Sounds Catholic - Benedict

Today's Sounds Catholic radio programme features reflections on the ministry of Pope Benedict. 

You can hear (at this link) the pope speaking to young people at Westminster Cathedral, and reflections from Bishop Basil Meeking, Bishop Emeritus of Christchurch, Fr. John Adams, Parish Priest of Papanui, and Bishop Charles Drennan (the latter recorded in an April 2010 homily at the Cathedral).

Westminster Text of Pope Benedict at this link

media & liturgy

A number of readers will be old enough to remember a time when the hierarchical structure of the Church was mirrored by the Church's communication structure. To put this simplistically, the thought was that the Holy Spirit would tell the pope, the pope would pass this on to the bishops, and the bishops would make sure that the priests and religious sisters and brothers of his diocese knew. Then through Sunday homilies and classroom teaching the message would get through to all the people of the church.  

This is a simplistic image, but you will understand what I mean. We do need to keep in mind that the greatest moments of growth in the Church (and subsequently in the world) came when individuals (parishioners, sisters and brothers and priests), listened for the Holy Spirit, heard, then responded with lives of love and service. These saintly lives were in fact always the great communicator of renewed vision and new life in the Church.

But for a moment, back to the general idea of a hierarchical, 'top-down' communication model.

Before 1960, whenever bishops gathered with the pope to clarify doctrine, or to consider how to best communicate some aspect of the life of God, it would be these bishops who would return to their home diocese and pass on the news. The diocesan bishops were usually the best ones to serve this role since not only did they have a background in all aspects of theology, but they had (albeit to different degrees) a good knowlege of and love for the people they served in the local diocese.

The early 1960's were a time of significant change in the world. Nowhere was this more evident than in the arena of technology and media communication. The four years of the Second Vatican Council coincided with a much greater ease of world communication. Here in New Zealand the first television broadcast was made in 1960, and even with a TV set then costing around $4.000 in today's money, by the close of the Council in December 1965, a significant percentage of New Zealanders either owned or rented a set. Newspapers were more available. Portable transistor and car radios enabled news broadcasts to be heard simultaneously around the world.

This meant that within hours of each of the sixteen conciliar documents being signed and published in Rome, a radio sound byte or newspaper headline had communicated an idea, a comment or even a rumour, as a fact. By the time a bishop arrived back in his home diocese a few weeks later, people were ready for change, any change, and every change, since change was the fashion of the sixties. In some cases the Council sound and news bytes (rather than Council fact) were already being implemented in local parishes and schools. 

Fifty years later, most Catholic New Zealanders know little more about the Second Vatican Council than the captions of the 1960's bytes and headlines.

At the opening of the Year of Faith in October last year, marking 50 years since the opening of the Second Vatican Council, I asked parishioners to name a couple of things that came out of the Council. Many parishioners reported two soundbytes: "Mass in English" and "priest faces people." These two responses were media headlines of the time in NZ newspapers. But they represent very limited understandings of the Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy published on 4 December 1963.  I then asked parishioners to name (even the general themes) of some of the sixteen documents of the Second Vatican Council. No parishioners could name more than three general themes. 

I was delighted at the intellectual faith curiosity that saw a number of these parishioners arrive at Mass the following week with the results of their Google searches of the titles of the sixteen documents. They were ready in case I asked again!

The prime motiviation of the bishops in their liturgy deliberations and decisions at the Council, was to ensure the "full conscious and active participation" of all the people of the Church in the Mass.  They were especially concerned that the Liturgy of the Word (readings from scripture) be in the local language of the people. Fifty years on, it is timely to reflect whether the Liturgy we pray today in our parishes and schools, is an accurate implementation of the teaching of the Second Vatican Council:

"In Masses which are celebrated with the people, a suitable place may be allotted to their mother tongue. This is to apply in the first place to the readings and "the common prayer," but also, as local conditions may warrant, to those parts which pertain to the people... 

Nevertheless steps should be taken so that the faithful may also be able to say or to sing together in Latin those parts of the Ordinary of the Mass which pertain to them.” (par.54 Sacrosanctum Concilium).   

If you are not familiar with the Council's Constitution on the Liturgy, you might find it helpful to read a chapter a day for a week as a Lenten "spiritual reading". If you do this you will notice at least a couple of things:

1. Much of what you thought the Second Vatican Council communicated about the Liturgy of the Church, while having a theme of accuracy, is often simplistic and even misleading soundbytes.
2. You will also notice that those who prepared this Constitution were especially concerned that the Liturgy be seen and experienced by the people of the Church as an encounter with Jesus Christ. You might reflect that in your own school or parish at times, the liturgy could be more about what the people are doing than what God is doing.

Yesterday Pope Benedict met with his priests of the diocese of Rome.  In his informal comments with them he reflected on the Second Vatican Council.  He spoke of the role of the media in the Council:

"The 'Council of the journalists', of course was not carried out within the faith but within the categories of today's media. That is to say, it was outside of the faith, with a different hermeneutic … a political hermeneutic. For the media, the Council was a political struggle, a power struggle between the Church's different strands. … There was a triple problem: the Pope's power transferred to the power of the bishops and to the power of all: popular sovereignty. The same thing happened with the liturgy. They were not interested in the liturgy as an act of faith but as something where things are made understandable, a type of communal activity. … These translations, the trivialization of the idea of the Council were virulent in the practice of applying liturgical reform; a vision of the Council outside of its proper interpretation, that of faith, was born."  "We know that this Council of the media was accessible to all. Thus it was the dominant one, the most efficient one, and it created a lot of calamities, problems, and misfortunes. … The true Council found it difficult to make its thought concrete and actual. The virtual Council was stronger than the real council. But the Council's strength was present and, little by little, it became more and more actual, becoming the true force that is, after true reform, the Church's true renewal. It seems to me that, after 50 years, we see how the virtual Council has broken down, been lost, and the authentic Council appears in all its spiritual strength." more complete text of the pope's comments at this link. So, there's my Lenten invitation for this next week. Join me in reflectively reading  Sacrosanctum Concilium. If you would like a PDF which is easier for printing and reading let me know and I will email you a copy.

very near

"The word is near you,

in your mouth and in your heart"

Readings for the First Sunday of Lent at this link.

It is inevitable that this week’s news of the pope’s resignation captures the headlines. The resignation of a pope is quite the news' moment. But life goes on. And most importantly, the Holy Spirit continues to work, even in and through those who have little interest in conclaves and popes. 

Those who see the Church primarily as an earthly institution will be fixated on the process and politics of the conclave and the election. Even on a purely human level the events of these weeks will be both interesting and captivating. 

The preparation for and outcome of the 2005 conclave, and the public interest and media reflections around that event, reminded us of the fact that there is something much bigger at work here.

And this "something bigger" was the heart of the almost eight years of papal guidance and encouragement from Pope Benedict. 

In his first homily as pope he reminded us that his “real programme of governance is not to do my own will, not to pursue my own ideas, but to listen, together with the whole Church, to the word and the will of the Lord, to be guided by Him, so that He himself will lead the Church at this hour of our history.” In this same homily he announced that the Church is alive simply because Christ is alive.

One of the key teachings of Pope Benedict is that Jesus Christ is very close to, and intimate with each and every human person. Human health and happiness are not human achievements. These basic needs are the fruit of living in personal relationship with Jesus Christ who is the human face of God.

Often we think that God is far away. The people of the Old Testament gave their lives to please and appease God. Their greatest signs of the divine presence were in the distant sky. The rainbow signalled the new covenant after the flood. In their forty desert years of pilgrimage from captivity to the land of promise, God guided them with heavenly signs, pillars of fire by night and cloud by day. If God lived in the sky (heavens) then the usual earthly place of encounter with God would be a mountain-top. Moses climbed the mountain to speak with God and returned to the people with the Law, which the people welcomed and enshrined in the Ark of the Covenant.

But in the birth of Jesus Christ, God was doing something new. Now God was experienced as living very near. His bodily legs walked earthly roads and he spoke and sang using a human voice and in human words. In Jesus, God was embracing with human arms. He loved with a human heart.  Through the Incarnation, the Old Testament desert had become a space of hope-filled intimacy with God.

In his message for this year’s Lent, Pope Benedict reflects on the promise offered by the desert. He writes:

“Recent decades have seen the advance of a spiritual “desertification”. In the [Second Vatican] Council’s time, it was already possible from a few tragic pages of history to know what a life or a world without God looked like, but now we see it every day around us. … But it is in starting from the experience of this desert … that we can again discover the joy of believing, its vital importance for us”. 

“In the desert we rediscover the value of what is essential for living; thus in today’s world there are innumerable signs, often expressed implicitly or negatively, of the thirst for God, for the ultimate meaning of life. And in the desert people of faith are needed who, with their own lives, point out the way to the Promised Land and keep hope alive. Living faith opens the heart to the grace of God which frees us from pessimism. Today, more than ever, evangelizing means witnessing to the new life, transformed by God, and thus showing the path”.

In today’s Second Reading we are reminded that the Word, who is Jesus - the human voice of God, is not only near us, but is IN us. 

When I love, there God is dwelling in my human heart. Whenever I receive the Eucharist, the reality of God is literally taken into my mouth.

In the days following the death of Blessed John Paul, the then Cardinal Ratziner was the Dean of the College of Cardinals. It was his concern to guide the Cardinals into conclave to elect a new pope.  On a couple of occasions in these days he spoke very strongly - in fact his name was removed from many media lists of papabile because of the clarity and passion of his words. 

In his last address moments before the conclave key was turned, he led the Church in prayer. I have changed the name in his prayer to make it the ideal prayer for us in these days:

In this moment, 

let us ask our Lord insistently that, 

after the great gift of Pope Benedict XVI, 

he will again give us a pastor 

according to his heart, 

a pastor who will lead us  

to knowledge of Christ, 

to his love, to true joy.

Amen.

from today's Press

Benedict, Champion of Faith

http://www.stuff.co.nz/the-press/opinion/8307006/Benedict-champion-of-clear-cut-faith

what is Vatican II?

Earlier today Pope Benedict met with the priests of his diocese of Rome. His address to them was informal and without notes, so there unfortunately may not be a complete text for a few days.

His comments are especially important since in this Year of Faith marking the fiftieth year since the opening of the Second Vatican Council, the pope speaks about the Council. It is unlikely that the next pope will have participated in the Council, so these last words from Benedict as Pope are a unique insight.

You can read a brief media summary of the pope's comments at this link.

and watch a video clip of the pope's meeting with his priests at this link.

tv interview with the pope

This is the only English language TV interview with Cardinal Ratzinger. Raymond Arroyo interviews the Cardinal shortly before his election as Pope Benedict.  The complete interview (45 minutes) is not available online, just a five minute cut at the start of Arroyo's 15th anniversary show.

This brief interview is especially significant as the future pope predicts that a new springtime in the Church will involve smaller numbers.

Slide the bar to 1minute35 seconds for the start of the segment.

Lenten diet of four quartets

A report in The Telegraph last month suggested that classic works of literature and poetry are "rocket-boosters" to the brain.

An Australian priest, after reading the article mades a helpful suggestion for a Lenten reflection.

Fr. Paul McCabe offers T.S. Eliot's Four Quartets as part of a useful Lenten diet. Eliot's four-part poem was widely criticized on publication in the mid 1940's for being too overtly religious. However this criticism served to popularise his work among those willing to savour the relationship between time and the divine.

You can hear Eliot read his Four Quartets at the youtube link below, and read along by tapping on this text.

We shall not cease from exploration

And the end of all our exploring

Will be to arrive where we started 

And know the place for the first time.

T.S. Eliot   Four Quartets