The Nativity Fast begins...

Today we begin what is known among Eastern Christians (i.e., Catholic and Orthodox) as St. Philip's Fast (otherwise known as the the Nativity Fast). It is called St. Phillip's Fast because on the Eastern liturgical calendar 14 November is St. Philip's feast. The St.Philip whose feast is observed on 14 November, like St. Stephen, was one of the original seven deacons from the sixth chapter of The Acts of the Apostles (verses 1-7). This fast is similar to the fast of the Great Lent, though not quite as austere in some aspects.

According to Byzantine Catholic practice, on Sundays, Mondays, Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays one abstains from meat, meat products, and all dairy and dairy products, which includes eggs. Fish and shellfish are distinguished from each other in Eastern Christian dietary practice, are permitted on some days, as are olive oil and wine until 12 December. In something of a reversal on Fridays through 12 December, while fast days, there is no limit to the number of meals eaten on these days and both olive oil and wine are permitted. 12 December, which is the Feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe on the Roman calendar, marks the last day of the initial part of the Nativity Fast.

St. Philip the deacon, icon by Ann Chapin

Beginning on 13 December, all days through 24 December are days of abstinence that one fasts from meat, meat products, all dairy, fish, olive oil, and wine. Shellfish is permitted. While it is important to take the fast seriously, in the United States, with our observance of Thanksgiving during the Nativity Fast, it is okay and I would say even encouraged to just go ahead and observe Thanksgiving in the normal and expected way. It is similar to how we Roman Catholics in the U.S. typically take a break from our strict Lenten observance on St. Patrick's Day. On Wednesdays and Fridays from 13-24 December it is customary to only eat one very modest meal. During the latter period of the Nativity Fast wine and olive oil are permitted only on Saturdays and Sundays.

As a Roman Catholic who for the most part observes Eastern Christian discipline (because we have largely abandoned such disciplines in the West) I make some modifications in keeping with my own tradition. Sundays are always feast days. So, there are no dietary restrictions on the Lord's Day. Also, I interpret no wine as no alcohol. Observing these lengthy periods of fasting is difficult, which is why the following tips from the website of Our Lady of Fatima Byzantine Catholic Church in San Francisco are necessary, the most salient of which I post:

1. The external observances of our Faith do not make us better than anyone else. No sense of superiority or exclusiveness should be allowed to enter into our practice.
2. Insofar as possible, it is best to fast quietly, without letting anyone know that you are fasting. This is clearly in line with Our Lord's teaching. When ordering at a restaurant, don't proclaim, "No meat for me, I'm fasting!" Just order the dish which accords with the fast.
3. Do not become discouraged if you are unable to keep the whole fast. The Evil Spirit is always on the lookout to fool us into giving up because we cannot do it all. Part of fasting is to learn our weakness and inability to save ourselves.
4. Remember that Fasting includes a) fasting from sin; b) additional spiritual reading and prayer; c) almsgiving and other works of Philanthropia ("the love of humankind"). Do not neglect these as you prepare for the Feast.

So, what to eat? I point you a great website with a lot of links to recipes that enable observance of both the Nativity Fast and fasting during the Great Lent: Sources for Orthodox Fasting. Also, this year, I am enthusiastic about another website, An Orthodox Kitchen.

"By feeling mild pangs of hunger, I realize that I am not sufficient to bring myself into being, or to sustain myself. The desire for food can be a sign to me of my even greater need for God. Every time I pass a 'Jack-in-the-Box' or other fast-food hamburger emporium and want to get an 'Ultimate Cheeseburger,' I am also reminded of the season of the year, of my commitment to the Lord, and that nothing is 'Ultimate' except God." It is an opportunity to make reparation for the times I have loved things more than God and to mortify my sensual desires, especially those I am prone to misuse and/or overuse, not seeking them for a greater good, but only to gratify personal desire. Things are not bad in and of themselves, but by misuse and overuse they can become detriments to me. There are always those who protest that fasting and other conscious deprivations "are artificial or external methods" of drawing close to God. Indeed, they can easily become such, but when done in the proper spirit of humility, in recognition of my need, these are effacaciuous means.

All holy men and women, pray for us

"fasting is an important part of penance"

Romano Amerio's Iota Unum: A Study of Changes in the Catholic Church in the XXth Century is certainly a tour de force, some might even call it a reactionary book. While I agree that it is the former, I disagree that it is reactionary. In fact, I find Amerio's style to be very dispassionate. There are certainly parts of his comprehensive analysis of the Church after the Second Vatican Council with which I take exception, but very few. In his extensive treatment of the post-conciliar changes in the Church he is intent to look at the subtle and fundamental ways that Church teaching shifted after the Second Vatican Council and shows that for the most part it is detrimental. In far too many instances we threw the baby out with the bathwater. In no aspect is this more true than when it comes to fasting and abstinence, which can only be seen as making a concession to the world, to what Amerio defines as somatolatry.

Amerio treats fasting in both its penitential and mortifying dimensions, a topic I find very important the day before the beginning of what is known in the Christian East as the Nativity Fast. In Iota Unum, published in the mid-1980s, Amerio correctly begins chapter ten, entitled Somatolatry and Penance by stating the obvious, namely that "sexuality has ... been taken as the very forming principle of the human person." It seems to me that he is quite correct in this assertion, which is nothing but a recognition that for the most part we are all Freudians now. As a result of the primacy given to human sexuality, which is a complete overthrow of all previous Christian anthropology, "the cult of the body" has come to dominate culture, a phenomenon he calls somatolatry, meaning the worship of the body (soma being the Greek word for the physical body). He is right to assert that in its modern manifestation we even exceed the ancient pagans in worshipping the human form. More to the point at hand, Amerio observes that "[t]he penitential element and the ascetic demands of the Catholic religion have retreated as a necessary consequence of the advance of somatolatry."

He goes on to trace the beginnings of the shift and identifies a special indult given during World War II "that suspended Friday abstinence from meat, and from all fasting except on Ash Wednesday and Good Friday." This indult was only in effect until the end of the war. The connection, however, is obvious because today, as Roman Catholics, normatively the only two obligatory fast days are Ash Wednesday and Good Friday. Friday abstinence from the meat of warm-blooded animals is only obligatory on Fridays of Lent. So, what began as a reasonable attempt to lift heavy burdens from already suffering people, became the norm. Even prior to the special indult of 1941, or the changes put into effect on papal authority after Vatican II, "fasting meant having only one full meal a day, besides a piece of bread in the morning and [when necessary]a light snack at night." This is still the norm for Eastern Christians today, be they Catholic or Orthodox. In addition to abstaining from meat, other types of food were "excluded from daily consumption" during days and seasons of fasting and abstinence. To point to the example of Eastern Christians, such foods are meat, dairy, including eggs, alcohol, olive oil, even including shellfish and fish. In other words, during seasons of fasting, one often eats a vegan diet.

Indeed, "fasting is an important part of penance and," Amerio continues, "it should be remembered that when Christ talks about 'doing justice' he sums up the works of justice under the three heads of almsgiving, prayer, and fasting, which are, as St. Augustine explains, representative of benevolence, the desire for God and the control of concupiscence." Concupiscence, of course, means the desire for gratification of the senses for its own sake and not for any greater good. To continuously seek to gratify our sensual desires, which we are encouraged culturally to do, to make pleasure for its own sake the point and purpose of our activities, to live once again according to Freudian principles (i.e., the pain/pleasure principle), is what it means to be a hedonist, which is opposed to following Christ who calls us to live in a new way. Today, the antiphon for the Magnificat for the thirty-third Sunday in Ordinary Time sums this up well: "By your trusting acceptance of trials, you will gain your life, says the Lord." So, we fast not only to do penance, but also to mortify our sinful desires.

This way of living, which is always new because it always goes against the grain of life in the world, was brought forcefully home to me last night when I watched the lovely film The Passion of Bernadette. My joy today is that in the Latin Church Sundays are always feast days, as it should be, a day that we rest while we rejoice by worshipping God and bask in the glow of Christ's resurrection from the dead.

All holy men and women, pray for us

"Fear is not the natural state of man" Aung San Suu Kyi

The release of Aung San Suu Kyi from house arrest in Burma today cannot go without remark. Back when it actually meant something, she was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1991. She has been under some form of detention in Burma for 15 of the past 21 years. She is the daughter of the Burmese independence hero, General Aung San, who was assassinated in 1947, just six months prior to Burma attaining its independence from Great Britain. She went on to study at St. Hugh's College in Oxford, focusing on philosophy, politics, and economics, only returning to Burma in 1988, when her mother was terminally ill.

While she was in Burma attending to her mother, Aung San Suu Kyi felt compelled to take up the torch of democracy against the highly repressive regime, saying in a famous speech she delivered in Rangoon on 26 August 1988, "I could not, as my father's daughter remain indifferent to all that was going on." From that point she led the opposition to dictator General Ne Win. Her opposition to the brutal military government, led by Win, is the reason she was placed under house arrest for the first time in 1989. Political pressure brought by her party, the National League for Democracy (NLD), finally forced the military regime into holding elections in 1990, which the NLD won handily. The results of the election were negated and martial law remained in force. She remained under house arrest until 1995.

Aung San Suu Kyi's politics are inspired by examples of Mahatma Ghandi and Martin Luther King, Jr. While she was free in Burma in the late 1980s, her activities consisted of traveling the country, organizing mass rallies and publicly advocating for peaceful political reform and, above all, for free elections. She is what Francis Sejested, chairman of the Nobel committee that awarded her the prize, said she was: "an outstanding example of the power of the powerless."

The importance of this day for the people of Burma cannot be exaggerated, assuming Aung San Suu Kyi's freedom lasts this time, which, given the track record of Burma's brutally repressive military junta, is a huge assumption. Given her track record of fearlessness, she will undoubtedly pick up where she left off. In a rare interview she was given permission to grant in 2007 to British journalist John Pilger, she said- "No matter the regime's physical power, in the end they can't stop the people; they can't stop freedom. We shall have our time."

"It is not power that corrupts, but fear. Fear of losing power corrupts those who wield it, and fear of the scourge of power corrupts those who are subject to it," Aung San Suu Kyi once wrote. Nonetheless, she continued, even under the "most crushing state machinery, courage rises up again and again. For fear is not the natural state of man."

All holy men and women, pray for us

The Cruciform Shape of Art: The intersection of faith and life

Note: On Thursday I posted a photograph of a bas relief of St. Martin of Tours that is probably the work of Eric Gill. I found the photograph in that on-line treasure trove of beauty Quaerere Deum. Lawrence, OP, the photographer, by mentioning Gill, caused me to recall something I originally posted back in March 2007 on our parish blog, which I am now re-posting in a slightly modified form

Too often we are sentimental about our faith, about what it really means at its deepest level and the implications it should have for our engagement with the world. The problem with being overly sentimental is that it leads to being shallow. For instance, it is often nice and comforting to believe that Jesus Christ, by his dying on the Cross, took away our sins and the sins of the whole world. How wonderful, we sometimes think, that God will forgive me for the last time I got angry and said some regrettable things to the person at whom I was angry, or forgive the impure thought I entertained, etc. Yet, in the very next instant we might encounter something on the television news, or in the newspaper, about yet another horrible thing one person did to another, or several people, a murder, a rape, a drug addict punching and robbing an old woman on her way to Church, an off-duty police officer mercilessly beating a petite woman in a drunken rage, or another act of genocide by a stronger group of people against a weaker group, etc., etc. In other words, the kind of things that happen in the world which caused Malcolm Muggeridge to accurately observe that original sin is the most empirically verifiable fact in the world. After witnessing such depravities, we give lie to our faith, by condemning, not the merely the actions, which are deserving of condemnation and opposition, but the people who perpetrate them. One significant proof of this, in the U.S. anyway, is that two-thirds of people still support the death penalty. How does it give lie to our profession? It gives lie because a person's dignity as a human being created in the divine image is not forfeited by sin, even heinous sin. For this we should all thank God everyday.

Several years back on the Westminster Cathedral blog, Solomon, I Have Surpassed Thee, Monsignor Mark Langham, who was then administrator of the Cathedral and its resident blogger, wrote a post entitled, Praying the Gill Stations. The Gill Stations were created by a famous artist named Eric Gill. In a 1989 biography by Fiona McCarthey, it was learned that Gill, a much celebrated artistic genius and a devout believer all his life, an adult convert to the Catholic faith from the Church of England, was quite sexually depraved. "Since then," (the 1989 biography), writes Msgr. Langham, "we have had to come to terms with the fact that our greatest Cathedral artwork is the product of a man who was in many ways detestable. There were many calls for the Stations to be removed." Thankfully, "the redemptive quality of art" prevailed. Msgr. Langham continues: "As so often in the Church's history, works of great beauty and inspiration have come from those who seem less than worthy of their talents. God uses vessels of clay to perform his great works, and sometimes it is shocking to us how weak those vessels are - yet his grace shines through, and even mediated by sinful hands, allows others to experience his presence."


Given his faith, his depravity, and much of his art, certainly including the Stations of the Cross, it seems that Eric Gill knew he was a man in need of redemption. A story related by Langham indicates this much: "As [the Stations] were being installed in the Cathedral, a woman came up to Gill to say that she did not think they were very nice carvings, to which he snapped back that it was not a very nice subject!" Without romanticizing evil, or the deep harm it causes others, such stories help us overcome our tendency to domesticate and sentimentalize the deep love of God, especially during Passiontide, the time each year when we see God's love in the sacrificial suffering and emptying out of his Son for our sakes, even for the sake of the worst sinners. May this lead us to a deeper compassion- a deeper suffering with- others, both those whose sufferings are caused by others and who, in turn, often cause suffering, perpetuating the cycle that brings about the need for a Savior in the first place, as well as for those who cause suffering in the first instance. These are the dysfunctions of Adam's race, explained in a somewhat disconcerting way in the great Easter exultet: "O happy fault, O necessary sin of Adam, which gained for us so great a Redeemer!" Are these sentimental words? In light of the faults of the world and of each of us, hardly!

Lord,
grant us your forgiveness,
and set us free from our enslavement to sin.
We ask this through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son,
who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit,
one God, for ever and ever.

(Photos by Msgr. Mark Langham for Solomon, I Have Surpassed Thee, formerly the weblog of Westminster Cathedral, London)

All holy men and women, pray for us

"Love is like a cloud that pours a lot of rain"

Joanie Jett covers the late, great Gram Parsons classic Love Hurts. I turned 45 yesterday and "I've really learnt a lot...love is like a flame that burns you when it's hot." I checked, especially on my birthday with St. Martin of Tours, and since last week, now, and forever "our God is a consuming fire" (Heb. 12:29). This strikes me as a great traditio for a November Friday. Our Friday music this month is songs by our rock n' roll dead covered by the living.

Love Hurts is one of my favorite songs, but a version I really don't like is the popular one by the Scottish group Nazareth.

All holy men and women, pray for us

"[H]e neither feared to die nor refused to live"

Today is my forty-fifth birthday. It is the liturgical Memorial of St. Martin of Tours. Here in the United States of America today is also Veteran's Day. For some reason I find the convergence of these things this year a little overwhelming. Hence, it is impossible for me to write anything original. To my great relief, I don't have to, which is one of the truly great blessings of being part of the great Tradition, the communio sanctorum. So, all of the below is taken, even if in modified form, from the invaluable on-line Catholic Encyclopedia:

St. Martin was a Roman soldier in the tradition of his father. However, he was attracted to Christianity from a very young age in the military camps, due to the spread of Christianity in the military after the conversion of the emperor Constantine earlier in the fourth century. It was when his unit was sent to Amiens, in modern-day France, that the famous event took place, the one that is always depicted, as in the bas relief below- "the celebrated legend of the cloak." As the story is handed down to us, it was at the gates of Amiens on a bitterly cold day that Martin encountered "a shivering and half-naked beggar." Martin was deeply moved by the beggar's need and so "he divided his coat into two parts and gave one to the poor man. The part kept by himself became the famous relic preserved in the oratory of the Frankish kings under the name of 'St. Martin's cloak.' Martin, who was still only a catechumen, soon received baptism." Shortly after being baptized he left military service and quickly set out for "Poitiers to enroll himself among the disciples of St. Hilary, the wise and pious bishop whose reputation as a theologian was already passing beyond the frontiers of Gaul."

St. Martin's relief (photograph by Lawrence, OP)

Lawrence's comment: "A bas relief, possibly by Eric Gill, of St Martin dressed as a First World War soldier tearing half of his cloak to give relief to a beggar. Today, 11 November, is the feast of St Martin of Tours (d.397)."

The cultus of St. Martin "was very popular throughout the Middle Ages." As a result of his popularity and the efficacy of his intercession many "churches and chapels were dedicated to him, and a great number of places have been called by his name. His body, taken to Tours, was enclosed in a stone sarcophagus, above which his successors, St. Britius and St. Perpetuus, built first a simple chapel, and later a basilica ([AD]470). St. Euphronius, Bishop of Autun and a friend of St. Perpetuus, sent a sculptured tablet of marble to cover the tomb. A larger basilica was constructed in [AD] 1014 which was burned down in [AD] 1230 to be rebuilt soon on a still larger scale This sanctuary was the cent[er] of great national pilgrimages until [AD] 1562, the fatal year when the Protestants sacked it from top to bottom, destroying the sepulchre and the relics of the great wonder-worker." Eventually the basilica "was restored by its canons, but a new and more terrible misfortune awaited it.

The revolutionary hammer of [AD] 1793 was to subject it to a last devastation. It was entirely demolished with the exception of the two towers which are still standing and, so that its reconstruction might be impossible, the atheistic municipality caused two streets to be opened up on its site. In December, [AD] 1860, skilfully executed excavations located the site of St. Martin's tomb, of which some fragments were discovered. These precious remains are at present sheltered in a basilica built by Mgr Meignan, Archbishop of Tours which is unfortunately of very small dimensions and recalls only faintly the ancient and magnificent cloister of St. Martin. On 11 November each year the feast of St. Martin is solemnly celebrated in this church in the presence of a large number of the faithful of Tours and other cities and villages of the diocese." Someday I will celebrate my birthday there.

Over on Fr. Barron's wonderful The Word on Fire blog today, Fr. Stephen Grunow, in a lovely reflection on St. Martin, writes these words:

"Martin did see the Lord Jesus, just as clearly as he saw the beggar, and he was able to see in both the divine image of God become man in Christ. But more than this ( if there could be more!) he saw in that half of his cloak that God who made himself a beggar for our sake deserved not half of what we have been given, but everything. To truly follow Christ means not simply to give part of ourselves to the Lord, but to give ourselves over to him completely.

"Martin knew that Christ did not simply want his cloak, he wanted the man who owned the cloak- Christ wanted Martin.

"And the Lord who so wanted Martin, also desires all of us."

In a letter written long ago about the death of St. Martin, Sulpicius Severus said, "Filled with joy, Martin was welcomed by Abraham. Thus he left this life a poor and lowly man and entered heaven rich in God's favor." In his life and in his death my heavenly patron, St. Martin of Tours, verified the truth of what my dear Don Giussani testified to in Rome before the world: "The true protagonist of history is the beggar: Christ who begs for man's heart, and man's heart that begs for Christ."

St. Martin of Tours, holy bishop, pray for us

Faith and memory on the universal Feast of the Dedication of St. John Lateran

In Is It Possible to Live This Way?: An Unusual Approach to Christian Existence, vol. 2- Hope, Giussani says, "faith is the recognition of the great presence of God made man" (pg. 7). Luke Timothy Johnson elucidates how this can be in his wonderful book Living Jesus: Learning the Heart of the Gospel: "The Holy Spirit is the mode of Jesus' resurrection presence to the world" (pg. 15). Faith is faith in Jesus Christ and hope, according to Giussani, "is always connected with Jesus" (Is It Possible, 7).

Floorplan of the Basilica of St. John Lateran

On the Feast of the Dedication of St. John Lateran, let us take up the challenge issued by Giussani in this volume of Is It Possible to Live This Way? "to begin to understand the meaning of this word, hope, as the Church of God in the world uses it, as the first apostles used it and as missionaries who go to all parts of the world use it and as one who lives faith in Christ in his office or in his establishment uses it" (pg. 7). Let us also be reminded that "[t]he Church you have in front of you now, in which you believe, is the Church that has inherited two thousand years of history" (pg. 9). So, "hope has a radical link with the word memory" (pg. 8).

In a sermon to mark this occasion, St. Caesarius of Arles said: "My fellow Christians, today is the birthday of this church, an occasion for celebration and rejoicing. We, however, ought to be the true and living temple of God."

All holy men and women, pray for us