USEFUL WISDOM FOR 2024 #30

 

AN ATTEMPT TO EXPLAIN THE FEAST OF THE ASSUMPTION OF MARY

 The Assumption of Mary into Heaven

The Assumption is the oldest feast day of Our Lady, but we don't know how it first came to be celebrated.

Its origin is lost in those days when Jerusalem was restored as a sacred city, at the time of the Roman Emperor Constantine (c. 285-337). By then it had been a pagan city for two centuries, ever since Emperor Hadrian (76-138) had leveled it around the year 135 and rebuilt it as Aelia Capitolina in honor of Jupiter.

For 200 years, every memory of Jesus was obliterated from the city, and the sites made holy by His life, death and Resurrection became pagan temples.

After the building of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in 336, the sacred sites began to be restored and memories of the life of Our Lord began to be celebrated by the people of Jerusalem. One of the memories about his mother centered around the "Tomb of Mary," close to Mount Zion, where the early Christian community had lived.

On the hill itself was the "Place of Dormition," the spot of Mary's "falling asleep," where she had died. The "Tomb of Mary" was where she was buried.

At this time, the "Memory of Mary" was being celebrated. Later it was to become our feast of the Assumption.

For a time, the "Memory of Mary" was marked only in Palestine, but then it was extended by the emperor to all the churches of the East. In the seventh century, it began to be celebrated in Rome under the title of the "Falling Asleep" ("Dormitio") of the Mother of God.

Soon the name was changed to the "Assumption of Mary," since there was more to the feast than her dying. It also proclaimed that she had been taken up, body and soul, into heaven.

That belief was ancient, dating back to the apostles themselves. What was clear from the beginning was that there were no relics of Mary to be venerated, and that an empty tomb stood on the edge of Jerusalem near the site of her death. That location also soon became a place of pilgrimage. (Today, the Benedictine Abbey of the Dormition of Mary stands on the spot.)

At the Council of Chalcedon in 451, when bishops from throughout the Mediterranean world gathered in Constantinople, Emperor Marcian asked the Patriarch of Jerusalem to bring the relics of Mary to Constantinople to be enshrined in the capitol. The patriarch explained to the emperor that there were no relics of Mary in Jerusalem, that "Mary had died in the presence of the apostles; but her tomb, when opened later . . . was found empty and so the apostles concluded that the body was taken up into heaven."

In the eighth century, St. John Damascene was known for giving sermons at the holy places in Jerusalem. At the Tomb of Mary, he expressed the belief of the Church on the meaning of the feast: "Although the body was duly buried, it did not remain in the state of death, neither was it dissolved by decay. . . . You were transferred to your heavenly home, O Lady, Queen and Mother of God in truth."

All the feast days of Mary mark the great mysteries of her life and her part in the work of redemption. The central mystery of her life and person is her divine motherhood, celebrated both at Christmas and a week later (Jan. 1) on the feast of the Solemnity of Mary, Mother of God. The Immaculate Conception (Dec. 8) marks the preparation for that motherhood, so that she had the fullness of grace from the first moment of her existence, completely untouched by sin. Her whole being throbbed with divine life from the very beginning, readying her for the exalted role of mother of the Savior.

The Assumption completes God's work in her since it was not fitting that the flesh that had given life to God himself should ever undergo corruption. The Assumption is God's crowning of His work as Mary ends her earthly life and enters eternity. The feast turns our eyes in that direction, where we will follow when our earthly life is over.

The feast days of the Church are not just the commemoration of historical events; they do not look only to the past. They look to the present and to the future and give us an insight into our own relationship with God. The Assumption looks to eternity and gives us hope that we, too, will follow Our Lady when our life is ended.

In 1950, in the Apostolic Constitution Munificentissimus Deus, Pope Pius XII proclaimed the Assumption of Mary a dogma of the Catholic Church in these words: "The Immaculate Mother of God, the ever-virgin Mary, having completed the course of her earthly life, was assumed body and soul into heaven."

With that, an ancient belief became Catholic doctrine and the Assumption was declared a truth revealed by God.
—Excerpted from Fr. Clifford Stevens in Catholic Heritage

GET A GRIP ON YOURSELF - PAY ATTENTION TO WHAT YOU DO!

 

Do not neglect the gift you have. Attend to your-self and to your teaching. Persevere in both tasks.

I Timothy: 4:14-16

 

I have a small paper copy of a famous "NO WHINING" button taped above my computer. It has the word WHINING in a circle with a left to right, line slashing through it.

People who whine, myself or others, whine not only when we are unhappy, but even more so when we expect to be rescued from our unhappiness by others. Whiners feel powerless and believe that if someone else would only do this or that, or quit doing this or that, they themselves would be happier and more successful.

I keep that sign above my computer to remind me each day to take responsibility for my own happiness - a decision that I actually made consciously for the first time, one spring day back in 1965.

Starting with small baby-steps, I marched out that day to meet life head-on with my mind made up to quit my whining, to start making myself happy and to quit blaming other people and the circumstances of my life for my unhappiness. I have made tremendous progress in the last 59 years, but there are still a few cancerous "whining cells" in my bloodstream that manifest themselves every now and then. I keep that "no whining" sign above my computer so every day I am reminded to keep working my program.

Imagine, for a moment, what you will be like in 2035! Will it be a matter of luck or intention? Some of you who struggled through college will be successful beyond your wildest imaginations! Some of you who graduated with honors will allow that advantage to slip away from you. For most of you, what happens to you between now and then will be of your own making, either by design or neglect. Whether you succeed or fail will depend a lot on you – on whether you accept or abdicate responsibility for your own life, instead of blaming other people and circumstances for where you have ended up. Sure, there are some circumstances beyond our control, a few tragedies over which we have no power, but I have tried to follow these words of George Bernard Shaw, "People are always blaming their circumstances for what they are. I don't believe in circumstances. The people who get on in this world are the people who get up and look for the circumstances they want, and of they can't find them, make them."

In our first reading today, the young missionary, Timothy, was discouraged by his circumstances, wanted to quit and come home, whining that nobody would listen to him. Timothy must have been a real whiner because Paul has to write to him at least twice. In his first letter he writes this to Timothy. "Let no one have contempt for you because of your youth, but set an example for those who believe. Watch over yourself and over your teaching; persevere in both tasks, for by doing so, you will save both yourself and those who listen to you." (4:12-16) In other words, "Quit whining! You've got important work to do! You're talented. Now go do it. Do what? Take care of yourself and take care of the people entrusted to your care."

In his second letter to the young Timothy, the problem seems to persist because Paul says this to him: "Fan into flame the gift that God gave you at your ordination. God did not give you a spirit of cowardice, but rather of strength, practical helpfulness and courage in the face of tragedy." (1:6-7)

"Timothy! Get a grip! Quit using your youth as an excuse! Attend to yourself and to the people God has entrusted to your care." This advice from Saint Paul is extremely appropriate even today. The one thing that all successful leaders, parents, spouses, professionals and teachers have in common is their passionate drive for improvement – both in who they are and in what they do – a fierce commitment to their own lifelong formation and an unflinching quest for personal excellence. In other words, all successful leaders, parents, priests, nursing professionals, spouses, and teachers are committed to "attending to themselves and attending to those entrusted to their care."

Excellence in pastoral ministry, parenting, marriage, business, health care or teaching is never about watching over either oneself or others, but watching over both. A priest who only takes care of himself and neglects his people is a disgrace as a priest, but so is the hard-working priest who never takes care of himself. A spouse who only takes care of himself or herself and neglects his or her spouse and children is a disgrace to marriage, but so also is the marriage partner or parent who is always taking care of others while neglecting him or herself. We must attend to ourselves and to those entrusted to us by God and keep them in balance.

In this discipline of watching over oneself and over what one is called to do, I would like to refer to what we call in seminary training, "the four pillars:" human formation, spiritual formation, intellectual formation and professional formation. These "four pillars" are used in our programs for the ongoing formation of priests after seminary as well. Even though they were developed for seminarians and priests, they apply to leaders, professionals, parents, spouses and teachers as well.

To attend to oneself and to one's call, to be good and good at what one does, one must pay attention to one's human formation. This means striving to become the best person we can be, as well as increasing one's capacity to relate to others. As Jesus put it, "A bad tree cannot bear good fruit nor can a good tree bear bad fruit." A mess of a human being can never be a good marriage partner, parent, priest, business professional, pastoral worker or teacher. Becoming a good "anything," begins with a whole, healthy human person.

To watch over oneself and over what one is called to do, one must pay attention to one's spiritual formation. A good priest must have a vigorous personal spiritual life if he is to be a successful spiritual leader, and a vigorous spiritual life is impossible without regular tending. It has been proven, over and over again in study after study, that marriages that have God in them last longer and are happier than those without God in them. In the Sacraments of Marriage and Baptism, parents are asked if they are willing to accept the responsibility of bringing their children up in the practice of the faith. Parents who are not working on their own spiritual formation will not be able to meet their responsibility as primary teachers of the faith to their children.

To watch over oneself and over what one is called to do, one must pay attention to one's intellectual formation. Any good priest, parent, professional, or marriage partner, must be open to growing in wisdom and knowledge in an ever more complex world with its ever evolving scientific and technological discoveries. We need to know what is going on in the world, if we are to engage the world and keep up with it. We must commit to being life-long learners or the world will simply leave us behind.

To watch over oneself and over what one is called to do, one must pay attention to one's professional formation. Even though each of us receives a different call in life, none of us is born a good parent, priest, pastoral worker, business or health professional, teacher or spouse. We must constantly sharpen our abilities and develop our skills. As Jesus told us in the parable of the talents, we might each be given different talents, but every one of us is called to invest those talents and help them grow. Saint Paul tell Timothy, "not to neglect the gift he has been given, ... but to be diligent in these matters, even absorbed in them ... so that your progress will be evident." "By doing so," he says, "you will save both yourself and those who listen to you."

All of you have been blessed. The challenge ahead of you is to now do something with those blessings. Grab the bull by the horns starting today! Accept personal responsibility for yourself. No whining! Cultivate your own drive for improvement – both in who you are and in what you do. In the end, life is not about finding yourself, but about working with God to create yourself.          

 

 

 

 

 

 

BREAD FOR THE JOURNEY, STRENGTH FOR THE TRIP

Elijah got up, ate and drank; then strengthened by

that food, he walked forty days and forty nights.

First Book of Kings 19:4-8

I am the living bread that came down from heaven;

Whoever eats this bread will live forever.

John 6:41-51

The Eucharist!  The Lord’s Supper!  The Blessed Sacrament, Holy Communion!  The Breaking of Bread! The Mass! Throughout our 2,000 year history, we have used several words to describe what we do here today. One of my favorites words for the Eucharist is that old fashioned word “viaticum.”  “Viaticum” was what we called the Eucharistic Bread when we gave it to those who were moments away from death.  It was their last Holy Communion.  The word “viaticum” means “nourishment you take with you when you set out on a trip.”  The fact of the matter is, we are invited to  receive “viaticum” every Sunday, the first day of every week, as “bread for the journey and strength for the trip” to help us during the week ahead.  This is not just any bread: when we eat this bread Jesus invites us to “feed on” his very flesh and blood.  We go forward each week,  then,  with God’s power under our belts! Two other words closely associated with this meal make it even more life-giving and soul-strengthening.  The word “parish” means a way station for pilgrims.  Like one of those stagecoach stops in the old western movies, a “parish” is where spiritual pilgrims stop to refresh themselves before continuing on their trip.  The word “companions” comes from the Latin words for “bread” and “with.”  So “companions” are “people you eat bread with.” So, what are we here for?  We are here as spiritual pilgrims on a journey to the Lord.  Our “parishes,” are fueling stations where we receive “viaticum,” bread for the journey - places to be encouraged by our “companions,” other spiritual pilgrims with whom we share this Bread of Life.

One of my favorite parables is the parable of the wedding feast where Jesus teaches us that “the good and bad alike” are invited to come and “dine with him.” This parable, and others like it, have always raised the question about who is worthy to receive the Eucharist: even more, what is the purpose of the Eucharist?  Is the Eucharist a reward for good behavior or the medicine sinners need to be healed?  It is the church’s duty to protect the Eucharist from desecration, heresy and triviality.  The church has done it’s job well over the centuries, but in a zealous attempt to protect the Eucharist, has it not ended up sometimes keeping it out of the very hands of those for whom it was most intended, those who most need it? 

There may be another way to look at the Eucharist: not simply as a reward for good behavior, but more so as powerful medicine for the sick of soul.  Jesus told stories like the parable I mentioned because he was under attack from religious leaders for welcoming sinners and eating with them!  Jesus believed that by welcoming them and being with them, they would more likely be motivated and strengthened to let go of their sins and be transformed. Even Judas was invited to the last supper! He was not only invited, he was invited to sit in the place of honor.  It was to Judas that Jesus gave the “choice morsel,” traditionally given by the host to the most honored guest!

Early Christianity preserved the idea of the Eucharist being medicine for sinners, placing the marginal and the wounded in the center of their communities in order to give them greatest care.  As time went by, probably because of doctrinal and discipline concerns, the idea of “worthy and unworthy” crept in.  Over time, feeling unworthy, people stopped going to communion, for all practical purposes, with Eucharistic adoration taking precedence over the reception of communion.  It got so bad that the church had to finally mandate communion once a year.  It was known as your “Easter duty” and it is still in effect today.

My own thinking in this matter has been affected greatly by 55 years of pastoral experience, especially by something that happened to me one day here at the Cathedral where we had a major outreach to disaffected Catholics. I was distributing communion.  Out of the corner of my eyes, I saw a woman who had come to see me the day before.  She was divorced from an abusive husband and had remarried. She did not believe in divorce, but had successfully rebuilt her life.  Even though she longed for the Eucharist, she had not received it since her divorce.  She was crying.  In front of me was a line of people, many of whom were validly married in the church.  Some of them were coming toward me, looking around, winking and waving at friends, obviously not very conscious of what they were doing or how important it was!  I don’t challenge the teaching of the church on the permanence of marriage, but I kept saying to myself: “we’ve got this “who’s worthy” thing all wrong!  That woman needs this more than anybody in this line!” 

This sacrament is cheapened, I believe, not so much by giving it to sinners who recognize their need for healing, but by giving it to unconscious people who care little about it, people who are not prepared to receive it, people who do not recognize the presence of the Lord.  St. Paul put it this way to the church at Corinth, “Everyone is to recollect himself before eating this bread and drinking this cup, because a person who eats and drinks without recognizing the Body is eating and drinking his own condemnation.”