Not much optimism in our world today. Too many signs of bad days ahead; in fact, are they already here?
We’re reading in our lectionary this week about the Period of Restoration, when some Jews returned to Judea and Jerusalem to restore Judaism, about 520 BC. Their dreams were fed by prophets like Jeremiah who promised: “Shouting, they shall mount the heights of Zion, they shall come streaming to the Lord’s blessings: the grain, the wine, and the oil, the sheep and the oxen; they themselves shall be like watered gardens, never again shall they languish.” (Jer. 31)
But their dreams were dashed by what they found, a city in ruins and some of their own people there wanted no part of them. The Prophet Haggai speaks to them:
“Thus says the LORD of hosts: This people says:“The time has not yet come to rebuild the house of the LORD.”(Then this word of the LORD came through Haggai, the prophet:) Is it time for you to dwell in your own paneled houses, while this house lies in ruins?Thus says the LORD of hosts: Consider your ways! Go up into the hill country; bring timber, and build the house that I may take pleasure in it and receive my glory, says the LORD.” (Haggai 1:1-8)
We’re a people too who were promised so much. World wars we fought would bring peace to our country and the world. Science promised a cure for everything and unlimited treasures from technology. I remember the heady days after the Second Vatican Council and the promise of a renewed church. Who expected Covid 19 and Climate Change, a fractious country and church, a world that’s a mess?
Yet, there’s more than Covid 19 and Climate Change going on in our world. God’s kingdom is coming, being built even now. Not a time for building paneled houses for ourselves. Time to “Go up into the hill country; bring timber, and build the house that I may take pleasure in it and receive my glory, says the LORD.”
Today the Passionists celebrate the feast of St. Vincent Strambi, CP (1745-1824). In his early years as a Passionist priest Strambi was a well known preacher, writer and spiritual director. He was a close associate of St. Paul of the Cross and wrote his biography after his death.
He was chosen to be bishop of Marcerata during tumultuous years in Italian history when Napoleon moved to take over Italy, the papacy and the Catholic Church. Strambi was an heroic supporter of the pope and fought for the freedom of the church.
To understand most saints you have to understand the times in which they lived. They’re antidotes for the poison of their time. Unfortunately historians pay little notice to the challenging times Vincent Strambi lived in.
In 1789, following the French Revolution, a Reign of Terror struck the church in France, religious orders were suppressed, priests and religious were imprisoned, exiled, put to death. Word of the terror quickly reached Italy and Rome; the defenseless Italian peninsula would be the next target for France’s fierce revolution.
Pope Pius VI asked for prayers that Rome be spared, and he called on Vincent Strambi, then one of the church’s best preachers, to prepare the people for a blow sure to come. In packed churches and piazzas in Rome Strambi promised that God would not abandon his people. The Roman people gained strength from his words.
In 1796 Napoleon Bonaparte turned to Italy, demanding heavy tribute from the Pope and the Papal States. The murder of the French General Duhot in Rome gave him the pretext for invading the city, deposing and imprisoning the pope and declaring the Papal States a Republic.
Religious houses were suppressed, their goods systematically confiscated. Strambi, a well-known opposition figure, fled to Monte Argentario, a Passionist sanctuary on the Mediterranean Sea.
In 1799 Pius VI died in exile and was succeeded by Pius VII who, in 1801, appointed Strambi bishop of Macerata and Tolentino, two important cities in the Papal States along Italy’s Adriatic coast, poverty-stricken from years of political and military turmoil.
The bishops of the Papal States were largely responsible for temporal as well as spiritual affairs and Bishop Strambi became a champion of the poor in his diocese. He lived sparingly himself, without signs of wealth or position. The poor were constantly on his mind. “Don’t you hear the cries of the poor?” he said one day to the treasurer of his seminary, looking out his window.
The education of poor children interested him especially and he urged his priests to care for them. In sermons he constantly looked to the Passion of Jesus for wisdom in the struggles of the time. His devotion to the Precious Blood of Jesus was influenced, at least in part, from reflection on the bloodshed the Napoleonic Wars brought to millions in Europe. Almost 4 million died as warfare rose to a level never seen before. Their blood was precious to God.
On May 5, 1809, after occupying Rome and most of the Papal States. Napoleon declared the region under French control and the temporal power of the pope abrogated. On June 6, 1809 Pius VII placed notices on church doors throughout Rome excommunicating anyone cooperating with the French. July 6, the French general Radet arrested the pope and brought him north to Savona.
Napoleon then demanded bishops sign an oath of loyalty to his new government. Refusal meant exile and imprisonment, signing was an act of disloyalty to the pope.
“I am ready for prison and for death. I am with the pope,” Strambi declared. On September 28,1808 he left his diocese under guard for northern Italy where he remained for 5 years under house arrest.
After Napoleon’s defeat in 1814 the church’s exiled leaders returned. Bishop Strambi returned to his diocese in May, 1814; immediately the pope asked him to come to Rome to preach a nine day “retreat of reconciliation” in late July and early August. Not all met the French invasion heroically.
In 1816 a typhoid epidemic followed invading armies. Food shortages and inflation spread through the bishop’s diocese. He opened hospitals for the dying and sought supplies for his suffering flock.
Physically frail from birth, Bishop Strambi became increasingly ill and found it harder to manage his diocese. By 1814, the world too had changed. The Papal States had no bishops in the long chaotic period of the Napoleonic invasion and new forces demanding change came to power. Strambi recognized it was too much for him.
In 1823 he asked the new pope, Leo XII, to allow him to retire. The pope accepted his resignation on one condition, that he come and live with him as an advisor in the Quirinal Palace, then the pope’s residence in Rome. A local commentator said of the departing bishop: “ He was a man who lived a holy life, giving alms to all and content with only the necessary for himself. We are sorry to see him go, for we lose a good pastor. The cries of the poor are especially loud, for they lose one who cared for and sustained them.”
Vincent died in Rome on January 1, 1824, having offered his life to the Lord in place of that of the pope who was seriously ill.
Pope Leo ordered the process for his canonization 8 days after his death. He was declared a Saint in 1950 and his relics now rest in Macerata, the city where he was a zealous pastor for twenty-two years.
St. Vincent Strambi’s room, Saints John and Paul Monastery, Rome
With the help of the Holy Spiirt, I on my part will do all I can that the living image of Jesus crucified be imprinted in the hearts of each of you. I do this gladly, not counting the cost. I consider myself fortunate to give my lifeblood so that Christ might be formed in you. I can say, like the apostle, that because of my love for you, I want to share with you “not only God’s message, but our very lives, so dear have you have become to us.”
I urge you, then, to look attentively on the Image of the Crucified, the bishop of your souls, on his throne of grace. In that way I shall fulfill my obligation to announce to you the death of the Lord, an obligation arising from my profession in the Congregation of the Holy Cross and Passion of our Lord Jesus Christ. I shall do all I can to urge you all to fulfill your duty to love him who first loved us, who offered himself on the altar of the cross for us, who shed his blood for us.
( Letter to the people of Marcerata on becoming their bishop)
September 23 is the feast of Padre Pio, the Italian Capuchin friar and a popular saints of modern times. I would say he’s a saint who’s a catechism. He was a stigmatic, who carried the wounds of Christ in his body. Church officials were wary of him;investigation after investigation questioned his credibility, but ordinary people recognized his holiness. To them he was a striking sign of God’s presence in an ordinary human being. Padre Pio taught, not by a book, but by himself.
People were the first catechism. They still are. Where do our printed catechisms come from? They’re recent instruments for forming people in their faith. Martin Luther was the first to compose a catechism in question and answers for ordinary people in the 15th century. In response to Luther, the Dutch Jesuit Peter Canisius composed the first Catholic catechism in 1555 followed by three others afterwards. The Council of Trent directed a catechism be written as a resource for the clergy and that appeared in 1556. Robert Bellarmine later composed an important catechism requested by Pope Clement VIII and after that bishops from all over the world composed catechisms for their people. I can still recite questions and answers from the Baltimore Catechism of my youth.
In earlier times, catechesis was done without relying on catechisms, through preaching, sacraments, the feasts and seasons of the year, and popular piety. People, like Padre Pio, are the most important catechism.
The Second Vatican Council changed the language of the liturgy from latin to the language of the people and revised the liturgical prayers and rites that they better serve as catechesis. Some today want to maintain the primacy of the catechism in catechesis but, while they’re still important, we need to catechize more through the liturgy, sacraments, feasts and seasons, and popular piety. It’s a task of the Second Vatican Council remaining to be done.
Don’t forget people.
In 2006 the bishops of the USA published the United States Catholic Catechism for Adults, which interspersed stories of saints and others as examples of the faith expounded in the book. They were acknowledging what we all know: people are better catechisms than books.
As I see it, some today want to restore America as a Christian nation, which means create a judicial, educational and political system favoring Christianity and all its privileges. It also means limiting the rights of non-Christians already here and limiting others like them from entering our country. Is that a fair summary?
We’re reading this week from Ezra, Nehemiah and Haggai, writers from the Period of Restoration, when some Jews returned to Jerusalem from exile anxious to restore Judaism. (522-486 B.C.). Good readings for today.
Judea was no longer a Jewish province then, but a Persian province. Jewish kings no longer reigned there and the temple was in ruins. A large number of foreigners and some Jews who never went into exile resided in Judea and Jerusalem, and so idealistic returnees didn’t have a free hand.
The Prophet Haggai, who only spoke for a few months, in 520 BC, advised the returning exiles to accept the present government and the present situation. At the same time he exhorted the Jews who stayed in Jerusalem to get out of their “paneled mansions” and build the temple. The Messiah will come at a future time we do not know. Until then, continue to rebuild the temple. God will be present there whatever it looks like, Haggai said.
There’s no perfect time or place; God is present in imperfect times and places like ours. The temple and the church are never finished in time, they’re always being built.
Ezra insisted on faithfully reading the scriptures. The consistent reading of God’s word Ezra gave people the the wisdom they needed; otherwise they would fall for the wisdom of the day.
God gives us wisdom day by day. Search for it.
Nehemiah was the brick and mortar figure of the Restoration, the practical person. Perfect buildings and the perfect places don’t exist, he believed, but do what you can day by day. Keep building.
The building of the Temple at the time of Ezra and Nehemiah is associated with the celebration of the Feast of Booths, when the Jews lived in tents for 40 years during their journey through the desert.
We read from the Book of Ezra and the Prophet Haggai this week, two important sources describing the Restoration period in Jewish history,, when a small Jewish community returns to Judea around 520 after exile in Babylon, thanks to the Persian king Cyrus.
Jewish history, like Christian history afterwards, is not unrelated to our own experience as a church today. The restoration of the temple and its liturgy is a key task Ezra and Nehemiah undertakes. It was a key task undertaken by the Second Vatican Council.
This week’s readings from Luke’s gospel are from chapters 8-9, part of Jesus’ Galilean ministry, which prepares his disciples for his great journey to Jerusalem.
Padre Pio is remembered on Tuesday, The Passionist bishop, Vincent Strambi is remembered on Wednesday, September 24. Vincent De Paul on Saturday.
The founders of churches throughout the world have an important place in our church calendar, because they did what Jesus commanded: “Go out to the whole world and preach the gospel, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.” (Matthew 25 )
Church founders are apostles like Peter and Paul, founders of the church in Rome, (June 29), or monk-bishops like Boniface, founder of the church of the Germanic peoples, (June 5), Patrick, founder of the church in Ireland, (March 17) Ansgar, founder of the church in Scandanavia, (February 3), Cyril and Methodius, founders of the church in the Slavic nations (February14).
The church in Korea, whose founding we celebrate today, can be traced back to the 17th century. Its foundation is special, as Pope John Paul II noted at the canonization of the Korean Martyrs, May 6, 1984:
“The Korean Church is unique because it was founded entirely by laypeople. This fledgling Church, so young and yet so strong in faith, withstood wave after wave of fierce persecution. Thus, in less than a century, it could boast of 10,000 martyrs. The death of these many martyrs became the leaven of the Church and led to today’s splendid flowering of the Church in Korea. Even today their undying spirit sustains the Christians of the Church of Silence in the north of this tragically divided land.” – Pope John Paul II at the canonization of the Korean Martyrs, May 6, 1984.
A priest, Andrew Kim Taegon and a layman Paul Chong Hasang, head the list of 103 martyrs canonized in 1984, but the early Korean church was from the first a church of laypeople. Decades before those celebrated today, it was without priests or bishops. All lay people, they kept faith alive at great cost and offered it to others.
By its nature, the Catholic Church draws from its member churches the gifts God has given them. The church is the body of Christ. May our churches today, old and new, be blessed with lay people like those who founded the church in Korea.
The Second Vatican Council, 60 years or so ago, called for increasing the role of the laity in the Catholic Church. It seems to me that goal has still to be met, at least in my country.
“Once again, Jesus sends lay people into every town and place where he will come (cf.Luke 10:1) so that they may show that they are co-workers in the various forms and modes of the one apostolate of the Church, which must be constantly adapted to the new needs of our times. Ever productive as they should be in the work of the Lord, they know that their labor in him is not in vain (cf. 1 Cor.15:58).” (Decree on Laity, 33)
O God, who have been pleased to increase your adopted children in all the world, and who made the blood of the Martyrs Saint Andrew Kim Tae-gǒn and his companions a most fruitful seed of Christians, grant that we may be defended by their help and profit always from their example.Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, God, for ever and ever.Amen.
I like the way psalms say it all. “Rejoice in the Lord, you just!” one psalm says. No need to make a prayer up on your own or think hard about saying something to God. Let the psalms help you. “Rejoice in the Lord, you just!”
“Let the earth rejoice in God, our king.” Why not join the earth praying? The “many isles are glad.” Be glad with them. The psalms call you to creation. They’re good prayers for the Season of Creation.
The psalms still our souls and draw them into the quiet grace of God’s presence. We think everything depends on us. No, it doesn’t. God “melts the mountains like wax” and “guards the lives of his faithful ones.” We think we have to know everything. No, we don’t. But God does.
The psalms draw us closer to God. They feed our minds and hearts, little by little. Their special grace is their simplicity as they tell us, for example, “rest in God as a child in a mother’s arms.”
Most of the psalms in our liturgy are songs of praise. “Praise the Lord, for the Lord is good.” Other psalms cry for help. Cry to the Lord, they say. “I cry to the Lord that he may hear me.”
The psalms call to a simple, deep prayer. Keep your eye on them in the liturgy of the Mass, Use them in your daily prayer. They’re wonderful basic prayers for everyone.
“Although the whole of Scripture breathes God’s grace upon us, this is especially true of that delightful book, the book of the psalms.” (St. Ambrose)
Every day the church meets the morning praying the psalms; every evening we end the day with these great prayers. A good way to pray always, as Jesus asks us to do.
A number of us reflect on the weekday lectionary readings each Monday morning. We share our reflections for about an hour after silently reading the scriptures for about 20 minutes. There’s a wisdom that comes from that kind of sharing.
Tuesday of this week we hear the tender story of Jesus raising the widow’s son. Monday was the Feast of the Our Lady of Sorrows. Someone wondered if Jesus was especially sensitive to the widow who lost her son, because he knew his own mother was likely to lose her Son.
It’s interesting the connections you make by reading the scriptures and feasts together over the week. Our reading for Thursday is Luke’s account of the sinful woman who stands behind Jesus in the Pharisee’s house, bathes his feet with her tears and anoints him with precious oil.
“Doesn’t he know who this woman is?” the Pharisee says to himself. “This woman has great love because she has been forgiven,” Jesus tells him. She knows the gift of mercy given her.
Jesus went through the towns and villages of Galilee with his disciples and women accompanied him, Luke writes, and names three: Mary Magdalene, who was delivered from seven devils, Joanna, the wife of Herod’s steward Cusa, and Susanna. Yes, many other women were with him, but those three are mentioned. Why those three? Were they influential women, big donors? Is that why they’re mentioned?
Or were they women like the one in the Pharisee’s house, Women who knew the great gift of mercy they were given?
As Jesus goes through Galilee his reception is mixed. Some are like little children in the marketplace, who won’t even look up from their games. (Wednesday)
Saturday’s reading describes the Sower casting seed on all kinds of soil, seeds of mercy and love. He casts seed in the house of the Pharisee, in the marketplace and on the soil of Galilee’s town’s and villages.
Readings from Luke’s 7th and 8th chapters this week sum up Jesus’ ministry in Galilee. We can see certain themes of Luke’s gospel in the readings.
Luke wants us to know that Jesus reached out to the gentiles even in his early ministry in Galilee, and so he relates the cure of the centurion’s slave -Monday’s reading. “I have not found faith like this in Israel,” Jesus says, praising the gentile centurion.
Luke then tells us Jesus raised the widow’s son to life-Tuesday’s reading. Jesus takes care of the poor.
On Wednesday we have Jesus’ short description of the reception he’s received from his generation. They are like children playing in the marketplace, so intent on their own games that they pay little attention to him. Does that also describe our generation today too? In the western world it seems Jesus himself, not just his church, is given scant attention. Jesus’ answer to John’s disciples, who ask if he is the one who is to come.The blind, the lame, the deaf are healed and the poor have the gospel preached to them, Jesus tells them.
On Friday, Luke offers an interesting picture of the followers of Jesus. As he journeys for one town to another some women, Mary Magdalene is most prominent among the, follow him and support him from their resources. Now only the twelve men, but women are his followers. Another theme of Luke’s gospel.
The feast of Our Mother of Sorrows is Monday. Saints Cornelius and Cyprian is Tuesday and the Martyrs of Korea Saturday. Even as the feasts of saints occur, it’s good to follow the gospels and see them in perspective.
The Victor's Place 