And from my erudite and ever-readable former pastor (when he was the parish priest at the Church of Our Savior on lower Park Avenue,
which was my initial 'refuge' for the TLM), a brief commentary that amazingly brings together many recent developments...
Fr. Rutler’s Weekly Column
May 6, 2018
The exotic concept of spontaneous generation was taken seriously by astute thinkers for a long time before the invention of microbiology. Of course, they knew about the proximate process of birth, but the biological source of life itself exercised such minds as Anaximander six hundred years B.C. and Saint Augustine, Shakespeare, and the philosopher of fishing Izaak Walton, and was at least a puzzle to Darwin.
Spontaneous generation was the theory that living organisms could arise from inanimate matter, like fleas born from dust, or mice from salt, and bees from animal blood and, in the speculation of Aristotle, scallops coming out of sand.
I came across an unintentionally amusing comment from the 1920 proceedings of the American Philological Society published by the Johns Hopkins University Press: “Since insects are so small, it is not surprising that the sex history of some of them totally eluded the observation of the ancients.”
The advent of micro-imagery photography of infants in the womb destroyed eugenic propaganda that this is not a human life. Those who deny that are on the level of those who continued to insist on spontaneous generation after the Catholic genius Louis Pasteur disproved it in 1859.
Cold people who are not only credulous but cruel, admit that the unborn child is human, but say “So what?” At the recent White House Correspondents’ dinner, an astonishingly vulgar comedienne joked about abortion to the laughter of pseudo-sophisticates in evening dress. But even she slipped and used the word “baby.” [!]
Christ used the image of the vine to explain that
all life is contingent, not spontaneously generated, but dependent on other lives. “A branch cannot bear fruit on its own unless it remains on the vine.” Likewise, those drinking champagne at the fancy dress dinner are related to every fragile life in the womb by a common humanity. To mock that is to de-humanize the self.
On the recent feast of Saint George, there was born in England, whose patron he is, Louis, a prince of the royal house. There were celebratory church bells from Westminster Abbey and a salute of cannons. Rightly so, for the birth of every baby is a cause for rejoicing.
That same day another baby, one with a
[supposed but never investigated] neurological infirmity , was deprived of oxygen support by judicial decree and against the will of his parents, who brought him into the world by pro-creation, as stewards of the Creator and not by spontaneous generation. This was in defiance of an effort by Pope Francis to rescue him by military helicopter. As sons by adoption, little Louis and little Alfie are princes of the Heavenly King, not by spontaneous generation, but by divine will.
Pope Leo XIII declared in
Rerum Novarum:
“The contention that the civil government should at its option intrude into and exercise intimate control over the family and the household is a great and pernicious error.”
An earlier post last week on his blog at National Catholic Register:
The saints slay the dragons
and adore the Lamb
If much is not known about the saints, they know us.
by Fr. George Rutler
April 29, 2018
It occurred to me this past week, celebrating Saint George the Martyr (or “Mega-Martyr” as he is known among the effervescent Byzantines), that friendship with a patron saint, on one’s name day day — 'onomastico' in Italian — is a practice that needs revival.
There are friends and acquaintances, but it is a special privilege to have a heavenly friend as a companion and encourager. It is helpful, but not necessary, to know much about what they did when they were alive here.
In the case of George, little is known, and when the unknown bits are embellished with fanciful legends such as stabbing dragons, they can seem remote. But think of an athlete, who has a native talent for some sport, and how a coach can protect and develop it. In that sense, albeit in a strained analogy, the patron saint is available to help.
There are those called Fundamentalists who object to the whole economy of saintly intercessions. The suffix “-ist” can distort a good thing. An artist well serves art, as a pianist is why there are pianos, but race and sex and things spiritual are not the same as a racist or sexist or spiritualist.
Fundamentals in religion are the cornerstone of Faith, but
a Fundamentalist misses the fundamental point of asking saints to pray for us, as if that compromised Christ as the sole mediator between man and God. That uniqueness is the essence of all the Church’s prayers offered “through Christ our Lord.”
The faithful certainly can pray directly to Jesus, but the Lord also wants us to do so not as a solo exercise but as part of his whole Church. He ordered us to pray for others
(Matthew 5:44). Saint James said that “the prayer of a righteous man has great power in its effect,” which is why
Saint Paul urged "that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and thanksgivings be made for all men, for kings and all who are in high position, that we may lead a quiet and peaceable life, godly and respectful in every way” (1 Timothy 2:1-2).
The saints in heaven are not remote from those who have been baptized, even if our chapels and churches and homes seem far different from the golden environment of the eternal realms, where they “fall down before the Lamb, each holding a harp, and with golden bowls full of incense, which are the prayers of the saints”
(Revelation 5:8).
Meanwhile, if much is not known about the saints, they know us. In the case of Saint George, I expect he wants us to know that dragons are real, in the form of the cruelties and vices that afflict mankind, and that the saints can help us to slay the passion and pride of those dragons through the power of the King of Saints: “I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace”
(John 16:33).
In fact, the Gospel for the Sixth Sunday after Easter today in the Extraordinary Form is a passage from John 16, verses 23-30 that immediately precedes the verse cited by Fr. Rutler, in which Jesus says that we can ask the Father directly anything in his name:
23... Amen, amen, I say to you, whatever you ask the Father in my name he will give you.
24 Until now you have not asked anything in my name; ask and you will receive, so that your joy may be complete...
26 On that day you will ask in my name, and I do not tell you that I will ask the Father for you.
27 For the Father himself loves you, because you have loved me and have come to believe that I came from God.
[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 06/05/2018 19:24]