Sunday Knox: Acts 1:12-14

Knox:
"Then, from the mountain which is called Olivet, they went back to Jerusalem; the distance from Jerusalem is not great, a sabbath day’s journey. Coming in, they went up into the upper room where they dwelt, Peter and John, James and Andrew, Philip and Thomas, Bartholomew and Matthew, James the son of Alphaeus and Simon the Zealot, and Judas the brother of James. All these, with one mind, gave themselves up to prayer, together with Mary the mother of Jesus, and the rest of the women and his brethren."


NAB:
"After Jesus had been taken up to heaven the apostles returned to Jerusalem from the mount called Olivet, which is near Jerusalem, a sabbath day’s journey away.  When they entered the city they went to the upper room where they were staying, Peter and John and James and Andrew, Philip and Thomas, Bartholomew and Matthew, James son of Alphaeus, Simon the Zealot, and Judas son of James. All these devoted themselves with one accord to prayer, together with some women, and Mary the mother of Jesus, and his brothers."

Review of Angels and Saints: A Biblical Guide to Friendship with God's Holy Ones + Contest

The Review:
In his newest popular book, Dr. Scott Hahn, in his typically humorous and personal tone, looks at the importance and everyday relevance of the angels and saints for the ordinary Catholic.  The book has a pretty basic structure, with the first part focusing on the Church's theological understanding of the role and canonization of the saints, with special emphasis on the scriptural foundations.  In the second half of the book Hahn, in the form of a meditation, looks at the lives of particular saints.  One element of this section that I appreciated the most is that at the end of each chapter, Hahn lets the saint (or another saint speaking about that particular saint) speak for him or her self.

My favorite chapter is the fourth one, which Hahn calls What Do the Saints Do? He reminds us that the saints are an active element of our lives.  They are our brothers and sisters in Christ, who truly desire that we attain eternal life with them.  So, how do they help us?  Dr. Hahn points to the Book of Revelation which "shows us the saints in heaven, they're engaged constantly in worship.....note that they are pleading with God for those who remain on earth (59-60)."  And guess what?  Not surprisingly, God answers the prayers of His saints in pretty dramatic fashion: "In response to the prayers of the saints, God calls upon the heavenly priests to blow their seven trumpets, evoking the Old Testament Battle of Jericho (61)."  That right there reminds us that God mightily responds to those prayers.  The whole chapter should give us great encouragement when we say I (or we) "believe in the Communion of the Saints."

St. Paul:
As part of this blog tour, I have been asked to comment on chapter nine, which focuses on St. Paul.  I was very delighted to get to write a bit on St. Paul.  When I ask people what their favorite part of scripture, I often hear one of three things: 1) The Psalms; 2) The Gospel of John; 3) Paul.  Notice I didn't say which letter of Paul, but simply Paul.  I have found that Paul has touched so many people who are daily Bible readers, Catholic or Protestant, that often they are unable to pick which of his letters they like best.  It would be like selecting your favorite child.  I have often felt the same way.  Those thirteen letters of St. Paul provide us a rich insight into understanding the Church, how to live as Christians, the role of Grace and Faith, and, put simply, Jesus Christ himself.  As Hahn says: "When we read them, we sometimes feel as if we're being propelled forward by a hurricane, a tidal wave, or some other force of nature.  But it's even stronger than that, because it's a force of Grace (104)."  And as Hahn points out, when we read those letters, or hear them in the liturgy, we are exposing ourselves to that same powerful force (105).

As I was reading this chapter, I couldn't help but think of the Pauline year that our Emeritus Pope Benedict XVI called for all the Church to observe in 2008.  Of all the special jubilee or thematic years that recent Popes have called, I must say that the Year of St. Paul was the one I most participated in.  I spent the year reading, and re-reading, Paul, led a few Bible studies on his letters, and made sure to meditate on many of the rich passages that have come down to us from him.   I really felt like I had been wrapped up in that "hurricane of Grace" that Hahn describes in this chapter.  The word that was continually impressed upon me was passion.  Paul, perhaps more than anyone else, knew that his whole life had been forever transformed by his encounter with Jesus Christ.  He, then, dedicated the rest of his life to proclaiming, with passion, that "Jesus Christ is Lord, to the Glory of God the Father (Phil 2:11)."  He did this, however, over a period of thirty long years.  We are so blessed to have St. Paul's words at our fingertips, as well as having documents that give biographical information about his life.  Yet, sometimes it is easy to forget that while he had many moments of not only trial and triumph as he went on mission, but also plenty of ordinary moments that made up his daily life.  I often want to be zealous like St. Paul, but Angels and Saints, and the Year of Paul in 2008, has helped remind me that the Christian journey is long.  The Lord often gives us this "ordinary" time to remember that we are totally dependent on him.  We need this time to grow in patience and trust in the Lord.  Often, I need to have a better understanding of this in my life far more than I typically do.  St. Paul, in all that he did, allowed God, in those extraordinary but more often in the ordinary moments, to build him up and remind him on whom he was totally dependent.

Contest:
Our friends at Image Books are happy to offer you, my faithful readers, an opportunity to win a free copy of this new book by Dr. Scott Hahn.  I will follow the standard contest procedures, as with typical contest on this blog which are:

1) If you have a website or blog or are active on Facebook, please announce this contest.   If you don't, that is OK.  You can still enter the contest. 

2) Please enter your name in the comment section of this blog post along with your favorite verse from one of St. Paul's letters.  I will randomly draw one winner at the conclusion of the contest, which will be on Sunday June 1 at 11:59PM.   

3) I will announce the winners on June 2nd.  The winners must contact me, via email, within a week with their full name and address.  I will then forward their name to Image who will send out the book soon after.

4) One entry per person.

5) Contest is only available to those who live in the United States.

Angels and Saints Blog Tour

May 27: St. Michael and the Angels - Catholic Katie 

May 28: Moses - Abigail’s Alcove

May 29: St. Paul - Catholic Bibles

May 30: St. Ignatius of Antioch - The Orant

May 31: St. Irenaeus of Lyons - Seasons of Grace

June 1: St. Jerome - Stuart’s Study

June 2: St. Monica and St. Augustine - Happy Catholic 

June 3: St. Thomas Aquinas - Blog of the Courtier

June 4: St. Therese of Lisieux - Single Catholic Girl

June 5: St. Maximilian Kolbe - Random Acts of Momness

June 6: St. Josemaria Escriva - Catholic Mom 

June 7: Queen of All Saints, Mother of the Church - This Cross I Embrace 

Thank you to Katie at Image Books for providing me a review copy.

Benedict on Wednesday: Preface to Jesus of Nazareth I

In the time of my youth—during the 1930’s and ‘40’s—there was published a series of exhilarating books about Jesus. I recall the names of just a few authors: Karl Adam, Romano Guardini, Franz Michel Willam, Giovanni Papini, Jean-Daniel Rops. In all these books, the image of Jesus Christ was outlined beginning with the Gospels: how He lived upon the earth and how, although He was truly man, He at the same time brought God to men, being one with God as Son of God. Thus, through the man Jesus, God became visible, and beginning with God one could see the image of the just man. 

Beginning in the 1950’s, the situation changed. The rift between the “historical Jesus” and the “Christ of faith” became wider and wider; the one pulled away from the other before one’s very eyes. But what meaning can there be in faith in Jesus Christ, in Jesus the Son the of living God, if the man Jesus is so different from how the evangelists present Him, and from how the Church proclaims Him on the basis of the Gospels? 

Progress in historical-critical research led to increasingly subtle distinctions among the different levels of tradition. Behind these layers, the figure of Jesus, upon whom faith rests, became increasingly more uncertain, and took on increasingly less definite outlines. 

At the same time, the reconstructions of this Jesus, who had to be sought behind the traditions of the Evangelists and their sources, became increasingly contradictory: from the revolutionary enemy of the Romans who opposed the established power and naturally failed, to the meek moralist who permitted everything and inexplicably ended up causing his own ruin. 

Those who read a certain number of these reconstructions one after another will immediately notice that these are much more the snapshots of the authors and their ideals than they are the unveiling of an icon that has become confused. In the meantime, distrust has grown toward these images of Jesus, and in any case the figure of Jesus has withdrawn from us even more. 

All of these attempts have, in any case, left behind themselves as their common denominator the impression that we know very little for sure about Jesus, and that it was only later that faith in His divinity shaped His image. This impression, in the meantime, has deeply penetrated the general consciousness of Christianity. 

Such a situation is dramatic for the faith because it renders uncertain its authentic point of reference: intimate friendship with Jesus, on which everything depends, threatens to become a groping around in the void. 

I felt the need to provide the readers with these indications of method because these determine the route of my interpretation of the figure of Jesus in the New Testament. 

For my presentation of Jesus, this means above all that I trust the Gospels. Naturally, I take for granted what the Council and modern exegesis say about the literary genres, about the intention of various expressions, about the communitarian context of the Gospels and the fact that they speak within this living context. While accepting all this as much as possible, I wanted to make an effort to present the Jesus of the Gospels as the real Jesus, as the “historical Jesus” in the real sense of the expression. 

I am convinced—and I hope that I can also make the reader aware of this—that this figure is much more logical, and from the historical point of view also more understandable, than the reconstructions we have had to confront in recent decades. 

I maintain that this very Jesus—the Jesus of the Gospels—is an historically sensible and convincing figure. His crucifixion and the impact that he had can only be explained if something extraordinary happened, if the figure and the words of Jesus radically exceeded the hopes and expectations of his time. 

Around twenty years after the death of Jesus, we find already in the great hymn to Christ in the Letter to the Philippians (2:6-8) the full expression of a Christology, in which it is said of Jesus that He was equal to God but stripped Himself, became man, and humbled Himself to the point of death on the cross, and that to Him is due the homage of creation, the adoration that in the prophet Isaiah (45:23) God proclaimed as due to Himself alone. 

Critical research quite rightly poses this question: what happened in those twenty years after the crucifixion of Jesus? How did this Christology develop? 

The action of anonymous communitarian formations, whose representatives are being sought out, in reality doesn’t explain anything. How could unknown groups be so creative, how could they be convincing and impose themselves? Isn’t it more logical, even from the historical point of view, to suppose that the great impulse came at the beginning, and that the figure of Jesus burst beyond all of the available categories, and could thus be understood only by beginning from the mystery of God? 

Naturally, to believe that even as a man He was God, and made this known by concealing it within parables while nevertheless making it increasingly clear, goes beyond the possibilities of the historical method. On the contrary, if one begins from this conviction of faith and reads the texts with the historical method and with its openness to what is greater, the texts open up to reveal a way and a figure that are worthy of faith. 

What then becomes clear is the multilevel struggle present in the writings of the New Testament over the figure of Jesus, and despite all the differences, the profound agreement of these writings. 

It is clear that with this view of the figure of Jesus I go beyond what Schnackenburg, for example, says in representation of a good portion of contemporary exegesis. 

I hope, however, that the reader understands that this book was not written against modern exegesis, but with great recognition of all this has given and continues to give to us. It has made us familiar with a great quantity of sources and conceptions through which the figure of Jesus can become present to us with a liveliness and depth that we couldn’t even imagine just a few decades ago. 

I have sought only to go beyond mere historical-critical interpretation, applying the new methodological criteria that allow us to make a properly theological interpretation of the Bible that naturally requires faith, without thereby wanting or being able in any way to renounce historical seriousness. 

Of course, it goes without saying that this book is absolutely not a magisterial act, but is only the expression of my personal search for the “face of the Lord” (Psalm 27:8). So everyone is free to disagree with me. I ask only that my readers begin with that attitude of good will without which there is no understanding. 

As I said at the beginning of the preface, my interior journey toward this book was a long one. 

I was able to begin working on it during summer vacation in 2003. In August of 2004, I gave definitive form to chapters 1 through 4. After my election to the episcopal see of Rome, I used all of my free moments to carry the project forward. 

Because I do not know how much more time and strength will be granted to me, I have now decided to publish the first ten chapters as the first part of the book, going from the baptism in the Jordan to the confession of Peter and the Transfiguration. 

"Jesus: A Pilgrimage" a conversation with Fr. James Martin, SJ

Sunday Knox: 1 Peter 3:15-18

Knox:
"Enthrone Christ as Lord in your hearts. If anyone asks you to give an account of the hope which you cherish, be ready at all times to answer for it, but courteously and with due reverence. What matters is that you should have a clear conscience; so the defamers of your holy life in Christ will be disappointed in their calumny. It may be God’s will that we should suffer for doing right; better that, than for doing wrong. It was thus that Christ died as a ransom, paid once for all, on behalf of our sins, he the innocent for us the guilty, so as to present us in God’s sight. In his mortal nature he was done to death, but endowed with fresh life in his spirit."

NAB: 
"Sanctify Christ as Lord in your hearts.  Always be ready to give an explanation to anyone who asks you for a reason for your hope, but do it with gentleness and reverence, keeping your conscience clear, so that, when you are maligned, those who defame your good conduct in Christ may themselves be put to shame.  For it is better to suffer for doing good, if that be the will of God, than for doing evil.  For Christ also suffered for sins once, the righteous for the sake of the unrighteous, that he might lead you to God. Put to death in the flesh, he was brought to life in the Spirit."

BBC's Illuminations - Treasures of the Middle Ages

Benedict on Wednesday: Pope Benedict on Dei Verbum (40th Anniversary)

ADDRESS OF HIS HOLINESS BENEDICT XVI
TO THE PARTICIPANTS IN THE INTERNATIONAL CONGRESS
ORGANIZED TO COMMEMORATE THE 40th ANNIVERSARY
OF THE DOGMATIC CONSTITUTION
ON DIVINE REVELATION "DEI VERBUM"
Castel Gandolfo
Friday, 16 September 2005

Your Eminences,
Venerable Brothers in the Episcopate and in the Priesthood,
Dear Brothers and Sisters,

I offer my most cordial greeting to all of you who are taking part in the Congress on Sacred Scripture in the Life of the Church, an event organized by the Catholic Biblical Federation and the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity to commemorate the 40th anniversary of the promulgation of Dei Verbum, the Dogmatic Constitution on Divine Revelation. I congratulate you on this initiative, connected with one of the most important Documents of the Second Vatican Council.

I greet the Cardinals and Bishops, who are the first witnesses of the Word of God, the theologians who investigate, explain and translate it into today's language, the Pastors who seek in it appropriate solutions for the problems of our time.

I warmly thank all who work in the service of the translation and circulation of the Bible, providing the means for explaining, teaching and interpreting its message. In this regard, my special thanks go to the Catholic Biblical Federation for its activity, the biblical ministry it promotes and its faithful support of the directives of the Magisterium as well as to its spirit of openness to ecumenical collaboration in the biblical context.

I express my deepest joy at the presence at this Congress of "Fraternal Delegates" of the Churches and Ecclesial Communities of East and West, and I greet with cordial respect the representatives who have spoken on behalf of the great world Religions.

The Dogmatic Constitution Dei Verbum, whose drafting I personally witnessed as a young theologian, taking part in the lively discussions that went with it, begins with a deeply meaningful sentence: "Dei Verbum religiose audiens et fidenter proclamans, Sacrosancta Synodus..."["Hearing the Word of God with reverence, and proclaiming it with faith, the Sacred Synod..."] (n. 1).  With these words the Council points out a descriptive aspect of the Church:  she is a community that listens to and proclaims the Word of God.

The Church does not live on herself but on the Gospel, and in the Gospel always and ever anew finds the directions for her journey. This is a point that every Christian must understand and apply to himself or herself:  only those who first listen to the Word can become preachers of it.

Indeed, they must not teach their own wisdom but the wisdom of God, which often appears to be foolishness in the eyes of the world (cf. I Cor 1: 23).

The Church knows well that Christ lives in the Sacred Scriptures. For this very reason - as the Constitution stresses - she has always venerated the divine Scriptures in the same way as she venerates the Body of the Lord (cf. Dei Verbum, n. 21).  In view of this, St Jerome, cited by the conciliar Document, said that ignorance of the Scriptures is ignorance of Christ (cf. Dei Verbum, n. 25).

The Church and the Word of God are inseparably linked. The Church lives on the Word of God and the Word of God echoes through the Church, in her teaching and throughout her life (cf. Dei Verbum, n. 8). The Apostle Peter, therefore, reminds us that no prophecy contained in Scripture can be subjected to a personal interpretation. "Prophecy has never been put forward by man's willing it. It is rather that men impelled by the Holy Spirit have spoken under God's influence" (II Pt 1: 20).

We are grateful to God that in recent times, and thanks to the impact made by the Dogmatic Constitution Dei Verbum, the fundamental importance of the Word of God has been deeply re-evaluated. From this has derived a renewal of the Church's life, especially in her preaching, catechesis, theology and spirituality, and even in the ecumenical process. The Church must be constantly renewed and rejuvenated and the Word of God, which never ages and is never depleted, is a privileged means to achieve this goal. Indeed, it is the Word of God, through the Holy Spirit, which always guides us to the whole truth (cf. Jn 16: 13).

In this context, I would like in particular to recall and recommend the ancient tradition of Lectio divina:  the diligent reading of Sacred Scripture accompanied by prayer brings about that intimate dialogue in which the person reading hears God who is speaking, and in praying, responds to him with trusting openness of heart (cf. Dei Verbum, n. 25). If it is effectively promoted, this practice will bring to the Church - I am convinced of it - a new spiritual springtime.

As a strong point of biblical ministry, Lectio divina should therefore be increasingly encouraged, also through the use of new methods, carefully thought through and in step with the times. It should never be forgotten that the Word of God is a lamp for our feet and a light for our path (cf. Ps 119[118]: 105).

In invoking God's Blessing upon your work, your projects and the Congress in which you are taking part, I join in the hope that enlivens you: May the Word of the Lord make progress (cf. II Thes 3: 1) to the very ends of the earth, so that through the proclamation of salvation the whole world through hearing it may believe, through belief it may hope, and through hope it may come to love (cf. Dei Verbum, n. 1). I thank you with all my heart!