Posted on 03/23/2002 5:34:00 AM PST by father_elijah
SHALL WE GATHER AT THE RIVER?
We Catholic Americans are at a crossroads. Our Lord Jesus Christ who is the Light of the World is exposing all those who wound his sacred Body by abusing children and youth. Our Lord is also exposing rot and disease within the structures and leadership of the Church from within provinces of religious orders, Catholic universities, and diocesan chanceries.
It is time to clean house. Not only do the pederasts, sex abusers, and homosexuals need to be removed from leadership and the ranks of the ordained, but also the Church needs to excommunicate all Catholic politicians in the United States of America whose votes continue the holocaust of abortion.
PREPARATION
In order to serve Christ and his poor Church in this time of crisis, each of us are called to avail ourselves of the sacraments that we may trample the devil under our feet. Let each of us 1) make a good confession; 2) receive the Eucharist on the Feast of Divine Mercy and receive Christ’s promises to St. Faustina of mercy and pardon; 3) engage in works of mercy; and, 4) encourage others to do the same.
We lead by prayer, and we are made strong by Christ’s self-offering of his Body and Blood, Soul and Divinity in the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. We have a great weapon for fighting evil in the rosary. We do not turn to prayer as a last resort, but we turn to prayer as the beginning, center, and end of all that we strive to do for Our Lord Jesus Christ. We engage in prayer for the Church knowing that when we pray we are not alone in prayer or in action. Our Lord, Our Lady, St. Joseph, and the whole communion of saints join with us in interceding for the Church.
We who long for the cleansing of the Church from these grave evils have the means of prayer through which we can grow in holiness even as we pray for the Church to be cleansed of evil and made holy as Christ is holy. Let us avail ourseves of these gifts of prayer:
The Daily Mass or a daily Act of Spiritual Communion
Perpetual Eucharistic Adoration
Benediction and Adoration
The Holy Rosary
The Chaplet of Divine Mercy
The Litanies
The Liturgy of the Hours
Other Chaplets and Devotions
Let every action we undertake be covered in prayer and overshadowed by the Holy Spirit so that only God’s will is desired and achieved through our efforts.
ACTION
For love of the Lord Jesus Christ, we are called to action against evil. Let each faithful Catholic offer themselves at Mass or at home to be the beginning point of the Church’s cleansing and renewal. Ask the Lord’s blessing that we may each speak the truth in love and walk in the Holy Spirit.
There are a variety of actions that one can undertake to be part of the solution. The following are suggestions that have been made on various internet discussion lists.
*Show up at your parish and pray at 3pm every day
*Show up at your diocesan Chancery and pray
*Show up at the nearest Chancery on the Monday after Easter
at 12 noon and pray the Rosary for the Cleansing of the Priesthood
*Write, telephone, and e-mail your bishops and priests and express your horror over the sexual scandals and tell them you expect full disclosure and immediate action.
*Write to the Holy Father -- write in Polish if you can -- and beg him to intervene and clean up the Church in the United States. Be sure to copy your bishop and pastor.
The following are some actions you may consider asking of the Holy Father(and recommending to your bishop):
1. Ask the Holy Father to lead the Church in a worldwide Day of Penance for the sexual sins of the Church’s leadership;
2. Ask the Holy Father to declare that homosexuals may not receive Holy Orders;
3. Ask the Holy Father to remove Cardinals, bishops, priests, and deacons who have covered up cases of sexual abuse.
4. Ask the Holy Father to give the Church in the USA new Cardinals especially elevating Archbishop Chaput of Denver
5. Ask the Holy Father to shut down religious orders or provinces of religious orders (like the California province of the Society of Jesus) that are a scandal in themselves.
6. Ask the Holy Father to give Cardinal Law, Cardinal Egan, and Cardinal Mahony new jobs at the Vatican.
7. Ask the Holy Father to suspend the US National Conference of Catholic Bishops and to appoint either a triumvirate to clean house or an Inquisitor General to root out evil and liberate the Church in the USA from error and crime.
8. Ask the Holy Father to restore the prayer “St. Michael the Archangel” to the close of every Mass.
9. Ask the Holy Father to extend the faculty to every priest in the Church to celebrate Mass according to the 1962 Missal.
10. Ask the Holy Father to excommunicate Catholic politicians who support the holocaust of abortion.
11. Ask the Holy Father to give the Cardinal’s red hat to Archbishop Chaput, Bishop Bruskewitz, Fr. Benedict Groeschel, Fr. Joseph Fessio, S.J.
12. Ask the Holy Father to disassociate the Church from those once Catholic universitiies and colleges that no longer affirm the magisterium of the Church or loyalty to the Pope.
13. Ask the Holy Father to make Fr. Benedict Groeschel the next Archbishop of New York.
Some will find these ideas too presumptuous, but it is clear that the Holy Father and the leadership of the Church in the USA need to hear from the rank and file faithful.
Finally, be sure to pray for the Pope, and write to the Holy Father a letter of encouragement. Assure him of your prayers for his intentions and for him personally. Also, write letters of encouragement to any deacon, priest, or bishop whom you know to be defenders of the faith and devoted to Our Lord Jesus Christ. Our good and faithful priests need to know that they are loved and cherished.
Jesus, King of the nations, hear us.
Christ, graciously hear us.
Our Lady of Guadalupe, pray for us.
Good Saint Joseph, pray for us.
St. Elizabeth Ann Seton, pray for us.
patent
I hope not because I play the guitar myself. But not in Church.
I don't know why you asked me that question but a google search for St. Faustina will bring up numerous references if you are interested.
When I heard that stat, it made me wonder why it is being blown out of proportion to seem like it constitutes the majority of Catholic priests.
Then I began to think that 1 out of 20 (!) people are/have been pedophiles. Pretty scary if true.
The meaning becomes clear when you take the Last Supper in its Jewish context. Jesus is performing a Seder meal. In the Seder meal, the historical event of the Passover is literally "made present;" it is more than a simple re-enactment.
Also, to complete the Seder meal, it was necessary that the lamb be entirely consumed.
I found this interesting link showing how the Seder meal reveals Christ
Well, since you ask...
The main comment I have is that I don't see any good in labeling someone an "anti-" Catholic.
I mean, we're all trying to understand stuff that can reasonably be understood to mean many different things.
The "truth" -- whatever it turns out to be -- is not biased -- the Truth isn't "anti-" Protestant or anti- Catholic or anti or pro anything at all. It just is.
By framing life where every attempt at truth is characterized as pro or anti this or that, you are shutting yourself off from objective reality.
Jesus found fault with a lot of religious practices of the people around him. That didn't make Him "anti-Judaism"... Just the opposite.
I don't think the frmail you got was anti-Catholic. I think the person was just anti-presumptuous posturing, anti-hiding behind dogma rather than searching for truth.
That all sounds reasonable to me. Jesus didn't ask Peter what Scriptures taught about this or that. Jesus asked Peter to 1) read and understand Scripture himself; 2) look around the world at what Christ was doing; 3) compare that reality to Scripture; 4) come to a conclusion himself about whether or not Christ was the Messiah. (Even when John the Baptist's followers question Jesus, He simply quotes what Scripture says, then describes what He has been doing... He leaves it to them to put two and two together -- He doesn't refer them to their local "learned" expert...)
As near as I can see, Christ never encouraged people to blindly accept ANYTHING as dogma but was forever asking EVERYONE to evaluate everything for themselves. This was the whole point of the parables -- they forced people to sort things out in their own minds...
(And it's not anti-Catholic to observe that the focus of mainstream Catholic thought has moved away from this foundation of individual effort and individual responsibility.)
Mark W.
Thank you for the interesting link. I've printed it out, so that I can keep the refs handy.
However, two things still stand out to me. Nothing there to my eyes makes a case for dogmatic transubstantiation. Paul is clear that the meal is about vastly more than food, and I think all Christians understand that. I just don't see any Scriptural (or extra-Scriptural) imperative to engage in pseudo-mystical mumbo jumbo that has no concrete sense.
FWIW, one thing that gets completely lost in Catholic mass (and Protestant services) is the notion that the Lord's Supper was, in fact, a meal. This seems perfectly clear in Scripture and out of it. The Lord's Supper as practiced by original Christians was an extended gathering of people for a meal, where people sat around, talked, exchanged views, and shared the time with each other while eating with the understanding that it was a meal and time and experience dedicated to Christ Jesus...
Religious services nowadays have replaced this meal concept and engaged interactivity dedicated to Jesus with ritual and "guided" imagery...
Mark W.
No, nothing in the link especially points toward transubstantiation.
The key for me is John 6, and especially the fact that Jesus points to the manna as pre-figuring the "true bread from heaven":
48I am the bread of life.
49Your forefathers ate the manna in the desert, yet they died.
50But here is the bread that comes down from heaven, which a man may eat and not die.
51I am the living bread that came down from heaven. If anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever. This bread is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world."
52Then the Jews began to argue sharply among themselves, "How can this man give us his flesh to eat?"
53Jesus said to them, "I tell you the truth, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you.
54Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up at the last day.
55For my flesh is real food and my blood is real drink.
56Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood remains in me, and I in him.
57Just as the living Father sent me and I live because of the Father, so the one who feeds on me will live because of me.
58This is the bread that came down from heaven. Your forefathers ate manna and died, but he who feeds on this bread will live forever."
The key to understanding this passage is typological. The bread Jesus refers to cannot be simply symbolic or representational, since an Old Testament type must refer to something superior in the New Testament. The miraculous manna could not be a type of inferior earthly bread. And in fact, Jesus tells us that He is the true bread from heaven (50-51).
This conforms with other typological evidence, such as the Ark of the Covenant. The Ark contained manna, Aaron's staff, and the Decalogue. The Decalogue was a type of Jesus, since John 1 tells us that Jesus is the Word. Aaron's staff is a type of the new High Priest, Jesus. So it should not be surprising then that the manna should also be a type of Jesus. In John 6 Jesus tells us that the manna was a type of the real bread from Heaven, or Himself.
Congratulations on your conversion. You are in excellent company including G.K. Chesterton, St. Augustine, Cardinal Newman, Russell Kirk, Evelyn Waugh, Bernard Nathanson, Lawrence Kudlow, Malcom Muggeridge, Graham Greene, Thomas Merton, JRR Tolkien and my paternal and maternal grandfathers.
Yes, I'll certainly grant you that is simple, direct language and a simple direct reading can be read as transubstatiation.
But also in John we read:
John 6:34-35 -- Then they said to Him, "Lord, give us this bread always." And Jesus said to them, "I am the bread of life. He who comes to Me shall never hunger, and he who believes in Me shall never thirst."
This is also simple and direct, and on the same topic, yet clearly it is not meant to be taken literally. Clearly Christians still feel physical hunger. Christians still feel physical thirst.
The physical process of eating and digestion are being used as metaphors for a spiritual reality.
I would never undercut the the importance of that metaphor -- and I can even see that there is more here than just a poetic comparison. The extended metaphor asserts the absolute reality of the spiritual world, the absolute reality and linkage between our spiritual self and our material self, and the absolute reality and importance of Christ to both realities and both selves.
But to my eyes it seems that to read these statements as physical statements, saying that the material food becomes the material Christ is unwarranted. (And, I think, such a reading overshadows the even deeper implications of the double meaning of a spiritual world co-existing with a material world with Christ being key to both.)
I apologize to lurkers if dwelling on this topic is boring or frustrating. I certainly don't think I have any absolute answers and I don't want to present my thoughts as answers for everyone. This is stuff I'm struggling to understand myself and the give-and-take here is very helpful in trying to make sure my thoughts are at least reasonably grounded...
Mark W.
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