Undusted Texts

  "Lord, teach me to be generous. Teach me to serve you as you deserve, To give and not to count the cost, To fight and not to heed the wounds, To toil and not to seek for rest, To labor and not to ask for reward, Save that of knowing that I am doing Your Will." --St. Ignatius of Loyola, "Prayer for Generosity" During the course of my schooling at a Jesuit school, I became well acquainted with the above prayer by St. Ignatius.  It is a prayer to dedicated to the Lord despite all the difficulties that come our way during this lifetime on earth.  "In the world you will have trouble," informed the Lord, and this is very true.  Christians will always experience friction with the aspects of the world that have not been fully enlightened by the light of Christ.  This is the basic theme of most of the prayer: Lord, teach me to serve You despite the difficulties the world will place on me.  One line has intrigued me, though: "To labor and...

  "I call upon You, God, Pantokrator, Lord Jesus Christ, Heavenly King: I call upon You, the maker of heaven and earth. I exorcise you, spirit unclean, according to the word of God, the maker of heaven and earth. Be put to flight by the one who wraps himself in light as a cloak: the one who alone has immortality and light unapprochable: to Whom be glory and power unto the ages. Amen." --St. Epiphanius of Salamis What St. Epiphanius' short prayer was written to do is something which the world has needed since the Garden: the exorcism of demons.  While sin is, of course, the choice of man, the demons play their part in trying to bend us toward sin, to constantly bombard us with temptation (think of C.S. Lewis' fictionalized account of this in The Screwtape Letters ).  But God does not leave us to their whims: we are not abandoned into the hands of the "worldrulers," as St. Paul calls them.  Indeed, He gives us the power of His Spirit to d...

"We though preach Christ crucified, to the Jews indeed a scandal, but to the Greeks folly..."--1 Cor 1:23 Christ is risen!  He Who was crucified for our sins has trampled death and risen again, and yet still the Cross is His sign.  By His Resurrection great power was given to the Cross, and it is for this that Constantine heard: "By this sign you will conquer."  And today we celebrate St. Constantine and his mother Helena, apostles of the Cross. We laud these two saints as "Equals to the Apostles."  Why do we do so?  Because of their immense effect in spreading the Gospel throughout the world.  On those who devotedly gave themselves to the apostolic duty of evangelization, we bestow this title, as we do to Mary Magdalane and Sts. Cyril and Methodius.  What did Constantine and Helena do to earn this title? Constantine was the Roman Emperor, and, like most Emperors, he was a pagan.  Yet as he prepared for a battle with his usurper, Const...

  A Maronite icon of the Theophany, when Christ sanctified the waters for our Baptism "Going forth therefore make into disciples all the nations, baptizing them into the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to keep all that I have commanded you."--Mt 28:19-20a Baptism is the door through which we enter the Church, the first Mystery every Christian experiences.  It is what marks one as a Christian.  To understand it, then, is key to understanding the Christian life in truth.  In Baptism, we are baptized into Christ's death and resurrection so that we die with Him and rise with Him so that we may life and rule with Him.  The effects are myriad, but the basic fact is this: "The power of Baptism is to be understood as a covenant with God for a second life and a purer lifestyle."  We enter into the Lord's New Covenant through our Baptism, and in this covenant He gives us innumerable graces and we give Him our lives...

I was recently instructed that, as a catechist, I should blend myself into my students, to make myself one of them, in order to make them accept me.  If I was too "different" or too blatant in my Catholicism, I would not be accepted.  Instead, I should work from within them, almost in an undercover way.  The thing is, it is difficult to be undercover when your students know you are teaching them the faith.  I can understand my professor's point: the members of the Church should integrate themselves into society so they can change it from within.  It is not an outside force that will bring change, but a force hidden within, such as hidden yeast leavens dough.  We are to be Trojan horses: we must sneak under their radar and then slowly purify their drinking water with the nectar of the faith.  The problem is this: I do not see this as an effective method. I apologize if I am being proud: I am just giving my opinion on an issue that directly affects h...

Though I hesitate to take on the title, by my studies, I think I must be classed as a theologian.  Yet with the trends popular among many who bear the title "theologian," I sometimes recoil at the very name itself.  I have thought about these positions and ideas that many theologians hold dear to their hearts (or dear to their intellects).  It is with a strong heart, a sound mind, and a firm will that I renounce these opinions.  I declare: I renounce renouncing the Father.   Though, it is true, God is beyond gender, the First Person of the Trinity revealed Himself under the title of Father: who are we to renounce that title? I renounce renouncing the Son.   Jesus Christ is the Son of God, one divine Person in two natures, human and divine.  The Councils stated it, and I confess it: anything else is heresy. I renounce the Spirit's domination.   The Holy Spirit is God, the Third Person of the Most Holy Trinity: this I affirm.  The Father a...