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Ascension of the Lord — Bidding prayers

Remembering and celebrating Jesus’ ascension today, we worship the God of timeless glory.

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12 May 2013. The Ascension of the Lord

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Most Recent Comments

2 comments
Following Seán O’Conaill’s article on “The Myth of Redemptive Violence”, Pádraig McCarthy urges us to read “The War Prayer” by Mark Twain
December 4 2023
Sean O'Conaill
So many thanks for this Pádraig. Mark Twain is next to Dickens in my list of favourite authors. 'Tom Sawyer' especially foreshadows the ascent of American capitalism in Tom's feigning absolute satisfaction in whitewashing his Aunt Polly's fence - to persuade his friends to part with their valuables, including vouchers for their knowledge of bible verses - just for the privilege of wielding his brush. As for Huckleberry Finn - nobody should miss reading that for Huck's development of a conscience re the runaway slave, Jim. As for Twain's drawing on the classic family feud between the Hatfields and McCoys for another episode in that novel - that foreshadows the absurdist self-destructive polarisation in US politics right now. I hadn't known of the above piece on the US's 'neo-imperial' wars in 1904/5 - and of course it was prescient of what would again happen in Europe in 1914 - dooming Christendom finally - the four Christian empires plunging the world into the war 'to end war'. Twain (Sam Clemens) also sent up his own participation in the US Civil War of 1861-65, capturing the heroic posturing that tends to break out when wars loom - and I once remember reading with pleasure 'A Yankee at the Court of King Arthur' too, an experiment in science fiction and time travel. What literary treasures are missed now by younger generations with the ascendancy of visual fiction!
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2 comments
Following Seán O’Conaill’s article on “The Myth of Redemptive Violence”, Pádraig McCarthy urges us to read “The War Prayer” by Mark Twain
December 4 2023
Pádraig McCarthy
The hymn Mark Twain quotes: “God the all-terrible! Thou who ordainest, Thunder thy clarion and lightning thy sword!” - This was a well-known hymn by Henry F Chorley (1842), used satirically. It has five stanzas. The first four end with the line, "Give us peace in our time, O Lord." The fifth ends: "Thou wilt give peace in thy time, O Lord."
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15 comments
05 Nov 2023 – 31st Sunday, (A)
November 5 2023
Sean O'Conaill
#14 "Seán, the “it” that Rene Girard doesn’t do for me is to satisfactorily address my long held unease with the teaching/belief that Jesus had to die such a horrible death, to appease his, apparently, vengeful Father, to save us for our sins, sins that we somehow inherited through the generations from our ancient, probably mythological, ancestors, Adam and Eve." Girard, although not a theologian, definitely did not accept the theology you summarise here, Paddy, and would have been made aware by e.g. Raymund Schwager that other great medieval theologians such as Duns Scotus and St Bonaventure never accepted it either. It is a total tragedy that our clergy were mostly never given a thorough grounding in that medieval debate - and in the Patristic Fathers also. I have already quoted from one of those fathers the following - from St Ignatius of Antioch c. 108 CE - in one of the letters written on his way to execution by wild beasts, most likely in the recently built Colosseum in Rome - it's well worth quoting again. “Stop your ears therefore when anyone speaks to you that stands apart from Jesus Christ, from David’s scion and Mary’s Son, who was really born and ate and drank, really persecuted by Pontius Pilate, really crucified and died while heaven and earth and the underworld looked on; who also really rose from the dead, since His Father raised Him up, His Father, who will likewise raise us also who believe in Him through Jesus Christ, apart from whom we have no real life.” Notice there especially the attribution to God the Father of the ‘raising’ of Jesus, AND the confidence of Bishop Ignatius that he too would therefore also be raised. In short, for the early Christians, the crucifixion and resurrection COMBINED had overthrown their fear of the judgement of Rome. They did not see the crucifixion as a SEPARATE event in need of a SEPARATE theological explanation. Those two events together had ‘redeemed’ them, relativising the judgement of the empire, and assuring them that they too could not be annihilated by it. As Jesus could not have been raised from death if he had not suffered death, it followed also that Jesus had accepted crucifixion to fall in with the Trinity’s intent to assure all who believed in Jesus that their lives also were safe from the utmost punishment and indignity that Rome could inflict. So redemption initially was NOT understood as arising from the appeasing of the Father by Jesus, but as the Father's intent and purpose FOR ALL BELIEVERS from the beginning. Out of that conviction Paul's belief in a New Creation also arose. And that Patristic 'take' is fully compatible with the Franciscan theology of Bonaventure, etc. that Richard Rohr so ably defends in his daily reflections. For Anselm in the 1090s the situation was completely different, because he was embedded in a social hierarchy that was supposedly divinely approved of - that 'honour pyramid' that had God the Father at its summit. And so we get what is best described as the imperial theology of God the Father needing satisfaction for sin, a theology that necessarily implies a kind of celestial narcissism. For me, the problem with the Jesus seminar is not that they use form criticism and biblical scholarship to pursue the historical Jesus but that they do so from the a priori position that the Resurrection did not happen - that it is 'mythical', i.e. a pious fiction. There are other perfectly competent scripture scholars - e.g. Luke Timothy Johnson - who reject that approach and defend the Creed, as do I. For me, the greatest disaster of all is never to have come as close to personal disaster as e.g. Ignatius came in being arrested for annoying the Roman Gods. My disasters were very different, but one of them was the experience of being literally arrested, by a cohort of police, in my home, for a vile crime of which I was totally innocent. It was a case of mistaken identity, soon realised - but the shock was intense and stayed with me, as did the memory of feeling sure that I was being accompanied through it. Only then did I come fully to understand the Creed, as a story of the subversion of the judgement of an empire for my sake also, in case I might ever fear the misjudgments of others. That is the gift that belief in the Resurrection can give to everyone - my reason for directly challenging the theology you reject in another piece here. https://associationofcatholicpriests.ie/rather-than-saying-that-the-church-has-a-mission-we-affirm-that-church-is-mission/ That's the best I can do right now: I need to rise fairly early tomorrow. Except to say that full belief in the Creed also relativises relativism and the secularising consensus that, with the death of Christendom, Christianity must also die. We should pray for that full sharing in the foundational conviction of the church.
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15 comments
05 Nov 2023 – 31st Sunday, (A)
November 5 2023
Paddy Ferry
Seán, the "it" that Rene Girard doesn't do for me is to satisfactorily address my long held unease with the teaching/belief that Jesus had to die such a horrible death, to appease his, apparently, vengeful Father, to save us for our sins, sins that we somehow inherited through the generations from our ancient, probably mythological, ancestors, Adam and Eve. I must admit that I only know of Girard from what you and Joe have shared with us over the years. Joe has also shared with us above that: "The penal substitution theories of atonement have been generally rejected in contemporary theology as based on an outdated feudal understanding of retribution." That may well be but has contemporary Christian/Catholic teaching also rejected such theories? I think I still hear mention at Sunday morning Mass of Jesus having to die to save us. While I have always felt unease and confusion with this belief I never really stirred myself to have a proper look at or study the teaching. Why did I not? I am not sure. It may well be because it is so basic to our faith. I know very learned people, university lecturer/professor and professional types who are practising Catholics but who would avoid any discussion on things like transubstantiation and even papal infallibility. Reject any of it and can you still call yourself a Catholic? So, when I came across the late, great Joseph Fitzmyer SJ, scripture scholar extraordinaire, in his writing on Romans, say that "Paul never said that Christ was sacrificed for our sake. That notion enters the later theological tradition .....etc." - I have shared this on many occasions on this site - I became more confident in acknowledging my own difficulty with this teaching and belief. Seán, I do think that Hebrews is fundamental to what you refer to as our 'cultic' priesthood. History may have caused its elevation and evolution over the ages but Hebrews and Melchizedek certainly sowed the seed. And, I don't need to repeat what I said above about Melchizedek and those few verses in chapter 14 of Genesis and, in fact, now, all of chapter 14 of Genesis. I am also puzzled, Seán, as to why you dismiss the Jesus Seminar so easily. It began with over 200 scripture scholars, I believe, and eventually there were 74, and 14 of them were very well known and respected scholars, including the late Marcus Borg and John Dominic Crossan. These are the only two I know anything about as I have read their books, The First Christmas, The Last Seven Days and The First Paul. I have found them to be absolutely fascinating. I have just started to read again The First Christmas as part of my Advent/Christmas reflection. Well, any excuse to read them again as they are wonderful books. Are those their only books, I wonder? I didn't realise, for example, that there is little convergence with Matthew's account of the Nativity and Luke's, the only two Gospels that tell the story of Jesus' birth. The Christmas story that we are familiar with is an amalgamation of the two. And, a consensus of mainstream biblical scholarship sees the stories as coming relatively late in the development of early Christianity. I wouldn't be sharing this stuff with my mother if she was still with us! Perhaps the most amazing thing I have learned from these books is the parallelism between Roman Imperialist theology and Jewish/Christian theology. Why has this never been explained to us? I presume it is part of priestly, seminary formation. I have mentioned before that John Crossan was born in Nenagh two years before my mother-in-law, Agnes. Agnes is now 87 so John must be 89. Agnes had never heard of him. I read somewhere that he is regarded as the greatest living expert on Jesus. I was aware of Luke Timothy Johnston taking issue with the Seminar but have other major scholars had reason to challenge them? This is a genuine question as I don't know a great deal about the Jesus Seminar. And, Seán, finally, you mention God and the Father a lot in your comments above. I do really think that the ultimate question that we have to address is our understanding of the reality of the Father God we claim to believe in. We have to deal with that, I think, before we can move onto anything else. I have tried to answer that question myself, thanks to Tony Flannery and Diarmuid Ó Murchú. It has been really enlightening reading you and Joe discuss this and other weighty topics. Thank you both for that. I feel a bit of an impostor engaging with you both given your much greater knowledge of these matters that I will ever have. I am still not sure I understand: 'Girard’s contention that all violence arises out of mimetic desire.'
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