Saint Maximilian Kolbe: The Inner Conflict

"The real conflict is an inner conflict. Beyond armies of occupation and the hecatombs of extermination camps, there are two irreconcilable enemies in the depth of every soul: good and evil, sin and love. And what use are the victories on the battlefield if we ourselves are defeated in our innermost personal selves?" (Maximilian Kolbe, writing shortly before his arrest in 1941 - he died in Auschwitz on August 14, 1941).

We Are Already a New Creation in Christ

The journey of faith makes you a new creature, who has "the dignity, the certainty of your destiny and the capacity to operate in a new and more human way."

This new humanity means "a different experience of the sentiment of yourself, a different perception of things, a different emotion of the presence of others, a different impetus and density in relationships, a different gusto in the troubled dynamic of work, an outcome that was inconceivable, unimaginable before" (Luigi Giussani).

According to Luigi Giussani (who is essentially reminding us - with certain emphatic notes - of the teaching of the New Testament), our belonging to Jesus Christ transforms us in a way that already begins in this present life. We change in a way that impacts our experience of reality and ourselves, while not ceasing to be mysterious. We are changed in the depths of ourselves and in our engagement of reality, especially in the realm of interpersonal relations with others and with God.

In our "journey of faith," in this life, we glimpse "signs" of God's power working in our lives, and such indications can bring consolation and encouragement. But in this life - as classical Christian spirituality has always said - we are not meant to seek the consolations of God but the God of consolations, He who is the Source of all that renews and transforms us. 

These signs are not meant to cause us to "pause in life" (so to speak) and attempt to "capture" the transfiguring power of God in some sort of analysis that we could then "possess" (conceptually or imaginatively) as the source of our confidence. God's plan for us remains a mystery always beyond us. We journey toward Him, and He who is Mystery carries us in this journey, He who in Jesus reveals Himself as the Mystery of Love drawn ineffably "close" to us.

We are a "new creation" in Christ, even in this life, not because we adhere to our conception, our own securely mastered definition and self-referential criteria for measuring "new creaturehood." We are a new creation because, in the living and journeying of all of life - everything we go through, everything we feel, everything we suffer - we adhere to Him, we trust in Him, we love Him who has first loved us.

Christina Grimmie: "Why Gain the World...?"

Three years, two months. Christina Grimmie, thank you for not losing yourself. Shine on, bright beautiful star!⭐♫  

Ground Zero August Ninth

Ground Zero August Ninth

by John Janaro

It was a single bright blazing 
luminous moment,
a brief foamy shiny speck of wave 
cresting on the giant ocean of time.

We did not mean to turn our heads, 
but the spark grabbed our gaze.
Our eyes fixed against the sky's edge.

And there was a flash on the horizon,
not like the sun's first hint of daily dawn, 
mild and sweet and seldom noticed.
No, there was a flash—full, furious,
splendid strange—
a convergence of ten thousand suns.
The force fell on our skulls and stole our feet,
and we flew.

As eyes, ears, bodies spun through the air,
the clouds roared 
and white hot light swallowed the earth.

There was no time to dither or complain, 
to flee or to be afraid.
Everything disappeared; 
everything changed
in that one flashing moment.

A moment of time burned us away
with fire raging in the wind.

~August 9, 2019

An Important Reminder From Saint Dominic

With his feast celebrated on August 8, the example and witness of the great medieval beggar, Dominic de Guzman, provide valuable instruction for us, all the more so when we dedicate our energies to the most worthy and noble of causes.

Dominic speaks here (in the text accompanying the image on the left) about preaching the Gospel, and his words pertain to the apostolic work of conversion. Here above all fruits grow out of humility, poverty, and love for God and our neighbor. 

But I think Dominic's words also speak to the spirit in which we must take up whatever just cause we are called to pursue, or whatever form of political or social advocacy.

Humility has different external forms. In certain circumstances, it requires vigorous and tenacious action for truth and justice and equity. Moreover, self defense and protection of others may require the use of material force, but never with violence in our hearts against the other person(s) as such.

Make no mistake: "whoever lives by the sword will die by the sword." Let us therefore always seek, by God's grace, to be men and women who build peace in the midst of our brothers and sisters, and who love God with confidence in His goodness.

Hong Kong: The Revolution IS Being Televised

Photo by May James / Hong Kong Free Press

‘The Revolution is being televised’ ...on YouTube and Twitter. 

As a “China-watcher” for some years, I am seeing something kinda new and significant in this Hong Kong “Summer of Protest.” 

Unlike the soul-stirring (and ultimately suppressed) student-led “Umbrella Movement” of 2014, there is no visible leadership here. In some places, 'conventional nonviolence' has given way to strategies inspired by Kung Fu philosophy, with guerrilla style disruptive tactics, savvy coordination via the internet, and surveillance-resistant anonymity, all of which enables current groups of demonstrators to have a remarkable degree of elusiveness and mobility. There have been some accusations of protester violence; but the obvious problem is police thuggery. Meanwhile, obsequious local public officials continue to dance to Beijing's tune.

Protesters have been taking to the streets on weekends since the beginning of June, when local legislation was proposed that would allow mainland China to extradite criminal suspects from the semi-autonomous former British colony. The legislation has been "suspended" (but not revoked), and protest demands have expanded to include the perennially controversial overall aspects of the current "One-Country-Two-Systems" arrangement.

This is a dangerous situation.

One thing seems clear regarding Hong Kong politics in the past decade: the kids are not buying it. They don't want their future to be some kind of new Soviet Union "with-Chinese-characteristics." The kids are taking enormous risks, dressed in black and wearing face masks, using 2019 technology in the spirit, bravery, restraint, and cleverness of classic Chinese martial arts heroes. Their opponent is a behemoth, but the kids ought not to be underestimated. Indeed, multitudes from every sector of Hong Kong society are calling for justice and respect for their human dignity. 

I don’t know how it will all play out, but if Beijing sends in the People's Liberation Army they will not find these protesters planted like sitting ducks to be shot down. They may instead be up against the ghost of Bruce Lee (with an encrypted cell phone). 

What will China do then? This is a dangerous situation, indeed. Stay tuned...

Transfiguration

TRANSFIGURATION: Jesus Christ is the center of the universe and of history. On Mount Tabor, He reveals His glory as the light. Later, on the cross, He will reveal His glory as unconquerable love.

"O Christ our God, at the time of your Transfiguration on the Mount, You showed your disciples as much of your glory as they could hold. Through the prayers of the Mother of God, let your eternal light shine also upon us sinners. O Giver of Light, glory to You!"

~Troparion, Feast of the Transfiguration, 
Byzantine Liturgy

An Encounter with Him as a Living Person...

These words are from seven years ago, on August 5, 2012. The design I put together today. Jesus is the same: yesterday, today, and forever (cf. Hebrews 13:8).

Reflections on Music and Musical Artists (Part 1)

Frequently on this blog, I write about musicians, performers, songwriters, composers, and various styles of music. In this post, however, I want to begin a series of reflections on what music is and what musicians are doing when they "make" music. 

These reflections will be general, ad-hoc, and variable. They are the thoughts of someone who is both a philosopher and a musician (as well as something of an "arts critic" and an avid listener who enjoys music). 

This means that my reflections will approach the topic from a variety of perspectives. I don't have (nor am I ready to attempt) any systematic "theory of music." I just want to verbalize some ideas and put them on the table. In doing this, I am trying to advance my own ongoing efforts to further refine and integrate many different considerations, impressions, and experiences of music as a fundamental facet of life.

I love how music shapes sound into a “language” that connects people because it expresses in a concrete way the many facets of the human experience, especially the mysterious longing for transcendence that “cannot help” leaving its mark on every authentic artistic endeavor. 

I listen to lots of kinds of music, seeking to discover the urge for beauty that gives it life. Often it is a search for “gold in the mud,” because music frequently reaches us within a context that harnesses it (and tries to use its affective power) to serve complex purposes - including distracting entertainment spectacles, ideological agendas, and emotional manipulation. 

The “language” of music is true in that universal, undifferentiated, multidimensional sense that pertains to the intuition of beauty. But music can be presented within a context that twists its diverse nuances into the service of lies: propaganda, political brainwashing, moral degeneration of various kinds, social/ cultural experimentation that attacks human dignity, or else just cheap superficiality posing as depth (which is essential to powering the engine of consumerism).

Still, there remains the ineradicable human need for beauty, even in its most primitive or elemental forms. Sound has a vast spectrum and an enormous "plasticity," yet the crafting of sounds insists on their being "gathered together" in some manner of resonance. 

The artist makes music by incorporating sounds into his or her own quest for the resonance of audible reality, for its "coming together" (in various forms) as an artifact within the universe of being. Every artist endeavors to make beautiful artifacts that "contain" and communicate something of the trajectory of the universe toward integration, and of the interior personal struggle toward an enduring fulfillment.

The resonance of music expresses, in so many different ways, the drama of the cry of the human heart for something "beyond," something greater - for a fulfillment corresponding to the whole expansion of freedom, for beauty. 

I think we can hear an echo of this cry in the work of any musician who is trying to be a real artist, though it may be partially obscured, muted, or buried under the imperfections and conflicting preoccupations that may accompany their work. 

We can discover these audible echoes of the heart even in some contemporary music artists who are rather caught up in the excesses of their enlarged ego, which - under a gigantic (but also fickle and fleeting) spotlight - craves attention, celebrity, ongoing relevance and - of course - lots and lots of money.

Real artists today are seekers of beauty amidst the turbulence in which they so often find themselves in this epoch. In every age there have been poseurs and charlatans who invade the world of creative expression. And today they are (like everything else in our time) bigger and noisier than ever. It’s not always easy to identify the real musical artists or to recognize the sounds of their searching. I hope God’s grace and my years of experience have begun to give me the wisdom to listen well (and perhaps help others to listen, and to make their own music).

...to be continued...

"Deepening the Sense of the Mystery"

"Christ does not resolve the drama of the 'I,' eliminating human desire, but, rather, exalting it, deepening the sense of the mystery. What kind of solution would be one that ended up flattening desire or suppressing it? .

"Instead, those who acknowledge Christ see their humanity brought beyond all imagination. For this reason, the deepening in us of the sense of mystery is the sign of His presence" 
(Fr. Julian Carron).

Summer Days

I have spent a lot of time indoors this Summer, because of the heat and humidity. But I get out, and have taken a few pictures.

We have had house shaking, power breaking afternoon thunderstorms.

...and some lovely, cooler, clear weather, like the day Eileen and I went to Wolf Trap (I still have to write more on that wonderful evening of music).

We have a few summer flowers, like this Asian immigrant, the hibiscus ("rose of Sharon") that blooms throughout the summer in this area.

...and the sun still sets pretty late in the evening.

Ignatius and His Soldiers of Love

The 16th century was a mess. It was the first real "globalization" of history, but too often it was driven by pride, avarice, and the lust for power.

Still, in the turmoil of that time, God was at work. Among other things, He gave this man a charism, and through him a "company" arose, and the Great Commission was taken up with a new awareness. The followers of Ignatius of Loyola truly carried the gospel into the whole world.

They still do. Jesuits have had their problems, but the grace of the charism of Saint Ignatius is always stronger, always renewed.

Only Jesus Really Knows Us

Jesus said, "I am the resurrection and the life" (John 11:25).

Do I really believe this? Do I really know what it means to trust in Him?

Jesus claims that He is the reason why I exist, that I was created so that I might be His brother, the brother of God the Son, the Word made flesh. In union with Him, I become a child of the Father in the Spirit.

This is why I exist; this is the foundation of my identity and destiny as a created person. God made me because He wanted to love me and to give me the power to love Him. I was created so that I might be raised up to share in the life of the Trinity. I was created by Eternal Love, so as to rejoice forever in Eternal Love.

And this is true for absolutely every human being without exception. It is at the very core of the humanity we all share. Every person is, by the mystery of God's mercy, on a path of life that leads ultimately to an encounter with the gift of God's love - and this means an encounter with Jesus, even though so many know nothing about Him right now. 

This is why our lives and words witness to Him, Jesus, always, even as we respect people of other religions, engage in dialogue with them, and learn many great and precious things from their stories of seeking truth and longing for goodness and beauty, from the genuine wisdom embodied in their cultures and traditions, and from the mysterious ways God has drawn them and worked in their lives. 

As we accompany others, collaborate with them, live in friendship with them, and witness to them, we are servants of the grace of God at work in them and in us.

Jesus wants to share His burning love with others, through us. Jesus wants everyone to meet Him and to discover that He is the only answer to the search for meaning and the yearning for love that God has fashioned in the depths of every human heart. 

Only Jesus really knows us; only He can answer for each one of us that unique, unfathomable question, “Who am I?”

Martha Said, "Yes, Lord. I Have Come to Believe..."

Today is the feast of Saint Martha.

Don't get down on Martha. Yeah, there was that time when she was so preoccupied with throwing a good dinner party that she didn't seem to recognize the uniqueness of the Guest.

But she also had that glorious moment when He revealed Himself to her and she responded with faith, and called Him by name.

It was a singularly difficult moment during the time of grief and mourning following the death of Lazarus. When Jesus arrived, Martha went out to meet Him. She was full of a wild expectation that she didn't understand, but it moved her to go to Him.

The result was one of the most beautiful accounts in the gospels, an encounter in which the drama of each of our lives is illuminated. The dialogue of Jesus and Martha sums up the history of our prayer - our seeking, asking, listening, responding to Him.

This text is worth the pondering of our hearts:

"Martha said to Jesus, 'Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died. [But] even now I know that whatever you ask of God, God will give you.' Jesus said to her, 'Your brother will rise.' Martha said to him, 'I know he will rise, in the resurrection on the last day.' Jesus told her, 'I am the resurrection and the life; whoever believes in me, even if he dies, will live, and anyone who lives and believes in me will never die. Do you believe this?' She said to him, 'Yes, Lord. I have come to believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God, the one who is coming into the world'" (Jn 11:21-27).

She believed. But what does it mean to "believe in Him"? It means to adhere to His Person with a faith vivified by hope and love, to trust in Him.

Be Not Afraid!

Be not afraid.

We are not abandoned or alone.

The Burning of Grief and Love

This is a strange time of life.

Lately, as I go through the "usual day," I keep bumping into things that remind me of my Dad: a picture, an old book, some music, or even some things not directly connected to him - common things like ivy (because Dad always trimmed the ivy and kept it neat along the side of the house I grew up in).

When this happens, a whole line of memories gets tapped, and with them come a variety of emotions that I don't even understand, and the awareness of the deep presence of a person in the history of my life, and an apparently gaping absence of that person "here-and-now" ... though not entirely. Past and present seem almost to merge for an instant, and I feel a sense of melancholy, but also peace.

Is this "grief"?

It hasn't shaken my faith, though it has made me more aware that faith depends on God's grace and that it adheres to mysteries beyond my comprehension. Clearly, faith does not provide a cheap escape from the pain and the strangeness of grief. I am grateful for my faith, which is a gift that takes me beyond myself. It brings consolation, but it is also the adherence of a frail human being who lives within the fragility of the present, with the fluxuations of internal and external changes from one moment to the next.

It's a mysterious experience that, sooner or later, everyone passes through.

We miss the people we love so much! When people die, they seem to vanish from the realm of everything we know from our experience of life, all that we see and feel and touch, all that we can measure and analyze scientifically or engage with on an ordinary practical level.

But there is still love - a light and a fire greater than the sun and all the stars. Stars burn out, but love burns through to something more, something larger than this universe and its limits. When I say "I love you" to my Dad (I feel dizzy and lost in the fog of all this, but still "I love YOU, Dad!") and whenever we say "I love you" to those who have passed away from this life, our hearts "find them" in their very reality as persons; and our hearts know that they are living in a new way.

They live in the Universe of Love, which our eyes are not designed to see (at least, not yet) but our hearts know it.

Our hearts long for it!

Maybe the pain of grief is part of our own "burning through" (beyond the limits of what we now know and measure) to that definitive world, that definitive life that our hearts whisper about, that is the promise of all our efforts to grow as persons - that Universe where Love is everything, where the embrace is all-sustaining, all-fulfilling, and never ends.

Splashdown 50

FIFTY YEARS AGO TODAY was "The Splashdown," i.e. the "returning them safely to earth" part of the historic journey of Apollo 11. 

And, once again, we all watched on TV.

Mary Said, "I Have Seen the Lord"

Today we celebrate the feast of Saint Mary Magdalene, called ἰσαπόστολος in the Byzantine tradition ("Equal-to-the-Apostles") for her original witness to Jesus's resurrection:

Jesus said to her, "go to my brothers and tell them, ‘I am going to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.’ Mary of Magdala went and announced to the disciples, 'I have seen the Lord'" (John 20:17-18).   .

July 20, 1969 - A "Giant Leap" Indeed

Fifty years ago, three human beings traveled from a beach in southern Florida to the moon, a voyage of a quarter of a million miles. Before the end of the day on July 20, two men would walk the lunar surface.

"That's one small step for [a] man, one giant leap for mankind," said Neil Armstrong as he planted his boot firmly on the dusty, unearthly ground.

"Beautiful... Magnificent desolation," said Edwin "Buzz" Aldrin, a few moments later as he stepped down from the lunar module to become the second human being to walk on the moon.

Sixty miles above the lunar surface, orbiting the moon (about once every two hours) was Michael Collins, pilot of the Command Service Module. Though he didn't get to walk on the moon, he had the essential task of carefully attending to the larger traveling spacecraft and the rockets, which were the only way any of them would get back home.

Meanwhile, a six year old me was on earth, fascinated, and - along with hundreds of millions of other people all over the world - watching it all happen on television. I remember it vividly, hearing the beeps and the crackles of earth-to-moon and moon-to-earth audio, and seeing a fuzzy but unmistakable image of an astronaut going down those steps. My parents, my brother and I watched it in our living room, on our black-&-white TV (we didn't have a color TV yet). People from my generation or older remember, and can tell you where they were and what time of night or day it was when they saw the "giant leap" on TV.
.

But even as we watched history being made on July 20, 1969, we all participated in another historic moment on earth, and most of us were unaware of its radical nature and fundamental importance for the coming decades: we were watching the first ever global live television broadcast.

Over the past fifty years, the communications technology that accompanied the Apollo mission has developed in ways no one could have imagined, so that now billions of people interact on a global level every day. People today develop and share multimedia content, and are able to "broadcast," "live" (in real time), in a manner accessible to the whole world, right from the palm of their hand.📲

This "giant leap" - for better and for worse - has transformed the global village into a global interactive network, a "global commons" with immense possibilities for discourse and learning, but also immense spaces for getting lost, and for the post-modern tribes to gather, define themselves, and wage war against one another.

...coming soon, more on this topic! 💻🔊📲📡🌐

"Man on the Moon"

"Man on the moon! Whew... oh boy! Oh boy!"

~Walter Cronkite, CBS News television studio, 4:17 PM E.D.T., July 20, 1969