Why I Wear a Chapel Veil and an Unexpected Benefit

May 10, 2024/0 Comments/in Catholic Theme, Devotionals, Eucharist/by Maria Riley

Why I Wear a Chapel Veil and an Unexpected Benefit

At every Mass and each time I am in a place with Jesus truly present in the Eucharist, I don my chapel veil.

I’ve been wearing a mantilla for just over a year. I’m not the only one in my parish, but we are among the vast minority. Today, canon law doesn’t require women to cover their heads. Yet, though entirely optional, veiling at Mass is a beautiful way to outwardly express your reverence: at its core, wearing a chapel veil is a tangible expression of awe and humility before the Eucharist.

What initially sparked my interest was that the women who wore chapel veils in my parish were the women whom I wanted to be like. I knew some of them personally, and their entire lives bore witness to Christianity. For them, the Faith wasn’t something practiced for an hour on Sundays; their entire lives embodied it.

For months I admired their mantillas from afar, still unsure if I had the confidence to pull one off. I felt nervous about drawing attention to myself. Yet, week after week, I found myself thinking about veiling for Mass.

Thus began the Great Internet Search of 2023. I sought out every article I could find about women wearing mantillas. I read about the history, why the practice stopped, and why women do choose to veil. I learned how it serves as a physical reminder to focus our minds and hearts on the presence of Christ in the Eucharist, fostering a deeper sense of spiritual connection and intimacy with God. In a world filled with distractions, the simple act of covering one’s head can create a sacred space for prayer and contemplation.

I was especially drawn to the fact that veiling means embracing my femininity. Men have never covered their heads. (In fact, the canon law was to uncover their heads, hence the tradition of removing hats when entering a church). Some movements in the secular world espouse that women should do everything the same as men, but the Church (and I) says, “Thank You, God, that men and women are different yet equal in dignity.” I am a beautiful, feminine woman, and wearing a lace veil is overtly embracing that.

I also felt compelled to have a sacred item I only wear for Jesus. I always try to dress up for Mass, but sometimes (particularly on weekdays or during very cold weather) my attire is less than glamorous. As I pilgrimaged around Poland last month, jeans were typical during Mass. Yet every time I stepped into a church, I wore my veil to remind myself in Whose presence I was.

The clincher was that Mary is never depicted without a head covering. This struck me right to the heart. I desire to be like Mary, to follow in her footsteps of faith, helping draw others to Christ. I aim to echo her Fiat throughout my life. Choosing to veil ultimately came down to my desire to be like her.

I took the plunge and haven’t looked back. I felt a little nervous and self-conscious the first time, but that quickly dissipated. I don’t worry about what anyone else thinks because I know my reasons: I seek to please God and detach from the opinions of others. Veiling is automatic for me now. If I do happen to forget my veil, I feel underdressed, regardless of what clothes I’m wearing.

And now, I recognize a completely unexpected benefit of wearing a veil at Mass. My veil hangs onto my forehead and around my face, creating a little cove just for me. The veil blocks out distractions in my peripheral vision like horses wearing blinders in a parade. When I sit at Mass and gaze at the altar, I don’t see the movements of those around me like I used to. My vision is limited to what—Who—is in front of me. My veil reminds me of what my focus should be on, and helps me keep that focus. An unexpected gift from a simple mantilla.

If you’re discerning wearing a chapel veil, I encourage you to pray about it and listen to how the Holy Spirit is moving in your heart. There is no list of reasons for or against veiling that can compare with hearing the call from within you.

Our Luminous Eucharist

April 6, 2024/0 Comments/in Catholic Writing and Publishing, Eucharist, History, Saints/by Margaret Zacharias

Our Luminous Eucharist

St. Pope John Paul II, in his 2002 apostolic letter Rosarium Virginis Mariae, added five new mysteries to the traditional Rosary. He called them “luminous,” and referred to them as Mysteries of Light, because they “demonstrate the light of God manifested through Jesus.” (1)

‘”… It is during the years of his public ministry that the mystery of Christ is most evidently a mystery of light: ‘While I am in the world, I am the light of the world’ (Jn 9:5).'” (2)

The culminating mystery is titled Institution of the Eucharist. We’ve just finished celebrating that fifth luminous mystery on Holy Thursday, to open the great Triduum of Easter 2024.

From the beginning of the church, many saints, theologians, and mystics throughout the world have devoted themselves to private prayer before the blessed sacrament in adoration and discernment.

The scriptural words of Jesus about his body and blood are clear and specific, but even during his earthly lifetime, many of his followers abandoned him because they were so difficult to accept (John 6:53-66).

As John A. Harmon S.J. has demonstrated, knowledge of the properties and development of doctrines about the body and blood of Christ have evolved over time. (3).

The thirteenth century was a period of flourishing growth for both.

At the University of Paris, St. Albert the Great (1200-1280), the mentor of St. Thomas Aquinas, was translating Aristotle and “… established the study of nature as a legitimate science within the Christian tradition.” (4)

Blessed Carlos Acutis’ list of eucharistic miracles includes no less than twenty-three that occurred between the years 1194 and 1297.

Ten are bleeding hosts, including two of the most reliable, Santarem, and Bolsena which was witnessed by St. Thomas Aquinas and Pope Urban IV. One is St. Clare’s remarkable defense of her convent against barbarian invaders with prayers and the blessed sacrament exposed in a monstrance. (5)

Today, April 6, is the traditional feast day of a more obscure thirteenth-century abbess who has been almost — but not quite — forgotten by history.

Although her feast been celebrated for more than 150 years (6), her name does not appear in the Proper Calendar for the Dioceses of the United States of America (7) nor on an extensive list of historical saints at Catholic Online (8).

She’s known, however, in Galway Cathedral (9); to the students of Saint Ignatius High School in Cleveland, Ohio (10); Our Sunday Visitor’s Simply Catholic in Indiana (11); EWTN; (12) the Encyclopedia Britannica (13); and she appears in Catholic Encyclopedia (14).

At his General Audience at St. Peter’s Square in Rome on November 17, 2010, Pope Benedict XVI spoke about this humble woman, who was orphaned at the age of five and raised by Augustinian nuns.

“… She is little known but the Church is deeply indebted to her, not only because of the holiness of her life but also because, with her great fervour, she contributed to the institution of one of the most important solemn Liturgies of the year: Corpus Christi …

“She is St. Juliana de Cornillon, also known as St. Juliana of Liège …

“When Juliana was 16, she had her first vision which recurred subsequently several times during her Eucharistic adoration. Her vision presented the moon in its full splendour, crossed diametrically by a dark stripe. The Lord made her understand the meaning of what had appeared to her. The moon symbolized the life of the Church on earth, the opaque line, on the other hand, represented the absence of a liturgical feast for whose institution Juliana was asked to plead effectively: namely, a feast in which believers would be able to adore the Eucharist so as to increase in faith, to advance in the practice of the virtues and to make reparation for offences to the Most Holy Sacrament …” (15)

The Vision of Saint Juliana of Mont Cornillon (b. c. 1191-1193, d. 1258) Philippe de Champaigne (1602-1674), Barber Institute of Fine Arts, University of Birmingham Public Domain, CC BY-SA 4.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0>, via Wikimedia Commons

Juliana kept her visions secret for twenty years before she began to speak about them, first with two close friends who shared her devotion, and then her confessor, Canon John of Lausanne.

Her bishop, Robert de Thorete, established the first liturgical feast of the Body and Blood of Christ in his Diocese of Liège in 1246. (16) With support from St. Thomas Aquinas, Pope Urban IV established Corpus Christi as a solemn liturgical feast for the entire Roman Catholic Church in 1264. (17)

But Our Lord first entrusted his mission to one solitary woman, on her knees in adoration before his luminous presence. St. Juliana persevered through many obstacles for over forty years, and she lived to see it fulfilled.

“You are the light of the world. A city set on a mountain cannot be hidden.

Nor do they light a lamp and then put it under a bushel basket; it is set on a lampstand, where it gives light to all in the house.

Just so, your light must shine before others, that they may see your good deeds and glorify your heavenly Father.” Matthew 5:14-16 (18)

St. Juliana of Liège, pray for us.

(Lüttich is the German spelling of French Liège) Insert: Kath. Pfarrkirche St. Gordian und Epimachus, Merazhofen, Stadt Leutkirch im Allgäu, Landkreis Ravensburg Chorgestühl, 1896, Bildhauer: Peter Paul Metz. Unmodified Photo: by Andreas Praefcke, CC BY 3.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0>, via Wikimedia Commons

Feature image: Map of Liège (Belgium) in the 16th century engraved on copper by Julius Milheuser in 1627 and published

by Johannes Blaeu in Amsterdam in 1649, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.

Images of St. Juliana of Lieges:

St.-Juliana-at-Blessed-Sacrament-with-Moon-Champaigne-sainte-Julienne-Barber-Institute-Birmingham.jpeg

St.-Juliana-of-Kath.-Pfarrkirche-St.-Gordian-und-Epimachus-Merazhofen-Stadt-Leutkirch-im-Allgau-Landkreis-Ravensburg-Chorgestuhl-1896-Bildhauer-Peter-Paul-Metz.jpeg

Notes:

https://www.nationalshrine.org/blog/a-guide-to-the-luminous-mysteries-at-the-

basilica/#:~:text=Instituted%20by%20Pope%20John%20Paul,of%20God%20manifested%20through%20Jesus.

https://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/252575/the-reasons-st-john-paul-ii-gave-for-adding-the-luminous-mysteries-to-

the-rosary

https://www.ewtn.com/catholicism/library/history-of-eucharistic-adoration-development-of-doctrine-in-the-

catholic-church-4086#

https://www.britannica.com/biography/Saint-Albertus-Magnus
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eucharistic_miracle
https://www.galwaycathedral.ie/news/saint-month-st-juliana-

liege#:~:text=Juliana%20was%20canonised%20in%201869,of%20Liège%2C%20pray%20for%20us.

https://www.usccb.org/prayer-and-worship/liturgical-year-and-calendar/proper-calendar
https://www.catholic.org/saints/stindex.php
https://www.galwaycathedral.ie/news/saint-month-st-juliana-

liege#:~:text=Juliana%20was%20canonised%20in%201869,of%20Liège%2C%20pray%20for%20us.

https://www.ignatius.edu/news/june-2022/st-juliana-s-line-through-the-moon
https://www.simplycatholic.com/st-juliana-of-liege/
https://www.ewtn.com/catholicism/library/st-juliana-of-cornillon-6285
https://www.britannica.com/topic/Feast-of-Corpus-Christi
https://catholicism.en-academic.com/18765/St._Juliana_of_Liege
https://www.vatican.va/content/benedict-xvi/en/audiences/2010/documents/hf_ben-xvi_aud_20101117.html
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Juliana_of_Liège
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feast_of_Corpus_Christi
https://bible.usccb.org/bible/matthew/5

Magnificat of a Prodigal

January 10, 2024/0 Comments/in Catholic Theme, Conversion Stories, Eucharist, Faith, Spiritual Life/by Mary McWilliams

Magnificat of a Prodigal

“I baptize you in the Name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit,” the priest said, making the sign of the Cross on the baby, a newborn not expected to live, and marking her forever as Christ’s own.

My urgent baptism the day I was born was probably the greatest gift my parents ever gave me. It lit a flame within me that oftentimes seemed to flicker dimly yet refused to be extinguished. As I wandered aimlessly and recklessly through the next decades, the grace I received at my baptistm acted as a homing device to bring me back to the true home and true faith that stirred inside of me.

I am a prodigal daughter, one who strayed long and far. One who thought she could grab her inheritance early and do better with it out in the world than within her Father’s house. Like the older son of the parable, I ended up metaphorically broken, dirty, and perishing from hunger.

We were a family that was Catholic, but not a Catholic family; an obligation passed down through my mother’s side. We knew about Catholic things―prayers, holy days, the pope―but as a family, we did not practice the Catholic faith. Culturally, the 1970s was an age of rebellion―not obedience―to tradition, ritual, and authority. Catholicism was an easy scapegoat. I was drawn to the mysticism, the precision of the rituals, and the stories told in the stained glass, but I didn’t understand any of it. I was curious about the people honored with statues but didn’t know them either, save Jesus, Mary, and Joseph. The old churches with their intricate architecture beckoned and the modern ones reflected messages around me that this faith was nothing to love. So many seemed to hate it, and I followed along.

While still going through the required CCD and Sunday motions, I became ABC: Anything But Catholic. How about Hinduism, Buddhism, Judaism? Then other eastern philosophies and exploration into yoga. I read enough to pick and choose what worked for me. Occult, New Age, and pursuit of worldly goals led to darker passageways and heavier sins, but there was always some flash, some small ray kindling in me that kept me from journeying as deep into the darkness that had captured many of my friends.

He has come to the help of his servant … he has remembered his promise of mercy.

By my 30s, wrong paths and hard lessons had beaten me down. I had pushed God away, doubtful I had a way back, but I started attending an Episcopal church. It was Catholic enough to be familiar but without … well, whatever it was I claimed offended me in my youth. I pondered the creed in the Book of Common Prayer and tried to recall the Creed I had memorized as a child. Was it exactly the same? The Creed was something I always believed. I didn’t know why. I could say it without feeling like a hypocrite. I knew that if I were serious about reuniting with God, I had to go back to my beginning. With a “try me” attitude, I began listening to Catholic radio and watching Catholic television constantly. What I thought were tough questions about the faith were satisfied quickly and easily.

Tentatively, I considered going to Mass, but refused to set my alarm, daring God. If he wanted me back to the Catholic Church, he’d wake me up. He did. I played that game the next week. Once again, he won. This continued for weeks until I wanted to go to church, and just to make sure I wouldn’t miss Mass, I set my alarm.

He has lifted up the lowly … He has mercy on those who fear him …

At Mass, I felt like I had crashed a gala event. Still, each week I went. I sat in the back feeling invisible, until Communion when I felt conspicuous. Alone in the pew, I knew it was not my time. It took three years of going to Confession, remembering a lifetime of sins, and speaking them out loud before I felt like I could honestly receive the Eucharist.

He has scattered the proud in their conceit …

On Easter, the day we celebrate his Resurrection, came a resurrection for me. After many years, torturous examens, and woeful pleas for forgiveness, I stepped up to receive the Body of Christ. “Amen,” I whispered, closing my eyes to dam up the tears. Immediately, I was surrounded by a beautiful aroma that was like home-baked bread with an undefinable sweetness. Not sweet like candy, fruit, or flowers, just a sweetness all its own. The experience simulated walking into a cozy home on a windy, frigid day, with a fire in the fireplace, and a scrumptious dinner in the oven. It had the joy of being welcomed by happy dogs and held by arms that had been waiting just for me. It had the intimacy of snuggling under a blanket with the person you love the most, who knows you better than anyone, your faces millimeters apart, trading secrets and dreams, giggling over private jokes. This sensation would remain with me through the end of Mass, and it continued through the summer.

He has filled the hungry with good things …

More than a decade later, I might experience a brief wafting of this aroma when I receive the Eucharist. I miss the intensity of the first months, but I think he knows I’m convinced he is with me. He promised, “Behold, I make all things new.” He took me, a soul that didn’t expect to survive, and bore me anew.

My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord.
My spirit rejoices in God my Savior.

Food for the Journey

November 24, 2023/0 Comments/in Catholic Writing and Publishing, Eucharist, Love/by Rick Clements

Food for the Journey

In the sacrament of the Eucharist, Jesus provides us with the strength and sustenance we need to tread the path of the cross, to make our way through the school of love that is this life. In the Eucharist, Jesus breaks open his Body and pours out his Blood as literal food and drink for us so that we can become more fully incorporated into his Body, more fully united with God in love. But he also breaks open his Body and pours out his Blood for us in order to strengthen and fortify us with the divine life and love, so that we can, in turn, break ourselves open and pour ourselves out in love for others. That is why the Eucharist has sometimes been referred to as “food for the journey.” The Eucharist nourishes and supports us on our own journey toward Love, and the Eucharist also strengthens us to go out and become “food for the journey” for other people.

A couple of years before he died, Pope Saint John Paul II wrote an encyclical in which he encouraged Catholics to rediscover their sense of amazement at the Eucharist.[i] It’s a message that many of us need to hear today, especially at a time when surveys indicate that only 31% of Catholics believe in the Real Presence of Jesus in the Eucharist,[ii] and only 39% of Catholics attend Mass on a weekly basis.[iii] Here are three ways to regain or strengthen your sense of amazement at the Eucharist: 1) Read, and re-read, and meditate upon, the words of Jesus regarding the Eucharist in the sixth chapter of the Gospel of John. Jesus makes it abundantly clear that the Eucharist is his actual Body and Blood and not merely some “symbol” of his love for us. Jesus also emphasizes the absolute necessity that anyone who claims to be his follower allow himself to be fed by the Eucharist; 2) If you’re not already attending Mass every week, start doing so. Jesus can’t feed you with the Eucharist if you don’t show up at the table. You wouldn’t choose to starve yourself physically; don’t starve yourself spiritually, either. Commune with the heart and mind of Jesus in the Eucharist, and allow him to transform your own heart and mind to be more like his; 3) “Receive what you are; become what you receive.”[iv] This profound exhortation regarding the disposition with which we should receive the Eucharist was first formulated by Saint Augustine. Meditate deeply upon Augustine’s insightful phrase, and strive to adopt this attitude every time you receive the Eucharist.

In the Eucharist, we receive the Body of Christ, incorporating us ever more fully into that Body, the Body to which we were first joined at Baptism. When we receive the Eucharist, Jesus abides in us, and we abide in him (John 6:56). Fortified by that divine food and drink, we are, in turn, to become the Body of Christ in the world. Like Jesus, we are to “break ourselves open and pour ourselves out” in love for our fellow human beings, becoming “food” and “drink” for them as they make their way through their own journey to Love.

* This article is an excerpt from Rick’s latest book, The Book of Love: Brief Meditations

Photo by Morgan Winston on Unsplash

[i] John Paul II, Ecclesia de Eucharistia.

[ii] https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2019/08/05/transubstantiation-eucharist-u-s-catholics/

[iii] https://www.pewforum.org/religious-landscape-study/attendance-at-religious-services/

[iv] https://earlychurchtexts.com/public/augustine_sermon_272_eucharist.htm

Corpus Christi: We Are the Body of Christ, and You Are What You Eat

June 2, 2023/1 Comment/in Catholic Theme, Eucharist, Evangelization, Faith/by Ben Bongers

Corpus Christi: We Are the Body of Christ, and You Are What You Eat

We have all heard the saying, “You are what you eat.” If that’s true, I am parts pizza, BBQ, peanut butter, and have coffee with a side of wine for blood!

So, IF we, Catholics, parishioners, Christians … are the “Body of Christ,” what are we made of—and most importantly, why does it matter?

First, let’s change the word “eat” to “consume.” We are formed by more than just what we eat. Everything we read, watch, listen to, and surround ourselves with has a bearing on who and what we are. If I eat a lot of greasy food, play a lot of high-intensity adrenaline-filled video games by myself, never get up from the couch or walk more than 100 feet a day, and smoke cartons of cigarettes while drinking nothing but energy drinks, my life expectancy goes from 82 years to 56.

But if I eat balanced meals, take time to shut down and refresh, get moderate exercise, and have a community of friends—neighbors, church family, clubs, and so on—suddenly I will be living a longer, and most importantly, happier life.

Now, that’s the outside life. Let’s talk about the inside life—the soul life. When we receive the Eucharist, we do not consume just a piece of bread or a sip of wine. No. We are receiving Jesus himself, in all his divine glory, sort of like a spiritual superpower; let’s call it “Jesus Juicing.” We begin to transform from the inside—out and become more like Him; better able to love and serve others. When our inside, our soul, begins to strengthen from “Jesus Juicing,” we find we have more peace, more wisdom, more self-control. But it not only benefits us, but the larger Corpus Christi, or Body of Christ, the Church! Remember, WE are the Body of Christ, the Corpus Christi. WE are the Church.

Being in a community isn’t a solo event. We are being nourished so we can help others. A great example is a group called New Roots for Refugees, run through Catholic Charities. My wife and I are avid gardeners. Last weekend we went to the New Roots for Refugees plant sale. Refugees from many different countries work together, growing vegetables and flowers that are then sold to gardeners—or after maturing—the fruits and vegetables are sold to eat. Interacting with these beautiful souls, we the Corpus Christi are being nourished by not just by the plants, but by “Jesus Juicing!” We’re strengthening our ties with people in need in the Body of Christ, and doing what we are all called to do—loving and serving each other.

So, there are 3 important things to remember on the feast of Corpus Christi:

We don’t need to just strengthen our outside-selves, but also our inside-selves with “Jesus Juicing.”
When we take care of the inside-selves, it will change the outside-selves.
We are not built to be a solo act. We are strengthening through “Jesus Juicing” to be of service to others.

Questions:

Are you allowing yourself to be changed?
How will you be of service to our Corpus Christi?

Mass on the Rock

March 8, 2023/4 Comments/in Eucharist, Faith, Inspirational, Pilgrimage, Spiritual Life/by Margaret Zacharias

Mass on the Rock

It was what the Irish call a ‘soft day.’ Drenching afternoon rain fell after a cold and misty morning. Some among us worried that it might not be worth the effort. It was difficult enough to walk when the ground was dry, never mind through a spooky meadow that rolled under your feet like a ship on the churning sea.

It looked to be quite a distance, too, at the end of what had already been an exhausting day. You’d understand if you yourself had a knee or a hip needing surgery. This group had eight or ten of them. Our hosts, who’d spent the whole wet day in the field preparing for our arrival, did understand. They kindly offered us the church in town to celebrate Mass for any of our pilgrims who felt they couldn’t make their way to the Rock.

Then somebody said, “The rain’s letting up!” Somebody said, “Let’s those of us who feel we can go, let’s give it a try?”

With Father’s encouragement, everyone managed to clamber off the bus and onto a gravel road. At the open fence gate, a young woman smiled and said, “You’re very welcome!” Just beyond her, the farmer took each hand into his own. He inspected our eyes, pilgrim by pilgrim, nodding his personal welcome as if it were a matter of life and death.

For over three hundred years, it was.

We set out across the fields, breathing in the thick green air. We shivered in our raincoats. Most of us had no idea where we were headed. If you knew what to look for, you might be able to recognize the place by an ancient grove of sacred Druid trees perched on the horizon. Eventually our guide pointed out an entrance, hidden among shrubs that grew beneath the trees. We pushed through a narrow opening to discover steep stone steps cut into a muddy hillside.

More than six feet below, the freshly-excavated chapel stretched out in an ell. Heavy cinder blocks were stacked along the sides; new boards were laid on top of the blocks for benches, and boards were laid below for walking across the mud. A pearly grey boulder held the corner. The air surged with aromas: freshly-sawn lumber, damp peat and fertile earth. We felt humbled to see so much labor expended to provide for us.

“Why, they wouldn’t believe we’re Father Flanagan’s people,” someone said, “If we hadn’t had the courage to come!’

The Rock turned out to be a smooth, asymmetrical chunk of granite, nearly three feet tall, and almost five feet in diameter. It sparkled as if it had been scrubbed with rainbows. Atop the boulder stood pictures of our Lord and our Lady on either side of a simple Crucifix.

Father laid his communion kit directly onto this stone altar. He passed the scripture book to the lector and shook off his coat. He vested for Mass right there on the soil among us. He tried to light candles, but they kept blowing out. Worn over only a short-sleeved shirt, his surplice flew in the chilly gale. But the flame of the Holy Spirit glowed in all hearts as he made the sign of the cross to open our liturgy.

While Father distributed Eucharist, three of us together began to sing at the same moment, the same inspired song: “This is holy ground. We’re standing on holy ground, for the Lord is present and where He is, is holy.” Another woman mimed the words for each verse while everybody sang: “He’s given us holy hands. He’s given us holy lips.” Father maneuvered from plank to plank as if he’d never celebrated Mass in any other way.

Stalks of ripened grain in the fields above our heads swayed in the breeze, blessing us like banners. Though we knew we would be invisible from the road, we could almost hear the tramp of soldiers’ feet on the wind. We reflected on Father’s homily, thinking about how many generations of Irish people had gathered for Mass just like this, under penalty of death. They hid below crops they were forbidden to eat, celebrating Eucharist without the luxuries of raincoats, candles or songs.

All that nourished them was the Lord. They did not consider His Feast a meager meal.

When we returned to ordinary time and contemporary place, that luscious green labyrinth still shimmied under our feet. But this time the walk did not seem long.

Three-year-old Michael led the charge to the bus. He scampered across the landscape with a wild flower in his hand. He went spinning around the meadow, cavorting in tall grass under the wide sky.

Every single one of us danced along behind him, all the way back to Ballymoe.

Royalty-Free Stock Image Shutterstock_1719546454 Licensed to Pearlpledge82 User ID 289304735 Standard License February 19, 2023

*A previous version of this true story was published in Sunday Bulletin, St. Theresa of the Child Jesus Catholic Church, Diocese of Des Moines, Iowa, 2007; and appears in another form on the author’s website, www.animaviva.com.

Who Are the “Scribes and Pharisees?”

November 5, 2022/2 Comments/in Current events, Devotionals, Eucharist, Evangelization, Faith, History, Holidays, Prayer, Spiritual Life/by Margaret Zacharias

Who Are the “Scribes and Pharisees?”

By the grace of God, I was able to travel to Germany and attend the 2022 Oberammergau Passion Play. I learned why most people blessed with this opportunity can afterwards only murmur, “It was a privilege.”

The experience was truly beyond words. Try, for example, to describe what you feel at the moment of Eucharistic consecration?

But there are a few insights that I think I can articulate. I’ll pass over the incredible chill of an outdoor theater high in the Alps. I won’t waste words to confirm that every villager in Oberammergau, from babes in arms to tottering elders, has indeed been focused on this reenactment of the Passion of Christ, as their personal act of worship, for the past 388 years.

It was like stepping into a time travel machine. In the audience, we felt almost a part of the action, 2,000 years ago on the surging streets of Jerusalem.

But who were “the scribes and the pharisees?”

When we hear this phrase read from scripture at mass, it’s all too easy to think, “Jesus, good. Scribes and pharisees, bad.”

At the 2022 performance, these gentlemen were portrayed as dignified representatives of an ancient religious tradition, caught in an impossible trap by politics of the Roman Empire.

Yes, a few simply dismissed Jesus’ words. But many tried to listen and understand. They stood in groups gathered all across the stage, discussing the new ideas with one another, getting angry, shrugging, stomping away, and returning to debate some more. I couldn’t help but feel that’s really the way it must have been.

Jesus was a 33-year-old man, trying to articulate a new revelation in human language. The scribes and pharisees, who were attempting to take it in, did not share one understanding, nor were they of one mind about what they should do.

The brilliant actor who portrayed Jesus also found the fine edge. I was fully aware of him as our Divine Savior, and that he knew exactly what the consequences of his words and actions would be. But he was also a young man debating theology with his elders in exactly the tempestuous manner that impassioned young human adults tend to use. As our faith teaches us, he was God and human, at the same time in one person.

We live in an era when we are called to raise our consciousness about the different ways we assign people into categories, and then speak as though a category label describes every individual.

This was my third trip to the country of Germany. I’ve admired their religious monuments in cities, villages, and fields; prayed with the people at mass; felt awe and wonder at their abiding faith. That faith has sustained generation after generation of German Catholics through all that they have endured.

We speak too easily in North America about “Germans” as synonymous with “Nazis.”

What if fate had placed you in 20^th century Germany, to live the most important stages of your life through two world wars, and under the sway of the Third Reich? How would you have faced the moral challenges? What destiny would you have chosen within a fate you could not escape?

We’ve forgotten that Adolph Hitler hated Catholics as much as he hated the Jewish people; forgotten the martyrs who died terrible deaths to defend their vision of Germany.

Contemporary literary fiction is replete with tales of Nazi-resistance movements in France, England, Denmark, Italy, and Holland.

But the full depth and breadth of Nazi-resistance movements within Germany itself – encompassing laborers, mothers, altar boys, laundresses, aristocrats, Protestant clergy, Catholic priests, members of religious orders, and even rebel German Air Force officers — have been brought forward only in the 21^st century.

On this first Saturday of November, I offer a short list of good books about the German resistance to the Third Reich.

Von Moltke, Helmuth and Freya, translated by Shelley Frisch, Last Letters: The Prison Correspondence, September 1944-January 1945, New York: New York Review of Books, 2019; Editors’ Introduction copyright 2019 by Helmuth Caspar von Moltke, Dorothea von Moltke, and Johannes von Moltke.
Utrecht, Daniel of the Oratory, The Lion of Munster: The Bishop Who Roared Against Hitler, Charlotte, N.C.: Tan Books, 2016.
Riebling, Mark, Church of Spies: The Pope’s Secret War Against Hitler, New York: Basic Books, 2015.
Zeller, Guillaume, translated by Michael J. Miller, The Priest Barracks: Dachau, 1938-1945,San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 2015
Rychlak, Ronald J., Hitler, the War, and the Pope, Huntington, IN: Our Sunday Visitor Publishing Division, 2010.
Rabbi David G. Dalin, The Myth of Hitler’s Pope: How Pope Pius XII Rescued Jews from the Nazis, Washington, D.C.: Regnery Press, 2005.
Lapomarda, Vincent A., The Jesuits and the Third Reich, Second Edition, Lampeter, Ceredigion, Wales, United Kingdom: The Edwin Mellen Press, Ltd, 2005.
Anonymous, The Persecution of the Catholic Church in the Third Reich: Facts and Documents, Gretna, LA: Pelican Publishing Company, 2003.
Coady, Mary Frances, With Bound Hands, A Jesuit in Nazi Germany: The Life and Prison Letters of Alfred Delp, Chicago: Loyola Press, 2003.
Goldmann, O.F.M., Gereon Karl, The Shadow of His Wings, translated by Benedict Leutenegger, San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 2000.
Koerbling, Anton, Father Rupert Mayer: Modern Priest and Witness for Christ, Munich, Germany: Schnell & Steiner, 1950.

The Passion of Christ

September 3, 2022/2 Comments/in Current events, Devotionals, Eucharist, Faith, History, Hope/by Margaret Zacharias

The Passion of Christ

These days the media seems to besiege us with headlines about the next terrible plague. Whether it’s the latest Covid variant or a new, horrible pox, it’s challenging not to become anxious. We shudder, and continue to pray that we and our families will be spared.

Imagine living in the seventeenth century Alps. Already ravaged by the Thirty Years’ War, Bavarian villagers learn that the Black Plague has come to town, in the person of a foreign peddler. They know that this frightening new disease has killed entire populations throughout the region. What will they do?

In 1633, the citizens of the Catholic village of Oberammergau, Germany, made a communal promise to God. If he saw fit to spare their town, if no one in the village died of the plague over the next twelve months, they would perform a play about the passion of Christ every tenth year, in perpetuity.

The first Oberammergau Passion Play to fulfill that offering was staged in 1634. Their promise has been faithfully kept for almost 400 years. (For more information, visit www.passionsspiele-oberammergau.de/en/home.)

Both the script and the methods of performance have evolved over the centuries. But even today, the play is still performed in its historical style of tableau. It is presented in two parts, each two-and-a-half hours long, with a break for dinner in between.

Every actor must have been born in the village, and nearly every native citizen is included somewhere in the ensemble of players.

In 2019, I watched a video of the casting ceremony for the 2020, now 2022, performances.

With an altar server carrying the crucifix before him, the parish pastor processed out of his church into the village square. The entire platz was filled with townspeople. Gathered to hear him announce the names of the persons chosen to portray the most illustrious characters, they maintained absolute silence.

The priest stopped next to the village school teacher; a young woman attired in an impeccably-pressed shirtwaist dress. She was poised at a large blackboard, already prepared with the names of the major characters, to write the names. An alternate was also chosen for each role, in order to sustain the lengthy performance season, five days a week from May to October.

As the teacher carefully inscribed each name in exquisite handwriting, no cheers or congratulations marred the solemnity of the occasion. Only a few murmurs of satisfaction, or mild disappointment, could be heard on the film.

I’m still hoping and praying to attend the 2022 Passion Play this September.

In 2018, when my travel companion and I first began to consider our mutual bucket list trip, we were both in perfect health. Then the originally scheduled 2020 event was postponed to 2022 because of the world-wide Covid-19 pandemic.

Recently, just as our long-awaited dreams seemed about to become reality, my travel companion sustained injuries in a bicycle accident. The same week in July, I sprained an ankle.

As I walked down the hall of my apartment building a couple of nights ago, I ran into a friend who is over ninety years old. She was working out a pain in her hip at the same time I was exercising my sprained ankle.

She said, “I’ll give you my Oberammergau jacket.”

I looked at her tiny frame, then at my own considerably more substantial one, and said, “Thank you so much. But I don’t think it will fit me.”

She told me that she had attended the Oberammergau Passion Play in her younger years. After we conversed with awe about the endurance of this Bavarian tradition, she shared a parting thought about her own pilgrimage.

“I always think of that time as a special privilege.”

Both of my friends regularly take advantage of the opportunities offered to us all as Catholics, to attend mass and to be active serving neighbors in urban villages that can operate like small towns.

As I reflected on her words, I heard a message from the Holy Spirit.

At every mass, in every liturgical season, we have motivation to gather as a living community, just as the townspeople do in alpine villages like Oberammergau. We have daily chances to meditate on the passion of Christ at every mass.

It’s because the people of Oberammergau do these things that they have been able to keep a four-century-old promise, generation after generation.

It really doesn’t matter if health challenges, personal finances, family responsibilities, or the world situation allow us to travel to Jerusalem or Oberammergau – or not.

Christ’s loving offering of his passion for our salvation is eternal.

He comes to us every day, on every altar, wherever and whenever the eucharist is celebrated.

How blessed we are, indeed, by that special privilege.