REAL - What is real? Is this a related question to Pilate's: "What is truth?"

ACCORDING TO A RECENT SURVEY, close to fifty percent of Catholics in the United States do not know the Church teaching that the bread and wine used in Holy Communion do not merely symbolize but actually become the body and blood of Christ. What is the cause of such a misconception? Maybe it can be traced back to inadequate catechesis. But I think the problem is deeper than poor theology; I believe it represents a kind of crisis of “humanity.”


One has to wonder if the reason why so many fail to believe in the Real Presence in the Eucharist is because they do not have a lived experience of “real presence.” Without an encounter with real presence in our daily lives, the Real Presence of Jesus Christ in the Eucharist becomes an idea, an abstraction. People have no frame of reference for seeing its relevance to their needs. For many, the misconstrual about the Flesh and Blood of Jesus Christ in the Eucharist stems from what is lacking in the flesh and blood of their own lives.

On a human level, what constitutes “real presence”?

Commitment

One element of real presence is commitment. It begins very simply by giving the person in front of me my undivided attention. One of the virtues that defined Blessed John Paul II’s holiness is that when he looked at you, you felt as if you were the only person on the planet. The Eucharist is Christ’s commitment of his never-failing Presence: I am with you always until the end of the world.

In a TV sitcom, a character at a party is talking to a couple, and is clearly bored. But then she glances at the door and exclaims, “Oh, look! Better people!” And she dashes off. Yet, C.S. Lewis reminds us: “It is with awe that we should conduct all our dealings with one another. There are no ordinary people. You have never talked to a mere mortal.”

Our Lord commits himself to us in the Eucharist because, as Pope Benedict XVI tells us, “the root of man’s wretchedness is loneliness – is the fact that my existence is not embraced by a love that makes it necessary.” Showing others charity for charity’s sake, anticipating others’ needs, giving without counting the cost – all this makes others know they are necessary.

Communication

A second key aspect of real presence is communication. One of the simplest but most powerful acts of charity we can perform nowadays is simply to listen to another person. How our isolation worsens when we have no one to talk to, no one to listen to us. It is not a coincidence that receiving the Eucharist at Mass is called “communicating.”


The goal of conversational communication and eucharistic communication is the same: the sharing of self with an other. Pope Benedict XVI says that conversation between people only comes into its own when they are no longer trying to express something, but trying to express themselves; then does dialogue become true communication. And the Catholic philosopher Louis Lavelle wrote that genuine communication takes place only when each “reveals to the other the deep, unknown desire he bears in the secret places of his heart.” This is the essence of the Eucharist.

Communion

And all real presence is marked by communion. What differentiates real presence from just being with others in a crowd is belonging: unity in charity, forgiveness, helping people, self-sacrifice, intimacy. We long for this oneness with others; united with one who loves me, I can face any fear… I am up to any challenge. In the Most Holy Eucharist, wrote John Paul II, “is the pledge of the fulfillment for which each man and woman, even unconsciously, yearns” (Ecclesia de Eucharistia 59). This is why “Holy Communion” is the Eucharist’s other name.

Pope Benedict teaches us that “communion always and inseparably has both a vertical and a horizontal sense: it is communion with God and communion with our brothers and sisters” (Sacramentum Caritatis 76). Living eucharistically means I am devoted to being a friend to others – to loving others’ needs more than my own concerns.

And so, the Holy Father exhorts us: “What the world needs is God’s love; it needs to encounter Christ and to believe in him… Missionary outreach is… an essential part of the Eucharistic form of the Christian life… The wonder we experience at the gift God has made to us in Christ… commits us to becoming witnesses of his love” (Sacramentum Caritatis 84, 85). People will come to believe in the Real Presence in the Eucharist the more we offer them a human experience of real presence in our daily interactions with them.

Rev. Peter John Cameron, O.P.
Copyright Magnificat

A Good Day to Delve into the Meaning of Freedom

Freedom can only thrive in a culture where self-giving, discipline and obedience overcomes Individualism, Hedonism, Minimalism – and their various sundry ally philosophies such as Relativism and Materialism. Great excerpt on freedom here. 

Are you thriving? Or are you just surviving? Discipline awakens us from our philosophical stupor and refines every aspect of the human person. Discipline doesn’t enslave or stifle the human person; rather, it sets us free to soar to unimagined heights. Discipline sharpens the human senses, allowing us to savor the subtler tastes of life’s experiences. Whether those experiences are physical, emotional, intellectual, or spiritual, discipline elevates them to their ultimate reality. Discipline heightens every human experience and increases every human ability. The life and teachings of Jesus Christ invite us to embrace this life-giving discipline. - by Matthew Kelly

René Girard talk in 2002 - truth coming from the Cross.

The fear of the Christians to the mimetic theory was the greatest surprise to me. To tell you the truth, I didn't expect it. But curiously, as to the mimetic theory, the attitude of many Christians is exactly the same as the attitude of many atheists, because fundamentally they are humanists, which are rooted in the Greek philosophical tradition, so that Christianity is a minor addition to that. The thing that is fundamental is that humanistic line which fears the knowledge of violence.

One might say that our world, our academic world, everything that comes out of the Enlightenment, is in that line - it's dangerous to talk about the knowledge of violence, we should not talk about this - the only way to save humanity from its own violence is not to talk about it. The Judaic Christian line, however is the very reverse.

I find this statement to be so 'right-on' as to most Christians being humanists rooted in the Greek philosophical tradition, tacking on Christianity as a minor addition to their way of being.  Many have simply not been able to embrace the knowledge of the Cross and of our own violence and therefore they default to the humanists line - it is better we do not talk about this.

Our Sins Weigh Us Down - The more so as we try to rely on 'this world' for Success

Psalm 39

Set me free from all my sins,

do not make me the taunt of the fool.

I was silent, not opening my lips,

because this was all your doing.

Take away your scourge from me.

I am crushed by the blows of your hand.

You punish man's sins and correct him;

like the moth you devour all he treasures.

Mortal man is no more than a breath;

O Lord, hear my prayer.

O Lord, turn your ear to my cry.

Do not be deaf to my tears.

In your house I am a passing guest,

a pilgrim, like all my fathers.

Look away that I may breathe again

before I depart to be no more.

Glory to the Father...

My heart was pierced by these words in this morning's meditation.  Words, sometime phrases, ring loud and I am struck; found guilty. 

taunt:  variant of tempter

Do not make of me the tempter of the fools: reaping what I sow; abuse on God and those near...

And what I am finding of late...?  Unbelief, attempting to rest in the flesh, thinking it a stong-hold yet built in sand or rocky ground; putting 'faith' in worldly 'success' models as I would curse circumstances and let out a torrent flood of anger and bitter words thus energizing the enemy.  Psalm 39 is a Psalm of David and it is a prayer for relief from persecutors as much as anything.  Sometimes, the enemy is elusive and we are our own enemies. Of Psalm 39, Matthew Henry writes,

There is no solid satisfaction to be had in the creature; but it is to be found in the Lord, and in communion with him; to him we should be driven by our disappointments. If the world be nothing but vanity, may God deliver us from having or seeking our portion in it. When creature-confidences fail, it is our comfort that we have a God to go to, a God to trust in. We may see a good God doing all, and ordering all events concerning us; and a good man, for that reason, says nothing against it. He desires the pardoning of his sin, and the preventing of his shame. We must both watch and pray against sin. When under the correcting hand of the Lord, we must look to God himself for relief, not to any other. Our ways and our doings bring us into trouble, and we are beaten with a rod of our own making. What a poor thing is beauty! and what fools are those that are proud of it, when it will certainly, and may quickly, be consumed!

I must remind myself that it is NOT 'the road to success' but the way-of-the-cross that leads to Christ, The Kingdom of God and self-substantiation. (Link here to a previous post.)

In a reflection on the Gospel of John Gil Bailie says:

"Christ replaces the world as a source of self-substantiation. The world used to be your source of self-substantiation and Jesus says that he is robbing it of its power to substantiate either itself or you. Slowly but surely it will loose its power to substantiate itself and to substantiate those who participate in it. If you want self-substantiation you have to go to the source and the only source of self-substantiation is God..."

The more I try to justify myself within the framework of what this world maps as 'success' the more I heap burning hot coals upon my head - festering in resentment and anger.  Oh Lord I pray, set me free from all my sins, do not make me the taunt of the fool.

DUNS SCOTUS: CANTOR OF THE INCARNATE WORD

In his audience today July 7, 2010, celebrated in the Paul VI Hall, the Pope dedicated his catechesis to Blessed Duns Scotus, who was born around the year 1266 in the Scottish village of Duns, entered the Friars Minor and was ordained a priest in 1291.

The Pope recalled that Duns Scotus had also tackled "the subject of freedom and its relationship with the will and the intellect". In this context he noted how "an idea of innate and absolute freedom (as developed after Scotus' time) located in the will which precedes the intellect, both in God and in man, risks leading to the idea of a God Who is not even connected to truth and goodness".

"Freedom", the Pope explained, "is authentic and helps in the construction of a truly human civilisation only when reconciled with truth. If disconnected from truth, freedom tragically becomes the principle that destroys the inner harmony of human beings, a source of abuse for the strong and the violent, a cause of suffering and mourning. Freedom ... grows and is perfected, said Duns Scotus, when man opens himself to God. ... When we listen to the divine Revelation, to the Word of God, in order to accept it, then we receive a message which fills our lives with light and hope, and we are truly free".

Benedict concluded the catechesis - his last until 4 August - by highlighting how "Blessed Duns Scotus teaches us that the essential thing in our lives is to believe that God is close to us and loves us in Jesus Christ; to cultivate, then, a profound love for Him and His Church. We are the witnesses of that love on this earth".

Link HERE to read more.

The Freedom we resist for the sake of the false self - self indentity - self esteem

Humans cannot attain a state of happiness without conversion, a complete reorientation of their entire existence. It cannot be achieved by their own effort; it can only result from the supreme freedom which God bestows as soon as we cease to hedge ourselves round with self-sufficiency, isolation, and arrogance.  The question is: how can human beings cross the borderline of human limitation to that divine intimacy which calls for complete surrender, and in return gives us all the resources of the infinite?  To find the answer we must turn to Saint John the Baptist,... he confessed and did not deny...  It is not I.  We must know the truth about ourselves without equivocation; we must be brought to the point of absolute honesty before ourselves and before others.  Again and again we will be tempted to stand on the pedestal of our own self-esteem, and this temptation must be overcome at all costs. We may cavort for a time on our high horse of vanity and self-deception, but sooner or later the animal will throw us and make off leaving us stranded in the wilderness.  We must abandon the fictions we have labored to polish so as to increase their plausibility.  An honest self-appraisal combined with a sober summing-up of one's own capacities and potentialities is the first step toward truth in life.  The truth shall set you free - and freedom, in every part of life, is all that matters. -- Fr Alfred Delp, SJ in Magnificat, May 2010, p. 396

We are "called" (as in vocation) out of these false and deceptive illusions of autonomous individuality to a Freedom of and in Grace - not by anything we have done, but rather by acknowledging that the world does not revolve around "me" and instead, re-presenting the One for whom Life revolves.

Be Open to Receive - St Bede

Bede, the Venerable
Link on the above for a rich telling of Bede whose feast day is today, May 25th.

Bede was also an eminent teacher... Following the "realism" of the catecheses of Cyril, Ambrose and Augustine, Bede teaches that the sacraments of Christian initiation make every faithful person "not only a Christian but Christ". Indeed, every time that a faithful soul lovingly accepts and preserves the Word of God, in imitation of Mary, he conceives and generates Christ anew. And every time that a group of neophytes receives the Easter sacraments the Church "reproduces herself" or, to use a more daring term, the Church becomes "Mother of God", participating in the generation of her children through the action of the Holy Spirit.

When meditating on Church teaching and teachers of the faith I've come to know that the secular notion of individuality, at least the version I was raised on, is so empty of nourishment and sustenance, for one's self and in particular those who are to come after.  Life, that is True Life (is there any other?) is not about myself getting ahead or even falling into the sin of fretting over.  Life is about Being Christ and therefore building up the Body of Christ - the regeneration of Life, as Mary so beautifully exemplifies.  Sin then can be understood as our refusal of the Gift of the Word of God.

Lightning Meditations by RONALD KNOX

Heart and Head

THE Church describes the heart of her Incarnate Lord as a treasure-house of all wisdom and knowledge. Most evidently, the popular devotion which tinges our prayer during the month of June is a devotion to the whole of our Lord's sacred humanity, not to one single part or aspect of it. That we should treat the Sacred Heart as the symbol of his emotional nature is not surprising. The language of lovers has claimed the heart for its symbol ever since the Middle Ages, and we have learned, in consequence, to treat it as the centre of the feelings, relegating the intellect to the head. The "heart-work" which John Wesley was for ever vindicating against its critics was precisely the enlistment of the emotions in the service of religion.

But from the beginning it was not so. To the Hebrews, as to the Romans, the heart was the seat of the intellect; "My son, give me thy heart" is only an appeal for the pupil's attention, and the "largeness of heart" granted to King Solomon was wisdom, not sensibility. This habit of speech is found in the New Testament as in the Old; nor is the distinction between head and heart observed in the liturgy, where cor and mens seem to be almost interchangeable. Have we a right to limit the range of the Sacred Heart by making it a symbol of our Lord's human tenderness, nothing else?

It is well that the sinner should find pardon, the mourner comfort, in the source from which pardon came to the Magdalen, comfort to the widow of Nairn. But there are other burdens that may be cast, if we will, on those patient shoulders. There is (for example) a kind of intellectual fatigue which overtakes us when we are introduced to the daring speculations of modern sci­ence; we cannot understand the very terms of them. Well, here is the effigy of that Heart which is the treasure-house of all wisdom and all knowledge. We have found a fresh avenue of approach; “Lord, you know all things; you can tell that I love you.”. Jn. 21:17. (Knox ‘you’ version).

What does it mean, Consecrated in the Truth?

Far from losing, we gain all in abandoning ourselves entirely to God by love and confidence. The sight of yourself: that confused heap of weaknesses, miseries, corruption, should never distress you. It is on this account that I say boldly, all is well, for I have never known anyone endowed with this keen insight, so humiliating, to whom it was not a most special grace of God; nor who has not found in it, combined with a true self-knowledge, that solid humility which is the foundation of all perfection. I have known, and do know many saintly people who, for their sole possession have that profound conviction of their weakness, and are never so happy as when they feel themselves, as it were, engulfed in it. They then dwell in truth, and consequently in God who is the sovereign truth. - JEAN-PIERRE DE CAUSSADE (1675 - 1751)

Man or Rabbit? C.S. Lewis

Why do we not only NOT press the questions that C.S. Lewis presents here but we bury further our heads in the sand, is it so we won't have to come to terms with our humanity?

But still—for intellectual honour has sunk very low in our age—I hear someone whimpering on with his question - “Will it help me? Will it make me happy? Do you really think I’d be better if I became a Christian?” Well, if you must have it, my answer is “Yes.” But I don’t like giving an answer at all at this stage. Here is a door, behind which, according to some people, the secret of the universe is waiting for you. Either that’s true or it isn’t. And if it isn’t, then what the door really conceals is simply the greatest fraud, the most colossal “sell” on record. Isn’t it obviously the job of every man (that is a man and not a rabbit) to try to find out which, and then to devote his full energies either to serving this tremendous secret or to exposing and destroying this gigantic humbug? Faced with such an issue, can you really remain wholly absorbed in your own blessed “moral development”?

Read this very relevant chapter by C.S. Lewis from God in the Dock

The Feast of Joseph the Worker: The 'Gospel of Work' and our Contemporary Challenge

The following is a reflection from Deacon Keith Rournier as well as a good rebuttal to the worship of the things of man.

On this Feast of Joseph the Worker, let us seek the intercession of the Patron of the Universal Church and follow his example, recognizing that all human work participates in the workshop of Nazareth...

Life without humility does not work

THE SPIRITUAL MASTERS OF THE CHURCH agree that the “virtue of humility attracted the Holy Trinity into the Blessed Virgin Mary’s heart” (Saint Thérèse of Lisieux). Saint Jerome says that God chose Mary to be his Mother “more on account of her humility than of all her other sublime virtues.” Saint Augustine comments that “Mary’s humility became a heavenly ladder by which God came into the world.” And Saint Bernard adds that, though Mary “pleased God by her virginity, she conceived by her humility.” As Our Lady herself attests after the Annunciation, God “has looked upon his handmaid’s lowliness” (Lk 1: 48). “In the new situation created by her divine maternity,” writes Father Raniero Cantalamessa, “Mary’s soul moved quickly and naturally to its point of truth, namely her nothingness, and nothing and no one could change this. In all this, the humility of the Mother of God is seen to be a unique miracle of grace.”


Humility before the gift

We want to share in that miracle of grace! Life without humility does not work. Father Simon Tugwell remarks that “most of our obstinacy covers up a certain degree of emptiness, a certain degree of dishonesty, of masquerading and posturing, of being uncertain of ourselves; that is why it has to be so unyielding. It can only preserve itself at the expense of a certain ruthlessness, maybe even cruelty and disregard of others.”

Humility begins in the awareness of what is most “down to earth” (“humility” from the Latin humus meaning “ground or earth”) – namely, that life is given. Everything I have and am is a gift from Another. This is why Saint Thomas Aquinas says that “humility’s rule lies in a judgment” – a judgment regarding the fact of our real nothingness. Without humility, our limitations tempt us in one of two ways: either we are scandalized by them, which makes us despondent, or we deny them, which makes us grandiose. But humility gives us a placid acceptance of our nothingness, saving us from the extremes of both self-contempt and “sanguine selfassurance” (Saint Thomas Aquinas).

Acknowledging the Presence

The example of the Blessed Virgin Mary shows us how humility makes one “submissive and ready to receive divine favor” (Saint Thomas Aquinas). There is a twofold dynamic to humility. On the one hand, as we have said, it is not possible to be humble if we deny our nothingness. But on the other hand, we cannot be humble if we fail to acknowledge the merciful presence of God acting in our life. This is the glory of Our Lady’s humility. “Humility mainly concerns a person’s subjection to God. It properly regards the reverence which bows down before God” (Saint Thomas Aquinas). Humility blesses us with a serene acquiescence before our nothingness that becomes a begging for the Infinite. God loves to be acknowledged by our nothingness.

“The one who humbles himself will be exalted” (Lk 14: 11; 18: 14), promises the One who was “humble of heart.” Authentic humility creates space in a soul that God refuses to leave empty; he fills it with himself. “No one makes himself naught except to let God fill the void” (L. Lavelle). A humble person is one who has decided to renounce pretentiousness in favor of the purpose that God has for him or her. “Perfect humility consists in constantly making oneself small for the sake of love, to elevate others” (R. Cantalamessa).

The mortification of humility

It is no surprise that recollection and vigilance distinguish the humble person’s life. “Humility disposes one to free access to spiritual and divine blessings” (Saint Thomas Aquinas). But those blessings come to us in the most subtle ways and – as Our Lady discovered – often as a surprise. Nothing is easier than for the noise of our self-assertive thoughts to drown out God’s voice speaking deep within us, delicately. Thus, humility craves silence… a silence that permits us to become detached from willfulness and absorbed in what God wills for us. Humility enables us to hear God communicating his love to us in just the way he wants to love us.

Rev. Peter John Cameron, O.P.
Copyright Magnificat

Memento Mori

The Seven Deadly Sins and the Four Last Things (1485) - Hieronymus Bosch

(Wiki Commons - Click to enlarge)

Feel free to come visit A Little Guide for Your Last Days blog, your one-stop blog for many resources on holy dying.

True North

Mentor, friend, and stout fellow, Gil Bailie posts on expecting a grandchild, being a former - or is it present? - Eagle Scout, and weathering cultural storms in Be Prepared … for random coincidence …

He refers in his post to Joe Carter's piece at First Things, The Most Influential Conservative Book Ever Produced in America, which shows how my Shire-produced hobbit mind works. It never occurred to me to label the Boy Scout Manual "conservative". Or perhaps, if anyone was so benighted as to see the Manual in Marxist terms, it was so much the worse for him/her. To libel the BSA was tantamount to libeling the Junior Woodchucks, or being so daft as to assume magnetic north is true north.

Of course, times have changed: up IS down, bad IS good, and the center does not hold.

The worshipers of mayhem and chaos, those possessed by the spirit of the age, feel a quaint need to kick over any restraints and mores that still exist. For them, following a path of being trustworthy, loyal, helpful, friendly, courteous, kind, obedient, cheerful, thrifty, brave, clean, and reverent is clearly pathology.

But for me and my house, we will keep lamps and oil ready during snowstorms, help the old lady shovel out, have the whetstone handy, and a few extra tins in the pantry. Especially when more snow is expected.

Send me a copy of the Metrosexuals' Manual when it comes out. I'm sure it will be good for a few laughs.

Memory Cloud or as in Greek mythology - the Muses - which are the daughters of Memory

"Memory is a funny thing, I think that we feel that it gives us our humanity in a great sense because when we cannot remember we feel as though we have lost not only those specific ideas about what came before or who we loved but we have lost certainly a part of ourselves." - Judith G. Levy

How true...

I can't help but remember, from Violence Unveiled by Gil Bailie that interestingly enough the biblical word "truth" is formed using Greek mythology. "Truth" translates the biblical Greek word "alethia." Alethia is a compound word composed of "a" (which means "not" in Greek) and "lethe" (which means "forgotten, hidden, or concealed" in Greek). Truth, then, literally means "that which is not hidden" or "that which is not forgotten."

"In Greek mythology the Muses are the daughters of Memory (Mnemosyne). The Muses make it possible to remember the past fondly or heroically, but they do so with fog filters."
from Violence Unveiled by Gil Bailie p 33. (link on the above quote to read more on MYTH from Bailie's book)

Not to deprive us all of "warm & fuzzy" fond memories, but what is at the heart of these concepts of memory - alethia - truth - "stop forgetting"? What and how are we, humanity, forgetting?

"... myth and the associated structures of what Girard calls the primitive sacred... make it possible to participate in, observe, or recollect certain violent events without having to actually witness them in any morally significant sense." p 35.

Hummm... hopefully you might want to delve into this a bit further. If so, check out the links and books we highlight in our sidebar.

Benedict XVI - Relativism

VATICAN CITY, NOV. 16, 2009 (Zenit.org).- Benedict XVI is cautioning evangelizers to be on guard against relativism, saying it infiltrates society and manipulates consciences...

The relativistic culture "enters the sanctuary of the family, infiltrates the realm of education and other realms of society and contaminates them, manipulating consciences, especially those of the young," he said.

"At the same time, however, despite these snares, the Church knows that the Holy Spirit is always acting," the Pope affirmed. "New doors, in fact, are opened to the Gospel, and spreading in the world is the longing for authentic spiritual and apostolic renewal. As in other periods of change, the pastoral priority is to show the true face of Christ, lord of history and sole redeemer of man..MORE>>

In my experience, relativism took a nasty turn during my college years. It merely took a sneer, a curl of the lip, a veiled threat to reject if I stood up for the Christian faith to cast me into the netherworld of relativism.

From a Girardian viewpoint, I feared becoming a victim and so accepted the herd's position rather than chance becoming an outcast.

The Holy Father is right. And there are huge numbers of "trip-wires" set by relativism today.

For Those With Ears to Hear

The wisdom of G. K. Chesterton distilled through a discerningly faithful mind of Dale Ahlquist:

...the evil of big business has an evil twin sister: big government. When government tries to right the wrongs created by capitalism, it creates an even worse mess. The idea of socialism may sound good: to provide houses and food for everyone. However, in order to carry this out, State officials would have to inspect houses and regulate meals. The State has found it easier, Chesterton points out, to provide the building inspectors without providing the builders, and easier to restrict the diet without providing the dinner. We have simply "added all the bureaucratic tyrannies of a Socialist State to the old plutocratic tyrannies of a Capitalist State." The result is a loss of liberty and an assault on the common man.

G. K. Chesterton - Apostle of Common Sense, p. 159

Longenecker - Father of Lies

For the record, Father Dwight Longenecker on the Father of Lies (and this isn't just because he gave a sterling celebrity blurb for my book).

Seeing Clearly - Catholicism

Man, oh man. When Jeff Miller (the 'Curt Jester') is right, he is right. In his words, One of the joys of being Catholic is that you can see reality more clearly and don't have to pretend to not see the obvious. Though it is a bittersweet joy since seeing this reality is rather frustrating when so many are comfortably ignoring it.

Love - caritas from CARITAS IN VERITATE

tip to Amy Welborn.

In the introduction of CARITAS IN VERITATE just released, Pope Benedict XVI writes:

Love — caritas — is an extraordinary force which leads people to opt for courageous and generous engagement in the field of justice and peace. It is a force that has its origin in God, Eternal Love and Absolute Truth. Each person finds his good by adherence to God's plan for him, in order to realize it fully: in this plan, he finds his truth, and through adherence to this truth he becomes free (cf. Jn 8:22).

Oh my, what goodness we have to look forward to as we plum the richness and spiritual depth of this latest ENCYCLICAL LETTER.

As there are ever-so-many-more folks unfamilar with Christian/Catholic understanding of some the most basic thoughts I just wanted to lift this one up: LOVE.