Goodness

The idea of Good must be an absolute; it cannot be conceived as something relative.  Otherwise, the concept is really one of more-or-less-better-than, i.e. relatively better than something else, neither of which is wholly Good.

Furthermore, the idea of Good must be rooted in an acknowledgement of the existence of God.  Good must be freely generated from a Creator-of-the-Good, and that Goodness must be a feature of the Creator's God-ness.

Goodness must be "free".  Why?  It must be "free" in the sense that it's essence is not determined by any condition outside of itself.  That's part of the absoluteness of the concept: i.e. "Good" is good because that's what we call its inherent essence.  It's not "good" because it's better than something else.  It's not "good" because it's sometimes "good" for a limited time or situation or particular entities.  What is found to be "good" is good because it bears recognizable qualities of the "Good," and what is called and known as "Good" is Good because it is a hallmark of the One Who Is Good: God.

I think I'm suggesting that the "Good" is a facet of God's Being which is made most manifest in Christ, much as we have come to understand Truth being most perfectly revealed in Christ-The-Word.

I think what I'm searching for or contending with is a way to describe and contrast my experience of what I know about God and God's Creation, most particularly God's Eternal Reality versus the contemporary myth or world-view of our culture.  Most people I know recognize that our cultural thinking carries a propaganda that there is no Truth, let alone a Truth that can be known; there is only relative perspectives and opinions and preferences.  Similarly, most people recognize that our social thinking promotes the lie that nothing is good or bad, there is not absolute basis for a morality, there is only that which is more or less preferable and it's based on each person's or group's passing notions of such.

Furthermore, our culture/society has nearly succeeded in persuading most of us (even Christians) that anything that is "real" has a divided nature.  "There are two sides to every coin."  "There are two sides to every story."  "You can't know what is good unless you have also experienced the bad."  "You can't make a choice unless there are at least two things available."  I would argue that all of this thinking is part of the lie first expressed by the serpent in the Garden of Eden.  I.e. I am arguing that dualistic thinking and conceiving is never fully or adequately revealing of that which is True because that which is True is One.  Similarly, that which is Good is Whole.

I'm sure there have already been some very great thinkers who have expressed very well what it is I am trying to understand as I try to describe my thoughts.  I realize that my present search for how to express something which I know deep w/in myself to be True is much like eyes trying to see through the darkness the Face of One Who's Voice they have heard in their heart.

More later.

Current Reading

I'm currently reading (and re-reading) Theological Reflection, Connecting Faith and Life by Joye Gros, O.P., D.Min. for a class.  It's a good introduction to the topic.  I may comment further on this TOPIC at a later date.  I plan to NOT quote or reference directly any material received from the program I'm in or any material recommended I read for the program.  This is simply a note that I'm reading this book, and I recommend it.

Re The Priesthood

I just read Sr. Sara Butler's paper "Women's Ordination: Is It Still An Issue?"  Butler gives an excellent explanation of the Church's Teaching on this topic.  I hope to learn more on this subject, but this is a GREAT over-view and she references other sources I hope to eventually explore.

To find this paper, google Sr. Sara Butler and then find in the list: Mar7dunwoodie.doc  (I don't know how to link a ".doc")

An Unaltered Faith

The  following texts are excerpts I've highlighted while reading The General Instruction of the Roman Missal (GIRM).  From the Introduction; Testimony of an Unaltered Faith:

The sacrificial nature of the Mass, solemnly defended by the Council of Trent, because it accords with the universal tradition of the Church, was once more stated by the Second Vatican Council, which pronounced these clear words about the Mass: "At the Last Supper, Our Savior instituted the Eucharistic Sacrifice of his Body and Blood, by which the Sacrifice of his Cross is perpetuated until he comes again; and till then he entrusts the memorial of his Death and Resurrection to his beloved spouse, the Church."
..."for whenever the memorial of this sacrifice is celebrated the work of our redemption is accomplished..."
So, in the new Missal the rule of prayer (lex orandi) of the Church corresponds to her perennial rule of faith (lex credendi), by which we are truly taught that the sacrifice of his Cross and its sacramental renewal in the Mass, which Christ the Lord instituted at the Last Supper and commanded his Apostles to do in his memory, are one and the same, differing only in the manner of their offering; and as a result, that the Mass is at one and the same time a sacrifice of praise, thanksgiving, propitiation, and satisfaction.
...the royal Priesthood of the faithful... For the celebration of the Eucharist is the action of the whole Church... For this people is the People of God, purchased by Christ's Blood, gathered together by the Lord, nourished by his word, the people called to present to God the prayers of the entire human family, a people that gives thanks in Christ for the mystery of salvation by offering his Sacrifice, a people, finally, that is brought together in unity by Communion in the Body and Blood of Christ.  This people, though holy in its origin, nevertheless grows constantly in holiness by conscious, active, and fruitful participation in the mystery of the Eucharist.

Singing To The Lord

This is one of my favorite quotes from "Sing To The Lord; Music In Divine Worship":
"Persons designated for the ministry of psalmist should possess 'the ability for singing and a facility in correct pronunciation and diction.'"

;)

reference:
GIRM, no. 102
LFM, no. 56

Faithfulness is powerful!

Re-reading the GIRM (General Instruction for the Roman Missal).  It seems to me there isn't much changed in the GIRM, even though the translation for the prayers, etc. are changed in the RM.  Even so, this is a manual I should re-read at least once-a-year!  There's so much to know!  Even so, what most amazes me is how well we do liturgy together even though most of us don't know the GIRM, not even the parts that pertain to our own specific ministry.  I think that testifies to the power of example and tradition.  It also goes to show that all those who make it their business to correct us along the way have a very important ministry too: that of keeping the faith, in more ways than one!  It's true, it doesn't take a degree to do liturgy well.  It doesn't take a degree or even a manual to teach and follow a plan.  It does however take great personal humility as well as devotion to the Lord to remain true, in this case true to "Lex Orandi, Lex Credendi, Lex Vivendi" in its deepest sense.  Thanks be to God for Jesus Christ; thanks be to Jesus for the Holy Spirit; thanks be to the Spirit of becoming One! :)

Russell's Classics

For the past several blog posts I've been listing books recommended by James M. Russell's Spiritual Classics.  I have not included in my listings all the books he includes in his collection; my listings and comments are not meant to be a summary of his work.  Also, I'm not sure I can heartily recommend Russell's book as an introduction to these works; his point of view is too often foreign to mine.  I am however glad that I am reviewing this work and that I have learned of a few more "spiritual classics" I hadn't previously encountered.

Teresa, mystic and reformer

The Interior Castle
by Teresa of Avila
1577

Read also: The Life of Saint Teresa.

Teresa was a mystic and a reformer.  To some, this seems a mystery to be resolved.  To me, one gives veracity to the other, much like faith and works.  "Faith without works is dead."  And works without faith is futile vanity.

The Way of a Pilgrim
written in the 19th century
by an anonymous writer, (Russian traveler? Greek monk?), someone fairly knowledgeable.
Setting is Russia.
Ideas taken from Orthodox Christian tradition, particularly the Philokalia, which advocates the ideas of hesychasm;
Focus of The Way of a Pilgrim is prayer, constant prayer, particularly using "the Jesus Prayer" as a mantra.
The experiences described by the Pilgrim is resonant of Tolstoy and Dostoevsky.
J.D. Salinger used The Way of a Pilgrim in his Fanny and Zooey.

This sounds like a book I would enjoy reading immensely.

Little Flowers

from Russell's Spiritual Classics:

The Little Flowers of St. Francis

Who:  Anonymous
What:  stories of Saint Francis and others of his "motley crew" !
Where:  Italy
When:  14th century
How:  originally in Umbrian?
Why:  accounts of the early Franciscan movement

As regards St. Francis, I've only yet read Chesterton's work.  I look forward to getting a copy of the Little Flowers; I'm sure I will treasure it.  There are many editions from which to choose!

Cloudy

more from Russell's Spiritual Classics (see my last two posts)

The Cloud of Unknowing

Who: Anonymous, an English Monk?, possibly a Carthusian
What:  spiritual guidebook, including translations of other religious texts ( such as Dionysius the Areopagite, a 5th c. Syrian); a statement of apophatic mysticism
When:  14th century
Where:  England?
How:  original in English?
Why:  to approach God in prayer through love rather than rationality
Influenced: Meister Eckhart, St. John of the Cross, some Trappist monks, Spinoza?, Kant, Kierkegaard

Hmm...  My experience of God is so grace-filled, so "in my face," that I am moved to approach God w/ the complete trust of a loved child, and because of this grace (where-in I KNOW I am loved), I approach God as One Who Knows Me and One Who Can Be Known because our communion is already in the flow of God's Love.

I would like to study this work someday; however, I'm not very attracted to the idea of the unknowableness of God.  I rather believe God makes Himself Knowable through Love.  And this is the best kind of knowing!!! :)

Augustine's City of God

more from Spiritual Classics, ed. Russell

City of God


Who: Augustine of Hippo
when:  early 5th century
Where:  north Africa?  Rome?
How:  original in Latin
Why:  encourage readers to keep their eyes and hearts fixed on the City of God regardless of any temptations or trials

I read Augustine's Confessions quite a while ago, but never read his City of God.  Russell suggests Augustine is a "difficult read but intriguing read" for the "modern reader," but I think he sounds timely!  When are we without trials and temptations?

Desert Fathers

Spiritual Classics; the thinking person's guide to great spiritual books
edited by James M. Russell
Magpie Books. London
copyright 2009

Sayings of the Desert Fathers
Latin name: Apophthegmata Patrum
Time-frame: 3rd/ 4th centuries
Locale: desert regions of Egypt
Original Source(s): passed down from the Coptic Church

"The basic idea of the fathers -- that we can ascend to God through a mixture of self-sacrifice, abstinence, and meditation leading to spiritual progress -- became a fundamental model of Christian practice that is still influential today."

Collections:
Amazon lists over 1,000 collections edited by various writers; some of the 1,000 being multiple versions of one editor.

http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_ss_c_1_16/185-7735205-4355945?url=search-alias%3Dstripbooks&field-keywords=sayings+of+the+desert+fathers&sprefix=Sayings+of+the+d%2Caps%2C330#/ref=sr_pg_1?rh=n%3A283155%2Ck%3Asayings+of+the+desert+fathers&keywords=sayings+of+the+desert+fathers&ie=UTF8&qid=1334003114

Here is one of Merton's.

I'm not sure how I will choose my edition!!!  I always lean toward's Merton, but each collection has a unique vantage point.

Screwtape's Appetite

...It may surprise you to learn that in His efforts to get permanent possession of a soul, He relies on the troughs even more than on the peaks; some of His special favourites have gone through longer and deeper troughs than anyone else.  The reason is this.  To us a human is primarily food; our aim is the absorption of its will into ours, the increase of our own area of selfhood at its expense.  But the obedience which the Enemy demands of men is quite a different thing.  One must face the fact that all the talk about His love for men, and His service being perfect freedom, is not (as one would gladly believe) mere propaganda, but an appalling truth.  He really does want to fill the universe with a lot of loathsome little replicas of Himself -- creatures whose life, on its miniature scale, will be qualitatively like His own, not because He has absorbed them but because their wills freely conform to His.  We want cattle who can finally become food; He wants servants who can finally become sons.  We want to suck in, He wants to give out.  We are empty and would be filled; He is full and flows over.  Our war aim is a world in which Our Father Below has drawn all other being into himself: the Enemy wants a world full of beings united to Him but still distinct.

Excerpt from Letter 8 of The Screwtape Letters by C. S. Lewis


"He wants servants who will finally become sons."  Thanks be to Christ Jesus Who makes this possible!

I'm enjoying reading Lewis' Screwtape Letters; I find the "devilish" humor refreshing!  Lewis packs many insights into the challenges of Christian discipleship into his terse and witty prose.

Christ's Healing and Call To Follow

Already in the first chapter of Mark's Gospel, Jesus is healing many people.  Three healing miracles are described in detail: Jesus cures the demoniac, Jesus raises up Peter's mother-in-law, and Jesus cleanses the leper.    These three seemed to be grouped together because, in the narrative style, they seem to happen in quick succession, and because they are all given w/in chapter one.  However, we know there is another healing to be described in chapter two: the healing of the paralytic.  So I'm not sure why the first three are considered a grouping of three more than all four are considered a group of four.  (Given that we know the chapter divisions were added after the original writing.)

What I think is interesting is that before these accounts of healing, we are given an account of the calling of the first disciples.  Then, immediately following the healing stories, we are given an account of the calling of Levi.
I'll have to think on this (grouping and order of stories) further after I have digested each of these accounts.

Meanwhile, I want to note that I am very glad and grateful to know that Jesus retreated to "deserted places" for prayer and refreshment.  Even Jesus needed to keep Himself in close, constant, vital relationship w/ His Father in order to do God's Will.  The Father ministers to the Son so the Son can serve.  Any service I hope to do must be fruit of my life and sustenance in Christ.

Reading Pilgrim's Progress by John Bunyan, Made into a Picture Book by Robert Lawson, With Text Retold and Shortened for Modern Reader, by Mary Godolphin.  I haven't read this since I was a young child!  Reading it again now makes me what to find the longer version and read it too.

I Was Found Of Thee

In Sabin's "The Gospel According To Mark" (New Collegeville Bible Commentary), she notes that in Jesus' day, it wasn't customary for teachers to seek out their disciples; normally, teachers attracted disciples.  She furthers compares Jesus to "Wisdom" who "calls those who are in need of her -- 'the simple ones' (Proverbs 1:22)"

How exciting and wondrous it must have been to be sought out by Jesus.  I can imagine how thoroughly compelling His call would have been.

And as I write that, I realize I do know how exciting and wondrous it is to be sought out by Jesus!  My Lord is truly compelling!  (Praise You, Jesus-Christ!)

My all-time favorite hymn describes this experience of being sought by the Lord Who Is Love:

I Sought The Lord

I sought the Lord, and afterward I knew 
 he moved my soul to seek him, seeking me. 
 It was not I that found, O Savior true; 
 no, I was found of thee. 

Thou didst reach forth thy hand and mine enfold; 
 I walked and sank not on the storm-vexed sea. 
 'Twas not so much that I on thee took hold, 
 as thou, dear Lord, on me. 

I find, I walk, I love, but oh, the whole 
 of love is but my answer, Lord, to thee! 
 For thou wert long beforehand with my soul; 
 always thou lovedst me. 

~Anonymous

My favorite setting for this text is that by J. Harold Moyer, as found in The Mennonite Hymnal, published in 1969

Straightaway

Notes:
The Good-News of Jesus-Christ is the Beginning of the New Creation.  (See, I like to use lots of capitals!!!)
Elijah & Elisha and John The Baptist & Jesus parallels: except the greater of each pair is reversed. (Much like the New Creation fulfills and surpasses the First Creation ~ ML's comment)

Now that I know Mark's use of the word we have translated as "at once" is actually "straightaway" and is a pun in both Greek and English, I'm thrilled to read (Mark 1:12) "Straightaway the Spirit drove [Jesus] out into the desert..."  Yes!  Even (especially?) Christ's being tempted (much as each of us are) is part of God's making His Way straight!  God can make things right even through temptation!  Each temptation can be viewed as a hardship, but even if it is, it can also be received as an invitation to join w/ God in making things right.

When we are initially aware of a temptation, we can think we are being given an invitation or opportunity to sin.  It is at least equally true that we are being given an invitation and opportunity to become (w/ the Spirit's help) more Christ-like.

Praise be to Jesus!
Holy are You, Lord-God of all creation!
:)

Commentaries on Mark's Gospel

I'm reading books w/ commentaries on the Gospel according to Mark.  One I find especially exciting is Marie Noonan Sabin's commentary of The Gospel According To Mark, which is part of the New Collegeville Bible Commentary series.  I'm just into the introductory section, but I'm already digging into the Scripture more.  I love learning more of God, especially through the stories and accounts He Himself has given us through inspired Word.  Thanks be to God!  Praise be to Jesus!

I just finished the intro.  SO excited!  I especially value Rabin's remarks re Mark's relating the New to the Old Testament, his use of keywords, and his over-all design using patterns of two's and three's.  How Rabin does/ n't use capitals is explained but is not completely clear to me.  I hope as I read and make my own lists comparing what other translations capitalize and she doesn't, or vice a versa, along w/ what I would like to capitalize and why, maybe what's being high-lighted or not will help make the text clearer and richer for me.  We'll see.  But I'm so excited to dig in!  Here we go! :)

Sacred Relationship

Notes taken from Scott Hahn's course re Biblical Covenants as found on St. Paul Center For Biblical Theology and his book A Father Who Keeps His Promises.

The nature of Biblical Covenants: Sacred Relationship
Five (+one) elements:
(oath)
mediator
blessings
consequences/ curses
sign
relationship

Six major Covenants in Old & New Testaments:
Each of these is between God and a group of people, mediated by:
Adam
Noah
Abraham
Moses
David
Jesus

Scripture reveals to us how God is forming His Covenant w/ His People.
Covenants are different from Contracts in that Contracts are promises between two parties (doesn't include God) exchanging property or services; whereas Covenants are oaths between one or more parties and God, forging a relationship.

Reading Rome Sweet Home and A Father Keeps His Promises, both by Hahn.  Also reading Silf's Inner Compass.