Roger Ebert, RIP

The news has come across the wire this evening that Roger Ebert has died. Just yesterday he wrote that, though his cancer had returned, he was nonetheless brimming with plans for the future: a new web site, his film festival, a documentary on his life. It makes for poignant reading tonight.

Like many people, I first encountered him through the television programme he hosted with Gene Siskel, only later discovering that he was primarily a critic in print. I remember being fascinated by the television show, principally, I think, because I had never before heard considered judgments and articulate criticism about much of anything, still less something as commonplace as movies. It was my first intimation that there might be more to the movies than just entertainment.  Those old shows, segments of which have made their way onto YouTube, still make for good viewing.

His print reviews make for good reading too. He could almost always be counted on to give a clear account of a film’s strengths and weaknesses, often with considerable wit. (Bad films, especially, seemed to inspire his muse, and his collection of critical pans, Your Movie Sucks, makes for terrific occasional reading.) High praise from him was often enough to convince me to clear some time for a film I might otherwise have passed over. I am going to miss my weekly visit to his site.

Readers of this blog might be interested in something he wrote exactly one month ago: a short essay called “How I Am a Roman Catholic”. Those who read him regularly will know that he grew up in a devout Catholic family, attended Catholic schools, but drifted — so I gather — from the practice of the faith in his adult years. Yet Catholicism remained in his bones, and he continued to circle around it. Indeed, in this recent essay he insisted that “I consider myself Catholic, lock, stock, and barrel”. True, this confession was confused to no small extent by his admission that he “cannot believe in God”. I take him to have meant that he had doubts, that he had no firm assurance of faith. If so, he would hardly be alone in that.

In that same essay he, rather surprisingly, staked out a position on a question of current moral controversy that was not calculated to endear him to people who matter. In other words, he was true to his critical task to the end: saying what he thought, with clarity and reason, and leaning into the wind when it blew contrary-wise.

Requiescat in pace.

Pope Francis

Habemus Papam!

It appears that my decision to not follow any of the pre-conclave speculations on papal candidates saved time and energy; Pope Francis seems to have taken most commentators by surprise. I am surprised too; I had, to my recollection, never heard of Jorge Mario Cardinal Bergoglio before yesterday. The two or three minutes during which he was on the balcony were hardly sufficient to form any adequate idea of the man, but he made a strong and favourable impression on me. Notice that he spent most of those minutes praying with and for the people gathered to greet him. A good beginning.

Among the three or four bits of background that are floating up into news reports is the observation that he has been known in Argentina as an unusually humble and self-effacing cleric, eschewing most of the pomp of his  office in favour of a life of relative simplicity. His choice of name would seem to be indicate that such observations are relevant to the kind of pope we can expect him to be. I am personally an enthusiast for papal pomp — the restoration of which was for me one of the attractive aspects of Benedict XVI’s reign — but I can also see the appeal of a principled (as opposed to a desultory) simplicity, such as one finds in Benedictine monasteries and (naturally) in the life of St. Francis of Assisi.

The two most informative pieces I have seen on Pope Francis were both written before his election. John Allen, who is generally regarded as being the best informed and most astute Vatican journalist in the English-speaking world, wrote a profile of him a few weeks ago, and back in 2005 the Catholic Herald published a fairly lengthy essay by Jose Maria Poirier about him after Benedict XVI’s election:

If he were Pope? Everything suggests that his approach would be above all pastoral, which is what a number of the cardinals were looking for in the conclave. He would govern the Curia with a sure hand, as he does his diocese. He would likely take a firm stand with the powerful of this world. But the modern-day media demands on the papacy would be a torture for this most retiring of Church leaders.

It would be a torture for most of us, I expect. The Holy Father made it clear in his first address that he wants the Catholic faithful to pray for him; Janet Cupo has posted a few suitable prayers.

A fond farewell

I have not written anything about Pope Benedict XVI’s recent announcement that he will step down from the papal chair. I was surprised — more surprised than I should have been had I been paying closer attention — and I am still trying to decide what I think about it. It was a prudential decision, and I have no doubt that he believes this decision to be best for the Church at this time. But I am sorry to see him go; I have a great deal of affection for this Holy Father, and I am saddened at the thought that he has found his service to us to be too much for him in his old age.

I am in no position to offer a general appraisal or summation of this pontificate, but a few highlights stand out in my mind: his beatification of Blessed John Henry Newman in England in 2010; his canonization of St. Hildegard of Bingen in 2012; his dedication to a renewal of the Church’s liturgical life, especially by granting permission for the wide(r)spread celebration of the pre-Vatican II liturgical rites and his creation of the Anglican Ordinariate (which, besides being a bridge to greater Christian unity, also has the potential to make the so-called “Anglican Use” rite more widely available, which for English-speaking Catholics can only be a good thing); and his clear and courageous speeches on numerous occasions, especially those delivered in Regensburg in 2006 and in London in 2010. On a personal note, I had the joy of seeing Pope Benedict in person on two occasions, both times in St. Peter’s Square in Rome.

Almost immediately after his announcement, pundits began speculating aloud about who might succeed him. Even people whom, I would have thought, were indifferent to or hostile to Catholicism were suddenly ready with advice. How very kind. As for myself, I have made a two-fold resolution: I am not going to read any (more) such speculations, which are too often simply self-serving wish lists, and, like Janet, I am going to begin praying now for the new pontiff, whoever he may be.

Much has been written about Benedict’s papacy in the last couple of weeks, and though I have not had time to read very much of it, here are a few of the better articles that I have come across:

• John Milbank, the brilliant Anglican theologian, has written a substantial essay drawing mostly on Benedict XVI’s encyclical Caritas in Veritate in which he explores the “erotic politics” of Benedict’s thought — that is, the way in which the Holy Father’s understanding of love, and especially of eros (widely understood), informs his thinking about politics and the public good.
• Tracey Rowland, who has written a book on Pope Benedict’s theological thought, writes at Crisis about his intellectual milieu: his teachers and his students. This is a reminder of just how central Joseph Ratzinger has been to Catholic theology in the past fifty years. These shoes are going to be difficult to fill.
• At the New York Times Ross Douthat raises a number of concerns about the Holy Father’s decision to step down, and I admit that they resonate with me. There is a real sense, he writes, in which this decision is at odds with the idea of the papacy:
  

  There is great symbolic significance in the fact that popes die rather than resign: It’s a reminder that the pontiff is supposed to be a spiritual father more than a chief executive (presidents leave office, but your parents are your parents till they die), a sign of absolute papal surrender to the divine will (after all, if God wants a new pope, He’ll get one), and a illustration of the theological point that the church is still supposed to be the church even when its human leadership isn’t at fighting trim, whether physically or intellectually or (for that matter) morally.

• David Warren writes that Benedict may have taken this unusual step in order to devote himself to the spiritual, rather than to the merely administrative, responsibilities with which he has been entrusted:
  

  And in retiring to a life of prayer, this man elected Pope may be taking upon himself a Gethsemane that only he fully understands, in light of his direct experience of Church government. The weight of the malice directed towards Rome, from the world outside but also from within many Church quarters, is something that must be dealt with not only pastorally, & politically, but in a mystical way, & thus necessarily out of public view. Benedict discerns that all his waning physical powers must be concentrated on that task, leaving the governing, pastoral, & other functions (iconic, liturgical, &c) to a successor. He took the name “Benedict,” which belonged to the founder of European monasticism. It is entirely possible that he knows what he is doing.

I hope, and trust, that it is so.

Pope Benedict held his last general audience earlier today; here is video of the final sung Pater Noster and his last papal blessing. Look at that smile. How I would have loved to be there:

Once at a time

Work out your own salvation
with fear and trembling.
– Epistle to the Philippians –

In the context of a discussion of Kierkegaard, Etienne Gilson touches on a matter fit for Lenten reflection:

Christianity’s own goal and solemn promise is to give each man eternal beatitude. It is both that promise and the way to fulfill it. Such a promise is for man of a literally “infinite” interest, and the only way for him to welcome it is to experience an “infinite passion” for it. In terms of the religious life, this means that the only answer a man can give to God’s message is a passionate will to achieve his own salvation, that is, to achieve his own infinite beatitude. A half-hearted effort to such an end would be quite out of proportion with it; it would not at all be a will to that end; it would not be that will at all.

On the other hand, if such a will actually arises in any man, it has to be the will to his own salvation, because what God has promised is actually to save him. Whether or not he was aware of the fact, Kierkegaard himself was merely repeating Bernard of Clairvaux, when he said: “This problem concerns no one but me.” And such indeed is the case, if the problem actually is to know how I myself can share in that beatitude which Christianity promises.

True enough, the same problem arises for each and every man, so that for an infinite number of men its solution, which is Christianity itself, is bound to be the same, but this does not mean that there is a general solution to the problem. Quite the reverse. Out of its own nature, this is such a problem as requires to be solved, an infinite number of times, once at a time; to solve it differently is not to solve it at all.

– Being and Some Philosophers

Laird: Into the Silent Land

Into the Silent Land
A Guide to the Christian Practice of Contemplation
Martin Laird
(Oxford, 2006)
154 p.

In this short but substantial book, Martin Laird gives a practical introduction to Christian contemplative prayer. It is a difficult, because profound, subject, and an adequate treatment calls for humility and fidelity and, not least, personal experience. Insofar as I can judge, Laird is a faithful guide. He draws widely on the Christian tradition of prayer, from the Church Fathers, the Carmelite mystics, spiritual masters east and west, and from contemporary writers such as Simone Weil. Despite his academic credentials (Laird is a professor at Villanova University) he wears his learning lightly and the tone of the book is personal and pastoral.

The purpose of contemplative prayer is to dispose one to encounter God. I phrase it this way intentionally: contemplation is not a technique with a guaranteed outcome, but a practice that prepares one for a personal encounter that comes at a time and in a manner not of one’s own choosing. Laird uses the image of the sailor: there is nothing he can do to make the wind blow, but there are skills he can develop to take advantage when it does, and the Christian contemplative tradition is substantially about developing this receptive attitude.  For it is an illusion, says Laird, to think that we are separated from God; in Him we live and move and have our being, but we are not aware of this. Contemplation is about slowly “excavating the present moment” in order to become aware of and receptive to God’s loving presence.

The principal contemplative practice is the cultivation of an intentional silence, a silence of body and mind. In a sense, it is quite simple: “Preserve a loving attentiveness to God with no desire to feel or understand any particular thing concerning God,” says St. John of the Cross. But inevitably there are difficulties, and chief among them are distractions — wandering thoughts, worries, day-dreams, and so on, which prevent the mind being quiet and attentive. Laird is particularly helpful in describing how to deal with such problems. He describes controlled breathing exercises (which remind me of non-Christian meditative practices, but which he plausibly argues is a neglected part of our own tradition too) and, most importantly, the “prayer word” which is repeated quietly, over and over, as a way of maintaining focus. The most common “prayer word” in the Christian tradition is the Jesus Prayer — more common in the East than the West, it is true — but it is a personal choice. (I myself lean on fragments of Psalm 46:10 and Ezekiel 36:26, or something from St. Augustine.) Laird gives quite a lot of attention to psychological aspects of contemplative prayer — to the abandonment of false personae, encounters with old emotional wounds, and other stages of spiritual maturation that are typically encountered in a dedicated contemplative practice.

This book has been for me an encouragement. The contemplative tradition has always attracted me, and I know that it is my path, but I have not been diligent in walking it. At some level I am afraid of delving too deep and dredging up a spiritual crisis of some sort; this has happened before, and it rendered me largely unfit for anything else. These days I have more or less all-consuming family responsibilities and I haven’t the luxury of being unfit. Hence my hesitation. But this book has made me reconsider my situation. Perhaps it cannot hurt to take up the Jesus Prayer again and see what happens. It’s a baby step, but one in the right direction.

[St. Augustine]
The third commandment enjoins quietness of heart, tranquility of mind. This is holiness. Because here is the Spirit of God. This is what a true holiday means, quietness and rest. Unquiet people recoil from the Holy Spirit. They love quarreling. They love argument. In their restlessness they do not allow the silence of the Lord’s Sabbath to enter their lives. Against such restlessness we are offered a kind of Sabbath in the heart. As if God were saying ‘stop being so restless, quieten the uproar in your minds. Let go of the idle fantasies that fly around in your head.’ God is saying, ‘Be still and see that I am God.” (Ps 46) But you refuse to be still. You are like the Egyptians tormented by gnats. These tiniest of flies, always restless, flying about aimlessly, swarm at your eyes, giving no rest. They are back as soon as you drive them off. Just like the futile fantasies that swarm in our minds. Keep the commandment. Beware of this plague.

Feast of St. Thomas Aquinas, 2013

I like to do something to honour the feast of St. Thomas every year (2012, 2011, 2010, 2009). This year the day has snuck up on me, so I’ll simply use what I have at hand. I have been reading — or trying to read, really — Etienne Gilson’s Being and Some Philosophers, in which St. Thomas’ metaphysics of being has a starring role. Here is a passage I highlighted:

This is a cardinal point in the doctrine of Thomas Aquinas. To posit substance as the proper receiver of existence (proprium susceptivum ejus quod est esse) is not to posit it as a “container” into which existence has but to flow in order to make it be. So long as there is no existence, there is no receptacle to receive it. Existence is here fulfilling an entirely different function. As we have already described it, the substance is “that which” exists, and it is quod est in virtue of its form. Form then is ultimate act in the order of substantiality. In other words, there is no form of the form. Consequently, should we have to ascribe “to be” or “is” to a form, it could not be considered as a form of that form. No point could be more clearly stated than is this one in the metaphysics of Thomas Aquinas.

My emphases. Maybe I am just not getting enough sleep these days, but I’ll give a special prize to anyone who can state this a little more clearly.

In the meantime, here is something edifying: my friend Adam Hincks, S.J. has posted a short reflection on the principal lessons he learned from a recent course he took on Thomistic metaphysics: What I Learned from St. Thomas Aquinas.

Merry Christmas!

A little late this year, but no less sincere: Merry Christmas!

Alma Redemptoris Mater, solemn tone

Last week when I posted the music for the Advent compline antiphon Alma Redemptoris Mater, Osbert pointed out that the same text has a solemn setting that is, in his words, “one of my favourite melodies in the entire plainchant repertory”. He has good reason to think so. I believe that this is the setting he was talking about:

Today being a great feast of Our Lady, I can hardly imagine a better day to start learning it.

Alma Redemptoris Mater

For the seasons of Advent and Christmas the usual Compline hymn to Our Lady (viz. Salve Regina) is replaced by Alma Redemptoris Mater. I do not know it nearly as well as I ought to. Care to practice with me?

O loving Mother of our Redeemer,
Gate of heaven, Star of the sea,
Hasten to aid thy fallen people who strive to rise again.
Thou who brought forth thy holy Creator,
All creation wond’ring, yet remainest ever Virgin,
Taking from Gabriel’s lips that joyful “Hail!”:
Be merciful to us sinners.

From such a humble thread, many glories have been woven. Here is a resplendent performance of a setting, for six voices, by Diego Ortiz. (The conductor’s manner in this video comes perilously close to being antic, but I give him the benefit of the doubt. The sound he coaxes from his choir covers a multitude of sins. And don’t give up on this too soon; it gets better as it goes on.)

(Hat-tip: The Chant Cafe)

Sing, but keep going

Tomorrow being the first day of Advent, today is the final day of the Christian year. I love the second reading from today’s Office of Readings, which comes from a sermon of St. Augustine:

O the happiness of the heavenly alleluia, sung in security, in fear of no adversity! We shall have no enemies in heaven, we shall never lose a friend. God’s praises are sung both there and here, but here they are sung in anxiety, there in security; here they are sung by those destined to die, there, by those destined to live forever; here they are sung in hope, there, in hope’s fulfillment; here they are sung by wayfarers, there, by those living in their own country.

So, then, my brothers, let us sing now, not in order to enjoy a life of leisure, but in order to lighten our labors. You should sing as wayfarers do — sing, but continue your journey. Do not be lazy, but sing to make your journey more enjoyable. Sing, but keep going. What do I mean by keep going? Keep on making progress. This progress must be in virtue; for there are some, the Apostle warns, whose only progress is in vice. If you make progress, you will be continuing your journey, but be sure that your progress is in virtue, true faith, and right living. Sing then — but keep going.

“Sing, but keep going” always puts me in mind of my favourite walking hymn, “I Feel the Winds of God Today”. Since I cannot find a good version online, let’s hear instead Ralph Vaughan Williams’ Variants on Dives and Lazarus, which is based on the same tune:

And may I take this opportunity, a little early, to wish everyone a good Advent.