Blog by-the-Sea

Pentecost at St. Peter's Basilica: The Journey to the Ends of the Earth

In his homily for the Solemn Mass of Pentecost today in St. Peter's Basilica, Pope Benedict XVI spoke about the universality of the Church that was born at Pentecost, which spoke the languages of all people.  He spoke of the significance of "Rome" in the ancient world.  He mentioned St. Luke's writing in Acts 1:8 ("But you will receive power when the holy Spirit comes upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, throughout Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth"), saying that "the journey of the word of God, begun in Jerusalem, reaches its destination, because Rome represents the entire world and thus embodies the Lucan idea of catholicity."  The Pope spoke about the nature of the Church, the intertwining of multiplicity and unity within the Church, and the role of the Church in service to the peace of Christ.  He said that the Church can be "a ferment of that reconciliation that comes from God" but "only if she remains docile to the Spirit and bears witness to the Gospel, only if she carries the cross like Jesus and with Jesus."

Afterward, he addressed the crowd in St. Peter's Square at the midday Regina Caeli, asking people to "rediscover the presence of the Holy Spirit in their lives."  In it are found "the 'I' of the disciple and the 'we' of the Church," which are inseparable.  After the prayer, he made an appeal for peace in  the current fighting in Lebanon.

An article is available from Asia News, which also has a separate article devoted to the Holy Father's appeal for peace in Lebanon.   The Vatican Press Office has the original Italian text of the Pope's homily and his words at the Regina Caeli.  English translations of the homily are available from Zenit and Papa Ratzinger Forum.  Translations of the Holy Father's words at the Regina Caeli are also available from Zenit and Papa Ratzinger Forum.

EWTN's special broadcasts today include two more re-broadcasts of the Mass at St. Peter's Basilica at 12:00 noon and midnight Eastern, 9:00 a.m. and p.m. Pacific.  Watch online.

Go Into All the World

Christ had said to them: “You shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria and to the end of the earth (Acts 1:8). Precisely to prepare them for this great mission, Jesus had promised them the Holy Spirit on the day before his Passion, in the Upper Room, telling them: “When the Counsellor comes, whom I shall send to you from the Father, even the Spirit of truth, who proceeds from the Father, he will bear witness to me; and you also are witnesses, because you have been with me from the beginning” (Jn 15:26-27).

The witness of the Spirit of truth must become one with that of the Apostles, thus fusing the divine and human witness into one saving reality. From this fusion flows the work of evangelization, begun on the day of Pentecost and entrusted to the Church as her task and mission down the ages.

- Pope John Paul II, Homily for Pentecost, 1997

* * * * *

“If you see charity, you see the Trinity”, wrote Saint Augustine. In the foregoing reflections, we have been able to focus our attention on the Pierced one (cf. Jn 19:37, Zech12:10), recognizing the plan of the Father who, moved by love (cf. Jn 3:16), sent his only-begotten Son into the world to redeem man. By dying on the Cross—as Saint John tells us—Jesus “gave up his Spirit” (Jn 19:30), anticipating the gift of the Holy Spirit that he would make after his Resurrection (cf. Jn 20:22). This was to fulfil the promise of “rivers of living water” that would flow out of the hearts of believers, through the outpouring of the Spirit (cf. Jn 7:38-39). The Spirit, in fact, is that interior power which harmonizes their hearts with Christ's heart and moves them to love their brethren as Christ loved them, when he bent down to wash the feet of the disciples (cf. Jn 13:1-13) and above all when he gave his life for us (cf. Jn 13:1, 15:13).

The Spirit is also the energy which transforms the heart of the ecclesial community, so that it becomes a witness before the world to the love of the Father, who wishes to make humanity a single family in his Son. The entire activity of the Church is an expression of a love that seeks the integral good of man: it seeks his evangelization through Word and Sacrament, an undertaking that is often heroic in the way it is acted out in history; and it seeks to promote man in the various arenas of life and human activity. Love is therefore the service that the Church carries out in order to attend constantly to man's sufferings and his needs, including material needs.

- Pope Benedict XVI, Deus Caritas Est

* * * * *

In full agreement with Our predecessors, with those saints whom our age has given to the Church on earth and in heaven, and with the devout instincts of the faithful, We are convinced that charity should today assume its rightful, foremost position in the scale of religious and moral values-and not just in theory, but in the practice of the Christian life. And this applies not only to the charity we show toward God who has poured out the abundance of His love upon us, but also to the charity which we in turn should lavish on our brothers, the whole human race.

Charity is the key to everything. It sets all to rights. There is nothing which charity cannot achieve and renew. Charity "beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things." Who is there among us who does not realize this? And since we realize it, is not this the time to put it into practice?

- Pope Paul VI,  Ecclesiam Suam

On the Emmaus Road: Christ Present in His Church

In his reflection before praying the midday Regina Caeli today, Pope Benedict XVI spoke of Jesus' presence with His disciples on the Emmaus Road, taken from today's Gospel reading for Mass (Luke 24:13-25).  The two disciples, downcast and dejected, had lost hope in Jesus, feeling abandoned and betrayed even by the Lord, when they encountered Him on the way.  Still today, he said, we encounter Jesus in the Word and in the Eucharist. 

News articles from Asia News and Catholic News Agency are online.  The Vatican Press Office has the original Italian text with the Holy Father's words in other languages following the prayer.  Full English translations are available at Zenit and Papa Ratzinger Forum.

After the prayer, he said in English:

"I am happy to greet all the English-speaking visitors present at today’s Regina Caeli prayer. On this Third Sunday of Easter, Saint Luke relates how the Risen Christ walks with his disciples, makes their hearts burn within them by his words, and reveals himself in the breaking of the bread. Let us pray that our Easter journey will teach us to open our hearts with joy to the living Christ present in his Church. Upon all of you I invoke God’s abundant blessings!"

Urbi et Orbi: "The resurrection of Jesus is essentially an event of love"

Here is the entire text of the Pope's Urbi et Orbi address for this Easter in the Vatican's English translation from the Vatican Press Office:

Resurrexi, et adhuc tecum sum. Alleluia! - I have risen, I am still with you. Alleluia! Dear brothers and sisters, Jesus, crucified and risen, repeats this joyful proclamation to us today: the Easter proclamation. Let us welcome it with deep wonder and gratitude!

Resurrexi et adhuc tecum sum – I have risen, I am still with you, for ever. These words, taken from an ancient version of Psalm 138 (v. 18b), were sung at the beginning of today’s Mass. In them, at the rising of the Easter sun, the Church recognizes the voice of Jesus himself who, on rising from death, turns to the Father filled with gladness and love, and exclaims: My Father, here I am! I have risen, I am still with you, and so I shall be for ever; your Spirit never abandoned me. In this way we can also come to a new understanding of other passages from the psalm: "If I climb the heavens, you are there; if I descend into the underworld, you are there … Even darkness is not dark for you, and the night is as clear as day; for you, darkness is like light" (Ps 138:8,12). It is true: in the solemn Easter vigil, darkness becomes light, night gives way to the day that knows no sunset. The death and resurrection of the Word of God incarnate is an event of invincible love, it is the victory of that Love which has delivered us from the slavery of sin and death. It has changed the course of history, giving to human life an indestructible and renewed meaning and value.

"I have risen and I am still with you, for ever." These words invite us to contemplate the risen Christ, letting his voice resound in our heart. With his redeeming sacrifice, Jesus of Nazareth has made us adopted children of God, so that we too can now take our place in the mysterious dialogue between him and the Father. We are reminded of what he once said to those who were listening: "All things have been delivered to me by my Father; and no one knows the Father except the Son and any one to whom the Son chooses to reveal him" (Mt 11:27). In this perspective, we note that the words addressed by the risen Jesus to the Father on this day – "I am still with you, for ever" – apply indirectly to us as well, "children of God and fellow heirs with Christ, provided we suffer with him in order that we may also be glorified with him" (cf. Rom 8:17). Through the death and resurrection of Christ, we too rise to new life today, and uniting our voice with his, we proclaim that we wish to remain for ever with God, our infinitely good and merciful Father.

In this way we enter the depths of the Paschal mystery. The astonishing event of the resurrection of Jesus is essentially an event of love: the Father’s love in handing over his Son for the salvation of the world; the Son’s love in abandoning himself to the Father’s will for us all; the Spirit’s love in raising Jesus from the dead in his transfigured body. And there is more: the Father’s love which "newly embraces" the Son, enfolding him in glory; the Son’s love returning to the Father in the power of the Spirit, robed in our transfigured humanity. From today’s solemnity, in which we relive the absolute, once-and-for-all experience of Jesus’s resurrection, we receive an appeal to be converted to Love; we receive an invitation to live by rejecting hatred and selfishness, and to follow with docility in the footsteps of the Lamb that was slain for our salvation, to imitate the Redeemer who is "gentle and lowly in heart", who is "rest for our souls" (cf. Mt 11:29).

Dear Christian brothers and sisters in every part of the world, dear men and women whose spirit is sincerely open to the truth, let no heart be closed to the omnipotence of this redeeming love! Jesus Christ died and rose for all; he is our hope – true hope for every human being. Today, just as he did with his disciples in Galilee before returning to the Father, the risen Jesus now sends us everywhere as witnesses of his hope, and he reassures us: I am with you always, all days, until the end of the world (cf. Mt 28:20). Fixing the gaze of our spirit on the glorious wounds of his transfigured body, we can understand the meaning and value of suffering, we can tend the many wounds that continue to disfigure humanity in our own day. In his glorious wounds we recognize the indestructible signs of the infinite mercy of the God of whom the prophet says: it is he who heals the wounds of broken hearts, who defends the weak and proclaims the freedom of slaves, who consoles all the afflicted and bestows upon them the oil of gladness instead of a mourning robe, a song of praise instead of a sorrowful heart (cf. Is 61:1,2,3). If with humble trust we draw near to him, we encounter in his gaze the response to the deepest longings of our heart: to know God and to establish with him a living relationship in an authentic communion of love, which can fill our lives, our interpersonal and social relations with that same love. For this reason, humanity needs Christ: in him, our hope, "we have been saved" (cf. Rom 8:24).

How often relations between individuals, between groups and between peoples are marked not by love but by selfishness, injustice, hatred and violence! These are the scourges of humanity, open and festering in every corner of the planet, although they are often ignored and sometimes deliberately concealed; wounds that torture the souls and bodies of countless of our brothers and sisters. They are waiting to be tended and healed by the glorious wounds of our Risen Lord (cf. 1 Pet 2:24-25) and by the solidarity of people who, following in his footsteps, perform deeds of charity in his name, make an active commitment to justice, and spread luminous signs of hope in areas bloodied by conflict and wherever the dignity of the human person continues to be scorned and trampled. It is hoped that these are precisely the places where gestures of moderation and forgiveness will increase!

Dear brothers and sisters! Let us allow the light that streams forth from this solemn day to enlighten us; let us open ourselves in sincere trust to the risen Christ, so that his victory over evil and death may also triumph in each one of us, in our families, in our cities and in our nations. Let it shine forth in every part of the world. In particular, how can we fail to remember certain African regions, such as Dafur and Somalia, the tormented Middle East, especially the Holy Land, Iraq, Lebanon, and finally Tibet, all of whom I encourage to seek solutions that will safeguard peace and the common good! Let us invoke the fullness of his Paschal gifts, through the intercession of Mary who, after sharing the sufferings of the passion and crucifixion of her innocent Son, also experienced the inexpressible joy of his resurrection. Sharing in the glory of Christ, may she be the one to protect us and guide us along the path of fraternal solidarity and peace. These are my Easter greetings, which I address to all who are present here, and to men and women of every nation and continent united with us through radio and television. Happy Easter!"

The Birth of the Church

In his reflection before praying the Regina Caeli today, Pope Benedict XVI spoke of Pentecost as the celebration of the birth of the Church, as Mary and the Apostles were gathered at the time of the descent of the Holy Spirit.  He mentioned its missionary nature from the beginning, and thus spoke in every tongue.  He also explained the phrase "one Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church" from the 4th century Nicene Creed, explained what was meant in calling the Church "Roman."

Asia News has an article.  Full translations are available from the Vatican, Zenit and from Teresa Benedetta at Papa Ratzinger Forum.

The greater part of it, in Teresa Benedetta's translation, includes those explanations of the words we use to describe the Church, as follows:

"In this extraordinary event we find the essential and qualifying notes of the Church: the Church is one, like the community of Pentecost, united in prayer and concord: it was 'of one heart and one mind" (Acts 4,32). The Church is holy, not for its merits, but because, animated by the Holy Spirit, it looks to Christ to conform to Him and to his love. The Church is catholic, because the Gospel is destined to all the peoples, and therefore, from the beginning, the Holy Spirit made it speak in all tongues. The Church is apostolic, because, built on the foundation of the Apostles, it guards their teaching faithfully through the uninterrupted chain of apostolic succession.

"The Church is also by its nature missionary, and from the day of Pentecost, the Holy Spirit has not ceased to push it along the roads of the world, to the extreme ends of earth and to the end of time.

"This reality, which we can verify in every era, is as anticipated in the Book of Acts, which describes the transmission of the Gospel from the Jews to the pagans, from Jerusalem to Rome.

"Rome stood for the pagan world, therefore all the peoples who were not among the ancient People of God. In fact, the Acts conclude with the arrival of the Gospel in Rome.

"We can therefore say that Rome is the concrete name of Catholicity and mission, it expresses loyalty to the origins, to the Church of all time, a Church that speaks all the languages and goes forth to encounter all cultures."

A Blessed Pentecost

I wish you a blessed Pentecost.

(Graphic includes Clipart from: ChristArt)

The Last Few Days of Easter

Sunday, Pentecost, will be the final day of Easter.  Of course, there is no prohibition on remembering the Resurrection at any time.  But the 50 days of remembering Easter this year will draw to a close tomorrow, on a day that is devoted to remembering the events of Pentecost, which followed the Ascension.

So today (Saturday) is the last day of this Easter to most easily recall the Resurrection in and of itself.  I have an easier time finding paintings and other artwork inspired by the crucifixion, a more difficult time finding art about the Resurrection.  I do not know why, but I could speculate.  The cross, it is said, naturally divides a canvas.  In the pictures shown here, in fact, the shape of a cross divides the picture although it is a picture of the Resurrection.

But, perhaps, it is nice this year to have Pentecost Sunday fall within Memorial Day, giving us in the U.S. a little more time to rest, to think about the various things this week-end represents.

In our country, of course, Memorial Day brings to mind those who have died in wars, past and present.  This year, the observance of Memorial Day will be the day after Pentecost.  That deserves its own space, its own day.  And Pentecost deserves its own space, its own day, remembered as Pentecost and not as the Sunday of Memorial Day week--end.

And today deserves its own space too.  It is the last precious day to remember the Resurrection, in its own right.  The last two days of Easter, a celebration of Jesus' life Resurrected, of our own hope for life beyond the grave, and also of our lives now in Christ, with Christ living in us as the Resurrected Lord, a down payment on life beyond the  grave, they are a celebration that the Cross, as important as it is, did not have the last word.  For the Gospel is about both sin and redemption, both the Cross and the Resurrection.  The Cross, for all its artistic beauty, did not have the last word.   The Father had the last word when the Son rose from the grave.

And for anyone who tired of sacrifice during Lent, now is a time of grace, of free gifts.  For anyone whose sadness over the crucifixion needed healing, now is the time for healing.  For anyone who tired of remembering their sins, now is the time for remembering God's grace and the gift of eternal life.  While we can remember that all the year, the Church season specifically devoted to it will draw to a close on Sunday.

So, for one of the last times I can say it this year: Happy Easter!

The Ascension

"To them he presented himself alive after his passion by many proofs, appearing to them during forty days, and speaking of the kingdom of God. And while staying with them he charged them not to depart from Jerusalem, but to wait for the promise of the Father, which, he said, "you heard from me, for John  baptized with water, but before many days you shall be baptized  with the Holy Spirit." So when they had come together,  they asked him, "Lord, will you at this time restore the kingdom to  Israel?" He said to them, "It is not for you to know  times or seasons which the Father has fixed by his own authority.  But you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Sama'ria and to the end of the earth." And  when he had said this, as they were looking on, he was lifted up,  and a cloud took him out of their sight." [Acts 1:3-9]

A time of waiting and discovery came to a conclusion.  Forty days between the Resurrection and the Ascension were spent in coming to terms with what had happened and with the fact that nothing in life or in worship would be the same again.  But the disciples were still trying to understand it on the 40th day, when they asked him, "Lord, will you at this time restore the kingdom to Israel?"  They were still waiting for the Messiah to free their small chosen people from the surrounding world, and from the Roman world in particular.

From "I am going fishing" (John 21:3) to "Feed my sheep" (John 21:17) is a gap, from the ordinary that once was and could never be again, but that Peter in an instant believed he could return to again, and the reality of who Jesus was asking Peter to become.

At the end of 40 days from the Resurrection, as they stood watching Jesus ascend to the Father, they waited 10 more days until Pentecost.  But they were not alone.  Along with having each other, and choosing one to replace Judas, Jesus already had told them, "I am with you always, to the close of the age." (Matt. 28:20).  Mary was there with them during that time, waiting too. (Acts 1:14)

But in all of this, there is still a waiting that differs from the waiting of the Nativity because it awaits so different an arrival.  Instead of the sound of a new baby's cry, it would be the sound of a fierce wind, the descent of the Holy Spirit. 

And instead of the political Messiah that they had still asked him about, who would protect them from the world, Jesus gave them a mission that was quite the opposite: "You shall be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in  all Judea and Sama'ria and to the end of the earth." (Acts 1:8) 

Image:  "The Ascension," one of the frescoes by Giotto di Bondoni in the Capella Scrovegni (Arena Chapel) in Padua. Used with permission of the Web Galleery of Art.

The Joy of the Nativity and the Resurrection

Here is a picture of a panel painted by Pietro Perugino.  I have added my own reflections.

Mary's joy that we share when we see pictures of her with the baby Jesus is only understandable in the context of a faith in the Resurrection of her Son.  Without Easter, we would not have the same joy in Christmas.  That is so, I think, because without the Resurrection, you have the sorrow of Gethsemane and the suffering of the cross, you have Mary the mother of the crucified master, rather than Mary the mother of the risen and glorified Lord at the right hand of the Father.

Day before yesterday, Anglican blogger Kendall Harmon posted an article about an Episcopalian church in Pasadena that is talking about abandoning the concept of the crucifixion as Christ dying for our sins as "the idea of God murdering his son for the salvation of the world."  That is certainly not the first odd theological suggestion to come from the Episcopal Church, but it is indicative of what is lost to Christian thinking when the Crucifixion is not seen solidly paired with the Resurrection.  If we saw Mary as the mother whose son was "murdered" for our salvation, it would be difficult to see anything so joyful and beautiful as this painting in remembering her holding her infant son.  Instead, those pictures would be sad memories of what might have been.

Sadly, this past Lent, a television show questioned the Resurrection by claiming that archaeologists may have found the tomb of Jesus.  In February, National Geographic was reporting that the archaeologist who excavated the cave in the TV show had slammed the show's claim that the cave was the tomb of Jesus, his wife and his son.  The American Archaeological Institute rejected the show's claim.  On April 11, the Jerusalem Post reported that several of the scholars shown in the TV show, including the statistician, had revised their conclusions and questioned some of the show's basic claims (hat tip Jimmy Akin).  While some revisionist non-Catholic theologians asserted that the show's claim, if correct, would not affect their faith, it is more reasonable to see how a lack of faith in the Resurrection would lead someone to eventually question the centrality of the crucifixion as well.

Indeed, while the Resurrection of Easter is more meaningful in the light of the Crucifixion, it is also true that the Crucifixion has meaning largely in the context of the Resurrection, and that the joy of the birth of the Christ child draws in turn from our belief that Jesus was the one who would be both Crucified and Resurrected and who indeed is God.  The Christian recognition of Mary as mother of God, in the Early Church, was part and parcel of the theology of the Trinity and of Christ as fully God and fully man -- the incarnation of Christ the Son of God born to Mary.

So pictures of Mary in the Nativity come to mind now, in May the month of Mary and in the season of Easter, as the joy of the Resurrection and the joy of the Nativity are intertwined.  The joy of the Nativity draws deeply from our faith in the Resurrection and the joy of the Ascension to be celebrated next week.

They are blessed who believe without seeing.

"Where signs and testimonies abound, there is less merit in believing.   St. Gregory declares that faith is without merit when it has proof from human reason [In Homilia 26 in Evangelium 1, in Migne. PL 76, 1197].

"God never works these marvels except when they are a necessity for believing.  Lest his disciples go without merit by having sensible proof of his resurrection, he did many things to further their belief before they saw him.  Mary Magdalene was first shown the empty sepulcher, and afterward the angels told her about the resurrection so she would, by hearing, believe before seeing.  As St. Paul says: Faith comes through hearing [Rom. 10:17].  And though she beheld him, he seemed only an ordinary man, so by the warmth of his presence he could finish instructing her in the belief she was lacking [Mt. 28:1-6; Lk. 24:4-10; Jn 20:11-18].  And the women were sent to tell the disciples first; then these disciples set out to see the sepulcher [Mt. 28:7-8].  And journeying incognito to Emmaus with two of his followers, he inflamed their hearts in faith before allowing them to see [Lk. 24:15-32].  Finally he reproved all his disciples for refusing to believe those who had told them of his resurrection [Mk. 16:14].  And announcing to St. Thomas that they are blessed who believe without seeing, he reprimanded him for desiring to experience the sight and touch of his wounds [Jn. 20:25, 29]."

- St. John of the Cross, The Ascent of Mount Carmel, Book Three, Chapter 31.

From that day he was their Lord - THE Lord

"The first tremor that ran through the Christian community as it awoke into life was the belief of Easter: "Christ is really risen, and has appeared to Peter."  This profoundly important event formed a starting point; by it the religious awe with which the disciples of Jesus had long regarded their master was transformed into a religion proper.  From that day he was their Lord -- the Lord.  This title (Maran, Kyrios, Dominus) in the language and usage of the time, among the Semitic peoples no less than among the Hellenic and Roman, possessed a concatenation of senses rangingn from the courtesy title, 'Sir' or 'Sire,' which was of no great consequence, to the expression of an unconditional personal surrender -- 'my Lord and my God!'  The general notion governing the whole series is that of sovereignty, domination, kingly power.  Hence although in itself it had only a civil meaning and was a matter of court etiquette it was quite well adapted to receive a religious colouring.  Whether men were accustomed, as in Egypt and elsewhere too, to think of the kings as the gods' descendants and successors, incarnations in time of the immortal Osiris; or whether, as in the Greek world after the time of Alexanderand the Roman after Caesar, the ruler or a number of rulers were regarded as raised by apotheosis to the level of the gods; or whether, as among the Jews, men speaking of the only God avoided using the divine Name and were in need of a word to express the attribute that characterizes him as king over all that exists -- in the language of the Septuagint Kyrios means 'Jahveh as king.'"

- Léonce de Grandmaison, S.J., Jesus Christ, pp. 141-142.

The Logic of the Resurrection

"The passion of the Logos up to his death in this world, even if there took place in it an agony and death of logic, still seemed somehow expressible in the words of this world.  But in what words are we to describe the logic of the Resurrection, whose nature is to burst open the graves of our ideas, to surpass our conceptions of time and space, to pass through in sovereign manner the closed doors of our minds.  It is so spiritual that all the laws of matter are suspended, and yet so physical that the Son of God not only appears, not only speaks, but also lets himself be touched and felt, and he eats and drinks in community with his own.

"The Word has become wholly divine, has remained wholly human.  This humanity which was always an expression of his divinity and has now been taken back into the heavenly sphere is so naturally credible in a physical earthly way that no distance separates it from this world.  The whole past of his earthly course is, as it were, gathered in the stigmata he shows and has taken into eternal truth.  The stigmata are more than an external sign, a kind of honorable distinction for having suffered: they are, beyond the gulf between death and Resurrection which reaches to the bottom of hell, the identity of the subject in the identity of consciousness.  It is always this man who suffered this life, this cross, and this death.  "See my hands and feet, that it is I myself" (Luke 24:39)."

- Hans Urs von Balthasar, Man in History, pg. 285.

He Is Risen!

"The prophets who prophesied of the grace that was to be yours searched and inquired about this salvation; they inquired what person or time was indicated by the Spirit of Christ within them when predicting the sufferings of Christ and the subsequent glory. It was revealed to them that they were serving not themselves but you, in the things which have now been announced to you by those who preached the good news to you through the Holy Spirit sent from heaven, things into which angels long to look." 

(I Peter 1:10-12 RSV)

Picture: "The Resurrection" by Pieter Lastman, Dutch, 1612, photo by me.  Museum information.

Christus resurrexit, quia Deus caritas est! Alleluia!

Pope Benedict's Urbi et Orbi message, given to about 100,000 people, can be found in 6 languages on the Vatican website.  The Urbi et Orbi message in English can also be found at Vatican Radio, Asia News, Zenit, and Papa Ratzinger Forum.  The Pope's Easter blessing in 62 languages can be found here.

There is also an Easter card type of greeting on the Vatican website here in English.  That greeting can be reached in other languages by choosing a language and then clicking on the Easter banner at the top of the page that opens.

In the Urbi et Orbi message, the Pope mentioned the suffering and war in the world, including the Solomon Islands, Iraq, and Lebanon.  He mentioned the doubting of St. Thomas, whose "faith was almost dead but was born again thanks to his touching the wounds of Christ, those wounds that the Risen One did not hide but showed, and continues to point out to us in the trials and sufferings of every human being."

Here is an additional excerpt:

"Brothers and sisters in faith, who are listening to me from every part of the world! Christ is risen and he is alive among us. It is he who is the hope of a better future. As we say with Thomas: “My Lord and my God!”, may we hear again in our hearts the beautiful yet demanding words of the Lord: “If any one serves me, he must follow me; and where I am, there shall my servant be also; if any one serves me, the Father will honour him” (Jn 12:26). United to him and ready to offer our lives for our brothers (cf. 1 Jn 3:16), let us become apostles of peace, messengers of a joy that does not fear pain – the joy of the Resurrection. May Mary, Mother of the Risen Christ, obtain for us this Easter gift. Happy Easter to you all."

Here is the greeting from the visual "Easter card":

"May the Risen Lord grant that the strength of his life, peace and freedom be experienced everywhere. Today the words with which the Angel reassured the frightened hearts of the women on Easter morning are addressed to all: “Do not be afraid! ... He is not here; he is risen (Mt 28:5-6)”. Jesus is risen, and he gives us peace; he himself is peace. For this reason the Church repeats insistently: “Christ is risen - Christós anésti.” Let the people of the third millennium not be afraid to open their hearts to him. His Gospel totally quenches the thirst for peace and happiness that is found in every human heart. Christ is now alive and he walks with us. What an immense mystery of love!

"Christus resurrexit, quia Deus caritas est! Alleluia!"

The Easter Mass, followed by the Urbi et Orbi blessing, can be viewed at any time on KTO French Catholic TV, with French commentary, at this page (click on "Regarder la Video").

The Joy of the Easter Vigil

News articles about the Easter Vigil in St. Peter's Basilica are available from Asia News and Catholic News Agency,  English translations of Pope Benedict XVI's Easter Vigil homily are available from the Vatican, Vatican Radio and Zenit, and from Teresa Benedetta at Papa Ratzinger Forum. 

The 3-hour service can be watched at any time on KTO French Catholic TV with French commentary The archived video is already available online.  Click on "Regarder la video." 

Here is an excerpt from the Vatican English translation from Vatican Radio:

"This is the joy of the Easter Vigil: we are free. In the resurrection of Jesus, love has been shown to be stronger than death, stronger than evil. Love made Christ descend, and love is also the power by which he ascends. The power by which he brings us with him. In union with his love, borne aloft on the wings of love, as persons of love, let us descend with him into the world’s darkness, knowing that in this way we will also rise up with him. On this night, then, let us pray: Lord, show us that love is stronger than hatred, that love is stronger than death. Descend into the darkness and the abyss of our modern age, and take by the hand those who await you. Bring them to the light! In my own dark nights, be with me to bring me forth! Help me, help all of us, to descend with you into the darkness of all those people who are still waiting for you, who out of the depths cry unto you! Help us to bring them your light! Help us to say the “yes” of love, the love that makes us descend with you and, in so doing, also to rise with you. Amen!"

Congratulations to All Baptized and Confirmed Tonight!

According to the USCCB, 612 catechumens will be baptized tonight, and 913 candidates, already baptized, will be confirmed -- 1,525 people altogether who will be received into full communion with the Catholic Church tonight in the Diocese of San Diego.  Nationwide, the numbers are tens of thousands of people from virtually every parish in the country.

To anyone reading this who is one of those people: Congratulations!

The Vigil and Feast of Pentecost

(Updated June 9 with links to English translations on the Vatican website.)

Asia News has posted its story on today's Mass and Regina Caeli of Pentecost and a complete translation of the homily.   The Vatican has posted the homily in English, as did ZENIT.  Here is an excerpt from ZENIT's posting of the adapted translation of the homily:

"At times it is thought that missionary effectiveness depends primarily on careful programming and its subsequent intelligent application through a concrete commitment. The Lord certainly does ask us for our collaboration, but before any other response his initiative is necessary: His Spirit is the true protagonist of the Church. The roots of our being and of our action are in the wise and provident silence of God.

"The images used by St. Luke to indicate the irruption of the Holy Spirit -- wind and fire -- recall the Sinai, where God revealed himself to the people of Israel and offered his covenant (cf. Exodus 19:3 and following). The feast of Sinai, which Israel celebrated 50 days after the Passover, was the feast of the Covenant."

ZENIT has also posted a translation of Benedict XVI's message at today's Regina Caeli here, and here is the Vatican's posting of the Regina Caeli.

Yesterday, at vespers for the Vigil of Pentecost, the Pope spoke to about 350,000 to 400,000 people from ecclesial communities gathered in St. Peter's Square, the crowd reportedly reaching all the way to the Tiber.   The Asia News article about the Pope's words at vespers includes quotations.  The Vatican website has an English translation of the homily. Teresa Benedetta, at Papa Ratzinger Forum, provided a translation (as mentioned by Amy Welborn ).  It is a generous, catechetical homily in professorial style, including this:

"If by looking at creation we can see the Spirit of Creation, God Himself, almost like creative mathematics, as a power who makes the laws of the world and brings order, and afterwards, also as beauty, then we come to know this: the Spirit of Creation has a heart.  He is Love.  The Son exists who talks to the Father.  And both are one together in the Spirit, which is, in a manner of speaking, the climate of loving and giving which makes of them the one God.  This unity of love, which is God, is a unity that is much more sublime than the unity of the simplest indivisible particle there is."

ZENIT also has greetings and addresses by others at the Vigil. 

Updated June 19: ZENIT has now posted an English translation of the Holy Father's homily at the vigil of Pentecost, as has the Vatican website.  From the latter:

"We find life in communion with the One who is life in person - in communion with the living God, a communion into which we are introduced by the Holy Spirit, who is called in the hymn of Vespers "fons vivus", a living source.

"The pasture where the sources of life flow is the Word of God as we find it in Scripture, in the faith of the Church. The pasture is God himself who we learn to recognize in the communion of faith through the power of the Holy Spirit."

"Thy good Spirit lifteth our lowliness from the gates of death."

"But was not either the Father or the Son 'borne over the waters?'  If we understand this to mean in space, as a body, then neither was the Holy Spirit; but if the incommutable super-eminence of Divinity above everything mutable, then both Father, and Son, and Holy Ghost were borne 'over the waters.' Why, then, is this said of Thy Spirit only?  Why is it said of Him alone?  As if He had been in place who is not in place, of whom only it is written, that He is Thy gift?   In Thy gift we rest; there we enjoy Thee.  Our rest is our place.  Love lifts us up thither, and Thy good Spirit lifteth our lowliness from the gates of death.   In Thy good pleasure lies our peace.   The body by its own weight gravitates towards its own place.  Weight goes not downward only, but to its own place.  Fire tends upwards, a stone downwards.  They are propelled by their own weights, they seek their own places. Oil poured under the water is raised above the water; water poured upon oil sinks under the oil.  They are propelled by their own weights, they seek their own places.  Out of order, they are restless; restored to order, they are at rest.  My weight is my love; by it am I borne whithersoever I am borne.  By Thy Gift we are inflamed, and are borne upwards; we wax hot inwardly, and go forwards.  We ascend Thy ways that be in our heart, and sing a song of degrees; we glow inwardly with Thy fire, with Thy good fire, and we go, because we go upwards to the peace of Jerusalem; for glad was I when they said unto me, 'Let us go into the house of the Lord.'  There hath Thy good pleasure placed us, that we may desire no other thing than to dwell there for ever."

- St. Augustine of Hippo, Confession, IX.10, from Philip Schaff, ed., A Select Library of the Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers of the Christian Church, Christian Classics Ethereal Library

St. Bonaventure on Pentecost

"Seven weeks had already passed since the Resurrection.  Then, on the fiftieth day, the Disciples were gathered together in the same place with the holy women and Mary, the Mother of Jesus, and they suddenly heard a great noise, like a mighty wind that came from the sky, and that descended on those 120 people gathered in that place.  At the same time, tongues of fire appeared on each one of them, thus showing that speech was given to their tongues, light and intellect to their hearts.  All were filled with the Holy Spirit, and they began to speak various languages, according to the prompting of that same Spirit that inspired them.  He taught them all truth, inflamed them with all charity, and strengthened them by His virtue.  So, aided by His grace, illuminated by His doctrine, strengthened by His power, while they were few in number and simple people, by their incendiary message, their holy example, and their astonishing miracles, they established the Holy Church throughout the whole universe.  And that purified Church, illuminated, made perfect by the virtue of that same Spirit, became lovable for her Spouse and His friends, because of her striking beauty and the admirable diversity of her garments, while, for Satan and his angels, she was as dreadful as an army arrayed in battle."

- St. Bonaventure, The Tree of Life, 39.

"But we do now receive a certain portion of His Spirit"

"But we do now receive a certain portion of His Spirit, tending towards perfection, and preparing us for incorruption, being little by little accustomed to receive and bear God; which also the apostle terms "an earnest," that is, a part of the honour which has been promised us by God, where he says in the Epistle to the Ephesians, "In which ye also, having heard the word of truth, the Gospel of your salvation, believing in which we have been sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise, which is the earnest of our inheritance.”  This earnest, therefore, thus dwelling in us, renders us spiritual even now, and the mortal is swallowed up by immortality.  "For ye," he declares, "are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you.”  This, however does not take place by a casting away of the flesh, but by the impartation of the Spirit. For those to whom he was writing were not without flesh, but they were those who had received the Spirit of God, "by which we cry, Abba, Father.”  If therefore, at the present time, having the earnest, we do cry, "Abba, Father," what shall it be when, on rising again, we behold Him face to face; when all the members shall burst out into a continuous hymn of triumph, glorifying Him who raised them from the dead, and gave the gift of eternal life? For if the earnest, gathering man into itself, does even now cause him to cry, "Abba, Father," what shall the complete grace of the Spirit effect, which shall be given to men by God? It will render us like unto Him, and accomplish the will of the Father; for it shall make man after the image and likeness of God."

- Irenaeus, Against Heresies (a Refutation and Subversion of Knowledge Falsely so Called), 180-185 A.D., Book V, Chapter VIII, paragraph 1, from The Early Church Fathers: Anti-Nicene Fathers, Vol I, from Christian Classics Ethereal Library.

Love the One Good in Which Are All Goods, and It Suffices.

What goods and how great, belong to those who enjoy this good. --Joy is multiplied in the blessed from the blessedness and joy of others.

WHO shall enjoy this good? And what shall belong to him, and what shall not belong to him? At any rate, whatever he shall wish shall be his, and whatever he shall not wish shall not be his. For, these goods of body and soul will be such as eye has not seen nor ear heard, neither has the heart of man conceived (Isaiah Ixiv. 4; I Corinthians ii. 9).

Why, then, do you wander abroad, slight man, in your search for the goods of your soul and your body? Love the one good in which are all goods, and it suffices. Desire the simple good which is every good, and it is enough. For, what do you love, my flesh? What do you desire, my soul? There, there is whatever you love, whatever you desire.

If beauty delights you, there shall the righteous shine forth as the sun (Matthew xiii. 43) If swiftness or endurance, or freedom of body, which naught can withstand, delight you, they shall be as angels of God, --because it is sown a natural body; it is raised a spiritual body (I Corinthians xv. 44) --in power certainly, though not in nature. If it is a long and sound life that pleases you, there a healthful eternity is, and an eternal health. For the righteous shall live for ever (Wisdom v. 15), and the salvation of the righteous is of the Lord (Psalms xxxvii. 39) If it is satisfaction of hunger, they shall be satisfied when the glory of the Lord has appeared (Psalms xvii. 15). If it is quenching of thirst, they shall be abundantly satisfied with the fatness of your house (Psalms xxxvi. 8). If it is melody, there the choirs of angels sing forever, before God. If it is any not impure, but pure, pleasure, you shall make them drink of the river of your pleasures, 0 God (Psalms xxxvi. 8).

If it is wisdom that delights you, the very wisdom of God will reveal itself to them. If friendship, they shall love God more than themselves, and one another as themselves. And God shall love them more than they themselves; for they love him, and themselves, and one another, through him, and he, himself and them, through himself. If concord, they shall all have a single will.

- St. Anselm of Canterbury, Proslogium, Chapter XXV, 1063-1078, translated from the Latin by Sidney Norton Deane, B. A. reprinted by Internet Medieval Sources, part of the Online Reference Book for Medieval Studies, sources editor Paul Halsall of Fordham University.

Looking to Jesus Christ, We Find Life's Ultimate Meaning

Asia News has posted articles on Pope Benedict XVI's journey yesterday and today in Poland, as he continues to journey through the places that were important to Pope John Paul II, seeking a greater understanding of his predecessor whose presence he feels assisting him in his own papacy. 

In an article about yesterday's events in Poland is this quotation from the Holy Father's message at the Basilica of Divine Mercy in Lagiewniki:

"Speaking in the Basilica of Divine Mercy in the presence of hundreds of sick people and thousands of pilgrims gathered outside, he said: “On this occasion we encounter two mysteries: the mystery of human suffering and the mystery of Divine Mercy. At first sight these two mysteries seem to be opposed to one another. But when we study them more deeply in the light of faith, we find that they are placed in reciprocal harmony through the mystery of the Cross of Christ."

The same website also has An article on today's Mass at Blonie Park in Krakow.

The Vatican web page on the Apostolic Journey already has posted English translations of all of the Pope's messages in Poland through this morning's Mass.  The homily began with a Scripture arising from the Ascension:

“Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking up to heaven?” (Acts 1:11).

Within that homily (from the Vatican's English translation), he said:

"They looked up to heaven because they looked to Jesus Christ, the Crucified and Risen One, raised up on high.  We do not know whether at that precise moment they realized that a magnificent, infinite horizon was opening up before their eyes: the ultimate  goal of our earthly pilgrimage.  Perhaps they only realized this at Pentecost, in the light of the Holy Spirit.  But for us, at a distance of two thousand years, the meaning of that event is quite clear.  Here on earth, we are called to look up to heaven, to turn our minds and hearts to the inexpressible mystery of God.  We are called to look towards this divine reality, to which we have been directed from our creation.  For there we find life’s ultimate meaning."

In the same homily, his last major message planned for this journey, he offered a final explanation for the places he chose to visit, in preference over some sites that are more historically important for reasons wholly unrelated to his purpose for traveling to Poland:

"At the beginning of the second year of my Pontificate, I have felt a deep need to visit Poland and Kraków as a pilgrim in the footsteps of my predecessor.  I wanted to breathe the air of his homeland.  I wanted to see the land where he was born, where he grew up and undertook his tireless service to Christ and the universal Church.  I wanted especially to meet the living men and women of his country, to experience your faith, which gave him life and strength, and to know that you continue firm in that faith.  Here I wish to ask God to preserve that legacy of faith, hope and charity which John Paul II gave to the world, and to you in particular."

Later today, the Holy Father will visit Auschwitz, a visit that will be viewed as important because of the Holy Father's youth in wartime Germany, and which also evokes memories of Catholic saints canonized by Pope John Paul II, including the Carmelite St. Edith Stein.

Picture: Divine Mercy icon from the convent chapel in Lagiewniki, Poland.

The Ascension

Abbot Joseph at Word Incarnate has a wonderful Reflection on the Ascension today.   The Pontificator has the wisdom of a reflection by St. Leo the Great.  Both have beautiful pictures of Ascension icons too.  Here is a portion of Abbot Joseph's good guidance:

"In the Old Testament, the high priest would enter the holy of holies with the blood of sacrificed animals as an offering for the atonement of the sins of the people. But now, Jesus, the High Priest of the New Covenant, as we read in Hebrews, enters the holy of holies in Heaven—the real one, not an earthly copy—offering his own shed blood for the forgiveness of our sins. He ever lives to intercede for us before the face of the Father, presenting to Him, until the consummation of the world and the end of time, his own perfect atoning sacrifice, which the Father receives and accepts as the new and everlasting covenant between God and man—the sacrificed body and blood of the Son of God made flesh."

Picture: Stained glass window of the Ascension from St. Augustine Parish, Montpelier, Vermont.

The Ascension Reveals the Highest Vocation of Each Person

In today's message before the Regina Coeli, Pope Benedict XVI spoke of the Ascension of Christ into Heaven, which is to be observed this coming week on the 40th day after Easter (Thursday, May 25  this year).  He also remembered the World Day of Social Communications, which is observed today, and his upcoming Apostolic Journey to Poland which will begin this coming Thursday. 

Here is part of what he said about the Ascension, as reported and quoted in the Asia News - Italy article:

"The Ascension, in the words of Benedict XVI, on the one hand commemorates the moment when Jesus 'revealed his divinity in an unequivocal way: he goes back to where he came from, that is, in God, after having fulfilled his mission on earth'. On the other hand, 'Christ ascends to Heaven with the humanity he assumed and which he raised from the dead: that humanity is ours, transfigured, divinized, become eternal. The Ascension, therefore, reveals the ‘highest vocation’ (Gaudium et Spes 22) of each person: called to eternal life in the Kingdom of God, Kingdom of love, light and peace'."

The ZENIT translation of the entire message is here, and here is the Vatican translation of the May 21 Regina Caeli.
 

The EWTN Special Programming Schedule for May includes the anticipated timing of broadcasts related to the Holy Father's journey to Poland.

Picture:  Stained glass window from the Cathédrale Saint-Julien of Le Mans, France. 
The photo is also available from Nicolas Janberg’s Structurae, (stained glass 1120) photo by Jacques Mossot.

Easter: time to simply rejoice in God's love

Jesus stayed with His disciples for 40 days from the resurrection to His ascension into Heaven, and then they stayed together in Jerusalem another 10 days until Pentecost, when the Holy Spirit descended.  As the spiritual blessings of Lent, and the importance of that time of self-examination, became important to me, so did the 50 day celebration of Easter.  The more I look at the cross and the more seriously I seek God’s guidance about changing me during Lent, the more I need to balance the 40 days of Lent with 50 days of Easter. 

Jesus remained 40 days with those who loved Him, from the Resurrection to His Ascension.  Those days spent knowing the resurrected Jesus are just as important as the days spent in Lent's self-examination. 

In the 40 days that followed the disciples’ sorrow over the cross, He rested with them, walked with them along the road, fed them, reached out to them, and reasoned with them to explain His death and resurrection.  The days were slow, easy days of living, in the regular flow of their lives: fishermen fishing, Jewish men traveling home from the observance of the Passover in Jerusalem, friends gathered at mealtime.  He talked to them about old prophecies fulfilled and about their missions for the future.  He reassured Peter about Peter’s future, and He left the Church with a commission to go into all the world and make disciples.  Those who had failed were given new hope and new confidence in themselves and sent out to serve Him again. 

During His life before the crucifixion, Jesus told His disciples to take up their cross and follow Him.  All of them tried.  All of them fled.  Only John and a few of the women were watching at the foot of the cross while Jesus died.  After the Resurrection, Jesus fed them, and He told Peter, in particular, to feed His sheep and to follow Him.  After the Resurrection, after Easter Sunday.  As Jesus asked Peter, “Do you love me?” we need to answer “Yes.”  At the Eucharist, in prayer, in reading Scripture, there is time to simply rejoice in God's love and celebrate the Resurrected Jesus’s time leisurely spent with us.  Lent is over, and the tomb is empty.  He is risen. 

Image: W. Ford Schumann's painting "The Risen Christ".  Photo by me.

Lingering for Forty Days

"This lingering for forty days is the crowning proof of Christ's tender regard for His little flock.  He who had laid down His life for them is loath to leave them.  Though they had forsaken Him, and doubted Him, they had not wearied, much less had they worn out, His love.  He stays to look again, and yet again, and yet again, upon them, as if turning back and lingering to bless them.  It is all of a piece with His life of love.  Everywhere He meets them without a touch of upbraiding, without recalling a single memory of all His bitter suffering, revealing Himself to the disciples with a tenderness and blessedness indescribably beautiful.

"How can He go till He has healed the Magdalene's broken heart?  He must linger till poor Peter can venture near to have his forgiveness assured.  He must stay to strengthen Thomas' faith.  He must tarry with them till He has made them feel that He is just the same friendly, brotherly Jesus that He has ever been, caring for them in their work, watching them with a yearning pity, stooping to kindle a fire for their warmth, and to cook the fish for their meal, and then to bid them come and dine."

- Mark Guy Pearse, as quoted by Dwight L. Moody in Thoughts for the Quiet Hour, devotional for July 2nd, 1900 edition, reprinted by Fredonia Books, c. 2001, page 67.

The distance over centuries is overcome by the Risen Lord

The Asia News article on Pope Benedict XVI's  weekly  General Audience message is here.  In it, he spoke of the twelve Apostles and of the significance of apostolic succession and apostolic Tradition in the Church.  Here is an excerpt from the article:

"'Through the apostolic ministry, it is Christ himself who reaches he who is called to faith. The distance over centuries is overcome by the Risen Lord who offers himself alive and working for us, in the present of the Church and the world.' The pope ended off the cuff: 'He is truly always with us and he gives us life, the road towards the future.'"

The ZENIT translation of the entire message, as given is here.  The Vatican official transcript is here.
From the official transcript:

Tradition can thus be understood as the living voice of the Gospel, proclaimed in its integrity by the Apostles and passed down by their successors. This Apostolic Tradition includes "all that helps God’s people to live in holiness and grow in faith". Through Tradition, "the Church, in her doctrine, life and worship, perpetuates and transmits to every generation all that she herself is, all that she believes".

May 1: Honoring St. Joseph the Worker and the Blessed Virgin Mary

May 1 this year (besides being my birthday!) brought news-making homilies on several different topics. 

At the beginning of a month consecrated to the Blessed Virgin Mary, the Holy Father made a personal pilgrimage to a Marian shrine.  The Catholic News Agency has the story here, and the Asia News story is here.  He prayed the joyful mysteries during his time there. 

Meanwhile, Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O'Connor, Archbishop of Westminster, today concelebrated mass with bishops of London's three Catholic dioceses in honor of  St. Joseph the Worker.  ZENIT has the text of his homily at Winchester Cathedral.  In that homily, he also mentioned the plight of immigrant workers.  Here is an excerpt:

In migrants, the Church has always contemplated the image of Christ who said, "I was a stranger and you made me welcome" (Matthew 25:35). Their condition is, therefore, a challenge to the faith and love of believers who are called on to heal the evils caused by migration and discover the plan God pursues through migration even when there are obvious injustices. God's appeal, made so forcefully in both the Old and the New Testaments, is for fraternity -- for there to be new bonds of friendship forged between newcomer and native.

The Pope honored his namesake St. Joseph on March 19, a mass for workers and in his message before the Angelus. 

Photo: The face of St. Joseph, from an 18th century French wood carving at Church of the Nativity, Rancho Santa Fe, California.

Fire Is Ever Aglow

"Fire is ever aglow, so likewise is that yearning love which is directed toward Thee, O God, who art the form of all that is desirable, and that truth which in every desire is desired.  In that I have begun to taste, of Thy honey-sweet giving, Thy sweetness beyond understanding—which doth by so much the more please me as it appeareth more limitless—I perceive that the reason wherefore Thou, O God, art unknown to all creatures is that they may have in this divine ignorance a greater rest, as in a treasure beyond reckoning and inexhaustible.  For he who findeth a treasure that he knoweth to be utterly beyond reckoning and unlimited is moved by far greater joy than he who findeth one that may be counted, and that is limited.  Hence this divine ignorance of Thy greatness is the most desirable nourishment for my intellect, chiefly when I find such a treasure in my field in such manner that the treasure is mine own."

- Nicholas of Cusa, The Vision of God, translated from the Latin by Emma Gurney Salter, The Book Tree, Escondido, California.

"They said to each other, 'Did not our hearts burn within us while he talked to us on the road, while he opened to us the scriptures?'" (Luke 24:32)

Tributes to the Myrrhbearers

Abbot Joseph, of the Mt. Tabor monastery in Redwood Valley (a Ukrainian Catholic monastery in Mendocino County, California), has a blog post from yesterday entitled The Holy Myrrhbearers. According to his post, the Byzantine Churches remember the Holy Myrrhbearers on the second Sunday of Easter.  His post is a tribute to those women who gathered at the tomb before dawn on Easter.  Here is a bit of it:

"Let us not allow these Easter days to pass without inviting the Risen One to send that lightning flash of an angel to roll away the heavy stone from our souls, to cause an inner earthquake that makes our old bad habits fall away like those stunned and hamstrung cemetery sentinels. May we come to Him like the holy myrrh-bearers, offering love and receiving Love in return. And let us continue to proclaim, with our lips and our lives, that Christ is risen!"

For a seventh century tribute to the Myrrhbearers, by St. Andrew of Crete, see his Canon of the Myrrhbearers, translated into English and made available online by Archimandrite Ephrem of Anastasis, the website of the Monastery of Saint Andrew the First Called, Manchester, England (a Greek Orthodox monastery).  An excerpt:
 

Glory to you, Christ Saviour, who poured out life, made light dawn for those in the darkness of ignorance, and shone over all the earth by your Rising.

Let the noble counsellor Joseph be praised with the Myrrhbearers and the godly Disciples, as he too is a herald of Christ’s Rising.

The Resurrection Power of the Word and Wisdom of God

"For the Son of God is “living and active,” and works day by day, and brings about the salvation of all.  But death is daily proved to have lost all his power, and idols and spirits are proved to be dead rather than Christ, so that henceforth no man can any longer doubt of the Resurrection of His body.  But he who is incredulous of the Resurrection of the Lord’s body would seem to be ignorant of the power of the Word and Wisdom of God.  For if He took a body to Himself at all, and—in reasonable consistency, as our argument shewed— appropriated it as His own, what was the Lord to do with it? or what should be the end of the body when the Word had once descended upon it? For it could not but die, inasmuch as it was mortal, and to be offered unto death on behalf of all: for which purpose it was that the Saviour fashioned it for Himself.  But it was impossible for it to remain dead, because it had been made the temple of life.  Whence, while it died as mortal, it came to life again by reason of the Life in it; and of its Resurrection the works are a sign."

- St. Athanasius, On the Incarnation, Section 31.

With Mary in Prayerful Anticipation of Pentecost

Asia News - Italy has posted its article on Pope Benedict XVI's message today before the regina coeli here.   In it, he mentioned the month of May, which is traditionally consecrated to Mary, and also May 1, on which the Church remembers St. Joseph the Worker.  Here is a quote:

"In the days following the resurrection of the Lord, the Apostles stayed gathered together, comforted by the presence of Mary, and after the Ascension, they persevered with her in prayerful anticipation of Pentecost. Our Lady was, for them, like a mother and teacher, a role she continues to undertake with Christians of all times."

The ZENIT English translation is here.  The Vatican official translation is here.

Within the past few days, other Benedict XVI news includes:

The Papal Message to the Academy of Social Sciences -- available from ZENIT and the Vatican. 

Letter to the Congregation for the Causes of Saints providing more specific definitions and standards for beatifications and canonizations -- an English language article from Vatican Information Service can be found on EWTN (a longer lasting link than the VIS link), and the entire letter is available in Italian on the Vatican website.

Image:  Mary's face, from the statue of Mary at the Mary altar of Church of the Nativity, Rancho Santa Fe, California, cast in bronze by Max DeMoss.  Photo by me.  Click on the photo to enlarge it.

The Emmaeus Road and the "Gospel of Judas"

On Easter Sunday, Rowan Williams, Archbishop of Canterbury, suggested that perhaps the people who think the Biblical Gospels are a sort of cover up of the truth have not really read them very well.  "What if this is a story we haven’t really listened to before?" he asked in his article for the Mail on Sunday newspaper.  "Whatever this [Biblical Gospel] is, it is not about cover-ups, not about the secret agenda of power; it may be nonsense to you, it may be unreal to you, but don’t be deceived about the nature of the message and those who lived it out in the days when the New Testament was being written," he said in his sermon on Easter Sunday.  While his liberal Anglican views differ from Catholic Church teaching on important issues, what he had to say about the Gospel of Judas and Da Vinci Code is worth considering.

The events told in Luke's Gospel of two men's encounter with Jesus on the Emmaeus Road comprise one of those Gospel accounts of the resurrection that support the proposition that those who think this was a "cover up" have not read it carefully enough.  First century men, trying to fabricate a story, would not have written this about themselves, most certainly not in contrast with what they wrote about the women from their own section of first century society.  It even has its amusing moments.  Those who think the Bible oppressive toward women, in particular, should take another look at this story.  That is just not the way the men wrote it -- and it was the men who wrote it, after all.  If they were trying to write something to justify themselves, to cover up the truth, and to oppress the women of their day, they would not have written about the Emmaeus Road.

The Gospel reading for this Sunday, April 30, follows the account of the appearance of Jesus on the Emmaeus Road, as told in Luke's Gospel.  The portion included in the daily reading is Luke 24:35-48, which begins with two disciples' return to Jerusalem after that appearance, and tells of Jesus's appearance in the room with them after they described it. 

The account of his appearance on the Emmaeus Road appears at Luke 24:13-35, and reads as follows in the Revised Standard Version:

13 That very day two of them were going to a village named Emmaeus, about seven miles from Jerusalem, 14 and talking with each other about all these things that had happened. 15 While they were talking and discussing together, Jesus himself drew near and went with them. 16 But their eyes were kept from recognizing him. 17 And he said to them, "What is this conversation which you are holding with each other as you walk?" And they stood still, looking sad. 18 Then one of them, named Cle'opas, answered him, "Are you the only visitor to Jerusalem who does not know the things that have happened there in these days?" 19 And he said to them, "What things?" And they said to him, "Concerning Jesus of Nazareth, who was a prophet mighty in deed and word before God and all the people, 20 and how our chief priests and rulers delivered him up to be condemned to death, and crucified him. 21 But we had hoped that he was the one to redeem Israel. Yes, and besides all this, it is now the third day since this happened. 22 Moreover, some women of our company amazed us. They were at the tomb early in the morning 23 and did not find his body; and they came back saying that they had even seen a vision of angels, who said that he was alive. 24 Some of those who were with us went to the tomb, and found it just as the women had said; but him they did not see." 25 And he said to them, "O foolish men, and slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken! 26 Was it not necessary that the Christ should suffer these things and enter into his glory?" 27 And beginning with Moses and all the prophets, he interpreted to them in all the scriptures the things concerning himself. 28 So they drew near to the village to which they were going. He appeared to be going further, 29 but they constrained him, saying, "Stay with us, for it is toward evening and the day is now far spent." So he went in to stay with them. 30 When he was at table with them, he took the bread and blessed, and broke it, and gave it to them. 31 And their eyes were opened and they recognized him; and he vanished out of their sight. 32 They said to each other, "Did not our hearts burn within us while he talked to us on the road, while he opened to us the scriptures?" 33 And they rose that same hour and returned to Jerusalem; and they found the eleven gathered together and those who were with them, 34 who said, "The Lord has risen indeed, and has appeared to Simon!" 35 Then they told what had happened on the road, and how he was known to them in the breaking of the bread.

Father Raniero Cantalamessa's commentary on this Sunday's Gospel mentions the surprising nature of this account and its aftermath, in comparison with what people might have expected the Gospel to say:

The disciples of Emmaus have just arrived out of breath to Jerusalem and are recounting what happened to them on the road, when Jesus appears in person in their midst saying: "Peace to you!" At first, fear, as if they saw a spirit; then amazement, disbelief; finally, joy. What is more, disbelief and joy at the same time: "And while they still disbelieved for joy, and wondered." . . .

All this tells us something important about the Resurrection. The latter is not only a great miracle, an argument or a proof in favor of the truth of Christ. More than that, it is a new world in which one enters with faith accompanied by wonder and joy. Christ's resurrection is the "new creation."

Similarly, Father Frank Doyle, SJ's Sunday Reflections on Living Space say "The disciples are filled with confused feelings. . . .  They recognise him and do not recognise him at the same time."

It seems to have been beyond the imagination of the men on the Emmaeus Road that Jesus would have appeared to some of the women without having appeared to any of the men.  They viewed the women’s reports as strange tales of visions of angels.  However seriously the men may have taken the women’s reports, they did not see fit to remain in Jerusalem in case the Lord appeared again.  When a stranger appeared among the men as they walked, they wanted to talk about the events of the day.  They did not recognize the man who walked with them as Jesus.  Were they in shock?  They speak as if the town was in turmoil over the strange reports made by the women of their fellowship group. 

The men wrote the Gospel accounts of these events, and even in the way they wrote them years after the fact, there is a story stranger than fiction.  If the Gospel writers had not depended upon these accounts of the facts from eye witnesses, they would not likely have reported that the people closest to Jesus did not immediately recognize Him.  Yet, that is the account given about both the men and the women.  If the Gospel writers were trying to prove the resurrection, ego would tend to make them write that the leaders of the Church had visions and recognized the Lord.  Yet that is not what anyone reported who was there at the time. 

Even in ghost stories, people recognize the ghost.  After a funeral, people comment that they still sense the presence of the person who has died, and they know whose spirit it is that they sense.  They are not at a loss about the person’s identity.  The ghost looks immediately like the departed.&nb