Peace, Penitence, and Prayer

The second of October is the memorial of the Holy Guardian Angels. One of the first prayers Catholics (and others) learn: 

Angel of God, my Guardian dear, / to whom God’s love entrusts me here, / Ever this day be at my side, / To light, to guard, to rule, to guide.

That God creates a custom pure-spirit protector for human beings is not a mandatory Catholic belief, but it is not a mere fable either. Sacred Scripture and Sacred Tradition refer to angels who gaze upon the heavenly Father’s face (Mt 18:10), yet have enough eyes to look out for us—more eyes than a mother, a teacher, or a nun.

Writer Mary Farrow penned a fantastic piece on Guardian Angels, quoting a professor who quoted a Cardinal on Guardian Angels’ three main areas of interest concerning us: peace, penitence, and prayer. When they’re successful, the universe is better off, because, according to St. Augustine and St. Thomas Aquinas, angels govern the processes of the entire universe, in ways known and unknown.

Since the more recent sexual abuse reports, many dioceses, including our own, have resorted to praying the Prayer to St. Michael after Mass (his feast was observed recently—29 September), hearkening back to a series of prayers once recited after every “Low” (recited) Mass. The series became known as the Leonine Prayers because Pope Leo XIII introduced them in 1884. They were discontinued in 1965, but in some places they’re making a comeback. Unofficially, they were for the conversion of Russia, but they have 1,001 uses.

Archangel Michael has the pleasant job of “casti[ng] into hell Satan and all the other evil spirits who prowl throughout the world seeking the ruin of souls.” The name Michael is Hebrew for “Who is like God,” because Satan wants to be like God and Michael reminds him he can’t be. Like Michael, however, Satan is a powerful pure spirit, except Satan devotes his towering intellect and will to diminishing people’s peace, penitence, and prayer.

When prayer and penitence go, peace follows suit. When priests stop praying, they start predating. When they stop repenting of their prideful, greedy, and lustful choices, their various victims lose peace. So we appreciate all the more St. Michael and his minions. 

Of course priests aren’t the only ones who entertain the deadly sins enough that temptations lead to actions: whosoever qualifies for a guardian angel, sure as heaven needs one.

I mentioned to a parishioner that today’s readings concerned marriage and the parishioner said, “I had a joke for you on that, but I forgot it.” It may be indiscreet to mention the parishioner’s name, but I will say it rhymes with “Snarl Tarzan.”

What’s no joke is the current situation of marriage and family life— though to be honest, it wasn’t always taken seriously in biblical times either. Why else would Moses have proposed conditions for divorce? Why else would Jesus have gone off as He did about the Creator’s intention for marriage? The evil spirits still prowl around the world seeking the ruin of souls. They prowl for bodies as well, because, as long as people are living, bodies and souls are together.

Since this diocesan Year of Real Presence began, I‘ve been considering how Jesus’ words, “This is My Body,” apply to every aspect of human life, including how we speak them sinfully. The many forms of self-worship drive people from God, from each other, and within themselves. What God has joined, let no one put asunder.

Commentators have noted the proximity of Jesus’ words on marriage to those on children. We connect angels with children often enough (cf. Mt 18:10). We also think of dead people, but they’re not angels either. None of us is. People often say, “I’m no angel,” when they want to excuse themselves from sin. 

We have to look somewhere for the root of our malady. When individuals go sour, marriages and families (and more) go sour. That’s no judgment on anyone, because God and the person know best. God’s always honest to us, but we’re not always honest to God.

Satan the home-wrecker wants to interrupt our awareness of God’s Presence with temptations, and he really wants us to interrupt our actions with sins. (Temptations aren’t sins, remember!) Satan wants peace, penitence, and prayer to end. He wants to harm children and the adults they become, and he will encourage us to find ways to do that. He wants bodies and souls to break up in one way or another.

The Temptation Triangle

“In my first article, Theophilus…”

I wanted that clause as the incipit for my second (though hopefully not last!) article for the Times News, because in that context it’s the only chance I'd get to riff on the beginning of the Acts of the Apostles, attributed to Saint Luke, which he begins by alluding to his “first book,” his Gospel, which detailed the actions and words of Jesus. Commentators understand “Theophilus” (Greek for “lover/beloved of God”) as a personification of anyone who might read what Luke wrote, at least from God’s point of view.

With that out of my system, I can engage in a bit of “l’esprit de l’escalier” (the spirit of the staircase): only at the bottom of the stairs, when I’ve left the party, have I thought of a better thing to say. This article seems perfect for the First Sunday of Lent, but it wouldn’t get to press for the appropriate clergy column. However, I’m relieved to note the themes expressed herein apply not just to the entirety of Lent, but like Lent itself does, to the whole disciple’s life.

This year of the Catholic Lectionary cycle features Mark, whose characteristically laconic style compresses Jesus’ wilderness fast to two verses of “just the facts.” So maybe this article would be better for Matthew or Luke’s year in the cycle. But another theme of Lent is heightened awareness of our mortality and our lack of guarantees as to whether we will ever pass this way again. The Muses don’t hang out on street corners just waiting to be picked up.

At last I get around to the point of this second article: an unrecalled source of inspiration moved me to ponder how the temptations of the first Lent correspond to other important realities of the Christian journey. Last year I made of them a graphic of concentric triangles and suspended it from the pulpit as I preached.

Each side of the outermost triangle lists one of the Satanic temptations as St. Matthew narrated them (4:1-11): Turn stones into bread; cast yourself from the Temple and expect to be rescued; receive the world in return for worshipping me. Moving toward the center of the graphic, each successive triangle mentions a corresponding idea or practice. It’s hard to describe, but I won’t retreat now.

When Satan submitted that Jesus should feed Himself in a time of intentional caloric deprivation, he wanted to erode Jesus’ trust in the Father’s wise and loving plan. That’s the aim of the Tempter’s every effort. The goods of this world make a good servant, but a poor master, yet is that not how things normally go for us?

Moving towards the center of the triangles, next we have what theology calls the “triple concupiscence”: the three avenues of temptation, or what I perhaps have coined the docents of the museum of sin: “sensual lust, enticement for the eyes, and a pretentious life” (1 John 2:15-17). In brief: the flesh, the world, and the devil. I can’t get away with saying any of these “made” me do what my will doesn’t intend (cf. Romans 7:15-22), but it sure feels that way sometimes.

Thus our first parents encountered the tree of the knowledge of good and evil (cf. Genesis 2:9,16-17). Perhaps God wanted to feed them from it all along, except for their grubby, grabby fingers. Better to have consorted with the “tree of life” (2:9), but the former’s fruit seemed “good for food, pleasing to the eyes, and desirable for gaining wisdom” (Genesis 3:6, the sides of the next triangle). See now why it’s not good for the man or woman to be alone?

Lent calls Christians to intensify the disciplines, not surprisingly three in number, that make disciples out of the curious crowd. We give them special attention during penitential periods so we may better appreciate their perennial importance in our lives. Jesus directs us to fast, pray, and give alms without fanfare, so that “your Father who sees in secret will repay you” (Matthew 6:4,6, 18).

Incidentally, the venerable option of sprinkling blessed ashes on people’s heads seems to convey the unassuming assumption of penance much more than a big ol’ cross. Then again, Jesus earlier told the crowds to “let their light shine brightly” (Matthew 5:16), so a cross might well convey how loudly His Gospel is meant to live within us. I take to paradoxes the “both-and” approach: letting the light shine is not flickering it like a disco ball.

The next level of triangles collapses into the very core of the graphic, where we find what Saint Paul called “the gift of God that you [Timothy, every God-fearer] have through the imposition of my hands” (2 Timothy 1:6). Paul explains, “For God did not give us a spirit of cowardice but of”—get ready for another triptych—“power and love and self-control.” For purposes of this meditation I shall reverse the order, and tie it all together:

Turning stone to bread would temporarily quell the lust of the flesh, since the earth-fruit’s “goodness for food” is valid enough. But Jesus spots the bluff, and by His steadfast fasting—an exercise of self-control—steads Himself fast in the Father’s love.

Had Our Lord thrown His Body from the top of the Temple, a fleet of angels would have been at the ready. But the eyes didn’t have it, however pleasing was the prospect of divine daring. What a show it would have been, if only to Himself! Jesus rather gives Himself sacrificially, as Love does, not for the likes or retweets but for God’s glory and honor—and again, not surprisingly, for the fulfillment of His own mission: divine direction always promotes human flourishing.

Scarcely thwarted by human fidelity, ever hoping to disprove it as with Job (1:9-11), Satan suggested Jesus bow before him, offering a large reward at a larger price. But the King and Center of all hearts knows the Prince of This World has not his day, but only his hour. Without pride, therefore, Jesus denies the devil. Why pick a fruit desirable for gaining wisdom when You have all the wisdom to be had? The power of prayer is Jesus’ connection to the Father in the Holy Spirit.

In His sacred humanity, God the Son learned to maintain this bond through the loving example of Mary and Joseph. It is not infused in us, although we do well to recall how ardently we must abide with those who “imposed hands” on us—those whose spiritual, emotional, and even physical proximity fostered our faith. Their involvement eventually enables us to walk with confidence in the Way of Christ.

Even so, “sin is a demon lurking at the door: his urge is toward you, yet you can be his master” (Genesis 4:7). No rest for the weary, as they say, except with the Spirit that God humanly entrusted to and through you.

We Are Not Alone

When Jesus sent seventy-two of his disciples out to share their stories of living in His story, He sent them out in pairs, like the "buddy system" we experienced as children. It is always good to have a little reinforcement, some extra encouragement, or challenge, when you need it. This describes the "Communion of Saints," the Church in heaven and the Church awaiting heaven, our brothers and sisters throughout the world and throughout the ages. In addition, the angels who eternally attend to the throne of God also show His providential care--especially our guardians who protect and intercede for us.

One concrete way to remember that we are never alone is the fact that Jesus gave us the Lord’s Prayer in the first person plural: God is our Father, who gives us daily bread, forgives our trespasses as we forgive, leads us not into temptation, and delivers us from evil.

It is important to know that we are not alone because the Evil One is not alone. Satan is the enemy of God’s plan, the enemy of man’s salvation. In league with that enemy are a host of other angels—beings of superior intelligence and freedom, just like the holy angels, but with the difference that they decided to invest that superior intelligence and freedom in a manner contrary to the desire of God. While they cannot best God, they seem to have a way with us human beings.

They do that by capitalizing upon our weak spots, which are our memory and our imagination: the ways we reflect on the past and the future. Remember in Genesis 3 how Satan injected doubt into the minds of the first man and woman, leading them to question whether (in the past) God really said we would die if we ate the forbidden fruit. Satan further polished that fruit to make it look more attractive, leading his customers to wonder how great they’d become (in the future) with all the power, pleasure, wealth, and prestige they could eat. No matter that they would be contravening the will of God in the process, that we would keep turning against one another by using violence and sex as tools for our advantage, meanwhile exponentially increasing our sense of loneliness.

Here’s the Good News: The offspring of the woman—Jesus, Son of God and Son of Mary—has crushed the head of the ancient serpent. He has delivered us from the eternal hold that sin, suffering, and death threaten to have over us. Our weaknesses need no longer define us. In the Genesis story, mercy showed itself in the fact that our first parents didn’t die as soon as they ate the fruit. That gave them, as it gives us whenever we sin, the chance to repent, to seek appropriate reconciliation, and to live again.

By God’s grace we can again appreciate what is beautiful, learn what is true, and choose what is good. That kind of activity contributes to the betterment of our world and the splendor of our God. People on the fence of faith can look at us when we’re striving to live that way and say, “This Jesus, this Catholic Church, is worth something. It might even be worth my life.”

The Ash Mash, Always In Fash

I have a few moments in between Masses to offer a reflection or two about this non-obligatory yet culturally and spiritually popular festa in cinerem, known as "Ash Wednesday."

Since I first started receiving ashes, and more acutely since I first started applying them, I've preferred the traditional declaration, "Remember [man] that you are dust and to dust you shall return" (memento, homo, quia pulvis es, et in pulverem reverteris). Of course the contemporary challenge to "turn away from sin and be faithful to the Gospel" is valid and effective as well, because it is the desired human and Christian response to the fact of mortality.

To date I do not recall anybody coming up to me for ashes with their tongue stuck out. One priest who was leading a retreat told that story and said that he gladly obliged, figuring that the recipient was either not accustomed to going to Mass or unwittingly treated it like any other Mass. We of a kinder, gentler Church might have chosen differently; but who am I to judge?

My best tale from today: when I applied ashes to one individual with the mortality memento, he thanked me – and I responded, under my breath, "don't thank me!" 

I didn't cause the human race to be subject to the ravages of sin, suffering, and death! No, but I accepted God's call to apply the remedy to sin, suffering, and death, even as I needed it.

The spiritual disciplines of a disciple (from the Latin discere, to learn) are prayer, fasting, and almsgiving/charity. To these I add watchfulness, perhaps the result of the first three.

"What do you mean by watchfulness?" Glad you asked. At all times we are under the perspicacious eye of the Primordial Enemy of Salvation and Transcendence (PEST). Being of angelic personhood, he will always be keener and wilier then we. Therefore we must unite our consciousness in real time with our Lord and Lover, attending to Him at once within the privacy of our "rooms" (as Jesus suggests today in Mt 6:4-6) and in His divers human disguises. If we try to do that for so long as one minute, we'll begin to notice the resistance seethe within us. This is not a failing, but rather an opportunity to remind ourselves of God's providential care, intended specifically for us in these God-awful circumstances.

A priest-friend reminded his Facebook friends that, while ashes are available today, the Gospel and the Eucharist (and, I would add, the Communion of Saints, ourselves included) are also available at each and every iteration of the Lord's One Saving Sacrificial Banquet. Cultural Catholics treat Ash Wednesday like some local baseball fans treat the day when every guest receives a free Jimmy Rollins bobblehead doll. God takes what He can gets, but maybe God also expects more out of us. "Well, that'll teach God to have expectations," our snarkier selves might retort.

One would surmise that an All-Knowing God neither has nor needs to have any "expectations" for us, as if He is somehow "waiting" upon our responses; but "one gets the feeling that God is on the journey, too" (St. Teresa of Ávila), so maybe in our limited time-space experience, the foreknowledge of God (Whom we oft imagine as "waiting at the end" vs. "present all the while") mysteriously permits our free action. We don't have to have it figured out; we just have to live it.

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Forgiveness is one of the major aims of Lent. Forgiveness of self always seemed like a strange concept to me, but the longer I run, the more I perceive its relevance in my life. Here is an article that might help you in this lifelong, needful spiritual discipline.

And here's a fun exercise from the Fellowship of Catholic University Students (FOCUS), who encourages people to post ashen photos and descriptions in the Twitterverse and Facebookia under #ashtag: a 21st century media m-ashup.

Void As Directed

A friend of mine interested in Francis of Assisi was directed to read "The Little Flowers of Saint Francis" by Brother Ugolino.  My friend relayed a story that reveals Francis' audacity--a characteristic not often associated with the soul whose statue is consigned to the garden.

And when Friar Ruffino had come unto him, he told him in order all the temptation wherewith he had been tempted by the demon, both within and without; and he [Francis] showed him clearly that he who had appeared unto him was the devil and not Christ, and that on nowise ought he to consent to his suggestions; "but when the devil shall say unto thee again: 'Thou art damned,' do thou answer him thus: 'Open thy mouth, for now I would void my dung therein'; and this shall be a sign unto thee that he is the devil and not Christ, that when thou shalt have thus answered him he will immediately flee away...."

There is a trace of the juvenile ruffian's excitement upon hearing such things from the mouth of Saint Francis.  Why not give the Taunter of the Virtuous a little of his own?  Convinced of the power and mercy of the Redeemer, we can proceed boldly through trials.

On the basis of this story, from Church history, and from personal experience, I would promote the venerable practice of spiritual direction.  We ought not proceed alone in the spiritual journey.  That is foolish, because the Tempter is cunning.  He knows our weaknesses and will make the best use of them toward our spiritual, moral, mental, and emotional collapse.  That's the best he can do--and as far as God is concerned, it's quite a lot, given the great freedom which He has granted us.

Like Friar Ruffino in the story above, we do well to reveal ourselves to someone whom we trust with our very lives.  Now there are reputable websites such as Catholic Spiritual Direction, but navigating these sites does not substitute for the actual practice.

At the very least, do you have someone (not everyone, and not just anyone) in your life to whom you grant bold access to you, without fear of judgment but with total freedom for charitable candor?

Twelve-step groups feature the practice of "sponsorship," which follows the same basic idea.  The sponsor leads the sponsee through the twelve steps of their program of recovery, and in many instances, the relationship affords both parties a certain transparency with regard to their attachments, feelings, etc.     In spiritual direction the transparency is not meant to be mutual; according to the above link, it's not meant to be several things that it's mistaken to be!

In marital practice, one's spouse often fulfills similar functions ("spouse" and "sponsor" are etymological cousins), as one's very best friend and aide to heaven.  But even in this relationship the walls can go up, one brick at a time, resulting in the rather dramatic line often posed to an offending spouse: "I don't even know you anymore."  It prompts the question, "Did you ever?"

St. Francis, thank you for being man enough to help a brother tell Satan off.  Not that you thought of it, but feel no shame for your manner of speaking: the vulgarity was important.

Satanic Verses

            “Get thee behind me, Satan!”  This phrase isn’t meant just for the waiter who is carrying the dessert tray.  To tie it to the first reading [24th Sun in OT, Cycle B, 9/15-16/2012]: Somebody out there must have accidentally misread Isaiah’s line, “My face I did not shield from buffets and spitting” to read “[buf-fayz].” People who shield themselves from [buf-fayz] would also be likely to quote Our Lord in the context of the dessert tray.  (But it's all about choices!)  

            There is a fascination today with the demonic.  The marketplace of opinions rivals any superstore; so it’s best to go to the Catechism, which I’d liken to the store’s courtesy desk (why wander around the aisles for hours?).  Paragraph 391 of the Catechism states that “Satan was at first a good angel, made by God,” but, like the other angels in that league, “they became evil by their own doing.”  They chose contrary to the divine will with complete freedom and understanding.  

            In paragraph 395, we are reminded that Satan is “powerful from the fact that he is pure spirit, but still a creature.”  By nature, angels are spiritual beings; they have no body, no outward form, except for their appearances to human beings.  Whenever the authors of Scripture have described angels, especially in the apocalyptic literature (e.g. Revelation and portions of the prophets), they seem rather fantastical.  Rightly so, for they are radically different from us!  What’s important is that Satan and his associates are not on par with God.  As crafty as they are, they are no match for God and His Kingdom.  Their best and only strategy is to tempt individuals to deviate from the Way of Christ—to disobey the Commandments, to minimize or ignore the Beatitudes, and to doubt the convictions of their own properly formed conscience.

            Consider the startling rebuke that Jesus gave to Peter.  Jesus revealed the divine plan to the disciples: He told them of His Passion, Death, and Resurrection.  It said He “began to teach them,” so we may suppose either that the disclosure mentioned in Mark 8:31 wasn’t the very first, or that He had been talking about it for some time.  Whether Peter’s rebuke was knee-jerk or the fruit of reflection is not clear.  The Greek verbs are in tenses that suggest a gradual, non-specific disclosure.  In any case, Jesus was forming their consciences in how His life would end and what it was for; and Peter would have none of it. 

Both Jesus’ and Peter’s rebukes were strong.  Peter adopted a more discreet manner, perhaps out of consideration for a Guy who was just talking crazy, or perhaps because everyone else was buying it except Peter.  Maybe he doubted Jesus’ credibility, or was embarrassed because, as far as he could tell, everyone else believed Him.  Maybe that’s why, in 8:38 (not in the reading), Jesus would warn the disciples about being ashamed of Him and His words in time, promising an equal response from the Son of Man in eternity.

             When Jesus rebukes Peter, He turns to look at the other disciples.  It’s as if Jesus wants them all to hear the content and tone of His words, and probably to make an example of Peter.  The moniker “Satan” takes us back to the book of Job, where the character is a regular in the heavenly court and not a denizen of damnation.  He acts as an advocate for rebellion, to fabricate for Job a situation that might prompt him to question God’s goodness.  God seems to be complicit in the Adversary’s actions.  Indeed, the word Satan sometimes was used even of human beings who incite evil.  But in a later location, I Chronicles, we begin to find the understanding that God is not responsible for evil, which mindset carries over into the time of Jesus.  That is why He definitely considers Peter an “outsider” to the Truth in this scene.

            Jesus clearly affirms that the Messiah must conduct Himself on the Father’s terms, and not on Peter’s.  Otherwise put, "His ways are not our ways and His thoughts are not our thoughts" (Isa 55:8-9).  Once he was informed of the Truth, Peter was out of line to entertain doubts.  Unlike Jesus in the desert and in Gethsemane, Peter had not subjected his human hesitation to what he knew to be true.  The initial difficulties that human beings have are normal; what we do with them is crucial.  Do we keep mulling them over in our heads to the point of mental stupor, or do we reaffirm the faith we have received?  If we are not certain of the truth, do we investigate—by asking someone whose opinion we trust or by consulting a reliable text or a website?  When we have a genuine difficulty the first line of action is always to pursue the Truth.  Once we are convinced of the Truth, the discussion is finished—unless we start it up again.

With the power and wisdom of God, and only so, we can face the confrontations and difficulties of each day.  By lovingly and persistently subjecting our minds and wills to the Lord, we gain true understanding and true freedom, and Satan is no match for us.