No, sorry, I'm not here to illumine your life and solve all your problems for boundless eternity, I'm just quoting from Monty Python's The Meaning of Life. Just a note, though... when I watched it, I had a friend who had seen it before serving as a strict censor, so I didn't see any of the bad parts. Rumor has it that it gets pretty morally offensive, so even though it is quite hilarious in bits, I'm not necessarily recommending it. Unless you have your own private censor, too. Boy, though, do I ever love the Pythons.
Anyway, since this is a religiously themed blog, here's a pretty sweet prayer, courtesy the aforementioned Pythons.
Chaplain:
Let us praise God!
O Lord, you are so big.
So absolutely huge.
Gosh, we're all really impressed down here, I can tell you.
Forgive us, O Lord, for this, our dreadful toadying
And barefaced flattery
But You are so strong and well, just so super.
Amen.
(I took out the bits where the congregation pretty much just repeats the prayer back after him.)
Tuesday, August 30, 2005
Sunday, August 21, 2005
Refreshing!
http://www.navhindtimes.com/stories.php?part=news&Story_ID=08209
Now that is the sort of headline I like to read. It's depressing, sometimes, when all you can find in the news about Catholicism is abuse, bankruptcy, corruption, schools and parishes closing, the shortage of priests and religious, liberals demonstrating for same sex marriage, female clergy, contraception, and any number of other things that just aren't going to happen in THIS church (see Jesus' words on the likelihood of the gates of Hell prevailing against His Church for reference, Matthew 16:18).
All the same, I wasn't sure I agree with Bishop Marx.
Interviewed yesterday by Cologne’s WDR television, Bishop, Rev Reinhard Marx commented: “In these past 2,000 years, not everybody has kept the ten commandments. Not even the Pope or the bishops! Who can keep all the commandments?”
...
“The important thing is that Jesus is our friend — but he is a demanding friend,” said Rev Marx. ‘It’s nothing new that all people can’t live up to all these goals, which are sometimes uncomfortable.”
Okay, Fact #1: We're all miserable sinners. Fact #2: He's right, technically, that no one will live up to all the standards Jesus gave us. However, I think that in the context of the article (I can't speak for what he really meant), the Bishop makes it sound as if it's not our fault, or that it's not that big of a deal. People need to be confronted with their sin. And those people who walk around with the Pill in their pocket can't be allowed to keep on with it just because no one in the past has been able to keep the Commandments perfectly -- we can't allow ourselves to become complacent just because Jesus loves us, this we know, 'cause the Bible tells us so.
In reality with God's grace we can lead lives which are holy and pleasing to God -- Jesus is "demanding" because He knows that's true. Sure, we know we're going to fall short sometimes or more likely most of the time, but that isn't any sort of an excuse. Our weakness is on account of our sin, not the other way around, because everyone can turn to God and He can give us strength that undermines the power sin holds over us.
Now, with a prayer for all of those who "turned red-faced and giggled" when asked if they lived by what the Pope preaches (and the Church teaches), and one for myself because I know I have my own challenges to overcome, I'm off to face the day!
Now that is the sort of headline I like to read. It's depressing, sometimes, when all you can find in the news about Catholicism is abuse, bankruptcy, corruption, schools and parishes closing, the shortage of priests and religious, liberals demonstrating for same sex marriage, female clergy, contraception, and any number of other things that just aren't going to happen in THIS church (see Jesus' words on the likelihood of the gates of Hell prevailing against His Church for reference, Matthew 16:18).
All the same, I wasn't sure I agree with Bishop Marx.
Interviewed yesterday by Cologne’s WDR television, Bishop, Rev Reinhard Marx commented: “In these past 2,000 years, not everybody has kept the ten commandments. Not even the Pope or the bishops! Who can keep all the commandments?”
...
“The important thing is that Jesus is our friend — but he is a demanding friend,” said Rev Marx. ‘It’s nothing new that all people can’t live up to all these goals, which are sometimes uncomfortable.”
Okay, Fact #1: We're all miserable sinners. Fact #2: He's right, technically, that no one will live up to all the standards Jesus gave us. However, I think that in the context of the article (I can't speak for what he really meant), the Bishop makes it sound as if it's not our fault, or that it's not that big of a deal. People need to be confronted with their sin. And those people who walk around with the Pill in their pocket can't be allowed to keep on with it just because no one in the past has been able to keep the Commandments perfectly -- we can't allow ourselves to become complacent just because Jesus loves us, this we know, 'cause the Bible tells us so.
In reality with God's grace we can lead lives which are holy and pleasing to God -- Jesus is "demanding" because He knows that's true. Sure, we know we're going to fall short sometimes or more likely most of the time, but that isn't any sort of an excuse. Our weakness is on account of our sin, not the other way around, because everyone can turn to God and He can give us strength that undermines the power sin holds over us.
Now, with a prayer for all of those who "turned red-faced and giggled" when asked if they lived by what the Pope preaches (and the Church teaches), and one for myself because I know I have my own challenges to overcome, I'm off to face the day!
Monday, August 15, 2005
Happy Assumption, Everybody!
Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners now and at the hour of our death!
Monday, August 08, 2005
And Saint Therese agrees
After my post of a few days ago about CCD, I came across a passage in St. Therese of Lisieux's autobiograpy, The Story of a Soul. Here she goes:
"Those innocent souls were like soft wax on which any imprint could be stamped--of evil, alas, as well as of good. I understood the words of Jesus: 'If anyone hurts the conscience of one of these little ones, he had better have been drowned in the depths of the sea.' Many, many souls would become most holy if they had been properly guided from the very start."
"Those innocent souls were like soft wax on which any imprint could be stamped--of evil, alas, as well as of good. I understood the words of Jesus: 'If anyone hurts the conscience of one of these little ones, he had better have been drowned in the depths of the sea.' Many, many souls would become most holy if they had been properly guided from the very start."
Friday, August 05, 2005
My Old Arch-Nemesis, CCD
After I was Confirmed in 8th grade, the church wisely decided that I must be as equipped as I'll ever be to deal with all of the challenges that could corrupt my faith and of course, perfectly knowledgable about everything that could be useful to me in my spiritual journey. Never mind that I was about to enter what could prove to be the most challenging and corrupting time in my life -- after 8th grade, they just don't want to deal with us little snots, especially not in CCD. So we are turned loose, usually with a vague recollection that there are something like six or seven sacraments, give or take a few, chrism is a holy oil, and that those darned do-gooding seventh graders won the canned food drive again.
Well, perhaps I'm being too harsh. Although I was severely bored out of my mind, I payed attention in CCD most of the time, and came out with a very, very basic knowledge of some of the foundations of the faith. I left knowing the sacraments, a few miscellaneous prayers, and how to make a proper examination of the conscience and a rosary out of string. By the end, I was a few toothpick crosses and saint cards richer for the experience. But I think I got more out of it than most.
All the same, I think we have a crisis in our religious education programs, and I feel qualified to speak out on this issue as I have just recently emerged from the ranks of CCDers and then decided I would have to try and teach myself the faith, and have since grown tremendously in my understanding of, and appreciation of, Holy Mother Church. I recognize that not everyone is going to take the initiative to start reading Scripture and researching Church history and canon law, however. It's those people I'm really worried about. CCD isn't doing it's job. It starts out young, which is good, and feeds the kids some of the basics which they need to know.
But in my own experience, as the kids get older they get the same old stuff, taught without enthusiasm. They never experience the richness of Catholicism. The mystery, how the Church revolves around the sacraments and especially the Eucharist, the beauty, the holiness, the history. Instead, we memorize one line definitions. "Angels are invisible spirits and God's helpers." All well and good, but no one is going to catch fire for Christ because they can define "chrism," "Holy Orders," and "omnipresent." Especially as they get older, they need to understand why they believe all these things and what they really mean. It's so rarely related to Scripture or Sacred Tradition. Instead of teaching kids about the physics of genuflecting (albeit important), we need to lead them into a deeper reverence, holiness, and understanding that makes them want to drop to their knees in Jesus' presence.
Most of all, I don't think we should just dump kids after Confirmation. Instead, that's when we should really start giving them stuff to think about and challenging them to know their faith. After eighth grade, they can handle all the deep and mysterious things that makes Catholicism extraordinary. The classes can start to get more specialized: Catholic Sacramentality, Defending the Catholic Faith, Church History, Marian Devotion, Protesant Studies, Old Testament, Personal Piety, Catholic Morality in the Modern World, Catholic Social Teaching, Bible Study. Gah, teach them Latin, go to a Tridentine Mass, teach them to chant a bit, take them to Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament, have them pray the Rosary. At the same time, take a leaf out of the Protestant book (even if it is a deficient book in so many ways) and find some way to claim these lives for Jesus. Play Evangelical and get these kids fired up. (Not in Mass, necessarily... to everything there is a time and place, and the craziness I've seen at Evangelical churches has no place in the reverence of Mass.) Make God relevant without watering Him down.
Even if they still get caught up in their lives and don't spend as much time with God as they should be, when they get older and faith starts becoming a grounding part of their lives, they'll be thankful they know so much about it. And when people ask them about God, and they can give good answers, or defend their faith -- they'll be thankful. I can invision all the CCD kids of my generation growing up and not being able to turn to their faith because they never experienced enough of it. That's how people get disallusioned with Catholicism -- it becomes boring and repetetive and empty because people don't understand what the sacraments really mean and aren't taught how to turn their hearts and minds to God.
At the same time, I know you can't just force faith on kids. And I know too that we don't have enough adults who could teach a lot of these courses, not having a good grip on some of the more weightier issues themselves. So maybe my dream world of submerging all the kids in some tougher theology isn't realistic. But there has to be something better than just letting kids free. Most of them don't even come back for Youth Group once they've been "liberated" -- so we shouldn't go liberating them so quickly. So, you don't want to brainwash the kids, that's fine. But if you don't at least lay a foundation and make an impression on the kids first, the secular world is going to step right up... and it has no qualms with brainwashing.
Another problem I see is that, in most cases, for this to stick it really needs to be reinforced at home. No matter how much we throw at them in CCD, if their parents let them leave it at the door when they get home, we'll have problems reaching these kids. (I was sort of an exception to this rule -- although my parents are both good people, Catholicism is not something you'll find a lot of in our house. No prayer or grace before meals, no religious pictures. My room is the only one with a crucifix. No talk about God or faith or Jesus. Still, day by day I'm getting deeper and deeper into my faith and, as I study, I fall more and more in love with it.) But for the most part, we also need to reach the parents and make them realize how important this is to their children and somehow get them on our side, too. We can take over the world for God and His Church if only we could reach the children and their parents.
If we want more "devout" Catholics, instead of those Cafeteria Catholics everyone's always talk about, we need to revamp how we're teaching our children. Starting at home and reinforced at religious education, we need to start giving these kids more of their own faith.
They deserve it, and I can guarantee they'll love it.
Note: There are actually a lot of good aspects of CCD at my own church, even if I did come out sounding more critical than I am. Today, I was helping out with our first graders -- they were learning how to say the Hail Mary and the Our Father, and today we made rosaries out of blue beads and string. (That actually led to some rosary violence...but we set that straight.)
There was also a video that was sort of long for little kids -- it said an entire five decades of the rosary, and by the end some of the kids were squirming. At the end, the lady on it said, "Okay, let's do that again!" and one little kid exclaimed with utmost horror, "Oh, no!" All the same, by the end you could tell they really had their Hail Marys down... small victories!
I was telling my group just to start saying a single decade of the rosary every day or before they go to bed and think about one of the mysteries, because, as beautiful as the rosary is and as much as I hope they come to cherish this beautiful prayer and devotion someday as they get older, it is extremely long for little kids, especially first graders.
God bless little kids; they sure are cute.
Well, perhaps I'm being too harsh. Although I was severely bored out of my mind, I payed attention in CCD most of the time, and came out with a very, very basic knowledge of some of the foundations of the faith. I left knowing the sacraments, a few miscellaneous prayers, and how to make a proper examination of the conscience and a rosary out of string. By the end, I was a few toothpick crosses and saint cards richer for the experience. But I think I got more out of it than most.
All the same, I think we have a crisis in our religious education programs, and I feel qualified to speak out on this issue as I have just recently emerged from the ranks of CCDers and then decided I would have to try and teach myself the faith, and have since grown tremendously in my understanding of, and appreciation of, Holy Mother Church. I recognize that not everyone is going to take the initiative to start reading Scripture and researching Church history and canon law, however. It's those people I'm really worried about. CCD isn't doing it's job. It starts out young, which is good, and feeds the kids some of the basics which they need to know.
But in my own experience, as the kids get older they get the same old stuff, taught without enthusiasm. They never experience the richness of Catholicism. The mystery, how the Church revolves around the sacraments and especially the Eucharist, the beauty, the holiness, the history. Instead, we memorize one line definitions. "Angels are invisible spirits and God's helpers." All well and good, but no one is going to catch fire for Christ because they can define "chrism," "Holy Orders," and "omnipresent." Especially as they get older, they need to understand why they believe all these things and what they really mean. It's so rarely related to Scripture or Sacred Tradition. Instead of teaching kids about the physics of genuflecting (albeit important), we need to lead them into a deeper reverence, holiness, and understanding that makes them want to drop to their knees in Jesus' presence.
Most of all, I don't think we should just dump kids after Confirmation. Instead, that's when we should really start giving them stuff to think about and challenging them to know their faith. After eighth grade, they can handle all the deep and mysterious things that makes Catholicism extraordinary. The classes can start to get more specialized: Catholic Sacramentality, Defending the Catholic Faith, Church History, Marian Devotion, Protesant Studies, Old Testament, Personal Piety, Catholic Morality in the Modern World, Catholic Social Teaching, Bible Study. Gah, teach them Latin, go to a Tridentine Mass, teach them to chant a bit, take them to Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament, have them pray the Rosary. At the same time, take a leaf out of the Protestant book (even if it is a deficient book in so many ways) and find some way to claim these lives for Jesus. Play Evangelical and get these kids fired up. (Not in Mass, necessarily... to everything there is a time and place, and the craziness I've seen at Evangelical churches has no place in the reverence of Mass.) Make God relevant without watering Him down.
Even if they still get caught up in their lives and don't spend as much time with God as they should be, when they get older and faith starts becoming a grounding part of their lives, they'll be thankful they know so much about it. And when people ask them about God, and they can give good answers, or defend their faith -- they'll be thankful. I can invision all the CCD kids of my generation growing up and not being able to turn to their faith because they never experienced enough of it. That's how people get disallusioned with Catholicism -- it becomes boring and repetetive and empty because people don't understand what the sacraments really mean and aren't taught how to turn their hearts and minds to God.
At the same time, I know you can't just force faith on kids. And I know too that we don't have enough adults who could teach a lot of these courses, not having a good grip on some of the more weightier issues themselves. So maybe my dream world of submerging all the kids in some tougher theology isn't realistic. But there has to be something better than just letting kids free. Most of them don't even come back for Youth Group once they've been "liberated" -- so we shouldn't go liberating them so quickly. So, you don't want to brainwash the kids, that's fine. But if you don't at least lay a foundation and make an impression on the kids first, the secular world is going to step right up... and it has no qualms with brainwashing.
Another problem I see is that, in most cases, for this to stick it really needs to be reinforced at home. No matter how much we throw at them in CCD, if their parents let them leave it at the door when they get home, we'll have problems reaching these kids. (I was sort of an exception to this rule -- although my parents are both good people, Catholicism is not something you'll find a lot of in our house. No prayer or grace before meals, no religious pictures. My room is the only one with a crucifix. No talk about God or faith or Jesus. Still, day by day I'm getting deeper and deeper into my faith and, as I study, I fall more and more in love with it.) But for the most part, we also need to reach the parents and make them realize how important this is to their children and somehow get them on our side, too. We can take over the world for God and His Church if only we could reach the children and their parents.
If we want more "devout" Catholics, instead of those Cafeteria Catholics everyone's always talk about, we need to revamp how we're teaching our children. Starting at home and reinforced at religious education, we need to start giving these kids more of their own faith.
They deserve it, and I can guarantee they'll love it.
Note: There are actually a lot of good aspects of CCD at my own church, even if I did come out sounding more critical than I am. Today, I was helping out with our first graders -- they were learning how to say the Hail Mary and the Our Father, and today we made rosaries out of blue beads and string. (That actually led to some rosary violence...but we set that straight.)
There was also a video that was sort of long for little kids -- it said an entire five decades of the rosary, and by the end some of the kids were squirming. At the end, the lady on it said, "Okay, let's do that again!" and one little kid exclaimed with utmost horror, "Oh, no!" All the same, by the end you could tell they really had their Hail Marys down... small victories!
I was telling my group just to start saying a single decade of the rosary every day or before they go to bed and think about one of the mysteries, because, as beautiful as the rosary is and as much as I hope they come to cherish this beautiful prayer and devotion someday as they get older, it is extremely long for little kids, especially first graders.
God bless little kids; they sure are cute.
Monday, August 01, 2005
St. Michael's Cathedral, Toronto
While I was on a mission trip with my youth group in Toronto a few weeks back, I went wandering with three friends of mine to look for a church that I saw out of the corner of my eye driving to our hotel. Well, I saw the steeple, at least, and it looked like it belonged to a much cooler structure, so I was dying to go find it.We did find it, and were impressed to see the rather beautiful (if not hugely impressive) St. Michael's Cathedral. We walked around it, but it was closed and under construction. We wandered back the next day, however, to find it open and went inside. It was gorgeous on the inside, but we couldn't stay long (or take pictures!) as Mass was starting.
Again, not knowing much about architecture or really anything else for that matter, I can't tell you a lot about the church. Although the sign said that it was built in the style of the 14th Century English Gothic period, if that means something to you! Someday, I swear, it will mean something to me...
Boy, churches rock. In my fantasy world, everyone should look at them and say, "Wow, if some people make such beautiful buildings to praise this God they're talking about, how much more wonderful and awesome this God must be! Whoo Christianity!" But I understand that you could then apply that to any other building: "Wow, if some people make such beautiful Parthenons, how much more wonderful and awesome Athena must be! Whoo Greek paganism!" But that doesn't change the fact: churches rock.
Is it mean-spirited of me to want all the pretty churches in the world to be Catholic? Because every time I see a cool church, I immediately think, "Oh, let it be one of ours..." I'm the same with people, though. "Oh, let them be one of ours..."
I'm definitely biased in favor of Catholicism, but I really don't see the problem with that.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)