Barron: The Christ Event

The title of Fr. Robert Barron's book 

                                                     b r i d g i n g 

                                             THE GREAT DIVIDE 

graphically states his aim.  The blurb on the cover explains what the book is meant to be: 

    MUSINGS OF A POST-LIBERAL, POST CONSERVATIVE EVANGELICAL CATHOLIC

The divide is the abyss that today's Catholics experience, an abyss that separates them from others in their own Church,  from Christians of other denominations, from modernity, and the world in general. Central to bridging the divide is Christ himself, and  Fr. Barron uses St. Thomas Aquinas to help us bring Christ's importance into proper focus. 

Here are two quotations that grabbed my mind and won't let go:

".....It is in light of the event of the Incarnation that Thomas interprets both God and the human, seeing the former as an uncanny, surprising, ever greater act of love, at the latter as, at its best, an act of sheer openness to the inrushing of God. To put it succinctly, he sees in Christ, the meeting of two ecstasies, and this coming-together is the lens through which he reads everything else...."p.88

"....the radically unworldly character of God's being is paradoxically enough revealed precisely in the act by which God enters the world. Were God a being in or alongside of the universe, one of the natures in the world, God could not become a creature without ceasing to be God or compromising the ontological integrity of the creature he becomes. In short, that God is totaliter aliter (totally other), and semper maior (always greater), that he is alluring yet totally ungraspable mystery, is given to us in the event of Christ....."p. 92

I don't know if Fr. Barron had read Giussani before writing this book, but the two men are on the same page, and speak the same language. Neither one reduces Christ to an abstraction, a theological or philosophical system, a rightest or leftist movement, a political stance, an ideology, or a sectarian doctrine. What makes me love them both is the awe they stand in before the Christ Event and the reverence with which they contemplate its implications.

Maritain: Science and Einstein Witness to God

"The science of phenomena ....bear witness to the existence of God....it is not a question of what science itself tells us, but of the very existence and possibility of science....if nature were not intelligible, there would be no science. Nature is not perfectly and absolutely intelligible; and the sciences do not try to come to grips with nature's intelligibility taken in itself (that is the job of philosophy). They rather reach for it in a rather oblique fashion, dealing with it only insofar as it is steeped in, and masked by, the observable and measurable data of the world of experience, and yet can be translated into mathematical intelligibility. Yet the intelligibility of nature is the very ground of those relational constancies which are the 'laws' - including the category of laws which deal only with probabilities - to which science sees phenomena submitted; and it is the very ground, in particular, of the highest explanatory systems, with all the symbols, ideal entities, and code languages they employ, (and with all that is in them that is still incomplete, arbitrary, and puzzlingly lacking in harmony ) that science constructs on observation and measurement.

    Now how would things be intelligible if they did not proceed from an intelligence? In the last analysis, a Prime Intelligence must exist, which is itself Intellection and Intelligibility in pure act, and which is the first principle of the intelligibility and essences of things, and causes order to exist in them, as well as an infinitely complex network of regular relationships, whose fundamental mysterious unity our reason dreams of rediscovering in its own way.

      Such an approach to God's existence is a a variant of Thomas Aquinas' fifth way. Its impact was secretly present in Einstein's famous saying: 'God does not play dice,' which, no doubt. used the word God in a merely figurative sense, and meant only: 'nature does not result from the throw of the dice', yet the very fact implicitly postulated the existence of the divine Intellect."

On the Uses of Philosophy Jacques Maritain, pp.65, 66

published by Princeton University Press 1962

      

Peter and John's love for Christ.

John 13:8 Peter said to him, "You shall never wash my feet!"

In this posting,  we are going to bounce back and forth from John to Peter, from Peter to John, seeing them both through the eyes of Thomas Aquinas in his Commentary on St. John's Gospel. There Thomas meditates on their relationship to Christ, and Christ's relationship to them. Feel free to add your own responses to Aquinas', just as I do , in italics, with mine. See what the reading tells you about Peter and John, about Aquinas, and about you and me.

Peter

1753 If you ask why Peter was the first to object, Origen replies that this was due to the intense love Peter had for Christ.The other disciples had a certain respectful awe and fear of Christ, and so complied without question to everything he did. But Peter, more aflame with love... and taking confidence from this love, refuses to comply and asks to know why: "A true friend will act as your equal and assume authority in your household." [Sirach 6:11] This is why in Scripture Peter often asks for explanations and does not hesitate to say what he thinks best. He thinks his friendship gives him a right to speak up!

1758 Peter says, You shall never wash my feet! He is saying in effect: By no means will I submit to this from my Teacher, my Lord and my God!  And although Peter said this out of zeal, it was an imprudent and disordered  zeal...His zeal was disordered for three reasons. He refused something that was beneficial and necessary...it seemed to indicate a certain disrespect for Christ by wanting to go against his plans. Finally it seemed to disparage his companions in that the others, according to Origen, yielded to Christ without an argument...Peter thinks he knows better than everybody else, even Christ! Sure, I can identify with that!

1761 Peter's words indicate his intense love for Christ. as well as an intense thick head. Before, when our Lord said to him, What I am doing you do not know now, he had intimated that it would be useful; yet Peter paid no attention to this, He doesn't listen, or he listens to the words, but doesn't let their meaning sink in  and could not be persuaded to have his feet washed. But when Our Lord warned him it would mean they would no longer be together, saying, you have no part in me, Peter offered more than just his feet, saying, Lord not my feet only, but also my hands and my head! For Peter was frightened by this answer and affected by love and fear, he offered all of himself for washing. Clement tells us in his Itinerary that Peter was so touched by the physical presence of Christ, whom he loved so intensely, that after the Ascension, when he recalled the sweetness of Christ's presence, he wept so much that his cheeks appeared to be furrowed. Nah, Clement is stretching too far to reach that conclusion. Maybe after Pentecost Peter would have felt that way, but not after the Ascension.

John

1804 John here mentions three things about himself. First, the love he had for Christ as he rested on him...Secondly he intimates his knowledge of mysteries, which were made known to him by Christ, and especially for the writing of this Gospel...Thirdly he mentions the special love Christ had for him, saying, whom Jesus loved, not exclusively but in a way above the others...I bet some of the other guys were jealous, even envious, of John's relationship. Oddly, Peter isn't.

For the present it is enough to say that John was more loved by Christ for three reasons.  First, because of the cleanliness of his purity: for he was a virgin when chose by he Lord, and always remained so: "He who loves purity of heart, and whose speech is gracious, will have the king as a friend." Secondly because of the depths of his wisdom, for he saw further into the secrets of God than others; and so he is compared to an eagle...Thirdly because of the great intensity of his love for Christ:"I love those who love me"( Prv 8:17) 

Peter

1805  Then when he says, so Simon Peter beckoned to him John mentions what led him to question Christ. ...

1806 Since everywhere in the Gospels, Peter is always presented as bold and as the first to speak out because of his fervent love, why is he now keeping silent? It does seem out of character. All of a sudden he is being discreet? Chrysostom gives three reasons for this. One is that Peter had just been reprimanded by our Lord for not allowing him to was his feet...As a result, he preferred not to bother our Lord just now. After getting slapped down, he figured he should keep his mouth shut. Another reason is that Peter did not want our Lord to reveal this openly so that others could hear it. I doubt it. Peter wouldn't give a damn about who heard what. Peter's just smart enough to recognize John's special relationship to Christ and figures he can take advantage of it. Wonder if he realizes that Christ knows what he is doing? The third reason is mystical. John signifies the contemplative life, and Peter the active life. Yes! Bingo! Beautiful! John is mysticism, contemplative knowledge through co-natural love. Peter is action, a working knowledge that lives out the knowing in active doing. This fits in perfect with Von Speyr's vision of Peter and John, Peter representing hierarchy and John representing love.

1817  A question arises here. Since Our Lord had indicated to John who the traitor was, saying it is he to whom I shall give this bread when I have dipped it, and then gave it to Judas, the disciples seem to have been exceedingly dull yeah, huhuhuhuh, ya think?! not to have understood what he just said. I answer that Our Lord said this privately to John in order not to reveal the betrayer. The reason for this being that Peter loved Christ so fiercely that had he been certain that Judas was about to betray him, he would have quickly killed him.

1818 Since John himself was one of those at the dinner, why did he say: no one at the table knew why he said this to him? Yes.., true...everyone else there would have heard. Maybe Christ whispered this to him, or said it sotto voce, so no one else could hear? Jesus tells at least John what is happening, but why tell even him? Why not say it is none of his business? I answer that it is usual for one who is good and without evil to believe that others also are without evil. Geez, Aquinas must be pretty good and without evil to think that way. I would never have come up with that conclusion. Now John was extremely good and never consider becoming a betrayer.  Thus he never suspected that another disciple would commit such a great crime. Hah! I would have started suspecting everybody, maybe  even accusing them, to divert attention away from myself.

Commentary on the Gospel of John, Thomas Aquinas

http://dhspriory.org/thomas/John 13.htm