Insight Scoop | The Ignatius Press Blog

Available in English: The International Theological Commission's document...

... titled, "The Search for Universal Ethics: A New Look at the Natural Law." The translation is not an official one; it was produced by Joseph Bolin, who has a Licentiate degree from the International Theological Institute in Austria, is a seminarian for the Archdiocese of Vienna, and is working on a doctoral degree at the University of Vienna, writing on the vocation to states of life, in light of the common vocation to holiness, according to Thomas Aquinas.

From Bolin's "Paths of Love" website, this note:

This translation is a mostly literal translation from the Italian text on the Vatican website. Typographical or translation errors may be present. Reports or comments are welcome by email or by posting a comment on my blog. Permission is required before republishing this translation or a derivation from it.

Go to the document. Thank you, Joseph, for the translation!

"The Magdalene: Saint, Sinner, or Goddess?"

An excerpt from The Da Vinci Hoax about Saint Mary Magdalene, whose feast is celebrated on July 22nd:

Chapter 2: The Magdalene: Saint, Sinner, or Goddess?

Any supposed attempts to rid the Church of Mary Magdalene or ban her name from being mentioned did not succeed, simply because they didn’t exist. In fact, many of the early Church Fathers remark about the Magdalene, and she is described by Hippolytus (c. 170-c. 236) as "the apostle to the apostles" in his commentary on the Song of Songs. Even feminist theologian Rosemary Radford Ruether, hardly a supporter of the Catholic hierarchy, scoffs at the notion of a conspiracy against Mary Magdalene, pointing to the positive treatment she received from the early Church Fathers:

"This high regard for Mary Magdalene continues in the fourth- and fifth-century Latin fathers of the church. Ambrose, bishop of Milan, associated Mary Magdalene with the New Eve who clings to Christ as the new Tree of Life, thereby reversing the unfaithfulness of the first Eve. Augustine maintains this view, pairing Mary Magdalene with Christ as symbol of the New Eve and the church in relation to Christ as the New Adam. Her faithfulness reversed the sin of the first Eve."

By the eighth century the Western Church was celebrating a feast day for Mary Magdalene, the twenty-second day of July. By the ninth century there were specific prayers for her feast day, and by the eleventh century there was "a complete mass dedicated to the saint (with introit, gradual, offertory, communion, and lessons)". It was also in the eleventh century that devotion to the Magdalene began to noticeably increase. The cult of Mary Magdalene was established at Vézelay, the Romanesque church in Burgandy that had been founded in the ninth century and was originally dedicated to the Virgin Mary. During the abbacy of Geoffrey (1037-1052) Mary was recognized as the patron of that church in a papal bull dated April 27, 1050, by Pope Leo IX. At the same time, relics of the Magdalene were being sought and gathered in earnest, and soon Vézelay became a major destination for pilgrimages.

Numerous stories, almost all of them fanciful and legendary in nature, were created to explain how Mary’s remains had arrived at Vézelay. A leading tradition in the West held that Mary Magdalene, Martha, and Lazarus were expelled from Palestine following the crucifixion of Christ. Floating in an oarless boat, they eventually arrived at the southern coast of France. In the East, a tradition stated that Mary had been the companion of the Apostle John and Mary, the Mother of Jesus, and that they had all settled in Ephesus. According to The Golden Legend, the Magdalene and John were betrothed. Some legends depict Mary living her final days in a cave in France, a hermit covered only by her long hair; these stories probably date back no farther than the ninth century.

During the late medieval era it was common to hear sermons about Mary Magdalene and how she fulfilled the apostolic life. She was also a model for Christians seeking to leave behind a life of sensuality and luxury, an encouragement to monks and nuns, as well as an exhortation to prostitutes. "But most of all a Magdalene sermon was the vehicle by which preachers called people to penance and offered them the hope of salvation. . . . We must not forget that it is our own age that officially memorializes Saint Mary Magdalene as a disciple; it was the ‘Dark Ages’ that honored her as a preacher and apostle of the apostles."

More excerpts on the book's website.

Also see "Meeting The Real Mary Magdalene," a May 2006 Ignatius Insight interview with Amy Welborn.

The Blessed Virgin Mary's Role in the Celibate Priest's Spousal and Paternal Love

The Blessed Virgin Mary's Role in the Celibate Priest's Spousal and Paternal Love | Fr. John Cihak, S.T.D. | Ignatius Insight

Introduction [1]

I wrote this article more on my knees than at my desk. It began with jottings from mental prayer over the past year. When I finally sat down to assemble them into a coherent whole, I had a pile of Post-It notes and scribblings on the last pages of Magnificat issues – a collection of my own pensées. This article is entitled, "The Blessed Virgin Mary's Role in the Celibate Priest's Spousal and Paternal Love." [2] I will argue in the following pages that Our Lady plays an essential and indispensable role in the development of the priest's masculinity, especially its spousal and paternal dimensions, and the manner that masculinity is lived out in celibate love. [3] In other words, I want to show how Our Lady helps the priest become a husband and father as a celibate and thus come to fulfillment as a man.

The Recent Challenges and the Perennial Condition

I offer this reflection in the here and now of the 21^st century Catholic Church in America, institutionally still reeling, I suspect, from the revelations of clerical misconduct that have shamed us, exposed us to ridicule and derision, and have also called us to accountability. However, one easily overlooked dimension of the recent challenge we have faced is the departure from active ministry of those who are called "JPII priests" (John Paul II priests). After we thought the 60s, 70s and 80s were over, we have had a discouraging repeat of attrition of priests from active ministry. I have known several of them who have subsequently attempted marriage, or suffered alcohol and drug problems. These are not dissenting priests. These "JPII priests" are committed to the Church and the priesthood and espouse the orthodox faith and the Church's disciplines, including clerical celibacy.

Why is this happening? One obvious answer is that intellectual orthodoxy, while necessary, is not sufficient for perseverance in the priesthood in these times. Another obvious answer is to place much blame on the culture and the state of family life. Many of these men who have come unmoored in their vocations have suffered from the effects of our culture of divorce, abuse, materialism and sexual license. A third answer is the deplorable example for many men given by their own fathers, who teach through their own behavior that to be a man means sexual conquest. A man, in this view, does not need to take responsibility for his actions, and is responsible to no one. Young men come to prepare for the priesthood with much more relational brokenness than in previous generations. I believe these answers are true, but do not go deep enough.

Perhaps more subtly considered the "JPII priest" attrition is simply a recent example of the perennial struggle for the celibate priest in his affectivity and relationships, in his heart and most especially in his spousal and paternal love. To put it simply, how are all those natural desires—including erotic desires—to be a husband and father supposed to function in the priest's free promise of celibacy? The answer that some ex-priests in the 1970s offered was that those desires have no place in celibacy and therefore the discipline of celibacy should change. The argument was that the discipline of celibacy prevented a man from fully developing as a man. When it was perceived that the Church would not change the discipline, they left. But this answer is too superficial for the deep mystery that is the celibate priesthood. Nevertheless the clash is felt deeply in the heart of a man called to celibacy in the priesthood. The gap appears not in the alignment of one's intellect to the truth of priestly celibacy, but how this truth of priestly celibacy becomes enfleshed in the priest's heart and in his relationships as a man.

Pope Benedict has given us an initial stab at the challenge in Deus caritas est in his treatment of the relationship between eros and agape and the transformation of disordered eros into an ordered eros that provides the vitality for agape love. [4] In the case of the celibate priest, it is the transformation of his disordered eros into a truly spousal and paternal love that is expressed in his celibate agape.

Can this happen? I think we would all say, Yes. But how does this happen? There is nothing automatic about it, and there are many potential pitfalls. Careerism, illicit relationships, alcoholism, drug abuse, exotic vacations, collections of various kinds, pornography and the flight into television and the Internet are simply inadequate ways of grappling with a mystery that lies, I would argue, at the very heart of the priesthood, and which we will explore in a moment. Because of our fallen nature, there is need for a deep healing of eros in the heart of every man. I suggest that we are still coming to terms with this challenge in our human and spiritual formation programs, and are only beginning to come literally to the heart of the matter. I propose that Our Lady plays an indispensable role in the transformation of the priest's masculinity, and the foundation for all that is said in this article lies in the important work of John Paul II in his Theology of the Body and Benedict XVI in Deus caritas est.

Read the entire essay...

Breaking: Fr. Joseph Fessio, S.J., dismissed from Ave Maria University

From Fr. Joseph Fessio, S.J., Founder and Editor of Ignatius Press:

This morning, (Monday, July 20^th) Dr. Jack Sites, Academic Vice President of Ave Maria University,  flew from Houston, where he was attending a meeting of the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools, to San Francisco, to inform me personally that I was being dismissed from Ave Maria University. Our meeting was amicable and Dr. Sites, as always, acted as a Christian gentleman.

He said that the reason for my dismissal stemmed from a conversation I had in November of 2008 with Jack Donahue, then chairman of the board of AMU. At that time I felt it an obligation to speak to the board chairman before the upcoming board meeting, to make sure he was aware of the urgency of the university’s financial situation. After I had informed him, using projections based on publicly available documents and statements,  he asked me what I thought was the solution. I told him that there were policies being followed that were at the root of the problem, that the present administration was irrevocably wedded to those policies, and that without a change of administration the university was at great risk.

Dr. Sites said that Jack Donahue related this conversation to Tom Monaghan, and it was decided (I don’t know specifically by whom) that the university could not have a faculty member making these criticisms of the administration and thus undermining the university.

Dr. Sites told me that there were unspecified others who had similar substantive concerns that I was undermining the university.

I continue to support the university. I pray for its success. I have great admiration for the faculty, students, and many of the staff. I do disagree with some of the policies of the administration. This seems to be the reason I was fired the first time, in March 2007, since the official explanation was “irreconcilable administrative differences”.

Nevertheless, I think it is an accurate summary to say that I am being dismissed as a faculty member because of a private conversation with the chairman of the board in which I made known my criticisms of the university administration; and because of allegations which have not been made known to me and to which I have not been given an opportunity to respond.

I will continue to recommend AMU to students and parents. And I will continue to think my dismissal is another mistake in a long series of unwise decisions.

Fr. Fessio will continue as Editor of Ignatius Press.

UPDATE (July 21, 2009): The Naples News has a story, "Ave Maria University fires Rev. Joseph Fessio a second time" (July 20, 2009).

UPDATE (July 22, 2009): The Naples News reports: "Bishop Frank Dewane was not consulted on the decision to fire the Rev. Joseph Fessio from his post as theologian-in-residence at Ave Maria University, the Diocese of Venice said in a statement this week." Read the entire story.

"'Confessions of an Ex-Feminist' should be de rigueur for college freshmen."

From a National Catholic Register review, written by Marge Fenelon, of Lorraine V. Murray's Confessions of an Ex-Feminist (Ignatius Press, 2008):

Confessions of an Ex-Feminist should be de rigueur for college freshmen. Starkly honest and to the point, this book touches upon the nerve, albeit a raw one, that triggers the loss of faith in so many young adults.

In sharing her own faith journey, Lorraine Murray shows readers how easy it can be to lose one’s faith, especially in the amoral climate of a college campus. Even though Murray’s experiences span the ’70s and ’80s — before most of today’s young adults were born — the threats to purity, temptations to infidelity and cultural pressure to abandon godly values are as real and dangerous now as they were then. Murray artfully exhibits this in relating her own story.

“The nihilists claimed everything happened by chance and people were simply stumbling along in a godless universe, trying to create their own meaning out of chaos,” Murray writes. “Such was the belief of atheistic existentialists like Jean-Paul Sartre, who became my new guru. In many ways, the whole hippie movement was based on nihilism, because it was generally accepted that people had to find their own way, since there was no God to give the universe a higher meaning. In the absence of God, there were no absolute values; one could just as well cherish beauty as ugliness, which might explain some of the art of the day. Oddly enough, though, even atheists must have faith in something, as Tolstoy pointed out: ‘Without believing that life is worth living, we would not live.’ Unfortunately, I wasn’t aware of this point in the heyday of my own spiritual rebellion.”

The entire review is available to subscribers of the Register.

On Ignatius Insight:

• From Catholicism to Radical Feminism and Back | An Interview with Lorraine V. Murray
• Warning: This Is a Dangerous Book | Lorraine V. Murray | Introduction to Confessions of an Ex-Feminist

Fr. Aidan Nichols: The Pope "gives social teaching an injection of theology"

Fr. Aidan Nichols, O.P., who has written several books for Ignatius Press (most recently, Lovely Like Jerusalem: The Fulfillment of the Old Testament in Christ and the Church), is one of my favorite contemporary theologians. He reflects on Caritas in Veritate in the July 17th edition of The Catholic Herald:

For Benedict, charity needs illumining by both reason and faith (3; 9), two distinct yet convergent ways of knowing. Not surprisingly, then, there is more genuine theological doctrine in the new encyclical. Sometimes it is upfront, sometimes it is expressed in a coded way which is one of the reasons people may find this letter difficult to read - something which certainly could not be said about Paul VI's enviably clear and far more straightforward document. The upfront theology is easy to spot. Benedict's thought about social engagement is Christological and even (54) Trinitarian. Let me take some examples of his Christocentrism, itself a sine qua non of genuinely Christian thought. The "charity in truth" of his title is the human face of the divine person of the incarnate Word (1). It reflects the God who is simultaneously Logos and Agape (3). If "humanism" is what you are looking for, only Christ is the revelation of what humanity is (18), a passage indebted to Pope John Paul II's 1979 letter Redemptor Hominis (which itself initiated a more Christocentric reading of the Second Vatican Council's Pastoral Constitution on the Church in the Modern World, Gaudium et Spes). The Church's social doctrine points, therefore, to the "New Man", Christ "the principle of the charity that 'never ends' " (12).

Like Benedict's earlier letter Spe Salvi (2007), Caritas in Veritate is also eschatological, and this is another litmus test of thoroughly revelation-grounded thinking. If global society could achieve unity and peace it would, to that extent, prefigure the final City of God to which the Church directs her own longing (7). The cosmic nature in which human society is set and which it inevitably transforms will be re-capitulated in Christ at the end of time (48): a difficult concept but essential for any distinctively Christian attitude towards the environment.

Moving on to the "coded" theology, this concerns chiefly the idea of gift or gratuitousness (34; 37; 39). Gift theory entered sociology in the Twenties and reached philosophical theology some decades later. The practice of giving, or gift exchange, can be seen as a signal of transcendence, and a clue to how to understand the doctrine of creation. That reminded theologians of a theme of ancient Christian thought, the self-diffusiveness of the divine goodness, itself with a background in the best paganism (the gods are not envious). Benedict uses a low-key version of gift theory to promote the idea that connatural with the divine plan are forms of economic activity with a built-in element of the gratuitous: in effect, preferential treatment by business in dealing with the poor. There is a touch of the divine about it.

This larger injection of theology indicates one of the things Benedict is seeking to do in this encyclical, which is to shoe-horn papal social doctrine into tradition with a capital "T". In other words, he wants to argue that, thanks to its consonance with elements in Scripture and the Fathers, and its affinities with confessors or martyrs who died for defending the demands of the common good, these documents, whose continuity before and after the Second Vatican Council he stresses, cannot be regarded as merely prudential or exclusively natural in character (12). It will be interesting to see how far this line of thought is allowed to go. Pope John Paul II's first encyclical began a process of linking the content of Church comment on social issues more closely with key doctrines. But what is now being suggested is that the authority of the apostolic Paradosis in some way also covers social encyclicals of this kind.

Read the entire piece. Also see:

"This is not an official newspaper."

The Guardian takes a look "behind the scenes" of L'Osservatore Romano, which is often referred to as "the Vatican's newspaper" or "the Pope's newspaper"—or simply "The Vatican," as in the recent headline, "Latest Harry Potter film wins Vatican approval":

Newspapers around the world may be suffering, but at least one very small one is making a big impression. L'Osservatore Romano, the Vatican daily paper, sells only 12,000 copies. Even taking account of its six weekly and one monthly edition in languages other than Italian, the total circulation is less than 100,000.

<snip>

The new editor has freed his contributors to write about a much wider range of topics, and allowed them to express views that are not necessarily those of the Vatican, let alone Benedict XVI, but which catch the attention of outsiders all the same. (When Britain's ambassador to the Holy See, Francis Campbell, suggested to Vian that the prime minister might write a piece for the paper ahead of his visit to see the pope, he leapt at the idea, even though nothing like it had been done since L'Osservatore was founded in 1861.)

Much as the editor welcomes the publicity, however, he says that a lot of it is generated by a fundamental misunderstanding. "This is not an official newspaper." Referring to another recent article that made waves, he explains: "When we publish an article on Michael Jackson and say that he was an important phenomenon, that does not mean the pope is giving him his blessing."

Some readers, though, would argue it does – or, at least, that it should. In its former, dryer guise, if L'Osservatore liked or hated or took something into consideration, then it was a fair bet his holiness did too. And now? Vian is almost impossible to pin down. The paper may not be "official", but he concedes that it "represents an authoritative point of view". L'Osservatore is a "newspaper of its environment that is conditioned by that environment".

Hmmmm...alright. I'm glad that has been clarified. Or "clarified". It makes me think of the saying (original source unknown, at least to me): "I fully realize that I have not succeeded in answering all of your questions . . . indeed; I feel that I have not answered any of them completely.The answers I have found only serve to raise a whole new set of questions, which only lead to more problems--some of which we weren't aware were problems. To sum it all up . . . in some ways I feel we are as confused as ever, but I believe we are confused on a higher level and about more important things."

The decline of Europe continues...

... as reported in The Independent (Ireland):

Best-selling authors are frantically racing to get their latest titles on the bookshelves as it is revealed Dan Brown's new blockbuster, the long awaited sequel to The Da Vinci Code, will be published on September 15.

The cover of The Lost Symbol was unveiled just last week and shot the book straight into Amazon's top 10, over two months before it is to hit bookstores. ...

The Da Vinci Code and its predecessors, Digital Fortress, Angels & Demons and Deception Point, are the top four best-selling adult paperback novels this side of the Atlantic.

Perhaps Dan Brown's sixth novel—slated, I'm guessing, for 2016, after seven years of "intense research"—could be called Muhammad's Forgotten Fable  or The Quranic Cipher. Then the reclusive novelist from New Hampshire could display his bold irreverence and historical acumen in a new and exciting manner, one certain to spark all sorts of illuminating dialogue and intellectual discussion.

"A Résumé of My Thought" by Hans Urs von Balthasar

A Résumé of My Thought | Hans Urs von Balthasar (Translated by Kelly Hamilton) | Ignatius Insight

"... meeting Balthasar was for me the beginning of a lifelong friendship I can only be thankful for. Never again have I found anyone with such a comprehensive theological and humanistic education as Balthasar and de Lubac, and I cannot even begin to say how much I owe to my encounter with them." -- Joseph Ratzinger (Pope Benedict XVI)

Hans Urs von Balthasar (1905-88) was a Swiss theologian, considered to be one of the most important Catholic intellectuals and writers of the twentieth century.

Incredibly prolific and diverse, he wrote over one hundred books and hundreds of articles. In this essay, first published in 1988 in Communio, the theological journal he helped found, and later in Hans Urs von Balthasar: His Life and Work (Communio Books/Ignatius Press, 1991; edited by David L. Schindler), he offers an introduction to his thought and writing.

Visit this IgnatiusInsight.com Author Page for more about Balthasar's life and for a full listing of the sixty volumes of his work translated and published by Ignatius Press.

---

When a man has published many large books, people will ask themselves: What, fundamentally, did he want to say? If he is a prolific novelist-for example Dickens or Dostoevsky-one would choose one or another of his works without worrying oneself too much about all of them as a whole. But for a philosopher or theologian it is totally different. One wishes to touch the heart of his thought, because one presupposes that such a heart must exist.

The question has often been asked of me by those disconcerted by the large number of my books: Where must one start in order to understand you? I am going to attempt to condense my many fragments "in a nutshell", as the English say, as far as that can be done without too many betrayals. The danger of such a compression consists in being too abstract. It is necessary to amplify what follows with my biographical works on the one hand (on the Fathers of the Church, on Karl Barth, Buber, Bernanos, Guardini, Reinhold Schneider, and all the authors treated in the trilogy), with the works on spirituality on the other hand (such as those on contemplative prayer, on Christ, Mary and the Church), and finally, with the numerous translations of the Fathers of the Church, of the theologians of the Middle Ages, and of modern times. But here it is necessary to limit ourselves to presenting a schema of the trilogy: Aesthetic, Dramatic, and Logic.

Continue reading...

The Medieval Mary

The Medieval Mary | The Introduction to Mary in the Middle Ages | by Luigi Gambero

In an earlier publication, dedicated to the patristic era [1], we attempted to gather together the essential elements of the most ancient Christian tradition about the Church's teaching on the Mother of the-Lord, We drew these elements from the writings of the Church Fathers and other Christian authors who lived in their time. That book was intended as a kind of immersion in the original sources of the Church's tradition. The present volume aims to continue the journey already begun, moving on into the next period of history. This period has been called "medieval"-a rather debatable term that still has negative and pejorative connotations. For our part, we consider this period to be a time full of cultural value, in every sense of the word "cultural". We will go through the writings of Christian authors from this period, gathering together the most weighty and significant moments In the development of Marian doctrine and devotion.

The historical period we are considering embraces a span of time reaching from the end of the patristic age (eighth century) to the end of the fifteenth century. The close of this long series of centuries may be fixed by two historical events critical to both East and West, events so significant as to determine the end of an era.

In the East, with the conquest of Constantinople by the Turks (1453), the fall of the Byzantine Empire gave rise to particular difficulties within the life of the Byzantine Church. Many scholars of Greek origin and education decided to take refuge in the West, while those who stayed behind found the continuation of theological research and study an arduous and difficult undertaking.

In the West, the medieval era appeared to be in irreversible decline as early as the thirteenth century. Nevertheless, today it is customary to Prolong the medieval era by two centuries, right up to the close of the fifteenth century. In reality, the historical factors that were destined to open the door to the Renaissance were already well under way. The political rivalries of various kings and princes, as well as actual wars, the outbreaks of plagues, the incursions and invasions of the Muslims into European countries, along with a certain stagnation within European culture, such as an obsessive and sterile tendency toward speculation, and other, less important factors, heavily influenced Western learning and culture. On the level of religious learning, properly speaking, one may observe an exaggerated move toward an individualistic approach, which emphasized the desire to pursue the interior life at the expense of a religious commitment to live out the faith in practice. Finally, there occurred the catastrophic events that ensnared whole regions of Christendom, namely, the Protestant Reformation and the English schism. We think, then, that the end of the fifteenth century can be taken as the end of the Middle Ages, during which Marian doctrine and piety were seen as vital components of the Church's life, as much in the East as in the West, and the figure of Mary was considered an indisputable sign of sure faith in the mystery of the incarnate Word.

Continue reading...

Pope Benedict fractures wrist, has surgery

From The Telegraph:

The 82-year-old Pontiff, who was enjoying a two-week summer break in the Italian Alps, tripped over during the night as he was leaving a bathroom next to his bedroom. He twisting his ankle and fractured his right wrist.

He went back to sleep and in the morning was able to walk into a hospital in Aosta to be examined. After an X-ray, Benedict XVI, who is an avid pianist in his leisure time, received a small operation on his wrist under local anesthetic. Doctors said he was well enough to joke with surgeons.
 
Officials said the treatment "went well" and denied initial reports that the Pope had suffered a "dizzy spell" that had caused his fall.

Dr Patrizio Polisca, the pope's personal physician who attended the hospital, said: "The Holy Father's overall condition is good."

The Holy Father appeared to be in very good spirits as he greeted the staff while leaving the hospital. Thank God it wasn't a more serious injury!

A few pics and a little fun from travels to exotic lands

Alright, alright, so Spokane, Washington, and Plains, Montana might not qualify as "exotic" for some people (especially those who actually live in Spokane and Plains). However, if you've never been to either city/town, there is plenty to see, ranging from a beautiful riverfront park to the stunning Davenport Hotel to Lake Coeur d'Alene to the Clark Fork River to, well, Plains—my hometown, a bustling little burg of some 1,200 residents (yes, I know, it's actually not a "burg." In fact, nobody I know uses the word burg. But I thought "bustling little burg" had a nice sound to it, even though it isn't altogether accurate—except for the "little" part).

Spokane and Plains are the two locations I hinted at in this post last week. One reader correctly guessed Spokane, but Plains proved more difficult, despite the glaringly obvious clue of a road sign for Hot Springs (where I was born) and Kalispell, which stands at the intersection of Highway 200 and Highway 28. How much more blatant could I be? Anyhow, here are few pictures from the July 1-8 trip, some of which might actually qualify for "semi-exotic," or at least "not your standard travel photo":

The Vision and Principles of Christopher Dawson

The Vision and Principles of Christopher Dawson | David Knowles | Introduction to Christopher Dawson's The Dividing of Christendom | Ignatius Insight

In the early years of his long life of study Christopher Dawson set himself the task of surveying the history of European civilization in the light of a master-idea: that religion is the dynamic force, the basic constituent and the inspiration of all higher human activity, and that therefore the culture of an era depends upon its religion, and not vice versa.

This task was to him a very demanding one, for it presupposed an intimate and detailed knowledge of the history—political, intellectual, social , aesthetic, and economic—of the cultures he undertook to consider. His first major writing, The Age of the Gods, was the outcome of many years of research in the religion of primitive man, and the early civilizations of the East. It remained in many ways his greatest single achievement, and it received immediate critical acclaim. Forty years ago, before the immense success of Arnold Toynbee's work, readers of world-history had been gjven Spengler's sombre picture of the West in decline, and the tendentious outlook of the History of the World by H. G. Wells.

Dawson's work was very learned, but there was nothing difficult or esoteric about it. He did not impose patterns on events nor did he create a vocabulary to express his ideas. The ideas he used were those common to all human thought. His mind had the clarity of wisdom, not the simplicity of the superficial, and his style was lucid and free.

The second instalment should have covered the civilization of the classical world, and he would have been fully competent to present this, but he left it aside, perhaps because he felt that generations of fine minds had made it familiar, and wrote of what was then a less cultivated field, the twilight of classical civilization and the dawn of medieval Christian culture. He called the book The Making of Europe. This was a less attractive theme for many, but it was probably Dawson's most influential book as it filled a gap that had long existed in general historical knowledge, and set out persuasively and convincingly a twofold thesis: that medieval and modern civilization derived a very large part of its human and secular content from Greece and Rome, and that the spirit that gave life and growth to what seemed to be a ruin was the spirit of Catholic Christianity.

It told the strange story of the transmission of Christianity to the West, together with the basic ideas of ancient government and thought, by way of the circumference of Christendom and back to Northern Europe. It was a book that opened a new world to many readers, and though in the thirty-odd years that have passed many have explored the archaeology and art of the Dark Ages, no work has completely taken its place.

Read the entire Introduction...

E-Books and Downloadable Audio Books from Ignatius Press

Here is a listing of e-books and downloadable audio books currently available or available soon from Ignatius Press (many of them are currently on sale for 15%-35% off regular price):

E-Books:

• Charity in Truth (Caritas in Veritate), by Pope Benedict XVI
• Saved in Hope (Spe Salvi), by Pope Benedict XVI
• Saint Paul, by Pope Benedict XVI
• Church Fathers, by Pope Benedict XVI
• The Spirit of the Liturgy, by Joseph Ratzinger
• Christianity and the Crisis of Cultures, by Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger
• God's Word: Scripture, Tradition, Office, by Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger
• Jesus of Nazareth Study Guide, by Various Authors
• Chance or Purpose?, by Christoph Cardinal Schönborn
• The Death of a Pope, by Piers Paul Read
• The Shadow of His Wings, by Fr. Gereon Goldmann
• A Cry of Stone: A Novel, by Michael O'Brien
• Eclipse of the Sun, by Michael O'Brien
• Island of the World, by Michael O'Brien
• Plague Journal, by Michael O'Brien
• Sophia House, by Michael O'Brien
• Strangers and Sojourners, by Michael O'Brien
• A Pilgrim's Journey: The Autobiography of St. Ignatius of Loyola, edited by Fr. Joseph N. Tylenda, S.J.
• Classic Catholic Converts, by Fr. Charles Connor
• Commonsense 101: Lessons from G. K. Chesterton, by Dale Ahlquist
• C.S. Lewis, the Man Who Created Narnia, by Michael Coren
• From Slave to Priest: The Inspirational Story of Fr. Augustine Tolton, by Sr. Caroline Hemesath
• Happy are You Poor: The Simple Life and Spiritual Freedom, by Fr. Thomas Dubay, S.M.
• If Your Mind Wanders at Mass, by Thomas Howard
• Prayer for Beginners, by Peter Kreeft
• The God Who Loves You, by Peter Kreeft
• The Philosophy of Tolkien, by Peter Kreeft
• The Tears of God: Persevering in the Face of Great Sorrow or Catastrophe, by Fr. Benedict Groeschel
• The Evidential Power of Beauty, by Fr. Thomas Dubay, S.M.
• The Order of Things, by Fr. James V. Schall, S.J.
• Upon This Rock: St. Peter and the Primacy of Rome in Scripture and the Early Church, by Stephen K. Ray
• With God In Russia, by Fr. Walter Ciszek, S.J.

Downloadable Audio Books:

• Charity In Truth (Caritas In Veritate), by Pope Benedict XVI
• God is Love (Deus Caritas Est), by Pope Benedict XVI
• Saved in Hope (Spe Salvi), by Pope Benedict XVI
• Arise from Darkness, by Fr. Benedict Groeschel
• Manalive: A Novel, by G. K. Chesterton
• A Cry of Stone, by Michael O'Brien
• Deep Conversion, Deep Prayer, by Fr. Thomas Dubay, S.M.

Liturgical Roles In the Eucharistic Celebration

Liturgical Roles In the Eucharistic Celebration | Francis Cardinal Arinze | From Celebrating the Holy Eucharist

The sacred liturgy is the public prayer of the whole Church. The chief person acting in every liturgical celebration is our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ himself, the one perfect Mediator between God and man.

But Christ associates the Church with himself in every liturgical act. Many liturgical acts are hierarchically ordered: with a role for the Bishop and priest, for the deacon, for those lay people who are assigned a liturgical role as defined by the Church, and for all the people of God. The Church in the diocese manifests herself in the most visible way when the Bishop celebrates the Eucharistic Sacrifice in his cathedral church, with the concelebration of his priests, the assistance of the deacons, and the participation of the faithful (cf. SC 41).

Lay Liturgical Roles

For proper celebration of the sacred liturgy and fruitful participation in it by all Christ's faithful, it is important to understand the roles proper to the ministerial or ordained priest and those proper to the lay faithful. Christ is the priest, the High Priest. He gives all baptized people a share in this role of offering God gifts. The common priesthood of all the baptized gives people the capacity to offer Christian worship, to offer Christ to the Eternal Father through the hands of the ordained priest at the Eucharistic celebration, to receive the sacraments, and to live holy lives, and by self-denial and active charity to make of their entire lives a sacrifice.

The ministerial priest, on the other hand, is a man chosen from among the baptized and ordained by the Bishop in the sacrament of Holy Orders. He alone can consecrate bread into the Body of Christ and wine into the Blood of Christ and offer them to the Eternal Father in the name of Christ and the whole Christian people. [1] It is clear that though they differ from one another in essence and not only in degree, the common priesthood of all the baptized and the ministerial or hierarchical priesthood are closely related (see LG 10).

Continue reading...

The moral of the story?

Be very, very careful of who you kiss when visiting Miami night clubs "notoriously associated with use of illegal recreational drugs including cocaine.”

Don't ever say this blog has never given excellent, morally sound, down-to-earth advice!

Imagine...One Small Step

The new commercial from CatholicVote.org, which ties into the 40th anniversary (July 20th) of the historic mission of Apollo 11 to the moon:

Visit the CatholicVote.org website.

Blessed G. K.?

From Zenit:

ROME, JULY 14, 2009 (Zenit.org).- Gilbert Keith Chesterton (1874-1936) is well known for his clever and humorous writing, and his thought-provoking paradoxes. But he might also become known as a saint, if a proposal to launch his cause of beatification goes forward.

ZENIT spoke with Paolo Gulisano, author of the first Italian-language biography of the great English writer ("Chesterton & Belloc: Apologia e Profezia," Edizioni Ancora), about the origins of this proposal. Here, Gulisano explains why Chesterton might merit recognition as a saint.

ZENIT: Who is promoting this cause of beatification?

Gulisano: The cultural association dedicated to him, the Chesterton Society, founded in England in 1974 on the occasion of the 100th anniversary of the great author's birth, with the idea of spreading awareness of the work, thought and figure of this extraordinary personality. For years now, there has been talk of a possible cause of beatification, and a few days ago, during an international conference organized in Oxford on "The Holiness of G.K. Chesterton" -- with the participation of the best exponents in the field of Chesterton studies -- it was decided to go ahead with this proposal.

ZENIT: Why a beatification?

Gulisano: Many people feel there is clear evidence of Chesterton's sanctity: Testimonies about him speak of a person of great goodness and humility, a man without enemies, who proposed the faith without compromises but also without confrontation, a defender of Truth and Charity. His greatness is also in the fact that he knew how to present Christianity to a wide public, made up of Christians and secular people. His books, ranging from "Orthodoxy" to "St. Francis of Assisi," from "Father Brown" to "The Ball and the Cross," are brilliant presentations of the Christian faith, witnessed with clarity and valor before the world.

According to the ancient categories of the Church, we could define Chesterton as a "confessor of the faith." He was not just an apologist, but also a type of prophet who glimpsed far ahead of time the dramatic character of modern issues like eugenics. The English Dominican Aidan Nichols sustains that Chesterton should be seen as nothing less than a possible "father of the Church" of the 20th century.

Read the entire interview.

Related IgnatiusInsight.com Excerpts and Articles

• Ignatius Insight author page for G. K. Chesterton
• Chesterton and Orthodoxy | Carl E. Olson and Dale Ahlquist
• Seeing With the Eyes of G.K. Chesterton | Dale Ahlquist
• Recovering The Lost Art of Common Sense | Dale Ahlquist
• Common Sense Apostle & Cigar Smoking Mystic | Dale Ahlquist
• Chesterton and the "Paradoxy" of Orthodoxy | Carl E. Olson
• The Attraction of Orthodoxy | Joseph Pearce
• The Emancipation of Domesticity | G.K. Chesterton
• The God in the Cave | G.K. Chesterton
• What Is America? | G.K. Chesterton
• Mary and the Convert | G.K. Chesterton
• Chesterton and Saint Francis | Joseph Pearce
• Chesterton and the Delight of Truth | James V. Schall, S.J.
• The Life and Theme of G.K. Chesterton | Randall Paine
• Hot Water and Fresh Air: On Chesterton and His Foes | Janet E. Smith
• ChesterBelloc | Ralph McInerny

Avoiding Biblical Paralysis: Sacred Scripture and Today's Catholic

Avoiding Biblical Paralysis: Sacred Scripture and Today's Catholic | Curtis A. Martin | Ignatius Insight

Who has never experienced frustration trying to read the Bible? The Book itself is fairly imposing, with more than 1,000 pages and seldom a picture. The characters seem to be right out of the Iliad and the Odyssey: "Mizraim became the father of Ludim and Anamin and Lehabim and Naphtuhim" (Gen. 10:13). Trying to read through the sacred text can lead to more perspiration than inspiration. So what is the layman to do? Many people read modern commentaries or even take classes on the Bible, looking for some helpful hints on how to crack open the sacred page and begin to experience the joy, the wisdom, and the life-transforming effects of which the saints and so many of our evangelical friends speak. This is usually where the problems begin.

A typical "Introduction to the Bible" course practically involves learning a new language and a new alphabet. For example, instead of Moses as the author of the Pentateuch (the first five books), we are told that J, E, P and D are the real authors. Just when one becomes acquainted with the prophet Isaiah, we are told that there are two of them, then three. The novices who thought that Matthew wrote the first gospel, are then told no, it was Mark, actually Q (or Q1, Q2, and Q3 for the more advanced! Just when the letters of St. Paul are beginning to become instructive, someone points out that they are not all really his. What are the Catholic faithful to make of this convoluted mess? Every new piece of information only seems to call attention to how little we can (really) know.

Read the entire essay...

Some healthy food for thought...

... from Monsignor Romano Guardini, whose books The End of the Modern World (orig. 1956) and Power and Responsibility (orig. 1951) are, I think, must read works; this quote is taken from the latter:

The advantages of a well-planned, dependable insurance system are indisputable. Sickness, unemployment, accidents, old age, and so on lost much of their terror when the material needs are assured. But let us imagine the goal of insurance-experts realized: one organization for all citizens, covering every possible need. What, in the long run, would be its effects upon the average man? What would become of personal conscientiousness and prudence, of independence and character, of healthy confidence and readiness for whatever comes? Wouldn't such a system of total, automatic welfare be also a system of tutelage? And, along with all that, wouldn't man's feeling of being led to his destiny by providence gradually disappear?

Or again: When traffic moves more swiftly, smoothly, will people really gain time? They would, if improved transportation meant more rest and leisure. But does it? Aren't people more rushed than ever? Don't they actually stuff more and more into the time they save by getting places faster? And when man does have more leisure, what does he do with it? Does he really break away from the pressures of life, or does he fling himself into more and more crowded pleasures, more exaggerated sports; into reading, hearing, and watching useless stuff; so that in reality, spirit-impoverishing busyness continues, only in other forms, and the beautiful theory of the richer life of leisure proves to be one more self-deception?

No mater where we start from, invariably we arrive at the same fundamental conclusion: the fundamental correction of cultural ills does not lie in the adoption of utilitarian reforms; however great their immediate advantages, their dangers are greater still. In the last analysis, the quality of the creature is determined by decisions of the spirit. And that means that man, as he has ever greater power at his disposal, leaders a life of ever greater peril.

It makes me think not only, of course, of the current hubbub over national(ized) health care, but of a current IBM commercial, which features people talking about building a "smarter" planet, towns, cities, government, retail, shipping, airports, etc., etc,—because "when you connect them altogether, what do you get? Happier people!" It gives me the creeps, in part because its core message is so grim and devoid of glimmer of joy or real meaning. Nope, the meaning of life is working on technology that makes life more efficient, which in turn makes us happier, because our lives are more efficient, which....auuuugh! It, in turn, makes me think of those folks who say, "I'm going to work hard for thirty years so that when I retire I can really enjoy life." Wha--? How incredibly depressing and sad.

A classic book on this topic is Josef Pieper's Leisure: The Basis of Culture; a new edition is being published by Ignatius Press this fall. Highly recommended.