Monastic Mumblings, a Friar's Journey

Feast of The Exaltation of The Holy Cross

Feast of The Exaltation of The Holy Cross
14 September 335

Isaiah 45:21-25
Galatians 6:14-18
John 12:31-36a

Constantine was first Christian Roman Emperor, and during his time, he sent his mother Helena to lead an expedition to Israel to look for the places holy to Christians. In the war of 135 the Romans of the time had specifically defiled these places by building their pagan shrines over them, preserving their memory by accident. On 14 September 335 the Church of the Holy Sepulcher was dedicated on the site of the Burial of Christ. It has become a day for recognizing the Cross (in a festal way that would be not be appropriate on Good Friday) as a symbol of triumph, this is our sign of Christ's victory over death, and a reminder of His promise, "And when I am lifted up, I will draw all men unto me." (John 12:32)

Tertullian, who wrote around 211 A.D., says that Christians don't do anything significant very often without making the sign of the cross. Certainly Christian's custom of tracing the sign of the cross on persons and things as a sign of blessing is very old. It may even predate the origins of Christianity. In Ezekiel 9, Revelation 7:2-4; 9:4; and 14:1 a mark placed on the forehead of the faithful identifies those belonging to God to be saved. In Ezekiel the Hebrew word used for "mark" is TAU. The mark is like an X or a +, two short lines crossing at right angles. The Essenes are understood to have marked their converts with a TAU when they baptized them since, they believed they were the faithful remnant of God's people.

It is quite possible that John the Baptist and his followers were influenced by the Essenes, and in any case, knew Ezekiel's words, so the tracing of a TAU on the forehead could very easily been part of John's method of baptism, then on to being used by the earliest Christians. It's use certainly continues today when each newly baptized Christian has a Cross traced on their forehead and are "marked as Christ's own, forever."

Almighty God, Whose Son our Savior Jesus Christ was lifted high upon the cross that He might draw the whole world to Himself: Mercifully grant that we, who glory in the mystery of our redemption, may have grace to take up our cross and follow Him; Who lives and reigns with You and the Holy Spirit, one God, in glory everlasting.

Ancient Religion

This morning during my Office, I was reading Job 29:1-20.

Some scholars feel that Job is the oldest book in the Sacred Scriptures, perhaps written before Moses (pre 1500 B.C.).  Others put it at the time of Solomon (ca. 900 B.C.), and some even as late as the Babylonian Exile or later (post 600 B.C.).

Whenever it was written, this morning I saw an interesting insight into the heart of God. In this book, as far back in time as it is, Job boasts of his Faith, in verses 12-13 he tells us what God expects of His followers:

I delivered the poor who cried, and the orphan who had no helper. The blessing of the wretched came upon me, and I caused the widow's heart to sing for joy. I put on righteousness, and it clothed me; my justice was like a robe and a turban. I was eyes to the blind, and feet to the lame. I was a father to the needy, and I championed the cause of the stranger.

There you have it, the Message. The Ancient Faith that God has been speaking to fallen humanity for thousands of years.  You see it throughout the Scriptures from the Hebrew prophets to Paul, James and of course the Lord, Jesus. Does the modern American Church hear it, or is it seduced by wealth and worldly power?

A Prayer for Our Enemies

Bless my enemies, O Lord. Even I bless them and do not curse them. Enemies have driven me into your embrace more than friends have. Friends have bound me to earth; enemies have loosed me from earth and have demolished all my aspirations in the world.

Enemies have made me a stranger in worldly realms and an extraneous inhabitant of the world.

Just as a hunted animal finds safer shelter than an unhunted animal does, so have I, persecuted by enemies, found the safest sanctuary, having ensconced myself beneath Your tabernacle, where neither friends nor enemies can slay my soul.

Bless my enemies, O Lord. Even I bless and do not curse them.

They, rather than I, have confessed my sins before the world. They have punished me, whenever I have hesitated to punish myself. They have tormented me, whenever I have tried to flee torments. They have scolded me, whenever I have flattered myself. They have spat upon me, whenever I have filled myself with arrogance. Bless my enemies, O Lord. Even I bless them and do not curse them.

Whenever I have made myself wise, they have called me foolish. Whenever I have made myself mighty, they have mocked me as though I were a fly.

Whenever I have wanted to lead people, they have shoved me into the background.

Whenever I have rushed to enrich myself, they have prevented me with an iron hand.

Whenever I thought that I would sleep peacefully, they have wakened me from sleep.

Whenever I have tried to build a home for a long and tranquil life, they have demolished it and driven me out.

Truly, enemies have cut me loose from the world and have stretched out my hands to the hem of Your garment.

Bless my enemies, O Lord. Even I bless them and do not curse them.

Bless them and multiply them; multiply them and make them even more bitterly against me:

So that my fleeing will have no return; So that all my hope in men may be scattered like cobwebs; So that absolute serenity may begin to reign in my soul; So that my heart may become the grave of my two evil twins: arrogance and anger;

So that I might amass all my treasure in heaven; Ah, so that I may for once be freed from self-deception, which has entangled me in the dreadful web of illusory life.

Enemies have taught me to know what hardly anyone knows, that a person has no enemies in the world except himself. One hates his enemies only when he fails to realize that they are not enemies, but cruel friends.

It is truly difficult for me to say who has done me more good and who has done me more evil in the world: friends or enemies. Therefore bless, O Lord, both my friends and my enemies. A slave curses enemies, for he does not understand. But a son blesses them, for he understands.

For a son knows that his enemies cannot touch his life. Therefore he freely steps among them and prays to God for them. Bless my enemies, O Lord. Even I bless them and do not curse them.

by St Nicolai of Zica

Constance and Her Companions, 9 September

It is amazing how the Christian calendar of Saints speaks in a timely way over and over again. Today is an especially poignant time to remember those who gave their all to serve victims of disaster, as Christ has served them and us. The Icon in today's post was written by Br. Tobias Stanislas Haller, of my Order.

Many cities have been destroyed over all of history and American ones are,  sadly,  not immune from disaster and destruction. New Orleans and surrounding areas as well as Southern Mississippi are suffering as many have in the past. Everywhere we see that Christians are reaching out the hand of Christ to our wounded brothers and sisters as in ages before us.

On this day we remember Sister Constance and her Companions. Sr. Constance was a nun of the (Episcopal) Community of St. Mary who, with her Companions, ministered to those stricken with the Yellow Fever epidemic in Memphis, Tennessee, in August of 1878.

Almost everyone who could afford to do so left the city and fled to higher ground away from the river. (It was not yet known that the disease was mosquito-borne, but it was observed that high and dry areas were safe.) While 30,000 citizens fled in terror, a few brave men and women remained at their posts to assist in spite of the terrible risk. Among those who stayed in the city were several communities of nuns, Episcopal and Roman Catholic, who had the opportunity of leaving, but chose to stay and nurse the sick. Most of them, thirty-eight in all, were themselves killed by the fever. One of the first to die (on 9 September 1878) was Constance, head of the (Episcopal) Community of St. Mary. Eventually more than 5,000 people died of the disease.

This fever and evacuation so depopulated the area that the city lost its charter and was not reorganized for fourteen years.

Prayer

We give You thanks and praise, O God of compassion, for the heroic witness of Constance and her companions, who, in a time of plague and pestilence, were steadfast in their care for the sick and the dying, and loved not their own lives, even unto death. Inspire in us a like love and commitment to those in need, following the example of our Savior Jesus Christ; who with You and the Holy Spirit lives and reigns, one God, now and for ever. Amen.

Welcome to the Kingdom

I dont often do this, but this post was so powerful, I had to repost it here. Welcome to the Kingdom

I bumped into Jesus the other day. This kind of thing doesn’t happen often so I figured I’d take advantage of the opportunity to speak to the Master himself.

“Jesus,” I said, “I’m trying my best to live life as your apprentice. What do I need to do?”

“Listen,” Jesus replied. “You know the guidelines my Father set out—they’re for your benefit.” He counted them off on his fingers as he listed them: “Don't murder, don't commit adultery, don't steal, don't lie, don't cheat, honour your father and mother."

“Yeah, I’ve been pretty good with all those.” I said “Those are definitely effective rules for a good life.”

I struggled for the right words. “But I want to do more. I want to be your hands and feet, and your voice. I want to help bring about your Kingdom. What else? What am I missing?”

Jesus looked at me with warmth in his eyes, yet I was locked in his grip. I could not move as he said softly, “Well, there is one thing...”

“What?” I pleaded.

He looked at me for a moment, then said “You tell me.”

My confusion must have been obvious because Jesus smiled at me.

“What are you holding back?” He asked.

“”Nothing.” I responded. “I’ve given you my life, asked you into my heart, accepted you as my personal Lord and Saviour, been born again, washed in the blood, redeemed, saved and sanctified. You name it—I’ve claimed it!”

“Yes, yes.” Jesus said with a hint of impatience. “I think I remember hearing something about that. We’re all very pleased. But what are you holding back?”

“Nothing.” I said wearily, as I averted his gaze.

“Mike.” He said it quietly, yet I had no choice. I turned my head and looked him in the eyes.

“What are you holding back?”

I didn’t as much hear the words as I felt them. Every cell in my body shook as he spoke. I heard the words in my head, in my heart and in my soul. I heard the words outside of time and space. The words soaked me like rain.

I turned my body to face Jesus directly and named the thing that I just couldn’t give him.

“What a coincidence,” Jesus said.  “That’s exactly what I want.”

Who is this Jesus?

There is a Celtic prayer of blessing I say once in a while that asks God to help us see the Face of Christ in those we meet, and pray that they see the Face of Christ in us.

That makes me wonder, Pilate once asked, "Who is this Jesus, why is He different"?

This question has been the central question of our Faith for Centuries. Now all around the world as people who are just trying to survive look at richly blessed American Christians - Who is the Jesus they see?  Do they see the Gentle Teacher of the Beatitudes, or do they see the American Christ? 

I am sadly afraid it is more the latter than the former.

† Our Christian Rights †

Considering our Rights as Christians has come to my attention recently and I wanted to post this powerful description of what a Christian should expect in the way of Rights.

The Christian Bill of Rights 

       

      

We, as disciples of the Lord Jesus Christ, have given our hearts, minds and lives to Him and are dedicated to serving the world in His name and in His love. We believe the following 9 rights to be self-evident in scripture.

We believe, furthermore, that these rights are God-given and are therefore not subject to the will of man, the legislation of government nor the fiat of the courts. Namely,

1. We have the right to be known as the children of God. (John 1:12)
2. We have the right to suffer persecution for our faith and to accept this persecution as normal. (2nd Timothy 3:12)
3. We have the right to shower our persecutors with love, grace, mercy and kindness. (Romans 12:14)
4. We have the right to suffer insult and injury without redress. (Matthew 5:39)
5. We have the right to be compelled to serve others and to serve over and above that which we are legally required to do. (Matthew 5: 41)
6. We have the right to pay more than a court 0rdered settlement against us requires, regardless of the justness of the verdict. (Matthew 5:40)
7. We have the right to poverty. (Luke 18: 18-25)
8. We have the right to pay taxes without complaint or comment as to how those taxes are spent. (Mark 12:13-17)
9. We have the right to refuse our self determination  for submission and obedience to God. (Mark 8:34 - 38)

With this document I hereby call upon all Christians to petition their government and demand their rights.

          

Doing the Gospel

While reading my friend Bryan's Blog, I ran across his posting on Spiritual Life 101. Seems so simple yet so hard.  I am surrounded by people who insist on a "literal" interpretation of the Bible. Well fair enough, then why do I have to defend myself when I say that our response to those who hurt us isn't more hurting. Oh well if they won't listen to Jesus or St. Paul. I don't know that they will listen to me or even Fr. Henri Nouwen.

The apostle Paul writes to the Romans: “Bless your persecutors; never curse them, bless them. … Never pay back evil with evil. … Never try to get revenge. … If your enemy is hungry, give him something to eat; if thirsty, something to drink. … Do not be mastered by evil, but master evil with good” (Romans 12:14-21). These words cut to the heart of the spiritual life. They make it clear what it means to choose life, not death, to choose blessings not curses. But what is asked of us here goes against the grain of our human nature. We will only be able to act according to Paul’s words by knowing with our whole beings that what we are asked to do for others is what God has done for us.

Convocation 2006

The Brothers gather on the steps of the high altar in the Church of the Stigmata at Mount Alvernia, the OFM friary in Wappingers Falls, NY.

Hopefully one day soon I will be in their number.

We all got Book

So if Baby got Book in the last post, how did we all get the Book. How did the Canon of Scripture develop and did it have some thing to do with the Council of Nicea?

Although the final collection and authoritative list of all twenty-seven books of the New Testament came much later (found for the first time in 367 A.D. in a pronouncement by Athanasius, bishop of Alexandria, and not in 325 A.D. during the Council), the process began much earlier.

The earliest collections were the letters of Paul, and the “Fourfold Gospel” (Matthew, Mark, Luke and John). By the end of the first century these four Gospels began to circulate together in codex (book) form.  While there were books that were popular among Christians that were not included in the New Testament (such as The Shepherd of Hermas and The Epistle of Barnabas), and early Christian writers knew and quoted from other gospels (The gospel of Hebrews and The gospel of Peter), no others were given the normative status of the four Gospels. New Testament scholar, Paul Achtemeier of Union Theological Seminary sums up this early consensus on the four Gospels:

"From these writings it is evident that the four canonical Gospels not only pretty well exhausted the reliable traditions about the sayings of Jesus, but also that all four were already well known in widely scattered Christian communities. A consensus had therefore emerged by the end of the first century that the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John were primary sources for, and authoritative expressions of, the Christian faith."

The first “canon” (authoritative list of books regarded as Scripture) was made not by mainstream Christians, but by the Gnostic teacher and leader, Marcion, in ca. 144 A.D. His Bible included only an edited version of Luke, and ten letters of the apostle Paul. There are two ironies to this. First, it was not mainstream Christians who were the first to make an authoritative list of Scriptures which excluded other books, it was the Gnostic community championed by Dan Brown in his Da Vinci Code. The second and more significant irony is that Marcion – himself a teacher with strong Gnostic leanings – did not include any of the Gnostic literature that Brown contends was excluded from the New Testament under Constantine!

It was Marcion and his truncated Bible that forced mainstream Christianity to respond in kind. Thus, from the middle of the second century on, lists of books regarded as authoritative for Christian faith began to circulate. Although there were occasional differences of opinion on some books, the four Gospels are on every list, and no others are. There  are several lists of books that were considered canonical,  which pre-date the council of Nicea- here are three:
The Muratorian Fragment (ca. 170);
Clement of Alexandria (ca. 200);
Origen (beginning of third century)