Christmas 2010

The following genealogy was composed by Bishop Jane of the Lindisfarne Community and was passed along by Kathleen.
 

 A genealogy of Jesus Christ, the son of Mary, 
the daughter of Anna:
Sarah was the mother of Isaac, 
And Rebekah was the mother of Jacob,
Leah was the mother of Judah, 
Tamar was the mother of Perez. 
The names of the mothers of Hezron, Ram,  Amminadab, Nahshon and Salmon have been lost. 
Rahab was the mother of Boaz,  
and Ruth was the mother of Obed. 
Obed's wife, whose name is unknown, bore Jesse. 
The wife of Jesse was the mother of David.

 Bathsheba was the mother of Solomon,
Na'amah, the Ammonitess, was the mother of  Rehoboam.
Ma'acha was the mother of Abijah and grandmother of Asa. 
Azubah was the mother of Jehosephat. 
The name of Jehoram's mother is unknown.
Athalia was the mother of Ahaziah,
Zibia of Beersheba, the mother of Jehoash. 
Jecoliah of Jerusalem bore Uzziah, 
Jerushah bore Jotha; Ahaz's mother is unknown. 
Abijah was the mother of Hezekiah, 
Hepzibah was the mother of Manassah, 
Meshullemeth was the mother of Amon, 
Jedidah was the mother of Jehoiakim, 
Nehushta was  the mother of Jehoiakin, 
Hamutal was the mother of Zedekiah.

 Then the deportation to Babylon took place. 
After the deportation to Babylon the name of the mothers go unrecorded. 
These are their sons: 
Jechoniah, Shealtiel, Zerubbabel,
Abiud, Eliakim, Azor and Zadok, 
Achim, Eliud, Eleazar, 
Matthan, Jacob, and Joseph, the husband of Mary. 
Of her was born Jesus, who is called the Christ.

 The sum of generations is therefore: 
fourteen from Sarah to David's mother; 
fourteen from Bathsheba to the Babylonian deportation; and fourteen from the Babylonian deportation 
to Mary, the mother of Christ. 

***

This is from Cathy.

Our children were having fun and hours of joy setting up and rearranging all of the items in the manger scene.  It was odd to see Barbie kneeling at the manger, but somehow appropriate.  When evening came and the children off preparing for bed, I looked at their final rendition.  Every item was there, in the correct place.  But behind the cattle, in the edge of the crèche, was an action figure in a suit of armor with an uplifted sword. He had a piece of duct tape covering his face . . it really made no sense to me.

Tucking the kids into bed, I commented on how much fun it was to remember the Christmas story thru the manger scene.  Then I casually asked my 7-year old about this odd, hidden character.  In a quiet voice he told me that he had put him in there to guard baby Jesus, and that he was really part of the Christmas story anyway.

When I asked exactly HOW he was in the story, my son said, "He's the silent knight".

***

The next selection is taken out of context. It is part of a continuing discussion in which George contributed the following reflection. It stands on its own.

 

What is important is that all of us have the same goal, target and reach the same terminal; the renewal of Christianity including Catholicism.  That is a big task, but it is worth the journey and we have the gift of The Holy Spirit renewing our spirit.
 
Our time is moving fast and most of the youth of the world think our selected battles are not worthy of the effort.  Just walk away from the internal strife of Catholic Christianity and follow The Gospel.  The youth may be right, but as Martin Luther spoke and wrote at Worms in 1521, "Here I Stand."
 
The dressing, trapping and polite protocols of Religious Pomp, Papal and Princely Power is still evident by the parades and processions of Roman Hierarchy. Yet, it does not reach page one of any media outlet and most of the youth of the world say; "What is that all about. Who are all those old men parading with their golden robes, big precious jeweled canes and pointed hats. Don't they know that the youth in the world is struggling for food, justice and truth." ?  As our sons say loudly, "We couldn't care less about them." 
 
Church structures must be reviewed, revamped and renewed and, if not in Truth, passed aside. For "We shall know the truth and it will set us free." (John, 8, 32) The questions must be raised, Papal Power, Infallibility, The Primacy of Canon Law, Clericalism, Celibacy, Women Priests, Scripture, Sacramental Life and European Power and Control of the Universal Church. Wow, that is a handful ! 
 
Thus, we should all know by now, that the very structures and Papal Powers of Catholicism must be replaced by The Living Gospel Of Christ and His People. The People Of God and The Holy Spirit under John XXIII, gave us great hope within the Spirit of The Vatican Council II. Thus, we already have our foundation. We have our spirit. We are on the right track.
 
Whether our journey is a speedy express or a slow local, we are journeying, and the journey will continue long after our human endeavors.

***

This article is by Jerry Filteau, NCR Washington correspondent.

 

Catholic Health Association backs Phoenix hospital
 

St. Joseph’s Hospital and Medical Center in Phoenix acted in accord with Catholic directives on medical ethics when it performed an abortion last year to save the mother’s life, the head of the Catholic Health Association of the United States said Dec. 21.


Earlier in the day Bishop Thomas J. Olmsted of Phoenix decreed that St. Joseph’s can no longer “utilize in any way the name ‘Catholic’” because the hospital has refused to accede to his view that the abortion violated the U.S. bishops’ “Ethical and Religious Directives for Catholic Health Care Services.”


Daughter of Charity Sr. Carol Keehan, CHA president and CEO, said, “St. Joseph’s Hospital and Medical Center in Phoenix has many programs that reach out to protect life. They had been confronted with a heartbreaking situation. They carefully evaluated the patient’s situation and correctly applied the ‘Ethical and Religious Directives for Catholic Health Care Services’ to it, saving the only life that was possible to save.”


NCR received Keehan’s statement in an e-mail late Dec. 21. At the time it was not yet posted on the CHA Web site.


St. Joseph’s is run by the Sisters of Mercy and is part of San Francisco-based Catholic Healthcare West, a system of 41 hospitals, mainly Catholic, in Arizona, California and Nevada.
“Catholic Healthcare West and its system of hospitals are valued members of the Catholic Health Association,” Keehan said. “Their long and stellar history in the protection of life at all stages is well known.”


In a Web page responding to frequently asked questions about Olmsted’s Dec. 21 announcement that the hospital could no longer call itself Catholic, St. Joseph’s said, “At issue is whether St. Joseph’s acted correctly in terminating a pregnancy to save the mother’s life. St. Joseph’s and its parent company, Catholic Healthcare West, continue to stand by the decision, which was made in collaboration with the patient, her family, her caregivers and the hospital’s ethics committee.”
On “the facts of the case,” the hospital said:
 

“A woman in her 20s with a history of moderate but well-controlled pulmonary hypertension found out she was pregnant. There was concern for her health because pregnancy with pulmonary hypertension carries a serious risk of mortality. Because of the severity of her disease, the woman’s risk of mortality was close to 50 percent. In November 2009 the woman was admitted to St. Joseph’s Hospital and Medical Center with worsening symptoms. Tests revealed that she now had life-threatening pulmonary hypertension. The chart notes that she had been informed that her risk of mortality was close to 100 percent if she continued the pregnancy. The medical team contacted the Ethics Consult team for review. The consultation team talked to several physicians and nurses as well as reviewed the patient’s record. The patient and her family, her doctors and the Ethics Consult team agreed that the pregnancy could be terminated, and that it was appropriate since the goal was not to end the pregnancy but save the mother’s life.”
 
National controversy over the case erupted last May when the Phoenix daily newspaper, The Arizona Republic, learned that Olmstead had been told about the abortion and had privately informed the head of the ethics committee, Mercy Sr. Margaret McBride, that in approving the abortion McBride had incurred automatic excommunication from the church.


At the time it was revealed that the woman in question was in the 11th week of pregnancy, had four other young children, and had resisted abortion as an option until it became clear that both she and the unborn child were in imminent danger of death if she tried to continue her pregnancy.
Olmsted contended that the hospital violated Directive 45 of the bishops’ “Ethical and Religious Directives for Catholic Health Care Services,” which says, “Abortion – that is, the directly intended termination of pregnancy before viability or the directly intended destruction of a viable fetus – is never permitted. Every procedure whose sole immediate effect is the termination of pregnancy before viability is an abortion.”


The hospital contended that it was not in violation of that directive but rather was following the modifying principle in Directive 47, which says, “Operations, treatments, and medications that have as their direct purpose the cure of a proportionately serious pathological condition of a pregnant woman are permitted when they cannot be safely postponed until the unborn child is viable, even if they will result in the death of the unborn child.”


On its frequently asked question Web page St. Joseph’s said, “Consistent with the ERDs [Ethical and Religious Directives], if we are presented with a situation in which a pregnancy threatens a woman’s life, we will make every effort to save both patients. If that is not possible, we will always save the life we can save. This is what we did in this case and we stand by the decision.”


Although by episcopal decree St. Joseph’s can no longer call itself Catholic, the hospital said, “St. Joseph’s will retain its name and our Catholic heritage will always be at the core of who we are. Our mission and values will not change.”


In response to a request from NCR, the San Francisco archdiocese -- where Catholic Healthcare West is headquartered -- issued a brief statement Dec. 21 saying that Archbishop George H. Niederauer of San Francisco “intends to initiate a dialogue with the leadership of Catholic Healthcare West” regarding questions Olmsted has raised “about the implementation of the ERDs” within the CHW system.


While it offered no judgment on the merits of the conflict between Olmsted and St. Joseph’s, the two-paragraph archdiocesan statement affirmed Olmsted’s “authority and responsibility to interpret the moral law and to teach the Catholic faith” within the Phoenix Diocese and to judge whether Catholic institutions in his diocese are in accord with the bishops’ ERDs.

***

"The Journey," by Mary Oliver, was passed along by Kenny Moore (aka Kenny the Monk).

One day you finally knew
what you had to do, and began,
though the voices around you
kept shouting
their bad advice--
though the whole house
began to tremble
and you felt the old tug
at your ankles.
"Mend my life!"
each voice cried.
But you didn't stop.
You knew what you had to do,
though the wind pried
with its stiff fingers
at the very foundations,
though their melancholy
was terrible.
It was already late
enough, and a wild night,
and the road full of fallen
branches and stones.
But little by little,
as you left their voices behind,
the stars began to burn
through the sheets of clouds,
and there was a new voice
which you slowly
recognized as your own,
that kept you company
as you strode deeper and deeper
into the world,
determined to do
the only thing you could do--
determined to save
the only life you could save.

***

A digital Christmas:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GkHNNPM7pJA&feature=player_embedded
 

Then, something a bit more traditional:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DKk9rv2hUfA

***

Worship and power by Philip Endean

Philip Endean, S.J., teaches theology at the University of Oxford. The understanding of Vatican II here draws on the magisterial work of John O'Malley, S.J., What Happened at Vatican II (Harvard UP, 2008). For other sources and further reading, see www.philipendean.com/littrans.htm

The Tablet (UK)

Bit by bit, the Catholic Church has been edging towards the moment when the new English translation of the Roman Missal will be in use in English-speaking countries around the globe. On 30 April 2010 the Holy See gave its recognitio to what was thought to be the final text, while on 20 August the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops released an updated version of the Ordinary with confirmation that Americans will start using it in Advent 2011. Yet the text is apparently still being revised in Rome. Matters remain unclear.

There are problems here about what counts as good translation. There are also serious questions about how authority is being exercised. In some ways, there are overlaps with the clerical-abuse scandal. Of course, the objective damage done by bad liturgy is as nothing to the moral wrong of children being violated. But in both cases authority has dealt high-handedly and secretively with the sacred, the intimate, the vulnerable. High officialdom has been evasive; lesser authority has tacitly colluded. What the situation needed was salutary English plain speaking.

How the new translation came about is now well known: the rejection of a 1998 version by Rome (despite the overwhelming support of the anglophone bishops' conferences); the changing of the translation ground rules with the Congregation for Divine Worship's (CDW) 2001 instruction, Liturgiam Authenticam; and the sacking of the staff of the International Commission on English in the Liturgy (Icel).

The published accounts of this process by Bishop Maurice Taylor, then the episcopal chairman of Icel, are all the more telling for their dignified and charitable understatement. But "abusive" would not be too strong a word to describe the exercise of authority here.

The best advocacy for the new translation that I have seen, from Archbishop Mark Coleridge of Canberra and Goulburn - who has also written well on the abuse crisis - refers to "an extraordinary level of consultation" in the preparation of the new translation. Perhaps, but I was myself involved in a couple of peripheral ways, and I was instructed to maintain strict secrecy when, through my then provincial, I was asked to comment on a draft of the Ordinary.
Crucially, nothing that challenged Liturgiam Authenticam seems to have been taken seriously. Even Archbishop Coleridge has to concede that the process of producing this document, "which
provided the hermeneutical base of the new translations, was confidential". Bishop Taylor notes that his fellow bishops had overwhelmingly passed the 1998 translation, but let the CDW proceed "without any complaint or question".

This situation hardly inspires confidence or trust. Given that there are also strong objective arguments against Liturgiam Authenticam, we have a serious problem. How are responsible Catholics to cope? The standard answer to that question is: "trust the authority of the Church's office-holders; give them the benefit of the doubt; make the best of the situation." But it is just such moves that have proved so catastrophic in matters to do with sexual abuse. Why are we to suppose them appropriate in this liturgical context?

In a message sent to the Vox Clara committee (set up a year after Liturgiam Authenticam to monitor English texts) just before giving his final recognitio, Pope Benedict himself acknowledged the difficulties ahead, and pointed to the need for both sensitivity and catechesis in implementing the change, given that "many will find it hard to adjust to unfamiliar texts after nearly 40 years".

Much is being promised by way of "catechesis". In a press release following the recognitio, Bishop Arthur Roche, the present chairman of ICEL, spoke of an interactive catechetical DVD, Become One Body, One Spirit in Christ. The online promotional video radiates reassurance: all we are doing is handing on what the Lord Jesus Christ gave to his Apostles; the Mass itself is not changing; we are merely adopting a more sacral register.

Such soothing statements, cutting long and disputed stories very short, are of course in one sense entirely appropriate to the task of "catechesis". Basic information needs to be got across to people who have other things to do with their lives than to study theology. In fact the new translation represents an eminently challengeable set of policy changes.

Bishop Roche's press release refers to the new translation as "a text of the highest quality that can truly be called a work of the Church". But a new translation can only be regarded as "a work of the Church", and judged to be "of the highest quality", if we know that widespread consultation and experiment have taken place. When the matter being put forward is controversial, "catechesis" becomes mere spin.

We need Pope Benedict's sensitivity as well as "catechesis". Many will feel bereaved, losing an approach to liturgy that has become loved and familiar, and a difficult process needs to be faced openly and honestly. When Church authority instructs us priests to prepare for the new translations, it may think it is saying "this change is a necessary correction to liturgical excesses of previous decades", or "fall in and obey for the good of the Church", or even "don't desert the people of God at a moment of need - help them make the best of a bad job".


But other associations are also inevitable: "as victims of abusive power relations that we are only beginning to perceive, we ask you to join us in passing that culture on". On my bad days, when this message is dominant, I see no way of continuing to preside at Mass in English with any integrity, once imposition day comes round. If we are to negotiate the change well, reactions of this kind need to be addressed seriously.
How might sensitivity mark the impending transition? Let me suggest four guidelines that might help all concerned.

First, acknowledge the wider issues at stake. There are good linguistic arguments on both sides as to whether we should say "and also with you" or "and with your spirit". But the choice here is also, and more centrally, about how to express the particular role of the ordained within the Church as a whole.

In general, the new translation's significance has to be situated within the conflicts underlying everything in Vatican II and its aftermath: how the Church deals with change; the relationship between Rome and local churches; how the Church addresses contemporary culture. Options about translation often imply controversial positions on more intractable human and spiritual issues. If Rome's real agenda when liturgical change is in question is that the English-speaking Churches got Vatican II wrong (or indeed the other way round), we should have that conversation openly. Arguments about ecclesiology are not conducted well in code.

Secondly, acknowledge conflicting concerns. The decisions of translation are normally judgement calls between conflicting goods. Non-inclusive "man" appears in the new text, whereas the 1998 text had sought to improve the 1973 one by avoiding it. This is not because our translators are unreconstructed sexists, but because in some contexts the alternatives are judged by some to be unsatisfactory, both linguistically and theologically. The final judgement call, whichever way, should not be read as rejection of the differing concerns, but rather an option that one is more important.

Similarly, the fact that the Lord at Communion is to enter "under my roof" is not only the recovery of a scriptural echo but also something of an archaism. In the UK, where the King James Bible still has its influence on ordinary speech, the scriptural consideration should probably prevail; elsewhere, the case seems far more doubtful.

Prudential decisions of this kind are, of course, the role of legitimate authority. But many people at the moment do not trust the hierarchy enough to accept a decision different from their own preferences - a relational difficulty that needs to be tackled by all involved. A first step might be that we desist from name-calling. It is distressing to read of eminent figures rubbishing our present liturgical idiom as the language of a barbecue, and anticipating the new version "putting paid to ‘parish tea-party liturgy'" (The Church in the World, The Tablet, 29 May). Such talk only encourages others in the bad habit of calling any Latin Mass a "gospel-avoidance-event".

Thirdly, recognise that reverence and accessibility are theologically complementary. Vatican II's liturgy document speaks of the rites radiating a "noble simplicity" (n. 34). To be true to the Gospel, the liturgy needs to be both dignified and straightforwardly intelligible. It is as un-Christian to choose between these as to opt for Christ's being either divine or human. Orthodoxy could be defined as the refusal to fall into such ways of thinking. If the introduction of a new text can be described as one side "winning" some kind of competition between gospel values, things have gone badly wrong.

Fourthly, only say in public what you actually believe. Archbishop Coleridge's lecture in support of the new translation reads as the work of an intelligent, knowledgeable and pastorally grounded man who has engaged with the issues, and is speaking with personal conviction. He also acknowledges that the process has been badly handled.

Even though I don't agree with his overall argument, those features of his text lead me to take him seriously, and to think about what he says. If the new translations are to be introduced successfully, we need a sense that our competent leaders really believe in them, and are commending them out of intelligent conviction rather than instinctive deference.

That said, at no point - on this or any other subject - should pastoral ministers teach or preach anything to which they cannot personally assent. Still less should they come under any pressure from their superiors so to do. Defending what you do not believe will be far more harmful to the Church than any public disharmony. Surely we have learnt by now the dangers of keeping up appearances "for the good of the Church".

Pastoral sensitivity to different voices is also a recognition of the truth that those voices may be expressing. And therefore - this is a paradox that a pluralist vision can never avoid - these guidelines disallow, absolutely, understandings of truth as coming only from one source. They would lead us somewhere different from where we now are, on much else as well as on liturgical matters. Moreover, the theology informing such procedures is sound, whereas its opposite is not.
Christian fidelity is not the monopoly of ecclesial conformists. The Church is integral to the life of grace, but always in a way pointing beyond its present achievement: it gives us "a sacrament and instrumental sign" of a reality greater than itself: "intimate union with God and ... the unity of all humanity" (Lumen Gentium, n. 1). In the pilgrim Church, ideological purity is no sign of theological wisdom.

This new translation, both in its content and in the manner of its imposition, represents a retreat from the salutary, evangelical reform of church style and mood that Vatican II represented. Those of us who experienced pre-conciliar Catholicism as abusive received Vatican II as a powerful reassurance that the Church was mending its ways. That gave us hope and liberation. It will be a scandal, in both the common and the theological senses of the word, if - at a level that really hurts - the new translation takes that reassurance back.
 


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