Texas Gulf Coast Catholic (Corpus Christi, Tex.), Vol. 6, No. 43, Ed. 1 Friday, February 12, 1971 Page: 2 of 6
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Page Two
TEXAS GULF COAST CATHOLIC
Friday, February 5, 1971
To Hear
And Be Cured
By Rev. Michael Chilen
Does listening to someone cure? Logic
connects curing of diseases with the taking of
medicines more readily than it connects die
curing of diseases with the hearing of words.
Yet people came from all over “to hear Jesus
and to be cured.” A generation erf logotherapy
has produced wonders under the guidance of
psychiatrist Viktor E. Frank!. But never will
mankind know the wondrous power of the
spoken word, until it knows the eternal
generation of the Word of God.
While it is possible to admit that words
cure, it is impossible to be cured without
coming to the author of the word and hearing
him. On this Sixth Sunday after the
Epiphany, we commemorate the occasion
when people came to Jesus “to hear Him and
to be cured.” We emphasize that they came
not just to be coming, but to hear and to be
cured.
In our day it seems reasonable to wonder if
there are people who come to the place where
Christ actually is wanting Him to cure them
of something. No doubt people come to Mass
where Christ actually makes Himself present
and to the sacraments. But why do they
come? There was a day in a particular place
where Christ made Himself present and “a
great crowd of people from all parts of Judea
and from Jerusalem and from the coastal
region of Tyre and Si don came to hear and to
be cured of their diseases.” (Lk 6:17). Is this
, the same reason men come to Him today?
In the context of the beatitudes preached by
Jesus to those who came that day, there is an
epiphany-like manifestation that shows the
real healing of the Word <rf God to be
something receivable by only the poor, the
hungry, the dejected, the hated The
manifestation becomes visible first in the
hearer’s mind.
It pictures two “classes” of people: the
blessed or happy and the bankrupt The
Blessed or happy are those who are to receive
the rewards of the Messianic Kingdom,
namely, the poor, the hungry, the dejected,
and the despised believer in Christ. (Lk 6:20f).
The bankrupt are those who will not receive
the Kingdom’s rewards, namely, the rich, the
sensually satisfied, the laughing, and the
popular. (Lk 6:24f>. Jeremiah gives this same
contrast in describing the blessed and the
carted. The cursed are those who put trust in
rain, relying on the things of the flesh and
who have hearts that turn from God. (Jer
17:5). The'blessed are tlro^ wHo put their
confidence in God and who make God their
hope. (Jer. 17:7),
The mental manifestation that Christ
makes to his hearers is one that pictures
Himself able to cure the blessed or the happy.
For the bankrupt, however he can do nothing
but warn them of their plight.
We note that many people today like the
crowd centuries ago, come to where Christ is
actually present, in Mass. But we question
if they really come to hear and to be cured. It
tt not so much that they think Christ has
nothing to offer them, they simply do not or
have not entered the environs of prayer
enough to realize that their Christian
Condition is such that they “need” a Savior to
cure them. Maybe it is that when they hear
the beatitudes and their anonymous
counterparts they think, “I am certainly not
rich, and, therefore, I am certain! y
deserving of the Messiah’s rewards and not
Ida warnings.” Not being rich, however, does
not mean being poor. True poverty leaves no
question in a person’s mind about his status.
He knows only God can help him.
The question we asked, therefore, is, what
is the reason you come to Christ in the Mass?
Do you need to be cured of something? Are
you willing to listen to Christ and be cured?
After all the hope of the poor and the needy
pends on Christ.
Finally, this whole doctrine pends on the
resurrection. If Christ never rose from the
dead—meaning, of course, he was only a
man—the whole of the Good News is
worthless, and we are “the most unfortunate
of all people” for having put our trust in a
man for this life only (cf. 1 Crr 15:19. Jer
17:5). “But Christ has, in fact, been raised
from the dead...” (1 Cor 15:20). So the hope
of those described by the preaching of Christ
Is Christ. And to Christ great crowds come to
hear Him and to be cured.
EDITORIALS
HOW TO KNOW GOD
By Rev. John A. O’Brien, Ph. D.
LITURGICAL DIALOGUE
By Fr. J. Wm Hennel
Lent - Preparation For Holy Week
What does Lent mean to you? To many
people it means many different things, but for
the Church Lent has only one meaning: “Lent
readies the faithful for celebrating the
paschal mystery (during Holy Week) after a
period of closer attention to tlie word of God
and more ardent prayer” (Const. Sac. Lit,
Art. 109). From now until Easter,.therefore,
we shall devote our columns to the theme of
preparation for Holy Week.
In her present understanding of Holy Week
the Church includes all the days between
Passion Sunday (to use its new name;
formerly we called it Palm Sunday) and
Easter Sunday. It is a “full” week of eight
days, climaxing in the Easter Vigil, given to
celebrating Christ's paschal mystery and
our sharing it
Paschal mystery—this is a pl.ise we hear
often in connection with our public worship.
We know that it has something to do with
Easter and therefore must be concerned in
some way with Jesus’ resurrection, but we
are not quite certain of its specific meaning
First of all, it is called a mystery, not
because it is entirely beyond our
understanding, but because we could never
know it if God had not made it known to us.
Also, it is called a mystery because it has no
exact parallel in our natural experience.
Moreover, the word mystery is used to
designate an event in the life erf our Savior
which is in some way mirrored in our own life.
It is in this sense most of all that the Church
ifc , this word when she speaks of celebrating
the paschal mystery during Holy Week.
It is called the paschal mystery becai. it
is concerned with a passover. The English
word pose it comes from the Hebrew word
pesach, the name for the Jewish feast which
celebrates the fact that the angel of death
passed over the Israelites’ houses in Egypt
which had been marked with the blood of the
lamb (cf. Ex, 12:21-30). (
ChriaUan usage applies the term paschal
mystery to Jesus’ “passing over from this
world to his Father,” (Jn. 13:1), which
occurred at the time when the Jewish feast of
the pasch was celebrated. The Jewish feast
celebrated the type, that is, the anticipation in
figure in the Old Testament of what God
would do for his people when his Son came
among men,
Christian usage further extends the idea of
the paschal mystery to include Jesus’ taking
his followers with him in his own passovertef.,
eg., Rev. 19:1-9). Basically the paschal
mystery is the fulfillment of Jesus’ seemingly
paradoxical words (to use the Jerusalem
Bible translation): “Anyone who loses his life
for my sake will find it” (ML 10:39), and “If
(a grain of wheat) dies, it yields a rich
harvest” (Jn. 12:24). It is the realization of
his words (as they are translated in the New
American Bible): “He who brings himself to
naught for me discovers who he is” (ML
10:39).
In the case of Jesus these statements were
verified in the most literal way: by his
passion and death, his resurrection and
ascension he became “Lord” (Phil. 2:6-11)
and the "firstborn of many brothers” (Rom.
8:29). His death on Good Friday and his
resurrection on Easter Sunday were equally
parts of his own “paschal event,” not
separate occurrences which just happened to
come one after the other. They were two parts
of one unified plaa
Jesus did not have to die. Voluntarily he
chose to give his life to his Father as an
entirely free sacrifice. Willingly he gave his
earthly life to his Father so that his Father
could give it back to him in the more perfect
form of heavenly life (cf. Jn. 10:17-18), not
unlike what we do at Mass. In the Mass we
give our gifts of bodily food, bread and wine,
so that God can give them back to us in the
more perfect form of heavenly food, the body
and blood of his Son.
By this sacrifice of his life so that his Father
could give it back to him Jesus achieved his
“passover” to his Father. He completed it by
his ascension into heaven.
Today he shares all this with us by our
baptism. “Are you not aware that we who
were baptized intq Christ Jesus were baptized
into his death? Through baptism into his
death we were buried with him, so that, just
as Christ was raised from the dead by the
glory of the Father, we too might live a new
life. If we have been united with him through
likeness to his death, so shall we be through a
like resurrection., .
"If we have died with Christ, we believe
that we are also to live with him.. . His death
was death to sin once for all; his life is life for
God. In the same way, you must consider
yourselves dead to sin, but alive for God in
Christ Jesus” (Rom. 6:3-5,7,10-11).
Jesus’ passion and death, his resurrection
and ascension are his passover. Our sharing
in them by our baptism is our passover.
Together they constitute the paschal mystery
which we celebrate during Holy Week and for
which we prepare during Lent
ON THE OTHER HAND
Meditation Over A Sick Child
Ay Odom Curran
Two a.m. my vespers
cold kitchen my cathedral
rocking chair my kneeler
sick toddler my prayer.
Who needs a retreat master
to explain
these hot little fingers seeking relief
roving constantly from my neck
to my shoulders
to my back and back
are my soul seeking relief
roving constantly around God?
Who needs a canon
and printed formulae
to teach me prayer
when I hear such
loving
trusting
entreating
prayer from parched lips,
“Mommy, mommy, mommy,...”
texas gulf coast
C A T H O L I C
Official Newspaper of the Diocese of Corpus Chris ti
President —.... —..... Most Rev. Thomas J. Drury, D.D,
Editor and Business Manager........Father Raymond Pena
Associate Editor....................Father Lawrence White
Advertising Manager................Mrs. Rudy Mirabal, Jr.
Circulation Manager....................Mrs. Irene Doyle
Address all corrrmnRations to:
TEXAS GULF COAST CATHOLIC
P.0 Box 2584, CorpusChristi, Texas 78403
Telephone 883-0681
Price: $4.00 per year
Entered as Second Class Matter United State; Post Office
Corpus Christi, Texas
Who needs a pulpit preaching patience
when that
and love
is all I can offer?
Who needs lofty lessons on hope
reflected off stained glass windows
on high holy days
when hope
is the divine balm of motherhood?
Press closer, little one, for comfort
as I press closer to God
fra- your comfort
Merge Into me
losing your pain in me.
Like God
I welcome it
Whimper why
why
why
the pain?
Dear God
why the pain
all around us?
Why his tiny pain?
Why my mother’s anguish
over my helplessness?
Is it to show us
we are helpless?
Ah, mass is ended
he goes to sleep
wet brow
limp limbs.
From kitchen cathedral
I carry him
to warm crib.
! go in peace
to my bed.
Thanks be to God
for pain
and relief of pain
which is love. ;
Amen.
To know God mere intellectual groping is
not enough. More helpful in seeing
intellectual subtlety are a pure he..! *
clean conscience. Christ did not promise the
beatific vision to the keen of info ect but He
did say: “Blessed are the clean of heart for
they shall see God,”
These words must have burned their way
into the mind of Ignatius, Bishop of Antioch.
Condemned to death by the Emperor Trajan
for his refusal to worship the nation’s idols, he
was being led through the streets of Rome to
the Flavian amphitheatre to be torn limb
from limb by the savage beasts in the area. A
Roman soldier mocked and scoffed him.
“Who,” he sneered, “is this Christian God
of yours?”
The venerable bishop gazed for a moment
into the soldier's sensual dissipated face.
“You shall know Him,” he replied, "when
you are worthy of Him.”
The person who suffers persecution for
justice's sake, who sacrifices for truth, who
hungers for righteousness, who lives a godly
life, penetrates to the deepest understanding
of God. Virtue is not less important than
knowledge in enriching one’s vision of God.
Live a holy life and God will dwell in you
and make Himself known to you. “Gal’s
thoughts,” observes George Macdonald, "His
will. His love, His judgments are all man’s
home. To think His thoughts, to choose His
will, to love His loves, to judge His judgments,
and thus to know that He is in us, to be at
home,”
When God dwells in the soul of a person, a
radiance shines in his face, a spiritual
resonance in his voice, and peace fills his
heart. Nothing in the universe can supplv the
radiance lost when God is banished from a
rumen life. The experience of humanity the
world over verifies the finding of SL Theresa:
“Where God is, there is Heaven. Where God is
noL there is Hell." Plato too caught a
glimmering of this mighty truth when he
declared: “To escape from evil we must be
made, as far as possible, like God; and this
resemblance consists in becoming just, holy
and wise.”
God is the answer to the cry of the human
soul for happiness. In the partial possession of
God in this life, we catch glimmerings of that
supreme ecstasy which the soul will
experience when it shall be in intimate union
with infinite Beauty, Truth and Love. Then
the unveiled majesty of the eternal king will
ravish the soul with beauty and still its
restless yearning with a love that knows no
ending.
This is illustrated in the life of St. Paul.
Word reaches the Apostle in his prison cell in
Rome that he is soon to be executed. Is he
upset and terrified at the grim news? On the
contrary, he was never more serene.
“I have fought the good fight,” he says, “1
have finished the course, I have kept the
faith.” Turning with confidence to the Lord
whose name he has carried afar unto the
Gentiles, he continues. “For the rest there is
laid up for me a crown of justice, which the
Lord, the just Judge, will give to me in that
day.”
A foretaste of (hat ineffable bliss is ■
experienced by all who walk in the paths of
peace and righteousness, who keep always
the joy of a good conscience, and who feel the
love of God warming their hearts with its
divine radiance.
OUR MORAL PROBLEMS
Man is a composite and lives
in the composite, while God is
a simple spirit. Therefore, if
our minds are unsuccessful to
understand Him, it is not
because he is too complicated,
quite the contrary, he is
simple. Then, we are unable to
understand him because of his
transcendence, that is
because he exceeds our much
limited intelligence. But the •
transcendence of a being do®
not render it necessary not to
understand it; the heart of the
matter is that we are subject
to the law erf aggregation. If
we look at the world around
us, we discover soon enough
that it is governed by the
universal law of composites.
Creatures, as a whole and
singly, are composites
Yes, multiplicity surrounds
us all over. In fact, knowledge
itself is multipie, it is a
multiplicity of so many states
erf conscience over that of
many externa! objects; and
man himself is multiple. We
human beings require two
eyes to have a good vision, two
legs to walk well, two ears to
hear distinctly, and soon. It is
tree, we have one heart, one
tongue, one stomach; but even
these all function together in
unison so that one cannot be
without the other.
Out of all the above
components that composite
creature we call man is
formed. Yet, if we take a good
look at him once again, we
cannot overlook the fact that
his being is multiple because it
consists of body and soul: the
faculty of knowing, his life, his
sensations belong all to the
body and soul; all is equally
material and spiritual in him.
During recent years, when
the revival of conscience has
been the subject of manifold
and various studies, it has
teen debated whether it is the
clash of the non-ego that
awakens the conscience of the
ego, or whether, on the
contrary, it is not the
conscience of the ego that
gives rise to that of the non-
ego; in any case, however, one
cannot be disjoined from the
other. Besides, all that man
perceives with his sens® is
one and simple. For, it is this
multitude of beings that forms
the soul of the world On the
other hand man does not deem
himself a collection, but a
united whole, and it matters
very little to him whether his
organs are referred to in the
plural. Hence, why
multiplicity presupposes
unity; without the latter the
former does net subsist
And the spirit too goes side
by side with multiplicity, with
one difference though that
while this reflects unity
Fr. Ignatius P. Chetcuti
everywhere and at al! times,
the components of the other
speak the language of unity
only, because the groupings
are unique.
Nevertheless, our
knowledge of things is not
awakened but for the
existence of two things which
might have opposing
cor notations, -,uch as that
between the knowledge of self
(a* ego and non-self or non-ego.
The object of such knowledge
is either self or non-self, and
not the relationship between
both. Now, to be able to notice
a diversity is the result of the
sharpening of the spirit A
man of simple heart, a child or
the man of the jungle , do
understand matters in a
simple fashion. But in the
course of educational training
their spirit succeeds in
sharpening and improving
itself. It is then that the
relationship between objects
sets in.But a relativistic
attitude alone is theoretically
to be abandoned; and this
because of the fact that there
are no multiples to contend,
with without bringing into the
picture oneness also. A
relationship supposes some
terms erf reference; likewise
the terms of reference erf a
relationship are non-
relationship, hence the.
simple, oneness, the object in
itself.
One and multiple: here is
man’s chief problem. Man is
immersed in the multiple, yet
he searches for the one; he
sees the oneness in
multiplicity, but he does not
succeed to grasp it nor to get
rid erf it As soon as he thicks
he has got one thing, this slips
off his hands and oneness
carries on to be the supreme
law of the being.
On the contrary, human
thinking oscillates from the
one to the multiple. This is the
real problem: to turn
multiplicity into unity.
Nothing else counts; but
should there be something
else, this something by facing
the impossibility of being but
nothing, caps® incoherence to
set in. heater tte reason w%V
relativism is misleading,
precisely because it
reintroduces always the
absolute, even though it denies
it
Likewise, if nothing exists
but the absolute, there would
be no problems, for all the
problems belong to
multiplicity as well as to
unify. If there was but one
being, no problem can arise.
This being cannot become a
problem of itself, because fay
positing some problem would
be equivalent to admitting
that exists, outside itself,
something which is able to
explain self or a part of it, or
something that self may seek
after, therefore definitionwise
we exclude the hypothesis
when the existence orf an orly
being is supposed.
As a matter of fact, there
are no problems for God; on
the confo^ry. man alone is full
of probems, because he is
multiple, lives in the multiple,
is subject to the multiple, but
gazes at the one.
(To be continued)
A WORD
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Pena, Raymond. Texas Gulf Coast Catholic (Corpus Christi, Tex.), Vol. 6, No. 43, Ed. 1 Friday, February 12, 1971, newspaper, February 12, 1971; Corpus Christi, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth835765/m1/2/?rotate=270: accessed April 28, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; .