Easter 2019

The headlines this morning about the bombing of churches packed on Easter morning in Sri Lanka seemed shockingly familiar this year. Only two years ago  Moslem fanatics in Egypt set off bombs in two crowded Coptic Christian churches on Palm Sunday. The explosions killed almost a hundred people and wounded many more. As of now the death toll in Sri Lanka is over 200.

During the past few years a friend of mine has worked to compile daily accounts of attacks on Christians all over the world. It is hard to read these accounts of varying brutality that occur practically every day. Most of the attacks are carried out by fanatical Moslems. Christians are beaten, raped, robbed, tortured, and murdered mainly because they are Christian. 

On another occasion during Easter season members of the Islamic State murdered four nuns of the Missionaries of Charity working in an elder care facility in Aden, Yemen. A few years ago, on the day after Easter, Taliban suicide bombers murdered over 65 Christian worshippers in Pakistan and wounded over 300. The only crime of those people, like so many thousands of others brutally persecuted in recent years, was that they were Christians. 

What is so bad about Christianity? Why do extremists, both secular and religious, hate it so much? Maybe I should ask, why do they fear it so much? 

Even after the Resurrection of Jesus on Easter Sunday, his subsequent Ascension forty days later, and the incredible events of Pentecost, St. Peter did not fully understand the implications of the Resurrection. Only after a personal vision convinced him that Jesus died and rose for all, did Peter see the light. He said,

“Now I really understand that God is not a respecter of persons, but in every nation he who fears him and does what is right is acceptable to him."

I have come to believe with Peter that God is not a respecter of persons, and that anyone who does right is acceptable to God. Still, I like being a Christian, especially a Catholic. I like the half hour of peace that attendance at daily Mass provides. I like the fact that I am not permitted or exhorted to kill innocent people, or even be angry at the guilty. But most of all, I like a religion that believes in and holds out hope for resurrection, for a life after death.

I like to think that the worshippers bombed in Sri Lanka or Egypt or the four nuns murdered in Yemen are living a new life, and that they are not just rotting bodies being picked apart by vultures. Some may think otherwise but what good  does that do them? It also strikes me that in reading accounts of the lives of the persecuted, they, like tens of thousands of other Christians who have also been brutally persecuted, had already given up their lives in the service of others. Like Jesus, they went about doing good and healing.

For Christians Easter, coming as it usually does at the outset of Spring, will always be a sign of new life.



The word "Easter" comes from a Germanic goddess of spring. Latin peoples used the word pasqua from the Jewish pasch or passover. When the Germanic peoples were converted, the Church wisely associated the word for Springtime with the feast of the Risen Lord. All around us new life is springing from the dead of winter. As the last traces of snow disappear, the flowers miraculously push their way up through their winter tomb.

Happy Easter!



###

Twelve Days of Christmas

The following description of the symbolic meaning of the popular Christmas carol, "The Twelve Days of Christmas" is the best explanation I have seen.* It seems particularly appropriate this season when persecution of Christians has reached unprecedented proportions all over the World. Every day in many parts of the world there are killings, tortures, beatings, thefts, and imprisonments meted out to Christians. So far Christians in America have been spared such atrocities. At this time of year we usually just  have to deal with creche vandalism and attempts by politically correct fanatics to ban Christmas from the holiday season.

"Catholics in England were forbidden to practice their faith openly during the years from 1538 to 1829. This song was developed to communicate their gift of faith in coded lyrics. The 12 days run from December 25 (Christmas) to January 6 (Epiphany). The "True Love" refers to God.

A Partridge is the symbol of Christ. The partridge will feign injury to protect nestlings who are defenseless. A pear tree is the symbol of the salvation of humanity, just as the apple tree signifies human downfall.

Two Turtle doves symbolize the Old Testament sacrifice offered by even the poorest of people in Israel (with which Christ was "redeemed" by His parents at His presentation in the Temple).

Three French hens symbolize the gifts of the three Wise Men, as also the three theological virtues of Faith, Hope, and Charity.

Four calling birds represent the four major prophets and the four Evangelists, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John.

Five golden rings represent the five Wounds of Christ (the reason for the change of melody at this point). The number five refers also to the five obligatory sacraments (Baptism, Penance, Holy Eucharist, Confirmation, and the Anointing of the Sick), as well as to the first five books of the Old Testament, the Pentateuch.

Six geese a-laying represent the six days of creation.

Seven swans a-swimming are the seven Gifts of the Holy Spirit and also the seven works of Mercy.

Eight maids a-milking refer to the eight Beatitudes preached by Christ in the Sermon on the Mount.

Nine ladies dancing are the nine ranks of angel choirs, the Spirits who surround the Throne of God in the Book of Revelation.

Ten lords a-leaping represent the Ten Commandments.

Eleven pipers playing are the eleven surviving Apostles.

Twelve drummers drumming are the twelve minor prophets of the Old Testament; the twelve points of the Apostle's Creed, the twelve Apostles; the Twelve Tribes of Israel; and the twelve fruits of the Holy Spirit. Twelve is also the Scriptural number representing completeness."

So, the original "partridge on a pear tree" is Christ on the Cross. Here is a striking image from a mural in the Church of St. Clement in Rome depicting Christ on the Cross that is also the tree of life.

I do not want to raise the controversial issue of why Catholics were persecuted in sixteenth century England, a country loyal to that Faith for over a thousand years, but I would like to say a few words about persecution in our time.

For the past 250 years many people, especially intellectuals, have come to believe that Christianity is the great enemy of humankind. Many of these intellectuals were born, raised, and educated as Christians but some proverbial "bee up their ass" made them not only turn against their religious tradition, but also vehemently attack it. They believed that Christianity was a superstition that stood in the way of reason and progress.

Opponents of Christianity regarded it as the enemy of Liberty, Equality, and Fraternity. For them the destruction and downfall of Christianity would usher in a new age of peace and human advancement. Little did they understand that since its inception Christianity had been the bulwark against all the different kinds of barbarism. Although Hitler was a bitter opponent of Christianity because of its Jewish origins, critics still try to blame Christianity for the Holocaust. In Russia Joseph Stalin despised his Christian roots and under his rule Communists murdered over twenty million people to create their workers' paradise.

When you attack Christianity, you don't get peace and prosperity, you get anything from gang killings in our cities to ISIS, the Taliban, and Boko Haran. It would appear that these terrorists fear Christianity more than American military might. Jesus spent his life teaching and healing. He has always been called the Prince of Peace. At Mass today Catholics recited Psalm 72:

Justice shall flourish in his time,
and fullness of peace for ever.

Today, peace seems further away from ever but at Christmas we can still hope. Here's a link to a lovely video featuring Vince Gill and daughter singing "Let there be Peace on Earth."

###

*Note: I came across this interpretation some years ago and it seemed very plausible. As my friend David in England notes in the comment below, it is not the only interpretation of the symbolism of the Twelve Days of Christmas carol that still today remains shrouded in mystery.

Pentecost and Persecution

                                  

 

Pentecost
Stained Glass Window
Assumption Church
Fairfield CT

                                  

Last Sunday Christians all over the world celebrated the feast of Pentecost. Christians believe that on that fiftieth day after the Resurrection of the Lord, His Spirit descended upon the first apostles in the form of tongues of fire.

Let's start out by clearing up a few misconceptions that some may have about the Holy Spirit. First of all, the Spirit is not a bird. I know that the traditional image of a dove given us by Christian artists is probably ingrained in all of us. It is hard to portray a purely spiritual being in art for a spirit has no body to paint or sculpt. In one gospel passage the movement of the Holy Spirit is likened to the fluttering flight of a dove and so I guess the early artists used the dove as a kind of artistic shorthand.

Speaking about images I have to confess that as a child I thought that the "tongues as of fire" that rested on the Apostles at Pentecost were actually human tongues on fire. It took me years before I realized that the "tongues" were actually similar to the darting flames that we would see in our own fireplaces. Also back then it was more common to refer to the Holy Spirit as the Holy Ghost, which only conjured up images from Abbott and Costello movies.

So who or what is the Holy Spirit? First, let's think about the word spirit. In my bedroom there is a picture of me as an infant. Next to it is a picture of me as a young man taken a short while after my wedding day. Next to that I can look into the mirror and behold a senior citizen. Which of these three images is me? I guess that even though I look different, they all are me. In other words my "spirit" is in all of them. My spirit is the real me. Another word for spirit is "soul," a word that is somewhat out of fashion today.

It is really ludicrous when people try to locate the place of the soul in our bodies. Some fools have even conducted experiments to weign a body before and right after death to see how much the soul might weigh. I guess that there are millions of people today who deny that they have a soul, or that there is anything spiritual about them. They really are denying their own self. I would also guess that some of our most intellectual people believe that they are just material beings, and that there is no spiritual world. When they say things like “I love you” it is just their genes or neurons driving them on.

But Christians believe that on Easter Sunday when Jesus rose from the dead, breathed on the Apostles, and said, "Receive the Holy Spirit," He was giving them His own self or spirit. He also makes it clear that He was sending them to continue the work that His Father had sent Him to do. "As the Father has sent Me, so I send you." They believe that only God can give them the strength and courage to continue the work.

If we can't see or feel or hear the Spirit, how is anyone supposed to know that He dwells in them? Christians believe they have to learn to read the signs. Just as the shipwrecked Robinson Crusoe knew that there were other men on his lonely island when he beheld their footprints, we will know the Spirit by His signs. St. Paul says in the letter to the Corinthians,

            There are different kinds of spiritual gifts but the same Lord;

            there are different workings but the same God

            who produces all of them in everyone.

Then, talking to us as well as to the Corinthians, Paul says that to "each individual the manifestation of the Spirit is given for some benefit."

What are the signs that the Spirit dwells in us? In years past Christians used to speak of the fruits of the Holy Spirit. If you pick a fruit from a tree and it tastes and smells and feels like an apple, then you can conclude that it's an apple tree. The same goes for a peach or pear tree. In his letter to the Galatians, St. Paul lists the fruits or signs of the Spirit as charity, joy, peace, patience, benignity, goodness, longanimity, mildness, faith, modesty, continency, chastity." Some of these words might sound strange to us today but we surely get the general idea. Who would not want to receive the Holy Spirit? Would we want to be uncharitable, miserable, quarrelsome, impatient, malicious, bad, mean-spirited, offensive, unfaithful, immodest, wasteful, or promiscuous?

We don't need miraculous, mystical, or ghostly experiences to encounter the Spirit today. Can it be that anyone, Christian or otherwise, who exhibits the fruits of the Holy Spirit is filled with the Spirit whether they believe it or not? 

It is no exaggeration to say that all over the world today, Christians are being persecuted for their beliefs. In America Christians are ridiculed and stigmatized. Recently, some elite Harvard students attempted to ridicule the Catholic Mass by performing a staanic Black Mass on campus. It’s hard to comprehend the motivation of these students.

More seriously, in the Middle East fanatical Moslems kill, burn, and rape in the name of God. In Africa they kidnap and maim young girls. Fo some reason Hindus in India find it necessary to attack Christians. The newly elected Prime Minister of India has a history of Christian persecution. In China, despite its growing wealth and power, the government sees the need to persecute peaceable Christians. 

What explanation can ther be for this world-wide persecution? Whatever the reason I believe that these perscutions will ultimately fail. I don’t like to make predictions but I would never bet against the Holy Spirit. My prediction is that the majority of people in China will be Christian by the next century.

###