Is the Vatican Anti-Semitic or Tone-Deaf?
Introduction
Since the beginning of the war in Gaza, Israel and the
Vatican have been at odds. Israel has objected to what it sees as the Vatican’s
false moral equivalence between terrorist aggression and Israel’s right to
self-defence. The Vatican has complained of a “disproportionate” Israeli
response which puts innocents at risk and threatens to ignite a wider regional
or even global conflagration.
Pope Francis wrote to the Jewish population of Israel in February 2024 condemning all forms of anti-Judaism and anti-Semitism:
"(The Church) rejects every
form of anti-Judaism and antisemitism, unequivocally condemning manifestations
of hatred towards Jews and Judaism as a sin against God …
Together with you, we, Catholics,
are very concerned about the terrible increase in attacks against Jews around
the world. We had hoped that 'never again' would be a refrain heard by the new
generations."
The Pope noted that wars and divisions are increasing all
over the world "in a sort of piecemeal world war," hitting the lives
of many populations.
Pope Francis has also directly condemned Hamas’ attack from Gaza into southern Israel.
In January 2024, in his yearly "state of the world" address to diplomats, Pope Francis directly condemned Hamas' cross-border attack from Gaza into southern Israel as an "atrocious" act of "terrorism and extremism." and renewed his call for the immediate liberation of those still being held by militants in Gaza. He added, this is “not the way to resolve disputes between peoples; those disputes are only aggravated and cause suffering for everyone.”
The Pope also decried the fact that it “provoked a strong
Israeli military response in Gaza that has led to the death of tens of
thousands of Palestinians, mainly civilians, including many young people and
children, and has caused an “exceptionally grave humanitarian crisis and
inconceivable suffering.” He called for an immediate ceasefire, the release of
hostages, and access to humanitarian aid for the Palestinian people. He also
reiterated his support for a “two-state” solution, as well as an
“internationally guaranteed special status for the City of Jerusalem”, aiming
for lasting peace and security. Expressing concern that the war between
Israel and Hamas could spread in the wider Middle East, he called for a
"ceasefire on every front, including Lebanon".
Pope Francis says that modern warfare often does not
distinguish between military and civilian objectives. There is no modern conflict
that does not end up in some way "indiscriminately striking" the
civilian population, he said. "The events in Ukraine and Gaza are clear
proof of this. We must not forget that grave violations of international
humanitarian law are war crimes, and that it is not sufficient to point them
out, but also necessary to prevent them.”
These differences between Israel and the Vatican are inevitable as Israel prosecutes its war while the Holy See attempts to remain above the fray, concerned to condemn war and advocate for humanitarian assistance for all parties.
No one
has explicitly suggested that the Vatican’s rhetoric reflects anti-Semitic or
anti-Jewish sentiment, but is rather the consequence of contrasting
perspectives and priorities.
That is, until now ....
The Letter
In his letter Pope Francis described the Catholics of the Middle East as "a small, defenceless flock, thirsty for peace" and thanked them for their desire to remain in their lands, together with their ability "to pray and love in spite of everything."
"You are a seed loved by God," said the Pope, who
also encouraged them not to allow themselves to be "swallowed up by the
darkness that surrounds you." The Pontiff invited Catholics living in
these war zones to be "shoots of hope," to "bear witness to love
in the midst of words of hatred," and to foster "encounter in the
midst of confrontation."
Pope Francis repeated that "as
Christians, we must never tire of imploring God's peace." "Prayer and fasting," the Pontiff explained, "are the weapons of
love that change history, the weapons that defeat our only true enemy: the
spirit of evil that foments war."
In addition, the Pope expressed his closeness to all people
living in the Middle East, regardless of their religious confession. He expressed his affection to "mothers who weep," to "those who
have been forced to leave their homes," "those who are afraid to look
up because of the fire that rains down from heaven," and "those who
thirst for peace and justice."
The Holy Father thanked the "sons and daughters of
peace for consoling the heart of God, wounded by the wickedness of humanity,"
for their work. He also thanked the "bishops and priests, who bring God's
consolation to those who feel alone and abandoned." To them he addresses a
request: "look to the holy people whom you are called to serve and let
your hearts be moved, putting aside, for the good of your flock, every division
and ambition."
He concluded his message by asking for the intercession of
the Virgin Mary, "Queen of Peace" and St. Joseph, "Patron of the
Church."
All well and good ….
Or was it?
A Jewish Perspective
The letter has elicited the same ambivalence
from many Israelis and Jews that previous Vatican declarations on the war have.
Some noted that Francis never referred to what Oct. 7th commemorates,
i.e., the unprovoked Hamas assault on Israel. Others complained that Francis
declared “the people of Gaza” are in his daily thoughts and prayers, saying
nothing about the people of Israel. Critics groused too that was ostensibly a
letter to the Catholics of the Middle East with no mention of Catholics inside
the state of Israel who are also suffering.
These objections are familiar, but there was a new element
in this letter which raised special “alarm” amongst some.
Pope Francis decried “the spirit of evil that foments war,” citing John 8:44 to the effect that this spirit was “murderous from the beginning” and “a liar and the father of lies.”
"People today do not know how to
find peace. As Christians, we must never tire of imploring peace from God. That
is why, on this day, I have urged everyone to observe a day of prayer and
fasting. Prayer and fasting are the weapons of love that change history, the
weapons that defeat our one true enemy: the spirit of evil that foments war,
because it is “murderous from the beginning”, “a liar and the father of lies” (John 8:44).
Please, let us devote time to prayer and rediscover the saving power of
fasting!"
Now, as a Catholic, I read this as a generalised attack on evil as it manifests itself in individuals and nations down the generations. The terms have entered Christian lexicon as a representation of Satan, not the Jews. Indeed, the expression has entered the lexicon of Catholics when referring to evil. Pope Francis used it in this sense to describe a "spirit of evil that foments war."
However, some consider John 8:44 to be one of the most problematic passages for Jewish-Christian relations in Scripture. Indeed, there is a campaign to have certain verses removed from the Gospel of John because they are anti-Semitic. This idea that the New Testament is inherently anti-Semitic emerged in the aftermath of the Holocaust.
In John Chapter 8 we read that Jesus was teaching in the Temple Court to people who gathered around Him. Whilst there, the “teachers of the law and the Pharisees” tested Him, trying to trap Him to have a basis for accusing him of heresy.
Verses 42 - 46 reads:
"Jesus said to them, “If God
were your Father, you would love me, for I have come here from God. I
have not come on my own; God sent me. Why is my language not clear to
you? Because you are unable to hear what I say. You belong to your father,
the devil, and you want to carry out your father’s desires. He was a
murderer from the beginning, not holding to the truth, for there is no truth in
him. When he lies, he speaks his native language, for he is a liar and the
father of lies. Yet because I tell the truth, you
do not believe me! Can any of you prove me guilty of sin? If I am telling
the truth, why don’t you believe me? Whoever belongs to God hears what God
says. The reason you do not hear is that you do not belong to God.”"
Such passages must be read in context. Jesus and His followers
were all Jews. He was not impugning all Jews or Judaism. Instead,
these passages were directed at a small group openly hostile to Jesus and His
message; the Pharisees and those who were maliciously looking to entrap Him to justify killing Him.
Did Pope Francis invoke a dangerous legacy when he chose
John 8:44 to characterise “our one true enemy” in this letter to Middle Eastern
Catholics; the enemy being Satan?
Ethan Schwartz a professor of the Hebrew Bible at Villanova, writing for the Religious News Service, certainly believes so:
"It is impossible to overstate
what a disaster this is for Jewish-Catholic relations. It recalls the most
dangerous rhetoric in Catholic history and threatens the progress made since
Vatican II …
If alluding to the idea that Jews
are the devil is not antisemitic, then nothing is antisemitic, and there is no
limit to what may be done."
He continues, John 8:44 has been used to justify persecution, oppression, and violence against Jews:
"As a Jew, I shuddered
when I read these words. They triggered an instinctual terror that I have not
felt since Oct. 7 itself.
Mortal fear of Catholics has been
a common feature of Jewish history, but it’s actually new for me."
He goes on:
"It would not be unreasonable to
speculate that no individual sentence has caused more Jewish death and
suffering than John 8:44. It has fuelled countless persecutions, pogroms and,
in its own way, the Holocaust …
In a war that much of the world
blames on the Jewish state, citing a verse that condemns all Jews as the
murderous children of the devil creates an unavoidable implication: The Jews
are the reason for this horror. They are the enemies of those who seek peace -
the enemies of the church and, indeed, of humanity itself."
Schwartz overstates his case and confuses the matter. He is the one who takes the verse out of context. Whilst he acknowledges the passage
is “very dense with information and allows for many interpretations and
conclusions,” he fosters this confusion by claiming Jesus' criticism is “directed specifically at the Pharisees
(8:13), or at Jews who do not believe in him (8:30-31)”. Then he says the “context
also regularly refers to "the Jews" without further nuance (8:22,48).”
He concludes, “Jews are said not to be
children of Abraham or even children of God.” This is a misrepresentation of Jesus and also of Pope Francis' message.
"Such a reading goes beyond discrediting Jews because of their unbelief in Jesus: it argues that (these) Jews, from the beginning, even before the New Testament, were not the real children of God; and not even the actual children of Abraham. This makes the promises of the Tanakh conditional on belief in Jesus. We find a similar rhetoric in Revelation 2:9 and 3:9. There, the gathering of Jews who do not believe in Jesus is called "synagogue of Satan," and they themselves "not Jews,” i.e., Jews who call themselves Jews but are not true children of Abraham and not true children of God."
But it is he who is reading it this way. Granted, what can
happen when such texts are used in contentious debates is seen in sermons given by
the 4th century Archbishop of Constantinople, John Chrysostom. In his warning to
Christians who enjoyed going to Jewish synagogues, Chrysostom warns that
going to these synagogues and celebrating holidays with them means "celebrating with demons," because whoever kills the Son of God can only be a
demon. What’s often overlooked is that at the time Jewish leaders were
engaged in a bloody quest to eliminate all Christians.
Many centuries later, Martin Luther used similar rhetoric in
different circumstances. In his, frankly unhinged, ‘On the Jews and Their
Lies,’ Luther saw in Jesus' characterisation of the Jews as “children
of the devil” confirmation that Jews should not live among Christians. He writes,
"while yet we treat no one so well, and at the same time suffer from no
one so much as from those wicked children of the devil, that brood of
vipers." In this treatise, he argues that Jewish synagogues and schools be
set on fire, Jewish prayer books destroyed, rabbis forbidden to
preach, Jewish homes burned, and property and money confiscated. Luther
demanded that no mercy or kindness be given to Jews, that they be afforded no
legal protection, and "these poisonous envenomed worms" should
be drafted into forced labour or expelled forever. He also advocated
murder of all Jews, writing "[W]e are at fault in not slaying them."
The book became popular with the rise of the Nazi Party and
the prevailing consensus is that it had a significant impact on justifying the
Holocaust.
See excepts from Luther's twisted treatise: here; and the full text here.
Conclusion
Much ado about nothing; anti-Semitism; or a case of stupidity?
There is growing ‘scholarly’ and
popular support today for the notion that anti-Semitism first surfaced in the
Gospels, particularly in St John and St Matthew, through the epistles of St Paul, onto
the early Church Fathers, was reinforced by the Reformation, and came to full
fruition with the German Third Reich.
John Allen, writing in Crux, queries whether the Vatican is
indifferent to the “historical ghosts” the pope’s letter has awoken, saying “there
are only two possibilities, and it’s honestly hard to know which is the more
troubling.”
Option one is that use of the verse was intentional, a sort
of scriptural shot across the bow at Israel and the Jewish world, warning them
of rising frustration with Israel’s approach to the war. If so, one must
question the judgment involved in using such an historically fraught passage to
make the point.
Option two is that the use of John 8:44 was unintentional, a case of whoever prepared a draft for the pope did not know the history of the passage or the reaction it might provoke. If that’s the case, he concludes, it raises troubling questions about the sensitivity level in the Vatican to Jewish-Christian relations, especially given that next year will mark the 60th anniversary of 'Nostra Aetate,' the "ground breaking document" of the Second Vatican Council that signalled a shift in the Church’s relationship with Jews and Judaism. Strange in view of Pope Francis’ recent off-the-cuff comment that “all religions are pathways to reach God.”
In the early years of the present pontificate we used to hear quite a lot about Pope Francis’s long-standing friendship with Abraham Skorka, a Buenos Aires rabbi. We don’t seem to have heard so much about him in recent years. Are they still on friendly terms, I wonder? And, if so, didn’t it occur to Francis to show him his draft letter and ask him for some input on the subject?
ReplyDeletehttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abraham_Skorka
You're assuming Pope Francis read the letter ....
DeleteYes, I suppose I am!
DeleteI have written more extensively on this issue in my own blog but the Cliff notes are that Christianity and Judaism are separate religions; they are not comparable equivalents and they can't both be right. The Church has a mission, and that mission extends to the Jews as well as everyone else. Some people think it went wrong with the Second Vatican Council, but Vatican II is only the place where the wrong step happened; it was not itself the wrong. Basically, we lost our nerve. We shouldn't be apologising for scripture, and it's taken me aback that, of all men, it should be Francis who upholds the Gospel of John. I guess he was right about letting ourselves be surprised.
ReplyDeleteI have written more extensively on this issue in my own blog
https://bell707.substack.com/p/who-do-you-say-that-i-am
but the Cliff notes are that Christianity and Judaism are separate religions; they are not comparable equivalents and they can't both be right. The Church has a mission, and that mission extends to the Jews as well as everyone else. Some people think it went wrong with the Second Vatican Council, but Vatican II is only the place where the wrong step happened; it was not itself the wrong. Basically, we lost our nerve. We shouldn't be apologising for scripture, and it's taken me aback that, of all men, it should be Francis who upholds the Gospel of John. I guess he was right about letting ourselves be surprised.
https://bell707.substack.com/p/who-do-you-say-that-i-am
Sorry about the double post. My internet has been playing up recently.
DeleteHmm, it's hard to know what to say. The Roman Catholic Church's historical attitude to the Jews would not have been much better than Luther's in many instances. Pope Francis might be well advised to stick to talking about the Tribe of Israel rather than the State - which is massively complicated and about which even Jews cannot agree - as might many of us.
ReplyDeleteGadjo
DeleteI don't think it particularly likely that Pope Francis is encoding some kind of antisemitic message into his letters with his choice of passages. Perhaps he is being historically insensitive, perhaps not. While one should be aware of the previous misuse of Scripture (cf. all the passages used to justify anti-abolitionist rhetoric), one must also not abandon its proper use and should seek to 'rehabilitate' rather than remove such passages. We mustn't fall into lazy literalist proof texting, but must read such verses in the context of the rest of Scripture - such as Rom. 11, Jn 4 - and the context in which they were written. Luther's frothing diatribe is his own.
ReplyDeleteAnd Francis is fundamentally correct here. All war and killing is evil, even if the war is 'just', for 'God is not a god of disorder, but of peace.' The intention of Just War Theory, often conveniently forgotten, was to limit war, rather than justify it. Only Satan delights in the death of the innocent, whether they be Israeli festival goers or Palestinian children. The Vatican does, perhaps, need to be a little more explicitly neutral in its condemnations.
Interesting that in today's new encyclical, Dilexit nos, the Pope has found something nice to say about Martin Heidegger, the philosopher who was banned from teaching in postwar West Germany.
ReplyDeletehttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin_Heidegger_and_Nazism
200 footnotes! Also good to see Fyodor Dostoevsky mentioned - there's a life of reflection in his writings. Martin Heidegger is a new one to me. Thanks for noticing and the link.
DeleteLooks like a powerful and very relevant encyclical given the state of the modern world. I grew up with a Sacred Heart icon centre stage in our home - a wedding present to my parents from the Irish side of our family. When I reframed it several years ago, it had my mother's Baptismal and first Holy Communion certificates. A treasured family possession!
Gavin Ashenden has been retweeting references to this encyclical as 'pseudosacral homopoetic prose' that's been 'ghost written by one of [Francis'] house fairies' and will 'make straight guys cringe'. Singled out for 'the "You Can't Make This Stuff Up" file' is the line 'Christ showed the depth of his love for us not by lengthy explanations but by concrete actions.' I had always assumed that the whole point of the Incarnation was showing us how to live a godly life 'even [unto] death on a cross'. But this is homopoetic cringe, apparently.
DeleteIt isn't entirely clear whether he agrees with what he's retweeting, although he makes no criticism of it, but I've found myself becoming more disappointed with the way Gavin has been leaning more towards the CM strand of online Catholicism since his conversion. Even if the encyclical is riddled with problems, long tweets full of snarky ad hominems are not an edifying way to address it.
I agree Gavin is "going down a rabbit hole". My initial impression from a quick first read is positive - and I'm a "straight guy"! I think men have an issue with discussing love of the incarnate maleness of Jesus and much prefer relating to His God-nature.
DeleteThe examples of so-called "homopoetic prose" given by Louie Verrecchio's (editor of Ask a Catholic) makes one wonder about his openness to art and poetry and, yes, his feminine side. He forgets Jesus had no issue with this.
Here's a paragraph in the encyclical that stands out:
“Acts of love of neighbour, with the renunciation, self-denial, suffering and effort that they entail, can only be such when they are nourished by Christ’s own love. He enables us to love as he loved, and in this way he loves and serves others through us. He humbles himself to show his love through our actions, yet even in our slightest works of mercy, his heart is glorified and displays all its grandeur. Once our hearts welcome the love of Christ in complete trust, and enable its fire to spread in our lives, we become capable of loving others as Christ did, in humility and closeness to all. In this way, Christ satisfies his thirst and gloriously spreads the flames of his ardent and gracious love in us and through us. How can we fail to see the magnificent harmony present in all this?”
I had a look at Verrecchio's blog, and he says:
DeleteI have to come to draw two very important, and eminently unavoidable conclusions:
One, Jorge Bergoglio is not a member of the Mystical Body of Christ of any rank. He simply does not meet the requirements of membership in the Church – not my requirements – but those proposed by the Church herself. Furthermore, the conciliar church in Rome, because its authoritative teachings endanger souls, cannot be the one true Church of Christ who is a Holy Mother.
This latter point means that the men who sat, or sit, at the head of the conciliar counterfeit church, cannot also be true heads of the Holy Catholic Church. This to me is just Catholic common sense.
An interesting source for Gavin to be retweeting.
Yes, I don't see anything in his selection of quotes that constitutes 'homopoetic prose' (whatever that is). One wonders how he copes with the writings of saints such as St. John of the Cross. I also notice that he's quite invested in Fatima, and Sr. Lucia compared saying the rosary to lovers spending hours together saying 'I love you' over and over, which sounds a bit homopoetic to me!
I think men have an issue with discussing love of the incarnate maleness of Jesus and much prefer relating to His God-nature.
I wonder if part of the issue is the loss, particularly among men, of an understanding of different kinds of love, and conflating them all with erotic or romantic love. I get the impression that it's much easier for a woman to tell her friend that she loves her than a man to tell a male friend the same.
Perhaps the only model of non-romantic love between men that we still see socially is the father-son dynamic. I imagine that a grown man - at least in the first half of life - would find being cast in the son role difficult, and he obviously can't take the father role with God (or perhaps some do, which is why so many seem to invent their own version of God). Women, on the other hand, are more accustomed to being in the dependant role (politically incorrect as it may be to say so), and so it's not as hard for us. That said, I think a lot of post-Reformation Catholic devotion (that's now regarded as traditional) tends to be quite feminine and flower. Even I found, e.g., Saint Alphonsus Liguori's prayers for the Stations a little over the top to pray.
Hmm, I'm sure I replied to this.
DeleteYou did ... but for some reason it was captured in the 'spam' section!
DeleteAll good points. It's interesting but true that we men rarely tell one another we love each other. In my own experience, expressions of love pass easier between my grandson and I, than between my father and I. And that's sad really. Thankfully, I am more able to tell all my children I love them - and use those words. Then there's rivalry between sons that can get in the way too. It took me many years to feel comfortable with actually using the word "love" in prayers to Jesus as a "brother" and as a man. Somehow relating to Him exclusively as God was easier - but it diminishes the relationship.
How does that work in Orthodoxy? My impression is that it is a more "muscular" expression of Christianity - despite its mystical traditions.
I think for a lot of men, and I'm guessing even more so for your father's generation, love was something you do rather than something you communicate. Love is shown through working to support the family, making sure you're brought up well and so on. I guess with your grandson you also have that ideal combination of the wisdom of maturity and the receptiveness of childhood, which might make things easier.
DeleteI don't think it's necessarily a male-to-male thing, either. My dad was much more forthcoming with verbal expressions of love when I was a child than when I was in my teens onwards. My mum will end a call with 'love you'; my dad wouldn't (unless there was a crisis). There's an old joke about a wife who complains that her husband never tells her that he loves her, and he replies that he told her he loved her when they got married, and he'll let her know if anything changes. I feel that sums up most men! The men on my Japanese side of the family are also more reserved, while the women are far more effusive.
Interestingly, as an only child, I have real difficulty relating to Christ as a 'brother', because that relationship is meaningless to me. A Benedictine spiritual director once asked me to list the ways I related to Christ, and got uppity when I didn't mention 'brother' (Catholics don't understand small families!) I said I may as well describe him as a chinchilla, because I'd never had one of those either (not my finest hour). But it's not in my language - I wouldn't even describe my closest friend as a brother or sister, because I don't know what that means.
I think Orthodoxy is perceived as more 'muscular' because it has kept its mystical traditions mainstream. I don't think that mysticism need be feminine in its nature, it's definitely not if you read the accounts of the desert fathers and mothers. I don't see anything specifically feminine about my practice, for example, except what I bring to it. There is certainly more emphasis on a kind of spiritual warfare and rigorous asceticism even for 'ordinary' lay people (fasting rules etc.) than there is in western traditions, and I think that sense of inner struggle and spiritual conquest of the passions appeals to men, particularly younger men (the same reason that so many prisoners end up converting to Islam IMO).
Orthodoxy was also bypassed by the bridal mysticism of the High Middle Ages, where theologians such as St. Bernard of Clairvaux interpreted the Bride of Christ as not just the Church but the individual soul, an idea which became particularly popular among nuns and female mystics, in intimate and often borderline erotic ways. Among the clergy and laity, this seems to have developed into the somewhat sentimentalist view of Jesus as 'my love' (and was taken to its extremes in some evangelical Protestant circles as 'Jesus-is-my-boyfriend' praise songs). But men are not brides, and it's unsurprising that many men find this kind of language hard (the mystical misapplied literally doesn't work).
In mainstream Orthodoxy, the Bride of Christ is (only) the Church. Individual believers are mystically united to the Church, but we are not, individually, brides, so there is a degree of separation between the male believer and the language of the bride, which seems to make it easier to accept.
My reply disappeared again 😢
DeleteIt seems Disqus wants to censor you!
DeleteI've started reading St John of the Cross' "Spiritual Canticle" and some of the background history of the "Song of Songs" in the medieval church. St John refers to "the exercise of love between the soul and Jesus Christ its Spouse", rather than the love between Christ and His Church. Not a conception I would have been comfortable with in my youth or even middle-age! I'm no mystic so the notion of the human soul partaking of the Divine Nature is beyond me. It's hard to shift from concrete reality to poetry.
Still. as St Bernard of Clairvaux tells us, we have to overcome a "a misguided love of the world, and an excessive love of self” to understand spiritual insights.
Sounds like you gave your Benedictine spiritual director a tough time! A sign perhaps more of temperament and age than being a single child, methinks!
I assume it's because I used the word that describes the kind of love named after the guy depicted on the Shaftesbury Memorial Fountain. The spam filter must think I've branched out into alternative content creation 🤣
DeleteI don't think that SD and I were well matched. Lessons were learned all round!
This is partly a problem with making mystical insights mainstream. People see that a mystical teaching is profound and transformative and want everyone to benefit from it, but it ends up being taken too literally by those outside of that tradition. The Church as the Bride of Christ is obviously conceptual, so people can accept it more readily. The idea of the individual soul as the Bride, mystically, is simply about the receptiveness and surrender of the soul, and the loss of oneself in the Divine Other, just as lovers lose themselves in each other during the act of lovemaking. But taken literally, it causes problems for people (particularly men) who aren't at the stage, because a man isn't a bride and the concept of bridehood comes with a load of 'associations' that get in the way, so they naturally balk at it.
There's a story in the desert fathers of one monk asking his abbot for advice in overcoming the passions. He's told not to fight them, but to observe them arising and turn them towards the godly intention that underlies them - when lust arises, turn it into love, its godly counterpart, and so on. Another monk asks the same thing, and is told to fight them and extinguish the passions as soon as they arise. He asks why he received different advice from the first monk, and was told that he was not yet ready to deal with his passions in that way. This is the problem with taking teachings and insights that arise for certain people in certain contexts and trying to generalise them without guidance.
I'm no mystic so the notion of the human soul partaking of the Divine Nature is beyond me
I would say just let go of the notion of the human soul partaking in the Divine Nature. It can't be grasped anyway. It's not a notion, it just is. It isn't a shift from concrete reality to poetry, it is the ultimate concrete reality, it's usually just buried under our own sin and baggage. There are times when the veil is lifted - at communion, for example, or in contemplation - and none of those need to be grasped. Running a theological treatise of transubstantiation through one's head while receiving communion would be to rather miss the point. The lilies of the field don't understand why they bloom, yet even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these!
Jews having a mortal fear of Catholics ? Shameful if this ever existed. Jesus was a Jew. It is the antithesis of the true faith to be anti semitic. It is all simple really, anyone (including Popes and Saints) promoting an anti semitic agenda is committing a grave sin. We are all God's children. Jesus is the Son of God and part of the Holy Trinity. He is no one's brother or boyfriend (sacrilege !) Any scripture that suggests Jesus is anti Semitic is either a mistaken mistranslation or a lie. No matter who wrote it. If one keeps in mind Jesus is the son of God and not capable of any sinful thoughts, utterances or behaviour then you understand Catholicism....The real problem is if you do not follow this true Catholic teaching you can call yourself a Catholic but you are not one.
ReplyDeleteYou need to define antisemitism. If Mel Brooks makes a bad movie, saying so is not antisemitic.
DeleteNo it isn't - but saying it's bad because he's Jewish would be.
DeleteChristians haven't always covered themselves with glory in their dealings with the Jews. Jews were invited to settled in England after the Norman conquest, for example, where they significantly contributed to the economy, as Christians at the time were forbidden from loaning money at interest. They were initially under the protection of the Crown, but state and Church attitudes began to shift from the twelfth century due to false allegations of 'blood libel' - that Jews used the blood of murdered Christians in their rituals - and the depiction of Jews as 'Christ killers' during the Crusades. In the last decades of the twelfth century, mobs attacked Jews throughout England, and the Jewish population of York was massacred at Clifford's Tower in 1190.
ReplyDeleteHenry III drastically increased taxes on Jewish lenders, who passed the debt on to their borrowers (Starmer, take note) making them increasingly unpopular among the English nobility. Edward I passed laws restricting Jewish businesses and requiring them to wear badges to identify themselves as Jews. Eventually, in return for money from parliament to finance his latest wars, Edward granted an Edict of Expulsion that expelled the Jews from England - an edict that officially lasted until the 1650s. This is not an unfamiliar picture across Christendom, so it's not an exaggeration to say that Jews have lived in mortal fear of Christians of all types at some point in history.
The Scriptures are not antisemitic, but there are passages in them that can be taken and used in that way (as for slavery and so on). With enough cherry picking, the Bible can be made to say whatever one wants it to say. This is true of those passages from the Gospels 'which untaught and unstable people twist to their own destruction, as they do also the rest of the Scriptures.'
Saying Hello to everyone. I know a lot of the history, but it’s not easy to keep up with things these days.
ReplyDeleteMay I be so cheeky as to wish all readers a joyful Reformation Day?
ReplyDeleteIt is most unlikely that in these publications the Bishop of Rome or his court were intending to promote anti-Semitism, which is a frighteningly prevalent thing though today, and the old conspiracy theories which bolster it. Words will easily be leapt upon by men of ill-will.
To condemn actions by the Government of Israel while ignoring the worse actions of others may be because of anti-Semitism, or a naïve Marxist desire to find an oppressor to condemn, and picking the more western one, which is foolery.
One should be careful feeding material to those who like to hate without thinking.
Gosh, it comes earlier every year! I wondered why there were a bunch of tiny Lutherans at my door demanding chocolate.
DeleteSpeaking of Reformation Days, if anyone's interested - no? OK - we descendents of the Radical Reformation will celebrate our quincentenary early next year. Gadjo is thinking of taking a trip to Zurich..
DeleteInteresting. I have not yet settled on where to clear my head on holiday next year. I had thought about Switzerland.
DeleteOne hears one of the tourist attractions these days is the "Sarco Pod." Apparently it looks like an Egyptian sarcophagus and offers short, one-wat trips to an unknown destination.
DeleteSlovenia is still a majority Catholic country. However ...
ReplyDeleteSlovenian language milestones celebrated on Reformation Day
Ljubljana, 31 October - Slovenia celebrates Reformation Day, a bank holiday, on Thursday to commemorate the 16th century religious, cultural and political movement that played a key part in the development and promotion of the Slovenian language, as the first books in Slovenian were printed during that time.
https://english.sta.si/3358066/slovenian-language-milestones-celebrated-on-reformation-day
And here's something for All Souls Day: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NrqIEwQhRMo
ReplyDeletehttps://catholicweekly.com.au/bread-of-life-homily/.....interesting article by Archbishop Fisher a couple of days ago....Food for thought. Is being a cultural Christian really being a Christian? More importantly according to John in the scriptures cultural Christians will be denied eternal life. Another mistranslation? I actually heard Cardinal Pell say that he thought that most people would be saved. (Cressida )
ReplyDeleteHow many people call themselves Christian or think Christianity is on balance good for people, but live as practical atheists, such that God and the things of God have no purchase on their day-to-day lives?
ReplyDeleteYet is such zombie Catholicism—where the faith has died in people’s hearts but lives on in their culture—really sustainable long term? Is it rationally defensible to promote a religion you don’t think is true? Can we have the fruits of a Christian civilisation without its foundational beliefs? Are we able to maintain that human beings have infinite dignity and intrinsic rights while dumping the idea that they are made in the image of God? Can liberal democracy, liberal education and much else we take for granted in our society survive without their original philosophical-theological underpinnings? Can we, for instance, promote endless forgiveness if people don’t believe God forgives, even from the cross, and enables us to do so, even when it’s very hard? Will an age without God keep producing works of exquisite beauty in art, architecture, literature and music? Perhaps the best answer to this is: perhaps. But an edifice built on such shaky foundations risks collapsing altogether…
In today’s Gospel (Jn 6:41-51) Christ is quite direct about this: “Unless you accept that I am come down from heaven, unless you are willing to be taught by Me, unless you let yourself believe, you will be like those wandering hungry and lost in the desert and you will not have eternal life .... Cressida
Perhaps the answer is in the alternative Gospel for today. In the Extraordinary Form, today is the resumed fourth Sunday after Epiphany and the Gospel is chapter 8 of Matthew, Jesus asleep in the boat as the storm rages. Just stay in the boat.
DeleteOur Gospel today was the parable of the rich man and Lazarus. It reminds us that faith without words is dead; we must live out our faith, however imperfectly, in relation to God and our neighbour for it to mean anything (Heb 13:2). In the parable, the rich man shows no mercy in life and, as such, cannot expect mercy in the age to come (Mark 4:24). The type of cultural Christianity, where people pay lip service to the Gospel but don't allow it to complete the painful work of transformation in their lives, is dead religion and empty ritual and will be spat out. I suspect, though, that God will save many more people than we expect him to (thankfully, or I'd better find my asbestos slippers).
DeleteI don't believe it's possible to have the fruit of a Christian civilisation without the foundation stone. It's true that some Christian values are 'coded' into nature and are pretty much universal, but wherever they occur they need some kind of underpinning. If we dispense with the idea of God or any higher objective moral power, we have no answer to the question 'why should I?' in respect of moral imperatives. Why should I keep a baby I don't want? Why should I help out my neighbour? Why should I feed the poor? A post-Christian society can coast along on Christian teachings for a while (most secular morality is really smuggled-in Christian teachings anyway), but, like a ship that's a few degrees off true north, eventually it drifts miles off course into the darkness.
Well another 4 years of the orange predator. I wonder if Boris is inspired to try a comeback?
ReplyDeleteBlessed are the peace-makers.
DeleteGood to hear from you, Clive.
DeleteGood to see you here, Clive, hope you are as well as can be expected.
DeleteMaalaistollo,
DeleteIndeed. But even if he achieves preace treaties in both Ukraine and the Middle East (and stops the targeting of traditional Catholics, etc etc) he'll somehow still be the Orange Boogeyman.
Gadjo.
I've been fighting some dragons, only to accidentally allow my domain name to lapse. But I've won my fight and my blog is back up.
ReplyDeleteTrump, I'm depressed.
Why? You'd prefer a vegetable?
DeleteAs I was saying... 🤨
DeleteIt's good to see you back, Clive.
I think Harris would have been far worse IMO. Her entire platform was almost unfettered abortion and vacuous celebrity pandering.
Oooops ... deleted Lain's comment acknowledging it's good to see you back!
ReplyDeleteYes, I was getting concerned you're blog had gone quite. I had similar problems a year or so ago.
Trump only won a few hours ago, and female voices are already being erased. Outrageous.
DeleteRemember how old Jack is, it's a generation thing.
DeleteLain, Anton recently brought this Scriptural verse to my attention:
Delete"Better is the wickedness of a man than a woman who does good; and it is a woman who brings shame and disgrace." (Sirach 42:14)
Clive, it wasn't Happy Jack who posted the same comment twice!
Delete@Clive - yes it's quite the miracle that Jack is online at all! It makes weeping statues look quite tame by comparison ☺️
Delete@Jack - I highly suspect that Anton wouldn't view Sirach as 'Scripture'...
Nevertheless, as St. John Chrysostom rightly notes in his On the Priesthood, this plucked cherry is part of a discourse on the extra worries that beset a father in the ancient world who had daughters instead of sons, for 'The enemy of holiness always presses virgins and troubles them, ready to devour them if someone wavers and falls. There are many insidious men, and beyond all this there is the fury of nature. She must prepare for a twofold war: one that attacks from the outside, and the other that disturbs within. Thus great is the fear of one who protects them, greater the danger and the anguish if something unwanted happens.'
As he goes on to say, these passages contain an analogy for the anxiety a priest should feel for the care of his flock, and indeed a man for the care of his soul: 'If an enclosed daughter robs her father of sleep and anxiety for her keeps him awake over fear that she will be sterile or that she would age or no longer be loved, what would the suffering be of one who is worried not for these reasons but for other, much more serious ones? Here one does not refuse a man but Christ himself. Here sterility does not end in ignominy but in harm, in the ruin of the soul. "Every tree," says the Scripture, "that does not produce good fruit will be cut down and thrown in the fire."'.
The preceding verses are also a warning against male lust...
I went through a period of finding life difficult. But things are much better.
ReplyDeleteIt's good to see you still going 😁
Is Clive the one with the well turned skating legs? Agree with you Clive about the devastating election result. Scary that a bible waving phony Christian convicted felon has the popular vote...so much for the rule of law and a constitution......Cressida
ReplyDeleteI am indeed.
DeleteTrump doesn't care for anyone but trump.
The result also says a great deal about the leftward drift of the Democrat Party and the alienation of the American public.
DeleteI've seen two Democrat commentators, one of whom was a candidate in 2020, saying that the party is effectively in thrall to rich Democrat elites and treats the ordinary American with disdain. She also made the point that in order to 'save democracy', the Democrat elite decided to 'cancel democracy' by installing their candidate without going through the primaries. Even the usually bullheaded far left commentator Cenk Uygur has been railing 'Democratic leadership said Trump was a maniacal clown - and then lost to him TWICE! Democratic voters - for God's sake, stop listening to establishment Democrats. All they've ever done is bring you loss after loss. We have to deliver for the average American, not the donor class!'
DeleteSome seem to be learning a lesson from this, but not enough, I fear. I've said for a long time that the best way to grow a genuine extreme far right is to keep ignoring people until they have nowhere else to go. One wonders if Starmer will work any of this out.
There is a very funny video on YouTube showing Cenk Uygar having a breakdown the first time Trump won. Look it out, there are a couple of versions, look for the longest.
DeleteNo Starmer won't, he will simply ask his friends in the judiciary to jail them.
Yes, Cenk has had some interesting moments! I'm surprised at the number of breakdowns that people are posting to social media, I'm not sure why hysterically-crying-in-your-car seems to be a whole new genre. I suppose that's what happens when people are so closely wedded to their political views it becomes part of their identity. Starmer is a nightmare, but I would have a meltdown on TikTok about him, or describe his election as 'heartbreaking', as Rory Stewart is with Trump. It's all so emotional.
DeleteI see Cenk's co-star, Anna Kasparian, has begun to wake up to the dangers of identity politics and the reality of leftism, after received a load of backlash from her own side about daring to complain that she'd been molested by a homeless man.
That should read, 'I wouldn't have a breakdown about him'...
DeleteJack should really pay for an upgraded blog with an edit feature, as an act of Christian charity.
I agree.
DeleteHe's probably loaded 😁
On politicians waiting to make a glorious (or inglorious) return, I think of the word "colombeylesdeuxeglisesiste". I thought I had seen it in a newspaper several years ago, but a search on the web only comes up with a 2023 article where I had suggested using it.
ReplyDelete