The Vertex of Love



October 8, 2012  By Jonathan Fleischmann

When Mary was predestined in one and the same decree with Jesus Christ by the design of God—before the creation of angels or the universe, and before the existence of sin or evil—she was predestined to be the Spouse of the Holy Spirit … to hold within herself all the love of creation. 

 

Love’s Mechanics

In the return of all created things to God the Father (cf. Jn 1, 1; 16, 28), “the equal and contrary reaction,” says St. Maximilian Kolbe, “proceeds inversely from that of creation.”  In creation, the saint goes on to say, the action of God “proceeds from the Father through the Son and the Spirit, while in the return, by means of the Spirit, the Son becomes incarnate in (the Virgin Mary’s) womb and through Him, love returns to the Father.” ¹ The Saint of Auschwitz goes on:

In the union of the Holy Spirit with her, not only does love bind these two beings, but the first of them (the Holy Spirit) is all the love of the Most Holy Trinity, while the second (the Blessed Virgin Mary) is all the love of creation, and thus in that union heaven is joined to earth, the whole heaven with the whole earth, the whole of Uncreated Love with the whole of created love: this is the vertex of love. ²

Love’s Equilibrium
The form of the diagram shown in Figure 1 is not found in the work of St. Maximilian.  However, it accurately represents the state of equal and opposite action and reaction, that occurs when two bodies make contact.  In this case, the “bodies” represent heaven and earth:  the uncreated and created orders, God and his creation.  The first point I would like to make is that the state of equal and opposite contact forces in Newtonian mechanics requires “force equilibrium.”  It may then seem very wrong to use an image like this one, because how can the state shown between God and his creation be in equilibrium?  Isn’t God’s act of love so much greater than the return of his creation that no “equilibrium” would be possible?  This would certainly be the case if it were not for Emmanuel, that is, God with us.  Jesus, who is truly man, and truly God, belongs to both the created and uncreated orders simultaneously.  In his person, Jesus is both the son of Mary, fully human and like us in all ways except sin, and the Eternal Son of God the Father, infinite and equal in all ways to the Triune God.

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Thus, the love of Jesus, the Word Made Flesh who is God, is by itself enough to “balance” the love of God.  However, there is even more in the equation of love’s equilibrium than the love of the Son, infinite and sufficient in itself, though it is.  According to St. Maximilian, the perfect love of the Trinity meets an adequate response in the perfect love of the Immaculate, which is the name St. Maximilian gives to the Blessed Virgin Mary.  How is it possible that Divine Love can find an adequate response in the love of a creature?  It is possible precisely because of the name that the Virgin Mary can claim for herself.  In 1854, the Blessed Virgin Mary proclaimed to St. Bernadette Soubirous: “I am the Immaculate Conception.”  In the words of St. Maximilian, the Blessed Virgin is the created Immaculate Conception, as in the words of St. Bonaventure, the Holy Spirit is the uncreated Immaculate Conception. ³  The Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father, and the Son ,as the perfect and infinite love between the Father and the Son in the eternal interior life of the Blessed Trinity.  Thus, the Holy Spirit is truly all the love of the Most Holy Trinity.  The Holy Spirit is also called the “Complement” of the Blessed Trinity, because he is the completion of the Trinity, not in “number” (quantitatively), but in essence (qualitatively).

When Mary was predestined in one and the same decree with Jesus Christ, ⁴ by the design of God—before the creation of angels or the universe, and before the existence of sin or evil—she was predestined to be the Spouse of the Holy Spirit. So she was predestined to hold within herself all the love of creation.  Thus, St. Maximilian says that the Blessed Virgin Mary “inserted into the love of the Most Holy Trinity becomes, from the very first moment of her existence, always, forever, the Complement of the Most Holy Trinity.”  We may paraphrase the thoughts of St. Maximilian Kolbe on the spousal relationship between the Holy Spirit, and the Blessed Virgin Mary, in the words of Fr. Peter Damian Fehlner:

In virtue of this spousal union formally denoted by the title, Complement, Mary is able to enter, as no other, into the order of the hypostatic union, her soul being wholly divinized, because by the grace of the Immaculate Conception, it has been ‘transubstantiated’ into the Holy Spirit. ⁵

It is for this reason that Mary—though she is a creature in both her person and her nature—is herself the created Immaculate Conception, and, therefore, all the love of creation. She can actually provide an adequate response to the love of the Holy Spirit, who is the uncreated Immaculate Conception, and, therefore, all the Love of God.  Thus, the equation of love’s equilibrium is balanced again.

Now that we have balanced the equation of love’s equilibrium twice over, we could certainly stop.  However, there is reason to continue.  St. Maximilian does not expressly mention St. Joseph in the context of these reflections.  However, the diagram in Figure 1, based entirely on the saint’s own reflections, certainly suggests the presence of St. Joseph in the order of the response of creation to God the Father.  The order of Father, Son, and, Holy Spirit, shown in the diagram, reflects the order of God’s loving act of creation. This was initiated by the zeal of the Father, designed by the wisdom of the Son, and effected by the action of the Holy Spirit.  This is the order referred to by St. Maximilian when he says that: “the equal and contrary reaction (i.e., the return of all creation to God) proceeds inversely from that of creation.”  We see this reflection in the diagram, where the reaction “force” of love is inverted, and the order of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, as the “action force,” is reversed to give the order of Holy Spirit, Son, and Father.

Notice, however, that in the return to God, it is creation that is reacting.  Thus, the individuals reacting—while reflecting the Holy Spirit, Son, and Father to greater or lesser degrees—are all creatures.  We have Mary, who is the perfect similitude (St. Bonaventure), transparent icon (St. Maximilian), or even quasi-incarnation (St. Maximilian) of the Holy Spirit, but who is still a created person, with a created human nature.  We have Jesus, who is the Word Incarnate, the same Person as the Second Person of the Blessed Trinity, but who is still in possession of a created human nature.  St. Maximilian stops here, but must we stop here?  I would dare to say that the analogy we have carried out so far on the inspiration of St. Maximilian suggests an obvious completion.  We have St. Joseph, who has been called the “perfect icon of God the Father” by more than one saint. ⁶  In the words of Fr. Joachin Ferrer Arellano:

In the light of the Scotistic thesis on the Primacy of Christ, to take one example, one discovers (…) how the virginal marriage of Mary and Joseph was predestined “ante mundi constitutionem” (before the constitution of the world), as an essential part of the one decree of the Incarnation of the Word in the womb of the Immaculate “ante praevisa merita” (before any consideration of antecedent merit).  Such is the saving plan, “the mystery hidden before the ages in God,” (cf. Eph 3:9) to be accomplished at the high point in the history of salvation.  That high point is the fullness of time (cf. Gal 4:4) when God sent his Son into the most pure bosom of Holy Mary Ever Virgin, espoused to a man of the house of David (cf. Lk 1:26) in fulfillment of the prophecy of Nathan.  God acted thus, that through the obedience of the Spouses of Nazareth the Son might be freely welcomed into history on behalf of all mankind in order to save it.  This welcome took place in the virginal womb of Mary, the Daughter of Zion, and in the house of Joseph, in the family home established by the marriage of the two Spouses (Mary and Joseph), “sanctuary of love and cradle of life.”  This is the theological foundation of the holy Patriarch’s greatness as virginal, messianic father of the Only-begotten of the Father: shadow and transparent icon of Him who wished to make Joseph unique partaker of his fatherhood in order to prepare the human nature of Christ for the holocaust of Calvary.  In this way, He made Joseph Father and Lord of the Church gushing forth from Christ’s opened side and born of the sword of sorrow of the Woman. ⁷

In addition to being the transparent icon of God the Father, St. Joseph was the true, virginal husband of the Blessed Virgin Mary. ⁸  In fact, it can even be said that St. Joseph is the virginal father of Jesus Christ.  For, again in the words of Fr. Joachin Ferrer Arellano:

Although singular, unique, and not univocal with fatherhood as this is ordinarily understood and commonly found among men, the position more common and traditional among theologians upholds the truly real fatherhood of Joseph in relation to Jesus, based 1) on his marriage to Mary, the Mother of Jesus, and 2) on the right of the husband over his wife.  He, therefore, who is born virginally of Mary, by reason of his birth, intimately pertains in some manner to Joseph as father. … In view of the dignity of Joseph as husband of Mary, to whom belongs the fruit of his wife’s womb, one is not permitted to overlook … how the indivisible virginity of both spouses—not simply that of Mary, but also that of her husband, the son of David—is ordered to the virginal fatherhood of Joseph according to the Spirit, in virtue of the obedience of faith to the saving plan of God.  This plan includes the messianic fatherhood of Joseph as son of David in relation to his virginal Son, constituted Son of David, the messianic King, because He was Son of Joseph. ⁹

In the return of all created things to God the Father, it is under the leadership, and in imitation of, St. Joseph, our patriarch, that the individual members of the Church must, by the merits gained for us through the redemptive sacrifice of Jesus Christ, the Incarnate Word of God, be transubstantiated into Mary, who is the Virgo Ecclesia Facta (Virgin-Made-Church). ¹⁰ It is only by being transubstantiated into Mary, the created Immaculate Conception, that we can be united to God as she is uniquely united to God, being transubstantiated with her into the uncreated Immaculate Conception, who is the Holy Spirit.  In virtue of this transubstantiation, we are possessed by the Immaculate, and we are thereby formed into a single community, or Church, sharing her personality.  To St. Maximilian, this is the only way that we can be members of Christ’s Church, and thereby united to God.  In the words of Fr. Peter Damian Fehlner:

To this dynamic union of love in which not only the being of the Holy Spirit and that of Mary are united, but the entire love of heaven and that of earth touch, merge and become one so as to culminate in the Incarnation, in the birth of the Son of God, the Man-God, and then in the incorporation of the members of the Church into that Body conceived by the power of the Holy Spirit, the Saint of Niepokalanow and Auschwitz (St. Maximilian Kolbe) ascribes the fecundity of the Holy Spirit, precisely because Complement of Father and Son. … Whence the importance of Mary’s possession of those who wish to be incorporated into Christ, conformed to him in life and in death: except through her it cannot be achieved (emphasis added).  This mysterious mutual possession, then, is the basis of all other cooperation in the work of salvation, the reason for rejecting the Protestant solus, and “passive” ecclesio-typology, and affirming the universal Marian mediation of grace or active ecclesio-typology. ¹¹

Thus, in accordance with St. Maximilian’s principle of action and reaction, what was first reversed in the order of God’s creative act, in the fullness of time, in the objective order of salvation, is reversed again in the subjective order of salvation. What was first reversed in the objective order of salvation means that, through the action of the Holy Spirit, Jesus Christ was incarnate of the Blessed Virgin Mary, and became man, and through him, love returned to the Father.  What was reversed again in the subjective order of salvation means that, in imitation of our patriarch and leader, St. Joseph, through the merits gained for us by the redemptive sacrifice of Jesus on Calvary, we can be transubstantiated into the Immaculate, and thereby form one Church, sharing her personality. Consequently, we share in her unique union with God in eternity, which is the Beatific Vision.  This can be illustrated in the diagram shown in Figure 1, if one imagines traveling from the top of the diagram to the bottom, and then returning from the bottom of the diagram to the top again.

Love’s VertexOur final meditation on the diagram shown in Figure 1 is the point of contact between heaven and earth, the vertex of love, where all the love of God, and all the love of creation, meet and are joined: “in that union heaven is joined to earth, the whole heaven with the whole earth, the whole of Uncreated Love with the whole of created love.” ¹²  This point of contact, between the whole heaven and the whole earth, is, according to St. Maximilian, the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary.  Why is this?  Why is the vertex of love not the Incarnation of Jesus Christ, the Son of God, who is love?  Indeed, the Saint of Auschwitz has been sharply criticized, and even ridiculed by some theologians, for what they have called “a heresy” along the lines of that of Joachim of Fiore. ¹³  It is claimed that, by making the vertex of love the Immaculate Conception, the centrality of the Incarnation of Jesus Christ, the Son of God, is denied.  However, precisely the opposite is true.  For, in the words of Fr. Peter Damian Fehlner:

Today, this joachimite tendency generally reveals itself in constant anxiety about Catholic proneness to “exaggerate” Mary, and a downplaying (emphasis added) of the active role of Mary in the work of salvation as Mother of God, and co-redemptress so as to exalt the “mediation” of the Holy Spirit as principal “co-redemptor” (and for some “mother”) of whom Mary is but the instrument (as are we), or so as to speak of the suffering of the Father. … But such historical trends have always been the prelude of Unitarianism: not an affirmation of the Trinity, but its denial, a denial which must ultimately lead to some form of pantheism. … The significance of St. Maximilian’s reflections on the Holy Spirit, and Mary, and of his preferred terminology cannot be underestimated. ¹⁴

It is the relationship of Mary to her Divine Son, which is the relationship of Mother of God, or Theotokos, which is the source of all her dignity, unparalleled among creatures.   This dignity so far transcends the dignity of every other created being as to make her a “quasi-part” of the Blessed Trinity.  It is in this very dignity, however, that the Incarnation of Jesus Christ is central, which is why St. Maximilian Kolbe’s reflections on the Blessed Virgin Mary are directly opposed to the joachimite heresy.  Fr. Peter Damian Fehlner paraphrases St. Maximilian Kolbe on this subject as follows:

Thus, Mary’s self-definition is: “I am the Immaculate Conception.”  Only Mary can say this, because only of Mary Immaculate, jointly predestined with Christ for an absolute primacy in creation, can it be said that the whole world and each of us was made “for her”. ¹⁵ Therefore, of no other just person can it be said as it was said to Mary “The Lord is with thee.” ¹⁶  For no other than the Immaculate can be Mother of God (emphasis added).  Indeed, she remains only a creature; nonetheless in virtue of the Immaculate Conception she far transcends the supernatural perfection of even the greatest saints and of all the saints together, for as “quasi-part” of the Trinity, she not only participates in the divine perfections, she is “inserted into the very bosom of the Trinity and into the order of the Incarnation.” ¹⁷ … ¹⁸  To be part of the Trinity, then, in so singular a way revolves about the divine Maternity, and by extension the spiritual maternity as well.  For in loving the Immaculate the divine Persons love us. ¹⁹

In the famous Roman conference of 1937, St. Maximilian defined sanctity with an equation: “S: v = V”.  The letter “S” stands for sanctity, the lowercase letter “v” stands for the will of a creature, and the uppercase letter “V” stands for the will of God.  It is Mary Immaculate who is the perfect image, or icon, of sanctity, because it is only she who satisfies Kolbe’s equation.  “We may add with the Saint: perfect sanctity is perfect charity or Immaculate Conception.” ²⁰  This is the meaning of the vertex of love, and why that vertex is the Immaculate Conception, rather than the Incarnation.  Mary is a created person, and yet her will is perfectly united to the will of God: “v = V.”  In the words of St. Maximilian:

The Immaculate, the full of grace, was always united to the will of God.  From all eternity, she was in the thought of God who had willed her so holy and perfect, to correspond with his will in a manner so complete.  Hence, we can say that to do the will of God, means to do the will of the Immaculate, and to do the will of the Immaculate means to do the will of God, because she is always united to God: the Lord is with thee; because she is always docile to the call of God: be it done to me; because she is always solicitous for the glory of God, always adoring, praising and thanking: my soul magnifies the Lord. ²¹

We know well from St. Thomas Aquinas that love is in the will. ²²  Thus, in the equation, “v = V,” we see that all the love of creation (in the will of the Immaculate Virgin Mary) is united to all the love of the Most Holy Trinity (in the will of the Holy Spirit), and, in the words of St. Maximilian, “in that union heaven is joined to earth, the whole heaven with the whole earth, the whole of Uncreated Love with the whole of created love: this is the vertex of love.” ²³

Oh sweet heart of Mary, be our salvation.
Ave Maria!

1. SK 1318.  All citations from the writings of St. Maximilian Kolbe in this paper, with the exception of the Roman Conferences, are abbreviated SK and taken from Scritti di Massimiliano Kolbe (Roma 1997). ↩
2. Ibid. ↩
3. Regarding the Mysteries of the interior life of the Blessed Trinity, St. Bonaventure said that the Son can be properly said to be “a conceived”, but only the Holy Spirit can be properly said to be “conception” (in I Sent.).  St. Maximilian added the word “Immaculate” (perfect, holy) to the name given the Holy Spirit by St. Bonaventure, an addition St. Bonaventure would surely have approved. ↩
4. The following is an excerpt taken from the Apostolic Constitution of Pope Pius IX Ineffabilis Deus, issued on December 8, 1854, in which the Holy Father solemnly declared the Dogma of the Immaculate Conception:  “From the very beginning, and before time began, the eternal Father chose and prepared for his only-begotten Son a Mother in whom the Son of God would become incarnate and from whom, in the blessed fullness of time, he would be born into this world.  Above all creatures did God so love her that truly in her was the Father well pleased with singular delight.  Therefore, far above all the angels and all the saints so wondrously did God endow her with the abundance of all heavenly gifts poured from the treasury of his divinity that this mother, ever absolutely free of all stain of sin, all fair and perfect, would possess that fullness of holy innocence and sanctity than which, under God, one cannot even imagine anything greater, and which, outside of God, no mind can succeed in comprehending fully. …  And hence the very words with which the Sacred Scriptures speak of Uncreated Wisdom and set forth his eternal origin, the Church, both in its ecclesiastical offices and in its liturgy, has been wont to apply likewise to the origin of the Blessed Virgin, inasmuch as God, by one and the same decree, had established the origin of Mary and the Incarnation of Divine Wisdom.”  Here Blessed Pope Pius IX makes use both of the Scotistic thesis on the Absolute Joint Primacy of Jesus and Mary, both of whose existence were ordained before God’s act of creation and before any consideration of original sin (cf. R. Rosini, O.F.M., Mariology of Blessed John Duns Scotus, translated by P. Fehlner, F.I., New Bedford 2008), and the formulation of St. Anselm, who said that Mary “shines with a purity greater than which none can be imagined” (De Conceptione Virginis). ↩
5. P. Fehlner, F.I., St. Maximilian Ma. Kolbe, Martyr of Charity – Pneumatologist (New Bedford, 2004). ↩
6. St. Theresa of Avila and St. Bernadette Soubirous are among these (cf. A. Dozè, “Le mystère de Saint Joseph révéle a deux femmes: Therèse (d’Avila) et Bernadette”, in Actas simposio de Kevelaer 2005), as well as St. Peter Julian Eymard (Month of St. Joseph). ↩
7. J. Ferrer Arellano, “The Virginal Marriage of Mary and Joseph according to Bl. John Duns Scotus”, in Bl. John Duns Scotus and His Mariology, Commemoration of the Seventh Centenary of His Death, Acts of the Symposium on Scotus’ Mariology, Grey College, Durham – England (New Bedford, 2009). ↩
8. Blessed John Duns Scotus and St. Maximilian Kolbe are both clear on this point, as are many other saints, including Blessed Pope John Paul II (cf. Redemptoris Custos).  The fact that Mary is the Spouse of the Holy Spirit, and the fact that their perfect spousal love results in Mary’s transubstantiation into the Holy Spirit, does not imply that the Holy Spirit is the “husband” of Mary, or that the Holy Spirit is the “father” of Jesus.  To approach an understanding of the perfect spousal union of love between the Holy Spirit and Mary, it must be understood that highest experience of spousal love, which is between husband and wife within the holy sacrament of marriage, is but an imperfect reflection of the source of spousal love, which is the Love between the Father and the Son in the Blessed Trinity, both of Whom in the inner life of the Trinity are, of course, without “gender” in the human sense of the term.  This Perfect Spousal Love is the Holy Spirit, and it is as a fruit of this Spousal Love that the Blessed Virgin Mary is one with the Holy Spirit; transubstantiated into the Holy Spirit; the Holy Spirit quasi-incarnate.  (P. Fehlner, St. Maximilian Ma. Kolbe, Martyr of Charity…) ↩
9. J. Ferrer Arellano, “The Virginal Marriage of Mary and Joseph…” ↩
10. The title “Virgo Ecclesia Facta,” or Virgin-Made-Church” is applied to the Blessed Virgin by St. Francis of Assisi in his Antiphon for the Office of the Passion (cf. J. Schneider, O.F.M., Virgo Ecclesia Facta: The Presence of Mary in the Crucifix of San Damiano and in the Office of the Passion of St. Francis of Assisi, New Bedford 2004).  The phrase “transubstantiation into the Immaculate,” though surprising, is used twice by St. Maximilian Kolbe to describe the total consecration to the Immaculate he demanded of his priests (cf. A. Geiger, F.I., “Marian Mediation as Presence and Transubstantiation into the Immaculate”, in Mary at the Foot of the Cross – III:  Mater Unitatis, Acts of the Third International Symposium on Marian Coredemption, New Bedford 2003). ↩
11. P. Fehlner, St. Maximilian Ma. Kolbe, Martyr of Charity… ↩
12. SK 1318 ↩
13. Joachim of Fiore was a theologian (c. 1135 – 1202) who de-emphasized the central role of the Incarnation in the Salvific Order.  His theories were declared heretical at the Fourth Lateran Council (1215) and at the Synod of Arles (1263). ↩
14. P. Fehlner, St. Maximilian Ma. Kolbe, Martyr of Charity… ↩
15. SK 1305. ↩
16. SK 1295 ↩
17. SK 1320; 1305; 1295; 1288. ↩
18.  Father Fehlner continues:  “While this personal communion or inexistence of the Holy Spirit and Mary Immaculate is absolutely unique in its perfection (a hierarchy or sacred order of its own kind), it is nonetheless the ontological basis making possible the sanctification of the Church as Bride of Christ, as sharing in the redemptive sacramentality of the Incarnation.  This mediation of Mary qua created Immaculate Conception is the source of that mystical personality of the Church qua Bride, a personality of virgin and mother underlying and permeating every other dimension of the Church, including the petrine, hierarchical, sacramental-liturgical.”  (P. Fehlner, St. Maximilian Ma. Kolbe, Martyr of Charity…)  See also J. Ferrer Arellano, “The Triple and Inseparable Mediation of the Immaculate, the Eucharist and the Petrine Ministry in the Building Up of the Church Until the Parousia (The Three Whites)”, in Mary at the Foot of the Cross VI: Marian Coredemption in the Eucharistic Mystery, Acts of the Sixth International Symposium on Marian Coredemption (New Bedford, 2007). ↩
19. P. Fehlner, St. Maximilian Ma. Kolbe, Martyr of Charity… ↩
20. Ibid. ↩
21. St. Maximilian Kolbe, in Roman Conferences of St. Maximilian M. Kolbe, translated with introduction and notes byFr. Peter Damian Ma. Fehlner, F.I. (New Bedford, 2004). ↩
22. Despite the objections of Dietrich von Hildebrand (cf. Dietrich von Hildebrand, The Nature of Love). ↩
23. SK 1318. ↩

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Taken from: http://www.hprweb.com/2012/10/the-vertex-of-love/

“An Extraordinary Synod, Indeed”

George Weigel

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According to Vatican-speak, a specially scheduled session of the Synod of Bishops is an “Extraordinary Synod,” meaning Not-an-Ordinary Synod, held every three years or so. In the case of the recently-completed Extraordinary Synod of 2014, extraordinary things did happen, in the “Oh, wow!” sense of the word. And if this year’s Extraordinary Synod was a preview of the Synod for which it was to set the agenda, i.e., the Ordinary Synod of 2015, that Synod, too, promises to be, well, extraordinary.

How was the Extraordinary Synod of 2014 extraordinary? With apologies to the Bard, let me count the ways:

1. The 2014 Synod got an extraordinary amount of press attention. Alas, too much of that attention was due to the mass media misperception that The Great Moment of the Long-Awaited Catholic Cave-In was at hand: the moment when the Catholic Church, the last major institutional hold-out against the triumph of the sexual revolution, would finally admit the error of its ways and join the rush into the promised land of sexual liberation, symbolized in this instance by a Catholic cave-in on the nature of marriage. What ought to have gotten the world’s attention—the witness of African bishops to the liberating power of monogamy and lifelong marital fidelity—got sadly short shrift, though Third World women are the principal beneficiaries of the truth about marriage the Church received from its Lord.

2. The 2014 Synod demonstrated the extraordinary self-confidence of bishops from dying local churches who nonetheless feel quite comfortable giving pastoral advice to local churches that are either thriving or holding their own. Many northern European bishops and theologians (and bishop-theologians) acted as if the blissful years when they set the agenda for the world Church at Vatican II had returned. That these same bishops and theologians and bishop-theologians have presided over the collapse of western European Catholicism in the intervening five decades seemed not to matter to them in the slightest. Happy days were here again.

3. The 2014 Synod was extraordinary, or at least the media claimed it was, for an unprecedented public display of discord among cardinals. Perhaps those who found this either unprecedented or unseemly could consult Galatians 2:11, where Paul reports that he “rebuked” Peter “to his face.” Or ponder the fierce arguments among North African bishops during the Donatist controversy. Or look into the quarrel between Bishop Cyprian of Carthage, a doctor of the Church, and Pope Stephen, Bishop of Rome. Or read the debates at the first session of Vatican II. The 2014 controversies were indeed noteworthy, in that otherwise intelligent men whose position had been pretty well demolished by fellow scholars were incapable of admitting that they’d gotten it wrong. But upon further review (as they say in the NFL), that isn’t so new either.

4. The 2014 Synod was extraordinary in that a lot of theological confusion was displayed by elders of the Church who really ought to know better. The idea of the development of doctrine was especially ill-used by some. Of course the Church’s self-understanding develops over time, as does the Church’s pastoral practice. But as Blessed John Henry Newman showed in the classic modern discussion of the subject, all authentic development is in organic continuity with the past; it’s not a rupture with the past. Nor is there any place in a truly Catholic theory of doctrinal development for rewriting the words of the Lord or describing fidelity to the plain text of Scripture as “fundamentalism.”

5. The 2014 Synod was extraordinary in its demonstration that too many bishops and theologians (and bishop-theologians) still have not grasped the Iron Law of Christianity in Modernity: Christian communities that maintain a firm grasp on their doctrinal and moral boundaries can flourish amidst the cultural acids of modernity; Christian communities whose doctrinal and moral boundaries become porous (and then invisible) wither and die.

6. One more thing: why were no representatives of the Pontifical John Paul II Institute on Marriage and the Family invited to a Synod on the family?

Extraordinary, indeed: in both Vatican-speak and plain English.

George Weigel is a senior fellow of the Ethics and Public Policy Center in Washington, D.C.

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Taken from: http://www.firstthings.com/web-exclusives/2014/10/an-extraordinary-synod-indeed

Woman's Indispensable Role in Salvation History

  

H.H. Pope John Paul II
General Audience
March 27, 1996

 

1. The Old Testament holds up for our admiration some extraordinary women who, impelled by the Spirit of God, share in the struggles and triumphs of Israel or contribute to its salvation. Their presence in the history of the people is neither marginal nor passive: they appear as true protagonists of salvation history. Here are the most significant examples.

 

After the crossing of the Red Sea, the sacred text emphasizes the initiative of a woman inspired to make this decisive event a festive celebration: "Then Miriam, the prophetess, the sister of Aaron took a timbrel in her hand; and all the women went out after her with timbrels and dancing. And Miriam sang to them: 'Sing to the Lord, for he has triumphed gloriously; the horse and his rider he has thrown into the sea'" (Ex 15:20-21).

This mention of feminine enterprise in the context of a celebration stresses not only the importance of woman's role, but also her particular ability for praising and thanking God.

 

Positive contribution of women to salvation history

2. The action of the prophetess Deborah, at the time of the Judges, is even more important. After ordering the commander of the army to go and gather his men, she guarantees by her presence the success of Israel's army, predicting that another woman, Jael, will kill their enemy's general.

To celebrate the great victory, Deborah also sings a long canticle praising Jael's action: "Most blessed of women be Jael, ... of tent-dwelling women most blessed" (Jgs 5:24). In the New Testament this praise is echoed in the words Elizabeth addresses to Mary on the day of the Visitation: "Blessed are you among women ..." (Lk 1:42).

The significant role of women in the salvation of their people, highlighted by the figures of Deborah and Jael, is presented again in the story of another prophetess named Huldah, who lived at the time of King Josiah.

Questioned by the priest Hilkiah, she made prophecies announcing that forgiveness would be shown to the king who feared the divine wrath. Huldah thus becomes a messenger of mercy and peace (cf. 2 Kgs 22:14-20).

3. The Books of Judith and Esther, whose purpose is to idealize the positive contribution of woman to the history of the chosen people, present—in a violent cultural context—two women who win victory and salvation for the Israelites.

The Book of Judith, in particular, tells of a fearsome army sent by Nebuchadnezzar to conquer Israel. Led by Holofernes, the enemy army is ready to seize the city of Bethulia, amid the desperation of its inhabitants, who, considering any resistance to be useless, ask their rulers to surrender. But the city's elders, who in the absence of immediate aid declare themselves ready to hand Bethulia over to the enemy, are rebuked by Judith for their lack of faith as she professes her complete trust in the salvation that comes from the Lord.

After a long invocation to God, she who is a symbol of fidelity to the Lord, of humble prayer and of the intention to remain chaste goes to Holofernes, the proud, idolatrous and dissolute enemy general.

Left alone with him and before striking him, Judith prays to Yahweh, saying: "Give me strength this day, O Lord God of Israel!" (Jdt 13:7). Then, taking Holofernes' sword, she cuts off his head.

Here too, as in the case of David and Goliath, the Lord used weakness to triumph over strength. On this occasion, however, it was a woman who brought victory: Judith, without being held back by the cowardice and unbelief of the people's rulers, goes to Holofernes and kills him, earning the gratitude and praise of the High Priest and the elders of Jerusalem. The latter exclaimed to the woman who had defeated the enemy: "You are the exaltation of Jerusalem, you are the great glory of Israel, you are the great pride of our nation! You have done all this single-handed; you have done great good to Israel, and God is well pleased with it. May the Almighty Lord bless you for ever!" (Jdt 15:9-10).

4. The events narrated in the Book of Esther occurred in another very difficult situation for the Jews. In the kingdom of Persia, Haman, the king's superintendent, decrees the extermination of the Jews. To remove the danger, Mardocai, a Jew living in the citadel of Susa, turns to his niece Esther, who lives in the king's palace where she has attained the rank of queen. Contrary to the law in force, she presents herself to the king without being summoned, thus risking the death penalty, and she obtains the revocation of the extermination decree. Haman is executed, Mordocai comes to power and the Jews delivered from menace, thus get the better of their enemies.

Judith and Esther both risk their lives to win the salvation of their people. The two interventions, however, are quite different: Esther does not kill the enemy but, by playing the role of mediator, intercedes for those who are threatened with destruction.

 

Holy Spirit sketches Mary's role in human salvation

5. This intercessory role is later attributed to another female figure, Abigail, the wife of Nabal, by the First Book of Samuel. Here too, it is due to her intervention that salvation is once again achieved.

She goes to meet David, who has decided to destroy Nabal's family, and asks forgiveness for her husband's sins. Thus she delivers his house from certain destruction (1 Sm 25).

As can be easily noted, the Old Testament tradition frequently emphasizes the decisive action of women in the salvation of Israel, especially in the writings closest to the coming of Christ. In this way the Holy Spirit, through the events connected with Old Testament women, sketches with ever greater precision the characteristics of Mary's mission in the work of salvation for the entire human race.

Taken from:
L'Osservatore Romano
Weekly Edition in English
3 April 1996

Return to Main Page: John Paul


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http://www.piercedhearts.org/jpii/general_audiences/gen_aud_1996/mar_27_1996.htm

Death of Sturdy AMAIC Supporter Bishop John Jobst



With reference to our AMAIC Constitution, the Most Reverend John Jobst, Bishop of Broome (Western Australia), had written:

“I welcome the establishment of the Australian Marian Academy which could be associated with the Marian Academy in Rome . One cannot but notice the role of the Mother of God in “crushing the serpent’s head” throughout the history of the Church …. [Pope John Paul II] has spoken out clearly and encouraged any efforts promoting the devotion to Mary the Mother of God. For these reasons the Marian Academy is very timely …. I can only say that the statements made in the Constitution are true and in keeping with the Church’s sound teaching …”.

 

 

 

At: http://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-07-08/broomes-flying-bishop-john-jobst-dies-at-94/5582832 we read of his death:

 

 

Kimberley's 'flying bishop' John Jobst dies aged 94

Updated Tue 8 Jul 2014, 9:22pm AEST

A Catholic bishop known throughout the Kimberley as the "flying bishop" for his habit of piloting light aircraft to visit his far-flung parishioners has died at the age of 94.

German-born John Jobst was bishop of the Kimberley region for nearly 37 years, finally retiring in 1995.

 

He was a pioneer of remote education in northern WA and helped establish several schools in Aboriginal communities.

He was also a founder of Notre Dame University in Broome and a passionate advocate of Indigenous land rights.

Bishop Jobst passed away at the weekend in Germany.

 

Bishop of Broome Christopher Saunders said Bishop Jobst was interested in schooling in remote Aboriginal communities years before Indigenous education became a government priority.

He was also well-known for using his pilot licence to cover his vast bush parish.

The aircraft were paid for with donations from church members in Perth.

"He flew those aircraft around the Kimberley, from station to station and from town to town, and some of the towns weren't much of a town then," Bishop Saunders said.

"But he was always willing to cart something, or go out of his way, or pick up someone who was sick or ill."

 

Bishop Saunders said his predecessor was a "fiercely determined" man.

"He turned determination into an art form and failure was something that he didn't live with very well," he said.

"Hence it was that he ... started eight remote schools in the Kimberley and was instrumental in getting the University of Notre Dame in Broome going."



 

Was Mary a Temple Virgin?



by Dr Taylor Marshall

Previously we examined the tradition and biblical foundation for the Catholic teaching that Mary was consecrated as a Temple virgin at the age of three and lived in the temple precincts till the age of fourteen when she was married to Saint Joseph and there after virginally conceived the Son of God.*

See post: The True Presentation of the Virgin Mary (Foretold in the Book of Sirach)

This school of Temple virgins in Jerusalem formed an altar guild that fulfilled the necessary tasks at the Temple. This included sewing and creating vestments, washing the vestments of the priests which would be stained regularly by animal blood, preparing liturgical linen, weaving the veil of the Temple, and most importantly, liturgical prayer. The Jewish and Catholic tradition holds that this school for Israelite virgins was completed by marrying age of about 14 and that they were dismissed at this time. There were also older women, perhaps widows such as the prophetess Anna, who served as teachers and governesses for the virgins under their care.

There has been some doubt as to whether their were really consecreated Jewish virgins at the Temple. In my previous post I referenced the first-century Jewish historian Josephus in support of “Temple virgins” in Jerusalem, but I fear that this cannot be substantiated. Jimmy Akin asked me for the citation and I cannot find it. One would assume that it would be in Book 5 of the Jewish Wars of Josephus. There Josephus mentions cloisters, but he does not tell us who lived in them. That’s as close as Josephus gets.

There are, however, three Scriptural accounts that are used by Catholics to demonstrate that there were special women who ministered at the Temple complex.

Exodus 38:8 mentions women who “watch (צָבָא) at the door of the tabernacle.”

The second is in 1 Samuel:

“Now Heli was very old, and he heard all that his sons did to all Israel: and how they lay with the women that waited (צָבָא) at the door of the tabernacle:” (1 Samuel 2:22, D-R)

In both of the verses above, Hebrew verb for “watch” and “waited” is the same. It is the Hebrew word צָבָא, which is the same verb used to described the liturgical activity of the Levites (see Num 4:23; 8:24). This corresponds to the Latin translation in the Clementine Vulgate, which relates that these women “observabant” at the temple doors – another liturgical reading.
So these women are not simply hanging out around the Temple, looking for men, gossiping, or chatting about the weather. These are pious women devoted to a liturgical function. In fact, the Court of Women might exist formally for these special “liturgical women.”

The third and final reference to these liturgical females is in 2 Maccabees:

And the virgins also that were shut up, came forth, some to {High Priest} Onias, and some to the walls, and others looked out of the windows. And all holding up their hands towards heaven, made supplication. (2 Macc 3:19-20)

Here are virgins that are shut up. In the Greek it is “αἱ δὲ κατάκλειστοι τῶν παρθένων” or “the shut up ones of the virgins.” In this passage the Holy Spirit refers not to all the virgins of Jerusalem, but to a special set of virgins, that is, those virgins who had the privilege and right to be in the presence of the High Priest and address him. It’s rather ridiculous to think that young girls would have general access to the High Priest of Israel. However, if these virgins had a special liturgical role at the Temple, it becomes clear that they would both address the High Priest Onias and would also be featured as an essential part of the intense supplication in the Temple at this moment of crisis.

There is further testimony of temple virgins in the traditions of the Jews. In the Mishnah, it is recorded that there were 82 consecrated virgins who wove the veil of the Temple:

“The veil of the Temple was a palm-length in width. It was woven with seventy-two smooth stitches each made of twenty-four threads. The length was of forty cubits and the width of twenty cubits. Eighty-two virgins wove it. Two veils were made each year and three hundred priests were needed to carry it to the pool” (Mishna Shekalim 8, 5-6).

We find another reference to the “women who made the veils for the Temple…baked the showbread…prepared the incense” (Babylonian Talmud Kethuboth 106a).

Rabbinic Jewish sources also record how when the Romans sacked Jerusalem in AD 70, the Temple virgins leapt into the flames so as not to be abducted by the heathen soldiers: ”the virgins who were weaving threw themselves in the flames” (Pesikta Rabbati 26, 6). Here we also learn that these virgins lived in the three-storey building inside the Temple area. However, it is difficult to find any other details about this structure. The visions of Anne Catherine Emmerich placed the cloisters of the Temple Virgins on the north side of the Temple (Emmerich’s Life of the Blessed Virgin Mary 3, 5).

Even more, the first century document by the name of the Apocalypse of Baruch (sometimes called “2 Baruch”) describes the Temple virgins living in the Temple as weavers of the holy veil:

“And you virgins who weave byssus and silk, and gold from Ophir, in haste pick it all up and throw it in the fire that it will return it to its Author, and that the flame will take it back to its Creator, from fear that the enemy might seize it” (2 Baruch 10:19).

So then, there is ample evidence for the role of consecrated women, especially virgins at the Temple. If one were to accept the passages above, we have plenty of testimony for cultic women in the time of Moses’ tabernacle, in the time of David, in the Second Temple era, and in the first century of Our Lord.

This substantiates the claims of the Fathers and Doctors of the Church who claim that the Blessed Virgin Mary was presented to the Temple and served there from the age of three until the age of fourteen. To claim that Temple virgins are a myth of celibacy-crazed Catholic bishops does not hold up. Scripture and Jewish tradition records that there were specially commissioned virgins associated with the Temple. We may not know much about them, but we know that they existed.

That the most holy human girl of all time, the Mother of the Messiah, should live as a temple virgin should come as no surprise. This also accounts for the vow of virginity she had taken since she “knew not a man” even though she was already espoused to Joseph.

Now then, there is also a tradition that Mary was allowed to enter the Holy of Holies. This seems absurd to us. Moses stipulated that the High Priest and only the High Priest be allowed to enter the Holy of Holies and that only once a year. It was the greatest privilege in Israel. Why was the Holy of Holies so special? It was the inner room that housed the ark of the covenant.

Yet remember that this is the Second Temple, not the original Temple of Solomon. The Ark of the Covenant was hidden by Jeremiah and it had been lost ever since. The Second Temple, therefore, had an empty Holy of Holies. It was an empty room. No Ark of the Covenant. Nothing. In a sense, the Second Temple was a sham. It was like an empty suit. The Temple was built to house the Ark of the Covenant, but Ark was not there.

So then, the Temple in Jerusalem was empty. It did not contain the ark of the covenant. And yet we Catholics know from Revelation 11:19-12:1 that the Mother of Christ is truly the Ark of the New Covenant. The wood ark of old contained the Word of God engraved in stone. The stainless womb of Mary contained the Word of God made flesh.

Perhaps by a singular inspiration, the High Priest of that time had been inspired to lead this immaculate virgin into the inner sanctum of the Holy of Holies. My heart leaps when contemplating this. The angels of heaven would rejoice to see the true Ark of the Covenant restored into the earthly Temple of Jerusalem. In fact, it would be a foretaste of the glorious assumption of Mary. The Temple represented a new Garden of Eden and, of course, Mary is the New Eve. Thus, her entry into the Temple reveals that the fullness of time has come. The New Eve will soon bring forth the New Adam to reverse the curse and lead the faithful into the presence of God.

This is speculation and I do not want it to obscure the purpose of this post, which is to defend the existence of Temple virgins in Jerusalem. Nevertheless, the presence of the New Eve at or in the Temple certainly is fitting since it hearkens back to the prophecy that the virgin mother will crush the head of the serpent. This is an exciting new perspective at the meaning of Christmas.
Immaculate Mary, dutiful at the Temple, pray for us.

*It is blasphemy to say that the Blessed Virgin Mary was an “unwed mother” or that she conceived Christ “out of wedlock.” Joseph and Mary were married before the angel Gabriel came to her in the Annunciation, and thus she conceived Christ after she was married to Saint Joseph. “The angel Gabriel was sent…to a virgin espoused to a man whose name was Joseph.” Joseph and Mary were “spouses.”


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Taken from: http://taylormarshall.com/2011/12/did-jewish-temple-virgins-exist-and-was.html