On Humility in Intercession

We all pray for our loved ones.  It's the most natural response to worry, especially when we're powerless to effect change in their situation that gives us pause.  Too, our first response to a frustrating situation is to ask for the obvious solution:

Dear Lord, please don't let Pat get laid off.

Please heal Sarah from her illness soon.

Please let Phil get into the grad program he so desperately wants to attend.

Please stop Julie's boss from blaming her unreasonably for the department's problems.

But this is not always the most efficacious prayer.  The Lord's ways are much more mysterious than ours; maybe Pat won't meet the person who connects him with his dream job unless he loses his current one.  Maybe Sarah's death will be the catalyst that draws her entire family back to God.  Maybe Phil needs to learn that failure is not the end of the world, and will get a better education at his backup school.  Maybe the extreme humility Julie is forced to learn in the face of injustice will come to play an invaluable role in making her a better mother to the children she will have five years down the road.

It's hard to see those we love suffer.  I gain much consolation these days from meditating on the Sorrowful Mysteries and the Stations of the Cross.  Our Lady was there, following along every step of the way.  She watched her son be wrongly accused, brutally beaten, humiliated in every possible way, and slowly - violently - murdered by the state.

I return frequently to the Fourth Station: Jesus Meets His Mother.  The two of them make eye contact as He's struggling along the road to Calvary.  What did her eyes say to Him?  The most noble and fitting explanation I've ever heard is that her eyes communicated love and encouragement: "You can do it!"  Certainly she shared His pain, and assuredly He knew that.  But to accept that you have to watch someone you love in pain and suffering, even when you know it's for the greater good, is one of the harder crosses to bear.

So lately, I've changed my prayers.  For those who are close to Our Lord, who might listen to Him in the face of crisis, I put aside my own desire for their immediate happiness.  I don't ask for an end to their oppression, just or unjust.  I don't ask for them to receive that which they feel (as do I) is owed to them.  Rather, I swallow my fears and ask for their sanctification in this particular situation.  May Joey's struggles in this class draw him nearer to You. May Harry and Denise's great desire for children in the face of infertility make them holier.  May Terri withstand the awful treatment her mother-in-law is giving her, and may it lead to both their sanctification.

It's a hard prayer, but one that Our Lady keeps reminding me is important.  This life is full of sorrows and suffering, and there really is no easy way out.  The purpose of this life is to draw close to God and to draw others close to Him.

Mater dolorosa, ora pro nobis.

Mater cruci corde affixa, ora pro nobis.

On the Population of Heaven

Most of us who attend Mass regularly have a few favorite priests, and possibly even friends who are priests.  When one of these priests is the celebrant (or, in some cases, even in the sanctuary), it brings me great joy, but also presents a great temptation.

See, it'd be so easy to get wrapped up in the prayer of the priest, and not the prayer of the Church - to go to Father Ed's Mass more for Father Ed than for Mass.  And I've seen this happen unintentionally countless times - whether Father's ars celebrandi causes people to refer to his Mass as "The Father Bill Show" or Father gets transferred and a quarter of the congregation moves with him (or stops coming)...

We're supposed to be more or less immune from that in the Roman Rite.  Our worship is liturgical and ought not to be based on the personality of the priest.  In fact, I try to take a step back and let the priest be Christ to me before he is Father Scott (doubly so because my knowledge of liturgical minutiae is so high).

But the via media is usually the best way, balance the key to solving the equation.  And sometimes reason cannot triumph over emotion; sometimes knowing the altar servers (and knowing how you experience God's love through them outside of Mass) does raise one's heart and mind to God just that little bit further.  The tension remains, however: how to keep focused on God with beloved people right in front of you?

Recently, I was at Mass with one such friend.  He sat in choir in the sanctuary; I, in the nave.  I had been managing to ignore him and focus on the sacred action, thankful for the statue that blocked him from my line of sight.  But at the Communion procession, such aids to prayer were gone, as my spot at the altar rail required me to look right over his head to gaze upon the tabernacle and crucifix.  I took a deep breath, hoping not to be too distracted.

And then it hit me: We know that heaven is populated (by saints, angels, and the Holy Trinity Himself).  And we hope to see our loved ones again in heaven.  The liturgy is heaven on earth.  Having friends who serve in the sanctuary is an even more perfect prefigurement of heaven, for heaven is populated by people we love.  Marriage does not exist in heaven; they say this is not because we will love our spouses any less, but rather because we will love everyone so much and more.

One ought not get caught up in Father Joe presiding or Deacon Bill preaching or little Johnny serving, but neither ought we meto ntally berate ourselves for caring who is there.  Allow the presence of our loved ones in the earthly sanctuary to lift us up to the heavenly sanctuary, where we will worship with those we have loved who've gone before.


Benedicite Angeli Domini Domino: laudate et superexaltate eum in saecula.
Benedicite caeli Domino: laudate et superexaltate eum in saecula...
Benedicite servi Domini Domino: laudate et superexaltate eum in saecula.

Our Lady of Sorrows

Let us adore Christ, the Savior of the world, who called his mother to share in his passion.

I've yet to meet a photograph that captures the grandeur of this statue, found in St Lucy Church back home in Newark, but here is the one place where I can stand before Our Lady and simply let my heart be moved.  Here she is a beautiful queen in mourning, with simultaneous sorrow and hope in her eyes.  May we all be blessed with such hope in God amid our sorrows.

Sancta Mater, istud agas,
crucifixi fige plagas
cordi meo valide.

On the Exaltation of the Holy Cross

There is something about the crux gemmata that has always captivated me.  The cross, this instrument of torture , has become for us the vehicle of salvation (and so much more)!  That's probably part of why the Anglo-Saxon poem Dream of the Rood has been a favorite of mine ever since I first discovered its existence in high school.  I reread it every year on today's feast.

     Listen! The choicest of visions I wish to tell,

     which came as a dream in middle-night,

     after voice-bearers lay at rest.

     It seemed that I saw a most wondrous tree

     born aloft, wound round by light,

     brightest of beams. All was that beacon

     sprinkled with gold. Gems stood

     fair at earth's corners; there likewise five

     shone on the shoulder-span. All there beheld the Angel of God,

     fair through predestiny. Indeed, that was no wicked one's gallows,

     but holy souls beheld it there,

     men over earth, and all this great creation.

     Wondrous that victory-beam--and I stained with sins,

     with wounds of disgrace. I saw glory's tree

     honored with trappings, shining with joys,

     decked with gold; gems had

     wrapped that forest tree worthily round...

That's just the preview.  Go read the whole thing for yourself; it's tiny for an epic poem, and entirely worth your while...



[Translation credit to Jonathan A. Glenn, University of Central Arkansas]

Hymn for the Nativity of Mary

Today is the feast of the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary.  Below is the hymn prescribed by the Church for Lauds (Morning Prayer) in the OF.  English translation from the Mundelein Psalter.

O Mary, Mistress of the world,
And Queen of heaven's blissful court,
O gleaming Star of life's wide sea,
And Virgin Mother, pure as snow.

To our poor earth, fair daughter, come,
In all your virgin glory, shine,
For you will bear most noble Flow'r,
When God the Son comes down as man.

Your birth from David's chosen stem,
We venerate with joy this day
You form our hope of Light to come,
To gladden and relieve our woe.

We dwell on earth, but through your prayer
Access to heaven we can win,
Once ransomed by the sacrifice
Of Christ your Son in which we share.

For ever glory and all praise
Be rendered to the Trinity,
Who gave to you a mother's place
Within the Church in name and grace. Amen.

On the Liturgy of the Hours: A Reflection

I have a long and storied history with the Liturgy of the Hours.  Okay, I exaggerate somewhat, but I've been praying the Office with varying degrees of consistency since I was eighteen, so I do have some ground to stand on here.  (Besides, you all know that brevity is not my strong suit!)

I first learned how to pray the breviary by attending Morning Prayer with the guys in the Pre-Theologate (i.e., Minor Seminary) program my freshman year of college, after the guys convinced me that it was open to anyone and I ought to come because Morning Prayer was awesome.  I quickly came to appreciate the beauty of praying the psalms in union with the whole Church, and ended the year by borrowing a spare breviary from my spiritual director.  I prayed Morning and Evening Prayer (Lauds and Vespers) just about every weekday that summer.

When I studied in Austria, we prayed Lauds and Vespers in common (often chanted), which drew between 10 and 50 students, on average.  I quickly realized that my class schedule was set up such that I could easily step away and pray each of the three daytime hours in between, and even while I was traveling, it was with friends who prayed similarly, so I was praying the full Office (5 to 7 hours* each day).

Upon returning to the States, my prayer life shifted again, and I returned to praying Lauds and Vespers on my own daily.  After a year or more, though the Office still held a special place in my heart, it was no longer my bread and butter.  I still went out of my way to pray the principal hours (Lauds and Vespers) on feasts, and sometimes also the Office of Readings (because those readings are generally awesome), but it was indeed going out of my way; it had become something that was not part of my routine.

When I moved home after college, I knew I needed structure, and so I picked up praying at least Lauds every morning.  However, I also decided to place myself ad experimentum in the liturgy, calendar, and spirituality of the Extraordinary Form of the Mass, taking advantage of the gap year I anticipated to learn a new (to me) type of prayer more deeply.  After a few months, the divergence between the two calendars became too much, and I put away my breviaries.**

It should come as little surprise, then, that one of the first papers I wrote in graduate school was about this divergence between the calendars, which had caused me so much pain the year before.  (I may be oversensitive, but there's clear disunity within the Roman Rite here, so I stand firm.)  Part of my program here at the Liturgical Institute is that we pray Lauds and Vespers together every weekday, and Mass in common weekly (both daily during the summer).  So, in order to reap more fully the benefits of studying here, I made the obvious decision: to pray with my classmates and our professors and staff members (rather than continuing my previous foray into the EF).  Too, my studies have reminded me that "liturgy" doesn't just mean Mass, nor even Mass and Sacraments, but includes the Divine Office, which is something that I, a layperson, consistently forget...

* * *

I've been traveling a lot lately.  I don't know about you, but when I travel, my prayer life suffers.  Sometimes it's because I lack the privacy I need to pray; sometimes it's because I'm so busy going and going and going that I don't find the time to do more than raise my heart to Our Lord throughout the day.  I know this is good and can be enough, if that's all I have, but it's disorienting at best to return from a trip and have your spiritual life all thrown out of whack (especially if you've been traveling over the weekend of a feast and you feel like you've missed the feast).

This past week, my travels have often involved seminarian friends, some of whom are transitional deacons (i.e., clerics who are canonically obliged to pray the Office).  On such occasions, it's quite common to receive a question like, "Have you prayed Morning Prayer yet?" or sometimes simply "D'you mind if I pray my Office?"  Each time, the gentleman (or -men) in question has prayed the psalms aloud, and I've prayed along by listening – really listening – to his words (to His Word, really).

And I've been struck by the beauty of it all: the radiance of God's Word as revealed in these particular prayers; the universality of uniting my heart in these same Scriptures that are being prayed throughout the world; the brilliant anchor that is the Liturgy of the Hours, keeping the pray-er rooted in God's time, even when his normal routine is shot to pieces.

There are so many reasons to be thankful for the gift of the Divine Office.  Presently, I am thankful for the reminder that, as a single layperson (doubly so as a student), I can take the time to pray at least the five canonical hours of the Office.  Praying the principal hours as I've been doing this past year has borne fruit, I'm sure, but nothing I can clearly see.  I remember clearly how the Office used to be not merely the backbone of my spiritual life but its entire skeleton, and I can see hints of that in some of the clergy around me - and it's beautiful, and I want that.

It's only been a few days yet that I've been praying the full Office, but it has been a wonderful source of stability and consolation.  As Fr Martis often says, the Liturgy shares her treasures with those who sit with her and wait.  I hope and pray that my commitment to pray all the hours for the coming months serves to be vehicle for such revelations.

May the Lord bless us, protect us from all evil, and bring us to everlasting life.

*When I refer to an "hour" here, it does not mean that I spent 60 minutes in a chapel; rather, it signifies my completion of a particular set of psalms and prayers.  The Liturgy of the Hours (aka the Divine Office) is prayed from a book called a breviary, and contains the hours of Matins (Office of Readings), Lauds (Morning Prayer), Terce (Midmorning Prayer), Sext (Midday Prayer), None (Midafternoon Prayer), Vespers (Evening Prayer), and Compline (Night Prayer).  Only one of the three midday hours ("little hours") is required for those who have promised to pray the Liturgy of the Hours.

**Yes, I did consider purchasing a traddy breviary in English, but I knew I was going to have to put it aside in graduate school, so I decided to wait.

On "Maximum Personality"

Human nature was made with the capacity to participate freely and willingly in a process of growing into the likeness of God. Created in the image of God, a human person also lives by relationship, and this provides for maximum individuality. God planned beings who could attain maximum personality.

-David Fagerberg, Theologia Prima, p24

Maximum personality. What a phrase! And situated so, as a gift one attains through relationship. As the persons of the Holy Trinity are eternally in relationship with each other, so are each of us called to relationship with those around us, to love those around us as the Trinity loves.  It is through these relationships - as well as through our relationship with God, of course - that we are principally to achieve holiness.

We know this from many theologians. But look at Fagerberg's last phrase there: to attain maximum personality. Through relationship, we achieve holiness; through relationship, we achieve maximum personality. The holier we become, the more we become truly ourselves? the more our own unique personality shines out?

Perhaps this is why so many saints and holy people are and have been such eccentric folks with habits strange and delightful.  Now that's a model of life I could strive for!

O Jesus, meek and humble of Heart, make my heart like unto Thine.

On Traveling, Friendship, and Prayer

Between class sessions this summer, I've been doing a lot of visiting of friends, especially of friends I haven't seen in a year or more.  While I have been blessed this year with many truly delightful new friends, there remains something golden about old friends who have known you for years and yet keep you around.  Too, while I've long been perfectly comfortable keeping touch via the phone and internet, it is always upon seeing people that I am reminded how much of their uniqueness is embodied in a way that simply cannot be communicated over great distances.  In these times, I take a deep joy in simply being with my loved ones, in resting in their presence.  Sure, it's great fun to go places and do things, to see their various cities and the places important to their lives, but doing is always, always secondary to being.  It is because of being with them that I return from a visit rejuvenated.

One of my classmates finds it consistently shocking that I am taking a silent retreat next week.  She just cannot fathom an entire week of Claire not talking (Admittedly, this is something that's not been done before)!  I laugh when she points this out, and smile quietly.  The truth is that I am deeply delighted to have the opportunity to simply rest in the presence of my Lord and my God, Who knows me most thoroughly and has since before I was born.

Too, as I rest in His Heart, He will fill mine, in which place each of you has an abode.  I pray that my week of rest with Him might spill over into each of your lives, and bring with it that peace which surpasses all understanding.

Jesus, meek and humble of Heart, make our hearts like unto Thine.

This Blog Is Not Dead!

For what it's worth: I have not forgotten about this blog.  It's just that summer courses have been a little bit completely insane.  But rest assured: I will return!

[PS - Thanks to those of you who have encouraged me to continue.  I do appreciate it.]

The Difference Between Men and Women: A Memory

I am in the throes of finals right now, so naturally my mind thinks back to completely unrelated incidents in college.

In all the dorms at Steubenville, the RAs would wander around before they went off duty and bless all the doors in the building with holy water, as well as any students still up studying or socializing.

If we were in a girls' dorm when it was this time, the RA would poke her head in the door and ask, "Would you like a blessing?"  If we said yes, she'd come in, dip her thumb in holy water, and trace the sign of the cross on our foreheads.  (She'd then, of course, remind us that our male guest had to leave shortly.)

If you were in a guys' dorm when the RA was doing his rounds, he'd poke his head in and ask if we wanted a blessing.  If we said yes, he'd take the holy water bottle and shake it at us, sprinkling us liberally with holy water, before reminding us that the ladies had to leave the building very soon thereafter.

The differences between men and women.  Love it!

On Sacrificing the Latin Language

Clearly the most noticeable new departure is that of language. From now on the vernacular, not Latin, will be the principal language of the Mass. For those who appreciate the beauty of Latin, its power and aptness to express the sacred, substitution of the vernacular certainly represents a great sacrifice. We are losing the idiom of the Christian ages; we become like profane intruders into the literary sanctuary of sacred language; we shall lose a large portion of that wonderful and incomparable, artistic and spiritual reality, Gregorian chant. We indeed have reason for sadness and perhaps even for bewilderment. What shall we put in the place of this angelic language? We are sacrificing a priceless treasure. For what reason? What is worth more than these sublime values of the Church? The answer may seem trite and prosaic, but it is sound because it is both human and apostolic. Our understanding of prayer is worth more than the previous, ancient garments in which it has been regally clad. Of more value, too, is the participation of the people, of  modern people who are surrounded by clear, intelligible language, translatable into their ordinary conversation. If our sacred Latin should, like a thick curtain, close us off from the world of children and young people, of work and the business of everyday, then would we, fishers of men, be wise to allow it exclusive dominion over the speech of religion and prayer?

-Pope Paul VI, Address to a general audience, on the new Ordo Missae, 26 November 1969.
ICEL, Documents on the Liturgy 1963-1979: Conciliar, Papal, and Curial Texts, par 1762.

It's no secret that I like Latin.  The language is beautiful to hear spoken or sung, and the process of hearing beautiful sounds and simultaneously reading a profound text (with full knowledge of their unity) has deeply impacted my own spiritual life, powerfully lifting me up into the prayer of the Church.

But the academic position I inhabit as a student and hopeful scholar of the Roman liturgy requires that I take a step back from my personal preferences and experiences (thought without discounting them entirely) and look more objectively at the nature of the liturgy, which is derived from the twofold purpose of the liturgy: the glorification of God and the sanctification of man (SC 112).

There is no question that through the Latin language, a principal element in the patrimony of the Church, God is glorified; the question is only to what degree modern man is sanctified or deterred from sanctity through the Latin language.  That phrases the question a bit harshly, yet it does point to where the liturgical reformers were looking: which is more important, the preservation of this beautiful element of our tradition or the salvation of souls?

Naturally, the response is a both-and, just like everything else in our lives.  But in the absence of an opportunity to formally study this question (classwork really puts a damper on my thesis research), Our Lord has placed in my life experiences that have helped me to understand what I once experienced as "the other side."

When Latin acts as a roadblock to participation, it seems to usually boil down to one of two reasons: The first is psychological blocks.  Often times, people have difficulty processing a foreign language, are unable to concentrate when they don't understand the words being spoken, are scarred by childhood experiences connected to the Latin language or liturgy, or simply feel excluded by the language barrier.  These things are difficult to change.  In other cases, however, the primary element that is lacking is simply proper handouts.

Intelligent participation in the liturgical action requires that one know what is going on.  This really hits home to me whenever I leave my missal at home, or there is a special procession with extra prayers.  I find myself sitting or standing with everyone else, intending for Our Lord to heed the prayer of the priest, for I trust in its beauty and efficacy, and yet filled with strong feelings of resentment and exclusion.  I ought to be able to pray these prayers!  But without knowing any of their content, I am truly up the creek without a paddle.  I know that I will be guided to shore eventually, but I am entirely unable to propel myself down the river - and when that contemplative propulsion is what God asks of us (unless we are reasonably impeded), does it not make sense to provide those oars to our people wherever possible?

When I happened upon this quote from Pope Paul VI, I was struck by how closely it mirrored my own sentiments.  Our Latin legacy is truly a treasure, one that cannot be lost.  Still, it does seem that the majority of people are brought to a place where they are able to insert their hearts into the worship of God more easily and more fully when the liturgical rites are in their native tongue.  Who am I to deny them that privilege when Holy Mother Church has so graciously (and so humbly) allowed it?

Spiritus sapientiae et intellectus, miserere nobis.

On Liturgical Jansenism

This quarter has been different for me.  Rather than delving deeply into subjects I knew only a bit about (as most of my previous classes here have been), each class has been either an articulation of principles I already knew but couldn't express well or an introduction to a whole new branch of theology.  Consequently, I've had far fewer "Aha!" moments that've brought me here (as you may have noticed).

Often people ask me whether I regret learning so much about the liturgy, because it's so beautiful when it's done well, which it so rarely is.  My answer is always no.

Some of you have been around while I was falling in love with the traditional Latin liturgy.  Some of you can remember me simply delighting in its complex simplicity, in its detailed fidelity.  I did not seek out the TLM as an escape from abuse-filled novus ordos; rather, the attractive power of that tradition proved so compelling that I couldn't stay away.

Fast forward a bit.  Here I am, as I've detailed a hundred times, surrounded by people with a deep knowledge of (and great love for) the traditions of the Church, who yet prefer the novus ordo.  And while I can and do spend many Sundays at the local EF parish, I also have the rare opportunity of having in the area numerous OF Masses that range from pretty good to excellent.  In short: I haven't had this much quality time with the OF since before I discovered the EF nearly three years ago.

And I find that I can pray the OF pretty well.  At these, too, my heart is united with that of my Lord and Savior; His Eucharistic Heart that I receive is the same in both forms of Holy Mass.  The abuses are different from place to place; I learn to block them out and step forward in faith.  I am an adaptable person; Our Lord will conform me to Him no matter where I end up.

But I've learned just enough for there to be a disconnect.  I could be quite content (if I had to) living in the OF as it is for the rest of my life, leaving behind all those beauties that I found in the EF.  But in order to do so, I would have to just write off my doubts, my criticisms, my confusions.  The Scripture readings at Mass are very beautiful - but now that I know the extent to which the centuries-old cycle of readings was ignored in its compilation, I find myself unable to respect the Lectionary quite as fully as I once did.

Part of me is perfectly willing to just flip the switch and disconnect that part of my brain that causes this trouble, that has doubts where the logical progression of things is not straightforward.  But our faith is a rational one, and as our liturgy is a manifestation of our faith (to say the least), oughtn't it, too, be rational?

No, we oughtn't have liturgy without reason, and doubly so for me, a student of the liturgy!  No one ought to have to turn off their brain so as to be able to manage with what is given them, though they know something doesn't seem to add up (I've seen this on both sides of the OF/EF debate, by the way).  There is a rift in my perception of the whole, and since I have the luxury of examining that rift, I must refrain from the temptation to walk away from it to the solid ground on one side or the other (for if I stay where it's safe, who will benefit from my education?).

Sanguis Christi, levamen laborantium, salva nos.