est, which by the way, sold 1.5 million copies in one country alone, your country, in less than 2 months?]

She presented her book at the headquarters of Italy's Radical Party, which has battled for decades against what it sees at Church interference in political life and was behind campaigns in the 1970s to legalise divorce and abortion.[Aha!]

Last year, the party lost a referendum campaign to repeal Italy's strict laws on assisted reproduction after Ruini, head of the Italian bishops' conference, instructed Catholics to abstain. The referendum failed because not enough people voted. [BRAVO again, Cardinal Ruini, and bravi tutti, Italian Catholics who chose to abstain from voting!]

"Secularism is an issue which concerns all countries, but perhaps we feel it more in Italy because we have the Vatican," said Panarello, who still uses the abbreviated version of her name that secured anonymity when her debut book was published.

In her new book, she quotes comments by the Pope and passages of doctrine and challenges them with examples -- often from her adolescence in Sicily -- designed to show people cannot and should not live by the Church's teachings. [Which millions have had no trouble living by in ages past and hundreds of millions today.]

"The only thing we could do in our area, Cardinal Ruini, was love," says one extract from the book.

"The only thing that could make us feel alive was to give ourselves completely to the other, sliding under the sheets together with the stereo on high so our parents in the room next door couldn't hear the din we made when making love." [Get a real life, Melissa! Read a book, listen to Mozart, look around you, appreciate nature - there are so many things in God's world that can make you feel alive, not just sex! What a pity to have such a limited sensibility, such limited horizons! ]

Panarello asks Ruini to imagine being a teenager "who can't wait to soothe her hormones" trying to pluck up the courage to buy condoms in a village pharmacy.

"I want the right to speak because I'm fed up with keeping my head down every time my freedoms and civil rights are threatened," Panarello said at the presentation. [How are her freedoms and civil rights threatened by a statement of church principles on what it considers right and wrong?]

"I hope Ruini replies, because I am raising sincere questions."

Panarello has disowned the film "Melissa P", based on her first book, for failing to interpret the true feelings of adolescence.

ROME, 15 April 2006(AP)- The conservative religious group Opus Dei has asked for a disclaimer on the upcoming film based on the best-selling novel "The Da Vinci Code."

Opus Dei, portrayed as a murderous, power-hungry sect in the novel by Dan Brown, wrote in an April 6 letter to Sony Corp. that a disclaimer would show respect to Jesus and to the Catholic Church.

"Any such decision by Sony would be a gesture of respect toward the figure of Jesus, to the history of the Church and to the religious beliefs of viewers," Opus Dei wrote in the letter, which was posted on its Italian Web site.

"The Da Vinci Code" contends that Jesus married Mary Magdalene and had descendants, and that Opus Dei and the Catholic Church were at the center of a cover up.

A spokesman for Sony Pictures Entertainment declined to say whether the film would bear a disclaimer.

"We have no plans to reveal any details regarding what is or isn't in the film until the release," the spokesman, Jim Kennedy, said in a statement. Kennedy's statement said the film was "a work of fiction, and at its heart, it's a thriller, not a religious tract."

The film starring Tom Hanks is slated for release next month.

Opus Dei, which has close ties to the Vatican, has described "The Da Vinci Code" as offering a deformed image of the Catholic Church.

On Friday, the priest who preaches before the pope in Advent and Lent denounced what he called works that slander the church for profit.

"Christ is still sold, but not any more for 30 coins," the Rev. Raniero Cantalamessa said in his Good Friday homily before Pope Benedict XVI in St. Peter's Basilica, referring to Jesus' betrayal by the Apostle Judas before his crucifixion, "but to publishers and booksellers for billions of coins."

I know this is a Catholic Forum and that the faithful in St Peter's heard approximately the same this Easter, but Sky News has just shown the Anglican Archbishop of Canterbury (head of the Anglican church) taking a firm and reasoned stand (during the Resurrection Sunday service) on books such as The Da Vinci Code and other conspiracy related trash that is flooding the market and is gobbled up by a sensation-hungry public. Sky showed only a short exerpt which sounded promising. I wonder if this homily (or speech?) would be available on Internet.

Opus Dei Decries Mohammed Cartoon
Published in Catholic Magazine

ROME, APRIL 16, 2006 (Zenit.org).- Opus Dei described as "deplorable" the publication of a cartoon showing the prophet Mohammed in hell, published by the magazine Studii Cattolici, edited by one of its members.

The cartoon, based on a passage of "The Divine Comedy," shows Italian poets Dante Alighieri and Virgil on the edge of a circle of flames looking down on Mohammed, whose body is cut in half. Dante comments that the prophet is cut in half because of the division he brought to society.

The editor of the magazine, Cesare Cavalleri, is a member of Opus Dei.

In a statement released by Marc Carroggio, director of the Opus Dei press office in Rome, the prelature stated: "We consider it deplorable that this cartoon should appear in a magazine that has the name Catholic in its title. Its publication shows a lack of sensitivity and Christian charity."

"Although the Opus Dei has no responsibility for this magazine," the statement continued, "and each person is responsible for his or her own actions, we wish to ask forgiveness for the offense given."

The statement adds that "religions and their symbols should be respected and religious sensibilities should not be subjected to ridicule. The only road to peace and brotherhood is respect for others' convictions and practices. Such respect cannot remain at the level of theory, but should be expressed in concrete gestures and actions.
---------------------------------------------------------------

MAG6 - Have you tried checking the website of the Archbishop of Canterbury? I'd have checked for you except that I have server problems today and can't access any site other than those I already have open and any links that may be in those site.

[This book review is from the New York Times. Fr. Neuhaus is an admirer of Benedict and we have used several of his comments and articles in our forum.]

'Catholic Matters,' by Richard John Neuhaus
The Zeal of a Convert

Review by PATRICK ALLITT
Published: April 16, 2006

IS it possible to be a dogmatic Catholic yet still enjoy intellectual freedom? Richard John Neuhaus, a leading Catholic commentator and editor of the ecumenical journal First Things, says yes, by "thinking with the church." In his new book, he argues that American Catholics can emerge from the confusion that has afflicted their church in recent years and rediscover "the splendor of truth." They must, however, welcome the guidance of the old Pope, John Paul II, and the new one, Benedict XVI, while taking their church's doctrines and traditions as their starting point.

The proper work of Catholic intellectuals, Neuhaus believes, is to reformulate the unchanging doctrines (the "deposit of faith") and the church's non-doctrinal teachings in the light of new experiences and insights. If they encounter difficulties, the problem lies not with the church but with themselves. "I think for myself not to come up with my own teaching," he writes, "but to make the Church's teaching my own." Accepting church authority on faith is necessary, he admits, but all thinking rests on some kind of prior faith: "The allegedly autonomous self who acknowledges no authority but himself is abjectly captive to the authority of a tradition of Enlightenment rationality that finally collapses into incoherence."

Ever since the Second Vatican Council (1962-65), he argues, American Catholic liberals and radicals have undermined the great tradition. They captured American seminaries, university theology departments and several archdiocesan chanceries, then challenged ancient customs in the name of the "spirit of the council." Catholicism too often became an "aesthetic shambles," with a jarring vernacular liturgy and rotten music. Some Catholics even began to think and speak of their religion as therapeutic rather than true. A church already in crisis, he argues, then had to endure the awful sex scandals of 2002-3 and learn that some of its leaders had protected sexual predators.

Neuhaus, born in 1936, was not always critical of religious radicals; he was once among their leaders. As an outspoken Lutheran pastor in the 1960's, he worked for civil rights with Martin Luther King Jr., led religious opponents of the Vietnam War and even speculated, in his 1970 book "Movement and Revolution" (written with Peter Berger), on the need for a new American revolution to restore peace and racial justice. ("I affirm the right to armed revolution," he wrote.) But beginning in the 1980's, he began to believe in the superiority of Catholic claims over those of his native Lutheranism. He became a Catholic in 1990 and a priest in 1991, and now writes on the virtues of docility, obedience and prudence. The drama of the book comes from the fact that to Neuhaus, a lifelong controversialist, docility doesn't come easily. He is, rhetorically, as combative as ever.

Becoming a Catholic in this generation, as Neuhaus says, is no arrival in safe harbor; it is more like setting sail into rough seas. Controversies over sex are part of the trouble. Most American Catholics today, opponents of abortion included, feel entitled to use contraceptives despite a church teaching against them. Neuhaus says they are wrong. "When sex asserts its own rights to pleasure and the satisfaction of needs," he writes, "pleasure and satisfaction are divorced from responsibility, the bond of marriage is loosened, promiscuity is made easier, disordered forms of sexual expression are declared normal and unintended new life is deemed expendable. Those who contend that there is a logical continuum from artificial contraception to abortion are right, I believe, but they are probably in a distinct minority among Catholics today."

As for homosexuality, he argues that the church rightly resists the "dehumanizing idea that one's core identity is determined by one's sexual desires." People who have same-sex relations, he says, should be thought of not as homosexuals but as sinners; a Christian's duty is to hate the sin and love the sinner.

Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, now Pope Benedict XVI, was Neuhaus's preferred papal candidate last year. As Neuhaus tells it, Benedict is not the reactionary "enforcer" depicted in the press but a firm yet conciliatory figure who seeks common ground. He points out that Ratzinger and John Paul II negotiated for years with the dissident Hans Küng before reluctantly denying him the right to teach as a licensed Catholic theologian. Early in his pontificate, Neuhaus writes, Benedict invited Küng to dinner and four hours of conversation at the Vatican, evidence that the new pope "combines a gentle dialogical spirit with an uncompromising commitment to the truth entrusted to the Church."

As a Lutheran pastor's son, Neuhaus "came to know the utterly gratuitous love of God by which we live astonished." Leaving this religious home was wrenching, but intense study convinced him that he had to. Neuhaus defends his vision of Christianity with wit and sure-handed confidence. I doubt whether many Catholics of the type he criticizes will be convinced, but he makes an erudite case for the old teachings, while humanizing them in the context of his own biography.


Patrick Allitt's most recent books are "Religion in America Since 1945: A History" and "I'm the Teacher, You're the Student: A Semester in the University Classroom."

like the one above. I enjoy reading Neuhaus in First Things. This book could be something to read" : as well.

I found the sermon of Rowan Williams, of which the BBC showed a minute extract. On Easter Sunday the Archbishop's homily (sermon) began as follows:

"One of the ways in which we now celebrate the great Christian festivals in our society ia by a little flurry of newspaper articles and television programmes raking over the coals of controversy about the historical basis of faith."
The rest to be found at:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/4913634.stm

Thanks to American Papist for leading us to this essay on
americandigest.org/mt-archives/006301.php
The blogger is Gerard Van der Leun and the blog is not Catholic, but the writer is evidently very literate, has a wonderful way with words, and judging from a review of his recent titles, an eclectic observer of the cultural scene.
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April 16, 2006
Judas: A Saint for Our Seasons



Have you ever betrayed your promise?
Did you ever break a vow?
Have you traded love for money,
And are you happy now?

Did you kiss him in the garden,
And then abandon him to fate?
Is your final sin forgiven,
Or is it far too late?

WHEN IT COMES TO DISCOVERING new ways to cheapen the human soul, the "professional intellectuals" of our society have cornered the market. So it was last week when, timed carefully to cash in on the Easter holiday, the "serious" editors of National Geographic chose to release their gleanings from a sheaf of rags and call them "The Gospel of Judas."

Having risen through the echo chamber of "higher" education and survived the ruthless but quiet vetting process of their "profession," these editors knew full well that what they were putting out into the world was not a "gospel." They also knew that calling it a "gospel" would ensure greater attention and greater sales.

Beyond that, the editors, secular cultists all, also got a quiet little tingle by having, in their minds, "stuck it" to the Christian church once again. As usual, such secularists love to stick it to Christianity. Addicts of auto-erotic spiritual asphyxiation, their onanistic pleasure in these deeds is only enhanced if they can be performed during the most holy days of the Christian calendar. Only then can maximum profit and pleasure be assured.

This dark thrill of denigration has the immediate benefit of pleasingly confirming them in their own Church of Zero, and the secondary benefit of being much, much safer than, say, sticking it to Islam, a faith that enforces its demands for respect with bombs and beheadings, and whose central message to all cowards is "Don't mess with Muhammad."

The sad fact of our modern era is that if you denigrate Islam, you often have to bag up body parts and hose down the sidewalk, but when you denigrate Christianity the most you need to clean up after yourself is a warm washcloth.

Your gedanken experiment for today is to ask yourself, regardless of your religious beliefs, if the editors of National Geographic, being given an ancient manuscript that "proved" the Koran was nothing more than the blatherings of some ergot-besotted Bedouin who had munched one too many hallucinogenic plants while hanging out in a cave near Mecca, would have published the same "proof" as loudly and as broadly?

Would they have done so, or would they have issued a Press Release citing concerns for the "provenance" of the manuscript and their employees' safety? Regardless of your religious beliefs, you know the shameful answer.

But beyond these considerations, the publication of the "Gospel" of Judas has another, deeper and more lasting benefit to our neophytes of nihilism. It puts one of the final elements of their anti-morality play at center stage. It seeks to sanctify treason.

It was never a question of "if," but only a question of "when" our contemporary society would discover an avatar who would make treason acceptable. It only codifies the realities of their secular belief system. Treason against others or one's country has long been as common as adultery in this country. Like adultery the rate of treason is on the rise because, like adultery and similar forms of personal betrayal, it no longer has any consequences at all.

It is true that the federal crime of treason is not easily established and is rarely if ever charged. But the formal crime of treason is not what I am discussing here. Rather the more common, garden variety of treason as understood by plain people -- the rabid and unremitting hatred, expressed in word or deed, of the country that gives you the freedom express your hatred. It is the treason of the ingrate, the soul-dead, the politically perverted, and the bitter; it is, as Roger Kimball at The New Criterion discusses, the treason of the intellectuals and "the undoing of thought."

It's a fact of our self-centered contemporary existence that betrayal has become one of the common forces that shape our lives. For when our own desires ride us like a drunken demon lodged on our shoulders, betrayal is the first order of the day when others seek to thwart our desires, or even when others become a mere inconvenience to our wants and whims.

We've long permitted greater and greater levels of betrayal in our society. We've codified them as law, policy and custom as far as the wishes of the individual are concerned. It is no longer sophisticated or fashionable to speak of selfishness as betrayal. That word is so harsh when, after all, we are only speaking of "differing needs," aren't we.

When the betrayal of others is glossed over with phrases such as "I needed to be me," or "I needed my space," or "I needed more money,"or "We were just on different paths," then the elevation of this disease of the soul from the betrayal of another into the larger realm of treason against all is only a question of degree.

The problem is that shame, a vestigial thing in many shrunken souls, persists, and shame must be driven out of the soul if the secular is to thrive. Both betrayal and treason are still weighted down by a lingering sense of shame within at the same time they are made safe from the onus of blame without. Both are permitted by our cults of personal freedom and "sensible" selfishness, but both are formed of dark matter and not easily expunged from one's soul no matter how reduced it may have become.

There was, perhaps, only one moment in history when humans "knew not what they did." In all other times we know, at the deepest level, exactly what we do when we betray another, or others, or ourselves, or our country. We know it clearly and so we bury the ugly deed deeply. Still it persists, remains and rots in the tomb of our souls.

A wiser culture called this "sin" and sought to have it confessed and forgiven as meaningless in the shadow of the greatest sacrifice. Our therapeutic culture calls it "guilt" and seeks to palliate and expunge it so that we may live a guilt-free life regardless of our acts. More and more of us live in the latter culture and seek a life forever free from sin, from guilt, from the consequences of our betrayals. And yet this final freedom eludes us.

What is needed, in this secular age of self-intoxication, is a Saint who will remit our sins of betrayal; who will by his very existence sanctify treason. And who better fits this role than the man who betrayed the greatest love for the smallest change, Judas?

The worshipers of the Church of the Self need Judas today more than they need Christ, and they need Christ more than they can know. They need Him so much that they are compelled to reject Him utterly lest their shabby Church be seen as it is, a hovel made of mud and wattle, of empty objects, shabby dreams and promises broken. A statue of Judas would blend right into the niche above their television; a household god whose only requirement is an offering of silver, from time to time, or a shopping spree at the mall to secure his love and blessing; our "Saint Judas of Perpetual Extortion."

Betrayal is a common catechism in the Church of the Self. Hymns to Me are the hosannas it hurls at an empty heaven. The politics of such a church require as First Things a rejection of all things not of, by, and for the self. A religion or a country of the people, by the people, and for the people is high on the list of things to be abhorred since it requires an allegiance that is other than to the self.

The Church of the Self effectively mandates treason, and we see it now manifested daily in the bright robes of "unstifled dissent" which shroud an increasingly vicious anti-Americanism that has its roots, not in reasoned criticism, but in unreasoned hate. We hear the hate but what we have not been allowed to see is the treason behind it.

That is now "changed, changed utterly."

Now our traitors to God and Country have found a sheaf of rags that "prove" that the greatest treason was really "all good;" that Judas was really the greatest friend Jesus ever had and was, with a kiss, doing him the greatest favor ever done.

Treason, done with the kiss of "my personal freedom," proves that you do not really hate your country, you love it. You are, in the final analysis, your country's best friend. In these "new" old tales about Jesus we read that Judas betrayed the Son of God because Jesus told him to do it. Really? Or did his betrayal come, not from any request that may or may not have been made, but from humanity's persistant lust to sin freely and without even the thin penalty of remorse? Was this final treason done because this sin had been secretly blessed by God, or for the sheer dark thrill of asserting the self at the expense of life in the light?

"I betrayed my friend, because he gave me the freedom to do so. Feel my love for him."

"I betrayed my country because it gave me the freedom to do so. Feel my love for it."

Black is white. Hate is Love. Slavery is Freedom. Treason is Loyalty. That last phrase fits right in to the secular catechism, doesn't it? All it needs to become holy writ is an avatar, a solid historical personage with the power to turn darkness into light, lies into truth, and betrayal into something that was, in the final analysis, "all good."

Saint Judas, step right up to the Gates, ring that bell, and don your halo -- you the man.
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MAG6 - Thanks for the link to the Archbishop of Canterbury's Easter Homily. Did you notice Amy Welborn cited parts of it on her blog?

[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 18/04/2006 10.36]

is really quite stunning. Thanks Teresa. Wish it could be reproduced in some of the world's newspapers....
No, I haven't seen the Amy blog. By the way, personally I don't think the Rowan Williams sermon of a very high order. I was just glad that at least he touched on the subject. The blogger in the post above really didn't hold back and I love some of his images for today's society and its "intellectuals".
PS: can't open the link I provided for the Canterbury sermon. It always happens when I post a link here. Sorry.

This is from John Allen's 4/21/06 Word from Rome:


Benedict XVI blesses a monstrance from St. Dominic's Parish
in New Orleans, La., on March 15. Speaking is Fr. Christopher Nalty,
a priest of the New Orleans archdiocese who works in the Congregation
for Clergy, accompanied by pilgrims from the archdiocese

Occasionally in the rush of travel and breaking news, certain items I've flagged for "The Word From Rome" fall through the cracks. Here's one, however, that despite being more than a month old is still worth recording.

On March 15, Benedict XVI expressed his solidarity with the victims of Hurricane Katrina in the United States by blessing a monstrance recovered from St. Dominic's Parish in New Orleans, located in one of the hardest hit areas of the city.

A group of parishioners had dug up the monstrance from several feet of mud, where it had remained for three weeks while the eight-foot-high flood waters receded. The group feared it was ruined, but weeks of painstaking restoration eventually brought it back to mint condition.

Pilgrims from New Orleans brought the monstrance to Rome, where Benedict XVI had agreed to bless it with Holy Water at the conclusion of a Wednesday General Audience. Afterwards, he also gave the pilgrims the white zucchetto he was wearing in exchange for a new one they had purchased at the famed Roman clerical shop Gammarelli's.

Now dubbed the "Hope Monstrance," the monstrance and zucchetto, along with photos of the event, are set to make the rounds of parishes and schools in New Orleans, serving the twin purpose of promoting Eucharistic Adoration and offering a symbol of the city's rebirth.

I think my oldest son (the priest) has met Fr. Nalty. My son graduated from Notre Dame Seminary in New Orleans although I think Fr. Nalty did most if not all his seminary work in Rome. My youngest son went down to New Orleans several times right after the hurricane and took some photos of the destruction including photos of a small Catholic Church, St. Robert Bellarmine, which was a total wreck inside. It was very sad to see the altar all messed up, a water line up to the foot of the crucifix on the wall behind the altar, statues toppled, and the pews all cracked, bleached out, and in disarray. Dozens and dozens of Catholic churches and schools were destroyed or nearly so.

I thought you would have something to say about the monstrance story, Benefan, but I didn't realize the connection was even closer through your son and Fr. Nalty!

Actually, Fr. Nalty is also mentioned in a book called, The New Men, about young men entering the priesthood. They tell how they got interested in it and about their experience in the seminary, kind of a book form of TV's "God and the Girl".

[This definitely falls under the category of ODD. As the archbishop points out, if they want to grant "human" status to apes, why can't they grant human status to humans--embryos, the unborn?]


Socialists petition Spanish congress to recognize ‘human rights’ of apes

Madrid, Apr. 25, 2006 (CNA) - In response to reports that Socialists in Spain have asked the congress in that country to include apes in the category of persons, Archbishop Fernando Sebastian of Pamplona said such attempts to be “progressive” were “ridiculous” and that calling for human rights for apes was like calling for humans to be granted the rights of bulls.

Archbishop Sebastian also criticized the government for “not granting the rights of persons to the unborn” and instead “giving them to monkeys.” “This society is either ridiculous or disjointed,” he said.

The leaders behind the movement plan to inform lawmakers about the current situation of apes at zoos and circuses in the country and will ask them to support their campaign demanding such animals be granted “the moral and legal protection that currently only human beings enjoy.”

Last September, Representative Francisco Garrido of the Socialist party applauded two scientific studies which “appeared, almost simultaneously, in order to remind us of the evolutionary proximity and genetic similarity we have with our relatives, the great apes.”

“Monkeys should be granted the rights of apes,” Archbishop Sebastian continued, “but not human rights, as that would be like saying humans should be granted the rights of bulls. I don’t get it,” he said.