aeternus

I recall hearing the following informational before concerning the “titles” for each of the “hours”. Perhaps this happened years ago when I began my practice of the Liturgy of the Hours prayer and integrated it into my life, but I had since forgotten it. I will say that the good thing about lacking a proper memory and forgetting what you have already been taught is that you can get very excited about learning something wonderful all over again! It never even occurs to you that you have forgotten something and so you don’t feel bad about yourself!

I’m sure many, many people already know that praying the Divine Office is a way of participating in the salvation won in the death and resurrection of Christ. This prayer is a public and common prayer by the people of God and it is rightly considered to be among the primary duties of the Church. Now, notice, we say primary duties of the Church - not just Priest, nuns and consecrated religious! This prayer is for everyone!

Through the formation of the church prayer in common gradually took the form of a set cycle of hours. Now, in praying these hours, we find them a way to recall Christ’s passion. Each of the “seven hours” is linked to an aspect of Christ’s Passion:

• Matins — Office of Readings - The Agony in the Garden
• Laudes — Morning Prayer - Jesus is Condemned to Death
• Terce — Mid-morning - Scourging & Crowning with Thorns
• Sext — Mid-day - The Way of the Cross
• Noon – Mid-afternoon - The Crucifixion
• Vespers — Evening Prayer - Jesus taken down from the Cross
• Compline — Night Prayer - Jesus placed in the Tomb

So maybe you do not have time to participate in the liturgy by taking time out to recite the psalms, but you can always take a moment for reflection and meditation with your breviary and just think about Christ’s passion during these times of the day…

This morning’s second reading from the office is from St. Boniface whose feast day we celebrate today. The opening paragraph is just wonderful and is as pertinent today as it was back in the 7th Century. Boniface writes:

In her voyage across the ocean of this world, the Church is like a great ship being pounded by the waves of life’s different stresses. Our duty is not to abandon ship but to keep her on her course.

Boy, what words of wisdom. Boniface surely could help us out today in Germany. Yesterday I read an article by Dr. Jeff Mirus who talks about how we are under constant and most ridiculous battle not just from outside our church, but most fiercely from within. In his article entitled, “When Fear and Anger Give way to Laughter” Mirus uses a current silly situation where 130 theologians from Germany and Austria have signed a petition for reform of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. He jokes in the article:

“Tell the German theologians to pin their 95 Theses to the door and we’ll get back to them.”
On the other hand, there is a priest in Minnesota who is being censured because he is trying to protect the innocent young minds of our school children. In his attempts to expose the insanity behind Virtus a program which is mandated for all Catholic schools and religious education programs. Virtus is being implemented in the archdiocese’s 220 parishes to comply with a 2003 mandate by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops in the wake of the clergy-sex-abuse scandal.
MANY believe that the program violates Vatican teachings (the magisterium) and that only parents should talk to children about sex.

I can hardly believe that the Bishops feel forced into implementing such a program as this! It is astounding. In the name of protecting children (through a some delusional secular culture mentality) should we expose 5 and 6 year old children to point to pictures of naked bodies to say what part is what and who should and should not touch them!? Or, should we love children and protect their little souls by centering our efforts of education to the adult population who has gone sex mad and gender nutty? Would not it be wise to turn our attention to battling the pornography industry and clean up television, movie and news media hype?! Can we PLEASE put a ban on having advertisements for “enlargement” medicines on every channel at every commercial break?!! We should be fighting the adult battle and not showing our 5 year old children how to protect themselves. If we can not battle, why, no - HOW could we possibly think they could!!! It is insane!!!

O.K… I had better stop this rant and get back to our saint of the day…
As we can see we have both sides of the Christ’s church being bombarded with waves today! The good forces and the bad are often mistaken for one another! We surely should pray to our dear Saint Boniface today for we need his and everyone’s help!

It was said Boniface showed a great zeal for meditation as a youngster. I found a short, but so wonderfully written biography on him from the Medieval Sourcebook at Fordham. I will include this paragraph about his contemplative aspects and how he shows us a great example in attaining a life of saintly union with our Lord:

… the saint’s daily contemplation and to his perseverance in fasting and abstinence. In this way, making gradual progress, we shall relate with conciseness and brevity his wonderful deeds, follow his life to its close, and examine it in greater detail. By balancing one aspect of his life against another we shall show that the venerable and holy Boniface was an example for us of eternal life in his evenly balanced moderation and that he laid before us the precepts of apostolic learning. Following the example of the saints, he climbed the steep path that leads to knowledge of heavenly things and went before his people as a leader who opens the gates of paradise through which only the upright shall enter.

from the Medieval Sourcebook: Willibald: The Life of St. Boniface

Giotto. The Visitation. 1302-1305. Fresco. Capella degli Scrovegni, Padua, Italy

What a special and wonderful feast day it is today, the feast of the Visitation. To remember that glorious event when Mary, in faithful happiness journeys to her cousin Elizabeth’s house to celebrate with her not only the incarnation of the word within her, but the beauty of Elizabeth’s womb which contains John the Baptist. Mary’s visit is both a spiritual rejoicing and plainly a womanly rejoice in the conception of human life!

How happy it is for a woman to carry a child, despite any physical trials and difficulties, the fulfillment of a women’s humanity is to conceive and bear life within her. Life is an innate truth dwelling within her to conceive a life beyond her own! I do not suppose that a man can truly appreciate this miracle! Indeed, I grieve for any person who can not experience this beauty, but I know too well myself, the pains involved in not being able to do so. May my angel children, who were too good for this earth be singing the glories of God eternally from above, amen.
So many people take for granted the gift of life. People think they will be able to conceive and have a baby whenever they choose. Like a right granted to them through science or through some physical reality of the world. It is too often thought that children are some sort of commodity, a thing of purchase, and not a grace and gift from God the Father. A child comes from eternity. They are a special and unique being in the mystery of God’s plan for humanity. Each life, each soul, has a purpose and a sacred reality to be lived and experienced on this earth. May we all serve Him as we were made to!

Let me include the canticle of Mary which is prayed each evening during Vespers from Luke [1:46-55]. It is so beautiful…

My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord,
my spirit rejoices in God my Savior
for he has looked with favor on his lowly servant.

From this day all generations will call me blessed;
the Almighty has done great things for me,
and holy is his Name.

He has mercy on those who fear him
in every generation.

He has shown the strength of his arm,
he has scattered the proud in their conceit.

He has cast down the mighty from their thrones,
and has lifted up the lowly.

He has filled the hungry with good things,
and the rich he has sent away empty.

He has come to the help of his servant Israel
for he has remembered his promise of mercy,
the promise he made to our fathers,
to Abraham and his children for ever.

In the Liturgy of the day from the Office of Readings we hear from St. Bede (remember his feast day was just a few days ago). He has a very beautiful thought on contemplative prayer associated with Mary, the visitation, and her canticle…

“it is an excellent and fruitful custom of holy Church that we should sing Mary’s hymn at the time of evening prayer. By meditating upon the incarnation, our devotion is kindled, and by remembering the example of God’s Mother, we are encouraged to lead a life of virtue. Such virtues are best achieved in the evening. We are weary after the day’s work and worn out by our distractions. The time for rest is near, and our minds are ready for contemplation”

- Saint Bede the venerable, in a homily

For Evening Prayer:

Virgo virginum praeclara,
mihi iam non sis amara;
fac me tecum plangere.

Fac ut portem Christi mortem,
passionis fac me sortem
et plagas recolere.

Fac me plagis vulnerari,
cruce hac inebriari
et cruore Filii.

Flammis urar ne succensus,
per te, Virgo, sim defensus
in die iudicii.

Fac me cruce custodiri,
morte Christi praemuniri,
confoveri gratia.

Quando corpus morietur,
fac ut animae donetur
paradisi gloria. Amen

—————————

Chosen Virgin of virgins,
to me, now, be not bitter;
let me mourn with you

Grant that I may bear the death of Christ,
grant me the fate of His passion
and the remembrance of His wounds.

Let me be wounded with distress,
inebriated in this way by the cross
and the blood of your Son

Lest I be destroyed by fire, set alight,
then through you, Virgin, may I be defended
on the day of judgement.

Let me be guarded by the cross,
fortified by the death of Christ,
and cherished by grace.

When my body dies,
grant that to my soul is given
the glory of paradise. Amen.

The Epistle to Diognetus is a well-crafted argument extolling the virtues of Christianity and one of the first Apologetics written for the Christian Faith. It is said the “writer was quite incapable of the restrained eloquence, the smooth flow of thought, the limpid clearness of expression, which mark this epistle as one of the most perfect compositions of antiquity .”

The full name of this Epistle is Epistle of Mathetes to Diognetus.  “Mathetes”is not a proper name; it simply means “a disciple.” The writer is a Johannine Christian who does not use the name “Jesus” or the expression the “Christ” but prefers the use of “the Word.” That reminds me, of course, of Saint Mary Magdalene de’Pazzi the great Mystic of the Ancient Order of Carmelites. In her rapturous visions (which were dutifully recorded by the nuns in her very large cloister in Italy) Saint Mary Magdalen spoke of Christ most eloquently and in her prose constantly referred to him as the WORD. Diognetus was most probably a tutor of the emperor Marcus Aurelius, who admired him for his freedom from superstition and sound educational advice (Meditations 1.6).

Anyway, the reason for all this background is simply to set the stage a bit for this morning’s Second Reading from the Office of Readings. It is a beautiful Christian meditation, but also, I would add, very Carmelite. For me it was this great realization, a deep penetrating realization of this which allows one to begin to experience the mystical life of being a Christian. We are all called to it, but if we can bend our stubborn wills to this understanding and train ourselves to practice the presence of God within each moments of our day, and most importantly by and through the grace of God, we may participate in this great reality more perfectly. Where ever you are in your spiritual journey, this is a great meditation to practice today. Here you go…

To speak in general terms, we may say that the Christian is to the world what the soul is to the body. As the soul is present in every part of the body, while remaining distinct from it, so Christians are found in all the cities of the world, but cannot be identified with the world. As the visible body contains the invisible soul, so Christians are seen living in the world, but their religious life remains unseen. The body hates the soul and wars against it, not because of any injury the soul has done it, but because of the restriction the soul places on its pleasures. Similarly, the world hates the Christians, not because they have done it any wrong, but because they are opposed to its enjoyments.
Christians love those who hate them just as the soul loves the body and all its members despite the body’s hatred. It is by the soul, enclosed within the body, that the body is held together, and similarly, it is by the Christians, detained in the world as in a prison, that the world is held together. The soul, though immortal, has a mortal dwelling place; and Christians also live for a time amidst perishable things, while awaiting the freedom from change and decay that will be theirs in heaven. As the soul benefits from the deprivation of food and drink, so Christians flourish under persecution. Such is the Christian’s lofty and divinely appointed function, from which he is not permitted to excuse himself.

I thought I would give my impressions from the documentary film, Into Great Silence.

I had learned about this film some months ago and was eager for it to come to my town. So, it was with great and anxious anticipation that I went to see the movie last week. As the movie began, all popcorn eating ceased (thankfully) and the half full theater itself plunged into silence. What a treat, to see a movie with others whom were also eagerly anticipating watching this movie about silence and themselves KEEPING silent! Wow! (I am sure the Holy Spirit was at work here!)

The documentary, for those of whom are unfamiliar with this film’s premise, is centered around the Carthusian Monks (contemplative order founded during the 11th century by Saint Bruno) at the Grande Chartreuse Monastery in the French Alpine Mountains. The location of this monastery is one of God’s great gifts to man for its vistas of the Alps from its location are beyond compare. I can not imagine a soul who’s heart would not swell with passion for God after viewing the earth from this most beautiful venue of His creation. The film captures life at the Monastery for a whole year so we are able to see the four seasons of this mountain paradise in snow white and tranquil green.

The filmmaker, Philip Gröning says of his work:

This transcendent, closely observed film seeks to embody a monastery, rather than simply depict one—it has no score, no voiceover and no archival footage. What remains is stunningly elemental: time, space and light. One of the most mesmerizing and poetic chronicles of spirituality ever created, INTO GREAT SILENCE dissolves the border between screen and audience with a total immersion into the hush of monastic life. More meditation than documentary, it’s a rare, transformative theatrical experience for all.

While I understand completely what the filmmaker is trying to accomplish, I would like to make an observation about how the “silence” was portrayed. I almost got the feeling that the silence itself was more important than the “reason” for the silence — namely Our Creator, God.

Let me try to explain…

The film seems to emphasis only the silence and not really explain why it is necessary. It is a mysterious silence, but perhaps not so explained was the “holiness” of this silence. Its kind of like music without lyrics and so the viewer must concentrate very hard to understand the score. The music is there, and it is definitely “classical” in nature but your not sure if it is a Renaissance piece or some Neo-classical noise.

I think clarity could have come with more attention to the WHY of the silence. It was not until almost the end of the film (nearly 3 hours!) that the audience was first introduced to any formal liturgy (save the late night Matins prays of the hours and the beautiful chanted prayer that accompanied it). It also was not again until the end where we got to hear the most beautiful and contemplative philosophy from the blind monastic and his love of God through his sacrificial life as a member of the community. (O.K. this is the point of the film where I actually could not hold back tears. He was such a beautiful soul that I was overwhelmed!) I guess I’m just concerned that viewers of this film (most of whom would be contemporary secular culturalist who are viewing this “very different life of silence” for the first time.) I just don’t want them to get the wrong idea. But, perhaps though, I am not trusting enough in Divine Providence by saying this!

Well, having critiqued this minor exterior versus interior silence issue I have with the film, I HIGHLY recommend this film to all. And, I even recommend taking your children. I took my 10 year old son with me and though he mumbled to me that he was starving (I would not let him interrupt the silent theater with popcorn eating! - What a mean mother I am, but it was a healthy sacrifice for him!) he truly enjoyed the film. We spent more time talking about it this past week than we have any other film I can remember. It was such a great teaching tool for the contemplative life!

Watch the movie trailer.

See when and where it is playing…

For more information about Carthusian monks, viewers may also be interested in Nancy Klein Maguire’s book An Infinity of Little Hours.

Film Info:
2006 162 mins Color Germany In minimal English subtitled French dialogue
35mm Aspect ratio: 1.85:1 Sound: Dolby SRD