taliwala sa mga hilay nga nagpasad sa katilingban...
sa mga kahasol nga hinimo sa kaugalingon...
sa mga kagul-anan sa uban nga kinahanglang ubanan...
hinaut unta nga ako magdalag presensya sa magbubuhat
presensya sa maghuhupay
taliwala sa mga kalipay nga natagamtam...
taliwala sa mga katawa ug agik-ik...
sa talidhay ug pahiyum
kining dughan sa hilum adunay mga bakho
adunay mga dangoyngoy sa pangindahay
kay human ko dad-a kining presensya ngadto sa katilingban
kining maong presensya akong naamgohan
lisud ampingan
akong nakita nga lungagon kining kaugalingon
buslot kining banga nga bika...
Thursday, November 5, 2009
Tuesday, July 14, 2009
landong
tugoti ang imong kaugalingon nga hiposon sa mga bukton sa imong magbubuhat panahon sa kagabhion.
pagmata mo sa kabuntagon tugoti nga ang misterio nianang imong gipikas diha sa misa mamahimong matuod diha sa kinabuhi nga imong ipahiluna sa altar sa kalibutan.
Sunday, April 5, 2009
graduation speech
Your Eminence Ricardo J. Cardinal Vidal, Archbishop of Cebu, your excellency Bishop Antonio Rañola, Priest Formators, Professors lay formators, friends and benefactors, Good afternoon.
I have always wanted to be close to God. and I realized that priesthood would be an excellent avenue for me to reach this intimacy with the Divine. Then I wanted to live and die as a priest; a good one at that. So great was my yearning that one time I told myself that it would be a great success, should I be able just to be admitted to study in the seminary. I have always imagined then the close relationship between God and the priest; that a priest is to be within whispering distance from God.
I became a seminarian and I wanted to experience this idealized imagination that I had before, the picture of being so intimate with God that I could hear him whisper. During those first months and years of my seminary life, I thought I was having a close relationship with God attaining it through my own efforts. I would spend much time on my personal devotions even on study periods and I would really find time to visit Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament. The feeling was good. I then felt flattered by the expressions of appreciation from people who saw the good seminarian that I believed I was The horror of committing sin and the avoidance of persons and situations that might soil my efforts to holiness tended to separate me from the rest of the community. That was my feeling. I was tempted to view myself as the best of all seminarians there is, thanking God of my goodness and comparing it with the misdeeds of others. It sounds familiar, isn’t it? Ahh…the Pharisee and the Publican.
My journey in the major seminary somehow dips me into the reality that I’m no longer a child, with someone to enforce authority from the outside that would allow minimal commission of evil deeds. To me, what is taught here is to appreciate the authority of God in my conscience thus becoming more helpful in the adult spiritual life because that authority goes with me anywhere. Here it is that I come to appreciate sin vis-à-vis the love of God. This is captured in a strophe of the praeconium of the Easter Proclamation rendered in Cebuano.
O katingalahang panumbaling alang kanamo,
O dili masukod nga pagpangga sa imong gugma,
aron matubos mo ang ulipon gitugyan mo ang imong bugtong anak
O palaran nga kalapasan,
O gikinahanglang sala ni Adan nga nakaangkon alang kanamo
sa ingon kadako nga Manunubos.
No, it’s not that I’m here committing sin liberally up to my heart’s further discontent but it’s in the formation content of this “best seminary in Asia” that I came to meet real people and dialogue with them about their experiences or non-experience with God. People who hate to go to Church not because they hate God but because of the attitudes of some personages in clergy whose character and countenance rather clouds the gospel message more than preaching it by their lips and hands.
I was always grateful that I became one of those students who were recommended to study abroad through the assistance of the good Opus Dei priests but His Eminence [Ricardo Cardinal Vidal] was not able to sign my papers and so that I fell without having started to fly, but, I gracefully landed on no less than the the motherly palm of God in this venerable institution. Oh happy fault. God knows best. Nothing happens by chance. I believe in the Divine Providence and why God chooses to form me/us in this seminary.
In this seminary, is taught and practiced that leadership is service and that’s one thing that I hope I have imbibed. That the erection of magnificent triumphalistic edifices without the corresponding building up of the church of the poor is insulting to the God of compassion and justice who always takes the side of our least sisters and brothers; that magnificent churches could well be an excuse that we are indolent to build up The Church; the people of God. But even as I am speaking of this I also feel I am too small for the noble task of building the people of God.
Now to this lifetime commitment that I am into, I maybe afraid of the things that come my way; I don’t know what the future holds for me but I’m sure God will be there. I trust in his grace in me and I hope that this grace in me will surely meet the Grace that is him. I believe I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me… and I trust that none can be against us if God is for us…
Your Eminence Ricardo J. Cardinal Vidal I am very grateful to your person the sign of unity of the Church of Cebu and a tangible presence of Christ the Good Shepherd. To the formators thank you for your words of teachings but more so thank you for your deeds worthy of emulation which inspire to you live what you teach that which you yourselves have lived. To our lay formators especially nanay Minnie Dosdos thank you for your undying labor in the vineyard of God. To our priest companion Fr. Dondon Aquino and to my Spiritual Director Fr. Bob Rice SJ both know me well and both earn my filial trust. To my benefactors and sponsors, Mrs. Carmen Mercado, Ms. Veronica Bariquit and Mrs Nene Abella also Sec. Ace Durano, thank you may God who will never be outdone in generosity keep you as apples of his eye. To our newfound friends brothers and sisters thank you. To my classmates, the brothers of St. Fancis of Assisi thank you, real brothers you will always be to me. To my family, to my parents Mr. and Mrs. Gabriel and Charlie Dutosme thank you God's gift to me is his gift to you, may we always be grateful to God for it.
To the Blessed Mother Mary and St. Joseph, I am ever grateful to these two guardians of my vocation. To God, God! may you help me sing of your mercies forever.
Lastly, may God humble me down all the more because of this praise I have received.
I thank you all.
I have always wanted to be close to God. and I realized that priesthood would be an excellent avenue for me to reach this intimacy with the Divine. Then I wanted to live and die as a priest; a good one at that. So great was my yearning that one time I told myself that it would be a great success, should I be able just to be admitted to study in the seminary. I have always imagined then the close relationship between God and the priest; that a priest is to be within whispering distance from God.
I became a seminarian and I wanted to experience this idealized imagination that I had before, the picture of being so intimate with God that I could hear him whisper. During those first months and years of my seminary life, I thought I was having a close relationship with God attaining it through my own efforts. I would spend much time on my personal devotions even on study periods and I would really find time to visit Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament. The feeling was good. I then felt flattered by the expressions of appreciation from people who saw the good seminarian that I believed I was The horror of committing sin and the avoidance of persons and situations that might soil my efforts to holiness tended to separate me from the rest of the community. That was my feeling. I was tempted to view myself as the best of all seminarians there is, thanking God of my goodness and comparing it with the misdeeds of others. It sounds familiar, isn’t it? Ahh…the Pharisee and the Publican.
My journey in the major seminary somehow dips me into the reality that I’m no longer a child, with someone to enforce authority from the outside that would allow minimal commission of evil deeds. To me, what is taught here is to appreciate the authority of God in my conscience thus becoming more helpful in the adult spiritual life because that authority goes with me anywhere. Here it is that I come to appreciate sin vis-à-vis the love of God. This is captured in a strophe of the praeconium of the Easter Proclamation rendered in Cebuano.
O katingalahang panumbaling alang kanamo,
O dili masukod nga pagpangga sa imong gugma,
aron matubos mo ang ulipon gitugyan mo ang imong bugtong anak
O palaran nga kalapasan,
O gikinahanglang sala ni Adan nga nakaangkon alang kanamo
sa ingon kadako nga Manunubos.
No, it’s not that I’m here committing sin liberally up to my heart’s further discontent but it’s in the formation content of this “best seminary in Asia” that I came to meet real people and dialogue with them about their experiences or non-experience with God. People who hate to go to Church not because they hate God but because of the attitudes of some personages in clergy whose character and countenance rather clouds the gospel message more than preaching it by their lips and hands.
I was always grateful that I became one of those students who were recommended to study abroad through the assistance of the good Opus Dei priests but His Eminence [Ricardo Cardinal Vidal] was not able to sign my papers and so that I fell without having started to fly, but, I gracefully landed on no less than the the motherly palm of God in this venerable institution. Oh happy fault. God knows best. Nothing happens by chance. I believe in the Divine Providence and why God chooses to form me/us in this seminary.
In this seminary, is taught and practiced that leadership is service and that’s one thing that I hope I have imbibed. That the erection of magnificent triumphalistic edifices without the corresponding building up of the church of the poor is insulting to the God of compassion and justice who always takes the side of our least sisters and brothers; that magnificent churches could well be an excuse that we are indolent to build up The Church; the people of God. But even as I am speaking of this I also feel I am too small for the noble task of building the people of God.
Now to this lifetime commitment that I am into, I maybe afraid of the things that come my way; I don’t know what the future holds for me but I’m sure God will be there. I trust in his grace in me and I hope that this grace in me will surely meet the Grace that is him. I believe I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me… and I trust that none can be against us if God is for us…
Your Eminence Ricardo J. Cardinal Vidal I am very grateful to your person the sign of unity of the Church of Cebu and a tangible presence of Christ the Good Shepherd. To the formators thank you for your words of teachings but more so thank you for your deeds worthy of emulation which inspire to you live what you teach that which you yourselves have lived. To our lay formators especially nanay Minnie Dosdos thank you for your undying labor in the vineyard of God. To our priest companion Fr. Dondon Aquino and to my Spiritual Director Fr. Bob Rice SJ both know me well and both earn my filial trust. To my benefactors and sponsors, Mrs. Carmen Mercado, Ms. Veronica Bariquit and Mrs Nene Abella also Sec. Ace Durano, thank you may God who will never be outdone in generosity keep you as apples of his eye. To our newfound friends brothers and sisters thank you. To my classmates, the brothers of St. Fancis of Assisi thank you, real brothers you will always be to me. To my family, to my parents Mr. and Mrs. Gabriel and Charlie Dutosme thank you God's gift to me is his gift to you, may we always be grateful to God for it.
To the Blessed Mother Mary and St. Joseph, I am ever grateful to these two guardians of my vocation. To God, God! may you help me sing of your mercies forever.
Lastly, may God humble me down all the more because of this praise I have received.
I thank you all.
Thursday, March 5, 2009
SOCIO-CULTURAL CONTEXT OF MINISTRY
Symbol: Hierarchical church
Worldview: the ordained as dispenser of blessings
Ethos: Great respect for the ordained. The priest is held in high esteem among the Filipinos.
The Church is not a democratic body of people. The government in the Church is not of the people, by the people and for the people. Some would say that the Church is not democratic because it is beyond democracy. The whole body of the Church is called the mystical body of Christ and the people is usually referred to as the people of God.
The symbol of hierarchy accordingly projects my own experience of the church as a layperson then and as a cleric now. The Filipino Church inasmuch as it has been colonized by medieval Spain still retains the traces and shadows of the medieval Spanish Church Filipinized to our context.
Allow me to state the ethos of the symbol that I chose. The great respect to the ordained vividly expressed in giving the priest extra special treatment. In a way it redounds to the advantage of the priest. in another way of looking at it, the ethos might also signify the peoples idea of transcendence. Their belief, our faith in the one greater than all of us who is God convinces them to treat the priest as a representative of God. They shoe reverence to the priest in the name of Jesus, God whose presence hopefully the people feel in the presence of the priest who acts in the person of Christ the head.
How do I feel about them?
I feel eerie considering the honor shown to a priest bearing in mind that I too would be shown the same kind of respect after presbyteral ordination. Even now as an ordained deacon I see already premonitions that would lead to these moments.
Another way of consideration is the question of my own self esteem. Why am I not comfortable with treatments of this sort? Well, the question would simple answer the lack of a healthy self esteem on my part or is it only a question of adjustment to the culture? Or have I any issue on authority and power. Anyhow, I still have to figure it out as to what is weightier among the three.
Experiences as a deacon and a reflection drawn from them.
My own experience vis-à-vis blessing sacramentals and utilities would tell me of the peoples faith in God emanated by the presence of the church minister side by side with their cultural upbringing. Last March 1,2009 I happened to bless a motorcycle. My companion Seminarian Noli Francisco pointed out to something that I already noticed. The thing is the blood splattered on the engine of the motorcycle. That is their local custom: to sprinkle animal blood on things to ensure protection and favor from other beings or to ward off evils caused by other invisible forces. Oh, I could have given them a short catechism to the owner but I did not!
The hierarchical structure of the church and the high regard of the laity to the clerics is beneficial to the Church as the people of God in a way that power is rightly used by those who wield it. If the priests be faithful to their tria munera and the evangelical vows then the hierarchical structure can be well utilized for the building of God’s project. To be emphasized however is the prophetic office of the priest that is to teach and feed the people with the Word of God. With my withdrawing attitude, God help me!
Worldview: the ordained as dispenser of blessings
Ethos: Great respect for the ordained. The priest is held in high esteem among the Filipinos.
The Church is not a democratic body of people. The government in the Church is not of the people, by the people and for the people. Some would say that the Church is not democratic because it is beyond democracy. The whole body of the Church is called the mystical body of Christ and the people is usually referred to as the people of God.
The symbol of hierarchy accordingly projects my own experience of the church as a layperson then and as a cleric now. The Filipino Church inasmuch as it has been colonized by medieval Spain still retains the traces and shadows of the medieval Spanish Church Filipinized to our context.
Allow me to state the ethos of the symbol that I chose. The great respect to the ordained vividly expressed in giving the priest extra special treatment. In a way it redounds to the advantage of the priest. in another way of looking at it, the ethos might also signify the peoples idea of transcendence. Their belief, our faith in the one greater than all of us who is God convinces them to treat the priest as a representative of God. They shoe reverence to the priest in the name of Jesus, God whose presence hopefully the people feel in the presence of the priest who acts in the person of Christ the head.
How do I feel about them?
I feel eerie considering the honor shown to a priest bearing in mind that I too would be shown the same kind of respect after presbyteral ordination. Even now as an ordained deacon I see already premonitions that would lead to these moments.
Another way of consideration is the question of my own self esteem. Why am I not comfortable with treatments of this sort? Well, the question would simple answer the lack of a healthy self esteem on my part or is it only a question of adjustment to the culture? Or have I any issue on authority and power. Anyhow, I still have to figure it out as to what is weightier among the three.
Experiences as a deacon and a reflection drawn from them.
My own experience vis-à-vis blessing sacramentals and utilities would tell me of the peoples faith in God emanated by the presence of the church minister side by side with their cultural upbringing. Last March 1,2009 I happened to bless a motorcycle. My companion Seminarian Noli Francisco pointed out to something that I already noticed. The thing is the blood splattered on the engine of the motorcycle. That is their local custom: to sprinkle animal blood on things to ensure protection and favor from other beings or to ward off evils caused by other invisible forces. Oh, I could have given them a short catechism to the owner but I did not!
The hierarchical structure of the church and the high regard of the laity to the clerics is beneficial to the Church as the people of God in a way that power is rightly used by those who wield it. If the priests be faithful to their tria munera and the evangelical vows then the hierarchical structure can be well utilized for the building of God’s project. To be emphasized however is the prophetic office of the priest that is to teach and feed the people with the Word of God. With my withdrawing attitude, God help me!
Thursday, February 26, 2009
AVE MARIS STELLA CEBUANO TRANSLATION
Ave sa dagat bitoon
Inahan kang piniling Diosnon
Ulay ka gayud gihapon
Palaran kang pultang langitnon
Gikalawat mo ang himaya
Gikan kang San Gabriel nga baba
Lipaya kaming makasasala
Kay ilis ka sa ngalan ni Eva
Ang mga binilanggo tangtangi
Ang mga buta hayagi
Ang kadautan namo ipaiway mo
Ang kaayohan namo pangayoon mo
Magpahayag ka Inahan namo
Dawata kining among pag-ampo
Niadtong nagpakatawo
Tungod kanamo nga sa tiyan mo
Birhen ka ulay nga usa ra
Sa ngatanan nagahinuklog ka
Luwasa kami sa sala
Ulayon mo kami unta
Ang kinabuhi namo labani
Ang dalan namo hawani
Nga si Jesus among makit-an
Ang kalipayng gikahidlawan
Daygon tang Dios nga Amahan
Daygon ta ang Dios nga Anak
Daygon tang Dios Espiritu Santo
Usa rang pagdayeg kanilang tulo
Amen
1. Ave maris stella,
Dei Mater alma,
Atque semper Virgo,
Felix caeli porta.
2. Sumens illud Ave
Gabrielis ore,
Funda nos in pace,
Mutans Hevae nomen.
3. Solve vincla reis,
Profer lumen caecis:
Mala nostra pelle,
Bona cuncta posce.
4. Monstra t(e) esse matrem:
Sumat per te preces,
Qui pro nobis natus,
Tulit esse tuus.
5. Virgo singularis,
Inter omnes mitis,
Nos culpis solutos,
Mites fac et castos.
6. Vitam praesta puram,
Iter para tutum:
Ut videntes Iesum,
Semper collaetemur.
7. Sit laus Deo Patri,
Summo Christo decus,
Spiritui Sancto,
Tribus honor unus. Amen.
Inahan kang piniling Diosnon
Ulay ka gayud gihapon
Palaran kang pultang langitnon
Gikalawat mo ang himaya
Gikan kang San Gabriel nga baba
Lipaya kaming makasasala
Kay ilis ka sa ngalan ni Eva
Ang mga binilanggo tangtangi
Ang mga buta hayagi
Ang kadautan namo ipaiway mo
Ang kaayohan namo pangayoon mo
Magpahayag ka Inahan namo
Dawata kining among pag-ampo
Niadtong nagpakatawo
Tungod kanamo nga sa tiyan mo
Birhen ka ulay nga usa ra
Sa ngatanan nagahinuklog ka
Luwasa kami sa sala
Ulayon mo kami unta
Ang kinabuhi namo labani
Ang dalan namo hawani
Nga si Jesus among makit-an
Ang kalipayng gikahidlawan
Daygon tang Dios nga Amahan
Daygon ta ang Dios nga Anak
Daygon tang Dios Espiritu Santo
Usa rang pagdayeg kanilang tulo
Amen
1. Ave maris stella,
Dei Mater alma,
Atque semper Virgo,
Felix caeli porta.
2. Sumens illud Ave
Gabrielis ore,
Funda nos in pace,
Mutans Hevae nomen.
3. Solve vincla reis,
Profer lumen caecis:
Mala nostra pelle,
Bona cuncta posce.
4. Monstra t(e) esse matrem:
Sumat per te preces,
Qui pro nobis natus,
Tulit esse tuus.
5. Virgo singularis,
Inter omnes mitis,
Nos culpis solutos,
Mites fac et castos.
6. Vitam praesta puram,
Iter para tutum:
Ut videntes Iesum,
Semper collaetemur.
7. Sit laus Deo Patri,
Summo Christo decus,
Spiritui Sancto,
Tribus honor unus. Amen.
Tuesday, February 24, 2009
did jesus know...
Did Jesus know that he was God?
Guy Davies
In my review of Brian Edgar's The Message of the Trinity here, I take issue with his statement,
if [Jesus] was aware of being God, could he live a life of faith and trust as every other human is called to do? Would the incarnation not be somewhat like the experience of the crew in Star Trek who, when visiting an alien planet could, in moments of danger, call out, 'Beam me up, Scotty!' and be miraculously...transported back to the safety of the starship. (p. 162)
I indicated that I would like to devote a post to considering this issue. Was Jesus, in his human mind, conscious that he was God?The gospel accounts seem to suggest that Jesus was aware that he was God the Son. He did things that "only God could do" like forgive sins (Mark 2:5-11) . He claimed to stand in a unique relationship to the Father as knower and known. As such he saw himself as the unrivalled revealer of God.All things have been delivered to Me by My Father, and no one knows the Son except the Father. Nor does anyone know the Father except the Son, and the one to whom the Son wills to reveal Him. (Matthew 11:27)It seems that the devil tried to use Jesus' awareness of who he was to tempt him to use his powers in a selfish, God-denying way (Matthew 4:1-11).If Jesus was not conscious of being God the Son, what to we make of the following statements?For as the Father raises the dead and gives life to them, even so the Son gives life to whom He will. For the Father judges no one, but has committed all judgment to the Son, that all should honor the Son just as they honor the Father. He who does not honor the Son does not honor the Father who sent Him. (John 5:21-23)Jesus exercised God's own prerogative of judgement. He, as the Son demanded to be honoured on the same terms as the Father. He was "making himself equal with God", as the Jews rightly perceived (5:18).I and My Father are one. (John 10:30)“If you had known Me, you would have known My Father also; and from now on you know Him and have seen Him.” Philip said to Him, “Lord, show us the Father, and it is sufficient for us.” Jesus said to him, “Have I been with you so long, and yet you have not known Me, Philip? He who has seen Me has seen the Father; so how can you say, ‘Show us the Father’? Do you not believe that I am in the Father, and the Father in Me? The words that I speak to you I do not speak on My own authority; but the Father who dwells in Me does the works. Believe Me that I am in the Father and the Father in Me, or else believe Me for the sake of the works themselves. (John 14:7-11)Jesus was conscious that he was one with God. The Father was "in" him and he was "in" the Father. To see the human Jesus was to see the Father because the Son is homoousion - of one substance with the Father.And now, O Father, glorify Me together with Yourself, with the glory which I had with You before the world was. (John 17:5)Jesus, in his human mind, was aware of his pre-existence as the glorious Son of God who dwelt with the Father before the world was.Edgar suggests that if Jesus knew that he was God, he would not have needed to exercise faith. But Jesus trusted in God and prayed to him continually. Luke's Gospel especially emphasises the importance of prayer for Jesus. He was aware of his human frailty and need as well as his divine glory.
N. T. Wright reflects,I do not think Jesus "knew he was God" in the same way that one knows one is tired or happy, male or female. He did not sit back and think to himself, "Well I never! I'm the second person of the Trinity!" Rather, "as part of his human vocation, grasped in faith, sustained in prayer, tested in confrontation, agonized over further in prayer and doubt, and implemented in action, he believed that he had to do for Israel and the world, that which according to scripture only YHWH himself could do and be." (The Meaning of Jesus, Wright & Borg, SPCK, 2003, p. 166).
But, perhaps we can go futher than that. Jesus knew that he was Man with a human intellect, a human emotional life and a human physicality. He was profoundly aware of his human needs and limitations. But he also knew that he was the Son of God, one with the Father from eternity and deserving of equal honour to the Father. In his human understanding, Jesus was conscious of his humanity and deity.
.None on this means that in Jesus there are two self-consciousnesses, but it does mean that there are two levels of consciousness of the one self. There is a divine consciousness that he is the eternal Son of God and there is a human consciousness of the same fact. These two forms of consciousness remain distinct, united in one person, communicating through the Holy Spirit. (The Person of Christ, Donald Macleod, IVP, 1998, p. 193).
.
The amazing thing is, that Jesus knew that he was the Son of God, yet he went to the cross to die for the sins of the world. The form of God took the form of a servant and was made sin for us. At the cross, his sense of being the beloved Son of the Father was overwhelmed by a crushing awareness of the holiness of God and the enormity of the sin that he bore in his own body on the tree. He who was homoousion with the Father cried out, "My God, my God why have you forsaken me?" (Matthew 27:46). Jesus, in his human consciousness, entered the hitherto unknown territory of abandonment by God as he was made a curse for us, "suffering in his soul the terrible torments of a condemned and forsaken man". (Calvin, cited in Macleod op cit. p. 177). Jesus' consciousness of being the Son of God brought him no comfort at that point. There was no reassuring, 'This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased', only the bleak, impenetrable darkness of the wrath of God upon the the sin-bearing Jesus.
.
Yes, Jesus knew who he was. But there was no, "Beam me up, Scotty!", only "Why have you forsaken me?" followed by the triumphant, "It is finished!" (John 19:30).
.
Guy Davies
In my review of Brian Edgar's The Message of the Trinity here, I take issue with his statement,
if [Jesus] was aware of being God, could he live a life of faith and trust as every other human is called to do? Would the incarnation not be somewhat like the experience of the crew in Star Trek who, when visiting an alien planet could, in moments of danger, call out, 'Beam me up, Scotty!' and be miraculously...transported back to the safety of the starship. (p. 162)
I indicated that I would like to devote a post to considering this issue. Was Jesus, in his human mind, conscious that he was God?The gospel accounts seem to suggest that Jesus was aware that he was God the Son. He did things that "only God could do" like forgive sins (Mark 2:5-11) . He claimed to stand in a unique relationship to the Father as knower and known. As such he saw himself as the unrivalled revealer of God.All things have been delivered to Me by My Father, and no one knows the Son except the Father. Nor does anyone know the Father except the Son, and the one to whom the Son wills to reveal Him. (Matthew 11:27)It seems that the devil tried to use Jesus' awareness of who he was to tempt him to use his powers in a selfish, God-denying way (Matthew 4:1-11).If Jesus was not conscious of being God the Son, what to we make of the following statements?For as the Father raises the dead and gives life to them, even so the Son gives life to whom He will. For the Father judges no one, but has committed all judgment to the Son, that all should honor the Son just as they honor the Father. He who does not honor the Son does not honor the Father who sent Him. (John 5:21-23)Jesus exercised God's own prerogative of judgement. He, as the Son demanded to be honoured on the same terms as the Father. He was "making himself equal with God", as the Jews rightly perceived (5:18).I and My Father are one. (John 10:30)“If you had known Me, you would have known My Father also; and from now on you know Him and have seen Him.” Philip said to Him, “Lord, show us the Father, and it is sufficient for us.” Jesus said to him, “Have I been with you so long, and yet you have not known Me, Philip? He who has seen Me has seen the Father; so how can you say, ‘Show us the Father’? Do you not believe that I am in the Father, and the Father in Me? The words that I speak to you I do not speak on My own authority; but the Father who dwells in Me does the works. Believe Me that I am in the Father and the Father in Me, or else believe Me for the sake of the works themselves. (John 14:7-11)Jesus was conscious that he was one with God. The Father was "in" him and he was "in" the Father. To see the human Jesus was to see the Father because the Son is homoousion - of one substance with the Father.And now, O Father, glorify Me together with Yourself, with the glory which I had with You before the world was. (John 17:5)Jesus, in his human mind, was aware of his pre-existence as the glorious Son of God who dwelt with the Father before the world was.Edgar suggests that if Jesus knew that he was God, he would not have needed to exercise faith. But Jesus trusted in God and prayed to him continually. Luke's Gospel especially emphasises the importance of prayer for Jesus. He was aware of his human frailty and need as well as his divine glory.
N. T. Wright reflects,I do not think Jesus "knew he was God" in the same way that one knows one is tired or happy, male or female. He did not sit back and think to himself, "Well I never! I'm the second person of the Trinity!" Rather, "as part of his human vocation, grasped in faith, sustained in prayer, tested in confrontation, agonized over further in prayer and doubt, and implemented in action, he believed that he had to do for Israel and the world, that which according to scripture only YHWH himself could do and be." (The Meaning of Jesus, Wright & Borg, SPCK, 2003, p. 166).
But, perhaps we can go futher than that. Jesus knew that he was Man with a human intellect, a human emotional life and a human physicality. He was profoundly aware of his human needs and limitations. But he also knew that he was the Son of God, one with the Father from eternity and deserving of equal honour to the Father. In his human understanding, Jesus was conscious of his humanity and deity.
.None on this means that in Jesus there are two self-consciousnesses, but it does mean that there are two levels of consciousness of the one self. There is a divine consciousness that he is the eternal Son of God and there is a human consciousness of the same fact. These two forms of consciousness remain distinct, united in one person, communicating through the Holy Spirit. (The Person of Christ, Donald Macleod, IVP, 1998, p. 193).
.
The amazing thing is, that Jesus knew that he was the Son of God, yet he went to the cross to die for the sins of the world. The form of God took the form of a servant and was made sin for us. At the cross, his sense of being the beloved Son of the Father was overwhelmed by a crushing awareness of the holiness of God and the enormity of the sin that he bore in his own body on the tree. He who was homoousion with the Father cried out, "My God, my God why have you forsaken me?" (Matthew 27:46). Jesus, in his human consciousness, entered the hitherto unknown territory of abandonment by God as he was made a curse for us, "suffering in his soul the terrible torments of a condemned and forsaken man". (Calvin, cited in Macleod op cit. p. 177). Jesus' consciousness of being the Son of God brought him no comfort at that point. There was no reassuring, 'This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased', only the bleak, impenetrable darkness of the wrath of God upon the the sin-bearing Jesus.
.
Yes, Jesus knew who he was. But there was no, "Beam me up, Scotty!", only "Why have you forsaken me?" followed by the triumphant, "It is finished!" (John 19:30).
.
Sunday, February 22, 2009
the exultet
Exultet iam angelica turba caelorum:
exultent divina mysteria:
et pro tanti Regis victoria tuba insonet
salutaris.
Gaudeat et tellus tantis irradiata fulgoribus:
et, aeterni Regis splendore illustrata,
totius orbis se sentiat amisisse caliginem.
Laetetur et mater Ecclesia,
tanti luminis adornata fulgoribus:
et magnis populorum vocibus haec aula
resultet.
Quapropter astantes vos, fratres carissimi,
ad tam miram huius sancti luminis claritatem,
una mecum, quaeso,
Dei omnipotentis misericordiam invocate.
Ut, qui me non meis meritis
intra Levitarum numerum dignatus est aggregare,
luminis sui claritatem infundens,
cerei huius laudem implere perficiat.
Vers. Dominus vobiscum.
Resp. Et cum spiritu tuo.
Vers. Sursum corda.
Resp. Habemus ad Dominum.
Vers. Gratias agamus Domino Deo nostro.
Resp. Dignum et iustum est.
Vere dignum et iustum est,
invisibilem Deum Patrem omnipotentem
Filiumque eius unigenitum,
Dominum nostrum Iesum Christum,
toto cordis ac mentis affectu et vocis
ministerio personare.
Qui pro nobis aeterno Patri
Adae debitum solvit,
et veteris piaculi cautionem pio cruore detersit.
Haec sunt enim festa paschalia,
in quibus verus ille Agnus occiditur,
cuius sanguine postes fidelium consecrantur.
Haec nox est,
in qua primum patres nostros, filios Israele
ductos de Aegypto,
Mare Rubrum sicco vestigio transire fecisti.
Haec igitur nox est,
quae peccatorum tenebras
columnae illuminatione purgavit.
Haec nox est,
quae hodie per universum mundum
in Christo credentes,
a vitiis saeculi et caligine peccatorum segregatos,
reddit gratiae, sociat sanctitati.
Haec nox est,
in qua, destructis vinculis mortis,
Christus ab inferis victor ascendit.
Nihil enim nobis nasci profuit,
nisi redimi profuisset.
O mira circa nos tuae pietatis dignatio!
O inaestimabilis dilectio caritatis:
ut servum redimeres,
Filium tradidisti!
O certe necessarium Adae peccatum,
quod Christi morte deletum est!
O felix culpa,
quae talem ac tantum meruit habere Redemptorem!
O vere beata nox,
quae sola meruit scire tempus et horam,
in qua Christus ab inferis resurrexit!
Haec nox est, de qua scriptum est:
Et nox sicut dies illuminabitur:
et nox illuminatio mea in deliciis meis.
Huius igitur sanctificatio noctis fugat scelera,
culpas lavat:
et reddit innocentiam lapsiset maestis laetitiam.
Fugat odia, concordiam paratet curvat imperia.
O vere beata nox,
in qua terrenis caelestia,
humanis divina iunguntur!¹
In huius igitur noctis gratia,
suscipe, sancte Pater,
laudis huius sacrificium vespertinum,
quod tibi in hac cerei oblatione sollemni,
per ministrorum manus de operibus apum,
sacrosancta reddit Ecclesia.
Sed iam columnae huius praeconia novimus,
quam in honorem Dei rutilans ignis accendit.
Qui, licet sit divisus in partes,
mutuati tamen luminis detrimenta non novit.
Alitur enim liquantibus ceris,
quas in substantiam pretiosae
huius lampadisapis mater eduxit.²
Oramus ergo te, Domine,
ut cereus iste in honorem tui nominis consecratus,
ad noctis huius caliginem destruendam,
indeficiens perseveret.
Et in odorem suavitatis acceptus,
supernis luminaribus misceatur.
Flammas eius lucifer matutinus inveniat:
Ille, inquam, lucifer, qui nescit occasum:
Christus Filius tuus,
qui, regressus ab inferis,
humano generi serenus illuxit,
et vivit et regnat in saecula saeculorum.
Resp. Amen.
exultent divina mysteria:
et pro tanti Regis victoria tuba insonet
salutaris.
Gaudeat et tellus tantis irradiata fulgoribus:
et, aeterni Regis splendore illustrata,
totius orbis se sentiat amisisse caliginem.
Laetetur et mater Ecclesia,
tanti luminis adornata fulgoribus:
et magnis populorum vocibus haec aula
resultet.
Quapropter astantes vos, fratres carissimi,
ad tam miram huius sancti luminis claritatem,
una mecum, quaeso,
Dei omnipotentis misericordiam invocate.
Ut, qui me non meis meritis
intra Levitarum numerum dignatus est aggregare,
luminis sui claritatem infundens,
cerei huius laudem implere perficiat.
Vers. Dominus vobiscum.
Resp. Et cum spiritu tuo.
Vers. Sursum corda.
Resp. Habemus ad Dominum.
Vers. Gratias agamus Domino Deo nostro.
Resp. Dignum et iustum est.
Vere dignum et iustum est,
invisibilem Deum Patrem omnipotentem
Filiumque eius unigenitum,
Dominum nostrum Iesum Christum,
toto cordis ac mentis affectu et vocis
ministerio personare.
Qui pro nobis aeterno Patri
Adae debitum solvit,
et veteris piaculi cautionem pio cruore detersit.
Haec sunt enim festa paschalia,
in quibus verus ille Agnus occiditur,
cuius sanguine postes fidelium consecrantur.
Haec nox est,
in qua primum patres nostros, filios Israele
ductos de Aegypto,
Mare Rubrum sicco vestigio transire fecisti.
Haec igitur nox est,
quae peccatorum tenebras
columnae illuminatione purgavit.
Haec nox est,
quae hodie per universum mundum
in Christo credentes,
a vitiis saeculi et caligine peccatorum segregatos,
reddit gratiae, sociat sanctitati.
Haec nox est,
in qua, destructis vinculis mortis,
Christus ab inferis victor ascendit.
Nihil enim nobis nasci profuit,
nisi redimi profuisset.
O mira circa nos tuae pietatis dignatio!
O inaestimabilis dilectio caritatis:
ut servum redimeres,
Filium tradidisti!
O certe necessarium Adae peccatum,
quod Christi morte deletum est!
O felix culpa,
quae talem ac tantum meruit habere Redemptorem!
O vere beata nox,
quae sola meruit scire tempus et horam,
in qua Christus ab inferis resurrexit!
Haec nox est, de qua scriptum est:
Et nox sicut dies illuminabitur:
et nox illuminatio mea in deliciis meis.
Huius igitur sanctificatio noctis fugat scelera,
culpas lavat:
et reddit innocentiam lapsiset maestis laetitiam.
Fugat odia, concordiam paratet curvat imperia.
O vere beata nox,
in qua terrenis caelestia,
humanis divina iunguntur!¹
In huius igitur noctis gratia,
suscipe, sancte Pater,
laudis huius sacrificium vespertinum,
quod tibi in hac cerei oblatione sollemni,
per ministrorum manus de operibus apum,
sacrosancta reddit Ecclesia.
Sed iam columnae huius praeconia novimus,
quam in honorem Dei rutilans ignis accendit.
Qui, licet sit divisus in partes,
mutuati tamen luminis detrimenta non novit.
Alitur enim liquantibus ceris,
quas in substantiam pretiosae
huius lampadisapis mater eduxit.²
Oramus ergo te, Domine,
ut cereus iste in honorem tui nominis consecratus,
ad noctis huius caliginem destruendam,
indeficiens perseveret.
Et in odorem suavitatis acceptus,
supernis luminaribus misceatur.
Flammas eius lucifer matutinus inveniat:
Ille, inquam, lucifer, qui nescit occasum:
Christus Filius tuus,
qui, regressus ab inferis,
humano generi serenus illuxit,
et vivit et regnat in saecula saeculorum.
Resp. Amen.
Monday, February 16, 2009
pamalandong: martes feb.17 2k9
Pamalandong- Mk.8:14-21
The yeast's function in baking is to ferment sugars present in the flour or added to the dough. This fermentation gives off carbon dioxide and ethanol. The carbon dioxide is trapped within tiny bubbles and results in the dough expanding, or rising. www.yeastgenome.org
Kung atong diretsohon, ang igpapatubo/yeast naghatag ug inpluwensya aron modako ang pan gikan sa usa ka pudyot nga harina.
Gipasidan-an ni Jesus ang iyang mga tinun-an kabahin sa yeast sa mga Pariseo ug ni Herodes. Ngano man diay? Tungod kay ang yeast sa mga Pariseo naggikan man sa ilang pagka hypocrito. "Beware of the leaven - that is, the hypocrisy - of the Pharisees. Lk.12:1….Kining ilang pagka-hipocrito, pagpakaaron-ingon maoy naghatag ug color sa ilang mga reaksyon ngadto kang Jesus.
Ang yeast ni Herodes mao ang iyang spirit of worldliness, preoccupation with pleasure and political ambitions. (catholic commentary on SS) Kining mga kinaiyaha ni Herodes mao usab ang naghatag ug color sa iyang opinion ug reaksyon ngadto kang Jesus.
Ato kuno kining suwayan ug lambigit sa atong kasamtangang estado karon pinaagi sa pagsusi sa atong kaugalingon.
Sa atong pakigrelasyon karon kang Jesus unsa man pud ang yeast nga nakainpluwensya niini?
Or nalimot ba kaha ta pag-atiman sa atong relasyon/pakigsuod kang Jesus tungod sa mga papers, reflections ug reports nga himoonon. Nabusy na tag himo ug mga powerpoint slides unya malimot na tag hatag ug personal time for a personal encounter with Jesus?
Or kining atong mga pagpaningkamot sa pageskwela, pag adto sa pastoral area ato ba kaha kining gihimo isip kabahin sa pagpalambo nato sa atong personal relationship kang Jesus?
Sa minubo, ato bang gihimo nga yeast sa atong formation ang pagpalambo sa atong personal relationship tali sa Dios.
The yeast's function in baking is to ferment sugars present in the flour or added to the dough. This fermentation gives off carbon dioxide and ethanol. The carbon dioxide is trapped within tiny bubbles and results in the dough expanding, or rising. www.yeastgenome.org
Kung atong diretsohon, ang igpapatubo/yeast naghatag ug inpluwensya aron modako ang pan gikan sa usa ka pudyot nga harina.
Gipasidan-an ni Jesus ang iyang mga tinun-an kabahin sa yeast sa mga Pariseo ug ni Herodes. Ngano man diay? Tungod kay ang yeast sa mga Pariseo naggikan man sa ilang pagka hypocrito. "Beware of the leaven - that is, the hypocrisy - of the Pharisees. Lk.12:1….Kining ilang pagka-hipocrito, pagpakaaron-ingon maoy naghatag ug color sa ilang mga reaksyon ngadto kang Jesus.
Ang yeast ni Herodes mao ang iyang spirit of worldliness, preoccupation with pleasure and political ambitions. (catholic commentary on SS) Kining mga kinaiyaha ni Herodes mao usab ang naghatag ug color sa iyang opinion ug reaksyon ngadto kang Jesus.
Ato kuno kining suwayan ug lambigit sa atong kasamtangang estado karon pinaagi sa pagsusi sa atong kaugalingon.
Sa atong pakigrelasyon karon kang Jesus unsa man pud ang yeast nga nakainpluwensya niini?
Or nalimot ba kaha ta pag-atiman sa atong relasyon/pakigsuod kang Jesus tungod sa mga papers, reflections ug reports nga himoonon. Nabusy na tag himo ug mga powerpoint slides unya malimot na tag hatag ug personal time for a personal encounter with Jesus?
Or kining atong mga pagpaningkamot sa pageskwela, pag adto sa pastoral area ato ba kaha kining gihimo isip kabahin sa pagpalambo nato sa atong personal relationship kang Jesus?
Sa minubo, ato bang gihimo nga yeast sa atong formation ang pagpalambo sa atong personal relationship tali sa Dios.
Monday, February 9, 2009
the greek and latin traditions regarding the procession of the holy spirit
THE GREEK AND LATIN TRADITIONS REGARDING THE PROCESSION OF THE HOLY SPIRIT
Pontificial Council for Promoting Christian Unity
The Holy Father, in the homily he gave in St Peter Basilica on 29 June in the presence of the Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew I, expressed a desire that "the traditional doctrine of the Filioque, present in the liturgical version of the Latin Credo, [be clarified] in order to highlight its full harmony with what the Ecumenical Council of Constantinople of 381 confesses in its creed: the Father as the source of the whole Trinity, the one origin both of the Son and of the Holy Spirit".
What is published here is the clarification he has asked for, which has been undertaken by the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity. It is intended as a contribution to the dialogue which is carried out by the Joint International Commission between the Roman Catholic Church and the Orthodox Church.
In its first report on "The Mystery of the Church and of the Eucharist in the light of the Mystery of the Holy Trinity", unanimously approved in Munich on 6 July 1982, the Joint International Commission for Theological Dialogue between the Roman Catholic Church and the Orthodox Church had mentioned the centuries-old difficulty between the two Churches concerning the eternal origin of the Holy Spirit. Not being able to treat this subject for itself in this first phase of the dialogue, the Commission stated: "Without wishing to resolve yet the difficulties which have arisen between the East and the West concerning the relationship between the Son and the Spirit, we can already say together that this Spirit, which proceeds from the Father (Jn 15:26) as the sole source in the Trinity and which has become the Spirit of our sonship (Rom 8:15) since he is also the Spirit of the Son (Gal 4:6), is communicated to us particularly in the Eucharist by this Son upon whom he reposes in time and in eternity (Jn 1:32)" (Information Service of the Secretariat for Promoting Christian Unity, n. 49, p. 108, I, 6).
The Catholic Church acknowledges the conciliar, ecumenical, normative and irrevocable value, as expression of the one common faith of the Church and of all Christians, of the Symbol professed in Greek at Constantinople in 381 by the Second Ecumenical Council. No profession of faith peculiar to a particular liturgical tradition can contradict this expression of the faith taught and professed by the undivided Church.
On the basis of Jn 15:26, this Symbol confesses the Spirit “to ek tou PatroV ekporeuomenon” (“who takes his origin from the Father”). The Father alone is the principle without principle (arch anarcoV) of the two other persons of the Trinity, the sole source (phgh) of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit therefore takes his origin from the Father alone (ek monou tou PatroV) in a principal, proper and immediate manner.1
The Greek Fathers and the whole Christian Orient speak, in this regard, of the "Father's monarchy", and the Western tradition, following St Augustine, also confesses that the Holy Spirit takes his origin from the Father "principaliter", that is, as principle (De Trinitate XV, 25, 47, PL 42, 1094-1095). In this sense, therefore, the two traditions recognize that the "monarchy of the Father" implies that the Father is the sole Trinitarian Cause (Aitia) or principle (principium) of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.
This origin of the Holy Spirit from the Father alone as principle of the whole Trinity is called ekporeusiV by Greek tradition, following the Cappadocian Fathers. St Gregory of Nazianzus, the Theologian, in fact, characterizes the Spirit's relationship of origin from the Father by the proper term ekporeusiV, distinguishing it from that of procession (to proienai) which the Spirit has in common with the Son. "The Spirit is truly the Spirit proceeding (proion) from the Father, not by filiation, for it is not by generation, but by ekporeusiV (Discourse 39, 12, Sources chrétiennes 358, p. 175). Even if St Cyril of Alexandria happens at times to apply the verb ekporeusqai the Son's relationship of origin from the Father, he never uses it for the relationship of the Spirit to the Son (Cf. Commentary on St John, X, 2, PG 74, 910D; Ep 55, PG 77, 316 D, etc.). Even for St Cyril, the term ekporeusiV as distinct from the term "proceed" (proienai) can only characterize a relationship of origin to the principle without principle of the Trinity: the Father.
That is why the Orthodox Orient has always refused the formula to ek tou PatroV kai tou Uiou ekporeuomenon and the Catholic Church has refused the addition kai tou Uiou to the formula to ek tou PatroV ekporeuomenon in the Greek text of the Nicene-Constantinopolitan Symbol, even in its liturgical use by Latins.
The Orthodox Orient does not, however, refuse all eternal relationship between the Son and the Holy Spirit in their origin from the Father. St Gregory of Nazianzus, a great witness to our two traditions, makes this clear in response to Macedonius who was asking: "What then is lacking to the Spirit to be the Son, for if nothing was lacking to him, he would be the Son? — We say that nothing is lacking to him, for nothing is lacking to God; but it is the difference in manifestation, if I may say so, or in the relationship between them (thV pros allhla scesewV diajoron) which makes also the difference in what they are called" (Discourse 31, 9, Sources chrétiennes 250, pp. 290-292).
The Orthodox Orient has, however, given a happy expression to this relationship with the formula dia tou Uiou ekporeuomenon (who takes his origin from the Father by or through the Son). St Basil already said of the Holy Spirit: "Through the Son (dia tou Uiou), who is one, he is joined to the Father, who is one, and by himself completes the Blessed Trinity" (Treatise on the Holy Spirit, XVIII, 45, Sources chrétiennes 17 bis, p. 408). St Maximus the Confessor said: "By nature (jusei) the Holy Spirit in his being (kat’ ousian) takes substantially (ousiodwV) his origin (ekporeuomenon) from the Father through the Son who is begotten (di’ Uiou gennhqentoV)" (Quaestiones ad Thalassium, LXIII, PG 90, 672 C). We find this again in St John Damascene: "(o Pathr) aei hn, ecwn ex eautou ton autou logon, kai dia tou logou autou ex eautou to Pnewma autou ekporeuomenon”, in English: “I say that God is always Father since he has always his Word coming from himself, and through his Word, having his Spirit issuing from him” (Dialogus contra Manichaeos 5, PG 94, 1512 B, ed. B. Kotter, Berlin 1981, p. 354; cf. PG 94, 848-849 A). This aspect of the Trinitarian mystery was confessed at the seventh Ecumenical council, meeting at Nicaea in 787, by the Patriarch of Constantinople, St Tarasius, who developed the Symbol as follows: "to Pneuma to agion, to kurion kai zwopoion, to ek tou Patros dia tou Uiou ekporeuomenon” (Mansi, XII, 1122 D).
This doctrine all bears witness to the fundamental Trinitarian faith as it was professed together by East and West at the time of the Fathers. It is the basis that must serve for the continuation of the current theological dialogue between Catholic and Orthodox.
The doctrine of the Filioque must be understood and presented by the Catholic Church in such a way that it cannot appear to contradict the Monarchy of the Father nor the fact that he is the sole origin (arch, aitia) of the ekporeusiV of the Spirit. The Filioque is, in fact, situated in a theological and linguistic context different from that of the affirmation of the sole monarchy of the Father, the one origin of the Son and of the Spirit. Against Arianism, which was still virulent in the West, its purpose was to stress the fact that the Holy Spirit is of the same divine nature as the Son, without calling in question the one monarchy of the Father.
We are presenting here the authentic doctrinal meaning of the Filioque on the basis of the Trinitarian faith of the Symbol professed by the second Ecumenical Council at Constantinople. We are giving this authoritative interpretation, while being aware of how inadequate human language is to express the ineffable mystery of the Holy Trinity, one God, a mystery which is beyond our words and our thoughts.
The Catholic Church interprets the Filioque with reference to the conciliar and ecumenical, normative and irrevocable value of the confession of faith in the eternal origin of the Holy Spirit, as defined in 381 by the Ecumenical Council of Constantinople in its Symbol. This Symbol only became known and received by Rome on the occasion of the Ecumenical Council of Chalcedon in 451. In the meantime, on the basis of the earlier Latin theological tradition, Fathers of the Church of the West like St Hilary, St Ambrose, St Augustine and St Leo the Great, had confessed that the Holy Spirit proceeds (procedit) eternally from the Father and the Son.2
Since the Latin Bible (the Vulgate and earlier Latin translations) had translated Jn 15:26 (para tou PatroV ekporeuetai) by "qui a Patre procedit", the Latins translated the ek tou PatroV ekporeuomenon of the Symbol of Nicaea-Constantinople by "ex Patre procedentem" (Mansi VII, 112 B). In this way, a false equivalence was involuntarily created with regard to the eternal origin of the Spirit between the Oriental theology of the ekporeusiV and the Latin theology of the processio.
The Greek ekporeusiV signifies only the relationship of origin to the Father alone as the principle without principle of the Trinity. The Latin processio, on the contrary, is a more common term, signifying the communication of the consubstantial divinity from the Father to the Son and from the Father, through and with the Son, to the Holy Spirit.3 In confessing the Holy Spirit "ex Patre procedentem", the Latins, therefore, could only suppose an implicit Filioque which would later be made explicit in their liturgical version of the Symbol.
In the West, the Filioque was confessed from the fifth century through the Quicumque (or "Athanasianum", DS 75) Symbol, and then by the Councils of Toledo in Visigothic Spain between 589 and 693 (DS 470, 485, 490, 527, 568), to affirm Trinitarian consubstantiality. If these Councils did not perhaps insert it in the Symbol of Nicaea-Constantinople, it is certainly to be found there from the end of the eighth century, as evidenced in the proceedings of the Council of Aquileia-Friuli in 796 (Mansi XIII, 836, D, ff.) and that of Aachen of 809 (Mansi XIV, 17). In the ninth century, however, faced with Charlemagne, Pope Leo III, in his anxiety to preserve unity with the Orient in the confession of faith, resisted this development of the Symbol which had spread spontaneously in the West, while safeguarding the truth contained in the Filioque. Rome only admitted it in 1014 into the liturgical Latin version of the Creed.
In the Patristic period, an analogous theology had developed in Alexandria, stemming from St Athanasius. As in the Latin tradition, it was expressed by the more common term of procession (proienai) indicating the communication of the divinity to the Holy Spirit from the Father and the Son in their consubstantial communion: "The Spirit proceeds (proeisi) from the Father and the Son; clearly, he is of the divine substance, proceeding (proion) substantially (ousiwdwV) in it and from it" (St Cyril of Alexandria, Thesaurus, PG 75, 585 A) .4
In the seventh century, the Byzantines were shocked by a confession of faith made by the Pope and including the Filioque with reference to the procession of the Holy Spirit; they translated the procession inaccurately by ekporeusiV. St Maximus the Confessor then wrote a letter from Rome linking together the two approaches — Cappadocian and Latin-Alexandrian — to the eternal origin of the Spirit: the Father is the sole principle without principle (in Greek aitia) of the Son and of the Spirit; the Father and the Son are consubstantial source of the procession (to proienai) of this same Spirit. "For the procession they [the Romans] brought the witness of the Latin Fathers, as well, of course, as that of St Cyril of Alexandria in his sacred study on the Gospel of St John. On this basis they showed that they themselves do not make the Son Cause (Aitia) of the Spirit. They know, indeed, that the Father is the sole Cause of the Son and of the Spirit, of one by generation and of the other by ekporeusiV — but they explained that the latter comes (proienai) through the Son, and they showed in this way the unity and the immutability of the essence" (Letter to Marinus of Cyprus, PG 91, 136 A-B). According to St Maximus, echoing Rome, the Filioque does not concern the ekporeusiV of the Spirit issued from the Father as source of the Trinity, but manifests his proienai (processio) in the consubstantial communion of the Father and the Son, while excluding any possible subordinationist interpretation of the Father's monarchy.
The fact that in Latin and Alexandrian theology the Holy Spirit, proceeds (proeisi) from the Father and the Son in their consubstantial communion does not mean that it is the divine essence or substance that proceed in him, but that it is communicated from the Father and the Son who have it in common. This point was confessed as dogma in 1215 by the Fourth Lateran Council: "The substance does not generate, is not begotten, does not proceed; but it is the Father who generates, the Son who is begotten, the Holy Spirit who proceeds: so that there is distinction in persons and unity in nature. Although other (alius) is the Father, other the Son, other the Holy Spirit, they are not another reality (aliud), but what the Father is the Son is and the Holy Spirit equally; so, according to the orthodox and catholic faith, we believe that they are consubstantial. For the Father, generating eternally the Son, has given to him his substance (...) It is clear that, in being born the Son has received the substance of the Father without this substance being in any way diminished, and so the Father and the Son have the same substance. So the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, who proceeds from them both, are one same reality" (DS 804-805).
In 1274 the Second Council of Lyons confessed that "the Holy Spirit proceeds eternally from the Father and the Son, not as from two principles but as from one single principle (tamquam ex uno principio)" (DS 850). In the light of the Lateran Council, which preceded the Second Council of Lyons, it is clear that it is not the divine essence that can be the "one principle" for the procession of the Holy Spirit. The Catechism of the Catholic Church interprets this formula in n. 248 as follows: "The eternal order of the divine persons in their consubstantial communion implies that the Father, as the 'principle without principle' (DS 1331), is the first origin of the Spirit, but also that as Father of the only Son, he is, with the Son, the single principle from which the Spirit proceeds (Second Council of Lyons, DS 850)".
For the Catholic Church, "at the outset the Eastern tradition expresses the Father's character as first origin of the Spirit. By confessing the Spirit as he 'who proceeds from the Father' ("ek tou PatroV ekporeuomenon" cf. Jn 15:26), it affirms that he comes from the Father through the Son. The Western tradition expresses first the consubstantial communion between Father and Son, by saying that the Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son (Filioque). (...) This legitimate complementarity, provided it does not become rigid, does not affect the identity of faith in the reality of the same mystery confessed" (Catechism of the Catholic Church, n. 248). Being aware of this, the Catholic Church has refused the addition of kai tou Uiou to the formula ek tou PatroV ekporeuomenon of the Symbol of Nicaea-Constantinople in the Churches, even of Latin rite, which use it in Greek. The liturgical use of this original text remains always legitimate in the Catholic Church.
If it is correctly situated, the Filioque of the Latin tradition must not lead to a subordination of the Holy Spirit in the Trinity. Even if the Catholic doctrine affirms that the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son in the communication of their consubstantial communion, it nonetheless recognizes the reality of the original relationship of the Holy Spirit as person with the Father, a relationship that the Greek Fathers express by the term ekporeusiV.5
In the same way, if in the Trinitarian order the Holy Spirit is consecutive to the relation between the Father and the Son, since he takes his origin from the Father as Father of the only Son,6 it is in the Spirit that this relationship between the Father and the Son itself attains its Trinitarian perfection. Just as the Father is characterized as Father by the Son he generates, so does the Spirit, by taking his origin from the Father, characterize the Father in the manner of the Trinity in relation to the Son and characterizes the Son in the manner of the Trinity in his relation to the Father: in the fullness of the Trinitarian mystery they are Father and Son in the Holy Spirit.7
The Father only generates the Son by breathing (proballein in Greek) through him the Holy Spirit and the Son is only begotten by the Father insofar as the spiration (probolh in Greek) passes through him. The Father is Father of the One Son only by being for him and through him the origin of the Holy Spirit.8
The Spirit does not precede the Son, since the Son characterizes as Father the Father from whom the Spirit takes his origin, according to the Trinitarian order.9 But the spiration of the Spirit from the Father takes place by and through (the two senses of dia in Greek) the generation of the Son, to which it gives its Trinitarian character. It is in this sense that St John Damascene says: "The Holy Spirit is a substantial power contemplated in his own distinct hypostasis, who proceeds from the Father and reposes in the Word" (De Fide orthodoxa I, 7, PG 94, 805 B, ed. B. Kotter, Berlin 1973, p. 16; Dialogus contra Manichaeos 5, PG 94, 1512 B, ed. B. Kotter, Berlin 1981, p. 354).10
What is this Trinitarian character that the person of the Holy Spirit brings to the very relationship between the Father and the Son? It is the original role of the Spirit in the economy with regard to the mission and work of the Son. The Father is love in its source (2 Cor 13:13; 1 Jn 4:8,16), the Son is "the Son that he loves" (Col 1:14). So a tradition dating back to St Augustine has seen in the Holy Spirit, through whom "God's love has been poured into our hearts" (Rom 5:5), love as the eternal Gift of the Father to his "beloved Son" (Mk 1:11; 9:7; Lk 20:13; Eph 1:6).11
The divine love which has its origin in the Father reposes in "the Son of his love" in order to exist consubstantially through the Son in the person of the Spirit, the Gift of love. This takes into account the fact that, through love, the Holy Spirit orients the whole life of Jesus towards the Father in the fulfilment of his will. The Father sends his Son (Gal 4:4) when Mary conceives him through the operation of the Holy Spirit (cf. Lk 1:35). The Holy Spirit makes Jesus manifest as Son of the Father by resting upon him at Baptism (cf. Lk 3:21-22; Jn 1:33). He drives Jesus into the wilderness (cf. Mk 1:12). Jesus returns "full of the Holy Spirit" (Lk 4:1). Then he begins his ministry "in the power of the Spirit" (Lk 4:14). He is filled with joy in the Spirit, blessing the Father for his gracious will (cf. Lk 10:21). He chooses his Apostles "through the Holy Spirit" (Acts 1:2). He casts out demons by the Spirit of God (Mt 12:28). He offers himself to the Father "through the eternal Spirit" (Heb 9:14). On the Cross he "commits his Spirit" into the Father's hands (Lk 23:46). "In the Spirit" he descended to the dead (cf. 1 Pt 3:19), and by the Spirit he was raised from the dead (cf. Rom 8:11) and "designated Son of God in power" (Rom 1:4).12 This role of the Spirit in the innermost human existence of the Son of God made man derives from an eternal Trinitarian relationship through which the Spirit, in his mystery as Gift of Love, characterizes the relation between the Father, as source of love, and his beloved Son.
The original character of the person of the Spirit as eternal Gift of the Father's love for his beloved Son shows that the Spirit, while coming from the Son in his mission, is the one who brings human beings into Christ's filial relationship to his Father, for this relationship finds only in him its Trinitarian character: "God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying Abba! Father!” (Gal 4:6). In the mystery of salvation and in the life of the Church, the Spirit therefore does much more than prolong the work of the Son. In fact, whatever Christ has instituted — Revelation, the Church, the sacraments, the apostolic ministry and its Magisterium — calls for constant invocation (epiklhsiV) of the Holy Spirit and his action (energeia), so that the love that "never ends" (1 Cor 13:8) may be made manifest in the communion of the saints with the life of the Trinity.
Pontificial Council for Promoting Christian Unity
The Holy Father, in the homily he gave in St Peter Basilica on 29 June in the presence of the Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew I, expressed a desire that "the traditional doctrine of the Filioque, present in the liturgical version of the Latin Credo, [be clarified] in order to highlight its full harmony with what the Ecumenical Council of Constantinople of 381 confesses in its creed: the Father as the source of the whole Trinity, the one origin both of the Son and of the Holy Spirit".
What is published here is the clarification he has asked for, which has been undertaken by the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity. It is intended as a contribution to the dialogue which is carried out by the Joint International Commission between the Roman Catholic Church and the Orthodox Church.
In its first report on "The Mystery of the Church and of the Eucharist in the light of the Mystery of the Holy Trinity", unanimously approved in Munich on 6 July 1982, the Joint International Commission for Theological Dialogue between the Roman Catholic Church and the Orthodox Church had mentioned the centuries-old difficulty between the two Churches concerning the eternal origin of the Holy Spirit. Not being able to treat this subject for itself in this first phase of the dialogue, the Commission stated: "Without wishing to resolve yet the difficulties which have arisen between the East and the West concerning the relationship between the Son and the Spirit, we can already say together that this Spirit, which proceeds from the Father (Jn 15:26) as the sole source in the Trinity and which has become the Spirit of our sonship (Rom 8:15) since he is also the Spirit of the Son (Gal 4:6), is communicated to us particularly in the Eucharist by this Son upon whom he reposes in time and in eternity (Jn 1:32)" (Information Service of the Secretariat for Promoting Christian Unity, n. 49, p. 108, I, 6).
The Catholic Church acknowledges the conciliar, ecumenical, normative and irrevocable value, as expression of the one common faith of the Church and of all Christians, of the Symbol professed in Greek at Constantinople in 381 by the Second Ecumenical Council. No profession of faith peculiar to a particular liturgical tradition can contradict this expression of the faith taught and professed by the undivided Church.
On the basis of Jn 15:26, this Symbol confesses the Spirit “to ek tou PatroV ekporeuomenon” (“who takes his origin from the Father”). The Father alone is the principle without principle (arch anarcoV) of the two other persons of the Trinity, the sole source (phgh) of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit therefore takes his origin from the Father alone (ek monou tou PatroV) in a principal, proper and immediate manner.1
The Greek Fathers and the whole Christian Orient speak, in this regard, of the "Father's monarchy", and the Western tradition, following St Augustine, also confesses that the Holy Spirit takes his origin from the Father "principaliter", that is, as principle (De Trinitate XV, 25, 47, PL 42, 1094-1095). In this sense, therefore, the two traditions recognize that the "monarchy of the Father" implies that the Father is the sole Trinitarian Cause (Aitia) or principle (principium) of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.
This origin of the Holy Spirit from the Father alone as principle of the whole Trinity is called ekporeusiV by Greek tradition, following the Cappadocian Fathers. St Gregory of Nazianzus, the Theologian, in fact, characterizes the Spirit's relationship of origin from the Father by the proper term ekporeusiV, distinguishing it from that of procession (to proienai) which the Spirit has in common with the Son. "The Spirit is truly the Spirit proceeding (proion) from the Father, not by filiation, for it is not by generation, but by ekporeusiV (Discourse 39, 12, Sources chrétiennes 358, p. 175). Even if St Cyril of Alexandria happens at times to apply the verb ekporeusqai the Son's relationship of origin from the Father, he never uses it for the relationship of the Spirit to the Son (Cf. Commentary on St John, X, 2, PG 74, 910D; Ep 55, PG 77, 316 D, etc.). Even for St Cyril, the term ekporeusiV as distinct from the term "proceed" (proienai) can only characterize a relationship of origin to the principle without principle of the Trinity: the Father.
That is why the Orthodox Orient has always refused the formula to ek tou PatroV kai tou Uiou ekporeuomenon and the Catholic Church has refused the addition kai tou Uiou to the formula to ek tou PatroV ekporeuomenon in the Greek text of the Nicene-Constantinopolitan Symbol, even in its liturgical use by Latins.
The Orthodox Orient does not, however, refuse all eternal relationship between the Son and the Holy Spirit in their origin from the Father. St Gregory of Nazianzus, a great witness to our two traditions, makes this clear in response to Macedonius who was asking: "What then is lacking to the Spirit to be the Son, for if nothing was lacking to him, he would be the Son? — We say that nothing is lacking to him, for nothing is lacking to God; but it is the difference in manifestation, if I may say so, or in the relationship between them (thV pros allhla scesewV diajoron) which makes also the difference in what they are called" (Discourse 31, 9, Sources chrétiennes 250, pp. 290-292).
The Orthodox Orient has, however, given a happy expression to this relationship with the formula dia tou Uiou ekporeuomenon (who takes his origin from the Father by or through the Son). St Basil already said of the Holy Spirit: "Through the Son (dia tou Uiou), who is one, he is joined to the Father, who is one, and by himself completes the Blessed Trinity" (Treatise on the Holy Spirit, XVIII, 45, Sources chrétiennes 17 bis, p. 408). St Maximus the Confessor said: "By nature (jusei) the Holy Spirit in his being (kat’ ousian) takes substantially (ousiodwV) his origin (ekporeuomenon) from the Father through the Son who is begotten (di’ Uiou gennhqentoV)" (Quaestiones ad Thalassium, LXIII, PG 90, 672 C). We find this again in St John Damascene: "(o Pathr) aei hn, ecwn ex eautou ton autou logon, kai dia tou logou autou ex eautou to Pnewma autou ekporeuomenon”, in English: “I say that God is always Father since he has always his Word coming from himself, and through his Word, having his Spirit issuing from him” (Dialogus contra Manichaeos 5, PG 94, 1512 B, ed. B. Kotter, Berlin 1981, p. 354; cf. PG 94, 848-849 A). This aspect of the Trinitarian mystery was confessed at the seventh Ecumenical council, meeting at Nicaea in 787, by the Patriarch of Constantinople, St Tarasius, who developed the Symbol as follows: "to Pneuma to agion, to kurion kai zwopoion, to ek tou Patros dia tou Uiou ekporeuomenon” (Mansi, XII, 1122 D).
This doctrine all bears witness to the fundamental Trinitarian faith as it was professed together by East and West at the time of the Fathers. It is the basis that must serve for the continuation of the current theological dialogue between Catholic and Orthodox.
The doctrine of the Filioque must be understood and presented by the Catholic Church in such a way that it cannot appear to contradict the Monarchy of the Father nor the fact that he is the sole origin (arch, aitia) of the ekporeusiV of the Spirit. The Filioque is, in fact, situated in a theological and linguistic context different from that of the affirmation of the sole monarchy of the Father, the one origin of the Son and of the Spirit. Against Arianism, which was still virulent in the West, its purpose was to stress the fact that the Holy Spirit is of the same divine nature as the Son, without calling in question the one monarchy of the Father.
We are presenting here the authentic doctrinal meaning of the Filioque on the basis of the Trinitarian faith of the Symbol professed by the second Ecumenical Council at Constantinople. We are giving this authoritative interpretation, while being aware of how inadequate human language is to express the ineffable mystery of the Holy Trinity, one God, a mystery which is beyond our words and our thoughts.
The Catholic Church interprets the Filioque with reference to the conciliar and ecumenical, normative and irrevocable value of the confession of faith in the eternal origin of the Holy Spirit, as defined in 381 by the Ecumenical Council of Constantinople in its Symbol. This Symbol only became known and received by Rome on the occasion of the Ecumenical Council of Chalcedon in 451. In the meantime, on the basis of the earlier Latin theological tradition, Fathers of the Church of the West like St Hilary, St Ambrose, St Augustine and St Leo the Great, had confessed that the Holy Spirit proceeds (procedit) eternally from the Father and the Son.2
Since the Latin Bible (the Vulgate and earlier Latin translations) had translated Jn 15:26 (para tou PatroV ekporeuetai) by "qui a Patre procedit", the Latins translated the ek tou PatroV ekporeuomenon of the Symbol of Nicaea-Constantinople by "ex Patre procedentem" (Mansi VII, 112 B). In this way, a false equivalence was involuntarily created with regard to the eternal origin of the Spirit between the Oriental theology of the ekporeusiV and the Latin theology of the processio.
The Greek ekporeusiV signifies only the relationship of origin to the Father alone as the principle without principle of the Trinity. The Latin processio, on the contrary, is a more common term, signifying the communication of the consubstantial divinity from the Father to the Son and from the Father, through and with the Son, to the Holy Spirit.3 In confessing the Holy Spirit "ex Patre procedentem", the Latins, therefore, could only suppose an implicit Filioque which would later be made explicit in their liturgical version of the Symbol.
In the West, the Filioque was confessed from the fifth century through the Quicumque (or "Athanasianum", DS 75) Symbol, and then by the Councils of Toledo in Visigothic Spain between 589 and 693 (DS 470, 485, 490, 527, 568), to affirm Trinitarian consubstantiality. If these Councils did not perhaps insert it in the Symbol of Nicaea-Constantinople, it is certainly to be found there from the end of the eighth century, as evidenced in the proceedings of the Council of Aquileia-Friuli in 796 (Mansi XIII, 836, D, ff.) and that of Aachen of 809 (Mansi XIV, 17). In the ninth century, however, faced with Charlemagne, Pope Leo III, in his anxiety to preserve unity with the Orient in the confession of faith, resisted this development of the Symbol which had spread spontaneously in the West, while safeguarding the truth contained in the Filioque. Rome only admitted it in 1014 into the liturgical Latin version of the Creed.
In the Patristic period, an analogous theology had developed in Alexandria, stemming from St Athanasius. As in the Latin tradition, it was expressed by the more common term of procession (proienai) indicating the communication of the divinity to the Holy Spirit from the Father and the Son in their consubstantial communion: "The Spirit proceeds (proeisi) from the Father and the Son; clearly, he is of the divine substance, proceeding (proion) substantially (ousiwdwV) in it and from it" (St Cyril of Alexandria, Thesaurus, PG 75, 585 A) .4
In the seventh century, the Byzantines were shocked by a confession of faith made by the Pope and including the Filioque with reference to the procession of the Holy Spirit; they translated the procession inaccurately by ekporeusiV. St Maximus the Confessor then wrote a letter from Rome linking together the two approaches — Cappadocian and Latin-Alexandrian — to the eternal origin of the Spirit: the Father is the sole principle without principle (in Greek aitia) of the Son and of the Spirit; the Father and the Son are consubstantial source of the procession (to proienai) of this same Spirit. "For the procession they [the Romans] brought the witness of the Latin Fathers, as well, of course, as that of St Cyril of Alexandria in his sacred study on the Gospel of St John. On this basis they showed that they themselves do not make the Son Cause (Aitia) of the Spirit. They know, indeed, that the Father is the sole Cause of the Son and of the Spirit, of one by generation and of the other by ekporeusiV — but they explained that the latter comes (proienai) through the Son, and they showed in this way the unity and the immutability of the essence" (Letter to Marinus of Cyprus, PG 91, 136 A-B). According to St Maximus, echoing Rome, the Filioque does not concern the ekporeusiV of the Spirit issued from the Father as source of the Trinity, but manifests his proienai (processio) in the consubstantial communion of the Father and the Son, while excluding any possible subordinationist interpretation of the Father's monarchy.
The fact that in Latin and Alexandrian theology the Holy Spirit, proceeds (proeisi) from the Father and the Son in their consubstantial communion does not mean that it is the divine essence or substance that proceed in him, but that it is communicated from the Father and the Son who have it in common. This point was confessed as dogma in 1215 by the Fourth Lateran Council: "The substance does not generate, is not begotten, does not proceed; but it is the Father who generates, the Son who is begotten, the Holy Spirit who proceeds: so that there is distinction in persons and unity in nature. Although other (alius) is the Father, other the Son, other the Holy Spirit, they are not another reality (aliud), but what the Father is the Son is and the Holy Spirit equally; so, according to the orthodox and catholic faith, we believe that they are consubstantial. For the Father, generating eternally the Son, has given to him his substance (...) It is clear that, in being born the Son has received the substance of the Father without this substance being in any way diminished, and so the Father and the Son have the same substance. So the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, who proceeds from them both, are one same reality" (DS 804-805).
In 1274 the Second Council of Lyons confessed that "the Holy Spirit proceeds eternally from the Father and the Son, not as from two principles but as from one single principle (tamquam ex uno principio)" (DS 850). In the light of the Lateran Council, which preceded the Second Council of Lyons, it is clear that it is not the divine essence that can be the "one principle" for the procession of the Holy Spirit. The Catechism of the Catholic Church interprets this formula in n. 248 as follows: "The eternal order of the divine persons in their consubstantial communion implies that the Father, as the 'principle without principle' (DS 1331), is the first origin of the Spirit, but also that as Father of the only Son, he is, with the Son, the single principle from which the Spirit proceeds (Second Council of Lyons, DS 850)".
For the Catholic Church, "at the outset the Eastern tradition expresses the Father's character as first origin of the Spirit. By confessing the Spirit as he 'who proceeds from the Father' ("ek tou PatroV ekporeuomenon" cf. Jn 15:26), it affirms that he comes from the Father through the Son. The Western tradition expresses first the consubstantial communion between Father and Son, by saying that the Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son (Filioque). (...) This legitimate complementarity, provided it does not become rigid, does not affect the identity of faith in the reality of the same mystery confessed" (Catechism of the Catholic Church, n. 248). Being aware of this, the Catholic Church has refused the addition of kai tou Uiou to the formula ek tou PatroV ekporeuomenon of the Symbol of Nicaea-Constantinople in the Churches, even of Latin rite, which use it in Greek. The liturgical use of this original text remains always legitimate in the Catholic Church.
If it is correctly situated, the Filioque of the Latin tradition must not lead to a subordination of the Holy Spirit in the Trinity. Even if the Catholic doctrine affirms that the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son in the communication of their consubstantial communion, it nonetheless recognizes the reality of the original relationship of the Holy Spirit as person with the Father, a relationship that the Greek Fathers express by the term ekporeusiV.5
In the same way, if in the Trinitarian order the Holy Spirit is consecutive to the relation between the Father and the Son, since he takes his origin from the Father as Father of the only Son,6 it is in the Spirit that this relationship between the Father and the Son itself attains its Trinitarian perfection. Just as the Father is characterized as Father by the Son he generates, so does the Spirit, by taking his origin from the Father, characterize the Father in the manner of the Trinity in relation to the Son and characterizes the Son in the manner of the Trinity in his relation to the Father: in the fullness of the Trinitarian mystery they are Father and Son in the Holy Spirit.7
The Father only generates the Son by breathing (proballein in Greek) through him the Holy Spirit and the Son is only begotten by the Father insofar as the spiration (probolh in Greek) passes through him. The Father is Father of the One Son only by being for him and through him the origin of the Holy Spirit.8
The Spirit does not precede the Son, since the Son characterizes as Father the Father from whom the Spirit takes his origin, according to the Trinitarian order.9 But the spiration of the Spirit from the Father takes place by and through (the two senses of dia in Greek) the generation of the Son, to which it gives its Trinitarian character. It is in this sense that St John Damascene says: "The Holy Spirit is a substantial power contemplated in his own distinct hypostasis, who proceeds from the Father and reposes in the Word" (De Fide orthodoxa I, 7, PG 94, 805 B, ed. B. Kotter, Berlin 1973, p. 16; Dialogus contra Manichaeos 5, PG 94, 1512 B, ed. B. Kotter, Berlin 1981, p. 354).10
What is this Trinitarian character that the person of the Holy Spirit brings to the very relationship between the Father and the Son? It is the original role of the Spirit in the economy with regard to the mission and work of the Son. The Father is love in its source (2 Cor 13:13; 1 Jn 4:8,16), the Son is "the Son that he loves" (Col 1:14). So a tradition dating back to St Augustine has seen in the Holy Spirit, through whom "God's love has been poured into our hearts" (Rom 5:5), love as the eternal Gift of the Father to his "beloved Son" (Mk 1:11; 9:7; Lk 20:13; Eph 1:6).11
The divine love which has its origin in the Father reposes in "the Son of his love" in order to exist consubstantially through the Son in the person of the Spirit, the Gift of love. This takes into account the fact that, through love, the Holy Spirit orients the whole life of Jesus towards the Father in the fulfilment of his will. The Father sends his Son (Gal 4:4) when Mary conceives him through the operation of the Holy Spirit (cf. Lk 1:35). The Holy Spirit makes Jesus manifest as Son of the Father by resting upon him at Baptism (cf. Lk 3:21-22; Jn 1:33). He drives Jesus into the wilderness (cf. Mk 1:12). Jesus returns "full of the Holy Spirit" (Lk 4:1). Then he begins his ministry "in the power of the Spirit" (Lk 4:14). He is filled with joy in the Spirit, blessing the Father for his gracious will (cf. Lk 10:21). He chooses his Apostles "through the Holy Spirit" (Acts 1:2). He casts out demons by the Spirit of God (Mt 12:28). He offers himself to the Father "through the eternal Spirit" (Heb 9:14). On the Cross he "commits his Spirit" into the Father's hands (Lk 23:46). "In the Spirit" he descended to the dead (cf. 1 Pt 3:19), and by the Spirit he was raised from the dead (cf. Rom 8:11) and "designated Son of God in power" (Rom 1:4).12 This role of the Spirit in the innermost human existence of the Son of God made man derives from an eternal Trinitarian relationship through which the Spirit, in his mystery as Gift of Love, characterizes the relation between the Father, as source of love, and his beloved Son.
The original character of the person of the Spirit as eternal Gift of the Father's love for his beloved Son shows that the Spirit, while coming from the Son in his mission, is the one who brings human beings into Christ's filial relationship to his Father, for this relationship finds only in him its Trinitarian character: "God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying Abba! Father!” (Gal 4:6). In the mystery of salvation and in the life of the Church, the Spirit therefore does much more than prolong the work of the Son. In fact, whatever Christ has instituted — Revelation, the Church, the sacraments, the apostolic ministry and its Magisterium — calls for constant invocation (epiklhsiV) of the Holy Spirit and his action (energeia), so that the love that "never ends" (1 Cor 13:8) may be made manifest in the communion of the saints with the life of the Trinity.
Wednesday, February 4, 2009
pastoral leadership: reflections on sessions participated
THE PRIEST AS STEWARD: A LAYMAN’S VIEW AND EXPECTATIONS
Its curious how the church divides the Christian World in two; the clergy and the laity
The Greek word kleros, signifying “share,” or “inheritance,” is used in I Pet. 5:3 to designate the priesthood of all the faithful. Most Christian churches, including the Roman Catholic, understand the clergy as persons functioning within the priesthood of all the people but ordained, or set aside, for particular service, especially in connection with eucharistic ministry.
A distinction between clergy and laity developed in the 2nd century, although the clerical ministry traces its beginnings to the commission of the Twelve Apostles and the Seventy for service. Over the centuries, the distinction between clergy and laity was emphasized by special privileges granted to the clergy, including those granted by the Roman emperor Constantine the Great. These privileges were later extended and codified by the Theodosian Code (438). Later progressive legislation in most countries removed the special privileges enjoyed by the clergy. Such privileges, including exemption from secular courts, were an important issue in the Protestant Reformation.
Although the laity as a class are not mentioned in the New Testament, they came into being with the clergy at the end of the 1st century; the laity were identified as the part of the church that is not in orders. If the office of the clergy is conceived as teaching, sanctifying, and governing, then the function of the laity is to be taught, sanctified, and governed. [1]
At the latter part of this description the function of the laity falls at the receiving end as if the clergy possesses access to the tree of knowledge. In our age, this doesn’t hold water anymore strictly speaking. One reality would surface out: in order for the clergy to be effective in their ministerial functions, they must know what to teach to the laity if they are to do this. They must have to hear feedbacks from them. They must need to know the context where the subjects of his ministry are situated into so that they could possibly meet. In a way the laity could teach the clergy regarding the latter’s effectiveness in doing his Christian ministry. Thus, there must needs be a dialogue between the two sides like this topic: The Priest as Steward: a Layman’s View and Expectations.
Thanks for the opportunity the seminary curriculum has given us. This type of feedbacking is very much facilitated in the form of a classroom discussion where the resource persons: Joe Salvador, Dodong Senining and Glenna Parilla expressed their own expectations regarding the ordained ministers as pastors in the parishes.
Valuable indeed were the feedbacks they gave us. They wanted to retrieve from the new breed of priests the good things they observed from the ones during their early years. They noticed that priests of today are no longer as outwardly prayerful as the ones during their early years. The type who recite the liturgy of the hours outside and saying the rosary outside the church, in a pasillo etc. that can be seen as an example of prayer to the people. In a way, this is true. People really look for examples. They do not content themselves on the words uttered by their pastors on Sundays as a form of exhortation, as to how they would live their lives for the rest of the six days of the week, in relation to the gospel digested by homilist for their Christian consumption on Sundays and Holy days of obligation.
One affirmed the clergy “we always hold you guys in high esteem”. Coming from a layman who himself is a manager, this statement very much affirms. He come from this premise when he would dart off his suggestions like this: “be a man of God- a man of the poor”. A man of the poor as he would continue to impart suggestions: “make them (the poor) your friends by becoming one of them” or did he mean one with them? I don’t surely know. But not in his next statement “Pabilin gyud nga pobre ang pari.”
In the area of politics one said: Politics is a relationship it is becoming a daily part of the life of priests. A suggestion comes in which for me is difficult. It says: the politicians, affirm their good deeds and stand firm against their bad deeds. Difficult in a situation where the Church would receive financial supports from these people.
Priesthood is never a bed of roses. This is not an ambition to enjoy. Why would I risk my self to a life without a wife to love and children to bear my name and raise as good Christians? There really are things that when explained would lose their real beauty and fragrance; things like the mystery of one’s vocation.
[1] Encyclopedia Britannica online
MARRIAGE INTERVIEW AND COUNSELLING
The talk was given by Rev. Fr. Eligio Suico a parish priest in Bogo. His introductory line goes like this: FIRST OF AL WEW MUST BE CONVINCED PERSONALLY OF THE SANCTITY OF MARRIAGE. He also pointed out the bad effect of the mass media in marriage and he refers to the convenient life of movie-stars changing partners as if it were a commodity that expires, as if considering the ,marriage is a contract for a short period of time. The sanctity of marriage commitment is never given any importance let alone the personal whims and caprices of both parties. In a way, the concept regarding marriage is getting more immature than it has been instead of the people maturing into concept of marriage as the time would go by.
According to Fr. Ely speaking in the native tongue these are the most common problems a pastor can encounter in the event of marriage counseling:
· Wa na paulia sa kapikas sa kinabuhi
· Nangitag lain ang usa
· Walay suporta nga gihimo ang kapikas
· Pagkapalahubog
· Pagpangulata
Fr. Ely on the other hand offers some preventive measures to save and acquire harmony in marriage:
Prayer
Appreciation of one another’s giftedness
Avoidance of focusing on the negative side
Maintaining the value of hopefulness that problems be overcome and the situation be made whole again.
MY OWN REFLECTION
There is a beautiful Tagalog song done by the Apo bearing the title barkada. One phrase there is very much true to relationship be it between lovers or among friends and family members. It states: LAHAT NG BAGAY AY NADADAAN SA USAPAN. True enough because communication is a basic necessity among relationships. Communication happens among all sorts of animals not excluding human beings. Even God feels it a need to communicate to us as in the case of Abraham and the other patriarchs and prophets. He even gave us an ultimate communication of himself not contented of his sent word to the prophets. He sent to us a living Word in the person of no less than his only Son. In this way he wanted to tells us that real persons communicate not just in words but by the whole of themselves. It is important to note that communication is not only limited to audible words but to unspoken gestures. This is not only true among the speech challenged persons but also among person who have the eloquence of speech because there are just things that would escape the boundary of words hence the there is a need to be sensitive at all times. USAPAN is the usual communication however it greatly needs sensitivity on both speaker and listener while it is all the more necessary to be sensitive to gestures.
As a person that would eventually be involved in counseling the married couples in this case, there is a necessity for me to live out the thing called sensitivity- the one that I pointed out above. As a would be pastor, I deem it a need to facilitate couples maintain, mend and improve the quality of their relationships. I also have the responsibility to remind and even inculcate it to them the SANCTITY of marriage and our individual call to SANCTITY in whatever state of life a person is in.
One thing that Fr. Ely encourage me is to read the lives of those exemplary Christians that have gone away before us and to learn from them for my own formation and for the formation of couples specifically.
FAMILY LIFE AND MINISTRY
Its good to know of the universal church’s concern for the formation of families but it’s also sad to note that this is one program that is not very much supported by pastors in the parish level. However, the problem may not be of the church’s program let alone the diligence of some pastors because this is not an easy task added to it is the burden of not automatically seeing the results of this program. For pastors that are not process oriented, this might be difficult for them to buy.
PRINCIPLE OF GRADUALISM
One thing that I am most appreciative of regarding this program of the Church is their trust in the idea or principle of gradualism which is expressed in this way.
· belief in the gradual and “ongoing growth of a person within the self;” eventually aiming at developing a sense of faith in the family members;
· the education be by the living of and witnessing to values being promoted; rather than by imposing them;
· that promotion be carried out by the families and with families and therefore, thru participative relationships;
· that formation of a parish core group is not an end in itself, but the beginning of a self reliant, self nourishing and self governing process aimed at change of values, improvement/deepening of husband wife relationships and growth in the spiritual/religious life of the couples and family members.
MY REFLECTION
Personally would I confess this truth that I am not a process oriented person. I want immediate results. I feel it a need to see them because for me it indicates fulfillment on my part; a success so to speak. But as I come to know, the Church can’t be treated that way. The Church is a loose organization taking into consideration each individuals pacing for growth in the Christian life.
The Church takes into account the various personalities of various members of the Body of Christ. Hence, the Church is promotes un-health in the integrity of the human person should she impose sweepingly and hastily the tenets of morality that she deems important to the Christian life. She can’t be a dictator or else she would cease to be faithful to Christ. She couldn’t be a tyrant to the implementation of behaviors in the families because aside from violating God’s gift of freedom to humanity, she could become very ineffective in spreading the good news of God’s reign. That is the reason why I quoted the principle of gradualism as adopted by the Family Life an Ministry because I appreciate very much this gesture of the Church imitating Christ’s gesture of patience and love to all.
To narrow down, the family is a fundamental society within the community. It’s universal whether the community is Christian or non-Christian at all or mixed. The formation program for me is a must when we talk about its necessity within the church. Why, because homilies are never enough. It doesn’t elaborate much as to the specific needs of the different sectors within the community. Taking it seriously, the formation program like the FLA in a way is intensive and inclusive because it not only deals with growth of the Christian life of the wife nor of the husband nor of the children but the whole family.
When we talk about formation programs within the Church, this one takes precedence over the others. This is very basic and would very much involve the witnessing of the doctrine of the most holy Trinity because primarily, the Trinity is a relationship and we can never “understand” the Trinity practically without our own experience of a loving relationship within our own respective families.
YOUTH MINISTRY
The talk was given by no less than the director of the youth ministry in the Archdiocese. I sympathize with the hardships he is experiencing now and I appreciate his sacrifices as director of the ministry. One adage regarding the youth seeped into my mind as I was listening to him. The saying goes “mas maayo pag pabantayon kog usa ka toril nga baka kay sa pabantayon kog pundok sa mga batan-on” . Even granting that the Asians are not known to be hyperactive nor do the Filipinos, this type of human state the youth are in connotes vibrant energy stemming from their nature.
Personally I am also involved in helping shape the youth in our parish, I still could testify to this energy that is in them. If not guided with proper education and channeled to the right activity this same energy could drag these creatures into activities and habits that would not be helpful to their integral growth. And a fact that I have experienced is their ability to work hard from dusk to dawn and from sunrise to sundown, with the motivation spurred on to them on the right spot. But they are very transient. They are like flowers, here today and gone tomorrow. So much so that in the youth ministry we keep on giving the same introduction because each year come new faces that need to be tamed, new persons that need to be shaped. The others may have landed on good jobs and the others may have contracted marriage- marriage being considered as the end of the person’s all youthful activities.
Nevertheless, the transience of the youth should not be a block to do ministry. The need to help them grow right is a must. The youth is the hope of the fatherland according to Dr. Jose Rizal but they cannot be the hope without the patience of the elders in forming them. Thus the responsibility or irresponsibility of the youth in the future is decided today. It is done by those in the position to educate them.
I for part may not be best suited in the formation of the youth considering my dominant personality but if given the chance I would gladly work with these people and for these people. Mas maayo na lang tingali nang magbantay ta sa mga batan-on nga kiat pas mga baka kaysa magbantay tag usa ka pundok sa mga leyon.
THE CHURCH AND THE URBAN POOR
"The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring glad tidings to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim liberty to captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, and to proclaim a year acceptable to the Lord." Luke 4:18-19
Many poor people now are populating the urban areas. We can almost always see them living in sub-human conditions due to many reasons. Many of them come from the rural areas and have arrived here to look for opportunities of finding jobs. The hope of augmenting their situation drives them to the cities.
Our tendency or I’m sorry, my own tendency is to find the one to blame regarding the mass poverty situation. Next to that is to question the role of the government and the corruption that has been contributing to the demise of our poor. Then follows the lifestyle of priests who supposedly are to live poor at least in spirit now that their lifestyle (perhaps my own too) are not to the service of the poor. Take for example our close association with the affluent than the candle vendors. We easily welcome them who can donate a good sum to the parish than to a poor lad begging for food. Contrasting these realities to Luke 4:18-19, we might be taken aback, much less if we use as standard Matthew 25 :41-45
Then he will say to those on his left,
'Depart from me, you accursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels.
For I was hungry and you gave me no food,
I was thirsty and you gave me no drink,
a stranger and you gave me no welcome,
naked and you gave me no clothing,
ill and in prison, and you did not care for me.'
Then they will answer and say,
'Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or ill or in prison, and not minister to your needs?'
He will answer them,
'Amen, I say to you, what you did not do for one of these least ones, you did not do for me.'
The talk given by Fr. Oscar Camomot wrings my imagination challenging my weak will. The austere challenge he gives me wakes me up to a realization like this: I don’t have to do many great things. If I can only educate a few children, I could make a difference. In a situation like this that we are steeped into we might as well rethink of our own lifestyle then our own capacity and the power at hand that we given of.
The idea of education as posed by him as he takes it from Mother Teresa of Calcutta is not impossible. It is not even more difficult if taken in the micro level. A priest can of course do these if he only has the will.
The talk liberated me from the ideal of helping the poor via dole-outs however for me, it is always good to help those in need however meager the help is given and no matter how small the assistance is extended because in the end, it’s the attitude that counts more than the quantity and the quality of help is measured in the heart.
The desire to change the world is like a wish to uproot the Everest to the Pacific but according to the Chinese we can uproot a mountain by starting to carry off its pebbles.
THE PRIEST AND THE FAMILIES OF OCWS
The phenomenon of Filipino Overseas Contract Workers (OCWs) has become an inescapable reality in Philippine society. To date, there are about three million of our fellow Filipinos who labor abroad, 80 percent on land while the rest at sea. A great number of these are women.
Their foreign employment has of late been encouraged by a government who has seen the value of the sizeable foreign money they remit to its cash-strapped coffers. Our government leadership has in fact referred to them as “unsung heroes” helplessly aware of the great sacrifice they endure to lift families, and even themselves, from the state of destitution which the lack of opportunity in their homeland has forced them into. Indeed, employment, however menial, in the First World countries and the Newly Industrialized countries of Asia, offers far more attractive remuneration than the low wages, and even unemployment, the OCWs face here at home. Then, too, in the case of those who seek well-compensated professional advancement such as those in the medical and scientific fields, these same countries provide the more challenging arena for career development.
But while the OCWs present apparent advantages, there lies beneath, insidious situations and consequences, both social and psychological, not only to the workers themselves but to the society as well.
An excerpt- Pastoral Letter on Illegal Recruiters of OCW’s Beware of Labor Hirelings! Circular no. 94-39; Series of 1994 July 18, 1994
Driven by poverty, lack of employment opportunities and cheap waging system, many of our skilled and competent workers opt to work abroad than rot here in our beloved country. There are more things to do however than to throw blames on different sectors of our country. The situation even if it calls for another prophetic voice to chant off the litany of misfortunes over our heads, also calls for a pastoral action. Action might speak louder than words. At present, the church continues to do apostolate to OCW’s but more specifically to sea-based workers. This she does through the Scalabrinian Missionaries.
The Scalabrinians have a variety of services for migrants. In addition to spiritual ministry and community building, they provide education in schools, local organization for cultural activities, care for the sick, counseling and legal referral, advocacy and care for the elderly. They also encourage the study of migration through research centers and the dialogue with political and civil groups through specialized magazines.
In the Philippines, currently, the missionaries are involved in the care of seafarers, the assistance to departing Filipinos and to refugees, the formation program of young missionaries, the service of the local Church to migrants and activities of research and publication.
Fr. Reynaldo Saavedra C.S. – a Scalabrinian and a seaman himself gave a talk to us concerning their apostolate to the Filipino sea-based workers whether in commercial ships or in the fishing industry where many unaccounted Filipino workers have suffered injustice and maltreatment in the hands of their foreign employers. The efforts exerted by this congregation is very laudable and commendable. However, their apostolate is not as expansive as parishes are scattered over the Philippines. Parish priests as part of their pastoral care might well include in their parish programs the families of the workers and also accompany them in their journey through counseling and other activities.
To sum up all the seminars we have attended so far, I have felt the difficulties of a priest’s life especially that of the parish priest. he has so much to attend to. He has so much sheep to feed. But it’s not a stranger that needs the help of the shepherd because every stranger is no stranger in the eyes of Jesus and everybody should be a brother to a Christian and everybody should be a pastor’s concern.
Looking into myself and viewing at the near distance I could not see an easy life for me but a meaningful life despite the many people to care for in the many sectors of the society.
Its curious how the church divides the Christian World in two; the clergy and the laity
The Greek word kleros, signifying “share,” or “inheritance,” is used in I Pet. 5:3 to designate the priesthood of all the faithful. Most Christian churches, including the Roman Catholic, understand the clergy as persons functioning within the priesthood of all the people but ordained, or set aside, for particular service, especially in connection with eucharistic ministry.
A distinction between clergy and laity developed in the 2nd century, although the clerical ministry traces its beginnings to the commission of the Twelve Apostles and the Seventy for service. Over the centuries, the distinction between clergy and laity was emphasized by special privileges granted to the clergy, including those granted by the Roman emperor Constantine the Great. These privileges were later extended and codified by the Theodosian Code (438). Later progressive legislation in most countries removed the special privileges enjoyed by the clergy. Such privileges, including exemption from secular courts, were an important issue in the Protestant Reformation.
Although the laity as a class are not mentioned in the New Testament, they came into being with the clergy at the end of the 1st century; the laity were identified as the part of the church that is not in orders. If the office of the clergy is conceived as teaching, sanctifying, and governing, then the function of the laity is to be taught, sanctified, and governed. [1]
At the latter part of this description the function of the laity falls at the receiving end as if the clergy possesses access to the tree of knowledge. In our age, this doesn’t hold water anymore strictly speaking. One reality would surface out: in order for the clergy to be effective in their ministerial functions, they must know what to teach to the laity if they are to do this. They must have to hear feedbacks from them. They must need to know the context where the subjects of his ministry are situated into so that they could possibly meet. In a way the laity could teach the clergy regarding the latter’s effectiveness in doing his Christian ministry. Thus, there must needs be a dialogue between the two sides like this topic: The Priest as Steward: a Layman’s View and Expectations.
Thanks for the opportunity the seminary curriculum has given us. This type of feedbacking is very much facilitated in the form of a classroom discussion where the resource persons: Joe Salvador, Dodong Senining and Glenna Parilla expressed their own expectations regarding the ordained ministers as pastors in the parishes.
Valuable indeed were the feedbacks they gave us. They wanted to retrieve from the new breed of priests the good things they observed from the ones during their early years. They noticed that priests of today are no longer as outwardly prayerful as the ones during their early years. The type who recite the liturgy of the hours outside and saying the rosary outside the church, in a pasillo etc. that can be seen as an example of prayer to the people. In a way, this is true. People really look for examples. They do not content themselves on the words uttered by their pastors on Sundays as a form of exhortation, as to how they would live their lives for the rest of the six days of the week, in relation to the gospel digested by homilist for their Christian consumption on Sundays and Holy days of obligation.
One affirmed the clergy “we always hold you guys in high esteem”. Coming from a layman who himself is a manager, this statement very much affirms. He come from this premise when he would dart off his suggestions like this: “be a man of God- a man of the poor”. A man of the poor as he would continue to impart suggestions: “make them (the poor) your friends by becoming one of them” or did he mean one with them? I don’t surely know. But not in his next statement “Pabilin gyud nga pobre ang pari.”
In the area of politics one said: Politics is a relationship it is becoming a daily part of the life of priests. A suggestion comes in which for me is difficult. It says: the politicians, affirm their good deeds and stand firm against their bad deeds. Difficult in a situation where the Church would receive financial supports from these people.
Priesthood is never a bed of roses. This is not an ambition to enjoy. Why would I risk my self to a life without a wife to love and children to bear my name and raise as good Christians? There really are things that when explained would lose their real beauty and fragrance; things like the mystery of one’s vocation.
[1] Encyclopedia Britannica online
MARRIAGE INTERVIEW AND COUNSELLING
The talk was given by Rev. Fr. Eligio Suico a parish priest in Bogo. His introductory line goes like this: FIRST OF AL WEW MUST BE CONVINCED PERSONALLY OF THE SANCTITY OF MARRIAGE. He also pointed out the bad effect of the mass media in marriage and he refers to the convenient life of movie-stars changing partners as if it were a commodity that expires, as if considering the ,marriage is a contract for a short period of time. The sanctity of marriage commitment is never given any importance let alone the personal whims and caprices of both parties. In a way, the concept regarding marriage is getting more immature than it has been instead of the people maturing into concept of marriage as the time would go by.
According to Fr. Ely speaking in the native tongue these are the most common problems a pastor can encounter in the event of marriage counseling:
· Wa na paulia sa kapikas sa kinabuhi
· Nangitag lain ang usa
· Walay suporta nga gihimo ang kapikas
· Pagkapalahubog
· Pagpangulata
Fr. Ely on the other hand offers some preventive measures to save and acquire harmony in marriage:
Prayer
Appreciation of one another’s giftedness
Avoidance of focusing on the negative side
Maintaining the value of hopefulness that problems be overcome and the situation be made whole again.
MY OWN REFLECTION
There is a beautiful Tagalog song done by the Apo bearing the title barkada. One phrase there is very much true to relationship be it between lovers or among friends and family members. It states: LAHAT NG BAGAY AY NADADAAN SA USAPAN. True enough because communication is a basic necessity among relationships. Communication happens among all sorts of animals not excluding human beings. Even God feels it a need to communicate to us as in the case of Abraham and the other patriarchs and prophets. He even gave us an ultimate communication of himself not contented of his sent word to the prophets. He sent to us a living Word in the person of no less than his only Son. In this way he wanted to tells us that real persons communicate not just in words but by the whole of themselves. It is important to note that communication is not only limited to audible words but to unspoken gestures. This is not only true among the speech challenged persons but also among person who have the eloquence of speech because there are just things that would escape the boundary of words hence the there is a need to be sensitive at all times. USAPAN is the usual communication however it greatly needs sensitivity on both speaker and listener while it is all the more necessary to be sensitive to gestures.
As a person that would eventually be involved in counseling the married couples in this case, there is a necessity for me to live out the thing called sensitivity- the one that I pointed out above. As a would be pastor, I deem it a need to facilitate couples maintain, mend and improve the quality of their relationships. I also have the responsibility to remind and even inculcate it to them the SANCTITY of marriage and our individual call to SANCTITY in whatever state of life a person is in.
One thing that Fr. Ely encourage me is to read the lives of those exemplary Christians that have gone away before us and to learn from them for my own formation and for the formation of couples specifically.
FAMILY LIFE AND MINISTRY
Its good to know of the universal church’s concern for the formation of families but it’s also sad to note that this is one program that is not very much supported by pastors in the parish level. However, the problem may not be of the church’s program let alone the diligence of some pastors because this is not an easy task added to it is the burden of not automatically seeing the results of this program. For pastors that are not process oriented, this might be difficult for them to buy.
PRINCIPLE OF GRADUALISM
One thing that I am most appreciative of regarding this program of the Church is their trust in the idea or principle of gradualism which is expressed in this way.
· belief in the gradual and “ongoing growth of a person within the self;” eventually aiming at developing a sense of faith in the family members;
· the education be by the living of and witnessing to values being promoted; rather than by imposing them;
· that promotion be carried out by the families and with families and therefore, thru participative relationships;
· that formation of a parish core group is not an end in itself, but the beginning of a self reliant, self nourishing and self governing process aimed at change of values, improvement/deepening of husband wife relationships and growth in the spiritual/religious life of the couples and family members.
MY REFLECTION
Personally would I confess this truth that I am not a process oriented person. I want immediate results. I feel it a need to see them because for me it indicates fulfillment on my part; a success so to speak. But as I come to know, the Church can’t be treated that way. The Church is a loose organization taking into consideration each individuals pacing for growth in the Christian life.
The Church takes into account the various personalities of various members of the Body of Christ. Hence, the Church is promotes un-health in the integrity of the human person should she impose sweepingly and hastily the tenets of morality that she deems important to the Christian life. She can’t be a dictator or else she would cease to be faithful to Christ. She couldn’t be a tyrant to the implementation of behaviors in the families because aside from violating God’s gift of freedom to humanity, she could become very ineffective in spreading the good news of God’s reign. That is the reason why I quoted the principle of gradualism as adopted by the Family Life an Ministry because I appreciate very much this gesture of the Church imitating Christ’s gesture of patience and love to all.
To narrow down, the family is a fundamental society within the community. It’s universal whether the community is Christian or non-Christian at all or mixed. The formation program for me is a must when we talk about its necessity within the church. Why, because homilies are never enough. It doesn’t elaborate much as to the specific needs of the different sectors within the community. Taking it seriously, the formation program like the FLA in a way is intensive and inclusive because it not only deals with growth of the Christian life of the wife nor of the husband nor of the children but the whole family.
When we talk about formation programs within the Church, this one takes precedence over the others. This is very basic and would very much involve the witnessing of the doctrine of the most holy Trinity because primarily, the Trinity is a relationship and we can never “understand” the Trinity practically without our own experience of a loving relationship within our own respective families.
YOUTH MINISTRY
The talk was given by no less than the director of the youth ministry in the Archdiocese. I sympathize with the hardships he is experiencing now and I appreciate his sacrifices as director of the ministry. One adage regarding the youth seeped into my mind as I was listening to him. The saying goes “mas maayo pag pabantayon kog usa ka toril nga baka kay sa pabantayon kog pundok sa mga batan-on” . Even granting that the Asians are not known to be hyperactive nor do the Filipinos, this type of human state the youth are in connotes vibrant energy stemming from their nature.
Personally I am also involved in helping shape the youth in our parish, I still could testify to this energy that is in them. If not guided with proper education and channeled to the right activity this same energy could drag these creatures into activities and habits that would not be helpful to their integral growth. And a fact that I have experienced is their ability to work hard from dusk to dawn and from sunrise to sundown, with the motivation spurred on to them on the right spot. But they are very transient. They are like flowers, here today and gone tomorrow. So much so that in the youth ministry we keep on giving the same introduction because each year come new faces that need to be tamed, new persons that need to be shaped. The others may have landed on good jobs and the others may have contracted marriage- marriage being considered as the end of the person’s all youthful activities.
Nevertheless, the transience of the youth should not be a block to do ministry. The need to help them grow right is a must. The youth is the hope of the fatherland according to Dr. Jose Rizal but they cannot be the hope without the patience of the elders in forming them. Thus the responsibility or irresponsibility of the youth in the future is decided today. It is done by those in the position to educate them.
I for part may not be best suited in the formation of the youth considering my dominant personality but if given the chance I would gladly work with these people and for these people. Mas maayo na lang tingali nang magbantay ta sa mga batan-on nga kiat pas mga baka kaysa magbantay tag usa ka pundok sa mga leyon.
THE CHURCH AND THE URBAN POOR
"The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring glad tidings to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim liberty to captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, and to proclaim a year acceptable to the Lord." Luke 4:18-19
Many poor people now are populating the urban areas. We can almost always see them living in sub-human conditions due to many reasons. Many of them come from the rural areas and have arrived here to look for opportunities of finding jobs. The hope of augmenting their situation drives them to the cities.
Our tendency or I’m sorry, my own tendency is to find the one to blame regarding the mass poverty situation. Next to that is to question the role of the government and the corruption that has been contributing to the demise of our poor. Then follows the lifestyle of priests who supposedly are to live poor at least in spirit now that their lifestyle (perhaps my own too) are not to the service of the poor. Take for example our close association with the affluent than the candle vendors. We easily welcome them who can donate a good sum to the parish than to a poor lad begging for food. Contrasting these realities to Luke 4:18-19, we might be taken aback, much less if we use as standard Matthew 25 :41-45
Then he will say to those on his left,
'Depart from me, you accursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels.
For I was hungry and you gave me no food,
I was thirsty and you gave me no drink,
a stranger and you gave me no welcome,
naked and you gave me no clothing,
ill and in prison, and you did not care for me.'
Then they will answer and say,
'Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or ill or in prison, and not minister to your needs?'
He will answer them,
'Amen, I say to you, what you did not do for one of these least ones, you did not do for me.'
The talk given by Fr. Oscar Camomot wrings my imagination challenging my weak will. The austere challenge he gives me wakes me up to a realization like this: I don’t have to do many great things. If I can only educate a few children, I could make a difference. In a situation like this that we are steeped into we might as well rethink of our own lifestyle then our own capacity and the power at hand that we given of.
The idea of education as posed by him as he takes it from Mother Teresa of Calcutta is not impossible. It is not even more difficult if taken in the micro level. A priest can of course do these if he only has the will.
The talk liberated me from the ideal of helping the poor via dole-outs however for me, it is always good to help those in need however meager the help is given and no matter how small the assistance is extended because in the end, it’s the attitude that counts more than the quantity and the quality of help is measured in the heart.
The desire to change the world is like a wish to uproot the Everest to the Pacific but according to the Chinese we can uproot a mountain by starting to carry off its pebbles.
THE PRIEST AND THE FAMILIES OF OCWS
The phenomenon of Filipino Overseas Contract Workers (OCWs) has become an inescapable reality in Philippine society. To date, there are about three million of our fellow Filipinos who labor abroad, 80 percent on land while the rest at sea. A great number of these are women.
Their foreign employment has of late been encouraged by a government who has seen the value of the sizeable foreign money they remit to its cash-strapped coffers. Our government leadership has in fact referred to them as “unsung heroes” helplessly aware of the great sacrifice they endure to lift families, and even themselves, from the state of destitution which the lack of opportunity in their homeland has forced them into. Indeed, employment, however menial, in the First World countries and the Newly Industrialized countries of Asia, offers far more attractive remuneration than the low wages, and even unemployment, the OCWs face here at home. Then, too, in the case of those who seek well-compensated professional advancement such as those in the medical and scientific fields, these same countries provide the more challenging arena for career development.
But while the OCWs present apparent advantages, there lies beneath, insidious situations and consequences, both social and psychological, not only to the workers themselves but to the society as well.
An excerpt- Pastoral Letter on Illegal Recruiters of OCW’s Beware of Labor Hirelings! Circular no. 94-39; Series of 1994 July 18, 1994
Driven by poverty, lack of employment opportunities and cheap waging system, many of our skilled and competent workers opt to work abroad than rot here in our beloved country. There are more things to do however than to throw blames on different sectors of our country. The situation even if it calls for another prophetic voice to chant off the litany of misfortunes over our heads, also calls for a pastoral action. Action might speak louder than words. At present, the church continues to do apostolate to OCW’s but more specifically to sea-based workers. This she does through the Scalabrinian Missionaries.
The Scalabrinians have a variety of services for migrants. In addition to spiritual ministry and community building, they provide education in schools, local organization for cultural activities, care for the sick, counseling and legal referral, advocacy and care for the elderly. They also encourage the study of migration through research centers and the dialogue with political and civil groups through specialized magazines.
In the Philippines, currently, the missionaries are involved in the care of seafarers, the assistance to departing Filipinos and to refugees, the formation program of young missionaries, the service of the local Church to migrants and activities of research and publication.
Fr. Reynaldo Saavedra C.S. – a Scalabrinian and a seaman himself gave a talk to us concerning their apostolate to the Filipino sea-based workers whether in commercial ships or in the fishing industry where many unaccounted Filipino workers have suffered injustice and maltreatment in the hands of their foreign employers. The efforts exerted by this congregation is very laudable and commendable. However, their apostolate is not as expansive as parishes are scattered over the Philippines. Parish priests as part of their pastoral care might well include in their parish programs the families of the workers and also accompany them in their journey through counseling and other activities.
To sum up all the seminars we have attended so far, I have felt the difficulties of a priest’s life especially that of the parish priest. he has so much to attend to. He has so much sheep to feed. But it’s not a stranger that needs the help of the shepherd because every stranger is no stranger in the eyes of Jesus and everybody should be a brother to a Christian and everybody should be a pastor’s concern.
Looking into myself and viewing at the near distance I could not see an easy life for me but a meaningful life despite the many people to care for in the many sectors of the society.
Wednesday, January 21, 2009
pamalandongi ying
YOU SHALL HELP TO PROVIDE FOR THE NEEDS OF THE CHURCH
.Ariel D. DutosmeDeacon Program 2009
Its tempting really especially for a diocesan cleric in terms of his faithfulness to live by the evangelical counsel of poverty. Anyway, its (the vow of poverty) not absolute for the secular clergy. But in the other side a question could be posed: Are secular clerics allowed to accumulate wealth in his lifetime as much as he could hold?
The fifth precept of the church admonishes all Catholics in this manner:You shall help to provide for the needs of the church. According to the Catechism of the Catholic Church # 2041, "The precepts of the Church are set in the context of a moral life bound to and nourished by liturgical life. The obligatory character of these positive laws decreed by the pastoral authorities is meant to guarantee to the faithful the indispensable minimum in the spirit of prayer and moral effort, in the growth in love of God and neighbor."
In the end its not only the Church as collective body who gets the help from the Christian Catholics but the clerics themselves receive a part of the provisions made by them. Situations such as secular clergy owning beach resort or a transportation business or a lending company, a bank etc. may tickle the minds of the public as to how on earth has this particular cleric got to accumulate all the money that came to finance these business ventures.
I wouldn’t condemn them. Who am I to do that? But its interesting to reflect on this phrase: Makauulaw kaayo tan-awon kung ang kura paroko nagbusyad ang tiyan sa katambok unya ang iyang mga parokyano namyahok ang aping sa kaniwang. (to be taken more figuratively than literally). Yes, we must receive gratefully the financial help offered by the parishioners but I bet if the intentio donantis would aim at making some clerics amass properties for themselves. To quote my spiritual director Rev. Fr. Bob Rice, SJ the technical term for the collections made during Sundays is Patrimonium Pauperitatis which is patrimony of the poor. Anyway to analyze it street-wisely, the clerics are avowed to poverty hence the collections are their patrimony.
Money given to Church are a big help to the Church and when we say Church it refers to the People of God not only for some who are in the hierarchy or clergy but to the People of God. The challenge for me is to accept gratefully whatever is given to me and consider it a help not only for myself but to the Church and especially to those member of the Church that mostly need the help where I am entrusted as an instrument of peoples charity. One problem that I see within me is the diligence to be transparent. It maybe not my intention to conceal but I don’t make things transparent at times because of indolence on my part. Its my struggle and I hope that I can grow much in this area.
.Ariel D. DutosmeDeacon Program 2009
Its tempting really especially for a diocesan cleric in terms of his faithfulness to live by the evangelical counsel of poverty. Anyway, its (the vow of poverty) not absolute for the secular clergy. But in the other side a question could be posed: Are secular clerics allowed to accumulate wealth in his lifetime as much as he could hold?
The fifth precept of the church admonishes all Catholics in this manner:You shall help to provide for the needs of the church. According to the Catechism of the Catholic Church # 2041, "The precepts of the Church are set in the context of a moral life bound to and nourished by liturgical life. The obligatory character of these positive laws decreed by the pastoral authorities is meant to guarantee to the faithful the indispensable minimum in the spirit of prayer and moral effort, in the growth in love of God and neighbor."
In the end its not only the Church as collective body who gets the help from the Christian Catholics but the clerics themselves receive a part of the provisions made by them. Situations such as secular clergy owning beach resort or a transportation business or a lending company, a bank etc. may tickle the minds of the public as to how on earth has this particular cleric got to accumulate all the money that came to finance these business ventures.
I wouldn’t condemn them. Who am I to do that? But its interesting to reflect on this phrase: Makauulaw kaayo tan-awon kung ang kura paroko nagbusyad ang tiyan sa katambok unya ang iyang mga parokyano namyahok ang aping sa kaniwang. (to be taken more figuratively than literally). Yes, we must receive gratefully the financial help offered by the parishioners but I bet if the intentio donantis would aim at making some clerics amass properties for themselves. To quote my spiritual director Rev. Fr. Bob Rice, SJ the technical term for the collections made during Sundays is Patrimonium Pauperitatis which is patrimony of the poor. Anyway to analyze it street-wisely, the clerics are avowed to poverty hence the collections are their patrimony.
Money given to Church are a big help to the Church and when we say Church it refers to the People of God not only for some who are in the hierarchy or clergy but to the People of God. The challenge for me is to accept gratefully whatever is given to me and consider it a help not only for myself but to the Church and especially to those member of the Church that mostly need the help where I am entrusted as an instrument of peoples charity. One problem that I see within me is the diligence to be transparent. It maybe not my intention to conceal but I don’t make things transparent at times because of indolence on my part. Its my struggle and I hope that I can grow much in this area.
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