The Vision of St Nicholas

 

The feast of St Nicholas!  In previous years I have reflected on St Nicholas's passionate defence of the divinity of Christ which led to his losing the run of himself and bashing Arius at the Council of Nicea. As you know, Nicholas spent some time cooling off in a gaol cell.

 

Well interestingly, last year at the Belfast Christmas Market at City Hall, I fell across a lovely icon of St Nicholas (see above), and in the two top corners are the figures of Jesus and Mary portrayed in the way they appeared to him as he was languishing in prison.  Draped over Our Lady's arm is the omophorium, the symbol of a bishop in the Eastern Church.  Nicholas regretting his rash actions prayed for forgiveness, and in response to  his prayer he received this vision and the grace of Our Lady herself returning his episcopal robe to him.  (You can read the whole story here on this site dedicated to the saint).

 

While we might secretly take delight in the saint's action - it reveals his humanity, and we can reflect on the many stories from his life, but I think this prison vision is the most wonderful event in Nicholas' life.  He made a mistake - he was right in his defence of the faith, but wrong in resorting to violence even if Arius probably deserved a good beating.  He prayed for forgiveness, and he found it revealed in what is a tender vision.  Jesus, revealed in his divinity and humanity, and Mary coming as a loving mother to her child. 

 

This is most consoling for us.  This event in Nicholas's life can inspire us not to fear God when we have sinned, but rather to return to him and ask forgiveness: if we do so, we will certainly experience his tenderness and love.  If God decided, out of love for us, to become man and to die on the cross for us, then he will certainly be open and welcoming to those who come to him seeking forgiveness.

Snippets

A few articles and issues for your consideration.

 

One of the big Catholic stories over the last couple of weeks was the document coming from the German diocese of Freiburg in which the Archbishop seems to have decided to allow divorced and remarried Catholics receive the Eucharist.  This was coupled with the off the cuff comments of Pope Francis that the Church will have to look at this pastoral issue and his calling of a Synod for next year to discuss marriage and family issues.  Now it seems that document was not official, but leaked.  Marie Meaney in Crisis magazine has an interesting article on the issue.  She asks: is a formal schism with German Catholics coming? 

 

David Quinn also an interesting piece in this week's Irish Catholic. I think we all recognise that the Church will have to tread very carefully on this issue.  Church law is one thing, but the moral law another.  At the end of the day the Church and the Pope cannot change the moral law.  As Pope Benedict XVI once said: "I'm only the Pope, there are some things I cannot change".  I'm sure Francis is aware of that too, though many in the Church are not - they think the Pope has power to change the moral law at will.  While there is reference to the position of the Orthodox Church's practice, I think it is based on a particular reading of Matthew 19 and in essence the meaning of the word porneia in 19:9.  Much controversy surrounds the meaning of this word, so the theologians will be delving into that controversy over the coming months.  That said one has to wonder why Jesus would allow for an exception when the whole thrust of his teaching is to close off the exception Moses introduced.

 

Further to the controversy of the pro-abortion Fine Gael TD no longer permitted to act as an Extraordinary Minister of Holy Communion, a letter to The Irish Catholic asks if politicians should be allowed serve in such roles at all - given their position as public members of a political party.  An interesting question worth discussing.

 

Another controversial issue was the funeral of the Nazi Erich Priebke.  The Diocese of Rome announced earlier this week that he was being refused a Catholic funeral.  As the week went on we discovered that he went to Confession and, we presume, he was reconciled with the Church before he died.  Interestingly the schismatic Society of St Pius X decided to give him a funeral, however protests prevented the body being brought to the church and so the funeral is on hold.   I offer for your consideration Fr Ray Blake's interesting blog post on the issue.  What Priebke did was horrendous, and the crimes of the Nazis deserve absolute condemnation, so I understand and accept that this man should not have a public funeral nor full public Catholic rites, though I note they have been given to mass murderers and terrorists before; such an action would be a public scandal (cf, Canon 1184).  It seems from later reports that the Diocese permitted a service in a private home, reiterating that prayers for dead can never be denied. 

 

And finally it seems the Church has successfully applied to gain control of the .catholic domain and she may well allow institutions and communities with canonical recognition to use it.  I wonder....??

Excuses...excuses....

Found out, Adam and Eve start making excuses. Adam blames the wife (and it has been way ever since), Eve blames the devil, the devil tries to slink away to gloat: dissension and blame has entered the world.  This passage from Genesis is very ironic - they wanted to be like God, but when they are caught they will not step up act like gods, taking responsibility for what they have done.  They do not argue their case or rebel, but like bold children knowing they have done wrong they try to get out of trouble by passing the buck.  Unfortunately for them God happens to be omniscient, so he knows what has happened.  His question "Where are you?" was their golden opportunity to come clean and who knows if they had, would the punishment been as harsh?  Who's to know?  But they don't - gone is human dignity with human responsibility.

The devil gets it first - crawler at the start, he'll be a crawler forever.  Woman will now have pain in childbirth and while she will love her husband, she will fall victim to male pride and will be lorded over - a feminist statement in Genesis which tells us that the oppression of women by men is wrong, but a result of the fall - that wonderful bond is wounded.  The man too will suffer: now he will have to work hard with little return - the world will now be a harsh place and in the end: death.

It is an awful curse.  You might ask why God did this - surely he should have forgiven them seeing as he is the God of love?  He does, he provides for mercy, we will look at it in a minute.  But he must also respect their free will.  Adam and Eve chose to do what they did - they disobeyed him, they wanted to become like God, so now he respects that decision - let them be gods.  But seeing as they are not divine, they do not have what he has, they cannot transform the world into a paradise nor cheat death.  Now they are in charge and suddenly their powerlessness is revealed. 

But there is mercy.  As he passes sentence, God speaks of the Redeemer in 3:15.  This verse is the Proto-evangelium, the first Gospel, the prophecy of the coming of Christ, and also a reference to Our Lady, the new Eve who will be conceived sinless.  The tragedy has a happy ending in Christ and, most wonderfully, an even better outcome.  "O happy fault", St Augustine sings, "that merited such a Redeemer!" 

God did not abandon them, and this is a consolation.  As they prepare to leave Eden, he clothes them: a symbol that he loves them dearly and is with them even in the midst of the world.  Eden is closed, but outside, in the wilderness, he is present and there lies the promise of a return.

Saint of the Confessional

Here in Padua, St Anthony is not the only saintly notable.  Another Franciscan elbows in for the limelight, St Leopold Mandic - a Croatian who settled in Padua and gained a reputation for holiness through his ministry in the confessional.  We priests always need renewal in our ministry and how we administer the sacraments.  It is too easy to get lax and dish out grace as if it was ordinary food.  So close to the mystery, there is always the danger we become too familiar with it, too casual.  We need to realise that when we administer the sacraments we are immersed in a great ocean of grace, a great mystery, which God in his goodness, has ordained us to pass on to our brothers and sisters.  Confession is a great mystery - the mystery of God's mercy, the mystery of the passion, death and resurrection of Jesus poured out on sinners with the intention of forgiving them their sins, regenerating them and strengthening them to pursue a life of holiness.  St Leopold understood: I pray we priests may do the same.

There is a wonderful story from the life of St Leopold and St Pio.  Both were Capuchins ministering around the same time, Leopold in Padua and Pio in San Giovanni Rotondo; both were renowned for their gifts in the confessional.  One intrepid lady decided to compare and contrast the two.  So she went to St Leopold in Padua, and came away delighted with his gentleness and kindness.  She then popped down to the south of Italy to see how St Pio compared.  She should have known better: Pio turned out to be very harsh with her during the confession.  Indignant (funnily, I expected that!), she tore into Pio, proclaiming that he was not as nice as his brother Capuchin in the north: Padre Leopold was kind and gentle.  Quick off the mark, St Pio turned and said: "He gets the easy ones: he sends all the difficult ones to me!"  Touche, Padre Pio!!

Lovely videos on the life of St Leopold produced by his brother Capuchins:

From Slave To Pope

How often do we hear the media raking up Pope Benedict's past in order to score points against him?  Too often.  When he was elected the usual suspects and the media homed in on his membership of the Hitler Youth when he was young.  The fact that he was enrolled without his or his parents' consent, and that every other boy in Germany was also enrolled seemed to escape their attention.  I notice when it was revealed that the revered Gunter Grasse joined the Waffen-SS in Germany during the war, the media dropped the discussion about Benedict, no doubt afraid that it would draw attention to Grasse.  The Irish media, however, keep strumming the same harp.

Well today we have the feast of another Pope with a past.  St Callistus started off as a slave, but then, according to traditions, he was supposed to have been a bit of thief, ending up in the clink for his misdemeanors.  Now we have to read his biography with caution because the only contemporary accounts of his life were written by two of his enemies - the anti-pope, Hippolytus of Rome (later reconciled, martyred, and canonised) and the theologian Tertuallian, who strayed after producing some marvellous works (never reconciled). 

In Hippolytus' work we are told that as a slave Callistus was put in charge, by his master, of funds collected for the care of widows and orphans.  It seems Callistus lost the money and fled.  He was caught, but then released on the condition he find the money.  Then then turned to do bit of extortion, and came the heavy on some Jews, either trying to borrow money or collect debts, but ended up in brawl in a synagogue, for which was arrested. When discovered he was Christian, he was sent to the mines in Sardinia.  There, it seems, the experience had a corrective affect on him, and indeed led to a deepening of his faith.  (That is interesting given recent events in Chile - something about the mines!) 

The rest is history.  On his release he is noticed by Pope St Zephyrinus, ordained a deacon, given charge of the catacombs now named after him, and on the martyrdom of St Zephyrinus, elected pope.  As pope he found himself between a rock and a hard place: on one side battling the heretics, and on the other those who did not want to pardon heretics who sought to be reconciled.  He was martyred in 222, supposedly by being thrown down a well.  No easy life.  But we can see the benefit of Callistus' need for mercy and his understanding of those who seek it themselves.  That is a mercy we all need, and it needs to be broadcast too.  One of the problems with the media today is that they rarely show mercy, oftentimes they like to whip up a fury in order to sell newspapers or increase ratings.  This is most problematic when the supposed facts are not facts at all, if they are, they have been taken out of context.  Lessons here for all of us, thanks to Pope St Callistus.

So today, all balanced on the media - one post encouraging, another with suggestions for improvement.  Now, back to that homily on St Therese for tonight.  Say a prayer that all will go well.