St Laurence: thoughts on the diaconate

Everyone knows the story of  St Laurence, the great martyr, the only non biblical saint honoured throughout the Latin Church with a feast.

He is a deacon; I had an Irish lady email to complain about "married deacons" who are being introduced into Ireland, she means permanent deacons of course, they were resisted in her country for a long time.
I have a friend who has just taken over a parish and the local clergy (priests) have been advising him to rid of  the permanent deacon in the parish he is just about to take over, partly because he is a bit disruptive in the parish, hasn't much grasp of theology and isn't that devout, he seems to have been trained on the cheap, without much regard to his spiritual formation, apparently he turns up Sundays and spends the rest of the time gossiping.

Deacons are a bit of problem for us in the West, our theology of Holy Orders doesn't quite have room for them, it is based too much on priests. Some of the VII Fathers, familiar with the Fathers and the theology of the East, wanted to broaden it but that depended on raising the role of the minor orders within the life of the Church, but that was somewhat dashed by the Council deciding to abolish them whilst restoring the permanent diaconate. In practice we end have ended up with a bishop as a priest plus and a deacon as priest minus. In Ireland, as elsewhere, the new openness to the diaconate is obviously the result of the shortage of priests, they can stand in for a priest, and for all the meaningful words, they are simply a substitute, a stand in.

The story of St Laurence tells us that the deacon was there to care for the poor, and to look after the Church's treasure. Historically, he was one who did the pastoral work, who took care of almsgiving and the Church's administration, he might also have been a catechist but everything he did was in communion with the bishop, in the story of St Laurence he shares in both the death of Christ and of his bishop Pope Sixtus. I cannot help thinking today  Diocesan Financial Secretaries, Head Teachers etc. ought to be deacons.

It is entirely praiseworthy that bishops are beginning again to wear the pontifical dalmatic, it should be remembered that Eastern bishops wear the sackos, the dalmatic like garment but not the chasuble, because rather than bishops being priests plus they are both priest and deacon. The deacon shares in the bishop's servant role and hence wears one of his vestments, which signifies his service of the Church.
It is worth considering the seven deacon's of Rome were not the Presbyter's assistants but the servants of the Bishop. In ancient sanctuaries the deacons stood around the bishops cathedra whilst the presbyters sat with him. At a deacons ordination, unlike a priests, the bishop alone lays hands on the new deacon.

One of the stories of St Laurence is that one the treasures he cared for was the Holy Grail which was sent to Valencia, his hometown, there is still an apparently 1st century Palestinian cup in there cathedral treasury there today. Modern theologies of the diaconate seem to want downplay the cultic role of the diaconate, in the Traditional Rite not only does he prepare the chalice but also offers it with bishop or priest, it is his role to  prepare and care for holy things, yet he does not take the place of either bishop or priest. In the Ethiopian he doesn't even read the Gospel, the priest does, assisted by the deacon. In the Byzantine liturgy for a great deal of the time he stands at the head of the people leading the Litanies, in the West, now he is supposed to lead the Prayer of the Faithful.

There are several accounts of newly appointed bishops getting rid of the previous regimes troublesome deacons by ordaining them presbyters, thus taking them away from the coffers and separating them from the poor and from immediate contact with the bishop's ministery.

Read More

Ugly Black Babies!

This little video is of a confrontation between an American abortionist and a couple of Christian activists. It is carried by LifeSiteNews.
The abortionist, Dr Ashutosh Ron Virmani, follows the Maries Stopes racist line; he speaks of "ugly black babies", he also follows her line on the poor; I suppose he would also follow her line about Gay people, who she didn't like either. Obviously, Dr Virmani is being harassed by Christians, and is American.

I am sure we can be confident no abortionist in the UK does it because they hate people, do they?

Read More

Benedict on Dominic's Prayer

In his catechetical series on prayer Pope Benedict spoke today about St Dominic, the man who was "either speaking to God or speaking about him". I find something stifling about later "methods" of prayer, the Carmelite or Ignatian methods for example. It is interesting that the Carthusians, founded a century before Dominic gave no place for "mental prayer", just the Office and Lectio Divina, thi reflect the ancient practice of   "just get on with it", do it, don't worry how. Dominic seems to be saying everything should be done prayerfully.
It is significant that Pope notes "the importance of external attitudes in our prayers".

Dominic seems merely to want to enthuse the whole of life with prayer.

In the founder of the Dominicans, "we can see an example of harmonious integration of contemplation of the divine mysteries and apostolic activity." It was said of him the he always "spoke with God or of God." "This observation indicates his deep communion with the Lord and at the same time, the continued commitment to lead others to this communion with God."

Although he did not leave writings on prayer, "the Dominican tradition collected and handed down his living experience in a work entitled: the Nine Ways of Prayer". " which "helps us understand something of the inner life of the saint, helps us to learn something about how to pray".

Each of these nine ways of praying is done "always in front of Jesus Crucified," with " a corporal and spiritual attitude, that intimately interpenetrating, favor recollection and fervor. The first seven ways follow an ascending line, like the steps of a journey, towards an intimate communion with God, with the Trinity: St. Dominic prayed standing, bowing to express humility, lying prostrate on the ground to ask forgiveness for his sins, on his knees in penance to participate in the sufferings of the Lord, with his arms open staring at the crucifix to contemplate the Supreme Love, with his gaze directed towards the heavens feeling himself drawn towards the world of God."

The Pope stressed that the last two ways " correspond to two forms of piety that the Saint normally practiced. First, personal meditation, where prayer acquires a more intimate, fervent and soothing dimension." After the Liturgy of the Hours or Mass, " St. Dominic prolonged his conversation with God, without any time limits. He would sit in an attitude of quite recollection and listening, reading a book or staring at the Crucifix. He lived these moments of his relationship with God so intensely that his reactions of joy or tears were outwardly perceptible. " " Witnesses say that at times he would go into a sort of ecstasy, his face transfigured, but immediately afterwards he would humbly resume his daily activities recharged by the power that comes from on High.." Then prayer while travelling between one monastery or another, he would recite Lauds, Sext, Vespers with companions, and, crossing the valleys and hills, contemplate the beauty of creation. At such times a hymn of praise and thanksgiving to God for so many gifts would gush from his heart, especially for the greatest wonder of all: the redemption accomplished by Christ. "
................
This saint reminds us of the importance of external attitudes in our prayers. That to kneel, to stand before the Lord, to fix our gaze on the Crucifix, to pause and gather ourselves in silence, is not a secondary act, but helps to us to place ourselves, our whole person, in relation to God. Once again, I would like draw attention to the need to find moments to pray quietly everyday for our spiritual life"

Read More

Dogs again

I really am horrified by the the desacration of the Blessed Sacrament in Australia, reported in the last post, it makes me feel both angry and sick.

Australia is the land of Bishop Morris and Fr Kennedy, both aged hippies who rejected the Catholic faith years ago. In the case of Bishop Morris I was surprised that his brother bishops seemed to take no action, indeed when his forced resignation was announced many seemed to support him. In the case of Fr Kennedy, for years he baptised invalidly and preached heresy with no censure from the Archbishop Brisbane, until Rome acted he was a "priest in good standing", as that was so one ask whether Bishop Bathurst is really a "bishop in good standing", could he be if he is tolerant of heresy an error in his diocese.

Fr Greg Reynolds' bishop had indeed suspended him but yet tolerated his celebrating Mass at which he preached heresy and set up his own church, an anti-church to the Church, for dissident Catholics. I really cannot understand why this priest having celebrated the sacraments whilst suspended was not excommunicated, if he continued to celebrate Mass then those who attended should also have been excommunicated.

Harsh? That is certainly what the liberal would claim. If I were the Pope I would place the whole continent under interdict until reparation was made, I would demand every bishop wore sackcloth for a year. It should certainly, at the very least make me, consider removing the indult for communion in the hand,

What strikes me as being strange is that Archbishop Hart, Reynolds' bishop takes a rather high handed approach towards the liberal secular Melbourne daily, The Age, for the way in which they report the story, they refer the Holy Eucharist as "bread and wine" and treat the whole incident as a bit of a joke, yet the Archbishop doesn't seem inclined to examine why the newspaper, published in his diocese, doesn't seem to have a higher understanding of a fundamental Catholic belief: could it not be that years and years of bad liturgy and poor catechesis have so degraded Catholicism that the bread of Angels has become crumbs given to housedogs? It should make him realise that far from being "awesome mysteries" most parish liturgies seem to give the impression we are distributing merely bread and wine. This just a notch down from the diocese of Linz's foccacia on stick Corpus Christi procession, and a few notches down from those people who used to ask me when I was going to let them "give out the wine again" or bishops who talk about the "Eucharist representing Christ" or priests being ordained to "build community".

Make some act of reparation for this sacrilege, and most especially for those who don't see it as a sacrilege.

Read More

Dog Receives Holy Communion

There is another scandal from Melbourne, now admittedly Fr Reynolds is suspended but...

FATHER Greg Reynolds wants his church of dissident Catholics to welcome all – ”every man and his dog”, one might say, risking the non-inclusive language he deplores – but even he was taken aback when that was put to the test during Mass yesterday.
A first-time visitor arrived late at the Inclusive Catholics service in South Yarra with a large and well-trained German shepherd. When the consecrated bread and wine were passed around, the visitor took some bread and fed it to his dog.

Madness breeds madness!

Read More

Pussy Riot

What does the Church do in the face of sacrilege?

In Moscow the Orthodox Church is pressing for the maximum penalty, as much as 7 years imprisonment, in the case of Pussy Riot who demonstrated against Putin with a blasphemous "prayer".
Before the arrest, I suspect even in Russia no-one had heard of them, if the Church authorities had not pressed charges it is likely they would have been a headline on Moscow news for one night and then been forgotten. As it is, even I have heard of them, and some of the media seem to want to present them as new dissidents, modern Solzhenitsyns or Sakharovs.
As with crucifixes in glasses of urine, the "art" is really in creating a reaction, the object or performance is incidental, what is being sought is outrage: no outrage, no art.
Apart from pressure from the Kremlin, the Moscow Patriarchate seems as bound up with the Putin Presidency as it was with the Tsar, there seems to be sense that simply ignoring the outrage to believers will show a moral weakness on the part of the Church that will set at at nought the hard won legal recognition the Church has sought since the fall of the USSR. Of course for many Russian believers the Pussy Riot is redolent of the atheistic contempt for the sacred of the communist era, not responding to it vigorously will merely encourage more of it. 

Read More

Olympics #3: 100,000 Condoms

I must say I rather enjoyed the Olympic opening ceremony, especially the egalitarian lighting of the "cauldron", it was good to see Cameron's big society given visual form and it was wonderful to see how billions of pounds could be spent in such a short time, though I guiltily wonder just how many NHS hip ops that was or whether the money could have been spent on mosquito nets in the third world - but that is the Judas question, so we shouldn't go there. I hadn't realise that the industrial revolution changed us from Hobbits to Orks but others have said that but it was a useful metaphor to use on Life Sunday.

I don't know when the "show" bit started to become so important and preceded the march of the future the worlds PE teachers but what I can't get my head around is why, apparently 100,000 condoms were distributed to the competitors.

Read More