Archive for year: 2008

Today is, of course, Boxing Day, December 26. And while some are running off to the malls for bargains, others are adding up the damage and realizing just how much Christmas can cost them!

And so are we Catholics, but for a different reason.

Today is the feast of St. Stephen, the Deacon  – the first martyr of Jesus Christ. I’ve always found it fascinating that his feast day immediately follows Christmas. It is as if Holy Mother Church, in her wisdom and through the liturgical calendar, is giving us a sober reminder after the great Feast that there is a cost to Christianity, to being a believer in Christ. It will cost you everything, even your very life – one way or another. No less an authority than Christ himself affirmed it: “Whoever wishes to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it”. It can meen a dramatic martyrdom like Stephen’s. But for most of us it will mean the hidden martyrdom of everyday death to self in order to stay alive in Christ.

But there is a far greater cost to not being a Catholic Christian. For rejecting Christ comes with a cost that one truly cannot afford to pay. It means a life lived apart from the Author of life, disconnected from ultimate Reality, devoid of the forgiveness of sins, and, if the situation persists, an eternity in which one will never, ever see God’s face.

Because he remained faithful to the end, Stephen did see God, and beholds that Beatific Vision now, and forevermore: “Look! I see heaven opened, and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God”. If we are faithful to the end, so will we.

Postscript: Recognize who’s in the background of the painting above? Acts tells us that those who killed Stephen “laid their cloaks at the feet of a young man named Saul”. Saul, persecutor of the early Church, was there, an accessory to Stephen’s martyrdom. As Stephen prayed for his executioners, just as his Master did, one must think that that prayer was especially efficacious. As the Church has always taught: if it were not for Stephen’s prayer, Saul would have never become Saint Paul. In this Pauline year, let us always remember that no one is beyond God’s saving grace – that everyone can (and should) become a saint.

(My article in Catholic Insight‘s December issue.)

James Bond is film’s most enduring character. Now in his 22nd official movie, agent 007’s latest celluloid adventure is called Quantum of Solace. The title is borrowed from a heretofore little-known Bond short story by creator Ian Fleming. 

It’s a double entendre: “Quantum” is the nefarious terrorist organization Bond battles in the film. A quantum is also defined as “a share or portion”. Bond is searching for his piece of peace, his own “quantum of solace”, following the events of the last installment, the superior Casino Royale (2006).

Quantum of Solace is an incredibly stylish film, and moves along at a much quicker pace than its predecessor – in fact, it’s the shortest Bond film in history, whereas Casino Royale, directed by Martin Campbell, was the longest. The added time did allow for proper character development. But Quantum‘s director, Marc Forster, had a different vision for his film – he wanted it to be faster – in his words, “like a bullet”.

Royale was a reboot of the series, where we discovered, along with new Bond actor Daniel Craig, how Bond becomes Bond, the British Secret Service agent with the license to kill. He also falls in love with the beauteous Vesper Lynd, who, forced to betray him and overwhelmed by guilt, commits suicide. Quantum picks up the storyline as Bond seeks revenge on those responsible.

At one point in Royale, Bond says to Vesper, “Do what I do for long enough, and there won’t be any soul left to save”. For love of her, he actually resigns from Her Majesty’s Secret Service until Vesper’s death. In Quantum, Bond gets back to the business of spying – and losing his soul – with a vengeance. This occurs in four ways:

Bond is saturated with sex, but never finds True Love. After losing Vesper, Bond (perhaps brokenhearted) reverts to his old, philandering ways in Quantum with fetching fellow agent Strawberry Fields. Her name – and “crude” fate – recalls Bond girls of the ‘60s, one of several nods to early 007 films. Vesper once chided him, “You think of women as disposable pleasures”. Clearly, Bond has not read Humanae Vitae, also from the ‘60s. He has yet to overcome lust, or discover that the self-gift of matrimonial sexual love points toward the Trinity itself – an eternal exchange of love. Only in light of the God who is Love will Bond discover the love he truly desires.

Bond is immersed in intelligence, but never knows Truth. Ethical dilemmas abound in Quantum. The CIA is in bed, so to speak, with the baddies, and so are the Brits. Bond’s boss/den mother, M (Judi Dench) is told by a British official that “If we only did business with good people, we’d have no one left to trade with”. Rene Mathis mentions to Bond that “When one is young, right and wrong are easy. When you’re older, it gets harder to tell”. Perhaps Pilate was thinking the same thing when deciding what to do with Jesus. When he asked Christ, “What is truth?” Truth itself was looking back at him. Today, like us, Bond has to battle more than dictators. He has to deal with what Pope Benedict called “the dictatorship of relativism”.  

Bond is drawn to beauty, but never apprehends the Beautiful. From Tom Ford suits to Aston Martins, from exotic locales to fetching femme fatales, Bond has a taste for the finer things in life. But his keen powers of observation never notice what Fr. Thomas Dubay dubs “the evidential power of beauty” – that beautiful things point to the beautiful God who made them – and him.

Bond is merciless without finding Mercy. The ‘blunt instrument” of the last film is armed with razor-sharp, and lethal, hand-to-hand combat skills, courtesy of the stunt team from the Bourne trilogy. Regrettably, like those films, Quantum suffers from hard-to-follow quick cuts in the action, most of which involves Bond taking full advantage of his license to kill. But Bond, at a key moment, unexpectedly spares an adversary’s life. Why? To prove a point to M, or so he can sleep at night? Perhaps he heeded Mathis’ advice: “Vesper gave everything for you. Forgive her. Forgive yourself”. Has 007 learned mercy? We shall see. But we must learn it – from our divine teacher, Christ, who truly gave everything for us, so we could forgive and be forgiven. As a fictional character, Bond can’t really discover this. Only we can experience Jesus, the Prince of Peace, our true Quantum of Solace.

(Here’s my latest article, from Catholic Insight magazine’s November issue.)

November sees two familiar events in the liturgical year for Catholics – All Saints Day (Nov. 1) and All Souls Day (Nov. 2). We pray for the latter, that they might join ranks of the former. That’s because All Souls’ Day is largely about helping the holy souls in purgatory attain the Beatific Vision of heaven.

Lost, a popular ABC television program, was once thought to be about purgatory. The story centres around a plane crash on a mysterious, supernatural island. Many of the survivors attempt to “atone” in some way for past sins. Although this theory about the enigmatic show’s meaning has since been discredited by its creators, it sparked a new interest in the actual reality of purgatory for many. 

But what exactly is purgatory? The Catechism of the Catholic Church says, “All who die in God’s grace and friendship, but still imperfectly purified, are indeed assured of their eternal salvation; but after death they undergo purification, so as to achieve the holiness necessary to enter the joy of heaven” (CCC 1030). One thing it is not is a “second chance” for those condemned to hell after death: “this final purification of the elect . . . is entirely different from the punishment of the damned” (CCC 1031). 

But even the very existence of purgatory, like the strange island of Lost, is highly dubious to many non-Catholics. Protestants view the idea as an unbiblical “invention” of the Catholic Church. Can their objection be sustained?

Many claim that since the word “purgatory” is not found anywhere in Scripture, that is sufficient proof of its non-existence. The word “Trinity” does not appear in Scripture either, but that does not mean that the doctrine is not taught therein. In fact, all  Christians believe that it is, implicitly. The question really is, is the concept of purgatory scriptural?

The Old Testament says this of Judas Maccabeus: “For if  he were not expecting that those who had fallen would rise again, it would have been superfluous and foolish to pray for the dead. But…it was a holy and pious thought. Therefore he made atonement for the dead, that they might be delivered from their sin” (2 Macc. 12:43–45). It is not necessary to pray for those already in heaven. As for people in hell, no amount of prayer can extract them (cf. Luke 16:19-31). There must be an intermediate state where those who are destined for heaven, yet still bound in some sense to sin, can be purified. 

Of course, 2 Maccabees does not appear in the Protestant biblical canon. One of the reasons it was removed from their Bibles is that the very “Catholic” doctrine of praying for the deceased who may be in purgatory is so clearly stated here. At the very least, this pericope highlights the fact that our Jewish forbears believed in such a doctrine. It was not “invented” by later Catholics.

In Matthew 12:32, Jesus himself refers to sin that “will not be forgiven, either in this age or in the age to come”. This implies, along with 2 Maccabees, that the temporal punishment due to sin can be expiated after death. 

Saint Paul writes about one whose work is tested by God in the “Day” of judgment and is found wanting: “he will suffer loss, though he himself will be saved, but only as through fire” (1 Cor 3:15). No one “suffers loss” in heaven – in fact, no one suffers at all there! Yet, this passage cannot refer to hell, either, for salvation does not occur there. This has to do with a purifying state.

The Book of Hebrews is startlingly clear: “Strive…for the holiness without which no one will see the Lord” (Heb. 12:14). If no one will see the Lord unless they are holy, what happens to those not fully sanctified before death? They may be forgiven sinners in a state of grace, but they may not yet have attained the Christian perfection of a Mother Teresa, either. 

God will complete his sanctifying work in his people, even if it occurs after death, in purgatory, making us capable to whistand the Beatific Vision. Consider the words of Revelation: “nothing unclean shall enter” the heavenly city (21:27). God must remove the imperfections in our soul and complete any temporal punishment due to sin (the eternal guilt having been forgiven) for us to dwell in his holy temple. 

Scripture, along with the teaching of the Church, is clear: the one who “invented” purgatory is none other than God himself. He saw to it – so we could one day see him.

(Another of my recent articles from Catholic Insight.) 

When I ask my Protestant friends (some of whom, sadly, are ex-Catholics) the question, “Why do you worship where you do, as opposed to somewhere else, some other congregation?” the answers vary: “I like the preaching.” “I like the music – love that contemporary Christian worship.” “I like the nursery program for my kids.” “I like the fact that it’s close to my home.” 

 

Yet the answers, although different, are also strangely alike – for they all have a common theme: “I”. “I like this; I prefer that. This is the worship that I like.”

But what kind of worship does God like?

Throughout salvation history, we do not see flexibility on God’s part here. God has always had a preference in these matters as well, a way he “likes” to be worshipped. In the Old Covenant, it was the temple liturgy that was central to the worshipping life of all Israel.

But what about the New Covenant? Is a multiplicity of worship forms acceptable in the New Testament Church, as my friends would believe? 

Here is how the brilliant Catholic convert Thomas Howard puts it, in his book On Being Catholic: “Christian worship did not proliferate randomly. There was a shape given to it in the beginning…it is not as though the apostolic community cast about for ingredients that might be appealing to local Jewish converts, or to Greeks, or to Scythians, Romans, Egyptians, or Parthians, least of all to that ubiquitous figure, ‘contemporary man’. No market research was brought into play. No caucuses – of youth, or of senior citizens, or of the affluent or the indigent, or of women, or of men, or of anyone else – were heard from. No theologians or reformers or charismatic leaders or prophets dictated the shape of things” (p.39). 

And the shape of things was the Mass, received “from the hands of Jesus Christ himself”, as Howard puts it.

Worship has always been a gift from the “top down”, from God to us, rather than something cooked up by us – from the “bottom up”, so to speak. I often hear complaints from fellow Catholics regarding the lack of participation or interest in the Mass by many, especially the young. As Catholics, we are “born again” in Baptism, but often many of us seem “bored again” each time we go to Mass! How do we get people more involved? The solution, according to some, is to “Protestantize” our worship with more “entertaining” elements: electric guitars, contemporary worship styles, perhaps a more informal atmosphere – you know, the stuff people “like”.

As a “Pre-16” Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger reminds us in his book The Spirit of the Liturgy, this attitude is fraught with danger. In speaking of Israel’s apostasy in their worship of the golden calf, he writes: 

“The people cannot cope with the invisible, remote, and mysterious God. They want to bring him down into their own world, into what they can see and understand. Worship is no longer going up to God, but drawing God down into one’s own world…Man is using God…he is placing himself above God…Worship becomes a feast the community gives itself, a festival of self-affirmation. Instead of being worship of God, it becomes a circle closed in on itself: eating, drinking, and making merry…self-seeking worship. It is a kind of banal self-gratification. (The)golden calf is a warning about any kind of self-initiated and self-seeking worship. Ultimately, it is no longer concerned with God, but with giving oneself a nice little alternative world, manufactured from one’s own resources. Then liturgy does become pointless, just fooling around. Or still worse it becomes an apostasy from the living God, an apostasy in sacral disguise. All that is left in the end is frustration, a feeling of emptiness. There is no experience of that liberation which always takes place when man encounters the living God” (p. 23).

The true worship, the Mass, is a gift from God. We must be educated about it in order to understand it. And we must understand it in order to appreciate it. And we will find that, in the end, we will “like” it, as God likes it, because it will set us free: “that liberation which always takes place when man encounters the living God”.

This is part one of my most recent Catholic Insight article, a film review of The Dark Knight, the latest Batman film.  

In a previous article (Catholic Insight, Sept. 06), I noted the Christological themes inherent in Superman Returns. The Dark Knight, the second installment of the Batman film franchise, so skillfully rebooted by director Christopher Nolan with 2005’s Batman Begins, also deals in spiritual issues – but in a much more nuanced manner. As Father Joseph Singh has noted, the difference between Superman Returns and these new Batman movies is the difference between C.S. Lewis’ Narnia series, where Christian symbolism is obvious, and J.R.R. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings, where one must look for God, and the devil, for that matter, in the details.