Tuesday, March 16, 2010
Bl. John Amias (16th century)
John was a cloth merchant in England. After his wife died, he divided his property among his many children, and travelled to France to study for the priesthood. When he was ordained, he returned to England to serve the underground Church. He was arrested and killed for the crime of priesthood.
Thursday, March 11, 2010
Luther, Indulgences, The History
These are my class notes from March 11, 2010. Why Post them? Because it was an interesting class.
Never can an indulgence be applied to some future act which one may commit. So if you accidentally break my window, I may forgive you, but you still have to pay for it. The indulgence, using the same analogy, is that you break my window, I forgive you but you don't have to pay me anymore. We still have atonement to do for our sins, we still have to pay the piper for our sins, that is what purgatory is for, to finish the cleansing. An indulgence omits that punishment, that cleansing.
Scripture foundations- Matthew 16:18-19
An indulgence erases the consequence for sin.
Scriptural foundation- Matthew 18:23-35 (parable illustrating Jesus' approval of an act of mercy), John 8:1-11 (woman caught in adultery- in this case, the legal consequence was execution by stoning and we know how Jesus responded to this)
Martin Luther- born in 1483, named for Martin De Tours. His father was a minor, who was a brutal alcoholic. Domestic violence shaped his upbringing. It is possible that his father was mentally ill and Luther inherited it. His father did fund an education for Luther. He hoped he would be a lawyer and handle family business. Luther was a quick learner, he was multi-lingual, he was a powerful speaker, he had a domineering personality. He graduated with honors, with a masters of arts. He was enrolled in the law school (according to the educational theory of the day, you had your complete education first and then specialize in something). After the enrollment something happened. On July 2, 1505, Luther was traveling from university to his home (or visaversa). A bolt of lighting struck a nearby tree, and Luther took cover. According to his own account, he prayed to St. Anne, and promised that if she saved him, he would become a monk. He did survive, and he enraged his father by instead of going to law school, he entered a friary in Erfurt, Germany, 15 days after that thunderstorm. This does not qualify correct discernment. NO, does this conform in anyway in to what is a religious vocation? NO. This is another sad example of those going into the church who do not have a vocation. 2 years later, he was ordained a priests on April 7, 1507. He was ordained for the Augustinians. Luther arrived in in the friary, already inflicted with scrupulosity. He was a good student, however, he very soon developed a subversion to scholastic theology as it was being taught there (Scholasticism had deteriorated from what it was originally suppose to be which was learning how to think and use reason to just pure memorization). He studied scripture. In 1508, only three years after he opened his first theology text book, he devolved a corner stone of what would become Lutheran theology based on Romans 1:17- THE JUST SHALL LIVE BY FAITH.
Luther Theology corrected
- the word JUST translated Dikaiosune (Greek)- the correct translation of this work is righteousness, being in a right relationship. The translation JUST is incomplete. So instead of the JUST shall live by faith, it should be the Righteous should live by faith. If it is translated correct, it means, when we have faith, we are already in a right relationship with God, not that you are saying yes I have faith means that all of a sudden the relationship is there. This is clarified in James 2:26- for just a body without a spirit is dead, so also faith without works is dead.
- so just declaring that yes I have faith so I am saved is incorrect, rather, it is faith in works, declaring and living results in the relationship.
He started writing about his erroneous theology in 1508 which was 9 years before his 95 Thesis.
IN 1511, three years after his invented theology of justification by faith alone. He was transferred to Wittenberg, where he taught and assisted in a local parish which the Augustinians staffed. The following year, 1512, he received his doctrine in theology, and begin teaching scripture. His first lecture was on the book of psalms, and it was a series of lectures. Luther had disliked scholastic theology, it took patience but he lacked patience even though he was brilliant. Scholasticsm would have been burdensome to him on the intellectual level, he rejected the basic philosophical, the absolute unity of faith and reason, and an understanding of reality within a context of a priori metaphysics and ontology. He was rejecting the metaphysics of a realists (it means that they believed in objective reality, that there are in the mind of God objective eternal truths that are real). Instead, Luther would go back in history of the scholastics to find the trouble makers, the William of Occam's out there and adhered to a erroneous metaphysics called Nomilnalism (which states that we cannot know objective truth and reality, all we can know is individuals, not the objective nature of what it means to be a thing- like a human being). Without the correct understanding of reality, that you start with ontology, that there is the one True God and that he created the universe, if you reject this and cut off the top of the intellectual period, what are you left with? Basically man becomes the measure of all things, I can know the name of a thing but what is the true definition, basically what my conscious tells me.
With this in mind, in September of 1517, one month before he kicks off the Protestant movement, Luther had a dry run so to speak. He has a public disputation, against Scholasticism. He is defending the Nominalist position against Realist (which has a different meaning then than it does today). So this is a public forum, by an ordained priest (Luther) publicly defending the position that there is not objective reality. From Luther's perspective, this disputation was a rounding success. He had this charisma that the younger students liked because he was rebellious. They liked the idea of the individual conscience as being supreme.
While after this dispute is breaking up, everyone is congratulating him he heard about the Dominican Father Tetzel who is making claims about indulgences who was saying that people no longer need to go to confession if they pay for the indulgence. Tetzel was obviously wrong in what he was teaching, indulgences were not wrong but the way Tetzel was teaching them was very wrong. Luther decides to take on Tetzel. So on October 31st, 1517, which is the day before a Holy Day of Obligation (which is All Saints Day), he post his 95 Thesis. Of these 95, 41 were judged to be heretical. They deal with indulgences, the whole sacramental services of the Church (specifically penance).
In previous centuries, there were many attempts as schism and such. The Church had survived it all, and had been brought into a false sense of security. The Catholic Church did not take Luther as seriously as they should have. They thought that what happened in the East (The great schism) could not happen in the West. Luther wrote a letter to Albert (Bishop) of Wittenberg demanding that he stop Father Tetzel. This is actually a right act because Tetzel was teaching error. No only did Albert do nothing, which was wrong, he should have smashed Tetzel, instead he reported Luther to Rome as a trouble maker. This report made it to the curia, so they sent it to the Dominicans to respond. So the guy they sent it to is a Dominican theologian with the curia who's name was Silverio Prieras, OP. He replied in May of 1518 with an essay concerning the Authority of the Pope.
Solverio told Tetzel that LUther was on to him and calling him out for the wrong act in which Tetzel was teaching about indulgences. So Tetzel fires back with his own 50 Thesis against Luther which actually did not defend himself in his wrong teaching but instead defending the Church and her authority to forgive sins (which was accurate). He ended up dying shortly after so we don't know what his role would have been. It would have been nice if the whole issue ended here because Tetzel who was a trouble maker in his erroneous teaching had died.
Before his death though (Johanne Tetzel), Luther was called in by his own superiors (The Augustinians). No one had sent the 95 thesis to Rome yet. His superiors were upset with Luther because he wrote a letter to a bishop in another diocese without telling them. The meeting had nothing to with Theology but was a disciplinary thing because they had made them look bad. Luther lost his temper (which was normal) and he started screaming, they screamed back. Luther wants to talk indulgences, where they want to talk authority. Luther goes so far as to deny the validity of indulgence period. This is going way overboard. He says because the word does not occur in scripture it is not valid and here you have the birth of Sola-Scriptora. The assertion is wrong though, there is a scriptural foundation for indulgences (see above).
Against Sola-Scriptora
- 1 Tim 3:15- But if I should be delayed, you should know how to behave in the household of God, which is the church of the living God, the pillar and foundation of truth
- Plus the Church wrote the bible under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit
5 months later, Luther was summoned to be the Master General of the Augustinian Order. Thomas d Vio had been the Master General of the Augustinians. He was an ardent Thomist; what he was trying to was correct some of the late medieval form of Scholasticism and restore the high medieval form of it. He had several meetings with Luther. Luther refused to recant and made the claim that He, Luther, was a loyal member of the church but as a professor he had a right to freely question matters fo the faith in its teaching. So error stops being error if it is presented in an academic setting. (Luther example- 2 +2 is 5 is no longer wrong until it has been debated)
It so happened that someone was ready to debate Luther. HE was a professor of Theology in Bulgaria, JOhan Maier von Eck (1486-1543). Eck is of the nobility, and Luther is not, so there is a class difference too. The much anticipated debate took place at Liepzig from June 27-July 16, 1519. Luther would not admit it, but he was intimidated by meeting Eck because Eck was of nobility. Luther invited someone to join him who came from LUther's college. Eck was polished, self-contained and self-assured. Luther used his usual strategy of shouting and stringing together countless sayings that had no meaning. Eck saw right through this, and he started to dissect Luther's arguments. Luther could not handle this because he had emotional issues. He has very little patience. Screaming would not work for Luther. He lost control until he became hysterical. Eck had no difficulty in exposing Luther and his beliefs. HE got Luther to admit three things publicly. First, that the entire church hierarchy was nothing ubt a human institution. Second, that the bishop of Rome did nto have primacy by the nature of his office, but only as a historical development. Third, that scripture was superior to papal pronouncements, Church councils, the Church Fathers, and was the only norm in matters of faith and morals. Von Eck basically gets Luther to admit that he is a Heretic. This is the first time that Luther is publicly identified as a Heretic.
The same year as this Leipzeg debate, the Protestant movement spread. People started publishing papers about this, the whole academic network, which was disobedient already, spread this like wildfire spreads. There was this huge portion of the population which was ready to reject the Church because of various abuses from the Church and others over the past centuries.
Going West- Switzerland- We meet another disloyal Catholic priest who had no vocation... Ulrich Zwingli (1484-1531). Switzerland was not a nation state at this time. Zwingli ordained a priest in 1505, it was a was well established reality that the basis for the Swiss economy came from renting out their young men as mercenaries. They were very much in demand. Zwingli began to publicly preach against this as being immoral. He said that they were trading human blood for gold. There is nothing heretical in this teaching, this is what he believed. But, since the papacy was a noteworthy client that hired the Swiss to fight its wars. And Since the papacy had become in many way corrupt during the Renaissance, the upper powers of the church became a regular target of Zwingli. Once the pattern of doing so begin, it became easy to protest one issue to denouncing other things. So the Pope was attacked by Zwingli not just for paying for mercenaries to attack other things which led him down the spiral of heresy. Neither Luther of Zwingli had real vocations and they had already had animosity against the Church.
Zwingli heard about Luther, particularly Luther's assertion of only that which can be found in the Bible need be believed. In 1519, Zwingli broke from the Church (interestingly, Luther and Zwingli are identified as heretics in the same year). Zwingli publicly started teaching gnostic positions (Manichean). He repudiates celibacy because it was imposed by a hierarchy that does not have biblical foundation according to him. He says monasticism was made up, he denounces sacred images for iconoclastic reasons (basically because all material things were evil). Violence began almost immediately. The cantons of Zurcih, Geneua left immediately and became Protestant. Whereas the Cantons of Freiburg and Lecerne stayed Catholic. The violence begin with these four. When in power, Zwingli begin imposing his manichean protestant program, he starts to vandalize Church property, smashing windows, murdering priest and nuns. The first war of the Reformation begins in Switzerland. HE dies himself killing Catholics in 1531. But we are not finished with Zwingli. The wars of religion have begun in 1519 and Switzerland has never again been completely Catholic.
Luther's spiral was slower. On June 15th, 1520, a year after the debate, after being exposed as a heretic, the Pope (Leo X) gets involved and issues a Bull identifying 41 of the 95 thesis as heretical. Luther was offered the opportunity to recant, it would have to be done publicly and in writing and if he did not the result would be public excommunication. 2 months later, August of 1520, Luther publishes a pamphlet called "Address to the Christian Nobility of the German Nation." He is referring to the German speaking people because there is not a German nation yet. IN this he picks up Autosephely, Galicanism, which is the national church ecclesiology and he presents it as if he invented it. He found a receptive audience because the Catholic Church had lost credibility because of a bunch of reasons, not only because of corrupt popes but also feudalism and corruption in monarchies. He is able to get support from local German princes and Dukes who for financial reasons, do not want to send money to Rome and they want to steal Church property. So the Lutheran cause, who identified his cause as the "German" cause and puts Germans against Italians in his cause.... he is able to have success. More later...
Never can an indulgence be applied to some future act which one may commit. So if you accidentally break my window, I may forgive you, but you still have to pay for it. The indulgence, using the same analogy, is that you break my window, I forgive you but you don't have to pay me anymore. We still have atonement to do for our sins, we still have to pay the piper for our sins, that is what purgatory is for, to finish the cleansing. An indulgence omits that punishment, that cleansing.
Scripture foundations- Matthew 16:18-19
An indulgence erases the consequence for sin.
Scriptural foundation- Matthew 18:23-35 (parable illustrating Jesus' approval of an act of mercy), John 8:1-11 (woman caught in adultery- in this case, the legal consequence was execution by stoning and we know how Jesus responded to this)
Martin Luther- born in 1483, named for Martin De Tours. His father was a minor, who was a brutal alcoholic. Domestic violence shaped his upbringing. It is possible that his father was mentally ill and Luther inherited it. His father did fund an education for Luther. He hoped he would be a lawyer and handle family business. Luther was a quick learner, he was multi-lingual, he was a powerful speaker, he had a domineering personality. He graduated with honors, with a masters of arts. He was enrolled in the law school (according to the educational theory of the day, you had your complete education first and then specialize in something). After the enrollment something happened. On July 2, 1505, Luther was traveling from university to his home (or visaversa). A bolt of lighting struck a nearby tree, and Luther took cover. According to his own account, he prayed to St. Anne, and promised that if she saved him, he would become a monk. He did survive, and he enraged his father by instead of going to law school, he entered a friary in Erfurt, Germany, 15 days after that thunderstorm. This does not qualify correct discernment. NO, does this conform in anyway in to what is a religious vocation? NO. This is another sad example of those going into the church who do not have a vocation. 2 years later, he was ordained a priests on April 7, 1507. He was ordained for the Augustinians. Luther arrived in in the friary, already inflicted with scrupulosity. He was a good student, however, he very soon developed a subversion to scholastic theology as it was being taught there (Scholasticism had deteriorated from what it was originally suppose to be which was learning how to think and use reason to just pure memorization). He studied scripture. In 1508, only three years after he opened his first theology text book, he devolved a corner stone of what would become Lutheran theology based on Romans 1:17- THE JUST SHALL LIVE BY FAITH.
Luther Theology corrected
- the word JUST translated Dikaiosune (Greek)- the correct translation of this work is righteousness, being in a right relationship. The translation JUST is incomplete. So instead of the JUST shall live by faith, it should be the Righteous should live by faith. If it is translated correct, it means, when we have faith, we are already in a right relationship with God, not that you are saying yes I have faith means that all of a sudden the relationship is there. This is clarified in James 2:26- for just a body without a spirit is dead, so also faith without works is dead.
- so just declaring that yes I have faith so I am saved is incorrect, rather, it is faith in works, declaring and living results in the relationship.
He started writing about his erroneous theology in 1508 which was 9 years before his 95 Thesis.
IN 1511, three years after his invented theology of justification by faith alone. He was transferred to Wittenberg, where he taught and assisted in a local parish which the Augustinians staffed. The following year, 1512, he received his doctrine in theology, and begin teaching scripture. His first lecture was on the book of psalms, and it was a series of lectures. Luther had disliked scholastic theology, it took patience but he lacked patience even though he was brilliant. Scholasticsm would have been burdensome to him on the intellectual level, he rejected the basic philosophical, the absolute unity of faith and reason, and an understanding of reality within a context of a priori metaphysics and ontology. He was rejecting the metaphysics of a realists (it means that they believed in objective reality, that there are in the mind of God objective eternal truths that are real). Instead, Luther would go back in history of the scholastics to find the trouble makers, the William of Occam's out there and adhered to a erroneous metaphysics called Nomilnalism (which states that we cannot know objective truth and reality, all we can know is individuals, not the objective nature of what it means to be a thing- like a human being). Without the correct understanding of reality, that you start with ontology, that there is the one True God and that he created the universe, if you reject this and cut off the top of the intellectual period, what are you left with? Basically man becomes the measure of all things, I can know the name of a thing but what is the true definition, basically what my conscious tells me.
With this in mind, in September of 1517, one month before he kicks off the Protestant movement, Luther had a dry run so to speak. He has a public disputation, against Scholasticism. He is defending the Nominalist position against Realist (which has a different meaning then than it does today). So this is a public forum, by an ordained priest (Luther) publicly defending the position that there is not objective reality. From Luther's perspective, this disputation was a rounding success. He had this charisma that the younger students liked because he was rebellious. They liked the idea of the individual conscience as being supreme.
While after this dispute is breaking up, everyone is congratulating him he heard about the Dominican Father Tetzel who is making claims about indulgences who was saying that people no longer need to go to confession if they pay for the indulgence. Tetzel was obviously wrong in what he was teaching, indulgences were not wrong but the way Tetzel was teaching them was very wrong. Luther decides to take on Tetzel. So on October 31st, 1517, which is the day before a Holy Day of Obligation (which is All Saints Day), he post his 95 Thesis. Of these 95, 41 were judged to be heretical. They deal with indulgences, the whole sacramental services of the Church (specifically penance).
In previous centuries, there were many attempts as schism and such. The Church had survived it all, and had been brought into a false sense of security. The Catholic Church did not take Luther as seriously as they should have. They thought that what happened in the East (The great schism) could not happen in the West. Luther wrote a letter to Albert (Bishop) of Wittenberg demanding that he stop Father Tetzel. This is actually a right act because Tetzel was teaching error. No only did Albert do nothing, which was wrong, he should have smashed Tetzel, instead he reported Luther to Rome as a trouble maker. This report made it to the curia, so they sent it to the Dominicans to respond. So the guy they sent it to is a Dominican theologian with the curia who's name was Silverio Prieras, OP. He replied in May of 1518 with an essay concerning the Authority of the Pope.
Solverio told Tetzel that LUther was on to him and calling him out for the wrong act in which Tetzel was teaching about indulgences. So Tetzel fires back with his own 50 Thesis against Luther which actually did not defend himself in his wrong teaching but instead defending the Church and her authority to forgive sins (which was accurate). He ended up dying shortly after so we don't know what his role would have been. It would have been nice if the whole issue ended here because Tetzel who was a trouble maker in his erroneous teaching had died.
Before his death though (Johanne Tetzel), Luther was called in by his own superiors (The Augustinians). No one had sent the 95 thesis to Rome yet. His superiors were upset with Luther because he wrote a letter to a bishop in another diocese without telling them. The meeting had nothing to with Theology but was a disciplinary thing because they had made them look bad. Luther lost his temper (which was normal) and he started screaming, they screamed back. Luther wants to talk indulgences, where they want to talk authority. Luther goes so far as to deny the validity of indulgence period. This is going way overboard. He says because the word does not occur in scripture it is not valid and here you have the birth of Sola-Scriptora. The assertion is wrong though, there is a scriptural foundation for indulgences (see above).
Against Sola-Scriptora
- 1 Tim 3:15- But if I should be delayed, you should know how to behave in the household of God, which is the church of the living God, the pillar and foundation of truth
- Plus the Church wrote the bible under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit
5 months later, Luther was summoned to be the Master General of the Augustinian Order. Thomas d Vio had been the Master General of the Augustinians. He was an ardent Thomist; what he was trying to was correct some of the late medieval form of Scholasticism and restore the high medieval form of it. He had several meetings with Luther. Luther refused to recant and made the claim that He, Luther, was a loyal member of the church but as a professor he had a right to freely question matters fo the faith in its teaching. So error stops being error if it is presented in an academic setting. (Luther example- 2 +2 is 5 is no longer wrong until it has been debated)
It so happened that someone was ready to debate Luther. HE was a professor of Theology in Bulgaria, JOhan Maier von Eck (1486-1543). Eck is of the nobility, and Luther is not, so there is a class difference too. The much anticipated debate took place at Liepzig from June 27-July 16, 1519. Luther would not admit it, but he was intimidated by meeting Eck because Eck was of nobility. Luther invited someone to join him who came from LUther's college. Eck was polished, self-contained and self-assured. Luther used his usual strategy of shouting and stringing together countless sayings that had no meaning. Eck saw right through this, and he started to dissect Luther's arguments. Luther could not handle this because he had emotional issues. He has very little patience. Screaming would not work for Luther. He lost control until he became hysterical. Eck had no difficulty in exposing Luther and his beliefs. HE got Luther to admit three things publicly. First, that the entire church hierarchy was nothing ubt a human institution. Second, that the bishop of Rome did nto have primacy by the nature of his office, but only as a historical development. Third, that scripture was superior to papal pronouncements, Church councils, the Church Fathers, and was the only norm in matters of faith and morals. Von Eck basically gets Luther to admit that he is a Heretic. This is the first time that Luther is publicly identified as a Heretic.
The same year as this Leipzeg debate, the Protestant movement spread. People started publishing papers about this, the whole academic network, which was disobedient already, spread this like wildfire spreads. There was this huge portion of the population which was ready to reject the Church because of various abuses from the Church and others over the past centuries.
Going West- Switzerland- We meet another disloyal Catholic priest who had no vocation... Ulrich Zwingli (1484-1531). Switzerland was not a nation state at this time. Zwingli ordained a priest in 1505, it was a was well established reality that the basis for the Swiss economy came from renting out their young men as mercenaries. They were very much in demand. Zwingli began to publicly preach against this as being immoral. He said that they were trading human blood for gold. There is nothing heretical in this teaching, this is what he believed. But, since the papacy was a noteworthy client that hired the Swiss to fight its wars. And Since the papacy had become in many way corrupt during the Renaissance, the upper powers of the church became a regular target of Zwingli. Once the pattern of doing so begin, it became easy to protest one issue to denouncing other things. So the Pope was attacked by Zwingli not just for paying for mercenaries to attack other things which led him down the spiral of heresy. Neither Luther of Zwingli had real vocations and they had already had animosity against the Church.
Zwingli heard about Luther, particularly Luther's assertion of only that which can be found in the Bible need be believed. In 1519, Zwingli broke from the Church (interestingly, Luther and Zwingli are identified as heretics in the same year). Zwingli publicly started teaching gnostic positions (Manichean). He repudiates celibacy because it was imposed by a hierarchy that does not have biblical foundation according to him. He says monasticism was made up, he denounces sacred images for iconoclastic reasons (basically because all material things were evil). Violence began almost immediately. The cantons of Zurcih, Geneua left immediately and became Protestant. Whereas the Cantons of Freiburg and Lecerne stayed Catholic. The violence begin with these four. When in power, Zwingli begin imposing his manichean protestant program, he starts to vandalize Church property, smashing windows, murdering priest and nuns. The first war of the Reformation begins in Switzerland. HE dies himself killing Catholics in 1531. But we are not finished with Zwingli. The wars of religion have begun in 1519 and Switzerland has never again been completely Catholic.
Luther's spiral was slower. On June 15th, 1520, a year after the debate, after being exposed as a heretic, the Pope (Leo X) gets involved and issues a Bull identifying 41 of the 95 thesis as heretical. Luther was offered the opportunity to recant, it would have to be done publicly and in writing and if he did not the result would be public excommunication. 2 months later, August of 1520, Luther publishes a pamphlet called "Address to the Christian Nobility of the German Nation." He is referring to the German speaking people because there is not a German nation yet. IN this he picks up Autosephely, Galicanism, which is the national church ecclesiology and he presents it as if he invented it. He found a receptive audience because the Catholic Church had lost credibility because of a bunch of reasons, not only because of corrupt popes but also feudalism and corruption in monarchies. He is able to get support from local German princes and Dukes who for financial reasons, do not want to send money to Rome and they want to steal Church property. So the Lutheran cause, who identified his cause as the "German" cause and puts Germans against Italians in his cause.... he is able to have success. More later...
Tuesday, March 2, 2010
From "Caritas in Veritate"
The Church does not have technical solutions to offer and does not claim “to interfere in any way in the politics of States.”She does, however, have a mission of truth to accomplish, in every time and circumstance, for a society that is attuned to man, to his dignity, to his vocation. Without truth, it is easy to fall into an empiricist and skeptical view of life, incapable of rising to the level of praxis because of a lack of interest in grasping the values — sometimes even the meanings — with which to judge and direct it. Fidelity to man requires fidelity to the truth, which alone is the guarantee of freedom (cf. Jn 8:32) and of the possibility of integral human development. For this reason the Church searches for truth, proclaims it tirelessly and recognizes it wherever it is manifested. This mission of truth is something that the Church can never renounce. Her social doctrine is a particular dimension of this proclamation: it is a service to the truth which sets us free. Open to the truth, from whichever branch of knowledge it comes, the Church's social doctrine receives it, assembles into a unity the fragments in which it is often found, and mediates it within the constantly changing life-patterns of the society of peoples and nations.
Monday, March 1, 2010
Abortion and African Americans
Here is an interesting article on the effects abortion has had on the African American community.
I love Mother Angelica
I love this Woman; she has such a simple, pastoral way of explaining the world. I like listening to her on EWTN radio.
Thursday, February 25, 2010
Seminarian Complaint
Complaining as a seminarian is a useful as a beaver on top of a mountain. And of course I realize that my complaints are not really worthy of being voiced as compared to other peoples' real problems. That being said, why do we have so much cursed writing? The amount of papers and assignments that I have now has completely doubled since when I first came to seminary over 5 years ago. I remember the days when it was said if you could get past 2nd Theology, than you were golden, good to go, assuming you had a vocation. Now, it seems like they believe we should all be master Theologians, Historians, and Liturgist before we leave. Everyone who is not a seminarian will say this is great but that is because the are not writing papers everyday. I'm tired now, but I'm sure once I'm ordained I will be thankful for all the hard work. I look forward to telling future seminarians my old war stories about how I had to work all the time and go to dumb countless meetings in the snow, up hill, both ways, and with very little food.
Tuesday, February 23, 2010
Catholic Underground
So these guys are from Baton Rouge and they run this Catholic Podcast. It is good listening if you want something int he background.
Lent Reading
Father Bryan Jerabek, a priest of our diocese, put together this Lenten Reading Plan. It looks to be very good if you can find the time.I love this image of Christ. When I reflect upon this image I am moved by the face of Jesus. It's as if Jesus is crying, agonizing and suffering, with a deep penetrating gaze of love which he has for me.
A Handbook for Marriage Prep
So I read recently that the Vatican will release a marriage preparation book for the Church universal. This will be helpful and I hope it comes soon. As for our diocese , and I'm sure many others, marriage preparation has been very subjective for the last how many ever years.
Here is a link reporting the story.
Here is a link reporting the story.
Friday, February 19, 2010
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
