What’s Happening?

Laughter is such a huge part of our lives that we actively seek it out. We want to watch things that make us laugh, read things that make us laugh, and spend time with people who make us laugh.

Dr. Tod Worner, Managing Editor of Evangelization & Culture, the Journal of the Word on Fire Institute, writes, “Humor and the laughter it begets are further manifestations of God’s divine spark. “Joy and Laughter,” says G.K. Chesterton, “is the gigantic secret of the Christian. There was something that God hid from all men when He went up a mountain to pray. There was something that He constantly covered by abrupt silence or impetuous isolation. There was one thing that was too great for God to show us when He walked upon our earth, and I have sometimes fancied that it was His mirth.”

Imagine the enormity of God’s mirth. Imagine the magnitude of his wit. God left us with just a taste of the wondrous joy to come: glorious, delicious, irrepressible laughter. Fr. James Martin is a prolific author, magazine editor, and media commentator whose witty and often humourous elucidations on Church activities and teaching are sought by many. Below is a popular video of his talk at Boston College on Joy, Humor, and the Saints. Take some time and relax with the wit and humor of Fr. James Martin – it’s time to laugh with the saints!

Father Michael Himes, a widely respected Catholic theologian and beloved faculty member at Boston College for almost three decades, recently passed on June 10 at the age of 75. I was drawn to his writings with a book on the public significance of theology called Fullness of Faith (1993). He also is well known for his book and video series, The Mystery of Faith: An Introduction to Catholicism (2004). With his death, I wanted to provide a timely example of his teaching and thought process with the video he did: Catholics: Why We Are a Sacramental People.

Fr. Himes, in a 2012 lecture at Boston College, explained to his audience that anything in creation could be sacramental. “All of us have personal sacraments: people, things, places or events which speak to us deeply and richly of the love of God which we know surrounds us always but of which we are not always aware … and sometimes those personal sacraments may be even more effective as signs of grace for us than the great public sacraments.” That is a beautiful insight into some facets of sacramental thought in the Catholic Church. His lecture can be viewed below.

Bishop Robert Barron
April 12, 2022

Mark Wahlberg’s new film Father Stu is one of the most theologically interesting films to come out in a long time. It considers some of the thorniest and most puzzling themes in the sacred science, including the nature of vocation, the purpose of suffering in the divine plan, the role of supernatural agency, the dynamics of redemption, and perhaps most thoroughly, the mystery of God’s providence. In the course of this article, I would like to say just a few simple things about the first and last of those motifs.

Let’s take providence first. I have argued for years that most people in the modern world are functionally deist in their understanding of God. This means that they consider God a distant cause, important perhaps in bringing the universe into being, but now essentially uninvolved with his creation. This might have been the philosophical perspective of the leading minds of the eighteenth century, but it is most assuredly not the perspective of the authors of the Bible. For the writers of the Torah, for Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Peter, John, and Paul, God is personally and passionately implicated in his creation, especially in the affairs of human beings. The God of Israel pushes, pulls, cajoles, corrects, punishes, leads, and lures his human friends into fullness of life. Psalm 139 gives classic expression to this Biblical intuition: “O Lord, you have searched me and known me. You know when I sit down and when I rise up; you discern my thoughts from far away. You search out my path and my lying down, and are acquainted with all my ways. Even before a word is on my tongue, O Lord, you know it completely. You hem me in, behind and before, and lay your hand upon me” (Ps. 139:1–5).

Wahlberg’s movie tells the unlikely story of Stuart Long, a burnt-out boxer from Montana who tried to make his way in Hollywood and ended up, to everyone’s enormous surprise, including his own, a Catholic priest. The journey commenced in the LA grocery store where Stu was working as a clerk. He spied a beautiful woman and was smitten. Inquiring after her, he discovered that she was a faithful attendee at the local Catholic parish, and so one Sunday, Stu went to Mass. Not a Catholic, not even a believer, he had no idea what to do or say at the liturgy, but he was intent upon getting to know the girl. After some awkward courting, she frankly informed the boxer that she would never consider dating someone who was not baptized. And so, with decidedly imperfect motivation, Stu entered the RCIA program and received baptism. In accord with Catholic theology, the sacrament had a truly efficacious effect on Stu, awakening and deepening his faith, and it ultimately prepared him to face a terrible trial. A motorcycle accident, depicted in the film with horrific realism, left him bedridden for months, but his Catholic faith and the support of his girlfriend sustained him. In time, he came to the realization that God wanted him to be a priest.

I won’t rehearse any more of the details of the story, but suffice it to say that, even as Stu was planning a life of movie stardom and marriage, God was about something else entirely. In point of fact, the Lord of the universe was so interested in the former boxer from Helena that, by careful steps, he led him, first to the Church, then to the faith, and finally to the priesthood. I wonder, honestly, how many devout Christians truly believe that God is so interested in them that he supervises their lives, drawing their freedom at every turn. Thomas Aquinas said, simply enough, that God’s providence “extends to particulars,” which implies that he knows and guides everyone individually. St. Paul told the Ephesians that the “power at work within us is able to accomplish abundantly far more than all we can ask or imagine” (Eph. 3:20). How our lives would change if we learned to trust that power and watch for the signs of his providence. A theme deeply related to providence is that of vocation or calling. Our culture highly privileges the rights, freedom, and prerogative of the individual. We celebrate, accordingly, those people who stand against the expectations of their families, friends, or traditions and make their own decisions, following their own chosen path. But this is repugnant to the Bible. The scriptural authors are interested, not in self-determination, but in the process by which a person awakens to God’s call. They celebrate those who enact, not the ego-drama, but the theo-drama, who abide, not by their own voice, but by God’s. They furthermore know that God’s call, once discerned, is practically irresistible. Once someone knows what God wants for him, he will do anything, overcome any obstacle, face down any opposition, in order to follow that divine directive. For biblical examples of this principle, think of Abraham, Jacob, Moses, David, Jeremiah, or Paul. Stuart Long belongs, in his own way, in that great tradition, for having discerned that God wanted him to be a priest, he faced down the opposition of his mother, his father, his girlfriend, many of the people in his parish, the seminary rector, and even some of his seminary classmates. Moreover, he remained faithful to his calling when he was afflicted with the degenerative muscle disease that would eventually kill him. “Here I am; send me” (Isa. 6:8), said the prophet Isaiah, and Fr. Stu said the same thing.

I wonder, again, how many devout Christians understand that the discernment of their vocation is the most important psychological and spiritual move that they will ever make, that every other decision they make in their lives is secondary. And I wonder how many have experienced the real joy and excitement of surrendering to God’s call? What I sensed, especially in the second half of Father Stu, is how this man, despite everything, retained the joy of knowing he was cooperating with a divine purpose. That is the joy that, as the Bible says, no one can take from you (John 16:22).

If you want to see a concrete and contemporary enactment of these two great biblical principles, you could do a lot worse than to watch Father Stu.

Haley Stewart
March 10, 2022
Word On Fire Institute

It’s been several years since I read Kazuo Ishiguro’s brilliant novel The Remains of the Day, but as I prepare for an upcoming trip to England, I revisited this story of a man wrestling with the significance of his life after living in relentless pursuit of the wrong things.

In the novel, Mr. Stevens, the butler of Darlington Hall, one of the great English houses, goes on his first ever vacation when his new American employer is away for several weeks. During his drive through the countryside, he reminisces about his life of service in the days of his now-deceased former employer, Lord Darlington. Stevens’ greatest aspiration is to be a truly great butler in the footsteps of his father, and to do so he cultivates the virtue he thinks is particularly essential for great butlers: dignity. To remain cool under pressure, to meticulously plan and implement perfection even when the unexpected arises, to wear an emotionless mask—these are the marks of Stevens’ excellence.

Thus, his every moment was devoted to perfectly managing the household of Lord Darlington, a man with good intentions who became involved in the political realm leading up to World War II, was influenced by pro-German figures, and ended up a Nazi sympathizer. As Stevens defends his late employer to people he meets during his journey (and to his own conscience), the reader easily perceives that Stevens is struggling to face Lord Darlington’s very real failures and their consequences on the global stage. To acknowledge this would challenge the story Stevens tells himself: that he was the butler to a truly great man and therefore his life has meaning. 

Stevens remembers what he considers great tests of his career when his dignity was heroically exhibited, including when his father fell ill and then died of a stroke during an important dinner party hosted by Lord Darlington for international guests. Rather than leaving the event to other staff members and spending the evening at his dying father’s bedside, Stevens congratulates himself on expertly handling difficult guests and orchestrating a demanding dinner without showing a moment of emotion at the news of his father’s demise. Only a truly great butler, a man of perfect dignity, could have done the same, Stevens imagines.

Stevens does experience discomfort over Lord Darlington’s firing of two maids employed by the estate when he realized they were Jewish—however, Stevens considers his duty to Lord Darlington to override this clearly immoral decision. While the housekeeper Miss Kenton threatens to leave over this injustice, Stevens believes the dignified course of action to be carrying out his employer’s wishes despite his personal opinions on the matter. Stevens’ misguided loyalty to Lord Darlington consumes his life and prevents him from taking right action or having significant relationships with others, including Miss Kenton. Although he never admits it to the reader, it is clear that he is very much in love with her, and yet his commitment to reserve and dignity holds him back from ever expressing his feelings. 

The novel resolves in a heartbreaking conversation with a complete stranger as Stevens tearfully and uncharacteristically describes his dissatisfaction with his life. While Stevens’ behavior is maddening, Ishiguro manages to make his protagonist so very human that we grieve for him and the tragedy of his lost life. 

Perhaps Stevens fails in his lack of prudence—the virtue that steers all the other virtues in the right direction. The Catechism of the Catholic Church describes prudence as the “auriga virtutum (the charioteer of the virtues); it guides the other virtues by setting rule and measure” (CCC 1806). Stevens’ rule and measure are all off. Like every truly great man, Stevens pursues virtue relentlessly. But his pursuit is disordered because the virtue he most ardently desires, dignity, is barely a virtue at all and certainly not equal to the more important virtues like charity. 

Stevens truly desires to do what is right, but as he considers dignity to be the highest virtue, when he hears Miss Kenton weeping he does not go to comfort her (how embarrassing to confront such emotions!), and—in what he considers the most impressive moment of his life—he neglected the deathbed of his own father. He may have meant to do right, but his life has been a catastrophic failure to love. 

How might we also fail in prudence by pursuing a good but not the right good? Perhaps by obsessively grasping for the applause of others in our careers and thus neglecting our obligations to our family or to God? Choosing “respectability,” like Stevens, in moments when it may be right (and more virtuous) to speak up for justice, even if it offends the people we desire to impress? 

The Remains of the Day asks us to reflect on the big questions of life, just as Stevens does: What is a fulfilled life? What is a good person? What makes our lives valuable? What are the virtues that we should aspire to? “I’ve given what I had to give. I gave it all to Lord Darlington,” Stevens explains to the sympathetic stranger at the end of the novel. “All those years I served him, I trusted I was doing something worthwhile. I can’t even say I made my own mistakes. Really—one has to ask oneself—what dignity is there in that?” Stevens has served the wrong master. And at the end of the day, rather than charting a new and better course, he obsesses over how he might improve his bantering skills to bring more pleasure to the life of his new employer. Poor Stevens! 

May we discover the truth before it’s too late and give our lives in service to the One worth serving and the work he calls us to do.

Rev. James Martin, S.J.
January 27, 2022

Everyone is sick of the pandemic and tired of hearing about Covid. When I turn on the radio in the morning to NPR (which I now think of as National Pandemic Radio) the first word that I hear is always “Covid,” “coronavirus” or “pandemic.” It is hard to escape. So I am going to keep this short.

I am also not going to try to sugarcoat anything or talk too much about “silver linings.” The pandemic is a terrible reality that we must all face, and one that does not seem to be going away any time soon. It is by turns frightening, maddening, annoying, depressing and angering. In addition to the obvious health challenges it poses—especially to the immunocompromised and to frontline workers—it is emotionally brutal.

But it is not hopeless. I have found in my own life, and in counseling others, a few tips drawn from Christian spirituality that have helped me avoid despair. Here are five.

1. Be smart.

The most important tip may not sound especially spiritual, but it is: Get vaccinated and boosted if you are able to. Wear a mask. Maintain social distances when you need to. Avoid large indoor gatherings especially when there are spikes, and if you are infected with Covid-19, by all means stay home.

As I said, this sounds like practical advice, but at heart it is spiritual advice. (Spiritual and practical usually go hand in hand.) It is not only about caring for yourself and your own health, but also about caring for others. It’s about reverencing them. As Pope Francis has said, getting vaccinated is an “act of love.” To be blunter than the pope: Life is not just about you. We have to begin with this tip, because it will help you (and others) survive.

Caring for yourself also may mean speaking with a therapist, a spiritual director or a trusted friend to help you navigate your way through the pandemic. There is nothing wrong with asking for help. People do it in the Gospels all the time.

2. Be hopeful.

St. Ignatius Loyola, the founder of the Jesuits, often talked about the “good spirit” and the “evil spirit,” which we can define broadly as the impulses that move us toward God, and those that move us away from God. And for those trying to lead good lives, says St. Ignatius, the good spirit will encourage us, console us and uplift us. The spirit that is not coming from God, by contrast, will cast us down, discourage us and cause “gnawing anxiety.” (Is there a better phrase for what we have all been feeling during the last two years?)

3. Be loving.

Over the last two years, I have been quarantined several times in my Jesuit community, as a result of some Covid-positive community members. It is not a surprise in a house of 12 men! So I have often felt, like many people, powerless to help others. But there is always something we can do to help lighten someone’s emotional load, if not their viral load.

4. Be monastic.

Every day I wake up and, since I’m no longer going into the office, I look at the same four walls in my relatively small room. And the view out my window is not any great shakes either. My window looks onto an alleyway and the brick-faced sides of several buildings. I can see about three inches of sky. And of course I’m not traveling anywhere these days, like most people. Early on, I said to a therapist, “Am I going to go crazy if I never leave New York City?” She laughed and said, “You won’t even go crazy if you never leave your room.”

5. Be prayerful.

At the very beginning of the pandemic, an elderly Jesuit in our community said to us during his homily, “Well, we’re always hoping for more time to pray, and now we’ve got it!” I know that this reality is far different for some people—say, families with young children, where many parents feel that they have less time and a more constricted space, with the kids at home.

You can handle this. You will get through it. God is with you. See you on the other side of all this.

Rev. James Martin, S.J.
December 30, 2021
America Magazine

I have lost count of the number of times I have heard people say at the beginning of January, “This year I’m going to pray more!” The tone in their voice is often insistent, and the words “pray more” said with great force, as if they are reproaching themselves.

Although some people eschew making resolutions at the start of the new year, I think it is a noble goal. But there is a danger: If we make a resolution that is unattainable and then fail in our resolve, it can make us feel bad about ourselves. In the case of failed resolutions about our prayer life, we may also feel guilty before God—and even worse than we did before we made our resolution.

With that in mind, here are five tips for putting your prayerful resolution into practice.

1) Pray Less. I know that sounds counterintuitive, but it is a way of guarding against making a resolution you cannot keep. In my experience, people often end up setting lofty goals that are nearly impossible to fulfill with their busy schedules.

“I’m going to pray for an hour a day without fail!” says the young mother or father with children to care for. Then, the first time that they hear crying during their prayer, and they halt prayer to care for their child, they may give up on prayer entirely. And, again, they feel needlessly guilty.

Even if you have the time for it, the prospect of 60 continuous minutes of prayer every day can seem overwhelming.

In that case, I often suggest beginning with more modest goals. Take it easy at first. (This is especially helpful for someone who has not been praying at all.) Start with 15 minutes a day. Or 30 minutes. This is not only more manageable, but has the advantage of seeming so doable that the person relaxes and enjoys it more—and ends up praying longer than planned. So to pray more, try to pray less. At least at first. Then pray more.

2) Mix it up. Often people get stuck in a rut, especially if they have been praying for a while. One of my spiritual directees (a person who comes to talk about how God is active in their daily life and private prayer) once told me, glumly, how monotonous prayer had become. Then he recounted his routine, which included the rosary, reading the Gospel for the day and then some Ignatian contemplation. You could hear the boredom in his voice.

In response, I suggested that he try some new ways of prayer. That goes for us all. If you are in a rut with centering prayer, try some Ignatian contemplation. If you feel tired of Ignatian contemplation, try some lectio divina. If you are bored with lectio, try centering prayer. It helps from time to time to shake things up.

This should not be surprising. It is like any relationship. If you and your friend want to stay connected (a good goal) but you meet with your friend in the same way every single time, you might find things getting stale. If you see your friend every week for dinner on a Friday night for months on end, with the intention of staying in touch, it may start to feel “old hat.” In that case, you’d both say, “Hey, let’s do something different. Let’s go for a walk on the beach or in the park one day. Let’s see a movie.” Then you might find yourself relating to your friend in a new way.

Something similar can be at work in prayer. Shake it up a bit.

3) Let go if it is not working. Another common complaint is that prayer feels like a burden. This is sometimes the case with devout people who have set up a busy schedule of prayer for themselves. One woman a few years ago told me that the list of people for whom she was praying daily (a good goal) ended up being a 30-minute commitment. Between that, the rosary, the daily Gospel, her examination of conscience and some spiritual reading, she was starting to dread prayer. Prayer had become a burden, and she started to avoid it.

In these cases, I advise people to let something go. For this directee, I reminded her that while praying for other people is important, if it has led you to abandon prayer, then perhaps it is time to forgo the list of names for a while. She could still pray for all of them with one common intention.

Now, of course, simply because some parts of prayer might be difficult does not mean that we always need to “let go” of something. But in some cases, especially if it is making you dread, avoid or even fear prayer, it is time to review what is on your “prayer plate.”

4) Get a spiritual director. Few things are as encouraging to the life of prayer as a spiritual director, someone who helps you notice where God is active in your prayer and daily life. In the past, this ministry was often seen as something reserved for clergy or members of religious orders. But today hundreds of thousands (millions?) of lay people see spiritual directors, who are often lay people themselves.

That begs the question: Where do I find one, and how do I know what to look for? My book Learning to Pray covers this in more detail but, in short, start by seeking someone who has been professionally trained for the job. St. Teresa of Ávila famously said if she had to choose between a director who was wise and one who was holy, she would pick wise. In other words, trained in direction. That is essential. It would be like saying of a physician: Do you want someone who is healthy or smart?

To find one, inquire at a local retreat house, ask someone who already sees a spiritual director for a recommendation, or see what you can find at Spiritual Directors International or the Office of Ignatian Spirituality.

5) Trust in God. Yes, that is a given, but often when we make resolutions about our spiritual life, we are tempted to think the results are up to us. (That kind of thinking has a special heresy all its own: Pelagianism.)

But it is God who invites us to pray, God who helps us to pray and God who gives us the fruits of prayer. It is not you just white-knuckling it and gritting your teeth. God is on your side.

In fact, the very desire to pray more is coming from God. So see this desire, and your resolution, as a call. And trust that God will be with you and will help you. As my own spiritual director likes to say, “The caller wants to help the called.”

 

It was a quarter-century since the beginning of World War II when Pope Paul VI spoke to the U.N. General Assembly and pleaded with the world to leave its violent ways aside and follow the path of peace.

“No more war, war never again!” he exclaimed.

Another quarter-century later, that message had all but dissolved as war exploded in the Persian Gulf. In response to Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait, the Western powers had assembled a ground and aerial combat force the size of which had not been seen since 1945. Led, of course, by the United States, these forces had begun a staggering campaign that would ultimately leave countless dead and displaced.

I could not believe that violence was the only way to address the invasion, nor war the only answer to Sadaam Hussein’s aggression. I have been an activist for most of my adult life, having been blessedly influenced by my dear friend Daniel Berrigan, S.J., whom I met while doing a film about Dan and his brother Philip, in 1981. This activism has led me to picket and pray and, on dozens of occasions, spend brief moments in jail for acts of (quite minor) civil disobedience. The carnage unleashed in the Persian Gulf compelled me to act yet again in hopes that somehow the bloodletting would end.

It didn’t. For all the marching and debating and activism that the peace community could muster, the war continued unabated. It seemed there was nothing we could do but be faithful to a call for peace and echo the words of Pope Paul VI.

My friend Joe Cosgrove thought otherwise. Not only is Joe Cosgrove a dedicated lawyer (now a former judge) and committed peace activist himself; he is in all ways a brother to me. Joe was Dan Berrigan’s friend and lawyer and participated with me in my first civil disobedience arrest and has represented me ever since. “I have an idea,” Joe said. “We can ask Pope John Paul II to bring the issue of the war to the World Court on behalf of the Vatican.”

What?

What seemed to be a wacky idea got even wackier as it was explained to me. The only “country” that had consistently objected to the build-up and carrying out of the Gulf War was the Vatican, with Pope John Paul II issuing plea after plea for the fighting to end. Joe had a simple plan: Since the only parties allowed to invoke the World Court’s jurisdiction are actual nations, and since the Holy See is a recognized diplomatic entity, it could bring an action to the court to challenge the war’s legitimacy under international law. Simple, right? The only problem was that neither of us were particularly close with the pope. But Joe had thought of a solution to that as well.

As a graduate of Notre Dame, with degrees in international studies, theology and law, he had made many contacts relevant to this venture, including someone who was quite close to Mother Teresa, who had also been outspoken about the war. Working with Joe over the course of a few weeks, this friend of Joe’s put him in touch with Mother Teresa, who was going to be in Rome a few days later. She invited us to meet her there and to bring our proposal, which she agreed to share with the pope. Easy as that.

I don’t know what motivated me to agree, but within a day I found myself flying from Los Angeles to New York, where I would meet Joe and head to Rome on this peace pilgrimage. It was about 6 p.m. when I arrived in New York, and while I waited for Joe, my better senses started to take over. How did I get myself into this foolish escapade? I was flying to Rome to deliver a message to Pope John Paul II through the intercession of Mother Teresa of Calcutta so that a suit could be brought in the World Court to stop a raging war in the Persian Gulf. It hurts all sensibility just to write those words! How could this group of ours have the audacity to think we could accomplish anything, let alone something of this magnitude?

Joe arrived a short while later, and I was prepared to tell him and the others that I was backing out. Nice to see you, I’d say, and then head back to the West Coast. But Joe arrived alone. “Where are the other pilgrims?” I asked. “What others?” Joe replied. “It’s just us!”

Now it got even more absurd.

I calmly explained to my dear friend that we were on a fool’s errand and wasting our time if we thought the two of us could do anything worthwhile in Rome. Joe listened carefully but held fast to his plan. He noted the sometimes inherent “foolishness” of the Gospel and the foolishness of thinking that we can, on our own, control anything. “We’re going there to tell the truth, and the rest is in God’s hands,” he said. “Besides, how can we determine what’s in store for us before we even take the first step?”

He was right. Sometimes the most blessed things in life come from unplanned moments. Whatever grace was to come of this trip was to come from God’s grace, not our efforts.

When we arrived in Rome, Joe made a quick call to the headquarters of the Missionaries of Charity, the religious order Mother Teresa had formed many years ago. We were told she was awaiting our arrival, so we gathered our things and hurried to meet her. We arrived at the nondescript door of a structure that had once been a large chicken coop but which now housed the sisters and Mother Teresa when she was in town. This was a place of utter humility, service and prayer. As we were ushered into a room, we saw a small chapel stacked with clothes that were to be distributed to the poor. In a moment, a tiny figure in a white sari with blue stripes met us with a broad welcoming smile. It was the living saint of Calcutta.

It was immediately clear that to her, no one was a stranger. In an instant, we were her friends, as if we had known one another all our lives. It wasn’t a skill, nor an act; it was just who she was. And it was pure gift. We spoke and shared and laughed (Mother had a keen wit and sense of humor) and told stories about our lives and our families.

Then we got down to business. Although Joe had explained things to her during their phone call a few days earlier, Mother confessed that she had never heard of the World Court, and with that revelation, she asked the most practical and innocent question: “So how do they make them obey?”

Indeed. What a question. Joe said that he had written a brief for the Holy Father that explained that the war violated several principles of international law and that a ruling from the World Court could, perhaps, spark a concerted effort to bring it to an end. Mother was patient but not terribly interested in the polemics. She had given Joe the floor, so she just listened, and when he finished she took the brief and matter-of-factly said that, indeed, she would be with the Holy Father in the morning and would deliver it to him in person. In utter humility, she asked: “What else can I do? I’ve written to the presidents but have not received a reply, so what can I do?”

I thought of all she already had done: the time Mother’s visit to Lebanon caused all warring factions to call a cease-fire while she was there; the Nobel Peace Prize she received for her tireless work with the “poorest of the poor.” I thought of a desperate world that looked to her for guidance and comfort and hope. “All we can do is pray,” she said, something, perhaps, we hadn’t really thought of.

As Joe and I walked back to our hotel, we looked at each other and just wept. We’d been in the presence of something indescribable; we’d planted seeds of hope and peace. At that point, all we could do, as Mother said, was “pray.”

The next day, a few hours after Mother’s visit, Pope John Paul II held his weekly audience and issued one of his strongest rebukes of the war to date. Perhaps something had taken root.

Mother had invited us to join her and her community for early Mass the next morning. Very early. I met Joe in the hotel lobby around 4:30 a.m. and told him what I’d heard on the news: There was a rumor that a cease-fire in the Gulf was imminent. When we arrived at Mother’s chapel, the news was confirmed: The war was over! A liturgy of hope was now a liturgy of thanksgiving and remembrance. Joe and I sat on the floor at the back of the chapel next to Mother who knelt in quiet meditation. When we reached the prayer of the faithful, gratitude for the war’s end was offered by several of the sisters. And after a long silence, a small voice made a final request: Mother asked that we “pray for all those we promised we’d pray for.” For Mother, that was the entire world.

A few weeks after we returned from Rome, we received a letter from the Vatican secretary of state with a message from Pope John Paul, thanking us for the brief Mother had delivered on our behalf and offering us his apostolic blessing. A few days later, on Easter, when he gave his Urbi et Orbi address, John Paul spoke yet again of the importance of international law, this time mentioning several points that were in our brief.

Did Mother Teresa or Pope John Paul or our prayers have anything to do with ending the war? Frankly, that is none of our business. As Father Berrigan often reminded us, we are only required to tell the truth and say our prayers. The rest is in God’s hands.

Pope Francis appoints a woman with the right to vote as undersecretary of the synod of bishops

America Magazine
Gerard O’Connell
February 06, 2021

Breaking with tradition and opening a new door in the synodal process, Pope Francis has appointed a woman, Nathalie Becquart, a member of the Xavière Sisters, Missionaries of Jesus Christ, in France, as one of two new undersecretaries of the synod of bishops. As such, she will have the right to vote in the synod. It is the first time this right has been given to a woman in the synod and raises the prospect that the right could be extended to other women participants at future synods.

Some have questioned whether Sister Nathalie will have the right to vote in the synod, but sources contacted by America point to two reasons for confirming this. First, the apostolic constitution “Episcopalis Communio,” promulgated by Pope Francis on Sept. 15, 2018, states, “The General Secretary and the Undersecretary are appointed by the Roman Pontiff and are members of the Synod Assembly” (Art. 22, No. 3). The members have the right to vote. Second, in an interview with Vatican News, Cardinal Mario Grech, the secretary general of the synod, speaks in Italian of her “possibilità di partecipare con diritto di voto,” which properly translated to English means “she can participate with the right to vote.”

As the other undersecretary of the synod, Pope Francis appointed a Spanish priest, Luis Marín de San Martín, O.S.A., the assistant general of the Augustinian order, and nominated him bishop.

Pope Francis’ nomination of Sister Nathalie to this position is another affirmation of his determination to appoint women to senior positions in the Vatican that do not require priestly ordination. Commenting on this appointment, Cardinal Grech recalled that “during the last synods numerous synodal fathers emphasized the need that the entire Church reflect on the place and role of women within the Church.” He said Pope Francis has frequently “highlighted the importance that women be more involved in the processes of discernment and decision making in the Church” and has increased the number of women participating as experts or auditors in the synods.

Significantly, Cardinal Grech said: “With the appointment of Sr Nathalie Becquart, and the possibility that she can participate with the right to vote, a door has been open. We will then see what other steps could be taken in the future.” This suggests that the possibility of giving women a vote in future synods is under consideration. It is something that has been requested for some time, including by several cardinals, bishops and other synod participants.

Cardinal Grech added, “The appointment of Sr Nathalie Becquart as Under-secretary will thus help us to remember in a concrete way that on this synodal way the voice of the People of God has a specific place and that it is fundamental to find ways to encourage the effective participation of all the baptized along this way.”

“This perspective has characterized the way in which Pope Francis has interpreted the Synod in his entire pontificate,” he said.

Commenting on the appointment of Father Luis Marín de San Martín, the cardinal said, “He has a vast experience in accompanying communities in decision-making processes and his knowledge of the Second Vatican Council will be precious so that the roots of the synodal way remain always present.”

“The fact that both under-secretaries are religious, each one having matured in a specific spirituality, says how important it is that the synodal Church take into consideration the various charisms present in the Church as well,” Cardinal Grech said. In addition, he said, “these appointments highlight the importance that the journey of a synodal Church be accompanied by a group that works together: the structure and the way the General Secretariat works must itself be synodal! Working together as a team allows the laity greater participation within the dynamics of responsibility.”

The cardinal drew attention to the fact that “synodality” is the theme for the next synod of bishops, which will be held in October 2022. Both new appointees have impressive curriculum vitae as outlined by Vatican Media.

Sister Becquart was born in 1969 in Fontainebleau, France. She gained a master’s degree in management at HEC Paris, studied philosophy and theology at the Centre Sévres of Paris and sociology at the School for Advanced Studies in the Social Sciences (EHESS) and specialized in ecclesiology at Boston College, with research on synodality. While working as a volunteer teacher in Beirut, Lebanon, she took philosophy and theology courses at St. Joseph Jesuit University. After working as a consultant in a marketing and advertising agency for nongovernmental orgnanizations and Christian groups in Paris, in 1995 she joined the Xavières sisters, a religious congregation with roots in Ignatian spirituality.

Since then, she has worked in a variety of roles including spiritual director for the Ignatian Youth Network in France, national coordinator of a French scouting program for youth in poor urban areas and director of the National Service for the Evangelization of Youth and for Vocations at the French Episcopal Conference from September 2012 to August 2018. She served as part of the preparatory team for the synod on youth and was an auditor at that synod. Since then, she has been following Vatican sabbatical programs at Catholic Theological Union, Chicago.

Bishop-elect Marín de San Martín was born in Madrid, Spain, 1961. He joined the Order of Saint Augustine in 1982 and after studying philosophy and theology in the Seminario Mayor Tagaste in Madrid was ordained a priest in 1988. He gained a license in spiritual theology and a doctorate in theology, with a thesis on the ecclesiology of St. John XXIII, from Comillas University, Madrid. He also obtained a license in dogmatic theology from the Gregorian University in Rome. He did parish ministry for several years, served as the director of Augustinian theological studies at Tagaste (1995–99) and as a provincial counselor for the Augustinian Province of Spain. From 2009 to 2013, he was secretary of the Augustinian Historical Institute. Since 2004, he has been teaching in the theology faculty of the Norte de España. Since 2008, he has served as general archivist of the Order of Saint Augustine and as an assistant general of the Augustinian Order and president of the Augustinian Spirituality Institute since 2013.

On January 22, baseball great Henry Aaron died in his sleep at age 86.  Aaron grew up in poverty amid the worst abuses of the segregated south, only to become the baseball player who smashed the hallowed home-run record of Babe Ruth.  Hank Aaron wasn’t as loud as some other stars, on or off the field. He was a steady presence, a fixture in right field, a mainstay at the All-Star Game, and a terror at the plate. His path was often difficult, and his name is sometimes overlooked when rattling off the greatest to ever play the game.

In 1959, two years after winning the MVP, Aaron and his wife and children were baptized and received into St. Benedict the Moor Catholic Church in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, under the instruction of Fr. Michael Sablica, a priest who was vocal in his support of the civil rights movement and believed the Catholic Church could be a powerful tool for social justice. Hank Aaron described him as “more than just a religious friend of mine, he was a friend because he talked as if he was not a priest, he was just good people.”

Throughout his career, Aaron was known to keep a copy of Thomas à Kempis’ devotional classic The Imitation of Christ in his locker.  Aaron said in his Hall of Fame induction speech, “The way to fame is like the way to heaven. Through much tribulation.”

– Andrew Petiprin, Word on Fire Institute