The Hell We Choose. An Advent Call to Holiness.

One of the more frequent objections I hear online against the Holy Faith is that God throws people, supposedly against their own wills, into hell and thus must be some kind of moral monster. The answer to this, of course, is simply that God doesn't determine our individual eternal fate alone, rather He does so in conjunction with our will. St. Augustine of Hippo summed this up perfectly in a sermon when he said,

God created us without us: but he did not will to save us without us (Sermo 169)

In that way salvation is like a marriage. God isn't a spiritual rapist, intent on forcing every one of His creatures into eternal union with Himself, rather He proposes, He offers, an eternal relationship and allows us the free choice to say "yes" or "no." Saying "no" has some logical consequences attached to it (see: Could God Have Made Hell a Nicer Place for more on that) as does saying "yes." These logical consequences make those without God (those who say "no") end up in "hell" and those with God (those who say "yes") end up in "heaven." Thus, just like marriage, it takes two "yeses" for someone to be saved - God's and their own. God, for His part, both wills all men to be saved (cf. 1 Tim 2:4) and provides the grace needed for each man to say "yes" to God. All that then separates the saved and the damned is the willingness of each individual person to say "yes" back to God. Or as CS Lewis puts it in The Great Divorce,

There are only two kinds of people in the end: those who say to God, "Thy will be done," and those to whom God says, in the end, "Thy will be done." All that are in Hell, choose it. Without that self-choice there could be no Hell. No soul that seriously and constantly desires joy will ever miss it. Those who seek find. Those who knock it is opened.

St. Catherine of Siena, the great mystic and Doctor of the Church, in her famous Dialogue (which was nothing less than a transcription of a conversation she had with the Father) received the same message on salvation from the lips of God

How great is the stupidity of those who make themselves weak in spite of my strengthening, and put themselves into the devil's hands! I want you to know, then, that at the moment of death, because they have put themselves during life under the devil's rule (not by force, because they cannot be forced, as I told you; but they put themselves voluntarily into his hands), and because they come to the point of death under this perverse rule, they can expect no other judgement but that of their own conscience. They come without hope to eternal damnation. In hate they grasp at hell in the moment of their death, and even before they possess it, they take hell as their prize along with their lords the demons.

Indeed it is our disposition toward Christ that even affects the way we see Him at the Last Judgement (for He looks on all of us the same) but the blessed,

wait for divine judgement with gladness, not fear. And the face of my Son will appear to them neither  terrifying nor hateful... The differences in the appearance of his face... will not be in him but in those who are to be judged by him. To the damned he will appear with just hatred, but to the saved with mercy and love. 

St. Catherine explains this thus,

So no one waits to be judged. All receive their appointed place as they leave this life. They taste it and possess it even before they leave their bodies at the moment of death: the damned in hate and despair; the perfect in love, with the light of faith trusting in the blood. And the imperfect in mercy and with the same faith, come to that place called purgatory.

 Thus it is the love of God that allows his beloved sons and daughters to turn their backs on Him forever. This love is powerful enough that He finally respects our choice, the choice we make not just with our lips but with our lives (cf. Matt 7:22). The great Dante, recognizing this truth, bold inscribes on the gates of hell,

Through me you pass into the city of woe:
Through me you pass into the eternal pain:
Through me among the people lost for aye.

Justice the founder of my fabric mov'd:
To rear me was the task of power divine,
Supremest wisdom, and primeval love.

Before me things create were none,
Save things Eternal, and I eternal endure.
All hope abandon ye who enter here. (Inferno, Canto III)

Such it is that some choose hell.

To put this in practical terms, I had the occasion of asking an atheist recently whether he would even want to be with Jesus for all eternity. Not whether he thought it possible, not even if he thought a person could survive death, but simply if he'd want it. He might think it as likely to come true as wanting to be Superman is, but still the question remained - would you even want it if it were possible? To those that answer "no," they can see immediately why existence apart from God, "hell," is possible.

Perhaps, though we might wonder, wouldn't the damnation of even one person ruin the joys of heaven  for all, including God? C.S. Lewis shows us that such thinking amounts to no more than,

the demand of the loveless and the self-imprisoned that they should be allowed to blackmail the universe: that till they consent to be happy (on their own terms) no one else shall taste joy: that theirs should be the final power; that Hell should be able to veto Heaven. (The Great Divorce)

Which itself would be loveless and unfair (the very things people accuse the doctrine of hell of). Hatred doesn't have the last say. Love does.

Which means every man has the same choice presented to him - know God or no God. The one is the narrow path that leads to eternal bliss. The other the wide road to perdition (cf Matt 7:13-14). For those whose lives are centered on Christ, death just means more Christ. For those who live Christless lives, they receive an eternity of just that - Christlessness. This Advent I implore you to take stock of your life and ask yourself what choice is the way you're living making? Remember, it isn't enough to pay lip service to living God, just as it isn't enough to say "I love you" to your wife and then cheat on her. Talk is cheap. Those who love Jesus will show it by the way they live their lives (cf. Jn 14:13), which means more than going along with the prevailing culture (cf. Rom 12:2). So take this season, where we are called to reflect upon the coming of Christ not just at Christmas, but at the end of time, and decide to live a life of holiness. Don't wait for next year or when the kids are older or when you get that promotion or graduate from school or retire. Start today.

You Might Also Be Interested In: St. Faustina Sees Hell

Recommended Reading:

St Dominic, Kind unto his Own, Severe with his Foes.

Today, the Church celebrates the feast of one of her great saints - Dominic de Guzmán. In his honor, I thought I'd let Dante offer up his praise. This in the singing verse translation by Laurence Binyon.

Therein was born the enthusiast amorous
     Of Christian faith, the saintly wrestler, kind
     Unto his own, severe unto his foes.
So charged, soon as created, was his mind,
     With quickening power, that in the womb it led
     His mother a prophetic tongue to find....
And that his name should with himself accord,
     They called him, prompted by a spirit from here,
     By the possessive of his only Lord.
Dominic was he named and I aver
     He was a husbandman chosen by Christ
     To tend his garden and be His helper there.
Messenger and familiar of Christ
     He showed him; for his love's first loyalties
     Clung to the first great counsel given by Christ.
Often, awake and silent on his knees,
     His nurse would find him on the floor, as who
     Should there be saying: 'I am come for this....'
A mighty teacher soon, he went his way
     About the vineyard to restore the vine
     Which, tended ill, fast withers and goes gray....
With doctrine and with will then, both endorsed
     With the apostolic office, forth he went
     Swift as a torrent from some high vein forced.
On stocks and stumps of heresy he spent
     His vehemence, most impetuously where
     Most stubborn was the opposed impediment. (Paradiso 11.55-102)

Grow in Holiness this Advent Wk 4; Round-Up

Definition via Google

If you've been regularly following the blog this Advent, you know we've been working on becoming holier. In the last week of this season of preparation, I present to you a round-up of Advent and Christmas posts for your reflection.

Grow in Holiness this Advent Wk 1, the Three Advents of Christ
Grow in Holiness this Advent Wk 2; Conquering Conquering Covetousness
Grow in Holiness this Advent Wk 3; Confess and Rejoice!
The Hell We Choose. An Advent Call to Holiness
The Three Advents of Christ
The Three Advents of Christ in Saint Bernard
The Three Advents of Christ in Dante
Gaudete Sunday!


The Spirit of Scrooge
Pope Francis on Christmas
Pope Benedict on Christmas
Keep Christ AND Mass in Christmas
How We Keep Christ in Christmas
Santa Claus, Herald of Christmas or Anti-Christ?


Have a holy final week of Advent and a very Merry Christmas in the presence of Our Lord.

Grow in Holiness this Advent Wk 3; Confess and Rejoice!

(This is the third in a series of Advent meditations. You can read the first mediation, on the Three Advents of Christ, and the second, on Conquering Covetousness by clicking those links. This week, we're looking at another essential part of Advent -- Confession.)

Picture with Story from Daily Mail - check it out HERE

It's the third week of Advent - Gaudete (Rejoice!) Sunday. This week we light the pink candle on our advent wreaths, Mass is celebrated by father in pink (sorry, rose) vestments, and we are called to Rejoice! that our Savior is near at hand.

One way to Rejoice! over the last two weeks of Advent is to make a sincere and contrite confession. Unburdening yourself of your sins and hearing the words of Christ, speaking though his priest,

God, the Father of mercies, through the death and resurrection of his Son has reconciled the world to himself and sent the Holy Spirit among us for the forgiveness of sins; through the ministry of the Church may God give you pardon and peace, and I absolve you from your sins in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen. 

 provides, as any Catholic can tell you, a feeling of relief and joy.

Rejoice! for the healing power of Christ is still alive and active in the world.

If you are skeptical, if you are asking yourself why you ought to confess in the presence of a priest, I'll point you to my post:

7 Reasons All Christians Should Confess to a Priest.

Yes, that says, "All Christians," not just all Catholics.

Aside from Eastern Orthodox, we also find the value of a good auricular confession maintained, though not stressed as essential, in some Protestant traditions, especially Anglicanism and Lutheranism.

Of course, most Protestant denominations have eschewed the traditional Christian practice of confessing their sins. Some confess only "in their heart," others have abandoned confessing altogether, believing that their Faith in Jesus means they have no need of confessing their sins post-conversion. This is, as I demonstrate in the aforementioned post , is a grave misunderstanding. For, as Jesus Himself assures us

nothing is hid that shall not be made manifest, nor anything secret that shall not be known and come to light. (Lk. 8:16-17, RSV)

Better to have it "come to light" in this life, in the confessional, than hiding it until all things will be dragged into the light after we have time to repent of them. We will confess our sins with repentance now or confess them unrepentant when it is too late, either way we will confess.

This is made wonderfully clear in The Divine Comedy. Dante, upon entering the first circle where he sees the damned being punished, meets Minos - the judge of Hell standing "orribilmente, e ringhia" ("horribly and growling"). The souls, lost for all eternity, having never confessed, having tried to keep their sins from "com(ing) to light," find themselves compelled to do what could have saved them,

Dico che quando l'anima mal natali vien dinanzi, tutta si confessa;e quel conoscitor de le peccatavede qual loco d'inferno è da essa. 

I say, that when the ill-born spirit comes before him, it confesses all; and that sin-discerner sees what place in hell is for it (Inferno 5.7-10)

Their confession is now futile.

vanno a vicenda ciascuna al giudizio, dicono e odono e poi son giù volte.

they go each in his turn to judgment; they tell, and hear; and then are whirled down. (Inferno 5.14-15)

But your confession isn't futile, at least not yet.

Confess, rejoice, and be glad as you come closer to Christmas.

Have a holy Advent!

And behold I am coming soon (Rev. 22:7, RSV)

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Grow in Holiness this Advent Wk 2; Conquering Covetousness

In Dicken's A Christmas Carol we meet the embodiment of Avarice, Ebenezer Scrooge, a man who loved gold more than God. His opinion of Christmas is well known to us all,

Merry Christmas! Out upon a merry Christmas! What's Christmas time to you but a time for paying bills without money; a time for finding yourself a year older, but not an hour richer; a time for balancing your books and having every item in 'em through a round dozen of months presented dead against you? If I could work my will... every idiot who goes about with 'Merry Christmas' upon his lips, should be boiled with his own pudding, and buried with a stake of holly through his hear. He should! (pp. 5-6)

Scrooge's love for money has replaced not only his love of Christmas, but love of anything else. This love of money isn't just greed, it is a false religion.

Dante dramatically presents this reality to us when he stands before the damned Pope Nicholas III (Giovanni Gaetano Orsini),

Fatto v'avete dio d'oro e d'argento;e che altro è da voi a l'idolatre,se non ch'elli uno, e voi ne orate cento?

You have wrought yourselves a god of gold and silver.
How then do you differ from those who worship idols
except they worship one and you a hundred? (Inferno 19.112-114)

St. Thomas Aquinas addresses the "spirit of Scrooge" in the Summa

man seeks, according to a certain measure, to have external riches, in so far as they are necessary for him to live in keeping with his condition of life. Wherefore it will be a sin for him to exceed this measure, by wishing to acquire or keep them immoderately. This is what is meant by covetousness, which is defined as "immoderate love of possessing." It is therefore evident that covetousness is a sin. (II-II. Q. 118, A. 1)

Or, in the more recent words of Pope Benedict XVI

Material possessions, in themselves, are good. We would not survive for long without money, clothing, and shelter. We must eat in order to stay alive. Yet if we are greedy, if we refuse to share what we have with the hungry and the poor, then we make our possessions into a false god. How many voices in our materialist society tell us that happiness is to be found by acquiring as many possessions and luxuries as we can! But this is to make possessions into a false god. (Address to Disadvantaged Youth, in Sydney, Australia.)

How tempting it is this time of year, especially for those who ignore Advent, focusing solely on the "shopping season" of the secular Christmastide - Black Friday through December 24th, to focus overly much on possessions. Indeed, admirably, much of this is the opposite of what Scrooge lived for. He wanted only to take, to increase, while ignoring those others about him. We rather look to purchase things for others, for those we love and cherish. However, this Advent I would recommend to you to take it one step further - give to someone in need. Not just through an organization, great and commendable as that may be, but directly, personally. How can you find such people? Contact your parish, they'll point you in the right direction. For Scrooge himself began to recognize this. While haunted by the Ghost of Christmas Past, upon seeing his younger self, he remembers a small boy who had earlier began singing God bless you, merry gentlemen! May nothing you dismay! at his keyhole. Scrooge's reaction?

Scrooge seized the ruler with such energy of action, that the singer fled in terror, leaving the keyhole to the fog and even more congenial frost. (p. 9)

His later reaction to his behavior?

'I wish,' Scrooge muttered, putting his hand in his pocket, and looking about him, after drying his eyes with his cuff: 'but it's too late now.'
'What is the matter?' asked the Spirit.
'Nothing,' said Scrooge. 'Nothing. There was a boy singing a Christmas Carol at my door last night. I should have liked to have given him something: that's all.' (p. 26)

We might not have the poor singing carols at our doors, but they might be a lot closer than you think.

If that isn't enough to motivate you, remember how Jesus, "the reason for the season," identifies Himself with the poor,

Come, you who are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you... For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, I was naked and you clothed me, I was sick and you visited me, I was in prison and you came to me.... Truly, I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these my brothers, you did it to me. (Matt. 25:34-40, ESV)

Have a holy Advent.

Come, Lord Jesus! The grace of the Lord Jesus be with all. Amen. (Rev. 22:20-21, ESV) 

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Grow in Holiness this Advent, the Three Advents of Christ

Yesterday, the Church's liturgical year began anew with the first Sunday of Advent. This is a time of preparation, though not penance, for the coming of the great feast of the Nativity of Our Lord. Just as Lent precedes Easter, so too does Advent precede Christmas.

We can all understand the power a good Lent has to make Easter truly celebratory. But many Catholics have lost a real sense of Advent as it has been trampled under the shopping frenzy that is the secular build-up to the feast.

What is Advent Anyhow?
As a refresher for those who might not be sure what exactly Advent is and what we are supposed to be doing, I direct you to the Catholic Encyclopedia:

with Advent the ecclesiastical year begins in the Western churches. During this time the faithful are admonished 

• to prepare themselves worthily to celebrate the anniversary of the coming into the world as the God of love,
• thus to make their souls fitting abodes for the coming in Holy Communion and through grace, and
• thereby to make themselves ready for His final coming as, at death and at the end of the world.

Advent, then, is a time to focus on the coming of Jesus. This is made clear in the name itself. "Advent" comes from the Latin "ad-venio" meaning "come to" or "coming."

What Are We to Dwell on During Advent?
With Christmas on the horizon it is easy enough to look back on the first coming of Christ, His birth into our sinful world on the first Christmas.

With the Feast of Christ the King behind us, hopefully, it is easy to keep in mind the final coming of Christ, that as the just judge at the world's end.

How different these advents are!

Perhaps no one has laid bare just what Christ's first advent really was better than C.S. Lewis,

Enemy-occupied territory - that is what this world is. Christianity is the story of how the rightful king has landed, you might say landed in disguise, and is calling us all to take part in a great campaign of sabotage. When you go to church you are really listening-in to the secret wireless from our friends: that is why the enemy is so anxious to prevent us from going. (Mere Christianity).

Compare that to Christ the All Powerful King, best presented, perhaps, by Michelangelo Buonarroti,

Not exactly landing "in disguise" this time is He?

There is, however, a third advent of Christ that we all would do well to ponder over the next four weeks. If the Nativity is the First Advent and the Last Judgement is the Final Advent, this other advent is one that occurs not once in the past or in the future, but each and every day in the heart of all believers and thus is the most important advent of all to dwell on during this season.

With that teaser, I'll direct you to: 

a post I wrote on St. Bernard of Clairvaux's description of the Three Advent's of Christ and, once you've digested Bernard, 

And I will encourage you to: 

use Dante' Divine Comedy as an Advent mediation on the Three Advents of Christ, each of which is "hidden" in the poem (don't worry you won't have to find them, I lay them all out HERE). 

How is this Supposed to Make me Holier this Advent?

In a word, meditation. While the word "meditation" frequently brings to mind certain "mind-clearing" techniques used in eastern religions, there is an authentic and very important form of meditation in our Christian tradition stretching back to the first centuries after Christ. This is laid out by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith in a 1989 letter to bishops (under the signature of then Cardinal Ratzinger, our present Pope Emeritus).

The meditation of the Christian in prayer seeks to grasp the depths of the divine in the salvific works of God in Christ, the Incarnate Word, and in the gift of his Spirit. These divine depths are always revealed to him through the human-earthly dimension. Similar methods of meditation, on the other hand, including those which have their starting-point in the words and deeds of Jesus, try as far as possible to put aside everything that is worldly, sense perceptible or conceptually limited. It is thus an attempt to ascend to or immerse oneself in the sphere of the divine, which, as such, is neither terrestrial, sense-perceptible nor capable of conceptualization. (Letter on Some Aspects of Christian Meditation).

Advent, being a time a quiet reflection and prayer, is the perfect time to delve into this tradition. As stated by the CDF, Christian meditation differentiates itself from eastern meditation in that the Christian is meditating on some aspect of his faith while the eastern mystic is clearing his mind of everything. GK Chesterton brings out this difference,

No two ideals could be more opposite than a Christian saint in a Gothic cathedral and a Buddhist saint in a Chinese temple. The opposition exists at every point; but perhaps the shortest statement of it is that the Buddhist saint always has his eyes shut, while the Christian saint always has them very wide open. The Buddhist saint has a sleek and harmonious body, but his eyes are heavy and sealed with sleep. The medieval saint’s body is wasted to its crazy bones, but his eyes are frightfully alive. There cannot be any real continuity between forces that produce symbols so different as that. Granted that both images are extravagances, are perversions of the pure creed, it must be a real divergence which could produce such opposite extravagances. The Buddhist is looking with a peculiar intentness inwards. The Christian is staring with a frantic intentness outwards. (Orthodoxy, p. 194)

By meditating on this great mystery, the coming of God-in-the-Flesh, you can grow closer to Jesus, the perfect preparation to celebrate His Nativity.

And isn't growing closer to Jesus - i.e. growing in holiness - the real "reason for the season?"

Have a Holy Advent!

For a detailed look at the Three Advents of Christ in Dante's Comedy, I highly recommend Mark Musa's Advent at the Gates.

For a deep meditation of the Nativity of Christ, I highly recommend Pope Benedict XVI's Jesus of Nazareth: The Infancy Narratives.

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The Feast of Christ the King

This weekend is the patronal feast of this blog, the Feast of Christ the King. In honor of one of my favorite feasts in the Church, I thought we'd take a closer look...

What is the official name of this feast?
While it is popularly known as the Feast of Christ the King, it's technical name is the Solemnity of Christ the King. It's original Latin title was Dominus Nostri Jesu Christi Regis, which was changed by Pope Paul VI to Dominus Nostri Jesu Christi universorum Regis (Our Lord Jesus Christ King of the Universe).

What is a "solemnity"?
Solemnity is the highest rank given to a feast by the Church.

What color vestments will the priest be wearing tomorrow?
White or Gold as he does for all major feasts. 
 

When is Christ the King celebrated?
Christ the King closes the liturgical year and is always celebrated on the last Sunday of ordinary time, the last Sunday before the first Sunday of Advent. This year the feast will be celebrated this Sunday on November 20th.


Is Christ the King celebrated in the forma extraordinaria, the 'traditional Latin Mass'?
Yes, but on a different date. In the old pre-Vatican 2 calendar the Feast of Christ the King is celebrated on the last Sunday in October, the Sunday before All Saint's Day. This is one of those areas where we might be better off changing the old calendar to match up with the new. That, however, is well above my pay grade.

Is this an ancient feast?
No. In fact it only dates to the twentieth century. Pope Pius XI founded the feast with his 1925 encyclical Quas Primus. That means no complaining about the change of date after Vatican Two.

Is there any Biblical evidence that Jesus is a King? I thought He was a poor, simple man.
Saint Paul, in his letter to the Philippians tells us that Jesus

"being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God: But made himself of no reputation, and took upon him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men: And being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross. Wherefore God also hath highly exalted him, and given him a name which is above every name: That at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in heaven, and things in earth, and things under the earth; And that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father." (2:6-11)

and in First Timothy he tells us that Jesus

"is the blessed and only Potentate, the King of kings, and Lord of lords." (6:15)

and in the Book of Revelations we read that Jesus

"hath on his vesture and on his thigh a name written, King Of Kings, And Lord Of Lords." (19:16)

Examples multiply, but I'll end with my favorite. The unwitting proclamation of Pontius Pilate

"And Pilate wrote a title, and put it on the cross. And the writing was Jesus Of Nazareth The King Of The Jews." (John 19:19)

Do any other Christians celebrate this feast?
Yes. Following the lead of Pius XI in honoring Christ as King with this feast are Anglicans, Lutherans, Methodists, Presbyterians, the Church of England, the United Church of Christ, and some Eastern Orthodox Churches all of whom adopted the feast after the Catholic Church. I suppose even high Church Protestants can look to Rome for guidance now and then. I'd call that ecumenism at its best.

What other posts have you written on Christ the King?
Several:

Christus Rex Est - being a brief overview of the feast

Quas Primus, Pope Pius XI on Christ the King (pt 1) - being a look at the Papal Encyclical of Pius XI

Quas Primus, Pope Pius XI on Christ the King (pt 2) - being the second part of the same.

Homeless Jesus - being a reflection on a statue blessed by Pope Francis.

The Homeless King - being the second part of the same.

Our World is "Enemy-Occupied Territory. Are YOU Ready to Fight? - being a call to arms of sorts.

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4 Halloween Mistakes for Catholics to Avoid

It's that time of year again.

Time for the secular world to entirely miss the point of (and forget the Catholic origins of) another holiday - Halloween. As faithful Catholics we know (or should know) that Halloween is the Eve of All Hallows (Saints) Day and should celebrate it as the Catholic holiday it is. That is, sadly, becoming more and more difficult with each passing year. To help you out this year, I thought to give you a handy guide on avoiding a few common Catholics Halloween mistakes.

Mistake #1 - Think Halloween is "Pagan" Rather than Christian
It is nearly inevitable that we Catholics must listen to those who would rewrite history, replacing the Vigil of a Catholic Feast with all kind of historical fabrications, creating (out of thin air and without any credible historical evidence) links to various pagan holidays (Samhain seems to be a favorite these days). Of course All Saints Day falls near a pagan holiday - every calendar day falls near one pagan holiday or another. It would be like claiming Memorial Day, Veterans Day, and Thanksgiving are really Catholic holidays because they all fall near Catholic Feast days - of course they do, every day is near some Catholic feast or another.

The fact, of course, is much less surprising. All Saints Day is celebrated on November 1 (and its Vigil - Halloween on October 31) not to compete with some Celtic pagan feast but because Pope Gregory III (reigned 731-741) consecrated a chapel inside St. Peter's Basilica ("the Vatican") to "all the saints" on November 1. In so doing, he began a feast dedicated to all the saints on the same day for Rome. Eight decades later, Gregory IV (reigned 827-844) decided to bring the feast to the Church Universal.


Not that there would be a problem even if the Church did decide to hold a feast for all the saints to "baptize" a pagan holiday.

Those Protestants who most insist upon a pagan origin for Halloween usually hold "Reformation Day" or "Fall Festival" celebrations and invite people to celebrate those instead of celebrating Halloween. So they replace what they think is a problematic holiday by celebrating a different holiday on the same day - exactly what they accuse Catholics of doing with Halloween. Ah, the irony of the season!

Mistake #2 - Celebrate Exactly Like the Secular World
The problem for us Catholics isn't so much a misreading of the history of Halloween, but with how Halloween is celebrated here in the United States, especially the increasingly semi-undressed female costumes (for ever younger girls) and blood-soaked, gore-filled costumes for even the youngest of boys isn't keeping the Catholic in Halloween. The secular world, with its obsessive focus on lust and violence, is profaning a holy day, something we Catholics must never join in doing. Participating in Halloween - craving pumpkins, trick or treating, etc - is fine, but the darkest extremes must be avoided to stay true to the Church and to who Jesus is calling us to be. Before you select your costume, ask yourself, "is this going to please God?" If not, pick another.

Mistake #3 - Make Halloween "No Fun"
While it is commendable to bring the focus squarely back onto the Feast of All Saints, opting for only saint costumes might be a step too far. I have nothing against dressing my kids as saints if they so choose (in fact one of my sons is being St. Michael this year), but I also have nothing against a little horror thrown in - such is quintessentially Catholic. The traditional ghouls, skeletons, vampires, and zombies all speak to a simple post-Easter reality - Christ has conquered death. At Halloween we mock death, we laugh in its face, proclaiming with St. Paul, "O death where is thy sting, O grave where is thy victory?" (1 Cor 15:55). Such leaves Catholics open to a less completely sanitized version of Halloween (without descending into a demonic display of lust and gore which has overcome the secular Halloween). This accords with our firm conviction that Christ has already destroyed death. Dr. Taylor Marshall sums this up nicely,

"Don’t be turned off by the ghoulish-ness of Halloween. Every great Catholic cathedral has gargoyles carved into its stone work. Illuminated manuscripts are also full of ghouls in the margins. Catholics are into this kind of stuff. Why? Because Christ has conquered death and the devil." (source)

The greatest example of this might be found in my favorite poem - The Divine Comedy of Dante Alighieri. We end in the Empyrean - the highest heaven - outside all space and time, beholding the very Vultus Dei (Face of God),

I believed, from the keenest of the living ray
that I endured, I would have been undone
had I withdrawn my eyes from it....
He who beholds that Light is so enthralled
that he would never willingly consent
to turn away from it for any other sight....
now my will and my desire were turning with
the Love that moves the sun and all the other stars. (Paradiso 33.76-78; 100-102; 144-145, Hollander)

But, earlier in the poem we are faced with images far worse and more terrifying than anything you'll see in your neighborhood or at a haunted house. The entire canticle could be cited, but let this scene from the eight circle's ninth pit suffice to make our point,

Who, even in words not bound by meter,
and having told the tale many times over,
could tell the blood and wounds that I saw now?...
it would be nothing to the ninth pit's filth.
No cask ever gapes so wide for loss
of mid- or side-staved as the soul I saw
cleft from the chin right down to where men fart....
he looked at me...
saying: 'See how I rend myself.'...
Another, with his throat pierced through
and nose hacked off just where the brows begin,
and only one ear left on his head...
And then another, whose hands had been chopped off,
raising his stumps up in the murky air
so that the blood from them befouled his face,...
I truly saw, and seem to see it still,
a headless body make its way...
And by its hair he held his severed head
swinging in his hands as if it were a lantern. (Inferno, 28.13-;22-24;29-30;64-66;103-105;118-119, Hollander)

Gruesome stuff that.

Mistake #4 - Claim Your Way of Celebrating Halloween is the Only Valid One
How to celebrate Halloween is ultimately a prudential decision, one on which good Catholics can disagree with one another. Each person, each parent, has to decide for themselves just what balance to strike between the grotesque display of the secular Halloween and refocusing on the saints. In the end, only you can determine how to best honor this great feast in your family. I just implore you to stay away from the extremes of, on the one hand, the lust and gore that have taken pride of place in the world's celebration and, on the other, of the complete retreat into a "fall festival" that some Protestants opt for. Be Catholic. Claim our holiday. And do it with class - honoring Christ in all things (cf. Col 3:17).

God bless and Have a Happy Halloween (and a Holy All Saint's Day)!

And don't forget to visit the graves of your dearly departed on All Soul's Day (October 2). The dead in Christ are still a part of the Church and need our prayers more than ever.


How are you choosing to celebrate All Hallow's Eve this year? What kind of costumes will you and/ or your kids be wearing?

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3 Holy Week Meditations with the Painter Giotto

Giotto di Bondone was one of the most important painters in history. He was at the forefront of what would be called the Renaissance in painting, bringing a far greater degree of realism to religious art. This realism allowed people to "see" the events of Christ's life in a whole new way, a way which imprinted the reality of these events to a greater degree than before possible. You can think of these paintings as to the Thirteenth Century what The Passion of the Christ is to us today - a jolting visual reminder of the events that opened the doors for our salvation. In fact, Giotto's masterpieces maintain their power to inspire meditation even for us today.

What better way, then, to enter into Holy Week than to take some time, reflect on the Biblical Word and enter into these events with the great Giotto?

Feel free to share these images on social media.

1. Betrayal

2. Crucifixion

3. Lamentation

A Couple Favorite Giotto Stories

These are from Giorgio Vasari's The Lives of the Most Excellent Painters, Sculptors, and Architects:

(W)hen Giotto was still a young man with Cimabue (his teacher), he once painted upon the nose of a figure that Cimabue had completed a fly which looked so natural that when his master returned to continue the work, he tried more than once to drive the fly away with his hand, convinced that it was real. (p. 35)

As Giotto's fame grew he received commissions from great patrons, including Pope Benedict IX, who was looking to have several paintings done for St. Peter's. When the Pope's courtiers traveled to Florence to get a sample from Giotto of his work...

Giotto... took a sheet of paper and a brush dipped in red, pressed his arm to his side to make a compass of it, and with a turn of his hand made a circle so even in shape and outline that it was a marvel to behold. (p. 22)

Not only did this get Giotto the job, it also gave rise to a proverb in Tuscany that was still current two centuries later when Vasari was writing,

'You are rounder than Giotto's O.' This proverb may be considered delightful, not only for the incident which gave rise to it but even more so because of its meaning, which involves the ambiguity the word 'tondo' takes on it Tuscany, where it refers not only to a perfect circular figure but also to dullness and crudeness of wit. (p. 23)

And to showcase Giotto's legendary wit, let this story from his time in the Kingdom of Naples suffice,

On another occasion, the king said to him: 'Giotto, now that it is so hot, I would put aside my painting for a while if I were you.' And Giotto answered, 'I certainly would too, if I were you.' (p. 27)

If all that isn't enough to make you love Giotto, he was also responsible for this, the campanile (bell tower) of Florence's Cathedral, which I've had the immense pleasure of climbing...

Have a blessed Holy Week and remember to always keep this in mind...

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Recommended Reading:

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The Three Advents of Christ in Dante

This Advent we've been looking at the traditional Three Advents, or comings, of Christ. First, in a general way, then sitting at the feet of the great Bernard of Clairvaux. Today, let's see what the greatest Christian poet, Dante Alighieri, can tell us about these comings by looking at his greatest work, The Divine Comedy, in which all three Advents are symbolically present.

First Advent of Christ - The Incarnation
In Canto IX of the Inferno (wherein Dante travels through Hell) we read how he and Virgil (Dante's guide) are barred from passing into the Infernal City of Dis (the deepest part of the Netherworld). Dante's trip has been ordained by Divine Providence and his passage cannot be stopped by Satan. To open the doors to the doleful city an angel suddenly appears amidst the terrors of Hell (just like Christ appeared amongst a sinful world). This mirrors the culmination of the First Advent of Christ - The Harrowing of Hell, when Christ "preached to those spirits that were in prison" (1 Peter 3:19)

and then, above the filthy swell, approaching,

a blast of sound, shot through with fear, exploded,

making both shores of Hell begin to tremble;

it sounded like one of those violent winds,

born from the clash of counter-temperatures,

that tear through forests; raging on unchecked...

As frogs before their enemy, the snake,

all scatter through the pond and then dive down

until each one is squatting on the bottom,

so I saw more than a thousand fear-shocked souls

in flight, clearing the path of one who came

walking on the Styx, his feet dry on the water.

From time to time with his left hand he fanned

his face too push the putrid air away,

and this was all that seemed to weary him.

I was certain now that he was sent from Heaven.

I turned to my guide, but he made me a sign

to keep my silence and bow low to this one.

Ah the scorn that filled his holy presence!

He reached the gate and touched it with a wand;

it opened without resistance from inside.

"O Heaven's outcasts, despicable souls,"

he started, standing on the dreadful threshold,

"what insolence is this that breeds in you?"

Second Advent of Christ - Conversion
In Canto VIII of the Purgatorio we see the Second Advent of Christ. Here Dante is traveling through the valley of the Princes in the anti-purgatory (the area just outside of Purgatory proper) when, just as night is about to fall, Dante learns that a serpent (symbol of the devil) comes into the valley each night to tempt the departed. Of course, the souls in purgatory are beyond the reach of Satan, so two angels appear to protect the holy souls from his reach. This mirrors the daily coming of Christ into the hearts of believers, giving them the grace to stay away from sin and the grasp of the prince of this world.

and then I saw descending from on high
two angels with two flaming swords, and these
were broken short and blunted at the end.

Their garments, green as tender new-born leaves
unfurling, billowed out behind each one,
fanned by the greenness of their streaming wings...

"From Mary's bosom both of them descend
to guard us from the serpent in the vale,"
Sordello said. "He'll soon be here, you'll see."...

"But then Sordello clutched his arm and said:
"Behold our adversary over there!" -
he pointed to the place where we should look...

I did not see, so I cannot describe,
how the two holy falcons took to flight,
but I saw clearly both of them fly down.

Hearing those green wings cutting through the air,
the serpent fled, the angels wheeled around,
flying in perfect time back to their posts. 

 

Third Advent of Christ - Final Judgement 
In Canto XXX of the Purgatorio, Dante is met by his beloved Beatrice who sternly judges him for his past sins before allowing him to move forward with her into Paradiso, into Heaven. Here we see the final of the Triplex Adventus, the Triple Advent of Christ, where Christ comes in glory to judge the living and the dead.

then, one of them, as sent from Heaven, sang
Veni, sponsa, de Libano, three times,
and all the other voices followed his.

As at the Final Summons all the blest
will rise out of their graves, ready to raise
new-bodied voices singing 'Hallelujah!'

just so rose up above the heavenly cart
a hundred spirits ad vocem tanti senis,
eternal heralds, ministers of God,

all shouting: Benedictus qui venis! then,
tossing a rain of flowers in the air,
Manibus, O date lilia plenis!...

I sensed the regal sternness of her face,
as she continued in the tone of one
who saves the sharpest words until the end:

"Yes look at me! Yes, I am Beatrice!
So, you at last have deigned to climb the mount?
You learned at last that here lies human bliss?"

I lowered my head and looked down at the stream,
but, filled with shame at my reflection there,
I quickly fixed my eyes upon the grass.

I was the guilty child facing his mother,
abject before her harshness: harsh, indeed,
is unripe pity not yet merciful. 

What do you think? How does reflecting on this sublime poetry from the height of Christendom help deeper your devotion to the Advents of Christ?