Posted on 05/27/2004 4:57:55 PM PDT by AskStPhilomena
Gawronski has let us at the NOR know repeatedly that he thinks our approach to the "internecine Church war" is much too "bellicose," is lacking "a common focus on love," and he has let your Editor know that his soul is therefore in grave peril.
And all this because your Editor "sneers at beauty"? Well apparently, given Gawronski’s particular notion of beauty. We know Fr. Gawronski well, and he has a side interest in Zen Buddhism, and a large part of his sense of beauty consists of long walks in the woods, meditation, harmony, and tranquility.
Well, it must be a nice life, enviable even. Strife and struggle, you see, are not beautiful.
However: "To everything there is a season, a time for every purpose under heaven…. A time of war, and a time of peace" (Eccles. 3:1,8). Given all the dissent, perversion, and betrayal in the Church, this is a time for war. Those who think this is a time for peace are merely crying, as Jeremiah put it, "‘Peace, peace!’ when there is no peace." And woe to those who do so, said Jeremiah, for "they shall fall among those who fall…" (Jer. 6:14,15).
If Fr. Gawronski really wants to know what the Editor of the NOR sneers at, it isn’t beauty, it’s cowardice (especially the Editor's own cowardice).
"Beauty" is indeed an ugly excuse for copping out in the civil war in the Church. Many Balthasarians fail to see (Fr. Fessio being an outstanding exception) that there’s beauty in strife and struggle. There was strife and struggle — probably violent — when Jesus overturned the tables of the moneychangers and drove them out of the Temple of God. To us, Jesus’ "bellicosity" was exquisitely beautiful. Did Jesus lack "a common focus on love"? You could say that, but that would be a superficial reading. The Temple is not to be a den of thieves. Nor is the Church. That’s why we orthodox Catholics fight, because of our love of God, His Church, and our fellow Catholics.
(Excerpt) Read more at cruxnews.com ...
The Jewish leaders were not blood thirty killers. They only put Our Lord to death because they thought his claims too much to bear. One good thing about the film "The Gospel of John" is that its staging shows clearly that Our Lord was comfronting the religious establishment and DEMANDING that they accept him as the promised Deliverer.
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