Review for Religious - Issue 62.0 (Lent 2003)

Special Lent Issue of Volume 62 of the Review for Religious, 2003.

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Review for Religious - Issue 62.0 (Lent 2003)
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description Special Lent Issue of Volume 62 of the Review for Religious, 2003.
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spelling sluoai_rfr-395 Review for Religious - Issue 62.0 (Lent 2003) Missouri Province of the Society of Jesus Jesuits -- Periodicals; Monasticism and religious orders -- Periodicals. Billy Special Lent Issue of Volume 62 of the Review for Religious, 2003. 2003-03 2012-05 PDF RfR.62.SL.2003.pdf rfr-2000 BX2400 .R4 Copyright U.S. Central and Southern Province, Society of Jesus. Permission is hereby granted to copy and distribute individual articles for personal, classroom, or workshop use. Please credit Review for Religious and reference the volume, issue, and page number and cite Saint Louis University Libraries as the host of the digital collection. Saint Louis University Libraries Digitization Center text eng Missouri Province of the Society of Jesus i tu a 0 lity Review for Religious Supplement The Eucharist find Mark’s Institution Narrative Growing in Christ: The Significance of Suffering Jailhouse Religion LENT EASTER 2003 :is !ook,ng tO facditate dtalogue w,tb God, dialogue .zvithin ~o.~rselves; And dialogue with dne an~tbe=r.~ As. ~Pope. Paul Vl ,.;said, Our Why of being.church :ioday is the way of di!!ogue. Spirituality. Review, a supplement of Review for Religious, is published at Saint Louis University by the Jest, its of the Missouri Province twice a },ear during the Lent/Easter and Advent/Christmas seasons. Please send all correspondence to: Review for Religious; Editorial Office: 3601 Lindell Boulevard ¯ St. Louis, Missouri 63108-3393 Telephone: 314-977-7363 ¯Fax: 314-977-7362 See inside back cover for information on subscription rates to Review for Religious. Spirituality. Review, a supplement of Review for Religious, is an interactive journal. We ask you, our readers, to give us your reactions and your suggestions. Please write to our address given above or fax: 314-977-7362 email us at review@slu.edu ¯V~Zeb site: www.reviewforreligious.org 02003 Review for Religious Permission is herewith granted to copy any material contained in this supplement issue of Review for Religious for personal or internal use, or for the personal or internal use of specific library. clients within the limits outlined in Sections 107 and/or 108 of the United States Copyright Law. MI copies made under this permission must bear notice of the source, date, and copyright owner on the first page. This per*nission is NOT extended to copying for commercial distribution, adver-tising, institutional promotion, or for the creation of new collective works or anthologies. Such permission will only be considered on written application to the Editor, Review for Religious. S pi eview REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS SUPPLEMENT Editor Associate Editors Canonical Counsel Editor Editorial Staff AdvisoO, Board David L. Fleming SJ Clare Boi~hmer ASC Philip C. Fischer sJ Elizabeth McDonough OP Mary Ann Foppe Tracy Gramm . Judy Sharp James and Joan Felling Adrian Gaudin SC Sr. Raymond Marie Gerard FSP Eugene Henseli OSB Ernest E. Larkin OCarm Bishop Carlos A. Sevilla SJ Miriam D. Ukeritis CSJ LENT EASTER 2003 contents tracings, eucharist 6 The Eucharist and Mark’s Institution Narrative Dennis J. Billy CSSR explains how Mark’s institution-of- the-Eucharist narrative helps us see not only that the Eucharistic action and Jesus’ passion, death, and resurrection are intrinsically linked, but also that the Christian community’s very life is bound up with both. Reflection and Questions 17 christian suffering Growing in Christ: The Significance of Suffering David L. Fleming SJ reviews the insights ab, out human suffering that come from the evolutionary approach of Teilhard de Chardin and relates them to the Ignatian prayer "Take and Receive." Prayer and Questions 2126 the now ~ Jailhouse Religion Mary Ellen Dougherty SSND gives insight into living in the present moment--a gift from her prison and jail students. Psalm and Questions Spirit~¢ality Review As we initiate the Review for Religious Supplement, I would like to reflect upon the idea of tracing. Consulting a dictionary we find that tracing means "to make one’s way, especially to follow a track or trail." Tracing can also mean "to follow or study out in detail or step by step, as for example the history of the labor move-ment." Tracing describes too our ability "to dis-cover by going backward over the evidence step by step, as for example one’s ancestry back to the 15th century." Christianity has long known the images of journeying and pilgrimage to describe every per-son’s human history in relation to our final union with God. The question is always how do we know the path, what direction should we take. I think that the word tracings captures the signs and markings that help us make decisions about our movements and orientations. In life’s journey we are not left clueless about the paths available to our progress. But, because we have only trac-ings, we must carefully search for and read and interpret the signs and markings we are given. 3 Lent/Easter 2003 Tracing~ 4 All of creation can be seen as tracings of God’s love for us. Although St. Ignatius Loyola in his famous Principle and Foundation at the beginning of his Spiritual Exercises does not use the image of tracings, we are pre-sented there with the Pauline idea that God is known to all of us through the world that he has created (Rrn 1:20) and by choosing carefully among his gifts we grow in our union with God. We have tracings also in our own life story, which only become apparent if we are reflec-tive people. Our canonized saints and the many holy people who grace our lives give us tracings for our pil-grimage to God’s kingdom through their own shared stories, through their lived example, through their teach-ings, and through their writings. Tracings never tell the whole story. Tracings are not a highway home. Tracings have a promise about them-- a promise that can be realized only if we work with them, carefully pursuing the direction forward that our prayer, our reflection, perhaps our consultation, and even a com-promise may indicate. I invite our readers to approach the writings of this supplement as possible tracings for their own spiritual growth. To help in this way, I intend that this supple-ment be seen differently from the journal Review for Religious. The articles presented in this supplement ask for our interaction--personal reflection and prayer, dia-logue with others or in community meetings, and response back to us as editors by the postcard insert or by fax (314-977-7362) or by ~mail (review@slu.edu) or through our website (www.reviewforreligious.org). We editors hope to receive lots of positive or, if need be, neg-ative comment--all with a view to making our entire pub-lication more helpful, more intellectually and spiritually nourishing, and more in tune with the needs and oppor-tunities of our time and provi~lential place in God’s world. Spirituality Review In the Lenten and Easter seasons, we more con-sciously identify with Jesus’ Jerusalem journey. Hopefully, the tracings we find here will help us in our direction forward towards God. A blessed Lent and an Easter of consolation. David L. Fleming SJ P.S. Please let us hear from you how you have inter-acted with this supplement. Lent/Easter 2003 DENNIS J. BILLY The Eucharist and Mark’s Institution Narrative eucharist Of the three Synoptic accounts of the Last Supper, the one from Mark is the earliest and most straightforward. It is generally agreed that its style and choice of words point to an early liturgical tradition from Palestine, most likely from Jerusalem itself, and it is widely thought to have served as the model for the accounts in Matthew and Luke. Although it is not the ear-liest New Testament account of the institution narrative (Paul’s account in 1 Co 11:23-25 pre-dates it), it is the first to be preserved in the the-ological context of the Passion narrative. Its place there reveals much about how the early Christian community understood the Eucharist and its relevance to the Christ event. Overall Narradve Context Mark’s account of the institution of the Eucharist (Mk 14:22-25) is a small though significant part of a large narrative that Dennis J. Billy CSSR lives at Collegio Sant’ Mfonso; C.P. 2458; 00100 Roma; Italy. Spirituali~ Review encompasses Jesus’ passion, death, and resurrection. This narrative, taking in the final three chapters of Mark’s Gospel, provides a straightforward description of what occurred. The major components are as follows: The conspiracy against Jesus; the anointing at Bethany; Judas betrays Jesus; preparations for the Passover supper; the treachery of Judas foretold; the institution of the Eucharist; Peter’s denial foretold; Gethsemane; the arrest; Jesus before the Sanhedrin; Peter’s denials; Jesus before Pilate; Jesus crowned with thorns; the way of the cross; the crucifixion; the crucified Christ is mocked; the death of Jesus; the holy women on Calvary; the burial; the empty tomb and the angel’s message; appearances of the risen Christ (subdivisions taken from The Jerusalem Bible). The integrity of this narrative is sound, although many scholars believe that the Gospel originally ended at Mk 16:8 and that the final passage of Mk 16:9-20 is a later addition. Some also hold that the first ending has been lost and that the addition of the last section by a copyist was an attempt to rectify the Gospel’s narrative integrity. Even without the actual accounts of Jesus’ appearances in Mk 16:9-20, however, the account rep-resents a tightly knit sequence of events that culminates in the startling news of the Easter proclamation: "You need not be amazed! You are looking for Jesus of Nazareth, the one who was crucified. He has been raised up; he is not here" (Mk 16:6; all Scripture citations come from the NAB). Everything in the Passion narrative is oriented toward this simple, joy-filled proclamation of the Easter event. Without the risen Lord, the earlier components of the narrative lose their cohesiveness and unravel. The insti-tution narrative of Mk 14:22-25 is no exception. Its posi-tion shows that it is intimately linked with the events Lent/Easter 2003 Billy * The Eucharist and Mark’s Institution Narrative immediately preceding and following it. The events before it suggest that a tragedy is about to unfold. The anointing at Bethany (Mk 14:3-9) presents Jesus as some-one already aware of his imminent death. The betrayal by Judas (Mk 14: 10-11) shows that the plot to have Jesus arrested and put to death (Mk 14:1-2) is well underway. His decision to celebrate a final Passover meal with his disciples (Mk 14:12-16) sets the stage for his own Passover journey from death to life. The events after the institution of the Eucharist bring this heightened awareness to its dramatic conclusion. Jesus’ agonizing moments at Gethsemane (Mk 14:32-42) give an insight into his struggle to accept his Father’s will. His arrest by armed guards (Mk 14:43-52) points to the utter humiliation in store for him. His trial before the Sanhedrin (Mk 14:53-65) depicts the devious means of those wanting him dead. Peter’s denials (Mk 14:66- 72) show how even those closest to Jesus would aban-don him in his time of need. His trial before Pilate (Mk 15:1-15) reveals the deep-seated prejudices of Roman justice. The details of his torture, horrific death, and burial (Mk 15:16-47) uncover the human heart’s capac-ity for brutality and senseless violence. A Prophetic Action Of special interest are the two incidents that flank Mark’s institution narrative. In the verses immediately preceding it, Jesus foretells his betrayal by Judas: "I give you my word, one of you is about to betray me, yes, one who is eating with me" (Mk 14:18). In the verses imme-diately after it, he foresees Peter’s repeated denial of him before night’s end: "I give you my assurance, this very night before the cock crows twice you will deny me three times" (Mk 14:30). The author of Mark’s Gospel places the institution narrative between these foreboding pre- Spirituality Review dictions of betrayal and denial in order to highlight the deep psychological pain that Jesus will soon undergo. Even as Jesus is breaking bread with his disciples, the lonely isolation of his Passion has already begun. He is not only going to be betrayed and denied by those clos-est to him, but he also knows this to be so. The imme-diate context of the institution narrative depicts the Eucharist as being intimately bound up with events cul-minating in and flowing from his suffering and death. By mentioning Jesus’ fore-telling of Judas’ betrayal and Peter’s denial, the author of Mark’s Gi3spel reveals Jesus’ prophetic prowess and presents the institution narrative in a related light. Jesus’ words of blessing on the evening before his death make little sense unless they are understood prophetic, representing a New Covenant between God and humanity. The bread and wine that he shares with his disciples symbolize the sacrifice of his body and blood to be given up and poured out for the sake of many. By placing his passion ¯ and death in the context of his last Passover meal, Jesus provides his followers with a remembrance that is in con-tinuity with their ancestral tradition and makes them aware of a new, definitive action of God in their lives. This remembrance shares in the very events that shape his own destiny in the plan of his Father. Using symbol in communicating the truth of his redemptive mission, Jesus stands in marked continuity Does Eucharist take :on new meaning when we consider that, even as Jesus is breaking bread with his disciples, the lonely isolation of his Passion has already begun ? 9 Billy ¯ The Eucharist and Mark’s Institution Narrative with the long tradition of Hebrew prophetic utterance. Hosea’s marriage to the faithless Gomer (Ho 1:2-9), Jeremiah’s loincloth (Jr 13:1-11) and shattered wine jugs (Jr 12-14), Ezekiel’s making bread from a single pot of wheat, barley, beans, lentils, millet, and spelt (Ez 4:9) and his mime of the emigrant (Ez 12:1-20) are all exam-ples of using concrete materials and activities propheti-cally to convey Yahweh’s message to his people. What is often forgotten when interpreting these actions is that, as authentic utterances of God’s word, they effect what they symbolize: "God’s word does not return in vain" (Is 55:11). Jesus’ "breaking the bread" and drinking the cup in the company of his disciples brings the event of Calvary into their midst. Before his actual death, Jesus and the redemptive effects of that first Good Friday become present under the appearances of the bread and wine that he eats and drinks with his disciples. These effects culminate in his Easter rising and have already been anticipated in his public ministry of teaching and healing. Mark’s Institution Narrative Although it only comprises four verses, the institution narrative (Mk 14:22-25) contains many theological themes. A look at each verse will provide us with some important background for understanding the meaning of the entire account. Verse 22: "During the meal he took bread, blessed and broke it, and gave it to them. ’Take this,’ he said, ’this is my body. ’" Mark introduces his readers to the institution nar-rative in the very middle of Jesus’ celebration of his Passover meal with his disciples. In doing so, he empha-sizes the action about to take place rather than the var-ious incidentals of the meal. This action involves the simple blessing and sharing of bread and wine. It is while Spirituality Review they are eating that Jesus blesses, breaks, and distributes the "bread of affliction" (Dt 16:3), the unleavened bread that reminds Jews during their traditional Passover cel-ebration of the haste with which their ancestors ate as they set out on their exodus from Egypt. By identifying the bread he is distributing with his body, Jesus gives new meaning to the Passover meal. His Last Supper with his disciples is the first Passover of the New Covenant. Rather than leading God’s people out of the slavery of Egypt to the Promised Land, he will lead them from the slavery of sin to the fullness of life. Verse 23: "He likewise took a cup, gave thanks, and passed it to them, and they all drank from it." Scholars agree that this verse probably refers to the third cup of the Passover meal, known as the "cup of benediction." Filled with wine, this cup of blessing normally comes after the main course of lamb and precedes the singing of Psalm 136 or the Great Hallel. This Jewish hymn, recited as an act of thanksgiving for the everlasting kindness of the Lord, comes after the eating of the paschal lamb. Jesus here suggests himself as the paschal victim of the New Covenant, not by specifically identifying himself with the lamb that was eaten, but by pointing to the bread and wine that respectively come before and after it. This symbolic inclusion makes the ties between the Eucharist and what is about to take place on Calvary even stronger. The real Lamb of sacrifice is the one offered up on the altar of the cross. The consecrated bread and wine shared at the Eucharist point to this sacrificial Victim. Verse 24: "He said to them: ’This is my blood, the blood of the new covenant, to be poured out on behalf of many.’" Jesus makes it clear that his action~ at the Last Supper are establishing a New Covenant between God and his peo-ple. Just as he has identified the unleavened bread of the Passover meal with his body that would soon be broken on Lent/Easter 2003 Billy ¯ Tbe EucbaristandMark’sInsti~utionNarrative How does it matter that Jesus makes: it~ clear that his actions at the Last’ Supper are establishing a New Covenant between God, and his people?. their behalf, he now identifies the cup of wine that he passes to them as his own blood that will be shed for them and for many others. The specific reference "the blood of the new covenant" is an allusion to the blood of sacri-fice that concluded the covenant of Sinai between God and his people (see Ex 24:8). By alluding to this sacrifice in his last Passover meal, Jesus interprets the entire Exodus experience of the Jewish people in a different light. Not only is Jesus the new paschal lamb that gives suste-nance to God’s people on their new journey from slavery to free-dom, but he is also the sacrificial lamb, the death of which will establish a new bond between God and his people. Verse 2 5: "I solemnly assure you, I will never again drink of the fruit of the vine until the day when I drink it new in the reign of God." This verse adds an eschatological quality to the institution narra-tive. It directs the action of Jesus’ ritual sharing of bread and wine with his disciples toward some future action which will inaugurate God’s reign for all time. This action is his death (the plan for which Judas has already set in motion, Mk 14:10-11) and burial (for which his body has recently been anointed, Mk 14:3-9). Jesus’ ref-erence to "drinking the fruit of the vine anew in the reign of God" refers to the messianic banquet, the defini-tive sign of the establishment of God’s reign. These words give this first Eucharist a peculiar, already-but-not- yet quality that is characteristic of all subsequent celebrations. At the Eucharist, Christians proclaim, at Spirituality Review one and the same time, both the presence of Jesus in their midst and his future coming. The reign of God, for them, is both present and yet to come. Mark’s institution narrative offers sound theological insights into the prophetic action shared by Jesus with his disciples during his last Passover meal. The author achieves this aim by making this action an integral part of a much larger narrative about the events relating to Jesus’ passion, death, and resurrection. Mark’s account of the first Eucharist cannot be properly understood apart from this larger, extended narrative. The latter expresses in dramatic form what the former expresses in the sym-bolic action of sharing bread and passing a cup of wine. Mark’s account of the institution of the Eucharist cannot help bringing to mind the events presented in the larger narrative. The two, for him, are inextricably intertwined. Celebrating the Eucharist Mark’s institution narrative thus encourages the Christian community to view its own Eucharistic cele-bration, too, within the larger narrative. Doing so helps us see not only that the Eucharistic action and Jesus’ passion, death, and resurrection are intrinsically linked, but also that the Christian community’s very life is bound up with both. The Eucharist gives the members of the Christian community the opportunity to discover the Christ event reflected in their own life. To gather around the table of the Lord, break bread together, and share the cup of blessing is to define existence entirely in terms of Christ. Not to do so amounts to either a betrayal of what Jesus stood for or a denial of it. The author of Mark’s Gospel was the first in the New Testament to present the institution narrative within the larger narrative of Jesus’ passion, death, and resurrec-tion. For some this decision may seem the obvious 13 Lent/Easter 2003 Billy * The Eucharist and Mark’s Institution Narrative choice, for it is generally agreed that Jesus instituted the Eucharist at a supper with his closest disciples the night before he died. It is also generally agreed that the words of the institution na~:rative stem from a liturgical for-mula with roots in ancient Palestine, possibly even in Jerusalem. It seems that the author deliberately projects this liturgical pattern back onto the institution narrative itself and then places this within the larger picture of Jesus’ passion, death, and resurrection so that his read-ers find in their Eucharistic worship together an authen-tic encounter with the suffering, dying, and rising Christ. Mark’s Gospel is first and foremost a document of faith. When shaping his account of the institution of the Eucharist, the author incorporates the liturgical sensitiv-ities of his audience into a carefully crafted narrative drama concerning Jesus’ passion, death, and resurrection. One aim of this engaging narrative is to deepen the wor-shiping community’s awareness of its own participation in Jesus’ paschal mystery. Such a goal would be especially important in view of the important liturgical role the Gospels had in the life of the community. Mark writes his Gospel to build up its faith. One way he does this is by rooting the institution narrative in both Christ’s life and the community’s life. The two, for him, are closely bound. Held Close in the Tradition In time, the Gospels of Matthew and Luke would follow Mark’s lead of integrating the account of the insti-tution of the Eucharist into the narrative of Jesus’ pas-sion, death, and resurrection. Although they would do so to further their own theological aims, they are clearly indebted to Mark for the original way in which he has used liturgical texts to reveal the deeper meaning of Jesus’ final hours. ~Fhe lack of an institution narrative in the Gospel of John shows that such an inclusion was not Spirituality Review essential to the Gospel genre. The decision to include it normally arose from the specific theological goals of the Gospel authors themselves. In the case of Mark’s Gospel, the inclusion of Jesus’ institution of the Eucharist in the Passion narrative is meant to heighten the worshiping community’s awareness of its intimate participation in that event. In all likeli-hood, the decision to do so was helped by the convic-tion that this Eucharistic formula represents an authentic tradition in strong continuity with the belief and practice of the earliest Christian community as well as with the words and teachings of the Lord Jesus himself. Whenever we hear the words of institution--"This is my body... this is my blood"--we are called, not only to remember Jesus’ passing through death to life, but also to enter and be shaped by it. Our celebration of the Eucharist reminds us that Jesus’ narrative has now become our own. The bread and wine we share give witness to the covenant that binds our stories together, forges our common identity, and forever holds us close. An Early Christian Profession As St. Ignatius of Antioch looked forward to his martyrdom by being thrown to wild beasts, he wrote to the Christians in Rome: "I plead with you: show me no untimely kindness. Let me be food for the wild beasts, for they are my way to God. I am God’s wheat and shall be ground by their teeth so that I may become Christ’s pure bread. Pray to Christ for me that the animals will be the means of making me a sacrificial victim for God .... For though ! lY Lent/Easter 2003 Billy ¯ The Eucharist and Mark’s Institution Narrative am alive as I write to you, still my real desire is to die. My love of this life has been crucified, and there is no yearning in me for any earthly thing. Rather, within me is the living water which says deep inside me: "Come to the Father." I no longer take pleasure in perishable food or in the delights of this world. I want only God’s bread, which is the flesh of Jesus Christ, formed of the seed of David, and for drink I crave his blood, which is love that cannot perish." -From a letter to the Romans by St. Ignatius of Antioch, bishop and martyr For Personal Reflection and for Dialogue 1. How do we relate our participatio~ in the Eucharist with the passion, death, and resurrection of Jesus? 2. How do we pray the Mass? 3. What are the ways we have found helpful to make our participation in the Eucharist more meaningful for ourselves? 4. What is most central about the Eucharist for us? Spirituality Review DAVID L. FLEMING Growing in Christ: The Significance of Suffering "I dream of a new St. Francis or a new St. Ignatius to show us the new type of Christian life (at once more involved in, and more detached from, the world). I pray that our longing may at least be the dust from which such a man will be formed." In this quote, alluding to the biblical creation of man and to the Ash Wednesday prayer "Remember, man, that you are dust and to dust you shall return," the Jesuit paleontologist Pierre Teilhard de Chardin sees even our longings and desires as significant for our own salvation and for the salvation of others. We can always be people of longing and desire--no matter our age or our physical health or other limitations. In human living, chronic illness and suffering are what we find hardest to understand and accept. What is the meaning of suffering in our life? How do we see it? Can we bring any vision David L. Fleming SJ is editor of this journal. He may be addressed at 3601 Lindell Boulevard; St. Louis, Missouri 63108. L~nt/Easter 2003 Fleming ¯ Growing in Christ 18 to this apparent defeat? Can we remain people of longing and desire? Teilhard de Chardin wrote twice about the place of suffering in Christian life. He had a very close relationship with his invalid sister, Marguerite-Marie. Despite her physical limitations, she was quite active in the leadership of an organization called the Catholic Union of the Sick. The organization had a little publication, and Marguerite-Marie talked her brother into writing a short essay for the 1 April 1933 issue. It is called "The Significance and Positive Value of Suffering." Let me try to synopsize the movement of Teilhard’s thought and present the vision he brings to this subject. How Suffering "Fits" in the World Illness tends to make people feel useless and even a burden. They feel cast aside by the great stream of life, incapable of effective work and accomplishment. When illness becomes a permanent state, they may wonder what their life’s meaning is. Teilhard sets himself the project of helping to dissipate these depressing views by showing, from one standpoint, the place and use of suffering in the construction of the visible world. I might add "in the shining forth of the kingdom of God." The world is not a finished product; it is under construction. We might think that the universe looks like a vast flower bed, with the flowers interchangeable at the gardener’s whim. It is as if we each could have been born indifferendy earlier or later, here or there. We are not cut flowers in a bouquet. Remember that, for all the beauty of a bouquet, cut flowers are already dying. A better image, then, is that we are like leaves and flowers on a great tree, and on this tree each appears at its own time and place. A world that is still in the process of being formed, Spirituality Review still growing like a great tree, may seem an idea that rings true, but may also seem too abstract. Teilhard, nevertheless, insists that the idea has important practical consequences. People wonder whether personal effort has a value, and whether individual human pain has a value. With this in view, let us return to the comparison of the world to a great tree with its leaves and blossoms. In a bouquet of carefully arranged flowers, all freshly cut (and now dying), we would be surprised to find a torn or drooping one. But in the case of trees we accept some broken branches caused by wind or ice, some shriveled blossoms caused by too much sun or not enough rain, some torn leaves after children have used sticks to knock apples down. These are signs of the difficult conditions of growth. So, in a world that is growing or is otherwise "under construction," its progress comes only after some failures, some wounds that are now scars. Sufferers are a part of the forward march and triumph of all. Like heroes, sufferers are casualties, lying in pain on a field of honor. Important as this kind of visioning is in giving some meaning to suffering, Teilhardnotes that, above all, we need to look to our faith. St. Paul says there are different organs and functions in the Body of Christ. What parts would seem more specially entrusted with seeing to it that all human work and activity are spiritually directed towards God? There seem to be two groups specially entrusted with that function. One is those who are called to lives of contemplation. The other is the sick and the suffering, particularly persons who are chronically ill or permanently disabled. Sufferers are in a sense driven out of themselves, compelled to depart from prevailing judgments of what is valuable and what is not. Are they not by this very fact destined and chosen to help the world rise above the 19 Lent/Easter 2003 Fleming ¯ Growing in Christ pursuit of immediate enjoyment towards a grander destiny? In their yearnings they stretch toward the divine more strenuously and more purely than people who are busy in the workaday world. They bring aid to their brothers and sisters working like miners in tunnels of material endeavor. By a divine paradox the chronically ill prove themselves to be the most active agents of true progress in a world that seems to have pushed them aside or trampled them underfoot in its material progress. Teilhard points out that, if his way of thinking is true, then sick people in their apparent inactivity have a grand task to fulfill. While Have we ever cons~dki’ed that, in a world- thSL. "under construction,":. its progress come~ odiy ~fter~ some failures, some wou,~ids that arernow sea~;s ~ pursuing their own recovery when avenues present themselves, they must use their remaining strength for the different kinds of productive work that are within their powers. Once they have resolved to combat their sickness in this way, they are in a position to realize that they have a ,~ special function to perform in proportion to their sickness, and that no one can replace them in that function: cooperating in the transformation (or conversion) of human suffering. The vast ocean of human suffering spread over our earthly globe as Teilhard envisions it what a mass of potential energy! The whole question is how to liberate it, give it a consciousness of its own significance and potential. The world would leap high towards God if all the sick together were to desire that the kingdom of God shine forth throughtheir pain. Spirituality Review Can this be the way that Christian eyes see and share in the passion of Jesus as it completes creation? Seeing a crucifix, we may be in the habit of seeing the suffering of only one person, a single act of expiation. We may fail to notice the creative power of that death, even though the cross is in fact the place of an action whose intensity is beyond expression. The crucified Jesus is not conquered; he bears the weight of all suffering, of everyone’s suffering, into union with God. Teilhard is only echoing the Gospel of St. John, where Jesus says "’and I--once I am lifted up from earth--will draw all men to myself.’ This statement indicated the sort of death he had to die" On 12:32-33). The Spiritual Energy of Suffering Teilhard returns to the topic of suffering in the preface to a book published in 1950 on the life of his sister Marguerite-Marie, who had died in August 1936. The preface, dated 8 January 1950, is titled "The Spiritual Energy of Suffering." Teilhard reflects: If all the pain were put on the scales opposite all the joy of the world, who could say which would outweigh the other? It seems that, the more we human beings grow and develop, the more we seem afflicted and surrounded--in our bodies, in our nerves, in our minds--with the problem of evil, of doing evil and of submitting to it. There appears to be no human progress without some mysterious tribute in tears, in blood, in sin. But, in order for our hearts to bend Without revolt to this hard law of creation, is it not psychologically necessary that, along with the painful wear and tear of much human work, we also discover a positive value that makes it definitively acceptable, even transfigures it? Here is where the Christian revelation can transform suffering (provided it is accepted in the right spirit) into Lent/_E(t~te?" 2=003 Fleming ¯ Growing in Christ "Suffering must first be treated as an adversary to be defeated." Is this our attitude? an expression of love and a principle of union. Suffering must first be treated as an adversary to be defeated. We must combat suffering vigorously up to the end. But at the same time we must receive it rationally and full-heartedly insofar as it can center us on God, breaking us out of our egoism and compensating for our faults. Yes, dark and repressive suffering can be reconstructed by a humble patient into a supremely active principle of humanization and divinization. How do we go about making suffering into something that has an authentic goodness about it? Teilhard reflects on what he has seen in his sister. There is a continuing refinement of her critical sense, a better balanced appreciation of human values. There is in her an heroic concern to meet with a smile, and to bear to the end, all the things that the sick have to live with. There is an increasing sensitivity of heart to others’ joys and sor-rows. There is in her a clear realization of how every reality finds both strength and simplicity within the divine omnipresence. And all of this shines out with a unique pacific power, an attractiveness, radiant like a halo. The Prayer "Take and Receive" I associate Teilhard’s reflections on suffering with St. Ignatius’s "Take and Receive" prayer in the Contemplation on the Love of God that he proposes at the end of his Spiritual Exercises. He calls this period of prayer a con-templation because he does not present anything new to think about. He suggests that we review impromptu, that we thus contemplate, our various relationships with God that the span of our retreat has shown us. Spirituality Review In the only prenote to a prayer exercise within the retreat, Ignatius wants to establish some clarity about love, important for appreciating and entering into this prayer period. The first prenote is that love ought to be expressed more in deeds than in words. Then the second prenote seems almost to contradict the first if we take note of Ignatius’s Spanish word comunicacidn. He says that love consists in "communication" between two parties. Often the English word used here is interchange or sharing. But the word communication perhaps better captures the paradox. Ignatius is pointing out that love is more than words, but love is mutual giving, including the communication back and forth of knowledge and affection we value and do not want to keep to ourselves. As a lover, then, God is not just giving us good things for us. God is always trying to communicate with us, and have us communicate in return. The first point of the Contemplation looks to the array of gifts through which God has been giving us love. The second point focuses on God’s desire for intimacy with us, leading him to enter his creation through incarnation and then sacramentally through Eucharist. The third point stresses the labor of God in communicating with us, giving us sunrises with constancy but also with endlessly creative surprises, keeping growing things growing with intricate leaves and blossoms to marvel at and fruit to eat, and, after being born among us, working with us at demanding jobs like carpentry, walking with us on tiring journeys, drinking companionably with us when we quench our thirst, being with us at our sickbeds, even dying in pain with us as we die in pain. The fourth point brings home the fact that there are no limits to God’s love; the superabundance of his communication can be compared to rays shining down on us from the sun or waters gushing up from a fountain or spring. 23 Lent/Easter 2003 Fleming ¯ Growing in Christ To each of these points, Ignatius suggests that our response in prayer may find expression in "Take and Receive," a prayer of his own composition. While Ignatius does not demand that we follow the exact wording of his prayer, the kernel idea is important. If we contemplate God as Lover communicating with us in the four ways specified in this Contemplation, we find ourselves asking what we can give to God that God has not already given to us. When we examine Ignatius’s prayer, we see that he is very particular about what he thinks we might be able to use in our communicating with God. The first gift we might make to God (and remember that the notion of love for Ignatius means not "giving away" but "sharing") is "all our liberty." Liberty (libertas/libertad) is the wide-open potential that God has given us a share in, and the actualizing of this potential is liberality/generosity (liberalitas/liberalidad). It is our generosity we share in the very giving of "all our liberty." And the generosity is truly our gift, our way of communicating with God in love. With this foundational communication, the other gifts follow. "My memory," the memories I come up with or fail to come up with, are really "mine." They are unique to me, and I rejoice to share them with God. "My understanding" includes all my own ways of knowing little truths and big truths, any and all sorts of things--all this I want to share with God. "My entire will" means all my wants and desires as only I can feel and express them. That is what I want to share v~ith God. Summing up, I offer to God all of myself in the phrase "whatever I have and call my own." In other words, with the unique likeness to God that I have received, I want to love as God loves--communicating what I am and have, with no limits or boundaries, insofar as I am able. As Ignatius’s prayer "Take and Receive" makes clear, that relationship is "enough for me." Ultimately I believe that we find here the Ignatian response to human limitation, illness, suffering, aging, and diminishment. "Take and Receive" is our "sharing" prayer with God. A Prayer Take, Lord, and receive all my liberty, my memory, my understanding, and my entire will, all I have and call nay own. You have given all to me. To you, Lord, I return it. Everything is yours; do with it what you will. Give me only your love and your grace; that is enough for me. --St. Ignatius Loyola For Personal Reflection and for Dialogue If we want to pray about this matter and seek dialogue in a faith-sharing group, we might look at the Ignatian exercise called the Contemplation on the Love of God in the Spiritual Exercises, and especially our response in the prayer Ignatius provides there, "Take and Receive." We might also consider St. Paul’s reflections shared with the Colossians (Col 1:24-29) about our sufferings "filling up" what is lacking in Jesus’ sufferings. Let us ask: Is this "filling up" simply, but hugely, the case of our own loving "communication" (sharing) with Christ, simply a matter of love, of what love does? Lent/Easter 2003 the now MARY ELLEN DOUGHERTY Jailhouse Religion For more than twenty years, I have been teaching writing courses in prisons and jails. Most of my students have been lifers or long-term prisoners. They have lived hard lives. The streets have not been good to them. Nor, most of them acknowledge, have they been good to the streets. On one of my usual teaching days at the prison, I went from there to my home in West Baltimore, where I had an appointment with Ed Burns, a former city police detective. Ed was doing research on the drug culture in West Baltimore with his coauthor, David Simon, for their book The Corner. Their project was focused on my immediate neighborhood, and some of the men Ed knew in his detective days were now housed at the penitentiary. I was a likely person to be interviewed. Ed asked me if I had anybody from my West Baltimore neighborhood in my class. There were several. When I mentioned a name, Ed recog- Mary Ellen Dougherty SSND may be addressed at 1406 West Lombard Street; Baltimore, Maryland 21223. nized itSmmediately, recalling the man’s criminal history. Though I knew that everything he told me was a matter of public record, I was reluctant to hear it. Michael was an erratic student, but an interesting one. He obviously lacked the fundamentals of education, but he was insightful, and, when in class, extremely attentive. When he missed a class, he was either at football practice or in lockup for some serious misdemeanor. He was large and curious and savvy. I never ask my students what their case histories are. Some volunteer to talk about the reasons for their incarceration, simply and candidly. Many make oblique references that leave me with impressions, but not facts. Others are markedly silent, and some, according to them, are simply not guilty. Michael was simply not guilty. (In fact, recent events proved that to be true. After twenty-six years in prison on a life sentence, he was released because an honest and astute judge realized that the evidence was contradictory and even false and that Michael could not have committed the crime for which he was incarcerated.) When I heard from Ed the stark facts about Michael’s life on the streets as Ed then knew the facts, I resisted, preferring to take my students as they were at the moment, not as they had been. I said that I knew Michael as a man intent on two things, football and learning to write, in that order. Ed shared an insight which I instinctively knew to be accurate, that Michael and many other prisoners like him have a gift for living in the moment. Although they may have life sentences, they do not project. They survive by paying attention to the present and living it as fully as the system and their ingenuity allow. They do what is in front of them to do, in Michael’s case play football and attend writing class. Paying attention is a ground rule for survival. Michael instinctively knew he would survive time in prison by being present to it. Lent/Easter 2003 Dougherty * Jailhouse Religion Living the Present Moment That insight gave me clarity about how prisoners bear the burden of their situation. Yet I continue to wonder. For years I have been reading and rereading a small classic written in the 18th century, Abandonment to Divine Providence by Jean-Pierre de Caussade SJ. His thesis, repeated on every page, is that the secret to a full spirituality issues from the grace of abandonment to God. The formula for abandonment is to live by what he calls "the sacrament of the present moment." Thich Nhat Hanh calls it "mindfulness." It struck me as a grand irony that my students in prison know instinctively how to practice the sacrament of the present moment while many of us, dedicated to cultivating the spiritual life, miss the moment. That "sacrament" also explained to me, at least partly, how my students behind bars manage to show up for life each day; how they cope with locked gates, stone walls and barbed-wire fences, steel bars and watchtowers. Unsavory as the moment may be, they live in it. Those who manage to engage fully in the best that is available to them offset the ominous threats of despair that are inherent in the system. While some of them live unexamined lives, many do not. They know where they are, where they are going, and where they are not going. Within the limitations of the context, they choose life by choosing the present moment, unaware of the terminology but intuitively familiar with the principle. The wisest of inmates know that the most destructive belief they can adopt is that their lives have been put on hold. Implicit in that belief is the notion that there is no life in this moment or in many, many moments to come. To indulge in that notion is despair, lived out in depression or violence or, most lethal of all, apathy. I have found that serious criminals generally make serious students (which is why I prefer teaching lifers). Likewise, Spirituality Review inmates who are aware of the moment generally attend carefully to life. A Time for Prayer This is perhaps why prisoners are showing an increasing interest in meditation groups. The natural gift that experienced prisoners get--paying attention to the moment--enhances their capacity for meditation. In turn, the effects of meditation are attractive to other less-focused inmates. Across the United States, and particularly on the West Coast, chaplains and volunteers have had success in offering meditation opportunities to men and women in prison. Although these initiatives are often sponsored by various religious groups, the meditation sessions are generally nonsectarian. Even centering-prayer groups allow for great flexibility in their focus. The purpose of these endeavors is not to convert prisoners to a given faith, but to empower them to clarity and calm. Research has proven that meditation has a positive effect on the prison population with regard to violence, drug and alcohol abuse, and even recidivism. And, though meditation sessions are usually not attached to any given faith, they help prisoners develop their own interior selves. Many prisoners, especially long-term ones, have well-seasoned and disciplined hearts. They have learned, often through meditation, to put their heart into something greater than themselves. Jailhouse religion has been oversimplified and underestimated. When I entered a prison for the first time, I went in as a teacher. Now I go in as a learner. I learn each week about the stark or sometimes illusive distance between good and evil. I learn about the perceptive pulse of God in the flesh and bone and blood of desperate humanity. I learn over and over again to be amazed and ashamed. Prisoners have taught me how to pray and how to hope. Lent/Easter 2003 Dougberty ¯ Jailbouse Religion A Prayer The Lord is kind and merciful, slow to anger, and rich in compassion. Bless the Lord, O my soul; and all my being bless his holy name. Bless the Lord, O my soul, and forget not all his benefits. He pardons all your iniquities, heals all your ills, redeems your life from destruction; he crowns you with kindness and compassion. He will not always chide, nor does he keep his wrath forever. Not according to our sins does he deal with us, nor does herequite us according to our crimes. For as the heavens are high above the earth, so surpassing is his kindness toward those who fear him. As far as the east is from the west, so far has he put our transgressions from us. Psalm 103 For Personal Reflection and for Dialogue 1. Who has taught me how to pray and how to hope? 2. What were the occasions of such growth for me? Spirituality Review Do you have this book for your prayer aud reflection for the Lent and the Easter season? Priszns for a Christ-Life provides perspectives that allow us to see our following of Christ in different ways. We Christians are truly blessed in having Jesus as a prism for our privileged understanding of God and God’s dealings with our world. These brief reflections drawn from the Prisms articles of Review for Religious are meant to be an occasion for deepening one’s thought and prayer about some basic issues of Christian life. 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