Tag Archives: Pope John Paul II

Oct 6 2012

Marriage: Willed and designed by God

 

Since tomorrow’s gospel speaks about the basic ground of human marriage- that is, it is designed and willed by God from the beginning, I am posting here as part 1 of my Sunday reflection online, a piece of my 25,000 word theological synthesis which  I did last year to complete my Academic requirements for the degree ‘Masters of Theological Studies’ in Melbourne College of Divinity. The topic on marriage is just one of the many aspects I have covered in my work. Part two of this post then would be my homily for tomorrow, 27th Sunday in Ordinary time.

Marriage

Marriage, a fundamental and ancient of human institution, is established and founded by a marriage covenant- “the irrevocable consent that the spouses freely give to and receive from each other.”[1] And this is rightly so because God has willed this from the beginning of creation, as re-affirmed by the Second Vatican Council  in its Constitution on the Church in the Modern world, acknowledging God himself as “the author of marriage who endowed it with various benefits and with various ends in view.”[2] 

In this light then, we can also  understand that marriage is a commitment for life, an indissoluble communion of love between a man and a woman, until the death of one of the spouses.[3]

Jesus himself affirmed this when he was confronted with the issue of divorce. Re-echoing the Genesis account,  he taught that it had always been part of the divine plan of the Creator that marriage  is between a man and a woman, forming an intimate communion of life and love[4], as expressed in their three-fold action of leaving (the parents), joining (with the spouse), and uniting (as one body)[5], to be “rooted in the personal and total self-giving of the couple, and being required by the good of the children.”[6] For by its very nature, marriage is “ordered toward the good of the couple and to the generation and education of children.”[7]

Marriage is indissoluble.

Walter Kasper explains that marriage is indissoluble not only because God wills it, but also because it is inherent in the sacrament itself. He  asserts that the indissolubility of marriage is in fact “based and founded on the anthropological character of marriage as such”, and that “it is in the inner tendency towards definitiveness and exclusiveness of the act of giving and receiving of the two persons in marriage.”[8] According to him, the indissolubility of marriage is “not based exclusively on a law of the church nor is it simply a moral norm or a metaphysical principle. It is rooted in the sacramentality of marriage itself.”[9]

Bishop Peter Elliot outlines three aspects which render “the bond of marriage indissoluble”[10]: i.e. mutual consent, consummation and spousal union. 

Consent, the Bishop notes, as “expressed through those simple words of taking and accepting each other are “words of great power, words which change reality.”[11] The Bishop adds that the words of consent make up “the form of a sacrament…the effectual form of marriage.”[12] The giving of  consent is also “an act of will by which a man and a woman by an irrevocable covenant mutually give and accept one another for the purpose of establishing a marriage.”[13]

Consummation is an expression of married love.[14] Pope John Paul II writes:

This conjugal communion sinks its roots in the natural complementarity that exists between man and woman, and is nurtured through the personal willingness of the spouses to share their entire life project…for this reason such communion  is the fruit and the sign of a profoundly human need.[15]

The Pope here is not separating the consummation aspect of marriage from consent  because he understands that it is constitutive, meaning that both aspects are intimately linked. For him, consent in consummation is not only a “consent to sexual intercourse, but as consent to the total giving of self in an exclusive and absolutely binding way.”[16]

The third aspect of marriage that makes it indissoluble is spousal union. The Genesis account describes this union quite clearly, i.e. “Therefore a man leaves his father and his mother and clings to his wife, and they become one flesh.” (Gen.2:24) Jesus has taught us that these three actions are not just human initiatives  but also of God.  “It is God”, Bishop Elliot says, “who joins husband and wife in this sacred bond as they exchange their mutual consent and consummate their solemn nuptial contract by sexual union.”[17] Together with the demands of marriage,[18] spousal union also demands an oath of faithfulness and exclusivity- a “task which had to be realized personally [because] marriage is an ontological bond, [an objective bond] that was exempt from any action or interference…”[19]

St. Paul has elevated marriage, in its aspect of a spousal unity, to a higher level.  He calls this sacrament of marriage a “great mystery,” which he applies by analogy to the relationship of Christ and the Church. [Eph.5:32]. Bishop Elliot agrees with St Paul by delving further the meaning of those words of consent expressed by the couples in marriage. He remarks that the consent they have expressed is a “consent of love, infused with the Love of the archetype which is signified in this sacrament of the ‘great mystery’ of the Love of Jesus Christ for His spouse, the Church.”[20] Knowing this great dignity of marriage, Pope John Paul II realizes that marriage is indeed a part of the Divine will and plan that marriage is an indissoluble covenant for it also serves as the “fruit, a sign and a requirement of the absolutely faithful love that God has for man [& woman] and that the Lord Jesus has for the Church.”[21] Thus, it is rightly called a sacrament.

 

[1] Rite of Marriage, English translation (Sydney: E.J. Dwyer, 1984), n. 2.

[2] Vatican Council II, Gaudium et Spes, n. 8.

[3] Peter J. Elliot, What God Has Joined: The Sacramentality of Marriage (Homebush, NSW: St Paul Publications, 1990), 205-206.

[4] Catechism of the Catholic Church, n.1660.

[5] (cf Mk 10:6-9; and Mt 19: 6-8) When Jesus responded to the issue of divorce raised by the Pharisees to him, he  re-affirmed the Old Testament teaching  saying: “From the beginning of creation, “God made them male and female,” and thus, “for this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh. So they are no longer two but one flesh. Therefore what God has joined together, let no one separate.” [Mk 10: 6-9].

[6] John Paul II, Familiaris Consortio, Apostolic Exhortation (1982), n. 20.

[7] Catechism of the Catholic Church, n.1660.

[8] Kasper, Theology of Christian Marriage, trans. P. Smith (London: Burns & Oates, 1980), 45.

[9] Kasper, Theology of Christian Marriage, 49.

[10] Elliot, What God Has Joined, 162.

[11] Elliot, What God Has Joined, 119.

[12] Elliot, What God Has Joined, 119.

[13] The Code of Canon Law, English translation, (1983), Can. 1057, § 2.

[14] (cf Gaudium et spes, 49) Consummation is another aspect of marriage that renders it indissoluble. Gaudium et Spes carefully puts this aspect in the context of married love. It teaches, “Married love is an eminently human love because it is an affection between two persons…and it embraces the good of the whole person. It can enrich the sentiments of the spirit and their physical expression with a unique dignity…” The Council also tells us that “married love is uniquely expressed and perfected by the exercise of the acts proper to marriage…[and] the truly human performance of these acts  fosters the self-giving they signify and enriches the spouses in joy and gratitude.”

[15]John Paul II, Familiaris Consortio, n.19.

[16] Elliot, What God Has Joined, 138.

[17] Elliot, What God Has Joined, 143.

[18] Vatican Council II, Gaudium et Spes, n.50.

[19] Edward Schillebeeckx, Marriage: Human Reality and Saving Mystery, trans. D. Smith (London: Sheed & Ward, 1976), 141.

[20] Elliot, What God Has Joined, 120.

[21] John Paul II, Familiaris Consortio, Apostolic Exhortation (1982), n. 20.

 

Aug 5 2012

What does it take to give up everything for Christ?

Homily for Youth Mass (Bendigo, Australia)

Giving up everything for Christ

Four years ago, a young man made an international headline because of his surprising move to give up his very promising career and entered the seminary to become a Catholic priest. Chase Hilgenbrinck, a very promising soccer-player who made it to the Major League Soccer in 2008 (the New England Revolution), let go of his celebrity-status and joined the Mount St. Mary’s Seminary in northern Maryland. His decision caught many by surprise except those who knew him.

Because Chase did well in the Sports Arena, he became a celebrity. As a celebrity, he became, famous and popular. As a celebrity he could have gathered millions of followers now in his Facebook and twitter if he didn’t sacrifice his passion for soccer to pursue his dream to become a priest. 

He has no regrets  so far, as it seemed. Few months ago, his former teammate caught up with him and one of the things he said really made me appreciate him all the more. He said: Looking through human eyes, it seems impossible that I would leave behind everything that I knew and everything that I worked for. But when I look with the eyes of faith and I realize that there’s so much more to life than the game, I realize just how blessed I am to be in a seminary.’

Friends, you might have heard his story or have read it somewhere, but it’s worth repeating. Stories like Chase’s, always inspire us, especially for  young people of today who may have all the ideals in life but are also caught up with the many detours, distractions and diversions along the way.

Chase realized that there is more to life than the game. Good on him. Jesus in our gospel would also have the same wish for the crowd who had followed him. Yet as he said in the gospel: ‘You are not looking for me because you have seen the signs but because you had all the bread you wanted to eat.’

But Jesus here is calling them to faith in him, ‘to believe in the one [the Father] has sent.’ He is sort of saying: ‘Following me is more than just getting the bread that you need for free. Following me is much more than just getting something out from me. Following me means accepting me as one of your circle of friends  and allowing me to form a big part of your life.

This is what Jesus wants to tell the crowd in today’s gospel. And he is reminding each one of us here and now this  same invitation: to be his friend.

The good thing is it’s always God who makes the initiative to reach out to us. As a Jesuit priest wrote: ‘We will never find God, but surely He’ll find us first.’ He is calling us to be his friends, and as any friendship entails, it has to be two way, meaning we have to do our part as well to meet God half-way so to speak.

But how? That is the question.

Pope John Paul II, in his homily given at the 10th World Youth Day held in Manila Philippines in 1995, would answer this question for us. The late Pope said:

‘Beloved ones, sisters and brothers: build your lives on the one model that will not deceive you! I invite you to open the Gospel and discover that Jesus Christ wants to be your “friend” (Cf. Jn. 15: 14). He wants to be your “companion” at every stage on the road of life (Cf. Lk. 24: 13-35). He wants to be the “way”, your path through the anxieties, doubts, hopes and dreams of happiness (Cf. Jn. 14: 6). He is the “truth” that gives meaning to your efforts and your struggles. He wants to give you “life”, as he gave new life to the young man of Nain (Cf. Lk. 7: 11-17), and gave a whole new future to Zacchaeus who was dead in spirit through ambition and greed (Cf. ibid. 19: 1-10). He is your “resurrection”, your victory over sin and death, the fulfilment of your desire to live forever (Cf. Jn. 11: 25). Because of this he will be your “joy”, the “rock” on which your weakness will be turned into strength and optimism. He is our salvation, our hope and happiness and peace.’

To grow into friendship with him though demands of us an attitude of gratefulness to God for taking care of us in all our needs  as we can reflect on our First Reading today. We need to thank him everyday and every Sunday when we go to mass for his gift of himself as the bread from heaven that sustains us in our Christian journey. To become a real friend of God, not just in theory but really in our practical life, means we must stop living ‘the aimless kind of life that pagans live’, as St Paul would tell us in our Second Reading today.

And I can tell you, if you have this sense of friendship with God, you can tell him everything because you can rely on him on everything. One way to do this is by writing a journal. And it is just amazing every time I read my journal, the experience comes back to me. And it is always a consoling experience, or a healing one even. I have to admit though, that yes, God is  my friend now, but I am not the very faithful of friend. Sometimes I would tend to do my own thing by not allowing him to play his part, but it always comes up either bad or a failure. I can sense God saying to me: ‘I told you so.’

So as we continue our celebration of the Mass today, let’s pray that we now open ourselves more to friendship with God. Because it is by this that we can come to realize that there is more to life than just eating, or drinking, or becoming popular. Life is walking alongside with our real and  the most dependable of friend, Jesus Christ.

 

May 6 2012

Getting in touch with our only true Vine…

Easter V B 2012 Readings

There are several passages in the Old Testament where Israel is presented as the vineyard of the Lord. In Isaiah XXVII, for instance, we read: Sing of the delightful vineyard! I the Lord am its keeper; every moment I water it for fear its leaves should fall; night and day I watch over it. It is another way of saying how dear his Chosen People are to the Lord. And none can be dearer to the Lord than his only begotten Son who became a Jewish man known as Jesus the Christ.

In today’s gospel Jesus takes up the same viticultural imagery to describe the relationship between himself and his followers. If they are truly to be his followers, they must remain closely united to him. His Father continues to watch over and take care of the true vine. He declares that: Every branch in me that bears no fruit he cuts away, and every branch that does bear fruit he prunes to make it bear even more. He adds: As a branch cannot bear fruit all by itself, but must remain part of the vine, neither can you unless you remain in me.

What are we to understand by remaining in Jesus? First of all, let me remind you that we all have free will. We are not automata. Look at the heavenly bodies, the millions of stars and planets and comets: they are wonderful to behold. All obey the astrophysical laws. At any moment God knows exactly where they are and precisely when they will disappear. By contrast, we are capable of doing the unexpected; we are much more entertaining. Not all our choices are between good and evil; many of them are morally neutral – what breakfast cereal to eat, whether to take tea or coffee. But we can make morally wrong choices, which amount to turning away from God. If we persist in that behaviour, we are indeed severing our links to God.

So the question becomes: by what exercise of free will can we remain united to Jesus? During my years in Rome I found that Australians and New Zealanders got together regularly; the Congolese got together regularly; the Zambians, the Ghanaians and the Tanzanians got together. Similarly, in practically every city of the world you will find Filipinos meeting regularly. This suggests that if we are to remain united to Jesus, we should get in touch with him regularly … through prayer for instance! That commandment which orders us to “keep holy the Sabbath day” has never been revoked. One of the best ways of sanctifying the Sabbath is to join the community in worship – not, you notice, in shopping. Even if that were not possible, we can raise our hearts and minds to God any time, anywhere. Given that God is looking after us 24/7 it is not unreasonable for us to take time to talk to God at least once a day.

Now while it is good to say some prayers, like the Our Father, the Hail Mary, the Glory be, God is going to find us rather boring conversationalists if that is all we ever say. Just as parents like their children to tell them about their day, so God welcomes us to talk to him about all the things that concern us. After all, God is our loving Father. Let our prayer be more than a series of petitions. God knows what we want even before we ask for it. But God might be interested in our opinion about certain matters, and will surely appreciate gratitude for favours received.

You know, there is both an individual and a collective dimension to the divine plan. God thinks big. He made an alliance with the whole Jewish people, not just with Moses and his family. The Christian Church has developed a theology of the Mystical Body of Christ – that is to say that all believers are united by the presence in each one of them of a spark of the divine life. Jesus died for all of us, not just some of us, but we can – by committing grave sin – separate ourselves from the community of believers.

Jesus told his disciples that his Father prunes those branches which bear fruit – i.e. ourselves – so that they will bear still more. At a certain point in our lives we come to realise that our powers are diminishing. We can’t play sport the way we used to, we can’t walk or run or swim as far or as fast as we used to. What’s more, everybody seems to speak more softly these days. These reductions in our physical powers are signs of our being pruned. Little by little we will experience other losses – through the death of a wife or a husband, or even of a child; we may have to give up driving; we grow more forgetful. In our second childhood, gradually we become almost as dependent as we were in our first, but with the painful memory that there was a time when we were autonomous and free.

I guess we all saw pictures of Pope John Paul II in his last years when he was stooped and sick. His was a very public decline towards death. It is said that he did consider resigning the papacy. Presumably he prayed for guidance. It is hard to see how it could be best for an organization as vast and complex as the Church to be led by a man in his dotage. Those of us who have views on this matter should make arrangements now for the time when we are old and frail. Ideally, I think, our last years should be a time of preparation for our meeting with God when we move on to the next stage of our existence. That means accepting the diminution of our own powers, willingly letting go of the attachments which mattered so much to us earlier in our lives, in all simplicity allowing God’s will to be done.

Perhaps you know Judith Wright’s poem “Bullocky” which is a meditation on the grave of a pioneer. It concludes with these lines:

“Grass is across the wagon-tracks,

And plough strikes bone beneath the grass,

And vineyards cover all the slopes

Where the dead teams were used to pass.

 

O vine, grow close upon that bone

And hold it with your rooted hand.

The prophet Moses feeds the grape,

And fruitful is the Promised Land.”

 

That’s not Scripture, but it’s a reminder that each of us has a place in the order of things so that even after our death we contribute something to the community. While we live, however, we have many opportunities to contribute in positive ways to the life of the community, the other members of the Mystical Body, other branches of the Vine. Let us not waste them. (Quentin Howard)

05-05-2012