Who Do You Say I Am?

I found myself arguing with Father DeSalvo quite unintentionally last night when he spoke about Jesus really being born in March and 6 April as the actual date of easter. I did not realize how reactive I had become toward "news" about the historical Jesus. I was greatly impressed as a late teen reading Jesus: An Experiment in Christology with historical criticism of scripture, accepting (like many others) that new truth was being revealed about Jesus. However, as I became exposed to the Third Wave through E.P. Sanders in the 1980s, I began to realize that this "news" was more polemic than history ("In the end, one no longer learns what the text says, but what it should have said, and by which component parts this can be traced back through the text.").

One example is the idea that is pertinent to the tension between West and East: the Pharisees were very "external" in their religion and that Jesus had come to replace that "external religion" with "I will put My law within them and on their heart I will write it". I adopted that belief as historical, although others had challenged that, too, as polemical, but I found it too convenient to ignore.

Now I find brilliant exegesis on the subject and I am humbled, yet again. Now the "head" is not the hypocrital enemy of the "heart". Once, again, they meet at the cross.

"Jesus did not act as a liberal reformer recommending and himself presenting a more understanding interpretation of the law. In Jesus' exchange with the Jewish authorities of his time, we are not dealing with a confrontation between a liberal reformer and an ossified traditionalist hierarchy. Such a view, though common, fundamentally misunderstands the conflict of the New Testament and does justice neither to Jesus nor to Israel. Rather Jesus opened up the law quite theologically conscious of, and claiming to be, acting as Son, with the authority of God himself, in innermost unity with God, the Father. Only God himself could fundamentally reinterpret the law and manifest that its broadening transformation and conservation is its actually intended meaning. Jesus' interpretation of the law makes sense only if it is interpretation with divine authority, if God interprets himself. The quarrel between Jesus and the Jewish authorities of his time is finally not a matter of this or that particular infringement of the law but rather of Jesus' claim to act "ex auctoritate divina," indeed, to be this "auctoritas" himself. "I and the Father are one" (Jn. 10:30).

Only when one penetrates to this point can he also see the tragic depth of the conflict. On the one hand, Jesus broadened the law, wanted to open it up, not as a liberal reformer, not out of a lesser loyalty to the law, but in strictest obedience to its fulfillment, out of his being one with the Father in whom alone law and promise are one and in whom Israel could become blessing and salvation for the nations. On the other hand, Israel "had to" see here something much more serious than a violation of this or that commandment, namely, the injuring of that basic obedience, of the actual core of its revelation and faith: Hear, O Israel, your God is one God. Here obedience and obedience clash, leading to the conflict which had to end on the cross. Reconciliation and separation appear thus to be tied up in a virtually insolvable paradox.

In the catechism's theology of the New Testament the cross cannot simply be viewed as an accident which actually could have been avoided nor as the sin of Israel with which Israel becomes eternally stained in contrast to the pagans for whom the cross signifies redemption. In the New Testament there are not two effects of the cross: a damning one and a saving one, but only a single effect, which is saving and reconciling."
(Cardinal Ratzinger, Reconciling Gospel And Torah: The Catechism, Section 3, 1 April 1996)

If Anyone Desires To Come After Me

At a meeting this past weekend, I heard Father Maximos emphasize that monastics are lay people giving radical witness to their baptismal vows. I was surprised by this statement. I've often heard John Michael refer to St. John Chysostom's teaching that all people, included those married, are called to a monasic life: "What then are these things [labors, readings, watchings through the night, fastings] to us (one says) who are not monastics? Sayest thou this to me? Say it to Paul, when he says, "Watching with all perseverance and supplication" (Eph. vi. 18), when he says, "Make not provision for the flesh, to fulfill the lusts thereof." (Rom. xiii. 14.) For surely he wrote not these things to solitaries only, but to all that are in cities. For ought the man who lives in the world to have any advantage over the solitary, save only the living with a wife? In this point he has allowance, but in others none, but it is his duty to do all things equally with the solitary[Hom. in Epist. ad Haeb., 7, 41.] Homily VII on the letter to the Hebrews.

Now, I find "The Western Church has canonized monasticism and the lay state as two forms of life. One corresponds to the “counsels,” the other to the “precepts” of the Gospel. . . . The essentially homogenous character of Eastern Church spirituality ignores the difference between the “precepts” and the “evangelical counsels". It is in its total demands that the Gospel addresses itself to everyone, everywhere.“When Christ,” says St. John Chrysostom, “orders us to follow the narrow path, he addresses himself to all. The monastics and the lay person must attain the same heights.” [Epist. ad Haeb., 7, 4; 7, 41 Adv. oppugn. vitae monast., 3, 14.] "

This "homogenous character" is surprising to me. I once got a stern lecture from a good monk when I stated that there was no difference between the two of us as Christians (I was thinking of the "precepts" at the time; he emphasized the "counsels"). The "Eastern Church spirituality" certainly leaves me disoriented, not because I'm in disagreement but because I have to shift my world to the more primitive monasticism I've only read about and am now encountering. The odd thing is that I already knew these things intellectually; it's just that the reality of the difference between us was only our "dress" really smacked me upside the head.

I am the Vine and You Are the Branches

I just read an excellent post on Pontifications the text of "Petrine Offices and Particular Churches" by Henri Lubac, S.J. , on Collegiality and the Petrine Office. I love the image Lubac gives of the collegiality as the connection of the Bishops to the Universal Church, with the Pope communicating the essence of this collegiality. I'm so accustomed to reading about collegiality as a concept opposing the Petrine office. This makes much more sense: the Church as one organismic whole, each Bishop revealing the Truth from the Church to his diocese, and the Pope making conscious the Truth of the whole through his Teaching. This reminds me of the Jungian concept of the "collective unconscious" and the idea that an individual could focus it and communicate it. Thus, the Pope is not some elected leader promulgating his platform; he collects and reflects the Truth back to the Church through the Bishops. An interesting point of Lubac's is that the Bishops that ignore the Pope's teachings are disconnecting their diocese from the heart of the Church. Breathtaking!

Anarchical Freedom and the Loss of Mystery

I have been reading the Pope's work from 1996: Truth and Freedom. It contains an explanation of his term "anarchical freedom" which he used recently referring to relationships outside of marriage in Christ. He is wrestling with the very heart of the Enlightenment and secular relativism from a perspective that is new to me. Yes, I understand that the Enlightenment required the banishment of the possibility of mystery. This was necessary for the enthronement of reason and the progress of science and technology by simplifying our view of the world.

In limiting our world view to reduce complexity, however,we also constricted our perceptual fields to our selves (I no longer think because I exist; I exist because I think). This limitation was not a one-time event but a steady march of "progress", as we simplified steadily and relentlessly what we allowed as "real". The benefit was that we developed a power-full model of the material world. The cost was that we became more and more unable to perceive the Truth. The paradox, of course, is that this depravity made some people much more aware of Mystery (Carl Jung comes to mind) because those whose perceptual fields were less limited noticed that others were missing something!

The Pope points out that now we have so simplified our world view that we have excluded the Truth and, thus, find ourselves bewildered. Like Alice in Wonderland, we are lost in anarchy, wanting to go somewhere and not caring where in particular, lost in a world with no reliable guides. This is the meaning of Anarchical Freedom. We find our way (as Lewis Carroll so curiously illustrates via the Chesire cat) by encountering Mystery. However, we have to put up with apparent madness in this encounter as we extend our perceptual fields, opening ourselves progressively to the Truth. It is only through the Truth that we find the reliable external guides that bring us Freedom.

It seems that through our Enlightenment we have marched into Hell while searching for individual power and now must widen our perceptual fields (open our eyes) to Mystery so that wecan find the Truth and be free. Hmmm--sounds familiar.

Knowing God

I think that we spend an awful lot of time discussing God, theology, spirituality, etc. I have long grown weary of such speech and consider it a Gnostic fault of mine. I found this quote of St. Columbanus (6th Century Celtic Saint) that spoke so eloquently to that point. He was a monk in Ireland, who with 12 of his brothers, went to evangelize the Franks in Gaul in the late 6th century. My guess is that he too struggled with communicating the good news using words.


Who, I ask, will search out the Most High in his own being, for he is beyond words or understanding? Who will penetrate the secrets of God? Who will boast that he knows the infinite God, who fills all things, yet encompasses all things, who pervades all things, yet reaches beyond all things, who holds all things in his hand, yet escapes the grasp of all things? “No one has ever seen him as he is.”

No one must then presume to search for the unsearchable things of God: his nature, the manner of his existence, his selfhood. These are beyond telling, beyond scrutiny, beyond investigation. With simplicity, but also with fortitude, only believe that this is how God is and this is how he will be, for God is incapable of change.

Who then is God? He is Father, Son and Holy Spirit, one God. Do not look for any further answers concerning God. Those who want to understand the unfathomable depths of God must first consider the world of nature. Knowledge of the Trinity is rightly compared with the depth of the sea. Wisdom asks: “Who will find out what is so very deep?” As the depths of the sea are invisible to human sight, so the godhead of the Trinity is found to be beyond the grasp of human understanding.

If any one, I say, wants to know what you should believe, you must not imagine that you understand better through speech than through belief; the knowledge of God that you seek will be all the further off than it was before.

Seek then the highest wisdom, not by arguments in words but by the perfection of your heart, not by speech but by the faith that comes from simplicity of heart, not from the learned speculations of the unrighteous.

If you search by means of discussions for the God who cannot be defined in words, he will depart further from you than he was before. If you search for him by faith, wisdom will stand where wisdom lives, “at the gates.” Where wisdom is, wisdom will be seen, at least in part.

But wisdom is also to some extent truly attained when the invisible God is the object of faith, in a way beyond our understanding, for we must believe in God, invisible as he is, though he is partially seen by a heart that is pure.

St Columbanus

Via Dolorosa

I've been thinking alot about the Way of Suffering. Not because I need any more, mind you. In fact, I'm usually appalled by those people who have to find artificial and arbitrary ways to suffer--you know, like kneeling on glass or something. I think of those people the same way I do of "cutters" (people who mutilate themselves by cutting their body to produce pain). They use the pain like any other distraction: their suffering is non-redemptive because it leads away from the Way of Suffering, not along it.

So what type of suffering is profitable, then? I think that metanoia requires suffering. Again, not that pain itself is somehow profitable. Instead, I believe that the change of the nous requires somes neurological changes that produce pain from the organismic level. As a therapist, I believe that we adapt to the crazy patchwork-quilt of conditional love that we encounter through our life, that we adapt in our bodies, including neurologically. Change at the organism level requires letting go of those adaptions that have shaped my internal tensions and neurological filters that "make" me "feel" safe. Thus, change leaves me anxious and hurting as I fear for my own survival: the more radical change, the more severe the pain.

I think this is why Jesus had to come to save me. I cannot change enough on my own, regardless of whatever method of "salvation" I choose, because I am too afraid of death. Jesus overcame the reality of death. He became human to provide a pathway for me to become divine (whoa, easy there) and he took on the pain of that transition, a pain I believe I could never handle. That's why I must join my miniscule suffering with that of Jesus, because he is the way and the vehicle out of my sin and suffering, a way I could never have traveled.

This makes me think of Francis' focus on the crucifixion. I used to find it macabre; now I believe that old Father Francis knew what he was doing. The more I join myself to (and allow myself to be joined with) the suffering and death of Jesus, the more I am freed to accept the divine life that is available to me, eternally. Not in a masochistic sense, though, since that way only increases the "sin"--the missing of the target. It just means that I embrace the Passion and the Cross because they are the only hope I have of escaping the pain that I have taken on in hope of feeling loved. So I seek those things that increase my "suffering"--the monastic ascetical practices that help sweep the house clean of distraction, for example--so that it becomes more radically like Jesus' suffering. Francis succeeded to the point of the stigmata, an incredible blessing when one looks at it through this lens.

Kinda makes me want to pray for more people "in" purgatory, since the whole concept focuses on purgation of what is "unclean" of me and in me.

Preach the gospel at all times. Use words if necessary

This very Franciscan saying (not attributed to Francis, though) describes a problem I've had all my life--when is it "necessary" to use words and are they all that helpful anyway. Ham used to speculate that writing was something we did for ourselves, helping one to focus and clarify one's thoughts. As a family systems therapist, I think of words as filling the "space" between actions and an attempt to manipulate others. As a communications therapist, I think that words are like arrows shot into the void--at best accidentally hitting some "target". Given that Francis spent much of his time in contemplative solitude in rude hermitages, I bet he didn't center his life on words.

Yet, Francis is known even secularly for his writings--among the first extant ones in the "Italian" vernacular. He used words to preach to the birds and the wolf as well as the people. Perhaps his speech was simply an integrated part of his actions, an unconscious action like lifting one's feet when running.

I think I am uncomfortable with words because they often do not point to mystery. They often appear vain, pointing to my intellectual vanities rather than to the glory of God. This gets paradoxical again--speak without "speaking", simply revealing. Perhaps words are okay as long as they are art, pointing to the golden shekinah that expands from the icons to fill the temple. Yes, that seems to fit: when they reveal God's presence they are golden and when they reveal my emptiness they are drab.

Uncertainty and Mystery

As I was watching and reverencing the elements of consecration during the Great Entrance of the Divine Liturgy on Sunday I suddenly was aware of the meaning of Heisenberg's Principle of Uncertainty. An odd thought, you may wonder, given the context. Actually, I was remembering a discussion with Dr. Hawksteeple as to exactly when the elements are transubstantiated. He had made the wonderful point that it was very Western to ask "when"; he offered the uncertainty that the transubstantiation could have "already" occurred by the epiclesis.

The problem is the paradox I create by trying to apply a (Western) filter of sequential time to an eternal event that is viewed through transubstantion. This is similar to the paradox Heisenberg uncovered, except he was thinking of location--that hitting an atomic particle with a photon (to "see" it) changes the position of the particle, so I can not be certain where it is even when I "see" it.

Part of my "breathing with both lungs" is learning to view the world in other ways than the Western way of locating things in four dimensions, which frees me to "see" the eternal in this world. I find this difficult because I don't like to feel uncertain about the world I construct around me--a poverty, no?

Eternal and Everlasting

The difference of emphasis between Eastern and Western Christianity can be seen in little things. For example, in the Western Rites we pray

Glory be to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Spirit,

as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end.

whereas in the Eastern Rites

Glory be to the Father + and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit,

now and ever, and forever.

It may seem a small thing, the difference between the last two phrases, yet it shows the difference in emphasis. The Western focus on beginning, present, and future, with its implicit notion of sequential time--everlasting life. The Eastern focus is on the now as it is across time, as we experience it in Heaven--eternal life. Both are important for Christians, as we contemplate God both incarnate in time and beyond time as a mystery.

O Heavenly King, Comforter, Spirit of Truth! You are everywhere present and fill all things. Treasury of Blessings and Giver of Life, come and dwell within us, cleanse us of all stain, and save our souls, O gracious Lord.

Primo unctio et postea

Yet another newbie blogger; this one is about the balance and tension between "Eastern" and "Western" Christianity; analytical and emotional mind; Occidental and Oriental; Mythos and Logos (but not "or"). How do we live in balance between the personal search for holiness as we encounter the mystical and yet receive the benefits of the shared wisdom of the Logos ("the kingdom of God is within/among us"). I am recently a Byzantine Rite Catholic, a long-time computer professional and licensed marriage and family therapist, as well as a "recovering" intellectual (not yet a "barrel rider", though).

I'm not interested in psycho- or theo-babble. This is hard work, staying in balance between spacious language and living the Gospel of Jesus. Right now I'm meditating on the motto "Primo unctio et postea speculatio" (First holiness, then learning), and the Franciscan ideal of learning. Francis was wary of the Universities and their appeal to the independent authority of "learning" (nice discussion of the medieval appeal to authority) that was pitted against the authority of the Church and the "Holy Roman Empire". He had been a participant himself in the bloody fruit of this struggle. He became more keen on taming Brother Ass, perhaps because he had realized the emptiness of "learning" outside of his relationship with God. How can we, besotted with books and webpages, stay on our via crucis while partaking of the experience of others?