Daily Mass - the twenty-second Sunday of Ordinary time

I must make a quick note. Thursday the 27th of August was the calendar date of the dedication and consecration of our Cathedral church in Nottingham in 1844. You may learn the history of the building by clicking this link. This, of course, was some six years before the Holy Father Pius IX erected once more a Catholic hierarchy of bishops in England and Wales, so there were English bishops acting as vicar generals without diocesan structures, administering the Catholics in these countries on behalf of the Holy Father himself in Rome. The Cathedral was thus dedicated by the vicar general of the Midland district, Monsignor Nicholas Wiseman, who later became archbishop of Westminster. Monsignor Wiseman brought to Nottingham the relics of the Apostle Saint Barnabas, from Rome; hence, the dedication of the Cathedral. I only mention all of this because the liturgical celebration would have been today, if it weren't for it being Sunday. It was celebrated as a solemnity at the Cathedral, and some of you may have seen that on the Cathedral livestream channel.

Mass was offered today for the people of the Parish. Let's have a quick look at today's Mass readings. As usual, I expand on the rather short paragraphs I have placed into the newsletter. The gospel reading today follows on from that of last Sunday, when Christ gave Peter the keys to the Kingdom of God. Peter became the rock and foundation of the Church and I suppose we could say that it went a little to his head, for he now attempts to interrupt Christ's solemn procession to the Cross and to death. 

"From that time onwards Jesus began to make it known to His disciples that He must go up to Jerusalem, and there, with much ill usage from the chief priests and elders and scribes, must be put to death, and rise again on the third day. Whereupon Peter, drawing Him to his side, began remonstrating with Him; 'Never, Lord,' he said; 'no such thing shall befall Thee.' At which He turned round and said to Peter, 'Back, Satan; thou art a stone in my path; for these thoughts of thine are man’s, not God’s.'" - Gospel of S. Matthew, 16: 21-23

Of course, like the other Apostles, in the presence of the majestic, miracle-working person of Christ, Peter was expecting the Messiah to be inevitably enthroned in a new Jewish kingdom, driving out in time the dreadful rule of foreigners, Greek and Roman. Judging from their reactions to the crucifixion, death and resurrection, later on, they probably did not understand or recognise the words 'and rise again on the third day.' So, when Christ in today's reading starts to speak of being abused by the Saduccees in Jerusalem and killed, Peter and the others probably were unable to bear it. Hence, Peter's protest: 'No, Lord, surely this could never, ever, happen to YOU!' Surely, the Jewish priests of Jerusalem could never so profane the holy!

Last week (on Monday), we honoured the holy Apostle Saint Bartholomew on his feast day, Saint Bartholomew who ended up being flayed alive and crucified in Armenia. The Apostles in time realised that suffering was inevitable, torture and death would come to them also, and they would thus follow the instruction of Christ in the gospel today: 'Whoever wishes to save his life will lose it...' One of the big philosophical questions has always been: Why does a good God allow so much suffering? It is the question we face in various forms in society today, where people try to convince us that there is no God. It often shuts us up, but it shouldn't. We may feel very like Jeremiah in the first reading today:

"Lord, Thou hast sent me on a fool’s errand; if I played a fool’s part, a strength greater than mine overmastered me; morn to night, what a laughing-stock am I, every man’s nay-word! Long have I prophesied, and still I clamoured against men’s wickedness, and still cried ruin; day in, day out, nothing it earns me, this divine spokesmanship, but reproach and mockery. Did I essay to put the Lord out of my thoughts, and speak no more in his name, all at once it seemed as though a raging fire were locked in my bosom, pierced my whole frame, till I was worn out with it, and could bear no more." - Jeremiah, 20: 7-9

We too are ridiculed in our message about a loving God, because 'good people suffer.' It's very like Peter's complaint: nobody wants to see suffering and death and, as evangelists, we don't do what's necessary to make the Christians message (the Good News) heard. But the Church has a theology of suffering, and continues to point at the Man on the Cross, visible in our churches. If God Himself will suffer for us, then we can too, and even happily. We have to demonstrate to society that there is no escaping the mortal condition, no matter how we try with our new technologies, and that attempting to escape the inevitable with, for example, euthanasia is futile, for the real possibility of suffering in hell afterwards still exists. Meanwhile, there is value in suffering in the Christian mind, for it draws us nearer to Christ on that Cross, for he said that 'Whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.' Whoever suffers and dies for Christ will find in an extraordinary way that he has saved his life. And when suffering comes to us, as it will do to the majority of us, we may (as Catholics still say today) 'offer it up,' and so unite it to the suffering of Christ Himself and make it worth our while.

The Sacred Heart

A few months ago, I spent some time getting through the overwhelmingly long diaries of the Mercy Sister, Saint Maria Faustyna Kowalska, who received the visions and the message of the Divine Mercy, in the middle of the twentieth century. As I went through it, I noted with surprise that it was very similar indeed to the old Sacred Heart visions and message from the seventeenth century, by the Visitation Sister, Saint Margaret Mary Alacoque. This prompted me to find her autobiography, which happily is much, much, much shorter (pictured above). I shall spend a few days running through it. I've already reached some way in and I'm most impressed with this beautiful soul. I shall be mounting her image in the side-bar of this blog, above the other visionaries I've placed there. 

The seven penitential psalms

Having just read through a biography of Saint Augustine of Hippo soon after his feast day on Friday the 28th of August, I was delighted to hear of his personal affection for the seven penitential psalms that the Church for century has reserved in her books. It is quite difficult to say sorry, when you want to; it's hard to find the right words. Happily, the old Hebrew mind gives you all the words you need. Like any other Saint, Augustine thought it very necessary that we maintain a constant spirit of penitence and, in his last agony, he had these psalms written large on sheets and hung about his death bed. We may still find books today that list the seven psalms. I've put the lot on a page attached to this blog, and you can find it here.

Saint Augustine, Doctor of the Church

The Friday last was the feast day of the great Saint Augustine of Hippo, so I set out to read the biography of this Saint presented by Pope Benedict in his homilies on the Doctors of the Church. 

Augustine is a popular Saint, his most well-known work being his very affective autobiography, called the Confessions, in which he sets out to demonstrate his conversion to Catholicism - the movement from human weakness, in great humility, to a grace-filled procession into the bosom of the Church. He is the greatest of the Latin Fathers, so voluminous in his writing, so much of which has survived (the greatest body of all the work of the early Fathers) and still furnishes us regularly today in the divine Office of prayer. He came from the province of Africa (near Carthage), extremely energetic and a high intellectual, this bishop still spent most of his time with the simplest of the Christians in his care. He is seen today as a great philosopher in the Western tradition, so is often referred to in a non-religious context. He may also have begun the tradition of autobiography as we understand it today, with the Confessions, which includes a detailed narrative of his conversion, through the influence of the great bishop Saint Ambrose of Milan and the tireless prayers of his mother, Saint Monica. Disenchanted with the Manichaeans, Augustine moved to Rome and then to Milan, plying his trade as a superlative teacher of the science of rhetoric. In Milan, his life changed when he attempted to learn rhetoric from the bishop Saint Ambrose, but ended up embracing the religion of his mother. She was able to witness his baptism in AD 387, before dying on the trip back to Africa. He tried to begin a monastic life at Hippo and was ordained in AD 391, setting up the rule that even today is followed by the communities of Augustinian canons, but he was quickly called to be bishop of Hippo in AD 395. He became one of the greatest forces in the Church at the time, opposing vigorously the heresies linked to Manichaeism, Donatism and then Pelagianism. He died in great distress in AD 430, even as Hippo was being besieged by the Germanic Vandals, who had invaded Roman Africa through Spain; he did not live to see the final capture of the city or the devastation of the province.

Augustine left behind very much for our intellectual and spiritual development. Aside from his autobiographical Confessions (famous and a bestseller for centuries), there are hundreds of letters, hundreds of homilies, and these are only what is extant; much more has been lost. Philosophy, apologetics, catechetics, doctrine, morality, the monastic life and scriptural exegesis are also included in the corpus. There is also the City of God, a large, twenty-two-book work treating the Christian view of politics and religion, that followed the sack of Rome by the Goths in AD 410, a grave shock for Roman citizens, who had not experienced this shame for over 800 years. His fifteen-book work on the Holy Trinity needs mention also, and his apologetic work on Christian doctrine, both of which have, together with the City of God, formed Western culture. He left nothing in death but the library of his works, with which Holy Church is indeed enriched. 

Daily Masses - Mass intentions, daily prayer intentions

The intentions I wish to mention specifically are Friday's (Mgr. Hargreaves(+)), Sunday's (Mick Prendergast(+) and Paul Bridges (+)), an today's (Michael Prendergast(+)). May eternal rest be granted unto them, and life eternal.

I have now implemented default intentions for every day of the week, which give some indication of my personal prayer intentions during the course of the week. They are as follows, and are subject to change in the future. Every intention requested by a parishioner or parishioners for a specific day replaces the default intention below:

• Sunday: the people of the Parish
• Monday: the Holy Father and the Bishop
• Tuesday: the Faithful departed of the Parish, specifically (they are remembered on Sundays, too)
• Wednesday: those sick or otherwise suffering, remembering especially the dying
• Thursday: Vocations to the priesthood and the Religious life
• Friday: Persecuted Christians (at the moment, various African and the Pakistani communities)
• Saturday: All who work in the Health Service, in particular doctors and nurses

Today is the feast day of the holy Apostle Saint Bartholomew, aka. Saint Nathaniel/Nathanael, a personal favourite. During my brief stay at the English College in Rome, I often passed by the church that contains his relics; it stands on the Tiber island, a short walk from the College. His martyrdom was memorably different from the other Apostles, for he was flayed alive and then crucified in Armenia. Before that, he was the Apostle to India, until he was joined (probably) by the Apostle Saint Thomas, who has left a more lasting memorial of his presence in south India in the Thomaschristian churches of south India. Bartholomew is known to have carried a copy of the Hebrew-language Gospel of Saint Matthew with him to India. When the philosopher Saint Pantaenus later visited India in the third century to debate the Brahmans, a community of Christians showed this to him. Because of the horrible manner of his torture before he died, Bartholomew is often presented to us in Latin iconography as without his skin and either holding his skin out or wearing it as a type of toga. Two pictures will demonstrate this.

Reading through the first letter of Saint John

 First reactions. It's not a very long letter at all, and has many features from the Gospel of Saint John, such as the theology of light and dark, good and evil and attachment to Christ. It is marvellously black and white, the constant theme being that if you love God, you keep His commandments (also a feature of his Gospel), and that if you don't keep those commandments and claim to love God, you're a bit of a liar. The whole letter is a warning against idolatry and apostasy, big problems at the time of its writing, because of the increasing vehemence of the persecuting Roman authorities as they attacked the early Christians in various places for 'impiety' - that is, the abandonment of the state religion and particularly the worship of Caesar. Appropriately, John ends with the stern warning:

"Beware, little children, of false gods." - I John 5: 7

This has been a very good introduction, as intended by the reading plan, for the reading of the whole Bible.

Reading through the whole Bible in a year

I don't mean cover-to-cover, I rarely mean that. It takes a great deal of perseverance to do something like that. But it is possible to tackle the Bible in portions, doing old testament and new testament texts continuously daily. I accomplished it once, about fifteen years ago, when I was young and enthusiastic, and I used a programme plotted by an American organisation called Catholics Come Home Network. I think I'll start again now, and I suspect that it may be different after the seminary programme that I have completed since. 

On this page is a full set of instructions and suggestions and several reading plans, if you would like to launch out on this ambitious programme. I shall use this one. These plans do require you to thumb through your own bible, which is very nice. But people who like using their phones, tablets, etc. have the benefit of the excellent Verbum app, which pulls out the relevant texts from the Bible and presents it ready-made every day, and that may be easier.

Let's see how far I get. Progress will be demonstrated on this page.

Daily Mass - the Assumption of our blessed Lady

It is rather odd, since the Holy Father in Rome marked the Assumption on its calendar day yesterday, but in England and Wales the Assumption of our blessed Lady is transferred to today, so that we lose a whole Sunday of readings. But it gives us a good opportunity to meditate upon the virtues of our blessed Lady, whom the Apostles and early Fathers identified with several extracts of the Old Testament, such as our Psalm 44(45) at Mass today, but also in the stories of the great women of the Israelite nation, such as Deborah, Judith and Esther. For example, there is the story of the triumph of the Hebrew lady Judith, who slayed a dangerous enemy of her people and so rescued them from ruin. Like Mary.

"When the victorious [Hebrew] army returned, with the spoils taken from their enemies, there was no counting the cattle and the pack-beasts and the plunder of all sorts; none, high or low, but was enriched with the booty. And now the high priest Joacim came to Bethulia, with all that were his fellow elders at Jerusalem, asking to see Judith; and when she answered his summons, all with one voice began to extol her; "Thou art the boast of Jerusalem, the joy of Israel, the pride of our people; thou hast played a man’s part, and kept thy courage high. Not unrewarded thy love of chastity, that wouldst never take a second husband in thy widowhood; the Lord gave thee firmness of resolve, and thy name shall be ever blessed. And to that all the people said Amen. Scarce did thirty days suffice for the men of Israel to gather the Assyrian spoils. Among these, all that proved to be Holofernes’ own went to Judith herself, gold and silver, clothes and jewels, and furniture of every sort; all these the people handed over to her, keeping high festival, while man and maid, wed and unwedded, played flute and harp together." - Judith, 15: 8-15

"Daughters of kings come out to meet thee; at thy right hand stands the queen, in Ophir gold arrayed. (Listen, my daughter, and consider my words attentively; thou art to forget, henceforward, thy own nation, and the house of thy father; thy beauty, now, is all for the king’s delight; he is thy Lord, and worship belongs to him.) The people of Tyre, too, will have its presents to bring; the noblest of its citizens will be courting thy favour. She comes, the princess, all fair to see, her robe of golden cloth, a robe of rich embroidery, to meet the King. The maidens of her court follow her into thy presence, all rejoicing, all triumphant, as they enter the king’s palace!" - Psalm 44: 10-16

These scriptural types of the Blessed Virgin are plainly in the mind of Saint John, exiled on the island of Patmos, when he composed the book of Apocalypse (Revelations), and painted the picture in our first reading today (Apocalypse, chapter 11) of the great sign in the heavens, of the Woman adorned with the sun, standing upon the moon and crowned with stars, and her battle against a dragon, who designs to revenge itself against her children - us. Soon enough, later this month, we shall honour her again in the feast of the Queenship of Mary (August the 22nd).

"And now, in heaven, a great portent appeared; a woman that wore the sun for her mantle, with the moon under her feet, and a crown of twelve stars about her head. She had a child in her womb, and was crying out as she travailed, in great pain of her delivery. Then a second portent appeared in heaven; a great dragon was there, fiery-red, with seven heads and ten horns, and on each of the seven heads a royal diadem; his tail dragged down a third part of the stars in heaven, and flung them to earth. And he stood fronting the woman who was in childbirth, ready to swallow up the child as soon as she bore it. She bore a son, the son who is to herd the nations like sheep with a crook of iron; and this child of hers was caught up to God, right up to his throne... the dragon, finding himself cast down to earth, went in pursuit of the woman, the boy’s mother; but the woman was given two wings, such as the great eagle has, to speed her flight into the wilderness, to her place of refuge, where for a year, and two years, and half a year she will be kept hidden from the serpent’s view. Thereupon the serpent sent a flood of water out of his mouth in pursuit of the woman, to carry her away on its tide; but earth came to the woman’s rescue. The earth gaped wide, and swallowed up this flood which the dragon had sent out of his mouth. So, in his spite against the woman, the dragon went elsewhere to make war on the rest of her children, the men who keep God’s commandments, and hold fast to the truth concerning Jesus." - Apocalypse, 12: 1-5, 13-17

Where does Mary's glory come from? Certainly not from herself, she who is a mere mortal and a creature like ourselves, although the most perfect of our race. Her glory comes from her being elected from all eternity to having given Christ His humanity; He having had only one parent clothed Himself in flesh, so to speak, within her womb. For that she was from her first moment of existence Full of Grace, as the angel declared on that wonderful day when she agreed with the plan of God and became His Mother. As Saint Paul says in the second reading today, Christ has ended death. 

"...we bore God witness that he had raised Christ up from the dead, and he has not raised him up, if it is true that the dead do not rise again. If the dead, I say, do not rise, then Christ has not risen either; and if Christ has not risen, all your faith is a delusion; you are back in your sins. It follows, too, that those who have gone to their rest in Christ have been lost. If the hope we have learned to repose in Christ belongs to this world only, then we are unhappy beyond all other men. But no, Christ has risen from the dead, the first-fruits of all those who have fallen asleep; a man had brought us death, and a man should bring us resurrection from the dead; just as all have died with Adam, so with Christ all will be brought to life. But each must rise in his own rank; Christ is the first-fruits, and after him follow those who belong to him, those who have put their trust in his return." - I Corinthians, 15: 15-23

In a particular way, the grace of Christ and His power over death is visible to us today in the bodies of many holy Saints, which seem to not decay normally after death, but slowly and sometimes not at all. And Mary our Mother was Full of Grace. Already in the Gospel story today, her very voice causes the tiny Saint John the Baptist to leap in his own mother's womb and we get those wonderful words which we say everyday, many of us: 'Blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb.' Indeed may you be blessed, o holy Mother, and may the names of Jesus and Mary be upon our lips constantly and at the hour of our deaths.

Book finished - Saint Bede's Ecclesiastical history of the English people

 This book was fun, for Bede attempts to stitch together a comprehensive history not only of the English (Anglo-Saxon) Church, but of the Christian presence in these countries before the arrival of the Anglo-Saxon peoples. The volume which I have is printed by Oxford University Press, and I acquired it (quite appropriately) from the local Waterstones in Durham, where Bede lies entombed in the old cathedral. The book unfortunately comes coupled with a critical commentary, in the form of substantial end-notes, perhaps because it has been printed for historians. The little asterisks throughout the main body of the book are rather intrusive, but I'll try to ignore them if I go through it again. 

I love Bede's devotional attitude and his veneration for the Saints and his sense of wonder at the wonderful miracles that accompanied the evangelisation of the British Isles; even if the book's editor feels the need to apologise for Bede's being a Catholic monk. I'm going to call this four stars out of five, and here's an interesting little factoid: at the end of Bede's Greater Chronicle, which is also bundled into this volume, at the end, he mentions that his abbot, Father Coelfrid, made a pilgrimage to Rome with a very special gift for the Holy Father. He never arrived, for he died at Langres. Coelfrid's gift for the Holy Father was a complete Latin-language Bible, carefully written by the monks of Bede's monastery in Northumbria. The critical commentary calls it the Codex Amiatinus, for it has been identified in a library in Milan. Now, watch this video:

Daily Masses - weekdays coming up to the feast of the Assumption of our Lady

 Because it's quite late again, I'm making a quick note again about the Masses said in the last two days. The Mass intention yesterday was for the repose of the soul of Cath McWeeney (+) and Mass was said today for Owen Toolan (+). May eternal rest be granted unto them, and peace in the embrace of the Eternal One. Here's a nice and very popular image of Mary Immaculate being borne off by angels after her passing from this mortal life. 

Book finished - the Soul of the Apostolate

A classic Catholic work, put together by the supremely busy Cistercian abbot, Dom Chautard. That's the same Order which lives at Mount Saint Bernard Abbey, down in Leicestershire. I got the book from the abbey shop, of course. Dom Chautard insists upon the interior life of prayer, which he says is essential for the Christian mission, whatever form that may take. The interior life cannot be separated from or in conflict with the active life for the salvation of souls. Now, it is easy to think that his target readership is composed of priests and Religious. But, oh no, he's talking about every one of us who is engaged in some work of other for the Church. At a time when the Bishop is ceaselessly talking about discipleship and then missionary discipleship, we have much to learn about the life of prayer which forms the backbone of that discipleship, and there are no better teachers of prayer than the Cistercian Fathers. And this book is a rather terse, rather short, argument for the establishment and maintenance of the life of prayer. In part three of the book, for example, the author speaks of the dangers that the active life of the Mission (life in the world) has for a Christian who has not built a solid interior life of prayer: he is doomed to either superficial success that ends when he himself leaves the mission, or to failure and desolation. The final part of the book is the most interesting, for the author presents methods of sustaining the interior life. There is first the daily mental prayer that should last at least fifteen minutes (going up to an hour), then the appropriation of the liturgical life of the Church and living the Mass and the divine Office, then a detailed description of the custody of the heart (actively monitoring and controlling human desire, with the end of uniting the will to the holy Will of God) and, finally, the absolutely essential devotion to the Blessed Virgin, the conduit of graces from her Son and the loving Mother of all Christian souls.

This is a great book to have in constant use, and very useful indeed for those of us (clergy and laity) who actively work within the Church for the glory of God and the salvation of souls. Here's the book, available for purchase on Amazon.

Psalm 123

 

I'm having some trouble finding time for the computer these days. There will be more posts tomorrow, hopefully. Meanwhile, here's a Dominican Sister reading Psalm 123. The translation from the Knox version I normally use is this:

"If the Lord had not been on our side, Israel may boast,  

if the Lord had not been on our side when human foes assailed us,

it seemed as if they must have swallowed us up alive, so fierce their anger threatened us.

It seemed as if the tide must have sucked us down, the torrent closed above us;

closed above us the waters that ran so high.

Blessed be the Lord, who has not let us fall a prey to those ravening mouths!

Safe, like a bird rescued from the fowler’s snare; the snare is broken and we are safe!

Such help is ours, the Lord’s help, that made heaven and earth."

Some five years ago, I was ordained...

 

...and I prepared this small watercolour for an ordination card. Nothing special, it was one of the first watercolours I attempted since secondary school. It shows a typically sacerdotal activity: offering worship to God in the form of the burning and offering of incense at Mass. I used photo reference, but purposely blurred out the facial features of the priest, in order to make the figure anonymous. The picture was to be about the priesthood and not about a particular priest.

Daily Masses - the feast of Saint Dominic and the nineteenth Sunday of Ordinary time

Mass was offered on Saturday for the repose of the soul of Pat Cowley (+), may she rest in the peace of Christ. Mass was offered twice on Sunday morning, first for the Parish intention (all Parishioners), and then for a last minute intention, for the people of Nagasaki who perished during the infamous bombing of that city on this day in 1945, a bombing which completely destroyed it. Nagasaki continues to have a large Catholic community which until the bombing traces its origin to the personal missionary efforts of the great sixteenth-century Jesuit missionary, Saint Francis Xavier. 

Our Sunday Mass readings today seemed to me to have the theme of God's presence within Creation being quiet and yet perfectly in control, while humanity trembles before the larger features of Creation. So, in our first reading, Elijah (Elias) learns to recognise the presence of God in a stirring breath of wind:

"There he made his lodging in a cave; and all at once the Lord’s word came to him, 'Elias, what dost thou here?' 'Why,' he answered, 'I am all jealousy for the honour of the Lord God of hosts; see how the sons of Israel have forsaken Thy covenant, thrown down Thy altars, and put Thy prophets to the sword! Of these, I only am left, and now my life, too, is forfeit.' Then word came to him to go out and stand there in the Lord’s presence; the Lord God Himself would pass by. A wind there was, rude and boisterous, that shook the mountains and broke the rocks in pieces before the Lord, but the Lord was not in the wind. And after the wind, an earthquake, but the Lord was not in the earthquake. And after the earthquake a fire, but the Lord was not in the fire. And after the fire, the whisper of a gentle breeze. Elias, when he heard it, wrapped his face in his mantle, and went out to stand at the cave door. There a voice came to him, 'Elias, what dost thou here?'" - 3 Kings, 19: 9-13

So, there is that idea of God our Lord appearing out of nowhere in particular, but just merely being present within Creation, and so represented by the 'whisper of a gentle breeze.' It reminds me of one of the teachings of Saint Thomas Aquinas, that God is immanent - inherent - within Creation, to the extent that the act of Creation was not terminated at some definite point in the past, but continues actively today, all things being held constantly in existence through that ongoing act of God. That's what I'm thinking about when I say that, despite the immensity of the challenges that life brings us, God is always firmly in control. He permits all things that torment us and never sends us more than we can bear. 

And surely this is the point of today's gospel reading, which presents the story of Christ walking upon the waves of a choppy sea. To understand this story, we have to step into the shoes of the Jewish men in the boat, with their understanding of the long and turbulent history of their nation, Israel, with all its uncertainties and difficulties. In the midst of every calamity they suffered, and the Old Testament is very graphical in the details of these, the Hebrews were certain of one thing: that God loved them in a particular way, and favoured them over all other nations, that He had worked marvels for them in the past and would do so again, when necessary. Hence the great hopes for the Messiah to restore Israel to the fortunes she had enjoyed under the united monarchies of David and his son Solomon. They were, after all, the People of the Promise, as Saint Paul notes in the second reading:

"...the continual anguish I feel in my heart, and how it has ever been my wish that I myself might be doomed to separation from Christ, if that would benefit my brethren, my own kinsmen by race. They are Israelites, adopted as God’s sons; the visible presence, and the covenant, and the giving of the law, and the Temple worship, and the promises, are their inheritance; the patriarchs belong to them, and theirs is the human stock from which Christ came; Christ, who rules as God over all things, blessed for ever, Amen." - Romans, 9: 1-5

Paul felt increasingly separated from his Jewish kinsmen, who continued to reject the Christian message, which is the culmination of their long history. But he, like the Apostles in that boat, continued to acknowledge the promises made to the Hebrew people by God, which are so very important in the several documents that have come to form the New Testament. The Hebrew/Jewish background is important, for in remembering the extraordinary story in the gospel reading, Saint Matthew notes that they were in trouble in a choppy sea, and that Christ came walking over the troublesome waves and said, 'Take Courage.' The leader of the Apostles took courage, however briefly, and could also perform the marvel. The presence of God in the Old Testament stories has become the presence of Christ in the New. For when Christ climbed into the boat, the storm ended. Think of the boat as the Christian Church, in which the presence of Christ - even the Real Presence in the Blessed Sacrament - persists, and everything becomes clear. Just as in the Elijah story in the first reading, God is completely in charge and ever present, despite storms and troubles of any type. If we think of our present crisis and fears, and remember Who walks over all of it to our assistance, quietly, serenely, then His own peace will be ours also. 

If we were Jews (and in a way we are, as members of a Jewish Church) we would sit up with a jerk when somebody who claimed to be God were to say 'I AM,' for that was the Name for God given to Moses on the holy mountain. And here, when the Apostles were in a superstitious fear about the Figure approaching on the waves, they heard the quiet voice - in fact, a very ancient voice - say, 'Take courage, I AM, do not fear...'

Continuing with the Doctors of the Church - Saint Jerome

Remember, a long, long time ago, at the end of September, 2019, when the bishops decided to name the following twelve months from the feast of Saint Jerome the Year of the Word? Well, a lot has happened since then, but I reckon the Bishop would still like us to make an effort to discover a new devotion to Holy Scripture.

I had set aside that book on the Church Doctors, but I'm diving back into it. I've been compiling short biographies of the Doctors based on the book on a page on this blog, and I'm up to the fourth-century Saint Jerome, often depicted in imagery as a cardinal of the Roman Church, because of his close relationship with the Holy Father Damasus. Jerome had an extraordinary devotion to Holy Scripture, spending a great deal of time gaining expertise in Hebrew (as well as Greek), and then translating into Latin (the Vulgate) for the Pope, who had begun to see that knowledge of Greek was declining in the West, even among the educated. Jerome was born in Dalmatia in the mid-fourth-century into a Christian family, and chose the eremitical life after baptism, often retreating to a life of solitude in the Holy Land, and devoting his time there to the study of Scripture. In AD 382, he arrived in Rome and became a secretary to the Holy Father Damasus. Aside from his work in producing the Vulgate Bible, he became a spiritual director and teacher of Scripture to many holy women, who also took up the study of the ancient languages. Jerome left Rome when Damasus died, and found his way to Bethlehem, where he died in about AD 420, having left behind a vast body of work on Scripture and a teaching legacy, both classical and Christian. Jerome thought that Scripture was a very personal means of communing with God, as well as a unifying force in the Christian communion. Devotion to Scripture study is therefore meant for us all, and brings with it a particular joy and the gift of Eternity. Thus prayer is meant to alternate with reading Scripture, in an ongoing conversation with God our Love. His love of asceticism and meditative prayer is just as strong as his love of Scripture. Then there was his love for the Holy Land, his place of retirement. He also had much advice about hard work and labour as a means of strengthening the soul against sin and building the Christian life, even in the rearing of children. In this, and in his general attitude to life and culture, Jerome seems to have been far ahead of his times. 

Portrait art - the Holy Father Francis

When I was a student at seminary, I used to carry a ball-point pen in my pocket and doodle in books all the time. One day, I sat in a pizzeria in a largish town called Arezzo, and copied this image of the Holy Father from a newspaper. I thought he had a nice smile.

Daily Mass - Transfiguration of the Lord

It's been a busy sort of week, this one. The Rosary has been delayed each day to the evenings, with late nights and early mornings. Just having a quiet evening at the moment, after visiting the hospital again. A poor gentleman, not very old at all, died suddenly and before his family could reach him. So, I went over to read some psalms and the litany of the Saints. It was all rather sad. Death is awful, but we cannot dwell upon it, for much has been promised us about resurrection beyond death. And we get a taste of that in the liturgy of the Church today.

For today is the great memorial day of the Transfiguration of the Lord, when He tried to put heart into his inner circle among the Apostles, Peter, John and James, before the terrible ordeal of his Passion and Death, and gave them an idea of the glory that our human forms (beyond death) can one day have. Today, we commemorate this moment, when Christ appeared to the terrified Apostles to be clothed in light itself. Whiter than white; the evangelists don't even know how to describe the light. The tradition of the Church draws our minds towards the episode in the book of Exodus when Moses, newly descended from the presence of God on the Mountain, has a face so bright that horns of light appear to be emanating from it:

"Moses came down, after this, from Mount Sinai, bearing with him the two tablets on which the law was written; and his face, although he did not know it, was all radiant after the meeting at which he had held speech with God. The sight of that radiance made Aaron and the sons of Israel shrink from all near approach to him." - Exodus, 34: 29-30

I fancy that those Apostles must also have had shiny faces for a while, before they descended to the plain. The ancient Hebrews had a vivid idea of God being clothed in white and the old Psalms must have been rocketing through the minds of the Apostles, even as they watched the figures of Moses and Elijah appear alongside for a quick conference. Take, for example, Psalm 103(104):

"Bless the Lord, my soul; O Lord my God, what magnificence is Thine! Glory and beauty are Thy clothing. The light is a garment Thou dost wrap about Thee, the heavens a curtain Thy hand unfolds." - Psalm 103: 1-2

But Peter said a strange thing, still overcome with wonder at the sight. He said that he would be pleased to build three tents, one for Christ, and two for the two figures in the vision. An interesting idea. The Jews had just been celebrating the festival of Sukkot, or booths, a harvest festival which remembers when the Hebrews were a mostly agricultural people and would camp in booths in the fields during the season, and also when the Hebrews were wanderers in the desert after being freed from Egypt and before the arrival in the Holy Land, so that they would be camping in booths in the wilderness. Peter may have been so entranced by the new revelation of Christ's majesty, that he may have wanted to keep that for longer, that it might remain with the Apostles for a while. Just as the ancient Hebrews had been permitted to retain he presence of God in a tent-like tabernacle in the wilderness. Perhaps Peter could house the figure dressed in light in a tent, together with the Hebrew celebrities, Moses and Elijah. If Christ wanted to strengthen the Apostles' faith before his mistreatment by the Sadducees and the scribes with this vision, the Apostles went overboard in their desire to defend the Man they had seen clothed with light. They would, even now, establish His royal dignity. The following episode in the Gospel of S. Luke is this: 

"...He sent messengers before Him, who came into a Samaritan village, to make all in readiness. But the Samaritans refused to receive Him, because His journey was in the direction of Jerusalem. When they found this, two of His disciples, James and John, asked Him, 'Lord, wouldst Thou have us bid fire come down from heaven, and consume them?' But He turned and rebuked them, 'You do not understand,' He said, 'what spirit it is you share.'" - Gospel of S. Luke, 9: 52-55

Only just recently, at Caesarea Philippi, Peter had declared for the first time that Christ was the Son of the living God, and been made the foundation of the Church by Christ. Immediately, He had sought to dissuade Christ from sacrificing Himself in Jerusalem. That was no way to go for a Jewish Messiah:

"...Simon Peter answered, 'Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God.' And Jesus answered him, 'Blessed art thou, Simon son of Jona; it is not flesh and blood, it is My Father in heaven that has revealed this to thee. And I tell thee this in My turn, that thou art Peter, and it is upon this rock that I will build My Church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it; and I will give to thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven; and whatever thou shalt bind on earth shall be bound in heaven; and whatever thou shalt loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.' Then He strictly forbade them to tell any man that He, Jesus, was the Christ. From that time onwards Jesus began to make it known to His disciples that He must go up to Jerusalem, and there, with much ill usage from the chief priests and elders and scribes, must be put to death, and rise again on the third day. Whereupon Peter, drawing Him to his side, began remonstrating with Him; 'Never, Lord,' he said; 'no such thing shall befall Thee.' At which He turned round and said to Peter, 'Back, Satan; thou art a stone in my path; for these thoughts of thine are man’s, not God’s.'" - Gospel of S. Matthew, 16: 16-23

All of this is connected, you see. Christ shows His followers glimpses of who He is, and seemingly paradoxically tells them that he has to go up to a massive self-sacrifice in Jerusalem. And they cannot see the connection with the Passover; they cannot see that the Messiah was to be not a great military leader and political redeemer of His people, but a sacrificial Lamb and spiritual redeemer of the world. They would see this after the resurrection, and only then would they be permitted to tell the story of the Transfiguration.

Update on daily Masses

I've been having less time with the computer in the last few days, so haven't been making posts here. As a quick summary, Masses were said this last weekend for the people of the Parish, and for repose of the soul of Mr. Patrick Farrell (+), and Mass was said today or the repose of the soul of Les Davies (+). Tomorrow morning, I shall conduct a graveside funeral service for a tiny, little baby. Please pray for the parents of the  child and for all of our people who mourn the departure of loved ones, family and friends. Eternal rest grant unto them, O Lord, and may perpetual light shine upon them. We hope, and may our hope be fulfilled in Christ our Lord.

Missa Pange Lingua - Josquin Desprez (15th century)

Josquin was a Flemish musician from the fifteenth century, with a career that took him across Europe back and from France and Italy. His sound is very familiar, if you've at all visited Westminster Cathedral and stopped at the gift shop. The following piece is composed probably for Corpus Christi Mass, for it is entitled Pange lingua, after Saint Thomas' famous hymn to the Blessed Sacrament.