Self-respect is a gift received

A spin on St Francis' make me a channel of your peace - make me an invitation of giving

William Hurlbut writes of St Francis in his article St. Francis, Christian Love, and the Biotechnological Future :

For Francis there was never any "escape from the desperations of natural life, but in a transformation in his spiritual understanding of the interwoven meaning of suffering and love. He came to see that the whole of creation, and each of its varied creatures in their distinct strengths and struggles, reflected and revealed the perfection of the Creator. If all things are from one Father, then all are kin and worthy of solicitude and appreciation. It was not nature in the abstract that he loved but every differentiated being in its particularity and individuality. Likewise, he loved not humanity in the abstract so much as individual human beings. He described this love as courtesy, a tender affection and concern for others as precious and unique, as creatures beloved of God; and his courtesy was born not of magnanimity or largesse (with their implicit sense of superiority) but of genuine humility of heart. He became the “little brother” (the Order of Friars Minor is the official name of his followers), placing himself in a position of neediness before others. Not so much a giver of gifts as a “giver of giving,” Francis provided the invitation to give by putting himself in circumstances that drew forth the generosity of others — and with it, their self-respect."

Here is a concept we should spend our entire life working toward: A "giver of giving" - being an invitation to give by drawing forth the generosity of others - and with it their self-respect. So "self-respect" is not something we muster up from within our selves through autonomous self-will or individualism... self-respect is rather a gift received. Imagine that.

Feast of St Francis & Revisiting St Bonaventure

These words of Dr. Robert Moynihan from Inside the Vatican magazing caused me to revisit my posts on St Bonaventure. Hope you enjoy.

October 4, 2011

Feast of St. Francis of Assisi

This was the prayer of St. Francis:

Lord, make me an instrument of your peace. Where there is hatred, let me sow love.  Where there is injury, pardon.  Where there is doubt, faith.  Where there is despair, hope.  Where there is darkness, light.  Where there is sadness, joy. 

O Divine Master, grant that I may not so much seek to be consoled, as to console; to be understood, as to understand; to be loved, as to love.  For it is in giving that we receive.  It is in pardoning that we are  pardoned, and it is in dying that we are born to Eternal Life.

Amen.
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Who was St. Francis?

Who was St. Francis of Assisi, really? Was he just a sort of superficial "hippy" who preached to birds? No. Quite the contrary...
More than 700 years ago, on February 24, 1209, St. Francis, then 27 years old, heard a sermon that changed his life. The sermon was on Matthew 10:9. Christ there tells his followers they should go forth and proclaim that the Kingdom of Heaven is near, taking no money with them, not even a walking stick or shoes for the road.

Inspired, Francis decided to devote himself to a life of poverty. Clad in a rough garment, barefoot, and, after the Gospel precept, without staff or scrip, he began to preach repentance. This why he became known as "il poverello," the "little poor man," and why it is said that he married no ordinary woman, but "Lady Poverty."

But this was not the only remarkable thing about Francis. Toward the end of his life, in a mystical vision, he became the first person in the Christian tradition to receive the "stigmata," the wounds of Christ himself, making him, in a sense, a living copy of his crucified Lord.  Tthis is the reason Francis was called by his follower, St. Bonaventure, "the angel of the 6th seal."
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The "Root of All Good"

Francis would have agreed with the phrase of St. Paul: “The love of money is the root of all evil.” ("Radix omnium malorum cupiditas est," Letter to Timothy, 6:10) If the love of money is the root of all evil, what then is the root of all good? Francis proposed a seemingly outrageous answer: the love of poverty is the root of all good.

Why so? Because he saw that, for one who loves poverty, all the desires of this world fall away.  No longer is there a desire to gather gold and silver and nickel and copper coins, or dollars, euros, rubles and yen, all the paper currencies, or bonds and stocks, or interest rate swaps and options, or jewels, or the works of master artists.

No longer is there a desire to amass these "goods" at any cost, including trickery, deception and cheating -- including the knowledge that some other men and women may be left destitute and miserable in the process. Rather, there is a desire to preach repentance to all, and the common good for all the sons and daughters of God, for all men: the good of peace, and justice, and wisdom, and humility.

And Francis is an example that following this path does not mean a man or a woman must quiver and crawl, without the power and the trappings of power so well known in our world. Being humble, loving poverty, does not have to mean being weak. In fact, the way of Francis -- the way of Christ -- is the strongest way a man or a woman can live, and the most long-lasting, for it builds peace in this present time, and it leaves a testimony for all ages to come, as Francis's life has, and it reaches even unto eternity.  It is a prophetic way to live...

The Sixth Seal

And this applies to St. Francis, because many in his time, and since, have believed that he was actually a type of prophet, a man who in himself spoke and fulfilled prophecy.  What prophecy?

In the Book of Revelation, the last book of the Bible -- and arguably the most enigmatic -- an aging John of Patmos describes a mystical vision granted to him concerning the future of human history, and of that history's final end (to be brief, that end is a wedding; human history, in this vision, in the Bible as whole, ends in a marriage between the Lord and his spouse, who is mystically the Church, gathered from all nations, from the farthest ends of the earth). John's vision begins when he sees a scroll "sealed with seven seals" of wax so that unauthorized people cannot open the scroll and read it.

Then, each one of the "seven seals" is opened, revealing an apocalyptic event. The opening of the first four seals release "The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse," each with their own specific mission (some identify these as the Antichrist, War, Famine and Death).

(The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, an 1887 painting by Victor Vasnetsov. The Lamb, very small with a golden halo, is visible at the top.)

The opening of the fifth seal releases the cries of those martyred for the "word of God."  The sixth and next to last seal initiates a time of cataclysmic events. The seventh seal reveals seven angels with trumpets who sound the trumpets to end all time.

What does all this have to do with Francis? Everything.

Because we know that St. Bonaventure, the great Franciscan theologian who lived in the generation after Francis, believed that St. Francis was, in fact, "the angel of the sixth seal." Bonaventure wrote this in his life of St. Francis, the Legenda Major, and told this to his brothers in conversation.

"Don't Hurt the Earth!"

Here is what John in Revelation says about the 6th seal (I have bold-faced the passage which Bonaventure believed refers to St. Francis): Revelation 6:12-17; 7:2-4

12 And I beheld when he had opened the sixth seal, and, lo, there was a great earthquake; and the sun became black as sackcloth of hair, and the moon became as blood; 13 And the stars of the heavens fell unto the earth, even as a fig tree casteth her untimely figs, when she is shaken of a mighty wind.

14 And the heavens departed as a scroll when it is rolled together; and every mountain and island were moved out of their places. 15 And the kings of the earth, and the great men, and the rich men, and the chief captains, and the mighty men, and every bondman, and every free man, hid themselves in the dens and in the rocks of the mountains; 16 And said to the mountains and rocks, Fall on us, and hide us from the face of him that sitteth on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb: 17 For the great day of his wrath is come; and who shall be able to stand?

2 Then I saw another Angel rising from where the sun rose, carrying the seal of the Living God. He thundered to the Four Angels assigned the task of hurting earth and sea, 3 "Don't hurt the earth! Don't hurt the sea! Don't so much as hurt a tree until I've sealed the servants of our God on their foreheads!" 4 I heard the count of those who were sealed: 144,000! They were sealed out of every Tribe of Israel...

The Seal -- the Stigmata

On or about September 14, 1224, the Feast of the Exaltation of the Cross, while he was praying on Mt. Alverna, and keeping a forty-day fast in preparation for Michaelmas (September 29), Francis had a vision as a result of which he received the stigmata.

Brother Leo, who was with Francis at the time, wrote: "Suddenly he saw a vision of a seraph, a six-winged angel on a cross. This angel gave him the gift of the five wounds of Christ."

From this moment on, St. Francis was in pain. He lived two more years. Suffering from these stigmata and from an eye disease, he was brought back to a hut next to the Porziuncola where his religious journey had begun. He died on the evening of October 3, 1226, singing Psalm 141. Hence his Feast Day today, Octiber 4.

Bonaventure and the Sixth Seal

About 30 years later, St. Bonaventure climbed Mt. Alverna. Bonaventure sought to discover a mystical way to reach God: "as much as possible be restored, naked of knowledge, to union with the very One who is above all created essence and knowledge."

In 1259, St. Bonaventure had a cell made at the sanctuary near the spot where St Francis experienced the stigmata. It is now the Chapel of St Bonaventure. Not long after, Bonaventure wrote his Life of Francis, seeking to transpose Francis into a universal prophet sent to the entire Church.

Francis was, in fact, in a mystical way, Christ, Who had returned to restore the Gospel life. Bonaventure saw Francis as the angel of the sixth seal, the third in the line of the great triad of prophets, after King David and the Apostle Peter; the Old Law (David), the New Law (Peter), and the New Law recovered (Francis) -- the one who ushered in a final age of world history.

Pope Benedict, Francis, Bonaventure, and the Angel of the Sixth Seal

Pope Benedict XVI is very familiar with all this. He studied Bonaventure in depth for his dissertation in the 1950s. And he is still making references to to these matters today. During his General Audience on March 10, 2010, dedicated to Bonaventure, Benedict made the following comments about the stigmata of St. Francis and St. Bonaventure:

"Of his writings, I would like to mention only one, his masterwork, the Itinerarium mentis in Deum, a 'manual' of mystical contemplation," Benedict said. "This book was conceived in a place of profound spirituality: the hill of La Verna, where St. Francis had received the stigmata. In the introduction, Bonaventure illustrates the circumstances that gave origin to his writing:

"'While I meditated on the possibility of the soul ascending to God, presented to me, among others, was that wondrous event that occurred in that place to Blessed Francis, namely, the vision of the winged seraphim in the form of a crucifix. And meditating on this, immediately I realized that such a vision offered me the contemplative ecstasy of Father Francis himself and at the same time the way that leads to it' (Journey of the Mind in God, Prologue, 2, in Opere di San Bonaventura. Opuscoli Teologici / 1, Rome, 1993, p. 499).

Benedict continued:

"The six wings of the seraphim thus became the symbol of six stages that lead man progressively to the knowledge of God through observation of the world and of creatures and through the exploration of the soul itself with its faculties, up to the satisfying union with the Trinity through Christ, in imitation of St. Francis of Assisi.

"The last words of St. Bonaventure's Itinerarium, which respond to the question of how one can reach this mystical communion with God, would make one descend to the depth of the heart:

"'If you now yearn to know how that happens (mystical communion with God), ask grace, not doctrine; desire, not the intellect; the groaning of prayer, not the study of the letter; the spouse, not the teacher; God, not man; darkness not clarity; not light but the fire that inflames everything and transport to God with strong unctions and ardent affections. ... We enter therefore into darkness, we silence worries, the passions and illusions; we pass with Christ Crucified from this world to the Father, so that, after having seen him, we say with Philip: that is enough for me' (Ibid., VII, 6).

"Dear friends," Benedict concluded, "let us take up the invitation addressed to us by St. Bonaventure, the Seraphic Doctor, and let us enter the school of the divine Teacher: We listen to his Word of life and truth, which resounds in the depth of our soul. Let us purify our thoughts and actions, so that he can dwell in us, and we can hear his divine voice, which draws us toward true happiness."

If we would seek God, then, and if we are to imitate Christ, and Francis, and pass through the apocalyptic events unfolding around us -- always unfolding, until the end of the world -- we must "ask grace, not doctrine, desire, not the intellect; the groaning of prayer, not the study of the letter."

This is the path of poverty which is indicated to us on this great feast day.
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Reason Must be Conquered by Revelation Part IV

"While meditating upon this vision (Francis receiving the stigmata), I immediately saw that it offered me the ecstatic contemplation of Fr Francis himself as well as the way that leads to it." - St Bonaventure from the Prologue of, "The Journey of the Mind to God." 

Click here to view my 1st post.  My 2nd post here and to link to my 3rd click here.

This is my 4th and final post in this series on Saint Bonaventure's "The Journey of the Mind to God."

While reading Bonaventure’s book, the Holy Spirit had me revisit a book I had read about a year ago, "St. Francis and the Cross: Reflections on Suffering, Weakness, and Joy."  This book was born of a 3 day retreat for Franciscan priests held at Mt Alverno. The book ends with a meditation by Marco Bove that I wish to share along with some reflections of mine that will be in (parenthesis): 

Francis basically remained a poor man, a man who lived by faith and who gave his life totally to God. Such a man does not make calculated plans and does not seek security in what he has, who he is, or what he knows. The Father is the source for everything, and the poor man places his trust completely in God. (He abides in the Other – reflecting his true subject being made in the image and likeness [Gen 1:26] – Love.)

One does not maintain such an inner attitude without a struggle and without intense suffering. When Francis arrived at Mt Alverno, he was full of many doubts: about himself, the trail he was blazing, the order he had founded, the choices he had made, the future, and his responsibility in regards to all this. (He is seeking the approval of others – he is experiencing humanity’s fallen nature – reflecting the restless subject.)

Like Jesus, Francis also sought the Father's will. Gradually God led him to the total gift of himself, to the experience of the cross: "My Father,... not as I will, but as thou wilt" (Mt 26:39). Herein lies the meaning of the stigmata. It is the external manifestation of something that occurred in the heart, so as to enable Francis to say with St Paul, "It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me" (Gal 2:20). (Here we insert Bonaventure's contention that true reason must abide in prayer so as to accept the cross [out of love] and thus over-coming restless reason which always gets stuck in an endless loop leading humanity back to the cross - love over restlessness.)

The inner struggle leading up to total surrender often assumes a form of resistance in the life of the believer. In opposition to the weakness and the foolishness of the cross are the wisdom and power of the world, which are rooted in a quest for clarity and efficiency based on expediency. But Jesus' cross is not based on any human criteria, and even less on any criteria related to expediency, efficiency, or effectiveness, because God's strength and wisdom are revealed through Jesus' cross. (His throwing off the myth of power allows God to strip him of the restless subject, that which seeks the approval of others, thus becoming a new life – an authentic image and likeness of his true Subject – participating in a reciprocity of love in praise and gratitude.)

St Bonaventure, a Doctor of The Church, was a great scholar and leader. He was dedicated to the art of reason and made great efforts to reconcile reason with revelation. In "The Journey of the Mind to God" St Bonaventure expressed what he came to know through his meditation on "crucified" Francis, which was that reason, centered in the heart, grounded in faith, can make intelligible Christian conversion, though in and of itself, reason does not necessarily lead to conversion.

In chapter 7 he beckons us to enter into the mystery of the stigmata - giving no heed to ourselves, as if we humans were substantial or sufficient beings in and of ourselves, rather he challenges us to embrace our poverty giving all...

"to the Gift of God, that is to the Holy Spirit. Little or nothing should be attributed to the creature, but everything to the Creative Essence - the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. And thus, with Dionysius, we address the Triune God: 'O Trinity, Essence above all essence, and Deity above all deity, supremely best Guardian of the divine wisdom of Christians, direct us to the supremely unknown, super-luminous, and most sublime height of mystical knowledge. There new mysteries - absolute and changeless mysteries of theology - are shrouded in the super-luminous darkness of a silence, teaching secretly in the utmost obscurity that is manifest above all manifestation; of a darkness that is resplendent above all splendor, and in which everything shines forth, of a darkness which fills invisible intellects full above all plenitude with the splendors of invisible good things that are above all good.'

"So much let us say to God. To the friend, however, for whom these words were written, we can say with Dionysius: 'And you, my friend, in this matter of mystical visions, redouble your efforts, abandon the senses, intellectual activities, visible and invisible things - everything that is not and that is - and, oblivious of yourself, let yourself be brought back, in so far as it is possible, to unity with Him Who is above all essence and all knowledge. And transcending yourself and all things, ascend to the super-essential gleam of the divine darkness by an incommensurable and absolute transport of a pure mind.'"

A good teacher on Bonaventure is Pope Benedict XVI. He writes in, Great Teachers that Bonaventure once explained his decision to become Franciscan:

"I must confess before God that the reason which made me love the life of blessed Francis most is that it resembled the birth and early development of the Church. The Church began with simple fishermen, and was subsequently enriched by very distinguished and wise teachers; the religion of Blessed Francis was not established by the prudence of men but by Christ."

Benedict went on to quote Bonaventure painting an image of Francis in these words:

"a man who sought Christ passionately. In the love that impelled Francis to imitate Christ, he was entirely conformed to Christ."

and as he goes on in the book to quote and describe how Bonaventure engaged the argument between reason and theology:

"...real theology, the rational work of the true and good theology has another origin, not the pride of reason. One who loves wants to know his beloved better and better; true theology does not involve reason and its research prompted by pride, [but is] motivated by love of the One who gave his consent" and wants to be better acquainted with the beloved: this is the fundamental intention of theology. Thus in the end, for Saint Bonaventure, the primacy of love is crucial... for St Bonaventure the ultimate destiny of the human being is to love God, to encounter him and to be united in his and our love. For him this is the most satisfactory definition of our happiness.

Today we can look back and see the trajectory of Bonaventure’s reflections - from the Crucified and Risen Christ to Francis and into the future where Henri de Lubac (1896-1991) a French theologian, wrote in "The Discovery of God":

"(There is) no real knowledge without mystery. And no man without God."

From the ending of "St. Francis and the Cross: Reflections on Suffering, Weakness, and Joy" Marco Bove suggests how Francis came to reflect this new life in Christ. Leaving Mt Alverno, after receiving the stigmata, Francis went straight to Umbria and the Marches on a long preaching tour. His biographers say that he was deeply inspired and very enthusiastic. The composing of the “Canticle of Creatures” followed and in it Francis highlights the key to a journey of faith: praise and gratitude. Bove commented that in the "Canticle” Francis expresses a new way of being in Christ which is:

“to stand before the Father and to face life itself. Praise bursts forth from the heart of a man who lives by grace and by grace alone, from the heart of a man who can only express gratitude through his life and through his words.”

So from the Crucified and Risen Christ to Francis receiving the stigmata – a place where reason is conquered by revelation – we touch on what it means to be human. It boils down to a question of desire* or will to be a subject – and our freedom to choose how to fulfill that desire.

Christian conversion, represented by Francis, is a true transformation of that desire – it is discovering the model whose relationship to the true God is such that in following That Model one enters into a life in which prayer and transcendence is central - where the Real Other in one’s life is God and this is radically different from a life where that is not the case.

One gets a sense that through his intense contemplation on Francis receiving the stigmata, Bonaventure saw that reason, left to itself, leads to the Cross, which illuminates our darkness, our violence. And thus we find Bonaventure, throughout the book, using reason as he talks about faith, but in the end he insists that reason must have a prior source of grounding – reason must be conquered by revelation - as he was keenly aware of the limitation of philosophy; that reason only exists as long as there are differences. Once left outside the love of God, we humans rubbing up against each other long enough, will unravel, much like the fractions within the Franciscan order that Bonaventure was dealing with; just like what Francis was struggling with prior to his visit to Mt Alverno. In time, this unraveling of reason will result in both, a crisis of culture as well as a crisis of the individual, thus destroying all differences – throwing everyone into sameness – a frenzied mob expelling reason - where the only source of truth now comes from The Voice on the cross: “Father forgive them for they know not what they do.” (Luke 23:34)
 .
We find throughout Bonaventure’s book insights, like a flicker, a glimmer of something more, a precursor if you will, for which no expression had yet been found and which we are only now beginning to grapple with, and that is how the self – what it means to be a person – is bound up in a Trinitarian and anthropological troth.

Indeed, the Lord Jesus, when He prayed to the Father, "that all may be one. . . as we are one" (John 17:21-22) opened up vistas closed to human reason, for He implied a certain likeness between the union of the divine Persons, and the unity of God's sons in truth and charity. This likeness reveals that man, who is the only creature on earth which God willed for itself, cannot fully find himself except through a sincere gift of himself. – Gaudium et spes, 24

And so Bonaventure closes out his book countering the "false-self" of reason, which was perfectly exemplified by Pilate's empty philosophical question, "What is truth?" with a clear and realistic expression of Franciscan spirituality – living for the Something Greater. I invite you to the cave of Francis and ask you to engage in a Franciscan form of centering prayer - one that is not so much an "inner" journey, as if to locate the essence of yourself within, but rather one in love modelled on Francis imitating Christ, as he was entirely conformed to Christ.

If you should ask how these things come about,

question grace, not instruction;

desire, not intellect;

the cry of prayer, not pursuit of study;

the Bridegroom, not the teacher;

God, not man;

darkness, not clarity;

not light, but the wholly fire

which inflames and carries you aloft to God

with fullest unction and burning affection.

This fire is God,

and the furnace of this fire leads to Jerusalem;

and Christ the man kindles it

in the fervor of His burning Passion,

which he alone truly perceives who says,

"My soul chooses hanging and my bones death" [Job, 7, 15].

He who chooses this death can see God because this is indubitably true:

"Man shall not see me and live" [Exod., 33, 20].

Let us then die and pass over into darkness;

let us impose silence

upon our cares, our desires, and our phantasms (imaginings).

Let us pass over with the crucified Christ

from this world to the Father [John, 13, 1],

so that when the Father is shown to us

we may say with Philip:

"It is enough for us" [John, 14, 8];

let us hear with Paul:

"My grace is sufficient for thee" [II Cor., 12, 9];

let us exult with David, saying:

"My flesh and my heart have grown faint; Thou art the God of my heart, and portion forever" [Ps. 73, 26].

"Blessed be the Lord God of Israel from everlasting to everlasting; and let all the people say:

So be it, so be it! Amen! Hallelujah!" [Ps., 106, 48].

(*Desire not from a psychological or what we usual think of as 'individual craving', but rather an anthropological understanding based on "all desire is a desire to be," it is an aspiration, the dream of a fullness attributed to the mediator.)

Reason Must be Conquered by Revelation Part III

My third reflection in this series on Saint Bonaventure's "The Journey of the Mind to God" focuses on chapters 3 & 4 and what appears to be a miscalculation which has led many astray by narrowing our notion of what constitutes a person.

After revealing how to "see" God in all that is around us, now in chapters 3 & 4, St Bonaventure challenges his own premise of writing this book, which is based on the revelation that Christ reveals, with a meandering into human reason tied to Plato and then adopted by St Augustine, as he gives thought to: What does it mean to be human? Or how might we best understand what a human being is? In this third step on the journey to God, St Bonaventure, consistent with St Augustine and Richard of St Victor, brings us to a precipice where he has us "reenter" ourselves. Bonaventure warns that there are risks, sighting how the mind, memory and intellect (the 3 powers we possess within ourselves) can obscure God, to the point of deception, saying that, "you will be able to see God through yourself as through an image, indeed, to see through a mirror darkly." [I Cor., 13, 12]

To grasp how treacherous a reentry can be check out this clip as the news commentator explains the degree of difficulty facing the crew and control center.

G. K. Chesterton observed how important it is to account for the trajectory (looking both ways) of an idea; "If some small mistake were made in doctrine, huge blunders might be made in human happiness."  One only needs to see the sad reality of our personal and social world today to notice that we have made those huge blunders, due in part by our justification of a turn inward.  St Bonaventure's reentry by way of reason, following in the footsteps of St Augustine's notion of entering into yourself, inadvertently lent itself to what has turned out to be a bankrupt concept of what constitutes a "person" in the modern day world of psychology and counseling, thus emptying the reality of "personhood" revealed by Christ of its original grounding in dialogue and relationality.

In a 1990 article that appeared in Communio titled, "Concerning the Notion of Person in Theology," Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger writes:

"... God who is in dialogue, stimulated the concept 'person'... In God, person means relation. Relation, being related, is not something super-added to the person, but it is the person itself. In its nature, the person exists only as relation."

The article continues:

"I believe a profound illumination of God as well as man occurs here, the decisive illumination of what person must mean in terms of Scripture: not a substance that closes itself in itself, but the phenomenon of complete relativity, which is, of course, realized in its entirety only in the one who is God, but which indicates the direction of all personal being. The point is thus reached here at which there is a transition from the doctrine of God into Christology and into anthropology."

Cardinal Ratzinger continues:

"... if it is true, however, that Christ is not the ontological exception, if from his exceptional position he is, on the contrary, the fulfillment of the entire human being, then the Christological concept of person is an indication for theology of how person is to be understood as such... In Christ, in the man who is completely with God, human existence is not canceled, but comes to its highest possibility, which consists in transcending itself, ... Christ is the directional arrow, as it were, that indicates what being human tends toward... and implies "being on the way" in the manner of human history."

Romano Guardini’s observation in his book, "The End of the Modern World" is apropos bringing us back to revelation and 'a calling' that conquers reason and is analogous to St Bonaventure's meditation on St Francis receiving the stigmata on Mt Alverno:

With the coming of Christ man’s existence took on an earnestness which classical antiquity never knew simply because it had no way of knowing it. The earnestness did not spring from human maturity; it sprang from the call which each person received from God through Christ. With this call the person opened his eyes, he was awakened for the first time in his life.

In a presentation that my friend Gil Bailie made at the 2005 Vatican conference: The Call to Justice: The Legacy of Gaudium et spes 40 Years Later he shared this about Augustine's inward turn:

For all the confusion to which it inadvertently contributed, the saving feature of Augustine's (and Bonaventure's) inward turn was that, like Trinitarian interiority, it was premised on communal, not a self-contained subjectivity... Where Augustine (and Bonaventure) turned inward in order to find God, the Western thought turned inward in search of a self-sufficient source of knowledge, truth and identity.

The slippery slope of the inward turn, as it attempts to locate the concept of person at some place "in" the psychic inventory, has proven to be a major hurdle to what is the most essential, radical and counter-intuitive element in Trinitarian thought - the relationality of God revealed by Christ. Though both Augustine and Bonaventure fashioned 3 'powers' (memory, intelligence, and will) to the human mind paralleling the relation of the three Persons to the divine essence, their inward turn unfortunately brought with it an implosion and 'self-centeredness' that we in the Western world find ourselves buried under today.

Christ unveils self-sufficiency as a myth revealing humans as interdividuals like mosaics: we are beings that are fashioned in and by diverse relationships. The difference between the romantic myth of 'individual' and the anthropological revelation of 'interdividual' revealed by Christ is like the difference of someone hiding a light under (or in) a bushel versus someone placing a light on a stand. Another way of saying it is if you look at a stained glass window of an old cathedral from the street - from outside, you will only see pieces of dark glass held together by strips of black lead (the turn inward). But if you cross the threshold and view it from inside (embracing yourself as creature, God's instrument), allowing the light to shine through, you will see a breathtaking spectacle of colors and shapes.

The appropriate inward turn, revealed by Christ, provides an ever expanding view of God's love and sacrifice for us.  I thought this video clip apropos to help visualize the saving feature of Augustine's and Bonaventure's turn inward seeking God rather than conceiving of a subject as contained within itself.

The Journey of the Mind to God was born out of Bonaventure's meditation on the stigmata of St Francis. Bonaventure saw the imprinting of the wounds of the Crucified on St Francis as his union with Christ - a final emptying or dying of his self - thus like St Paul, he could say: "With Christ I am nailed to the Cross. It is now no longer I that live, but Christ lives in me." [Gal. 2:20]

So the seeking of God through yourself is not about any self-help, self-love, self-esteem or self sufficiency, rather, reentry is the sacrifice of the very self we cling to "revealing your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ who is your life appears, then you also will appear with him in glory." [Col. 3:3-4]

 I re-post Bonaventure's words as he meditated on St Francis receiving the stigmata:

Living for the "SOMETHING GREATER"

If you should ask how these things come about,

question grace, not instruction;

desire, not intellect;

the cry of prayer, not pursuit of study;

the Bridegroom, not the teacher;

God, not man;

darkness, not clarity;

not light, but the wholly fire

which inflames and carries you aloft to God

with fullest unction and burning affection.

This fire is God,

and the furnace of this fire leads to Jerusalem;

and Christ the man kindles it

in the fervor of His burning Passion,

which he alone truly perceives who says,

"My soul chooses hanging and my bones death" [Job, 7, 15].

He who chooses this death can see God because this is indubitably true:

"Man shall not see me and live" [Exod., 33, 20].

Let us then die and pass over into darkness;

let us impose silence

upon our cares, our desires, and our phantasms (imaginings).

Let us pass over with the crucified Christ

from this world to the Father [John, 13, 1],

so that when the Father is shown to us

we may say with Philip:

"It is enough for us" [John, 14, 8];

let us hear with Paul:

"My grace is sufficient for thee" [II Cor., 12, 9];

let us exult with David, saying:

"My flesh and my heart have grown faint; Thou art the God of my heart, and portion forever" [Ps. 73, 26].

"Blessed be the Lord God of Israel from everlasting to everlasting; and let all the people say:

So be it, so be it! Amen! Hallelujah!" [Ps., 106, 48].

Reason Must be Conquered by Revelation Part II

I did not originally intend to create a series of posts reflecting on Saint Bonaventure's "The Journey of the Mind to God" however as this is the second post on the book, and I am only through chapter 1, I got a feeling that I will be posting more reflections.

From the notes: "Saint Bonaventure follows Saint Augustine in his conception of history as a most beautiful drama, composed by God and acted by mankind.(1) The beauty of this drama and its meaning, however, can be grasped only through faith and on the basis of revelation. But since we are in such a position that we can witness only a small part of this drama, we need Holy Scripture to raise us to a point from which we can view and comprehend it in its entirety — from the creation of the world to judgment day."(2)

WOW! Gazing into this mystery is truly a challenge for any of us, especially if we are using only our reason, and that is why Bonaventure insisted that we see that reason must be conquered by revelation.

(1) "conception of history as a most beautiful drama, composed by God and acted by mankind."

My friend Gil Bailie gave a weekend retreat with Franciscan Father Richard Rohr in the '90s and out of that retreat came a number of tapes and tape sets. I particularly love, "Entering the Biblical Story at the Eucharistic Table" - so much so that I transcribed it. In this talk Gil refers to this "most beautiful drama, composed by God and acted by mankind:"

Jesus never claimed to be operating on his own. He even says in John’s Gospel, “If I had come in my own name you would believe me, but because I have come in the name of the one who has sent me you don’t believe.” We are asked to be like that. We are asked to re-present Christ to the world. To be actors in the great drama – like von Balthasar’s ‘Theo-drama’, a magnificent orchestration of the grandeur of the Christian drama in history - and so the language of drama is appropriate – and the language of re-presenting it to the world, in however way, even though we are all clay vessels, we are all clumsy, we’re all fallen and sinful, we don’t do a very good job of it, despite our clumsiness God knows how to use leftovers and misfits – in fact our clumsiness is part of it, our failures to do it are part of it.

We are called; we are incorporated; we are deputized to receive into our lives - personally and with our communion with one another - the spirit of Christ, and to step into the world and absorb all the anxieties, uncertainty and the confusion and be part of the light of Christ in the world.

In another section of the tape Gil continues:

So we take our lives, and this is our supreme privilege, we must not see this as some kind of melodramatic act of renunciation, it is the source of our freedom, to take our lives, thank God for them because it is a gift to us, and break them or let them be broken and give them away. And then, Jesus says, “do THIS in memory of me.” Do what? Do this in memory of me. Not just the gesture, of course we do the gesture; of course the Real Presence, but when Jesus says, do THIS, He is talking of something much more vast then that. He means doing that which the gesture represents – being Christ in the world. ...

... It is at the Eucharistic table that we receive this gift and are nourished for the journey to go back out into the world and be Eucharistic people - be Christ to the world, absorbing that unforgivenness and being people who are not there on their own, but rather people who are saying with Paul, "I live now not I, but Christ lives in me."

I am always blown away by his reflection... Ah, wait now, we have one more part to the original reflection.

(2) The beauty of this drama and its meaning, however, can be grasped only through faith and on the basis of revelation. But since we are in such a position that we can witness only a small part of this drama, we need Holy Scripture to raise us to a point from which we can view and comprehend it in its entirety — from the creation of the world to judgment day.

Again reread the words of Bonaventure from my last post that ring so true: There is something greater.

Christ instituted the Mass so that we can enter into His Mystery - This Drama. The Mass was not conceived in the language of modern day 'me-ism' rather we are first opened and prepared to receive the Liturgy of the Word (likened this to a willingness to sacrifice yourself) and then we actually enter into the drama - we take our part as actors in the Liturgy of the Eucharist.

Wondrously and mysteriously, The Story is presented and re-presented to us so as to jar our memory, the memory for which Christ asks us, "Do THIS in remembrance of me," so that with the opportunity, given to us at each Mass, we can shout 'yes' or amen and actually participate in it's trajectory so that "we can view and comprehend it in its entirety — from the creation of the world to judgment day."

At every Mass we are encouraged to repeat Mary's 'yes' and to enter into THIS Journey - to make our life apart of THE Story.  Saint Bonaventure's book is retelling this very journey to God. 

So memory matters!  We improve our memory through repetition and ritual and it is here that humankind enters the drama within the Mass.

AMEN!

Reason Must be Conquered by Revelation

In a class on the updated Mass I find myself constantly going back to Lk 11, 29-32 and that there IS Something Greater than... (myself) Here.  Then on the feast day of St. Bonaventure appearing in The Magnificat was this reflection and also found here: The Journey of the Mind to God .

Living for the "SOMETHING GREATER"

If you should ask how these things come about,

question grace, not instruction;

desire, not intellect;

the cry of prayer, not pursuit of study;

the Bridegroom, not the teacher;

God, not man;

darkness, not clarity;

not light, but the wholly fire

which inflames and carries you aloft to God

with fullest unction and burning affection.

This fire is God,

and the furnace of this fire leads to Jerusalem;

and Christ the man kindles it

in the fervor of His burning Passion,

which he alone truly perceives who says,

"My soul chooses hanging and my bones death" [Job, 7, 15].

He who chooses this death can see God because this is indubitably true:

"Man shall not see me and live" [Exod., 33, 20].

Let us then die and pass over into darkness;

let us impose silence

upon our cares, our desires, and our phantasms (imaginings).

Let us pass over with the crucified Christ

from this world to the Father [John, 13, 1],

so that when the Father is shown to us

we may say with Philip:

"It is enough for us" [John, 14, 8];

let us hear with Paul:

"My grace is sufficient for thee" [II Cor., 12, 9];

let us exult with David, saying:

"My flesh and my heart have grown faint; Thou art the God of my heart, and portion forever" [Ps. 73, 26].

"Blessed be the Lord God of Israel from everlasting to everlasting; and let all the people say:

So be it, so be it! Amen! Hallelujah!" [Ps., 106, 48].

In my formation studies with the SFO I gleaned that for Bonaventure, divine revelation, not human reason, is the way to God. God is to be revealed, not reasoned. Truly there IS Something Greater than... (myself) Here [Lk 11, 29-32]. Bonaventure's emphasis on revelation does not mean that we do not make use of reason. Bonaventure plainly demonstrates that devotion has to be prior to mere intellectualism.

I believe that Rome's revisions of the word use at the Mass is challenging us to move out of the false notion that we only represent an independent 'self' and enter more fully into the Mystery just as Bonaventure says, "(W)e may come to think that mere reading will suffice without fervor, speculation without devotion, investigation without admiration, observation without exultation, industry without piety, knowledge without love, understanding without humility, study without divine grace, the mirror without the divinely inspired wisdom." (P.4). On the other hand, Bonaventure tried to be well-balanced in his reasonings, that is, being scholastic without leaving the realm of monasticism; being religious and spiritual but also intellectual.

In whatever Bonaventure wrote he intended to awaken us all to the One Reality: that there is something greater than... (myself) here. Reason has to be conquered by revelation. Contemplation can not stop on the first or second level, where the rational soul contemplates the outer world and itself but recognizing that it is not complete in itself. The true and final contemplation is when the soul sees beyond the outer world and itself; when it ascends with the whole of creation above itself. There IS Something Greater than... (myself) Here!

So I contend (with Bonaventure's help) that the revised wording of the Mass challenges us all to enter more closely, more reverently and more humbly into this Mystery of Sacrifice, Real Presence and Communion.  Suddenly the words, "Lord, I am not worthy" ring so powerful.