Tuesday, January 27, 2009



Man of Holiness, Thomas Aquinas;

Man of head and heart, Thomas Aquinas

A homily,

Peter Menkin, Obl Cam OSB

Church of Our Saviour (Episcopal)

Mill Valley, CA USA

Wednesday Eucharist, January 28, 2009

Wisdom 7:7-14

Psalm 37: 3-6, 32-33

Matthew 13: 47-52

In the name of the Father, Son, and Holy ghost.

Let me declare a few matters about the Saint, Thomas Aquinas. He believed that God loved mankind, that God was love. He was a brilliant man of mind and heart.

Introduction

Though a Dominican all his life, originally this Doctor of the Church, was foiled and discouraged from living a life directed towards holiness, and in becoming a Dominican he became more so less presumptive of God. By less presumptive I mean he did not presume on God to be but a man. As history tells us, a year before the end of his life, St. Thomas stopped writing, burned much of his work, and said it was all so much “straw.” Seemingly extreme, the Saint and Holy Man does in such ways abandon himself to God.

The kind of family efforts to dissuade him from becoming a Dominican included kidnapping. At one time, Thomas on the way to Rome was seized by his brothers and brought back to his parents at the castle of S. Giovanni There he was held a captive for a year or two and besieged with prayers, threats, and even sensual temptation to make him relinquish his purpose. Finally the family yielded and the Dominican order sent Thomas to Cologne to study under Albertus Magnus, where he arrived probably toward the end of 1244. He accompanied Albertus to Paris in 1245, remained there with his teacher.

St. Thomas was frequently abstracted and in ecstasy. Towards the end of his life the ecstasies became more frequent. On one occasion, at Naples in 1273, after he had completed his treatise on the Eucharist, three of the brethren saw him lifted in ecstasy, and they heard a voice proceeding from the crucifix on the altar, saying “Thou hast written well of me, Thomas; what reward wilt thou have?” Thomas replied, “None other than Thyself, Lord”

Another source says:

The end of 1225 is usually assigned as the time of his birth. …( 1227 is the more probable date.). All agree that he died in 1274.

The Saint, his ideas

Yes, we are talking about a man, a Saint of great thought, powerful heart, and relationship to God so strong he is considered a Saint. Through the centuries this man has been one of the seminal thinkers of Christianity. We celebrate his Feast Day in Church today, January 28, 2009, and remember that he posited that there is God. His faith and arguments so strong, as I say, they influence Christianity today. That is more than 850 years after his death, and all the time between. That makes one think of things that matter, those that last, the matters of the Church and Christ.

His life exemplified a pinnacle of mind, and his ideas on God and the natural world have been examined through the centuries. Who is there who doesn’t know the name Aquinas?

As reminder of his thought, his writings, as summarized by one source:

In his Sacred doctrine, Thomas’ fivefold proof of the existence of God posited the following. I’ve divided them here for the sake of emphasis on love.

· (1) There is first the mover, unmoved, a first cause in the chain of causes. This absolutely necessary being, “an absolutely perfection being”, is a rational designer.

· (2) In this connection thoughts of unity, infinity, unchangeableness, and goodness of the highest exist. These matters are deduced.

· (3) The spiritual being of God is defined as thinking and willing. His knowledge is absolutely perfect. He knows himself and all things appointed by him. Every knowing being strives after the thing known, as end, and will is implied in knowing.

· (4) As God knows himself as perfect good, he wills himself to this end. God wills everything; everything is brought by divine will in the relation of means to an end.

· (5) God wills good to every being, which exists. He loves it. Therefore, love is the fundamental relation of God to the world.

· The divine love exists for every creature in like measure. The good assured by love to the individual exists for different beings in various degrees.

· The loving God gives to every being what it needs in relation to practical reason, affording the idea of moral law.

I want to emphasize that Christian living, and receiving God’s love isn’t limited to Saints and Holy men and women. They, too, strove and practiced living lives that in knowing the goodness of God, the life of Christ, and the redemption and need for turning, turning, turning each day towards a way of life that is for neighbor and Christ, responded to the New and Old Testament, The Bible (see Wisdom 7: 7-14). Though we fall and fail, we do again.

The Anglican divine

Richard Hooker was influenced by Thomas Aquinas’ natural law, and it is the Anglican Hooker who with this influence developed the theory of “Via Media.” Both believed in the “natural light of reason.” A divine, Hooker wrote “…a signature work of reformed Anglican theology entitled The Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity. Through this work, Hooker connects scripture, tradition and reason in an effort to assert the authority of the Anglican Church hierarchy in the face of the Puritan challenge. The work not only marks a high point in Anglican theology, but its discussion of natural law influenced John Locke and the American Founding Fathers.”

Thomas lived a life of Biblical wisdom, as did Hooker..

Commonality of Christian and Biblical living

After all, as we think of Saint Thomas, we have much in common as Christians, and it is in part that which we have in common that is also indicative of our living Communion with the Saints. Is this not a miracle of Christ? A miracle of love?

For we Christians, love is the answer. There is also the community of the moral, of ethics, of what we know as Christian living. This man has contributed much to our way of Christian living. Let us remember him, and as one of our readings today says of his way of life as we celebrate him:

He lived a life of Humility—

Do not say, “He will consider the great number of my gifts, / and when I make an offering to the Most High God, he will accept it.

Holy man he became and was, and he lived a life of teaching, praying, and learning. His faith led him to fulfill telling us Truth:

He lived a life of Truth—

Do not devise a lie against your brother, /or do the same to a friend.

He lived a life considerate in speech and self-control—

Do not babble in the assembly of the elders, /and do not repeat yourself when you pray.

The intentions of Thomas’ heart were good, as our Lectionary quote from the Bible implies. His prayers were of strong and pure intention. When he prayed, he prayed so that he did please God through his respect of intention so that individual prayers were not repeated. This does not mean he did not say repeated prayers, as a chant, or that he did not say prayers that were stated differently so that they revealed the facets of his need and heart. These things are presumed.

Thank you for your attention this day. As a say, Thomas was a man of love in Christ, a man who believed and demonstrated with reason and through heart and head there is a God, we celebrate the life and teachings of Thomas Aquinas.

May the Lord bless and keep us. May the Lord make his face to shine upon us and be gracious to us. The Lord lift up his countenance upon us and give us peace.

Note on three images: The first and third are of Thomas Aquinas. The second shows a likeness of the Anglican divine Richard Hooker.

 

Friday, February 13, 2009



Martin Luther: Reformer, Hymnist

A Homily

By Peter Menkin

Church of Our Saviour (Episcopal)

Mill Valley, CA USA

Wednesday Eucharist, 10:30 a.m.

February 18, 2009

Lesser Feasts and Fasts, 1994

Isaiah 55: 6-11

John 15: 1-11

Psalm 46

In the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Ghost.

Our readings today are rich, and so is the life of Martin Luther. This remarkable and great man of history did, as God’s instrument, reform the Christian Church throughout the world. Who does not know the name? Those of the Christian faith, certainly do.

If you come away with any good news from this Homily, let it be that God works in history. That Martin Luther, a man of God, was a man of God in history. That God still speaks. He speaks to us in many ways. As Luther so ardently said 500 years, ago, the Bible speaks to us. As we know, the Holy Spirit is a guide.

Martin Luther, man of history, was a writer of hymns, famous for music that we sing today. He is a reminder of a Christ-inspired, a Christ-filled life, and a Christ-gifted man of faith. His most notable and memorable hymn is, “A Mighty Fortress is Our God.” Here is a part of the hymn played for us. (Some of the hymn is played on a musical instrument, no voice.)

These are some words from the hymn:

“A mighty fortress is our God

A bulwark never failing;

Our helper He amid the flood

Of mortal ills prevailing.

For still our ancient foe

Doth seek to work us woe –

His craft and power are great,

And, armed with cruel hate,

On earth is not his equal.”

One commentary says: “Luther’s hymn was sung boldly as an affirmation of God’s power over forces that sought to disrupt the truth of God.”

Martin Luther was born November 10, 1483, at Eisleben, Germany. He studied at Mansfeld, Magdeburg and Eisenach, Germany. At the age of 18, he entered the University of Erfurt intending a career in law. But dropped out almost immediately, believing that law represented uncertainty. Almost at the same time he received his Master’s degree, he became a monk. This was 1505. He had entered the Augustinian monastery at Erfurt to prepare for the priesthood.

He was appointed professor at the University of Wittenberg in 1508. After his ordination, he was awarded a Doctor of Divinity and attracted large congregations by his preaching.

In 1511 he visited Rome, became critical over the corruptions in the church and agonized over the problem of salvation–that it was not won by indulgences, but was a gift of God’s grace.

On October 31, 1517, Luther posted his 95 theses of denunciation in Wittenberg with a view to begin a public debate. This started a quarrel between Luther and the church.

These are the first three theses:

1. When our Lord and Master Jesus Christ said, “Repent” (Mt 4:17), he willed the entire life of believers to be one of repentance.

2. This word cannot be understood as referring to the sacrament of penance, that is, confession and satisfaction, as administered by the clergy.

3. Yet it does not mean solely inner repentance; such inner repentance is worthless unless it produces various outward mortification of the flesh.

During 1521, Luther maintained his stand before the Diet of Worms that led to his excommunication. German princes and followers among churchmen and the people supported him. At this time he began translating the Bible into German. He completed the whole translation in 1531.

The translation of the Bible into German, invention of the printing press, and hymn writing all brought the spirit of God to common men, gave Martin Luther, the great preacher, another venue that moved the Christian world towards the new way–Protestantism.

History of man and of creation, which means our earth and the universe, is God’s field. He acts so greatly. Yet God acts with and in mankind. He as friendly maker brought so much to one man, Martin Luther, who in Christ remarkably added and was an instrument of movement in human life. So we know that Christ acts in man, for in our reading today from John, the reading offers: “I am the true vine, and my Father is the vine grower. He removes every branch in me that bears no fruit. Every branch that bears fruit he prunes to make it bear more fruit…” Martin Luther did this in accord with his understanding of the Bible. He was a prophet.

Thomas Carlyle, the Scottish Calvinist and Essayist of the 19th Century, says:

As a participant and dispenser of divine influence, he shows himself among human affairs a true connecting medium and visible messenger between heaven and earth, a man, therefore, not only permitted to enter the sphere of poetry, but to dwell in the purest centre thereof, perhaps the most inspired of all teachers since the Apostles.

Martin Luther’s teachings went this way, as Luther the reformer had become Luther the revolutionary:

· The Bible is the only source of faith; it contains the inspiration of God.

· Faith alone can work justification; man is saved by confidently believing that God will pardon him. This faith not only includes a full pardon of sin, but also an unconditional release from its penalties.

· The hierarchy and priesthood are not Divinely instituted or necessary, and ceremonial or exterior worship is not essential or useful. Ecclesiastical vestments, pilgrimages, mortifications, monastic vows, prayers for the dead, intercession of saints, avail the soul nothing.

· All sacraments, with the exception of baptism, Holy Eucharist, and penance, are rejected. A powerful theological concept and attitude, Luther’s influence of reformation remains with Protestants and Catholics today. The Reformation is an ongoing movement, even this more than 500 years later. The Anglican Church, with its middle way of Protestant/catholicism, emphasizes in focus the sacraments of baptism and Holy Eucharist. In the case of Eucharist, since the Anglican of today and since 1979 has emphasized it (in specific, the Protestant Episcopal Church USA)—Holy Eucharist every week! Baptism as a celebration and important emphasis for the “Priesthood of All Believers,” as well! No wonder we have a Feast day celebrating Martin Luther in our Church lives.

· The priesthood is universal; every Christian may assume it. A body of specially trained and ordained men to dispense the mysteries of God is needless and a usurpation.

· There is no visible Church or one specially established by God whereby men may work out their salvation.

Whether you believe all or part of Martin Luther’s statements, his influence and thought, his ideas and faith, his life of believing changed the world.

We remember Martin Luther in hymn. He always wrote the words, sometimes the music itself, and often took the music from popular songs of his day. His most well known hymns:

· Dear Christians, One and All, Rejoice

· Saviour of the Nations, Come

· From Heaven Above to Earth I Come

· Christ Jesus Lay in Death’s Strong Bands

· Come, Spirit of God, Holy Lord

· Lord, Keep Us Steadfast in Your Word

God in history is enacted by the story of Martin Luther, as are his hymns.

Amen.

More likely an Anglican poem as represented in an Episcopal Parish, this poem speaks of the quiet and reverence that is the atmosphere and practice in the sacristy–a room where preparation of things holy and special is done for setting before the altar of the Lord.

Note the audio reading by the poet at the end. The work speaks of the experience as one of beauty and gratitude, a sense of gladness and celebration. Though a routine activity prior to Communion, the poem also expresses the experience and ethos of the room as an encounter with God. The poet, Peter Menkin, believes this to be a special routine that is of Biblical dimension–both of the Old and New Testaments.

 

Preparing for Worship

By Peter Menkin

June 20, 2008

God, in the Sacristy of the Church:

We encounter you– as

We go about our routine

Preparing for Communion.

Yet aware of beauty and the gratitude:

This is the day the Lord has made,

Let us be glad in it.

Doing the work of worship:

Preparing in this room, holy

Sacred items reverently placed.

One of us prepares the wine

for Communion,

for blessing:

Contained in silver; and the water,

For blessing, contained in silver.

The bread for the Body, prepared,

for Communion,

for blessing,

Offered on silver. Lovely, lovely, lovely.

These items that are earthly, memorials of You.

How lovely is your presence:

This sacred time of waiting,

Working, preparing, as we speak

Together quietly, in peace.

Audio reading by poet is here:

http://www.archive.org/details/PreparingForWorshipByPeterMenkin