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No 4931

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Fr Russell Pollitt analyses pope’s new encyclical Page 9

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Radio Veritas: We need urgent funds

BY STUART GRAHAM

R

Pope Francis prays in front of an icon during a gathering with young people in Piazza Vittorio in Turin. On his visit to the northern Italian city, to which The Southern Cross’ pilgrims with Archbishop William Slattery travelled in May, the pope also viewed the Shroud of Turin and visited the sanctuary of St John Bosco. The founder of the Salesian order, with which Pope Francis’ family had much interaction, was born 200 years ago in the Piedmont region around Turin, where the pope’s parents came from before they emigrated to Argentina. See page 5 for more on the pope’s trip to Turin. (Photo: Paul Haring/CNS)

ADIO Veritas station director Fr Emil Blaser OP has called on Catholics to support the station by airing their views in on-air discussions, by talking about it to other Catholics, by advertising their businesses and by donating money where they can—and by entering the current competition to win two places on the Saints of Italy pilgrimage in September.

“Personally, I don’t think Catholics generally are supportive of Radio Veritas,” Fr Blaser said. “There are four million Catholics in the country. Many have never heard about Radio Veritas. Maybe if they had heard about it, then they would be happy to support it.”

Fr Blaser said the station is battling to meet its costs, which are around R130 000 a month.

“In May we had no money to pay Sentech [the signal distributor for the South African broadcasting sector]. We did in the end, but unless money comes in by debit orders or credit card, we will find ourselves in the same mess every month.”

He said the station “would love to have more programmes and presenters, but we don’t have the funds”.

The Dominican priest said the station is trying to get sponsors for programmes and advertisers, but this is often difficult. Banks, for example, do not support religious organisations. The station, he said, needs the support of Catholic businesses.

There is a false belief that Radio Veritas has a bottomless pit of funding, Fr Blaser said.

The Lenten Appeal, for example, gives R300 000 a year, while a handful of parishes give money. But the bulk of income has to be raised by the station.

Private supporters can make donations, once-off or by monthly contributions.

The station needs priests to tell their parishioner to listen to Radio Veritas.

“We are on many mediums,” he said. “You can find us on conventional radio [576AM in Gauteng], on the Internet through live streaming [on www.radioveritas.co.za] and on DStv audio channel 870.”

He added: “The bishops need to tell priests to inform their people that there is a Catholic station out there. The Church should be more upfront in supporting Radio Veritas.”

Fr Blaser said Radio Veritas plays a vital role in trying to give people hope in a time of despair.

Fr Emil Blaser OP of Radio Veritas Values propagated through media rub off on people, he said. Radio is an extremely powerful way of reaching people and spreading a message, with 94% of people in South Africa using the medium.

“We are being bombarded with worldly media. There is a plethora of worldly values broadcast on radio and TV. As Catholics we have to be intent on spreading the Gospel and evangelising the world we live in,” Fr Blaser said, adding that Radio Veritas must be part of that.

Fr Blaser said he knows many nonCatholics who tune into the station and who have discovered it by chance. “I know of at least 20 Anglican priests who listen to Radio Veritas.”

Fr Blaser said the station is working on various fundraising initiatives.

One of these includes the raffle with a prize of two places on the Saints of Italy pilgrimage to Italy, including spending money.

“Only 2 000 tickets are being sold at R300 each, so the chances of winning in the August 6 draw are high,” Fr Blaser said.

People can SMS the word “Italy” and their name to 41809 or go to www.radioveritas.co.za/ index.php/competition, Fr Blaser said. “Someone will get back to you about how you can deposit the money.”

Another fundraiser will be a Radio Veritas Golf Day on October 8 at the Serengeti Golf Course in Johannesburg.

Radio Veritas will broadcast live from the beatification of Benedict Daswa in Thohoyandou in September. n To sign up for monthly contributions to Radio Veritas go to www.radioveritas.co.za/index. php/donate-now. For more information on the Saints of Italy pilgrimage visit www.fowler tours.co.za/saints-of-italy-2015/

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The Southern Cross, July 1 to July 7, 2015

LOCAL

Winter theology wows Swaziland M

Bishop José Luis Ponce de Leόn of Manzini (left) with Fr Nicholas King SJ

Priest publishes short stories STAFF REPORTER

A

CAPE Town priest has published a set of short stories. Fr Ralph de Hahn ‘s book, titled Let Me Tell You a Story, features 42 short stories with a Catholic message. Some of these have previously appeared in The Southern Cross.

All proceeds will go to the archdiocesan fund for new churches in Crossroads and Wallacedene.

A total of 5 000 copies have been printed of Let Me Tell You a Story, and Fr de Hahn is busy going to parishes to promote the book.

He believes the stories “could be used in prayer and discussion groups, and even provide sermon material”, and would be “very good reading” for Grade 7-12 learners and their parents.

Archbishop Stephen Brislin of Cape Town, who wrote the foreword for the book, has asked all the parishes in his archdiocese to support the fundraising efforts for the two churches. n Let Me Tell You a Story is available at R100 from the Cape Town chancery, Catholic Bookshop or parish repositories.

ORE than 300 people gathered at the George Hotel in Manzini, Swaziland, to listen to Fr Nicholas King SJ speak about “The Scandal of Christian Disunity—A Biblical Approach” as part of the Jesuit Institute’s annual Winter Living Theology series.

Journalists from Swazi TV and The Observer were present, interviewing Fr King before he spoke.

Finance minister Martin Dlamini also attended.

This was the first time the Jesuit Institute had taken the series to Swaziland, which through its diocese of Manzini forms part of the Southern African Catholic Bishops’ Conference region.

“It will be the best-attended Winter Living Theology at any location since its relaunch by the Jesuit institute in 2007,” said Fr Russell Pollitt SJ, director of the institute.

In his opening address, Bishop

José Luis Ponce de León of Manzini said when he heard Fr King was coming to South Africa, he phoned the Jesuit Institute and asked if there was any possibility that Swaziland could be part of the series.

“When I phoned Fr Russell, he asked me if I was really serious about this,” the bishop told the gathering. “I said, ‘Of course I am serious. We are always serious here in Manzini’.”

Many people expressed their gratitude to Fr King. An elderly sister told him that he had given the “tools to answer questions that we are so often asked by other Christian denominations, ones that we just cannot answer”.

Speaking on Mary, as the patroness of Christian unity, Fr King said she is never an obstacle between Christians. He used the gospel of Luke to examine Mary’s role. “If we keep our eyes fixed on the one

Mary points us to, then we will always be led to Christ, her son.”

A participant asked him why some Catholics seem to think Mary is God. Fr King replied: “We Catholics do not worship Mary, we venerate her. It’s unfortunate that some Catholics have got it wrong and seem to think and behave, at times, as if Mary is more important than Jesus, but this is never correct.

“This confuses other Christians and does in fact give them an inaccurate picture of the place and role of Mary in our faith.”

Fr King will preach at a special Mass at St Patrick’s church in Grahamstown during the annual arts festival on Sunday, July 5 at 8:00.

He will then speak in Port Elizabeth from July 7-9 and in Cape Town from July 14-16. n For more information see www. jesuitinstitute.org.za or e-mail admin@jesuitinstitute.org.za

Call to reject al-Bashir ‘African solidarity’ claims

BY STAFF REPORTER

A

TTEMPTS to portray last month’s failure to arrest Sudan’s President Omar alBashir for war crimes on behalf of the International Criminal Court as a “form of African solidarity” must be rejected, Catholic Parliamentary Liaison Office research coordinator Mike Pothier has said.

Mr Pothier said the government had ignored its obligations under international law, acted in violation of the Constitution, and displayed contempt for the High Court by allowing Mr al-Bashir to leave.

If there was any solidarity to be discerned in what happened, it was strictly limited to a “solidarity of the elite”, he said.

“The attempt to portray these developments as some form of ‘African solidarity’ must be rejected,” he said.

“President al-Bashir is not wanted by the ICC for harming Western interests or for violence aimed at Europe or America. He was indicted for genocide and mass-murder of African people in Darfur,” Mr Pothier explained.

“To this day, his regime is targeting black (as opposed to Arab) African civilians in the southern provinces of his country as part of its ongoing programme of subjugation of Sudan’s non-Arab and non-Muslim population,” he said.

Mr al-Bashir was in South Africa for an African Union heads of state meeting. A warrant for his arrest has been issued by the ICC. Before his departure, the North Gauteng High Court ordered that his arrest be carried out.

Mr Pothier said there may be some validity to the argument that the ICC has shown a bias against prominent African figures by focusing its prosecutorial efforts on warlords, dictators and génocidaires from Africa.

However, in a democracy there are few things as important as the rule of law, Mr Pothier said. South Africa’s Constitution recognises this, by naming “supremacy of the Constitution and the rule of law” as a founding provision, right at the beginning, in Section 1. “Everything else in the Constitution, and therefore in the

Running free: Omar al-Bashir rest of the law, flows from this and depends on it,” he said.

“It may be said that this was an extreme case, involving a head of state, and that the government had to balance the risk of massive diplomatic fallout among African neighbours against its duty to respect the court’s judgment,” Mr Pothier noted.

“Such reasoning can only place the country on a trajectory of increasing disregard for constitutional government. Court orders are not to be respected and honoured only when the price of doing so is acceptable.”

There are two positive results to take from this otherwise shameful incident, Mr Pothier said.

Firstly, the judiciary—the third arm of government—has shown itself once again to be independent, responsive and unafraid to reach a decision which it must have known would be unpopular with the executive.

Secondly, President al-Bashir left the summit early. Even if the South African government declined to take the court’s order seriously, President al-Bashir was taking no chances.

“His hasty dash back to Khartoum may not have been the outcome that human rights movements all over the world would have preferred to see, but it was a victory of sorts.”

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The Southern Cross, July 1 to July 7, 2015

LOCAL

3

Bishops: End attacks on refugees STAFF REPORTER

A Fr Russell Pollitt SJ (left) with Pacsa director Mervyn Abrahams at a meeting of the organisation in Pietermaritzburg.

‘Be a spoke in the wheel of injustice’ BY dYLAN APPOLIS

Q

UOTING Lutheran theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Jesuit Father Russell Pollitt told a Pietermaritzburg meeting: “We are not to simply bandage the wounds of victims beneath the wheels of injustice; we are to drive a spoke into the wheel itself” The director of the Jesuit Institute told the annual meeting of the Pietermaritzburg Agency for Community Social Action (Pacsa) that faith-based groups are to be that spoke in the wheel in South Africa.

In its 36 years, Pacsa has played a vital role in promoting human rights and social justice.

“Social justice is at the very heart, I would argue, of our foundational text: the Scriptures. One theme running through Scriptures is that of protecting the vulnerable, the foreigner, the widow and the orphan, we cannot ignore this,” Fr Pollitt told the meeting.

“I do not think we can talk about being authentically Christian in South Africa today without seeing the promotion of justice as an absolute requirement,” he said.

H

e went on to say that we are living in a society and world that is increasingly interdependent but despite this, divided by injustice.

This we find in the personal realm—things like racism and greed—but also in the institutional realm, built into the economic, social and political structures of life.

“It is easy to point fingers at President Jacob Zuma or the African National Congress, but we know that in our families, neighbourhoods, business lives and in the corporate sector, corruption and injustice abound,” Fr Pollitt said.

He said that faith-based organisations, such as Pacsa, have a crucial role to play in South Africa today.

They need to practise discernment—individually and corporately—to come to a deeper understanding of the movements, aspirations and struggles of our

world today.

He warned that faith-based organisations need to guard against becoming “another NGO” which pursues a cause.

“What makes us different is that we are motivated by faith, and faith always offers hope because we are concerned about the human person in their totality,” Fr Pollitt said. “If we cannot offer our society and world hope, we have lost our very essence. Our social action needs to be ‘faith in action’ which inspires hope,” he said.

H

e suggested that the hardfought-for rights of the people of South Africa are being eroded.

“These rights were realised in the Constitution but are being undermined by ruling elites, by what some people call a one-party state.

There are two standards in the country: one for ruling elites and one for the rest.”

He told the gathering that faithbased organisations must energetically confront unjust structures and institutions that keep people poor, and work for integral development.

“But we are not just about changing structures, we must also help cultivate and generate new attitudes/convictions,” he said.

Fr Pollitt also said that faithbased organisations need to be an alternative voice to the pessimism and defeatism that permeates South Africa today.

“How can we name the problems but also balance that with the hope that our faith offers? We need to tell the good stories,” he said.

At the end of his talk Fr Pollitt suggested a number of problems that confront South Africa today which need urgent attention. Many of them, he emphasised, were underpinned by corruption. “That’s the cancer that is eating away at everything.”

He listed things like poor education, health care, racism and gender inequality, as among some critical issues SA needs to face.

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TTACKS on any group in South Africa are ultimately attacks on the fabric and values of our society, according to a statement issued by the Southern African Catholic Bishops’ Conference.

The bishops also “repudiate the use of violence to express grievance as it only leads to a cycle of more violence and deeper helplessness”.

The statement, signed by Bishop Frank Nubuasah of Francistown, Botswana, was issued to coincide with World Refugee Day. South Africans have been known and admired throughout the world for their spirit of forgiveness and reconciliation, the statement said.

“We demonstrated to the world that we could lift ourselves out of our divisions and establish a new basis for our society and democratic government,” it said. “Despite our past, we managed, with the help of

many other nations, to work through our differences in order to find a deeper shared identity out of which our nation was renewed.”

The attacks on migrants from other African countries therefore was a shock. “It may seem that the great ideals which bind us as a national community have been lost and we might be tempted to despair,” the statement said.

“We see these attacks unfortunately not as isolated incidents but rather as part of a larger process of turning inwards as a country, that is a result of fear of the unknown and a fear of taking steps definitively to resolve some of the issues which face us. It is also part of a continuing tendency to seek political expression through violence,” it said.

The bishops “call upon the Catholic community, and indeed all people of goodwill, to find practical constructive ways to live in a spirit of communion today, placing

ourselves at the service of the greater good”, the statement said.

“This spirit of communion is not merely a call to live with the migrant and refugee in our midst in a kind of enforced tolerance. It is firstly a call to all of us to reject all the forces that seek to separate us from our neighbour, that seek to make ethnic and other differences a cause of division and disharmony,” the bishops said.

“It is secondly a call to learn what contribution each person, who is uniquely called by God, can make to our community, and to find ways to enable that contribution to be made for it is only in this way that we fulfil our God-given purpose,” they said.

“All of us know in our hearts the potential that lies within our diverse society when it works together for a common goal. We ask that God’s Spirit guide all of us, no matter what our place or function.”

SA praise for pope’s new encyclical STAFF REPORTER

T

HE communications officer for the Southern African Catholic Bishops’ Conference said that with Pope Francis’ emphasis in his new encyclical, Laudato Si’, on taking responsibility for the environment’s wellbeing, South Africans will be challenged to do their part in conserving energy.

For example, Fr S’milo Mngadi told Catholic News Service, South Africa’s “electricity crisis cannot be solved simply through price hikes”, noting that “we need to move away from coal and find other sources of energy that are renewable”.

The encyclical, which will be translated into local languages and distributed to parishes in the SACBC region, “will serve to close the gap between spirituality and environmental responsibility”, Fr

Local reaction to the pope’s encyclical on the environment has been positive, supporting initiatives such as solar power.

Mngadi said.

“In South Africa, the focus on spirituality tends to make people aloof from day-to-day life,” he said.

“The pope reminds us that we are grounded here on earth.”

Laudato Si’ was also praised by an inter-faith environmental group.

The Southern African Faith Communities’ Environment Institute (SAFCEI) endorsed the pope’s call for systemic change, agreeing that “we are one earth, and that human societies should stand together in calling for solutions to heal the earth, not endanger it”.

“Africa, the cradle of humankind, stands to be the worst affected” by climate change, SAFCEI said in a statement.

The group called for an increased focus on renewable energy.

“We [South Africa] have the best solar resources in the world,” said Liz McDaid, energy and climate change consultant to SAFCEI. “Let us use these God-given gifts to heal the world. Let Africa lead!”

Combined African ordination held

BY FARAYI MATONdO

H

UNDREDS of people witnessed an ordination ceremony presided over by Archbishop Buti Tlhagale in Johannesburg’s Christ the King cathedral.

More than 600 people thronged the cathedral for a rare combined African ordination service as the Dominican Order of Southern Africa saw three servants ordained: Frs Damazio Ngoma and Mike Mwale to the priesthood, and Neil Mitchell to the diaconate.

Fr Ngoma is from Malawi, and Fr Mwale is from Zimbabwe.

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The ceremony included joint choirs, dancing, waving of hands, ululations and occasional whistling.

The liturgy was celebrated in English, Shona, Chewa and Ndebele.

In his homily, Archbishop Tlhagale said that those who are “serving in the name of Christ” exercise their office as teachers and shepherds. He reminded the ordinands: “The pulpit belongs to Christ.”

The archbishop said that priests “tend to forget what we have committed ourselves to”, and called on them to “serve with humility”.

“Empty yourselves. Strive to be like Our Lord,” he said, adding that

priests must be “less driven by our own personal wants”.

Dominican Father Lewis Tsuro, chaplain to the Zimbabwean Catholic community in South Africa said: “When you have ordinations in the Catholic Church, you always keep in mind the community—the local church we have found ourselves in.”

Fr Tsuro pointed out that Malawians, Zimbabweans and South Africans coming together in celebration was rare.

As a Dominican he said he was proud “to have more priests to our vocation”.

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The Southern Cross, July 1 to July 7, 2015

INTERNATIONAL

Family Synod document widens

BY LAURA IERACI

T Missionaries of Charity sisters gather around the body of Sr Nirmala Joshi, 80, inside a church in Kolkata, India. Sr Nirmala succeeded Bl Mother Teresa as the head of the Missionaries of Charity and expanded the movement overseas. (Photo: Rupak de Chowdhuri, Reuters)

Bishop: Let’s talk about married priests

BY MICHAEL KELLY

A

N Irish bishop has urged his colleagues to establish a commission to discuss the possibility of ordaining married men.

Bishop Leo O’Reilly of Kilmore also wants the Irish bishops’ conference to empower the commission to further study female deacons.

The proposal stemmed from a 10-month listening process that Bishop O’Reilly led in the Kilmore diocese, which led to a diocesan assembly and a new diocesan pastoral plan to tackle challenges facing the Church, including the declining number of priests.

Bishop O’Reilly told The Irish Catholic newspaper that he plans to ask that the idea of the new commission be discussed at the next meeting of the bishops’ conference in October and “take it from there”.

“I think the other bishops would be open to the idea of a discussion and we are reaching a situation where we have to look at all the options possible,” he said.

Bishop O’Reilly told the newspaper that his proposal came in response to Pope Francis.

“Pope Francis has encouraged individual bishops and bishops’ conferences to be creative in looking at ways to do ministry in the future,

so I think we have to consider all options,” he said.

The proposed commission would be similar to one in Brazil under the leadership of Cardinal Claudio Hummes, former prefect of the Congregation for the Clergy and retired archbishop of São Paulo, and Bishop Erwin Kräutler of Xingu, Brazil, to study the possibility of ordaining married men in response to the shortage of priests.

Mandatory celibacy for priests in the Latin rite of the Catholic Church is a matter of law and tradition, not doctrine or dogma.

Church authorities have at times given permission for married clerics of other Christian traditions who become Catholic to be ordained as priests.

Currently, the Catholic Church permits only men to be ordained as deacons. Permanent deacons can preach and preside at baptisms, funerals and weddings, but may not celebrate Mass or hear confessions.

Some historians say women deacons existed as a special category in the early history of the church.

However, a 2002 study by the International Theological Commission concluded that the role of female deacons was not the same as male deacons.—CNS

HE working document, intended to guide discussions at the Synod of Bishops on the family in October includes a much wider array of issues affecting the family than were in the final document released after the extraordinary synod last year.

Last year’s relatio had 62 paragraphs; the new working document, issued at the Vatican, has 147.

While some issues addressed in the relatio were expanded upon, more than a dozen others were entirely new and also based in the lived experiences of families, such as poverty, infertility, ecological degradation, bioethics, the role of women, the role of grandparents, ageing, loss, disability, migration, prayer and fear of commitment.

The elaboration of many of these themes was drawn from the recent catecheses of Pope Francis on the family, which he has been giving at his weekly general audiences since December. Other points drew on his apostolic exhortation, The Joy of the Gospel, and other speeches he has given.

On the issue of poverty, the working document noted “concrete family life is strictly linked with economic reality”. Rooted in the practical, it cited insufficient wages, unemployment and financial insecurity, lack of dignified work, job insecurity, human trafficking and slave labour as the “most relevant problems” facing families in the area of economics.

O

n women, the document said the condition and status of women are not consistent from culture to culture. In developing countries, women continue to be exploited and subjected to different forms of violence, including forced abortions and sterilisations or, at the other end of the spectrum, “wombs for rent” for surrogate motherhood, the document said.

In developed countries, it said, “women’s emancipation” has led women to renegotiating their roles

Cardinal Sean O’Malley of Boston, Pope Francis and Cardinal Laurent Monsengwo Pasinya of Kinshasa, Congo, arrive for a meeting in the synod hall at the Vatican last year. The working document for the Synod on the Family has been expanded to include a wider array of issues.

(Photo: Paul Haring/CNS) in the family, but also to their desire to have a child “at any cost”, which has “aggravated” the “inequality between men and women”.

I

n a separate sub-section on “cultural contradictions”, the document cited conflicting forms of feminism: one that sees “maternity as a pretext for the exploitation of the woman and an obstacle to her full realisation” and one that sees having a child as a “tool for self-affirmation, to obtain by any means”. Citing Pope Francis, the document noted the need to develop a “better understanding” of sexual difference.

The document acknowledged that a greater role for women in the Church in decision-making processes, in “the governance of certain [Church] institutions” and in the formation of priests “can contribute to the recognition of the decisive role of women”.

Ageing, widowhood and death were also new to the document.

Recognising the loneliness experienced by many elderly, the document said they must be more appreciated. Grandparents in particular have the important function

of offering their children and grandchildren support, a witness of faith and a sense of their roots.

On the experience of loss, the document said some widows and widowers are able to take on an “educative mission” with their children and grandchildren and experience a renewed sense of purpose in life. But such is not the case for all widows and widowers, who need the support of a Christian community, the document said.

Migration, and all of the traumas, cultural adjustments and losses associated with it, has also wreaked havoc on families, the working document said.

Families that have members with a disability are challenged not only by the disability, but also by the social stigma and the concern about how their loved one will be cared for once the main caregivers die, the document said, as it encouraged communities to be more welcoming of people with disabilities.

The document also noted a number of ecological issues that pose challenges to families, including a lack of access to clean water and the degradation of arable land for cultivation.—CNS

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INTERNATIONAL

Pope visits ‘icon of love’

BY LAURA IERACI

P

OPE Francis’ two-day pastoral trip to the northern Italian city of Turin included veneration of the Shroud of Turin as well as a commemoration of the 200th anniversary of the birth of St John Bosco.

During the trip, he spent private time with his Italian relatives who are from northern Italy; had lunch with juvenile detainees, immigrants and homeless people; visited with the sick; celebrated Mass in a major outdoor square; and met separately with workers, young people and members of the Salesians.

The pope’s visit to the shroud took place in silence and lasted only a few minutes, but his time of prayer and contemplation was marked with gestures of reverence and tenderness.

Revered by many as the burial cloth of Jesus, the shroud was the second stop on the pope’s packed itinerary—his first being a gathering in a public square with thousands of people from the world of work.

The pope did not give a speech in the cathedral of St John the Baptist, where the shroud is housed, but he described it later as an icon of Christ’s great love for humankind.

“The shroud draws [us] to the face and martyred body of Jesus and, at the same time, impels us towards the face of every suffering and unjustly persecuted person.

It impels us in the same direction as Jesus’ gift of love,” he said, making reference to the words of St Paul. The pope’s two most recent predecessors also visited the shroud: Pope Benedict XVI in 2010, calling it the “icon of Holy Saturday”, and Pope John Paul II in 1998.

In the afternoon, Pope Francis celebrated an outdoor Mass in one of Turin’s central squares, Piazza Vittorio. Officials estimated the crowd at 100 000 people.

During a visit to the Valdese temple the next day, the pope asked the Waldensians, whom the Catholic Church excommunicated and persecuted hundreds of years ago, for forgiveness.

“In the name of Jesus Christ, forgive us,” he said, making him the first pope in 800 years to visit a Waldensian place of worship.

“I ask you for forgiveness for the unChristian, even inhuman, attitude and behaviour that we had against you over history,” he said in his talk to the Waldensians and representatives of the Methodist, Evangelical, Lutheran and other Christian communities in Turin.

The pope called for Christian unity by making sure people focus on God first and differences later. Waldensian Pastor Euge-

Pope Francis touches the case holding the Shroud of Turin in the cathedral of St John the Baptist in Turin, Italy.

(Photo: Paul Haring/CNS) nio Bernardini told the pope his visit represented climbing over a wall that had been erected “eight centuries ago when the Waldensian movement was accused of heresy and excommunicated from the Roman Church”.

The pastor asked: “What was the sin of the Waldensians? Being a movement of evangelisation” by laypeople on the move, sharing the Bible in people’s native languages, rather than the Latin.

He gave the pope a reproduction of the very first Bible printed in French, which the Waldensians had commissioned in 1532.

T

he pope told young people at a gathering in in Piazza Vittorio how to live out real love and hold onto hope in a world that disrespects, uses and deceives people.

With so many wars being waged around the world, how can people trust today’s political candidates and global leaders to do something about it, especially if they have financial investments in the arms industry, he asked.

Being “two-faced is the currency of the day”, he said.

Vested interests are what kept many past atrocities from being stopped, he said, including being the reason why, during World War II, the Allies did not bomb rail lines being used to send Jews, Christians, Gypsies and homosexuals to concentration camps to be killed.

“If you trust only in men, you have

lost,” he told young people; instead, trust in Christ and go against the grain.

The pope then warned them he was going to make himself unpopular by using a word “no one likes”, but “sometimes the pope has to risk things in order to tell the truth”.

The word is “chaste”, he said, as love between two people has to be lived chastely.

“It is a love that considers the life of the other as sacred: I respect you, I don’t want to use you,” he said, adding he recognised “it’s not easy,” especially overcoming the current hedonist and “easy” concept of love.

When meeting with workers, employers and the unemployed, the pope emphasised the importance of saying “no” to a throwaway economy, the idolatry of money, corruption, and unfairness, which generates violence.

All members of society have to collaborate to make sure work doesn’t harm people’s dignity, puts the common good first, and strongly protects the rights of women, “who also carry the biggest burden in taking care of the home, children and older people”.

He said women “are still discriminated against, even at work,” he said.

P

ope Francis visited the sanctuary of Our Lady of Help of Christians, the site of St John Bosco’s home for poor and abandoned boys where he urged Salesian priests and sisters to teach kids to “not be afraid” and offer them practical training in key skills for “times of crisis” like the electrician and plumbing trades.

The order’s founder, St John Bosco, was born 200 years ago in the Turin region, and he was a pioneer in vocational education and worked with poor and abandoned children.

Pope Francis explained he had gone to a Salesian boarding school when his mother remained temporarily paralysed after giving birth to her fifth child. He said it was with the Salesians that “I learned to love Our Lady.”

“The Salesians helped me face life without fear and obsession, to move forward with joy and in prayer.”

During his brief time in Turin, the pope also visited the church where his paternal grandparents were married and where his father, Mario, was baptised. He spent time with six of his cousins and their families, about 30 relatives in all, the Vatican said.

The pope’s father and other family members, including his grandmother, Rosa, left for Argentina in 1929.—CNS

Christians call for justice in Galilee pilgrim church attack

BY JUdITH SUdILOVSKY

D

RUZE, Muslims and Jews joined thousands of Christians in a demonstration in Galilee after an arson attack seriously damaged the Benedictine church of the Multiplication in Tabgha, a popular pilgrim site.

The demonstrators carried large wooden crosses and Vatican flags and called for justice. At one point a group of young demonstrators blocked the access road to the church.

“We don’t seek revenge, but justice,” retired Latin Patriarch Michel Sabbah of Jerusalem said at a Mass celebrated at the church in Tabgha before the demonstration. Auxiliary Bishop Giacinto-Boulos Marcuzzo of Jerusalem concelebrated the Mass.

The blaze injured an elderly monk and a volunteer and destroyed the church’s roof while damaging a storage room, church offices and a prayer room.

Israel has said it would help with repairs.

The attack was likely perpetrated by radical Jewish settlers as part of the “price-tag” campaign of terrorist acts.

The Ha’aretz newspaper reported that ongoing attacks on churches have become a concern for police, who began intelligence work to identify activists

Fire damaged the Benedictine church of the Multiplication at Tabgha on the Sea of Galilee in Israel following an arson attack. (Photo: Catholic Church in Jerusalem/CNS) with violent intentions in May 2014, before Pope Francis’ visit to Israel.

However, perpetrators of the attacks

continue to elude investigators because they exist along the seam of extremist groups and religious theological groups, the report said. It noted that at the eye of the storm in Jerusalem are tensions at the Cenacle, which Christian tradition holds is the sight of Jesus’ last supper, while Jewish tradition believes that the chamber under it is the Tomb of David.

The Assembly of the Catholic Ordinaries of the Holy Land noted in a statement that the Tabgha attack is the third the Benedictine community in the Holy Land has suffered. One was on the Benedictine Dormition Abbey on Mount Zion near the Cenacle, where a fire was set in May 2014, just minutes after the departure of Pope Francis. The assembly noted that Benedictine monks on Mount Zion are incessantly the targets of “acts of contempt and violence”.

“Jews, Christians and Muslims together must fight against such manifestations of violence and extremism,” the statement said.

In recent months, other attacks were perpetrated against Christian sites or mosques and investigations were not followed up. Given the seriousness of these incidents, we demand immediate investigation, and the perpetrators of this act of vandalism be brought to justice.”—CNS

The Southern Cross, July 1 to July 7, 2015

5

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The Southern Cross, July 1 to July 7, 2015

LEADER PAGE LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

What may cause homosexuality

Editor: Günther Simmermacher

P

Selecting new bishops

I

N June, two news stories highlighted the method by which the pope selects bishops.

The process of selecting bishops in the Latin-rite Church usually follows this procedure: when a vacancy arises, the papal nuncio is tasked with identifying three nominees, after an unstipulated amount of consultation with stakeholders, including other bishops. This shortlist, called a terna, is then sent to the Vatican. The names may not be made public.

The Vatican’s Congregation for Bishops then reviews the names, in some cases by consulting with other offices, for example the Secretariat of State, if the appointment of a new bishop is politically sensitive. The bishops’ congregation may reject one or even all the names on the terna, ask for alternative nominees or add new names for consideration.

The congregation then advises the pope of its recommendation. In the case of very important dioceses, the pope might already have his own ideas. The final decision on the appointment is his alone.

For a long time in the early Church bishops were elected by the clergy and laity (to this day, the Church speaks of bishops being “elected”, when clearly they aren’t), though by the fourth century the process was already subject to the growing influence and veto of the metropolitan bishop.

In time, secular interests began to interfere in appointments. To diminish direct interference, the Church in the 12th century reformed the rules to the effect that the selection process excluded the laity. The plan did not work everywhere, with some political powers maintaining veto rights well into the last century.

These historical intricacies came to mind with the recent elevation of Archbishop Heiner Koch as the head of the Berlin archdiocese. It entailed a nonpublic and secret election process involving some clergy and laity, and even a veto option for local political powers.

While the veto right is a protocol formality that won’t be invoked, some Catholics in other countries voiced support for the idea of the laity’s direct involvement in electing new bishops.

A popular election of bishops would be a bad idea. Such a process could be tainted by lob-

The Editor reserves the right to shorten or edit published letters. Letters below 300 words receive preference. Pseudonyms are acceptable only under special circumstances and at the Editor’s discretion.

Name and address of the writer must be supplied. No anonymous letter will be considered.

bying, politicking and bickering—and in totalitarian states be subjected to temporal pressures.

Inevitably, the effect would be divisive.

Still, the opaque and unaccountable method by which bishops are presently selected does not always yield good fruits.

In recent years several bishops—in the United States and Ireland especially—have been pressured to resign because of their mishandling of abuse cases.

In June, US Archbishop John Nienstedt and his auxiliary bishop both resigned their positions as a result of the Vatican’s new rules governing episcopal failures in handling abuse cases.

Clearly, beside the many fine servants in the Catholic episcopate, there are some men who should never have become bishops. The problem is particularly glaring in regions where bishops were appointed not on merit, but because of the ideological positions they occupied and through patronage.

Moreover, the recent public protests against the archbishop of San Francisco show that the wrong bishop in the wrong place can divide the Church.

A bishop who is not accepted by most of the clergy and laity of his diocese cannot perform his ministry, especially where the faithful are forthright in their criticism. The selection of a new bishop, therefore, should be contingent on how his appointment will be accepted in the diocese.

Does the current process account sufficiently for this imperative? Is the lack of transparency in fact an obstacle to finding the right candidates?

While any process must take into account the circumstances of local churches, it might be governed by more standardised guidelines than currently, especially in the scope of consultation with local laity and clergy.

The faithful also have a right to a bishop. The reality of dioceses being vacant for long periods, sometimes years, is undesirable.

There is no reason why there should not be a successor in place when a bishop retires after having reached the age of 75, nor should a diocese need to be vacant for long when its bishop is being transferred to another diocese.

Much good would be accomplished by a judicious reform of the procedure by which bishops are nominated.

OPE Francis’s recent encyclical, Laudato Si’, chastises those who deny scientific findings instead of allowing their ethics to be influenced by the scientific consensus.

The temptation for us Christians to engage in scientific denialism is strong, because it often allows us to remain securely in a moral comfort zone. But scientific denialism— whether it relates to cosmology, evolution, ecology or human sexuality—seriously undermines our

Autonomy is not perfect freedom

D

OCTOR Vincent Couling’s use (June 10) of Rabbi Sasportas’ quotation (“Denial is pushing something out of your awareness. Anything you hide in the basement has a way of burrowing under the house and showing up on the front lawn”) to depict the “Catholic hierarchy” as the villain is rather bombastic.

The Catholic Church is not swayed nor does she arrive at her moral teachings and doctrines through secular vote counting or “mainstream scientific consensus”.

The learned doctor builds a strawman case for homosexual “minority variants”.

Found in the soup of modern culture is “man” who is imposing his disordered will on society and when found wanting, aims “his” weaponry at the moral edifice of the Church that is the “pillar and bulwark of truth” (1 Tim 3:15).

In Spe Salvi, Pope Benedict XVI sounds a warning: “The modern ideology of progress depends primarily on the dominion of human reason.

‘Progress’ occurs in overcoming all forms of dependency in the quest for perfect freedom, understood simply as human autonomy.

“The kingdom of reason is the new condition for the human race to attain total freedom: by virtue of their intrinsic goodness, ‘reason’ and ‘freedom’ guarantee a new and perfect human community that has overcome the shackles of faith and the Church.

“This ideology contains a revolutionary potential of explosive force, as we see in the subsequent political history of the West.”

Modernism is positing a counterfeit hope that disordered human conditions can be held up as good and acceptable as long as bystanders are not harmed by them.

The insatiable quest for absolute freedom of choice will eventually be shipwrecked on the shores of eternal damnation unless we ascend to the “unconditional love of God in Christ Jesus”.

Repentance, reconciliation, prayer and the regular receiving of the Eucharist is the medicine that over time chips away our “disor-

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credibility as messengers of Jesus.

Scientific evidence has accumulated over the last 50 years suggesting that homosexuality is determined at the so-called epigenetic level.

In layman’s terms, this means that homosexuality appears to be due to unpredictable chemical interactions that take place in utero and influence how cells reproduce after a foetus’s inherited genetic structure is in place. A recent survey of evidence by the Academy of Sci-

dered inclinations”—desires such as lust, hatred, power, and the false promises presented by Satan.

The promise of true hope is found in Christ Jesus and the Church he founded on St Peter.

Henry Sylvester, Cape Town

Read Bible on gay relationships

I

N his letter Dr Vincent Couling writes: “The mainstream scientific consensus is that being gay or lesbian is not a mental illness but a normal human sexual orientation.”

Really? How does he arrive at such an opinion? Was there some sort of questionnaire/referendum properly conducted and if so could Dr Couling give us the details?

In an article in the magazine Love One Another, Dr Gerhard JM van den Aardweg states: “Homosexuality is not an inherited trait. It has no genetic origins: nor is it caused by disorders of the endocrine system or peculiar structure of the brain. The homosexual orientation is the consequence of an arrested emotional or personality development resulting from psychological deformation incurred during childhood or youth”.

Only one of these statements is right—but which one? Perhaps readers who are knowledgeable on this issue, and qualified to comment, could enlighten us.

Dr Couling also refers to “some inscrutable philosophical reason” for the Church’s teaching, but I would disagree with this and here I would recommend reading Pope John Paul II’s “Theology of the Body”—but with an open mind.

We will find that far from being complicated, this great saint has explained God’s teaching on our sexuality simply and using the Bible by way of explanation. Adding the Catechism of the Catholic Church to one’s reading will do no harm!

Why do those who support abortion, same-sex unions, euthanasia and the like never quote the Bible in support of their stands but often distort facts to suit their agendas (such as Cardinal Walter Kasper with the Synod on the Family!)?

Deacon Mike Harrington, Johannesburg

Sexual sin

J

UST a thought in reply to Dr Couling’s letter. The solution to all sexual sin has been taught to us ordinary sinners for two millennia: “Stay away from temptation”.

Same-sex marriage, cohabitation and so on are akin to willingly entering into temptation with, more often than not, a sinful outcome.

And that’s all there is to it.

Maria Kruger, Plettenberg Bay

Irish referendum

D

OCTOR Vincent Couling gives the scientific method some questionable authority and dismisses the philosophical basis of the Church’s teaching for being “inscrutable”.

A scientific study or survey, as Dr Couling attempts to use the recent Irish referendum, cannot say anything about morality, and because the Church’s is a moral argument, his argument fails.

A kind of category mistake is committed. If, by a parity of Dr Couling’s reasoning, science found

ence of South Africa (ASSAf) is available at www.assaf.co.za.

Surely these findings must profoundly influence how we think and talk about LGBT people (not least, the many gay teenagers who suffer excruciating feelings of rejection).

Assertions that “the Church has always taught…” or “the Bible says…” accompanied by facile endorsements of the Catechism to treat gays with respect are often in danger of sounding like the apartheid government enjoining us to treat blacks with respect.

Derrick Kourie, Pretoria that bestiality or paedophilia were “regularly occurring” among human beings, would it make both morally acceptable? Similarly, if, by survey, it was found that most people thought Jews were sub-human, as in 1930s Nazi Germany, would there be no problem? The collapse of the argument should be clear.

Secondly, the rejection of “an essential human nature that is unconditionally normative” has its roots firmly in the Cartesian “I think therefore I am”; Kantian transcendentalism; Sartrean existentialism; and many of the other philosophical myths of the last five centuries or so.

To my mind, though, all this drama is predicted in the Garden of Eden: man turns away and rejects the objectively Real in favour of that which is the product of Man and his doing. As the sense of wonder, which ironically gave rise to the sciences, wanes with the retreat from the “inscrutable” into the subjective and artificial, life becomes banal.

While the result of the Irish referendum is cause for much reflection, it is not an answer to a moral question. Moral questions need moral answers. This is the great wonder of life!

Wade Seale, Cape Town

Ask theologians

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HE assertions in Dr Vincent Couling’s letter as emanating from the results of the Irish majority referendum in favour of same sex marriage beg some questions.

Dr Couling quotes Canon 1084– 3 which forms part of the chapter dealing with the specific diriment (nullifying) impediments of antecedent and perpetual impotence.

As he states, the canon deals with sterility, neither prohibiting nor nullifying the marriage. Thus the context of the canon is in relation to physical inability of partners to carry out the act of marriage, or to generate life resultant to the act.

The canon is constructed to deal with the issue of impotent and infertile partners—not with the issue of potent and fertile partners. Thus, to use the canon as a support for the issue of potent fertile same sex partners is to use canon 1084-3 in a canonically incorrect context.

I would like to answer Dr Couling’s rhetorical question (“Dare we…”), in which “we” presumably refers to accredited canon lawyers and/or moral theologians, to whose number I do not belong.

Yes, Dr Couling, the theologians would be well advised to have the courage of their convictions, for it is they who will be called upon to render an account of their stewardship in this regard; not the denizens of the Emerald Isle.

We, the Catholic rank and file, should keep them in our prayers rather than flirt with semantics or extra-contextual quotations. We need to change our disposition; not our laws.

Luky Whittle, Kroonstad Opinions expressed in The Southern Cross, especially in Letters to the Editor, do not necessarily reflect the views of the Editor or staff of the newspaper, or of the Catholic hierarchy. The letters page in particular is a forum in which readers may exchange opinions on matters of debate.

Letters must not be understood to necessarily reflect the teachings, disciplines or policies of the Church accurately.

Letters can be sent to PO Box 2372, Cape Town 8000 or editor@scross.co.za or faxed to 021 465-3850

The Southern Cross, July 1 to July 7, 2015

PERSPECTIVES Judith Turner

As I’m getting older...

W hy do we have to grow old?

Why did God design us to grow old?

During my childhood years I never thought of time. My friends and I were just living and having fun and time was slipping through our fingers.

We never gave a second thought to what month it was, what year it was and how old we were. We were unaware that time was passing by. That is why a lot of things seem like it happened yesterday.

It feels like I got married not long ago, that I had my babies not long ago, that I started my career not long ago. But it all did happen a long time ago.

As we are ageing we ask ourselves: how did I get here so fast? Where did the years and my youth go? I remember seeing older people throughout the years and thinking they were years ahead of me, and that 40 or 50 or 60 was so far off that I could not imagine what it would be like.

Now, my friends and I all fall into these age groups and our hair is starting to grey. We share remedies for all forms of aches and pains and we laugh about how we are getting old. Some of my friends are in better and others in worse shape than I am—but in all of us I see a great change. We say to each other that we are now the older folks we used to see in others.

If you are at the start of the winter of your life then you have a great opportunity to shape this part of your life. Whatever you still wish to accomplish, get on with it and do it. Do not procrastinate and put things off for too long. This life has a dreamlike quality and goes by amazingly quickly.

Do what you can today. There is no promise that you will see as many seasons of life as others may. That is okay, too.

Live for today and say all the things you want to tell your loved ones while you have time to do so. This will help them to appreciate and love you even more for yourself, and not only for the things you have done for them over the years.

T

he beautiful part about this stage is that life has taught us a few lessons.

And good ones. We are now more confident, we know who we are, we know what is good for us and what isn’t. We have more knowledge. We are emotionally more intelligent. We are able to make decisions with more confidence. We have learnt great lessons through relationships and we appreciate the good relationships we still have. We understand the impor-

“Now that our hair is starting to grey, we share remedies for all forms of aches and pains and laugh about how we are getting old.” (Photo: morguefile)

Saints of Christian Unity

A

Pope Paul VI and Patriarch Athenagoras attend a prayer service in Jerusalem in January 1964. (Photo: Giancarlo Giuliani/ Catholic Press Photo/CNS) Great Schism of 1054.

Another fruit was the Catholic-Orthodox Joint Declaration of 1965, which was read out on December 7, 1965, simultaneously at a public meeting of the Second Vatican Council in Rome and at a special ceremony in Istanbul.

Although the schism did not end, it was a big step, a sign of willingness to take a new path of friendship and reconciliation.

It opened the door to many other later forms of collaboration in pursuit for unity.

T

here was joy in the recognition of the many riches shared by the two churches: the faith and the sacraments.

Thus, they could talk of Two Sister Churches fundamentally related, surpassing all the differences that may have arisen out of canonical, political and doctrinal variation that had precipitated the division.

In their declaration Paul VI and Athenagoras I regretted the offensive

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tance of being present to the spirit who dwells within us and we have learnt a few ways of how to listen to the spirit.

I have to admit that I do have some regrets. Mostly they are about the things I wish I hadn’t done, but also those I should have done. I comfort myself in the hope that this is balanced by the many things I am glad I did. When you take stock of your life, you may find the same.

And as the winter of your own life is likely to sneak up on you in no time at all, make the most of every day that God grants you and enjoy it as much as you can. Don’t forget to have some fun and be content with whatever comes your way.

No matter what may happen to you, the acceptance that all our experiences serve a wise and higher purpose can turn each day into a good one.

Every day each of us can say: “Today is the oldest I have ever been. With this new age I will be better than my previous self.”

Live healthily and remind yourself every so often that nothing in our present existence truly belongs to any of us.

Only who we are and what we are is important and has power and value—not what we have. A happy and loving heart and a peaceful accepting mind are the only wealth in this life that is worth acquiring.

The ageing process turns us into good people and that is God’s plan with old age.

Fr Evans Chama M.Afr

The border-crossing pope S a young priest, Fr Giovanni Montini was appointed to serve in the pope’s diplomatic mission in Poland.

One experience from that time that weighed on him heavily was what he considered to be an excessive nationalism, betrayed in the attitude which considered strangers as enemies. People closed borders to wrap around themselves.

It was big relief to him when he was recalled to Rome. “This concludes this episode of my life, which has provided useful though not always joyful experiences,” he recorded.

Indeed, as response to the “suffocation” of isolationism, Giovanni Montini would later consecrate himself to opening frontiers.

In 1963 Cardinal Montini became Pope Paul VI, succeeding John XXIII who had convoked the Second Vatican Council but died shortly thereafter (Pope John featured in this series last month).

Paul VI presided over the council until its conclusion in December 1965. He also oversaw the implementation of the council’s resolutions until his death at 80 in August 1978.

He remained faithful and kept burning the torch of reconciliation and unity put aflame by John XXIII. One monumental event of Paul VI’s pontificate was his meeting with the Orthodox ecumenical patriarch of Constantinople, Athenagoras I, in Jerusalem in 1964.

Pope Paul VI was the first pope in centuries to meet the heads of various Eastern Orthodox faiths. The meeting with Athenagoras, the “first among equals” in the Orthodox Church, bore fruit by annulling the mutual condemnations and the subsequent excommunications of the

Faith and Life

words, the reproaches and the gestures on both sides that accompanied the sad events of the schism. So they removed both from memory and from the midst of the Church the sentences of excommunication and committed these to oblivion.

Finally, they deplored all the subsequent events that led to a breakdown of mutual trust, and thus the break of communion between the two churches.

During his visit to Rome in 1967, Patriarch Athenagoras I recaptured the encounter in Jerusalem three years earlier in the wisdom of oriental poetical language, hailing Paul VI as one who brought “from the West to the East the kiss of love and peace”.

That 1964 meeting was so momentous that last year Pope Francis and the current patriarch of Constantinople, Bartholomew, met in Jerusalem to commemorate its 50th anniversary.

Pope Paul VI directed the gaze of reconciliation also to the Anglican Church.

He became only the second pope to meet an Anglican archbishop of Canterbury, Dr Michael Ramsey, in 1966, following the visit of Archbishop Geoffrey Fisher to Pope John XXIII in 1960.

Paul VI was a good friend of the Anglican Church, which he described as “our beloved sister Church”. Along with Archbishop Ramsey, he encouraged the foundation of the Anglican Centre in Rome.

Pope Paul’s legacy is that of all the “Saints of Christian Unity”: to dare crossing the borders of division. n Next month, the final “Saint of Christian Unity” in this series will be Patriarch Athenagoras I.

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7

Michael Shackleton

Open door

Are Church-approved miracles credible?

Some of my friends believe that Jesus performed miracles, because the Bible says so, but they find it hard to believe that the Church accepts that miracles happen, such as in the cause of the canonisation of saints. They say the Church’s word is not as credible as the word of God. Can you comment, please?

H Ferreira

R

EAD John 11 where Jesus learns that his friend Lazarus is ill and, later, that he has died. When Jesus goes to Bethany, Martha gently chides him, saying if he had been there sooner, her brother would not have died. Notice how much faith she had in Jesus and acknowledged him as the Christ, the Son of God. Some of the crowd around Lazarus’s tomb had the same expectation that Jesus could have prevented Lazarus’ death: “Could not he who opened the eyes of the blind man have kept this man from dying?”

Their confidence was rewarded when he called the dead man from the tomb and presented him to his sisters alive. Many doubting Jews then believed in him, but some of them ran off to the Pharisees, afraid that if too many applauded the “signs” that Jesus performed, the Romans would retaliate and punish the people.

All saw the same spectacular event, a man dead for four days being restored to life. Their reactions were poles apart. Those who had faith in Jesus, and those who were moved to faith in him, understood at once that raising a dead man to life was the “sign” of God’s presence and power.

Those who, notwithstanding the magnificence of a miracle, ran off to report Jesus to the Pharisees, saw no such sign. Their motive was political. The great things Jesus said and did, they apparently considered to be crowd-attracting stunts that would bring down the anger of their Roman overlords.

In many places in the gospels Jesus indicated that he wanted people to show faith in him. He performed miracles in response to those who believed he could. He did not work many miracles where there was lack of faith (Mt 13:58).

When the Church, after thorough investigation, attests that miraculous cures have been granted through the intercession of a saintly person, it does so in the same tradition as the miracles described in the gospels. The Church’s word in this case may not be as credible as the gospels but there is the same faith in Christ, faith in prayer and the certainty that these signs declare that God is still present with us.

Accepted miraculous events challenge our faith in Christ. They are much more than mere remarkable incidents that can be shrugged off as inexplicable because their cause is obscure.

n Send your queries to Open Door, Box 2372, Cape Town,

8000; or e-mail: opendoor@scross.co.za; or fax (021) 465 3850. Anonymity can be preserved by arrangement, but questions must be signed, and may be edited for clarity. Only published questions will be answered.

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8

The Southern Cross, July 1 to July 7, 2015

COMMUNITY

The Men For Change group from St Mary Magdalene parish in Lentegeur, Cape Town, attended a day of spiritual reflection at CBC Centre in Stellenbosch. Maud Stellenboom of the chancery office facilitated the retreat. Chimese Abraham OMI from Zambia and Johannes Hausiku from Namibia were ordained to the diaconate at St Joseph’s parish in Cedara, Pietermaritzburg. They are pictured with Bishop Evans Chinyama Chinyemba OMI from Zambia (second left), deacon Stephen SCJ and Oblate community superior Fr Joseph Phiri.

Consolata missionary vocational director Fr daniel Kibuwa visited the Ethiopian and Eritrean Catholic community at Holy Rosary parish in Tembisa, Pretoria. Mass was celebrated in thanksgiving and included a renewal of marriage vows, a celebration of the first-year anniversary of Hailu Adalo as community coordinator, and an observance of refugee and immigrants month. (From Left) Catechist demeka Lamnigo, married couple Mr Adimaso and Mrs Stion, community coordinator Hailu Adalo, Fr Kibuwa and group chairperson Tesama Haile.

Catholic Charismatic Renewal in the Western Cape held its annual archdiocesan growth seminar at Our Lady of Fatima parish in Bellville, Cape Town. The seminar, opened by Archbishop Stephen Brislin, lasted eight days and included a youth presentation by Sean Lategan, a vibrant Pentecost Mass concelebrated by Fr Ralph de Hahn, Fr Peter-John Pearson and Fr Mari Joseph and praise and worship by the music ministries of Belhar, Athlone, Mitchells Plain, Manenberg, Bonteheuwel and durbanville parishes.

Kenny and Bernadette Fernandez on a pilgrimage to the Holy Land with the Charismatic Renewal group from Cape Town, are pictured near Jericho with the Mount of Temptations in the background.

Married couples renewed their wedding vows at the Wedding Sanctuary in Cana, Galilee, during a pilgrimage to the Holy Land.

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Five Franciscan brothers made their First Profession after the year’s novitiate in Zimbabwe. They are seen here with minister provincial Fr david Barnard, who received them into the Order of Friars Minor.

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Fr John Johnson CO with the Brothers of the Blessed Sacrament sodality after Corpus Christi Mass at St Joseph’s parish in Bloemfontein.

POPE FRANCIS

The Southern Cross, July 1 to July 7, 2015

9

Why pope’s new letter is a game-changer Pope Francis’ encyclical Laudato Si’ has opened up a new chapter in the Catholic Church. Fr RUSSELL POLLITT SJ analyses the groundbreaking document.

I

F you think that Pope Francis’ new encyclical Laudato Si’ (“Praise be to You”) is about climate change, you are mistaken. It is about conversion—the conversion of hearts and lifestyles.

The pope does not say anything environmentalists and scientists have not already said. Laudato Si’ is revolutionary because it marks a massive shift in Catholic thinking on the relationship between human beings and the earth. In time it may be politically influential but it is already theologically revolutionary.

It is also the latest authoritative contribution to Catholic Social Teaching and, significantly, is addressed to “every person on the planet”.

The Southern African bishops are also quoted. In paragraph #14 Francis quotes our bishops: “Everyone’s talents and involvement are needed to redress the damage caused by human abuse of God’s creation.”

Papal encyclicals normally quote other popes, the Bible or the Catechism. In this document, 21 out of the 172 footnotes quote bishops’ conferences from around the world.

And, significantly, the majority of the citations are from conferences in the global south.

This indicates that Francis is listening carefully to the Church throughout the world and, importantly, to the Church on the margins. It also sends a strong message about centralised control.

For anyone who thinks that Pope Francis and his predecessor, Benedict XVI, are not on the same page, think again. The encyclical is scattered with references to Benedict and takes up a number of themes he often spoke of: ecology,

A farmer tends to his field on a dry plain in Mali, Africa. Pope Francis’ encyclical Laudato Si’ speaks about the effect of climate change. It also has relevance for Southern Africa, whose bishops he quotes. (Photo: Nic Bothma, EPA/CNS) relativism and human hope.

Like Benedict, Pope Francis strongly critiques the international community, saying that recent world summits have failed to reach effective global agreements on the environment. He answers his critics—who say he should not be meddling in science—by asserting that the ecological crisis is not just a scientific one, but also a crisis of humanity.

Pope Francis writes in an accessible manner. Only 28 pages of the encyclical’s 184 are an uncomfortable analysis of environmental problems. The majority of the document is theological.

Francis makes the radical claim that human life is centrally defined by the human-earth relationship.

How you relate to other people and the earth is as important as how you relate to God. The pope explicitly rejects an interpretation of Genesis that suggests that people have “dominion” over the earth. Nature, he says, is not an instrumental good; humans are in a relationship of mutual responsibility with it.

Francis seeks an “integral ecol-

ogy” that brings together human, social, cultural, economic and environmental issues. He focuses on an integral ecology as a new paradigm for justice. He says that the Church must introduce, in her teaching about sin, the sin against the environment: “ecological sin”.

T

he pope makes it clear that the ecological crisis goes hand in hand with the spread of social injustice: “The earth, our home, is beginning to look more and more like an immense pile of filth” because of “unfettered greed and out-of-control consumption”.

Francis uses many examples and says: “We are not faced with two separate crises, one environmental and the other social, but rather one complex crisis which is both social and environmental.”

He further says: “The analysis of environmental problems cannot be separated from the analysis of human, family, work-related and urban contexts, and of how individuals relate to themselves.”

The pope calls on all people to commit themselves to the common good, in solidarity with those on

the margins and with a preferential option for the poor. He says that this would be the best way of caring for future generations: by committing to caring for the poor today.

In the penultimate chapter Pope Francis suggests lines of approach and appropriate action, as analyses are no longer enough.

He says that the Church does not pretend to have all the answers but what he wants is dialogue that leads to action. He suggests there be forms and instruments put in place for global governance: “an agreement on systems of governance for the whole range of the so-called ‘global commons’.”

Francis insists on the development of honest and transparent decision-making processes, so that policies and business initiatives can bring about “genuine integral development”.

He calls for proper environmental impact studies and warns that corruption, which conceals the actual environmental impact of a given project in exchange for favours, usually produces specious agreements that fail to inform adequately and do not allow for full debate.

However, care of the planet is not just for world bodies and governments. Francis says: “Happiness means knowing how to limit some needs which only diminish us, and being open to the many different possibilities which life can offer.”

In this way, he says, “we must regain the conviction that we need one another, that we have a shared responsibility for others and the world, and that being good and decent are worth it.”

The pope invites everyone—families, schools and the media—to ecological conversion and says that education and training are key challenges to this conversion. He says that the starting point should be a new lifestyle that brings “healthy pressure to bear on those who wield political, economic and social power”.

Pope Francis says “an integral ecology is also made up of simple daily gestures which break with the

logic of violence, exploitation and selfishness.”

Laudato Si’ is significant for a number of reasons. The pope identifies many of the issues the world faces—ecological and social—as “spiritual problems”. He, therefore, underlines the fact that our lifestyle choices are part of our spirituality and we all have responsibility to create an “ecological citizenship”.

It brings about a synthesis between Catholic theology and the ecological movement. This is new and therefore many theologians see Laudato Si’ as a major step forward in Catholic thinking which goes far beyond the confines of the institutional Church.

The encyclical is relevant to believers and non-believers because concern for the earth is a concern for humanity at large.

This opens the door and awakens new possibilities for relationships with people who may not have had any relationship with the Church. It challenges people across religious, political and social divides and brings into question a number of the presuppositions and positions anyone might hold on the ecological question.

It broadens what many theologians have thought to be a narrowly focused morality of the Church in recent years: human sexuality alone. Francis invites the Church to a new way of seeing social morality, which has, at its core, the human person.

Laudato Si’ addresses many of the big questions South Africa faces: poverty, unemployment, corruption, poor leadership, and, yes, even Eskom indirectly.

The pope asks us to think about how we build our houses, how we structure our economy, what we do to make profits in our business ventures, how we spend profits, what we teach in our classrooms, how we use water and electricity and how we treat the person begging us for help at the traffic light.

What, we should ask, must I change in my lifestyle today? n Fr Russell Pollitt SJ is the director of the Jesuit Institute South Africa.

In Pope Francis’ words...

T

HE following are selected quotes from Pope Francis’ encyclical letter, Laudato Si’, on Care for Our Common Home:

The earth, our home, is beginning to look more and more like an immense pile of filth.

The entire material universe speaks of God’s love, his boundless affection for us. Soil, water, mountains: everything is, as it were, a caress of God. Because of us, thousands of species will no longer give glory to God by their very existence, nor convey their message to us. We have no such right.

Doomsday predictions can no longer be met with irony or disdain.

We may well be leaving to coming generations debris, desolation and filth.

Leaving an inhabitable planet to future generations is, first and foremost, up to us.

Many things have to change course, but it is we human beings above all who need to change.

This is the way human beings contrive to feed their self-destructive vices: trying not to see them, trying not to acknowledge them, delaying the important decisions and pretending that nothing will happen.

We know that technology based on the use of highly polluting fossil fuels—especially coal, but also oil and, to a lesser degree, gas—needs to be progressively replaced without delay.

“Less is more.” A constant flood of new consumer goods can baffle the heart and prevent us from cherishing each thing and each moment.

In reality, those who enjoy more and live better each moment are those who have given up (grazing) here and

Pilgrimage to Medjugorje led by Fr. Kenke & Fr. Lekhema 22 September – 06 October 2015 R21 995 incl. Airport taxes Beatification of Benedict Daswa 12 – 14 September 2015 Cost available upon request

there, always on the lookout for what they do not have.

This situation has led to a constant schizophrenia, wherein a technocracy which sees no intrinsic value in lesser beings coexists with the other extreme, which sees no special value in human beings.

It is clearly inconsistent to combat trafficking in endangered species while remaining completely indifferent to human trafficking, unconcerned about the poor, or undertaking to destroy another human being deemed unwanted.

Since everything is interrelated, concern for the protection of nature is also incompatible with the justification of abortion.

The acceptance of our bodies as God’s gift is vital for welcoming and accepting the entire world as a gift from the Father and our common home, whereas thinking that we enjoy absolute power over our own bodies turns, often subtly, into thinking that we enjoy absolute power over creation. n For an overview of Laudato Si’, visit www.scross.co.za/2015/06/laudato-si/

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10

The Southern Cross, July 1 to July 7, 2015

PERSONALITY

Popular comedian takes Catholic faith on stage Comedian Jim Gaffigan is a rare thing: his Catholic faith is part of his stand-up routine. MARK PATTISON speaks to the comic, actor and author, as well as to Mrs Gaffigan.

C

OMEDIAN Jim Gaffigan, an actor known both for his funny books like Dad Is Fat (which was on The New York Times bestseller’s list for three months) and Food: A Love Story and his inclusion of his Catholicism in his standup routines, has a close collaborator: his wife Jeannie.

“We’re truly partners,” Jeannie Gaffigan said. That partnership has even extended to working together on a new sitcom that is being launched in the US on July 15, The Jim Gaffigan Show, of which the couple are the executive producers.

Jeannie doesn’t finish his sentences, but she can finish his jokes.

“I can write in Jim’s voice well,” she said. “I can understand his views about bacon. They’re not my point of view about bacon, but I know how his point of view is funnier.”

Jim talks a lot about bacon. A sample line: “What makes breakfast in bed so special is you’re lying down and eating bacon, the most beautiful thing on earth.”

“For comedians to have a writing partner is very rare,” Jim said. “I was rather reluctant to get in with anyone. But Jeannie was so good.”

A sneak peek of the show can be

viewed on Jim’s website (www.jimgaffigan.com).

The couple’s collaboration started with a short-lived sitcom from 2000, Welcome to New York.

Writing for TV, Jeannie said, “was something he was not familiar with, and I was. I was running a not-for profit theatre company. We lived on the same block. Jim asked me to help him work on scripts. I was glad to do so. We started working together, and we really just connected. We’re really creative people.

We both like to work a lot. We both added to each other’s skill sets. That professional relationship coincided with a romantic relationship.”

Speaking about their budding romance, Jim recalls: “I lived across from this church where [later] I got married in and our kids got baptised in.

“I didn’t go in this church for 15 years. And then I met Jeannie. I had this romantic notion of having a lot of kids; I’m one of six. I would walk

by Jeannie, and she would get pregnant.”

The Gaffigans now have five children—daughters Marre and Katie Louise, and three sons, Jack, Michael, and Patrick—and they live in a two-room apartment in Manhattan.

Their family, and their faith, will figure in the show. Jim stars as a fictionalised version of himself as a stand-up comedian raising five children in a two-bedroom New York City apartment—so the show is “really is a reflection of our lives,” he noted.

One of the characters is a foreign-born priest whom Jeannie said “will be Jim’s ‘Jiminy Cricket’,” a

Pilgrimage Highlights

• Explore Krakow, the city of St John Paul’s student and priestly life, just two months before World Youth Day. • Wadowice, St John Paul’s birthplace, on his birthday!

• Czechostowa with Black Madonna • Divine Mercy Sanctuary with the tomb of St Faustina and the original painting of the Divine Mercy image • Kalwaria Zebrzydowska, with the miraculous icon of Our Lady of Calvary • Niepokalanow, the Franciscan monastery of St Maximilian Kolbe • Mass in a chapel carved out of rock in the Wieliczka Salt Mine • Zakopane, with wooden chapel of Our Lady of Fatima

Jim Gaffigan, the comic actor known both for his funny books and his inclusion of his Catholicism in his stand-up routines. (Photo courtesy of TV Land) reference to the conscience-prodding insect from the Disney movie Pinocchio.

T

he production deal gives the Gaffigans a lot of unusual freedom.

“Pick a comedy you don’t like, and I’m sure there’s a dozen people you can blame. If you don’t like this show,” Jim said, “there’s only two people to blame, Jim and Jeannie— and it’s obviously Jeannie’s fault!”

The role of Jeannie is played by Ashley Williams, who perhaps is best known for her role of baker Victoria on the sitcom How I Met Your Mother.

Various comedians will appear as fictionalised versions of themselves, including Chris Rock and Dave Attell.

Jim, 48, is asked frequently about bringing Catholicism into his comedy and working “clean”, meaning using no profanity.

“The Catholic thing, it’s very much evolved. I don’t think comedians set out to do a certain style of comedy. I messed around with different styles of stand-up when I started, and you always end up doing what your personality is. In

real life I may curse occasionally. I don’t curse [in the act] because it’s not necessary to curse,” he said.

“I was raised a kind of cultural Catholic. And now I’m somebody who’s much more of a Catholic than even my family indicated I would be. The evolution of that as a topic of comedy has constantly surprised me,” he said.

“But I never imagined I would be the father of five. I never imagined I would be associated with doing food jokes, either. It’s not like we really have this much control over this path.”

Jeannie, 45, is a native of Milwaukee, and Jim is originally from Illinois. The couple has been married since 2003.

Jim has said in interviews he will probably forever be known as “the Hot Pockets guy” for a popular comic routine he did in 2005 about a fast food item in the US (“You can have a Hot Pocket for breakfast, a Hot Pocket for lunch, and be dead by dinner.”)

But what if he had a say in how he’d like to be remembered?

“I think that comedians just want to be known as funny. All the other characteristics are—Hot Pockets or ‘clean comic’—I just want to be considered funny. Not like-aclown funny, but insightful funny,” he said.

“Hopefully, when it’s all said and done, I want to be remembered as a decent father and husband. But when it comes to comedians, just funny.”—CNS

The comedy of Jim Gaffigan I think it’d be great if you had a kid that ended up being pope.

That would be the ultimate bragging rights. “Oh, your son’s a doctor? Yeah, ours is pope. Oh, they have a house? He has his own city.”

I used to have a lot of faith in humanity before the advent of the website ‘comment’ section.

When you don’t drink, people always need to know why. They’re like, “You don’t drink? Why?” This never happens with anything else. “You don’t use mayonnaise?

Why? Are you addicted to mayonnaise? Is it OK if I use mayonnaise?”

I was watching the Animal Planet. Did you know that the male seahorse has the baby?

Why don’t they just call that one the female?

How did we get to the point where we’re paying for bottled water? That must have been some weird marketing meeting over in France. Some French guy’s sitting there, like, “How dumb do I think the Americans are? I bet you we could sell those idiots water.”

I never have free time. You ever go to the cash machine, there’s two people in line in front of you—you get kind of flustered? You’re like, “Forget it!

I’m not standing here for 40 seconds. I’ve got things to do.”

Wouldn’t it have been weird to go to high school with the pope?

You know, somebody did, someone’s sitting at home, watching TV in Poland, they see the pope, they think: “That guy was a jerk! He was so mean to me and now he’s pope?

Retirement Home, Rivonia, Johannesburg Tel:011 803 1451 www.lourdeshouse.org

I got a swirly from the pope!”

My wife always brings up “camping’s a tradition in my family”. Hey, it was a tradition in everyone’s family until we came up with the house.

The song goes, “Morning has broken”, and I’m pretty sure my children broke it. Like everything else they break, if they did break it, they’ll never admit it.

I guess the reasons against having more children always seemed uninspiring and superficial. What exactly am I missing out on? Money? A few more hours of sleep? A more peaceful meal? More hair? These are nothing compared to what I get from these five monsters who rule my life…each one of them has been a pump of light into my shriveled black heart.

Frail/assisted care in shared or single rooms.

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CLASSIFIEDS Bessie lost her husband Tony tragically in 1960. She laboured valiantly to run their barber shop in Maraisburg after Tony’s death, also running the home and raising her four children, Alex, Joan, Anthony and Margaret. At the time Margaret was only five.

Of Lebanese descent, Bessie paid a visit to the Holy Land and Lebanon in the 1970s where she made a special pilgrimage to the tomb of St Charbal Markhouf.

The funeral Mass was held at the church of St John the Apostle in Florida on June 23.

John Lee

Bessie Joseph

B

ESSIE (Fagri) Joseph died, aged 96, in June after a fall at Nazareth House in Yeoville, Johannesburg. She was a great-great-great grandmother.

Mrs Joseph had been living at Nazareth House for the past two years.

She was well known in local Catholic circles, particulary in Florida where she was a member of the parish of St John the Apostle (formerly St Bruno’s) on the West Rand.

Bessie Joseph was an indefatigable member of the Legion of Mary over many years and a lifelong client of our Blessed Mother.

Along with the late Cynthia Tuckett and the late Mollie Walsh she did much to spread the Legion in this area as an important tool of Catholic evangelisation over the years.

She was a perfectionist, as all those who knew her would attest to, and demanded perfection in all the work she did.

CLASSIFIEDS

A

The documents will be shipped to the Congregation for Saints’ Causes at the Vatican.

If the findings are accepted, recognising Fr Flanagan’s heroic virtues, he will be declared “venerable”.

Numerous people have worked on the sainthood cause “diligently and respectfully over several years”, Archbishop Lucas said.

“The result of all this good work is wrapped up in these boxes,” he said.

The cause for sainthood is about more than promoting Boys

Town or its founder, he said.

“We’re trying to discover what God has accomplished in this holy priest, who allowed God to use him as his instrument.”

Fr Flanagan cared for the physical and spiritual wellbeing of children, Archbishop Lucas said.

And that ministry continues today at Boys Town, meeting the changing needs of youths, he said.

Boys Town has spread across the world since Fr Flanagan’s day.

In South Africa, Boys Town and Girls Town are located at Magaliesburg in Gauteng.—CNS

Southern CrossWord solutions

Liturgical Calendar Year B Weekdays Cycle Year 1 Sunday July 5 Ezekiel 2:2-5, Psalms 123:1-4, 2 Corinthians 12:7-10, Mark 6:1-6 Monday July 6, St Maria Goretti Genesis 28:10-22, Psalms 91:1-4, 14-15, Matthew 9:18-26 Tuesday July 7 Genesis 32:23-33, Psalms 17:1-3, 6-7, 8, 15, Matthew 9:32-38 Wednesday July 8, St Gregory Grassi and companions Genesis 41:55-57; 42:5-7, 17-24, Psalms 33:2-3, 10-11, 18-19, Matthew 10:1-7 Thursday July 9 Genesis 44:18-21, 23-29; 45:1-5, Psalms 105:1621, Matthew 10:7-15 Friday July 10, St Veronica Giuliani 2 Corinthians 4:6-11, 16, 17, Psalms 59:2, 10, 17-18, Matthew 16:24-27 Saturday July 11, St Benedict Genesis 49:29-32; 50:15-26, Psalms 105:1-4, 6-7, Matthew 10:24-33 Sunday July 12 Amos 7:12-15, Psalms 85:9-14, Ephesians 1:3-14, Mark 6:7-13

SOLUTIONS TO 661. ACROSS: 3 Paraclete, 8 Aura, 9 Priestess, 10 Novels, 11 Stand, 14 Laden, 15 Time, 16 Salvo, 18 King, 20 Fugue, 21 Grave, 24 Senior, 25 Obsession, 26 Menu, 27 Venerable. DOWN: 1 Saint Luke, 2 Providing, 4 Airs, 5 Alert, 6 Latent, 7 Test, 9 Plans, 11 Solve, 12 Disguised, 13 Demetrius, 17 Often, 19 Grieve, 22 Vesta, 23 Abbe, 24 Soul.

Community Calendar

50TH WEDDING ANNIVERSARY

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your usEd sTaMps can help in the education

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Contact Keith at 083 372 9018 or 031 209 2536.

NELSPRUIT: Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament at St Peter’s parish every Tuesday from 8:00 to 16:45, followed by Rosary, Divine Mercy prayers, then a Mass/Communion service at 17:30pm.

ful intercessor of all who invoke you, special patron in time of need. To you I have recourse from the depth of my heart and humbly beg you to come to my assistance. Help me now in my urgent need and grant my petitions. In return I promise to make your name known and publish this prayer. Amen.

Riccarda.

and show me herein that you are my Mother, O Holy Mary Mother of God, Queen of heaven and earth, I humbly beseech you from the bottom of my heart to secure me in my necessity. There are none who can withstand your power, O show me that you are my mother. O Mary conceived without sin, pray for us who have recourse to thee. Thank you for your mercy towards me and mine. Amen.

DICKENS—Shirley and Bernard. We give thanks to GOd for a blessed 50 years of marriage. Without Him it would not be possible. Thank you Jesus.

IN MEMORIAM

LEO—damascene damian. In loving memory.

Passed away June 26, 2000, Kuilsriver. Rest in peace. Always lovingly remembered by your mother, brother, sisters, family and friends.

SHIELD—Agnes Marjory (Arnot). Passed away July 10, 2013. Still very sadly missed by her ever-loving husband Cyril and sons Gavin, Trevor and Brian and their families. Thank you for her life Lord and her willingness to be part of mine. May she rest in peace and love.

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DURBAN: Holy Mass and Novena to St Anthony at St Anthony’s parish every Tuesday at 9am. Holy Mass and Divine Mercy Devotion at 17:30pm on first Friday of every month. Sunday Mass at 9am. 031 309 3496 Overport rosary group.

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Boys Town founder up for sainthood BOUT 800 people witnessed history as the archdiocese of Omaha, Nebraska, advanced to Rome the sainthood cause for the founder of Boys Town, Fr Edward Flanagan.

Archbishop George Lucas was the main celebrant of a Mass at St Cecilia cathedral in Omaha.

This marked the closing of the archdiocesan phase of the canonisation effort with a special ceremony to encase and officially seal four boxes—4 600 pages—of documents detailing the archdiocese’s three-year investigation.

The Southern Cross, July 1 to July 7, 2015

HOLY ST JUDE, apostle and martyr, great in virtue and rich in miracles, kinsman of Jesus Christ, faith-

THANKS

ALMIGHTY eternal God, source of all compassion, the promise of your mercy and saving help fills our hearts with hope. Hear the cries of the people of Syria; bring healing to those suffering from the violence, and comfort to those mourning the dead. Empower and encourage Syria’s neighbours in their care and welcome for refugees. Convert the hearts of those who have taken up arms, and strengthen the resolve of those committed to peace.

O God of hope and Father of mercy, your Holy Spirit inspires us to look beyond ourselves and our own needs. Inspire leaders to choose peace over violence and to seek reconciliation with enemies. Inspire the Church around the world with compassion for the people of Syria, and fill us with hope for a future of peace built on justice for all.

We ask this through Jesus Christ, Prince of Peace and Light of the World, who lives and reigns for ever and ever.

Amen. Prayer courtesy of the USCCB. O MOST beautiful flower of Mount Carmel, fruitful vine, splendour of Heaven, blessed Mother of the Son of God, Immaculate Virgin, assist me in my necessity.

O Star of the Sea, help me

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15th Sunday: July 12 Readings: Amos 7:12-15, Psalm 85:9-14, Ephesians 1:3-14, Mark 6:7-13

W

E have, each of us, a mission from God, and it will not always fit in precisely with the agenda of the powerful of this world. That seems to be the message of the readings for next Sunday.

In the first reading, we have the wellknown encounter between the prophet Amos and the High Priest Amaziah, of the northern kingdom of Israel, who knows that prophets are dangerous to the state, and that Amos has to be silenced.

Amos has to go back to where he came from, namely the southern kingdom of Judah: “And prophesy there. You are never again to prophesy in Bethel.”

We should notice the reason that he gives: “for it is the king’s sanctuary”. It is always a temptation for those in power to harness religion to their own ends; but good religion always refuses the temptation.

So we are invited to applaud as we hear Amos’ response: “I am not a professional prophet [unlike you, Amaziah, we hear him say]. No—I am a shepherd and a dresser of sycamore trees.”

So why is he pursuing this dangerous path, we ask? The answer is simple, namely that he

S outher n C ross

God has a mission for all has a mission: “The Lord took me from going after the flock, and the Lord said to me, ‘Go and prophesy to my people Israel’.” Once we have heard that voice, and recognised it for what it is, there is really no choice but to go, no matter how uncomfortable the consequences.

That is the truth known to the poet who sings the psalm for next Sunday: “I shall listen to what the Lord God is going to say to me—for he will speak peace, upon his people and upon those whom he loves.”

There is absolute confidence in God (without that confidence we cannot possibly follow our mission), “for God’s salvation is near to those who revere him”.

Then the poet imagines a wonderful world: “Truth shall spring up from the earth, and justice look down from heaven…justice shall go before the Lord’s face.” It is a beautiful vision of the Reign of God to which we are all missioned.

The second reading for next Sunday is the wonderful opening of the Letter to the Ephesians, and you may also like to know that it is a single sentence, the longest in the entire

New Testament.

What does it say about our mission? Well, it starts, as all our missions must start, with “the God and Father of Our Lord Jesus Christ, who blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ”.

So our mission is not really about us, but about God and about Jesus, who “chose us in him before the foundation of the world, for us to be holy and spotless before him in love”.

We may reflect at this point that our mission would be a good deal easier if only we did show forth those admirable qualities. You could spend quite a lot of time prayerfully reflecting on virtually every phrase of this reading, but think what it means for the author to say that “he (is that Jesus or God? The text blurs the distinction between them), made known to us the mystery of his will…for everything to be summed up in Christ.”

And then, as must always be the case, the Spirit is brought into the mix “who is the guarantee of our inheritance, for the redemption of [God’s] possession, to the praise of his glory”. That would not be a bad way for us to live our lives.

Why Jesus was a knight

S

What is wrong is that the great ancient myths and a good number of anthropologists, philosophers, and psychologists tell us that this kind of “hero” is not the mature archetype of the true warrior or prophet.

The mature saviour, prophet or warrior is not “the hero”, but “the knight”. And this is the difference: the hero operates off his own agenda, whereas the knight is under someone else’s agenda. The knight lays his or her sword at the foot of the king or queen. The knight, like Jesus, “does nothing on his own”.

But this isn’t easy to understand and accept. The powerful idealisation we throw onto our heroes and heroines is, like love in adolescence, so powerful a drug that it is hard to see that something much fuller and more mature lies beyond it.

The obsessive love that Romeo and Juliet die for is very powerful, but a mature couple, holding hands after 50 years of marriage, is the real paradigm for love.

The lonely, isolated, unapologetic hero grips the imagination in a way that the more fully mature man or woman does not: Alan Ladd riding off into the sunset at the end of the movie, Shane; any number of characters played by Sylvester Stallone or Arnold Schwarzenegger; and, not least, the hero of Argo, overruling even the orders of the US president in saving the hostages in Iran.

The Nobel-prize winning philosopher Albert Camus, in his book The Plague, presents us with what should, by all accounts,

Conrad

EVERAL years ago, the movie Argo won the Academy Award as the best movie of the year. I enjoyed the movie in that it was a good drama, one that held its audience in proper suspense even as it provided some good humour and banter on the side.

But I struggled with several aspects of the film. First, as a Canadian, I was somewhat offended by the way that the vital role that Canadians played in the escape of the US hostages from Iran in 1979 was downplayed to the point of simply being written out of the story. The movie would have been more honest had it advertised itself as “based on a true story” rather than presenting itself as a true story.

But that was more of an irritation than anything serious. Art has the right to exaggerate forms to highlight an essence. I don’t begrudge a filmmaker his film.

What bothered me was how, again, as is so frequently the case in Hollywood movies and popular literature, we were shown a hero under the canopy of that adolescent idealisation where, by going it alone, the hero singularly saves the world, alone is the “messiah”, and whose self-sequestration coupled with a certain arrogance is presented as human superiority.

But this, the classic hero who does it “his way” and whose wisdom and talent dwarfs everyone else, is an adolescent fantasy.

What’s wrong with that “classic hero” as he is normally portrayed in many of our movies?

Rome, Assisi, Florence, Siena, Padua, Milan, Venice and more 6 - 17 September 2015

Nicholas King SJ

Sunday Reflections

The gospel is a precious moment in the mission of the disciples in Mark’s gospel (and it may help us to realise that in this gospel they are represented as not being all that bright), as they are sent out “two by two, and he gave them authority over unclean spirits”.

Not only that, however, but they are to travel light: “He ordered them to take nothing from the journey, but only a stick—no loaf of bread, no credit-card, nothing in their pockets.”

We then watch in admiration as they go off on their journey: “They went out and preached that people should repent. And they expelled many demons, and they started anointing many sick people, and curing them.”

And what happens in the mission? Well actually it was an immense success.

But you might like to read the rest of chapter 6, which we are not, alas, going to be given next Sunday, and see what happened to John the Baptist, another of God’s missionaries. You have been warned.

Southern Crossword #661

Fr Ron Rolheiser OMI

Final Reflection

be an example of a most noble hero.

His hero is a certain Dr Rieux who, because he is an atheist, struggles with the question of meaning: if there is no God, then where can there be meaning? What difference does any virtue or generosity ultimately make?

Dr Rieux answers that question for himself by finding meaning in selflessly giving himself over, at the risk of his own life, to fighting the plague.

What could be more noble than that?

Few things fire the romantic imagination as does this kind of moral rebellion. So what could be more noble than the hero in the movie Argo, going it alone in taking on the regime in Iran?

The philosopher Charles Taylor has a certain answer to this. Commenting on Camus’ hero, Dr Rieux, Taylor asks: “Is this the ultimate measure of excellence? If we think of ethical virtue as the realisation of lone individuals, this may seem to be the case. But suppose the highest good consists of communion, mutual giving and receiving, as in the paradigm of the eschatological banquet.

“The heroism of gratuitous giving has no place for reciprocity. If you return anything to me, then my gift was not totally gratuitous; and besides, in the extreme case, I disappear with my gift and no communion between us is possible. This unilateral heroism is self-enclosed. It touches the outermost limit of what we can attain to when moved by the sense of our own dignity. But is that what life is about? Christian faith proposes a quite different view.”

And so it does: We see this in Jesus. He comes into this world precisely as a saviour, to vanquish the powers of darkness, violence, injustice, Satan and death.

But notice how, almost as a mantra, he keeps saying: “I do nothing on my own. I am perfectly obedient to my Father.” Jesus was never a hero, nor a “lone ranger” doing his own thing while barely concealing a smug superiority.

He was the paradigm of the “knight”, the humble foot-soldier who always lays his sword at the foot of the King.

ACROSS

3. Clara and Pete find Holy Spirit together (9) 8. Laura mostly has a seance experience (4) 9. It presses her to conduct pagan services (9) 10. New kinds of books (6) 11. Be upright (5) 14. Weighed down (5) 15. Do extra duty over it (4) 16. Fusillade (5) 18. Monarch in a good deal (4) 20. One composed by Bach for church organ (5) 21. Is it serious to dig this?

(5) 24. Elder (6) 25. Old boy at the sitting has fixed idea (9) 26. It lists the courses tastefully (4) 27. Reveal Ben as canonisation hopeful (9)

DOWN

1. Evangelist disturbs Lake Tunis (5,4) 2. Supplying on condition? (9) 4. Ventilates publicly (4) 5. Watchful (5) 6. Overdue on New Testament. Not apparent (6) 7. Trial at cricket match (4) 9. Schemes (5) 11. Find the answer (5) 12. Had a false appearance (9) 13. The silversmith of Acts 19 (9) 17. Decimal frequency (5) 19. Regive and cause distress (6) 22. Roman goddess (5) 23. French priest (4) 24. Spirit (4) Solutions on page 11

CHURCH CHUCKLE

A

MAN visited the priest and told him of a local family’s problems.

“The father,” he sobbed, “is dead, the mother is too ill to work, and the nine children are going hungry. They are about to be evicted into the bad winter weather unless someone pays their rent, which amounts to R3 000.”

“That’s awful,” the priest exclaimed. “But may I ask who you are?”

The sympathetic visitor wiped his eyes, and between sobs replied: “Father, I’m the landlord.”

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