Organization: The American University
Newsgroups: bit.listserv.catholic
Date:         Fri, 13 Nov 1992 00:08:24 EST
From:         Jim McIntosh <JIM@AMERICAN.EDU>
Subject:      Re: Nature of List--Fossil
              12 Nov 1992 20:55:32 GMT from <stabosz@CHOPIN.UDEL.EDU>

On Thu, 12 Nov 1992 20:55:32 GMT Rae Stabosz said:
>My note was in reaction to Jim MacKintosh's (sp) disparaging of the
>pre-Vatican Church, as if it was a bogeyman and its practices not
>worthy of appropriating to our own times.  That Church produced many
>saints, and their words are available for all to read -- what they
>had to say about the daily work involved in living out their faith.

The original spelling was "Mackintosh" but over time it's changed to
"McIntosh" -- I think when they started intermarrying with the Irish. :-)

I'm sorry you thought my post was disparaging of the pre-Vatican Church.
I think that Church was addressing the people of its day, and was doing a
fine capable job. I couldn't agree with you more about the saints it
produced. I'm a Franciscan and have spent more hours than I can remember
reading Francis's writings (what few we have of them) and the other
sources of his life. At the same time, I do feel that the changes since
the Vatican Council have been good ones, and more change is still needed
as we attempt to discover how to preach the Good News to the people of
the twenty-first century, how to live the Gospel Life in these amazing
times, and how to grow in our love and understanding of God and God's
plan for us.

>Until recently, for example, if I had to identify myself as any kind of
>Catholic I would identify myself as a "liberal Catholic."  However,
>I have had a radical change in thought recently and now I am re-
>appropriating my classical Catholic upbringing (labeled "conservative"
>in today's Church), and making a serious attempt to integrate it with
>my liberal experience.  So right now it is that I am noticing the
>paucity of spiritual resources in the liberal camp.  Or is it?

I think the liberal camp has a tendency to be more active, and the danger
in activity is that we can lose our roots. Francis faced this question in
his time. He felt the call to preach the Word, but at the same time he
loved contemplation more than anything else in the world. He was
constantly looking for excuses to spend more time in contemplation. One
time sent a message to Clare and another friar whose he trusted to be
close to the Lord. The question he posed was "Which shall I do?" and the
response came back from both Clare and the friar "You have to do both."

This is an important message for us today. As much time as we spend out
doing our active work, we must spend an equal amount of time working on
our spiritual life and our relationship with God.

There's a "ecumenical" church here in DC called The Church of the Savior.
It is a truely impressive church. Unlike the typical Catholic parish,
which (at least in my experience) seems to have time for perhaps a day or
two a month at a soup kitchen, this little church of 300 people has an
incredible wealth of ministries. They own twelve apartment buildings
which they bought to keep out of the hands of the condo developers. They
then fixed up the buildings and rent them back to the original tenants.
They run a health clinic for the tenants and other poor people in the
neighborhood. They have an employment agency specializing the in low
paying jobs needed by people in the neighborhood. They have a job
training ministry. They have a ministry called "Health Care for the
Homeless" which sends doctors into DC shelters. They have an infirmary
for homeless people recovering from serious illness. They have a series
of transitional homes, and more recently have opened a Single Room
Occupancy (SRO) apartment building for formerly homeless people. Not bad
work for 300 people!

And yet at the root of it all they have a strong commitment to the
contemplative life. Each church member must recommit their church
membership each year, and before they can make the commitment they must
make a retreat and spend considerable time in prayer to make sure that
the Lord is, in fact, calling them to spend another year with the Church
of the Savior. The church has bought a large farm in the Maryland
countryside, which they've turned into a retreat center. They hold
retreats all year long and a number of these retreats are silent
retreats. (I joke with my COS friends that they are almost Catholic,
except for the fact they have no alcohol at their parties.)  :-)

IMHO, the COS concentration on working for and with the poor, mixed
equally with a strong emphasis on developing a spiritual life is very
Franciscan and a good model for how to live one's life. Both are
important. Actions without contemplation are empty. Contemplation without
action misses the message of the Gospel. (Not that I'm knocking those
called to the contemplative life. I have a lot of respect for my
Franciscan sisters, the Poor Clares, who are a cloistered order. That is
a different calling in and of itself. I'm speaking here of the lay
response to the Gospels.)

>That's where this is all coming from.  I know, Amanda, that my own
>life and that of countless others is full of the presence of God...
>I just want to hear that it's okay to strive for holiness in our
>lives, and that in fact this is what we are all striving for... not
>to push our own agendas, but to remove the planks from our own eyes
>so that we can see clearly how to remove the specks from the eyes of
>our hurting and violent and impoverished and victimized and victimizing
>brothers and sisters all over this world we've been given custody
>of.

Amen.

Jim McIntosh, SFO (jim@american.edu)
The American University
Washington DC 20016-8019 USA
Newsgroups: bit.listserv.catholic