IN EXILE
By Father Ron Rolheiser, OMI
He taught us how to pray while not knowing how to pray. That’s a comment sometimes made about Henri Nouwen.

It seems almost contradictory to say that. How can someone teach us to pray when he himself doesn’t know how? Well, two complexities conspired together here. Henri Nouwen was a unique mixture of weakness, honesty, complexity and faith. That also describes prayer, this side of eternity. Nouwen simply shared, humbly and honestly, his own struggles with prayer and in seeing his struggles, the rest of us learned a lot about how prayer is precisely this strange mixture of weakness, honesty, complexity and faith.

Prayer, as we know, has classically been defined as “the lifting of mind and heart to God,” and given that our minds and hearts are pathologically complex, so too will be our prayer. It will give voice not just to our faith but also to our doubt. Moreover, in the Epistle to the Romans, St. Paul tells us that when we do not know how to pray, God’s Spirit, in groans too deep for words, prays through us. I suspect that we don’t always recognize all the forms that takes, how God sometimes prays through our groans and our weaknesses.

The renowned preacher Frederick Buechner, speaks of something he calls “crippled prayers that are hidden inside our minor blasphemes” and are uttered through clenched teeth: “God help us!” “Jesus Christ!” “For God’s sake!” These are prayers? Why not? If prayer is lifting mind and heart to God, isn’t this what’s in our mind and heart at that moment? Isn’t there a brutal honesty in this? Jacques Loew, one of the founders of the Worker-Priest movement in France, shares how, while working in a factory, he would sometimes be working with a group of men loading heavy bags onto a truck. Occasionally one of the men would accidently drop one of the bags which would split open leaving a mess and a mini-blaspheme would spring forth from the man’s lips. Loew, partly seriously and partly in jest, points out that while the man was not exactly saying the Lord’s Prayer, he was invoking the name of God in real honesty.
So, is this in fact a genuine modality of prayer or is this taking the Lord’s name in vain? Is this something we should be confessing as a sin rather than claiming as a prayer?

The commandment to not take the name of God in vain has little to do with those mini- blasphemes that slip out between clenched teeth when we drop a bag of groceries, jam a finger painfully, or get caught in a frustrating traffic jam. What we utter then may well be aesthetically offensive, in bad taste and disrespectful enough of others so that some sin lies within it, but that’s not taking the name of God in vain. Indeed, there’s nothing false about it at all. In some ways it’s the opposite of what the commandment has in mind.

We tend to think of prayer far too piously. It is rarely unadulterated altruistic praise issuing forth from a focused attention that’s grounded in gratitude and in an awareness of God. Most of the time our prayer is a very adulterated reality – and all the more honest and powerful because of that.

For instance, one of our great struggles with prayer is that it’s not easy to trust that prayer makes a difference. We watch the evening newscasts, see the entrenched polarization, bitterness, hatred, self-interest and hardness of heart that are seemingly everywhere, and we lose heart. How do we find the heart to pray in the face of this? What, inside of our prayer, is going to change any of this?

While it is normal to feel this way, we need this important reminder: prayer is most important and most powerful precisely when we feel it is most hopeless – and we are most helpless.

Why is this true? It’s true because it’s only when we are finally empty of ourselves, empty of our own plans and our own strength that we’re in fact ready to let God’s vision and strength flow into the world through us. Prior to feeling this helplessness and hopelessness, we are still identifying God’s power too much with the power of health, politics and economics that we see in our world; and are identifying hope with the optimism we feel when the news looks a little better on a given night. If the news looks good, we have hope; if not, why pray? But we need to pray because we trust in God’s strength and promise, not because the newscasts on a given night offer a bit more promise.

Indeed, the less promise our newscasts offer and the more they make us aware of our personal helplessness, the more urgent and honest is our prayer. We need to pray precisely because we are helpless and precisely because it does seem hopeless. Inside of that we can pray with honesty, perhaps even through clenched teeth.

(Oblate Father Ron Rolheiser, theologian, teacher and award-winning author, is President of the Oblate School of Theology in San Antonio, Texas. He can be contacted through his website www.ronrolheiser.com.)

THINGS OLD AND NEW
By Ruth Powers
The Portiuncula Indulgence is coming up! What is that? Let me explain.

Possibly one of the most misunderstood teachings in the Catholic treasury is that of indulgences, and because many Catholics misunderstand this gift of God through His church, we do not take advantage of them when they are available to us. In order to understand indulgences one must first understand a little bit about church teaching on the consequences of sin and the nature of penance. First of all, sin has consequences: guilt and punishment, and punishment is both eternal and temporal (in this world). The idea that we have consequences for sin in the world goes all the way back to the story of the Fall in Genesis, where God tells Eve, “I will greatly multiply your pain in childbearing, in pain you shall bring forth children.” (Genesis 3:16) When the sinner repents God removes both the guilt and the eternal punishment, but the temporal punishment may remain, as we see in the story of David when he repents of his sin with Bathsheba, and the prophet Nathan tells him that God has forgiven him, but that he will still have to suffer some consequences for his act. (2 Samuel 12)
Temporal penalties can also be remitted or removed, and God uses the church to do so. This is the basis of both the idea of the penances given as part of the Sacrament of Reconciliation, and the church’s teaching on indulgences, which are closely connected. In the early church when one confessed sins one was given a penance that was often public and severe to lessen that temporal punishment for sin, but the church realized that the sinner could shorten the time of that penance by pious acts of prayer or charity that expressed sorrow for the sin concretely. The concept of indulgences developed as a way to shorten the time one would have been required to spend in doing a particular penance. It became customary to assign a particular number of “days” to a particular indulgence, meaning that performing this act would have removed that number of days from the person’s penitential discipline. Unfortunately, many people misinterpreted this to mean that a certain number of days would be removed from their time in Purgatory. This is not possible, as time in Purgatory does not exist in the same way we know time here. Instead, we can look at the definition of indulgences given by Pope Paul VI in his Apostolic Constitution on indulgences. He said, “an indulgence is a remission before God of the temporal punishment due to sins whose guilt has already been forgiven, which the faithful Christian who is duly disposed gains under certain defined conditions through the church’s help when, as a minister of redemption, she dispenses and applies with authority the treasury of the satisfactions won by Christ and the saints.” In an attempt to eliminate the confusion around “days” of indulgences, at the time he issued this teaching, he reduced the terminology around indulgences to partial (removes some of the temporal punishment due to sin) or plenary (removes all of the temporal punishment due to sin). However, he is clear that only God knows exactly how efficacious any particular indulgence is, because only God can read the heart of the person seeking it.
The church offers numerous opportunities throughout the year for us to obtain a plenary indulgence, and one of my favorites as a Franciscan Secular is coming up soon. On Aug. 2 we celebrate the Feast of the Portiuncula. The Church of St. Mary of the Angels, which was called the Portiuncula or “Little Portion” was one of the chapels repaired by St. Francis of Assisi in the time after his conversion. It became the chapel where he lived and where he began to gather the followers who would eventually become the Order of Friars Minor, or Franciscans. It was also the place where he came to die in 1226. The little church, which is the cradle of the Franciscan Order, is now completely enclosed by the beautiful Basilica of St. Mary of the Angels in Assisi. In the beginning the indulgence could only be obtained at the little church itself, but in 1967 when Pope Paul VI reformed the teaching on indulgences he reaffirmed the Portiuncula Indulgence and extended it to all parish churches. A plenary indulgence can be obtained on that feast day by devoutly visiting the parish church, and there reciting at least the Lord’s Prayer and the Creed for the intentions of the Pope, and receiving sacramental confession and Holy Communion. In order to gain the indulgence one should also be free from any attachment to sin, even venial sin.
In these times of stress especially it is important to avail ourselves of the many helps the church holds out to us to help us remain faithful to the gospel, and draw closer to God, and the gift of indulgences is an underused treasure.

(Ruth Powers is the Program Coordinator for St. Mary Basilica Parish in Natchez. She has over 35 years’ experience as a catechist and theology teacher at all levels from preschool to graduate school.)

Reflections on Life
By Melvin Arrington
All throughout Scripture we read about the need for and the benefits of patience, the fourth Fruit of the Spirit. The frequent references extolling longsuffering and endurance suggest that these qualities were lacking as much in the ancient world as they are in our own time.

In his classic Way to Inner Peace, Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen offers penetrating insights into this elusive but essential virtue. He notes that patience is not an absence of action; rather it’s timing, waiting on “the right time to act, for the right principles and in the right way.” He calls it “submissive waiting: a frame of mind which is willing to wait because it knows it thus serves God and his holy purposes.” And he adds “a person who believes in nothing beyond this world is very impatient, because he has only a limited time in which to satisfy his wants.” In conclusion Sheen believes “the more materialistic a civilization is, the more it is in a hurry.”
Some people seem to be in a hurry all the time, and they don’t want to slow down for anything or anybody. In fact, they would probably view waiting as a waste of time. When I was young and immature that was more or less my perspective. Back then, I didn’t realize that, paradoxically, it’s possible to accomplish a lot by not doing anything. For example, when we find ourselves in a holding pattern – standing in line, sitting in a doctor’s office, or on the phone “on hold” hoping to be able to speak to a “real person” – we’ve actually been granted extra time for prayer and reflection. In these situations we should be still and listen because God is probably trying to tell us something.
After all, being busy, in a hurry, rushing here and there can lead to serious consequences, such as anxiety. Perhaps those things are outward signs of an inner turmoil that’s already present. Either way, we all know how harmful anxiety can be physically, psychologically and spiritually. Anyone suffering from this malady should obviously seek medical help, but also invoke divine assistance. We should never underestimate the power of prayer.
The Psalmist must have had prayer in mind when he wrote, “Wait for the Lord, take courage; be stouthearted!” (27:14) When we pray, we want an answer immediately; we don’t want any delays. But as the parable of the persistent widow (Luke 18) shows, our petitions should not be of the one-and-done variety. Rather, we must “pray without ceasing” (I Thessalonians 5:17), and pray confidently, knowing that the Lord hears and answers every prayer – yes, every single prayer! Sometimes the answer is “yes,” and other times it’s “no.” And more often than we realize the answer is “Hold on. It’s not time yet.”
According to the old saying, “the early bird gets the worm,” but for those who are impatient the pertinent adage is “good things come to those who wait.” If we do this, one of the things we’ll discover is that God’s clock keeps perfect time. When something is supposed to happen right away, and it doesn’t, some of us may become irritable; others may begin to worry; a few may even succumb to anxiety. But God’s schedule is not necessarily the same as ours. His timetable always overrides our own. He’s in charge and He has a plan for us, so we need to trust His timing and allow His will to unfold. Those guided by patience have a view to the big picture. They know they’re in for the long haul. And they know that good things do indeed come to those who wait.
And so, we see that patience has connections to each of the theological virtues, faith, hope and love. It takes faith to yield to the workings of the Holy Spirit in our lives rather than attempt to accomplish all things on our own. It takes hope to anticipate the good things God has in store for us without becoming restless. And, of course, there’s love. I Corinthians 13 tells us that love is patient; love bears all things.
Patience is forbearance; it enables us to endure suffering. Bearing wrongs patiently is one of the spiritual works of mercy (CCC 2447). My whole life I’ve heard people refer to “the patience of Job,” but after reading his story in the Old Testament I came away with the impression that in some ways he didn’t seem patient at all. Job complained and he questioned God about his predicament; however, he did remain faithful and he persevered. And it’s important to note that in the end he was rewarded.
So that has to be the lesson for us as we continue to go about our daily lives as best we can, given the restrictions of the corona pandemic. How long can God’s people endure being away from the Mass and the Eucharist? How long? As long as it takes. Because we know there’s a prize reserved for the stouthearted, those who persevere, those who wait for the Lord.

(Melvin Arrington is a Professor Emeritus of Modern Languages for the University of Mississippi and a member of St. John Oxford.)

THEOLOGY AT THE MOVIES
By James Tomek, Ph.D.
Watching on Netflix Bob Nelson’s 2016 “The Confirmation,” about a boy and his father looking for stolen tools, immediately makes me think of “The Bicycle Thieves,” a 1948 post war Italian film about a father and son’s search for a stolen bicycle, necessary for work. There is a theology lesson in the comparison. After a short discussion of the two films, I will focus on the treatment of sacrament in the Nelson film.

The renown Vittorio De Sica movie is an example of neorealism, a genre that shows the real poverty of post-World War II Rome, where a bicycle is a precious tool to find and do work. With the help of his wife Maria, pawning her bed sheets, Antonio Ricci is able to unpawn his bicycle and leave the unemployment line as a poster hanger. The disparity of classes is shown when Ricci gives up and treats his son Bruno to a restaurant lunch with his remaining money. He tells his son that, with a job, they can eat every day, like at the adjourning table, where a well-off family casually dines. The film ends with Ricci and son wandering aimlessly on foot. In today’s society, Ricci and family belong to those most hurt by the COVID epidemic.
“The Confirmation” follows a similar movement, about a father and son searching for a stolen set of tools, but the frame here is slightly different, focusing on the boy’s growing awareness of the complexities of life, as he spends a weekend with his estranged father Walt, while his mother and new husband go off on a weekend Catholic marriage encounter. The film opens with 8-year-old Anthony at confession, where we learn that he will soon receive the Eucharist and then be confirmed. But, here the film seems to lose focus as it hesitates between critiquing the Catholic faith and focusing on a son’s awareness of his father’s troubled existence. Hollywood does not always handle confession very well. Here, Father Lyons corrects Anthony’s awkward confession in a rude abrupt manner. Not my experience. Priests, personally speaking, are very helpful with penitents, especially first-time ones. Then later, in a conversation with his father, when Anthony is worried about the cannibalistic idea of “eating” Jesus’s body, the father Walt demeaningly interjects that it is only crackers and grape juice. Walt does advise Anthony that these are subjects that he will have to deal with later on. Is this in fact, the Confirmation of the title? Cannibalism with an 8-year-old? Grape juice?
Bishop Joseph Kopacz, in a recent message to First Communion students, referred to Communion as a beautiful moment of coming close to Jesus who also wants to be with us intimately. Anthony’s mother Bonnie has superficial notions of the sacraments. The absolution she seeks is an imperfect contrition. The 8-year-old boy does seem older, and he does come of age discovering the weaknesses and strengths of his father, who is recovering from alcoholism. The movie does succeed in developing the understanding of father and son. The father is skilled in a smaller more “artistic” type of woodwork. His love of seeing doors mounted well is sacramental. We also see him putting brakes on his wife’s car – an ability requiring a deep sense of car mechanics. Anthony does witness true signs of friendship in Walt’s friend Otto who teaches Anthony about the effects of sobering up and the need to be patient. “The Bicycle Thieves” is very strong in showing the plight of the poor uneducated in postwar Rome, but it does not get into the specifics of Ricci and son. The Confirmation does succeed in getting into the souls of the characters. Relating the sacrament of Confirmation, with an anointing of true wisdom to the characters, is well enacted, but however, spoiled by a view of Catholicism seen in the superficial “get it done” attitude of the mother to the sacraments.
Paying attention to our faith is a characteristic of theology seen in the Jane Hirshfield poem “Theology.” “A border collie’s preference is to do anything entirely, with the whole attention. This Simone Weil called prayer. And almost always her prayers were successful.” Paying attention raises existence to a prayer/sacramental level. The carpenter reflecting on his trade is at the start of an understanding of creation. Baptism, Confirmation, and the Eucharist are sacraments of initiation, given to adults in the early church. Confession or Reconciliation is a vital part of maintaining these sacraments. Maybe we should teach children the general notion of sacrament rather than splitting them up individually. In carpentry, when we just want to learn how to fix things, we have a “material” mental attitude. Just get the job done. When we give carpentry more attention on how it really is a co-creation of the world, we are becoming more “sacra” mental. We elevate our existence from a material mentality to a “sacra-mentality.” The father Walt is a gifted carpenter and mechanic. When his tools recovered, he will be able to continue his work or art as a carpenter. With a sacramental attitude one has the patience to give one’s vocation full attention. Our official church Sacraments help us develop this attention. We are baptized into a community that needs forgiving and needs to forgive. Confirmation anoints us with a Holy Spirit strengthening oil, but it is essentially baptismal. We finish the initiation by taking part in the Eucharistic meal. We are not eating just to ease our physical hunger. We are at the table to share our lives with others as we remember Jesus’s example. Do Baptism and Confirmation happen once? We constantly renew these sacraments just as we need to renew our vocations, especially when, at times, we get discouraged and want to quit. The Eucharist is our constant reminder to reconcile ourselves to a sacramental view.
In “The Bicycle Thieves,” Ricci and his son are in a society too poor to see the sacramental quality of life. He is a poster hanger – a job that, with a little patience and education, however, can take on sacramental vocational status. I remember, in my youth, when wall papering needed to be done, we had to wait until Aunt Mary was available. She had the patience to measure and prepare the paper and then hang it, thereby transforming rooms into beautiful places to live in.

(James Tomek is a retired language and literature professor at Delta State University who is currently a Lay Ecclesial Minister at Sacred Heart in Rosedale and also active in RCIA at Our Lady of Victories in Cleveland.)

IN EXILE
By Father Ron Rolheiser, OMI
At the risk of being simplistic, I want to say something about prayer in a very simple way.

While doing doctoral studies, I had a professor, an elderly Augustine priest, who in his demeanor, speech, and attitude, radiated wisdom and maturity. Everything about him bespoke integrity. You immediately trusted him, the wise old grandfather of storybooks.

One day in class he spoke of his own prayer life. As with everything else he shared, there were no filters, only honesty and humility. I don’t recall his exact words, but I remember well the essence of what he said and it has stayed with me for the nearly forty years since I had the privilege of being in his class.

Here’s what he shared: prayer isn’t easy because we’re always tired, distracted, busy, bored and caught up in so many things that it’s hard to find the time and energy to center ourselves on God for some moments. So, this is what I do: no matter what my day is like, no matter what’s on my mind, no matter what my distractions and temptations are, I am faithful to this: Once a day I pray the Our Father as best I can from where I am at that moment. Inside of everything that’s going on inside me and around me that day, I pray the Our Father asking God to hear me from inside of all the distractions and temptations that are besetting me. It’s the best I can do. Maybe it’s a bare minimum and I should do more and should try to concentrate harder, but at least I do that. And sometimes it’s all I can do, but I do it every day as best I can. It’s the prayer Jesus told us to pray.

His words might sound simplistic and minimalistic. Indeed the church challenges us to make the Eucharist the center of our prayer lives and to make a daily habit of meditation and private prayer. As well, many classical spiritual writers tell us that we should set aside an hour every day for private prayer, and many contemporary spiritual writers challenge us to daily practice centering prayer or some other form of contemplative prayer. Where does that leave our old Augustinian theologian and his counsel that we pray one sincere Our Father each day – as best we can?

Well, none of this goes against what he so humbly shared. He would be the first to agree that the Eucharist should be the center of our prayer lives, and he would agree as well with both the classical spiritual writers who advise an hour of private prayer a day, and the contemporary authors who challenge us to do some form of contemplative prayer daily, or at least habitually. But he would say this: at one of those times in the day (ideally at the Eucharist or while praying the Office of the Church but at least sometime during your day) when you’re saying the Our Father, pray it with as much sincerity and focus as you can muster at the moment (“as best you can”) and know that, no matter your distractions at the moment, it’s what God is asking from you. And it’s enough.

His advice has stayed with me through the years and though I say a number of Our Fathers every day, I try, at least in one of them, to pray the Our Father as best I can, fully conscious of how badly I am doing it. What a challenge and what a consolation!

The challenge is to pray an Our Father each day, as best we can. As we know, that prayer is deeply communitarian. Every petition in it is plural – “our,” “we,” “us” – there’s no “I” in the Our Father. Moreover, all of us are priests from our baptism and inherent in the covenant we made then, we are asked daily to pray for others, for the world. For those who cannot participate in the Eucharist daily and for those who do not pray the Office of the Church, praying the Our Father is your Eucharistic prayer, your priestly prayer for others.

And this is the consolation: none of us is divine. We’re all incurably human which means that many times, perhaps most times, when we’re trying to pray we’ll find ourselves beset with everything from tiredness, to boredom, to impatience, to planning tomorrow’s agenda, to sorting through the hurts of the day, to stewing about who we’re angry at, to dealing with erotic fantasies. Our prayer seldom issues forth from a pure heart but normally from a very earthy one. But, and this is the point, its very earthiness is also its real honesty. Our restless, distracted heart is also our existential heart and is the existential heart of the world. When we pray from there, we are (as the classical definition of prayer would have it) lifting mind and heart to God.

Try, each day, to pray one sincere Our Father! As best you can.

(Oblate Father Ron Rolheiser, theologian, teacher and award-winning author, is President of the Oblate School of Theology in San Antonio, Texas. He can be contacted through his website www.ronrolheiser.com.)

SPIRIT AND TRUTH
By Father Aaron Williams
In my previous column, I discussed the development of the liturgy of Palm Sunday. In this edition, I want to address Masses which belong to the ‘early days’ of Holy Week: namely, Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday.
The Mass given for the Monday of Holy Week has been surprisingly consistent throughout the centuries, more so perhaps than any other Mass during the week. The Gospel passage is taken from the twelfth chapter of St. John’s gospel and chronologically speaking occurs the day before Palm Sunday, making it interesting to be placed the day after in the Lectionary. But, there are two reasons for the placement of this passage: one, because it makes mention of the rising of Lazarus within the context of the Passover (thus, foreshadowing the rising of Christ), and second, because of St. John’s aside that Judas was a thief and would take money from the apostle’s communal purse.
Apart from the Gospel, there is no proper rite associated with this day. Before the reform of the Holy Week liturgies promulgated by Pope Pius XII in 1955, special petitions were offered on this day against the church’s persecutors and for the Pope. These were suppressed in 1955, and with the exception of the change of the order of the Mass, the Mass given in the Missal of 1962 is virtually the same as the Mass in the Missal of Pope St. Paul VI.
The Masses of Tuesday and Wednesday are where we see real change. Prior to the reforms which followed the Second Vatican Council, the Passion according to St. Mark was read in full in the Mass of Tuesday, and that of St. Luke was read at the Mass of Wednesday; St. Matthew’s had been read on Palm Sunday. In the reformed Mass, the gospels of Palm Sunday are read on a three-year cycle so each year during Holy Week the faithful only hear two readings of the Passion: one from either Matthew, Mark, or Luke and then St. John’s version on Good Friday. In the older form of the Mass, all four Passion accounts were read during the course of the week.
There was a slight alteration in the length of the Passion readings from before 1955 and after. In the liturgies before 1955, the synoptic Passion readings included the account of the Last Supper. This section was removed after 1955 and the readings begin in the Garden of Gethsemane.
The modern Roman liturgy introduces two new Gospel readings for Tuesday and Wednesday, but with a sort of traditional flair. The reading given for Tuesday is Our Lord’s prediction of the betrayal of Judas at the Last Supper as given in St. John’s Gospel. The placement here is appropriate since the next day, Wednesday, is traditionally known as “Spy Wednesday” – when Judas met with the chief priests to arrange the manner in which he would betray Jesus. Naturally, the Gospel passage in the modern liturgy which is read on Wednesday is this the account of this meeting between Judas and the Jewish authorities as given in St. Matthew’s Gospel.
Thus, while the arrangement of the readings in the older form of the Mass were designed to bring the faithful’s attention to the events of the Passion itself, the readings of the newer form intentionally lead the faithful chronologically through the events of Holy Week in the order they played out.
One final note since I will not have space to provide a full column on this topic. In the early Medieval liturgical rites in use prior to the Council of Trent, these three days served as a final preparation for the Penitents to be given absolution on Holy Thursday morning. Formerly, grave public sinners brought themselves to the door of the Cathedral on Ash Wednesday when they were ceremonially ‘cast out’ of the church and given sackcloth to wear in penitence for all of Lent. In these last days, their penitence often took on a more physical form and they would beg outside the door of the Cathedral until the morning of Holy Thursday when the Bishop would prepare to meet them inside at the altar.
The deacon would go outside into the square and three times tell the penitents to approach the church. Three times the penitents would step forward and prostrate themselves. Once this was completed, the deacon took them by the hand and led them straight through the church and up to the altar where the Bishop would remove their sackcloth and grant them sacramental absolution. This would allow them to rejoin the faithful for the Mass of Holy Thursday night where they could once again partake in Holy Communion.
In my next column I will discuss a the traditional prayer service of Tenebræ, which is regaining popularity today in many parishes, as well as ways this service is even included, in an altered form, in the modern Liturgy of the Hours.

(Father Aaron Williams is the administrator at St. Joseph Parish in Greenville)

Kneading Faith
By Fran Lavelle
I have been trying to process the devasting toll the coronavirus has had on so many around the world and the impact of George Floyd’s death. Every day seems to bring its own new set of challenges to our already highly emotionally charged world. In all of it I have been listening to the voices of our young people from teenagers to the 40-somethings. It occurred to me that the generations who were brought up watching Sesame Street, Mr. Rogers, and Barney have taken notice that we are not as Barney proclaimed, ”a happy family.” Watch the news, look at your social media newsfeed, talk to the younger members of your community and you will quickly hear their clarion call for change. And, in thinking about the messaging they grew up with, I totally understand where their clarion call is coming from. Moreover, I truly appreciate it.

In the past decade or so in this country we have allowed the politics of hatred to divide us so deeply that we have stopped seeing one another as God’s beloved and only as opposites. If you are not with us, you are our enemy. The divisiveness is driving wedges between co-workers, church members, friends and family. And the Body of Christ is suffering because we are quick to see one another as hostile enemies, forgetting that we share in our dignity as God’s beloved.

In Genesis 1:27 we read: “God created mankind in his image; in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them.” When the dignity of others is eroded by indifference, prejudice and distrust we stop seeing the beauty of God’s creation. The first Chapter of Genesis teaches us about the goodness of creation and the divine desire that human beings share in that goodness. God brings an orderly universe out of chaos and gives humanity dominion over it. With the power of dominion comes the responsibility to be good stewards of our resources.

The good news is that we have an excellent resource to help us have constructive dialogue. Catholic social teaching is the articulation of Catholic doctrines on matters of human dignity and common good in society. The following is a summary from the USCCB on the core principles of Catholic social teaching:
Life and Dignity of the Human Person: The Catholic church proclaims that human life is sacred, and that the dignity of the human person is the foundation of a moral vision for society. This belief is the foundation of all the principles of our social teaching.

Call to Family, Community and Participation: The person is not only sacred but also social. How we organize our society directly affects human dignity and the capacity of individuals to grow in community. We believe people have a right and a duty to participate in society, seeking together the common good and well-being of all, especially the poor and vulnerable.

Rights and Responsibilities: The Catholic tradition teaches that human dignity can be protected and a healthy community can be achieved only if human rights are protected and responsibilities are met. Every person has a fundamental right to life and a right to those things required for human decency. Corresponding to these rights are duties and responsibilities – to one another, to our families and to the larger society.

Option for the Poor and Vulnerable: A basic moral test is how our most vulnerable members are faring. In a society marred by deepening divisions between rich and poor, our tradition recalls the story of the Last Judgment (Matthew 25:31-46) and instructs us to put the needs of the poor and vulnerable first.

The Dignity of Work and the Rights of Workers: The economy must serve people, not the other way around. Work is more than a way to make a living; it is a form of continuing participation in God’s creation. If the dignity of work is to be protected, then the basic rights of workers must be respected.
Solidarity: We are one human family whatever our national, racial, ethnic, economic and ideological differences. We are our brothers’ and sisters’ keepers, wherever they may be. Loving our neighbor has global dimensions in a shrinking world. Pope St. Paul VI taught that “if you want peace, work for justice.”
Care for God’s Creation: We show our respect for the Creator by our stewardship of creation. We are called to protect people and the planet, living our faith in relationship with all of God’s creation.
Let us listen to the voices of our young people and heed the call for unity.

“Each one of us is called to be an artisan of peace, by uniting and not dividing, by extinguishing hatred and not holding on to it, by opening paths to dialogue and not by constructing new walls!” – Pope Francis

(Fran Lavelle is the Director of Faith Formation for the Diocese of Jackson)