Right to life and health

The House of Representatives recently passed their Health Care Reform bill, with an amendment – the Stupak-Pitts Amendment – that prohibits federal money being used for elective abortions.  Read a little about the activity in the House here:

http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2009/nov/09110706.html

http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2009/nov/09110707.html

So, there is more of a chance that the right to life will be upheld and that the right to health care may be aided as well.  This blog is not an endorsement of the current legislation in the works, there are far reaching economic and social ramifications to the elements in the bill that was passed, but the US Bishops have continuously – for over a decade – called for needed health care reform that respects life.  While this bill may not be a workable solution, it is heath care reform that respects life.  We will see.

Next up, the Senate’s deliberation.

Jesus in the Eucharist

A theological discussion with some of my seminary friends inspired this blog today, and because theology students engage in discussion over fine theological points some may not find this blog that interesting.  However, if you do, let me first say that in no way to I (or any serious Catholic) reject the Real Presence of Jesus in the Eucharist.  I do not think there is a huge danger of people construing this blog that way, but a disclaimer up front seemed prudent.  All of that mess being said, let us begin with the question that was posed:  “Is Jesus physically present in the Eucharist?”

To start, we’ll need to cover some medieval scholastic metaphysics; don’t be scared.  The normative way of describing the change that the bread and wine undergo during the consecration at mass is termed “transubstantiation.”  In order to understand what this means, one must know the basic vocabulary used by scholastics like St. Thomas Aquinas.  Everything in the universe was understood by these philosophers as a “substance.”  The chair I’m sitting in is a substance, water is a substance, the bread and wine offered at mass are substances.  Good so far?  Okay, then furthermore, every substance consisted of matter and form.  Here we will start using diagrams to keep everything straight.

Matter is the stuff something is made of.  For instance, bread is made of wheat and the chair is made of wood and fabric.  Form is what makes the substance that particular substance.  I know a chair when I see one, even if there are millions of chairs that all look different, each has the form of a chair.  Another example is the human person.  I know a human when I see one, even if all humans look different (different sizes, cosmetic differences, some are missing limbs, some have deformities, etc.) they are all humans; they all have a human form.

So, now that we have these vocabulary words, we can better understand the concept of transubstantiation.  If we break down the word we can find its meaning.  “Trans” signifies change, and “substantiation” refers to substance.  So “transubstantiation” is a change in substance.  This a good word to use for the consecration because if you look at the Precious Body and Blood of our Lord in the Eucharist from a purely empirical, non-faith, perspective, you would see only bread and wine.  Why is that?  It is the teaching of the church that neither the matter or the form of the bread and wine change, only the substance:

So, the appearance and the stuff it is made out of does not change, but what it actually is, its very substance has become the presence of our Lord Jesus Christ, Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity.  If someone, heaven forbid, put the consecrated host under a microscope it would still look like bread.  It still has the form of bread, but in faith we believe Jesus when he says, “This is my Body.”  The very isness of the host has changed, even though it cannot be seen empirically.

Now, the question remains.  Is Jesus physically present in the Eucharist?  It would depend on what you mean by physcially.  I would probably answer “yes” most of the time.  The substance is still there physically.  The Lord wanted a way to be with us, even though he was not going to be present in his walking-around resurrected body like he was before his Ascension.  On the other hand, I do say that Jesus is not materially present.  The host is not a fleshy piece of Jesus’ body, nor does it have the form of a body.  So, if by physically one means matter and form, then the answer would be no.  Still, I do not think that the word “physically” carries that connotation.

Are you completely confused yet?  If you are, don’t worry.  “Transubstantiation” is a word that attempts to describe an ineffable mystery!  Jesus’ presence among us in the Eucharist can never be fully understood, because that would mean trying to explain the presence and reality of God.  It can never be done.  God is infinite.  Still, one thing to remember is that God loves us so much that he deemed that we would never again be without the presence of the Son again.  This ultimately is the most important truth.

Salvation… The Great Equalizer

Lately, I have been thinking about the silliness of us humans.  We have received the greatest gift possible, salvation.  We have been redeemed by our God Most High, through the Sacrifice of the Son, in the Power of the Holy Spirit, and we accept this in our lives with great joy.  However, oftentimes, we question if we truly have redemption.  We sin and we confess our sins, but then we remain in our guilt feelings.  I am not saying we should not recognize our unworthiness before God, our proper place as creatures under God, and be constantly thanking God for his great mercy, but I am saying we should be truly faithful when it comes to our central tenet.

If we come out of the confessional, and continue to beat ourselves up with guilt over the sins we confess, do we really have faith in God’s mercy?  Do we have faith in the power of Christ’s sacrifice, the power of the blood He shed that makes such a thing as Reconciliation possible?  I would say no.  To continue in soul-burdening guilt is to say, “Yes Lord, thank you for forgiving me, but I know that I am still a wretch that cannot possibly be one with you.”  This is not the truth.  The truth is that GOD says we are redeemed.  GOD says our sins are absolved in the sacrament of Reconciliation.  Who are we to doubt?  Salvation saves us like it saved Mary (in her Immaculate Conception), Joseph, Peter, Paul, Elizabeth, Catherine of Sienna, Augustine, Monica, Martín de Porres, Juan Diego, Rose of Lima, Anthony of Padua, and Eugene de Mazenod.  We are just as saved as all of the saints!  Reconciliation is a celebration, not a punishment.  We should celebrate during the sacrament, rejoice when leaving the confessional, and live in the Spirit as we turn away from sin and draw closer to God.  So, come on Catholics!  Let’s stop dragging around as if we were not set free.  When sin comes, when you fall, deal with it through God’s mercy.  Then live a joyful life!  It is disrespectful and faithless not to give great praise and thanks to God and let the weight of that sin go.  God did, and that should be good enough for us.

You Search Me Lord, and You know me.

Psalm 139

O LORD, you have probed me, you know me:
you know when I sit and stand; you understand my thoughts from afar.
My travels and my rest you mark; with all my ways you are familiar.
Even before a word is on my tongue, LORD, you know it all.
Behind and before you encircle me and rest your hand upon me.
Such knowledge is beyond me, far too lofty for me to reach.
Where can I hide from your spirit? From your presence, where can I flee?
If I ascend to the heavens, you are there; if I lie down in Sheol, you are there too.
If I fly with the wings of dawn and alight beyond the sea,
Even there your hand will guide me, your right hand hold me fast.
If I say, “Surely darkness shall hide me, and night shall be my light” –
Darkness is not dark for you, and night shines as the day. Darkness and light are but one.
You formed my inmost being; you knit me in my mother’s womb.
I praise you, so wonderfully you made me; wonderful are your works! My very self you knew;
my bones were not hidden from you, When I was being made in secret, fashioned as in the depths of the earth.
Your eyes foresaw my actions; in your book all are written down; my days were shaped, before one came to be.
How precious to me are your designs, O God; how vast the sum of them!
Were I to count, they would outnumber the sands; to finish, I would need eternity.
If only you would destroy the wicked, O God, and the bloodthirsty would depart from me!
Deceitfully they invoke your name; your foes swear faithless oaths.
Do I not hate, LORD, those who hate you? Those who rise against you, do I not loathe?
With fierce hatred I hate them, enemies I count as my own.
Probe me, God, know my heart; try me, know my concerns.
See if my way is crooked, then lead me in the ancient paths.

This is just a good reflection for me today.  The Lord knows me, and I pray he leads me in right paths.

Lift High the Cross

We celebrate today the Triumph of the Cross.  It is one of the great oddities of Christianity that we rejoice in this Cross, the implement that killed our Lord, our God and Savior.  Still, we value this Cross so much, that is is our very identity.  We wear crosses in public, we have a tradition of building our churches in the shape of a cross, and for us Catholics, almost no prayer comes and goes without marking ourselves with the Sign of the Cross.  It may seem bizarre for non-Christians, but that should not surprise us:

For Jews demand signs and Greeks look for wisdom, but we proclaim Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles, but to those who are called, Jews and Greeks alike, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. For the foolishness of God is wiser than human wisdom, and the weakness of God is stronger than human strength. – 1 Corinthians 1:22-25

This wisdom of God is that he turned a symbol of death into a symbol of life.  The cross was the image of a painful, humiliating, despicable death.  The Romans made sure that it was feared, which helped them control the people their occupied territories.  When the Cross of Christ triumphed over the death it was designed to inflict, through the power of the One it bore, the Cross was then transformed.  We now wear the death sentence as a proclamation of eternal life.  In the victory won through the Cross, it is now a bold symbol of God’s victory in this world.

Many people see Christianity, especially Catholicism, as merely an exhaustive, and exhausting, list of rules and scare tactics.  So many see the Cross as burden meant to crush us and keep us in our place.  Nothing could be further than the truth.  St. John the Evangelist speaks in today’s readings of the Cross as God’s healing hand.  As once the bronze serpent healed all afflicted in the desert, the Cross was lifted up to heal all who look upon it and raise them up to new life.

For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him might not perish but might have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world might be saved through him. – John 3:16-17

So rejoice today all you lands!  Jesus our Savior has won the victory.  The Cross has triumphed over death.  We have been made free, and God calls us to be one with Him forever.  Lift high the Cross!

Immaculate Mary

On this First Saturday of the month, I’d like to give some space to Our Mother, Mary.

You are the glory of Jerusalem, the surpassing joy of Israel; You are the splendid boast of our people. With your own hand you have done all this; You have done good to Israel, and God is pleased with what you have wrought. May you be blessed by the Lord Almighty forever and ever! – Judith 15:9-10

Mother Mary, pray for us, you children, who are in such great need in this world.  Pray that we have hearts that love above all else, so that we may follow your Son in humility and faith.

We live in the light

From today’s First Reading from Paul’s First Letter to the Thessalonians:

But you, brothers and sisters, are not in darkness,
for that day to overtake you like a thief.
For all of you are children of the light
and children of the day.
We are not of the night or of darkness.
Therefore, let us not sleep as the rest do,
but let us stay alert and sober.
For God did not destine us for wrath,
but to gain salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ,
who died for us, so that whether we are awake or asleep
we may live together with him.
Therefore, encourage one another and build one another up,
as indeed you do.

Just good thoughts for today.  Build each other up!  We live in the light of God; what need is there of tearing each other down.  Live in the light; cast off the darkness.  Shine for all to see, today and every day!

Fatherhood

As you may have guessed, I am not a dad in the sense of having helped give life to a new child, or having taken on the role with an adopted child.  I have however taken on the role of spiritual fatherhood.  Recently, I have been thinking on the vocation to fatherhood, both in the familial sense and ministerial sense.  I find great wonder in the fact that Fatherhood is a vocation given to humanity by God from on High.

God is The Father.  This has been revealed to us throughout the ages through the Holy Spirit’s action among God’s people, and was revealed to us in the most definitive way by the Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, who taught us among so many other wonderful truths, to call God our Father.  The most well-known prayer in Christianity is in fact the Lord’s Prayer, “The Our Father” to us Catholics.  If we want to know how to be a Father, we must look to the Origin of Fatherhood, The Father himself, The First Person of the Trinity.

Who is this Father?  The Father is the “Creator of heaven and earth.”  All that is was created by him, by his pouring forth his will and power.  Furthermore, he is God, the Father of Israel.  He chooses his people, and they will always be His people.  He teaches them how to love, by his love of them.  He shows them the way in a burning bush, the proclamation of his Name, by setting them free from captivity, and by sending them the help they need to reach their full potential.  Our full potential in God is to be one with him, and he sent the Son and Spirit to us to allow us to reach this goal.  Lastly, he is the Father of the “seen and unseen.”  He can discern that which we would rather ignore, or do not see at all.

So, for family fathers, these roles have been given to them in their own way.  Creation is obvious for biological fathers.  How amazing is it that God allows men to have a hand in his role of creation, in making life?  It’s nearly unbelievable.  My brothers have participated with God and their wives in this amazing exercise four times now, and each time I am amazed, and can see an even more profound amazement on their face as they look at the children God entrusted to them.  For fathers who are not biologically connected to their children, the creation of a family, a covenant of love and life, is just as amazing.  This speaks to the second characteristic of fatherhood, the love for one’s people.  A family is a participation in the covenant God has with his people.  A father has to say yes to loving his children and his wife in the same constant, unwavering, completely forgiving manner that God says yes to us eternally.  That is a very daunting task.  This is especially so when a father has to help his children through something they do not understand or refuse to see in its full light.  Teenagers struggling to find their identity are a good example.  How does a father help their teen understand adulthood when they want to reject their parents as examples of adulthood and make their own way?  God bless the fathers (and mothers) of every teenager!

Similar considerations come to my mind and heart when I think of the people God has entrusted to me.  I must help God and my pastor create a loving covenant of parishioners, along with the parish pastoral team and staff.  This covenant must be nurtured and sustained with patience and love on my part.  I have to work as hard as I can to bring my parish ever deeper with God.  I have to navigate that which is confidential, that which is sensitive, that which is painfully public, and that which is quietly or sometimes very noisily moving through the community.

How can this be done?  The best generic answer is prayer and patience!  Still, I have to draw my strength from the best example I have of Fatherhood, and that is my Lord God.  When times get tough, or overwhelming, it does my soul good to remember that God entrusted this role, which is ultimately his role, to me and to all fathers.  This calls me to humility because my vocation is not my own, but it also calls me to gratitude and confidence.  I rest in the fact that The Father gave me my role as Father Jonathan, and that he, as the Good Father he is, he will be always be faithful and see me through with love, patience, and perfect Fatherly help.

Why God Gave Us Deacons (among other, actual reasons)

So this morning, as on every Monday, I had the 6am mass.  Today is a wonderful feast of St. Bartholomew, a time for rejoicing in God’s plan for our Church, and the celebration of the priesthood that comes to us through Bartholomew and his fellow Apostles.  For this reason I was very excited when I woke up for mass, at least for the three seconds before I saw that my alarm-clock read 5:51!  I guess I had not set it, or turned if off in a state of semi-consciousness.  Whatever the reason, I had 9 minutes to get to mass.  Not.. good..  So I threw on some clothes, gargled some water, wet down my hair to make it pseudo-presentable, whipped on my shoes and ran out my bedroom door (past my pastor who was awake already watching TV with a, lets say bemused, expression on his face.

Here is where I started to celebrate all of deacon-kind.  Deacon Tom Billimek, who is a beautiful human being, had everything ready, he set the lectionary, sacramentary, and credence table.  He’d gotten everything where everything needed to go, and he had held out for me.  He could have rolled on into a communion service at 1 minute after the hour and given me up for lost (or snoozing), but he didn’t.  He  had faith that God would drag my behind to the chapel come high-water, but hopefully not that other thing.  Now, all this is enough to extol the three-finger-be-prepared-cannot-do-without wonderment of the parish deacon, and then came the kicker.  In my near-lucidity of having been awake a whole 10 minutes, the clear-headedness needed for preaching was not with me.  Never fear however, Deacon Tom was ready to preach, and he did a great job!  God bless you Deacon Tom!

So, the next time you are reflecting on the three orders of Holy Orders, remember that the rock solid base of any of your favorite priests or bishops is always, theologically and practically, the holy deacon.

Healthy Christianity

Simply drop the term “Universal Healthcare” in any gathering of Americans these days and you will have a veritable firestorm on your hands.  What to do about healthcare has become a huge contention among the various political factions, and as usual, the Catholic Church has something to say about it!  Also as usual, Christians, and especially Catholics, will have a very difficult time navigating this issue.  Here are some reasons why:

Decent, Affordable Healthcare is a Fundamental Right

Yes, you read it correctly.  There are many rights identified by the Church, the right to life, the right to shelter, the right to express oneself.  Among these rights is health care.  In A Framework for Comprehensive Healthcare Reform as far back as 1993, the USCCB asserted that “healthcare is more than a commodity; it is a basic human right, an essential safeguard of human life and dignity” (1).  This echoes papal statements about the right to healthcare.  Pope John XXIII in Pacem in Terris states that every human has “the right to be looked after in the event of ill health” (11), and in Mater et Magistra lists “health care” among the “economic and social rights” (61). The Second Vatican Council’s document Gaudium et Spes even lists health among the “needs” of all human persons (84).  The conditions in 1993 in the United States caused our bishops to express concern that “our nation’s healthcare system serves too few and costs too much” (Framework, 1).

The Right to Healthcare is Pro-Life

This statement works both ways.  Taking the USCCB’s statement about health care being “an essential safeguard of human life and dignity” (1), the pro-life connotation is clear.  However, this also means that all life must be given this basic right.  A great concern has risen in the current US healthcare debate about the place of the so-called “reproductive right” of abortion in healthcare.  It does not make any sense to try and offer healthcare universally and then make one of the provisions of that healthcare the complete destruction of the health of a very sizable section of that universal population, the unborn.  In no way can government sponsored, subsidized, supported, or provided healthcare include abortion as a provision.  Nor can it include euthanasia on that list, by reason of the same contradiction.  How can ending life be considered “healthcare.”  This truth is present in virtually every document the Church has to offer that touches on the medical sphere, including the ones above.  At this point, if anyone denies the evil of abortion and euthanasia, they have not been reading anything the Church has published.  I will proceed with the assumption that this point is proven.  If it turns out this is an incorrect assumption, then I will have something else to blog about!

Now how do you reconcile this as a Christian in the US today?

This question is definitely more difficult to answer, in that no one is giving Christians a viable option.  Democrats seem to be adamant about pushing abortion into the current legislative efforts.  It seems that their leadership refuses to see any other options.  It is possibly an extension of the belief that sufficient access to unlimited abortion will ultimately be good for women and for society, which has simply not borne out for the past several decades.  Adding to this scandal is the fact that there are many Christians in the Democratic party.  Republicans, on the other hand, have shown a lack of desire to do something about the healthcare crisis.  I call it a crisis because “tens of millions of Americans do not have health insurance” (USCCB Action Alert, July 17, 2009).  There are many Christians in the Republican party as well, many of them make a point of their Christianity in public on a regular basis.  However, if healthcare is a fundamental right, and tens of millions of Americans are being denied this right, then “the current health care system is in need of fundamental reform” (ibid).  Republicans have not shown much motivation to bring about this reform.

So what can we do?  Well, firstly, we cannot support healthcare legislation that supports, much less mandates, abortion.  However, we cannot do nothing.  Simply rejecting President Obama’s legislation and doing nothing else is not enough.  We must advocate for truly universal healthcare that is affordable and feasible, effective and viable for every American.  The following directives must guide our efforts:

“-Include health care coverage for all people from conception until natural death;

-Continue the federal ban on funding for abortions and reject any mandate for abortion coverage or access to abortion;

-Include access for all with a special concern for the poor and vulnerable and support inclusion for legal immigrants;

-Preserve pluralism, including freedom of conscience for providers, health care workers and patients; and

-Restrain costs and apply costs equitably among payers” (ibid).

It is daunting, but it can be done.  The thing is, something must be done.  Write a letter, write three letters.  Get informed, participate in constructive dialog.  And above all, pray.

St. Raphael the Archangel, pray for us.