What would Kaiser be writing these days?

The Synod is the most significant event since the Second Vatican Council—that is, unless you read the press rather than theologians. According to my news feed, it is a dud. If I include the right-wing “traditionalist” media, it is the work of the devil. 

I wonder how our great friend and companion, Bob Kaiser, might be reporting on these events. We could all use a good dose of Kaiser’s prose at his propagandistic best.

I admired Bob Kaiser. No matter that the world seemed to turn against him, he remained a dreamer, though I can hear him complain loudly that he was a realistic one. His vision took root in Rome during the Second Vatican Council: an incarnate Church deeply rooted in faith, nourished by the Lord Jesus, guided by the wisdom of the faithful called and gathered together to ponder and pray, would prevail; that the Lord Jesus through His Incarnation blessed our world with a vision to make all things holy: churches, men and women, study, and politics, the whole enchilada.

He wrote and spread his enthusiasm. He sold an inspired dream in which all the pieces fell into place as if Providence had ordained it, and the whole mess would begin to function as it should. Sex, imagination, and creativity played a huge role, as did prayer, the discernment of spirits, and holding fast to the promise of the Ecumenical Councils. He called this Ignatian DNA. Father Ignatius was always present for Kaiser, as for most of us. 

Another key is that Kaiser’s vision was shared. Of course, we all know and appreciate the great lengths he went to share his insights with us, his Jesuit companions—even when we couldn’t pronounce the word “autochthonous” and thought it was missing a vowel. Sharing entailed advocating a position, but in a broader sense, it also meant that the church, the gathering of fellow Christians, shared a vision for what is possible in a world redeemed by the Lord Jesus.

As corny as it sounds, Kaiser was a cheerleader. He had journalistic objectivity when required but was unequivocal about where he stood. His vision was boldly democratic—the last fruit of the Enlightenment, which began to emerge in the turbulent world of the first Jesuit explorers and missionaries.

And Bob, you encouraged me to write. I still can see the sea of red ink when you returned my paper “Xavier meets the Zen Roshi,” which I asked you to edit. Thank you.

I am no longer connected to the church in the same way I was when I graduated from college or was a young Jesuit, but my first impression is there is barely a blip on the enthusiasm meter—certainly nothing like when John 23 said, “I want to throw open the windows of the Church so we can see out and the people can see in.” The windows have been thrown open, and everyone inside looks bored to death.

It may be a case of the press coverage skewing the argument. Let me try to put on my Kaiser glasses and take a very biased look. 

Pilgrim’s Progress

I watched some of the opening salvos and prayers at the Synod on Synodality. It comes at the end of Pope Francis’s apostolic visits to Asia, then Europe, a horrendously long journey for an 87-year-old man with mobility issues. Francis began the first long leg of his trip to Indonesia, Papua New Guinea, East Timor, and Singapore from September 2nd-13th; then, with barely time to catch his breath, he visited Luxembourg and Belgium from September 26–29th, returning to Rome to begin on October 2nd the last session of what might be the nail in the coffin of the monarchical church. He is the Pope and well taken care of, but I am exhausted just thinking about the effort required for so much travel. 

I followed as much of the journey as possible on YouTube, local TV news coverage in Asia, and the official Vatican News Service. I currently live in Asia. I have friends in Singapore and Bali. I know Jesuits and former Jesuits who live and work in India, Thailand, and Nepal. It is very different from Europe or South America, as are the Jesuits working here. I studied the photographs of Francis's private meetings with his brother Jesuits wherever his plane landed. Something I found very encouraging was that he always began by opening the floor for questions and never, as far as I know, delivered any cautions or admonitions; certainly nothing like my early days of Jesuit training more than 50 years ago.

Six countries in just over two weeks. It's not the kind of slow-moving travel I favor. I want a chance to absorb a bit of local color and adjust the clock of my biorhythms. But Francis and I have different missions. He spent a few hours and perhaps even slept in former colonies; he visited the courts of colonizers; he held court in two of the smallest and richest city-states; he touched ground in the world’s largest Muslim majority countries as well as two of the four surviving Catholic monarchies; in one of the poorest Catholic new nations, half the population attended his papal mass; and then he attended a celebration of the oldest Catholic University in the world founded in 1424. (For a more detailed look at the itinerary *). 

I was curious about Francis’s attitude toward meeting these cultures outside the Vatican bubble. His stump speeches were very carefully worded, very “correct;” they seemed open and welcoming. He’s been the Pope for more than a decade, so he has a trusted staff. He is inclusive; he is inquisitive, and he is a reformer. His message was pretty much the same at every stop, so I concentrated on his body language and facial expressions as carefully as I could when he was introduced to hundreds of diverse people. 

At times he seemed to exude a kind of joy, something that I most remember in John 23 and John Paul the First. Frankly, I am more comfortable with that than the seriously burdened look of John Paul the Second or Benedict, whose smiles felt like, against their better judgment, they were following a commandment or a recommendation from the Papal PR team rather than experiencing real joy. Perhaps that is a professional hazard whether your moniker is the Bishop of Rome or Pontifex Maximus. On Francis’s face, a bit of absolute joy still shines, though he shows the wear of years of trying to do the most impossible job in the Catholic Church. Serious work, indeed.

This may be a byproduct of taking the world and our responsibilities seriously. It is not the ecstasy of understanding the chorus of birds' songs that Francis’s namesake experienced, but Francis of Assisi was a mystic, not the practical workaholic charged with modernizing an antiquated, creaky, and too often corrupt regal court. Ignatius’s final years in Rome were largely administrative, too, but we do not have live footage of his daily routine. 

I want to talk about three public conversations that I witnessed.

My god, he’s getting dressed down! 

I followed the progress of Pope Francis’s visit to both campuses of the oldest Catholic University in the world on the occasion of its 600th-anniversary celebration. Even with a few interruptions, that's a pretty good run.

At the Old University of Leuven, which occupies the magnificent ancient buildings, the primary language is Dutch. Francis graciously thanked his hosts and gave a short blessing or prayer in Italian. Then, a striking woman stepped up the rostrum and began to address him in Dutch. A woman in charge, she wore no signs of belonging to a religious congregation. She smiled; she seemed equally gracious and respectful, but I could see that she spoke to Francis as an equal, believer-to-believer, not as his subject in a medieval court. Google suggests that she was probably Bénédicte Lemmelijn, dean of the theology faculty.

There was no simultaneous translation available on YouTube. The Pope had a translator standing at his back, but I had no such luxury. However, I decided not to rush to Google to get an authorized translation into a language I understood. Instead, I tried to listen to the words spoken without fully understanding and watch her deliver the unspoken.  

Soon it became clear. She was politely and respectfully dressing him down! Of course, their body language, tone, and facial expressions told some of the story. She did not hold back. I was captivated. Francis appeared flummoxed, not shaken but clearly thrown off his game. The ceremony ended. It did not seem cut short, but when it was over, Francis was taken out past a good student choir that sang in either old Flemish or Dutch. Then, without much ado, he was whisked off to Rome for the opening of the Synod. 

I knew, in a way that defies logic and rational thought, that I had witnessed the salvos of a debate that neither party will be able to win conclusively, given our limited human resources. I didn’t know anything about the shape of the argument other than it was more vast than either party realized. It was shielded by the norms of doctrinal debate and the history of reform, but it is now impossible to sweep it back under the rug.

After 20 minutes scanning various news reports, entirely European, I was able to sketch the outline of the dispute. I will summarize the argument as objectively as I can. The theological, religious studies, and philosophy departments at Leuven had prepared a paper for the Papal visit concerning the role of a professional, academic theology faculty in today’s world. They stated that they intended to be objective, using all the tools available as scholars and researchers to examine today’s faith landscape. One phrase struck me: “[T]heology as a scientific discipline is not a ventriloquist of the church.” 

Then the committee expressed a concern. “Throughout the history of the Church, women have been made invisible,” the letter read. “What place, then, for women in the Church?” The Pope gave a response that I knew by heart: “The Church [is] female, noting that the Italian word for it, “chiesa”, is a feminine noun.” Jean-Pascal van Ypersele, a climatologist at UCLouvain University, replied that Francis had “failed to rise to the occasion. . . . To reply that the Church is a woman is really missing the point of the question – about the Church’s respect for women and their role in the institution and in society.” 

The Pope could not let this pass in silence. Speaking at the French campus of Louvain, Francis said, “womanhood speaks to us of fruitful welcome, nurturing and life-giving dedication.. . . For this reason, a woman is more important than a man, but it is terrible when a woman wants to be a man: No, she is a woman, and this is ‘heavy’ and important,” he said. This argument wasn’t even going to fly at the more conservative campus. In a press release issued just moments after the pope’s speech, UCLouvain criticized Francis’ remarks on women as “conservative” and “deterministic and reductive.”

The line of questioning got under his skin. Responding to the criticism with journalists on the plane back to Rome, he returned to his argument about women's place and role, “if this seems ‘conservative’ to some people, it is because they do not understand, or ‘there is an obtuse mind that does not want to hear about this.” 

I hear a chorus of critics telling me that I could not have fleshed out this argument simply by listening to an unfiltered Dutch speech without translation, picking up a few words in a short statement in Italian, some body language, and the inflection in the speakers’ voices. And the critics are right. But I know that given their arguments' positions or merit, neither side can claim victory and that an unresolved dispute will continue unresolved. 

One man stood for thousands.

The second conversation I want to talk about is a speech by one man at the “Penitential” ceremony, which began the current Synod session in Saint Peters. Laurence Gien, standing in front of bishops, cardinals, all the members of the Synod, and Pope Francis himself, gave testimony about the trauma of being molested by a priest. He said he was “just trying to appeal to their better selves.” 

The sanctuary of Saint Peters was bare. The clergy did not wear vestments, and although they seemed to be seated by rank, the separation did not seem as rigid as when they wear their miters. Francis's slightly elevated chair was on the east side. There were some prayers, and a choir, with a predominance of young women, sang. But again, it did not have the formal feel of a papal ceremony. 

After a reading from the Hebrew Bible, Gien was the first to speak. A dignified man in a simple black suit stood facing the pope on the opposite side of the sanctuary and began to describe in some detail his molestation when he was 11 years old. I think he said, “Sixty years ago.” It had such an impact on me that I had to review it. Here is the YouTube link; Gien begins at the time mark 8:46.

Gien said he was “just trying to appeal to their better selves.” I am still searching for the words that adequately describe my reaction. The Church has been searching for words since the extent of the abuse and the attempted cover-ups first came to light. Gien’s personal description was so explicit that it took my breath away. He even described the act itself: “Far from Rome, in a small town in Southern Africa, a predator honed in on me … on a beautiful South African morning, he led me by the hand to a dark place where, in the screaming silence, he took from me what should never be taken from any child.” No one in Saint Peter’s looked away, though I noticed that some senior clergy avoided eye contact at difficult points in the narration.

Gien said that the Church had looked away for too long. He called for transparency, but there was no call for reparations or punishment. He simply said that these incidents should have been reported to the authorities. He also said that the effects of this kind of abuse can never be erased and that they ripple out into the wider church. 

Many details regarding compensation, prevention, and punishment must still be worked out. I would personally like to see an investigation of Timothy Dolan’s transfer of 57 million dollars into financial instruments, among them a trust he established for the maintenance of Catholic cemeteries to avoid paying compensation to victims of abuse in Milwaukee. I did not see Dolan among the cardinals at this ceremony. He’s one of the churchmen elected to represent the US Church at the Synod; he is known for his hostile response to the victims of clerical abuse seeking reparations; he is also one of the most responsible for the Americans’ lackluster response to Francis’s call for a Synod; I do know that he was in New York on the 19th of October for the Alfred E. Smith political dinner where he hosted Donald Trump. The Synod closes on the 27th. Dolan clearly knows who butters his bread.

This was a remarkable moment. What was secretly hidden has come to light, but senior officials can no longer obstruct victims motivated by protecting the Institution’s good name or assets.

“The Church cannot be understood without being rooted in a place and a culture.”

When I decided to dedicate time to observing the Synod and comparing notes with my experience during Vatican II, I asked myself, where are the theologians, or more specifically, who are the best creative theologians working today? Who are John Courtney Murray, Gus Weigle, Hans Kung, Urs van Balthasar, Edward Schillebeeckx, Yves Congar, Augustin Bea, and Henri de Lubac in today’s church? Who are the men and women Kaiser would be asking to his legendary Sunday night dinners? 

But what do I really know about doing theology? As a Jesuit theology student, I read something from the luminaries I listed, usually 10 to 20 mimeographed, pirated pages from a larger text or article. There was some casuistry afloat that Jesuit seminarians were not obliged to pay the high price of textbooks, including royalties to the author because they were Jesuits. I cannot remember ever spending a semester with one book in its entirety. This was how I might open my argument that I cannot recognize essential theology—due to my inadequate Jesuit training.

However, I’d witnessed great theology being done, although I was hardly aware of it. During the year that I lived in a small community on the Upper Westside with Avery Dulles, he finished “Models of the Church.” He taught courses, so days were consumed with class and student meetings, but every night after dinner, when all the dishes had been washed and put away, he would go to his room, surrounded by stacks of books—this was very pre-Google—and he shut the door.  

Avery was very conservative by disposition. There was no firebrand reformer like Hans Kung, but in retrospect, the open way Avery embraced several of the Reform models was itself radical. He would share some of the issues with us from time to time over dinner, but the work, at least the portion that we witnessed, was solitary. We did not knock and invite him to watch a TV show with us. But from long before 1972-3 in a sprawling shared apartment on 102nd Street, this is how theology was done. Even in the intense work at the old Woodstock leading up to Vatican II, individuals worked alone and came together to test one another and present a unified, coherent position. All that changed at Vatican II, and I’d like to think that Kaiser’s Sunday soirees also had something to do with it. 

Cardinal Jean-Claude Hollerich is a young Jesuit Cardinal from Luxembourg whom Francis chose as the Synod's General Rapporteur, indicating a high level of confidence and trust. He was also a member of the Japanese Province, as were Pedro Arrupe, Father Adolfo Nicolás Pachón, and Father LaSalle, whom I revere as the first Jesuit Zen Master. 

Cardinal Hollerich introduced the Synodal module focused on “Places " by stating that the Church “cannot be understood without being rooted in a place and a culture.” This phrase caught my attention. I would describe it as “theological anthropology,” or at least that discipline will have a significant impact. It also feels like an extension of the Ignatian missionary impulse without the colonial jingoism that accompanied those first brave explorers, missionaries, and saints. I would describe it as “theological anthropology,” or at least that discipline will have a significant impact. 

If it is a theological proposition, it seems like the exact opposite of a universal church where one size fits all, that the good news of liberation Jesus delivered in the first century of the common era transcends language and culture, the theological template of the church triumphant; it will require our best minds to unpack it and our most prayerful Christians to work with it in the various cultures they encounter. That cannot be a solitary pursuit. Working together will be the norm. Observing the panels that I’ve witnessed during the Synod, they are much more diverse than I’d imagined; they include religious women, laymen and women, many people of color, and many languages other than the traditional European church languages, though Italian seems to be the lingua franca.

This theological inquiry dovetails with the personal work I’ve been doing for over 50 years. Suddenly, the Synod’s inquiry became interesting again.

Going to Battle under a False Flag.

I began my survey of the Synod prepared to criticize Francis; I was looking for evidence that his dream of a Synod on Synodality was insignificant, bogged down, and unable to move past Curial politics to what matters. The Synod's day-to-day work seems geared to ensuring that “Sector Eight” functions smoothly. I looked at Francis during a deliberation or a ceremony, and I thought I saw a bleak and frustrated expression, as you might expect after spending years defining terms and conditions while carefully and deliberately sidestepping urgent questions lurking in the shadows. 

We’re at the end of an era. Speaking from the Chair of Peter as an oracle, Francis cannot transform our modern world. I don’t think Popes ever could, although it’s part of the script religious monarchs inherit. (I discussed my view of the Infallibility doctrine in “Vatican I was a Colossal Mistake”). But once or twice in a century, it might be possible to bypass this repetition of history and begin anew. Did Francis miss this opportunity?

The Lord Jesus preached a vision of humankind transformed. He did not teach us, love us, live, die, and then live again so that we could all say our prayers in Latin and cower before Irish priests lecturing about the evils of masturbation. He did not throw the money changers out of the Temple at the risk of his life so that priests in his name could make deals with Mafiosa to stuff their pockets. He did not preach freedom, love, and salvation so that nuns recruited by colonizers would savage indigenous children on the tundra or the savanna and subjugate them to the whim of European elites. He did not form an old boys' club with a peculiar set of initiation rituals for this new elite, or worse, afford cover for pedophiles to abuse children. Once in a great while, an opening appears, giving us a chance to wipe away the insidious accretions of the past and start afresh. That was the promise of Vatican II.

I focused on the concerned look on Francis’s face and the lack of enthusiasm in Paul Six Hall rather than the politics of reform. I could barely detect a smile among the delegates. Perhaps everyone was simply trying to be “recollected," but I doubt it. Francis is trying to reset the stage for Vatican II's promise to finally take hold, but the forces of the clerical monarchy are still too strong to die with a single blow, especially because Francis is determined to use collegial decision-making to kill the demon. Vatican II brought out the best of theological thinking that had gone into hiding during the reactionary authoritarian pontificates of almost every Pope called Pius since Vatican I, but it only took a few years before the entrenched monarchy and the aristocrats who love the money and power began to write their revisionist history and mount an aggressive campaign against reform. Francis’s critics have started their attack, and we can see that this clique is perhaps more underground but still alive and kicking in the halls of the Vatican and elsewhere.

Jesus said a person's enemies will be those of his own household (Matthew 10:36). When I began to see Francis’s critics emerge, I realized that I had been wrong in my initial assessment of the Synod. It was pretty clear that many Americans in the hierarchy had become enemies of Francis--they told us. But some are passive-aggressive and try to hide. They use False Flag tactics to discredit or implicate their rivals, create the appearance of enemies when none exist, or create the illusion of organized and directed persecution.

In my view, the tactics of the devout cult that reveres Latin Mass burn all the oxygen in the room and stifle any real conversation. That is the intention. They parade a pious front to avoid criticism but are filled with too much self-pity to merit serious consideration. Sentimental arguments based on nostalgia are False Flags. Go ahead. Pawn your freedom for an “et cum spiritu,” but do it on your own time. 

However, when I recognized the tactic, I saw evidence that Francis’s Synod was succeeding. He is playing a long, deliberate game to replace Papal fiat with a far more open and democratic process. It will take more time than he has, so he is laying the foundation and will have to wait for death to cancel a lot of the votes for monarchy. 

Some of the questions that the Synod cannot answer cannot yet be answered. Best leave them that way. All the churchmen Francis talked with on his journey were dressed in almost identical costumes; they were from many races and ethnicities, but, at least in my sample, they were almost all men. To grasp all things is the only way to bring the word of God to all men and women, and it will take some time before women's voices gain parity. Francis can say that the word for church is feminine, but that does not settle the conversation. I don’t know how it will play out, but neither does Francis.

What would Kaiser do with all this? He would write. He would not hold back. He included a vast array of theology in his dream. His lease on a rather luxurious apartment in Rome became, at least in legend, the hotbed of the most forward-thinking theologians and experts at the Council. To quote Cardinal Hollerich, Kaiser cannot be understood without being rooted in a place and a culture. The church you reported on with your genius, Bob, continues and changes, probably not fast enough for your taste, but it is changing.

I confess, Bob, that you still inspire me. I miss your voice, the breath of your vision, and the depth of your commitment. Hand it to Francis; he is trying to be all things to all men. I know that you, Bob would approve, and so do I. I pledge to do my best to carry on the dream. 

___________________

*Luxembourg's population is 672,050, and Belgium's is much larger, at 11,870,000. Those countries are two of the last four remaining Catholic countries with royals as constitutional heads of state. Queen Mathilde of Belgium is one of only four women allowed to wear white in the presence of the Pope, and I can’t pass over in silence that Belgium was one of the last notoriously evil colonizing powers. 

Indonesia, with a population of 281,190,067 in 2022, is the largest Muslim-majority country in the world. India has the largest Muslim population as well as more than 4000 Jesuits, the most of any country in the world. East Timor’s population of 1.341 million fought for independence twice--from Portugal in 1975 and Indonesia in 2002. Papua New Guinea, with a population of 10,329,931, has one of the richest biodiverse environments remaining on Earth, 

Singapore, with its 5.637 million people, has more than 35% who identify as Christian; Anglicans number 22,000, which seems small given that it was one of the last colonial holdings of the United Kingdom in Southeast Asia. It gained independence on 9 August 1965. 

Louvain University, founded in 1424, has 30,760 on its new French-speaking campus, but from what I was able to observe of language, customs, and Francis’s somewhat perplexed look, the smaller Old University of Leuven occupies the very old medieval buildings and is primarily Flemish or Dutch-speaking.

Big Changes for Jesuit Spirituality

Newsflash! Pope announces changes to the Spiritual Exercises

13 March 2024

Pope Francis will hold a joint press conference with Arturo Marcelino Sosa Abascal SJ, the Father General of the Society of Jesus to announce the first major revision of the Spiritual Exercises of Saint Ignatius in 500 years. This follows the discovery of a document found in Saint Ignatius’s desk with instructions not to open until the tenth year of the reign of the first Jesuit Pope. 

The Jesuit Curia has released a translation of the text of Saint Ignatius's letter.

Rome, January 4, 1556

As I near the end of my life, I pray (and worry) constantly about the future of our Company. Although it seems to be thriving, supplying extremely well trained priests to stem the tide of the reform movement and missionaries around the globe, something haunts me. The vision that I had by the River Cardoner is fading. I have been particularly troubled by the prospect of losing that vision after I die.

The administration of the Society will not suffer, there are plenty of talented men, but I fear our collective understanding of God’s will is more than slightly cloudy. .I am worried for the visionaries. Our men are certainly a cut above regular priests. We have a lot of second sons of high ranking families, bright kids, eager, many are extremely devout, but it is almost that they do everything too perfectly. The gay ones have to hide out because there are so many trying to prove themselves. Damn macho post medieval tribal culture is deadly.

Then I had an experience with a young applicant to the Society, a mestizo who came back with some missionaries from the Americas. He can neither read nor write, and his Latin is rudimentary so I had to have him work in the kitchen while he catches up, but he claimed to have had a vision of the Blessed Mother that directed him. He started to talk to me about it, and I was very moved. I have weighed the spirits carefully and it is clear to me that Mariano had an authentic vision.

Mariano says that the Virgin told him that we Jesuits place too much emphasis on earning God’s Love. I blame myself for the emphasis on love through actions and not in our hearts. (Love is expressed through actions, but it has to do with intent). He says that the Virgin told him that priests who are privileged and jealous of their position become blind to the immediacy of God’s love and can’t see that this love comes without any conditions. He’s absolutely right, but centuries of fighting have conditioned us to enforce conditions rather than seeing beyond them.

I would turn our enterprise over to Mariano if I could. I know that this is God’s will, but I can’t execute it. The Inquisition would go ballistic. The Pope’s funding scheme for Saint Peter’s would collapse. The Society would split apart with the infighting. Sometimes I am tempted to just let the cards fall where they may, those snobby Jesuits who spend years studying the minute distinctions in the writings of Avicenna and Aquinas need to do more quiet meditation, but I will have to leave that aside. I have decided to send Mariano into hiding,

This is where I am being led right now. I have to get this young man to safety and protect his vision. The time will be ripe at some point, but not at this moment. Until then we must protect this inspiration. The fires of the Inquisition need to be extinguished, and warring factions need to at least reach a detente. The church does need reform and a strong hand is necessary right now so fight fire with fire, but make sure that the proposition of “ends justify means” is discussed in the ratio. Keep an open mind. Things change.

I have authorized the foundation of a clandestine cell of Jesuits near Buenos Aires in the New World. Mariano will lead this small community. Their practice will be kept alive by recruits from the indigenous community that they will serve for as long as it takes. I want to keep the flame alive while things sort themselves out. Mariano has told me that the Virgin told him that Jesuits will begin to practice the quiet meditation that Xavier wrote about from Japan, and she approves. I find that perhaps the hardest thing to believe of all the wonders he shared with me, but I suppose it is possible.

Mariano has my permission to restructure the Spiritual Exercises. I will note them here so that anyone who reads this will know that I approve of the changes. He has turned them on their head. The first week will be the Contemplatio ad Amorem. The main meditation instruction will be the fourth method, to follow the breath as it rides on the sound of a word in prayer. Mariano says that human beings can find God in all things instinctively. He is right. In my version of the Exercises I thought I had to lead the retreatant by the nose. We don’t need to go through hell to experience the Presence in rocks and stones, mothers and babies, even in the clanging of pots and pans.

This experience will be the basis of the meditations on the events and sayings in the life of our Lord Jesus Christ during the second week which will stand as they are with the exclusion of the stories about Mary. The third week also remains as it is, but without my interpretation. We can approach the meditation on His sacrifice and death and allow them to speak for themselves, and create their own inner narrative. But again the story of Mary going to the tomb will be left for the entirely new fourth week.. 

The new fourth week is a series of meditations which Mariano received in his vision of the Blessed Virgin. She was the person who really allowed God to become human. I hope we don't have to wait 500 years to experience how Mary the Virgin can help guide us to continue the Incarnation, but 500 years is just a drop in the bucket of eternity. We can all begin to experience immediacy right now in the moment. We don’t have to wait. Waiting for the present moment is an oxymoron. However the changes in my Exercises will have to wait.

Mariano tells me that in the clandestine Buenos Aires cell, washing dishes will be part of everyone's daily practice. It should smooth out the rough edges between Avicenna and Aquinas. There may be random occurrences in the universe, but few mistakes.

Father Ignatius

Reforming the Roman Curia is like trying to teach an elephant ballet

Reforming the Roman Curia may be harder than teaching an elephant ballet, 

Or why I love my ex.

According to Canon Law, I am an ex-Jesuit. In 1975, after almost 10 years in the Jesuits, I formally asked to be released from religious vows. Someone in an office in Rome eventually read my appeal and granted my request. I went into the office of my religious superior, a man I didn’t know well. We both knew we were gay but our chosen paths were so different that there was immediate animosity. After some awkward conversation, he and I put our signatures at the bottom of two papers. Both my promises to God in the context of the Constitutions of the Society of Jesus and their legal and moral obligations towards me were rescinded. No money was exchanged. It took about 10 minutes. The whole process, however, from my exclaustration and the 19th Annotation retreat that my director asked me to undertake, through to the point that I mustered the courage to make a clear decision took more than a year.

Today I’m glad that I followed this formal path. In retrospect it might have been simpler just to walk out the door and not look back. It was not easy. It was emotional and gut wrenching. Eventually I came to discard other traditional religious trappings, fully severing my ties to the Catholic Church. I rejected some beliefs outright, for example the "intrinsically disordered nature" of same sex orientation, while others I quietly set aside, but in the end like a married couple who achieve an amicable separation, our divorce was clean. I cherish the years that I was a Jesuit. There is no resentment. Thankfully, I still maintain a deep affection for my ex although we live very separate lives.

I entered the Jesuits less than a year after Paul VI closed the Second Vatican Council. Hopes were high. Most young Jesuits at the time were buoyed by the promise that the Church would shed its medieval trappings and present the Gospel to a world in need. But particularly with the election of John Paul II, the retrenchment within the hierarchy stifled my enthusiasm. Choked might be more accurate. Ratzinger shared Wojtyła’s conviction that Vatican 2 was a radical departure from tradition, too radical. Although they both had to admit that the Council was the work of the Holy Spirit--it was after all a church council--under the guise of not throwing the baby out with the bathwater, they reigned in the spirit of reform. Hardliners sifted through the documents to see which ones they had to live with. They drew a line in the sand with regards to Liberation Theology for example, and began to carve out exemptions for the Tridentine Mass. Benedict even dusted off the Papal throne and took the red slippers out of the closet. 

From my outsider position I saw a recalcitrant Curia unwilling to give up power, money and control, but after almost five decades of trying to bolster up a crumbling European style monarchy on life support, it became clear the form of government was so antiquated and corrupt that it would be wiped away unless real reform was given a chance. Enter the first Pope from the New World and the first Jesuit Pope. He has had a formidable task given the landmines that centuries of absolute rule have left planted to defend itself from all criticism. 

An ex-Jesuit friend commented on the current state of the leadership of Francis, including the backlash that began to surface the moment he paid his own hotel bill after being elected. “Dragging along the Curia, the Bishops, and all the ‘people of God’ will take many years.” Dragging is not usually a word associated with “metanoia,” conversion or change of heart, one of the favored words in post Vatican 2 theology, but for me points to the heart of the matter.

Reforming the Curia is like teaching an elephant ballet. Patient training may yield some behavior modification but it won’t be dancing. It’s also extremely difficult. The elephant will demand more treats to learn the act. Or more harsh discipline, or coercion. In human terms that usually means money and power. Deprive the beast and you might cause a deadly rampage. That is what the likes of the gay Australian Cardinal and Benedict’s Platonic boyfriend seemed to be threatening. Time to get back to that old time religion where the elephants perform as they were trained, the people applaud and hand over cash--or else.

A few days ago a fellow Buddhist, a gay Californian who is also here in Asia right now with his husband said to me with regard to the American political scene, “Where are the new leaders? Where are the JFK’s or the MLK”s? It seems that we are only seeing reactionary people seeking the limelight and a few others standing up to them, brilliantly and strongly, but no one is actually inspiring a generation with the same power as “Ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country?” Surveying the official face of the Roman Church until Francis, I say the same thing.

I see Francis limping along in full view, looking tired but not giving in, listening, speaking carefully and then going home to cafeteria meals in a communal residence. Sure he’s pope. The food is good and the health care top notch, but gone are the high flying days of fancy Kielbasa cooked in a palace by an adoring staff for a table of favored quests on a closely held list. Francis may have the kind of leadership required, generous and humble but he's not really cut out for elephant training. The circus will look entirely different. The results may also take many years. Rome wasn’t built in a day and it will take more than a day to rebuild, if we can keep the dancing elephants calm. 

I am and will continue to be an outsider. I may have given up my right to vote, but I can still love and support Francis and what he stands for. I am not alone. I will continue to express my views as clearly and forcefully as I can. It is the right thing to do. 

Vatican 1 was a colossal mistake.

It’s no secret that I think that Vatican 1 was a colossal mistake that’s sucked up more spiritual oxygen than it’s worth in its rather brief history. Ex Cathedra has about as much to do with the proclamation of the gospel of Jesus as the proclamation of Charles III as king certifies the divine right of the British monarchy to rule the fate of nations. Zero, except for his bank account. What we are witnessing now is the slow, painful demise of a spiritual monarchy and the upset of curial hangers-on and courtiers who have been sucking the papal tit for money and power for a century and a half. It’s not pretty but it’s entirely predictable. The rub is that this proclamation can’t be wrong no matter how wrong it is, or the whole house of cards comes crashing down.

It was a California Jesuit, perhaps John Loubonis or Gene Bianchi, who retorted to one of my historical analyses: “remember the logical fallacy ‘post hoc, propter hoc.’” My worthy opponent was defending arguments in favor of the truth of the doctrine of papal infallibility. The fact that Pius IX surrendered the Palazzo del Quirinale to Victor Emmanuel when he lost the Papal States, his army of 15,000, his rights, privileges and income as one of the kings of what we now know as the the Republic of Italy of course has nothing to do with shoring up his spiritual authority at a time when he lost everything else on which he imagined that authority rested. Of course not. It was just a quirk of fate or a pure coincidence that allowed him to reassert a doctrine lurking in the shadows until a political upheaval allowed the truth to reveal itself.

In the cult of objective spiritual truth, it is vital to dissociate the muck of historical circumstance from the hard work of doing logical analysis. Post hoc ergo propter hoc* is what is known as “informal fallacy.” It refers to assumptions embedded in ordinary language. “I saw Johnny on the street just after the bus left the station” does not necessarily imply that Johnny took the bus from Bakersfield. If I needed to demonstrate that Johnny took that bus, of course, I could just ask Johnny to show me his bus ticket or search his pants pockets for the incriminating evidence, but then there is still the possibility that he might have picked up a ticket from a real passenger who’d dropped it on the sidewalk or had boarded the bus in Oakland and disembarked on 6th Street. Nothing is certain. But I am certain that the Roman church is pulling a fast one. They’re not showing the ticket from Bakersfield.

After all this, you might think that I am actually interested in the pope’s infallible words. I'm not. I was curious that Benedict, recently of happy memory, said he was no oracle, but he could be given the proper conditions. Even John 23 said something to the effect that “I am infallible, but you’re not going to hear it from me.” So these guys hold the authority of the oracle in their back pocket just in case. Meanwhile, it has caused immense disruption and controversy across doctrinal Christianity. This interests me. The church is standing in its own way.

Why and how? I think that the “why” is self-evident. The “how” might require some digging, but let’s dig.

Avery Dulles became very conservative in his later years. I asked him why he supported this kind of centralized authority, and he said that his argument rested on the Ignatian principle of “Thinking with the Church.” I should have countered, “Even if that thinking is wrong?” But I didn’t. I was intimidated by the obligations of friendship and his red hat, but after John Paul 2 strongly reiterated the centralized power of papal authority, any further discussion was over as far as Avery was concerned.

This was not always the case. During a symposium about the Jesuits’ connection and promise to hitch their horses to the papal cart, a strategy that proved immensely successful, I asked a simple question: why? Avery said that despite everything, any problems or contradictions, we obeyed because of “filial piety.” That was enough for him. I then asked how we could support something or someone on a premise that contradicted the person's own understanding, or how could we justify believing one thing when the person in question actually said something different about themselves? He reiterated his statement about filial piety but later privately said, “I really didn’t answer your question, did I?” He did not, and I cannot accept a pious notion to guide us. Today I would phrase my question differently, “Why do people believe nonsense?” Usually because of laziness, or fear, or tradition, none of which are good reasons.

I am quite sure that we will never hear any infallible words from Francis. The question is whether or not the absurd travestry of papal monarchy will simply die off without being addressed directly. The opposition is gathering its forces to nullify any work by the upcoming synod.

*Post hoc ergo propter hoc (Latin: 'after this, therefore because of this') is an informal fallacy that states: "Since event Y followed event X, event Y must have been caused by event X." It is often shortened simply to post hoc fallacy. A logical fallacy of the questionable cause variety, it is subtly different from the fallacy cum hoc ergo propter hoc ('with this, therefore because of this'), in which two events occur simultaneously or the chronological ordering is insignificant or unknown. Post hoc is a logical fallacy in which one event seems to be the cause of a later event because it occurred earlier. [1]

Post hoc is a particularly tempting error because correlation sometimes appears to suggest causality. The fallacy lies in a conclusion based solely on the order of events, rather than taking into account other factors potentially responsible for the result that might rule out the connection.[2]

A simple example is "the rooster crows immediately before sunrise; therefore the rooster causes the sun to rise."[3]

The Christmas Papers

 December 25, 2022

Today is Christmas. I am alone, but far from feeling sad, abandoned or left out.

I live in a remote village in India. I am very far from my immediate family. I am the only person within miles who has the blood of Jesus in my cultural veins. All my expat friends have departed seeking warmer winds to fill their sails. There are no holiday tables filled with fancy mashed potatoes and cranberry sauce, no Santa Claus, no angels singing, “Away in a manger, no crib for His head.”

I also haven’t even set out any sentimental reminders of the birth of Jesus. I have not decked a green tree with my collection of Kashmiri papier-mâché ornaments. My landlord Hari Singh’s older brother died five days ago. Indians don’t celebrate festivals that coincide with a recent death in the family, and will not for a period of some years. Out of respect I have kept all my decorations in their cardboard boxes.

So my celebrations of the birth of divinity among us have been inward. They have taken the shape of personal reflections. 

The landscape of faith, belief and even doubt has never been a level, clear and easy access for me. All the churches and their priests, every council and most theologians set out certain criteria to gain admission which, they claim, can lead to fulfilling a particular set of promises whether in this world or in the hereafter. Philosophy is a bit more nuanced, but it still aims for coherent, reasonable and persuasive explanations why humans opt for, even stake their lives, on some list of characteristics, principles and belief statements about the nature of the world, both seen and imagined. I question whether or not any of these worldviews pass a personal test for allegiance. In times of crisis, philosophy has little or no impact. There is rarely a clear decision that leads to action. When there’s a huge existential crisis where we used to rely on philosophy, but now, there are not many people, not even existentialists, ready to pick up a sword and head off to Israel and put up the good fight, (Actually they might have to cross swords with several splinter fundamentalist groups already fighting, but this clutters the landscape).

Since the beginning of the Covid lockdown I have been isolated, but I decided to try to use my time in a semi-productive way: to allow the practice of meditation to explore my isolation and, yes, loneliness. At first many of the cultural features that go to constitute “me” became more clear: yes, I miss cheesecake; the only white face I see faces me in the mirror; I like having meat in my regular diet. Over time, however, these peculiar characteristics started to lose importance. They seemed to fade away. It was quite natural, not forced. The isolation also heightened the kind of attention that I paid to my daily life. I can’t understand Hindi, and it’s the only language I hear on a regular basis. I didn’t say to myself, it sounds like music, but I did ask myself if perhaps it’s the way the a dog hears spoken language. I began to listen to the inflections and tone coupled with some spontaneous gestures that have become more or less decoded. The process is quite fluid, changing from minute to minute. 

Then several other things happened that opened an exploration. A former Jesuit died. Gene Bianchi was a bright, genial professor. He was a friend of a woman I know quite well who is also on the faculty of Religious Studies at Emory. I began reading the praise for his work. He’d forged many interesting connections between the world’s great spiritual traditions. Thoughtful, accepting, inclusive, are some adjectives that I found appropriate. He made us all richer.

At the same time I was also studying some small textual samples from what’s been called “The Gospel of Thomas.” It is a work that was apparently widely circulated in the early church until churchmen deemed it a bit too gnostic, which means more than non-conforming. It purported to provide a secret understanding, threads to an inward understanding of Jesus. I am a post-Trent Catholic, and Jesuit to boot so it was my older uncles and brothers who shaped the creeds and ceremonies that I took to be the true expression of god’s word to the exclusion of all dissenters and gnostics. My listening has been conditioned by what historians of religion call “family resemblance.” They would say that I cannot really taste the debate about the nature and substance of three persons in one god because it is treated like a settled matter. All the nuances of the argument have been so highly edited, sanitized, even bowdlerized, it is impossible to place myself back into the conservation. So many of the “conditions of understanding'' have assumed the texture of wall paper that I don’t even notice them.

I am sure that in another era I would be labeled a heretic and a dissenter. I grew up loving Jesus, and then as a young man, I cut my teeth on the narratives of his life, ministry and death. In my heart I feel that they point to a purpose and possibility for humankind that far outshines our lofty visions, our petty ideas about who we are, and our squabbles, but I cannot accent to the notion of god most Christian churches demand for admission. The idea of any god, much less than the triune god presented by orthodox Christianity, is an intellectual challenge. 

But curiously the question itself began to reshape itself. I stopped asking what I actually believed in as if it were some personal ontological do or die question. Living alone in India without all the cultural support for the Christian church, I started to ask myself what if I'd actually heard Thomas preach about Jesus? Would I have become Christian? Do I even know what that would have meant on the plains of eastern India looking out across the Bay of Bengal?

I doubt it. I can’t know if the message would have carried any appeal. Even if through some hindsight into the transmigration of my soul, I knew that I was a maharaja’s accountant who was also enslaved, could I have heard something in the message of Jesus that liberated me. But it is such an odd question, or an amusing thought experiment so very far from my world. Is it even important? What I find intriguing is that in a foreign country, outside the cultural and most of the intellectual trappings of the western/Christian world, it is a question that I cannot escape.

The case against Christianity

“The difference between a Miracle and a Fact is exactly the difference between a mermaid and a seal.” --Mark Twain

I am nearly 80 years old. I am well aware that this in no way qualifies me as a trustworthy guide, so I offer what I write only as my personal reflections. I’ve always been on the lookout for solid advice about living my life fully. I am well aware of my own limitations. This is the spirit in which I discuss my bout with the religion of my ancestors as well as my personal beliefs.

I hope I’m a good Christain. I try to be. The maxims that come down to us from Jesus, particularly his teachings about how we should treat one another, are the core of any spiritual discipline. They are also difficult which adds value. The counsel that you can recognize the followers of Jesus by their actions and their love, and not by what they say gets high marks. Being of service to others is also important. It's how I earn my place in the world. It’s a source of peace.

However I insist that any teaching passes the litmus test of ordinary common sense, but the notion of “common sense” may be so culturally conditioned at this point that it is no longer a reliable guide. 

Let’s examine the belief that some type of supernatural oversight provides the glue that holds our civilization together, at least the way we in the West think about it. Though this is not explicitly a teaching of Jesus, it is an underpinning of most traditional Christian theology. (This is distinct from the conundrum of why a loving god allows for the existence and apparent triumph of evil). From my observation, except in the most rarefied or academic theological conversation, the “divine plan” scenario amounts to little more than esoteric wallpaper or crowd control. Conservatives want us to believe that social cohesion is an important and reasonable justification for this belief, as long as they determine the scope and content of the belief structure, but when the social order breaks down, like what’s happening right now, the weakness of this utilitarian argument becomes pitiable. It’s not working. The system is collapsing right in front of our eyes, at a speed that is unbelievable. No words can prop it up. Language and logic turn upon themselves devouring each other, creating chaos, forcing proponents of any position to exaggerate their slightest differences and disagreements creating deeper chasms, more separation, more selfish hoarding of resources, more death, more suffering. It’s a deplorable situation. In my view, it highlights that all that we can really know with certainty is that events are chaotic and unpredictable. According to proponents of religious organizations, the cure is more of the same medicine--their own. Failure always falls to us frail humans--we were not assiduous or faithful enough. This is the failsafe of supernatural remedies.

With regard to the written records of the teachings of Jesus, I’ve spent countless hours studying, trying to sort out what he actually might have said, what he preached that might claim truth in the deepest sense, touching the core of our humanity, and thus possibly could be considered revelation. When my faith in the supernatural was fading, I imagined that at least I might find a guide to living an authentic life. At some point when I decided to be more hard headed and reasonable, I started to simply seek out useful insights about the nature of man and the transcendent, our place in the world, what we might call the meaning of life though that’s a pretty meaningless phrase. It’s just a fill-in-the-blank statement.

I’ve tried as much as possible to separate myself from parochial in-fighting. This was not always the case, but I have no time and little energy left for that battle. Actually, I’ve come to believe that anyone who engages in it or even thinks it’s important is a fool. It’s not just a waste of time--it’s a pernicious delusion to think that this is a path to salvation. It’s divisive. Taking sides sows hatred, distrust and suspicion among the many diverse inhabitants of this earth. It almost makes me believe in the devil. 

So why am I violating my principles and doing it? I cannot and will not try to dissuade anyone who chooses to follow a conventional, orthodox or even modern evangelical path, but by the same token, to keep silent would be to condone and implicitly imply consent to the pernicious way the right wing evangelical church uses their version of the Jesus teaching to hijack the democratic institutions of America. They are not alone. There is also ample evidence that authoritarian movements worldwide are using some version of a particular cultural religious belief system for control and manipulation. 

There will always be problems criticizing any religion based on a book that purports to be revealed truth, and this is especially difficult when tradition, family, and friendship are involved. However my contention is that we always mix tradition, family and the ties of friendship with many unexamined principles that govern our lives. We do this because that’s the way humans are constructed. In terms of the argument, this is neither good nor bad, nor is it totally ignored in the meta argument. However it is relatively unexamined when we consider the influence of ingrained beliefs when we put on the guise of modern, liberated humans, and try to cast off traditional beliefs, practices and taboos.  

Most post reformation Christian religions depend on sacred texts. These scriptures deserve respect as the vessels of tradition and sacred history, but, in my view, this in no way places them beyond analysis and criticism. The biblical narratives are of uncertain human authorship, demonstrably patched together from a collection of traditions, sayings, folktales, ethical and religious admonitions, miracle stories, sectarian debate and even political diatribe to which people attribute divine inspiration. Scholars, linguists, even archeologists have done deep work on these aspects of the texts and their findings are more clear than even a generation ago.  

To get ecumenical, the problem with the divine authorship claim is shared by Muslim and Jews, and to a certain extent most Buddhist sects. The playing field has the imposed boundaries you might expect: you are allowed, even encouraged to be critical as long as your efforts are either directed at people who disagree with an agreed upon meaning, the interpretation of your team, or if your aim is to demonstrate divine authorship. 

Playing the ecumenical card will not absolve me of singling out the illegitimate use of protestant Christianity for criticism, but I focus on that issue here because it is what I have studied and know fairly intimately. 

We humans over our short history have not been very successful really helping others in need. Let's be honest. Christianity in any of its sectarian guises stinks. How many positive qualities can you name that are not simply reinforcements of a cultural norm? What kind of training does it offer that’s not simply “do good and avoid evil” because the consequences go far beyond your present life. They last forever! The worst kind of training is when it imposes human control and monitoring of good and evil, playing on our human guilt, fear, envy, greed or a host of other complicated, unclear, conflicted and convoluted motivations all the while claiming divine authorization.

Do the texts themselves, or even the counsel of the church contain any clear useful advice about contemplation beyond a general admonition to pray? No, not even if you read beyond the conflicting messages about following the Law. This is not to say that there is any hostility towards contemplation or introspection. However, most of the spiritual discipline that leads a Christian on an inner search is the work product of practitioners who were members of one of the churches, either lay, religious or clergy. I cannot deny that they were inspired by their belief, and the fact that there are prayers but no clear specific indications about methods of prayer in the Teaching of Jesus as there are for example in Buddhism. This is perhaps a blessing. It opens the gate rather than fences off the field.

Some people might even think that it is incorrect to follow this vein. If most of your friends have some spiritual proclivity, it might even be dangerous. I might be condemned as totally out of line, but echoing Allen Watts, that position only reinforces the most dangerous human blindness: the taboo against knowing who we are. Why should any religious system be excluded, immune from the same kind of scrutiny as we might apply to a political party, a system of government, a philosophical or moral proposition, a recommendation about child rearing, the merits of a particular diet, or let’s stretch it, proving that the acceleration of an object is dependent upon two variables, the net force acting upon the object and the mass of the object. I trust that the days of stake burning are over, but I am well aware that speaking frankly is still dangerous if I voice my opinion among certain groups, sects, or political factions.

31 December 2022

I’d barely time to catch my breath when the pope emeritus died. 

“Don’t speak ill of the dead,” was something my mother said many times. It might be an old Irish warning before they broke out the whiskey at the wake.

OK, but I am not going to join the chorus of praise for the pope emeritus either. And it has begun in full force. The cause for his canonization has certainly already been written and is a foregone conclusion. He was probably not the pernicious conservative rat that the neo-libs want to portray, but he was no angel. He loved his cats, so not all bad, but he was a little too gay for most conservatives. There might be a fight between cat lovers and opponents of those crazy red pumps. 

I listened to an interview with the neo-conservative George Weigel who talked about the bromance between John Paul 2 and Ratzinger. According to Weigel, this is the heart of their shared doctrinal assumptions: “The Council had been the work of the holy spirit but its implementation had not been less than satisfactory because it had not been properly understood (in the way that they understood it). It was not seen in the context of the church’s settled tradition.” So the two set out to give the Council an authoritative interpretation (which I presume means reinterpretation from the top down, from the pope’s mouth). Their contention was that the Council was not a paradigm shift; there was never a demand to start the catholic church over again. 

This is very lofty and theological. I have a different view. When the fathers who held the levers of power surveyed the work of Vatican 2, and realized that it spelled the end of the monarchy that their position and livelihood depended on, they began the process of limiting the damage. Paul 6 was the harbinger. Still in the thrall of John 23, he was neither a visionary nor a strong man, either would have been disqualifiers for the enclave that elected him. John Paul 1 may or may not have unleashed a hornet's nest by starting an audit of the finances of the Holy See, and he didn’t live long enough to even really begin the work. However the scare was enough to propel the unlikely, and extremely conservative Wojtyła to almost 3 decades of fomenting and leading a backlash, hounding Arrupe and all the liberal Jesuits who were involved in social action and, god forbid, liberation theology, the list goes on, but he had an amazing team of supporters, Santo Subito. He anointed the man who just died to continue the work of “reinterpreting” Vatican 2. 

He passed the torch of stemming the tide to Ratzinger who couldn’t match the charisma of John Paul and was as inspiring as an accountant. Though he did try, even in the face of the erupting sex abuse scandals to rule with an iron hand, he was clearly not up to the job. I was elated when Ratzinger resigned. He lived on, and had a nice retirement. But my gut feeling is that he became a kind of Silenced Saint. Support for an all powerful papal monarchy has become more entrenched, and perhaps even increased. Look at how tired and worn out Francis looks after 10 years.

How much support could we gather for a “Get back to Jesus” movement in the Roman church. Well at least Ratzinger is no longer available to write a compelling list of reasons against it while pretending that it’s already in place.

The word for the day is “bowdlerize,” as in he was great but let’s cut out the slightly offensive parts, or why in hell didn’t he consult the damage control consultants. Some of my favorite bits from the life of Benedict et al were the rehabilitation of neo-Nazi Bishop Richard Williamson of the Society of Pius X  by lifting his excommunication, and, moving right along, taking his nifty red slippers out of the closet while blaming a cabal of gay clergy for the horrific unfolding of the sex abuse scandal.

It is the proper thing to eulogize a former leader of an institution, and to my mind just adds evidence that we are not dealing with anything that could be remotely called spiritual, but rather the survival of a political organization interested in the usual political squabbles, money and most importantly power. I’d been inspired to enter the Jesuits just after Vatican 2. I am not inspired to find a lot of virtue in the life and work of a man whose life work was to contain, even shut down that inspiration.

Jesus--Teacher? Prophet? Saint? God? 

After reading a lot of the hubbub about the Francis vs. Benedict camps among the hierarchy, and of course the straight and true path the Benedict took, the argument swings in favor of Ratzinger because Aristotle saved the world! What I am really asking myself is that it does matter who we say Jesus is. And until almost 400 centuries after the death of Jesus, there was no consensus among believers, or at least we can say that there were several competing schools of thought. Why I say that Aristotle saved the world was the definition by the Council of Nicaea that Jesus was of the same substance as his father. The language Greek and the philosophy was Aristotlian.

Homoousios (the father and the son are of the same substance) vs. Homoiousios (the father and the son are of similar substance)

I’ll go for “It makes not one iota of difference.” It’s all about power and control which are pretty close to being of the same substance.

In the days of Google translator we think that there is a simple equivalency between words of different languages. Beyond ordering pizza or asking directions to the bus stop, this is far from true. Translation becomes especially difficult when dealing with language about God, god, gods, Greek gods, the Hebrew god of Abraham, Allah etc. All these words that refer to the undefined, unknowable and transcendent stem from a particular time and place.

The Council of Nicaea was held in 381, in a town in modern day Turkey after the emperor Constantine moved the capital of the Roman empire from Rome to Constantinople. It was the first council in the history of the Christian church that attempted to address the entire body of believers. It was convened by Constantine to resolve the controversy of Arianism, a doctrine that held that Christ was not divine but a created being. He invited all the bishops, archbishops, metropolitans, presbyters, in both the eastern, Greek, and western, Latin, branches of Christian world. Legend says that of the 1,800 invitees between 250 and 318 attended. 

So, yes, this is about the multiplicity of gods (and I suspect, bringing the Christology of the early communities into the monotheistic fold). In its language it is about the “essence” of god and Jesus. It was also the beginning of the move (or maybe an expression of a movement already afoot) to formulate church doctrine in terms of Greek philosophy. The council fathers (no mothers represented) were trying to formulate a statement declaring that the Lord Jesus was god by asserting that he was of the same essence as god. 

The language of the Council was both Greek and Latin. The official text coming out of the Council was Greek. I don’t know Greek, and even with a dictionary I can't be precise. In Latin however, God of gods does not refer to any multiplicity of gods. I think it is probably best described as a logical tautology: “God is of the essence of God.” Deum verum de Deo vero; natum, non factum; ejusdemque substantiae qua Pater est. As a matter of fact, looking at the latin, the elaboration of the tautology, “light from light” (light is always of the essence of light) seems to be missing, perhaps an addition or a variant text. 

What interests me about Nicaea is the treatment of “being” or “substance.” Without this connecting factor, we’d have at least three gods, two, a Father and a Spirit without form, and Jesus who exists as a kind of pagan demiurge, a member of the multi-leveled god realm who control our fates, who is a created being. This was what Arius taught, and a very large number of the early churches believed. 

What we have is the answer of the council to the followers of Arius. Jesus was truly god of the truly god, he was born (as a human while still remaining god) but not made (in the same way that god made Adam or, for example, the way that the gods created Isis as a manifestation of the divine for the initiates of her cult). He, the Father and the son (filioque) are substantially the same.The filioque would drive another split, but that just gets way too complicated. I vote for Unitarianism just because it’s simpler and more beautiful, but that’s a pond I don’t want to dip my toes into here.

The Case for a spiritual Christianity

As I was searching for an answer to my question about remaining Christian, or perhaps just identifying with the church of our mothers and fathers, but not accepting all the doctrinal overstepping and the insistence on adherence, I thought that perhaps if I took a step back from my hypercritical mind set, relaxed and simply observed the landscape, a convincing argument might present itself. I love the music and art of the church as a real source of spiritual nourishment. Perhaps I could fully embrace a kind of spiritual agnosticism.

In 2019, as I watched the live coverage of the catastrophic fire that almost destroyed the magnificent Cathedral of Notre Dame on April 15th,  I confess, I was in tears. I am a francophile; I love Paris; when I was a student in northern France, I visited the cathedral many times. Watching the fire engulf the whole transept, I was devastated. It touched me on a very deep level that went beyond grief and shock.

Then I remembered another catastrophic disaster. Watching the twin towers burn and collapse, the loss of life and the extreme wanton destruction was horrific. I was also devastated but in a different way. It was a terrorist attack. My feelings were mixed with horror and fear. 

Both the Twin Towers and Notre Dame were iconic markers on the skyline of major cities. Construction on the Twin Towers began on August 6th, 1966 and they fell after a terrorist attack on September 11th, 2001. Pope Alexander III laid the cornerstone for Notre Dame Cathedral in 1163. It took hundreds of years to build--the last major restoration was by Viollet-le-Duc in the mid 19th century. 

I followed the work on replacing and renovating both the Twin Towers and Notre Dame closely. The design process of rebuilding in New York was predictably contentious. Experts and property developers were called in. There were debates about the design, reconfiguring the site, accommodating commercial uses, providing transportation links, and how to remember the victims. Though still the World Trade Center, it would be something different. The process was very American and, at least in form, attempted to look democratic. In France the debate was about whether to allow any changes during the renovation. Initially some suggested a new design for the spire that was a modern innovation when it was rebuilt in the mid-19th century. In short order The French Senate passed a bill requiring that the reconstruction be faithful to its “last known visual state.” They would rebuild the spire exactly as it was, to the millimeter, using the materials and construction techniques specified by Eugène-Emmanuel Viollet-le-Duc, the only accommodation being improvements for modern technology, electricity and building safety, plus a new design for the square in front of the cathedral, underground parking, and the open space and adjacent buildings on the Ile de France.

Both The Twin Towers and Notre Dame caught fire and fell, one completely and large portions of the other, within several hours. That is really the only similarity. In New York a huge number of people perished. In Paris no one died. One was caused by a terrorist attack and the other by accident or negligence. One was a commercial property and the other a sacred space. I was shaken deeply by both tragedies. I watched them both unfold live on TV. Though I hesitate to trace my emotional reactions to a disaster as a path to religious belief, examining my responses has been revealing. 

To extend my theological metaphor, rebuilding the World Center was like the Council of Trent in response to the massive cultural, political and intellectual shift of the Reformation, and renovating Notre Dame is like a careful meditation, a prayer on the source of our faith.

I’ve watched the renovation of Notre Dame searching the internet for every report, argument, and discovery as the work progressed on Le chantier du siècle. When plans were revealed for redesigning the interior space to accommodate current liturgical practice, Alexandre Gady, art historian, said “Curiously it wasn’t the clergy talking about the sacred this morning, it was historians like me who defend historical monuments. Notre Dame is sacred, not just in the Catholic sense but also sacred in the way it unites us, that it speaks to us and that it tells our history.” 

Other critics said that the over zealous clergy of Paris were set on turning their tourist attraction into a spiritual Disneyland.

If all the people who love Notre Dame, whether or not they are committed Catholics or not, whether they belong to other religions or none, whether they’ve have contributed money, time or talent to preserve this valuable artifact of our spiritual heritage, or simply sent their love, if the result is a slick Disney remake of Victor Hugo’s The Hunchback of Notre Dame I’ll know that we are really in the twilight of Western civilization. 

What do I know?

On Christmas eve I started watching this bit of fluff “Inside the Vatican, episode 1” on YouTube. Suddenly there was a very handsome man with a magnificent voice singing to the world. Mark Spyropoulos is a British baritone with Greek roots who found himself in the oldest church choir in the world, the personal choir of the pope, Cappella Musicale Pontificia. 

Mark started talking about singing the Nicaean Creed solo during the televised mass that goes out to millions upon millions. One day he realized how many people had heard him make this profession of faith. He’d sung it at every papal mass for 3 years.

He quoted the Latin: Credo in Unum Deum. “I believe in One God.” He went on, “I didn’t sing, ‘We believe in One God.’” It was he, Mark, who made a very personal profession of faith. He asked himself: Did he really believe in the One God? And what did that even mean? “I don’t even know. Sometimes I feel like a fraud. I’ve just declared the beginning of the Nicaean Creed in front of the Pope and the world, surely I should be sure of what I’m saying. Sometimes I know what I'm singing and sometimes I don’t.”

“If  you ask me if I believe in God, my reply is that I don’t understand the question. What do you mean by God? (I could hear his interviewer prompt him: God as defined by the Catholic Church) These are massive questions.”

“I’m a baritone. What do I know?”

And apparently it became a kind of personal crisis of faith. Aside from the musical insider joke, he really didn’t know. Then he told a story of a rather beautiful personal revelation; I think it was while singing a Bach piece, the 1747 version as opposed to the earlier 1745, the one that Francis preferred. Apparently Francis is a kind of hands-on boss when it comes to certain details.

“Well, what do I know? I'll tell you what I know. I can tell you that when I am immersed in this music, I feel in touch with something.”

Singing he got that he really believed in a power greater than himself. He was actually far more eloquent than my jesuitical argument.

Medici Archive Project, Music Program. Vox Medicea (directed by Mark Spyropoulos).