Another worthy piece from the June 05 Touchstone: Frederica Mathewes-Green on the natural meaning of human sexuality, including this nugget from what was probably a sidebar in the print issue but is tacked on to the end of the online article:
My generation somehow didn’t think that would happen. We thought we would always be the younger generation. We thought we’d always set the standard for what it means to be sexy and gorgeous. We made fun of old married people, the ones who got hitched, settled down, had kids, had mortgages, and thirty years later were having old-married-people sex with each other.
It turns out that, even if you make fun of people like that, you still get old anyway. The alternative is not staying young forever; the alternative is being just as old, and not having formed any lasting relationship, and going to bed most nights by yourself. You’re not having old-married-people sex; you’re not having sex with anybody.
Ouch!
Much was made the past few weeks about the decision by Francis Beckwith - philospher, professor at Baylor University and blogger at the excellent Right Reason blog - to convert to Catholicism. Beckwith, who was raised as a Catholic but left the faith long ago and was president of the Evangelical Theological Society (ETS) when he decided to return to Catholicism (he has since resigned his post and left the ETS).
As inclined as I am to do back-flips or maybe a fancy end-zone dance at this victory for Christ and His Church, I also recognize that if we were to lose, say, Janet Smith to the Evangelicals, we wouldn't look on it very kindly if they were to gloat.
That said, it is a great thing and we Catholics should be happy.
My reason for blogging this belatedly is having stumbled across the June 2005 issue of Touchstone Magazine which contains an essay from Dr. Beckwith reflecting upon the teachings of then recently departed Pope John Paul II entitled, wait for it, "Vatican Bible School: What John Paul II Can Teach Evangelicals."
It would seem that he learned very much indeed.
Zenit has a brief biography of Charles of St. Andrew, who will be canonized on Sunday, making PF very happy.
*COUGH* TSO blogs about a couple of books I wouldn't mind seeing in a few weeks. *COUGH*
"For one thing, Catholics old enough to remember the pre-Vatican II Mass know that it’s as capable of being celebrated in drab, uninspiring fashion as any other rite." - John Allen
Allen does say something I agree with - namely that those anxious for the old rite will be disappointed when they see that it can be celebrated irreverently and abusively. I suppose some might say that at least there won't be any "hippie music", though I would caution them not to underestimate the lengths to which liturgists will go to undermine all things traditional.
Not that I'm against this motu proprio business, not at all. I think it's immensely important, just not in the way you might think. My hope is that a wider availability of the traditional rite will cause both to influence each other over the next few decades so that the next missal will preserve what is best from each of them and will be an elegant and organic development of traditional Catholic worship.
Hopefully I'll be alive to see it.
John Allen disappointingly plays to his audience in the NY TImes op-ed on the Pope's anticipated motu proprio loosening the restrictions on using the 1962 Missal for Mass.
This is shameful language. Not the long arc part - that's true and it's a good thing. I mean the part where he audibly exhales in exasperation and casts a pox upon both the Blefescuian trads and Lilliputian liberals.
He's right of course, in that most Catholics don't care, won't know what the motu proprio is (or even what that Latin phrase means) and won't notice anything different when it is released. What he doesn't address is whether those are good things. It is obviously not good and a sign of spiritual malaise that the average Catholic is ignorant about his spirtual patrimony, but Allen here laughs it off as a big-end/little-end squabble.
Is the Mass the source and summit of our Catholic lives? If so, is it a concern that many Catholics probably couldn't tell you what the Real Presence is? Or that others find the Mass at their local parish so spiritually uninspiring that they worship at schismatic traditionalist chapels? These are serious questions that touch on the center of the Catholic faith, not peripheral issues. What Allen dismisses as a food-fight between partisan "activists" is actually a discussion about the very substance of Catholicism. By liberalizing use of the old missal, the pope will be making an emphatic statement in that conversation.
Sure, Allen doesn't have to be an apologist, but with a slot in the NY Times, Allen had a teaching moment. He could have taken any number of angles that would have demonstrated the mystery and importance of the Eucharistic celebration in the Catholic life. Instead, he proudly proclaimed how embarrassed he is that his crazy uncles won't shut up.
Thanks for nothing.
Not that it's any of my business, but since Rick Garnett asked what we should think about the reunion of the Russian Orthodox Church with the Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia, I thought I'd direct him to Daniel Larison, a convert to orthodoxy who was baptised in the ROCOR, who has unappreciative comments about the Nadia Kizenko article that sparked his question. Larison's blogging on the subject are here, here, here and here.
Since that's a lot to read, I'll summarize some of his key points: authentic communion is an unqualified good; the USSR is no more, so the issue of collaboration with the Soviets is moot; it's silly to think that Putin has gained any kind of control over ROCOR members (of whom there are really only about 150,000 worldwide); and finally, of course the process wasn't democratic (I add that as Catholics, we should see that as a good thing).
Listening to a talk show program discussing Rudy Giuliani, I hear a long-time NYC journalist describe Giulani as "very clear in his vision, very strong in his will... overly loyal to incompetent cronies and not very good about listening from below but imposing his own personal views down the line."
This is all strangely familiar...
Then I hear, "Donald Rumsfeld has nothing on Bernie Kerik."
Giulani '08: Like Bush, only worse!
They're coming in a little heavier now
- John Peter Pham, writing for PBS: The Key to the Keeper of the Keys - I haven't read this one yet, but it should be the most interesting of the bunch cited here.
- The UK Times is, with reservations, impressed, though the reviewer is for some reason astonished (astonished!) that Benedict to an extent accepts some of the results of modern exegesis.
- Time Magazine profiles a rabbi mentioned prominently in the book.
- John Allen had a review back when the Italian edition came out. This week, he blogs Cardinal Martini's warm comments at the release of the French edition.
- Reviewer for the UK Times online can't believe the Pope is Catholic.
Bloggers:
- Father Joseph O'Leary has a review too lengthy for me to read, but others may want to give it a shot. I'll give you a hint of his take: "One must declare groundless Benedict’s appeal to “canonical exegesis”, an exercise in biblical theology whereby any text from the Old or the New Testament can serve to explain any other biblical text."
- Zadok had Initial Thoughts when the Italian edition first came out and has blogged much since.
- At dotCommonweal, Lawrence Cunningham enjoyed the book and has several observations.
Synopses:
More to come, I'm sure!
"[L]ibertarians who actually begin to approach something recognisably like a libertarian view of politics (which might involve some reduction in the size and power of the state) are exceedingly few in number, while those who would like to unite the worst instincts of the parties of greed, sex and death are rather more numerous." - Daniel Larison
Shorter Peter Singer: Saving very premature babies only makes future retards. Let them die!
The anti-war Republican was profiled by the New Republic here. It's a decent intro if you don't know much about him, but the question I have to ask is: did Michael Crowley really have to waste Congressman Paul's lunch hour just to snare a whopping four quotes? Did Crowley forget to bring his notebook to lunch?
This is somewhat belated, but it just came online. The March issue of the Italian monthly 30 Days just came online, and the whole issue consists of tribute to Pope Benedict XVI on the occasion of his 80th birthday written by various cardinals from around the world.
Check it out here.
My wife and many others will surely appreciate this feature from the NY Journal News on Alice von Hildebrand.
This pretty much leaves me speechless.
Entropia Universe offers its players a debit card that can be used at real-world atms to withdraw up to $3,000 a month from their supply of virtual cash.
An estimated 500,000 Chinese gamers are "gold farmers" who perform menial tasks inside online worlds to create virtual goods to sell to players in the West.
A typical gold farmer earns $65 to $100 a month.
No pun intended, but some people inhabit a completely different world.
Wow. Since I forswore pro basketball several years ago, I'd forgotten what a pompous and ignorant man Bill Walton is. Back when my beloved Bullies were making their runs, he never missed an opportunity to bash Jordan and Pippen and to downplay the Bulls' dominance. EVERY GAME he announced, he found an opportunity to brag about how he was superior to MJ or really anybody else on the court.
For all that however, the most ludicrous thing he ever said was against Charles Barkley. I honestly don't remember the specific game, but it had to be the '97 playoffs. Charles got embarrased on D and Walton summoned all of his definitive false authority to proclaim that "Charles Barkley was rated the worst defender in the history of the NBA!"
Every single person in my dorm room (and there were probably a dozen of us crammed in there because my roommate had the biggest TV on our floor and we had a two-TV set-up so we could watch sports and play N-64 at the same time) uttered some version of "What the f*** is he talking about?" knowing that he was of course referring to no actually existing poll except maybe one he took of his three brain cells in the split second before he said that nonsense. My roommate, however, turned to me and deadpanned: "Has he never seen Dickie Simpkins play?"
Priceless
PS In other basketball-related bloggage, I think it's A-OK for whites to root for the few white boys there are in the NBA. The same year as the Walton incident, every black dude on my floor could tell you what Tiger Woods shot at the Masters. I conducted a poll: excluding mini-golf, not one of them had ever swung a golf club.* There's absolutely nothing wrong with that. Even though I don't follow the game anymore, I'm happy deep down inside any time a Hispanic player makes it at any level.
*For the record, neither have I.
I haven't done one of these in a while:
Newer stuff:
- Two from the New York Times:
"My First Lesson in Motherhood" - A truly moving story about a woman and her husband, who upin arriving in China to pick up the baby girl they're adopting, find out they're getting more than they bargained for.
"Genetic Testing + Abortion = ???" - The practice of sex selection and aborting babies that have specific deformities makes even some ardent pro-choicers nervous. Unfortunately, the horse has already left the gate on this one since, as the author mentions, 90 % of Down Syndrome babies never get to breather their first breath. Still, it's nice to see people take notice even at this late hour.
- Two from City Journal:
"The Incredible Shrinking Father" - One of the more disturbing byproducts of the radical and near-uncontrolled rise of artificial reproduction is the disappearing father. (And given the tremendous amount of harmful byproducts of the rise, this is saying something.) I can look back over the people I've known in my life and it is simply true that the worst off on any number of indicators were the ones with dads who were absent or messed-up. Now we're intentionally starting kids off with this handicap.
"Save the Catholic Schools!" - A look at the immense good that urban Catholic schools do. I'm ambivalent about public funding of religious schools, but it's nice to see Catholic schools get props for the work they do in our nation's cities.
- "Atheists with Attitude" - A review of the New Atheists (with special emphasis on Christopher Hitchens). Confining his criticism to the typical hand-wringing over the in-your-face brashness of the NAs, Anthony Gottlieb wonders why they can't all be gentle and condescending to us stupid religious sheep, like David Hume.
Older stuff:
- Pope Benedict on the conversions of St. Augustine from his visit to Pavia last month. Does it get any better than that? Seriously, does it?
- "The Conservative Convert" - Eric Scheske gives us a spiritual sketch of Russell Kirk. It's about 4 years old, but I just discovered it and it's a fantastic read.
A blogger I'm not familiar with considers the danger of separating Maria Montessori's Catholic sensibility from her pedagogical method. From my limited readings, I understand his concerns, but I don't know enough about Montessori teaching in practice to say whether I agree or disagree.
The WaPo has a book review of a sympathetic treatment of the current reproduction scene.
While the two men are dashing across the country to attend their daughters' birth, Nelson starts hemorrhaging. Doctors race to stop the bleeding and ultimately perform an emergency hysterectomy to save her life. An unfortunate accident? Perhaps. But Nelson, we learn, was overweight. She had delivered her own children by Caesarean section and was at increased risk for uterine rupture. Yet the doctors and prospective fathers still agreed to transfer four embryos to her, creating a predictably dangerous pregnancy....
For this reader, the most poignant stories of Everything Conceivable concerned the peripheral players: David Nelson, Ann's husband, who stood photographing Okun and Ethington's newborn daughters while his wife lay nearly dying from their birth...
The reviewer's criticism is that "it is in not dwelling on these accidents-in-waiting that Mundy's book falls short." It seems inconceivable (ha!) that somebody could treat this subject without dwelling on the potential for real harm, but such is the case with unquestioning cheerleaders of reproductive technology.
If you want a serious look at the problems and complications brought about by the rapid change in this field, the Institute for American Values released a report last September entitled "The Revolution in Parenthood: The Emerging Global Clash Between Adult Rights and Children’s Needs." The report is an overview of what's happening (which, 8 months later is almost outdated due to the rapid speed of developments) and what's in store for the future.
The Holy Father held a rally with the youth of Brazil and Latin America on Friday. These addresses have a special place in my heart, so here's the whole English translation from Zenit:
My dear young friends!
"If you would be perfect, go, sell what you possess and give to the poor … and come, follow me" (Mt 19:21).
1. I was particularly eager to include a meeting with you during this my first journey to Latin America. I have come to inaugurate the Fifth General Conference of the Bishops of Latin America which, according to my wish, will take place at Aparecida, here in Brazil, at the Shrine of Our Lady. It is she who leads us to the feet of Jesus so that we can learn his teachings about the Kingdom, and it is she who stirs us up to be his missionaries so that the people of this "Continent of Hope" may have full life in him.
In their General Assembly last year, your Bishops here in Brazil reflected on the theme of the evangelization of youth and they placed a document into your hands. They asked you to receive that document and add your own reflections to it in the course of the year. At their most recent Assembly, the Bishops returned to the theme, enriched now by your collaboration, in the hope that the reflections and guidelines proposed therein would serve as a stimulus and a beacon for your journey. The words offered by the Archbishop of São Paulo and the Director of Pastoral Care for Young People, both of whom I thank, confirm the spirit that moves your hearts.
While flying over the land of Brazil yesterday evening, I was already anticipating our encounter here in the Stadium of Pacaembu, anxious to extend to all of you a warm Brazilian embrace and to share with you the sentiments which I carry in the depths of my heart, and which are very appropriately indicated to us in today's Gospel.
I have always felt a very special joy at these encounters. I remember especially the Twentieth World Youth Day at which I was able to preside two years ago in Germany. Some of you gathered here today were also present! It is an emotional memory for me on account of the abundant fruits of the Lord's grace poured out upon those who were there. Among the many fruits which I could point to, there is little doubt that the first was the exemplary sense of fraternity that stood as a clear witness to the Church's perennial vitality throughout the world.
2. For this reason, my dear friends, I am certain that today the same impressions I received in Germany will be renewed here. In 1991, during his visit to Mato Grosso, the Servant of God Pope John Paul II, of venerable memory, said that "youth are the first protagonists of the third millennium … they are the ones who will be charged with the destiny of this new phase in human history" (16 October 1991). Today, I feel moved to make the same observation regarding all of you.
The Christian life you lead in numerous parishes and small ecclesial communities, in universities, colleges and schools, and most of all, in places of work both in the city and in the countryside, is undoubtedly pleasing to the Lord. But it is necessary to go even further. We can never say "enough", because the love of God is infinite, and the Lord asks us -- or better --requires us to open our hearts wider so that there will be room for even more love, goodness, and understanding for our brothers and sisters, and for the problems which concern not only the human community, but also the effective preservation and protection of the natural environment of which we are all a part. "Our forests have more life": do not allow this flame of hope which your National Hymn places on your lips to die out. The devastation of the environment in the Amazon Basin and the threats against the human dignity of peoples living within that region call for greater commitment in the different areas of activity than society tends to recognize.
3. Today I would like to reflect on the text we have just heard from Saint Matthew (cf. 19:16-22). It speaks of a young man who ran to see Jesus. His impatience merits special attention. In this young man I see all of you young people of Brazil and Latin America. You have "run" here from various regions of this Continent for this meeting of ours. You want to listen to the words of Jesus himself -- spoken through the voice of the Pope.
You have a crucial question -- a question that appears in this Gospel -- to put to him. It is the same question posed by the young man who ran to see Jesus: What good deed must I do, to have eternal life? I would like to take a deeper look at this question with you. It has to do with life. A life which -- in all of you -- is exuberant and beautiful. What are you to do with it? How can you live it to the full?
We see at once that in the very formulation of the question, the "here" and "now" are not enough; to put it another way, we cannot limit our life within the confines of space and time, however much we might try to broaden their horizons. Life transcends them. In other words: we want to live, not die. We have a sense of something telling us that life is eternal and that we must apply ourselves to reach it. In short, it rests in our hands and is dependent, in a certain way, on our own decision.
The question in the Gospel does not regard only the future. It does not regard only a question about what will happen after death. On the contrary, it exists as a task in the present, in the "here" and "now", which must guarantee authenticity and consequently the future. In short, the young man's question raises the issue of life's meaning. It can therefore be formulated in this way: what must I do so that my life has meaning? How must I live so as to reap the full fruits of life? Or again: what must I do so that my life is not wasted?
Jesus alone can give us the answer, because he alone can guarantee us eternal life. He alone, therefore, can show us the meaning of this present life and give it fullness.
4. But before giving his response, Jesus asks about a very important aspect of the young man's enquiry: why do you ask me about what is good? In this question, we find the key to the answer. This young man perceives that Jesus is good and that he is a teacher -- a teacher who does not deceive. We are here because we have the very same conviction: Jesus is good. It may be that we do not know how to explain fully the reason for this perception, but it undoubtedly draws us to him and opens us up to his teaching: he is a good teacher. To recognize the good means to love. And whoever loves -- to use a felicitous expression of Saint John -- knows God (cf. 1 Jn 4:7). The young man in the Gospel has perceived God in Jesus Christ.
Jesus assures us that God alone is good. To be open to goodness means to receive God. In this way, he invites us to see God in all things and in everything that happens, even where most people see only God's absence. When we see the beauty of creation and recognize the goodness present there, it is impossible not to believe in God and to experience his saving and reassuring presence. If we came to see all the good that exists in the world -- and moreover, experience the good that comes from God himself -- we would never cease to approach him, praise him, and thank him. He continually fills us with joy and good things. His joy is our strength.
But we can only know in an imperfect, partial way. To understand what is good, we need help, which the Church offers us on many occasions, especially through catechesis. Jesus himself shows what is good for us by giving us the first element in his catechesis: "If you would enter life, keep the commandments" (Mt 19:17). He begins with the knowledge that the young man has surely already acquired from his family and from the synagogue: he knows the commandments. These lead to life, which means that they guarantee our authenticity. They are the great signs which lead us along the right path. Whoever keeps the commandments is on the way that leads to God.
It is not enough, however, simply to know them. Witness is even more important than knowledge; or rather, it is applied knowledge. The commandments are not imposed upon us from without; they do not diminish our freedom. On the contrary: they are strong internal incentives leading us to act in a certain way. At the heart of them we find both grace and nature, which do not allow us to stay still. We must walk. We are motivated to do something in order fulfil our potential. To find fulfilment through action is, in reality, to become real. To a large extent, from the time of our youth, we are whatever we want to be. We are, so to speak, the work of our own hands.
5. At this point, I turn once more to you, young people, because I want to hear you give the same response that the young man in the Gospel gave: all these I have observed from my youth. The young man in the Gospel was good. He kept the commandments. He was walking along the way of God. Jesus, therefore, gazing at him, loved him. By recognizing that Jesus was good, he showed that he too was good. He had an experience of goodness, and therefore of God. And you, young people of Brazil and Latin America, have you already discovered what is good? Do you follow the Lord's commandments? Have you discovered that this is the one true road to happiness?
These years of your life are the years which will prepare you for your future. Your "tomorrow" depends much on how you are living the "today" of your youth. Stretching out in front of you, my dear young friends, is a life that all of us hope will be long; yet it is only one life, it is unique: do not let it pass it vain; do not squander it. Live it with enthusiasm and with joy, but most of all, with a sense of responsibility.
Many times, we who are pastors feel a sense of trepidation as we take stock of the situation in today's world. We hear talk of the fears of today's youth. These fears reveal an enormous lack of hope: a fear of death, at the very moment when life is blossoming and the young are searching to find how to fulfil their potential; fear of failure, through not having discovered the meaning of life; fear of remaining detached in the face of a disconcerting acceleration of events and communications. We see the high death rate among young people, the threat of violence, the deplorable proliferation of drugs which strike at the deepest roots of youth today. For these reasons, we hear talk of a "lost youth".
But as I gaze at you young people here present -- you who radiate so much joy and enthusiasm -- I see you as Christ sees you: with a gaze of love and trust, in the certainty that you have found the true way. You are the youth of the Church. I send you out, therefore, on the great mission of evangelizing young men and women who have gone astray in this world like sheep without a shepherd. Be apostles of youth. Invite them to walk with you, to have the same experience of faith, hope, and love; to encounter Jesus so that they may feel truly loved, accepted, able to realize their full potential. May they too may discover the sure ways of the commandments, and, by following them, come to God.
You can be the builders of a new society if you seek to put into practice a conduct inspired by universal moral values, but also a personal commitment to a vitally important human and spiritual formation. Men and women who are ill-prepared for the real challenges presented by a correct interpretation of the Christian life in their own surroundings will easily fall prey to all the assaults of materialism and secularism, which are more and more active at all levels.
Be men and women who are free and responsible; make the family a centre that radiates peace and joy; be promoters of life, from its beginning to its natural end; protect the elderly, since they deserve respect and admiration for the good they have done. The Pope also expects young people to seek to sanctify their work, carrying it out with technical skill and diligence, so as to contribute to the progress of all their brothers and sisters, and to shed the light of the Word upon all human activities (cf. Lumen Gentium, 36). But above all, the Pope wants them to set about building a more just and fraternal society, fulfilling their duties towards the State: respecting its laws; not allowing themselves to be swept along by hatred and violence; seeking to be an example of Christian conduct in their professional and social milieu, distinguishing themselves by the integrity of their social and professional relationships. They should remember that excessive ambition for wealth and power leads to corruption of oneself and others; there are no valid motives that would justify attempting to impose one's own worldly aspirations -- economic or political -- through fraud and deceit.
There exists, in the final analysis, an immense panorama of action in which questions of a social, economic and political nature take on particular importance, as long as they draw their inspiration from the Gospel and the social teaching of the Church. This includes building a more just and fraternal society, reconciled and at peace, it includes the commitment to reduce violence, initiatives to promote the fullness of life, the democratic order and the common good and especially initiatives aimed at eliminating certain forms of discrimination existing in Latin American societies: avoiding exclusion, for the sake of mutual enrichment.
Above all, have great respect for the institution of the sacrament of Matrimony. There cannot be true domestic happiness unless, at the same time, there is fidelity between spouses. Marriage is an institution of natural law, which has been raised by Christ to the dignity of a sacrament; it is a great gift that God has given to mankind: respect it and honour it. At the same time, God calls you to respect one another when you fall in love and become engaged, since conjugal life, reserved by divine ordinance to married couples, will bring happiness and peace only to the extent that you are able to build your future hopes upon chastity, both within and outside marriage. I repeat here to all of you that "eros tends to rise . . . towards the Divine, to lead us beyond ourselves; yet for this very reason it calls for a path of ascent, renunciation, purification and healing" (Encyclical Letter Deus Caritas Est , 5). To put it briefly, it requires a spirit of sacrifice and renunciation for the sake of a greater good, namely the love of God above all things. Seek to resist forcefully the snares of evil that are found in many contexts, driving you towards a dissolute and paradoxically empty life, causing you to lose the precious gift of your freedom and your true happiness. True love "increasingly seeks the happiness of the other, is concerned more and more with the beloved, bestows itself and wants to 'be there for' the other" (ibid., 7) and therefore will always grow in faithfulness, indissolubility and fruitfulness.
In all these things, count upon the help of Jesus Christ who will make them possible through his grace (cf. Mt 19:26). The life of faith and prayer will lead you along the paths of intimacy with God, helping you to understand the greatness of his plans for every person. "For the sake of the kingdom of heaven" ( Mt 19:12), some are called to a total and definitive self-giving, by consecrating themselves to God in the religious life -- an "exceptional gift of grace", as the Second Vatican Council expressed it (cf. Decree Perfectae Caritatis, 12). Consecrated persons, by giving themselves totally to God, prompted by the Holy Spirit, participate in the Church's mission, bearing witness before all people to their hope in the heavenly Kingdom. I therefore bless and invoke divine protection upon all those religious who have dedicated themselves to Christ and to their brothers and sisters within the vineyard of the Lord. Consecrated persons truly deserve the gratitude of the ecclesial community: monks and nuns, contemplative men and women, religious men and women dedicated to apostolic works, members of Secular Institutes and Societies of Apostolic Life, hermits and consecrated virgins. "Their existence witnesses to their love for Christ as they walk the path proposed in the Gospel and with deep joy commit themselves to the same style of life which he chose for himself" (Congregation for Institutes of Consecrated Life and for Societies of Apostolic Life, Instruction Starting Afresh from Christ, 5). I pray that in this moment of grace and profound communion in Christ, the Holy Spirit will awaken in the hearts of many young people an impassioned love, prompting them to follow and imitate Jesus Christ, chaste, poor and obedient, totally devoted to the glory of the Father and to love for their brothers and sisters.
6. The Gospel assures us that the young man who went to meet Jesus was very rich. We may understand this wealth not only on the material level. Youth itself is a singular treasure. We have to discover it and to value it. Jesus appreciated it so much that he went on to invite the young man to participate in his saving mission. He had great potential and could have accomplished great things.
But the Gospel goes on to say that this young man, having heard the invitation, was saddened. He went away downcast and sad. This episode causes us to reflect further on the treasure of youth. It is not, in the first place, a question of material wealth, but of life itself, and the values inherent in youth. This wealth is inherited from two sources: life, transmitted from generation to generation, at the ultimate origin of which we find God, full of wisdom and love; and upbringing, which locates us within a culture, to such an extent that we might almost say we are more children of culture and therefore of faith, than of nature. From life springs freedom, which manifests itself, especially in this phase, as responsibility. There comes the great moment of decision, in a twofold choice: firstly, concerning one's state of life, and secondly concerning one's profession. It is about providing an answer to the question: what do I do with my life?
In other words, youth appears as a form of wealth because it leads to the discovery of life as a gift and a task. The young man in the Gospel understood that his youth was itself a treasure. He went to Jesus, the good Teacher, in order to seek some direction. At the moment of the great decision, however, he lacked the courage to wager everything on Jesus Christ. In consequence, he went away sad and downcast. This is what happens whenever our decisions waver and become cowardly and self-seeking. He understood that what he lacked was generosity, and this did not allow him to realize his full potential. He withdrew to his riches, turning them to selfishness.
Jesus regretted the sadness and the cowardice of the young man who had come to seek him out. The Apostles, like all of you here today, filled the vacuum left by that young man who went away sad and downcast. They, and we, are happy, because we know the one in whom we believe (cf. 2 Tim 1:12). We know and we bear witness with our lives that he alone has the words of eternal life (cf. Jn 6:68). Therefore, we can exclaim with Saint Paul: Rejoice always in the Lord! (cf. Phil 4:4).
7. My appeal to you today, young people present at this gathering, is this: do not waste your youth. Do not seek to escape from it. Live it intensely. Consecrate it to the high ideals of faith and human solidarity.
You, young people, are not just the future of the Church and of humanity, as if we could somehow run away from the present. On the contrary: you are that young man now; you are that young man in the Church and in humanity today. You are his young face. The Church needs you, as young people, to manifest to the world the face of Jesus Christ, visible in the Christian community. Without this young face, the Church would appear disfigured.
My dear young people, soon I shall inaugurate the Fifth Conference of the Bishops of Latin America. I ask you to follow its deliberations attentively; to participate in its discussions; to receive its fruits. As was the case with earlier Conferences, the present one will also leave a significant mark on the next ten years of evangelization in Latin America and the Caribbean. No one must stay on the sidelines or remain indifferent in the face of this ecclesial initiative, least of all you young people. You are full members of the Church, which represents the face of Jesus Christ for Latin America and the Caribbean.
I greet the French speakers who live on the Latin American continent, and I invite them to be witnesses of the Gospel, and to be actively engaged in the life of the Church. My prayer is addressed to you young people in a particular way: you are called to build your lives on Christ and on fundamental human values. Everyone should feel invited to work together in order to build a world of justice and peace.
My dear young friends, like the young man in the Gospel who asked Jesus: "What good deed must I do, to have eternal life?", you are all seeking ways to respond generously to God's call. I pray that you may listen to his saving words and that you may become his witnesses for the peoples of today. May God pour out upon all of you his blessings of peace and joy.
My dear young people, Christ is calling you to be saints. He himself is inviting you and wants to walk with you, in order to enliven with his Spirit the steps that Brazil is taking at the beginning of this third millennium of the Christian era. I ask the Senhora Aparecida to guide you with her maternal help and to accompany you throughout your lives.
Praised be our Lord Jesus Christ!
This made it's way around St. Blogs a week or so ago, but I just got to see it for the first time.
Wow.
His parents blog is here.
... and I stumbled across the remains of St. Matthew.
Well, it wasn't me; it was some other guy.
I guess we can rule out any chance of visiting the boy's patron anytime soon.
Fasinating article, courtesy of Amy.
Atheist Mother Theresa-hater Christopher Hitchens debates Christian theologian Doug Wilson at the Christianity Today Website:
I actually think Hitch won the first round (form-wise, not content-wise of course), Wilson's response is pretty sloppy except for this section:
You conclude by objecting to the sovereignty of God, saying that the idea makes the whole world into a ghastly totalitarian state, where believers say that God (and who does He think He is?) runs everything. I would urge you to set aside for a moment the theology of the thing and try to summon up some gratitude for those who built our institutions of liberty. Many of them were actually inspired by the idea that since God is exhaustively sovereign, and because man is a sinner, it follows that all earthly power must be limited and bounded. The idea of checks and balances came from a worldview that you dismiss as inherently totalitarian. Why did those societies where this kind of theology predominated produce, as a direct result, our institutions of civil liberty?
Wilson takes the second round, though.
John Allen is traveling with the pope and seems to be live-blogging the trip. Good stuff as usual.
Of course you've mastered Sudoku. I mean, c'mon! The ones in the newspaper are so lame!
How about Kaukauro? Well, if you can even find one in your local paper, you're lucky. Even then, Kaukauro puzzles often have multiple possible answers and sometimes you simply HAVE to guess? Yuck!
Fear not, people with too much time on your hands! I present to you the Sudoku-Kaukauro hybrid!
It doesn't get much press, because the case is so fundamentally stupid it should have ended decades ago and reporting honestly on it would pubicly shame NOW and other pro-choice groups. As Jill Stanek notes, "This has always been a free speech case." It's as simple as that.
Yet the charade went on. Early in the trial, they actually had a mafioso-style tree diagram with a picture of Joe Schiedler at the top and branches going down to hundreds of other pro-life activists. Schiedler, you see, was the don, controlling his foot soldiers and sending them out to strong-arm women entering clinics.
I call this a sort-of victory because it is a monumental injustice that good people trying to save the unborn have been subjected to 21 years of legal harrassment by deep-pocketed groups trying to lawyer them out of existence. Briefly put, this ruling says you can't treat sidewalk counselors like the mob. That's nice, but 21 years and three trips to the highest court in the land is overkill. Meantime, Joe Schiedler lost his house over this.
Congratulations to Joe, to the folks at Operation Rescue and to all other pro-life activists who now have a strong legal precedent to smack over the heads of abortion proponents who try to intimidate them.
For those wanting more details, here's a timeline of the case, found at Jill Stanek's page.
Meet the rising star of the Democratic Party:
Lovely.
The review is interesting enough, and should give anybody with any convictions nightmares. We got rid of one Tom DeLay, and here comes another.
One qualm I have is the scapegoating of lefty bloggers for Democratic infighting, as in, "liberal bloggers... saw Emanuel as a triangulating sellout.." and, "after the election bloggers would point to a blue wave in state legislatures as an early sign of success."
That sentiment was undoubtedly expressed at the Daily Kos, but it's also the nub of a long-time issue between the "liberal" and "moderate" wings of the Democratic party.
The February English version of the Italian journal 30 Days has just come online and has five stoties on the plight of Iraqi Christians who have fled Iraq and have been taken in with open arms by Syria. It should shame us that the Baathist regime in Damascus is doing more for Iraqi Christians than the U.S.
Guy Sorman has a feature in the recent City Journal that claims the 21st century will not belong to China, as is widely believed. It's a great piece, with excellent reporting on the difficult lives of the Chinese, but his conclusion simply isn't supported by the facts he reports.
Here is an excerpt from his conclusion:
Of course, a fifth scenario is possible, the one that can’t be predicted. But those in the West who think that the future belongs to China should think again.
Why? China is growing economically as more and more Western businesses are sending manufacturing jobs over there, and Sorman himself points out that radical social upheaval isn't likely, which means there is a practically endless supply of cheap, docile labor (not to mention a source of military conscripts should they decide to do a little empire building). Meantime the other major powers (except, arguably, the U.S.) are waning. What's to stop China from dominance?
Our only hope is to make our one export to China our educational system.
Monday marks 10 years since his installation as Archbishop of Chicago. He reflects on lessons learned for the Sun Times.
The Tribune also has an interview and a story.
UPDATE: The trib also has a pretty neat slideshow.
The New York Times gives us booze and smokes to enjoy.
Oh and they also throw in a book review by Dave Barry.
Will Saletan of Slate is very hand-wringingly pro-choice.
Critics complain that these bills seek to "bias," "coerce," and "guilt-trip" women. Come on. Women aren't too weak to face the truth. If you don't want to look at the video, you don't have to. But you should look at it, and so should the guy who got you pregnant, because the decision you're about to make is as grave as it gets.
The lead-in to an eye-opening article about the war in Iraq. I remember thinking when Woodward's last book came out that finding Kissinger's fingerprints on the war was the worst news for this country in the 6 1/2 years of Bush's presidency. Didn't work out so well for Iraq either.
I'm not too personally invested in the French elections, but the cartoon at the top of this story is too good to ignore.
One new, two old from Touchstone.
New, from the May 2007, Allan Carlson takes us on a brief tour of 400 years of Protestant history on the question of artificial contraception.
Old, from May 2005, but available online for the first time now, John F. Kippley addresses illegitimacy and Anthony Esolen turns the Good Samaritan around: how we can treat people like they are our neighbor when we don't have any?
But now the culture of personal achievement and illusory autonomy—which is to say, the culture of total work, that has turned Sunday into at best a brief restorative for the infinitely more important Monday, if Sunday is not already Monday along with all the other days of the week—this paltry culture, I say, has atoned for removing the father from the home by removing the mother, too. The results are ghost towns, rich in things (and not even so dreadfully rich in those, either, once the unnecessary bills and the taxes are paid) and poor in soul.
No children crisscross the backyards of their playmates, because they have no playmates, nor do they even know the names of the people who own the yards. Nor are there the shouts of children to cheer the heart; those who have been graciously allowed to live, live under a sort of parole, whereby they are trucked before breakfast far away to a gaily postered miserable asylum, and then are trucked back to the groomed lawn and flophouse just before sundown.
If some delinquent child should venture onto the street before his male or female parent has returned from the commissariat, and bust up his knees by falling from his bicycle, he can cry all he wants. Nobody will hear him. The society of women is no more. There are no mothers who are not your own mother, and your own mother is not around, and, if she is around (let the truth be told), often enough she is no great shakes either. You are an appendage, or appendix, to her career, and you know it.
Jim McGreevey considering Episcopal priesthood.
As far as I can tell, this is not a hoax.
During May, Fides News is going to celebrate by publishing a series of 18 articles on Mary's apparitions at Lourdes followed by 6 articles on Marian shrines in Africa.
Is there anything left to be said about any of the evangelical atheists?
At this crucial moment in American history, we should all stand by our president.
