Easter season has come to a close. For us and for our salvation, He came down from heaven1. Now, He sends us out into the world. Renewed by his body, we become the body and hands of His church2. We must learn not only to do the work, but we must learn also to love working in His vineyard3. The Lord is good and He is generous4. Working in His vineyard is without toil. His burden is light and rest is plentiful5. On this Pentecost, let us go forth bathed in the fire of the Holy Spirit. Let it burn away that which does not last. Let in us remain only that which is of the Lord.
I encourage you, brothers and sisters, to remember that each of you are called to be Saints. Remember that it is our duty at all times and everywhere to give Him praise. This duty is particular to each of us. Whether as catechists, ministers, or in our daily actions, each of us represents the face of the Church to each person that we meet. As we move into this new season, take heart in knowing that Christ has called you to tremendous things. “Amen, amen, I say to you, whoever believes in me will do the works that I do, and will do greater ones than these…” 6. This is hard to believe, at times. Let doubt not palely cast o’er our enterprises of great pith and moment7. Let our action be not about our weakness but His strength. We work not for our glory, but to partake in the glorifying of His kingdom. We work not so that we might be known8 but so that others might know Him.
Ad majorem Dei gloriam.
1. Nicene Creed. Lines 14-15
2. St. Teresa of Avila, “Yours are the hands through which he blesses all the world. . . Christ has no body now on earth but yours.”
3. St. John Henry Newman, "As Christ has His work, we too have ours; as He rejoiced to do His work, we must rejoice in ours also."
4. Matthew 20:1-16. "Are you envious because I am generous?"
5. Matthew 11:28-20. "Come to me, all you who labor and are burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am meek and humble of heart; and you will find rest for yourselves. For my yoke is easy, and my burden light.”
6. John 14:12-14.
7. Hamlet Act 3, Scene 1, Lines 85-86
8. St. Barsanuphius, "Do not seek to be regarded as somebody, don't compare yourself to others in anything. Leave the world, mount the cross, discard all earthly things, shake the dust from off your feet."
O shepherd of Israel, hear us,
You who lead Joseph’s flock
My Lord, my shepherd, you have led me and my tiny flock so far from home. We dwell here, strangers in a strange land. Grant that I may always remember that you, Lord, are the shepherd, you are the Master of this flock that you have entrusted to me.
Shine forth from you cherubim throne1
upon Ephraim, Benjamin, Manasseh.2
As is written by the prophet Ezekiel, you are not bound to the temple in Jerusalem. Your cherubim throne has traveled with your people before, and I know you are with us, this family of mine whom you have so blessed.
O Lord, rouse up your might,
O Lord, come to our help.
Without your help, O Adonai3, how can I hope to fulfill this task which you have entrusted to me, poor man that I am. I hope in your promise and I obey, and yet my years, though few, weigh heavy upon my head. Who is there in Heaven but you. To whom should I turn.
God of hosts, bring us back;
Let your face shine upon us and we shall be saved.
Bring us back, Lord, to our own people. How long have we dwelt in a foreign land, the harsh tongue of foreigners about us. Mary and the child staying indoors, rightfully fearing to show their faces in the market square while I ply my wares to earn a pittance. How long, oh Lord. I long for your saving word.
Lord God of hosts, how long
Will you frown on your people’s plea?
How long will my plea for mercy, for return to my own land, go unheeded. Many years have I dwelt here, a stranger in a strange land. I trust in your time, in your guidance, as it was you who led me safely here in a dream. The child, though, your child, has sprung up among the Egyptians.
You have fed them with tears for their bread,
An abundance of tears for their drink.
You have made us the taunt of our neighbors,
Our enemies laugh us to scorn.
Here, among the Greeks, the Ptolemians, the Romans and the few brothers from the Northern tribes, my neighbors are strangers, and our enemies, enemies to your promise, are my only companions in my daily toil. The light in my little home, far brighter than any around us might realize, seems the only light shining in the darkness. How long, Lord, before the darkness comprehends the light you have bestowed upon your servant, for me to guide, to guard, to embrace, and to love?
God of hosts, bring us back;
Let your face shine upon us and we shall be saved.
Lord, bring us back. Guide your servant and protect us. Lead the little flock you have entrusted to me, so that this light might shine forth to the nations, to the glory of your people Israel.
_You brought a vine out of Egypt;
To plant it you drove out the nations.
Before it you cleared the ground;
It took root and spread through the land.
The mountains were covered with its shadow,
The cedars of God with its boughs.
It stretched out its branches to the sea,
To the Great River it stretched out its shoots._
My trust lies in you, oh Adonai, for I know that what you have done for the nation of my people Israel, you can do for my little family. Look kindly on your servants who call to you, and as you did in the days of my fathers, in the days of my ancestor David and the Joseph for whom I am named, so too I know you shall do for us in my days. The promise you have given my bride shall be fulfilled in the child you have given us.
Then why have you broken down its walls?
It is plucked by all who pass by.
It is ravaged by the boar of the forest,
Devoured by the beasts of the field.
Such atrocities you have permitted in your wisdom. Whether committed by your own people or the nations. These, we are not to understand. Not for us to wonder why but to trust in your word and, as for me and my house, to follow you, Adonai, wherever you may lead. Even to Egypt.
God of hosts, turn again, we implore,
Look down from heaven and see.
Visit this vine and protect it,
The vine your right hand has planted.
Protect this young vine in my house. You it was who planted the vine in my home, in my heart, and in my bride. You have made me only a dresser of sycamores4, a protector, a father in all ways but one. But this vine, from whom shall spring many branches, this vine is your own.
Men have burnt it with fire and destroyed it.
May they perish at the frown of your face.
How Herod sought to destroy it. His selfishness of heart led us to this foreign land, where we wait upon your word. May you judge between him and us.
May your hand be on the man you have chosen,
The man you have given your strength.
I know not why you chose me, O Adonai, for I am too young. But like the prophet Jeremiah before me, I shall do your will, oh Lord. You are my strength and my song. You are my savior. My strength and my courage lie in you alone, for you have rescued me. I will guide and guard your family, which you have entrusted to me as your steward. May I be faithful and prudent, that your trust in me may not fail due to my own weakness.
And we shall never forsake you again:
Give us life that we may call upon your name.
I once made plans and did what was right by my own prudence. And then you showed me that my prudence did not suffice for the surprising path you were calling me to follow. So I abandoned myself to your shepherding, for you are a good shepherd who feeds your flock in verdant pastures. When you called, I acted according to your word. May I never fail to heed your words. Desire of the nations.
God of hosts, bring us back;
Let your face shine on us and we shall be saved.
1 Cherubim are one of the choirs of angels. The writer of this psalm refers here to the Hebrew tradition that God, who “dwelt in unapproachable light” sat upon a throne carried by angels. This imagery was reflected in the two angels on the Ark of the Covenant and in the vision at the beginning of the Book of Ezekiel.
2 Ephraim and Manasseh were the two sons of Joseph. Benjamin was the only full brother of Joseph, so the Tribe of Benjamin and the two Half-Tribes of Ephraim and Manasseh carried on the lineage of Jacob through Rachel, his preferred bride. This line refers to their historical tribal lands, which had been pillaged at the time of its writing.
3 Adonai is the Hebrew word for Lord as traditionally transliterated. The Hebrew people would use that word to substitute for the Name of God, the four letter word revealed to Moses on Sinai, which only the High Priest could speak before the Holy of Holies on the High Holy Day.
4 Sigh...the boss told me to unpack this reference. There is...a lot. The reference, simply put, is to the prophet Amos who describes himself as a “herdsman and a dresser of sycamores.” So, first, read through Amos. Second, to dress sycamores was to care for a species of fig tree that would naturally produce fruit several times per year, but could, with care, produce fruit all year round. To call Joseph a dresser of sycamores is to suggest that he did not plant the tree that he is caring for, but that, with his ministrations, it will grow strong. I may unpack this more in a future post because I think that this--nurturing trees that they may grow strong--is the image of true masculinity and strength.
Author: Joseph
]]>Waters rising past my strength,
Shame drowns my flaccid tongue.
Alone, floods do my breath out-length.
To twisted tide, succumb.
But in that moment hope restored,
Your voice rings warm and true;
Alone no more, nor e’er before,
My heart clings on to You.
Redeemed by mercy, Your love I must proclaim,
No better life than this, that You have called my name.
Author: Alec
]]>Alright, the boss said the first post didn’t quite get all the way there on the magnanimity side of things, so let’s try again.
Last time, I said, “While humility says, ‘I can only do great things with God’s grace,’ magnanimity recognizes that, with God’s grace, I can do great things.” Not only are we called to do great things, but we must respond “always and everywhere,” either with greatness or with fading into nothing.
Ok, so that’s done...no...say more. Oh...um...alright…
The Japanese were not too far off when they said the Emperor was divine. The same sentiment appears in Psalms “For you have made them little less than gods, and all of them sons of the most high.” (Somewhere in Psalms...8, I think...). We as humans are capable of amazing things, by our nature alone. What other creature in the world can both develop 100 ways to use a peanut and figure out how to destroy the entire planet?
While the greatness of which we are capable merely as human beings is impressive, we can so often get lost in the mysteries of the world, of the cosmos, our minds, our sins, of ourselves--of course, that last one is the greatest mystery--that we lose sight of how great our blessings are and how truly great our call is.
C.S. Lewis (whom I perhaps treated too harshly last time) puts this best in The Magician’s Nephew: “You are a son of Adam and a daughter of Eve, and that is honor enough to raise the head of the lowliest beggar and shame enough to bend the head of the highest emperor.” We are only human, which is to say that we are fallen and in our fallen nature we lost our first innocence, lost the gift of original justice, and we bear the four effects of the fall: ignorance in the intellect, malice in the will, tendency to sin in our desires, and weakness in our capacity to resist taking the easy way out.
But we are also, in baptism, adopted sons and daughters of God. In the Redemption that He has already won for us and offers us freely, He gives the “power to become children of God” (John 1:14).
What does it mean to be a child of God? Well, let me pretentiously adjust my eyeglasses while I pull out the Greek.The word child used in John is υιος (Son) which is the same word used for Christ throughout the Gospels (ο υιος του θεου), and as Bishop Barron loves to point out, the phrase used for the Roman emperor. Then, in John 17, Christ has the lovely prayer that we might be one with Christ as He and the Father are one.
I am going to make the shocking claim that Christ meant exactly what he said. We are, in fact, called to divinity.
In the Eternal Word of God’s assuming human nature, there was some cross-contamination: Christ, the Son of God, took on everything in human nature but sin, and in return, gave us everything of himself except his divine nature. Grace--God working in our hearts to make us by adoption what Christ is by nature--succeeds in its purpose. By becoming more Christ-like, we are adopted into his divinity. God became man so that man can become God. Full stop.
We are called to share in the inner life of the intimacy of the Trinity for eternity. In doing so, we are not diminished to become less ourselves, like Cassilius and the other pawns of Dormammu in Doctor Strange. Rather, in shining forth the image of God in us, we become more ourselves: “An image of God the world’s never seen” before and never will see again, unique in all creation and beautiful (Danielle Rose). Our sin mars us and makes us as similar as a crowd of basic Northface-and-Uggs college clones. Only by living our life to the fullness of God’s glory are we made both more into Christ and most fully ourselves.
It is the virtue of magnanimity, brought to its fullness through the virtue of Charity, that drives us on even to this grandeur. Not only will we do the greatest thing that we can by our strength according to our human nature, but we will “do greater things than these” in Christ’s strength, as we rise with Him to the Father (John 14:12).
God made you precious, for union in love with Him and all the saints in glory.
Why settle for anything less?
Author: Joseph
]]>Hey guys. Joseph here. I have seen a number of posts on New Year’s resolutions or the reasons that we should not make resolutions this year, and, honestly, in the words of Robin in Young Justice, I’m whelmed. Not over-whelmed, not under-whelmed. Just…whelmed. (Yes, I know that the word whelmed actually means under-whelmed. Don’t @ me.) But I’m not exactly surprised at the lack of motivation or the boasting that we see online. We, as a culture, have lost sight of many virtues. During this (and every) New Year, I think it most appropriate to highlight our lagging humility and magnanimity. (My hope in future posts is to call to mind virtues such as perseverance, constancy, prudence, gratitude, and temperance, but these two are a good start).
We have lost track of humility to such an extent that even some prayers for humility and common quotes on humility mistake it for something else. Now, I really do think that something like the Litany of Humility can be a very helpful prayer for everyone. I have benefited greatly from the prayer. But technically speaking, it is worded in such a way that, in correcting one extreme—pride—it goes too far in the other extreme—approaching self-castigation and false humility. The desire to be praised, for instance, is a good thing for the vainglorious to avoid, and as we all tend to vainly desire glory, it's not a bad thing to pray that God delivers us from excessive love of praise. We should, however, desire to do things that are truly praiseworthy, ourselves imitating the praiseworthy deeds of the saints. And if someone does praise us for following the will of God, we can rejoice in God’s will working through us. Provided, of course, that we do not lose sight of how our ability to do the will of God is itself His gift, we can rejoice in His gift working in us. Similarly, a desire to be esteemed, to be recognized as being worthy of imitation, can be excessive. But even St. Paul tells us to be imitators of him as he is an imitator of Christ. It is good to so live our lives that other people hold us in high esteem for the right reasons, and we can rejoice when people imitate our faith. If, by our actions, God worked through us to lead another to move towards holiness in word and deed, that is something to rejoice in!
Because I want to pick a fight with more than just the pious, let me take a swing at C.S. Lewis, too. Lewis’ definition of humility is “not thinking less of yourself but thinking of yourself less.” While not wrong—the humble will think of herself less than the proud—this definition points at an effect of humility, not humility itself.
Also, St. Bernadette Soubirous has the fantastic quote (that I have never seen translated to English, for some reason), “It takes many humiliations to make just a little humility” (Il faut beaucoup d'humiliations pour faire un peu d'humilité). Now, my girl Bernadette got it right, but still did not offer a good definition. To make this perfectly clear, humiliation and humility are not the same thing. Humiliation is an emotion: a kind of sorrow or fear at the apparent evil of another seeing me as less than I wanted them to see. Like every emotion, humiliation is amoral, but like every emotion, it can be a sign to us of places where we still need to grow. Humiliation is a sign that I am still proud, and therefore ashamed of my weakness. True humility can look at one’s weaknesses and accept them as God’s strength (2 Cor. 12:10).
“So Joseph, you want to tear down all these perspectives on humility as insufficient. Seems like a pretty proud thing to do. What would you put in their place, tough guy?” I’m glad you asked. Humility is a virtue by which we know our own limits and do not extend ourselves beyond those limits in word (boasting) or in deed (striving). The humble, therefore, can acknowledge her own genuine strengths and gifts, and can even advocate for herself (If you want more on this, the guys discussed it in Episode 28). She knows who she is and where she is strong, i.e. what strength God has given her in nature and in grace. But the humble can also look at her weaknesses honestly and admit when she needs help, when the strength she has been given or has gained is insufficient for the task. Most of all, she can admit that she can do nothing without the grace of Christ who strengthens her.
The problem when seeking humility (at least when we are succeeding in seeking humility) is that we can take it too far. Far too often we think too small (the vice is called pusillanimity) and strive only for the scraps which we can easily obtain rather than the feast that is still within our grasp. Sometimes this small-heartedness disguises itself as false humility, but the result is that we become bitter and incapable of rejoicing in the great deeds of others. We feel insecure, and in our insecurity try to minimize the blessings of others when we should build them up (See the episode on “Envy”).
This is where the virtue of magnanimity comes in. Magnanimity strives for the heights, strives to do the greatest deeds that we are capable of. While humility sets the limits, magnanimity aims to reach them. While humility says, “I can only do great things with God’s grace,” magnanimity recognizes that, with God’s grace, I can do great things. Contrary to Mean Girls, the limit does exist, but with these virtues together, we can both recognize that limit, and, by the grace of God, strive to fulfill it.
We are not made for comfort but for greatness, and if we strive for that greatness, we no longer need to ground others to feel full ourselves. We were made to be sons and daughters in the Son of God. We were made to sing in the company of the heavenly hosts. We were made to soar together to the heights.
Author: Joseph
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