This coming Sunday the Church celebrates The Solemnity of Corpus Christi. In yesterday’s post we set the stage for a transition from the very public ministry of Jesus establishing his identity and mission to Israel – to one in which the disciples will more deeply explore Jesus’ identity in order to discover their part in his divine mission. We pick up the account as the apostles return from their first mission. Continue reading
Most people know St. Anthony of Padua as the patron saint of lost and stolen articles, but have you ever wondered why he is that particular patron saint?
The Patron Saint of Lost Things. The reason for invoking St. Anthony’s help in finding lost or stolen things is traced back to an incident in his own life. As the story goes, Anthony had a book of psalms that was very important to him. You have to remember this was before the age of the printing press and so all books were of great value, and besides the value of the book, the psalter had the notes and comments he had made to use in teaching students in his Franciscan Order. Continue reading
This coming Sunday the Church celebrates The Solemnity of the Most Holy Body and Blood of Christ, popularly known by its truncated Latin name of Corpus Christi. Each year on this solemnity the gospel is taken from one of the miraculous feeding of the multitudes. This year the reading is from the Gospel of Luke 9:10-17 when five loaves and two fish become the starting point for feeding more than 5,000 people. Continue reading
We have all kinds of solemnities, feast days, and other special days in the church year. We commemorate happenings in the life of Christ: Mary’s visit from Gabriel, the birth of Jesus, the arrival of the maji, the Baptism of our Lord, the Transfiguration when the glory of Christ is revealed, Palm Sunday, the empty tomb and Resurrection of Easter, the glorious Ascension, the explosive coming of God’s spirit to the church at Pentecost … and then we have Holy Trinity Sunday. And suddenly it is like we have moved from these great events in the life of Christ, and now…. tadah!! We are celebrating… well… what are you celebrating this Sunday? Take a moment and make a list of the possibilities. Continue reading
THY WILL BE DONE – Are we completely giving ourselves over to God’s will? And embracing the high adventure of His plan, over our plan, wherever that may lead?
LOVE OUR PEOPLE – Are we loving our people above all else and as if they are Jesus in disguise? Are we detached from things, money, power, honor and comfort, so we are free to love people most fully? Are we helping each person take one step closer to reaching their own dreams in this world and becoming a saint in the next?
DELIGHT and SURPRISE – Are we doing everything that is expected of us…plus more? And delivering joyful, radical service that delights and surprises?
KEEP IT SIMPLE – Do we relentlessly simplify our processes and solutions, so our product and organization stays “lean and mean,” rather than cluttered or slowed by the unimportant? Are we continually asking, “What would this look like if it were simple?”
RADICAL FOCUS – Do we know who we are? Are we focused on the mission? Are we willing to give up everything non-essential? Are we able to cut through the distractions, noise, and busy-ness and just do the hard work that really matters?
GIVE MY BEST – Am I being a good steward of God’s gifts, working hard, taking initiative, and always giving my best?
CONTINUAL IMPROVEMENT – Is this making us better versions of ourselves? Are we committed to excellence, personal accountability, understanding the why, and getting better at our craft every single day? Are we more disciplined, smart, virtuous, prayerful, faithful, and effective today than we were yesterday?
BE GENEROUS – Are we generous with our gratitude, time, patience, mercy, forgiveness, optimism, and kindness? When in doubt, be generous.
GREATER THAN THE SUM – “I can do things you cannot, you can do things I cannot. Together we can do great things.” — Saint (Mother) Teresa
LEAVE ROOM – Work is a means to an end, not an end itself, and should not be all-consuming. Is our work sanctifying us and benefiting others? Is it nourishing our families, rather than competing with them? Is it enabling and supporting leisure and a rich contemplative life, with plenty of room for silence, prayer, worship and life’s higher things?
Today is the Memorial of St. Barnabas one of the prominent Christian disciples in Jerusalem. According to Acts 4:36, Barnabas was a Cypriot Jew. In Acts 11:22, the Jerusalem church sent Barnabas to Antioch to proclaim the word of God. While there he apparently heard that St. Paul, former persecutor of Christians, was in Tarsus. Acts 9 tells of the conversion of Saul in the memorable Damascus Road story. What Acts leaves out and St. Paul provides in Galatians 11, after the experience in Damascus, for three years, Paul was in “Arabia” (Gal 1:17) In the first century this refers to the Syro-Arabian desert, farther north, which includes portions of modern-day Syria and Jordan; likely the region of the Nabataean Arabs, east and south of Damascus. Continue reading
This coming Sunday is Holy Trinity Sunday. The selection of the first reading from the Book of Proverbs can be seen as a celebration of Wisdom even in the primordial moment of creation. It is as though the scribes are saying, “Look, we are celebrating in our day, what the Lord has provided for us since the dawn of creation.” The dawn when the Spirit hovered over the chaos. Continue reading
In today’s gospel we hear a warning from Jesus about anger and the words we use.
“You have heard that it was said to your ancestors, You shall not kill; and whoever kills will be liable to judgment. But I say to you, whoever is angry with his brother will be liable to judgment, and whoever says to his brother, Raqa, will be answerable to the Sanhedrin, and whoever says, ‘You fool,’ will be liable to fiery Gehenna.” (Mt 5:21-22)
In Hebrew the word “raqa” means “empty” or “foolish.” Here is a story from the Talmud about “raqa.” Continue reading
This coming Sunday is Holy Trinity Sunday. In the previous two posts we considered the larger tradition of the Wisdom books of the Old Testament, as well as the Book of Wisdom specifically. Today we will endeavor to focus on the first reading for the upcoming Sunday liturgy.
Many commentaries refer to Proverbs 8:22-31 as a celebration of Wisdom even in the primordial. It is as though the scribes are saying, “Look, we are celebrating in our day, what the Lord has provided for us since the dawn of creation.” This shift of focus is marked by the change from “I” (vv.12, 17) to the Lord (vv. 22–31). The section begins with “the Lord” and ends with benê ʾādām (“I found delight in the sons of men”), the climax and aim of God’s creative works.
This section, unified thematically by wisdom’s connection with God’s creative works, falls into two equal stanzas. The first pertains to her origin before creation (vv. 22–26); the second, to her presence and celebration during the creation (vv. 27–31). These two halves are linked by a thematic chiasm:
A, wisdom’s origins (vv. 22–23);
B, the negative state of the creation (vv. 24–26);
B′, positive presentation of the creation (vv. 27–29);
A′, wisdom’s celebration of humanity’s origins (vv. 30–31).
22 “The LORD begot me, the first-born of his ways, the forerunner of his prodigies of long ago; 23 From of old I was poured forth, at the first, before the earth. 24 When there were no depths I was brought forth, when there were no fountains or springs of water; 25 Before the mountains were settled into place, before the hills, I was brought forth; 26 While as yet the earth and the fields were not made, nor the first clods of the world.
The first stanza establishes that wisdom’s has precedence in rank and dignity over the rest of the creation. Wisdom’s precedence is both qualitative (i.e., begotten, not created) and temporal (i.e., existing “before” any other creature). As a result she is competent to counsel and authoritative when she speaks. The stanza’s first strophe represents Wisdom’s begetting in the primordial past (vv. 22–23), and its second strophe represents her begetting before the sea (v. 24), land (vv. 25–26), and implicitly sky (v. 27).
Begotten, Not Created. The language of “begetting,” “created,” and the like has, historically, been the source of great controversies. Beginning at least as early as the apologist Justin Martyr (A.D. 125), Christians, almost without exception, identified Sophia/Wisdom in Proverbs 8 with Jesus Christ. This almost universal interpretation of the passage embroiled the church in controversy about the precise nature of the relationship between God and Christ. From the time of Origen (ca. A.D. 180) patristic exegesis interpreted Wisdom’s birth in Proverbs 8:25 as Christ’s continual coming into existence. Not all agreed with such understanding. Led by the Alexandrian deacon Arius, a group called the Arians held that there was a time when the Son “was not” and thus the Son was created as God’s most exalted creature. They concluded this using Prov. 8:22, “the LORD begot/created me,” as their primary text. In contrast, orthodox Christians held that Christ was of the same substance as the Father, the true Son of God, and not a creature. Orthodoxy interpreted Prov. 8:22 by explaining that the ever-existing Son was “created” when he became incarnate. According to his second strategy, the “creation of Wisdom was actually the creation of Wisdom’s image in creatures as they were brought into being.”
Before all else. The expression “the first born”(rēʾšît) can also be translated as “in the beginning” which has appeal to the Christian ear given the Prologue of the Gospel of John. Verses 22-25 point to Wisdom (Sophia) as perhaps the agent or creative force of all creation. The creation is first described a “what there was not” – depths, fountains, mountains, hills, and fields
Many have noted the movement from the subterranean depth (v. 24a) to the springs leading to the surface (v. 24b) to the visible mountains rooted in the depths (v. 25a) to the hills (v. 25b) to the land and its fields (v. 26) to the sky and its horizon (v. 27)..Sea, land, and sky depict the entire universe of the living. All of this is described with reference to human habitation: from the oceans, which is most remote (v. 24), to mountains, which is less remote (v. 25), and climatically to land, where human beings dwell (v. 26). The latter is progressively intensified from “land” to “open fields” to “arable soil.”
It is during the month of June when the Supreme Court of the United States (SOCTUS) releases its decisions on the cases it has agreed to hear. There are five cases that are expected to be significant for life in these United States – and for those who carry the mantle “pro-life.” Continue reading
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