Offering Ourselves

Here's a good quote from Fr Brendan Freeman in his book Come and See:

The Eucharist is a mystery and as such cannot be fully understood by reason alone; faith must supplement our reason. But there has to be something we understand about it, something to hold onto and practice. I believe that by washing his disciple’s feet, Jesus is telling us something about the mystery of the Eucharist, something easily understood, something as easily understood as, who is more privileged? The one who serves the table? Or the one who sits at the table and is served? What does this tell us about the Eucharist? In the Eucharist, Jesus hands over his body and pours out his blood for us. Jesus’ words are repeated every day at the consecration: “This is the cup of my blood … it will be shed for you and for all. Do this in memory of me.” We know that our blood is our life force, our life. When someone says, “I offer you a cup of my blood,” they are saying very graphically that they are offering themselves, their very existence to us. Now, we cannot offer actual blood, but we can serve each other and in this way pour out our blood for the other. St. Benedict calls the monastery a school of the Lord’s service. As such, it is a eucharistic school, a place where we connect liturgy and life. However, you do not have to be in a monastery to be in this school. The message is so simple: serve each other and you will fulfill the law of Christ who came among us to serve and not to be served.

Where Your Treasure Is . . .

On Monday, in the October Magnificat magazine, there was a wonderful meditation by Fr John Tauler, O.P, a 14th century Domincan, on detachment and eternal life. Here’s a quote:

“From this detachment is born kindness, and also separation from all worldly things; so that one now receives freely from God’s hands and with entire thankfulness, joy or sorrow, or whatever else, may befall him in the inner life or the outer: everything helps him to eternal happiness. Such a man has the grace to feel that whatever happens to him has been eternally foreseen by his heavenly Father, and in the very way it does happen, and, viewing all things as God does, he rests in peace of mind, no matter what occurs.”

The phrase that really struck me was, . . .”whatever may befall him in the inner life or the outer.” That’s the hard one, the inner life. Things don’t always go my way, and I find it easier to accept the external circumstances while still arguing and rethinking those circumstances in my mind. It’s hard to let it go. Fr Tauler tells us, and I really welcomed this reminder, that to be detached we need to accept the things that befall us and, even harder, be truly grateful for it. I remind myself that, whatever happens, if it weren’t for God’s grace in my life, I wouldn’t be here to be grateful for them. No matter how much they irk me at the moment.

Limiting our Horizons, Tuesday, October 18, 2011

After a tooth extraction and implant on Thursday last week, it’s been a rough few days.  That procedure was a bit rougher than I expected, especially the after effects.  Luckily, the procedure itself went very well to all appearances and I think I’m finally able to lay off the Vicodin in order to sleep at night.  While recovering at home on Friday afternoon, I finished reading, and began rereading Chesterton’s Orthodoxy.  I’d like to do one or two posts on my impressions, but that may be a couple of weeks down the road, at best.  I need to try to understand what’s he’s saying more completely.

Reading Chesterton is like having literary fireworks go off in your face.  His style is so very distinctive, and his ideas come so fast and furiously (to borrow a phrase that’s much in the news recently), not to mention that they are so original, that you have to stop and really think about what it is he’s saying.  It’s very easy to be blinded by the fireworks.   Here’s a mild example:

Spiritual doctrines do not actually limit the mind as do materialistic denials. Even if I believe in immortality I need not think about it. But if I disbelieve in immortality I must not think about it. In the first case the road is open and I can go as far as I like; in the second the road is shut. But the case is even stronger, and the parallel with madness is yet more strange. For it was our case against the exhaustive and logical theory of the lunatic that, right or wrong, it gradually destroyed his humanity. Now it is the charge against the main deductions of the materialist that, right or wrong, they gradually destroy his humanity; I do not mean only kindness, I mean hope, courage, poetry, initiative, all that is human.

 The materialist, rationalist view that is being so actively promoted these days as the only “reasonable” way to look at the world, with those who dare to disagree being branded mean spirited or even fascist or racist, is really a very closed way of looking at things.  It absolutely cannot tolerate dissent, all in the name of rationality and diversity.  It’s nonsense, and only the fact that it has so pervaded and weakened our educational system allows this view to go on so unchallenged.  People are, tragically, no longer educated to think these kinds of things through, much less think in a way contrary to the herd.

Anyway, back to Chesterton and my ice pack.

Listening to Tradition, Sunday, October 9, 2011 – Isaac of Stella

Incited by something external
Is like a small lamp
Whose flame is fed with oil,
Or like a stream fed by rains,
Where flows stop when the rains cease.
But love whose object is God is like
A fountain gushing forth
From the earth.
Its flow never ceases,
For He Himself is the source of this love
And also its food,
Which never grows scarce.

Listening to Tradition, Sunday, October 2, 2011

A Song

Lord, when the sense of thy sweet grace
Sends up my soul to seek thy face.
Thy blessed eyes breed such desire,
I dy in love's delicious Fire.
     O love, I am thy Sacrifice.
Be still triumphant, blessed eyes.
Still shine on me, fair suns! that I
Still may behold, though still I dy.

     Though still I dy, I live again;
Still longing so to be still slain,
So gainfull is such losse of breath.
I dy even in desire of death.
     Still live in me this loving strife
Of living Death and dying Life.
For while thou sweetly slayest me
Dead to my selfe, I live in Thee.

Richard Crashaw

It's the Little Things

My father-in-law, Bill McGaw was many things, including an actor in a movie with Clark Gable and Barbara Stanwyck, no less, but he always considered himself a newspaperman first and foremost. In the 1970’s in El Paso he started a weekly newspaper dedicated to getting at the truth of many stories that seemed to always go unreported in towns with a very strong and closely knit power structure. One thing that he always said was that, for many powerful people, it was usually some small and very trivial mistake that tripped them up, something they never considered important at the time. As an example, think of Al Capone and the failure to file tax returns in a timely manner. 

It turns out this is good advice in the Christian life also. Here’s a good quote from Blessed Peter Favre, SJ (no I don’t think he was a quarterback long ago).

"Seek grace for the smallest things, and you will also find grace to accomplish, to believe in, and to hope for the greatest things. Attend to the smallest things, examine them, think about putting them into effect, and the Lord will grant you greater. Many seek anxiously for grace to perform good works of a more general kind while neglecting in the meantime particular tasks for which it would have been easy to find grace. "

Listening to Tradition, Saturday, February 26, 2011

A Tabernacle

To love, suffer, and pray, always with the joy that comes from Jesus. Fiat! Deo gratias! I want to be Eucharistic, a hidden apostle of the divine heart. To practice complete, confident, and loving abandonment. To go to God through the cross, through the heart of Jesus, under the tender protection of Mary, my Mother. May I welcome whatever the future holds. Since it comes from the heavenly Father and the one Friend. As the future arrives, it will bring its own graces. Until then and even afterward, I must remember that “today’s trouble is enough for today” (Mt 6:34), and that I can work and suffer for others and for the glory of God only today.

Finally, inner depths, where he comes in communion, wonderfully uniting himself to us, making himself our guest, our friend, our spiritual food, living on in us spiritually after the actual presence has ceased; this is the tabernacle of his heart, the place of his delights, his repose and his joy. Oh, how I long to be for him at the same time a heaven, a tabernacle, and this appearance under which he comes to me! From beneath this veil where my Savior hides, I will let him shine forth, drawing those he wants to save.

Elisabeth Leseur, was a married lay woman (†1914).  Her cause for canonization is in progress.

Miscellaneous Musings, January 18, 2011

From No Man is An Island, Thomas Merton

This discovery of Christ is never genuine if it is nothing but a flight from ourselves. On the contrary, it cannot be an escape. It must be a fulfillment. I cannot discover God in myself and myself in Him unless I have the courage to face myself exactly as I am, with all my limitations, and to accept others as they are, with all their limitations. The religious answer is not religious if it is not fully real. Evasion is the answer of superstition.

I've known a number of people in my life, non-believers, who insist that religion is a crutch.  Unfortunately, at the time I knew most of them, I didn't know how to answer such an assertion.  Merton gives us some idea in the above quote.  Having faith, believing what God says and taking Him at His word, requires the strength to walk without crutches.  It takes the most difficult thing of all, the courage to admit to ourselves who and what we are, sinners, fallen, weak human beings.  Then it takes accepting that truth.  I'm learning that only then can one begin to grow in faith.  It ain't easy.

From the Desert Fathers, Sunday, January 9, 2011

O strange and inconceivable thing! We did not really die, we were
not really buried, we were not really crucified and raised again,
but our imitation was but a figure, while our salvation is in
reality. Christ was actually crucified, and actually buried, and
truly rose again; and all these things have been vouchsafed to us,
that we, by imitation communicating in His sufferings, might gain
salvation in reality. O surpassing loving-kindness! Christ
received the nails in His undefiled hands and feet, and endured
anguish; while to me without suffering or toil, by the fellowship
of His pain He vouchsafed salvation.

St. Cyril of Jerusalem, On the Christian Sacraments.

The Danger of a Single Despot

"When the Constitution was thus perfected and established, a new form of government was created, but it was neither speculative nor experimental as to the principles on which it was based. If they were true principles, as they were, the government founded upon them was destined to a life and an influence that would continue while the liberties it was intended to preserve should be valued by the human family. Those liberties had been wrung from reluctant monarchs in many contests, in many countries, and were grouped into creeds and established in ordinances sealed with blood, in many great struggles of the people. They were not new to the people. They were consecrated theories, but no government had been previously established for the great purpose of their preservation and enforcement. That which was experimental in our plan of government was the question whether democratic rule could be so organized and conducted that it would not degenerate into license and result in the tyranny of absolutism, without saving to the people the power so often found necessary of repressing or destroying their enemy, when he was found in the person of a single despot."

Our president recently referred to people who value the ideals on which our government was founded as his "enemies."  I wonder if we might see in him the single despot so feared by the Founders?  Fortunately, they left us the saving power to prevent such things, if only we will be wise enough to use it.

UPDATE

The above quote is from an introduction to Democracy in America, by John T. Morgan in the Kindle edition of the book.  However, readers should be warned that this introduction is a product of, I believe, a 19th century historian, and some of his views on race are unfortunate, at best, at worst, racist.  Still, the truth of some points he makes about deToqueville's understanding of America are still valid.

What Was I Thinking?

When I wrote the previous post, I was thinking that to write on a broader range of topics than those relating to Benedictine monasticism, I really should start another blog not referred to as an Oblate blog. What was I thinking?

The rational I used to justify the new blog was that William of St. Thierry, a Cistercian father, wrote a book that didn’t deal directly with monastic topics but rather focused on what it takes to be a Christian. I was thinking that he wasn’t writing in the monastic tradition, why, I don’t know. He most certainly was, because after all, what is the point of a monastery except to form a community dedicated to seeking God? What is the point of being an Oblate, except to seek God within my own vocation. It means, as I have said so many times before, that the whole point to the Rule, is to create a way of life that encompasses all important aspects of our human condition, work, prayer, conversion, community, hospitality, or dealing with authority and the importance of obedience. It’s all in there. I don’t know what made me think a study of the most important tenants of my faith, or commenting on what is going on in my world would be subjects not to be covered on an Oblate blog. What was I thinking?

I guess I just wasn’t, so I decided to correct the situation in the name of stability, another topic covered in the Rule.

From Fr. Michael at Getheseme Abbey

Image via Wikipedia

Our gospels tells us of how Jesus, as he went around to all the towns and villages and saw the crowds, how “his heart was moved with pity for them because they were troubled and abandoned like sheep without a shepherd.” Are these words reminding us of something terribly important if we are going to have new vocations to the religious and priestly life today? Do we find our own hearts moved with pity and do we recognize sufficiently how many, especially the young, are troubled and abandoned? Do we see the crying need for persons to guide and instruct the crowds of our own time? Have our affluence and technological advances stolen from us this sense of pity and compassion, this sense of urgent need, blinded us even to how troubled and abandoned the people of our time truly are? I find myself asking these questions and wonder if they might be a way of deepening our prayer and attracting vocations.

Listening to Tradition, St. John Climacus

Repentance is the renewal of baptism. Repentance is a contract with God for a second life. A penitent is a buyer of humility. Repentance is constant distrust of bodily comfort. Repentance is self-condemning reflection, and carefree self-care. Repentance is the daughter of hope and the renunciation of despair. A penitent is an undisgraced convict. Repentance is reconciliation with the Lord by the practice of good deeds contrary to the sins. Repentance is purification of conscience. Repentance is the voluntary endurance of all afflictions. A penitent is the inflicter of his own punishments. Repentance is a mighty persecution of the stomach, and a striking of the soul into vigorous awareness.

St. John Climacus

Listening to Tradition, St. Cyril of Jerusalem

O strange and inconceivable thing! We did not really die, we were not really buried, we were not really crucified and raised again, but our imitation was but a figure, while our salvation is in  reality. Christ was actually crucified, and actually buried, and truly rose again; and all these things have been vouchsafed to us, that we, by imitation communicating in His sufferings, might gain salvation in reality. O surpassing loving-kindness! Christ received the nails in His undefiled hands and feet, and endured anguish; while to me without suffering or toil, by the fellowship of His pain He vouchsafed salvation.

                               St. Cyril of Jerusalem, On the Christian Sacraments.

Listening to Tradition, William of St. Thierry

Yet, brethren, let all exaltation be far from the opinion you have of yourselves, from your littleness and lowliness, from one your mouths. For exalted thoughts are death and it is easy for one who sees himself perched on high to grow dizzy and be in mortal danger. Give another name to your profession, inscribe your work with another title.

                                                                        William of St. Thierry, The Golden Epistle

Listening to Tradition, Tuesday, April 6, 2010

“Pray as though everything depended on God. Work as though everything depended on you.”  St. Augustine

Wisdom from G.K. Chesterton

“When the old Liberals removed the gags from all the heresies, their idea was that religious and philosophical discoveries might thus be made. Their view was that cosmic truth was so important that every one ought to bear independent testimony. The modern idea is that cosmic truth is so unimportant that it cannot matter what one says. The former freed inquiry as men loose a noble hound; the latter frees inquiry as men fling back into the sea a fish unfit for eating. Never has there been so little discussion about the nature of men as now, when, for the first time, any one can discuss it. The old restriction meant that only the orthodox were allowed to discuss religion. Modern liberty means that nobody is allowed to discuss it.”

                                                                            G. K. Chesterton, Heretics

The above was written in 1904 or 1905; it is as apt today as it was back then, or more so. It seems today that anyone can say anything and expect no consequences. But there are consequences and they are becoming more evident every day.


For the past many years, I would say since the time of the Viet Nam war, political and social dialogue in this county has become more polarized and it seems the point of the debate has become “winning,” not seeking the good of the country. Much less has it been seeking the good. Statements of all kinds, on both “sides” have become more extreme with each passing year. The consequence is that we are getting to the point that no one trusts anything anyone else says. It is becoming impossible to function as a society. This is a severe consequence.


The community envisioned by Benedict is one built on trust. The Rule says, in Chapter 4,

Let the brethren give their advice
with all the deference required by humility,
and not presume stubbornly to defend their opinions; 
but let the decision rather depend on the Abbot's judgment, 
and all submit to whatever he shall decide for their welfare.

I wish the wisdom of the 6th century, or even the early 20th century, were more prevalent today.

Even though this may seem a completely un-democratic environment, the passage shows that the basis of the monastic community is a mutual trust that each member of the community will seek the good of the entire community. The monks “shall not presume stubbornly to defend their opinions.” The goal isn’t to win, it’s to seek the good.

Listening to Tradition, The Desert Fathers

The way of humility is this: self-control, prayer, and thinking yourself inferior to all creatures.

                                                                                              Abba Tithoes

Listening to Tradition, Maritain

To this true God the saint is entirely given. But there are false gods; even, as I shall shortly say, there is a spurious and distorted image of God that can be called King or Jove of all false gods, the great god of idolators. With regard to this god, the saint is a thorough atheist, the most atheistic of men – just because he adores only God. (Italics in original).


Jacques Maritain, The Range of Reason

Listening to Tradition, Thomas Merton

Our God also is a consuming fire. And if we, by love, become transformed into Him and burn as He burns, His fire will be our everlasting joy. But if we refuse His love and remain in the coldness of sin and opposition to Him and to other men then His fire (by our own choice rather than His) becomes our everlasting enemy and Love, instead of being our joy, will become our torment and destruction. 
When we love God's will we find Him and own His joy in all things. 

Merton, Thomas, New Seeds of Contemplation. New York: New Directions, 1961, p.124