Catholic Sensibility

One of my favorite greetings to our 17-year-old cat is, “I count on Count.”

Mi gato bello. People who meet him think he’s female, but he’s always been a “man’s cat,” as my wife says.

Lately, he’s been spending a lot of time on the computer hutch:

My wife is starting to worry about him. He cries to get attention. He seems to have lost a bit of body mass. But he still has a healthy appetite and he purrs loudly when petted or groomed. He’s begun to eliminate around the upstairs of the house, rather than use the litter boxes in the basement. But he’s still rather spry, and will chase the younger cats and consent to be chased.

The worry is that we’re getting close to the end. Of course, he may still have many years left in him; he’s always been extremely healthy. His teeth and gums are good. None of the other maladies that have bothered our other rescued pets.

If all the earth’s water were gathered into one sphere, it would be slightly larger than Saturn’s number two moon, Rhea. According to this illustration, I can see it from my backyard. The USGS gives some helpful info here.

In the whole of 1 Corinthians 15, Saint Paul is less comforting the mourners and more trying to exhort the believers into a better expression of the Christian life. This passage we look at today is definitely aimed at the mourners, even if their situation is somewhat different than the ancient Church at Corinth.

Let’s read:

Behold, I tell you a mystery.
We shall not all fall asleep, but we will all be changed,
  in an instant, in the blink of an eye, at the last trumpet.
For the trumpet will sound, the dead will be raised incorruptible,
  and we shall be changed.
 
For that which is corruptible must clothe itself with incorruptibility,
  and that which is mortal must clothe itself with immortality.
 
And when this which is corruptible clothes itself with incorruptibility
  and this which is mortal clothes itself with immortality,
  then the word that is written shall come about:
“Death is swallowed up in victory.
Where, O death, is your victory?
Where, O death, is your sting?”
 
The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law.
But thanks be to God
  who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.

The first part of this passage echoes an earlier writing of Saint Paul in Thessalonians. We looked at it here. I like this first part of the reading. Paul calls us closer, like he’s sharing a very important insight: a professor quieting down and getting the whole class’s attention. Or a trusted guide taking us aside and gesturing to the trail ahead, drawing back the curtain on some new wonder. And so it will be.

Paul borrows from deeper in his Judaism, too. Isaiah (25:8, another funeral selection) contributes verse 55 (green) and Hosea gives verse 56 (blue), and the two quotations from the different prophets make for a fitting taunt of human mortality. I suppose it’s fine for us to poke at death, the eventual vanquished, from behind the robes of the Lord.

I do think that the passage from Isaiah 25:6-9 makes for a good pairing with this 1 Corinthians. It gives the mourners a message of hope. It’s a quiet sequence in which we acknowledge things don’t seem right–just yet. Perhaps we think our hopes have been defeated, and we doubt the time after death. But the apostle Paul is a trusted guide. And even more, we can rely on Christ. If this message of comfort needs to be built up in the mourners, then chose a good gospel message to follow. Let Jesus have the last word, because it’s sure going to be a good one when that last trumpet wails.

The Liturgy of the Word always leads off with the reassembled people of Israel listening to the Law for the first time in their lives:

12. Three readings are used in the liturgy of the word. The texts are chosen from those in the Lectionary (nos. 704 to 706) for the rite of the dedication of a church.

The first reading is always, even during the Easter season, the passage of Nehemiah that tells of the people of Jerusalem gathered in the presence of the scribe Ezra to hear the proclamation of the law of God (Neh 8:1-4a, 5-6, 8-10).

FYI, this passage is also proclaimed on the Third Sunday in Ordinary Time.

13. After the readings the bishop gives the homily, in which he explains the biblical readings and the meaning of the dedication of a church.
The profession of faith is always said. The general intercessions are omitted, since the Litany of the Saints is sung in their place.

Diocese–check. Between dioceses and national conference–check, check. What support can catechists and the ministry of formation expect from Rome? Pope John Paul II sees the role of Rome as a service to sister dioceses everywhere, but also something of the very essence of what it means to be a particular Church:

270. “The command of Christ to preach the Gospel to every creature applies primarily and immediately to them (the Bishops)—with Peter, and subject to Peter”. (Ad Gentes 38a; cf. canon law 756 §§ 1-2) The ministry of the Successor of Peter—in this collegial mandate of Jesus regarding the proclamation and transmission of the Gospel—assumes a basic responsibility. This ministry must be considered “not only as a global service reaching every Church from the outside, but from inside as something already belonging to the essence of every particular Church”. (John Paul II, Allocution to the Bishops of the United States of America, during the meeting in the seminary of Our Lady of Los Angeles 16-IX-1987. The expression is taken from Communionis Notio 13 (CDF, 1993).)

The Congregation for Clergy is key, we read:

The ministry of Peter in catechesis is exercised in an eminent way through its teachings. The Pope, in what regards catechesis, acts in an immediate and particular way through the Congregation for Clergy, which assists “the Roman Pontiff in the exercise of his supreme pastoral office”. (Apostolic Constitution Pastor Bonus, art. 1. This constitution, of 28 June 1988, deals with the reform of the Roman Curia which had been requested by the Council: cf. Christus Dominus 9. The first reform was promulgated by Regimmini Ecclesiae 18 (Paul VI, 1967).)

Five functions exist for this curial department, all lifted word for word from the 1988 document Pastor Bonus:

271. The Congregation for the Clergy thus:

– “has the function of promoting the religious education of the Christian faithful of all ages and conditions;

– issues timely norms so that catechetical lessons be conducted according to a proper programme;

– maintains a watchful attention to the suitable delivery of catechetical instruction;

– grants, with the assent of the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith, the prescribed approbation of the Holy See for catechisms and other writings pertaining to catechetical instruction; (See nn. 282 and 284 of this chapter)

– is available to catechetical offices and international initiatives on religious education, coordinates their activities and, where necessary, it lends assistance”. (Pastor Bonus 94)

Are you surprised the Congregation for Clergy is on point for this?