After recording The Journey Home there was a kind of a lightning round where I was asked quick questions by John Matthew Swaim and Seth Paine.
This is a short video of my answer when asked about G.K. Chesterton.
How far can we torture St. Joseph to sell our house?I have been very annoyed by the whole bury a St. Joseph statue to sell your house idea. Even more annoyed to see these kits sold in Catholic stores.
I once wrote a parody that included the idea where you could buy a Jack Bauer and St. Joseph pack and have Jack torture St. Joe until your house sells. While this is a parody form of Reductio ad absurdum, it follows the same logic.
I think of Saint Teresa of Avila relying on this great saint without ever resorting to burying him at all.
“Would that I could persuade all men to be devout to this glorious saint,” wrote St. Teresa in her autobiography, The Life of St. Teresa of Jesus of the Order of Our Lady of Carmel, “for I know by long experience what blessings he can obtain for us from God.”
“It is now very many years since I began asking him for something on his feast, and I always received it,” wrote St. Teresa. “If the petition was in any way amiss, he rectified it for my greater good.” source
Just a taste from an excellent post by Amy Welborn titled It’s not the reverence; It’s the ego:
I’m going to suggest that the core of what drives people crazy (in a bad way) about the celebration of this Mass is the always-present-fear that when you open the door and sit down in that pew, you are never quite sure if what’s about to happen might involve you being subject to surprise attacks and being held hostage by someone’s ego.
You go to Mass with your hopes, joys and fears. You’re there carrying sadness and grief, questions, doubts and gratitude and peace. You’re bringing it all to God in the context of worship, worship that you trust will link you, assuredly to Christ – to Jesus, the Bread of Life, to His redeeming sacrifice. That in this moment, you’ll be joined to the Communion of Saints, you’ll get a taste of the peace that’s promised to the faithful after this strange, frustrating life on earth is over.
And what do you get?
Who knows. From week to week, from place to place, who knows.
Who knows what the personality of the celebrant will impose on the ritual. Will it be jokes? Will it be a 40-minute homily? Will it be meaningful glances and dramatic pauses? Will it be the demand for the congregation to repeat the responses because they weren’t enthusiastic enough?
This puts very succinctly what I have experienced myself when I travelled more widely in parishes in my diocese and to other places. A hesitancy towards what you are about to experience. Almost a relief at the end of Mass to have experienced nothing out of the ordinary at all. A rather miserable way to look at Mass with a complacency to the Mass as being the source and summit of our faith.
Sometimes it seems the message of some priests is contrary to John the Baptist with them indicating “I must increase.” Or you get the feeling that some other person or group have imposed themselves on how Mass is celebrated at that parish.
Amy puts this all and more very well in her post. I really like that her occasional posts on the subject are not part of the liturgy wars trying to contrast one Mass against the other. That they are observations and not mandates about what will fix everything.
What especially struck me when I read this the other day was that earlier the same day I read a section from Benedict XVI’s apostolic exhortation Sacramentum Caritatis.
Certainly the ordained minister also acts “in the name of the whole Church, when presenting to God the prayer of the Church, and above all when offering the eucharistic sacrifice.”53 As a result, priests should be conscious of the fact that in their ministry they must never put themselves or their personal opinions in first place, but Jesus Christ. Any attempt to make themselves the center of the liturgical action contradicts their very identity as priests. The priest is above all a servant of others, and he must continually work at being a sign pointing to Christ, a docile instrument in the Lord’s hands. This is seen particularly in his humility in leading the liturgical assembly, in obedience to the rite, uniting himself to it in mind and heart, and avoiding anything that might give the impression of an inordinate emphasis on his own personality. I encourage the clergy always to see their eucharistic ministry as a humble service offered to Christ and his Church. The priesthood, as Saint Augustine said, is amoris officium,54 it is the office of the good shepherd, who offers his life for his sheep (cf. John 10:14–15).
Plus for the time being I am rather settled in my daily liturgical life where I don’t have that fear that I am going to experience the priest’s ego and not the Logos. So I count myself privileged to be currently in this situation.
This version of The Weekly Francis covers material released in the last week from 8 August 2021 to 11 August 2021.
The Weekly Francis is a compilation of the Holy Father’s writings, speeches, etc which I also post at Jimmy Akin’s blog.
Angelus
General Audiences
Papal Tweets
- “In #TheGospelOfTheDay (Jn 6:41–51), Jesus reveals Himself as the Bread of life. For He alone nourishes the soul, He alone makes us feel loved even if everyone else disappoints us, He alone gives us the strength to love and forgive in difficulties, He alone gives eternal life.” @Pontifex 8 August 2021
- “God does not come in extraordinary events, but works amid the apparent monotony of our daily life, in the frequently dull rhythm of our activities, in the little things that, working with tenacity and humility, we achieve in our efforts to do his will.” @Pontifex 10 August 2021
- “The external law cannot bring life because it does not change the heart. The radical newness of the Christian life is life according to the Holy Spirit who frees us from the law and at the same time brings it to fulfilment in the commandment of love. #GeneralAudience” @Pontifex 11 August 2021
Papal Instagram
So I have been going through G.K. Chesterton’s “St. Thomas Aquinas” again since it is the next book we are looking at as part of our local Chesterton society.
The first chapter “On Two Friars” is superb with the comparisons between St. Aquinas (sometimes St. Dominic) and St. Francis.
I have repeated the following quote quite a lot over the last two decades and it is nice to see I usually quoted it correctly.
“It is an old story that, while we may need somebody like Dominic to convert the heathen to Christianity, we are in even greater need of somebody like Francis, to convert the Christians to Christianity.”
Still, the image I have in mind of the comparisons between Francis and Aquinas is of St. Laurel and Hardy. This kind of works on some levels.
I also enjoyed this point:
“St. Francis is called humane because he tried to convert Saracens and failed; St. Dominic is called bigoted and besotted because he tried to convert Albigensians and succeeded.”
Along with this analysis:
“St. Thomas takes the view that the souls of all the ordinary hard-working and simple-minded people are quite as important as the souls of thinkers and truth-seekers; and he asks how all these people are possibly to find time for the amount of reasoning that is needed to find truth. The whole tone of the passage shows both a respect for scientific enquiry and a strong sympathy with the average man. His argument for Revelation is not an argument against Reason; but it is an argument for Revelation. The conclusion he draws from it is that men must receive the highest moral truths in a miraculous manner; or most men would not receive them at all. His arguments are rational and natural; but his own deduction is all for the supernatural; and, as is common in the case of his argument, it is not easy to find any deduction except his own deduction. And when we come to that, we find it is something as simple as St. Francis himself could desire; the message from heaven; the story that is told out of the sky; the fairytale that is really true.”
This version of The Weekly Francis covers material released in the last week from 6 July 2021 to 4 August 2021.
The Weekly Francis is a compilation of the Holy Father’s writings, speeches, etc which I also post at Jimmy Akin’s blog.
Angelus
General Audiences
Homilies
Messages
Papal Tweets
- “The Lord is aware of all that we have been through in this time. He is close to those who felt isolated and alone, feelings that became more acute during the pandemic. He is not indifferent to this. #IamWithYouAlways” @Pontifex 23 July 2021
- “The Lord is always close to us: through new invitations, new words, with His consolations. The Lord is eternal. He never, ever retires. #IamWithYouAlways” @Pontifex 24 July 2021
- ““I am with you always” are the words as Bishop of Rome, elderly person like you, want to address to you on the first World Day of Grandparents and the Elderly. The Church is close to you, to us. She loves you and doesn’t want to leave you alone! #IamWithYouAlways
@laityfamilylife” @Pontifex 25 July 2021 - “The significance of this Day is that every grandfather and grandmother, every older person, especially those among us who are most alone, might be visited by an angel! #IamWithYouAlways
@laityfamilylife” @Pontifex 25 July 2021 - “Dear grandparents, what is our vocation today, at our age? To preserve our roots, to pass on the faith to the young and to care for the little ones. Let’s never forget this. #IamWithYouAlways
@laityfamilylife” @Pontifex 25 July 2021 - “It would be good to ask ourselves every day: “What do I bring to Jesus today?”. He can do a lot with one of our prayers, with a gesture of charity for others. This is how God loves to act: He does great things, starting from those small things. #GospelOfTheDay (Jn 6:1–15)” @Pontifex 25 July 2021
- “In this time of pandemic, the Tokyo Olympics are a sign of hope, a sign of universal brotherhood marked by a healthy competitive spirit. #Tokyo2020” @Pontifex 25 July 2021
- “On this #WorldDayAgainstTraffickingInPersons, I invite everyone to work together with the victims to transform the economy of trafficking into an economy of care. #CareAgainstTrafficking #EndHumanTrafficking #TalithaKum” @Pontifex 30 July 2021
- “The invitation in the #GospelOfTheDay (Jn 6:24–35) is this: rather than being concerned only with material bread, let us welcome Jesus as the bread of life and, starting out from our friendship with Him, learn to love each other. Freely and without calculation.” @Pontifex 1 August 2021
- “Let us pray for the Church, that she may receive from the Holy Spirit the grace and strength to reform herself in the light of the Gospel. []” @Pontifex 3 August 2021
- “The Gospel is the Good News and the force that changes our lives and hearts for the better. For this I ask you to read the Gospel every day and meditate on a short passage to be nourished from this inexhaustible source of salvation. #GeneralAudience” @Pontifex 4 August 2021
- “Let us #PrayTogether for all priests so that, following the example of #SaintJohnVianney, they may bring to all their brothers and sisters in difficulty the living Gospel of their witness of love, mercy, and solidarity.” @Pontifex 4 August 2021
- “Today, a year after the terrible port explosion in the capital Beirut, I appeal to the international community to offer #Lebanon concrete assistance in undertaking a journey of “resurrection”, so that Lebanon may once more be a message of peace and fraternity.” @Pontifex 4 August 2021
Papal Instagram
About a month ago I was interviewed by Eddie Trask of the “Catholic RE.CON.” YouTube channel.
The interesting thing about being interviewed by him was how often I forgot that this was even being recorded. I was at ease as if we were just talking among friends.
In other news, The Journey Home episode I was on is being broadcast on August 9th.
Here’s a headline
“Latin Mass Held in New Orleans Despite Pope’s Restrictions”
It included this boilerplate of articles of this type.
“a solemn and ancient form of Catholic worship spoken almost entirely in the Latin language by a priest who faces away from the congregation.”
Just in case you missed this fact:
“Latin intonations are spoken by a priest who mostly faces away from the congregation.”
I was awaiting them saying “The Mass is held at 9 AM by a priest who faces away from the congregation”
This misunderstanding is because so many bishop’s have installed “Adblock Orientum”
The article itself is not totally without merit, just odd emphasis and idiotic headline.
I am back from the Chesterton conference, and it was as great an experience as the last two conferences I have attended.
This year they also had a simultaneous virtual conference where talks were broadcast live. I am glad they are doing this for those unable to attend. The talks are diverse and informative.
Yet it is not the talks that primarily draw me.
I want to take notes from conversations of people I met and the extended ones into the wee hours during the Afterglow. While Chesterton comes up, you never know what else will come up. Sometimes I am just willing to be the fly-on-the-wall listening to conservations where I would have nothing to contribute intelligently. So much is interesting to me, more so the people that attend the conference.
“The best way that man could test his readiness to encounter the common variety of mankind would be to climb down a chimney into any house at random, and get on as well as possible with the people inside. And that is essentially what each one of us did on the day that he was born.” – GKC “Heretics
If you climb down a chimney into a Chesterton conference, you will also “encounter the common variety of mankind.”, just with a lot less friction.
We also had a relatively large contingent of people from the Central Florida G.K. Chesterton Society I attend. It was great spending time with them.
A highlight is always Dale Ahlquist. I so appreciate his drive to promote Chesterton. However, what amuses me the most is his superb comic timing and comic body language.
I am already anticipating next year’s conference in Milwaukee.
Plus I am so glad I took the time to visit the Marion E. Wade Center. It was not far from the convention, and the people who work there were great in accommodating us. They had many of GKC’s books and some of his personal books laid out. It was fun to see his doodling in not just the margin of his books.
Another highlight was seeing C.S. Lewis’s copy of GKC’s Orthodoxy with marginalia.
The Marion E. Wade Center museum features memorabilia and rotating displays with selections from our collection of books, letters, manuscripts, and artifacts. Through these exhibits we invite our visitors to explore more deeply the seven authors’ lives, writings, and the historical context in which they lived. Permanent pieces on display in the museum include: a wardrobe owned by C.S. Lewis, desks and pens belonging to C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien, bookshelves from Charles Williams, the eyeglasses of Dorothy L. Sayers, and Owen Barfield’s chess set and pipe.