Breaking the Word

Saturday, September 23, 2006

24th Saturday in Ordinary Time (II)

Memorial of Saint Pio of Pietrelcina
Movies, Reviews & Stupid Questions

Readings: 1 Corinthians 15:35-37, 42-49; Psalm 56:10c-12, 13-14; Luke 8:4-15

They are stupid questions. Paul is none too subtle in his response to those who inquire into how dead people are raised, and what sort of body they have. Why does Paul think these questions – which still attract speculation in some quarters even in our day – stupid? And if these are indeed stupid questions why does Paul seem to present a rather lengthy explanation?

Recently I mentioned to someone that I’d gone to watch a movie. He responded by saying that he’d not watched it but had read many reviews, and then launched into an exposition of the things he’d read. Listening to him, it seemed clear that he knew a lot more about the movie than I did. He had even formed a rather firm opinion about the movie based upon what he’d read. Indeed, his sharing helped me to appreciate better several elements in the movie that I’d not paid enough attention to. Still I couldn’t help wondering how much he really knew. How much can one know a movie without having actually experienced it – without having watched the plot unfold from scene to scene, without having listened to the dialogue and the sound effects, without having felt the reactions that are evoked by the interplay of the various elements? Sure, reviews are useful. I read them myself, both before watching a movie – in order to decide which ones are worth a trip to the cinema – and also after – to heighten one’s appreciation of what has been watched. But reviews can’t replace the movie-experience itself can they? And, to be blunt, one would be stupid to think otherwise.

Could these considerations help to explain Paul’s response in the first reading? Are the questions he criticizes stupid because they seek to do the impossible: to fully comprehend the resurrected life without committing oneself to walking the way that leads to it? Is this not similar to reading lots of reviews about a movie without actually watching it? And doesn’t Paul’s apparent explanation highlight the differences that exist between our present experience and what is to come, between the reviews and the movie? The thing that is sown is perishable but what is raised is glorious. Paul can only use metaphors to indicate what this glorious future that awaits us might be like.

Isn’t this why the gospel parable is so important? It reminds us that while we cannot yet grasp fully what the next life will be like, it is possible to live so as to prepare ourselves for that life. It is possible even, to some extent, to live that life in the present, to be as open as the good soil to receive the seed of God’s Word into our hearts and lives so as to yield a harvest. Isn’t this the only way that we can gradually come to understand the mysteries of the kingdom of God? We need to open our hearts and commit our lives to what has been revealed to us. In the words of the psalmist, we need to walk in the presence of God in the light of the living. We need to watch the movie, even as we may continue to read the reviews.

What is our approach to the mysteries of the kingdom? Which do we prefer: the movie or the reviews?

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Breaking News: Easter

The fifty days from Easter Sunday to Pentecost are celebrated in joyful exultation as one feast day, or better as one "great Sunday." These above all others are the days for the singing of the Alleluia. The Sundays of this season rank as the paschal Sundays and, after Easter Sunday itself, are called the Second, Third, Fourth, Fifth, Sixth, and Seventh Sundays of Easter. The period of fifty sacred days ends on Pentecost Sunday. The first eight days of the Easter season make up the octave of Easter and are celebrated as solemnities of the Lord. On the fortieth day after Easter the Ascension is celebrated, except in places where, not being a holyday of obligation, it has been transferred to the Seventh Sunday of Easter (see no. 7).[R4] The weekdays after the Ascension until the Saturday before Pentecost inclusive are a preparation for the coming of the Holy Spirit. ~ General Norms for the Liturgical Year & Calendar, 22-26

From 36th Jesuit General Congregation

It is our union with one another in Christ that testifies to the Good News more powerfully than our competences and abilities.... In our individualistic and competitive age, we should remember that the community plays a very special role since it is a privileged place of apostolic discernment.... The Jesuit community is a concrete space in which we live as friends in the Lord. This life together is always at the service of mission, but because these fraternal bonds proclaim the Gospel, it is itself a mission. –Companions in a Mission of Reconciliation and Justice (CMRJ), nn. 7-9.

With the poor, we can learn what hope and courage mean.... In our communities and apostolates, we hear the call to rediscover hospitality to strangers, to the young, to the poor, and to those who are persecuted. Christ himself teaches us this hospitality. –CMRJ, nn. 15-16.

At the heart of Ignatian spirituality is the transforming encounter with the mercy of God in Christ that moves us to a generous personal response. The experience of the merciful gaze of God on our weakness and sinfulness humbles us and fills us with gratitude, helping us to become compassionate ministers to all.... For us Jesuits, compassion is action, an action discerned together. Yet we know that there is no authentic familiarity with God if we do not allow ourselves to be moved to compassion and action by an encounter with the Christ who is revealed in the suffering, vulnerable faces of people, indeed in the suffering of creation. –CMRJ, nn. 19-20.

(T)he Society must respond more decisively to the Church’s call for a new evangelization, giving special emphasis to ministry to and with the young and with families.... A special gift Jesuits and the Ignatian family have to offer to the Church and her mission of evangelization is Ignatian spirituality, which facilitates the experience of God and can therefore greatly help the process of personal and communal conversion. –CMRJ, nn. 22-23.

In many societies, there is an increased level of conflict and polarization, which often gives rise to violence that is all the more appalling because it is motivated and justified by distorted religious convictions. In such situations, Jesuits, along with all who seek the common good, are called to contribute from their religious-spiritual traditions towards the building of peace, on local and global levels. –CMRJ, n. 28.

Pope Francis has emphasized the fundamental connection between the environmental crisis and the social crisis in which we live today. Poverty, social exclusion, and marginalization are linked with environmental degradation. These are not separate crises but one crisis that is a symptom of something much deeper: the flawed way societies and economies are organised. The current economic system with its predatory orientation discards natural resources as well as people. For this reason, Pope Francis insists that the only adequate solution must be a radical one. The direction of development must be altered if it is to be sustainable. We Jesuits are called to help heal a broken world, promoting a new way of producing and consuming, which puts God’s creation at the center.... The multifaceted challenge of caring for our common home calls for a multifaceted response from the Society. We begin by changing our personal and community lifestyles, adopting behaviour coherent with our desire for reconciliation with creation. – CMRJ, nn. 29-30

From 35th Jesuit General Congregation

From General Congregation 35

By sending us to 'those physical and spiritual places which others do not or have difficulty reaching,' the Pope entrusts to us the task to 'build bridges of understanding and dialogue,' according to the best tradition of the Society, in the diversity of its ministries.
- Decree With Renewed Fervor and Dynamism, n. 6

To be missioned to this work 'at the New Frontiers of our times' always requires that one also be rooted at the very heart of the Church. This tension, specific to the Ignatian charism, opens the way to true creative fidelity.
- Decree With Renewed Fervor and Dynamism, n. 13

In every mission that we carry out, we seek only to be where (Christ) sends us. The grace we receive as Jesuits is to be and to go with him, looking on the world with his eyes, loving it with his heart and entering into its depths with his unending compassion.
- Decree on Identity, n. 15

For ultimately, there is no reality that is only profane for those who know how to look. We must communicate this look and provide a pedagogy inspired by the Spiritual Exercises, that carries people - especially the young - into it.
- Decree on Identity, n. 10

Our ministries of proclamation of the Word and the celebration of the Life of Christ in the sacraments continue to be fundamental for our mission and our lives together as Jesuits.
- Decree on Mission, n. 19

The complexity of the problems we face and the richness of the opportunities offered demand that we engage in building bridges between rich and poor and establishing advocacy links of mutual support between those who hold political power and those who find it difficult to voice their interests. Our intellectual apostolate provides an inestimable help in setting up these bridges, offering us new ways of understanding in depth the mechanism and links among our present problems.
- Decree on Mission, n. 28

Jesuit community is not just for mission, it is itself mission.
- Decree on Mission, n. 41

In this global context it is important to highlight the extraordinary potential represented by our character as an international and multicultural body. Acting consistently with this character can not only enhance the apostolic effectiveness of our work but in a fragmented and divided world it can witness to the reconciliation in solidarity of all the children of God.
- Decree on Mission, n. 43

Faith in Jesus Christ teaches us that self-realization comes from self-giving and that freedom is not so much the power to choose as the power to order our choices toward love. At the same time, love for Jesus Christ and the desire to follow him call us to trusting commitment. Commitment to the Word Incarnate cannot be separated from commitment to the concrete manifestations of the Word that are at the center of our lives, the Church and the Society which exists to serve the Church.
- Decree on Obedience, n. 19

Saturday, September 23, 2006

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