Archive Posts Year of Faith 2012-13

Week One

The logo of the Year of Faith. The ship symbolises the Church. The mast of the vessel is a cross with full-blown sails which form the monogram of Christ (IHS) and in the background is a sun representing the Eucharist.

First Week opening posts here

Gospel Cannot Thrive on Pride - Loving this one - Summary From Rocco Palmo.

Pope Benedict Full Text Opening Speech at Synod "Two Keys." Very wordy !

At the Synod, English Bishop Kieran Conry of the Diocese of Arundel & Brighton talks about the legacy of Vatican II for his diocese and the Year of Faith and the challenges faced by the loss of people from the church. This is good, especially his closing statement !

Click here for Vatican Radio mp3 interview with Bishop Conry.

Pope Benedict's personal memories of Vatican II .

The Holy See has published the new official texts of the Mass for the New Evangelisation. It is hoped that this Mass text will be used at appropriate celebrations throughout the Year of Faith. You can access the new mass texts here:

There will be a multilingual pastoral guide entitled "Living the Year of Faith" which is due to be published shortly and pilgrims to Rome during the year will receive an image of the Christ from the Cathedral of Cefalù in Sicily (above), with the following text: "May the Year of Faith lead all believers to learn by heart the Creed and to say it every day as a prayer, so that the breath matches the faith"

Year of Faith Hymn
The Year of Faith now has an official hymn downloadable here: "Credo, Domine, adauge nobis fidem". (I believe, Lord increase my faith). The music and words have been designed for congregational singing throughout the Year of Faith and beyond, mixing the verses in English with the refrain in Latin.
- Damian Howard SJ from the Online Journal of The British Jesuits, opens Thinking Faith’s series for the Year of Faith by reflecting in this article on why a whole year devoted to the experience and practice of faith could be a moment of healing for the Church.

Rowan Williams, Archbishop of Canterbury addresses the Synod. Full text here. (H/T to Rocco Palmo for link)

He talks a lot about the discipline of contemplation. Nice to see he mentions Thomas Merton and Taize too.
- I like this article "Defining Vatican II's rules of engagement" by Andrew Hamilton Consulting Editor of Australian publication Eureka Street . It clarifies the different ways we communicate depending on our attitude to the way in which we believe the forms of Vatican II are addressed.
- Some personal reflections on Vatican II from here
  - Poem and Prayer for Year of Faith
    - Friday Fish Year of Faith
      - Mandalas in The Year of Faith.

Week Two

Don't forget to check out the archives page on my blog side bar.

Time Magazine's man at the Synod of Bishops, Rupert Blair Kaiser gives 2012 Tablet lecture to mark Vatican II's 50th anniversary. Title of article "Don't let anyone tell you the Council didn't change much." Click here to read article.

Toronto's Cardinal recalls "Beautiful Vatican II ", 50 years on .

"A faith that's sad or mad and not glad is bad"

An mp3 recording of the Cardinal in interview here.

"We fail future generations if we allow Vatican II to fade."

Chris McDonnell speaks at meeting of Catholics concerned at direction
of Post- Conciliar Church - Tablet article here - 11 October 2012.

Humour in The Year of Faith: A light - hearted and hopefully not too irreverent a post.

Inside The Synod. Round Up of Events and Videos from here

American Martyrs and First North American Native Saint

Archbishops address the problem of conversion from Islam to Christianity

Week Three

A Few Personal Thoughts on Evangelisation

The Pope on The Nature of Faith Full Address

John Allen's round up of the Synod from NCR here entitled

"A Global Crop of Cardinals; Syria; Vatileaks; and Possible Popes."

Concluding Message From Synod Of Bishops

Fr. Adolfo Nicolás, superior general of the Jesuits, recently talked about the New Evangelization at the synod of bishops meeting in Rome this month to discuss the Church’s missionary outreach. Speaking as the head of a missionary order and as a missionary himself (he spent most of his life in Asia), Fr. Nicolás offered seven principles for missionary work.

The full text of Pope Benedict XVI's homily at the Final Mass of the XIII Ordinary Assembly of the Synod of Bishops for the New Evangelization.

WEEK FOUR

The synod is now over, so what follows ???

From Thinking Faith, The Online Journal of The British Jesuits four articles

Dominic Robinson SJ explores the pope’s call to evangelise in the light of Vatican II Council’s understanding of evangelisation and later developments of this teaching.

The three below are from the Thinking Faith Archives
Jesuit theologian James Corkery explores the background to and content of one of his favourite documents of Vatican II, Dei Verbum, the Dogmatic Constitution on Divine Revelation.  http://www.thinkingfaith.org/articles/20121017_1.htm

Isabel Smyth SND examines the origins of Nostra aetate, the Second Vatican Council’s decree on the Church and other faiths, and looks at the enormous impact it had on inter-faith relations and the questions it leaves us with today.   http://www.thinkingfaith.org/articles/20101027_1.htm

  50^th Anniversary of Vatican II: The history and legacy of the council  Read here
Oliver Rafferty SJ asks to what extent the Council achieved the initial aims that were set for it by Pope John XXIII. What were the implications of contemporary global events, and where are we now in relation to Vatican II?http://www.thinkingfaith.org/articles/20121012_1.htm

NOVEMBER

CLICK HERE FOR NOVEMBER UPDATE RESOURCES FOR YEAR OF FAITH

Vatican Diary :

A selection of the most significant remarks – or the most curious – made in the assembly during the course of the twenty-two general congregations, at twelve of which Benedict XVI was present. ( From journalist Sandro Magister)

Being Catholic in a Secular Culture: Text and audio of address by Bishop Egan

The above address was given by the Rt Rev. Philip Egan, the Bishop of Portsmouth, at the Faith and Culture Symposium at Aquinas College, Stockport, organised by the Diocese of Shrewsbury as one of the events to mark the Year of Faith opened by Pope Benedict XVI on October 11.

Pope Benedict has established a new Pontifical Academy for Latin. With a document entitled Latina Lingua, the Pope establishes the new foundation as part of the Pontifical Council for Culture. The Holy Father wrote: "In today’s culture, the danger of an increasingly superficial knowledge of Latin may be noted in the context of the widespread weakening of humanistic studies. This is also a risk in the context of the philosophical and theological studies of future priests. Moreover in our own world, in which science and technology play such an important role, there is a renewed interest in the Latin culture and language and not only on those continents whose culture is rooted in the Greco-Roman heritage. This attention seems all the more meaningful since it not only involves academic and institutional sectors but also concerns young people and scholars from very different nations and traditions."

The full text of the Pope's letter and the statutes of the new foundation can be found here:

I learnt Latin at school and certainly appreciated it in all sorts of ways;- as a microbiologist where the roots of so many words are derived from the Latin( and Greek) and as a lover of literature. My Latin teacher read to us from a Latin version of Winnie The Pooh. Great fun !

A History of Christianity in Fifteen Objects. Click here

Pope Creates Six New Cardinals Full Text of Speech from Vatican Radio here

Click here for The Tears of a Cardinal; The Hope of A Church ?

via Rocco Palmo at Whispers in the Loggia on the installation of 55 year old Filipino Cardinal Luis Antonio (Chito) Tagle of Manila.

and click here for an earlier article from Rocco celebrating the fact that Cardinal Tagle is a highly accomplished social media practitioner.This is a great post from Rocco which also features some of Cardinal Tagle's weekly homilies on video.

Rocco says "Arguably as "digital native" as a senior prelate can be at this point, the Filipino cardinal-designate – has rooted his online presence not so much in status feeds on Facebook as YouTube. Aired every weekend on local TV in metro Manila, Tagle hosts The Word Exposed, a half-hour commentary covering each of the Sunday readings, which likewise goes viral in anticipation of each weekend's liturgy."

Click here for the full texts and /or videos of Cardinal Tagles addresses to The International Eucharistic Congress held in Ireland earlier this year when he was Archbishop.

I didn't manage to keep this up to date all the way, did I ?!

Somewhere along the way things got very exciting and we have a new Pope.

His name is Francis, just in case you didn't know !!

and here's the last entry post of Pope Francis celebrating the final Mass of the Year of Faith in Rome.

No comments:

More from Seamus Heaney

“History says, Don't hope
On this side of the grave,
But then, once in a lifetime,
The longest-for tidal wave of justice can rise up
And hope and history rhyme.
So hope for a great sea change
On the far side of revenge
Believe in miracles....”

“The aim of poetry and the poet is finally to be of service, to ply the effort of the individual into the larger work of the community as a whole.” ―

“I can't think of a case where poems changed the world, but what they do is they change people's understanding of what's going on in the world.”

and five more......

On his inspiration: 'The completely solitary self: that's where poetry comes from, and it gets isolated by crisis”

On which animal he'd prefer to be: "I might enjoy being an albatross, being able to glide for days and daydream for hundreds of miles along the thermals. And then being able to hang like an affliction round some people's necks."

On fame: "The gift of writing is to be self-forgetful, to get a surge of inner life or inner supply or unexpected sense of empowerment, to be afloat, to be out of yourself. The prizes can’t help you at all.”

On becoming a poet: "My quest for precision and definition, while it may lead backward, is conducted in the living speech of a landscape and a language that I was born with. If you like, I began as a poet when my roots were crossed with my reading."

On authority "At home in Ireland, there's a habit of avoidance, an ironical attitude towards the authority figure. "

Easter Hope All Year Round

Celestial spirit that doth roll
The heart's sepulchral stone away,
Be this our resurrection day,
The singing Easter of the soul -
O gentle Master of the Wise,
Teach us to say: "I will arise." ~
Richard Le Gallienne

"The great gift of Easter is hope - Christian hope which makes us have that confidence in God, in his ultimate triumph, and in his goodness and love, which nothing can shake."
-- Basil C. Hume

Celtic Christianity may offer us a lifeline in the form of an approach to faith which is rooted in the imagination...[Celts] excelled at expressing their faith in symbols, metaphors and images, both visual and poetic.
They had the ability to invest the ordinary and commonplace with sacramental significance, to find glimpses of God’s glory throughout creation and to paint pictures in words, signs and music that acted as icons opening windows on heaven and pathways to eternity
Ian Bradley The Celtic Way

Favourite Quotes from Pope Francis

“Thanks to magnanimity, we can always look at the horizon from the position where we are. That means being able to do the little things of every day with a big heart open to God and to others. That means being able to appreciate the small things inside large horizons, those of the kingdom of God.

This offers parameters to assume a correct position for discernment, in order to hear the things of God from God’s ‘point of view.’ … However the risk in seeking and finding God in all things, then, is the willingness to explain too much, to say with human certainty and arrogance: ‘God is here.’ We will find only a god that fits our measure. The correct attitude is that of St. Augustine: seek God to find him, and find God to keep searching for God forever.”

-- Pope Francis

Carlo Caretto's Love Letter to His Church

How much I much criticise you my church and yet how much I love you !

You have made me suffer more than anyone and yet I owe you more than I owe anyone. I should like to see you destroyed and yet I need your presence.

You have given me much scandal and yet you alone have made me understand holiness. Never in the world have I seen anything more obscurantist, more compromised, more false, yet never have I touched anything more pure, more generous or more beautiful.

Countless times I have felt like slamming the door of my soul in your face – and yet, every night, I have prayed that I might die in your arms!

No, I cannot be free of you, for I am one with you, even if not completely you.
Then too – where should I go? To build another church?

But I cannot build another church without the same defects, for they are my own defects. And again, if I were to build another church, it would be my church, not Christ’s church. No, I am old enough. I know better!"

Did the Woman Say ?

Great Quotes

A blank piece of paper is God's way of telling us how hard it is to be God.

Sidney Sheldon

There are things you can’t reach. But
you can reach out to them, and all day long.
The wind, the bird flying away. The idea of God.
And it can keep you as busy as anything else, and happier.

Mary Oliver

“A man should hear a little music, read a little poetry, and see a fine picture every day of his life, in order that worldly cares may not obliterate the sense of the beautiful which God has implanted in the human soul.”

– Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

"There is an Indian proverb or axiom that says that everyone is a house with four rooms, a physical, a mental, an emotional, and a spiritual. Most of us tend to live in one room most of the time but, unless we go into every room every day, even if only to keep it aired, we are not a complete person."

~Rumer Godden, A House with Four Rooms, 1989

“And

"
"You can get all A's and still flunk life."

"Lost in the mystery of finding myself alive."

Walker Percy

"The day came when the risk to remain tight in a bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom”

A tough life needs a tough language-and that's what poetry is. That's what literature offers- a language powerful enough to say how it is. It isn't a hiding place. It is a finding place.
Jeanette Winterson

There are two kinds of people: those who say to God, “Thy will be done,” and those to whom God says, “All right, then, have it your way.”

- C.S. Lewis

The independent hearts of Celtic descendents everywhere still yearn for the solitary place, still rejoice in the goodness of creation, still see the Lord beside them as they walk, still see Him in the face of friend and stranger. The gospel light with its eastern fire still gleams. The truth still lingers in the heart.
Pat Robson – The Celtic Heart

People are itchy and lost and bored and quick to jump at any fix. Why is there such a vast self-help industry in this country? Why do all these selves need help?

They have been deprived of something by our psychological culture. They have been deprived of the sense that there is something else in life, some purpose that has come with them into the world."

-- James Hillman

Loyalty to the country always. Loyalty to the government only when it deserves it.
--Mark Twain

During times of universal deceit, telling the truth becomes a revolutionary act.
--George Orwell

We are not to simply bandage the wounds of victims beneath the wheels of injustice: - we are to drive a spoke into the wheel itself.

― Dietrich Bonhoeffer

Who controls the past controls the future. Who controls the present controls the past.
-- George Orwell

Never for the sake of peace and quiet deny your own experience or convictions.
--Dag Hammarskjöld

If you want to build a ship don't herd people together to collect wood and don’t assign them tasks and work, but rather teach them to long for the endless immensity of the sea.
— Antoine de Saint-Exupery

For what are we, without hope in our hearts, that someday we'll drink from God's blessed waters?"
-Bruce Springsteen

"Sometimes grace works like waterwings when you feel you are sinking."
-Anne Lamott

"A prayer may be a wordless inner longing, a sudden outpouring of love, a yearning within the soul to be for a moment united within the infinite and the good, a humbleness that needs no abasement or speech to express it, a cry in the darkness for help when all seems lost, a song, a poem, a kind deed, a reaching for beauty, or the strong, quiet inner reaffirmation of faith. A prayer in fact can be anything that is created by God that turns to God."

Paul Gallico

"God does not die when we cease to believe in a personal deity, but we die on the day when our lives cease to be illuminated by the steady radiance, renewed daily, of a wonder, the source of which is beyond all reason."

Dag Hammarskjold

When asked if I am pessimistic or optimistic about the future, my answer is always the same: If you look at the science about what is happening on earth and aren’t pessimistic, you don’t understand the data. But if you meet the people who are working to restore this earth and the lives of the poor, and you aren’t optimistic, you haven’t got a pulse. What I see everywhere in the world are ordinary people willing to confront despair, power, and incalculable odds in order to restore some semblance of grace, justice, and beauty to this world.”

― Paul Hawken

The greatest religious challenge of our age is to hold together social action and spiritual disciplines. This is not just a theological necessity, dictated by the need to integrate all of life around the reality of the living God. It is a matter of sheer survival. The evils we confront are so massive, so inhuman, so impervious to appeals and dead to compassion, that those who struggle against them face the real possibility of being overwhelmed by them.”

~ Theologian Walter Wink

One day you will ask me which is more important? My life or yours?
I will say mine and you will walk away not knowing that you are my life.

~ Khalil Gibran

Blue Eyed Ennis

Archive Posts Year of Faith 2012-13

Rowan Williams, Archbishop of Canterbury addresses the Synod. Full text here. (H/T to Rocco Palmo for link)

He talks a lot about the discipline of contemplation. Nice to see he mentions Thomas Merton and Taize too.

I like this article "Defining Vatican II's rules of engagement" by Andrew Hamilton Consulting Editor of Australian publication Eureka Street . It clarifies the different ways we communicate depending on our attitude to the way in which we believe the forms of Vatican II are addressed.

Some personal reflections on Vatican II from here

Poem and Prayer for Year of Faith

Friday Fish Year of Faith

Mandalas in The Year of Faith.

"We fail future generations if we allow Vatican II to fade."