Jesus Christ, Door to the Sheepfold and Master of Dogma

John 20:19 "On the evening of that day, the first day of the week, the doors being shut where the disciples were, for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood among them and said to them: Peace be with you." 

Man never has the whole truth at his disposal; a portion of it always remains with God. In all communication of truth, there is a kind of reservatio mentalis. This reserving , however, is not done by us, but by God. When arranging matters as we think best, we must always say: assuming that God does not arrange things otherwise. For man to make use of reservatio mentalis is all right provided he reserves something not for his own advantage, but for God's advantage. In belief, the reservatio of truth occurs on the part of God, who perhaps holds it back for communication to us at a later time. In belief there is a foregoing of complete understanding of truth, an abdicatio of truth, which is based on the recognition that everything we know and love has, in God, the form of the ever-greater. 

But this foregoing does not apply in the case of dogma. Here, nothing is relativized. Dogma is the door that is closed against everything non-Christian outside of it. As directed to the outside, the dogmas are rigid and uncompromising. We must regard the door that the Lord closes behind him as closed for as long a he does not instruct us to do otherwise. And he himself does not open the door anymore , but goers right through the closed door. For him, the rigid closedness does not exist, for him every truth is open. But for  us the closing must be regarded as final, as absolute. If we were able to add something to the Lord's truth by our own thought, the everything would be repeated called into question, including within the confines of the Church. Then, however, the door would not longer be the Lord, but rather, man and his truth.The Lord alone has the freedom to enter, from the outside to the inside, through the closed doors. What is closed for us is open for him. In heaven there will no longer be any unclosed doors because there will no longer be any unbelief. 

Dogmas are securings of belief against outside dangers, not closures for the sake of closure. Dogma has a basis of immovable truth , but it opens itself out from that basis into the unlimitedness of living, inexhaustible truth in God. Objectively, it has an absolute point of departure; but it is also relative in each person who subjectively assimilates it, because here absolute truth is grasped only partially and imperfectly, and exists within an open movement of belief toward the Lord. The framework of the dogmatic truth is unshakable, but within its confines, the infinite truth of the Lord moves in sovereign freedom. God's truth is infinite, and is therefore always just outlined and suggested in dogmatic precepts. The measure of dogmatic truth remains the Lord himself; and the Lord can see everything differently, and infinitely more fully than any particular believer can see it. Neither individual believers nor the Church as a whole have any authority to make changes in dogma; but they are also not allowed to do so, because it is the Lord alone who comprises the truth of dogma. 

From the way that the absolute and relative are intertwined, we can see that whereas man may regard himself personally as the greatest sinner, he nevertheless has no right to regard someone else as more guilty than himself. Another person could, perhaps, by citing different reasons, prove to him that he is wrong; an he too, in a certain respect, could be right. But in the end, both would be wrong, because the Lord alone holds in his hand the measuring stick of sin. All human judgments must, in the end, yield before his exclusive judgments. Similarly, the Lord remains the master of dogma, whose entire depths, which men do not plumb, are his own depths, which he avails himself of in freedom.

Adrienne von Speyr John vol.4, pp. 200, 201

Von Speyr: On Scandal

John 13:11 For he knew who was to betray him. That is why he said: You are not all clean.

The Lord knows his betrayer, but he does not point him out, for outwardly he still belongs to the community, although inwardly he has turned away from the Lord. The Lord does not expel anyone; a person who goes away has excluded himself. Before the community, the Lord does not give a hint as to who will leave it soon, for the scandal is not yet public. So, too, the Church will not bring scandals to light before the instigators themselves give occasion for it. 

The scandal of Judas was one that had to happen, but many another scandal in the Church has no visible cause. Yet the Lord does not spare her such scandal. Is it because the Lord himself took upon himself the scandal of the Cross? Is it because through one person's scandal the other members of the Chruch are horrified and thus strengthened in their loyalty to the Church? In any case, the offense is tolerated, even if it affects the Church's holy of holies. The Lord endures it in the room at the Last Supper. The Church must endure scandal; she may not circumvent or deny it, or act as if it were not there, or distance herself from it. Nor is it said that the Church should immediately and by all means stifle the scandal by eliminating the evil, for perhaps the sinner may still repent. Nor does the Lord cast Judas out - it can be better to let an abscess ripen than to put a knife to it too soon and kill it in its early stages. Not every scandal rousing book needs to be immediately banned, even if it may not keep the Church's doctrine intact. Perhaps it is better to talk first and to clear up misunderstanding by the light of day, and fairly. Many in the Church are sinners. and every sin is a tacit scandal and a heresy. But the Church is held together by love. 

John, Adrienne von Speyr, vol III, p.29

The Mystery of Christ reflected in the Sacrament of Confession

...Divinity and humanity are not separate spheres within the Son. Everywhere we try to penetrate into his humanity, we encounter the mystery of his being more than a man, that is, his divine sonship. He is not beyond all understanding, and yet precisely in our understanding, the incomprehensible overwhelms us; rather than being able to see him in his entirety, it is we who find ourselves seen by him and drawn into his ever greater dimensions. Because we are incorporated in this way, we lose any overview of our own situation. It is he who contains us in his perfect openness both to the Father and to the world.

    Whenever we confess according to his will, we must consider his double attitude so that we, too, may learn the correct attitude. He shows us who he is by opening himself to us: he is the one open to the Father, who in disclosing himself to us, also shows us the Father, also glorifies the Father.

...confession is the fruit of the divine human life. The Lord's turning to us, the form bequeathed to the Church, would be the...legacy that in some way is comprehensible in itself, and the turning to the Father would be the unsurveyable sphere of inspiration. We can understand a great deal about confession, just as we could about miracles. We know, for example, that before, the woman was hemorrhaging, and now, she is healthy. Only the nexus between these two facts remains incomprehensible. Or we understand that our Lord was dead and now lives, but we do not understand how that is possible. We do understand, however, that the things extending into the sphere of understanding are related in the sphere of the incomprehensible and are its manifestation. We understand a great deal about confession in the same way: for example, that there must be penance, that it is advisable for a person to admit his errors, and that there must also be an an authority and  a judgment upon good and evil on earth. We also more or less understand many things about faith: that the God-man did penance for our sins on the cross and for that reason the penance we accept for our guilt acquires somehow a symbolic character. Yet all the comprehensible elements are integrated into a whole which as such remains beyond our vision. In the course of the centuries the Church may acquire an increased understanding both of many individual elements and of the incomprehensibility of the whole, and with both of these an understanding of the mystery of Christ, the way he wished to remain alive for us in the vitality of the Father.

  Confession    Adrienne von Speyr   pp 148, 149

John Paul II: priest, poet, philosopher and *prophet*

How may ways can you see the following prophetic statements by John Paul II coming true in the USA, never mind globally? The first part is from an address made in 1976 at the Eucharistic Congress in Philadelphia. The second part was said in answer to a question about the Third Secret of Fatima in Fulda Germany in 1980.

1.We are now standing in the face of the greatest historical confrontation humanity has ever experienced. I do not think the wide circle of American Society, nor the wide circle of the Christian Community realize this fully. We are now facing the final confrontation between the Church and the anti-church, between the Gospel and the anti-Gospel, between Christ and the antichrist. This confrontation lies within the the plans of Divine Providence. It is, therefore, in God's Plan, and it must be a trial which the Church must take up and face courageously....

2.We must prepare ourselves to suffer great trials before long, such as will demand of us a disposition to give up even life, and a total dedication to Christ and for Christ. With your prayers and my prayers, it is possible to mitigate the coming tribulation, but it is no longer possible to avert it, because only thus can the Church be effectually renewed. How many times has the Church sprung from the shedding of blood? This time too, it will not be otherwise....

Blessed John Paul  II, Magnificat Magazine,  pp 308, 9

Speyer: The Church

".....The Church does not function, after all, in the manner of a sieve,  which would sift the good from the bad, would effect a strict selection; but more like a melting pot into which everything is thrown together and makes an effort to live from God's grace. The Church is vested with grace. She lives from the grace of the living Lord, but no less from the grace of the Father, who gives her his sanction, and the grace of the Spirit, who blows through her. She is the locus of an encounter with eternity, indeed,  quite actually the locus of the beginning of life, the beginning of eternity in the midst of time. Man is drawn into this origin, shaken to the core in it and converted, enriched, and at the same time made poorer. Within it he gauges constantly anew what the Lord is, what distance separates him from sinners; he comes to feel his own powerlessness, sees also the consummate powerlessness of the Lord, which is the source of all grace, and understands that there can be no comparison between the two. And yet he knows that his existence in the Church is nothing but grace and love, and that even the feeling of his powerlessness is an instance of the Lord's grace, a gift in view of his poverty, and a sign by which the Father recognizes him."

The Countenance of the Father, Adrienne von Speyr, p.103 Ignatius Press

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Fr. Robert Barron: Chesterton on Church

"...Recently I was perusing one of Chesterton's most popular books, Orthodoxy, and my attention was drawn to chapter 6, 'The Paradoxes of Christianity'. In this section of the book Chesterton recalls his puzzlement when he read the critiques of Christianity that came from so many different quarters. On the one hand, Christianity - especially Catholicism - was criticized for being too worldly, too caught up in wealth, property, pomp, and ceremony.Where, for instance was the spirit of the carpenter of Nazareth in the expensive theatrical display of the Vatican? On the other hand, Christianity was reviled for its excessive spiritualism, its indifference to the concrete concerns of the world, its tendency to pine after 'the things of heaven'. Similarly, some critics complained that Christianity, with its stress on sin, penance, and punishment, was excessively pessimistic, while others held that, given its emphasis on the love of God, the intervention of the saints, and the promise of eternal life, it was ridiculously optimistic. Finally, certain enemies of the faith maintained, probably with Joan of Arc, and the Crusades in mind, that Christianity was bloodthirsty and warlike, while others held, probably with Frances in mind, that Christianity was too pacific and nonviolent. What puzzled Chesterton, of course, was not that the Church had its critics, but that its critics were so varied, so at odds with one another, so mutually exclusive.Whatever, this Christianity was, he concluded, it must be something strangely shaped indeed, to inspire such a wildly divergent army of enemies. 

     Then it occurred to him that perhaps it was not Christianity that was misshapen, but rather its critics. Perhaps it was they who, from their various eccentric points of view, saw the rightly shaped Christianity as distorted: 'suppose we heard an unknown man spoken of by many men. Suppose we were puzzled to hear that some men said he was too tall, and some too short; some objected to his fatness, and some lamented his leanness; some thought him too dark and some too fair. One explanation...would be that he might be an odd shape. But there is another explanation. He might be the right shape.' It could be the case, in short, that 'it is Christianity that is sane, and all its critics are mad - in various ways' It is the sheer depth and breadth of the Church, the complexity and multifacetedness of it, which narrow-minded enemies cannot grasp. Christianity, Chesterton surmised, was perhaps, too capacious to be easily comprehended.

     However - and here is Chesterton's main point - it does not seem that Christianity is merely 'sensible,' standing . as it were, in the middle, taking in both extremes. It does not seem to be the case that the Church is somewhat worldly and some what otherworldly, to some degree life affirming and to some degree life denying, a little optimistic and a little pessimistic. on the contrary, there seems to be, everywhere in the life of the Church, a quality of excess, frenzy, enthusiasm: Francis of Assisi was 'more a shouting optimist than Walt Whitman' and St Jerome, 'in denouncing all evil, could paint the world blacker than Schopenhauer.' One Christian saint could be more starkly ascetical than the severest Stoic, another Christian saint could celebrate life more ecstatically than a priest of Dionysus. In defending the celibacy of the clergy, the Church could be 'ferociously against having children',  and in upholding marriage and family, it could be at the same time, ferociously for having children.' The Church consistently and poetically placed opposites side by side, and allowed them to coexist in all the purity, power, and intensity; Christianity encouraged lamb and lion to lie down together, without ever forcing the lion to become lamblike or the lamb lionlike. Chesterton offers us a wonderful image: The Church 'has always had a healthy hatred of pink. It hates that combination of two colors which is the feeble expedient of the philosophers. It hates that evolution of black into white which is tantamount to a dirty grey.' "

Bridging the Great Divide, Robert Barron, Bowman & Littlefield, pp. 5, 6

What a beautiful exposition of Chesterton's vision of the Church! I can't help thinking that much of the cultural Catholicism of today is precisely the bland "pink", or the dirty "grey" that are foreign to the Church's nature. Also, no individual saint, no matter how great, could ever perfectly harmonize or contain the richness of the Church in his own personality, first of all because all of us are limited creatures very much affected by original sin, and secondly because the virtues of a saint would have most likely been developed as a result of his conversion, and served as a corrective to the abuses of his day and age. So every age challenges us to sanctity with its unique blend of circumstances.

The Masculine Love of John for Christ

John 13: 23 One of his disciples lay on Jesus' breast, the one whom Jesus loved.

John "places himself in a completely different relationship to the Lord from that of the other disciples. The others are still wholly caught up in themselves, enclosed in their own spheres...John, on the contrary,  rests on Jesus' breast....He knows only one thing and it fills his whole soul: the Lord loves him, and he lets himself be loved by the Lord. That is the single content of his life; that is his office.

...the hierarchical Church, for which the sacraments were instituted, and which is their steward, does not exclude the Church of love. with its immediate contact between loving souls and the Lord. 

    Why does the Lord permit this uttermost sign of  love: resting on his breast? Is it because he himself is man? Or is it because John is a lover? Both reasons are valid.  The Lord is a human, and every human being needs tangible love.

...But neither the Lord's love nor John's love has a purpose at this moment. although the purposes of love are fulfilled, love rests entirely in itself, having its own meaning in itself. John symbolizes love  as Peter does office. Both were called from the very beginning. Since then, Peter has been singled out in many respects. but here John is clearly given preference. It shows that such love for the Lord really exists, and that it takes this form. This is made evident to all, without the others feeling set aside. For John embodies the love of all. He is love becoming visible. One sees in him what love is. The Lord condescends to this form of loves' expression so that the others will recognize love in it.

Here John is at the same time the first priest, and as such an incitement to love. He shows that the priestly office, far from excluding the office of love, rather has love as its center. As long as a priest does not venture to lay his head on the Lord's breast, his love is not yet completely given. What John, the model, does, is perfect self-giving in love, resting in love, in a love that is not continually doing and demanding, but ultimately simply love, and rests in love.

John also represents masculine love without the slightest trace of disorder; the love between men who share the same orientation in their work and tasks, looking in the same direction, but then turning at times to each other and resting with each other, beyond office and work. The Lord wants us to seek and see not only restless intensification in love; he wants us to find the fulfillment of love as well. We should allow ourselves this time of fulfillment and not distort the growth and the always-more of Christian life into a kind of athletic achievement.  This generosity, which gives itself time and takes a break, is likewise masculine.

John: The Farewell Discourses Adrienne Von Speyr Vol. III pp. 47, 48    Ignatius Press

Family Church is Church Family

Why do you say that to generate is not human generation if it does not generate a people?

Giussani: Procreation isn't truly human if it doesn't create a people in as much as generating one single  person, a principle of further generation is initiated. By its nature, a generation doesn't ever finish, it always expands, it's destined to always expand. And it is only the concept of family that "concludes" the generation; the generative idea is the concept of family. The family is, in miniature, a people. But if a family is closed in on itself, it is no longer a generator, even if it has nine children; to be a generator, a family must be open to the possibility that it communicates itself to others, that it creates other families. It might not create families; for example, two can be married without creating children, but they live their humanity in such a way that they communicate to other families in the block of houses something that makes the others have thoughts, feelings, gestures, that are more human: this is a dawn, a beginning of a new people.

Does the value of the Church lie in the particular Church or in the total Church?

Giussani:  Either it is in the total Church, or it is not in any Church. The particular Church does not have the value of Catholicity, of totality; it does not have the capacity to express a meaning of everything, because  being a particular Church, it exalts its particular aspects, its circumstances. Only the universal Church, that is, the Church as a unity around the Pope, only that is truly a culture that challenges the culture of the world...

The only universal claim that is fulfilled, fulfilled even among three who live in a little house, secluded, is the Church. Therefore a person who doesn't have a consciousness or a conception or a sense of that totality is not a part of a people, and is not the source of a people, is not a facilitating factor for bringing one to the reality of a people: this is adequately given only by faith.

Is It Possible  to Live This Way? Vol.2  Hope, pp. 140-141

Machiavelli on Obama and Romney

SR: Thanks for speaking with me again. Tell me, what do you think of our two candidates for president?

M: Why do you ask? What does my opinion matter? 

SR: You have a reputation for being manipulative, deceitful, and power hungry, so I thought it would be interesting to see what you think of these two politicians.

M: I will take your remark as a compliment, and answer this way: these two candidates are certainly my equal in political skills. I admire their ability  to change their positions and adapt to public opinion, split and divide the populace into interest groups, and then play on the feelings of each group to unite as many voters behind their side by giving a negative spin to everything the opposition says. 

SR: Would you give the edge to Romney or Obama?

M: It's hard to say, because it's impossible to know when a candidate is speaking for himself,  and when he is expressing what his advisers tell him to say. I would probably give the edge to Obama  because of his  proven ability to divide and conquer the American public.

SR: Why do you say that?

M: Look at  how skilfully Obama has undermined the Catholic bishops, using Catholics like Biden and Pelosi to speak against  the Church, and promote him as the candidate of the working class. Also, Obama's use of Catholics, especially disgruntled nuns and the Kennedy family, to give speeches against Church teaching at the Convention is masterful manipulation.  

SR: What about Romney's choice of Ryan, a Catholic, to be his running mate? Isn't Romney doing the same thing? 

M: Not exactly. It is a smart political move for Romney to have a Catholic as a vice president, since Obama has one as his vice president. But there is a difference. Ryan may turn out to actually believe Church teaching, whereas Biden is a dyed in the wool Democrat all the way, and nothing more than a cultural Catholic. Biden and Ryan may cancel each other out, because Catholics on both sides can use the one they want to justify their preference for the Democratic or Republican Platform.

SR: Hmm. I hadn't thought of that. So, do you think the Catholic vote will be the decisive factor?

M: No. It never has been, in spite of all the pronouncements and declarations of bishops. There is no reason to think Catholics will start listening to the bishops now.

SR: If the election took place today, who do you think would win?

M: I'd probably give the edge to Obama, since he has the liberal press and the media in his pocket. But the election is still far away. There are many other factors to consider. For example, the economy, the Mideast, Israel and the Palestinian problem, Afganistan, Pakistan and India, Iran and its drive for nuclear power, world-wide terrorism,  scandal and corruption here in the states or elsewhere, etc. Anything can happen anywhere, anytime, to sway pubic opinion one way or another. And it is impossible to see what that unpredictable event might be. 

SR: So we wait and see?

M:  Of course. Enjoy the entertainment. Politics continues to be the most expensive soap opera big money can provide!

For the Fun Of It: Nancy Pelosi and Jesus Christ

1)Christ, to his followers,  over 2000 years ago:"You are the light of the world. You are the salt of the earth."    (Matthew 5:13)

2)Nancy Pelosi, to the press,  in 2012
                     a) when reporters asked her position regarding the Church's teaching on contraception:
"I do my religion on Sundays, in church, and I try to go other days of the week: I don't do it at this press conference!"
                     b) when the same reporters asked about the lawsuits the bishops are bringing against the HHS mandate: "I don't think that's the entire Catholic Church. Those people have a right to sue. But I don't think they're speaking ex cathedra for the Catholic Church."

Some questions for Nancy:
a) Why don't you "do it" at the press conference?
b)Why is okay to "do it" in church if you can't "do it" in public for the press?
c)Why is not okay to "do it" with the press if it is okay to" do it" in church?

d) Whom do "those people" represent?
e) Are they suing in behalf of themselves as individuals?
f) What's the difference between their constituency and yours?

g) Did Jesus Christ limit his words and deeds to the churches of his day, the temple and the local synagogues?
h) Why did he feel free to preach and work miracles in the marketplace, the wading pool at the temple, the village well, city gates, highways and byways, and foreign territory?
i) Whom did he think he represented?

Book Worth Reading

Title:  Black Man You Are on Your Own
Author: George Sombe Mukuka
Publisher: www.publishamerica.net/product47859.html

            What did I like about this book? 1.) The subject matter: Apartheid in South Africa, in the Church, in the seminary, in the priesthood, and how Black Consciousness fused with the Gospel message of Christ to change institutional structures and make the Church more the family of God it is called to be. 2.) The methodology: the depth of research, the documentation, the interviews, the oral history, the scholarly organization of the materials, and the impartial presentation of a raw slice of life that is part of South African history, which deserved to be preserved, and would otherwise have been ignored and forgotten.  3.) The style: direct, clear, objective  narration of explosive issues that could easily have been mishandled by a less competent writer.

New Wine, old wineskins

         "...The first Christians were well aware that everything happening in them and among them - the new and exceptional compared with the lives they had led before, the revolutionary compared with the lives so many others around them were leading - was not the fruit of their adherence, of their intelligence, or of their will, but a gift of the spirit, a gift from on high, a mysterious energy with which they were invested."   Luigi Giussani, Why the Church?  p.89

Just like what makes us Christians so different from everybody else around us today, right? Of course not. The newness of the Christ event doesn't come through to so many of us Christians today because we are old wine skins,  and Christ is always  New Wine. With our set ways of thinking and feeling inside secure Comfort Zones we reduce Him to sentiments, ideas, rules, and acceptable norms that cannot contain Him. And if perchance, by a miracle of grace, He does slip inside, how furious we get when He bursts the wine skin apart. 

Machiavelli comments on Chief Justice Roberts

 SR: What do you think of Chief Justice Roberts’ ruling?

M: First, why don’t you tell me how you feel about the ruling?

 SR: How do I feel?   Let down! Disappointed!  I was hoping for a much different outcome.

M:  Oh you poor thing, you wanted Roberts to be your savior, did you? He was to strike down the law, eliminate the problem and solve your Church-State dilemma? You had a bunch of unreal expectations, didn’t you!? Roberts is not God, you know. 

SR: I don’t expect him to be God! At least he could have acted the like so-called Conservative he is supposed to be!

M: Well, he didn't do what you wanted, did he? Instead of playing God, he played Solomon. He neatly dodged the complex problems the law creates by following his Conservative policy of judicial restraint.  He left no side a total winner, and no one a total loser.  So the struggle remains. And the question too:  which side wants to win more?  And what will the victory cost?

SR:  Well, we can’t let the law stand. I think it is a heck of a stretch to establish the law by calling it a tax.

M: Yes, this accommodation by Roberts is a stretch, maybe even a “bending over backwards”. But so what? The real question is what do you do next? How will this ruling affect the lawsuits your Church has before the court?

SR: I don’t know.  Also, with the presidential campaign going on and the economy still shaky, almost anything can happen.

M:  Right! No one knows what’s coming. That is what makes the soap opera of American Politics so amusing.  But of course, you Catholics have no cause for worry, do you?

SR: What do you mean?

M: You people believe that Jesus is the Lord of History, do you not? You believe He uses evil to accomplish good! He turns defeat into victory! Ultimately He makes sense out of all the suffering and disasters you run into in life, right?

 SR: Yes, but the way you put it is an oversimplification.

M: Not really. You believe you end up in heaven or hell, and that is all that matters. So now all you have to do is throw yourself into the fray, because even if you lose, you win.

SR: What do you mean?

 M: Perhaps your Church in America could be going through its version of the French Revolution.  I don’t mean that the clergy and nuns will be guillotined necessarily, but that the State will disestablish you, take over your schools, hospitals, and service agencies and make them into truly American institutions that give the Public what it entitled to by  the law of the land. 

SR: That would be a travesty of justice! It would be against everything the Constitution says and the rights we are guaranteed!

 M: Perhaps. But then again perhaps not, given the “evolving” way the Constitution is being read in your times.  It is quite likely that the Sovereign State will continue to expand its reach in society and eliminate the Church from Public Life. It has happened time and again in the past. You know that from history, don’t you?

SR: Yes, but what is the point of your argument? Where are you going with this?

M: It is very simple, really.  If Obama gets re-elected and Obama Care gets strictly enforced, then the Church loses what little influence and power it has in society. You believers can always say the Church’s defeat was God’s way of purifying the the institution, much as He used Israel’s enemies to grind His rebellious people into submission. 

SR:  What if Obama loses the election, and Obama Care gets struck down?

 M: Then for the time being you have “dodged the bullet”, as the expression goes. If your Church wins its lawsuits, and Romney  wins the election, then you can all breathe easy and continue on your complacent way until new crises occur. Either way, what does it matter? Win or lose,   eventually you will all be swept up in the sands of time, right?

 SR: As usual, I don’t totally agree, but don’t know exactly what to say in response. 

M:  So then,  say nothing for now. I always enjoy having the last word.

 

Prayer for Religious Liberty in America

           God Our Father, from your provident hand we have received our right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. You have called us as your people and given us the right and duty to worship you, the only true God, and your Son, Jesus Christ. Through the power and working of the Holy Spirit, you call us to live out our faith in the midst of the world, bringing the light and saving truth of the Gospel to every corner of society. We ask you to bless us in our vigilance for the gift of religious liberty. Give us the strength of mind and heart to readily defend our freedoms when they are threatened; give us courage in making our voices heard on behalf of the rights of your Church. and the freedom of conscience of all people of faith.  Grant, we pray, O heavenly Father, a clear and united voice to all your sons and daughters gathered in your Church in this decisive hour in the history of our nation, so that with every trial withstood, and every danger overcome- for the sake of our children, our grandchildren, and all who come after us- this great land will always be " one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all." We ask this through Christ our Lord. Amen.  

1.)Today, what does it mean for the United States of America to be "under God?" Under His judgment? His blessing? His guidance? Could we possibly delude ourselves any longer into thinking that it means He is "on our side" and that our "democracy" is divinely inspired and sustained? 

2.) Do the moral principles that originally formed the substructure of our American democratic system at its founding have any traction in today's Culture? 

3.) Is our country devolving into a form of totalitarianism? Is the State attempting to absorb the role of the Church in society? 

Dialogue on the HHS Mandate

SR:  Signore Machiavelli, I am intrigued by your admiration of President Obama. What is it about him that interests you most?

 M: His use of words, the way he takes words and reinterprets them so as to give them new meaning. His evolving use of words is creative and entertaining, no? 

S:  Perhaps, but what he does with words is also dangerous. 

M: Ah! You refer to the way he neutralizes the Church by recasting freedom of religion as freedom of worship!  What a clever way to render his opposition harmless! 

SR: Since we are talking about words, I don’t think the word clever is fitting in the case. I think the term deceitful or diabolical would be more accurate. 

M: But the man is a politician.  This is what politicians do. They play with words to gain and keep power.  Words are their weapons as much as guns and bombs. All is fair in war and love, and politics!

SR: Seriously, what do you think of his attempt to recast freedom of religion into freedom of worship?

 M: A very smart move.  Give the man credit for seeing a great opportunity and taking advantage of it.  It is his chance to win the Culture War in one big battle.

 SR: What about the other battles the Church and Obama are fighting over, such as Same-sex marriages, abortion, stem cell research, genetic engineering, contraception, and nanotechnology?

 M: All those other battles become simple mop-up operations, because  the Church will have lost her effectiveness in the marketplace, or what you today call The Public Square.

SR: What if Obama does not win his court case on the HHS Mandate? What if the courts rule in the Church’s favor and support freedom of religion?

M: Obama loses nothing. A little set-back is what he suffers, nothing more.

SR: Why do you say that?

M: First of all, most people do not realize the HHS Mandate is about freedom of religion. They think the issue is who will pay for reproductive health services. And they think Obama has wisely provided the solution by saying the Insurance companies will pay.

SR:  You said “First of all”. Did you have something else to add?

 M: Of course, of course. Secondly, many Christians and Catholics would love to see Obama win HHS battle in the courts, because he already has won their minds and hearts. They have no problem if their practice of religion is limited to the confines of a church building. 

SR: So Obama has them even if the courts rule against him?

M:  Of course! They do not want to be the “light of the world”, or “the salt of the earth”, or the “yeast in the bread”, to use your Biblical metaphors.  They want to enjoy the comforts of religion without its challenges.  It is what they already are doing. It is the civilized, tolerant way to behave instead of disturbing people with faith belief. 

SR: But the Church is supposed to evangelize the culture, and witness to Christ in the world. 

M: Perhaps in other countries, where people have nothing to lose.  But in the United States people are usually too comfortable to evangelize. The Culture has already evangelized them.  You should not blame Obama for taking advantage of the situation.

 

St. Paul: Playing with Prepositions

                                           

                                          Part One: Some reflections on in, from, to, and with 

St. Paul has a unique way of using prepositions to move us into right relationship with God and one another. Religion’s role is to teach us how to relate correctly, while codependence is a dysfunctional way of relating.  Prepositions are insignificant parts of speech, compared with more important words such as nouns and verbs. God is always turning matters upside down and inside out by making the insignificant into the important. Nobodies are always chosen to be his somebodies.  St. Paul tells us that God uses the weak to shame the strong, and the foolish to shame the wise. In fact, God chooses what is lowly and despised to bring to nothing the things that are something ( see I Cor.  1:27 -28). St Paul is imitating God, we might say, by not using nouns and verbs exclusively to help us into right relationship, but prepositions, (the nobodies of the Grammar Book), to help us get into the continual conversion process our religion calls for.                 
 St. Paul’s perception of himself is equally humble and therefore wonderful. Paul never calls himself a theologian. He refers to himself as an “apostle”, seemingly a proud title, but its basic meaning in Greek is probably what Paul is proud of. And that meaning is "to be sent as an ambassador of someone else," namely Christ. Paul also calls himself “a slave of Jesus Christ”. He does not belong to himself but to His Master.  As Christ’s property, Paul does what he is told to do, namely preach the Gospel to the Gentiles. His slavery is freely embraced, and in fact is what enables him to be sent all over as an apostle.  It was a glorious vocation, but the glory of it came through the suffering involved in carrying it out. 

 Part of the marvel of Paul is his use of prepositions as a way of gaining entry to the Mystery of God that is in Christ.  His aim was to get real people to know Jesus Christ.  Paul used everyday examples and metaphors taken from their lived experience and daily conflicts in order to introduce them to spiritual realities beyond their imagining. Through his letters, Paul changed the way the people of his day saw reality, and the way they related to one another and God. In doing so he laid the foundations of Christian civilization in what would centuries later be Europe.   That is a stunning achievement, all the more astounding, when we realize that Paul had no idea what he was accomplishing. All he wanted to do was write a few letters to a few scattered communities. He had no idea of the impact his words would have on us centuries later. If he had, he probably would have been more careful of how he expressed himself. Paul’s Master, Jesus Christ did with Paul what Paul could never have hoped to achieve had he been pursuing his own agenda. Our Lord used Paul to change peoples’ thinking, feeling, behaving, in short, how they saw themselves in relation to Christ's message. By following Paul, people would move from codependence to interdependence, from tribalism to Church, or in the terms Paul uses, from death to life, from sin to grace, from slavery to freedom, in Christ Jesus.

Prepositions ably express various styles of codependence, and also concisely state the interdependence we care called to. In addition, prepositions illustrate the journey from one state of being to another.  Prepositions help us to see whatever we are stuck in, to look beyond it towards what we are being called to, and to go with the flow of grace moves us to cooperate. But they are so insignificant that they do not win our attention by themselves. Prepositions are humble servants that do not try to be noticed. All they want is to be part of the process of freeing us and helping us grow. Perhaps St. Paul should be named the patron saint of prepositions.  For, like John the Baptist, Paul goes before the Lord. Preparing the way for Christ, Paul positions himself before the people not as their savior, but as a slave of Christ.  Paul incarnates the meaning of the term pre-position by helping all who will listen to him to relate to God and man in Christ Jesus.

PART FOUR

The Cross

Christian community is based on the mutual support we as Church give to one another through prayer, donations, worship, fellowship, study, the sacraments and service.  This is the lifelong process of loving one another in Christ.  Those last two words “in Christ”   sum up the mystery of the Church very concisely, and need more explanation. For me, the symbol that best explains our identity as Christ’s Church is the Cross.

The horizontal beam of the Cross represents Christ reaching out to embrace all humanity in endless self gift. The vertical beam stands for his offering of himself to the Father to save us.  When we sign ourselves with the Cross, or when a priest blesses us with the Cross and we in turn bless ourselves, we 1) express our faith in Christ’s saving death; 2) call upon its power to save us; 3) commit to live out its saving  power in the oblation we make through our Christian lives. Without the Cross, our suffering is wasted. With the Cross, our suffering is redemptive. The Church is the Family of God taking up the Cross because it is first taken up by it.

The power of the Cross enables us to grow from codependence to interdependence.  It is helpful for us believers to use those two terms, which are not religious, even though our growth is religious activity and a spiritual reality.  The reason why is that “codependence” and “interdependence” are not yet overly loaded words nor empty clichés. (Religious terms have a way of becoming both, probably the latter as a result of being the former.) As somewhat neutral words, codependence and interdependence can help us to see our religious beliefs in a fresh way. We thereby avoid the pitfall of thinking we understand beforehand everything we are talking about, or thinking we are talking about a lot of nothing. Thus “codependence” and “interdependence” become a means of applying to ourselves what Christ accomplishes for us by his dying and rising.  While Christ on the Cross catches us up in himself and brings us to his Father in his gift of himself, the dynamic of the Cross does not reoccur in us unless we freely embrace Him. Christ’s humble, self sacrificing love is freely given, and has to be received in the same manner.  This does not mean merely that we thank Him for his generosity, but that we enter into his sacrificial self giving.  We cannot receive what He has to give unless we are prepared to continue handing on what He offers us by our own self sacrifice.

God is self-giving love. He is incapable of not giving Himself away.  Christ’s Cross contains the Father’s self-gift as well as his own outpouring of self as the Father’s Son. Thus the Cross communicates to us their Spirit of Oneness who makes us capable of union with one another by giving ourselves away. Husband and wife live out of this love by their sacrifice of themselves for each other, and for their children. Their self-gift results in their growth into a deeper realization of their own identities.  Through his self-gift the man becomes a father and therefore more of a man; the woman, a mother and therefore more of a woman. The new being of each demonstrates to us the fruitfulness of self-giving love, and is the pattern we follow in the Church as the Family of God, as we father, mother, brother and sister one another in the Christian Life. The self-gift of the Triune God through the Cross of Christ makes us into the Family of God. The Cross calls us continually grow into who we are by continuously giving away the Love we are receiving, The only way to receive the gift is to keep giving it. The only way to give it is in our self giving which opens us to keep receiving more and more of God’s endless outpouring. This is the dynamic of Life in Christ as the Family of God through the power of the Cross.

The Black Priests I Know

              Since my retirement, I have been living with a group of retired priests, all of them White, at the old seminary. The classrooms, dorms, study halls and refectories of the place have been reincarnated as an archdiocesan center, so the facility is now filled with many Diocesan Offices and Agencies, as well as many daily and overnight visitors who are renting its meeting places.  Since the retired priests live here all the time, we get to see each other’s family and friends who drop in to visit. I was surprised the first time one of my fellow retirees asked me “How come you know so many Black priests?”  The second and third time, however, I found myself bristling. I think it was because no one ever asked me why I had so many White people coming in to visit me, but just took those visits as normal. I probably am reading into things, or overreacting, but I was picking up a tinge of prejudice in the question.

              By the way, the term “Black” in this context means African not “African-American” or “American Black”. The Black priests are all “foreigners” who come from six different countries in Africa.  Three have returned home to Ghana, Uganda and Nigeria, and about a half a dozen, all Nigerians, are working here in the states, usually in hospital or parish ministry.  And I put “foreigners” is in quotation marks, because they stay foreigners in everyone’s minds even if they become citizens. Often it is because of accent and language use that they are tagged with that label.

               I answered my fellow retiree's question with a shrug: “It is one of the blessings God has given me”. My words cut short any more discussion, which was fine with me, because who drops by to see me is nobody else’s business.  However, there is really a second question, unspoken, behind the first, which I do want to try to answer.  It is “Why are they coming here to visit you”?  That is my topic.

The Black priests I know stop by to visit because we are friends, not Black friends as opposed to White friends, but just human-being friends. I have just made an outrageous assertion which, I believe, should astound you. Why? I believe most friendships in my experience are really utilitarian relationships of codependent persons. It works this way: I pretend I like you for yourself, while in truth I like you for me, for what I can get out of you. You return the favor by engaging in the same collusion with me. Thus we secretly agree to not be upfront by acknowledging how we are using one another, and we make believe that mutual respect and regard is the basis of our relationship. But the “friendship” ends if the usefulness ends, or if one of the persons wakes up to the self deception involved, tries to raise the relationship to another level, and the other partner refuses. What happens, you ask, if both parties agree to go beyond the utilitarian mode they are operating in? Something wonderful: they go beyond codependence to interdependence. The process involves a lot of humility, honesty, and openness, but it actually does happen. Some (not enough!) married couples I know are best friends, some single people too, including celibate priests, believe it or not! I have to admit however, that in normal life, codependent relationships are the norm and interdependence is the exception.

Another outrageous assertion: the Black priests are often better friends and brothers to me than many White priests I have known a lot longer.  Although I know the Black priests a shorter time, we connect on a deeper level. Why is that? It is a question I have asked myself, a question I began asking in 1985 when I first began to know different priests from Africa. Why am I friendly with and more of a brother to, these priests from Africa, than many of the American priests I know?

My hunch is that in America we priests tend to be Lone Rangers, at least here in the Northeast. This may be a result of our training, our life-style, the declining numbers of the clergy, shifts in morale,    problems of busyness in ministry, and so on. But it is not a complete explanation.  I think a more precise answer involves the way we North Americans understand both friendship and Church.  Friendship takes time to form, just as Church takes time to build, because both at base are relationships. We usually find time to do what we consider important, and in this country   forming friendships and building church are not high on our list of priorities.  I believe our culture denigrates “Friendship” and “Church” to the arbitrary category of “Personal Likes and Dislikes”, and thus classifies them both as undeserving of serious attention. After all, a “personal” like or dislike (such as religion or a particular human being) is just a matter of taste. Also, what we call friends in America are often no more than acquaintances.  And what we call Church can be no more than a grouping of acquaintances, a bunch of people we are more or less comfortable being under the same roof with, so long as they don’t intrude into our private space by daring to sit in our pew. 

The priests I know from Africa, (and also, by the way, the ones who come from India), are usually more open to friendship than my North American confreres.  They experience the priesthood as a real brotherhood and not a snooty Old Boys Clerical Club.  This may be a matter of Culture, meaning their particular African culture versus our North American.  My African brothers also have a deeper understanding of Church than we North Americans do. They come from a connection that is organic and not one seen as a social construct.

 I suppose social scientists could prove or disprove these two working assumptions of mine regarding Friendship and Church. All I can say is that my theory is based on concrete experience. In any case, this openness to Friendship and Church is what I like most about the Black priests I have encountered.  Both on a natural level, (and therefore supernatural), I think we are able to meet each other without the pretensions illusions, and yes, prejudicial class consciousness that are so much a part of life in America.

 Another thing I like about these men is their courage. I have thought about that word, “courage” and can find none better to describe what I see in them. I am not talking about natural courage alone, because that is often mixed with foolhardiness, ignorance, stupidity, and/or desperation.  My African brothers have as much of that natural courage as we all do. To acknowledge that is no compliment.  What I admire in them, however, is a courage born of faith.  Perhaps it would be better to call this courage a happy fortitude, or strength of heart.

 It takes only natural courage to come to this country because of all the advantages and enticements of the American Dream, but it requires strength of heart to come in spite of the many attractions. Strength of heart presupposes the maturity to face the pros and cons of coming to America, and the steadfastness of spirit to deal with all the cultural conflicts that await them, including racism.

Racial prejudice is one of our cultural conflicts, but it deserves particular mention because it is such a pervasive reality. Most African priests who come to America have experienced racial prejudice at home or in their travels. Yet the American experience is different. Why? Here as elsewhere  prejudice can hide behind and combine itself with many more disguises, such as liberal condescension, preferential treatment, sophisticated jargon, anti-Catholic sentiment,   anticlerical attitudes, radical feminism, and sexual orientation. Such mixtures make it impossible to separate the strand of racism from whatever else it is married to at the moment.  Even when the African priests recognize prejudice over here, they are in no position to confront or deal with it.  “It’s in the water”, a friend of mine says, meaning it is so basic, so much a part of the culture, that we absorb it all the time without realizing it. Prejudice is in the water we drink and the air we breathe because we are raised with an innate sense of superiority as a result of being born White Americans. (Of course we neglect to realize that we had no input as to our skin color and nationality.)

 Our American bias does not usually express itself in anything so crass as  dirty looks or hate stares, but clothes itself in a mantle of personal  superiority for the simple fact of being not-Black.  Black is perceived as the basest of colors.  Any other hue is preferable, be it yellow, tan, or a light shade of brown.  Brown black, the normal Black color, is bad, but not as bad as Blue black, the darkest color of all. In spite of good manners, political correctness of expression and conduct, which we tolerant White Americans display, the blip of our bias will sooner or later flash on the Black radar screen.

 “Cada persona es un mundo,” a Mexican friend once told me. It was a wonderful way of saying that each person is sui generis, and a Mystery. Because each person is unique, and we can never fully know anyone, so writing a few lines about each one of the Black priests as separate individuals would serve no purpose. So, instead, I am going to focus on the one Black priest whom I have more contact with than the others. He was fortunate to find employment in a nearby hospital, while all the others live and work at greater distance. I hope that by portraying him with some accuracy I can give an idea of the qualities and characters of all the others. His real first name is straight from the Old Testament, so here I will call him Elisha. There are very real differences among all the Black priests, but Elisha is a great example of what they all have in common.  What he personifies in himself is true of the others as well, to various degrees.

What stands out to me about Elisha is his meekness. He personifies meekness to the nth degree. If you saw the musical Chicago, try to remember the song and dance routine called The Cellophane Man. Elisha really is the man nobody sees, and nobody notices. He does nothing to call attention to himself. This surprised me when I first got to know him, because the other priests, (especially the Igbo  from Nigeria), were often loud and assertive. Not that they weren’t humble, they were.  But they were humble more as a requirement of working in a strange country. More than one of them said to me, “Even when we are right, over here we are wrong, just for opening our mouths.”  They are saying quite a “mouthful” with that statement. As outsiders they have no way to address an injustice, or work the system against itself or manipulate it to their advantage. They are at its mercy. It doesn’t matter if there is a work-related problem in the Pastoral Department at the hospital, or in the kitchen at the parish rectory, the Black priests have no adequate recourse. Their only hope is to keep their mouths shut, their head down, and keep going.  This requires a great deal of self control.  Elisha however, doesn’t have to restrain himself.  His meekness is simply part of his personality. The others are humble because they are smart enough to be careful in a new environment, whereas Elisha would be meek even if he were home in Nigeria. 

 His humility is sometimes a problem. An example from around 2004: a couple of us were prepping Elisha for a job interview.  It was a real effort, (heroic, on our part) to get him to look us in the face while talking to us. He was so used to looking down, avoiding other persons’ eyes, that  it never occurred to him that he would need  to be more assertive, more in your face  in order to make a good impression at a job interview.  But he was humble enough to listen to us, make himself do what we told him, and he got the job!  

Another strange fact:  Elisha’s meekness is also the source of his boldness.  I presume that sounds as weird to you to hear as it does for me to say it, (or in this case write it).  My experiences with him over ten years have made me see that Elisha’s meekness is what fuels requests for help.

Many of us human beings, no matter what our nationality or culture, would be tempted to suffer in silence than admit our needs and wants by asking for help. We see this suffering in silence as a virtue, when it can be a vice.  Our stubborn desire to be independent deprives us of the care and support others would be happy to offer us. It also puts us in the unwitting position of trying to get others to satisfy the desires and needs we are unwilling to articulate. We end up playing manipulative games in order to meet needs we refuse to admit are there. Elisha doesn’t do that. He doesn’t confuse needs with wants, doesn’t manipulate or play games. With humble awareness of his personal limitations he forthrightly asks for the help he needs. He doesn’t play the victim, doesn’t get obsequious, or fawning or flattering.  He just states his need and asks for help. If you say no, he moves on with no hard feelings. If you say yes, he is grateful and receptive. He doesn’t mind receiving, doesn’t mind asking, and he doesn’t hold it against you that you are in a position to help him.  He will also go out of his way for you if you ever need him or give him the chance to be of assistance.

Here is a more recent example of his meekness, a case that irritated me: Elisha took his car to a garage for repairs.  The next day he got a ride back to the garage to pick up his car at the time he had been told it would be ready.  But it wasn’t.   He spent the rest of the morning and afternoon sitting there!  I find that so incredible.  Why didn’t he call somebody and ask for a ride?  Even if all his friends were busy or working, one of us could have found a free moment to go get him.   I know I am unfairly judging him by how I would have acted.  I would have gone crazy with frustration if I had to sit there the whole afternoon and wait until closing to get a ride. I suppose in Elisha’s case, it may have been simply a matter of long practiced self-discipline. Whatever it was, it is a quality I do not have. I do know that to Elisha it was no big deal, just another part of living and breathing. His lack of transportation was not a big enough deal to move him to bother someone else.

  I used to think that what I saw as his meekness was an inferiority complex, but it is not. Elisha does not think that he has nothing much to offer. He is just not a self-starter. But he is fun to be with. He as a great deal to offer in terms of charm, wit, practical wisdom, humor,  book learning and common sense, as well as pastoral experience. The challenge is to get him to share it.  Share it he does, if someone takes the initiative and speaks to him first. But if you wait for Elisha to take the initiative, you will be waiting a long time. Spontaneity, opening his mouth and expressing himself, or letting you in on what is going on inside him, well, that is just not going to happen.  

Another example of this meekness of his (and also his strength of heart) is the reason why he came to the United States.  It is very simple. He would have died if he had stayed home.  He had serious health problems, and no money. In Nigeria, I am told,  serious illness plus no money equals death as sure as one plus one makes two. If you are a poor man, you die.  End of the story.  You as a “Westerner” reading this may think I have just stated an obvious, foregone conclusion. But  most Africans would know better. In fact most Africans would probably find my statement naïve in the extreme.  Why? One reason is that they do not measure wealth and poverty in terms of money alone as we do in this culture, but in terms of what has been harvested from the previous season, and, more importantly, in terms of human relations. A man is rich because he is a member of a family a clan, a tribe, a people, and not because he has a big bank account. A man is poor in the extreme if he is an outcast, cut off from and rejected by the people he belongs to. Then he really is as good as dead! Another important factor which escapes our Western consciousness: traditional medicine in many African countries is both very effective and equally inexpensive. Therefore, in the case of seventy or eighty percent of all illnesses, Western medicine is not called for.  Elisha, sad to say, had exhausted the traditional remedies which had helped him all his life, and was left with no answers.

Fortunately, his bishop had told him he could come here and work for whatever time he had left, and fortunately that turned out to be quite a lot, since he got medical care as part of the salary benefits which go with his job. Coming here added years to his life. But he did not come out of a desire to have a career, enjoy the freedom America offers, make a lot of money, etc.  He came because, very simply, he had to find someplace to go if he was going to have any chance of staying alive.  

Why is that so unusual?  Isn’t that the same situation with many desperate immigrants?  No.  Elisha wasn’t interested in staying alive only for his own sake.  He also wanted to stay alive because he had responsibilities. Back home his life was not about him; he was living for others. His death would have meant that these others would have no means of support. He owed it to them to stay alive so he could fulfill his promise to his mother to take care of them. As a youngster he promised his mom he would take care of his brother, one single person. But it was a promise he made for life. Today his brother is married and has two sons. So caring for his brother means sending money back home for his brother and sister in law, as well as paying the university tuition for his nephews. Elisha lives frugally so he can keep his loved ones alive.  True, his standard of living has improved somewhat, but much of all he earns gets sent back to Africa.

This is typical of all the other priests as well.  They love life, but they do not live for themselves. One of them has had a well dug for his village; a second stocked a local clinic with equipment and medical supplies; a third bought books, supplies and uniforms for the kids in his village school, and of course, is sending money to keep his mom and dad alive with food and medicine. I could continue with examples from the lives of the other African priests, but you get the idea.  I admire them because they live for more than themselves, for their families, their church, and their people.  They do it automatically, naturally, without giving it a second thought. And if their care for a person or project ends, they do not say, “Now I have paid my debt, leave me be.” They quietly move on to the next person or project that demands their attention, because the needs never end.

  If there is anything the African priests are not, it is rugged individualists. But I think it is their solidarity with one another that enables them to stand alone. Perhaps the best way to understand them is to say that, in general, Africans start off with a communal perspective, while we Americans start off with an individualistic point of view. They see everything in terms of the group, even themselves. Friendship is a group thing to them, not only a matter of one on one. Of course, they have particular friends they are closer to than others, but their closer friendships are open to welcome others into relationship. They enjoy   being together. It is a cause for celebration, on however small or large a scale. In America, most of us see the group as an extension of the individual. To us, the group is little more than many individuals together, an aggregate of individuals collected into a sum total.

 With the Africans, the group is basic. In fact, the individual is a manifestation of the group, an expression of the group, so he is never by himself even when he is the only person in the room. He always carries the group in his heart.  Why do they see this way? Because it is the way things are. The group is basic.  It should be a truism to say that the family group is the basic unit of society, and that the individual is an extension of the family. Yet more and more, the common attitude in America is that the family is a bunch of individuals, or a collection of separate persons. The family is not even considered as an extension as of those individuals, because unity between them is seen as accidental and superficial.

 The same attitude, unfortunately, holds true with Church. I think most Africans build their concept of Church upon the interconnectedness of the family of man, which is a perfect fit. We Americans, well, I am not sure what we build our concept of Church on.  I think it may be accurate to say Americans experience Church as a bunch of individuals who share the same taste in creedal and moral preferences. It is a kind of religious association to attend to spiritual needs. You can shop for church as you shop for any other product that you have a taste for.  It is not something you are blessed with and stuck with at the same time like your family of origin.

 We Americans probably have work to acquire a sense of community, whereas the Africans have to struggle to acquire a sense of individuality. Their sense of the family, the group, the people, is what they start out with. Why do I think this is so important? Because I think it is the one characteristic that enables them to connect with one another and with anyone else, on a human level and therefore on the spiritual level as well.  Our spiritual bond doesn’t sit on top of our humanity but flows through our humanity and vivifies it.

This human level of connection is my concluding reason for my friendship with African priests, and calls for more explanation.

At first, I was surprised and put off by their constant use of titles. They were always calling me “Father” and addressing one another that way too.  I am used to calling fellow priests by their first name. As I understand it, in their culture what a title connotes depends a great deal on the country you are in.  Usually, the priest is seen by everybody as a special person, and may be put on pedestal by the rest of society. But in Nigeria, for example, the male still enjoys more power and prestige than the female. Although things are changing, there a man is more important than a woman, and a priest is more important than a nun or religious sister. So many connotations go into the title, “Father” in that country, both positive and negative. In general, in most places “Father” is a sign of respect given to an older man, not just to an ordained priest, and the same is true of the term “Mother”. When I introduce any Black friends to my ninety six year old mother, they all call her “mum” or “momma” or “mother.”  They also address my mother’s brother and sister-in-law by the titles Uncle and Aunt. They have a respect for the elderly that is genuine, and genuinely lacking over here in our culture!

   So when I called them by their first names and tried to get them to do this with me, I explained that we Americans are somewhat democratic in our relationships, and the term “Father “ while a sign of respect is often an empty formality and a way of distancing ourselves from one another or standing on class status.  If there was anything Christ emphasized with his disciples, it was how they were to be humble brothers. After a time most of them, especially all the younger ones, were able to call me my first name, but a couple of the older generation, Elisha included, were not. It was a result of their training I suppose.  But I did get them to use my first name after the title “Father”, which I see as a partial victory. I think “brothering” one another is how Christ wants us to “father”.  They agreed, I think, because they are naturally brothers to each other on a human level, and saw that common humanity as the foundation on which relationships with all their differences and distinctions were built.  If we can’t connect as human beings, how can we connect as children of God?

Let me finish this article with a mea culpa.  I plead guilty to the fault of exaggeration and oversimplification. I am sure there are individualistic African priests, men who are self centered, egotistical, selfish, indulgent, grasping, and greedy.  Every person who leaves the womb has the same flawed human nature that the rest of us are born with. It has something (everything!) to do with original sin.  However, I do not think I am idealizing or romanticizing very good and decent qualities of Black priests out of all proportion.  They suffer from the same defects and weaknesses that afflict priests the world over.  Are there not men  in Africa who leave the priesthood, who forsake their vows of poverty, chastity and obedience, who lead double lives,  or who stay in ministry for the money, or because they find it easier to stay in than to go and earn a living by the sweat of their brow?  Of course.  I am sure there are priests from Africa who are not the men of God they should be. Let me also affirm there are plenty of good and great American priests, men of prayer and dedication, men who live for Christ and His Church.  All Black priests are not perfect saints, and all American priests are not self-centered functionaries. All I want to affirm, and affirm gratefully, is that to date, the Black priests it has been my good fortune to know exemplify the brotherhood that is Christ’s priesthood at its best.