What This Protestant Pastor Would Like to See in the New Pope

I’m not a gambling person, but I’d bet my lunch money that the Pope has a dozen Bibles in 4 or 5 languages within arm’s reach of his most comfortable chair, and uses all of them.

It's awul when a person (especially a kid) apaproaches in real sincerity and then gets a rebuff. Probably non-Catholics receive Communion in Catholic churches pretty often when they come for a Wedding or a Funeral Mass; but they should be kindly instructed beforehand that if they are not Catholic they are invited to come up for a priestly blessing.

That's indicated by approaching the Priest with arms crosses across the chest. Then the priest knows to give the blessing. At least that's how it's done in my Diocese during Catholic Wedding and Funeral Masses.

I don't think it's just a matter of "understanding." Who can understand such things? When Christ says "This is My Body," ho can we properly say anything except "Amen"?

We have a special Mass once a monh for the residents and caregivers of a home for people with multiple disabilities, including --- what do they call it now? -- "global cognitive deficits". I dons't think any of them could pronounce, let alone understand, "Transubstantiation," but they can receive if they grasp that this is not bread, that Jesus Himself wants to live in them.

I hope the day comes when all this can be made right.

Pray for me, if I may ask; and I'll pray for you and your son.

I dons't think any of them could pronounce, let alone understand, "Transubstantiation," but they can receive if they grasp that this is not bread, that Jesus Himself wants to live in them.

The Reverend James Bradley's sermon from Sunday. My son heard it and we all thought it was beautiful. In fact, at the very end, I had tears in my eyes.

THE PRODIGAL: COMING HOME Lent IV, 2013

In the end, he came home. He came home and found a welcome there. The problem with today’s parable is that we have all heard it too many times. It’s one of those passages that’s familiar to everyone.

Two sons/rich father/younger son wants his inheritance/gets money and goes on a toot/runs out of money and goes home/father rushes to embrace him/cloak and ring and kill the calf/big party/elder son feels betrayed/father says “get over it and rejoice”. End of story.

So the preacher asks us to consider “how we’re like the younger son” and “how we’re like the elder son” and “what do we learn from all this?”

We learn about the need to repent our sins.

We learn God always forgives.

We learn how we feel neglected and overlooked and jealous.

We learn that God invites us to go beyond that and join the party.

End of sermon….Time for the Nicene Creed.

That’s the problem with this parable—we know it so well we think we know what it means. The truth just seems so…so obvious.

In the end, the Prodigal came home and found a welcome there.

Perhaps the parable isn’t merely about the characters or repentance or forgiveness or the invitation to rejoice. Perhaps, there is something deeper, something more profound and, ultimately, more troubling and challenging. Perhaps the subtle, quiet tune that repeats and repeats beneath the louder major chords of Jesus’ story is the one we need to listen for.

Perhaps, in the end, that tune is calling us to “come home”.

In John’s Gospel, Jesus says:

“Just as the Father has loved me, I have loved you, abide in my love. If you obey my teachings you will abide in my love just as I have obeyed my Father and abide in him.”

In another place he says, “If anyone loves me…my father will love him, and we will come and abide in him.”

The Greek verb that keeps getting translated as “abide” is monain—and one of the possible translations of monain would be “make your home with….”

How remarkably that changes those verses:

I have loved you, make your home in my love…

…If anyone loves me, my father will love him and we will come and make our home in him….

The noun of the English verb “abide” is abode—a place to live, a place to abide, a home…. As in “welcome to my humble abode….”

****

When the younger son has hit rock bottom: alone, disgraced, penniless, sitting among the pigs, longing for their food he came to himself.

“He came to himself”—what a remarkable phrase! We could interpret it any number of ways: “he came to his senses”; “he woke up”; “he realized who he was”; “he had a breakthrough”, “he saw the truth”….add your own way of saying it.

But this we know: once he came to himself, he decided to GO HOME.

GOING HOME is a difficult decision—painful and wrenching and humiliating. “Going home” isn’t something people do unless they are driven to it by the circumstances of life.

When an adult child moves back in with their parents because they lost their job or their marriage broke up, it is often a source of embarrassment for all concerned. What we’re taught, in this culture, from the time we are children is that the “point of life” is to LEAVE HOME and “be on our own” and “make our own life” and “pay our own way.” Going Home in our middle-class society is an act of desperation. It is the last resort.

So this sub-theme of the Prodigal and his brother—this “call” to Come Home—runs against the grain and swims upstream.

The year I went away to college, my parents moved to a different town. So when I came home, nothing was the same. Going Home, even under the best conditions, is jarring and unsettling because the home you come back to is never the one you left.

The great American novelist, Thomas Wolfe, enshrined our view of “going home” in the title of his best known book: You Can’t Go Home Again.

So, what does it mean to us that the story of the Prodigal and his brother is a story of “coming home”?

Henri Nouwen wrote a book about Rembrandt’s painting of “The Return of the Prodigal Son”. In that book, Nouwen relates something a dear friend of his told him. Listen: “Whether you are the younger son or the elder son, you have to realize that you are called to become the father.”

That is true for each of us. Jesus’ parable calls us to “come to ourselves” and find, in the innermost parts of our being, the compassion and love and un-judgmental hospitality of the father in the story. It is valuable and important to examine how we are “the Prodigal” and how we are the “elder son”. We can grow from that revelation. But the growth of realizing we are just like the brothers isn’t nearly enough.

We are called by God to “come to” our deepest SELF—the SELF that welcomes “home” both the humiliation and the arrogance within us; that welcomes “home” both our thoughtlessness and our resentments; that welcomes “home” both the brokenness and the self-righteousness of our lives.

We are called far, far past recognizing the two brothers in ourselves to un-concealing the wise, gentle and all-loving parent so well hidden in our hearts. And that is there—deeper down and further in. That is there, believe me.

Beyond that—beyond even that—this parable calls to US as a church, to create a HOME where God will dwell with us and we will dwell with God.

Let me say it again, just so I can begin to believe it: you and I are called to create the space where God can make a home in the hearts and lives of each of us and those who aren’t here yet.

What would that “look like”? How would that be?

I wish I knew completely.

I do know a few things about it. Like the father in the parable today, we must welcome “home”—to a place of acceptance—all those who come broken and hurting. Like the father in the parable, we must invite the faithful and the dependable into a celebration and a feast beyond their imagining. There must be no “judgment” here. This must be a place where those who cause pain and those who feel pain are brought together and made one and reconciled. This must be a place of refreshment and hospitality and invitation and healing. This must be a place of “homecoming” to a HOME like nothing we have ever known before. This must be a place where God can make a home with us and we can make a home with God.

What we do up here is invite Christ to “make his home” within us. We literally take Christ’s Body and Blood within ourselves.

“Come home”—bring your brokenness and your prideful-ness—God will give you welcome here.

“Come home,” come taste and see how sweet the Lord can be.

“Come home” to your deepest self and make your home with God.

“Come home….”

Sometimes we forget what it is all about. I walked into the Church off the street at 42. It was how they responded that let me know I was at home.

I hope you and your family find or have found your home....

Oliver was 7 when the Catholic priest took the host from him in church. I went to the Catholic church because I was raised Catholic but our Episcopal church had no service that day.

One of our kids had the same experience, but I don't fault the priest, who was merely attempting to properly discharge his duty. It was our fault for not correctly instructing our son.

Our kids have been raised Catholic from birth, but our younger kids are only familiar with with Tridentine rite. We attended a Novus Ordo Mass shortly after one of our kids made First Holy Communion and forgot to explain to him how to receive Holy Communion according to the Novus Ordo rite. Between his lack of familiarity with the proper approach and the fact that he's a lefty and was switching his hands back and forth, the priest became alarmed and quite rightly questioned him.

Since the Catholic and the Episcopal faiths are not interchangeable, it doesn't seem reasonable or fair to expect the Catholic Church to ignore the doctrinal differences and to casually distribute the Holy Eucharist to those who don't accept the Catholic belief in the Real Presence.

-----------------

Re: Can Episcopalians Receive Communion?

No--Anglicans may not receive the Eucharist in a Catholic Church--no matter how "high church" they may happen to be. The Anglican communion does not have a consistent, universal teaching regarding the real presence--nor does it have valid orders.

Eastern Orthodox Churches are another matter. They do have valid orders and a consistent belief in the real presence. Fr. Vincent Serpa, O.P.

http://forums.catholic.com/showthread.php?t=263618

Would that inspire you to buy one?

Thank you for this post.

I expect that the next pope will place a very high value on unity among the churches. However, with the radical left tilt to mainstream protestantism’s leaders despite chasing after them so hard for the last 40 years, the next popes will quite likely turn their emphasis to the Eastern churches. This might have some significant appeal to Anglicans and even several particular Lutheran churches (Church of Finland, for instance), but I expect it might feel to many Westerners, whether mainstream of evangelical, that the Catholic church is turning away from them.

Ecclesiastical Authority continuum:
<-———Evangelical———High Church Protestant———Orthodox-———Catholic-———>
BUT:
Liturgical style:
<————Evangelical-——High Church Protestant——Catholic———High Church Anglican-———Orthodox-——>
Theology:
<————Protestant-———High Church Anglican————Catholic———Orthodox——>
Culture:
<————Protestant-———High Church Protestant————Catholic———Orthodox——>

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“The Anglican communion does not have a consistent, universal teaching regarding the real presence—nor does it have valid orders. “

See my post subsequent to the one you replied to.

Read the words of our priest and tell me again how we are not taught about the”real presence”.

Very beautiful. Amen.

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Catholics don’t give a hoot what anyone else wants. The Catholic Church is DOGMA. Get over it.

It is nice of you to read the first paragraph of this article and to comment on it. Thank you.

Communion in the Episcopal Church is far different that in the Catholic Church. If you we’re well catechized you would know the difference and would act accordingly.

“Oliver was 7 when the Catholic priest took the host from him in church. I went to the Catholic church because I was raised Catholic but our Episcopal church had no service that day.”

It is unfortunate that your son was put in a position for that to have happened to him. While I commend you for seeking out a religious service with your children, your convenience is not really a good reason to disrespect the rules of Catholicism.

Since you were “raised Catholic” and have familiarity with Catholicism, it might have been better for you to have explained to your son that when we visit the services of another Christian denomination, we abide by THEIR rules out of respect for them.

When we attended a wedding in an Episcopalian church, I explained in advance to my children that, despite the similarities between their service and our own, we, as Catholics are not allowed to receive communion in a Protestant service, but should otherwise behave with reverence and respect.

It was a beautiful wedding, consecrated by God, even if WE did not receive communion.

Pope Benedict teaches that "Truth needs to be sought, found and expressed within the “economy” of charity, but charity in its turn needs to be understood, confirmed and practised in the light of truth. In this way, not only do we do a service to charity enlightened by truth, but we also help give credibility to truth, demonstrating its persuasive and authenticating power in the practical setting of social living. This is a matter of no small account today, in a social and cultural context which relativizes truth, often paying little heed to it and showing increasing reluctance to acknowledge its existence."

CARITAS IN VERITATE

Charity (and some degree of unity) requires mutual understanding and respect for one another's beliefs and traditions. The truth is that it's not possible (whether we like it or not) for the Church to ignore the doctrinal differences that exist at this point, nor the lack of valid orders.

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"In my recent article entitled “Pope announces procedure for Anglicans to enter into full communion with the Catholic Church,” I made mention at the end that one stumbling block for Anglicans is the Roman Catholic doctrine of Transubstantiation. I was reminded by a reader that, “most Anglicans including Episcopalians believe in the 'real presence' of Christ in the Holy Eucharist but they do not call it transubstantion.”

-snip-

"...Therefore, Roman Catholic doctrine regarding the Holy Eucharist is substantially different from other Christian viewpoints. Some Lutherans believe in consubstantiation, while others reject it in favor of Luther's sacramental union."

http://www.examiner.com/article/transubstantiation-versus-consubstantiation-doctrine-of-the-holy-eucharist

PLEASE READ THIS (LINK)

Catholics are most certainly your neighbors. It would be wrong to bear false witness against them. There's a commandment about that.

that it can easily be argued that outsider opinions simply don't matter

well, in terms of can your opinion elect the next pope, yes, they don't matter. Neither do mine either, or even the Cardinals to some extent. They have to bear in mind each time they vote that they are controlled by the Holy Spirit

a unity of effort and of friendship that, in Christ, -- on that I heartily agree.

I see the past two Popes as growing closer to the Orthodox. The re-emphasis of the Bishop of Rome as first among equals (down to JPII's funeral led by the other Patriarchs of Catholicism) went down really well and we should maintain that -- by removing the "political" differences

With various non-Catholic denominations it varies.

we are closest to those who acknowledge the True presence of Christ in the Eucharist like the Lutherans and to some/more extent with Anglicans and Methodists. At the other extreme, there are groups with next to nothing in common with orthodoxy -- with those we should be united on common purposes like anti-baby killing etc., and be content to agree to disagree.