St. Joseph and the Crisis in Fatherhood

Two things always drive me nuts in the often gilded but not always accurate hagiography concerning St. Joseph; 1. When he's pictured as a 97 year old man, 2. When he's referred to as the "foster-father" of Jesus. Let's focus on the second for now.

"In this family, Joseph is the father: his fatherhood is not one that derives from begetting offspring; but neither is it an "apparent" or merely "substitute" fatherhood. Rather, it is one that fully shares in authentic human fatherhood and the mission of a father in the family."

- Blessed John Paul II, Redemptoris Custos, 21 

What a comfort this quote is for an adoptive father's heart. We all feel it deeply, we know it intrinsically. The children we adopt are our own, they become our own, and we are owned by them... we are their fathers. No other labels, tags, or adjectives are necessary. This truth, echoed by our Blessed John Paul in his exposition on St. Joseph, is essential to understanding true fatherhood today, even as it suffers so many diabolical attacks. 

People of Faith propose that the “Father from whom all fatherhood on earth is named” has stamped something of His essence into our very existence (cf. Eph 3:14-15 (Blessed John Paul II, Letter to Families, 15). Fatherhood, and motherhood, is deeper than biology. Too often, we find men who are in fact biological fathers, but fall terribly short of the vocation and vision of what authentic fatherhood truly is! Scratch the surface of the crisis in biological fatherhood, the father wound, the absentee father, the weak or the dominating father wound, and it will reveal an even deeper hole in the realm of spiritual fatherhood. 

In his catechesis on the human person, the Theology of the Body, Blessed John Paul II writes that “Christian celibacy (in which Joseph gave himself to God and his bride, Mary) “must lead in its normal development to ‘fatherhood’ or ‘motherhood’ in the spiritual sense... in a way analogous to conjugal love.... On its part, physical generation also fully corresponds to its meaning only if it is completed by fatherhood and motherhood in the spirit, whose expression and fruit is the whole educational work of the parents in regard to the children born of their... union.” (TOB 78:5)

Let's pray on this great feast of fatherhood for a renewed vision and application of the truth of what being father means; to guard and protect, to care for and cultivate the gift of femininity and new life. This is our task, our privilege. And Joseph teaches us this in every action and decision he made for the Holy Family. St. Joseph, Patron and Guardian of the Universal Church, pray for us!!

Sacred Art and the Human Heart

I had a wonderful meeting with the Irish sculptor Dony Macmanus today in Manhattan. A dream of mine to create a course on the Theology of the Body and Sacred Art is starting to take shape as sure as this master forms his works in clay and stone. I know this work needs a solid foundation and thought Dony would be the perfect person with whom to connect for ideas. He has been creating deeply moving work for well over a decade; sculpted pieces, busts and bronze figures and altarpieces (and occasional paintings as well). For most of that time, the fire behind it all has been Blessed John Paul II's Christian anthropology or vision of man and woman, made in the Divine image; the Theology of the Body. Dony discovered the teaching through the comments of a priest visiting him in his studio in 1999, in the middle of his creation of a figure of Christ crucified. Dony was intent on showing the reality of the incarnation of Jesus, building up his sculpture from the very bones of the Word made flesh, adding musculature, sinew and skin, layer on layer. A profoundly prayerful experience. After discovering the Pope's TOB, his work took flight, and through teaching his art in the transcendent light of the TOB, he has been able to draw others deeper into the Word made flesh. Conversions are happening in the studio! Conversions among young artists though contact with the beauty of the human form and the Beauty in Whose Image this form is fashioned. 

"To admire the icons and the great masterpieces of Christian art in general, leads us on an inner way, a way of overcoming ourselves; thus in this purification of vision that is a purification of the heart, it reveals the beautiful to us, or at least a ray of it. In this way we are brought into contact with the power of the truth. I have often affirmed my conviction that the true apology of Christian faith, the most convincing demonstration of its truth against every denial, are the saints, and the beauty that the faith has generated... Today, for faith to grow, we must lead ourselves and the persons we meet to encounter the saints and to enter into contact with the Beautiful.

- Pope Benedict XVI, Message to Conmunion and Liberation, 2002

I'd encourage you to visit Dony's website (below) and pray for the success of his work, our TOB course, and for the hands and hearts of artists the world over. Their's is a vocation of beauty, leading others to beauty, through the beautiful. 

http://www.donymacmanusstudios.com

Far and Away

"In the far reaches of the human heart there is a seed of desire and nostalgia for God."

- Pope John Paul II, Fides et Ratio, 24

And when you're Irish it's multiplied a thousand times over. 

I've always had an ache, a pull at the heart that comes in sweet pangs of music, rain washed skies, scents and smells, tea, mince, the feel of old polished wooden boards, the yellowed pages of books I've loved, the sound of the tin whistle, the pipes, the loon's cry. Mountains. 

I think this ache is felt everywhere in the human race, but it seems to me (again, with my insider information) that the hearts of the Irish exude it. Perhaps beauty is the culprit? 

Beauty is the arrow of God sent to pierce mortal hearts. It's in the very lilt of the Celtic voice, the deep green quilts of turf that spill and spread themselves over the craggy climbs and cliffs of Ireland, and beauty dances with abandon in Erin's jigs and reels. She weeps in her dirges and airs. If we let ourselves feel this longing, this ache, it can take us to holy places. And holy faces too. To Jesus and Mary and the holy men and women of our race. 

"When men have a longing so great that it surpasses human nature and eagerly desire and are able to accomplish things beyond human thought, it is the Bridegroom who has smitten them with this longing. It is he who has sent a ray of his beauty into their eyes. The greatness of the wound already shows the arrow which has struck home, the longing indicates who has inflicted the wound."

- Nicholas Cabasilas, The Life in Christ, Second Book, 15, 14th century

Face It or Fear It

If we are to continue in this Lenten journey with sincere hearts intent on deepening our relationship with God and not just keeping the rules or requirements of our faith, then we have to continue our efforts at this authentic "FaceTime" with God. And today, in the second Sunday of Lent, we get it. Oh boy do we get it. 

"Jesus took Peter, James, and John his brother, and led them up a high mountain by themselves. And he was transfigured before them; his face shone like the sun..."

- Matthew 17

What a heart-breaking, mind-blowing beauty must have overwhelmed these first century fishermen, standing before that Face. These blue-collar, blistered and hand-calloused men stood with their own weathered faces, creased by countless hours in the light of another sun. It's powerful light was merely the earthly antecedent and icon of the light of the Eternal Son whom they now beheld. 

Think of your own experiences with beauty. A walk in the woods, the piercing rays of a sunrise or sunset over water or mountain. Stepping into the splintered and multi-colored light from high windows, spilling over the marble floors of a great cathedral.... Better still, think of the faces that surround you every day. The unrepeatable people in your daily life. The faces and the names...

Thoreau once reflected in his meditations by the shores of Walden Pond, “To be awake is to be alive. I have never yet met a man who was quite awake. How could I have looked him in the face?”

Now multiply that ray of beauty to an infinite degree, one that never fades but only increases with each Eternal and Unfolding Now Moment. And this Face of God, this Jesus the Incarnate Son, knit forever to our humanity by His own, is madly in love with you. His Divine Gaze falls (and will fall for all eternity) on your own face, your human face, through and with His human eyes. It's insane, it's completely gratuitous, superabundant madness. It's crazy love.

"Look at Him looking at you," St. Teresa of Avila encourages us. This is Heaven.

In Pope Benedict's encyclical on the virtue of hope, Spe Salvi, he sends us into the fire and the light of this Beautiful Face:

"Before his gaze all falsehood melts away. This encounter with him, as it burns us, transforms and frees us, allowing us to become truly ourselves. All that we build during our lives can prove to be mere straw, pure bluster, and it collapses. Yet in the pain of this encounter, when the impurity and sickness of our lives become evident to us, there lies salvation. His gaze, the touch of his heart heals us through an undeniably painful transformation “as through fire”. But it is a blessed pain, in which the holy power of his love sears through us like a flame, enabling us to become totally ourselves and thus totally of God."- Pope Benedict XVI, Saved in Hope, 47

Lord of Light, grant us the grace day by day to enter more deeply into this Your Holy Gaze, and not to fear this holy fire. There all can be made new. Let us not be afraid to see Your true Face, and in that light to finally see our own.

"Look to him and be radiant, and your faces may not blush for shame." 
- Psalm 34

Be Perfect, But Not That Perfect

If you cherry-pick Matthew 5:48 off of the organically blossoming harmonious branch of the thoughts of Jesus on which it is found, you're toast. Your life is going to be a hard one, your family will suffer, your friends too. Perfect doesn't mean flawless. A perfect haircut. Perfect grammar. Something akin to the world of Gattaca, a powerful film with strong Brave New World allusions and genetically modified perfect and miserably boring people.

Today's verse from Matthew 5:48 reads "Be perfect, just as your heavenly Father is perfect." When we read that scripture in its proper context, however, we find where it flows from; a more wholistic and holy place - the love of others. 

So perfection in God's eyes means loving perfectly, totally; not being totally distanced from others in the attempt to be pure. 

Blessed John Paul II put it this way. “The perfection of the Christian life is measured, rather, by... love.” 

This means that “perfection is possible and accessible to every human being, whether in a ‘religious institute’ or in the ‘world.’”  In fact, a person who does not live in “the state of perfection” can nonetheless “reach a higher degree of perfection... than a person who lives in the ‘state of perfection’ with a lesser degree of love” (TOB 78:3). 

And perfect love, St. John tells us, casts out all fear. What a sweet and liberating thought. What a freedom awaits the person who embraces the authentic Christian life! 

Which Marriage are You Called To?

This week I've been co-teaching with Fr. Brett Brannen a course on the Theology of the Body designed specifically for priests. It's been such a blessed experience as a married man to enter into the great gift and mystery of this equally spousal call for men to love and serve their bride, the Church (which is made up of each and every one of the laity). 

Each of us in our own way, as we've been reflecting, is called to become a gift, a spousal gift in and through our masculinity, for a bride. Fr. Brett likes to ask young men who are discerning a call to priesthood with a question, and it's not "Are you called to priesthood or married life" but rather "Which marriage are you called to?"

Each vocation reminds us of the spousal call - each contains the call to be a free, total, faithful, and fruitful gift in seed form - single, married, consecrated or ordained for the Kingdom. And the marriage we are all oriented towards, ultimately, is in Paradise. There the hole in the human heart will be filled. So let's pray for our fathers, all of them, that their gift might bear fruit in this world and in the next!

Faces and Names

I want to begin today's 40 Days of Blogging post with an extended thought by Pope Francis, interspersed with the captivating photography of Lee Jeffries, the man whose tender images of homeless souls from around the planet continues to inspire me in this year's Lenten journey. To put it bluntly, I'm getting schooled by both of these men. Francis calls me to look up and truly see others - to learn their "faces and names" - and Lee offers them to me, in all of their gritty and gripping power. 

"If we are to share our lives with others and generously give of ourselves, we also have to realize that every person is worthy of our giving. Not for their physical appearance, their abilities, their language, their way of thinking, or for any satisfaction that we might receive, but rather because they are God’s handiwork, his creation..."

"God created that person in his image, and he or she reflects something of God’s glory. Every human being is the object of God’s infinite tenderness, and he himself is present in their lives..."

"Jesus offered his precious blood on the cross for that person. Appearances notwithstanding, every person is immensely holy and deserves our love..."

"Consequently, if I can help at least one person to have a better life, that already justifies the offering of my life..."

"It is a wonderful thing to be God’s faithful people. We achieve fulfilment when we break down walls and our heart is filled with faces and names!"

- Pope Francis, Joy of the Gospel, #274

Lent is, in many ways, a symbol of our entire earthly pilgrimage. It's our movement through history, our personal one with all of its ups and downs, its fog and its light, and that of the whole human family. Lent gives us a lens, a wider scope of vision, inviting us to see the whole picture of our existence, our dreams, desires, our aches and longings for intimacy, and our often futile attempts to fulfill these desires on our own. That's why we fast. We fast during Lent to focus more clearly on this desires. 

If we truly fast, allowing ourselves to be stripped so that God's glance can "pierce our naked hearts" then these hollows make us hunger for faces and names. Faces and names that we can say we know, intimately, and whom we can say know us. For when Easter breaks like match-fire over this our dark history, when that Resurrection Day finally dawns, this is all that will really matter, isn't it? The faces we met, the names we came to know and learn by heart. 

When Lord, did we see You cold and hungry? Ah, there all along! In the faces and names that were surrounding me... And all of these now sing as a great cloud of witnesses...

We are made for one another. 

We are meant for one another. 

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To see more of Lee Jeffries work, visit: http://leejeffries.500px.com

To read more of Pope Francis's Joy of the Gospel, visit: http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/francesco/apost_exhortations/documents/papa-francesco_esortazione-ap_20131124_evangelii-gaudium_en.html