Today is the feast of St. Lawrence, one of the great martyrs of the Church. The story of his martyrdom has become legendary over the centuries:

As deacon in Rome, Lawrence was charged with the responsibility for the material goods of the Church, and the distribution of alms to the poor. When Lawrence knew he would be arrested like the pope, he sought out the poor, widows and orphans of Rome and gave them all the money he had on hand, selling even the sacred vessels to increase the sum. When the prefect of Rome heard of this, he imagined that the Christians must have considerable treasure. He sent for Lawrence and said, “You Christians say we are cruel to you, but that is not what I have in mind. I am told that your priests offer in gold, that the sacred blood is received in silver cups, that you have golden candlesticks at your evening services. Now, your doctrine says you must render to Caesar what is his. Bring these treasures—the emperor needs them to maintain his forces. God does not cause money to be counted: He brought none of it into the world with him—only words. Give me the money, therefore, and be rich in words.”

Lawrence replied that the Church was indeed rich. “I will show you a valuable part. But give me time to set everything in order and make an inventory.” After three days he gathered a great number of blind, lame, maimed, leprous, orphaned and widowed persons and put them in rows. When the prefect arrived, Lawrence simply said, “These are the treasure of the Church.”

The prefect was so angry he told Lawrence that he would indeed have his wish to die—but it would be by inches. He had a great gridiron prepared, with coals beneath it, and had Lawrence’s body placed on it. After the martyr had suffered the pain for a long time, the legend concludes, he made his famous cheerful remark, “It is well done. Turn me over!” (Source)

Lawrence is not the only martyr to be celebrated this week; we also celebrate two martyrs from the Nazi era as well: St. Maximilian Kolbe (August 14) and St. Teresa Benedicta of the Cross (August 9, superseded by the Sunday liturgy this year). The close chronological proximity of these two saints reminds us that the early church is not the only era of many martyrs; in fact, the 20th century saw more Christians killed for their faith than the rest of Church history combined. And this bloodshed has not abated; even today many Christians throughout the world face persecution, including martyrdom, just for following Christ. Two examples:

Christians Hit by Islamic “Purity” Pogroms in Pakistan

Nigerian Islamists Force 13-year Old Girl To Watch Pastor Hacked to Death

We who live in complete comfort and enjoy religious freedom need to pray for these courageous brother and sisters in Christ. Let us invoke the powerful intercession of the martyr-saints:

St. Lawrence, pray for us!
St. Maximilian Kolbe, pray for us!
St. Teresa Benedicta of the Cross, pray for us!

*Note: the title of this post derives from Tertullian’s famous quote: “The blood of the martyrs is the seed of the Church”.

Last week I wrote about my skepticism towards the Medjugorje apparitions, while acknowledging that God has clearly worked through the events in that town for good (even in my own life). Austin Ruse, the President of the New York and Washinton, D.C.-based Catholic Family & Human Rights Institute (C-FAM), has just written an article with similar conclusions for The Catholic Thing.

Read it here.

Yesterday Twitter went down in a denial-of-service attack.

Across the country millions were in a state of shock as they had no way of informing the world that they were drinking their coffee, sitting on the couch, or going to the bathroom. President Obama declared a state of emergency and ordered that millions of hand-held whiteboards be distributed so that people could describe every event of their lives to those around them. However, this caused some unintended problems as many of the “tweeters” did not know what the two-legged creatures surrounding them were – they had forgotten what real-life “people” looked like.

*Apologies to Don McLean for the title to this post.

I received an interesting comment (which I deleted) to my blog post about prolife violence (written shortly after the abortionist George Tiller was shot and killed):

Will there be PAYBACK for Dr. Tiller?

Will there be COUNTERTERROR against right-to-lifers?

If a right-to-lifer gets counterterrorized TO DEATH, will that be murder, or JUSTIFIABLE HOMICIDE?

WHO would be the most effective TARGETS for anti-right-to-lifist counterterror?

WHERE do they LIVE?

I went to the commentor’s website and the operator had this lovely statement in the profile:

Right-to-lifism is murder, and ALL right-to-lifers are murderers. Swear it, believe it, proclaim it, and act on it.

I think the prophet Isaiah said it best:

Woe to those who call evil good and good evil, who put darkness for light and light for darkness, who put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter. Isaiah 5:20

As you can see from the right side of this page, I’m currently reading Henry Chadwick’s translation of St. Augustine’s Confessions, as well as Peter Brown’s biography of the great saint.

By some weird convergence, I just discovered that Oxford University Press is about to publish a biography of St. Augustine by Henry Chadwick! He wrote it back in the early 80′s and it has only recently been discovered.

I am so looking forward to reading it.

Jesus ascends
    Peter, James, John follow
    Alone with Jesus
    On the mountain, away from all.
Jesus transfigured
    Glory from glory
    God from God
    Light from Light
The Law and the Prophets testify
    ”This is he of whom we speak”
The Beloved Son
    All of the Father within
    ”Listen to him and you listen to me”
Coming down
    Back to the world, the cross to come
    Glory pointing to sorrow, leading to glory
The three to be transfigured:
    Peter, the rock, ruling in love
    James, the son of thunder, soon to drink Christ’s cup
    John, the eagle, the beloved son of Mary
Alone with Jesus
    Transfigure me
    Make me your beloved
    Let me enjoy your favor
- written on retreat, summer 2008

What a great story: a group of six Franciscan Friars decide to walk from Raleigh to Washington DC. On the way, they are able to minister to many lost souls:

For six weeks, the brothers walked from Roanoke with only their brown robes, sandals and a belief in the kindness of strangers to feed and shelter them.

The sight of six men in flowing habits, trudging single file on the side of the road, prompted many to pull over and talk, even confess. People on their way to work described their loneliness. College students wanted help figuring out what to do with their lives. Children, mistaking them for the Shaolin monks in movies, ran up to ask the friars if they knew how to beat up bullies.

“Dressed like we are in our habits, it’s like a walking sign that says, ‘Tell us your life’s problems,’ ” explained Cliff Hennings, the youngest of the friars at 23.

In every instance, the friars made time for conversation. They shot the breeze with a gang of drunk bikers, dispensed relationship advice to the brokenhearted commuters and bore witness to one and all, yea, even to the Chik-fil-A employee dressed as a cow.

Of course, since the article was written for the Washington Post, most of the underlying reasons for their trek are ignored, but even in this secular paper the spiritual underpinnings of their journey comes across. It is amazing how St. Francis continues to inspire and motivate people to come to Christ, almost 800 years after his entrance into eternal life.

St. Francis, pray for us!

This is an interesting study: the Princeton Review surveyed the students at college campuses and came up with the schools with the “most religious” students. At the top of the list? Thomas Aquinas College, a Catholic school in California. Diverse traditions were represented in the list, as Mormon Brigham Young University and Evangelical Wheaton College were 2nd and 3rd, respectively, and non-sectarian Hillsdale College was 4th.

I’m not sure how they determined that a college had “religious” students, but much of the list seems in keeping with popular perceptions. One surprise – at least to me – was the inclusion of the University of Notre Dame at #8. I know that they have a strong group of practicing Catholics there, but I was under the impression that it was a minority of their entire student body. Perhaps I was mistaken. Also, I was surprised that other very religious schools – such as the Franciscan University of Steubenville – were not included, but perhaps they didn’t qualify for the survey for other reasons.

I do think such a study is useful, as there is very little real difference in the academics of most colleges across the country. So knowing details about the demographics of the students can be very helpful in determining what school to attend.

A study found that people who use condoms have poorer mental health than those who do not:

A leading Scottish psychologist has claimed that condom use is associated with poorer mental health, problems with stress and depression, saying his research shows the natural conjugal act can significantly boost the mental wellbeing of men and women.

But my favorite line was the following:

“The more often people are using condoms independent of age, independent of the nature of their relationship, the greater use of immature defense mechanisms against stress”

So using an immature defense mechanism against parenthood leads to a greater use of immature defense mechanisms against stress. Who’d have thunk it?

Today is the 48th birthday of President Obama. It seems like as good as time as any to remind us of Paul’s advice:

I urge, then, first of all, that requests, prayers, intercession and thanksgiving be made for everyone— for kings and all those in authority, that we may live peaceful and quiet lives in all godliness and holiness. This is good, and pleases God our Savior, who wants all men to be saved and to come to a knowledge of the truth.
1 Timothy 2:1-4

Albert Mohler, president of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary and a leading Evangelical in this country, writes about the problem of young Evangelical Christians engaging in premarital sex and what can be done about it. There is nothing new in this subject, but I think his potential solution is very interesting. As he notes, most Christian leaders will immediately argue that more teaching and preaching on abstinence is needed. However, Mohler argues that perhaps Evangelicals should begin to focus more on the rise of “late” marriages – i.e., not getting married until one is in his mid to late 20′s (and even later) – and instead promote “early marriage”. He quotes a sociologist who states,

Evangelicals tend to marry slightly earlier than other Americans, but not by much. Many of them plan to marry in their mid-20s.Yet waiting for sex until then feels far too long to most of them. And I am suggesting that when people wait until their mid-to-late 20s to marry, it is unreasonable to expect them to refrain from sex. It’s battling our Creator’s reproductive designs.

As provocative as this sounds, I have to agree with Mohler and I think the advice also applies to young orthodox Catholics.

In our culture, most people don’t marry until after they are out of college, yet men and women both are physically able to conceive a child a decade earlier than that. Historically in most cultures the average age to get married is during the teen years – not after one has seen a quarter century go by.

It is true that our culture is not set up for people to marry at a very early age such as before they are 18. Yet I have seen too many well-meaning Catholic and Evangelical parents urge their children to wait until they are “ready” to get married and mean by that until they are financially stable – i.e. they have a college degree and a steady job. What this often means is that the parents prefer materialism over purity. So a young man and woman in college who are created by God to be sexually attracted to one another are forced to refrain from the relations that God has intended for them in order to secure a better financial footing – is this really a spiritually healthy way to live?

Just a note: I am in no way advocating premarital relations; in fact, I believe early marriage is a primary way in which we can combat its practice in our childrens’ lives.

The number of books in my “read next” pile has just reached 20. Does anyone know of any Matrix-like technology which can download the contents of these books directly into my brain? I’m sure Steve Jobs must be on the case…

One of the bedrock doctrines of the Christian Faith is that God became man in the Incarnation. Not just “man” in the generic sense, but a specific man born as a Jew in Bethlehem 2,000 years ago. He had a modest home, annoying relatives, and all the things that make up a “real life.” As Scripture says, he is like us in all things “except sin.”

The fact of the Incarnation impacts every part of our life as Christians. One of the primary things it tells us is that we are not to disdain the physical world, and in fact that God has effected our redemption through it. In other words, the physical world becomes our means to salvation. We can see this most clearly in the sacraments, when God takes humble physical objects like bread or water or oil and transforms them into something so much more and then uses them to save us. Every sacrament must also have a real human being as its minister – some sacraments require a priest, but others can be celebrated by anyone (for example, a baptism). But all sacraments require a communion of at least two people.

The importance of this physical connection can be seen in the Church’s refusal to allow the sacrament of confession to be celebrated over the phone or over the internet – the penitent and the priest must be physically present to one another for the sacrament to be valid.

I thought of all this when I saw this headline:

Fla. Megachurch Brings Worship to the iPhone

The article explains that this church, which prides itself on its “distributed” form of worship, now streams its worship service via the iPhone so that people can join them wherever they are. The pastor is quoted as saying, “It’s not a place you leave your community to go, it’s the gathering of community for worship, service and equipping.” So this pastor believes that simply watching a service from your phone is participating in that community’s “worship.”

Yet how does a large church gather its members together? The problem of gathering all members of a Church together for Sunday worship has actually been a problem since the first century – and is one that was solved in the first century as well. Each city was appointed a bishop to be the head of that local church. It was the bishop to whom all local decisions were referred. For example, writing in the early 2nd century, St. Ignatius of Antioch declares:

See that ye all follow the bishop, even as Jesus Christ does the Father, and the presbytery as ye would the apostles; and reverence the deacons, as being the institution of God. Let no man do anything connected with the Church without the bishop. Let that be deemed a proper Eucharist, which is[administered] either by the bishop, or by one to whom he has entrusted it. Wherever the bishop shall appear, there let the multitude[of the people] also be; even as, wherever Jesus Christ is, there is the Catholic Church. It is not lawful without the bishop either to baptize or to celebrate a love-feast; but whatsoever he shall approve of, that is also pleasing to God, so that everything that is done may be secure and valid.
Letter to the Smyraeans

But the authority of the local bishop did not separate the local church from the universal Church; in fact, it was through the bishop that the local church was united to the rest of the universal (or “catholic”) Church. The early Church was “distributed” by the fact that each local church was in communion – through the Eucharist – with all the other local churches throughout the Roman Empire (and beyond).

If you think about it, today the Pope is the pastor of a “megaChurch” of over 1,000,000 members. While it is true that he has made his sermons and other teachings available via various technologies (including the iPhone), he understands that a true worship experience is not simply listening to him via a TV or computer or phone, but instead requires a real gathering of people in one location to celebrate the Eucharist under the guidance of a local priest who is appointed by the local bishop. This is the way the incarnational, sacramental Church worships.

Take some time today to read a fascinating article entitled “An Ecumenical Moment for One” by Lutheran pastor Russell Saltzman. Saltzman is lamenting the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America’s acquiescence to modern cultural norms, this time by its acceptance of homosexuality:

It isn’t about homosexuality. That in the moment is merely the presenting issue following a long, long line of revisionist propositions that have found a home with the Christian left. The authority of Scripture, the reality of sin, the name of God as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit—all these and other critical expositions on God’s revelation to humanity have been under sustained attack. When these go, well, only sex is left and here we are, about to bless what Scripture, natural law, and common sense itself condemns.

This will not pass without notice, of course…Frankly, the creation of one more Lutheran church body in America is a dauntingly depressive possibility. I’m not entirely certain I want anything to do with it . . . unless we’re talking about a ministerium organized to open dialogue on becoming a Roman Catholic affiliate, congregations, pastors, the whole caboodle, eventually seeking full communion with the bishop of Rome. If Rome cooperates, this ought to be pretty easy. Just think of us as inactive members seeking reinstatement. In my congregation, an officially inactive member is welcomed back to full fellowship by making a contribution and receiving Holy Communion, and sometimes we’ve been known to even skip the contribution part. Couldn’t the Church of Rome handle that? There might be a few subsidiary issues to settle, but get us inside first and everything else becomes manageable. What is needed here is a brave archbishop or two, together taking cognizance of what is about to happen to the ELCA, and stepping forward as potential shepherds. Can’t really call it stealing sheep if the previous shepherd has run off, can you?

No, I’m not being facetious. Not altogether. The original intent of the sixteenth century Reformers wasn’t to start a new church but to be a witness for evangelical reform within the one church. Our Lutheran confessional documents—notably the Augsburg Confession of 1530—forcefully argues that nothing Lutherans taught was contrary to the faith of the church catholic, nor even contrary to that faith held by the Church of Rome. As it has happened, much to our Lutheran chagrin, late twentieth century Rome itself become a better witness to an evangelical gospel than early twenty-first century Lutherans have proved capable of being. And for all the radical Lutheran polemic coming after Augsburg—you know, about the pope being the latest anti-Christ sitting on the throne of the whore of Babylon—truth is, these days, I get far less trouble from the bishop of Rome than I get from my own bishop.

Read the whole article here and be sure to pray for Pastor Saltzman and the whole ELCA.

The Catholic archbishop of Westminster has come out warning his flock of the dangers of “social networking,” such as can be found on Facebook and MySpace:

“Friendship is not a commodity,” said the prelate. “Friendship is something that is hard work and enduring when it’s right”.

Archbishop Nichols said that social networking sites such as Facebook and MySpace encouraged a form of communication that was not “rounded”, and would not therefore build communities. “Facebook and MySpace might contribute towards communities, but I’m wary about it,” he said. The Catholic religious leader said young people were being encouraged to build up collections of friends as commodities, that these friendships could easily collapse, and teenagers were therefore left desolate.

As can be seen on the right side of this blog, I am on Facebook, so I do not condemn the technology outright. But I am uncomfortable with its use of the term “friend” to designate those connected to you on the site. A “friend” is more than just a connection on a website, and the devaluing of this term can have serious consequences, as can be seen from the linked article (a young man committed suicide because of the taunts of online “friends”). Whenever we reduce other people to commodities – such as making them just something to increase our list of “friends” online – we seriously endanger their dignity as images of God.