If you would like to get an idea of how insightful and far-thinking Father Francis Canavan S.J. was, as well as how he exemplified the Ignatian principle of thinking with the Church, see his 1991 First Things article "The Popes and the Economy":
The liberal mind, atomistic and mechanistic as it is, constantly detaches means from ends and turns them into ends in themselves. In our doctrine of freedom of speech, for example, “expression” becomes its own end, to be pursued and protected without regard to the ends for which a rational and free people might have intended to guarantee it constitutional protection. Similarly, economic productivity and efficiency become ends in themselves, to be pursued without limit. It is against this that the Church protests. ...
Catholic individualism differs from liberal individualism precisely in that it looks to our common human nature as created by God for the obligatory norms of human action. Therefore, as Paul VI also said, faced with a rapidly developing world, we must ask what the goals of development are, and we must look for the answer in a new, complete, and transcendent humanism that aims at “the fully-rounded development of the whole man and of all men” and “is open to the Absolute and is conscious of a vocation which gives human life its true meaning” (PP, 16, 20, 42). Since this is the language of theology, it may seem remote from the practical concerns of economics, but it offers an answer to a question that economics on its own cannot answer: What is economic development for?
Please pray for the repose of Father Canavan's soul. Details of his wake and memorial services are on the Fordham Web site. Click the "Father Canavan" tag below or scroll down for more posts about him.
Father Francis Canavan observes, "Water naturally runs downhill. So do our human passions." He was provoked to think about this when watching a program in which a fellow declared that Christian opposition to the current sexual revolution resulted in the Church "losing its credibility." "If he had said," writes Canavan, "that the Church was losing popularity, I would have understood him, because chastity has never been popular. But why did he say that the Church was losing credibility, i.e., the ability to be believed?" What is being demanded of Christians, he writes, is that they go with the flow of human passions. "It is a morality that has flowed, like water, downhill to its lowest level. In the nineteenth century, even that great exponent of liberal freedom, John Stuart Mill, could still declare: 'It is better to be a human being dissatisfied than a pig satisfied; better to be Socrates dissatisfied than a fool satisfied.' Today the satisfied pig declares Socrates to be lacking in credibility."
Scroll down or click the "Father Canavan" tag below for more on the great Jesuit writer and scholar, including details on his wake and memorial services.
I will post some more recollections of Father Francis Canavan S.J. later today. In the meantime, his friend and (if I'm not mistaken) former student Dr. Kenneth Grasso posts a bio of him from an encyclopedia. It includes the vintage photo at left and this fine observation about his writings on Catholicism, American culture, and contemporary America’s search for a public philosophy:
"At the heart of [Canavan's] writings is a far-ranging critique of the liberal individualist intellectual tradition. Understanding liberal political theory to be shaped in important ways by the liberal tradition’s philosophical commitments (in particular, by its embrace of a nominalist metaphysics), Canavan argued that the liberal model of man and society is flawed because it is incompatible with the Christian understanding of the nature and destiny of the human person and corrosive of the matrix of institutions, convictions, and virtues on which a democratic society depends for its vitality and ultimately its very viability. He further argued that the claim of liberalism to be 'neutral' on the whole question of the human good is specious and turns politics into 'a shell game' in which, in the name of neutrality, social life is reorganized in accordance with liberalism’s distinctive and highly controversial vision of the human good."
I first heard of Francis Canavan S.J. in April 2006, at a monthly gathering of writers in Manhattan, when one of the fellow regulars, Dimitri Cavalli, handed me an unexpected gift in honor of my entrance into the Catholic Church that Easter vigil.
It was a copy of Pins in the Liberal Balloon,* the 1990 book of columns written for Catholic Eye** by Father Canavan. Dimitri had known the Jesuit priest while studying at Fordham, where Canavan was a professor of political science for many years.
The book stayed on my shelf for a while, as I had lots of reading to do as a new Catholic, being particularly interested in the writings of saints, and wasn't too eager to peruse a work by a modern-day author I had never heard of. Finally, one day that summer, I started taking it with me on my daily commute to work as an associate news editor at the Daily News, and was quickly hooked.
I had only recently been able to wean myself off the expensive habit of purchasing volumes of Ignatius Press's anthologies of G.K. Chesterton's Illustrated London News columns. Now, here was a writer of my own time, composing "quick hit" columns on culture-war topics, and, like Chesterton, doing so with depth, clarity, and wit.
I had thought the days were gone when writers like Chesterton or his idol Samuel Johnson could write newspaper stories about current events that were worth reading years later. The idea that someone could do so in the digital age, when so little of what seems like an interesting read today is worth digesting next week, let alone next year, was terrifically inspiring.
Wanting to meet the author, I contacted Dimitri, who, if I recall, said that Father Canavan was still alive but that he had not seen him for some time. Soon after, a chance remark to my friend Michael Potemra, the books editor of National Review led to the exciting news that Father Canavan regularly lunched with the staff of the Human Life Foundation (publisher of Human Life Review), which shared its offices with National Review at the time. Michael told Faith McFadden of Human Life Review about my desire to meet him. Delighted that Father Canavan had won a new fan, she generously arranged for me to sit at his table at the foundation's awards dinner that October—coincidentally on his 89th birthday.
Meeting him at the dinner was a joy. I asked him about his life and the stories came pouring out.
From then on, until I last spoke with him thirteen days ago, there were many more stories.
As can happen with age (and sometimes, I find, at my age), he would often retell the same stories. There was one he told so often —in nearly every conversation we had—that I came to see it as his Ur-story, encapsulating the message of his life and work. It would come to mind whenever we were discussing the changes in American culture since the 1960s—which was often, since we shared an interest in the wounds caused by the sexual revolution and how to heal them.
Father Canavan was the humblest man one could hope to meet. Although he was a brilliant cultural observer, he rarely if ever took credit for his observations. Instead, he would mention a comment someone else had made, adding his own perspective. His Ur-story usually began with his noting that, as a writer in Commentary had observed, the Sixties were really about a rebellion against authority. Then the narrative would begin:
"Now, back in the Sixties, I was an associate editor for America magazine, and I used to envy the international correspondent. He would get to travel to places like El Salvador. I traveled to Washington."
There in the capital city, Father Canavan would visit his friend Father Brian McGrath S.J., who was the administrative vice president of Georgetown University at a time when the hallowed school was becoming a hotbed of radicalism. On one occasion, during a time when he was himself seeing the effects of radicalism firsthand as dissent overtook America, he shared with McGrath his concerns about the direction things were going.
He told the Ur-story with slight additions and emendations each time, but the punch line was always the same: "Father McGrath told me that a professor said to him, 'What are you worried about, Father? You guys can't lose."
The message, he explained, was that even a Georgetown professor could see that the secular culture had nothing to offer in comparison to the Church. The liberalism that fueled the decline of morality had no real substance. The longings of hearts could find their fulfillment only in what the Church had to offer—only in Christ.
To understand what that story meant to Father Canavan, and why he felt compelled to share it, is to understand the joy that was essential to his makeup, as well as his deep desire to inspire others to keep fighting the good fight.
During the time we were friends—two years and change—hearing him tell and retell the Ur-story, it seemed to me that he was becoming as a finely polished stone. The intervals between the retelling of it became shorter and shorter. It was as though he were becoming more and more pure, the traces of disillusionment and anxiety being purged, so that all that would remain of his spirit would be a song of praise—ad majorem Dei gloriam.
I had an image that when the priest, who was physically more fragile by the day, got to the pearly gates, the only luggage he would take with him would be his Ur-story. He would tell it to St. Peter, and by the time he got to, "You guys can't lose," that would be it; "OK, you're in."
To put it a different way, as another Jesuit friend, Father Sean Raftis, says, for some holy people as they age, the veil between heaven and earth becomes very thin. It did seem that way with Father Canavan.
To be continued tomorrow. Please pray for the repose of Father Canavan's soul. _______________________________________ *All commissions on Amazon purchases made through this blog go toward helping pregnant women who suffer from hyperemesis gravidarum. For details, click here
**Catholic Eye is an excellent monthly newsletter that does not have a Web site. It is published by the National Committee of Catholic Laymen, Inc., which shares its headquarters with Human Life Review: 353 Lexington Ave., Suite 802, New York, NY 10016. Subscriptions are $34.95 per year prepaid, first-class postage included.
Please pray for the repose of the soul of Father Francis Canavan S.J., who died this morning at Montefiore Medical Center in the Bronx at the age of 91. He was admitted there on Saturday with a broken hip.
I loved Father Canavan very much and will have more to say about him in the coming days.
I'll post some of my own memories of Father Canavan tomorrow. In the meantime, for a look at his prophetic understanding of how cultural relativism would play itself out in 21st-century American life, see his 2000 Human Life Review essay "The Dying of the Mind."
"It seems to me and many others that [Legion of Christ founder Father Marcial Maciel] was a man with an entrepreneurial genius who, by systematic deception and duplicity, used our faith to manipulate others for his own selfish ends. ...
“While it’s difficult to get a hold of official documents,” Archbishop O’Brien said, “it’s clear that from the first moment a person joins the Legion, efforts seem to be made to program each one and to gain full control of his behavior, of all information he receives, of his thinking and emotions. [Many who leave it suffer] deep psychological distress for dependency and need prolonged counseling akin to deprogramming.
“This is not about orthodoxy. It is about respect for human dignity for each of its members.”
RELATED: Diocesan seminarian Mason Slidell writes of the archbishop's saying "this is not about orthodoxy": "For all charter members of Fortress Catholicism, please read the above quote again. It is wrong to use orthodoxy as a cover for totalitarian tendencies. 'They love the Pope' should not be a justification for cult of personality. 'They love the Blessed Mother' should not be a justification for psychological blackmail. 'They hate the Buddy Jesus crowd' should not be a justification for vowed secrecy. We respect the life and dignity of the human person and must defend it from ALL attacks."
If you are in need of pastoral care in the wake of the Legion of Christ/Regnum Christi crisis, see the list of resources, including diocesan Catholic priests and religious who have made themselves available, at regainnetwork.org. For the latest news on the crisis, see the continuing coverage in American Papist.
Comments closed. Please pray for the Holy Father and for the healing of Christ's Mystical Body.
Father James Martin S.J. was on "Colbert Report" the other day, not his first time on the show and no doubt not his last, if Colbert's reaction is anything to go by. Glad to see Colbert mention Father Martin's book My Life With the Saints.*
*All commissions on Amazon purchases made through this blog go toward helping pregnant women who suffer from hyperemesis gravidarum. For details, click here.
"I want to say something about the moment we are living - and why it is so important to get priorities correct, now. We are like a man waking from a binge. Most of us feel a strange headache, a sense of disorientation, on account of the economic meltdown. I am not going to propose any remedy, but I can say this: If you and I get our relationship with God in order, the other things will fall into their right place.
"Whatever economic problems we have, whatever family problems, whatever parish problems - they are ultimately spiritual problems. If we give God first place, the rest will follow. Jesus speaks today about fasting, prayer and giving alms: Why? Not so other people will admire us, but to get right with God. ...
"Don't waste this crisis. God sent it to us for a reason. It is the moment to get our priorities straight. Perhaps in addition to the financial crisis you are facing a difficult family problem or some serious health issue. Do not waste the crisis. It is a call from God. Now is the acceptable time. Now is the day of salvation. Now is the moment to reorder priorities - and to give first place to God."
Personal to Catholic priests and religious: Please help Legion of Christ/Regnum Christi members get pastoral care
I wrote earlier about the urgent need for Catholic priests and religious willing to provide pastoral care to those suffering in the wake of recent revelations about the Legion of Christ's founder, Father Marcial Maciel.
Since the crisis broke, ReGain, the support network for former members of the Legion of Christ and Regnum Christi, has provided a list of pastoral-care resources on the front page of its Web site. One diocesan priest who permitted his name to be included on the site wrote me today saying that the responses he received convinced him that there is a real need for such help.
The point was also driven home to me yesterday when a friend who is an RC member told me about an informal get-together of a few longtime nonconsecrated members of the movement that took place following the news about Maciel's having a daughter. Believing Maciel was innocent of wrongdoing, the members, who are highly educated, discussed how he could possibly have fathered the girl. Some of them wished to believe that Maciel, during one of many hospital visits that he made during a period of time for an unspecified condition, fell victim to someone who took semen from him while he was unaware and used it to impregnate the girl's mother.
The friend who shared this information with me did so out of dismay that intelligent, well-educated RC members could be so in denial as to invent such a preposterous story.
If you are a priest or religious, please consider allowing your contact information to be included on ReGain's site so that current or former LC/RC members who need pastoral care may contact you directly. Write ReGain via the contact form on its Web site, or write me and I will forward your information to the organization. ReGain's list of resources includes a disclaimer stating that inclusion on the list does not constitute an endorsement of its entire Web site.
Welcome to the working weak A guest post by FATHER GEORGE W. RUTLER
The discovery of penicillin as an antibiotic has been called the most important medical discovery of the last thousand years. The extraction from mold of the genus Penicillium has saved at least two hundred million lives so far. Penicillin has been around for millions of years but its antibacterial properties were noticed for the first time on September 28, 1928, when Alexander Fleming saw bacteria-free mold in a laboratory dish which he had retrieved from a pile of rubbish in St. Mary's Hospital, Paddington, London. He paid attention. No one until then had.
Fleming was the son of a Scottish farmer and, learning Latin as a Catholic student, he knew the meaning of "age quod agis." As a maxim, "do what you are doing" means to pay attention to ordinary things and extraordinary things may result. When Jesus walked among men, most did not pay much attention to him precisely because he seemed ordinary. "He sighed from the depth of his spirit" and said, "Why does this generation seek a sign? Amen I say to you, no sign will be given to this generation" (Mark 8:12). The truth behind miracles is in the often unnoticed details. For instance, the miraculous feedings of the five thousand and four thousand were not as important as the twelve and seven baskets of fragments left over, which represent the Apostles and the sacraments. "Do you not yet understand or comprehend? Are your hearts hardened? Do you have eyes and not see, ears and not hear?" (Mark 8:17-18).
Lent is a time to increase the power of perception. Small acts of penance and good confessions in this season are meant to increase that power. Instead of attempting extraordinary things, it is better to do more intensely the ordinary practices of Christian life: prayer, almsgiving, study, and evangelism. "Age quod agis."
Jesus asked, "Have I been so long with you, Philip, and do you still not understand?" (John 14:9). Shortly before Cardinal Dulles died last December, he reflected on how "doing what you are doing" with love in the normal process of living can lead to the most remarkable discoveries of God's power in human weakness. It is simply a matter of paying attention:
"Suffering and diminishment are not the greatest of evils but are normal ingredients in life, especially in old age. They are to be accepted as elements of a full human existence. Well into my ninetieth year I have been able to work productively. As I become increasingly paralyzed and unable to speak, I can identify with the many paralytics and mute persons in the Gospels, grateful for the loving and skillful care I receive and for the hope of everlasting life in Christ. If the Lord now calls me to a period of weakness, I know well that his power can be made perfect in infirmity. 'Blessed be the name of the Lord.'"
The above is the "From the Pastor" column of the February 22 bulletin of the Church of Our Saviour, reprinted by permission of the author. If you enjoy it, please consider making a donation of any amount to the Church of Our Saviour.
"Now if this had been a Catholic priest or bishop arrested in similar circumstances, I imagine there would be a hue and cry from the Catholic hierarchy in this country and there needs to be one now. So far it is black religious leaders who are crying foul, but this is far from being an issue of color. Every voice that values freedom of religion and speech in this country should be raised in alarm over this egregious travesty of justice."
"When anyone restricts access to reproductive health services, every woman affected is a living example of a colonized body."
So says Katrina Cantrell, associate executive director of Women's Health Specialists. The "reproductive" services to which she alluded was of course abortion, and the occasion of her statement was the sentencing of one Rev. Walter Hoye.
An abortion-clinic escort follows Rev. Hoye with a blank sign to cover up his sign offering help to pregnant women.
Rev. Hoye stood outside an Oakland, California abortion clinic on May 13, 2008, carrying a sign that said "Jesus loves you and your baby. Let us help you!" This "crime," captured on video (above), was a violation of the city's Bubble Law. Applicable exclusively to abortion clinics, the law defines "harassing" as "the non-consensual and knowing approach within eight feet of another person or occupied motor vehicle for the purpose of passing a leaflet or handbill, to display a sign to, or engage in oral protest, education, or counseling with such other person in a public way."
In other words, merely intending to talk (or display a sign) about abortion is an offense, whether or not any contact is made, and whether or not that person even knows of the "approach" or actually feels harassed.
At Rev. Hoye's trial, no patient testified that she felt threatened or "colonized" by him. Even the prosecutor couldn't muster more than some embarrassed, empty bluster in defense of the conviction. "To suggest that he was merely holding a sign on the sidewalk does not speak to the totality of what is going on here," said Alameda County Deputy District Attorney Robert Graff. "This is a balancing of rights here. These people's rights have to be balanced as well."
What else was there to the "totality", other than the sign and perhaps some words? What rights were violated? Of which people?
On a daily basis I am approached, within two or three feet, by people offering me leaflets or handbills for fast food, health clubs or mens' suits. Some promote political or religious causes or solicit contributions. I am no more "colonized" or "harassed" by their conduct that I am by the ads plastered on every building and lampost. They are merely offering choices which may affect me in some way, big or small.
But in Oakland yesterday, to offer the biggest choice of all—the choice of life—became a crime.
Did the Legion just sort of go wrong? Did they have most things right and just mess a few things up? I feel like going back to those people in college who told me that the Legionaries had it right and demanding that they now look at the present situation, caused in large part precisely because they misunderstood Ignatian obedience. As a Legionary, one could not represent, could not discern, could not manifest. And so within this atmosphere, the poison spread. This is not a situation where for the most part, they have an intact spirituality, with all the "good parts" of Jesuit life -- as I was so often told. Where are all those people who said those things now? I wish they would come out and admit they were wrong. Admit that Ignatius knew what he was talking about and did not need to be modified even stricter than he ever intended to be. "Strict" is actually not even the question. Rather, psychologically destructive. Ignatius was a good psychologist, a reader of men's hearts and minds. He knew better than to propose an obedience that the Legionaries impose. And wisely so.
If you are a current or former member of the Legion of Christ or Regnum Christi who would like to receive pastoral care, several diocesan priests and religious have made themselves available. See the list of pastoral-care resources on regainnetwork.org.
For updates on the Legion of Christ/Regnum Christi crisis, see AmericanPapist.com.
Comments closed. Please pray for the Holy Father and for the healing of Christ's Mystical Body.
"By destroying death forever, Christ has assured those who place their trust in Him that death is not final, but rather transitional; in the many mansions of the Father's house, earthly death is a threshold through which we pass, rather than an impenetrable wall."
—Fallen Sparrow, from his beautiful post on the passing of his beloved uncle; read the whole piece.
In my Church History class yesterday, the professor talked about Erasmus's publishing the Novum Instrumentum, a critical edition of the New Testament that was adopted by Protestant scholars. He quoted the aphorism, "Erasmus laid the egg that Luther hatched."
I volunteered that, in that case, perhaps the Renaissance humanist's book should have been called the Ovum Instrumentum.
Mrs. Bradley gathered herself to spring conversationally into the ring and separate the two contestants. But she was not as quick as the priest. To her relief, though, his voice was pleasantly calm and his manner totally unruffled. ...
"The precise point missed by people who failed to understand the saints in this: Saints, perhaps more than other men in the world, understood beauty. They were the great lovers of beauty. They thought the world was all so marvellous that only God deserved to have it for His own.”
"Bosh!" said Dr. Allenby, rudely. And then he had the good grace to laugh at himself. "Sorry, Father. I've been terribly rude. But really, I haven't your gift of playing with words. I'm not a Jesuit."
"Neither am I,” said Father Hall, “and believe me, I'm not playing with words at all. I'm playing with hard facts back of a human phenomenon. I'm talking about the very thing that makes the Christian ascetic—whether a hermit in the desert or a shop-girl giving up a strawberry sundae at noon, or a nun keeping silence from twelve to three o'clock on Good Friday, or a business man refusing to put salt in his soup, though a dash of salt would vastly improve it—different from all the others you talked about. To the Christian, the world is too, too beautiful. It isn‟t evil. It‟s lovely. That is why one has to be careful what one does with it."
"I don‟t understand you at all," said Shirley Green.
"Too deep for me, and I'm supposed to be a Catholic," chimed in Grace Melville, feeling that the priest was talking just a little like the ghost of Chesterton.
He saw he had to explain.
"In the first place, remember that a Christian does not merely renounce unless the thing is wrong or a matter of sin. He renounces in the sense of giving to God. Now, nobody would insult a friend by giving him something that he thought was evil or ugly or that he himself didn‟t like. A lover doesn‟t walk up to his ladylove and say, 'Of course, I know this is a bunch of milkweed, and nettles; but because the horrible bouquet is so hideous, I am giving it to you.' That‟s not a gift or a sacrifice; that‟s an insult. A man doesn‟t say to his friend: 'Here, you take this steak I ordered. The darn thing is tainted and, anyhow, I don‟t like steak.' 'Here‟s my dog. It's got a vicious temper; I suspect it's infected with rabies, and it will probably bite you and the children; but please accept it with my compliments.'
"So the Christian wouldn‟t offer God the sacrifice of something which he regarded as ugly or vicious or worthless or belonging to the devil. No; the Christian ascetic renounces because he realises that the world is so glorious that only God can rightly wear its jewels upon His hand; only God can rightly enjoy the world‟s great music; only God who painted the great landscapes of earth can properly appreciate them."
A short film by parishioner Alex Buder is getting an unofficial premiere at my parish's weekly young-adult gathering Thursday night. It's an inventive modernization of an historical episode. Watch this clip and see if you can tell whom it depicts before the characters' names are mentioned.
The answer, and more details about the film, are on Alex's Web page.
"The most effective cusser I ever heard of never used a really profane word in his life. He was the Catholic coach of a football team, and he believed that a team moved more effectively when it was goaded on by the spur of vigorous language. Yet he regarded the names of God and Christ as deeply sacred. And the common curses he had heard all his life he disdained as worn to pitiful shreds.
"So he invented his cursing as he went along.
“'Great balls of codfish!’ he’d cry, and his team would wilt.
“'You fat, lazy hamburgers!' he’d shout, and the team would jump as if he’d whipped them.
“'I’ll horndoozle the lot of you. By the great mooncalf you can all go jump into a bed of molten lava! Dad bing you, you big white slugs!'
"The team could never decide whether they marvelled more at his ability to think out new plays or his ability to dig up expurgated curses that made the plays effective."
Robert N. Going performs an act of service for Latin students everywhere with his presentation of the first part of Sister Anna Roberta C.S.J.'s "Latin Declension Song."
If you can't wait for Part 2, the complete lyrics are here.
When I was a freshman she had one day in the front of her classroom a sign with the single word "meum" on it. The final "m" was lit up and blinking like on of those all-night eatery logos.
Of course, she waited till someone asked her what it meant. "The ‘meum’ is the final word in the Consecration of the Eucharist in the Mass," she explained. "That last, glorious 'm' is the very moment when the Eucharistic bread is transformed into the Body of Jesus!"
She went on to further elaborate on how marvelous it was that the words of consecration should end in a liquid consonant, one whose sound itself trailed off almost infinitely.
You see, then, that not only a phrase could excite her, but that she could see volumes of theology in a single letter.
I am praying today for my friends who would like to be married. Valentine's Day can be tough for single people, myself included.
At the same time, it is good to be reminded that love does not find its finality in a person. It is always meant to point beyond itself—upward.
When I was a child, I was happy to get a Valentine from anyone; I didn't think of it as being a day just for romantic lovers. It was only when I was old enough to think about romance that Valentine's Day carried with it the fear of being alone.
The truth is, I was not alone then, and I am not alone now. I have always been blessed with people who love and care about me.
Loneliness for someone to share my life with is a valid feeling; it's not something I can or should attempt to deny for the sake of claiming fulfillment in Christ. At the same time, with each passing year, I feel more and more that such a feeling loses its meaning unless it is directed towards making more room for Jesus in my heart, for the simple reason that He never stops reaching out to me.
I find it very moving that an analysis of a Eucharistic miracle found that, when the consecrated Host had become heart tissue. He truly gives us His heart, and all he asks for is ours.
O my God! I love Thee above all things, with my whole heart and soul, because Thou art all-good and worthy of all love. I love my neighbor as myself for the love of Thee. I forgive all who have injured me, and ask pardon of all whom I have injured.
RELATED: "Aunt Judie," a widow, draws upon a beautiful memory to remind her nieces and nephews that every day is an opportunity to show love.
"For most of my life, there have been two certainties about Valentine's Day: I will not have a date, and my father will send me a jumbo box of chocolates."
"Please pray for my friend Don, who had diabetes for years before it was diagnosed. Consequently his body has been severely damaged. He's lost the sight in one eye, and his kidneys have been damaged to point where this family man in his early forties is looking at dialysis. He's despondent and doesn't know how he's going to pay for everything.
"He's really low. I don't know how to help him except by prayer. Please remember him in your intentions."
I had forgotten what a great song this was until I heard it on SuperOldies tonight: Billy Preston's "That's the Way God Planned It." In addition to the turntable clip below, YouTube has the live version from the Concert for Bangladesh, but the original version is superior.
Today, I found a way to stay alert during my two-hour class at the John Paul II Institute, the longest of my grad-school classes and the only one I am taking at that center for theology of the body/Balthasarian spirituality. (Normally, I study across the street at Dominican House of Studies.)
I brought a bottle of Diet Pepsi to class. Every time the professor used the expression "complete self-gift" (or "self-giving"), "total self-gift," or "complete and total self-gift," I took a swig. (I stopped counting at twelve swigs.)
Also meriting a swig was the mention of Lumen Gentium's universal call to holiness; the professor mentioned it once today. And I was ready to take a swig at the mention of Gaudium et Spes 22, but the only time it came up was when a student mentioned it, which doesn't count.
What the head of the Legion of Christ is saying to members
Thomas Peters of American Papist has two eyewitness reports of the message given by Legion of Christ head Father Alvaro Corcuera at a Washington, D.C.-area Mass for Regnum Christi members last Sunday. One is his own account; the other is from a Regnum Christi member.
I was with Thomas at the Mass and can vouch for everything he reports, right down to his account of the acquaintance, a member of Regnum Christi, who approached us after Mass to ask how we each heard about it.
Comments closed. Please pray for the Holy Father's intentions and for the healing of Christ's Mystical Body.
The e-mail Father Thomas Berg LC sent to members of the Legion of Christ's lay movement, Regnum Christi, in the wake of recent revelations about its founder, Father Marcial Maciel, is courageous and compassionate. At the same time, it testifies to why there is cause for concern about the Legion and Regnum Christi, particularly in Father Berg's reminder that members may seek pastoral care from non-Legionary priests:
Remember you are free to speak with anyone, inside or outside the Movement about your pain, your reactions to this tragic news, and for ease of conscience to speak to whomever you believe can best help you at this time. I would encourage you to reach out to and find guidance from priests whose holiness and sound judgment you trust, whether Legionaries or not.
While members of a Catholic religious institute generally obtain their spiritual direction from that same institute, it always ought to be understood that, as Catholics, we belong first and foremost to Holy Mother Church. A healthy institute does not see Catholic priests who are diocesan or from other orders as outsiders, people of whom one should be wary.
The most generous thing I can say about Regnum Christi members' having to be told it's OK to seek guidance from non-Legionary priests, is that it shows an immaturity in their formation—which is strange for a group that devotes a large amount of its efforts to catechesis. At worst, it reinforces assertions by ex-members that the institutional mentality of the Legion and Regnum Christi impairs its members' spiritual liberty.
RELATED: See regainnetwork.org for a list of pastoral-care resources for those suffering in the wake of the Legion of Christ/Regnum Christi crisis, including contact information for priests and religious who have made themselves available. For news updates on the crisis, visit American Papist.
Comments closed. Please pray for the Holy Father and for the healing of Christ's Mystical Body.
Just in time for tomorrow's memorial for Our Lady of Lourdes, Father James Martin S.J., author of My Life With the Saints, posts his tribute to the French girl to whom Our Lady appeared, St. Bernadette Soubirous. The clip is from his DVD "Who Cares About the Saints?"
All commissions on Amazon purchases made through this blog go toward helping pregnant women who suffer from hyperemesis gravidarum. For details, click here.
Kudos to Father Thomas Berg LC for the pastoral concern he expresses in his letter to members of the Legion of Christ's lay arm, which last week suffered disturbing revelations regarding the order's founder, Father Marcial Maciel.
For a list of pastoral-care resources for LC/RC members, including numerous priests and religious who have made themselves available, see www.regainnetwork.org.
Comments closed. Please pray for the Holy Father's intentions and for the healing of Christ's Mystical Body.
Since many readers are finding this page through searches for information on the Legion of Christ/Regnum Christi crisis, I would like to refer you to Thomas Peters at American Papist for the latest news, as I am unable to keep up with it. Thomas is doing real yeoman's work covering the fast-developing story; all the most newsworthy links are appearing on his blog pretty much as soon as they hit the Web.
A reminder: If you or anyone you know is in need of pastoral care in the wake of the crisis, priests and religious have made themselves available. See the list of pastoral-care resources at regainnetwork.org.
Italian blessed olive leaves, Australian hazel nut
Earth as first seen from space
"And in this he showed me a little thing, the quantity of a hazel nut , lying in the palm of my hand, as it seemed. And it was as round as any ball. I looked upon it with the eye of my understanding, and thought, 'What may this be?' And it was answered generally thus,'It is all that is made.' I marvelled how it might last, for I thought it might suddenly have fallen to nought for littleness. And I was answered in my understanding: It lasts and ever shall, for God loves it. And so have all things their beginning by the love of God.
"In this little thing I saw three properties. The first is that God made it. The second that he loves it. And the third, that God keeps it. But what is this to me? Truly, the Creator, the Keeper, the Lover. For until I am substantially oned to him, I may never have full rest nor true bliss. That is to say, until I be so fastened to him that there is nothing that is made between my God and me."
More apologies from prominent members of Legion & Regnum Christi
Father Richard Gill LC, director of Regnum Christi in New York, follows Father Thomas Berg LC's example in issuing an unqualified apology to those affected by the recent revelations about the Legion of Christ's founder, Father Marcial Maciel.
Like Father Berg, Father Gill also apologizes explicitly for the Legion's actions in defending its founder while accusations piled up over the years, offering "prayers and sacrifices for anyone who was victimized, so they may continue to heal and discover the love of Jesus Christ."
Be sure to read canon lawyer Ed Peters' commentary on Father Berg's and Father Gill's statements. While he applauds their being "willing to step forward, even while their leadership dithers day after day," he writes that there remain serious issues in need of address.
In related news, Jay Dunlap, who directed the Legion's public-relations response to the accusations against Maciel, has also issued a plea for forgiveness for his "personal failings in this horrid series of events. American Papist's Thomas Peters (son of Ed)" notes that it is a good apology, but, as with other statements from people connected with the Legion, raises questions about the timeline of events.
Comments closed. Please pray for the Holy Father, for all current and former members of the Legion of Christi and Regnum Christi, and for the healing of Christ's Mystical Body.
We will know Him by His wounds; He will know us by ours
I.
"I saw a great radiance and, in the midst of it, God the Father. Between this radiance and the earth I saw Jesus, nailed to the Cross in such a way that when God wanted to look at the earth, He had to look through the wounds of Jesus. And I understood that it was for the sake of Jesus that God blesses the earth."
— St. Maria Faustina Kowalska, Divine Mercy in My Soul
II.
Intra tua vulnera absconde me. [Within thy wounds, hide me.]
"If there is any way to picture Judgment in terms of the Mass, it is to picture it in the way the Father greeted His Son, namely, by looking at His hands. They bore the marks of labor, the callouses of redemption, and the scars of salvation. So too when our earthly pilgrimage is over, and we go back to the beginning, God will look at both of our hands. If our hands in life touched the hands of His divine Son they will bear the same livid marks of nails; if our feet in life have trod over the same road that leads to eternal glory through the detour of a rocky and thorny Calvary, they too shall bear the same bruises; if our hearts beat in unison with His, then they too shall show the riven side which the wicked lance of jealous earth did pierce.
"Blessed indeed are they who carry in their Cross-marked hands the bread and wine of consecrated lives signed with the sign and sealed with the seal of redemptive Love. But woe unto them who come from Calvary with hands unscarred and white."
Father Thomas Berg LC sets an example for his Legionary brothers in expressing unqualified pain and sorrow "for anyone who, in any way, has been hurt by the moral failings of Fr. Maciel."
UPDATE:Canon lawyer Ed Peters notes:: "Berg issues no cost-free, third-party apologies for things he (Berg) did not do, but instead expresses his profound personal sorrow for the victims of Maciel. Berg has no power to make material reparations to the victims, but he has pledged the power of his priestly prayers and personal penances on their behalf. Berg recognizes that the Maciel crisis is not simply some sort of internal Legion imbroglio, but a crisis for the whole Church. Berg clearly understands what 'communion of the saints' demands of us in this life, as well as what it portends for the next." [Read the full post.]
Legion, Regnum Christi face 'pastoral crisis,' says AmPapist blogger Thomas Peters
In today's American Papist, Thomas Peters writes that "there is a pastoral crisis facing the Regnum Christi and Legionary memberships, involving how they relate to Maciel, and especially how they absorb these discoveries about his moral depravity. In this task, I don't think they are being helped by their Legionary pastors. And while this is a complicated phenomenon, it boils down to a simple point: the Legion do not have objectivity about Maciel. Their commitment to spreading Maciel's spirituality has become unhealthy because this task now has an insurmountable contradiction to overcome - Maciel's own life."
"The 'big lie,' Father Benedict [Groeschel] said, (and I’m paraphrasing him at this point), is to think that if we say all the right prayers and live correctly, then nothing bad will ever happen to us. Sadly, there are many good people who have lost their faith by believing such a lie, and that makes it a big one indeed!
"One only has to think of Jesus Christ, the sinless Son of God, and how much He suffered on the cross, to correct one’s view on this matter. In our own day, there are many whom we know have lived saintly lives, many who have prayed much, and yet have suffered too."
—Michael Dubruiel, husband of Amy Welborn, from his last column, written Monday night. Michael died suddenly Tuesday morning.
Religion News Service reports that the Legion of Christ's spokesman in Rome said yesterday the order has no plans to apologize to any "alleged" abuse victims of its founder, Father Marcial Maciel, or offer them pastoral care. "They have surely found a way by now to receive adequate care," he said.
The RNS story continues:
Yet according to one longtime observer, Maciel’s troubled history has already provoked a crisis within the movement.
"These people are in a spiritual free-fall," said Jason Berry, one of the duo of journalists who first reported the accusations against Maciel in 1997, and the co-author of a 2004 book on the case, Vows of Silence."
"Imagine being told for all these years that the founder is a saint falsely accused by the Vatican," he said. "Imagine the sense of betrayal they must feel."
If you or anyone you know is suffering in the wake of the Legion of Christ/Regnum Christi crisis, the home page of ReGain (www.regainnetwork.org), a network of former LC/RC members, has a list of resources that includes many priests and religious who have made themselves available for pastoral care.
"I have been on all sides of this issue for most of my life, and I can simply not escape the logic. That fetus a pregnant woman is carrying inside of her, regardless of the gestation stage, is a living, breathing human being. Yes, breathing – the amniotic sac forms 12 days after conception, and in the second trimester the baby is actually breathing the amniotic fluid. It’s not an ‘unviable tissue mass.’ Not a wart, a mole, a skin outcropping, a boil, or a bundle of uncoordinated cells. It’s not just a ‘fetus’.
"It’s a baby. Not fully developed, true. Like an infant is not a fully developed and mature adult. But it’s a baby. ...
"And I stand condemned. I’ve paid for three [abortions] and was responsible for probably several more, I’m not really sure. But it breaks my heart. Because I’ve been convicted in my soul. It took years after the fact, but I was shown the Truth. And not to get mumbo-jumbo, oogly-boogly on you, but it was a spiritual awakening that did it. It happened unexpectedly, and it threw me to my knees in sudden tearful epiphany of what it meant for a man to be with a woman, what sex was really designed for by our Creator and… what abortion is."
The above, a sneak preview of tomorrow's LOLsaints.com entry, is actually a Station of the Cross, believe it or not. In that sense, it's unusual, in that the stations normally do not depict the resurrected Christ. Jeff informs me it is at a retreat house that he, in gentlemanly fashion, declines to name publicly.
Priests and religious who are willing to offer pastoral care for those affected are urged to contact ReGain via its Web site.
If the contact link on the ReGain Web site is not working, please contact me. However, please note that I will not respond to any requests for information about the crisis. My only interest is to help people who are suffering find pastoral care within the Church.
Comments closed. Instead, asking again, please pray for the healing of all who are suffering because of this news, and for the Holy Father's intentions.
New revelations about the Legion of Christ's founder, which have been rumored in the blog world for the past few days, have just been reported on the New York Times Web site.
When I first heard the rumors days ago, I asked readers to pray. Please redouble your prayers now, for all those affected by this crisis, for the healing of the Church, and for our Holy Father Pope Benedict.
Please return to this blog tomorrow morning for another request I am preparing that is related to this crisis.
With so many people expending energy commenting upon this situation on other blogs, I am closing the comments to this post. What is needed, more than anything, is prayer. Whatever your opinion of the Legion of Christ and Regnum Christi, the Mystical Body is suffering a deep wound.
"A human being must become real before it can expect to receive any message from the superhuman; that is, it must be speaking with its own voice (not one of its borrowed voices), expressing its actual desires (not what it imagines that it desires), being for good or ill itself, not any mask, veil, or person."
— C.S. Lewis, from a letter to a friend explaining the title of Till We Have Faces
IV.
Lord, hear my voice, my present voice I mean, Not that which may be speaking an hour hence (For I am Legion) in an opposite sense, And not by show of hands decide between The multiple factions which my state has seen Or will see. Condescend to the pretence That what speaks now is I; in its defence Dissolve my parliament and intervene.
Thou wilt not, though we asked it, quite recall Free will once given. Yet to this moment's choice Give unfair weight. Hold me to this. Oh strain A point—use legal fictions; for if all My quarrelling selves must bear an equal voice, Farewell, thou hast created me in vain.
'Suffering is an integral part of his mission' The Holy Father on Jesus' 'messianic secret'
"This year, at Sunday Mass, the liturgy proposes the Gospel of St. Mark for our meditation. A special characteristic of this Gospel is the so-called 'messianic secret,' the fact that, for the moment, Jesus does not want anyone outside the restricted group of his disciples to know that he is the Christ, the Son of God. This is why he often admonishes the apostles and the sick people whom he heals to not reveal his identity to anyone.
"For example, the Gospel passage this Sunday (Mark 1:21-28) tells of a man possessed by a demon, who suddenly cries out: 'What do you want with us Jesus of Nazareth? Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are: the holy one of God!' Jesus answers him: 'Be quiet! Come out of him!' And immediately, the evangelist notes, the evil spirit came out of the man with a loud cry. Not only does Jesus chase demons out of people, freeing them from the worst slavery, but he prohibits the demons themselves from revealing his identity. And he insists on this 'secret' because the fulfillment of his mission is at stake, on which our salvation depends.
"He knows in fact that to liberate humanity from the dominion of sin he must be sacrificed on the cross as the true paschal lamb. The devil, for his part, tries to divert his attention and direct it instead toward a human logic of a powerful and successful messiah. The cross of Christ will be the demon’s ruin, and this is why Jesus does not cease to teach his disciples that in order to enter into his glory he must suffer much, be rejected, condemned and crucified (cf. Luke 24:26). Suffering is an integral part of his mission.
"Jesus suffers and dies on the cross for love. When we consider this, we see that it is in this way that he gave meaning to our suffering, a meaning that many men and women of every age understood and made their own, experiencing profound serenity even in the bitterness of difficult physical and moral trials."
I have burdens on my heart today for a friend who is suffering emotional pain, as well as for others whose needs have been brought to my attention, so I wrote the following post, "The wallflower and the carpenter," in hope of providing comfort.
I do not mind the burdens, because it is a blessing to be able to pray for others, but they are so many and deep that I would like to ask each of you reading to share them by praying for my intentions. If you are a priest, I would be grateful if you would remember my intentions during the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. Thank you and God bless you.
UPDATE, 2/3/09: Thank you so much for your prayers, which are still very needed. My friend who has been suffering has felt the graces, as have I.
It seemed like I was always running; a born escapist.
My parents split before my sixth birthday; some of my earliest memories are of their arguing. Perhaps that is why I learned to read before I even started school—absorbing the letters and sounds as I lost myself in "Sesame Street."
From then on, when Mom and Dad's harsh rebukes to one another sounded in my ears, I had a way out. I could turn off the television, go to my room, shut the door, open a book, and enter another world.
My favorites were stories such as Lewis Carroll's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass, where I could put myself in the place of the bright little girl whose journeys into the unknown began with flight from everyday life.
From the Alice books, I graduated to C.S. Lewis's The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe. With it, I received new food for my imagination—and a strange new edge to my longing to escape, one that I did not quite understand.
Like Through the Looking Glass, the plot of Lewis's fantasy turned upon a piece of ordinary household furniture's becoming a gateway to a fantastic new dimension. But the image of the double-doored wardrobe as mystical portal was familiar in a personal, almost experiential way, all the more mysterious because I couldn't put my finger on where I had seen it before.
* * *
My mother had custody of me and my sister. We moved from our beautiful house on Galveston Bay into an apartment with stucco walls and what Mom joked were cockroach electoral conventions on the ceiling. In place of our rather staid former neighbors were a steady trickle of colorful and sweaty houseguests: artists, shipbuilders, yoga fanatics, small-town actresses. When they broke out the jug bottle of Paul Masson, I would close my bedroom door in a vain attempt to shut out the marijuana smoke, the childish giggling, and the ironic strains of my mother's favorite song crackling over the phonograph—Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young's "Teach Your Children."
And I would open a book and fly away.
As long as I had something to read, I was well behaved, which was why Mom let me take my books to temple on Friday nights. She had a Blanche DuBois-like sense of propriety that made her bring me and my sister up in our inherited Jewish religion, even as she herself had taken to spending her mornings at the ashram.
But I didn't spend too much time in my children's books during services. I couldn't; there was too much going on, especially when the Torah section of the service began. The veil of the ark in the wall behind the pulpit would be parted, and the doors behind it opened to reveal the scrolls, covered in embroidered cloths that bore Hebrew lettering and the image of a crown. All in the sanctuary would stand and sing as the rabbi processed down the aisle, bearing a bulky Torah scroll on his shoulder. He carried it as delicately as if it were a baby.
Until the ceremony when I would become a bat mitzvah at 13 and would read from the Torah, that was the nearest I could approach the presence of the word of God. The scroll's parchment, like the holy mountain in Exodus, was sacred, not to be touched except by a special metal pointer, a yad. As the rabbi passed my aisle, I leaned over, as my mother had instructed me; touched the Torah's cover with my prayer book, and kissed the book with solemn devotion.
Then the Torah was uncovered and placed on a table in the middle of the pulpit; the week's Torah portion was read, and we all stood and sang as it was returned to its place in the Ark, a shuttered cabinet at the center of the wall behind the pulpit. I had one last glimpse of the scroll as it stood majestically in its home; then the Ark's doors were shut, its veil closed, and the sanctuary resumed its normal outlines, its aura of holiness diminished.
I was vaguely sorry the Torah was out of sight, though I didn't know why. The presence of it had taken me out of myself. The truth was that I felt terribly alone.
* * *
Aquinas asks, "Is sorrow to be shunned more than pleasure is to be sought?"
If you replace "sorrow" with "loneliness," I think the answer modern culture gives is an unqualified yes. Loneliness is seen as equal to unhappiness, and it is to be avoided at all costs. Fleeing it is perhaps the easiest of temptations. It is especially easy because, in many of its manifestations—like avoiding introspection, burying oneself in work, or networking electronically with friends—it does not feel like a vice.
But the Angelic Doctor thinks differently. We are designed in such a way, he says, that we are able to pursue pleasure more eagerly than we avoid pain—and, since grace builds on nature, there is an "ought" behind that "is."
The pleasure we are to pursue, he makes clear, is not mere hedonism. Pleasure for Aquinas "is desirable for the sake of the good which is its object." The highest pleasure, then, is the delight whose object is the supreme good, beatitude, the perfect union of the soul with God.
We enter into that beatitude through living out the Beatitudes, and the very first of them requires we allow, within our innermost being, an empty space.
The amount of space we make in our hearts for God determines not only whether we receive beatitude, but also how much of it we receive, as St. Therese of Lisieux describes beautifully in her Story of a Soul.
Writing to her sister Pauline, Therese recalls how, as a child, she was "astonished ... that God does not give equal glory in heaven to all His chosen":
I was afraid they were not all equally happy. You made me bring Daddy's big tumbler and put it by the side of my tiny thimble. You filled them both with water and asked me which was the fuller. I told you they were both full to the brim and that it was impossible to put more water in them than they could hold. And so ... you made me understand that in heaven God will give His chosen their fitting glory and that they last will have no reason to envy the first.
Yet, St. Therese's life makes clear that she never thought of being herself only a "thimble." She wanted to have the greatest possible union with her divine Spouse. How she increased her capacity to hold His love is the same way that you or I may increase our own—through beginning with the spiritual poverty that makes room in our heart for God, and opening our heart still more through the theological virtue of charity. The habits of loving we develop in this life are what determine the depth of our union with God's love in the next.
Loneliness then, while not a good in itself, can be turned to the greatest good. It can set us on the path to the highest heaven, provided we are willing to follow it as far as it goes—to the Cross.
* * *
Aquinas observes that both the first beatitude, "Blessed are the poor in spirit," and the last, "Blessed are they who are persecuted for the sake of righteousness," have the kingdom of heaven for their reward.
Experiencing poverty in spirit leads us to the glory of the soul—union of our heart with the crucified Lord. Experiencing persecution for the sake of righteousness leads us to the glory of the body—the general resurrection in heaven. In between, with our heart united to Christ on the Cross, we bear one another's burdens in love.
What, then, is the use of being an escapist? There is, as the atheist Sartre reminds us, no exit. It reminds me of when Alice, having passed into Looking-Glass World, wants to keep moving away from her house. Every move she makes ends in frustration as her house keeps coming up to meet her. She finally realizes that, in Looking-Glass World, she has to walk towards her house in order to progress to the world beyond it.
Everywhere we meet the Cross. We cannot avoid the pain—so we have to eagerly move towards the supreme pleasure, as Archbishop Sheen wrote in Calvary and the Mass:
That is why Calvary is actual; why the Cross is the Crisis; why in a certain sense the scars are still open; why Pain still stands deified, and why blood like falling stars is still dropping upon our souls. There is no escaping the Cross not even by denying it as the Pharisees did; not even by selling Christ as Judas did; not even by crucifying Him as the executioners did. We all see it, either to embrace it in salvation, or to fly from it into misery.
* * *
Easter Vigil, 2006. The day the running stopped.
A newly professed Catholic, I received Christ's Body and Blood.
Gazing upon the tabernacle, my thoughts went back to my earliest experience of the presence of holiness—that is, a sense of the sacred emanating from a place, and not a person I could see.
The memories of my childhood fascination with the Ark came back to me. They still do, on a preternatural level, every time I gaze at what is, for Catholics, the Holy of Holies, where the Real Presence of the Lord—His Eucharistic Body—is reserved. The Church, as well as each individual church, is known as the porta caeli, the "gate of heaven," the expression an awestruck Jacob used when he realized the desert place where he had spent the night was actually the house of God.
That porta truly is the portal to another world. When I gaze upon the veil of the tabernacle, like Alice musing over the looking-glass, I imagine that the other side of it extends into forever. And, like her, I wish I could be absorbed into it while remaining myself.
Indeed, the forever curious protagonist of Carroll's tales, even when propelled into the most fantastic surroundings, remains always the same little girl. As Martin Gardner notes in The Annotated Alice, John Tenniel's original illustrations to Through the Looking-Glass show that Alice, in crossing to the other side of the mirror, retains her original dimensions; she does not change into a mirror-image of herself.
Alice's retention of her original form is accentuated by the fact that, unlike in Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, in which she is almost continually eating or drinking, she does not consume a single thing in Looking-Glass World. She tries, many times, but the foodstuffs come alive, and, as the Red Queen reminds her, "it isn't etiquette to cut anyone you've been introduced to." All of which makes perfect sense, since, as Gardner observes, Looking-Glass food would have been poisonous to someone from the other side; its isotopes would be reversed.
And it is there that the analogy of the tabernacle to a Looking-Glass-style gateway breaks down. Because I can eat the food from the other side—the panis angelicus, Bread of Angels—and, far from destroying my substance, it perfects it, bringing it closer to being capable of existing in heaven.
"Panis Angelicus"
That is why Mary could be assumed body and soul into heaven without any pain in the transition from an earthly body to a glorified one. She had never sinned, and so, through her "Yes" to God, she lived a completely Eucharistic life.
Christ has passed "through the veil" of the tabernacle of flesh. Far from disintegrating into the Looking-Glass World of death, where the human body's natural processes are reversed, he has transformed the other side, so that "death is swallowed up in victory."
In the light of His Resurrection, it is our world that is the Looking-Glass World. And the first thing Jesus does is put things in order, turning this topsy-turvy universe right side up. He does this work, and is still working, to show us that our true identity is in Him. We have it through the liberty that comes from being made in his image; it grows throughout this life as we are continually converted through our union of love with Him.
,* the 1990 book of columns written for Catholic Eye** by Father Canavan. Dimitri had known the Jesuit priest while studying at Fordham, where Canavan was a professor of political science for many years.
columns. Now, here was a writer of my own time, composing "quick hit" columns on culture-war topics, and, like Chesterton, doing so with depth, clarity, and wit. 
