Br.Barry - Wednesday Chapter Talks 29 October 2014

BBC Documentary - Br. Barry at Melrose Abbey

Fw: Chapter Sixty Four - Rule of St. Benedict

On Thursday, 30 October 2014, 

Br.Barry ...

Chapter Sixty Four.

Chap. 64 of the Rule is entitled ‘The Election of an Abbot’. Verses 3 -6 give an indication of how St. Benedict viewed the monastery’s relation to the local Christian community.

If a monastery elects a man who ‘goes along with its own evil ways’ then the local Christians have not only the right but the duty to intervene in that monastery’s affairs: ‘they may be sure that they will receive a generous reward for this’; ‘they may be sure that to neglect to do so is sinful’.

Specifically, the local bishop, other religious superiors as well as ordinary Christians are urged to keep an eye on what the monastery is doing.

There was, of course, quite a dramatic example of this here at Nunraw a couple of months ago. The community reversed its decision to build a new Guest House after considering the forthright views of other individuals and religious communities.

Be that as it may, these verses of the Rule and those recent events at Nunraw do highlight the monastery as a local or particular or individual church, in the sense that St. Paul refers to ‘the church of God in Corinth’ or ‘the church in Thessalonika’.  A ‘local’ church usually refers to a diocese so we won’t use that term.

Our Constitutions state: ‘The monastery is an expression of the mystery of the Church’.  Monastic profession is often described as a deepening or strengthening of the Sacrament of Baptism.

 When the various aspects of monastic life are seen as primarily the practises of an individual church then they take on a different perspective.

One advantage of this perspective is that it guards against the danger of seeing Xtian monastic life as mainly a part of a wider inter religious monastic culture. In that view, Xtian or Catholic monks are regarded as having more in common with Bhuddist and Hindu and other forms of monasticism than they do with baptised Christians. It is quite a common view in a certain type of monastery–devotee. It is also perhaps present in some monks: Thomas Merton was, I think, probably guilty of this at one point in his life.

Another Cistercian writer, in the 1990’s, constantly contrasts ‘monastics’ with ‘the baptised’, as if the former were not included in the latter. Although, to be fair, it is obviously unintentional.

The Eucharist is the source and the summit of the Christian life so it follows that the monastic community is most clearly a church at its Eucharistic celebration and a monk is most a monk when he participates in the celebration of the Eucharist.

When the monastery is seen as an individual church, the Divine Office, even the littlest of the Little Hours, is carried out not just on behalf of the Church but as a means, second only to the Eucharist, to deeper communion with the Church. As Columba Marm

ion wrote ‘when in choir, we bear a twofold personality, that of our misery, our frailty, our faults but also that of members of Christ’s Mystical Body’.

Lectio Divina becomes not just a traditional monastic practise but principally a sharing in the Church’s calling to receive the Word of God. Mary, the Mother of God, is traditionally the model of the monk in this regard, ‘pondering these things in her heart’.

Mary is also the model of the Church: ‘the whole mystery of the Church is inseparably bound up with the mystery of Mary’, as someone expressed it. So in Lectio these two, monk and Church, coincide and by means of his reading the monk goes deeper into the Church.

But what is the Church?

As in the Word Incarnate, the divine and human are present but cannot be separated so in a similar  way the Church is made up of visible and invisible elements that are inseparable. We see the visible in the Church’s organisation, its hierarchy, its members, its worship, its activity and its buildings.

The invisible is accessible to faith: the Holy Spirit, the soul of the Church; Christ, its Head; the Father, of whom St. Paul says ‘to the church in Thessalonika which is in God the Father’.

All these are present in the little church which is a monastic community and its monastery.

These verses of the Holy Rule illustrate that the monastery is nothing but part of the Universal Church.

Saint Braulio of Saragossa -Night Office Reading

   

 Patristic Reading, 29/10/2014

http://saints.sqpn.com/saint-braulio-of-saragossa/

Wednesday 30th Week Ord. TimeYear II

First Reading Wisdom 4:1-20

Second Reading (Alternative)

From a letter by Braulio of Saragossa (Epistola 3O:PL 80, 677)

Daily becoming empty for the living

O bitter terms of death; without Christ is all our life vain. The tears escape, the very life is oppressed with heaviness, my dictation quavers, and for grief the words do not come in correct order. She has gone, she has gone whom we loved, in whom you had the ties of love and all consolation, while to me she brought distinction and was an example of charity. She was your glory, our praise, your ornament, and our source of exultation. Who would believe that she would depart so early in life, when she appeared to be God's provision for your old age, to refresh you when weary and to comfort you when anxious amid the cares of the world? But what we did not expect has occurred and what we did not even think of has come. Alas for mortal life, daily becoming empty for the living!

What can we do, since such is the condition of mortals? Let us be consoled in the Lord, in whom is the consolation of a far better life and, as true faith holds, let us not cease to hope that she has been carried to a better place and released from the misery of this life. I doubt if one could find a single person who enjoys living in the face of all the evils that constantly arise; if one could, he would prove to be either foolish or stupid. Therefore, since our Creator and Redeemer, who both sees the future and holds the present, has seen what was best for her soul, I think she was carried away because he loved her, and lest wickedness of the world should pervert her mind, sufficient for the day is its own trouble. Therefore, let us rejoice, rather than mourn; not because we have lost, but because we have had such a one, you a wife and I a sister.

Because it is a part of your wisdom to live in such a way that you will not incur reproof from your enemies, be consoled and magnanimously avoid grief; to express it very briefly, you should hold within yourself both love for her who is gone and a reasonable consolation. I think that will become easier as time passes, but you must begin now, for everything that is thought over and meditated frequently becomes easier, no matter how dreadful it may seem. Therefore, most illustrious of men, use all your efforts to console yourself and your family; at her death, you must not forget those whom you and she both loved, lest you seem to have lost the affection you had through her when she was alive.

May Almighty God fill your heart with his grace and take away your sorrow and allow you, after a long time, to share immortal life with her.

            . Responsory   1 In 4:9.16b; In 3:16

God's love for us was revealed when he sent his only Son into the world so that we might have life through him. + God is love, and whoever lives in love lives in God and God lives in him.

V. God loved the world so much that he gave his only Son, so that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. + God is love ...

   Youtube ...

alt.christnet.theology ›

March 28th - St. Braulio, Bishop of Saragossa d. 651 

AT the college founded in Seville by St. Isidore, one of the more promising of the alumni was a boy of noble birth called Braulio, who grew up to be so eminent a scholar that Isidore regarded him as a friend and disciple rather than a pupil, and used to send him his own writings to correct and revise. Braulio prepared for the priesthood and was ordained, and when in 631 the see of Saragossa became vacant at the death of his brother Bishop John, the neighbouring prelates assembled to elect a successor and their choice fell upon Braulio. They are said to have been assisted in their selection by the appearance of a globe of fire which rested above Braulio's head, whilst a voice pronounced the words, "Behold my servant whom I have chosen and upon whom my spirit rests". 

As a pastor, St. Braulio laboured zealously to teach and encourage his people, and at the same time to extirpate the Arian heresy which continued to flourish even after the conversion of King Reccared. He kept in close touch with St. Isidore, whom he assisted in his task of restoring church order and regularizing ecclesiastical discipline. A small portion of the correspondence between the two saints has survived to this day. So great was St. Braulio's eloquence and his power of persuasion, that some of his hearers asserted that they had seen the Holy Spirit, in the form of a dove, resting On his shoulder and imparting in his ear the doctrine he preached to the people. 

Jerusalem - Dominus Flevit Thursday 30th Oct 2014

Thursday  30th Oct 2014 Facebook
 https://www.facebook.com/goodnewsofjesuschrist/timeline?filter 

Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint Luke 13:31-35.

...
Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who kill the prophets and stone those sent to you, how many times I yearned to gather your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, but you were unwilling! 
Behold, your house will be abandoned. (But) I tell you, you will not see me until (the time comes when) you say, 'Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.'"

Commentary of the day : 

Saint John-Paul II, Pope from 1978 to 2005 
Apostolic Letter “Redemptionis anno”, April 1984 

“Jerusalem…
How often have I wanted to gather your children together”

In addition to its renowned and magnificent monuments, Jerusalem has living communities of believing Christians, Jews and Muslims, whose presence is a pledge and a source of hope for the nations, which in all parts of the world look towards the Holy City as towards a spiritual patrimony and a sign of peace and of concord. Yes, as the homeland of the heart of all the spiritual descendants of Abraham who have a deep love for it, and as a place where, for the eyes of faith, God’s infinite transcendence and created things meet, Jerusalem is a symbol of gathering, of union and of peace for the whole human family. The Holy City thus includes a firm call for peace to all of humankind and in particular to all who adore the one great God, the merciful Father of all peoples. Alas! We have to admit that Jerusalem continues to be a reason for rivalry, violence and territorial claims.

This situation and these thoughts bring to our lips the words of the prophet: “For Zion’s sake I will not be silent, for Jerusalem’s sake I will not be quiet. Until her vindication shines forth like the dawn and her victory like a burning torch.” (Isa 62:1) We think of the day, and we await it with impatience, when we shall all truly be “taught by God” (Jn 6:45), so that we might hear his message of reconciliation and peace. We think of the day when Jews, Christians, and Muslims will be able to share with one another in Jerusalem the greeting of peace, which Jesus addressed to his disciples after his resurrection: “Peace be with you.” (Jn 20:19)

Quick Information

The chapel was built by the Italian Antonio Barluzzi in 1955, recalls weeping of Jesus over the city of Jerusalem.

Detailed Information

Before Jesus entered Jerusalem on a donkey, he looked up from the Mount of Olives to the city. He wept over it, because he foresaw the disaster that would make the Jewish people, because it would not recognize him as the Messiah (Lk 19.41 to 44).

19,37ff Luke 37 And when he was already close to the slope of the Mount of Olives, began the whole multitude of the disciples, with joy to praise God with a loud voice for all the mighty works that they had seen, 38 saying, Blessed is he who comes, the king, in the name of the Lord! Peace be in heaven and glory in the highest! 39 And some of the Pharisees in the crowd said to him: Teacher, but thy disciples rightly! 40 He answered and said, I tell you, if these should hold their peace, the stones would immediately cry out. Jesus weeps over Jerusalem 41 And when he was come near, he beheld the city andwept over it , 42 saying: If you, even you knew at that time, which make for peace! But now they are hidden from your eyes.43 For the time will come upon you when your enemies are around you a Wall pose, surround you and hem you in on every side 44 and you raze and thy children in thee, and no stone on the other, can be in you, because you did not recognize the time in which you were afflicted. 

The "Dominus Flevit Church" recalls today that event. Since the 16th century, this place is set with the grief of Jesus about the fate of Jerusalem in connection.

1881 acquired the Franciscans of this site, which was on a procession from the Mount of Olives to the Holy Sepulchre . Establishing this church came when the Franciscans at this point unearthed an old cemetery and it came across the remains of a monastery and a church dating from the 5th century. Built in 1955 by the Italian architect Antonio Barluzzi the new chapel, the original mosaics there were left where they had found it. The roof was the shape of a teardrop. Instead eastward, as required by the rule, the church is oriented to the west. The Dominus Flevit Church is primarily known for their interior shots: Through a window behind the altar has a unique view of the Old City and the Temple Mount. 

Saint Jude in Dublin - for the Hopeless

COMMENT:

On occasion in Dublin, in the Church of Our Lady of Lourdes I found the the special statute of St. Jude
This is the obvious devotion to Saint Jude "the Saint for the Hopeless and the Despaired"
The body of St Jude was taken to Rome. Statue of St. Jude Thadeus in the Archbasilica of St. John Lateran by Lorenzo Ottoni..

I look again to search for the photograph taken  in Dublin. 

St. Jude, statue in the Church of Our Lady of Lourdes, Sean Macdermot Street Lower, Dublin.

Below; the Last Supper (Leonardo), 

Apostles Thadeus and Simon 28 October 2014

Youtube 

  Discovering our Saints - Sts. Simon and Jude

He is the patron

of the Chicago Police Department

Tradition has it that Jude the Apostle, patron saint of lost causes, preached in Judea and Samaria and later Syria, Iraq and Libya, before being martyred in Beirut. According to legend King Abgar of the small Aramaic kingdom of Edessa wrote to Christ during-His lifetime offering Him sanctuary, to which Jesus replied with an image of himself, and after His death St Thomas sent Jude to the king, who was cured of his ailment (historically Edessa did have a Christian presence in the first century).

As a result, Jude is traditionally shown holding an image of Jesus by his heart. Alternatively, he is shown with a flame over his head, signifying his presence at Pentecost as one of the 70 who received the Holy Spirit. For obvious reasons his life story is somewhat patchy - as is his very identity. Jude the Apostle is sometime identified as Thaddeus, and is twice called Jude of James in the New Testament, and he may be the same as the "Jude , brother of Jesus", the traditional author of the Epistle of Jude.

One biography, although stemming from the 14th century and so of questionable veracity, states that Jude was born into a Jewish family in Galilee and was

the bridegroom at the wedding of Cana, and that his wife was a cousin of the Virgin Mary. (This is possible: it's likely that among Jesus's closest followers would have been relatives).

Jude, along with Bartholomew, is traditionally seen as bringing Christi­anity to Armenia, the first nation to adopt Christianity as a state religion. St Thaddeus Monastery in what is now northern Iran still stands today, on the grounds of a church that dates back to AD68, and Dominicans visitors to Armenia in the 13th century found a substantial devotion to

the saint.

He was martyred in AD65 along with Simon the Zealot. Sometime later his body was brought to Rome and placed in St Peter's Basilica, and he remains there with Simon. Along with many of the early relics, traditions abound about where they have remained down the years, including a lake in Kyrgyzstan.

Before that, though, it is said that pilgrims went to his grave and that he acquired the title "the Saint for the Hopeless and the Despaired". He is also, due to the influence of the Dominicans and Claretians in the American Midwest, the patron saint of the Chicago Police Department.

COMMENTS on: Sunday, October 26, 2014. William.Pope Francis

Senor de los Milagros – the Lord of Miracles

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From William -

Fw: Comment: Mass Homily by Fr. Raymond

On Monday, 27 October 2014, 16:42, William Wardle <williamwardle2bp@btinternet.com> wrote:

Comment (if I may)

Dear Fathers,

Attending Church services and functions over the years, I have sensed in certain stalwarts an expression of confidence in their lives of devotion. They love the Lord their God by their attention to the decrees passed down over the centuries. Their devotion to the Sabbath, for example, produced at one meeting a stunning statement from one that they would never have taken a job that entailed their working on a Sunday (yet in an emergency, would they find the hospital closed? I remained silent).

Rather, I sense that Jesus was not delimiting the love of God to human observance but expanding it so far beyond human limitations as to reveal the full extent of God's love for us! God the Father embraces us, and asks each one of us to respond to His all embracing love.

The commandment is about our response to God's love, not as justified by our own structures of religion, to justify our inadequacy in the face of such overpowering love. We are not left to fall back on our own inadequacy and its justification: Jesus gave us His Spirit which cries out to us and for us.

The ocean of God's love stretches out before us as far as the eye can see. We cannot swim its entire length to reach those distant far shores of devotion and saintliness, but we can delight in the water of life that supports us in our endeavour. Sometimes, I think there is even greater joy in discovering that we are able to float freely upon such waters! Such is the love of God.

Yet dreaming of those far distant shores,

With my love in Our Lord,

William  

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Pope Francis: Love of God and neighbour are inseparable

Posted: Sunday, October 26, 2014 10:15 pm

El Senor de los Milagros “Today's Gospel reminds us that the whole law of God is summed up in love for God and neighbour,” said Pope Francis,  during his address to pilgrims before the Angelus in St Peter's Square on Sunday. In his reflections on the day's Gospel readings,  the Holy Father said:  “You cannot love God without loving your neighbour and you cannot love your neighbour without loving God.”   The “novelty” of Christ’s teaching consists in the union of the two commandments, he said.  Pope Francis also recommended the reflection of his predecessor, Benedict XVI. on the teaching, which is found in paragraphs 16-18 of his first Encyclical letter, Deus caritas est. See below* Pope Francis went on to say:  “Jesus completes the law of the covenant, which He unites in himself, in his flesh, divinity and humanity, in a single mystery of love,” and, “In the light of the word of Jesus, love is the measure of faith, and faith is the soul of love: we cannot separate the religious life – the life of piety – from that of service to our brothers and sisters – to those flesh-and-blood brothers and sisters we actually meet.” Following the Angelus, Pope Francis recalled the beatification, on Saturday in Sao Paulo, Brazil, of Mother Assunta Marchetti: the Italian-born co-founder of the Missionary Sisters of St Charles Borromeo, known as “Scalabrinians” after the late 19th century bishop of Piacenza, Giuseppe Scalabrini, who helped found the missionary congregation originally dedicated to maintaining Catholic faith and practice among emigres to the New World, which now focuses its missionary work on migrants, refugees and displaced persons. “Blessed Assunta Marchetti saw Jesus present in the poor, in orphans, in the sick, in migrants, said Pope Francis. “We thank the Lord for this woman,” he continued, “a model of tireless missionary spirit and courageous dedication to the service of charity,” who serves as an example and a confirmation of the truth that we can and must seek the face of God in the brother and sister in need.” Pope Francis also had greetings for pilgrims from all over Italy and from around the world, especially those of the Schoenstatt movement, with whom he met on Saturday, and for the Peruvian community in Rome, which came to the Angelus in procession with an image of El Senor de los Milagros – the Lord of Miracles – an image of Christ crucified that was painted by an anonymous freed slave in the 17th century in Lima, and that has become a focus of deep veneration and intense devotion, especially among Peruvians. Source: Vatican Radio *From Pope benedict's Deus caritas est