Visitation

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 “… Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting:

The Soul that rises with us, our life’s Star,

Hath had elsewhere its setting,

And cometh from afar:

Not in entire forgetfulness,

And not in utter nakedness,

But trailing clouds of glory do we come

From God, who is our home:

Heaven lies about us in our infancy …

 

… The Clouds that gather round the setting sun

Do take a sober colouring from an eye

That hath kept watch o’er man’s mortality …”

William Wordsworth

Ode: Intimations of Immortality from

Recollections of Early Childhood (1)

 

Visitation

May is the month our church sets aside each year to honor the Blessed Virgin Mary. 

In 2024, May includes at least five significant liturgical celebrations:

  • Solemnity of the Ascension of the Lord, Thursday, May 9 (or Sunday, May 12);
  • Optional Memorial of Our Lady of Fatima, Monday, May 13;
  • Solemnity of Pentecost on May 19;
  • Memorial of the Blessed Virgin Mary, Mother of the Church, Monday, May 20;  
  • Feast of the Visitation of the Blessed Virgin Mary on Friday, May 31.

This month opens with the second Glorious Mystery of the Rosary, encompassing two additional Marian holy days as well as another Solemnity, the third Glorious Mystery, and concludes with the second Joyful Mystery — enough to make anyone’s head spin.

Decades ago, when our planet seemed safer and more civilized than it does today, I was blessed with opportunities to visit several Catholic shrines as a pilgrim.

It’s impossible to do justice to the full set of liturgical crescendos this month contains in a brief article for a first Saturday. But I offer a few reflections here about the opening solemnity and the closing feast from my pilgrimages to shrines in the Holy Land.

***

Christian Chapel of the Ascension on the Mount of Olives – Jerusalem, Israel
Fallaner, CC BY-SA 4.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0>, via Wikimedia Commons

 

A small Christian monument called the Chapel of the Ascension stands on the Mount of Olives in Jerusalem, not to be confused with the larger mosque that looms nearby.

This probably does mark the place where Jesus proclaimed his majestic final commission to the apostles, the ‘go out into all the world’ speech we hear in the gospel reading for the Solemnity of the Ascension, Mark 16:15-20. (2)

But even though the chapel contains an ancient footprint in its rock floor that legend describes as made by Our Lord’s right foot when he departed, this holy place on the Mount of Olives may, or may not, be where Jesus actually ascended into heaven.

Some scholars, as well as many local Christians whose families have lived here for generations, believe the Ascension might have occurred elsewhere.

Church of the Primacy of Saint Peter – Tabgha, Israel
Berthold Werner, CC BY-SA 3.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0>, via Wikimedia
Commons

 

Another possible location hosts the small Church of the Primacy of Peter, on the northwest banks of the Sea of Galilee, believed to be where Jesus fed his friends one last breakfast of freshly-caught fish, as described in John 21. (3)

That rocky shoreline is also visited by thousands of Christian pilgrims, both Catholic and Protestant. It’s an alternative place where some believe the Ascension might actually have taken place.

View of the Sea of Galilee – from the Church of the Primacy of Saint Peter, Tabgha, Israel
someone10x, CC BY 2.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0>, via Wikimedia Commons

 

Shore beside the Church of the Primacy of Saint Peter – Tabgha, Galilee, Israel.
https://www.flickr.com/photos/emeryjl/, CC BY 2.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0>, via
Wikimedia Commons

 

Wherever it occurred, the description of the Ascension in Acts 1:6-12 (4) tells us that the gathered apostles received a visitation from ‘two men dressed in white,’ usually interpreted as angels.

These men appeared ‘suddenly,’ admonishing the disciples to stop looking ‘up at the sky,’ and promising that Jesus would ‘return the same way he departed.’

***

Two distinct Visitation shrines hold importance in the town of Ein Karem, once a small village in the Judean hills, now considered a ‘suburb’ of sprawling modern Jerusalem.

The first is the Church of St. John the Baptist, in downtown contemporary Ein Karem.

Courtyard and Entrance to Church of Saint John the Baptist, Ein Karem, Israel.
Chris06, CC BY-SA 4.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0>, via Wikimedia Commons

 

By tradition dating back to Saint Helen, mother of the Byzantine emperor Constantine, and supported by archeological research through layers of Crusader construction, there is evidence to believe that John the Baptist was born in the now-underground cave on this site.

Birth Cave of Saint John the Baptist, Ein Karem, Israel
Pikiwiki Israel, CC BY 2.5 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.5>, via Wikimedia Commons

 

A fountain in the courtyard appears to have been the original village water source, probably located on the temple property where Elizabeth’s husband Zacharias was serving as Jewish priest when an angel appeared to him to announce the news of his son. Their primary dwelling is believed to have been here, or very close by.

Higher into the foothills is a site traditionally identified as the family’s summer home, and many scholars believe that this would have been where young Mary went to visit her much older cousin.

A curving, terraced brick pathway with very wide steps winds around the steep mountain trail today, leading up from the main village to the Church of the Visitation.

This shrine is a much larger complex, a former monastery. In contrast to the lower church in Ein Karem, where John the Baptist’s family is highlighted, the Church of the Visitation contains imagery devoted almost exclusively to Mary.

Detail of Front Facade – Church of the Visitation – Ein Karem, Israel. Elizabeth is pictured at
upper left.
Berthold Werner, CC BY-SA 3.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0>, via Wikimedia
Commons

 

The exception is a sculpture in strikingly contemporary style, portraying two pregnant women, facing each other.

***

Paradoxically, as liturgical time runs forward in May, divine time seems to spin backward, in earthly terms, to the moment when two unborn infants recognized each other from within their mothers’ wombs.

It was only after a very young woman — who had said “yes” to a divine act with consequences she could not possibly have fully understood — had received affirmation and confirmation from her wiser, more experienced cousin, that she burst into the Magnificat.

Sober sunset clouds will gather. One of these babies will be beheaded. One will die by crucifixion.

But these are the moments when Wordsworth’s “… eye that hath kept watch o’er man’s mortality …” is most deftly invoked by the poet.

Penance, Baptism, Resurrection, and Ascension will change the whole game.

“The ‘clouds of glory’ that these babies ‘trail’ contain Eternity for those who believe.”

May enduring faith, hope, and love guard your hearts this May.

Veni Sancte Spiritus.

 

 

Featured Photo: Panoramic View – Church of the Visitation – Ein Karem, Israel Attribution Tombah, CC0, via Wikimedia Commons

Notes:

  1. Quoted from https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/45536/ode-intimations-of-immortality-from-recollections-of-early-childhood.
  2. https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/050924-Ascension.cfm
  3. https://bible.usccb.org/bible/john/21
  4. https://bible.usccb.org/bible/acts/1

Catholics, Know Your History!

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Catholics, Know Your History!

Writer Mary McWilliams urges Catholics to embrace the Catholic Church’s history with all is blemishes and beauty, and to begin with the spirited re-release of, ‘Triumph, The Power and Glory of the Catholic Church.’

If Catholic news junkies have felt a bit twitchy that their church is the target of arrows firing from numerous directions, those nervous tics have merit. Assaults on the Catholic church worldwide have made frequent headlines: the Chinese Communist Party asserts heightened control on religious institutions in Hong Kong (1); militants attack Sunday worshipers at a Catholic Church in Burkina Faso, killing 15 brothers and sisters (2); and here in the homeland an investigation by US senators into deleted FBI records regarding a memo deemed “anti-Catholic” (3).

That was just in February. In January, the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops released its, “State of Religious Liberty in the United States,” citing the top five threats in 2024 that include increased attacks on churches, suppression of free speech, and mandates on medical professionals (4).

Which may make a bit premature the October 2023 updated re-issue Triumph, The Power and the Glory of the Catholic Church: A 2000 Year History. Or, given the barrage of threats, the timing may be fortuitous for author H. W. Crocker III and his press, Regnery Publishing, to offer this 600-plus page tome on such a lush, complex topic. Since this is a faith that has suffered strikes outside and within, going back to the days after the Lord designated a brash fisherman the rock on which he would build his church, wouldn’t it be reasonable to understand the threats and how they have been handled?

Have you ever succumbed to the argument that Martin Luther had “some good points” in his theses? Or bowed your head in shame over the Inquisition? Been lost on how to respond to criticism of Vatican II? Catholics, know your history; not only the Genesis account of Adam and Eve, original sin, and the lovely stories of Fatima and Lourdes, but of the Dark Ages, the Renaissance, the Reformation up to 20th Century, Nazism, Communism, schisms, heretics, and where we stand today:  a culture that has determined a new era and dubbed it “post-Christian” as though Jesus Christ and his Salvation have become passe´ and given way to a movement that even Dr. Frankenstein’s “… dreams easily surpassed … transhumanism” (p. 541).

Know your history, with its deep, ugly, beautiful, and completely magnificent flaws and glory. Triumph presents it all. Two thousand years is a lot to take in, even snuggled down in the most comfy chair, but Triumph promises to be a “brawling, colorful history, full of pageantry and spirited polemic …” Mr. Crocker, a well-known novelist, historian, myth-buster, and lover of the faith, takes time to frame each era, tie it to the next, and expound on the politics, strategies, conflicts, players, and positions.

Revel in the chapter on Constantine and think of those altogether indifferent to any faith:  “Constantine had nothing to gain by embracing Christianity – a small, unpopular, and persecuted faith. His mother was a Christian and his father had been sympathetic to Christians, but their influence was secondary. It was battle that convinced him — the Christian God delivered him victory at the Milvian Bridge” (p. 52).

The author tackles the Reformation with command, describing it as “… the worst cataclysm to befall the Western world since the sack of Rome in 410” (page 289). He explains Luther, described by one historian as “the most anal of theologians,” and how his “barbarian creed” became out of control because Pope Leo X tackled what he thought was a greater threat, the Turks’ invasion of Hungary and Germany with its lances set on the Holy Roman Empire. That is only one instance where Triumph offers insight into the quandaries popes underwent throughout time while navigating hostilities and juggling divergent and powerful leaders.

He addresses both the villains of the church, and the heroes. Charles of Hapsburg, who at age 20, denounced Martin Luther at Worms and remained loyal to the church, even when popes turned against him. Fr. Jerzey Popieluszko, chaplain of Poland’s Solidarity movement, who ceaselessly preached non-violence despite communists’ violence toward him, up to his murder (p. 507). Beloved Pope John Paul II who, with his keen intellect and intuition, understood that old methods no longer worked with modern political threats and introduced a new approach. “What was needed now was a new banner of religious freedom to challenge the primary threat to the faith — Communist totalitarianism. When the Council decided to put the liturgy into the vernacular, the future pope, who understood the primacy of culture, saw springs of popular renewal (p. 522).”

Mr. Crocker counsels that the church will be in conflict until the Second Coming. Jesus has already won the war, but the church militant still needs to fight battles without shame: “… there is no need for muting the trumpet, for fudging the truth to make it more palatable to its enemies, for prevaricating instead of being courageous” (p.537).

In Triumph, Mr. Crocker affirms, “The Catholic Church … is the most extraordinary story in the world. The Church is a great force, and perhaps through it – indeed, only through it —Christendom will rise again” (p. 541).

 

 

1 https://catholicvote.org/report-religious-freedom-collapsing-in-hong-kong

2 https://www.vaticannews.va/en/africa/news/2024-02/burkina-faso-15-persons-killed-in-ferocious-attack-on-catholic.html

3 https://catholicvote.org/fbi-reportedly-deleted-info-related-to-anti-catholic-memo/

4 https://www.usccb.org/committees/religious-liberty/2024-annual-report

Knight and Castle Image by Dmytro from Pixabay

Martin Luther Image by Andreas Breitling from Pixabay

Our Luminous Eucharist

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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

 

©Copyright 2024 by Margaret King Zacharias

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:

  1. 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.

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

the-rosary

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

catholic-church-4086#

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

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

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

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

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

 

 

 

 

Cath-Lit Live: A Faith Such as Heaven Intended

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“Cath-Lit Live!” features brief interviews with Catholic authors who are releasing new books. Hosted by Catholic author and speaker Amy J. Cattapan, “Cath-Lit Live!” gives viewers a glimpse into the latest Catholic books while getting to know a bit about the author as well.

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A Faith Such as Heaven Intended by Amanda Lauer

Ruth Simmons can’t bear the thought of watching her older brothers and the only boy in her class march off to war, so she decides to tag along, not knowing that Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, is the last place a young lady would wish to find herself in July of 1863, on the verge of the bloodiest single battle in the Civil War. In her quest to help out on the battlefront, Ruth meets the insufferable Ben Holt, a brilliant surgeon—hardly older than she—who seems determined to thwart her plans to go into medicine. By chance, the two end up working in Washington City, as the city faces threats from the invading army and assassins targeting Federal leaders in the final few months of the war. Can Ruth and Ben set their political differences—and competitiveness—aside to survive the treacherous last year of the war?

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About the author:

An avid reader and history buff since childhood, Amanda Lauer is the author of the award-winning Heaven Intended Civil War series. In addition, Amanda has written two time-travel novels Anything But Groovy and Royal & Ancient, she contributed short stories to the anthologies Treasures: Visible & Invisible and Ashes: Visible & Invisible. Amanda and her husband John have been married 42 years, have four grown children, a daughter-in-law, three sons-in-law, and eight precious grandchildren.

You can catch “Cath-Lit Live” live on A.J. Cattapan’s author Facebook page. Recorded versions of the show will also be available to watch later on her YouTube channel and Instagram.

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Copyright 2024 Amy J. Cattapan
Banner image via Pexels

Celebrate the dedication of the ‘mother and head’ of all churches on Nov. 9

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Celebrate the dedication of the ‘mother and head’ of all churches on Nov. 9

The diesel engine of the American pilgrims’ tour bus couldn’t quiet the buzzing of questions concerning their next Roman site.

“Who’s St. John Lateran?”

“I’ve never heard of him.”

“What did he do to become a saint?”

Tucked away in southeast Rome and across the street from the Holy Steps (the stairway St. Helena excavated and believed Christ climbed to his meeting with Pilate), sits the historic archbasilica commonly known as “St. John Lateran.”

“There is no saint named John Lateran,” the tour guide announced as the pilgrims gathered at the front entrance of the oldest public church in Rome. It was built on a large campus that housed a palace, barracks, and other edifices owned by the wealthy and powerful Lateran family. The church was originally dedicated to the Most Holy Savior, then later to Sts. John the Baptist and John the Evangelist, giving it the official name of The Archbasilica of the Most Holy Savior and of Saints John the Baptist and the Evangelist. Most people simply refer to it as St. John Lateran. In a city of many ancient churches filled with art and history, this one has a special designation.

What would most Catholics say is the “pope’s church?” St. Peter’s Basilica? That’s the church most associated with the Holy See. In addition to other ceremonies and Masses at St. Peter’s Basilica, the pope celebrates Christmas Eve Mass there, installs new cardinals and, until recently, bestowed the lamb’s wool pallium on new archbishops.

But every year, on Nov. 9, the pope travels less than 15 minutes from St. Peter’s to celebrate the dedication of St. John Lateran. As the bishop of Rome, Lateran is the pope’s archbasilica. And, as Catholics, it’s our church too. The church of every Catholic everywhere in the world.

“Omnium urbis et orbis ecclesiarium mater et caput,” the tour guide read, pointing to the message in Latin. Translated in English, it is “The mother and head of all the churches in the city and the world.” Every Catholic has a parish home, the church they attend regularly and are probably registered. They also have their diocesan home, the cathedral in the diocese that is known as the “bishop’s church.” On an international level, they have St. John Lateran, the mother and head of all churches. Sojourners from around the world are welcomed at daily Masses and join in this universal place as a family. The pope celebrates Mass on many holy days, such as the feast of Corpus Christi and even Christmas Day. On a jubilee year, its holy doors are the first opened of four major basilicas in Rome. Between the 12th and 16th centuries, it hosted five ecclesiastical meetings, collectively known at the “Lateran Councils.” It housed popes until the 14th century. John Paul II journeyed to Lateran for the Rite of the Possession of the Chair of the Bishop of Rome after being elected pope in 1978, invoking Revelation 21:3 when he said, “I wish to kneel down in this place and kiss the threshold of this temple which has been for so many centuries ‘the dwelling of God with men.’” (1)


Yards from the basilica is a statue of St. Francis of Assisi, who ventured to Rome to request permission from Pope Innocent III, in residence at the Lateran palace, to begin his order. Larger than life statues of the 12 apostles surround the perimeter of the nave, each showing the symbols associated with them: Peter holding the keys; John the Evangelist with pen and eagle; Bartholomew, who was flayed alive, holding the skin of his face. Each one teaching us the glory of their entrance into heaven and reminding us that the art in churches was never meant simply as pretty decoration of some artist’s spiritual interpretation. Art was meant to help teach the Gospel, to both the illiterate and privileged. It is just as important today to keep that art public to help enlighten moderns to the Word.


The archbasilica has survived natural disasters and fires, a 1993 bombing, and more than 200 popes. It is a place of rich history that includes the fiendishness of Nero and the benevolence of Constantine who handed the property over to the church under the care of Pope Melchiades (2). Like countless other Catholic churches, it displays sumptuous art and has been a place of significant occasions, some of which have harbored tragedy and joy. It could be argued, however, that the most momentous event takes place daily and exponentially with the arrival of Catholic pilgrims from their native lands who come to the comforting revelation that this basilica is also their home. If you can’t attend a Mass there Nov. 9 to celebrate its dedication, make a virtual visit and get to know your home away from home.

Click here to take a virtual tour of St. John Lateran.

Copyright 2023 Mary McWilliams
Photos by Mary McWilliams:

Feature Image: The front of The Archbasilica of the Most Holy Savior and of Saints John the Baptist and the Evangelist, commonly known as “St. John Lateran.”
Image 2: Statue of St. Francis of Assisi and companions requesting permission from Pope Innocent to establish a new order.
Image 3: St. Peter, in the nave of St. John Lateran shown holding his symbol, the keys to the Kingdom of Heaven.

References:
(1) https://www.vatican.va/content/john-paul-ii/en/homilies/1978/documents/hf_jp-ii_hom_19781112_possesso-laterano.html
(2)https://www.vatican.va/various/basiliche/san_giovanni/it/basilica/storia.htm

Mount Carmel

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Mount Carmel

By this Chronos time of our renewed baptism in the Holy Spirit at Pentecost, pleasant weather has finally arrived in most parts of the United States. Many of us as Catholics can look forward to outdoor liturgical celebrations with the beauty of nature surrounding us in this season.

The public witness of Corpus Christi processions; devotions to the Sacred Heart of Jesus and the Immaculate Heart of Mary; as well as the glory of sacramental ordination for well-formed young men to the sacred priesthood; all are spiritual highlights that await us in June.

Mount Carmel commonly refers to the promontory of a mountain range with the same name, located about thirty miles west of the Sea of Galilee, on a peninsula that penetrates into the Mediterranean Sea. Today it stands at the edge of a modern city, Haifa, Israel, near the ancient Crusader city of Acre.

Dedicated to the Blessed Virgin Mary as Our Lady of Mount Carmel, and stewarded by the Carmelite orders since the thirteenth century, this popular pilgrimage site is also called Stella Maris, Star of the Sea. This may be in part because the entire peninsula is surrounded by water, but the roots of the alternate title go back much further into history.

Scholars believe that the usage ‘Star of the Sea,’ as both a place name and as a title for Mary, began with St. Jerome. He translated Mary’s Hebrew name, according to its meaning in the annals of the Exodus from Egypt — Miriam, the sister of Moses and Aaron, bore the same name with the same spelling as Mary, the mother of Jesus.

The site on which the Mount Carmel monastery stands today has additional roots that go deep into the Old Testament.

Sign at the base of the statue of Elijah calling down fire from heaven to defeat the prophets of Baal, in the monastery gardens, Mount Carmel. Author’s personal photo, used with permission.

A sign engraved in Latin, Hebrew, and Arabic at the base of a statue of the prophet Elijah in the monastery gardens declares the understory grotto at Mount Carmel to be Elijah’s cave, and this mountain the site at which he defeated the prophets of Baal (I Kings, Chapter 18):

(17) When Ahab saw Elijah, he said to him, “Is it you, you disturber of Israel?”

(18) He answered, “It is not I who disturb Israel, but you and your father’s house, by forsaking the commands of the LORD and you by following the Baals.

(19) Now summon all Israel to me on Mount Carmel, as well as the four hundred and fifty prophets of Baal and the four hundred prophets of Asherah who eat at Jezebel’s table.”

(20) So Ahab summoned all the Israelites and had the prophets gather on Mount Carmel (I Kings, 18:17-20.). (https://bible.usccb.org/bible/1kings/18).

 Elijah’s activity on Mount Carmel did not stop there, either. In II Kings, Chapter 1, we read that:

(3) …the LORD said to Elijah the Tishbite: Go and meet the messengers of Samaria’s king, and tell them: “Is it because there is no God in Israel that you are going to inquire of Baalzebub, the god of Ekron?”

(4) For this, the LORD says: You shall not leave the bed upon which you lie; instead, you shall die … (II Kings, 1:3-4) (https://bible.usccb.org/bible/2kings/1)

 Elijah delivered the message as God had commanded. Then he raced with haste up to the top of Mount Carmel, so he could watch over the Jezreel Valley for this new king’s angry men, who had been sent to kill him.

Twice again Elijah was forced to call down fire that destroyed two commanders and two battalions of fifty men, before a third commander who had been sent with more men to capture him pleaded for mercy, and received it. (II Kings 1:1-18). (https://bible.usccb.org/bible/2kings/1)

Fr. Lawrence Hoffmann celebrates mass in the garden at Mount Carmel monastery, Haifa, Israel. Author’s personal photo, used with permission.

The holy mass that my pilgrimage group was privileged to experience in the garden at Mount Carmel was a peaceful and anointed celebration.

At the end of our liturgy, as the priest pronounced the final blessings, into the silence after each human response came a single gentle “caw,” in chorus from the birds in the trees.

Despite the many problems our human lives face today, and the impotent ‘baals’ that the misguided seek for answers, there is still ‘a God in Israel’ – as there always has been, and always will be.

Let’s live in Kairos time this June.

May you feel ‘amens’ resounding from God’s creation, and continue to bring your own witness into the world.

May you remember that Our beloved Lady, Star of the Sea, stands guard at Mount Carmel, where Elijah the Tishbite worked his miracles. They continue together, to watch over us all.

©Copyright 2023 by Margaret King Zacharias

Featured Photo: Welcome sign at Mt. Carmel. Author’s personal photo, used with permission.

 

Lovely Genealogies

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Lovely Genealogies

Those lovely genealogies. You know what I’m talking about. Those long lists of tribes, generations and peoples, with impossible tongue twisting names that force even the most seasoned lector to stumble and stammer over the syllabic hills and valleys of a phonetic purgatory.

Yeah, those genealogies.

Mercifully, those genealogical lists don’t appear too often in the daily readings, but every now and then you find yourself internally cringing as you realize that the lector is about to attempt a series of tongue twisters to end all tongue twisters—which will eventually reverberate around the church, and twang your overly sensitized auditory nerve.

And then, like a trip to the dentist, you realize that the experience is going to live up to the expectation, as the lector steps to the pulpit and begins the reading. The pronunciations are everything you feared, and you say to yourself for the 20th time, why are genealogies so important?

Indeed. Why have the ancient archivists taken the time to painstakingly reproduce those seemingly innocuous lists? Couldn’t they have left them out? Shouldn’t they have left them out?

It’s so typical of us to look at history through the lens of modern culture. The genealogies of long-forgotten peoples seem utterly irrelevant, and yet for the peoples of the past … they provided that all important filament of belonging that connected beliefs, talents and physical attributes to present realities—providing context and understanding for the individual as well as the collective.

Litanies of ancient tribes and peoples would hardly seem necessary in today’s world, but that is only because we have made technological advances that no longer require those tedious lists. They are still just as important as they were 5,000 years ago, we just tabulate them a little differently: in the forms of genealogical databases and DNA testing.

Long ago, I appointed myself as the unofficial genealogist for my family. I am fascinated with my genetic lineages, and the tales they have to tell. Over the years I have discovered that I come from a long line of writers, composers and teachers. I have been all three, at one time or another.

I also hail from a hardy Irish, seafaring family. They were Merchant Marines, sea captains and watermen. I have never been any of those things.

Juxtaposed to my more illustrious chromosomes, I admit to a lineage of scoundrels as well. In fact, I discovered that several family members in my distant Irish lineage were exiled to the Americas because they were involved in a plot to kill the Queen of England. Oh dear! Rest assured … I have never done that, either.

Still, I find these trends to be fascinating. They tell me so much about the genetic material flowing through my veins, and allow me to investigate the strengths and weaknesses in my family line. But most importantly, they provide me with a sense of belonging. I know where I came from, and where I belong in the human saga.

Could it be so very different for the family of God? Wouldn’t it be necessary … even vital, to maintain a record of the ancestral filament that stretches from the first Adam … through the Patriarchs and Prophets to the Second Adam: Jesus Christ?

That would be an absolute imperative, I think.

Those truly remarkable genealogies in the Bible are a codified record of the work of God down through the ages. They are documented evidence of God’s promise of salvation from Adam to Christ, and they are a record of the critical impact upon the people of God—despite the victories, and failures of their human endeavors.

But most importantly, they are a record of the promise of God—wending its way throughout salvation history to the entrance of Jesus Christ upon the world stage—Who is the fulfillment of that promise.

Yes, those lovely, lovely genealogies are still difficult to pronounce, but they exist as evidence of God’s faithfulness and love to an often difficult—yet salvageable people.

At this point, one has to ask: Why has God remained so steadfast throughout all of human history?

Because He is our Father, and He loves us.

Besides … we’re family.

“… [For] you are all one in Christ Jesus. And if you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham’s descendant, heirs according to the promise.”  (Gal. 3:28-29)

©Copyright 2023 by Sarah Torbeck

 

Meet Servant of God Joseph Dutton

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Meet Servant of God Joseph Dutton

He stepped off the boat at Molokai and said to Father Damien. “I am here to help.” He stayed for the rest of his life.

Ira Barnes Dutton was born in Stowe, Vermont, on April 27, 1843. Ira grew up in an entirely Protestant environment, taught Sunday school, and worked in a bookstore in Wisconsin when the Civil war began. He remembered how “the streets were lined with cheering crowds, bands were playing, and flags flying.” Ira enlisted in September 1861 and served four years with the 13th Wisconsin Regiment.

The 13th Wisconsin saw little fighting during the war, but it did enable Ira to demonstrate his inborn leadership skills. He eventually was promoted to captain. He considered the military a career, but as the numbers of personnel decreased after the war, he realized that his chances for advancement were very slim. He left the army in 1866 and spent the next 20 years working at different jobs. He also married an unfaithful woman, and the marriage lasted a short time. He never even mentioned her name. He filed divorce papers in 1881.

“I never injured anyone but myself.”

Ira worked in cemeteries, ran a distillery in Alabama, and moved to Memphis to work on the railroads. In 1875 he took a job with the War Department, processing claims against the government. Ira was successful in all his undertakings and was an upstanding citizen. But at night, he would stay home and drink, and he became an alcoholic. He would say, “I never injured anyone but myself.” He quit drinking in 1876, and he never drank again.

Baptized on his fortieth birthday

Ira fell away from religion during the war. But he did become interested in Catholicism. He had become friends with some Catholics, and their influence spurred him to want to learn more. He acquired a catechism and began to study. He was received into the Catholic Church on April 27, 1883. The occasion also marked his fortieth birthday. He changed his name to Joseph, who he greatly admired. Joseph quit his job with the government, and set out to begin a new life.

Joseph desired to do penance for his wild years and sinfulness. He headed to Our Lady of Gethsemani Monastery in Kentucky. This was the home of the Trappists Monks, and he was determined to do repentance for the rest of his life. After 20 months, he realized he needed to do penitential action and not penitential contemplation. He knew about Father Damien and his apostolate for lepers at Molokai in Hawaii. He left the Trappist Monastery and, with the blessings of the Abbott, began preparing to leave for Molokai. He remained lifelong friends with the Trappists.

Meeting Father Damien of Molokai

Joseph Dutton arrived in Molokai sometime in 1886. When he arrived at Molokai, he remembered how Father Damien greeted the new patients with Hansen’s Disease (Leprosy). When Father Damien approached him, Joseph said, “My name is Joseph Dutton; I have come to help, and I have come to stay.”

Father Damien told him he could not pay him, and Joseph replied, “I do not care about that.” He would stay for the rest of his life.

 

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President Theodore Roosevelt admired him

Joseph was a member of the Secular Franciscan Order. He was often called Brother Joseph. He began writing letters to officials and people of influence, seeking help for those afflicted with leprosy. He would explain how life was for them on the island. President Theodore Roosevelt expressed his admiration and respect for Brother Joseph, one of his frequent contacts. Joseph worked side by side with Father Damien for two years until the holy priest passed away. Before his death in 1889, Father Damien said, “I can die now. Brother Joseph will take care of my orphans.”

Brother Joseph served as administrator, carpenter, repairman, and even medic bandaging wounds and taking care of the sick and dying. He had saved the money he received from two pensions and used it for the lepers. He spent 44 years caring for the young boys and men who had Hansen’s Disease.

“A happy place—a happy life.”

Brother Joseph Dutton died in Honolulu on March 26, 1931. He was buried in the grave next to St. Damien at St. Philomena Church in Kalawao. Before his death, he was quoted as saying, “It has been a happy place—a happy life.” President Theodore Roosevelt, aware of Brother Joseph’s military service and his selfless years on Molokai, ordered the U.S. Pacific Fleet to pass Molokai and dip their colors in salute to the heroic patriot.

The Joseph Dutton Guild is spearheading the effort to continue the cause for canonization.

Copyright 2022 Larry Peterson
Image: Image from the History of Medicine, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Who Are the “Scribes and Pharisees?”

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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 20th 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 21st 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.

Copyright 2022 by Margaret Zacharias

The Passion of Christ

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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.

 

Copyright 2022 by Margaret Zacharias 

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