Sauerkraut Nuthin'! MARY is the Gate to the New Year!

©2009, Randall A. Beeler

My apologies to sauerkraut devotees, but I despise the stuff. Not just for the acrid, make-yer-teeth-curl taste but for the depressing associations with New Year's Day.

Please understand: growing up, I hated school. New Year's Day routinely meant the end of Christmas Break, and my mom or Mrs. Urban were always cooking sauerkraut on New Year's Day. I can't explain my mother—I mean, she's Italian! But she (like many) has always associated sauerkraut with a Happy New Year, like Southerners in the United States associate good luck in the New Year with black-eyed peas and cornbread (something I can stomach with no nasty memories).

But on those New Year's Days when we went to my Nana Vitanza's upstairs-apartment in the Bloomfield section of Pittsburgh (for some decent food--Italian, thank you!), her downstairs landlady, Mrs. Urban (a kindly old Polish woman, really) would be cooking what smelled like a dumptruck of sauerkraut—for no army in particular that I could scout in the environs.

It stunk—three stories up! I break into a cold sweat just writing this. That slithering, serpentine odor would curl its way into my nostrils and choke me on the all-too-hideous realization that I had to go to school the next day. What sadist invents such a thing (uh, sauerkraut and school, I mean)?

Who invented New Year's Day, for that matter? Who thought this rude end to the celebration of the Incarnation as an easing back into the routine? I have to tell whomever that it's working no better than the sauerkraut.

As my loathing of school spawned my sauerkraut phobia, perhaps our apprehension of what is to come now that Christmas is over spurs the world's pursuit of New Year's Day.

So Emmanuel is with us. Well, He's gone into hiding in Egypt. When He finally does spring onto the world scene 30 years later, He will end up on the Cross. Yes, we know that He will rise from the Dead … but … what if He doesn't this time?

What if the stench of the world's crushing our hopes and dreams—it's incessant, cliché demands that there is no free lunch and our deep-down haunting awareness that our own efforts, no matter how heroic, are doomed to failure—choke us on the "reality" that the grind begins again and again, world without end, no Amen?

Mary never visited Mrs. Urban, but She well knows the end of Christmas. Think about it. Her Advent begins with the Annunciation—an alarming encounter, no doubt, but with the promise of bearing God Himself to the world. Her stay with cousin Elizabeth is nothing short of magnificat-i-cent, so to speak. The Nativity is a bit adventuresome, but Mary and Joseph do find a place to have the Christ Child, rent-free, and, in the end, are regaled by everyone from shepherds to angels to Magi. (The gold must've come in handy, even if a carpentry-based family had little use for frankincense and myrrh.)

But Her purification and Jesus' presentation at the Temple leave a sour taste in the mouth. Yes, the Christ Child is destined for a strange glory, like our New Year, but the price of it is a sword piercing Mary's heart (Lk 2:34-35). A darkness lay ahead for Her, as it does right now for us. The world is cold, the nights are long, our shadows look taller than our souls. Christmas seems burnt out, school is about to start, and Spring is so far away. What is this icy finger that pierces our hearts?

The Church's January-1st celebration of the Solemnity of Mary the Mother of God invites us to embrace this New Year as Mary does Her prophesied sword: by treasuring everything in our hearts (Lk 2:51)—even sauerkraut and school.

If we are to bear Christ to the world, we must do as Mary does: treasure this sword and all that God gives—and hold on. Christ comes, but to blossom in our world like an ever-opening rose requires a cross that we are called to share with Him. The wormwood and the gall on the sponge held up to us, crucified and nearly dead from the attacks of our ancient enemy, may seem as acrid as sauerkraut to an school-loathing child on New Year's Day. Yet, our New Year must journey through cold and darkness, with God.

Otherwise, how are we ever to know that He is with us when we need Him most?

Mary, Mother of God, be our Gate to the New Year. May our hearts be pierced—not out of vanity—but to open them for Christ. For like the growing light of the New Year, He must wax ever brighter for us to see ourselves as He sees us.

And He will never fade. Amen.

Conning Ourselves Out of Christmas?

©2009, Randall A. Beeler

14 For while all things were in quiet silence, and the night was in the midst of her course, 15 your Almighty word leaped down from heaven from your royal throne, as a fierce conqueror into the midst of the land of destruction (Wis 18, DRE)

4 But when the fullness of the time had come, God sent his Son, made of a woman, made under the law (Gal 4, DRE)

For it was a cave used as a stable by the mountaineers of the uplands about Bethlehem; who still drive their cattle into such holes and caverns at night. It was here that a homeless couple had crept underground with the cattle when the doors of the crowded caravansaries had been shut in their faces; and it was here beneath the very feet of the passers-by, in a cellar under the very floor of the world, that Jesus Christ was born.
(G. K. Chesterton, from The Everlasting Man)

God reveals Himself as Emmanuel, "God-with-us," at a time when the world appears to least need Him. Rome has conquered and united East and West. Humankind has reached its peak, as recounted in Virgil's Aeneid:

No foe, unpunish'd, in the fighting field
Shall dare thee, foot to foot, with sword and shield;
Much less in arms oppose thy matchless force,
When thy sharp spurs shall urge thy foaming horse. (VI)

But the vision given by Anchises to Aeneas is doomed to frustration: when Rome has all the earth, has attained all things, what then? Even as Aeneas, at the end of The Aeneid, fails the pax Romana, the Roman vision of peace and world order, and plunges his sword into Turnus (XII), so Rome wins the world only to find that the world is not enough:

25 For what is a man advantaged, if he gain the whole world and lose himself and cast away himself? (Lk 9:25)

Christ comes in "the fullness of time"—the nick of time, the time when the world is most tired of itself, even before it knows it is tired of itself. Herod and all Jerusalem tremble, Magi trek from far reaches, Caesar tries to make his world account for itself in a massive census. At the height of its business, activity, and initiative, the world cannot pause itself.

Christ pauses us, and the heavens follow:

O ye beneath life's crushing load,
Whose forms are bending low,
Who toil along the climbing way
With painful steps and slow;
Look now, for glad and golden hours
Come swiftly on the wing;
Oh rest beside the weary road
And hear the angels sing.
("It Came Upon A Midnight Clear")

Even now, though, we hasten away Christ. Already we see Christmas trees, still green, heaped with the garbage on trash day. The stores display Super Bowl snacks, Valentine's Day candy, and Presidents Day regalia on the shelves. Accountants are braced to tabulate taxes and the first-quarter retail let-down. The Christmas is fairy tale is quaint, the world tells us, but we must get back to the real world of grind, grunt, and groan.

The Church celebrates Candlemas, on February 2nd, as the close of the Christmas Season; it marks the day on which Mary, according to the Law, makes a sacrifice at the Temple, for Her purification (Lk 2:22-24). The world trades Simeon's blessing (Lk 2:34) for Groundhog Day, desperately hoping that we can cheat Winter out of its six-weeks reign. Like Bill Murray's character (Phil Conners) in the movie, Groundhog Day, we despair that our lives are an endless repetition of gaining the world, gaining the world, gaining the world … only to lose our very souls.

We are Phil Conners—we love (philo) to "con" ourselves into trying to conquer the cold of the death, the Winter of the world: if we just try it again, just one more time, we'll get it right.

Thank God that the Christ Child waits for us. Every day—not just Christmas Day—the shepherds and kings step out of their rutted paths to pause at a wonder. What God does once, God does forever, for God is eternal. Therefore, as His Resurrection is eternal, so is His Incarnation eternal.

At each Daily Mass, the Church witnesses this reality to the world; as we kneel at the Consecration, as we step forward to receive the Eucharist, we again receive the Christ Child. Every day is Christmas, and every human heart is the Manger. Christmas never ends.

How silently, how silently
The wondrous gift is given!
So God imparts to human hearts
The blessings of His heaven.
No ear may hear His coming,
But in this world of sin,
Where meek souls will receive him still,
The dear Christ enters in.
("O Little Town of Bethlehem")

Church & State: Piercing the Heart of The City of Man

©2009, Randall A. Beeler

Father Pacwa's homily for the Daily Mass at Our Lady of the Angels excellently summarizes the history of the Martyrdom of Saint Thomas á Beckett. In Her wisdom, the Church places the Feast of Saint Thomas the day after that of the Holy Innocents, because Saint Thomas offers an antidote to Herod's bloodshed.

To be sure, Saint Thomas does not originally bear innocence, for he is every bit as cunning as Herod in carrying out his duties as King Henry II's Chancellor. Insofar as Chancellor Beckett, like Herod, serves the City of Man, he is friend to King Henry. But the monarch does not count on the fact that, when he makes Chancellor Beckett Archbishop Beckett, the Saint will serve the call of the City of God with open-hearted integrity.

Saint Thomas is the antidote to Herod not because the Archbishop is as innocent as the Innocents whom Herod slaughters but because, in Saint Thomas, all Herod-like tenacity, cunning, and self-serving is baptized by God's Grace into holy perseverance, aplomb, and self-emptying.

In becoming Archbishop of Canterbury, Beckett dons a hair shirt, reflecting his renunciation of the finery with which he surrounded himself as Chancellor. But God speaks in sighs and groans deeper than the designs of men. As a hair shirt is the turning inside-out of a garment-of-comfort for a thorn-in-the-side of penance, so Grace turns Archbishop Beckett's hidden virtue inside-out. All the potency of grace swaddled in the pomp of the Chancellory now bursts forth like sunrise over Canterbury. If the wordly Beckett had once buried his heart in ermine when in service of Henry, Archbishop Beckett now wears his heart on his sleeve …

… a heart ready to be pierced by the swords of the four knights sent by Henry to slay Beckett:

34 And Simeon blessed them and said to Mary his mother: Behold this child is set for the fall and for the resurrection of many in Israel and for a sign which shall be contradicted. 35 And your own soul a sword shall pierce, that, out of many hearts thoughts may be revealed. (Lk 2, DRE)

The piercing of Beckett's heart casts sunlight on the dark and vainglorious designs of the City of Man, whose walls gleam on the outside but whose ghetto streets are paved on the backs of the Innocents. The only antidote to the Herods and Henrys who rule over the City of Man is the City of God's wall-less, defenseless, hairless heart, ready for the piercing of the Sword.

In answer to King Henry's Herodian violence, Saint Thomas á Beckett lives out Saint Simeon's nunc dimittis:

29 Now dismiss your servant, O Lord, according to your word in peace: 30 Because my eyes have seen your salvation, 31 which you have prepared before the face of all peoples: 32 A light to the revelation of the Gentiles and the glory of your people Israel. (Lk 2, DRE)

Old Simeon sheds light on the darkness of Herod: the only way to renew our innocence is, as Saint Thomas á Beckett does at the Altar of the Mass (that is his altar of execution), to open our arms like the Christ and be pierced.

So, with all of England for nearly 900 years, Beckett beckons us to pilgrimage to our Canterburys, our altars, our sacrifices of the Mass in the tabernacles of our hearts, to be pierced again and again by Love. Our hearts must be pierced, for without Grace, they harden like Herod and Henry.

May this Feast Day of Saint Thomas á Beckett be our blessed hair shirt. May we, in Saint Thomas' martyrdom, see the real use of all the hair shaven from our once-hardened hearts—to make blessedly prickly hair shirts that pierce the City of Man with arrows of the Trinity's transforming Love.

The Slaughter of the Innocents

©2009, Randall A. Beeler

hen Jesus therefore was born in Bethlehem of Juda, in the days of King Herod, behold, there came wise men from the East to Jerusalem, 2 saying: "Where is he that is born king of the Jews? For we have seen his star in the East, and have come to adore him." 3 And King Herod, hearing this, was troubled, and all Jerusalem with him … And behold, the star which they had seen in the East went before them, until it came and stood over where the child was. 10 And seeing the star they rejoiced with exceeding great joy. 11 And entering into the house, they found the child with Mary his mother; and falling down they adored him. And opening their treasures, they offered him gifts: gold, frankincense, and myrrh. 12 And having received an answer in sleep that they should not return to Herod, they went back another way into their country … 16 Then Herod perceiving that he was deluded by the wise men, was exceeding angry: and sending killed all the menchildren that were in Bethlehem, and in all the borders thereof, from two years old and under, according to the time which he had diligently inquired of the wise men.

A baby troubles Herod and all of Jerusalem … to the point of infanticide.

Why?

Ruling at the pleasure of Rome, Herod is to keep the peace in his territory and ensure that tax revenue flows to Rome. Neither a Roman nor an ethnic Jew, but rather an Idumean convert to Judaism (for political reasons), Herod rules by cunning. He rebuilds the Jewish temple as a sop to the Jewish populace, yet maintains Roman hegemony over his subjects.

A prophesied "King of the Jews" threatens the Jerusalem-niche Herod carves out for himself. An Heir of David entails not merely the end of Herod's Idumean usurpation of the Jewish throne but also an inevitable confrontation with Rome. The advent of the King of the Jews is the end of the world as Herod knows it.

So Herod slaughters the innocents rather than face a life not of his own device.

An angelic dream ushers Saint Joseph to take Mary and the Christ Child to Egypt for seven years until the death of Herod. Thereby, Jesus' infancy mirrors the migration of Israel's children to Egypt, to flee famine (Gen 45-50).

Herod himself suffers from a famine … of faith. He abides no king but himself.

In answer, the Church, in the midst of Christmas, celebrates the Feast of the Holy Innocents and beckons us to journey with the Christ Child into the Egypts of our hearts.

To dare that journey, we must be famished of relying on ourselves, commanding our lives, and dictating to future generations whether they may live.

As human persons created in the image of God, we are given a perilous freedom, in which we are tempted to take the fruit of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil—to manage good and evil on the terms that we create. We are therein free to slay the Christ Child and any other of the offspring of our freedom—in the name of our autonomy.

Every age must pilgrimage to this Egypt of decision. Every people and nation and era must dare to lay  our hard-earned, long-journeyed-for gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh at the feet of an infant and his impoverished Mother and Carpenter Father.

Myrrh is a burial spice, meant to forestall and cover the corruption of expired flesh. Our laying down at the Manger is our admission that our own efforts to save ourselves expired long ago. We must journey to this Egypt and recognize our old lives as mummies, so that, renewed by God's saving power, we can walk away from the empty tomb, assured that our Herodry is dead.

Christmas calls us to render the landscapes of our souls safe again for Christ to grow us into maturity.

The price, sadly, is the lives of the Innocents; this part of the story we dare not erase. Innocent children who have no say in the matter reveal to us our own peril, our rickety palaces and tetrarchies. As Herod insists that such must be the price, so we must witness that these little ones die—yet, not in vain. Their suffering redeems us and demonstrates that no life—even those of unwitting infants—is pointless.

We cannot possibly understand why a nation as blessed as ours insists, Herod-like, upon the death of 55 million Innocents and counting. So many who have never abided such evil wonder why this demonic slaughtered is allowed to continue.

God speaks to us through the Holy Innocents—not through dreams or Magi or mad kings. These little ones' testify to our eagerness to abort our hope rather than to dare to live in faith, dependent on God, as these little ones are dependent on the womb.

We are the Innocents. Through the ages, demons have tried to slaughter the children of God. But God will not allow this evil to usurp Truth, Beauty, and Love. The lives of these little ones are working a redemption that is far beyond the cunning of Herod and the ferocity of demons.

Dare we have the imagination of the Magi and lay down our pitiful gifts? Dare we dream like Joseph? Dare we bear the Christ Child like Mother Mary? Dare we believe that God is at work even in this Egypt?

History is our evidence. Herod is dead. Rome is ruins. The Cross, the scalpel, the rack, the rope—name the instrument of execution—miraculously becomes the path to life:

9 After this, I saw a great multitude, which no man could number, of all nations and tribes and peoples and tongues, standing before the throne and in sight of the Lamb, clothed with white robes, and palms in their hands. 10 And they cried with a loud voice, saying: Salvation to our God, who sits upon the throne and to the Lamb … 16 They shall no more hunger nor thirst: neither shall the sun fall on them, nor any heat. 17 For the Lamb, which is in the midst of the throne, shall rule them and shall lead them to the fountains of the waters of life: and God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes. (Rev 7, DRE)

If we despair that we are wholly innocent of Herod's temptation, let us ask the Holy Innocents to intercede for us. Let us journey with them and the Christ Child into this Egypt in faith, to dare to live out what God calls us to in this our age of decision.

Unexpected Family Trouble? Third Time's the Charm

©2009, Randall A. Beeler

42 And when he was twelve years old, they going up into Jerusalem, according to the custom of the feast, 43 and having fulfilled the days, when they returned, the child Jesus remained in Jerusalem. And his parents knew it not. 44 And thinking that he was in the company, they came a day's journey and sought him among their kinsfolk and acquaintance. 45 And not finding him, they returned into Jerusalem, seeking him. 46 And it came to pass, that, after three days, they found him in the temple, sitting in the midst of the doctors, hearing them and asking them questions. 47 And all that heard him were astonished at his wisdom and his answers. 48 And seeing him, they wondered. And his mother said to him: Son, why have you done so to us? Behold your father and I have sought you sorrowing. 49 And he said to them: How is it that you sought me? Did you not know that I must be about my father's business? 50 And they understood not the word that he spoke unto them. 51 And he went down with them and came to Nazareth and was subject to them. And his mother kept all these words in her heart. 52 And Jesus advanced in wisdom and age and grace with God and men. (Luke 2, DRE)

The Church is no stranger to family squabbling, which is why She enshrines the Feast of the Holy Family in the heart of the Christmas Octave

Family means expectations. Pregnant mothers are expectant. We expect family to arrive on a certain day and leave on a certain day. Parents expect the best from their children, who, in turn, expect their parents to stand by them. We give and receive gifts in the expectation of the unexpected—surprise and joy, hopefully.

All too often the results are unexpected. Family members come late or not at all. Children who know better fail to live up to that knowledge. Parents who should stand by their children run away. All the gift-buying, decorations, and food preparation unexpectedly fail to deliver the joy we were expecting.

The Church is also Expectant:

nd a great sign appeared in heaven: A woman clothed with the sun, and the moon under her feet, and on her head a crown of twelve stars. 2 And being with child, she cried travailing in birth: and was in pain to be delivered. (Rev 12, DRE)

She lives in this world and constantly faces the truth that she was founded on the Rock of a Peter who would thereafter deny the Christ. Saint Peter's denial finds its gestation in what he utters to Christ right after Christ calls him the Rock:

21 From that time Jesus began to show to his disciples, that he must go to Jerusalem, and suffer many things from the ancients and scribes and chief priests, and be put to death, and the third day rise again. 22 And Peter taking him, began to rebuke him, saying: Lord, be it far from you, this shall not be unto you. 23 Who turning, said to Peter: Go behind me, Satan, you are a scandal unto me: because you savour not the things that are of God, but the things that are of men. (Matt 16, DRE)

Saint Peter cannot understand how this Christ can be both the Son of God and so subject to men. His rebuking Christ is eerily similar to the Sanhedrin's evidence for Christ's execution:

57 But they holding Jesus led him to Caiphas the high priest, where the scribes and the ancients were assembled. 58 And Peter followed him afar off, even to the court of the high priest, And going in, he sat with the servants, that he might see the end. 59 And the chief priests and the whole council sought false witness against Jesus, that they might put him to death. 60 And they found not, whereas many false witnesses had come in. And last of all there came two false witnesses: 61 And they said: This man said, I am able to destroy the temple of God and after three days to rebuild it. (Matt 26, DRE)

Saint Peter follows from far off, failing to live up to the Rock-like character Christ expects of him, failing to stand by his Lord and Savior, to the point of three times denying his familial tie to the Christ Whom he called the Son of God: "I know not the man" (Matt 26:72b, DRE).

Jesus' abandoning Mary and Saint Joseph reveals a similar familial discord. Mary and Saint Joseph are not being neglectful nor faulty in their theology: these are the two chosen by the Father to be the Mother and Father of His Son; they are doing what good parents do. They expect Jesus to know better, to not abandon them.

He is gone three days—three days that figure the three days He will need to rebuild the Temple, three days that figure His sojourn in the tomb, three days to rebuild Saint Peter—and the family of humanity.

For these three days in the Temple, the Son of God is hearing and questioning the priests and scribes, some of whom will, twenty years later, preside over His execution. But now the Son of God is age twelve, gaining the rights of Jewish manhood, to sit at the feet of the teachers and contemplate the Torah: the Son of God, the Author of the Torah, making Himself subject to the same men by whom He will be subjected to death, death on a cross.

If Mary and Saint Joseph marvel at Jesus' response, they do so for the same reason that we marvel at all of God's revelations to us: families are not built to expect the unexpected. In that way, our family discord becomes a sacramental means of revealing God's Triune nature.

To embrace the unexpected requires Mary's "Let it be done unto me according to thy Word," Saint Joseph's silent obedience to the commands of God-sent dreams, Jesus' sweating blood in the Garden at the words, "Not my will but thy will be done." Self-giving love. The same Love that is the very activity of the Holy Trinity—the Father giving way to the Son giving way to the Spirit giving way to the Father and the Son eternally.

Before He ascends to the Father, the Son again subjects Himself to man, on the shores of Tiberias, where He feeds His disciples a meal and questions and listens to Saint Peter:

17 He said to him the third time: Simon, son of John, do you love me? Peter was grieved because he had said to him the third time: Do you love me? And he said to him: Lord, you know all things: you know that I love you. He said to him: Feed my sheep. (Jn 21, DRE)

Three times, one for each day spent in the tomb. Saint Peter can no longer deny God's love. Although he cannot expect the unexpected, he can lead his brothers in making room in their temples, their very selves, for the self-giving, self-dying love that mirrors the Trinity.

May you and your family expect God's richest blessings on this Feast of the Holy Family.

Christmas: The Battle Is Won!

©2009, Randall A. Beeler

There is something defiant in [Christmas] also;
something that makes the abrupt bells at midnight
sound like the great guns of a battle
that has just been won.
(G. K. Chesterton, from The Everlasting Man)

Today, we celebrate the Feast of the Church's First Martyr, Saint Stephen, whose story is recounted in Acts 6-7. On this day in which Canadians "box" ill-fated Christmas gifts for return and Americans shop for post-Christmas bargains, we may fail to see the significance of Saint Stephen. Christmas is over, says the world, and you, O Church, mark it by a stone-throwing?

The word, Martyr, means, simply, "witness," which begs the question: to what does a Martyr witness? Even if we proclaim, as Chesterton does, that Christmas means the battle is won, how does the violent death of Saint Stephen witness a victory?

Christ's birth infiltrates enemy-usurped territory. Right under the counting of Augustus and the stalking of Herod, Christ is greeted by His Shepherds. After He rises from the dead, He will command His Chief Shepherd, Saint Peter, to "Feed My sheep" (Jn 21:17c, DRE). As a Deacon, Saint Stephen is literally charged by the Apostles with the task of feeding Hellenic Christian widows and children (Acts 6:1-7). Filled with the Holy Spirit, Saint Stephen feeds the sheep in deed and word, battling those who would attempt to frustrate his mission:

8 And Stephen, full of grace and fortitude, did great wonders and signs among the people. 9 Now there arose some, of that which is called the synagogue of the Libertines and of the Cyrenians and of the Alexandrians and of them that were of Cilicia and Asia, disputing with Stephen. 10 And they were not able to resist the wisdom and the spirit that spoke. (Acts 6:8-10, DRE)

Celebrating Saint Stephen's martyrdom the day after Christ's Birth reveals that the enemy had never usurped any territory. As our baptism underscores, we are God's prized possession. Like a stalwart Captain, God leaves no man behind, even if rescuing that man means that God becomes Man.

In becoming Man, God reveals that this world has always been His, to the point that, unlike any artist, He becomes a brush stroke in His painting; unlike any novelist, He reveals Himself as the Protagonist of history. He does not assume flesh and blood but shines a light into our darkness to show that our flesh and blood have always been His manger.

The first stones that strike Saint Stephen show that each of is God's precious flesh and blood. Saint Luke takes great pains to parallel Saint Stephen's execution with that of Christ's:

54 Now hearing these things, they were cut to the heart: and they gnashed with their teeth at him. 55 But he, being full of the Holy Ghost, looking up steadfastly to heaven, saw the glory of God and Jesus standing on the right hand of God. 56 And he said: Behold, I see the heavens opened and the Son of man standing on the right hand of God. (Acts 7, DRE)

63 But Jesus held his peace. And the high priest said to him: I adjure you by the living God, that you tell us if you be the Christ the Son of God. 64 Jesus said to him: You have said it. Nevertheless I say to you, hereafter you shall see the Son of man sitting on the right hand of the power of God and coming in the clouds of heaven. (Matt 26, DRE)

The flesh and blood that Saint Stephen renders to Christ is a Eucharistic sacrifice. Saint Stephen really is feeding the sheep—with his very self. Christ has won the battle that never was a battle. Our flesh-and-blood hearts are His sacrificial altar.

A battle presumes combatants. Lucifer, being a creature of God, cannot possibly combat God. Hopelessly self-deceived, Satan then tempts us into his self-deceiving darkness. God battles not against Satan nor against us—but rather for our hearts, in the process revealing that His passion for us beats with the flesh and lifeblood of our hearts.

The First Martyr reveals that all of us are martyrs—witnesses. All of us are to render our flesh and blood at the disposal of the One Who is eternally predisposed to our flesh and blood. If we are struck by the stones hurled by the world, our bleeding wounds demonstrate that every such stone is one the builders rejected (Matt 21:33-42) and hurled—to blessedly reveal each one of us as little Christs.

On the Feast of Stephen, we are neither boxed in by the world nor do we buy and sell our souls, but we purchase the Pearl of Great Price (Matt 13:45-46) by giving ourselves in Mercy:

Good King Wenceslas looked out
On the feast of Stephen
When the snow lay round about
Deep and crisp and even
Brightly shone the moon that night
Though the frost was cruel
When a poor man came in sight
Gath'ring winter fuel

"Hither, page, and stand by me
If thou know'st it, telling
Yonder peasant, who is he?
Where and what his dwelling?"
"Sire, he lives a good league hence
Underneath the mountain
Right against the forest fence
By Saint Agnes' fountain."

"Bring me flesh and bring me wine
Bring me pine logs hither
Thou and I will see him dine
When we bear him thither."
Page and monarch forth they went
Forth they went together
Through the rude wind's wild lament
And the bitter weather

"Sire, the night is darker now
And the wind blows stronger
Fails my heart, I know not how,
I can go no longer."
"Mark my footsteps, my good page
Tread thou in them boldly
Thou shalt find the winter's rage
Freeze thy blood less coldly."

In his master's steps he trod
Where the snow lay dinted
Heat was in the very sod
Which the Saint had printed
Therefore, Christian men, be sure
Wealth or rank possessing
Ye who now will bless the poor
Shall yourselves find blessing.

The Merciful Let-Down of Christmas

©2009, Randall A. Beeler

At the end of the Book of Job, Job keeps silence.

And for good reason—God appears.

hen Job answered the Lord, and said: 2 I know that you can do all things, and no thought is hid from you. 3 Who is this that hides counsel without knowledge? Therefore I have spoken unwisely, and things that above measure exceeded my knowledge … 5 With the hearing of the ear, I have heard you, but now my eye sees you. 6 Therefore I reprehend myself, and do penance in dust and ashes. (Job 42, DRE)

Throughout Job's trials, in the face of the self-justifying counsel of his friends, Job proclaims that, only when God shows Himself, will anyone be justified:

25 For I know that my Redeemer lives, and in the last day I shall rise out of the earth. 26 And I shall be clothed again with my skin, and in my flesh I shall see my God. 27 Whom I myself shall see, and my eyes shall behold, and not another: this my hope is laid up in my bosom. 28 Why then do you say now: Let us persecute him, and let us find occasion of word against him? 29 Flee then from the face of the sword, for the sword is the revenger of iniquities: and know that there is a judgment. (Job 19, DRE)

The Christmas Eve silence that enfolds us in the snow-shrouded dells of our souls is Job's silence. We have called upon God to justify us.

And He comes.

But our attempts at self-justification deafen us to God's justice. We think we want the Peace that passeth all understanding, but Jesus warns us that He comes "not to send peace, but the sword" (Matt 10:34, DRE). We hurry about during Advent, preparing and spending and saving and meeting and greeting to make everything just right for that Christmas Day moment of peace … that always seems to elude us.

Then comes the let-down. We are spent and wonder why we lack the "Christmas spirit." Our old hurts and grievances spring up and, like Job bathed in Satan's outpoured bowls of grief, we are riddled with the sores of our existence, gasping, and wondering why God allows this sword.

Mercy.

Underneath the palace of Herod is the cavern stable where Jesus is born. Under the counting eyes of Caesar, the Father counts us worthy enough, amid the dung of the stable, for His Son to take "the form of a servant, being made in the likeness of men, and in habit found as a man" (Phil 2:7b, DRE).

Like Job, we think we can truly see and proclaim justice. Oh, yes, we have been made to thirst for justice, but when justice comes, we must be hushed to silence in order to see Divine Mercy.

Christmas is a let-down: God lets Himself down into our Mangers, amidst our ox-ishness, ass-ishness, and mis-shepherded ways. Are we surprised, then, that we feel this let down?

We must be so let down … in order to lay down our defenses.

nd it came to pass when the king sat in his house, and the Lord had given him rest on every side from all his enemies, 2 he said to Nathan the prophet: Do you see that I dwell in a house of cedar, and the ark of God is lodged within skins? … 4 But it came to pass that night, that the word of the Lord came to Nathan, saying: 5 Go, and say to my servant David: Thus says the Lord: Shall you build me a house to dwell in? … the Lord will make you a house … 12 I will raise up your seed after you, which shall proceed out of the bowels, and I will establish his kingdom. 13 He shall build a house to my name, and I will establish the throne of his kingdom fore ever.(2Sam 7, DRE)

The Lord does build the house—a stable—deep enough in the countryside that only the shepherds can listen for that coming.

So we come this Christmas …

… stilled by a silence that we did not catch the still small voice of …

… mercifully let down by our own noisy efforts to justify ourselves and our idea of Christmas, God, the world, and ourselves …

… let down by God's letting down of Himself, in the midst of our attempts to lift ourselves up.

No, no, He says. Kneel down. I will build the house, out of your clay and straw. You cannot lift yourself up to Me. I give you Myself. I have always given Myself to you. Listen. You can hear My heart beat.

Our God has His own heartbeat.

He is the Cornerstone we would-be builders rejected.

Our protests have been so loud, we have not heard Him. But it is Christmas. Now we see Him.

Let all mortal flesh keep silence,
and with fear and trembling stand;
ponder nothing earthly minded,
for with blessing in his hand
Christ our God to earth descendeth,
our full homage to demand.

What We Hope for in Advent: The Tearing of the Veil

©2009,  Randall A. Beeler

50 And Jesus again crying with a loud voice, yielded up the ghost 51 And behold the veil of the temple was rent in two from the top even to the bottom (Matt 27, DRE)

The Church proclaims that our salvation begins with the Annunciation, celebrated on March 25th. With Mary's "Be it done to me according to your word" (Lk 1:38a, DRE), our salvation is upon us. No wonder, then, that Jesus so often preaches that the "Kingdom of Heaven is at hand" (Matt 4:17, DRE). He is the Kingdom of Heaven; His entire life, from the moment of His conception to His ascension is our salvation. The Resurrection carries such import because it is the Good News that what the Son of God does once, He has always and will always do. Thus, His entire life is one cloth, without beginning and without end:  He rises from the dead and returns to the right hand of the Father because He reveals that this is Who God has always been.

We might then puzzle over why we celebrate His birth. After all, is not the real paydirt at the foot of the Cross or on the doorstep of the empty tomb? Why the dirt of a cavern stable in Bethlehem?

Bethlehem is where the veil is torn.

Being the very Body of the resurrected Christ in the world and for the world, the Church celebrates the drama of the Christ by stretching the garment across the cycles of the year. Think it no accident that the Annunciation is celebrated on the heels of the Spring Equinox, when the day and night are balanced, and the light is waxing stronger.*

Jesus comes in the "fullness of time" (Gal 4:4, DRE), when the world seemingly needs no salvation. But, as always, the light wanes, hopes fade, the harvest is over; perhaps this time the darkness will overcome the light.

So, at the Winter Solstice, when the light is at its dimmest, we see in the Manger that God has been with us all along—even as our hopes are fading, even as our brightest aspirations are snuffed out, even as our most furtive efforts are frozen in the frost.

What was announced to the Blessed Virgin, what was visited by Mary to Elizabeth, what was dreamt of by Saint Joseph, what was cradled by Simeon, and gifted by the Magi is, at Bethlehem, revealed to the world.

What pauses us at Christmas is that the veil is already torn.

It is a done deal. We cannot foresee how it will happen, but the child in the Manger is the substance of what we now know we were never crazy to hope for.

The siege has ended.

In tearing open presents at Christmas, we celebrate that the sin-imposed veil over man's embrace of God is torn as surely as the Christ's burial shroud lays in a useless heap in the empty tomb.

May your last days of Advent be filled with this substantial reason to hope.

[*Pax, please, my brothers and sisters in the Southern Hemisphere; the Church is telling a parable here, and the Church was birthed in the Northern Hemisphere. Like all parables, it must ultimately show itself to be only like the Reality it figures. Even in the Southern Hemisphere, the point of the parable is valid.]

Christmas Means God Matters

Image via Wikipedia

©2009, Randall A. Beeler

My Blog and Facebook profiles note that I am a "maker of Rosaries." Actually, I do not make but assemble them from various parts I order from The Rosary Shop. I do not form the beads, forge the findings, or fabricate the crucifixes and medals. My Rosary work is really a collaboration with a lot of unsung artisans.

Thus, I think of Rosary work as a collective prayer lifted up to God, for I cannot take credit for it: I am blessed to be at the right place at the right time, with a job and means of living that provide me the funds and time to assist in spreading devotion to this Christ-Centered Form of Prayer.

I wish I could say that I was brilliant enough to figure this out on my own, but God actually had to gently allow this realization to seep into me after months of Rosary-making. As this what-now-seems-obvious revelation dawned on me, I was reminded of a  joke I heard a few years ago.

One day, a materialist scientist, fed up with the God delusion, decided to humor the ridiculous superstition of Theism by holding a ceremony to forever dispense with people's need to believe in a Creator.

"God," he declared, in New York City's Central Park, "I thank you for the help you've given man to reach the point in our evolution where we can make ourselves in our own image. However, the time for your services is over; we release you from your burden. I'm sure that lots of other universes could use your talents."

To the materialist's surprise, God answered, "I appreciate the retirement ceremony, but could you please just humor an old, decrepit God for a few moments and have a little contest with me so that I can admire your skills?"

Nonplussed, the materialist agreed.

God then formed a man from the dirt of the earth and began to breathe life into him. The materialist bent down to gather some Central-Park soil from which he would derive the necessary carbons and genetic material to form his man in the laboratory.

As the materialist was cupping his hand around the soil, God said, "Hey, wait a minute! Go make your own dirt. I made that stuff."

[insert rim-shot here]

Just as I assemble Rosaries from the work of so many others whom I cannot name, so we men are sub-creators, creating solely in the image of God, assembling our world from the good things that God makes out of nothing. We cannot make our own dirt. Only God creates out of nothing—ex nihilo.

Just as the materialist can create no material of his own, so we cannot re-create man anew from the tainted pedigree of original sin. In the matter of salvation, we need a Mother—a mater—from which material our salvation can materialize.

As God creates all things out of nothing, so, in Mary, God materializes His very Presence with us—Emmanuel:

nd a great sign appeared in heaven: A woman clothed with the sun, and the moon under her feet, and on her head a crown of twelve stars. 2 And being with child, she cried travailing in birth: and was in pain to be delivered. 3 And there was seen another sign in heaven. And behold a great red dragon, having seven heads and ten horns and on his heads seven diadems. 4 And his tail drew the third part of the stars of heaven and cast them to the earth. And the dragon stood before the woman who was ready to be delivered: that, when she should be delivered, he might devour her son. 5 And she brought forth a man child, who was to rule all nations with an iron rod. And her son was taken up to God and to his throne. 6 And the woman fled into the wilderness, where she had a place prepared by God, that there they should feed her, a thousand two hundred sixty days … 15 And the serpent cast out of his mouth, after the woman, water, as it were a river: that he might cause her to be carried away by the river. 16 And the earth helped the woman: and the earth opened her mouth and swallowed up the river which the dragon cast out of his mouth. 17 And the dragon was angry against the woman: and went to make war with the rest of her seed, who keep the commandments of God and have the testimony of Jesus Christ. (Rev 12, DRE)

So the Shepherds herd in from the fields, the Wise Magicians trek from all corners of the world, the Angels sing, Herod sniffs and scratches in vain, Caesar counts the populace to no avail, and the Ox and the Ass pause in their munching.

We have heard the story so many times that we take for granted this disparate group of players. Too easily, we forget that only God can create such a motley—or materly—crew.

As the materialist discovers, Christmas means that God matters—that is, out of nothing, He matters us into being.

Caesar- & Obama-Care? Think Again—God Is In Charge

©2009, Randall A. Beeler

nd it came to pass that in those days there went out a decree from Caesar Augustus that the whole world should be enrolled. 2 This enrolling was first made by Cyrinus, the governor of Syria. 3 And all went to be enrolled, every one into his own city. (Lk 2, DRE)

Haunting the social networks, the blogs, and the news wires is the spectre of a trillion-dollar health-care proposal being debated by the United States Congress. Climate talks just finished in Copenhagen. The European Court will soon make a judgment on Ireland's abortion law.

And we are anxious about it all.

What will our future be? We must do something! Send out the word, protest, write our representatives—anything to keep us from feeling so helpless. The powers and principalities are making changes that we hardly know about … and to what end?

What will be our future?

Oh, the disruption and displacement caused by Caesar Augustus' census … and to what end? To better tax us, my dear. What better embodiment of man making himself God than to count other men for the purpose of directing them, amassing them, taxing them, using them?

In this maelstrom of manipulation bobs the tiny bark of Mary and Joseph. Trekking the hill country from Nazareth to Bethlehem, they are refugees swept up by Caesar … and to what end?

In Mary's womb, God sleeps, unaware that He is being counted, unaware that Herod seeks His blood, aware only of the warmth of Mary and the reassuring tones of Saint Joseph's voice: "Mary, we are almost there; God will find us a place in this world. God will find us His place in this world."

To what end is God leading us, to so put Himself in the power of Caesar? In the peril of Herod? With only the Virgin and Saint Joseph to protect Him?

Right now. Today. To what end?

Today, Augustus is a statue worn down by pigeon droppings. Herod is, well, mixed up with a variety of other Herods, kept in faint memory by, of all things, the Bible.

Holy Mary and Saint Joseph have no end but increase, millions of souls devoted to them, relying on them as this pair continue to trek through the hill country of our lives. Right now. Today.

God rests in Mary's womb as He rests in His humanity as He rests in the Tomb as He rests in the heavenly Throne. Obama-care, climate-change legislation, and court verdicts wither like the grass that fades. Emmanuel—God-with-us—finds His end with us.

And in Him, we find our beginning.

I am not saying that we should not carry on the battle for what is right. Yes, all health-care and climate legislation and court decisions must be founded on the Natural Law of the dignity of the human person created in the image of God. Yes! Let us image God in our efforts to witness to the world the Way, the Truth, and the Life—the Christ, Our Lord and Savior.

But we do not despair. We know our end already. For the end of all our striving is merely the prelude to the real story:

But for them it was only the beginning of the real story. All their life in this world and all their adventures in Narnia had only been the cover and the title page: now at last they were beginning Chapter One of the Great Story which no one on earth has read: which goes on for ever: in which every chapter is better than the one before. (C. S. Lewis, the end of The Last Battle)

So our striving, our battling, our adventuring this Christmas ought to witness to the world that we do not doubt our end but rather are living what our end already is … Him. To be ever in His Beloved Presence, hearing Him say, "Well done, good and faithful servant!" And therein to know that we are not slaves but faithful sons and daugters, Kings and Queens of Narnia, little Christs, ready to embark on the real adventure.

May you be blessed as Advent blossoms into the Winter Rose Bloom of Christmas, for "once a King or Queen of Narnia, always a King or Queen of Narnia!"

16 For the Spirit himself gives testimony to our spirit that we are the sons of God. 17 And if sons, heirs also; heirs indeed of God and joint heirs with Christ: yet so, if we suffer with him, that we may be also glorified with him. (Rom 8, DRE)

Propaganda & Pope Pius XII

©2009, Randall A. Beeler

4 Unto an inheritance, incorruptible, and undefiled and that cannot fade, reserved in heaven for you, 5 who, by the power of God, are kept by faith unto salvation, ready to be revealed in the last time. 6 Wherein you shall greatly rejoice, if now you must be for a little time made sorrowful in divers temptations: 7 That the trial of your faith (much more precious than gold which is tried by the fire) may be found unto praise and glory and honour at the appearing of Jesus Christ. (1Ptr 1, DRE)

Lost in yesterday's celebration of the Venerable status of Pope John Paul the Great was the according of the same status to Eugenio Pacelli, Pope Pius XII. However, in the coming days, when the news gets slow, I suspect that media outlets will disseminate stories of those descrying the Venerable status of Pius XII as a mark of Catholic insensitivity to Jews because "everyone knows" that Pius XII "did not do 'enough'" to oppose the Nazi Holocaust of the Jews.

Pope Benedict XVI knows what he is doing.

Why John Paul II and Pius XII together? At first glance, we can see why the world might resonate with Papa John Paul II, and not Pius XII, who, after all, appears to represent all that the Church seemingly abandons with Vatican II. Watch black-and-white footage of the bespectacled Pacelli as he wears the Papal Tiara and is borne on a litter. Brrrr, the world says—how medieval!

In contrast, Karol Wojtyla seems to embody (up to a certain point, as we will see) all the "modern advancements" the Church has instituted since the archaic, holed-up-in-the-Vatican-enclave days of Pius XII. Papa John Paul was photogenic, a dynamic speaker, charismatic, energetic, and spry enough to visit far countries. Instead of using a litter, the man sneaked out of the Vatican to cross-country ski, for heaven's sake! He didn't need a tiara to show his royalty.

But Papa Benedetto knows that both Karol Wojtyla and Eugenio Pacelli wear crowns … of thorns.

In the 2007 Mass celebrating the 50th anniversary of the death of Pius XII, Pope Benedict XVI preaches from the prologue to the First Letter of Saint Peter (quoted above) and therein reveals that the two now-Venerable Pontiffs are of the same cloth—the crucifixion coat of the Christ (Jn 19:23-24)—and that the Church (both pre- and post-Vatican II) is itself the same seamless garment.

In the close of the Gospel of Saint John, the resurrected Christ delineates for Saint Peter what we can now infer is the implicit work of the Vicar of Christ, the Pope, the Shepherd, the Servant of the Servants of God:

15 When therefore they had dined, Jesus says to Simon Peter: Simon, son of John, do you love me more than these? He said to him: Yea, Lord, you know that I love you. He said to him: Feed my lambs. 16 He says to him again: Simon, son of John, do you love me? He said to him: yea, Lord, you know that I love you. He said to him: Feed my lambs. 17 He said to him the third time: Simon, son of John, do you love me? Peter was grieved because he had said to him the third time: Do you love me? And he said to him: Lord, you know all things: you know that I love you. He said to him: Feed my sheep. 18 Amen, amen, I say to you, When you were younger, you girded yourself and walked where you would. But when you shall be old, you shall stretch forth your hands, and another shall gird you and lead you whither you would not. 19 And this he said, signifying by what death he should glorify God. And when he had said this, he said to him: Follow me. (Jn 21, DRE)

Popes Pius XII and John Paul II follow Jesus Christ to quiet deaths of suffering, known only to them and Our Lord. Publicly, their hands are girded, and they are led to where they do not want to go, as is the Christ. They are bound by the circumstances of their times and spattered with insults, as is the Christ.

A vibrant and engaging soul, Karol Wojtyla, in his closing years, is bound to the Vatican by his gun-shot induced Parkinson's disease. Not only can he no longer hike and cross-country ski, he daily withstands the demands for his resignation and the claims that he is a Neanderthal in a post-Cold-War world that he can no longer comprehend.

A bright and empathic soul, Eugenio Pacelli, besieged by Nazi forces and propaganda, prepares a declaration against the Nazi slaughter of the Jews, when the Dutch Bishops issues a pastoral letter to be read in all Dutch churches, a few days after which, the Nazis round up Dutch Catholics of Jewish descent and sent them to their deaths at Auschwitz. Among these is Saint Teresa Benedicta á Cruce (Edith Stein).

Having already made the Vatican a sanctuary for Jews and others fleeing the Holocaust, Pius XII keeps his declaration secret, in order to protect the thousands who would be slaughtered in a Nazi reprisal.

Years after his death, during the Cold War, Eugenio Pacelli's good memory is smeared by Communist propaganda, claiming that he harbored an anti-semitism and collaborated with the Nazis in the persecution of the Jews. Ironically, two decades after communism is demonstrated as bankrupt, Western media still promotes the same propaganda—the same media who shrilly cried out for Pope John Paul II's resignation.

In this way, both men identically feed Christ's sheep through their own sufferings, completing what is lacking in the sufferings of Christ:

23 If so you continue in the faith, grounded and settled, and immoveable from the hope of the gospel which you have heard, which is preached in all the creation that is under heaven: whereof I Paul am made a minister. 24 Who now rejoice in my sufferings for you and fill up those things that are wanting of the sufferings of Christ, in my flesh, for his body, which is the church (Col 1, DRE)

Vatican II does not create a "new Church." Rather, it enables the Church to do what it always has done, a feast of veneration that is more clearly read in the Servants of the Servants of God, who empty themselves as does the Christ, than it is read in the babbling of those who would attempt to re-make the Church in the image of the self. Pax Christi.

Pope John Paul II: Santo Subito!

©2009, Randall A. Beeler

123 My eyes have fainted after your salvation: and for the word of your justice. 124 Deal with your servant according to your mercy: and teach me your justifications. (Ps 119, DRE)

In his December 18th homily at the celebration of Vespers with students of Roman universities, Pope Benedict XVI notes that

We must study, deepen our knowledge, yet while maintaining a 'little' soul, a humble and simple spirit like that of Mary, 'Seat of Wisdom'. ... In that grotto each of us can discover the truth about God and about man. In that Child, born of the Virgin, these two truths came together. Man's longing for eternal life softened the heart of God, Who deigned to assume the human condition.

On this day when the Holy See has declared Pope John Paul the Great venerable, we should recognize that Karol Wojtyla's heroic status is derived not from the virtues that the world prizes—his amazing intelligence (he was one of the foremost philosophers of the 20th Century), his artistry (he was an accomplished playwright and actor), his courage (he faced down Nazism, Communism, and survived an assassination attempt), and his charisma (the largest crowds in human history gathered to see him).

Rather, Pope John Paul II is heroic in the Theological virtues of faith, hope, and charity and the Cardinal virtues of prudence, justice, fortitude, and temperance.

But, to the world, what does the declaration of His Holiness' venerable status mean, other than a seeming public relations opportunity for the Church?

Pope John Paul II answers that question by living out Psalm 119.

Well, no incredible matter there, some might say. After all, have not literally thousands of Saints, chronicled and anonymous, lived out the Law of God in an intimate relation of love?

Yes, emphatically, yes. However, God graces Karol Wojtyla, Pope John Paul II, with the courage and fortitude to reveal that intimacy, even when the man does not know he is doing so. From this unconscious embrace of the living God radiates the intelligence and artistry, courage and charisma, and the Theological and Cardinal virtues for which the world and the Church today formally revere him.

As the headlines show, the world hungers for the intimacy and vulnerability that flows from even the smallest, most unwitting gestures of the life of Venerable Karol Wojtyla.

In 1987, Pope John Paul II traveled to San Giovanni Rotondo and there visited the crypt of the then-not-even-Venerable Padre Pio. For the Church and the world, such a visit is what a Pontiff does: fulfilling the steps necessary to promote the canonization causes of a man who, since that time, was canonized by Pope John Paul II.

Yet, something else is happening in that 1987 visit, something that does not become visible until Karol Wojtyla stands before the crypt of his old friend and touches it. Here is a man—a saintly man—reuniting with someone he loves and reveres.

When a priest, young Karol met with Padre Pio, who disclosed to Karol things that history has since revealed the Polish Priest's future.

Sometimes, two men can see—really see each other—in the light of God, and nothing else matters, not even the reality that they are but two frail men. They share. They know. Together, they faint after God's salvation, dealing with each other in terms of God's mercy, teaching each other His justifications.

In the Karol Wojtyla who touches the tomb of a dear one, we see what makes him Venerable: he is a "little soul," like Mary (to Whom He gives everything Totus Tuus). In that grotto housing Pio's body, a cave strikingly different from but incredibly similar to the grotto in which Jesus was born, we see two men embracing. Pope John Paul II is not mourning the absence of an old friend; He is talking with Pio, in intimate terms—the two Santi Subiti expressing to each other what the world, what all of us, long for: abundant, eternal life.

But we need not hear their unutterable conversation. For the very humanity of the two men—the one already returned to dust and bones, but alive in Christ, and the other having already heard from Pio the suffering journey he too would make to the grave—shows the world what it cannot have by its own efforts: our humanity on our terms.

We call His Holiness Pope John Paul II Venerable because He surrenders His humanity to God on God's terms. Thanks be to God!

Today, God gives Him back to us in a way that both the Church and the world can admire. Santo Subito!