tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-60026593981370700212024-03-14T11:35:45.881-04:00Last Of AllAnd he sat down, and called the twelve, and saith unto them, If any man desire to be first, the same shall be last of all, and servant of all. - Mark 9:35Unknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger95125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6002659398137070021.post-1825503686798063682023-12-09T15:52:00.003-05:002023-12-09T15:52:44.760-05:00George Eastman<p>This is a post being moved from a blog I do for our church men's prayer group. I'm doing some housecleaning there and felt this one was worthy of being preserved. </p><h1 style="text-align: left;">A Sad Death?</h1><p>During a discussion about experiencing a happy death, I thought of an excellent example of what I have always assumed was a sad death, that of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Eastman">George Eastman</a>, founder of Eastman Kodak. George Eastman was born July 12, 1854, and died March 14, 1932. His father, George Washington Eastman, died of a brain disorder when George was 8 years old, and his mother, Maria Kilbourn Eastman, began taking in boarders to support George and his two older sisters and pay for his education. George left school early and began working to help his mother support the family. He never married nor had any offspring but was devoted to his mother and sisters. His mother died in 1907, her final two years in a wheelchair, when George was 53. </p><p>At age 30, in 1884, George patented the first photographic roll film, and four years later, the first camera designed to use that film to introduce photography to the masses. The business he developed and managed based on those inventions made him a very wealthy man. George became a leader in industrial relations, introducing "profit sharing" for all employees, a benefit I enjoyed during my 34 years as an employee, long after George's death.</p><p>George donated more than $100M ($2B in today's dollars) to various non-profits around the world. There was a focus on the arts, health and dental care for poor children, and two southern historically black universities.</p><p>Some spinal disorder in his final two years resulted in intense pain and difficulty standing or walking. He suffered depression, perhaps from his condition and remembering the lingering deaths and suffering of his parents. He committed suicide with a pistol shot to his heart and left this note: "<strong><em>To my friends, my work is done - Why wait? GE</em>"</strong></p><p>As an employee of Kodak, I never heard any reference to Mr. Eastman having any interest in faith or church or any connection with either. I guess I assumed he was just an unhappy atheist who committed suicide.</p><p>But I wondered if there was more to the story and Googled something along the line of "Did George Eastman have any church or faith connections?" <a href="https://rbscp.lib.rochester.edu/506">That brought up a fascinating story by a long time personal friend of Mr. Eastman, George E. Norton, Rector of St. Paul's Episcopal Church in Rochester NY from 1923 to 1948</a>. Included in that story were two faith related quotes from Mr. Eastman. The first is from a letter, a copy of which Pastor Norton had in his possession.</p><figure class="wp-block-image size-large"><img alt="" class="wp-image-4177" height="278" src="https://stpetersmpg.files.wordpress.com/2022/11/screen-shot-2022-11-02-at-2.32.50-pm.png?w=1024" width="514" /></figure><p>The second quote was made in person to Pastor Norton in response to Norton's statement, following some church criticism by Eastman, that Eastman was not a member of the church and consequently didn't know what he was talking about. Eastman replied, " "<strong><em>Young man, who are you, and by what right do you think you can read me out of the church. I was baptised in St. Luke's Church and I was confirmed by Bishop Cox. You can't read me out of the church</em>."</strong></p><p>The last paragraph in Pastor Norton's story was about the funeral of George Eastman:</p><figure class="wp-block-image size-large"><img alt="" class="wp-image-4179" height="145" src="https://stpetersmpg.files.wordpress.com/2022/11/screen-shot-2022-11-02-at-2.34.34-pm.png?w=1024" width="523" /></figure><p>So, maybe the death of George Eastman wasn't seen by him as sad. Maybe nobody had ever explained to Mr. Eastman the complicated theology of the Catholic Church, the benefits of its sacraments, the necessity of worship, and it's view of suicide. Maybe nobody had invited him in. But it appears that he lead an unselfish life that resulted in better lives for thousands who enjoyed employment by him, preserved important memories with his inventions, or benefited from the generous distribution of his wealth. And, lest we get hung up on the suicide issue, there is this from the Catechism of the Catholic Church. Of course only God knows how George Eastman's life looked to him.</p><figure class="wp-block-image size-large"><img alt="" class="wp-image-4181" height="63" src="https://stpetersmpg.files.wordpress.com/2022/11/screen-shot-2022-11-02-at-2.35.45-pm.png?w=1024" width="487" /></figure><p>In the meantime, in hope for a happy death, let's focus on “<strong><em>seeking first the Kingdom of God</em></strong>, the <strong><em>Our Father</em></strong>, the <strong><em>Commandments</em></strong>, the <strong><em>Beatitudes</em></strong>, the <strong><em>Gifts of the Spirit</em></strong>, the <strong><em>Virtues</em></strong>, and the <strong><em>Creed</em></strong>. Hmm, those are the same things suggested last week for protection from demons!</p><p><strong>Footnote:</strong> And one truly sad death was the death of Eastman Kodak, the imaging company that failed to respond to the shift from silver halide to digital imaging and, after long and painful suffering, went bankrupt in January 2012. A healthy George Eastman would have not allowed that to happen.</p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6002659398137070021.post-77936593932299636222023-10-22T17:51:00.003-04:002023-10-22T17:51:43.662-04:00A Pilgrimage to Poland<p>In September 2023 we took a trip to Poland. Readers might enjoy this summary of the trip and learnings. Or, they may not, but here it is.</p><p style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;"><b><a href="https://drive.google.com/file/d/1Yyd8iw_tZ97AxN34QBW5vgTB3lsEqgBP/view?usp=share_link" target="_blank">A Pilgrimage to Poland</a></b></span></p><p><br /></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6002659398137070021.post-22465382290388740072023-06-18T12:45:00.002-04:002023-06-18T12:45:24.592-04:00Oops and Apologies<p>If you tried to read my last post, <i>From Chaos to the Church</i>, and found it messy and ugly, try again. I have cleaned it up and hopefully made it more readable.</p><p><a href="http://www.lastofall.net/2023/06/from-chaos-to-church.html">From Chaos to the Church</a></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6002659398137070021.post-77509298403285110282023-06-18T11:09:00.001-04:002023-06-18T11:50:06.305-04:00From Chaos to the Church<h2 style="text-align: left;"> A Great Course</h2><div><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">In January of this year an email from <i><a href="https://www.thegreatcourses.com/" style="color: #954f72;">The Great Courses</a></i> offering big discounts caught my eye. One course offered for only $25, <i>Foundations of Western Civilization</i>, inspired me. <i>History of Western Civilization</i> had been my toughest course as a Vanderbilt freshmen in the fall of 1960, and, while the title was slightly different, foundations vs. history, this looked like a good chance to make up for what I had missed in that course decades ago. I ordered it, and my wife and I enjoyed the 48 episodes, usually one per night, over the next few weeks. I recommend it. Buy and enjoy it (at their discount prices).<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">An interesting coincidence was that the lecturing professor, Thomas F. X. Noble of Note Dame, had been our son's History of Western Civ. professor at the University of Virginia almost 40 years ago. Some Goggling of the professor led to "<a href="https://irishrover.net/2015/04/a-noble-farewell-professor-retires-after-41-years/" style="color: #954f72;">A Noble Farewell: Professor Retires After 41 Years</a>." In that 2015 article, the professor offered this memory: <o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><br /></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">"<i>One difference between a public, secular university and a Catholic university, he explained, is that at the latter, "We are actually much freer to talk about things than they are." He continued, "In public universities, there is kind of a soft left orthodoxy to which everyone must hue, or basically, keep your mouth shut. Whereas here we can actually talk about anything, which is really quite remarkable...it opens our capacity to explores and to investigates and to talk-and even to argue.</i>"</p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><br /></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">Very interesting, but I believe that "soft left orthodoxy" may have hardened in the last eight years. </p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><br /></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">I mention this because it is a shame the students of 40 years ago at UVA didn't get the same emphasis on Church history as we got in the current presentation by Professor Noble. The current version includes an episode titled <i>The Hebrews - Small States and Big Ideas</i>. Here are some phrases from that episode:</p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><br /></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">"Three central religious ideas contained in the Hebrew Bible constitute the key foundations of Western Civilization...The idea of the covenant...one God for one people, not a god for a place or a state...The idea of exclusive monotheism...The idea of ethical monotheism...and this: "Western literature is unimaginable without its fundamental formative text: the Bible."</p></div><p><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif;">More recently, I have struggled with some of the writings of G.K. Chesterton, a British writer of a century ago who never found an obscure word he didn't like. But his thinking is profound. For example, he states that we cannot treat the Church as a child once we discover that she is our mother and the mother of our country, "</span><i style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif;">much older and more aboriginal</i><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif;">." That is part of a discussion of confusion of patriotism, nationalism, and faith in God, always a serious current issue.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif;">All these preliminaries are leading to presentation of an updated chart I have worked on over the past several years. It depicts, in simple terms, the first 2000 years of the Church, from God's selection, preparation, and education of the pagan Hebrew people, through the Incarnation, to the establishment of The Church. Comments and observations are welcome.</span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_IaK94dH4or0AXV2frOktv4wSURzVE-EpMK4oh4TmxZNwnkH0IICtOEMuvl4vrqjwt9f7G0NRdyvTOV2H3mE7eI76gonfxk-XwN059qBqHNX15VTF4UVYUdewCm36GzhjefKv8PYHshlMwcnkA7YnR-Vvh8gayu1p1RoqjMx2z4nDinyiBK3rDQ4t6A/s2176/Screenshot%202023-06-18%20at%2010.38.37%20AM.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1632" data-original-width="2176" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_IaK94dH4or0AXV2frOktv4wSURzVE-EpMK4oh4TmxZNwnkH0IICtOEMuvl4vrqjwt9f7G0NRdyvTOV2H3mE7eI76gonfxk-XwN059qBqHNX15VTF4UVYUdewCm36GzhjefKv8PYHshlMwcnkA7YnR-Vvh8gayu1p1RoqjMx2z4nDinyiBK3rDQ4t6A/w400-h300/Screenshot%202023-06-18%20at%2010.38.37%20AM.png" width="400" /></a></div><br /><p><a href="https://drive.google.com/file/d/1_7KttQsxc9FHryyAVtuUsmqbLR8mnFOi/view?usp=share_link" target="_blank">Link to PDF of the chart. </a></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="background: repeat white;"><o:p> </o:p></span></div></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6002659398137070021.post-49753435800533803332023-05-16T10:38:00.000-04:002023-05-16T10:38:32.696-04:00Miracles?<h2 style="text-align: left;"> <b style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; text-align: center;"><u><span style="font-size: 16pt;">A Chesterton Quote Impossible to Remember</span></u></b></h2><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in; text-align: center;"><b><u><span style="font-size: 16pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></u></b></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">"<i>Anyone who likes, therefore, may call my belief in God merely mystical; the phrase is not worth fighting about. But my belief that miracles have happened in human history is not a mystical belief at all; I believe in them upon human evidences as I do in the discovery of America. Upon this point there is a simple logical fact that only requires to be stated and cleared up. Somehow or other an extraordinary idea has arisen that the disbelievers in miracles consider them coldly and fairly, while believers in miracles accept them only in connection with some dogma. The fact is quite the other way. The believers in miracles accept them (rightly or wrongly) because they have evidence for them. The disbelievers in miracles deny them (rightly or wrongly) because they have a doctrine against them</i>." - Orthodoxy by Gilbert Chesterton - Page 157<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">That quote is eight lines out of a 55 line paragraph in Chesterton's book. Apparently Mr. Chesterton was never at a loss for words.<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in; text-align: center;"></p><h1 style="text-align: left;"><b><u><span style="font-size: 16pt;">What's My Point?</span></u></b></h1><b><u><span style="font-size: 16pt;"><br /><o:p></o:p></span></u></b><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">For about three months, I have been choosing a few lines meaningful to me from Chesterton's book and copying them into a Google document on my iPad. The goal is to have a better understanding of Chesterton's interesting defence of orthodox theology which I find to be logical and rational. On the morning of May 14, 2023, the paragraph portion above was what I copied.<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">Maybe those words about miracles caught my attention because of my current situation, following various advised medical regimens after a diagnosis of pancreatic cancer. The adventure started in the late summer of 2021 with a mild but not painful discomfort in my lower left abdomen. I could have easily continued to ignore it. <o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">However, I got an early October appointment with my GP and after some discussion with him, wondered aloud if we couldn't just do a scan to see if anything was going on. He said yes and, a couple of hours later, on a Friday afternoon, I was undergoing the scan. A couple of hours after that I got a call from the doctor saying that I would be seeing a surgeon the following week.<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">The surgeon took a look at the scan and, when I asked if he was going to do a biopsy, said no, that it didn't matter what it was, it had to go. I guess he knew, from the scan, based on his experience, what it was. The early November surgery he scheduled resulted in removal of about half the pancreas, a few inches of duodenum, the spleen, and a few lymph nodes, two or three indicating malignancy. <o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">After a month or so of surgery recovery, the oncologist started me on a six month chemo regimen. I took the summer of 2022 off, but a scan in early fall dictated a more intense chemo (Folfirinox) for six months. Then in early spring 2023, after a favorable scan, I was shifted to a less intense chemo (5-FU) which is ongoing. As of May 2023, I feel great, pretty much the same as summer of 2021 before the whole adventure started. A few days ago I rode my recumbent bike 20 miles in 75 minutes, a bit faster than four minutes per mile, and about what I was capable of two years ago. I am thankful.<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">Now, what about the miracle issue? Many people have told me during this ordeal that they are praying for me. I don't know exactly what they are praying for but I love them and thank them for it. My own prayer for myself has been for fortitude, patience, peace, and joy, all fruits or gifts of the Holy Spirit, throughout the process, wherever it leads. I'm experiencing that now and give thanks for answered prayer, probably not of documentable miracle status.<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">I am personally attributing miracle status to, and thank God for, the inspiration that sent me to the doctor in October 2021. As I said in an earlier paragraph, the discomfort wasn't that bad and could have been easily ignored. Without that early detection before lung or liver involvement, I suspect I would be dead or nearly so by this time. Life expectancy for stage 4 pancreatic cancer is 12 to 18 months.<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">My miracle is not dramatic like such as healing of a crippled man or a man born blind. I don't believe I would be justified in asking for a miracle of that scale, or that I could ask with faith, and don't intend to do so.<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">Of course the skeptic, relying on his or her "<i>doctrine</i>," would say it was all luck, that I won a small prize at the lottery, or maybe just bad luck that I have the cancer at all, or maybe that the story isn't over...I'm still going to die from pancreatic cancer. How pessimistic!<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">I could take full credit for the decision, talking about what a smart fellow I was to see the doctor and suggest a scan when I did. I'm not taking that route.<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">My evidence of a miracle is that I feel good, am still serving and enjoying life, that the whole experience has been sobering, educational, and valuable, and that I am a slightly better person, perhaps better able to express sincere empathy, for having gone through the experience. Thanks be to God for sending me to the doctor in October 2021. And may He continue to grant me fortitude, patience, peace, and joy throughout the process wherever it leads.<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><h1 style="text-align: left;"><b><u><span style="font-size: 16pt;">Catholic Teaching on Miracles</span></u></b></h1><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">I know that my miracle wouldn't meet miracle criteria established by my Church. Here is a quote from <a href="https://catholicworldmission.org/miracles-and-catholic-tradition/" style="color: #954f72;">this article on the subject</a>: </p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><br /></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">"Because miracles play such an important role in the Catholic faith, a Vatican-appointed Miracle Commission composed of scientific experts and theologians works to determine whether these claims are authentic and genuine. For example, a commission researching an event of seemingly miraculous healing will call upon the help of medical rofessiohnals appointed by the Vatican to determine if there is any medical explanation."</p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><br /></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">I won't be calling on the Miracle Commission to evaluate my evidence. I will just give thanks for it. I suppose that for every dramatic and mysterious event explored by the Church's Miracle Commission, there are millions of small undocumentable blessings, each one miraculous.</p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><br /></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><u style="background-color: white; font-size: 11.5pt;"><br /></u></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><u style="background-color: white; font-size: 11.5pt;"><br /></u></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><u style="background-color: white; font-size: 11.5pt;">Bonus</u></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span face=""Open Sans", sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: 11.5pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span face=""Open Sans", sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: 11.5pt;">For the curious: <b><a href="https://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/health/conditions-and-diseases/pancreatic-cancer/pancreatic-cancer-prognosis#:~:text=Up%20to%2010%20percent%20of,is%203%20to%203.5%20years." style="color: #954f72;">Educational Material on Pancreatic Cancer</a></b><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6002659398137070021.post-91290341317895190692021-07-28T06:29:00.001-04:002021-07-28T06:29:05.610-04:00The Exodus - Fact or Fiction and “A History of the Jews”<p>This post is from a blog I do as part of a men’s prayer group at the Basilica of St. Peter, Columbia, SC. Recommendation of an impressive book is included. <a href="https://stpetersmpg.blog/2021/07/22/july-21-2021-the-exodus-fact-or-fiction/">https://stpetersmpg.blog/2021/07/22/july-21-2021-the-exodus-fact-or-fiction/</a></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6002659398137070021.post-67865991122279288092019-12-29T10:30:00.000-05:002019-12-29T10:30:38.084-05:00Massacre of the InnocentsSaturday December 28 on the Catholic Liturgical Calendar is a Feast day in memory of The Holy Innocents, those slain by King Herod in fear of a new King having recently been born, eventually to replace him as King. If only Herod had known that he had less than a year to live!<br />
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Much academic analysis of Sacred Scripture of the last century seems aimed at disputation of details, and many scholars have disputed the story of the Massacre of the Innocents found only in Matthew 2. There is no proof of, or absence of, the events reported, but it is refreshing to find some detailed, well referenced, analysis supporting the reasonableness of the Biblical account. I just stumbled on this <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_L._Maier" target="_blank">Paul L. Maier</a> article which has helpful information about 1st Century history and context, an interesting analysis of the mind of Herod, some surprising details, and a surprising ending. Don't start reading unless you have ten or fifteen minutes to get to the end. The article (which is not Sacred Scripture) is <a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=mWnYvI5RdLMC&pg=PA169&dq=Herod+and+the+Infants+of+Bethlehem&hl=en#v=onepage&q=Herod%20and%20the%20Infants%20of%20Bethlehem&f=false" target="_blank">HERE</a>.<br />
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Part of the problem in defending these mysterious Bible stories is that we read into them more than is actually written, especially in art. For example, here is an influential <a href="https://www.alamy.com/the-massacre-of-the-innocents-by-cornelis-cornelisz-van-haarlem-1562-image68542713.html" target="_blank">1590 painting depicting the Massacre of the Innocents.</a> Imaginations sometimes run wild, and that seems to be excessive artistic license taken with these simple lines in the Gospel According to St. Matthew. (Matthew 2:16-18)<br />
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<i><span class="text Matt-2-16" id="en-NIV-23186" style="-webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; box-sizing: border-box;">When Herod realized that he had been outwitted by the Magi, he was furious, and he gave orders to kill all the boys in Bethlehem and its vicinity who were two years old and under, in accordance with the time he had learned from the Magi.</span> <span class="text Matt-2-17" id="en-NIV-23187" style="-webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; box-sizing: border-box;">Then what was said through the prophet Jeremiah was fulfilled: </span></i><i><span class="text Matt-2-18" id="en-NIV-23188" style="-webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; box-sizing: border-box; position: relative;">“A voice is heard in Ramah, </span><span class="indent-1" style="-webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; box-sizing: border-box;"><span class="text Matt-2-18" style="-webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; box-sizing: border-box; position: relative;">weeping and great mourning, </span></span><span class="text Matt-2-18" style="-webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; box-sizing: border-box; position: relative;">Rachel<span class="crossreference" data-cr="#cen-NIV-23188Q" data-link="(<a href="#cen-NIV-23188Q" title="See cross-reference Q">Q</a>)" style="box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 0.625em; line-height: 22px; position: relative; top: 0px; vertical-align: top;"></span> weeping for her children a</span><span class="indent-1" style="-webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; box-sizing: border-box;"><span class="text Matt-2-18" style="-webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; box-sizing: border-box; position: relative;">nd refusing to be comforted, </span></span><span class="indent-1" style="-webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; box-sizing: border-box;"><span class="text Matt-2-18" style="-webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; box-sizing: border-box; position: relative;">because they are no more.”</span></span></i></blockquote>
Maier, by the way, is a historian and novelist and a prominent Lutheran leader, writer, and spokesman. You can read about him <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_L._Maier" target="_blank">HERE</a>.<br />
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<br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6002659398137070021.post-70974744377104410032019-10-26T08:20:00.002-04:002019-10-26T08:20:56.922-04:00Life in Christ and Getting a Job<a href="https://www.franciscanmedia.org/saint-peter-chrysologus/" target="_blank">Saint Peter Chrysologous</a> was a bishop of the early church, a preacher so skilled in his presentation of the Truth that he is known as the "Doctor of Homilies." He was born about 350 years after the resurrection of Jesus and lived about 70 years, finally as Bishop of Ravenna, a city in northern Italy and the capital of the Western Roman Empire. His preaching probably drew large crowds in that populous city. Maybe it was a mega-church.<br />
<br />
But maybe his crowds were smaller because St. Peter Chrysologous spoke simple and direct Truth about what it means to be transformed rather than conformed to the ways of this world. This morning the <i>Office of Readings</i> in the <i>Liturgy of the Hours</i> included this paragraph from one of his homilies. (This screen shot is from the <a href="https://universalis.com/" target="_blank">Universalis APP.</a>)<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEheeFQMdi8O6v554wbXq7K-jdvQ0A5IOp43x0RcEK_qIWWC_yBWIRSp3x3qGnH9O8JOaIR1LIDek6QpJxvZzPTz7grxob38efayTWAq2Ynfa5X43B4iQ533JP9BtXlCIbs9OfumyklxK64D/s1600/IMG_0231.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="489" data-original-width="1374" height="141" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEheeFQMdi8O6v554wbXq7K-jdvQ0A5IOp43x0RcEK_qIWWC_yBWIRSp3x3qGnH9O8JOaIR1LIDek6QpJxvZzPTz7grxob38efayTWAq2Ynfa5X43B4iQ533JP9BtXlCIbs9OfumyklxK64D/s400/IMG_0231.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
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Well, those are not personal qualities that we would tend to point out and brag about on our applications for employment in the 21st century are they? They are somewhat other worldly. It is fascinating to me that this comes on the heels of reading, just this week, an <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Business-Secrets-Trappist-Monks-Authenticity/dp/0231160631" target="_blank">inspiring book about the Monks of Mepkin Abbey and the philosophy which guides their personal and business lives. </a>And, yes, they are in business, formerly poultry and eggs and currently mushrooms. So, I suppose that if one wanted to join the Monks, to be employed, so to speak, at Mepkin Abbey, those qualities recommended by St. Peter Chrysologous are the ones that would offer a chance of success.</div>
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I'm keeping this post short like Father Peter's famously short homilies. For better explanation and understanding of how it is not only possible but beneficial and even life-changing to follow his counter-cultural advice in the 21st century, buy and read <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Business-Secrets-Trappist-Monks-Authenticity/dp/0231160631" target="_blank">Business Secrets of the Trappist Monks</a>. Having visited them several times and having participated in service projects there, I can vouch for its truth. You can download it to your Kindle from Amazon for about $10 and read it in three or four hours. Then you may want to read it again. I certainly need and want to do so because I have a way to go to follow Father Peter's sound advice.</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEit7qfWMSObDdP11qYeebqnoJM72Dw68SKgApEoxQ0j7cHLa1Rx_Sg1GkomPwgPO3jgME3oC9k2ZtWNhcdAQN7JnN1IwTVIEO0wL86q1pAzRzNKe4xxTeD2HGwTOtIOSEyzQmFneIrl9Ml4/s1600/Screen+Shot+2019-10-26+at+7.49.23+AM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="777" data-original-width="505" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEit7qfWMSObDdP11qYeebqnoJM72Dw68SKgApEoxQ0j7cHLa1Rx_Sg1GkomPwgPO3jgME3oC9k2ZtWNhcdAQN7JnN1IwTVIEO0wL86q1pAzRzNKe4xxTeD2HGwTOtIOSEyzQmFneIrl9Ml4/s320/Screen+Shot+2019-10-26+at+7.49.23+AM.png" width="207" /></a></div>
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<br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6002659398137070021.post-62071688292110082962019-10-02T19:31:00.000-04:002019-10-03T17:26:43.386-04:00Baptismal Sticking Points<br />
<h2>
Introduction</h2>
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When I was received into the Catholic Church in 2011, it was
after a few months of weekly meetings in a membership class on Catholic
theology and practice, preparation for and reception of the sacrament of
reconciliation (confession), and presentation of documentation of my April 15,
1951, baptism at the First Baptist Church, Maryville, TN. I had been eight
years old and had “walked the aisle” on March 30, 1951, in response to the
traditional Baptist end-of-service invitational hymn, probably on the first or
second of the unknown number of verses of “<i>Just as I Am</i>,” and confessed faith in Jesus as my
savior and asked to be baptized and received into the church. That simple process is a key
element of Baptist “liturgy.”<o:p></o:p></div>
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To be asked to provide that ancient history was a bit
surprising to me at the time because I knew that the baptismal practices of
Catholics and Baptists were quite different, and that my former
Baptist church would have required re-baptism of former Catholics
wanting to become Baptist. Here are brief summaries of the key beliefs of the two.</div>
<h2>
<br />Baptist Baptism</h2>
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<ol>
<li>Only for “believers” who have reached the “age of
accountability” and “made a decision” for Christ</li>
<li>By total immersion in water</li>
<li>An act of obedience and testimony by the believer</li>
<li>Symbolizes the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus and
the believer’s death to sin, burial, and resurrection to new life in Christ.</li>
<li>May be repeated if some new level of commitment or
conversion is reached or if the baptized person feels his or her conversion at
the initial baptism was not sincere (enough).</li>
</ol>
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<h2>
Catholic Baptism</h2>
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<ol>
<li>For any who have never been baptized and desire entry into
the Church, the Body of Christ, following a period of instruction about the
faith.</li>
<li>For the children, even infants, of Baptized and Confirmed believers
who promise, in faith, to instruct and raise those children and infants in the
faith of the Church. Full membership in the Body of Christ requires Christian
Education and the Sacrament of Confirmation at an accountable age.</li>
<li>Immersion is fine but not required. Baptism must be by water,
with right intent, in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.</li>
<li>An act of Grace by the Triune God, Father, Son, and Holy
Spirit, through which the baptized are freed from sin and reborn as sons of
God.</li>
<li>Done once only since the effectiveness depends only on the
Grace of God and not on the person baptized or the person doing the baptizing. To
doubt is an expression of lack of faith. (Baptism done by force, with wrong intent, in
some name other than that of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, or in lemonade
or beer instead of water, is not considered valid. Throughout Sacred Scripture,
washing with water is always a symbol of cleaning and removal of sin.)</li>
</ol>
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The bottom line is that Catholics take the act of Baptism,
done properly and with proper intent, very seriously and will not re-baptize
Christians who have been so baptized. Catholics do, however, welcome the chance to
educate and Confirm such persons in the Catholic faith. The results of that process depend on
The Holy Spirit at work in the lives of all involved.</div>
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<h2>
Reconciling the Two</h2>
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I have never doubted the validity or sincerity of that innocent
and childlike “conversion” and baptism I experienced at age 8 in the Baptist Church, but I
have learned that conversion is not a “once and done” thing but a life-long
process of learning and serving, examining and confessing, and increasing
commitment, a process that I have observed both Baptists and Catholics
experiencing.</div>
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<o:p></o:p></div>
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I remember an insightful statement by a Lutheran seminary
professor: “Don’t be concerned about whether you have crossed some imaginary or subjective line. Just focus on making progress in the right direction.” </div>
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To
oversimplify a bit, I would say that the line to be crossed is key in Baptist
theology while Catholic theology focuses more on continually moving in the right
direction toward the holiness commanded by Jesus. I suppose that is why
Catholics are accused by the “<i>faith alone</i>” adherents of “<i>works righteousness</i>.” Well,
anyone familiar with the New Testament will know of lots of uses of such imperatives as study, work, endure, persist, fight, finish, etc. as well as to instances of
failure or falling away by believers. And all those “works” can be done in
perfect (or even imperfect) faith.<o:p></o:p></div>
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At least two things we Catholics and Baptists can agree on
are:<o:p></o:p></div>
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<ol>
<li>Baptism is important</li>
<li>We are saved by grace through faith and it is not from us
but is a gift of God. (Ephesians 2:8)</li>
</ol>
Catholics just see more complications and more divine
mystery in the underlying processes and identify even whatever good works we
may do as not of ourselves but as gifts of God.<br />
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<h2>
What About Those Other "Denominations?"</h2>
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And then there are the Orthodox, Episcopal, Lutheran, Methodist,
Presbyterian, Church of God, etc. understandings of Baptism.
Below are some official statements from church websites. At most of the links
there is much more explanation than the simple screen shots I have posted.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<u><b><span style="font-size: 18.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Southern Baptist</span></b><o:p></o:p></u></div>
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<a href="http://www.sbc.net/aboutus/basicbeliefs.asp" style="text-align: start;">http://www.sbc.net/aboutus/basicbeliefs.asp</a></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 18.0pt; line-height: 107%;"><u>Catholic</u><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhijMI6lxYEfoYCAw3yoUsJx5KMUshaz_TChNVfAJYJlVh_RKlMzRgcqq9_ti3kKUYdwJsyQNK4v9dlQJfly-AUWHy3XHcYY_4qGO144osWwcphul-OBA1X4nDOUPvWWn3WkPODR_HChU3P/s1600/Catholic+Baptism.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="149" data-original-width="657" height="90" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhijMI6lxYEfoYCAw3yoUsJx5KMUshaz_TChNVfAJYJlVh_RKlMzRgcqq9_ti3kKUYdwJsyQNK4v9dlQJfly-AUWHy3XHcYY_4qGO144osWwcphul-OBA1X4nDOUPvWWn3WkPODR_HChU3P/s400/Catholic+Baptism.JPG" width="400" /></a></div>
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<a href="http://www.vatican.va/archive/ccc_css/archive/catechism/p2s2c1a1.htm">http://www.vatican.va/archive/ccc_css/archive/catechism/p2s2c1a1.htm</a></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 18.0pt; line-height: 107%; mso-no-proof: yes;"><u>Episcopal</u><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<a href="https://www.episcopalchurch.org/baptism">https://www.episcopalchurch.org/baptism</a></div>
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<b><u><span style="font-size: 18.0pt; line-height: 107%; mso-no-proof: yes;">Orthodox</span></u></b></div>
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<a href="https://www.oca.org/orthodoxy/the-orthodox-faith/worship/the-sacraments/baptism" style="text-align: start;">https://www.oca.org/orthodoxy/the-orthodox-faith/worship/the-sacraments/baptism</a></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 18.0pt; line-height: 107%; mso-no-proof: yes;"><u>Lutheran (ELCA)</u></span></b> <br />
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<a href="http://download.elca.org/ELCA%20Resource%20Repository/Baptismal_Covenant_and_Faith_Practices.pdf">http://download.elca.org/ELCA%20Resource%20Repository/Baptismal_Covenant_and_Faith_Practices.pdf</a></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 18.0pt; line-height: 107%; mso-no-proof: yes;"><u>Methodist</u><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<a href="http://www.umc.org/what-we-believe/baptism" style="text-align: start;">http://www.umc.org/what-we-believe/baptism</a></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 18.0pt; line-height: 107%; mso-no-proof: yes;"><u>Presbyterian (PCUSA)</u><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<a href="https://www.pcusa.org/news/2016/1/21/what-presbyterians-believe-baptism/" style="text-align: start;">https://www.pcusa.org/news/2016/1/21/what-presbyterians-believe-baptism/</a></div>
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<h2>
<o:p> Summary</o:p></h2>
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<o:p>In spite of the varied understandings of the practice and meaning of the Sacrament of Baptism, we all agree that it is the entry point to the Christian Church, the Body of Christ. We can probably also agree that there is just one Truth. We just don't agree exactly on what that one Truth about Baptism is. </o:p></div>
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6002659398137070021.post-83179057487263232732019-07-28T13:21:00.000-04:002019-07-28T13:21:54.766-04:00The Gospel of John Movie (2003)<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgzYVzjqyKSHt9qqUoXLmxGiMFfMStvbhuTraTEDwG0LRjHCZu1NOH3_cIs-BFo4enAiUEawrnEoQtXBbZp0s15J_bduo8WFhCED31UkZEMEAXM7NiMUkK9yKQtsklYkfIyCsY5BpbKMP3u/s1600/IMG_1578.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="640" data-original-width="444" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgzYVzjqyKSHt9qqUoXLmxGiMFfMStvbhuTraTEDwG0LRjHCZu1NOH3_cIs-BFo4enAiUEawrnEoQtXBbZp0s15J_bduo8WFhCED31UkZEMEAXM7NiMUkK9yKQtsklYkfIyCsY5BpbKMP3u/s320/IMG_1578.jpg" width="222" /></a></div>
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This dramatization of <i>The Gospel According to St. John</i>
is a work of art, beautifully staged and acted, the words coming directly from
Sacred Scripture, the American Bible Society’s <i>Good News Bible</i>, nothing omitted
and nothing added. A viewer can read along with the movie. Simply summarized,
it is a pure proclamation of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, God incarnate. It
begins with creation, placing Jesus, the Word, with God and actually being God,
at the creation, and ends with his post resurrection, pre ascension,
appearances to the disciples. Scottish actor <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_Ian_Cusick">Henry Cusick</a> and Canadian
actor <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daniel_Kash">Daniel Kash</a> are
excellent as Jesus and Simon Peter. Christopher Plummer is the narrator.</div>
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I don’t remember when I first heard of the movie or watched
it, but I found it very helpful a dozen or so years ago with Lutheran
Confirmation classes of students around age 12. They were spellbound. And I
found it to be a perfect aid and conversation stimulator in an Adult Bible
Study of John’s Gospel. The faintest
praise I have read is an Associated Press quote on the DVD box: “<i>Thought
Provoking Entertainment</i>.” I suggest it may also be, for some viewers, Life
Changing Entertainment resulting from belated realization of who Jesus was and
is and what He did and does, and what He asks of his followers.</div>
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This <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Gospel_of_John_(2003_film)">Wikipedia
article</a> gives details of backers, artists, cast, and musical score and
points out the one controversial and sometimes questioned scene in the movie,
the silent presence of Mary Magdalene at the Last Supper. I would guess she was
not present there, but the Gospel of John certainly considers her a prominent
member of the close followers of Jesus. And, in writings of the first century
and earlier, it was not unusual to omit mention of women. The scene at the
Wedding at Cana, Mary, Mother of Jesus, instructing the servers to “<i>Do
whatever he tells you</i>,” the dialogue with the woman at the well and her
resulting evangelization of her community, the interactions with Mary and
Martha, and the important role of the women at his resurrection all speak to
the importance and prominence of the women followers of Jesus.</div>
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Check out the movie. If you get through Jesus’s dialogue
with the Samaritan Woman at the Well in John Chapter 4, I predict you will be
hooked and will end up watching the movie more than once. And of course, it is
no longer necessary to buy the DVD (photo above) since the movie is free on <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Gospel-John-Christopher-Plummer/dp/B0753YF699">Amazon
Prime</a> (Average Rating of 4.5) and on <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=47OkuvT5JFo">YouTube</a> as well.</div>
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<br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6002659398137070021.post-74414477154714467962019-06-09T08:01:00.000-04:002019-06-17T08:44:33.948-04:00Pentecost 2019 - Eight Years Catholic<br />
<h2>
Introduction</h2>
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<o:p></o:p></div>
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I was received into the Catholic Church at Pentecost 2011
and, in 2016 wrote a blog post titled <a href="http://www.lastofall.net/2016/05/pentecost-2016-five-years-catholic.html">Pentecost
2016 – Five Years Catholic</a>. Three years later, I wrote this one without
first reading the earlier one. There are a couple of common themes and some new
current thoughts, but I just enjoyed going back and reading the earlier one and
think it was better. I believe there is a lot of truth in the (approximate)
words of Flannery O’Conner: “<i>I don’t know what I think until I read what I
wrote</i>.” But, here goes with the current thinking.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<h2>
Becoming Catholic</h2>
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<o:p></o:p></div>
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It is common among Catholic Christians, and Christian
Catholics, to share how and when and why we became Catholic. Some are so-called
“cradle Catholics,” born to Catholic parents, baptized and confirmed in a
Catholic church, perhaps educated in Catholic schools and married in a Catholic
ceremony and sometimes with little knowledge about or interest in other
Christian faiths. </div>
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Some are convicted, converted, and reborn former atheists or
agnostics drawn into the Church by the Holy Spirit. </div>
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And many are
"converts," former Baptist, Lutheran, Presbyterian, Methodist,
Episcopalian, Pentecostal, or whatever Christians who became convinced that the
Catholic Church, with all its warts and wounds and problematic history, really
is the Church that Jesus established and left people in charge of when he
returned to the Father and is the Church with which they want to be in full
communion. They too usually credit the Holy Spirit with motivating their
move.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<h2>
The Question of Authority</h2>
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<o:p></o:p></div>
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Many in that latter group had come to believe that the
Catholic Church has divinely assigned authority, under Holy Spirit guidance, over theological issues and
argue that the Church is not a democracy subject to the whims of its “members,”
many of whom may be still more conformed to the world than transformed by the
Holy Spirit. (And, yes, some Catholic leaders with that authority have been
imperfectly transformed also, but they still bear the responsibility and are
accountable for their actions.) <o:p></o:p></div>
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I have generally put myself in that “looking for authority”
group, having been baptized Baptist and having served and worshiped in Baptist,
Presbyterian and Lutheran churches, experiencing some discomfort with so-called
Baptist Distinctives, Presbyterian Predestination, and Lutheran open discussion
and votes on current theological issues such as requirements for
ordination and holy matrimony. </div>
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In my case, that search for authority was not
based on belief that the Catholic Church majesterium is and always has been right all the
time or to relieve me of responsibility for having a well-informed and
well-formed conscience, but to acknowledge the authority and to say to those
Catholic leader/servants, “It is your responsibility to open yourselves to The
Holy Spirit and to understand, explain, and defend true theology. Get to
work!”<o:p></o:p></div>
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<h2>
Building Christian Unity</h2>
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<o:p></o:p></div>
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There is a second key issue I sometimes forget that
increased my interest in the Catholic Church, and that is the fragmentation of
and competitive squabbling among Christians and the resulting damage to the witness of the
Church. I was reminded of it by the Daily Mass readings for June 6, 2019. <o:p></o:p></div>
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First was from Acts 23:6-11. The “Jews,” the Chief Priests
and the whole Sanhedrin, Pharisees and Sadducees, had been assembled to
confront Paul, recent Christian convert and troublemaker, and hopefully hasten
his martyrdom. But Paul was a very smart guy, a Jewish Roman citizen,
well-educated and familiar with the Hebrew scriptures and all the political and
theological current issues.</div>
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Paul went right to the dividing issue, resurrection, which the Pharisees
believed in and the Sadducees rejected: "<i>My brothers, I am a Pharisee, the
son of Pharisees; I am on trial for hope in the resurrection of the dead</i>."
With that comment, the unity of the anti-Pauls was destroyed: "<i>When he
said this, a dispute broke out between the Pharisees and Sadducees, and the
group became divided</i>. “Martyrdom delayed! </div>
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And then, in the Gospel reading, there was this from Jesus’s
“High Priestly Prayer,” part of his John 17 farewell to his disciples: <i>Lifting
up his eyes to heaven, Jesus prayed saying: "I pray not only for these,
but also for those who will believe in me through their word, so that they may
all be one, as you, Father, are in me and I in you, that they also may be in
us, that the world may believe that you sent me.</i>"</div>
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Note the last phrase, the evangelistic purpose of Christian
unity: “…<i>that the world may believe that you sent me.</i>”</div>
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I first got interested in the idea of Christian unity while
living in Japan (1992-1995), enjoying worship and service at St. Paul’s
International Lutheran Church, and seeing the confusion, in a nation that was
2% Christian, caused by the multiplicity and diversity of mostly western groups
claiming the name of Christ. I specifically remember a co-worker telling me
that, yes, his relative is a Christian, a Mormon, and another co-worker, asking
me what is going on when he sees a Christian church in the USA on TV and
someone is putting his hand on another’s forehead and the latter then falls to
the floor unconscious. Well, how does one explain away those difficulties people
face in believing that the Father sent the Son?</div>
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So, a second important reason for my interest in
Catholicism, beyond the structure and authority, was that I wanted to cast a
vote in favor of Christian unity by submitting to and being received by the Church
that Jesus established and left someone in charge of, promising the Holy Spirit
as guide.</div>
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<o:p></o:p></div>
<h2>
Moving in the Right Direction</h2>
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<o:p></o:p></div>
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I have no expectation that all Christians are going to join
together in the Catholic Church anytime soon, but I do have a reasonable
expectation that all Christians, Catholics included, may eventually obey the
two Greatest Commandments and replace criticism and competition with love for
each other. After all, the key theologies expressed in the Nicene Creed and the
Lord’s Prayer, both recited at every Catholic Mass, must be of primary
importance and must provide some common ground that can keep most of us from
arguing more complicated issues which may not be resolved for hundreds of
years. <o:p></o:p></div>
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Resolving Complicated Issues</h2>
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<o:p></o:p></div>
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The primary complicated issue is differences in
understanding of The Lord’s Supper, Holy Communion, Eucharist, that, as
explained in John Chapter 6:52-71, has been a dividing issue since the very
beginning. It may keep us from full communion but need not prevent cooperation
in love and service. A key point for meaningful dialogue in the direction of
Christian unity in Truth is that concerned Christians in all faith traditions
should be able to respectfully explain not only why they believe as they do but
also why those in other faith traditions believe as they do. None of the
beliefs are without some, sometimes misunderstood or out-of-context, Biblical
foundation.</div>
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<h2>
The "Full Gospel" Church</h2>
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<o:p></o:p></div>
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I have some hope that more and more Christians will
recognize that my occasional somewhat tongue-in-cheek description of the
Catholic Church as the “full-gospel church” has some merit and will
investigate. After all, we have The Triune God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit,
the promises of salvation and resurrection, the Greatest Commandments and Great
Commission, The Great Cloud of Witnesses, the saints, daily and frequent Sunday
Masses, Church Fathers, Martyrs, seven Sacraments, The Real Presence, Mary the
Mother of God whom “<i>all nations will call blessed</i>,” Women’s Sodality, Men’s
Knights of Columbus. St. Vincent de Paul Society, abbeys and convents, monks
and nuns, pilgrimages, and enough optional personal practices of piety to suit
any taste. </div>
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Since Vatican II, we even celebrate Mass in the language of the
people as recommended 500 years ago by Father Martin Luther. And, we offer
bingo to seniors for fellowship and entertainment, though I’m not sure where
that came from. Finally, we have the 700+ page <i>Catechism of the Catholic Church</i>
which explains the faith in four sections (Creeds, Sacraments, Christian
Living, and Christian Prayer), topics that should sound quite reasonable to any
Christian and to any agnostic or atheist interested in Christianity. At least
the last two should sound reasonable, and those are good starting
points. <o:p></o:p></div>
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Common Ground</h2>
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Oh, and back to that first, perhaps confusing sentence
containing the terms “Christian Catholics” and “Catholic Christians.” I intend
the first to imply those cradle Catholics who are experiencing continuing conversion,
spiritual growth, and perseverance and the second to imply Christians for whom
reception into the Catholic Church has been one major event in their continuing
conversion, spiritual growth, and perseverance. We all have something in
common, wherever we are right now, the importance of sharing that continuing
conversion, spiritual growth, and perseverance. <o:p></o:p></div>
<br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6002659398137070021.post-90912690404791236152019-03-08T11:33:00.002-05:002019-03-08T15:43:44.641-05:00The Penitential Psalms & Lent<br />
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Morning Prayer seems most beneficial when it results in some
searching beyond the provided texts and “learning” of some new things about
Sacred Scripture, theology, or Church history. The quotes around that word in
the previous sentence suggest that I don’t usually remember much from such
searches and depend on some personally written summary I can refer to later.
There is joy in organizing and summarizing information in a way that will be
useful. So, here is one such simple summary.<br />
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<o:p></o:p></div>
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Today (3/8/2019), one of the Morning Prayer readings is
Psalm 51. I was inspired (or inclined) to look it up in the Catholic Study
Bible, 2nd Edition (NABRE) and found this commentary: “<i>A lament, the most
famous of the seven penitential Psalms</i>…” The first word of Psalm 51 in Latin
is <i>Miserere</i> (have mercy).<br />
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<o:p></o:p></div>
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For the record, here are the seven Penitential Psalms including
a key phrase from each:<o:p></o:p></div>
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<ul>
<li>Psalm 6: Have pity on me Lord, for I am weak (vs. 3)</li>
<li>
Psalm 32: Then I declared my sin to you; my guilt I did not hide (vs. 5)</li>
<li>
Psalm 38: I acknowledge my guilt and grieve over my sin (vs 19)</li>
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Psalm 51: Have mercy on me God, in accord with your merciful love (vs. 3)</li>
<li>
Psalm 102: Lord, hear my prayer; let my cry come to you (vs. 1)</li>
<li>
Psalm 130: But with you (Lord) is forgiveness and so you are revered (vs. 4)</li>
<li>
Psalm 143: Show me the path I should walk, for I entrust my life to you (vs.
8b)</li>
</ul>
<o:p></o:p><br />
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All seven have traditionally been identified as Psalms of King
David, famous for his adultery, murder, disobedience, and love of and by God.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>No wonder these Psalms are associated with
and used during Lent!<o:p></o:p></div>
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I was aware of the Penitential Psalms but not of the first documentation
of Christian recognition of them nor of recognizer <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cassiodorus">Cassiodorus</a>, sixth century
monastery founder and author of <a href="https://psallamdomino.blogspot.com/2011/10/commentaries-on-psalms-cassiodorus2.html">Exposition
of the Psalms</a>. An interesting quote is in this link about the exposition: “<i>Cassiodorus,
like many patristic commentators, saw the psalms as the necessary starting
point for Scriptural study: one should learn the psalms first, he suggests, and
only then move on to the New Testament, for they serve as preparation for it</i>.” Anybody
out there who has “learned the Psalms?”<o:p></o:p></div>
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And according to this <a href="https://www.themorgan.org/collection/hours-of-catherine-of-cleves/241">link</a>,
the seven were part of Jewish liturgy as early as the third century and have sometimes been associated with the Seven
Deadly Sins.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<a href="https://www.catholicity.com/prayer/seven-penitential-psalms.html">Here
are the seven in prayer form from A Catholic Prayer Book</a>.<o:p></o:p></div>
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And below is some penitential music, <i>Miserere Mei.</i><o:p></o:p></div>
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<iframe allow="accelerometer; autoplay; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="329" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/IX1zicNRLmY" width="540"></iframe>
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<br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6002659398137070021.post-74979427114437950932019-01-25T20:25:00.001-05:002019-01-25T20:28:52.627-05:00THE Bible StoryMany of us raised in a Christian church know lots of Bible stories. We know about the sins of Adam and Eve, Abraham's willingness to sacrifice Isaac, the leadership of Moses and Joshua, Samuel's anointing of Saul and David, David's killing of Goliath, the wisdom of King Solomon, the birth and ministry of Jesus, the resurrection story, Paul's Damascus Road story, problems in the early church, etc.<br />
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But we may be unable to see the forest for the trees and not have a clear view from the 50,000 foot level of how all those stories comprise THE BIBLE STORY, the theology of the Christian faith, the narrative that begins with the creation stories of Genesis, continues with the choice of a people and promise and arrival of The Messiah, Jesus Christ, and ends with experiences of the early Church, the continuing "Body of Christ." All that story can rightly be called The Gospel, the good news, focused on Jesus Christ, God in flesh, Savior of the world.<br />
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The reason for always keeping THE BIBLE STORY in mind when we read Sacred Scripture is that it keeps us from going off on tangents, from grabbing verses or stories out of that overall context and drawing misleading lessons from them. No matter how deeply we dig, we must always remember the big picture, the context, and make sure our conclusions and positions make sense in that overall context of theological truth.<br />
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The chart below is an attempt at visual presentation of THE BIBLE STORY, from the pre-creation chaos, through the revelation of God, to the one holy, catholic, and apostolic church, the continuing Body of Christ, into which we are invited today. Here is not just one verse out of context but thirty one, carefully chosen to illustrate the major parts of that important story.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh_UvxmqOBdQMao5vTEm1tLRuB5ES8zuecKGSrq9XA-l4UVQ1R4clBjD06VR3xRJXGJ9_LrNmco_NlJ0Mo1PDEqPAguRlYf66r52SNaSzQMQQVLQYXEX0mus-Wm7pdfHTQvpGuJtEQy79IC/s1600/Chaos+to+Church.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="720" data-original-width="960" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh_UvxmqOBdQMao5vTEm1tLRuB5ES8zuecKGSrq9XA-l4UVQ1R4clBjD06VR3xRJXGJ9_LrNmco_NlJ0Mo1PDEqPAguRlYf66r52SNaSzQMQQVLQYXEX0mus-Wm7pdfHTQvpGuJtEQy79IC/s400/Chaos+to+Church.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
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Since the chart is not readable in this post, it is broken into three sections below for improved legibility. There are a title block, a left side, BC so to speak, and a right side, AD so to speak. To download and print the entire document in readable size and resolution, <a href="https://drive.google.com/open?id=1QsNr9giPr3Z7yBHtaFMlVuU1mED5f_ua" target="_blank">use this link</a>.<br />
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Title Block</h2>
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I'll begin with two fundamental teachings of the Catholic Church about the Bible, and about the relationship between the Old and New Testaments.</div>
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Left Side (BC)</h2>
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The left side of the chart covers creation to the prophetic promises of the Messiah, the Anointed One, the King, Jesus Christ.</div>
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The theological truths taught in the ancient creation stories are that God created all, His creation was good, and that humankind messed it up. Then God chose a people out of the resulting chaos and revealed himself to them as not one of many gods (polytheism), not even the most important god of many (henotheism), but the one and only God (monotheism). And then prophets Isaiah and Jeremiah began to announce the promise of a Messiah and a new way of living, of being washed clean, of the end of war. These sixteen verses are chosen to illustrate that revelation of God resulting in realization by the people.</div>
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Right Side (AD)</h2>
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The right side of the chart covers the incarnation, God in flesh, the ideal King, fully God and fully human, coming and dwelling among us. He heals and teaches and gathers followers, disciples, some of whom become apostles. He teaches prayer, the greatest commandments, the Great Commission, and promises the Holy Spirit. He establishes and teaches the Sacraments. Then he returns to the Father and leaves his Apostles in charge. Under the promised guidance of the Holy Spirit, they build, lead, and guide the early Church, dealing with issues as they arise, under the promised Holy Spirit.</div>
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And that is THE BIBLE STORY, admittedly over-simplified, illustrated by just thirty one verses. Anytime we take deeper dives into Sacred Scripture, it is helpful to remember where we are in this miraculous story and make sure we consider that context in our search for understanding.</div>
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<br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6002659398137070021.post-84569095426434029622018-11-21T11:48:00.000-05:002018-11-21T11:48:31.397-05:00Gospel According to St. John: Unique<br />
I'm not very skilled at digging deeply into Sacred Scripture, finding new meaning and writing paragraphs about a verse or two. But I love looking at the Bible from a 50,000 foot view, so to speak, and detecting patterns, themes, characteristics, and differences. So, here are thoughts and observations about the <i>Gospel According to St. John</i> which St. Augustine apparently Tweeted was "<i>shallow enough for a baby to wade and deep enough for an elephant to swim</i>."<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh8KPlGox_MZWJz1zz-WjbJWltuleI3a-VtDLkcfVswZgUajqSSrUOaWnNXA_kmJp0I6b3pSqwQ00u5i6beFISlUeJaYuv920q4-IsB12wJrHyj_Cp9_dQW4TfiZIlzGkHW80KyGogAojAZ/s1600/John+1.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="371" data-original-width="310" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh8KPlGox_MZWJz1zz-WjbJWltuleI3a-VtDLkcfVswZgUajqSSrUOaWnNXA_kmJp0I6b3pSqwQ00u5i6beFISlUeJaYuv920q4-IsB12wJrHyj_Cp9_dQW4TfiZIlzGkHW80KyGogAojAZ/s1600/John+1.JPG" /></a></div>
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The chart below is an illustration of a simple difference among the Gospels, what they say about the ancestry of Jesus.</div>
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Mark is the earliest and shortest and has a wonderful beginning: "The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ." So, if we had any doubt about what the Gospel of Jesus is, Mark makes it clear. Mark doesn't, however, say anything about the birth or ancestry of Jesus. He just gets right to what happened.<br />
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Matthew, generally viewed as a Gospel targeted at a Jewish community, has a beautiful birth story with wise men and <a href="https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Matthew+2&version=NABRE" target="_blank">flight to Egypt</a> and traces Jesus's <a href="https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=matthew+1%3A1-17&version=NABRE" target="_blank">ancestry back to the patriarch Abraham</a>, who begat Isaac, who begat Jacob, who begat the heads of the 12 tribes of Israel.<br />
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And Luke, generally viewed as targeted to a community of Gentiles, relates the <a href="https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Luke+1%3A26-38&version=NABRE" target="_blank">Annunciation</a>, the <a href="https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Luke+1%3A39-55&version=NABRE" target="_blank">Visitation</a>, the <a href="https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=luke+2&version=NABRE" target="_blank">Nativity</a>, the <a href="https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Luke+1%3A68-79&version=NABRE" target="_blank">Benedictus</a>, and traces the <a href="https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Luke+3%3A23-38&version=NABRE" target="_blank">ancestry all the way back to Adam</a>, father of all.<br />
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The writer of John had more time to think about the theology of Jesus and a Trinitarian God and copied the first words of Genesis, placing Jesus "<a href="https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=john+1%3A1-2&version=NABRE" target="_blank">I<i>n the beginning</i></a>," with God, and the same as God, at the creation.<br />
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Word counting is a great way to identify major themes in books of the Bible, and it is truly wonderful if one has software such as <i>Bible Works</i> which will do all the counting. Here are some important words in John, in each case having as many or more appearances in that Gospel than in the other three combined. A good way to explore use of these words is to use an <a href="https://www.biblegateway.com/quicksearch/?quicksearch=eternal+life&qs_version=NABRE" target="_blank">online searchable Bible</a> to find the uses of the words and meditate on them.<br />
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The "I I am" (which looks like 11 AM) deserves special consideration because the double emphasis, use of the pronoun "ego" which translates "I" even with the inflected verb (eimi) which translates alone as "I am" is understood by scholars and theologians as a reference to God identifying himself, at the burning bush, to Moses as "I AM." (<a href="https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Exodus+3%3A13-14&version=NABRE" target="_blank">Exodus 3:13-14</a>) Every religious Jew hearing that phrase from Jesus as in, "I AM the way, the truth and the life," heard it as a claim to divinity. Believers bowed in awe and unbelievers charged blasphemy.<br />
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It is worthy of note also that the word usually translated as testify or bear witness is the Greek word from which we get the English martyr. For the early Christians, bearing witness <a href="https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=acts+7&version=NABRE" target="_blank">as Stephen did</a> often resulted in martyrdom.<br />
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A review of the use of "believe" can increase understanding of the fact that belief in john goes far beyond mental or intellectual belief to "believing in" or conversion or a change in direction of ones life. Here is an <a href="https://www.biblegateway.com/quicksearch/?qs_version=NABRE&quicksearch=believe&begin=50&end=50" target="_blank">easy link to the list of 83 occurrences of "believe" in John</a>.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgG4G0tqxy53i63cB_b-ga79eoif3PVUhKYvSDMb_eIT8LTpt7Z3yUGQf6xoKkyiYzpUvVMaC9mlq3ANAgANIzhm-KwM0qoAIKc-dyxXaBd8KhyphenhyphenWf5gmtrRXsRUIva_bcSFjZmqqaiXKkpc/s1600/John+4.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="317" data-original-width="402" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgG4G0tqxy53i63cB_b-ga79eoif3PVUhKYvSDMb_eIT8LTpt7Z3yUGQf6xoKkyiYzpUvVMaC9mlq3ANAgANIzhm-KwM0qoAIKc-dyxXaBd8KhyphenhyphenWf5gmtrRXsRUIva_bcSFjZmqqaiXKkpc/s1600/John+4.png" /></a></div>
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John was written around sixty years or so after the resurrection, probably to a well-grounded Christian community that knew well the stories of the birth, baptism, and transfiguration, and the parables and celebrated the Eucharist routinely. Therefore those stories were not told again, though we do have John's remembrance of the baptism, the Last Supper with Foot Washing, and John 6 explaining the significance of the Eucharist.</div>
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We have already mentioned in the first diagram that only John begins the Gospel of Jesus at the creation. It is worthy of note that John includes no parables or exorcisms but is organized around Seven Signs usually followed by long discourses by Jesus about key principles of the faith. One thing we can be especially thankful for is that all four Gospels begin the resurrection story early in the morning or at dawn on the first day of the week, Sunday.</div>
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Below is an index of sorts of the content of John, chapter by chapter. The seven signs are in chapters 2, 4, 5, 6, 9, and 11. The three extended dialogues, Jesus with Nicodemus, Jesus with the Samaritan Woman at the well, and Jesus with the woman caught in adultery, in chapters 3, 4, and 5, are very interesting and simple while being theologically deep. Major events are in the third column. For a good story that could be expanded into a movie, read the Chapter 9 full "Crime Scene Investigation" aimed at identifying the culprit in the Sabbath healing of the man born blind. Jesus only appears at the beginning and at the end of the story. And, finally, the discourses which are all familiar to us from Gospel readings at Mass.</div>
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Jesus and his followers spent a lot of time walking an area of around 900 square miles. In the Gospel of John, that includes three trips between Galilee and Jerusalem. No wonder Jesus instructed them, in Luke's Gospel, to not carry anything with them. And no wonder that the writer of John declared that Jesus did many other signs not recorded in the Gospel. <br />
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The three trips "<i>up to Jerusalem</i>" are quite different from the single long journey in the other Gospels and are the basis for Church teaching that His ministry was three years. Note the two Bethany's, one across the Jordan where John baptized Jesus, and one a suburb of Jerusalem.<br />
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Here are 24 key verses from the Gospel according to St. John including presence of Jesus at the creation, the incarnation, teachings about Mary, use of "believe," and importance of the "I AM."</div>
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<b><u><span style="font-family: "calibri light" , sans-serif; font-size: 8.0pt; line-height: 107%;">John – A Few Key Verses</span></u></b><b><span style="font-family: "calibri light" , sans-serif; font-size: 8.0pt; line-height: 107%;"><br />
1:1 </span></b><span style="font-family: "calibri light" , sans-serif; font-size: 8.0pt; line-height: 107%;"> In the
beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.<br />
<b>1:14 </b> And the Word became flesh
and made his dwelling among us, and we saw his glory, the glory as of the
Father's only Son, full of grace and truth.<br />
<b>1:29 </b> The next day he saw Jesus
coming toward him and said, "Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the
sin of the world.<br />
<b>2:5 </b> His mother said to the
servers, "Do whatever he tells you."<br />
<b>2:11 </b> Jesus did this as the
beginning of his signs in <span style="background: yellow;">Cana</span> in
Galilee and so revealed his glory, and his disciples began to believe in him.<br />
<b>2:19 </b> Jesus answered and said to
them, "Destroy this temple and in three days I will raise it up."<br />
<b>4:13-14 </b> Jesus answered and said
to her, "Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again; <sup>14</sup> but whoever drinks the water I
shall give will never thirst; the water I shall give will become in him a
spring of water welling up to eternal life."<br />
<b>5:24 </b> Amen, amen, I say to you,
whoever hears my word and believes in the one who sent me has eternal life and
will not come to condemnation, but has passed from death to life.<br />
<b>6:35 </b> Jesus said to them, "I
am the bread of life; whoever comes to me will never hunger, and whoever
believes in me will never thirst.<br />
<b>6:56 </b> Whoever eats my flesh and
drinks my blood remains in me and I in him.<br />
<b>8:12 </b> Jesus spoke to them again,
saying, "I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will not walk in
darkness, but will have the light of life."<br />
<b>10:14 </b> I am the good shepherd, and
I know mine and mine know me,<br />
<b>12:44-45 </b> Jesus cried out and
said, "Whoever believes in me believes not only in me but also in the one
who sent me, <sup>45</sup> and whoever
sees me sees the one who sent me.<br />
<b>14:6 </b> Jesus said to him, "I
am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through
me.<br />
<b>15:1 </b> "I am the true vine,
and my Father is the vine grower.<br />
<b>17:20-22 </b> "I pray not only
for them, but also for those who will believe in me through their word, <sup>21</sup> so that they may all be one, as
you, Father, are in me and I in you, that they also may be in us, that the
world may believe that you sent me. <sup>22</sup>
And I have given them the glory you gave me, so that they may be one, as we are
one,<br />
<b>19:26-27 </b> When Jesus saw his
mother and the disciple there whom he loved, he said to his mother, "Woman,
behold, your son." <sup>27</sup>
Then he said to the disciple, "Behold, your mother." And from that
hour the disciple took her into his home.<br />
<b>20:30-31 </b> Now Jesus did many other
signs in the presence of (his) disciples that are not written in this
book. <sup>31</sup> But these are
written that you may (come to) believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of
God, and that through this belief you may have life in his name.</span><span style="font-family: "calibri light" , sans-serif; font-size: 8.0pt; line-height: 107%;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
Read the Gospel According to St. John at one sitting. It won't take that long, unless you start reading all the footnotes and references.<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6002659398137070021.post-67831864635405484122018-03-27T07:49:00.000-04:002018-03-27T08:21:06.229-04:00Reading the Bible, Cover to Cover<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<div class="MsoNormal">
In a recent morning prayer group discussion, the difficulty
of cover-to-cover reading of the Bible was mentioned. The problem is that after
the stimulating stories of Genesis and Exodus, it is easy to get bogged down in
the legal details of Leviticus and lose interest. Even if an ambitious reader
survives Leviticus, Deuteronomy looms ahead.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br />
It reminded me of an exhibit I created a decade or so ago outlining where in
the Old Testament to find stories of various events and including a suggested
order of reading if one just wants to get the narrative without the digressions
into legal issues or side stories. Please excuse my exclusion of the
Deuterocanonical Books since this chart was created during my Lutheran years.<br /><br />The chart features a little segment across the bottom just
above the timeline suggesting an order of reading of books for one who just
wants to get the story from creation through the patriarchs and favorite son
Joseph, enslavement in Egypt, deliverance from slavery by Moses, wilderness
wandering, entrance into Canaan led by Joshua, the period of judges including
Deborah, Samson, and Samuel, the first three kings, Saul, David, and Solomon,
division of the kingdom, civil war, defeat, exile, return, and rebuilding by
Ezra and Nehemiah. The books that are not key to that narrative are above this
segment on the chart. It’s a great story. Here is a clip of that suggested
order of books. </div>
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<o:p></o:p></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgTpNoxnSFWxR5Qi5r1kYINDi13aK4ENP-F_6APs4ugrAB5HTj8i_wPBFINLghxo18z3McHejapK1cLIYUGGPsPu-QS8aqi38nmQZXO7Ggd1NRHcaG8HdZvF4qH-TU7KT5ZdKR4AMc2beeF/s1600/Screen+Shot+2018-03-27+at+7.36.57+AM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="72" data-original-width="965" height="44" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgTpNoxnSFWxR5Qi5r1kYINDi13aK4ENP-F_6APs4ugrAB5HTj8i_wPBFINLghxo18z3McHejapK1cLIYUGGPsPu-QS8aqi38nmQZXO7Ggd1NRHcaG8HdZvF4qH-TU7KT5ZdKR4AMc2beeF/s640/Screen+Shot+2018-03-27+at+7.36.57+AM.png" width="640" /></a></div>
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For Christians, it is important to remember to look for Jesus
even in the Old Testament. To quote the Catechism of the Catholic Church, “<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">All Sacred Scripture is but one book, and
that one book is Christ, because all divine Scripture speaks of Christ, and all
divine Scripture is fulfilled in Christ</i>.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>And there is the famous quote attributed to St. Augustine: “<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The New Testament is in the Old Testament
concealed; the Old Testament is in the New Testament revealed</i>.” (My
apologies to our Jewish friends who have an entirely different view of the
Hebrew Scriptures which we have co-opted and renamed.)</div>
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<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
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Anyway, here is the chart. If it helps, use it. If not, ignore it. And, yes, I am sure it can stand some improvements and fine tuning. I think Leviticus is probably misplaced.</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiiINY8oVsDu0UmCHJDAz5UiSl5_053PXN0XiQNqe3-zBw0PqwGHqhjZCNSRpl_lNOqIiirb6_gn_1yf88bM1aZEnMfnrquc4AN2Cz2o5UBCsGUQnvnGlC8rxPuboCF5WMCt8oltM162WsK/s1600/WhereinBible1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1230" data-original-width="1600" height="491" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiiINY8oVsDu0UmCHJDAz5UiSl5_053PXN0XiQNqe3-zBw0PqwGHqhjZCNSRpl_lNOqIiirb6_gn_1yf88bM1aZEnMfnrquc4AN2Cz2o5UBCsGUQnvnGlC8rxPuboCF5WMCt8oltM162WsK/s640/WhereinBible1.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
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<!--EndFragment--><br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6002659398137070021.post-70457592566131765952017-10-29T11:35:00.000-04:002017-10-29T11:35:13.434-04:00Reformation Lamentation<div class="MsoNormal">
I just finished reading <i>A Column of Fire</i>, the third of
Ken Follett’s volumes of historical fiction set in the Middle Ages. This one
portrays life in the 1500’s in the wake of Catholic Priest Father Martin
Luther’s October 31, 1517, courageous attempt to inspire reform of his church.<o:p></o:p></div>
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Follett’s novel and all the current celebration of the
500th anniversary of Father Martin’s action inspired me to review the
Reformation years as described in my Lutheran Seminary textbook, <i>The Story
of Christianity</i> by Justo L. Gonzalez. Follett’s thousand or so pages are
an elaboration of probably a dozen or so in the textbook, mostly focused on the
people driving and caught up in the competition between Catholic “Bloody Mary”
Tudor, Protestant Elizabeth I, and Catholic Mary “Queen of Scots” Stuart,
potential successor put to death on orders of Elizabeth.<o:p></o:p></div>
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Elizabeth and Mary Tudor were half-sisters and
Elizabeth and Mary Stuart were cousins so I suppose one could say it was just a murderous family squabble. A summary statement from Gonzalez: “<i>The total number of those
executed for religious reasons during Elizabeth’s reign was approximately the
same as those who died under her half sister Mary Tudor though it should be
remembered that Elizabeth’s reign was almost ten times as long as Mary’s</i>.” The
heroes of Follett’s story are those suffering the persecution and fighting
for religious freedom.<o:p></o:p></div>
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The Gonzalez text relates the burning at the stake, in
Calvin’s Geneva, with Calvin’s consent, of Michael Servetus, a Spanish
physician condemned by both Protestants and Catholics for heresy. Servetus is
credited with having argued “<i>that the union of church and state after
Constantine’s conversion was in truth a great apostasy.</i>” I think Servetus was exactly
right and that it was that union, entangling the Church, the Body of Christ, in
political intrigue and granting it political and temporal power, even the power
to identify, label, and condemn to death heretics, which nurtured corruption and
finally triggered the destructive reformation of the sixteenth century. Well,
at least Calvin is reported to have argued for beheading rather than burning
Servetus because it involved less suffering.<o:p></o:p></div>
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So, I find little to celebrate about the Reformation but
much to lament.<o:p></o:p></div>
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I lament that union of Church and State which actually was
finalized under the Emperor Theodosius I who decreed that all citizens of the
Roman Empire were to be Christian. That, of course, led to lots of mass baptisms
without the benefit of catechesis, either before or after the event, never a
good idea.<o:p></o:p></div>
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I lament the Church corruption that was nurtured and grew in
that atmosphere of temporal power and motivated Martin Luther’s posting of a
formal list of grievances. <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Dalberg-Acton,_1st_Baron_Acton" target="_blank">Lord Acton</a> spoke the truth: “<i>Power tends to
corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Great men are almost always bad
men</i>…”<o:p></o:p></div>
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I lament Henry VIII’s “<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dissolution_of_the_Monasteries" target="_blank">Dissolution of the Monasteries</a>” of
England, Wales, and Ireland. It was worse than it sounds.<o:p></o:p></div>
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I lament the torture and killing, by Protestants and Catholics, of thousands of
Protestants and Catholics, for heresy. At least during the
early years of persecution of the Church, Christians were being killed and
burned by pagan rulers and not by "professing" Christians. <o:p></o:p></div>
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I lament the killing of those poor folks who were not "Protestants" because they followed neither Luther, nor Calvin, nor
Zwingli, nor Knox, but who decided that baptism was valid only if by total
immersion of professing believers, received such a baptism, and then suffered death by "<i><a href="http://www.patheos.com/blogs/karenspearszacharias/2012/04/20/the-third-baptism/" target="_blank">the third baptism</a>,</i>" drowned at the
hands of "Protestant Christians."<o:p></o:p></div>
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I lament the Thirty Years War, fought over enforced
geographic religious divisions based only on political and personal considerations, “Christians”
fighting “Christians,” which resulted in the death of approximately 20% of the
population of Germany.<o:p></o:p><br />
<br />
I lament that even a hundred years after the Thirty Years War, thousands of Protestants were expelled from Austria and became refugees, some settling in Georgia and South Carolina and founding a bank. Google it if you want the details.<br />
<br />
But that is all ancient history. Most of all I lament the current fragmentation of The Church, The Body of Christ, that is the residue of that violent reformation. I lament the existence of hundreds, some say thousands of "denominations" differing and sometimes arguing, criticizing, or condemning each other over theological fine points.<br />
<br />
I lament the consumer market that has developed for faith seekers. Now I can seek, or even organize, a church that suits me rather than seeking to be part of a global Body of Christ with a common universal statement of belief and common resources and worship practices. It becomes all about me when I do that.</div>
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I lament that even within "denominations," we are fragmented into thousands of little churches sprinkled around
the country, sometimes within blocks of each other, many struggling to pay their bills and their pastors, if they have pastors, many with
little Christian Education or outreach, sometimes clinging to the past and serving as hospices for
their declining memberships.<br />
<br />
There is power in unity and in numbers and in working together
in ministry in highly visible churches sitting on high ground and attracting curious multitudes just as Jesus attracted the multitudes. The early Middle Ages "powers that were" had the right idea, huge cathedrals as the centerpieces of the towns, though Father Martin certainly had valid complaints about the fund raising methods used at the time to finance some of those cathedrals.<o:p></o:p></div>
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I do, however, celebrate the
religious freedom that gradually evolved over the past five hundred years and
that most of the world enjoys today. Now most Christians can just focus
on Jesus and not worry about political power and persecution even as we lament that part of the world is still trapped
in a Middle Ages mindset, willing to imprison and kill people over theological issues. Unfortunately, the world still needs heroes fighting for religious
freedom. <o:p></o:p><br />
<br />
I just look forward to the day that freedom brings us together rather than further separating and dividing us.<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<i>Isaiah 2:2-4 In days to come, The mountain of the LORD'S house shall be established as the highest mountain and raised above the hills. All nations shall stream toward it; many peoples shall come and say: "Come, let us climb the LORD'S mountain, to the house of the God of Jacob, That he may instruct us in his ways, and we may walk in his paths." For from Zion shall go forth instruction, and the word of the LORD from Jerusalem. He shall judge between the nations, and impose terms on many peoples. They shall beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks; One nation shall not raise the sword against another, nor shall they train for war again. </i></blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<i>John 17:20-23 "I pray not only for them, but also for those who will believe in me through their word, so that they may all be one, as you, Father, are in me and I in you, that they also may be in us, that the world may believe that you sent me. And I have given them the glory you gave me, so that they may be one, as we are one, I in them and you in me, that they may be brought to perfection as one, that the world may know that you sent me, and that you loved them even as you loved me. </i></blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<i>Ephesians 2:19-22 So then you are no longer strangers and sojourners, but you are fellow citizens with the holy ones and members of the household of God, built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus himself as the capstone. Through him the whole structure is held together and grows into a temple sacred in the Lord; in him you also are being built together into a dwelling place of God in the Spirit. </i></blockquote>
</div>
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<o:p></o:p></div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6002659398137070021.post-84567518688504864592017-09-27T09:21:00.000-04:002017-09-27T09:21:44.893-04:00Like Mother, Like Son: Growing Up and Growing Old Together<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgBOXBzZdWNDhUQuj5vZDucni5mQAuBLV6tLru1FkIv_PJu5aEUQ78sGxlAcNwUL_5W2MJzy-MpSC7iKCNoGxsJt8yn87wBO90Tw9of-ImJKoo7BVVtLClDSKA3wV9u31IIz2OIoEX5X7ON/s1600/reunion.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="406" data-original-width="460" height="282" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgBOXBzZdWNDhUQuj5vZDucni5mQAuBLV6tLru1FkIv_PJu5aEUQ78sGxlAcNwUL_5W2MJzy-MpSC7iKCNoGxsJt8yn87wBO90Tw9of-ImJKoo7BVVtLClDSKA3wV9u31IIz2OIoEX5X7ON/s320/reunion.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>
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My Mother, Wilma Irene Shelley (Brownie) Williams was born January 9, 1921 and died September 20, 2017. This is a remembrance and tribute I read at her funeral.</div>
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When I think of growing up with my mother, both of us young
but I younger, I am very thankful for the sometimes unjustified trust she
placed in me, the somewhat dangerous freedom she allowed, and the
self-confidence she always exhibited and encouraged. She was a strong,
empowering mother, a woman who knew what she wanted. She couldn’t have paid a
better compliment to my fiancé, Karen, in the summer of 1964 when, after going
through the planning and activities leading up to our September wedding, she
said to me, “<i>Karen is a young woman who
knows what she wants</i>.”</div>
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One thing I learned from Mother, and Daddy, in my childhood
and adolescent years was that a life like theirs, centered on work and home and
family and church, is a good life. Thanks to her and the example she and Daddy
set, my goal, what I wanted, from adolescence, was to live such a life. I was
blessed with the appearance of Karen, who seemed to have a similar goal, and we
got an early start, getting our family well under way while Mother was still
working on raising hers.</div>
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Through all the middle years Mother and I had a good but
also somewhat distant relationship. I was always interested in what she and
Daddy were up to, and they were always interested in what we were doing. I
don’t recall getting any advice or guidance from her and Daddy in those years,
nor do I recall feeling any need to offer them any. We didn’t phone or write
often or spend a lot of time together, just visiting three or four times a year
and always enjoying each other’s company, but not a lot of deep or serious discussion.</div>
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I’ve often wondered what life would have been like if I had
spent it all in Maryville in pretty much constant contact with Mother and
Daddy, maybe even running a little furniture business. I believe that, as
independent as Mother and I both were, we were better off with some distance. I
might have driven her into an early grave had we been closely monitoring and
commenting on, and perhaps hearing gossip, or just opinions, about each other’s
activities all those years.</div>
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Then, over the last ten or fifteen years, there was a change,
both of us old, but she older. I am again very thankful for the trust she
placed in me and freedom she gave me to take care of her financial and property
and legal issues. I never was able to mow the lawn to her complete
satisfaction, and she was a very tough sell on moving to an assisted living
environment, but she always trusted me to handle the money and pay the bills
and would sign whatever I put in front of her. That made my job easy, and I am
thankful for that.</div>
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Mother didn’t want to live this long. (Yes, I might have
helped her die younger, as I mentioned, by staying in Maryville.) Her dream was
to die peacefully in her sleep just before losing control and becoming
dependent on others. When Daddy died in 2003, she told some of us that she
would be following right behind him. When, ten years later, she moved to
assisted living at Sterling House, I said something about the upcoming Christmas,
and she informed me she wouldn’t be around at that time. I always told her I
had her on a ten year plan and that she needed to find something to do.</div>
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I remember in her middle years one of Mother’s favorite
things was to visit elderly folks and take them some beautiful item she had
made at her speedy sewing machine or something delicious grown in her very productive garden or made in
her efficient kitchen from her extensive recipe collection. I think she must
have decided during those years that she did not want to be one of those people,
sitting or lying and waiting for visits and gifts. I believe that feeling was
strongly reinforced when she saw Daddy move to a “memory care” facility and saw
her younger sister die in nursing and hospice care. So, in her last years,
Mother had to learn patience, a very tough lesson for an impatient woman.</div>
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If you didn’t know her, you might think Mother was lacking
in faith and optimism, but that would be wrong. She was very optimistic about going to
Heaven soon, and, note taker and list maker that she was, I suspect she had
written and memorized a list of things to go over with Clyde Williams as soon
as she got there and was looking forward to doing so.</div>
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Through all her declining years, my prayer for her was
always for peace and comfort, if not joy, and hopefully a little joy mixed in
along the way. I believe those prayers were answered partially as she lived and
now they are answered in full.</div>
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Thanks be to God.</div>
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Her obituary can be found <a href="http://www.mccammonammonsclick.com/obituary/Wilma-Brownie-Williams/Maryville-TN/1754262" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">here</a>.</div>
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<o:p></o:p></div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6002659398137070021.post-257823502856683122017-06-20T20:45:00.001-04:002017-06-20T20:45:59.927-04:00Just a MouthpieceHearing Sacred Scripture is a key element of Catholic
worship. Usually, from the Old Testament, we hear a reading from the Law,
Prophets, or Writings and sing a Psalm responsively. Then we hear a reading
from one of the New Testament books other than the Gospels. Finally a selection
from one of the Gospels is read by an ordained priest or deacon and heard with
special reverence, followed by a homily. Often some important theme connecting
the readings is reflected in the homily as well.<br />
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Though a lector at St. Peter’s Catholic Church for a few
years now and, before that, at Ebenezer Lutheran Church, it was Dr. Monte
Luker, professor of Hebrew and Old Testament at Lutheran Theological Southern
Seminary, who first instructed me in lector best practices. I’m not going to
try to blame any of my bad habits or errors on my friend and former teacher,
but will try to explain what I took away from the directions he offered and why
I read as I do.</div>
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The objective of a lector in worship is to draw the
attention of the worshipers to the words without any injection of personality
or slant or opinion and without calling any attention to himself or herself.
This principle links back to the first sentence of the blog which states the
importance of “hearing” over that of reading. I believe this is the reason
that, at Ebenezer Lutheran, lectors wore simple robes at the ambo. Even
clothing and style should not distract from the hearing of The Word.</div>
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My way of fulfilling that objective is to read with
sincerity, reverence, and awe, slowly and carefully pronouncing and emphasizing
each word, completely without drama, while avoiding a monotone. I admit that
may be a fine line. But, if I am reading the words of St. Paul, I want the
hearers to hear and consider all the words but not any interpretation I may
have of them. I am not playing the role of St. Paul, trying to imagine how he
might have spoken, but am simply conveying what he wrote, omitting or
diminishing nothing. To quote my former Pastor Frank Honeycutt, “<i>There are no
throwaway words in the Bible</i>.”</div>
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So, I keep my eyes on the written page and do not try to
make eye contact with listeners. Intermittent eye contact seems to me would
imply that the words being spoken at the time of eye contact are especially
important and are from me to the hearer. Even if I were to memorize the
scripture to be read, I would still consider it important to keep my eyes glued
to the printed page to assure accuracy and to avoid the impression that it is I
doing the speaking or that I am emphasizing one point more than another. As a
lector, I am only a mouthpiece. </div>
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Let me hasten to say that these guidelines I try to follow
do not apply in any way to the pastor or priest or teacher charged with
exegetical responsibility. The best delivery for such persons is without script
and with continuous eye contact and appropriate drama and emphasis to make the
points deemed most important for the persons present, at the current time,
after careful, prayerful, and inspired study of the written expression of the
Word of God. That is a much heavier burden than just reading it.</div>
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And, I must confess that my practices are contrary to the
instructions in the <i>Workbook for Lectors, Gospel Readers, and Proclaimers of
the Word</i>, United States Edition, produced by Liturgy Training Publications.
But, I do the best I can and am always willing to step aside for someone who
wants to serve.<br />
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Yes, it is I at the ambo, reading, eyes down as promised. I do look up for the announcement, "<i>A reading from the____ chapter of ______,</i>" and for the closing, "<i>The Word of the Lord.</i>"</div>
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6002659398137070021.post-20740793291113275992017-05-27T07:38:00.003-04:002017-05-27T07:42:28.352-04:00The Church of My Youth: Six Points<span style="font-family: "calibri"; font-size: 12pt;">I was thinking this morning about the church of my youth and
the Southern Baptist Sunday School which was the center of it. There was the
Six Point Record System, the extensive organization, class officers, weekly
Teachers' Meetings, Assemblies, rigorous age grading, separation of men and
women, Reports, the Sunday School Report at the following Church Service, etc.
Fortunately all that is documented in an <a href="https://archive.org/stream/sundayschooloffi00flak/sundayschooloffi00flak_djvu.txt">online full text of a 1936 book on thesubject</a>. Anybody who grew up Southern Baptist in that era will enjoy looking
through this. Or maybe nothing has changed!</span><br />
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And then there was BTU with its Eight Point Record System. <o:p></o:p></div>
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All good disciplinary training if perhaps a bit legalistic and short on
spirituality and divine mystery.</div>
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Images below are screen shots from the book at the link
above referring to the Six Point Record System. <o:p></o:p></div>
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-->Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6002659398137070021.post-25589700803926623762017-04-01T20:54:00.000-04:002017-04-01T20:54:17.763-04:00Christian Faith, A Three Legged StoolA Peter Beinart article in the April 2017 issue of <i>The Atlantic </i>points out a correlation between the increasingly vicious and hateful political climate in the USA and decreasing participation in organized religion. The differences in positions between left and right have always been present, but we seem to be losing respect for each other and, in Beinart's words, "<i>have come to define "us" and "them" in even more primal and irreconcilable ways</i>."<br />
<br />
Beinart provides statistics showing that the percentage of US citizens rejecting any religious affiliation increased almost 300% from 1992 to 2014. And even the "<i>percentage of white Republicans with no religious affiliation has nearly tripled since 1990</i>." Beinart quotes Geoffrey Layman of Notre Dame: "<i>Trump does best among evangelicals with one key trait: They don't really go to church</i>." And, Beinart states, "... l<i>iberal non-attenders fueled Bernie Sanders's insurgency against Hillary Clinton</i>.<br />
<br />
You can read the article to see why Mr. Beinart believes these religious and political trends are related, but I have a slightly different take on it. It seems to me that if we give up on the idea that we are all the result of the creative activity of a benevolent God who is "<i>gracious, merciful, and abounding in steadfast love</i>," we lose respect for each other and one of the most important bases of our civilization crumbles. And we fight.<br />
<br />
What are we to do? Well, one possibility for Christians is to do a much better job of learning and teaching the essentials of the Christian faith. What a mish-mash of Christian theologies we have allowed to develop in the American culture of freedom!<br />
<br />
Now, before launching into theological issues, let me make it clear that I am not ordained, am not a preacher, and am not speaking with any authority. What I am describing below is more personal testimony, a description of what I have come to believe, at this point, over a lifetime in Christian churches of various labels and a smattering of Lutheran seminary education about theology and Church history. So here goes:<br />
<br />
It seems to me that the Christian faith stands on a three legged stool.<br />
<ul>
<li>The first leg is Sacred Scripture, the written expression of "The Word," the Bible Jesus knew and read from and quoted and referred to and to which the writers of the New Testament referred, and the New Testament, written and assembled, by the Church, after, sometimes long after, the ministry of Jesus. The first complete listing of the NT Canon, after all, is from the fourth century AD.</li>
<li>The second leg is Jesus, The Christ, eternal Anointed One, God in flesh, Immanuel, who came and lived among us and showed us The Way and died, at our hands, for us. </li>
<li>The third leg is The Church, The Body of Christ, established by Jesus, and led by the Holy Spirit, whom Jesus promised, to follow his example and to develop and teach the basic theologies of the faith, the Holy Trinity, and the divinity of Jesus.</li>
</ul>
The diagram below is an attempt to show how these three legs, Sacred Scripture, Jesus, and The Church, fit together and to present a pretty complete picture of the theology of Christian faith as I currently understand and experience it.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiJYHKceFnTjm_-_bfFEYws-a8Ms-krBjR-3dCNsz8vOFjXr7H8zwuxaOxowzgzKVZ_kPuGbc20EFlifJHod-BRgk4ydoowJbT91cfBxcyuJJMfhJ1QdKe6BUA1bmUnEZRNhtYk-mFB_Let/s1600/Screen+Shot+2017-03-31+at+8.50.40+AM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="475" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiJYHKceFnTjm_-_bfFEYws-a8Ms-krBjR-3dCNsz8vOFjXr7H8zwuxaOxowzgzKVZ_kPuGbc20EFlifJHod-BRgk4ydoowJbT91cfBxcyuJJMfhJ1QdKe6BUA1bmUnEZRNhtYk-mFB_Let/s640/Screen+Shot+2017-03-31+at+8.50.40+AM.png" width="640" /></a></div>
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Don't like diagrams? I'l try to explain. I believe that Sacred Scripture is the story of our developing understanding of God, that Jesus was God in flesh, with us for a specific period of time, and that the Church is his legacy, his body, through which we jointly can be in union with The Triune God, and abide in Him. That is pretty much unbelievable, isn't it. It almost sounds ridiculous. Well, I just label it Divine Mystery, subject to our best efforts to explain the unexplainable.</div>
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Church is where Christians belong. Church is not a civic club, a social club, a networking organization, or a social service agency. Nor is it a hospice, just taking care of old folks as they die off. It is the Body of Christ, intended to go about doing good just as Jesus, the original Body of Christ did.</div>
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Just as Jesus and his followers took up space and attracted attention in the first century, the Church is supposed to take up space and attract attention in the world today. We are to be a community, salt and light and leaven, always going out from the church building and having a positive influence and inviting and drawing people in. That is not evident from what we see? Well, Jesus never promised that the Church would be perfect but only that the gates of Hell would not prevail against it.</div>
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If we did a better job with Christian education, maybe we could reduce the mish-mash and focus on these essentials and maybe the Body of Christ would grow and some of the viciousness and hate would moderate.</div>
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If these ideas seem strange, Google "<i>church as the body of Christ scripture</i>" for more food for thought. And read John 6 closely for a better understanding of worship, Holy Communion, and unity with Christ. These are not easy or simplistic teachings as evidenced by the response to talk of flesh and blood by some disciples as described in these verses from John 6: </div>
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<i>After this many of his disciples turned back and no longer walked with him. So Jesus said to the twelve, "Do you want to go away as well?" Simon Peter answered him, "Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life, and we have believed, and have come to know, that you are the Holy One of God."</i></blockquote>
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<br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6002659398137070021.post-87831452734090470682017-02-21T08:10:00.000-05:002017-02-21T08:12:59.016-05:00Last Two Dollars<div class="MsoNormal">
I was having trouble understanding the man, but I believe
his last words as the police walked up were, “<i>I’m down to my last two dollars</i>.”<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
One of my favorite workouts is a five mile or so walk in the
City of Columbia at a 17 minute per mile pace. It is a good time for thinking
as well as exercising. I do it once a week or so, and yesterday was the day. On
such a journey, one sees and experiences the city much differently than driving.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I do not stick to busy and crowded Main and Gervais but take
the side streets through neighborhoods and by smaller businesses. Lots of
lawyer offices, medical offices, non-profits, historical homes, etc. Today I
walked south on Pickens, crossed Taylor, and saw something unusual at the bus
stop on the southwest corner.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
There were two men there, a forty something Black man
sitting on the bench, and an elderly Black man, legless, lying flat on the
concrete sidewalk on his back beside a wheelchair. I wasn’t easily distracted
from my walking and whatever was going through my mind at the time so I just
kept moving on. <o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I assumed the two were together, the younger looking after
the older, but I wondered if I should have said something or perhaps asked if
he needed help getting the man back in his wheelchair. I thought of the Good
Samaritan and began to feel a little guilty for just passing on by. So, a
hundred yards or so further along, I stopped and turned to look just as the
younger man got up and walked off. Maybe he was going to call for help.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<div class="MsoNormal">
So, at that point, I had to walk back and do a little
investigating. I asked the man if he was taking a nap. He said he was trying
to. I asked if he was OK. He said yes. I asked if he needed help getting in his
chair. He said no. So, I left again. But I still felt there was unfinished
business so I went around the block and passed the man again. <o:p></o:p></div>
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On this third pass, I bent down and tried to talk to him,
though he was difficult to understand. I asked if he needed me to call an
ambulance. He said no, that he was OK. I asked where he lives, expecting that
perhaps he is a resident of the Marion St. Tower, nearby home to many poor and
disabled. He said, “<i>Right here</i>.” <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
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Then a police car with two officers pulled up. Just as the
man mentioned the “<i>two dollars</i>,” one of the officers asked the man if he was
OK. He said he was. Then an ambulance arrived. The officer thanked me and said,
“We’ve got it.” I felt dismissed. Maybe the officer was thinking I had called
in the situation. It looked like the ambulance drivers were about to get a
stretcher out, but I didn’t stick around to see what happened. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So, what is wrong with that situation. It’s not lack of “<i>health
care</i>” since the man is obviously on Medicare, probably because of age and
certainly because of disability. There is a good chance he suffers from some
mental illness because almost certainly he has had opportunities through the SC
Department of Social Services for some housing and has rejected those
opportunities. Surely he has!<o:p></o:p></div>
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I hope the ambulance drivers took the man to the closest
emergency room and that the police called the Department of Social Services to
send someone to meet him there and arrange appropriate nursing care and housing
for him. If the man insists on being on the street during the day to panhandle
and enjoy some social interaction and independence, let him do so. But the City
of Columbia should not allow him to spend helpless nights on the street. It is
dangerous, unhealthy, unsafe, and unacceptable.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
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<div class="MsoNormal">
Mental health reforms, apparently inspired by One Flew Over
the Cuckoo’s Nest, might have had some good results but also had a lot of
unintended and unfortunate consequences. I frankly don’t have any sympathy for
people wanting the government to provide their flu shots and birth control
pills and pay for their annual physicals, but our system for caring for the
helpless needs a lot of improvement. That is a priority.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I’ll be keeping my eyes open for the man. He won’t be
difficult to spot. Next time I see him, hopefully in his chair, I will find out
his name, how old he is, how he lost his legs, how much income he has, and the
name of his social worker. I’ll give him a few dollars. Then I will call that
social worker who will tell me that she can’t discuss the case because of
privacy concerns. Then I’ll find Mr. ______ and give him a few more dollars and
tell him that he must give his social worker permission to talk to me if he
wants any more help from me. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
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And maybe once he has a safe place to sleep and bathe and
get clean clothes and eat three meals a day, his SSI or SS income will be
enough that he won’t always be down to his last two dollars.<o:p></o:p></div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6002659398137070021.post-9220568274495692262016-12-22T16:35:00.000-05:002016-12-23T13:03:53.144-05:00The Same as if it Were<div class="MsoNormal">
It was the fall of 1990, and I was in a new member class led by Pastor Saresky at Faith Lutheran Church (Missouri Synod) in Penfield, NY. He was discussing Communion, The Lord’s Supper, Eucharist, the celebration of that Last Supper Jesus celebrated in the Upper Room with his closest followers and commanded that they continue in remembrance of Him. It seemed to me that my new pastor was presenting a quite different view than what I had learned in my Southern Baptist and Presbyterian backgrounds so I asked, “<i>You aren’t saying that the bread and wine are literally the body and blood of Christ, are you</i>?” He answered, “<i>No, but it is the same as if they were</i>.”<o:p></o:p></div>
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That was one giant step in my journey from young Baptist to elderly Catholic. Pastor Saresky was expressing Lutheran doctrine, a theology of “<i>the real presence</i>” of Jesus, “<i>in, with, and under</i>” the elements of bread and wine. I believe that is a bit divergent from Luther’s position which, even for the time of the Reformation, was a bit at odds with Catholic teaching. Luther apparently believed that the 12th century doctrine of Transubstantiation was an unnecessary attempt to explain the divine mystery and that it was adequate to just say that the bread and wine are the body and blood of Christ.<o:p></o:p></div>
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But, all that is just an introduction to what I want to write about. There is a bit of an uproar going on now in social media about Trump supporters, even some of the picks for his administration, taking the early chapters of Genesis, those that cover the prehistoric events before historical figure Abraham appears on the scene in Chapter 12, as literally true. Such believers are sometimes referred to as Young Earth Creationists, a handy label used to disrespect and marginalize.<o:p></o:p></div>
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Those early Genesis events include two divergent creation stories, the story of Adam, Eve, Eden, and that nasty serpent, the first shedding of blood in jealousy, rapid population growth and the spread of wickedness, the story of Noah and his family, a couple of conflicting stories about a great flood covering the earth, and the Tower of Babel story about why there were so many languages and about the desire of humans always to be God, or at least to worship themselves.<o:p></o:p></div>
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Here is the problem. Many people who would never think of taking the words of Jesus in John 6 literally, want to take the stories in Genesis 1-11 literally. There is no way to submit the John 6 teachings to any kind of scientific investigation. Whether we believe those words is simply a matter of personal faith. But we know from scientific investigation that the earth is not just a few thousand years old. And, given the way continents have shifted position and risen and sunk, we may not be able to prove scientifically that the land masses comprising the highest mountains were never under water, but we do know they were not under water in the last five thousand years.<o:p></o:p></div>
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I recall another former pastor, maybe 25 years after the Saresky lesson, saying that when we ask difficult questions sparked by literal understanding of those first 11 chapters of Genesis, questions such as, “<i>Where did the wives of Cain and Able come from</i>?” or “<i>Where did the waters in Genesis 1:2 come from</i>?” we are simply asking the wrong questions. The questions we should be asking are about the theological truths taught in those ancient stories. Nothing we have learned from scientific investigation of the origins of the universe and humankind takes anything away from those lessons.<o:p></o:p></div>
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Those ancient stories, first written down perhaps 3000 years ago, represent hundreds or perhaps thousands of years of oral tradition, stories told and retold in an attempt by the people to explain how things were, and why they were that way. Where did the earth and its people come from? Why did they have to work so hard? Why was there so much sin and suffering? Why were people selfish and jealous? Why did people want to be God? And, as a believer in the One Triune God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, active in the lives of people from the beginning, I accept these stories as part of Sacred Scripture revealing spiritual truth. In other words, theologically speaking, “<i>It is the same as if those ancient stories were literally true</i>.”<o:p></o:p></div>
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The thing that concerns me, the reason for this little essay, is that when we Christians take the position that the ancient stories refute what we have learned through scientific investigation, with our God-given intelligence, about creation, we lose credibility and fail to help people understand the great spiritual truths taught in both Old and New Testaments, the truths that lead us to The Church, the Body of Christ. We make an easy target for those who want to ridicule and discredit the Church. Some non-believers even argue that, when we insist on such literal interpretations, we are worshiping the Bible, the written expression of the Word of God, instead of The Triune God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. We should not let that happen. Jesus Christ is the Word of God, and, according to Catholic teaching, Sacred Scripture is all about Him.<o:p></o:p></div>
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It is interesting to reflect on the words at the beginning of Genesis and at the beginning of the Gospel of John, the theological or spiritual gospel.<o:p></o:p></div>
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“<i>In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters.</i>” – Genesis 1:1-2<o:p></o:p></div>
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“<i>In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind.</i>” – John 1:1-4<o:p></o:p></div>
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And, by the way, the two most basic spiritual and eternal truths taught in the ancient stories are these:<o:p></o:p></div>
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<ul>
<li>God created and it was good (but we don't know exactly how)</li>
<li>Humankind has a strong tendency to be bad and to blame somebody else for it</li>
</ul>
<o:p></o:p><br />
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<o:p></o:p></div>
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And one final thought: Efforts, such as <a href="http://dawn.orlandobible.org/archeology_Booklet.aspx">this one</a> to “prove” the Bible is true seem to me to completely miss the point and, for me, would be an expression of lack of faith. They ignore not only the characteristics of ancient writings but the simple fact that Christianity is a spiritual matter of personal faith. After all, if we could "prove" that everything in the Bible is true, no faith would be required.</div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6002659398137070021.post-51206566694506212982016-05-23T07:36:00.001-04:002016-05-23T08:49:56.120-04:00Confessing Failure to HelpIt's 10pm in the parking lot of a hotel, and we are just arriving, tired and looking for a good night's sleep. A minivan pulls up, window down, and a young Black woman says, "<i>Sir, I'm not asking for any money or anything but we just need a place to sleep tonight. We can check into a shelter in the morning, but they don't have room for us tonight</i>."<br />
<br />
Well, I'm not going to ask her to share a room with my wife and me, and I'm not going to check her in on my credit card and ID, taking responsibility for anything that might happen in the room, regardless of how long she might stay. I doubt the Holiday Inn would even allow that under the circumstances.<br />
<br />
I admit that I am suspicious, thinking that it is really just money she wants and that she may be going home somewhere at bedtime. I'm concerned about who else might be in the car and whether it is an organized scam, maybe even a setup for armed robbery if I get too close to the car, wallet in hand. My wife has walked on to the hotel entrance and is waiting there for me.<br />
<br />
So, I ask the woman, from some distance, if she has a credit card, and she says she doesn't. I suggest that the shelter that has agreed to take her in the morning should have a referral system for some place she can get temporary shelter. Surely suburban Atlanta has such a system in place for single women with children, if that is, in fact her situation. I don't see the children but there seems to be a child seat in the car. I would have known where to send her in Columbia SC.<br />
<br />
I tell her that I can't help her, and she drives away.<br />
<br />
After getting to the room, I still have her on my mind and wonder if she is circling through the parking lot and soliciting other arrivals, so I go back outside and look around. My plan is that, if I see her, I will ask her to park her car at the door of the hotel and come inside by herself, in view of security cameras, so I can see her ID and discuss her dilemma with her. I have a couple of hundred dollars in cash and will be glad to give her enough to pay for a room somewhere that does not require a credit card, a small gift of no consequence to me and possibly very helpful to her.<br />
<br />
I don't see her anywhere. So, I go back to the room feeling guilty for passing up an opportunity to help somebody, obviously in much worse shape than I, even if she is lying and scamming.<br />
<br />
If I ever face that same situation again, I now have a plan. I will say to the driver, "Drive to the front door of the hotel, step out of the car by yourself and go just inside the door by yourself, where there will be security cameras and I can see your ID and we can discuss your situation in a public place. Maybe I can help."<br />
<br />
If she takes me up on that, I will be glad to give her enough money for a night in a hotel. And I won't have to feel guilty, and she can do whatever she wants to with the money. If she doesn't take me up on that, I will know it is a scam.<br />
<br />
As for the young woman I encountered Friday night, at least, if she was telling the truth, she is in a shelter now.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6002659398137070021.post-91755797288418613532016-05-15T06:46:00.000-04:002016-05-15T06:46:12.107-04:00Pentecost 2016 - Five Years Catholic<div class="MsoNormal">
At Pentecost, 2011, I was received into full communion with
the Catholic Church at St. Peter’s Catholic Church, Columbia, SC. From a purely
logical standpoint, I had concluded, hopefully under the influence of The Holy
Spirit, that Jesus established The Church, His “<i>Body</i>,” and left Apostles in
charge, promising the guidance of The Holy Spirit, and that that Church, with
its apostolic succession, was The Church I wanted to be a part of. And, yes, I
know there has been much misbehavior of Catholics and Catholic leadership
down through the centuries even with that guidance of the Holy Spirit. However,
Jesus promised not that the Church would be perfect but only that the gates of Hell
would not prevail against it.<br />
<br />
Aside from that logic, a number of things about Catholic
faith appealed to me spiritually and theologically. It is not just about me and
whether I am “saved” but is primarily about growing in worship of and service
in the name of the Triune God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, obedience of the
Greatest Commandments and The Great Commission. Catholicism recognizes that
there is divine mystery and theology beyond human understanding but eloquently,
if imperfectly, expressed in the centuries old Nicene Creed, a clear statement
of The Gospel of Jesus Christ which we are commanded to proclaim. That divine
mystery is acknowledged in the reverence and ritual of Mass, the focus on the
timeless sacrifice of Jesus, and the mystical sharing in His Body and Blood
clearly prescribed in the Gospel of John and practiced in the early church and
down through the centuries.<br />
<br />
Before making the change from Lutheran to Catholic, I read
through the several hundred pages of the <i>Catechism of the Catholic Church</i> and
concluded that the Catholic Church could reasonably be described as “<i>full
gospel</i>,” a term relatively recently and narrowly applied to some charismatic
evangelical churches, but that, in the case of Catholicism, it would mean
paying attention to all of Sacred Scripture, and to the ways it was written, compiled,
understood, preserved, revered, and practiced by the early Church.<br />
<br />
The key statement in the Catechism about the Bible is this: “<i>All
Sacred Scripture is but one book, and this one book is Christ, because all divine Scripture speaks of Christ, and all divine Scripture is fulfilled in Christ.</i>” (P134). With
that understanding of the Bible, Catholicism generally resists the temptation
to boil down the complexity of our relationship with the Triune God to simple
formulas and selected Bible verses without context. We reverently hear readings
of Sacred Scripture from the Old Testament, Psalms, Epistles, and Gospels in most
celebrations of The Mass, but it is clear that Catholics do not worship the
Bible (or Mary either). It is the Triune God alone, Father, Son, and Holy
Spirit whom Catholics worship.<br />
<br />
I have joked that one reason I became Catholic was that I
wanted to be persecuted. Not true of course but I do hear and read disturbing condemnations
of Catholicism from time to time from serious and faithful non-Catholic Christians.
There are still divisive issues that keep us from being one, but I have
concluded that the answer to those divisive issues is usually not either-or,
but both-and. We have been saved, <u>and</u> we are being saved, <u>and</u> we will be saved.
We are predestined <u>and</u> we are called to make decisions for Christ. We are
adopted, our names written down, justified by grace through faith, <u>and</u> we are
commanded to persevere, obey, work, give, serve, love, learn, and finish the
course. Jesus came to save souls <u>and</u> to save the world. God created the heavens
and the earth (in unknown ways) <u>and</u> that act of creation continues and includes
all the processes still operating, including any “evolutionary” processes. Eternal
life begins when we are baptized <u>and</u> there will be a resurrection, details of
which I have no knowledge and about which I have no concern, at some future
time. These are just examples. If one carefully considers Sacred Scripture in its
entirety, I believe that the both-and approach is validated and that we waste
our time insisting on either-or decisions rather than serving together. We, the
Body of Christ, have a job to do.<br />
<br />
During progression through three prior Christian
denominations, I sometimes had the conviction that the current theology I was
hearing was correct and would argue in defense of it. Now, in the Catholic
Church, I believe that the theology is sound, but the primary feeling is one,
not of being right, or of needing to prove or argue in favor of anything, but
of being at home, in The Church, even if I sometimes see and hear things (usually
expressions of personal piety or theological slants) that cause a little
discomfort. And I take comfort joining weekly with Catholics around the globe, hearing
the same selections from Sacred Scripture, reciting the Nicene Creed, and
“passing the peace” in hundreds of languages, and then standing in line with
fellow worshipers, awaiting my turn, to share in the Body and Blood of Christ.<br />
<br />
Thanks be to God!</div>
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<o:p></o:p></div>
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6002659398137070021.post-66331215228603070192015-09-25T07:15:00.000-04:002015-09-25T07:15:12.518-04:00"Believing," "Believing That," and "Believing In"<div class="MsoNormal">
</div>
<ul>
<li>Matthew 24:23 - Then if anyone says to you, 'Look! Here is
the Messiah!' or 'There he is!'-- do not believe it.</li>
<li>James 2:19 - You
believe that God is one; you do well. Even the demons believe-- and shudder.</li>
<li>John 3:16 - For God so loved the world, that He gave His
only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish, but have
eternal life.</li>
</ul>
Those are three often quoted Bible verses, the first giving
an example of “believing” something heard or read, the second an example of “believing
that” something is true, and the third an example of “believing in” some thing
or some person. The little three letter Greek word translated “in” is important
in John 3:16 and can also be translated “into.” Trying to understand the Greek
is complicated by the fact that the word translated “believe” can also be
translated as “believe in” or “have faith.” So, putting those two Greek words
together can be translated as "have faith in," or “believe in in” for double emphasis implying a serious, life-changing, kind of belief.<br />
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<o:p></o:p></div>
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The reason I thought of commenting on the subject of belief is the frequency with which people are accused of not “believing in” global
warming or of not “believing in” evolution. Use of that language supports speculation that those two topics, global warming and evolution, have become twenty first century matters of faith, or perhaps even religions. Well, let me make it clear that I do not "believe in" global warming, nor do I "believe in" evolution.<br />
<br />
Before you get too excited and start calling me names, let
me hasten to add that I do “believe that” our climate changes with time and “that” there
has been a significant warming trend over the past few thousand years, maybe
even a degree or so in the last few decades, and “that” it is at
least partly due to human activity. Just the presence of 7 billion bodies at
98.6 degrees F should have a warming effect, with or without any atmospheric CO2
influence. And certainly our cutting of so much forest in recent centuries would have tended to result in warming. I just don’t “believe in” global warming to the extent that I
organize my life or even my day around the concept. (I do recycle and moved
into the city at least partly to cut down on driving, but I still take hot
showers, keep the house at comfortable temperatures throughout the year, and drive a gasoline powered automobile.)</div>
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I also want to affirm that I “believe that” evolutionary
processes are an important part of God’s creation even though they really have not been proven conclusively to result in new species and offer no explanation for why there is anything to evolve. I see no reasonable way to
refute the evidence of their existence, nor do I see any good reason to try to
do so. I just don’t “believe in” evolution to the extent that I let it guide my
daily living and set my priorities or even suggest atheism. There is really
nothing I can do about it anyway. I understand that evolution is a very slow process, and I
have not been trained in any genetic modification techniques.</div>
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Turning to religion, with respect to personal faith in something around which I
can try to organize my life, I can use “believe” in all three ways.</div>
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<o:p></o:p></div>
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I “believe” the Catholic Catechism statement on Sacred
Scripture: “All Sacred Scripture is but one book, and this one book is Christ, ‘because
all divine Scripture speaks of Christ, and all divine Scripture is fulfilled in
Christ.’” Well, of course such believing is a matter of Christian faith, and we
really can’t expect people of other faith traditions or of no faith to buy it. <o:p></o:p></div>
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I “believe that” Jesus was the only Son of God, eternally
begotten of the Father, God from God, Light from Light, true God from true God,
begotten, not made, con-substantial with the Father, that through Him all things
were made, that for us and for our salvation, he came down from heaven, that by
the power of the Holy Spirit he was born of the Virgin Mary, and became man,
that for our sake he was crucified under Pontius Pilate; that he suffered,
died, and was buried. That on the third day he rose again in fulfillment of the
Scriptures; that he ascended into heaven and is seated at the right hand of the
Father. That He will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead, and
that his kingdom will have no end. (That is all from the Nicene Creed.) And,
here again it is a matter of faith which Christians tend to view as a gift and
not a personal accomplishment. It is not something to generate pride, but
rather something to motivate thanksgiving and action.<o:p></o:p></div>
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But neither “believing” nor “believing that” approaches what
Jesus really asks of us. It is only “believing in” Him, as in John 3:16 quoted above, that approaches the
ideal. And that means having a desire, even if we fail, to organize our lives based on what we
have been told and what we have learned about Him and what we have come to
believe about Him. It might be like a "believer in" global warming adopting a cold shower, open window, bicycle only approach to life, which wouldn't be all bad. It might be like a "believer in" evolution dedicating his or her life to trying to persuade others of the truth of it and the absence of any creator, which would be all bad.<o:p></o:p></div>
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Objectively, “believing in” Jesus, means, at the very least,
being baptized and a part of His Body, the Church, which He founded and left to do his work,
obey his commandments, and follow his example. It is through His Church that we
achieve unity with Him. Subjectively, however, the interesting and often confusing thing is that understandings and expressions of that unity by the millions of Christians around
the globe vary as much as the differences in their personalities, dispositions,
educations, understandings, cultures, environments, spiritual maturities, and personal histories. And
that is a lot of variability, and a very good thing, creating many opportunities for us to help each other along.<o:p></o:p></div>
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So, don’t be looking for “cookie cutter” Christians as you travel the globe, or even as you look around the community in which you reside.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%; mso-bidi-language: HE;">1 Corinthians 12:27 -</span></b><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%; mso-bidi-language: HE;"> Now you are the body of Christ and individually members of it. </span><o:p></o:p><br />
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%; mso-bidi-language: HE;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%; mso-bidi-language: HE;"><b>Colossians 1:15-19</b> - He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation; </span>for in him all things in heaven and on earth were created, things visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or powers-- all things have been created through him and for him. He himself is before all things, and in him all things hold together. <b>He is the head of the body, the church;</b> he is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, so that he might come to have first place in everything. For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, and through him God was pleased to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, by making peace through the blood of his cross.<br />
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