Circles for Shepherds and Magi

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Circles for the Holy Family
Circles for Christ the King
Circles for Saint Joseph
Circles for Our Lady
Circles for Zachary and Elisabeth

Notes 73

Power tends to corrupt even Christians.

The Church is the Body of Christ does not mean: the Roman Catholic Church is the Body of Christ.

The Bible is a fetish.

Since we do not speak and act the Gospel, we twist and interpret a text.

You will accept even my love.

Poser for Orthodox Christians: he that loveth not his brother whom he hath seen, how can he love God whom he hath not seen?

Could it be that you had only human feelings?

When it comes to God, the devil is in the definitions.

In heaven and hell the spirit will be strong, and the flesh willing.

02004 12 30 +

Mary Anne's brother, Bernard J. Nelson, died today, aged 69. May the heavens welcome you with rejoicing.

Notes 72

We who know you are responsible for those who don't.

Be convinced that some I despise will go into the kingdom of God before me.

Who could be satisfied with returning to any period of Christianity?

Solzhenitsyn: Elevation Toward Religion

From an Interview by Joseph Pearce:

Solzhenitsyn: Not a return to religion but an elevation toward religion. The thing is that religion itself cannot but be dynamic which is why “return” is an incorrect term. A return to the forms of religion which perhaps existed a couple of centuries ago is absolutely impossible. On the contrary, in order to combat modern materialistic mores, as religion must, to fight nihilism and egotism, religion must also develop, must be flexible in its forms, and it must have a correlation with the cultural forms of the epoch. Religion always remains higher than everyday life. In order to make the elevation towards religion easier for people, religion must be able to alter its forms in relation to the consciousness of modern man.

Circles for the Holy Family

A Java applet.

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Circles for Christ the King
Circles for Saint Joseph
Circles for Our Lady
Circles for Zachary and Elisabeth

Last Christian Carnival of 2004

Enjoy the Last Christian Carnival of 2004 at MediaSoul.

Christian Carnival: Christmas Edition at Patriot Paradox.
Christian Carnival XLVIII at Parableman.
Christian Carnival XLVII at TheGodBlog.com
Christian Carnival XLVI at A Physicist's Perspective
Christian Carnival XLV at CowPi Journal
Christian Carnival XLIV at ChristWeb
Christian Carnival XLIII at Digitus, Finger & Co

The Catholic Carnival: Holiday Edition

Enjoy The Catholic Carnival: Holiday Edition at Living Catholicism

Catholic Carnival IX at A Penitent Blogger
The Eighth Catholic Carnival at Living Catholicism.
Catholic Carnival—Advent Edition at Dunmoose the Ageless
The Sixth Catholic Carnival at Happy Catholic
The Fifth Catholic Carnival at Living Catholicism
The Fourth Catholic Carnival at Dunmoose the Ageless
The Third Catholic Carnival at Living Catholicism
The Second Catholic Carnival—On the Eucharist at The Curt Jester
The First Catholic Carnival at Living Catholicism

On the Holy Family

A Talk

I am so glad that Jesus’ public ministry did not involve his family—that he did not require his followers to say good things about Joseph and to recognize Mary as the Mother of God, that he did not establish a Holy Family website, jmj.com.

Jesus’ family and background did not recommend him to his hearers. A son of a carpenter? From Nazareth? And his mother—weren’t the circumstances of her pregnancy and marriage rather suspect?

Of course, we [Catholics] believe that Joseph was a saint to whom angels spoke, that Mary was the immaculately conceived Virgin Mother of God, and that Jesus was God’s son, a descendant of David born in Bethlehem as the Scriptures foretold.

What is the connection between Jesus’ family in his lifetime and the Holy Family that we have been learning to know for two millennia and will continue to learn to know in this millennium?

The most important connection is: it’s the same family. The Joseph who heard the angel also worked for a living, paid taxes, and registered in the census. When the Blessed Virgin was found to be pregnant before marriage, others besides Joseph knew it, and not everyone had Gabriel’s insider information. Jesus, God’s Son, would not have been born if Mary had not accepted the angel’s word and would have been killed by Herod’s troops if Joseph had not obeyed the angel’s command.

There were indeed perks for being the parents of God. We know of a few: messages from angels early on, visits from shepherds and astrologers, good wine at a wedding—once. But however many of these there may have been, great experiences recede, and life—so difficult and unsatisfactory for me and so easy for everybody else; or perhaps so sweet to me, but with a precarious sweetness—comes back. The angel spoke to Joseph in dreams, and Simeon had told Mary: “A sword shall pierce through thy own soul.” And Jesus was forsaken by God.

When Joseph and Mary’s twelve-year-old son was missing after the feast, his parents really didn’t know where he was, did search for him sorrowing, did receive from him a rather smart remark about “Why did you search? Didn’t you know I had to be here in my Father’s house?”—and it certainly wasn’t Joseph and Mary’s house in Nazareth—and they really didn’t understand what he was saying. And: how would you have felt?

Much of the Holy Family’s life was like our life: eating and drinking, earning a living, cooking and cleaning, being tired, sleeping, being faithful to our spouse, raising and protecting our children, visiting relatives, partying with friends, praying in a group, dancing; and whatever may have been the state of their souls and spirit, their bodies and perceptions and emotions and joys and sufferings and fears were like ours. And we know from the Gospels that Mary and Jesus did not always agree.

This life with family and friends and coworkers is the life that God asked the Holy Family to live and asks most of us to live, and it affords plenty of opportunity to learn to love God and learn to love our neighbor—to learn to love God by learning to love our neighbor.

And that neighbor includes our family. In some ways, it is harder to act with charity towards those we love than towards a friend or a stranger. We want more for our loved ones and expect more, and we expect them to agree with us about the what, the how, and the when even before we tell them. A long day of working, homemaking, and schooling shortens fuses, and we face, yet again, other wills, when we want our will be done; our home has become a scene of conversion.

I used to regret that I did not do great things. I know now that the great thing always available to me is to do from obedience and love what I am doing. For most of us, it is our vocation to live in a family, and it is our path to glory. For myself, I don’t tell Mary and Olivia often enough how much happiness I have experienced in this path.

The opportunities for learning to love that God’s love gives us are abundant. They come our way much more frequently and inconveniently than we want them to come. Every moment—this moment—is a calling from God. Often we do not listen, or listening, do not hear, or hear noisily. God accepts this. It has taken me years to hear some things, and I still miss a lot; and too often when I do hear, I still disobey.

Every moment is a calling from God. And we may also say: a calling from Mary, who is our Mother. On the cross, Jesus saw his mother, and the disciple whom he loved, and he said to his mother, “Woman, behold thy son!” And to the disciple, “Behold thy mother!” And from that hour the disciple took her into his home (John 19:26–27).

As we have taken her into our own homes with devotions, images, and the Rosary. We know that Mary considers us her children: she has told us. We in our homes, our friends in their homes, and strangers, some of whom have no homes, are brothers and sisters in her holy family, now and forever.