The Working Catholic: Two Labor Days by Bill Droel

  

The original Labor Day parade was held in 1882, in New York City. It was sponsored by the Knights of Labor. Its organizers were two Catholics. Though not related, they share the same last name. Matthew McGuire (1855-1917) was a machinist from New Jersey; Peter McGuire (1852-1906), working in Chicago at the time, was a carpenter. In 1894 Labor Day became a national holiday and was set on the first Monday of September.

St. Joseph, also a carpenter, is associated with Labor Day in round-about fashion. The saga begins here in Chicago where on May 1, 1886 a federation of labor unions began a campaign for an eight-hour workday. A subsequent rally in our now trendy Haymarket area turned violent when someone threw a stick of dynamite. Police then fired wildly into the crowd. Four workers and seven police died. Seven workers were rounded-up and sentenced, four of whom were hanged in November 1886.

In July 1889 communist leaders in several European countries designated May 1^st as Labor Day to honor the Chicago Haymarket workers. (Illinois Labor History Society; www.illinoislaborhistory.org)

 In 1956, to offset the communist influence on Europe’s Labor Day Pope Pius XII (1876-1958) established May 1^st as the Feast of St. Joseph the Worker. Some U.S. bishops immediately asked to observe the new St. Joseph feast on the first Monday of September in our country only. Permission was granted. Nonetheless instead of the September date, the May 1^st date for St. Joseph took hold in the U.S.

 Ed Marciniak (1917-2004), a Chicago labor activist, saw in the two dates a significant difference in worldviews. People in the U.S. “have never developed a strong class consciousness,” as did those in communist-influenced Europe, he wrote. Working families in Europe drifted away from Catholicism because Church officials there and in Latin America got too much “in league with the wealthy against the poor.” By contrast, U.S. Catholicism “has never had…a hostile working class.” (Since 1968 many Catholics in our country have left the church behind. They walked away out of indifference or lately in disgust, but not out of economic or political hostility.) 

An economic system predicated on “class struggle…will be inadequate and distorted,” Marciniak concludes. So maybe having two dates in our country (May 1^st and first Monday in September) contains a hidden blessing. 

(Learn more about Marciniak in Ed Marcinaik’s City and Church, National Center for the Laity, PO Box 291102, Chicago, IL 60629; $20). 

 

 

The Working Catholic: Mystery by Bill Droel

 

It is commonly ranked as the top professional football play of all time. Only 22-seconds remained in the December 1972 AFC Division final. The Steelers were losing. That’s when Terry Bradshaw pitched the immaculate reception to Franco Harris (1950-2022) for the thrilling victory. The play is legendary; it can be viewed on several websites.

The Eucharist is not a legend. It is not a reenactment. It is not available on instant replay. It is a total reality that contains the Pascal Mystery of Jesus Christ. However, to enter into the Eucharist and absorb the real presence of Jesus/God it is necessary to experience the world as enchanting. And that is a problem. All of us these days are prone to misplaced enchantment. We take many things for granted, assuming that what we don’t know can easily be learned through a Google search. We shift our curiosity to superficialities—to rumors about celebrities, to gossip about schoolmates, to endless detail about daily comings-and-goings. We go to a football game, yet spend our time there attending to our mobile device.

We modern people have replaced awe and reverence with a blasé take on reality. Yes, a rare eclipse stimulates our imaginations. For the most part, however, we neglect the daily discipline of contemplation that would allow us to apprehend the surprising movements of grace lurking within or beneath normal routines. Nearly everything nowadays is taken at face value; and even then not taken too seriously. Ours is an age of irony.

There are moments when we do encounter something that defies the trivial. There are some levels of experience that are not readily explained on the internet. What is the meaning of death? What accounts for singular and incomprehensible recoveries? The internet does not know. Our first reaction is to diminish such things. There are clichés we can use to move on.

Another reaction to uncertainty is a MAGA-style conspiracy theory. It is intolerable that scientists can’t immediately know the cause of and simple cure for Covid-19. So it must be a hoax and the remarkable vaccine is really perpetuating a sinister plot. Our disposition toward the gracious and mysterious is scant.

The Eucharist is a complete story. It is more than a story, of course, but its enchanted drama is prior. Without that prior enchantment, an effort to philosophically explain the Eucharist can unintentionally have an opposite effect. Nor is openness to enchantment aided by too much technical stress on prior requirements for Eucharistic worthiness. No one is worthy. The Eucharist is a gift.

The Eucharist is a dynamic event that cannot be dissected. It has to be captivating. Marriage is a mystery. It must be entered into without total certainty and yet without paralyzing doubt. Marriage reveals what it contains over months and years; in its highs and lows. In the same way, the Eucharist is a mystery. The word mystery is not a cop-out, used by those who lack sensible explanations. The word mystery means that which can only be known in relationship.

Droel edits a print newsletter, INITIATIVES (PO Box 291102, Chicago, IL 60629).

The Working Catholic: NO CONSECRATION by Bill Droel

The bells are back.

Years ago and for years before that, the attention of worshipers at Mass drifted for understandable reasons: their ignorance of Latin and their partially obstructed view of the drama. Congregants often used their time at Mass for private prayer. Thus at key moments in the Mass, particularly at the consecration, altar servers would ring an assemblage of bells. The bells went quietly into a closet nearly 60 years ago. In recent months, however, several churches have dusted off the old Mass bells. Their purpose is similar to what it was in the old days. Only today the distraction is individual use of mobile devices during what should be communal worship.

The Assyrian Church of the East has a Mass/Divine Liturgy ritual (Anaphora of Addai and Mari) without a consecration, also called “words of institution.” This ancient ritual, now used mostly in India, is in full communion with Roman Catholicism. How can this be? How can Jesus Christ be really present in what appears as bread and wine unless the formula of Jesus’ Last Supper is prayed over the bread and wine?

The current Mass ritual for Roman Catholics (the 1969/1970 Novus Ordo) is meant to pull all worshipers into “full and active participation” in this premier prayer. It is a single prayer, from the entrance procession to the dismissal procession. Christ is really present in a magnificent way throughout—beginning to end. Christ is present in the presider (the alter Christus). Christ is really present in the proclamation of God’s revealed Word, through the voice of the lectors. Christ is really present in the communion bread and the communion wine. Christ is really present in the congregation as they pray the Mass and as they head for the exit sign, acting as members of the Mystical Body of Christ.

Isn’t it possible that the truth of Christ really present in the entire Mass is conveyed as well in the Anaphora of Addai and Mari Rite (without an explicit consecration) as in the Latin Rite (with or without bells)? Still, is the Anaphora of Addai and Mari valid?

Most Catholics in the United States celebrate Mass in what is called the Latin Rite and most presume theirs (be it celebrated in Spanish, English or Polish) is the only Mass ritual. Yet in addition to the Latin Rite, Roman Catholicism has several other equally valid rites. For example, in October 2009 Pope Benedict XVI approved the Anglican Rite. Its Mass, celebrated here-and-there in Great Britain, the United States and India, varies only slightly from the Latin Rite. The ancient Byzantine Rite is widely used in the East, but also at a small number of designated parishes in the U.S. It has many differences from the Latin Rite. There is likewise the Maronite Rite used in Lebanon. There’s the Ge’ez Rite used in Ethiopia and also in Chicago’s Uptown neighborhood. All of these rites are equally valid within Roman Catholicism. So too are several more that are traced to the early days of Christianity.

Keep in mind too that the Mass or Divine Liturgy in all of the Eastern Orthodox churches is valid and licit; that Christ is truly and really present in their worship. 

The Assyrian Church of the East (the Addai and Mari Rite), which belongs to the East Syriac Rite, is not Eastern Orthodox; it is a separate branch of Christianity. Its Mass, as mentioned, is quite different from a Latin Rite Mass. However, it is valid and licit; Christ is truly and really present in their worship. Since 2001 there has even been an official agreement allowing “mutual admission” of one another’s worshipers between Assyrian Church of the East and Roman Catholicism.

To make matters more complicated and more interesting, Roman Catholicism judges the Mass of several break-away denominations to be valid, though not licit. That is, Christ is really present in their Liturgy/Mass, even though their rites may differ from the common Latin Rite. By illicit, Roman Catholicism means disapproval of their independent governance status. The Polish National Catholic Church, headquartered in Scranton, is one example.

Suffice it to say that God is bigger than any one parish, bigger than any one formula for the Mass/Liturgy and certainly bigger than any two-minute segment of a liturgy.

Droel edits a print newsletter on faith and work, INITIATIVES (PO Box 291102, Chicago,

The Working Catholic: Eucharist by Bill Droel

 

Our U.S. Catholic bishops host a Eucharistic Congress in Indianapolis from July 17-21, 2024. It is the culmination of a three-year process meant to teach the real presence of Jesus/God in the Eucharist.  The bishops are reacting to surveys that seemingly show that Catholics do not know or do not believe the dogma of the Eucharist. (There is ambiguity. For example, to answer a survey question by saying “the Eucharist is a symbol” does not preclude the belief that it is God’s real presence. It can be both. Additionally, our bishops have multiple motives. For example, one faction is using the Eucharistic Congress to highlight a contradiction between President Joseph Biden’s devotion to the Eucharist and his support for abortion access.)

Pope Pius X (1835-1914) was a conservative. He opposed several modern trends. However, he is credited with opening the door to modern liturgical reforms, centering them in the dogma of the Eucharist. In the first two decades of the 20 th century, monasteries in Germany, France and Belgium experimented with reforms that were soon enough authorized at Vatican II (1962-1965). These changes are meant to bring worshipers into closer relationship with the Eucharistic, through the Mass. They include prayers at Mass said aloud by the entire congregation—the Gloria, the Creed, the Sanctus, the Lamb of God and several responses. The Mass itself is prayed in the vernacular, rather than in Latin—in Spanish, English, Polish and more. Taking a cue from Pius X, regular reception of the Eucharist in both the consecrated wine and bread is the norm, no longer something rare or selective. Qualms about one’s worthiness are taken care of in the opening penitential rite of the Mass.

It is interesting to note that from the early 1900s until Vatican II, the liturgical movement was connected with the virtue of social justice. For example, Fr. Lambert Beauduin, OSB (1873-1960), a major figure in the liturgical movement, was a labor chaplain with a strong social conscience and compassion for the poor. Fr. Virgil Michel, OSB (1890-1938) of Minnesota did more than anyone else in the U.S. to promote the liturgical movement and the dogma of the Eucharist. “The liturgy is the ordinary school for [and] the indispensable basis of social reconstruction,” Michel said. The Eucharist inside a church is a failure if it doesn’t live in jobsites and neighborhoods during the week, he preached.

The concept linking Eucharist and social regeneration is called the Mystical Body of Christ. The Mystical Body is Christ acting all week long through people who are allergic to injustice. The phrase was well-known in the years prior to Vatican II. Then it quietly disappeared. 

Could the loss of the Mystical Body concept be listed among the causes of weak appreciation for the Eucharistic dogma? Might a renewed emphasis on social renewal be an effective way to reverence Christ’s real presence in the Eucharist? To be continued…

Droel edits a newsletter on faith and work for National Center for the Laity (PO Box 291102, Chicago, IL

60629)

Humanity and the quest for peace.

 

Isaiah 11

Could there be an evolving of humanity’s awareness of the sacredness of the material and the spiritual?  It would move us towards creation and away from destruction.  (The evolving Divine Milieu – Teilhard de Chardin)  

With wars raging, peace seems impossible.  An ethic of non-violence is unimaginable, but let’s look to St. Paul.  He followed Genesis, ‘all is good’ and Romans 8, All creation is groaning for redemption.    

Love exists in our experience of family and friends.  We are waiting for love that is beyond friendship or family.  We wait for love that is unconditional for all creation.

For in hope we were saved.  Now hope that sees for itself is not hope.  For who hopes for what one sees?  But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait with endurance.  (Romans 8:24-25)

Are we evolving towards universal unconditional love for all creation?   (The evolving  Divine Milieu – Tailhard de Chardin)

 

PBS  -  Teilhard de Chardin, scientific visionary

MPT Presents | Teilhard: Visionary Scientist | PBS

Moral Guidelines

 

Rembrandt

Have we lost our way?  

President Joe Biden seems impervious to the criticism that sending arms to Israel resulting in massive killings is wrong.  Candidate and former President Donald Trump is without shame with the revelation of his sexual crimes. His business dealings even violate capitalist norms. Both men have millions of followers.  
Thomas Friedman says we’ve lost our moorings as a society. (“How We’ve Lost Our Moorings as a Society” May 28, 2024, New York Times)

But what about the ancient Decalogue, the ten commandments? The spring festival of Shavous celebrates God giving the Law to the Hebrews.  Is this just ritual?

The Law states: “You shall not kill; you shall not covet your neighbor’s wife or your neighbor’s goods.”  Have we dismissed the Decalogue?  Are we pursuing the idolatry of the Golden Calf?  (Ex. 32:19)  

As a nation, our Golden Calf is power and money.

The Two-Fold Detour of Christianity in the Fourth Century by Matthew Fox

 Christianity took a two-fold detour in the fourth century.  First, when the emperor Constantine became Christian and spread Christianity through the empire in order to make some peace between warring factions of Christians.

While peacemaking is a good thing, Christianity paid a severe price when it moved from being essentially a thorn in the empire's side to being a crusade in Christ's name.

New Testament scholar Dominic Crossan wonders aloud if the Nicene Creed called by Constantine was a 'nightmare.'

The 'desert fathers' movement (beginning third century) and subsequent monastic movements (beginning fourth century) both resisted the dominant imperial values of the imperial culture before and after Constantine.

The price paid by a so-called "Cristian empire" was severe on indigenous peoples, their cultures and religions especially from the time of Columbus on.  "Christian empires" of the Spanish, Portuguese, English, Dutch, or Belgian colonizers seldom qualified as something Christ-like.

The second shadow that emerged in the name of Christianity in the fourth century was that of Augustine and his cherished Neo-Platonism.

Augustine planted dualisms of body vs. soul, sexuality vs. spirituality, nature vs. grace, male vs. female alongside his notion of original sin that fashioned a dualistic Christianity that spread in Western Europe and beyond. 

There were movements that resisted this dualism--Aquinas was key--but as historian Pere Chenu laments, it never really took hold in the church. 

Christianity became less and less moored to Jesus and his teachings and to the original meaning of the Christ event--including the Cosmic Christ and a creation-centered mysticism.

Unmoored from the gospels, it became moored to the needs of empire-building including invoking the idea of 'redemption' (understood as redemption from original sin) as the rallying cry to conquer peoples of the earth.  And preaching that one was doomed to hell if this 'redemption' was not accomplished exclusively through Christ.  And feeding the Doctrine of Discovery (mercifully but belatedly buried recently by Pope Francis after five+ centuries).  

The Nicene Creed, crafted by bishops under the eye of Emperor Constantine, does show important traces of the Cosmic Christ cosmology, but it astonishingly leaves out the teaching of Jesus.  No mention whatsoever of 'love thy neighbor'; 'what you do to the least you do to me"; "Be you compassionate as your Father in heaven is compassionate"; the Beatitudes; or justice.  One has to look elsewhere for that--maybe back to the gospels themselves?