I received an e-mail this week from the G.K. Chesterton Theatre Company in LA.

The company produced Malcolm and Teresa back in 2008, and now has a new production highlighting the life of Franz Jagerstatter.

I'm passing the notice along for those in Los Angeles...

“An Act of Reparation”
By Irish playwright, Cathal Gallagher
Directed by Maria Vargo

Coming Soon to
The Odyssey Theatre

This is a riveting true story of one man’s courage and faith during World War II under the German Reich in his struggle and determination to follow his conscience. Franz Jagerstatter, a native of Austria, takes a stand that will ultimately change his life, and the lives of those he loves, forever.

The Odyssey Theatre
2055 So. Sepulveda Blvd.
Los Angeles, CA 90025

February 18th through March 7, 2010
Thursdays, Fridays, Saturdays at 8:00 pm
Sunday Matinees at 2:00 pm

$20.00 per ticket, and $15 for Seniors/Students or groups of (10) ten or more.

For Ticket Purchase and Directions
Contact: www.odysseytheatre.com
or Call (310) 477-2055
GKC Theatre Company (310) 462-5141

Featuring: Jade Carter, Amber Bonasso, Deborah O’Brien, Bette Smith, Toni Trenton, Jacques Freydont, William Knight, John Graham, Steve Fogelman, Stephen Knight, Catalina Tautu, Alexander Schottky, Jason Kaine, John Mullen and Lane Wray

G.K. Chesterton Theatre Company brings to families, plays that explore issues of conscience, faith and heroism with special emphasis on the men and women who stood against the current tide of their time. Great plays can shape character in positive ways, and we feel a special obligation to produce inspiring works, based on true stories.

Labels: events, hollywood, moral life

Whether you are looking for work, or weary of your work, or simply looking for a way to bring your prayer and your work together, you might find this novena to St. Josemaría Escrivá helpful.

For instance, on day 7 of the novena, you have the chance to meditate on maturing in virtue through work. The prayers include this quote from Escrivá:

A complete range of virtues is called into play when we set about our work with the purpose of sanctifying it: fortitude, to persevere in our work despite the difficulties that naturally arise and to ensure that we never let ourselves be overwhelmed by anxiety; temperance, in order to spend ourselves unsparingly and to overcome our love of comfort and our selfishness; justice, so as to fulfill our duties towards God, society, our family and our fellow workers; prudence, to know in each case what course to take, and then to set about it without hesitation...And all this, I emphasize, is for the sake of Love. (Friends of God, 72)

Labels: conversion, moral life, prayer

In the August 31 edition of America magazine, Bishop D'Arcy, the bishop of Fort Wayne-South Bend, asks some questions of the University of Notre Dame and other Catholic universities as well. Some highlights:

It is not about President Obama.... It is not about Democrats versus Republicans.... It is not about whether it is appropriate for the president of the United States to speak at Notre Dame or any great Catholic university on the pressing issues of the day.... The response, so intense and widespread, is not about what this journal called “sectarian Catholicism.” Rather, the response of the faithful derives directly from the Gospel....

Another serious question of witness and moral responsibility before the Notre Dame administration concerns its sponsorship over several years of a sad and immoral play, offensive to the dignity of women, which many call pornographic, and which an increasing number of Catholic universities have cancelled, “The Vagina Monologues,” by Eve Ensler.

Although he spoke eloquently about the importance of dialogue with the president of the United States, the president of Notre Dame chose not to dialogue with his bishop on these two matters [ND commencement and The Vagina Monologues], both pastoral and both with serious ramifications for the care of souls, which is the core responsibility of the local bishop....

I firmly believe that the board of trustees must take up its responsibility afresh, with appropriate study and prayer. They also must understand the seriousness of the present moment. This requires spiritual and intellectual formation on the part of the men and women of industry, business and technology who make up the majority of the board. Financial generosity is no longer sufficient for membership on the boards of great universities, if indeed it ever was. The responsibility of university boards is great, and decisions must not be made by a few. Like bishops, they are asked to leave politics and ambition at the door, and make serious decisions before God....

Where will the great Catholic universities search for a guiding light in the years ahead? Will it be the Land O’Lakes Statement or Ex Corde Ecclesiae? The first comes from a frantic time, with finances as the driving force. Its understanding of freedom is defensive, absolutist and narrow. It never mentions Christ and barely mentions the truth. The second text, Ex Corde Ecclesiae, speaks constantly of truth and the pursuit of truth. It speaks of freedom in the broader, Catholic philosophical and theological tradition, as linked to the common good, to the rights of others and always subject to truth. Unlike Land O’Lakes, it is communal, reflective of the developments since Vatican II, and it speaks with a language enlightened by the Holy Spirit.

The whole article from this wise shepherd is worth a read and some reflection.

Labels: bishop, church, communication, communion, dialogue, human life, moral life, politics, pope benedict xvi, USA

Here's a trailer for an upcoming documentary on abortion. Looks horrifying.

"[We would] break down their natural modesty, separate them from their parents and values and become the sex experts in their lives so they would turn to us. When we could give them a low dose birth control pill they would get pregnant on it or on a defective condom..."

According to LifeSite News, the film does not have distribution yet, and is still in post-production. The website for the project is bloodmoneyfilm.com.

Labels: human life, moral life, suffering

What follows are four points about health care reform from Bishop R. Walker Nickless, the bishop of Sioux City, Iowa. Since it's not possible to link directly to the relevant part of his letter, I'm reprinting it here (emphases mine):

The current national debate about health care reform should concern all of us. There is much at stake in this political struggle, and also much confusion and inaccurate information being thrown around. My brother bishops have described some clear “goal-posts” to mark out what is acceptable reform, and what must be rejected. First and most important, the Church will not accept any legislation that mandates coverage, public or private, for abortion, euthanasia, or embryonic stem-cell research. We refuse to be made complicit in these evils, which frankly contradict what “health care” should mean. We refuse to allow our own parish, school, and diocesan health insurance plans to be forced to include these evils. As a corollary of this, we insist equally on adequate protection of individual rights of conscience for patients and health care providers not to be made complicit in these evils. A so-called reform that imposes these evils on us would be far worse than keeping the health care system we now have.

Second, the Catholic Church does not teach that “health care” as such, without distinction, is a natural right. The “natural right” of health care is the divine bounty of food, water, and air without which all of us quickly die. This bounty comes from God directly. None of us own it, and none of us can morally withhold it from others. The remainder of health care is a political, not a natural, right, because it comes from our human efforts, creativity, and compassion. As a political right, health care should be apportioned according to need, not ability to pay or to benefit from the care. We reject the rationing of care. Those who are sickest should get the most care, regardless of age, status, or wealth. But how to do this is not self-evident. The decisions that we must collectively make about how to administer health care therefore fall under “prudential judgment.”

Third, in that category of prudential judgment, the Catholic Church does not teach that government should directly provide health care. Unlike a prudential concern like national defense, for which government monopolization is objectively good – it both limits violence overall and prevents the obvious abuses to which private armies are susceptible – health care should not be subject to federal monopolization. Preserving patient choice (through a flourishing private sector) is the only way to prevent a health care monopoly from denying care arbitrarily, as we learned from HMOs in the recent past. While a government monopoly would not be motivated by profit, it would be motivated by such bureaucratic standards as quotas and defined “best procedures,” which are equally beyond the influence of most citizens. The proper role of the government is to regulate the private sector, in order to foster healthy competition and to curtail abuses. Therefore any legislation that undermines the viability of the private sector is suspect. Private, religious hospitals and nursing homes, in particular, should be protected, because these are the ones most vigorously offering actual health care to the poorest of the poor.

The best way in practice to approach this balance of public and private roles is to spread the risks and costs of health care over the largest number of people. This is the principle underlying Medicaid and Medicare taxes, for example. But this principle assumes that the pool of taxable workers is sufficiently large, compared to those who draw the benefits, to be reasonably inexpensive and just. This assumption is at root a pro-life assumption! Indeed, we were a culture of life when such programs began. Only if we again foster a culture of life can we perpetuate the economic justice of taxing workers to pay health care for the poor. Without a growing population of youth, our growing population of retirees is outstripping our distribution systems. In a culture of death such as we have now, taxation to redistribute costs of medical care becomes both unjust and unsustainable.

Fourth, preventative care is a moral obligation of the individual to God and to his or her family and loved ones, not a right to be demanded from society. The gift of life comes only from God; to spurn that gift by seriously mistreating our own health is morally wrong. The most effective preventative care for most people is essentially free – good diet, moderate exercise, and sufficient sleep. But pre-natal and neo-natal care are examples of preventative care requiring medical expertise, and therefore cost; and this sort of care should be made available to all as far as possible.

Within these limits, the Church has been advocating for decades that health care be made more accessible to all, especially to the poor. Will the current health care reform proposals achieve these goals?

The current House reform bill, HR 3200, does not meet the first or the fourth standard. As Cardinal Justin Rigali has written for the USCCB Secretariat of Pro-life Activities, this bill circumvents the Hyde amendment (which prohibits federal funds from being used to pay for abortions) by drawing funding from new sources not covered by the Hyde amendment, and by creatively manipulating how federal funds covered by the Hyde amendment are accounted. It also provides a “public insurance option” without adequate limits, so that smaller employers especially will have a financial incentive to push all their employees into this public insurance. This will effectively prevent those employees from choosing any private insurance plans. This will saddle the working classes with additional taxes for inefficient and immoral entitlements. The Senate bill, HELP, is better than the House bill, as I understand it. It subsidizes care for the poor, rather than tending to monopolize care. But, it designates the limit of four times federal poverty level for the public insurance option, which still includes more than half of all workers. This would impinge on the vitality of the private sector. It also does not meet the first standard of explicitly excluding mandatory abortion coverage.

I encourage all of you to make you voice heard to our representatives in Congress. Tell them what they need to hear from us: no health care reform is better than the wrong sort of health care reform. Insist that they not permit themselves to be railroaded into the current too-costly and pro-abortion health care proposals. Insist on their support for proposals that respect the life and dignity of every human person, especially the unborn. And above all, pray for them, and for our country. (Please see the website for the Iowa Catholic Conference at www.iowacatholicconference.org and www.usccb.org/healthcare for more information)

Labels: bioethics, human life, moral life, politics

Last December, Family Theater Productions in Hollywood sponsored a Theology of the Body script contest.

The winning script? A characteristically brilliant piece of writing by Sean Dillon, fellow Act One 2002 alumnus:

Labels: hollywood, John Paul II, marriage and family, moral life, movies, respect, theology of the body

On the memorial of St. John Mary Vianney, patron saint of priests, I've decided to pull a few passages from a letter to priests that was published by Pope John Paul II on Holy Thursday of 1986. In this letter, the Pope reflected on the Curé D' Ars and the value of his example for priests today.

The depth of his love for Christ and for souls

The Cure of Ars is a model of priestly zeal for all pastors. The secret of his generosity is to be found without doubt in his love for God, lived without limits, in constant response to the love made manifest in Christ crucified. This is where he bases his desire to do everything to save the souls ransomed by Christ at such a great price, and to bring them back to the love of God. Let us recall one of those pithy sayings which he had the knack of uttering: "The priesthood is the love of the Heart of Jesus." In his sermons and catechesis he continually returned to that love: "O my God, I prefer to die loving you than to live a single instant without loving you... I love you, my divine Savior, because you were crucified for us... because you have me crucified for you." For the sake of Christ, he seeks to conform himself exactly to the radical demands that Jesus in the Gospels puts before the disciples whom he sends out: prayer, poverty, humility, self-denial, voluntary penance. And, like Christ, he has a love for his flock that leads him to extreme pastoral commitment and self-sacrifice. Rarely has a pastor been so acutely aware of his responsibilities, so consumed by a desire to wrest his people from the sins of their lukewarmness. "O my God, grant me the conversion of my parish: I consent to suffer whatever you wish, for as long as I live." Dear brother priests, nourished by the Second Vatican Council which has felicitously placed the priest's consecration within the framework of his pastoral mission, let us join Saint John Mary Vianney and seek the dynamism of our pastoral zeal in the Heart of Jesus, in his love for souls. If we do not draw from the same source, our ministry risks bearing little fruit!

The specific ministry of the priest

Saint John Mary Vianney gives an eloquent answer to certain questionings of the priest's identity, which have manifested themselves in the course of the last twenty years; in fact it seems that today a more balanced position is being reached. The priest always, and in an unchangeable way, finds the source of his identity in Christ the Priest. It is not the world which determines his status, as though it depended on changing needs or ideas about social roles. The priest is marked with the seal of the Priesthood of Christ, in order to share in his function as the one Mediator and Redeemer. So, because of this fundamental bond, there opens before the priest the immense field of the service of souls, for their salvation in Christ and in the Church. This service must be completely inspired by love of souls in imitation of Christ who gives his life for them. It is God's wish that all people should be saved, and that none of the little ones should be lost (cf. Mt 18:14). "The priest must always be ready to respond to the needs of souls," said the Cure of Ars. "He is not for himself, he is for you." The priest is for the laity: he animates them and supports them in the exercise of the common priesthood of the baptized—so well illustrated by the Second Vatican Council—which consists in their making their lives a spiritual offering, in witnessing to the Christian spirit in the family, in taking charge of the temporal sphere and sharing in the evangelization of their brethren. But the service of the priest belongs to another order. He is ordained to act in the name of Christ the Head, to bring people into the new life made accessible by Christ, to dispense to them the mysteries—the Word, forgiveness, the Bread of Life—to gather them into his body, to help them to form themselves from within, to live and to act according to the saving plan of God. In a word, our identity as priests is manifested in the "creative" exercise of the love for souls communicated by Christ Jesus. Attempts to make the priest more like the laity are damaging to the Church. This does not mean in any way that the priest can remain remote from the human concerns of the laity: he must be very near to them, as John Mary Vianney was, but as a priest, always in a perspective which is that of their salvation and of the progress of the Kingdom of God. He is the witness and the dispenser of a life other than earthly life (cf. Presbyterorum Ordinis, 3). It is essential to the Church that the identity of the priest be safeguarded, with its vertical dimension. The life and personality of the Cure of Ars are a particularly enlightening and vigorous illustration of this.

His intimate configuration to Christ and his solidarity with sinners

Saint John Mary Vianney did not content himself with the ritual carrying out of the activities of his ministry. It was his heart and his life which he sought to conform to Christ. Prayer was the soul of his life: silent and contemplative prayer, generally in his church at the foot of the tabernacle. Through Christ, his soul opened to the three divine Persons, to whom he would entrust "his poor soul" in his last will and testament. "He kept a constant union with God in the middle of an extremely busy life." And he did not neglect the office or the rosary. He turned spontaneously to the Virgin. His poverty was extraordinary. He literally stripped himself of everything for the poor. And he shunned honors. Chastity shone in his face. He knew the value of purity in order "to rediscover the source of love which is God." Obedience to Christ consisted, for John Mary Vianney, in obedience to the Church and especially to the Bishop. This obedience took the form of accepting the heavy charge of being a parish priest, which often frightened him. But the Gospel insists especially on renouncing self, on accepting the Cross. Many were the crosses which presented themselves to the Cure of Ars in the course of his ministry: calumny on the part of the people, being misunderstood by an assistant priest or other confreres, contradictions, and also a mysterious struggle against the powers of hell, and sometimes even the temptation to despair in the midst of spiritual darkness. Nonetheless he did not content himself with just accepting these trials without complaining; he went beyond them by mortification, imposing on himself continual fasts and many other rugged practices in order to "reduce his body to servitude," as Saint Paul says. But what we must see clearly in this penance, which our age unhappily has little taste for, are his motives: love of God and the conversion of sinners. Thus he asks a discouraged fellow priest: "You have prayed..., you have wept..., but have you fasted, have you kept vigil...?" Here we are close to the warning Jesus gave to the Apostles: "But this kind is cast out only by prayer and fasting" (Mt 17:21). In a word, John Mary Vianney sanctified himself so as to be more able to sanctify others. Of course, conversion remains the secret of hearts, which are free in their actions, and the secret of God's grace. By his ministry, the priest can only enlighten people, guide them in the internal forum and give them the sacraments. The sacraments are of course actions of Christ, and their effectiveness is not diminished by the imperfection or unworthiness of the minister. But the results depend also on the dispositions of those who receive them, and these are greatly assisted by the personal holiness of the priest, by his perceptible witness, as also by the mysterious exchange of merits in the Communion of Saints. Saint Paul said: "In my flesh I complete what is lacking in Christ's afflictions for the sake of his body, that is, the Church" (Col 1:24). John Mary Vianney in a sense wished to force God to grant these graces of conversion, not only by his prayer but by the sacrifice of his whole life. He wished to love God for those who did not love him, and even to do the penance which they would not do. He was truly a pastor completely at one with his sinful people. Dear brother priests, let us not be afraid of this very personal commitment—marked by asceticism and inspired by love—which God asks of us for the proper exercise of our Priesthood. Let us remember the recent reflections of the Synodal Fathers: "It seems to us that in the difficulties of today God wishes to teach us more deeply the value, importance and central place of the Cross of Jesus Christ." In the priest, Christ relives his Passion, for the sake of souls. Let us give thanks to God who thus permits us to share in the Redemption, in our hearts and in our flesh! For all these reasons, Saint John Mary Vianney never ceases to be a witness, ever living, ever relevant, to the truth about the priestly vocation and service. We recall the convincing way in which he spoke of the greatness of the priest and of the absolute need for him. Those who are already priests, those who are preparing for the Priesthood and those who will be called to it must fix their eyes on his example and follow it. The faithful too will more clearly grasp, thanks to him, the mystery of the Priesthood of their priests. No, the figure of the Cure of Ars does not fade.

(from the Letter of Pope John Paul II To All the Priests of the Church for Holy Thursday 1986)

See also:

Letter of Pope Benedict XVI Proclaiming a Year for Priests - June 16, 2009

Encyclical Letter of Pope John XXIII on Saint John Vianney - August 1, 1959

Labels: conversion, John Paul II, mercy, moral life, paschal mystery, pope benedict xvi, priesthood, saints, vocations, Year for Priests

During the past week, many people have been watching a YouTube video of a wedding entrance. It doesn't take place at a Catholic wedding, but it clearly seems to be in a Christian context.



There's something infectious about the moment. It's a fun celebration of the joy of the moment, communicating a carefree sense of celebration... a unique, creative and serendipitous ode to human love.

However, it seems to me that such an outpouring of self-expression is more suited to a reception than the start of a worship service. In the words of Cardinal Ratzinger,

"Real liturgy implies that God responds and reveals how we can worship him. In any form, liturgy includes some kind of 'institution.' It cannot spring from imagination, our own creativity -- then it would remain just a cry in the dark or mere self-affirmation. Liturgy implies a real relationship with Another, who reveals himself to us and gives our existence a new direction." (The Spirit of the Liturgy, "Liturgy and Life")

I think the young playwright Karol Wojtyla had a similar insight, more particularly as it relates to marriage, in a passage from The Jeweler's Shop. A couple struggling through their married life after starting on a wobbly foundation observe their situation as follows:

CHRISTOPHER
When we took the rings I felt your hand trembling ....
We forgot to pay attention to the face of that old man,
whom Mother told me about: his eyes are said to be very expressive.
It is not our fault that we read nothing
in his eyes; and he said little -- things we knew anyway.
So do not be surprised, Mother, than his words left no trace
(things we knew anyway -- we did not sense greatness),
and Monica's trembling hands told me much more.
I was engrossed in her being moved, and in my own
experience of her being moved, which I shared fully
-- and I saw us two deep down in our own experience:
I think I love her very much.

MONICA
We were taken up with each other -- how could we tear ourselves away ...
He did nothing to fascinate us ...
he simply measured, first, the circumference of our fingers, then of the rings,
as an ordinary craftsman would. There was no artistry in it even.
He did not bring us closer to anything. All the beauty remained
in our own feeling. He did not widen or narrow anything ...
I was absorbed by my love -- and by nothing else, it seems.

In essence, the hyperfocus on their own powerful emotions / desire for each other overshadowed the sacramental and transcendent dimensions of the vows they were entering into. The jeweler, a priest-like figure who stood before them -- almost like a witness at a marriage -- was in the periphery of their experience, a mere tired formality in the background of what they perceived as most important.

I wonder how often this sort of thing happens to men and women approaching the altar and the sacrament of marriage. How often does God's role in the marriage covenant become only window dressing for a couple preparing for marriage? I don't have the answer, but only want to pose the question.

We live in a hypersentimental culture. But sentimentality doesn't carry us through trials and difficulties. The grace of God -- the initiating and sustaining power of human love, enabling two distinct persons to become one flesh in the mundane but very demanding sacrifices of each being for the other -- is an essential part of what Christians acknowledge and ask for when they come together in the covenant of marriage.

I know some will say I'm a spoil-sport for raising this question, but is an entrance procession like the one above really an appropriate way for a couple to present themselves before God and the human community at the threshold of their marriage vows? I don't know the answer, but merely want to raise the question.

Labels: church, John Paul II, liturgy, marriage and family, moral life, multimedia, poetry, prayer, sacraments

From CatholicVote.org

Labels: communication, human life, moral life, multimedia

A few weeks ago, I happened upon an article on Matthew Lickona's blog about a comic book project he's undertaken: Alphonse. Here's how he describes the project:

Alphonse is the story of eight lives that intersect because of an attempted abortion. Why "attempted?" Because while there are no angels or demons on either side, there is definitely a monster in the middle: Alphonse. Rendered "grotesquely abnormal" by his unwitting mother's use of controlled substances, he is both sentient and freakishly coordinated. He is also deeply wounded, twisted by fear and rage after the attempt on his life, and bent on revenge.
But violence begets violence. Alphonse is pursued even as he is pursuing, and haunted by the claim that there may be another way...

I ordered a copy of the first issue, and read it as soon as it arrived last week. Now, I'm not much of a comic book guy -- didn't grow up with them around, except the occasional Archie Comic. But I think Alphonse is very well-conceived and well-done. It has the potential to reach an audience that is largely ignored in the abortion discussion... It could appeal to a demographic that ordinarily wouldn't care, or might be paying for their girlfriends' abortion(s). It's not didactic, or saccharine, or otherwise radioactive to the young male audience. It will appeal to their thirst for justice, and to their preference for violence as mediator of meaning, but, in a parable-like way, may reveal some readers as perpetrators of injustice. The plot is dark, fast-paced, violent, and unconventional. Imagine the movie Juno, but hijacked by writer-directors Christopher Nolan ("The Dark Knight") and Tim Burton ("Corpse Bride").

Alphonse is treated not so much as victim as protagonist in the story line. He's taking matters into his own hands, motivated by the way he has been treated. It's an interesting story choice, a kind of twist on the common perception of the unborn as aggressor against one's future happiness, as a sort of disease agent attacking one's dreams.

I'd recommend that you buy the comic book if you have an interest in this effort. Like most worthy artistic projects, it won't continue without patronage / financial support:

This is, for me, a labor of love – I just want to tell the story of Alphonse. But my artist and letterer need to eat. I think Chris and Wes are very good, and their work is well worth what I pay for it. But it was only because of the generosity of friends that I was able to afford the production of Issue One. So, if you’re curious to see what happens next, here are some ways you can help.

1. Buy Issue One of Alphonse, and tell others about it. I have a feeling that support for a story like this is going to spread by word of mouth or probably not at all. If you like what you read, if you think there’s something worthwhile there, tell someone. All profits from Issue One will go to finance the rest of the series.
2. Ever hear of Kickstarter.com? It’s a micro-financing site that allows you to make donations toward the creation of a project, donations that will be transferred only if a given project is 100% funded. So if you pledge $10, that $10 goes into my account only if enough money is pledged to complete production of Issue Two. If I don’t get enough pledges, no money is transferred, and everyone walks away clean. My Kickstarter project page can be found here.

Labels: communication, moral life, multimedia

Today, Pope Benedict XVI signed his third encyclical letter, Caritas in Veritate ("Charity in Truth").

According to a Catholic News Agency article, it may be a week or more before the publication becomes available:

The upcoming social encyclical of Pope Benedict XVI "Caritas in veritate" - Charity in truth - will bear the date of the feast of Sts. Peter and Paul, June 29, but will likely become public on July 6 or 7, the Italian daily Corriere della Sera said on Saturday.

An article by Gian Guido Vecchi quotes what he claims are several original paragraphs of the Pope’s third encyclical.

The article goes on to provide some passages that will supposedly be included. Among the citations, this:

According to Vecchi, the encyclical will hardly be “good news to the liberals and bad news to the conservatives,” as claimed by some analysts who have not seen the text of the document.

“The Pope quotes Paul VI’s Populorum progressio, which in 1967 denounced the gap between rich and poor countries, but the encyclical also takes from Humanae vitae in criticizing abortion and contraception,” Vecchi writes.

The encyclical, in fact, is likely to say that “openness to life is at the core of every true development,” and regarding the ambiguous policies aimed at “reducing the need for abortion” by means of other social policies, the Pope warns that “if personal and social sensibility toward the welcoming of a new life is lost, even other forms of welcoming (life) useful to social life become fruitless.”

We'll have to wait and see.

UPDATE (7/7/2009): Caritas in Veritate is now available online.

Labels: caritas in veritate, church, moral life, pope benedict xvi

On April 25th of this year, Cardinal James Francis Stafford, the recently-retired head of the Apostolic Penitentiary, released a decree announcing that there will be special indulgences available to both priests and the rest of the faithful during the Year for Priests (which begins tomorrow).

Since there are certain indulgences attached to tomorrow's celebrations, I'm dedicating a blog post to the topic today, in the hope that at least some of you will be able to take advantage of this special opportunity.

Here's the introduction to the decree, which provides some context:

During the Year for Priests established by the Holy Father on the occasion of the anniversary of the death of St. John Mary Vianney, the gift of special indulgences is granted.

Shortly the day will come on which will be commemorated the 150th anniversary of the pious departure to Heaven of St John Mary Vianney, the Curé d'Ars. This Saint was a wonderful model here on earth of a true Pastor at the service of Christ's flock.

Since his example is used to encourage the faithful, and especially priests, to imitate his virtues, the Supreme Pontiff Benedict XVI has established that for this occasion a special Year for Priests will be celebrated, from 19 June 2009 to 19 June 2010, in which all priests may be increasingly strengthened in fidelity to Christ with devout meditation, spiritual exercises and other appropriate actions.

This holy period will begin with the Solemnity of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, a day of priestly sanctification on which the Supreme Pontiff will celebrate Vespers in the presence of the holy relics of St John Mary Vianney, brought to Rome by the Bishop of Belley-Ars, France.

The Most Holy Father will likewise preside at the conclusion of the Year for Priests in St Peter's Square, in the presence of priests from across the world who will renew their fidelity to Christ and the bond of brotherhood.

May priests commit themselves, with prayer and good works, to obtaining from Christ the Eternal High Priest, the grace to shine with Faith, Hope, Charity and the other virtues, and show by their way of life, but also with their external conduct, that they are dedicated without reserve to the spiritual good of the people, something that the Church has always had at heart.

The gift of Sacred Indulgences which the Apostolic Penitentiary, with this Decree issued in conformity with the wishes of the August Pontiff, graciously grants during the Year for Priests will be of great help in achieving the desired purpose in the best possible way.

Before describing the particular requirements for the indulgences, I should acknowledge that there are many people who either are not familiar with the Church's teaching on indulgences, think the Church has abandoned the practice of granting them, or have objections to what they think the Church teaches about them. To all such people, I recommend the following two articles: Indulgences: the treasures of the Catholic Church and Myths about Indulgences. I also cover the topic briefly at the beginning of an RCIA Hollywood podcast on a Catholic vision of the moral life.

The decree continues by spelling out the particulars, which I'll summarize here:

• For priests:
  
  A plenary indulgence is available on any day of this Year for Priests.
  
  The conditions are:
  • praying Morning or Evening Prayer before the Blessed Sacrament (either exposed or reposed);
  • offering themselves with ready and generous hearts to celebrating the sacraments, especially Confession; and
  • observing the normal conditions for an indulgence: being truly repentant for sin; going to confession, participating in the Eucharist, and praying for the Pope's intentions.
  
  A partial indulgence is available to priests "every time that they devoutly recite the prayers duly approved so as to lead a holy life and to carry out in a holy manner the offices entrusted to them."



• For all of the faithful:
  
  A plenary indulgence is available:
  • on the days which open and close the Year for Priests;
  • on the 150th anniversary of the death of St John Vianney (August 4);
  • on the first Thursday of each month; and
  • on any other days established by the local bishop.
  
  The conditions are:
  • attending Mass;
  • offering prayers and good works to Jesus Christ, the Eternal High Priest, on behalf of the Church's priests; and
  • observing the other normal conditions for an indulgence: being truly repentant for sin; going to confession and praying for the Pope's intentions.
  
  On the same days, the elderly, sick, and homebound can obtain the indulgence by:
  • reciting prayers for the sanctification of priests;
  • offering their sufferings to God through Mary, Queen of Apostles; and
  • fulfilling the conditions prescribed for all of the faithful as soon as they are able.
  
  A partial indulgence is available to all the faithful whenever they devoutly recite five Our Fathers, Hail Marys, and Glorias (or another expressly approved prayer) in honor of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, with the intention that priests be preserved in purity and holiness.

During this Year for Priests, may the first sign of our solidarity with the Church -- and with priests, in particular -- be our prayers and offerings to God, along with the witness of a holy life.

Labels: charity, conversion, events, mercy, moral life, prayer, priesthood, suffering, Year for Priests

I received this e-mail from Katie von Schaijik of the Personalist Project today:

There was so much interest in the talks the other night that we decided to hasten the launch of our public forum for discussion.

You'll find there Dr. Healy's reflections on his experience of the event and his impression of the controversy surrounding Christopher West these days. Soon we'll be able to add audio recordings of the lectures, with, hopefully, video to follow.

We think of the forum as an online watering hole for personalists and their friends. We're calling it the Linde, after 2 establishments of that name in Liechtenstein, where we used to drink beer and philosophize between classes.

We hope you'll visit often and add your comments to our discussions!

Labels: communication, dialogue, John Paul II, moral life, theology of the body

On this great feast of Pentecost, I'm simply going to link to a couple of talks given by Father Raniero Cantalamessa, OFM Cap, preacher to the papal household.

Pentecost and the love of God

the grace of Pentecost and loving the Church

Veni Sancte Spiritus!

Labels: charity, communication, communion, conversion, Holy Spirit, moral life

Last evening, Catholic University of America (CUA) held a discussion entitled "The Obama Administration and the Sanctity of Human Life: Is There a Common Ground on Life Issues? What is the Right Response by 'Pro-Life' Citizens?" The discussion, featuring Professor Robert George and Professor Doug Kmiec, and moderated by the Honorable Mary Ann Glendon, was held at the National Press Club in Washington, DC. (A complete description of the event may be found here.)


I've transcribed the introduction by Professor William Wagner to give you a sense of the nature and format of the discussion:

Good afternoon.

I'm Professor William Wagner, the director of Catholic University's Center for Law, Philosophy and Culture. It's my pleasure to welcome you here today to a public exchange of views on the topic of The Obama Administration and the Sanctity of Human Life: Is There a Common Ground on Life Issues? What is the Right Response by Pro-Life Citizens? Today's event features presentations and discussions by two leading scholars and political commentators, both Roman Catholics, and both members of the pro-life community, presenting two different perspectives on the current administration's policies regarding such issues as abortion and embryonic stem cell research, and their impact on societal attitudes regarding respect for human life.

The purpose of the event is to advance understanding within the pro-life intellectual community in the United States of the issues, of what potential for common ground exists with the Obama administration on life issues, and what, in any event, is the right response of the pro-life community to the new administration.

The coverage in the press of issues relating to Obama's recent appearance at Notre Dame University indicates that discourse within the Catholic and pro-life communities on this question is of general interest to members of the American public. We are very pleased that members of our audience today represent not just the pro-life community, but other communities of discourse within the United States as well. These members of our audience are most cordially welcome.

We hope that the exchange of views we will hear today will be of value not just to members of the pro-life community, but to all members of the American public, regardless of their view on these issues.

You will note that today's event is billed as a discussion and not a debate. For it is not a debate. It is intended to present for the audience's consideration a fuller presentation of views on both sides of the question to be compared and considered within the largest possible lens. The tenor of our event is much in accord with the challenge posed by the nation's president while he was at Notre Dame. I quote him: "The question, then, is how do we work through these conflicts? Is it possible for us to join hands in common effort as citizens of a vibrant and varied democracy? How do we engage in vigorous debate? How does each of us remain firm in our principles and fight for what we consider right without demonizing those with just as strongly-held convictions on the other side?"

The Catholic University's Center for Law, Philosophy and Culture -- the sponsor of today's event -- exists to promote inquiry into the role of law in relation to culture and culture's orientation to the human good. The scope of its inquiry is both theoretical and practical. In its theoretical aspect, the Center aims to contribute to the academic fields of jurisprudence and the philosophy of law, as well as to Christian political and social ethics. In the practical dimension, it seeks to foster renewal and transformation of culture under contemporary circumstances through law and law reform.

In the President's remarks just mentioned, he concluded by calling for open hearts, open minds, fair-minded words. This is good. In the present setting, under the sponsorship of our Center, we would want, however, to clarify and make explicit what the President certainly meant to leave as implicit: What do we leave our hearts and minds open to, in particular? So as we convene this discussion today, let us leave our minds open to the truth, and our hearts open to love for one another in the light of our Creator's love for all of us.

I will now shortly turn the floor over to our able moderator, the Honorable Mary Ann Glendon, Learned Hand Professor of Law at Harvard Law School and former United States Ambassador to the Holy See. Before I do, allow me to say just a word about our format. Professor Glendon will speak for several minutes, not just to introduce our speakers, but further to introduce our topic. Then she will keep time as each speaker presents in turn. Each speaker will come to the podium to give a twenty minute presentation of his basic viewpoint. Thereafter... the moderator and the two speakers will sit before us and Professor Glendon will pose questions to the speakers. She will then also read questions from the audience for the speakers to consider in turn. Monitors are prepared to pass out note cards to the audience. You're invited to write down questions as they occur to you and pass them to the outside of your aisles, to be assembled to be given to Professor Glendon. And then each speaker will have a brief time for closing comments.

Professor Glendon...

Professor George's opening remarks are now posted on the Public Discourse website here. A snip:

The common ground I am interested in is with pro-life Americans who, like Professor Kmiec, have supported the President politically. The election is over, and the current question is not who anyone thinks will do the best job as President, or even whether one may legitimately support candidates who deny the fundamental dignity and right to life of unborn human beings and who promise to protect and extend the abortion license and expand the funding of embryo-destructive research. The question is: On which issues will we support the President’s direction, and on which will we challenge him because he is heading in the wrong direction? Those pro-life Americans who voted for him and support him should not object when we speak for the most vulnerable and defenseless of our fellow human beings, even when that means severely criticizing the President’s policies. They should stand with us on common ground, and join their voices with ours.

You can watch the streaming video of the entire event on CUA website here.

If you simply want to listen to the audio, I've created an MP3 audio podcast available on my podcast feed, or directly here.

Additional resources:
Dawn Eden was there and files this report about Kmiec's answer to a question she had submitted.

Labels: church, communication, conscience, dialogue, human life, moral life, multimedia, podcasts, politics

Father Robert Barron of Word on Fire has written a thoughtful article on dialogue, in wake of the speeches given at Notre Dame's commencement cermonies last Sunday. A snip:

It comes down to that slippery little word “dialogue.” I realize that to say that one is against dialogue is akin to saying that one is impatient with motherhood, patriotism, and sunny days. But the point is this: one should, in certain circumstances, be suspicious of dialogue. The great Canadian Jesuit philosopher Bernard Lonergan laid out the four basic moves that characterize the action of a healthy mind.....

He goes on to describe these four characteristics:

1. Attentive: Has to be able to absorb the data / facts of a situation


2. Intelligent: Needs to discern patterns of meaning


3. Reasonable: Must be capable of reasoning in order to form proper judgments vis-a-vis truth claims


4. Responsible: Must accept responsibility for the way the judgments formed will affect one's life and behavior

Father Barron then critiques the way Father Jenkins and President Obama used the concept of dialogue:

What I sensed in both Jenkins’s and Obama’s speeches was a sort of fetishism of dialogue.... The conversation, they seemed to imply, should remain always open-ended, the dialogue on-going, decision or judgment permanently delayed. But dialogue is a means to an end; it is valuable in the measure that it conduces toward judgment. G.K. Chesterton said that the mind should remain open, but only so that it might, in time, chomp down on something nourishing.

Read the whole article here.

Labels: communication, dialogue, moral life, relativism

The Personalist Project is hosting a lecture by Dr. Michael Healy, with a response by Christopher West, on June 3 in West Chester, PA.

Both speakers will consider the true nature of sexuality as essentially deep and intimate and in relation to betrothed love. Sex is not just another instinct or appetite, but unique in its vocation toward the expression of something higher. Von Hildebrand’s Purity, the Mystery of Christian Sexuality (on which Dr. Healy’s lecture is based), written in the 1920’s, anticipates many of the insights of John Paul II’s Theology of the Body.

More details here.

Labels: events, marriage and family, moral life, theology of the body

So the ND commencement has come and gone; the analysis of the speeches has begun.

The text of President Obama's speech was posted online, but I also audio recorded the speech so I could compare the prepared text with what he actually said. He didn't stray far from the text, but there were some interesting variations. And you could also get a sense of the responses -- shouts, applause, laughter, etc. -- by listening to the audio.

You can download the audio of the speech as an MP3 file here.

What I've done below is post the text of the speech. Any additions made by the President during his delivery are shown in bold. Any deletions are showing in strikethrough.

A significant section of the speech -- the part about the e-mail he received, all the way through the prayer he said at night -- is pretty similar to what he said in his 2006 Call To Renewal Keynote Address, which I've already analyzed in detail here. I did this back in March, figuring that the ND speech would be similar in nature. Very similar indeed.

It is, to a large extent, a sermon on the value of listening to each other and disagreeing in a civil manner. No objections to that whatsoever. But the suggestion that it is okay to disagree about essential matters, and that as long as it is done without rancor, it will not be problematic, is incredibly naive, I think. It's a well-packaged recipe for relativism... and I don't know how you keep a country going without agreeing on matters that are essential to the common good. Not a faith issue at all... no mystical experiences required. No prerequisites in struggling through the dark night of the soul. Is it a child, or isn't it? That's not a question that requires a creed to answer with firmness or certitude.

Thank you, Father Jenkins for that extraordinary generous introduction. You are doing an extraordinary outstanding job as president of this extraordinary fine institution, and your continued and courageous and contagious commitment to honest, thoughtful dialogue is an inspiration to us all.

Good afternoon Father Hesburgh, Notre Dame trustees, faculty, family, friends, and the class of 2009. I am honored to be here today, and grateful to all of you for allowing me to be part of your graduation.

I want to thank you for this honorary degree that I received. I know it has not been without controversy. I don't know if you're aware of this, but these honorary degrees are apparently pretty hard to come by. So far I'm only 1 for 2 as President. (MASSIVE EXTENDED APPLAUSE). Father Hesburgh is 150 for 150. I guess that's better. Father Ted, after the ceremony, maybe you can give me some pointers on how to boost my average.

I also want to congratulate the class of 2009 for all your accomplishments. (SOME IN THE CROWD BEGINS SHOUTING SOMETHING). And since this is Notre Dame, I mean... That's alright... and since... (STUDENTS BEGIN CHANTING SOMETHING -- "WE ARE ND" ?) We're fine, everybody. We're following Brennan's adage that we don't do things easily. We're not going to shy away from things that are uncomfortable sometimes. (APPLAUSE). Since this is Notre Dame, we should talk about your accomplishments not only both in the classroom but also and in the competitive arena. (LAUGHTER) No, don't worry, I'm not goint to talk about... that (LAUGHTER) We all know about this university's proud and storied football team, but I also hear that Notre Dame holds the largest outdoor 5-on-5 basketball tournament in the world (CHEERS) -- Bookstore Basketball.

Now this excites me. I want to congratulate the winners of this year's tournament, a team by the name of "Hallelujah Holla Back." Congratulations. Well done. Though I have to say, I am personally disappointed that the "Barack O'Ballers" didn't pull it out. Next year, if you need a 6'2" forward with a decent jumper, you know where I live.

Every one of you should be proud of what you have achieved at this institution. One hundred and sixty three classes of Notre Dame graduates have sat where you are sit today. Some were here during years that simply rolled into the next without much notice or fanfare -- periods of relative peace and prosperity that required little by way of sacrifice or struggle.

You, however, are not getting off that easy. You have a different deal Your class has come of age at a moment of great consequence for our nation and the world -- a rare inflection point in history where the size and scope of the challenges before us require that we remake our world to renew its promise; that we align our deepest values and commitments to the demands of a new age. It is a privilege and a responsibility afforded to few generations - and a task that you are now called to fulfill.

This is the generation that- your generation - that must find a path back to prosperity and decide how we respond to a global economy that left millions behind even before this crisis hit - an economy where greed and short-term thinking were too often rewarded at the expense of fairness, and diligence, and an honest day's work.

Your generation We must decide how to save God's creation from a changing climate that threatens to destroy it. Your generation (MORE SHOUTING FROM SOMEONE IN THE AUDIENCE. THE PRESIDENT SIMPLY SPOKE MORE LOUDLY, OVER THE NOISE, FOR THE REMAINDER OF THIS PARAGRAPH) We must seek peace at a time when there are those who will stop at nothing to do us harm, and when weapons in the hands of a few can destroy the many. And we must find a way to reconcile our ever-shrinking world with its ever-growing diversity -- diversity of thought, of culture, and of belief.

In short, we must find a way to live together as one human family. (BIG APPLAUSE)

It is this last challenge that I'd like to talk about today. Despite the fact that Father John stole all my best lines. For the major threats we face in the 21st century -- whether it's global recession or violent extremism; the spread of nuclear weapons or pandemic disease - These things do not discriminate. They do not recognize borders. They do not see color. They do not target specific ethnic groups.

Moreover, no one person, or religion, or nation can meet these challenges alone. Our very survival has never required greater cooperation and greater understanding among all people from all places than at this moment in history.

Unfortunately, finding that common ground -- recognizing that our fates are tied up, as Dr. King said, in a "single garment of destiny" - is not easy. Part of the problem, of course, lies in the imperfections of man - our selfishness, our pride, our stubbornness, our acquisitiveness, our insecurities, our egos; all the cruelties large and small that those of us in the Christian tradition understand to be rooted in original sin. We too often seek advantage over others. We cling to outworn prejudice and fear those who are unfamiliar. Too many of us view life only through the lens of immediate self-interest and crass materialism; in which the world is necessarily a zero-sum game. The strong too often dominate the weak, and too many of those with wealth and with power find all manner of justification for their own privilege in the face of poverty and injustice. And so, for all our technology technological and scientific advances, we see around the globe violence and want and strife that would seem sadly familiar to those in ancient times.

We know these things; and hopefully one of the benefits of the wonderful education you have received at Notre Dame is that you have had time to consider these wrongs in the world, perhaps recognized impulses in yourself that you want to leave behind and grown determined, each in your own way, to right them. And yet, one of the vexing things for those of us interested in promoting greater understanding and cooperation among people is the discovery that even bringing together persons of good will, bringing together men and women of principle and purpose, even accomplishing that can be difficult.

The soldier and the lawyer may both love this country with equal passion, and yet reach very different conclusions on the specific steps needed to protect us from harm. The gay activist and the evangelical pastor may both deplore the ravages of HIV/AIDS, but find themselves unable to bridge the cultural divide that might unite their efforts. Those who speak out against stem cell research may be rooted in admirable conviction about the sacredness of life, but so are the parents of a child with juvenile diabetes who are convinced that their son's or daughter's hardships might can be relieved. (BIG APPLAUSE)

The question, then, is how do we work through these conflicts? Is it possible for us to join hands in common effort? As citizens of a vibrant and varied democracy, how do we engage in vigorous debate? How does each of us remain firm in our principles, and fight for what we consider right, without -- as Father John said -- demonizing those with just as strongly held convictions on the other side?

And of course nowhere do these questions come up more powerfully than on the issue of abortion.

As I considered the controversy surrounding my visit here, I was reminded of an encounter I had during my Senate campaign, one that I describe in a book I wrote called The Audacity of Hope. A few days after I won the Democratic nomination, I received an email from a doctor who told me that while he voted for me in the Illinois primary, he had a serious concern that might prevent him from voting for me in the general election. He described himself as a Christian who was strongly pro-life, but that's WAS not what was preventing him potentially from voting for me.

What bothered the doctor was an entry that my campaign staff had posted on my website - an entry that said I would fight "right-wing ideologues who want to take away a woman's right to choose." The doctor said that he had assumed I was a reasonable person, he supported my policy initiatves to help the poor and to life up our educational system but that if I truly believed that every pro-life individual was simply an ideologue who wanted to inflict suffering on women, then I was not very reasonable. He wrote, "I do not ask at this point that you oppose abortion, only that you speak about this issue in fair-minded words."

Fair-minded words.

After I read the doctor's letter, I wrote back to him and I thanked him. I didn't change my position, but I did tell my staff to change the words on my website. And I said a prayer that night that I might extend the same presumption of good faith to others that the doctor had extended to me. Because when we do that - when we open UP our hearts and our minds to those who may not think precisely like we do or believe precisely what we believe do -- that's when we discover at least the possibility of common ground.

That's when we begin to say, "Maybe we won't agree on abortion, but we can still agree that this is a heart-wrenching decision for any woman is not made casually to make, with. It has both moral and spiritual dimensions.

So let us work together to reduce the number of women seeking abortions. Let's reduce by reducing unintended pregnancies. Let's make , and making adoption more available. Let's provide , and providing care and support for women who do carry their child to term. Let's honor the conscience of those who disagree with abortion, and draft a sensible conscience clause, and make sure that all of our health care policies are grounded not only in sound science but also in clear ethics and sound science, as well as respect for the equality of women." Those are things we can do. (APPLAUSE)

Understand - class of 2009 -- understand I do not suggest that the debate surrounding abortion can or should go away. Because no matter how much we may want to fudge it -- indeed, while we know that the views of most Americans on the subject are complex and even contradictory -- the fact is that at some level, the views of the two camps are irreconcilable. Each side will continue to make its case to the public with passion and conviction. But surely we can do so without reducing those with differing views to caricature.

Open hearts. Open minds. Fair-minded words.

It's a way of life that has always been the Notre Dame tradition. (APPLAUSE) Father Hesburgh has long spoken of this institution as both a lighthouse and a crossroads. A The lighthouse that stands apart, shining with the wisdom of the Catholic tradition, while the crossroads is where "...differences of culture and religion and conviction can co-exist with friendship, civility, hospitality, and especially love." And I want to join him and Father JOHN Jenkins in saying how inspired I am by the maturity and responsibility with which this class has approached the debate surrounding today's ceremony. You are an exemplar of what Notre Dame's about. (BIG APPLAUSE)

This tradition of cooperation and understanding is one that I learned in my own life many years ago - also with the help of the Catholic Church.

You see I was not raised in a particularly religious household, but my mother instilled in me a sense of service and empathy that eventually led me to become a community organizer after I graduated college. And a group of Catholic churches in Chicago helped fund an organization known as the Developing Communities Project, and we worked to lift up South Side neighborhoods that had been devastated when the local steel plant closed.

And it was quite an eclectic crew. Catholic and Protestant churches. Jewish and African-American organizers. Working-class black, and white and Hispanic residents. All of us with different experiences. All of us with different beliefs. But all of us learned to work side by side because all of us saw in these neighborhoods other human beings who needed our help - to find jobs and improve schools. We were bound together in the service of others.

And something else happened during the time I spent in THESE those neighborhoods. Perhaps because the church folks I worked with were so welcoming and understanding; perhaps because they invited me to their services and sang with me from their hymnals; perhaps because I was really broke and they fed me; perhaps because I witnessed all of the good works their faith inspired them to perform, I found myself drawn -- not just to THE work with the church, but to be in the church. It was through this service that I was brought to Christ.

And at the time, Cardinal Joseph Bernardin was the Archbishop of Chicago. (APPLAUSE) For those of you too young to have known him, or know of him, he was a kind and good and wise man. A saintly man. I can still remember him speaking at one of the first organizing meetings I attended on the South Side. He stood as both a lighthouse and a crossroads -- unafraid to speak his mind on moral issues ranging from poverty, and AIDS, and abortion to the death penalty and nuclear war. And yet, he was congenial and gentle in his persuasion, always trying to bring people together; always trying to find common ground. Just before he died, a reporter asked Cardinal Bernardin about this approach to his ministry. And he said, "You can't really get on with preaching the Gospel until you've touched hearts and minds minds and hearts."

My heart and mind were touched by him. They were touched by the words and deeds of the men and women I worked alongside in parishes across with in Chicago. And I'd like to think that we touched the hearts and minds of the neighborhood families whose lives we helped change. For this, I believe, is our highest calling.

Noe you , class of 2009, are about to enter the next phase of your life at a time of great uncertainty. You will be called upon to help restore a free market that is also fair to all who are willing to work; You'll be called to seek new sources of energy that can save our planet; to give future generations the same chance that you had to receive an extraordinary education. And whether as a person drawn to public service, or simply someone who simply insists on being an active citizen, you will be exposed to more opinions and ideas broadcast through more means of communications than have ever existed before. You will hear talking heads scream on cable, and you'll read blogs that claim definitive knowledge, and you will watch politicians pretend to know what they're talking about. (LAUGHTER) Occasionally, you may also have the great fortune of seeing important issues debated by people who do know what they're talking about... by well-intentioned, with brilliant minds and mastery of the facts. In fact, I suspect that many of you will be among those brightest stars.

And in this world of competing claims about what is right and what is true, have confidence in the values with which you've been raised and educated. Be unafraid to speak your mind when those values are at stake. Hold firm to your faith and allow it to guide you on your journey. In other words stand as a lighthouse.

But remember too that you can be a crossroads. Remember too that the ultimate irony of faith is that it necessarily admits doubt. It is the belief in things not seen. It is beyond our capacity as human beings to know with certainty what God has planned for us or what He asks of us, and those of us who believe must trust that His wisdom is greater than our own.

This doubt should not push us away from our faith. But it should humble us. It should temper our passions, and cause us to be wary of too much self-righteousness. It should compel us to remain open, and curious, and eager to continue the moral and spiritual debate that began for so many of you within the walls of Notre Dame. And within our vast democracy, this doubt should remind us even as we cling to our faith to persuade through reason, through an appeal whenever we can to universal rather than parochial principles, and most of all through an abiding example of good works, and charity, and kindness, and service that moves hearts and minds.

For if there is one law that we can be most certain of, it is the law that binds people of all faiths and no faith together. It is no coincidence that it exists in Christianity and Judaism; in Islam and Hinduism; in Buddhism and humanism. It is, of course, the Golden Rule - the call to treat one another as we wish to be treated. The call to love. The call to serve. To do what we can to make a difference in the lives of those with whom we share the same brief moment on this Earth.

So many of you at Notre Dame - by the last count, upwards of 80% -- have lived this law of love through the service you've performed at schools and hospitals; international relief agencies and local charities. Brennan is just one example of what your class has accomplished. That is incredibly impressive, and a powerful testament to this institution. And now (APPLAUSE) ... now you must carry the tradition forward. Make it a way of life. Because when you serve, it doesn't just improve your community, it makes you a part of your community. It breaks down walls. It fosters cooperation. And when that happens -- when people set aside their differences even for a moment to work in common effort toward a common good; when they struggle together, and sacrifice together, and learn from one another -- all things are possible.

After all, I stand here today, as President and as an African-American, on the 55th anniversary of the day that the Supreme Court handed down the decision in Brown v. the Board of Education. Brown was of course the first major step in dismantling the "separate but equal" doctrine, but it would take a number of years and a nationwide movement to fully realize the dream of civil rights for all of God's children. There were freedom rides and lunch counters and Billy clubs, and there was also a Civil Rights Commission appointed by President Eisenhower. It was the twelve resolutions recommended by this commission that would ultimately become law in the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

There were six members of the this commission. It included five whites and one African-American; Democrats and Republicans; two Southern governors, the dean of a Southern law school, a Midwestern university president, and your own Father Ted Hesburgh, President of Notre Dame. (APPLAUSE) They worked for two years, and at times, President Eisenhower had to intervene personally since no hotel or restaurant in the South would serve the black and white members of the commission together. And finally, when they reached an impasse in Louisiana, Father Ted flew them all to Notre Dame's retreat in Land O'Lakes, Wisconsin, where they eventually overcame their differences and hammered out a final deal.

And years later, President Eisenhower asked Father Ted how on Earth he was able to broker an agreement between men of such different backgrounds and beliefs. And Father Ted simply said that during their first dinner in Wisconsin, they discovered that they were all fishermen. And so he quickly readied a boat for a twilight trip out on the lake. They fished, and they talked, and they changed the course of history.

I will not pretend that the challenges we face will be easy, or that the answers will come quickly, or that all our differences and divisions will fade happily away. Because life is not that simple. It never has been.

But as you leave here today, remember the lessons of Cardinal Bernardin, of Father Hesburgh, of movements for change both large and small. Remember that each of us, endowed with the dignity possessed by all children of God, has the grace to recognize ourselves in one another; to understand that we all seek the same love of family and the same fulfillment of a life well-lived. Remember that in the end, in some way, we are all fishermen.

If nothing else, that knowledge should give us faith that through our collective labor, and God's providence, and our willingness to shoulder each other's burdens, America will continue on its precious journey towards that more perfect union. Congratulations class of 2009 on your graduation, may God Bless you, and may God Bless the United States of America.

Labels: communication, human life, moral life, politics, relativism

So there's this Catholic university in Indiana. Maybe you've heard of it. Maybe you've also heard that the President of the United States has been invited to speak at commencement tomorrow, and to receive an honorary law degree. It's been in the news. A little.

I haven't blogged about it at all. There have been plenty of others to do so.

(If you follow me on Twitter, Facebook or Delicious, you've read plenty about it there.)

If you want to follow the coverage of the prayerful demonstration that has been officially sanctioned by the University, you can see the schedule of events here, which begins with all-night adoration tonight.

Tomorrow, John Norton of Our Sunday Visitor will be live-blogging the event.

Pray for everyone at the University, for the President of the United States, for the Catholic Church in America, for our nation as a whole, and for the unborn. Our Lady, intercede for us all. Obtain for us all the mercy of your Son.

O Mary,
bright dawn of the new world,
Mother of the living,
to you do we entrust the cause of life:
Look down, O Mother,
upon the vast numbers
of babies not allowed to be born,
of the poor whose lives are made difficult,
of men and women
who are victims of brutal violence,
of the elderly and the sick killed
by indifference or out of misguided mercy.
Grant that all who believe in your Son
may proclaim the Gospel of life
with honesty and love
to the people of our time.
Obtain for them the grace
to accept that Gospel
as a gift ever new,
the joy of celebrating it with gratitude
throughout their lives
and the courage to bear witness to it
resolutely, in order to build,
together with all people of good will,
the civilization of truth and love,
to the praise and glory of God,
the Creator and lover of life.

Pope John Paul II, Evangelium Vitae

Labels: human life, Mary, mercy, moral life, politics, prayer

On May 13, 1917, Mary appeared to three shepherd children in the hills of Fatima, Portugal... 92 years ago today.

I had the chance to be in Fatima for the 75th anniversary of the apparitions, in 1992. It was an amazing week. I was digging through my photo albums a while ago, and it gave me the idea of blogging about my overseas travel adventures: the semester I spent in Austria back in 1992, the summer I spent in England in 1993, and the travels in Europe and Israel during my seminary studies in the fall of 1996.


Today I'm posting a link to the document about Fatima published by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith in the year 2000. It includes several elements about the secrets of Fatima and their interpretation. The theological commentary – which has a great discussion of the proper understanding of private versus public revelation – was written by then-Cardinal Ratzinger. Here's a teaser from the end of his analysis:

What is the meaning of the “secret” of Fatima as a whole (in its three parts)? What does it say to us? First of all we must affirm with Cardinal Sodano: “... the events to which the third part of the ‘secret' of Fatima refers now seem part of the past”. Insofar as individual events are described, they belong to the past. Those who expected exciting apocalyptic revelations about the end of the world or the future course of history are bound to be disappointed. Fatima does not satisfy our curiosity in this way, just as Christian faith in general cannot be reduced to an object of mere curiosity. What remains was already evident when we began our reflections on the text of the “secret”: the exhortation to prayer as the path of “salvation for souls” and, likewise, the summons to penance and conversion.

I would like finally to mention another key expression of the “secret” which has become justly famous: “my Immaculate Heart will triumph”. What does this mean? The Heart open to God, purified by contemplation of God, is stronger than guns and weapons of every kind. The fiat of Mary, the word of her heart, has changed the history of the world, because it brought the Saviour into the world—because, thanks to her Yes, God could become man in our world and remains so for all time. The Evil One has power in this world, as we see and experience continually; he has power because our freedom continually lets itself be led away from God. But since God himself took a human heart and has thus steered human freedom towards what is good, the freedom to choose evil no longer has the last word. From that time forth, the word that prevails is this: “In the world you will have tribulation, but take heart; I have overcome the world” (Jn 16:33). The message of Fatima invites us to trust in this promise.

Finally, mentor and friend Barbara Nicolosi is currently working on the screenplay for a major motion picture about Fatima. Details here: http://fatimathemovie.com

Labels: conversion, hollywood, Mary, moral life, movies, pilgrimage, travel

Full text here.

This address covers so much territory that I'm tempted to just unpack a paragraph at a time... one post a day. But, then again, that would be a month of blog posts...

I know everyone in the Catholic blogosphere will be quoting this keynote in the coming days. But here's a passage I'm guessing may get overlooked among all the others. Paragraph 15:

If we are serious about our patriotic duty, then we must pray everyday for our leaders, especially our President, and our nation. We should also practice more fervently our fasting and abstinence for the conversion of our lives and the transformation of our society. If we want to act for the common good, the good of all, in our nation, then we will seek to convert our lives each day to Christ, especially through the Sacraments of Penance and the Holy Eucharist. Christ desires to announce the Gospel of Life and bring about its saving effects in our nation by the complete conversion of our lives to Him for the sake of all our brothers and sisters, without boundary, and for the sake of the preservation of the sanctuary of human life, marriage and the family.

Labels: charity, church, conversion, human life, marriage and family, moral life, politics, prayer

As some of you may have seen last night, Christopher West appeared on ABC's Nightline in a segment about John Paul II's Theology of the Body.

As might be expected from a secular news source, the story was sexed up and distorted a good deal. The ABC reporter (or at least the editors) missed the point that this teaching is about what it means to be human, not about some fad which people are 'trying out' to improve life in the bedroom. TV coverage here and web article here. Look no further than the article's title: Sex Sermonist's Heroes: Pope John Paul II and Hugh Hefner.

Some of this could have been avoided, I'm sure, but I'm hopeful that a few people might search out West's website (tobinstitute.org) and delve a bit more deeply into the topic.

I posted the following comment on the Nightline article:

I recommend Christopher's book, The Love That Satisfies, where he draws out the backdrop of this beautiful teaching by John Paul II and Benedict XVI, particularly as discussed in the latter's letter entitled God Is Love (Deus Caritas Est). The TV interview sort of jumbled up the insight about Hugh Hefner, and made it unnecessarily ambiguous. What Hefner and John Paul II had in common was an awareness that the Victorian / Puritan view of sex was radically insufficient. Hefner's response was obviously defective, but the insight that the Victorian view was problematic contains a seed of insight... which John Paul II recognized as well, and unpacked in a Biblical and deeply human way, to point an authentic way forward... recognizing God's beautiful plan for love and life.

I'm pleased that West decided to post a series of clarifications on his website to untangle some of the misrepresentations which were part of last night's coverage:

In an effort to correct any editorial comments which may appear misleading, the following few points will help clarify the actual teaching of The Theology of the Body:

• Christopher West is not a sex therapist. He is a Catholic educator, author, lecturer, and faculty member of the Theology of the Body Institute. The TOB Institute is an educational organization and does not engage in sex therapy.


• John Paul II's Theology of the Body is intended for every human being,regardless of his or her state in life and regardless of what sexual tendencies one might experience in this fallen world. The TOB provides not only a vision of God's glorious plan for human sexuality and married love, but a vision of what it means to be human and what it means to love in the image and likeness of God.


• From beginning to end, Sacred Scripture unfolds a glorious love story, a story about the "marriage" between God and humanity, Christ and the Church. By inviting men and women to participate in this love, Scripture shows us the "path of love" -- including the path for spouses in their sexual intimacy. However, in a cultural climate fixated on the mechanics of sex rather than on authentic marital love, to describe the Bible as the "ultimate sex guide" can be misleading. It is certainly a guide to love, and, indeed, to the "ultimate" love: the love revealed in Christ.


• The Song of Songs presents an unabashed biblical celebration of the chaste love of a husband and wife, including multiple references to the intimacies of "tasting" the goodness of the other. To construe this as an endorsement for "oral sex" (as the culture uses that term) can be more than misleading. Please see Christopher West's book Good News About Sex and Marriage (chapter 5) for the full context of his answer to this question.


• The Song of Songs is of great importance to a proper understanding of Christianity. Indeed, the saints and mystics of the Catholic tradition have written more commentaries on the Song of Songs than any other book in the Bible. It is in the very center of the Bible for a reason. Calling it the "centerfold" in Scripture, Christopher intends to redeem the common understanding of the word "centerfold," which is usually associated in popular culture with pornography. In no way is it meant to compare the sacredness of the Song of Songs with the distortions of pornography.

My previous posts on the topic of the Theology of the Body are available here.

Labels: communication, John Paul II, marriage and family, moral life, Puritan America

Very often you'll see an abortion debate in the combox of a Catholic blog in which someone pro-choice changes the subject by talking about torture... e.g. if you're pro-life, why did you elect a President who was pro-torture?

I found the following response over at Amy's to be an effective expose of the problems with the pro-choice arguments. No wonder they need to change the subject.

All of you commenters here who keep bringing up torture and going on and on about it:

You all are such simplistic one-issue voters on this torture issue. You're in such lockstep with the Vatican and the hierarchy that it's clear you have abandoned free thinking entirely.

I’m personally opposed to torture, but I don’t think I could ever impose that view on somebody else.

I’d rather see us have a President who works to reduce the need for torture. We need to get at the deeper issues here – it’s not just as black and white as you religious-types always say. We should work with torturers to support them, not criminalize them.

Your belief that torture is “wrong” is just that – a religious belief. Well, what about all of the people who don’t share that belief? We live in a diverse, pluralistic society. Get with the program.

How can you take what is a matter of faith for you and impose it upon another person who might not share that faith?

Did you know that the amount of torturing in this country actually went up during the Clinton presidency? It was lower under Republican presidencies.

Torture is a difficult issue, and people of good will can disagree about it. Ultimately, I think the torturer should be free to make that choice in consultation with his attending doctors, his field agents, and his God.

Besides, even if we made torture illegal, guess what? - there would still be people out there torturing. And they wouldn’t have access to all the sophisticated equipment that we have in modern torture chambers. They’d use whatever they could find – sticks, broken glass, even coat hangers.

Is that what you want? You want us to go back to the days of back-alley torturing with coat hangers?

A truly enlightened society would keep torture safe, legal, and rare.

Labels: choleric, human life, moral life