We remember a mother and her son this week, St. Monica and her son St. Augustine. I heard a song long ago that said: “A Mother’s Love’s a Blessing.” Augustine could have sung that song.
In his “Confessions,” he praised God for bringing him “late” to a faith he found beautiful; he also acknowledged a mother’s tears and prayers helped bring him to Jesus Christ. She was like the woman in the gospel. As she brought her dead son to be buried, she met Jesus. He saw her tears, stopped the funeral procession and raised her son to life.
“ I was like that son,” Augustine says. ‘I was dead. My mother’s tears won me God’s life.”
Like many women of her time, we don’t know much about Monica. She married a man named Patricius, a tough husband who put her down and went out with other women. They had three kids, but Augustine was special; she followed him, hoping be would be the person she knew he could be. Above all, she wanted him to have faith.
He was a hard son to deal with, smart, well educated, hooked on the “lovely things” about him, deaf to her advice, blind to the path she wanted him to take, but she followed him anyway, convinced God had something big for him to do, and she finally got her wish
Doesn’t she sound like many today? How many today love their kids, or their husbands or their wives or their friends, but worry they’ll get mixed up in the wrong things–not going to church, deaf to the gospel? But they stick by them anyway.
That’s not easy to do and so it’s good to remember Monica and the moving words to God Augustine wrote in his Confessions. Did he ever show them to her, I wonder?
“O beauty every ancient, O beauty ever new. Late have I have loved thee. You were within me, but I was outside, and it was there that I searched for you. In my unloveliness I plunged into the lovely things which you created. You were with me, but I was not with you. Created things kept me from you; yet if they had not been in you they would have not been at all. You called, you shouted, and you broke through my deafness. You flashed, you shone, and you dispelled my blindness. You breathed your fragrance on me; I drew in breath and now I pant for you. I have tasted you, now I hunger and thirst for more. You touched me, and I burned for your peace.”
Fittingly, the church celebrates Monica’s feast on August 27th, the day before her son’s.
John Henry Newman (1801-1890), a prominent member of the Anglican Church, was canonized a saint by Pope Francis in Rome on October 13, 2019. Newman was received into the Catholic Church by the Italian Passionist, Blessed Dominic Barberi.
I’ve often wondered why Newman asked for Dominic to receive him into the church. Dominic, a Passionist missionary recently from Italy, was more than a zealous Catholic priest and religious. I think Newman saw in him something he treasured, namely his devotion to the mystery of the Passion of Jesus.
For Newman the mystery of the Cross interpreted everything. “The death of the Eternal Word of God made flesh is our great lesson how to think and how to speak of this world. His Cross has put its due value upon everything which we see.”
Shortly after his conversion Newman wrote “The Mystery of Divine Condescension.” (Discourses to a Mixed Congregation” 14) It’s a wonderful reflection on the mission of Jesus described by Paul the Apostle in his Letter to the Philippians, “Though he was in the form of God, Jesus did not deem equality with God something to be grasped at, but he emptied himself…” The reflection also reveals in a striking way Newman’s personal relationship to God.
He begins by considering at great length the mystery of God. God is beyond anything we know. God is infinitely beyond us. “There is a gulf between me and my great God. Yet, I’m a human being, I need someone who can weep with me, and rejoice with me, and in a way minister to me. How can I hope to find that in the Infinite and Eternal God.”
(God) is so far above us that the thought of Him does but frighten me; I cannot believe that He cares for me…I know that He is loving towards all His works, but how am I to believe that He gives to me personally a thought, and cares for me for my own sake? I am beneath His love; He looks on me as an atom in a vast universe. He acts by general laws, and if He is kind to me it is, not for my sake, but because it is according to His nature to be kind…”
My complaint is answered in the great mystery of the Incarnation,” Newman continues.
God discloses himself to us. God discloses himself, first of all, in nature. Nature is part of the mystery of divine condescension. Newman has a beautiful section in his reflection about finding God in nature.
But nature gives us only a glimpse of the glory of God. God’s condescension goes so much further. In the mystery of the Word made flesh, the Creator humbles himself to the creature.”Your God has taken on Him your nature.”
What form do we humans expect God to take? “Doubtless, you will say, He will take a form such as “eye hath not seen, nor ear heard of” before. It will be a body framed in the heavens, and only committed to the custody of Mary; a form of light and glory, worthy of Him, who is “blessed for evermore,” and comes to bless us with His presence….He will choose some calm and holy spot, and men will go out thither and find their Incarnate God. He will be tenant of some paradise, like Adam or Elias, or He will dwell in the mystic garden of the Canticles, where nature ministers its best and purest to its Creator.”
But, “the Maker of man, the Wisdom of God, has come, not in strength, but in weakness. He has come, not to assert a claim, but to pay a debt. Instead of wealth, He has come poor; instead of honour, He has come in ignominy; instead of blessedness, He has come to suffer. He has been delivered over from His birth to pain and contempt; His delicate frame is worn down by cold and heat, by hunger and sleeplessness; His hands are rough and bruised with a carpenter’s toil; His eyes are dimmed with weeping; His Name is cast out as evil.
He is flung amid the throng of men; He wanders from place to place; He is the companion of sinners. He is followed by a mixed multitude, who care more for meat and drink than for His teaching…And at length “the Brightness of God’s Glory and the Image of His Substance” is fettered, haled to and fro, buffeted, spit upon, mocked, cursed, scourged, and tortured. “He hath no beauty nor comeliness; He is despised and the most abject of men, a Man of sorrows and acquainted with infirmity;” nay, He is a “leper, and smitten of God, and afflicted”. And so His clothes are torn off, and He is lifted up upon the bitter Cross, and there He hangs, a spectacle for profane, impure, and savage eyes, and a mockery for the evil spirit whom He had cast down into hell.”
O Jesus, I cannot comprehend you more than I did, before I saw you on the Cross; but I have gained my lesson. I have before me the proof that in spite of your exalted nature, and the clouds and darkness which surround it, you can think of me with a personal affection. You have died, that I might live.
“Let us love God,” says your Apostle, “because He first loved us.” I can love you now from first to last, though from first to last I cannot understand you. As I adore you, O Lover of souls, in your humiliation, so will I admire you and embrace you in your infinite and everlasting power.”
Blessed Dominic Barberi was born in Viterbo, Italy, on May 22, 1792. At 22, he gave up farming work and, called by God to religious life, he entered the Passionist congregation. Gifted with a good mind and heart, he was ordained a priest and devoted himself to teaching, preaching, spiritual direction and writing philosophical, theological, and spiritual treatises. His feast day is August 26.
In 1840, Dominic left Italy to bring the Passionist community to Ere, Belgium. Then, in 1842, he went to England and became a popular preacher of missions and retreats, establishing a Passionist retreat at Aston Hall, near Stone.
Blessed Dominic worked for the unity of the Church — a mission God called him to from his youth. He longed for the return of “separated brethren” to the Catholic Church — an expression coined by him. He anticipated by 150 years the present ecumenical movement based on love, dialogue, respect for conscience and mutual discernment.
Besides a desire to dialogue with other religious traditions, Dominic also wished to speak to the “lost sheep” of this world through preaching missions. Popular missions, stressing basic catechesis and devotional prayer, were then the primary way the Roman Catholic reached out to the peoples of Europe and also the Americas. Dominic preached countless missions in England, even though he spoke a broken English.
People found him intelligent, friendly, respectful, caring and a deeply spiritual man. The Anglican world found him a man of dialogue bringing the fresh air of a new religious springtime. Many Anglicans, John Henry Newman among them, turned to the Catholic Church through his example. Blessed Dominic received the profession of faith of the future Cardinal and now Saint John Henry Newman, then esteemed as “the Pope of the Protestants, their great spokesman, one of the most learned men of England”. For Newman Dominic was a good priest, learned and holy. He said he was Dominic’s “convert and penitent”.
Domenic died in Reading, near London, England on August 27, 1849. His grave in Sutton, St. Helens, England has become a place of pilgrimage for the English people. Pope Paul VI declared him “Blessed” on October 27, 1963 during Vatican II, calling him an example of ecumenism and describing him as an apostle of unity.
“Hear me, O coastlands, listen, O distant peoples. The Lord called me from birth, from my mother’s womb he gave me my name. He made me a sharp-edged sword.” (Is 49:1-2)
Lord, you sent Blessed Dominic to seek out the lost sheep of your flock by preaching your truth and witnessing to your love.
May we follow his example and build up the unity of your Church as a sign of faith and love. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit one God, for ever and ever.
! Thessalonians was written early on during Paul’s 2nd missionary journey with Silvanus and Timothy. Written about 20 years after the death and resurrection of Jesus, the letter is Paul’s first letter and the first writing of the New Testament.
Paul’s message to the people of Thessalonika can be summarized in a sentence. “ For if we believe that Jesus died and rose, so too will God, through Jesus, bring with him those who have fallen asleep” (Thes. 4:14)
In the letter Paul commends the Thessalonians, who are mostly Gentiles. They received Paul’s message through the power of the Holy Spirit, not just through Paul’s words. They are experiencing strong opposition from Jews as well as from their own people, who seem to portray Paul and his companions as religious peddlers trying to profit from a gullible audience.
Paul mentions the persecution going on in Judea. In this week’s gospel readings from Matthew Jesus denounces the scribes and Pharisees who oppose him in strong terms. Commentators believe Matthew’s gospel may well describe the opposition Jesus’ followers faced after his death and resurrection, rather than the opposition Jesus faced in his lifetime.
Is this why the compilers of our lectionary put these two readings together. Matthew’s gospel is a commentary on the opposition the Thessalonians face.
Paul assumes the final coming of Jesus will occur in his own lifetime, but the day is unknown. It will come as a “thief in the night.” ( 1 Thes 5: 1-2) The same theme is repeated in Matthew’s gospel this week.
Instead of focusing on the last days, Paul tells the Thessalonians to live today.
Like many Catholic religious communities in the western world my community, the Passionists, is shrinking in North American and Europe and growing elsewhere. I wonder why we’re not getting vocations.
Our readings this week at Mass – Paul’s First Letter to the Thessalonians and the Gospel of Matthew – make clear that Jesus and his followers were sharply opposed. Scholars say the gospel describe a time later on in Matthew’s community, after Jesus’ death and resurrection, but even so Jesus faced strong opposition in his day.
The letters to the Thessalonians describe the opposition Paul faced. Unfortunately, our lectionary readings, leaving out most references to that opposition, may cause us to lose sight of what Paul and his followers accomplished.
It’s true generally that when you don’t see the challenges and crosses people face, you don’t get to know them well. That’s true of individuals and groups– like the Passionists. Bumps on the road are part of your story.
Fr. Alessandro Ciciliani in a Passionist International Bulletin from Rome, The Congregation at the Time of the Canonization of St. Paul of the Cross 1867, describes some bumps on the road my community faced then. It’s a wonder we survived.
From our foundation in the 18th century by St. Paul of the Cross our survival was threatened. In Paul’s day, there was strong opposition to new religious communities in the church and in society. (The time was unfavorable to older religious communities too. In 1774, the Jesuits were suppressed) Humanly speaking, we shouldn’t have gotten started.
In our early days, the popes were strong allies, but shortly after the death of St. Paul of the Cross (1775) the papacy as an institution was severely weakened and almost disappeared. When Pope Pius VII died exiled by Napoleon in 1799, smart people predicted he was the last of the popes.
Threats to our survival continued in the 19th century. In his article Ciciliani describes the closure and seizure of most of our foundations in Italy shortly after St. Paul’s death. By 1850 we had three provinces and 27 houses in Italy. In the space of 20 years 21 of those houses were seized by the government, and the religious told to go home. Anticlerical laws issued by the Kingdom of Savoy and the Kingdom of Italy insisted that communities like ours weren’t needed; the new governments also saw properties and assets as sources of revenue for themselves.
“There was a lot of confusion among the religious and little hope for the future. Consequently there was a temptation to return to their families or look for accommodation with the diocesan clergy,” Ciciliani writes.
What’s surprising, though, were the creative thrusts emerging in the church and in our community in those dark days. In 1817, Pope Pius VII– the pope supposed to be the last – created the Propaganda Fidei, a papal arm that built up the church in South America and Asia, and in 1834 organized the church in North America.
In 1844 the Passionist, Blessed Dominic Barberi, began a vital mission in England. In 1861 4 Passionists arrived in Philadelphia and planted the community in North America. Other new missions were started and flourished. It was not the last gasp of survivors, but people dreamed new things. A dream was alive in them.
The scripture readings tell us the church grows in response to challenge and opposition. The history of my own community says the same. Father Ciciliani writes of the “terrible experience” my community faced in the 19th century, but ends by recalling that the mystery of the cross is terrible too, but it does not end in death; it brings life.
We’re leaving the Old Testament in our lectionary readings this week to read from Paul’s Letter to the Thessalonians, which may be the earliest writing of the New Testament. We’ll be reading from Thessalonians most weekdays till next Tuesday.
About four scripture readings in our morning and evening prayers are from Thessalonians, so this is a good time to deepen our understanding of this book of scripture.
We’re also leaving Matthew’s gospel the end of this week; next Monday we start reading from Luke’s Gospel on weekdays. Every year we repeat the gospels, the lectionary readings and celebrations of the saints. Why the repetition?
The liturgy calls for deep reading. Deep reading is different than the quick reading we do a lot of today. We’re looking for facts.
We need to take in more than facts, however. Deep reading recognizes we need time to understand. We learn little by little. We are slow learners. Besides, we forget. So we need deep reading.
Deep reading is how we learn from the gospels and other scriptures, from our prayers and from the lives of the saints. These are not sources we learn all at once. We learn from them today. “If today you hear his voice, harden not your hearts.” We learn from them today, and tomorrow.
The scriptures, our prayers, the lives of saints like Monica, Augustine, John the Baptist, whose feasts are celebrated this week, have something to tell us today. Along with the signs of the times, God speaks to us through them.
St Rose of Lima is the first saint of the Americas to be canonized. She’s the patroness of Peru, the Philippines and the West Indies. Her feast is August 23.
By all accounts Rose was extraordinarily beautiful from her birth. Her family, seeing how attractive she was, gave her the name, Rose. They probably envisioned a good marriage for her, improving their own fortunes, for her family struggled to make ends meet.
But Rose, influenced by the example of St. Catherine of Siena, wanted to enter give her life to God and devote herself to a life of prayer. Her family forbade it and in spite of their opposition Rose began a life of prayer and penance at home. She was a religious rebel.
Her penances seem excessive to us today. For one thing, she minimized and disfigured her physical beauty instead of enhancing it. Instead of fine clothes she wore the simple habit of a Dominican tertiary. She shunned Lima’s social life, which prized beautiful women, for a life of prayer and fasting. Instead of cultivating influential friends, she took care of the poor and the sick. She gave herself to the poor.
When she died at 31, thousands came to her funeral at Lima’s cathedral and miracles were reported by those who prayed for her intercession.
Facing great opposition, St. Rose of Lima followed a call from God. She resisted an arranged marriage by her family, probably supported by Dominican theologians who, following the decrees of the Council of Trent, told her she had the right to choose marriage on not.
She herself learned something more: troubles bring suffering, but they also bring an increase in God’s grace. Here’s the saint speaking for herself:
“Our Lord and Savior lifted up his voice and said with incomparable majesty: “Let all know that grace comes after tribulation. Let them know that without the burden of afflictions it is impossible to reach the height of grace. Let them know that the gifts of grace increase as the struggles increase. Let them take care not to stray and be deceived. This is the only true stairway to paradise, and without the cross they can find no road to climb to heaven.”
When I heard these words, a strong force came upon me and seemed to place me in the middle of a street, so that I might say in a loud voice to people of every age, sex and status: “Hear, O people; hear, O nations. I am warning you about the commandment of Christ by using words that came from his own lips: We cannot obtain grace unless we suffer afflictions.
“We must heap trouble upon trouble to attain a deep participation in the divine nature, the glory of the children of God and perfect happiness of soul.”
That same force strongly urged me to proclaim the beauty of divine grace. It pressed me so that my breath came slow and forced me to sweat and pant. I felt as if my soul could no longer be kept in the prison of the body, but had burst its chains and was free and alone and going swiftly through the whole world saying:
“If only we would learn how great it is to possess divine grace, how beautiful, how noble, how precious. How many riches it hides within itself, how many joys and delights! Without doubt they would devote all their care and concern to winning for themselves pains and afflictions. No one would complain about his cross or the troubles that come.” (Office of Readings, St. Rose of Lima)
St. Rose of Lima is honored in the Chapel of the Peruvian Saints in the Cathedral in Lima, Perus, along with St. Martin de Porres, St. Francisco Solano, and St. John Macias.
“Christians live from feast to feast,” St. Athanasius said. The church’s feasts are linked to each other through the year, and every feast is linked to the great feast of the Resurrection of Jesus.
The feasts of Mary follow the pattern of the feasts of her Son, for she shares in his saving work. Following the feasts year by year, we learn the mysteries of God, little by little. Mary was blessed from her conception. ( Immaculate Conception, Dec. 8). We celebrate her birth 9 month later. (The Nativity of Mary, September 7). Her death and assumption into heaven are celebrated Augustus 15th.
The Feast of the Queenship of Mary, August 22, is part of the mystery of her assumption into heaven. Introduced into the liturgy of the Roman Catholic church in 1955, the feast celebrates the privileged place of Mary in heaven. She “was taken up body and soul into heavenly glory when her earthly life was over, and exalted by the Lord as Queen over all things.” (Second Vatican Council, Lumen Gentium 59)
Royal titles were commonly given to God and those anointed by God in the Old Testament; Christianity continued the pratice, giving royal titles to Jesus and Mary. She is called queen in traditional Christian prayers like the Hail Holy Queen (Salve regina) and Queen of Heaven (Regina Coeli):
“Hail, Holy Queen, Mother of mercy, our life, our sweetness and our hope. To you do we cry, poor banished children of Eve. To you do we send up our sighs, mourning and weeping in the valley of tears. Turn then, most gracious advocate, your eyes of mercy towards us, and after this our exile, show to us the blessed fruit of your womb, Jesus. O clement, O loving, O sweet Virgin Mary.
Pray for us, O holy Mother of God, that we may be made worthy of the promises of Christ.
Mary is a queen, but also a mother. She is the Mother of God, Mother of Jesus Christ, Mother of us all, the New Eve, given to us by her Son from the Cross through his disciple John.
Mary knows her greatness is from her Lord, as she acknowledges in her Magnificat:
“My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord; my spirit rejoices in God, my Savior. He who is mighty has done great things to me; holy is his name.” ( Luke 1:46-55)
In the portrayal above, Fra Angelico captures Mary’s humility; she bows before her Son, her hands closed in prayer. The saints below her know that honors given to her are a reflection of the graces promised to humanity.
“Pray for us, O Holy Mother of God, that we may be made worthy of the promises of Christ.”
Our readings this week from the Book of Judges paints the picture of a barbarous society that war can bring about. We end the week (Friday and Saturday) reading from the Book of Ruth, a story of a loyal woman who brought peace to people not her own. A foreigner not a Jew, Ruth remained faithful to Naomi, her Jewish mother-in-law, and returned with her from the plains of Moab, to Bethlehem where Jews sought refuge in time of famine.
In answer to Naomi who wants her to remain with her own people since her husband is dead, Ruth says: “Do not ask me to abandon or forsake you! For wherever you go, I will go, wherever you lodge I will lodge, your people shall be my people, and your God my God.”
Foreigners can become friends, trusted friends. Wars divide; violence kills. The loving response of Ruth brings different people together.
In Bethlehem, Ruth meets Boaz, a relative of Naomi, as she gleans in his fields, and he marries her. They have a son, Obed, the father of Jesse, the father of David. And from that great lineage, the Gospel of Matthew says, Jesus Christ is born. Ruth enters the Geneology of Jesus. Non-Jews are ancestors of Jesus.
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