St. Boniface: Apostle to the Germans

Today is the feast day of St. Boniface (754).  This morning while driving to the Airport and listening to the Daily Mass on KBVM, I heard a wonderful homily which introduced me to St. Boniface, the English Benedictine monk who would become "The Apostle to the Germans" (The archived readings and homily can be found here, June 5th).

In order to understand the life and actions of St. Boniface, we first need to understand the context into which he was called to proclaim the Gospel.  Boniface went on his first missionary journey to Germany in 719 at the request of Pope Gregory II.  From his biography on www.americancatholic.org, we see that when St. Boniface arrived in Germany. he found that....

Paganism was a way of life. What Christianity he did find had either lapsed into paganism or was mixed with error. The clergy were mainly responsible for these latter conditions since they were in many instances uneducated, lax and questionably obedient to their bishops .... These are the conditions that Boniface was to report in 722 on his first return visit to Rome. The Holy Father instructed him to reform the German Church.

So what were the paganism practices the Germanic people had lapsed into?  According to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Germanic_paganism,

Across the Germanic world, there was some variation in the places where pagans worshipped, however, it was common for sites displaying prominent natural features to be used. Tacitus claimed that the 1st century tribes of Germany did not "confine the gods within walls... but that they worshipped outdoors in sacred woods and groves",[14] and similarly there is evidence from later continental Europe, Anglo-Saxon England and Scandinavia that the pagans worshipped out of doors at "trees, groves, wells, stones, fences and cairns".[15] In some later cases, temples would be built on such sites, the most notable being the Swedish Temple at Uppsala which, according to Adam of Bremen, writing in the 11th century, was built around a grove which was "so holy that each tree is itself regarded as sacred".

According to Tacitus, the Germanic tribes think of temples as unsuitable habitations for gods, and they do not represent them as idols in human shape. Instead of temples, they consecrate woods or groves to individual gods.

So it is clear that pagan worship held created things, trees, nature, as sacred which is evident since the Germanic people of this region worshiped at Thor's Oak, a place of veneration of the Germanic deity Thor, (or Donar), the god of Thunder.

On his return from Rome, in 723, St. Boniface began his efforts to bring the Germanic people to Christ.   To do so, he had to begin by uprooting paganism.  In what might be unimaginable today: 

On his return to Hesse, he decided to try to root out the pagan superstitions which seriously affected the stability of his converts. On a day publicly announced, and in the midst of an awe-struck crowd, Boniface and one or two of his followers attacked with axes Thor's sacred oak. These German tribes, along with many other primitive peoples, were tree-worshipers. Thor, god of thunder, was one of the principal Teutonic deities, and this ancient oak, which stood on the summit of Mt. Gudenberg, was sacred to him. After a few blows, the huge tree crashed to earth, splitting into four parts. The terrified tribesmen, who had expected a punishment to fall instantly on the perpetrators of such an outrage, now saw that their god was powerless to protect even his own sanctuary.

St. Boniface had this sacred oak tree, the tree of pagan worship, felled not because he did not love or appreciate nature and God's Created things, but to dislodge the people from their pagan beliefs and practices so they could come to know and accept Christ. Tradition has it he used the wood from Thor's Oak to build a chapel. The felling of Thor's oak is considered the beginning of the Christianization of Germany.

The site of the original chapel built using the wood of Thor's Oak eventually became the site of the 12-14th century Gothic Cathedral of St. Peter, which stands today in Fritzlar, Germany to this today.  A statue of St. Boniface holding his axe faces the Cathedral

St Boniface was over 70 years old and was spending his final years doing missionary work among some of the early converts who had been drifting back into paganism.  On one of these missionary trips, in 754, he was martyred along with the rest of his party by a band of armed pagans.

St. Boniface, pray for us, that we might never place the good and proper love of nature and created things, above our love of their Creator, our Heavenly Father and his Son, our Lord Jesus Christ.

Photos: http://www.orthodoxengland.org.uk/boniface.htm (1), http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Bonifacius_by_Emil_Doepler.jpg (2), http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Fritzlar_dom_st_peter.jpg (3)

5 years !

5 years ago, I was not yet a Catholic, but I will never forget when this beautiful, faithful, man was chosen as our current Holy Father. 5 years ago he, following the example of Mary, said yes and he humbly entrusted himself to our prayers with these simple words..

“Dear Brothers and Sisters,


After the great Pope John Paul II, the Cardinals have elected me, a simple and humble laborer in the vineyard of the Lord.


The fact that the Lord knows how to work and act even with inadequate instruments consoles me, so above all I entrust myself to your prayers.


In the joy of the Risen Lord, confident of his unfailing help, let us move forward. The Lord will help us and Mary, his Most Holy Mother, will be on our side. Thank you.”

Since that time I have read as much as I can from this beautiful, brilliant, kind, devoted, faithful man. We are truly blessed with his by his deep faith, love, wisdom, and intellect.

Today speaking to youth in Malta, our Holy Father radiates the same untiring encouragement to live and embrace our faith:

"Here in Malta, you live in a society that is steeped in Christian faith and values. You should be proud that your country both defends the unborn and promotes stable family life by saying no to abortion and divorce. I urge you to maintain this courageous witness to the sanctity of life and the centrality of marriage and family life for a healthy society. In Malta and Gozo, families know how to value and care for their elderly and infirm members, and they welcome children as gifts from God. Other nations can learn from your Christian example. In the context of European society, Gospel values are once again becoming counter-cultural, just as they were at the time of Saint Paul."

I pray for perseverance, that my own faith will be as lively at 83 (should I be blessed with that many years) as that of our wonderful Holy Father.

Please pray for our Holy Father, Pope Benedict XVI.  Pray for his continued strength, and protection, and for the guidance of the Holy Spirit.

Photo: http://www.markmallett.com/blog/wp-images/pope_benedict_xvi.jpg

Dominican Sisters of St. Mary

It seems that much of what we hear about religious life in America is about its drastic decline over the past 40 years.  But then we have this amazing story, which simply flies in the face of all we hear about the state of religious life.  The Dominican Sisters of St. Mary of Ann Arbor, MI was founded in 1997 with 4 sisters, and has since grown to a vibrant community of nearly 100 sisters whose average age is 26.  The average age of Sisters entering St. Mary's is 21 years old.  I cannot tell you what an inspiration these beautiful devout Sisters are to us laypeople who struggle to live any degree of holiness in our daily secular lives.

Let us pray for all our beautiful Brothers and Sisters in Christ who have listened to and answered God's call into a life espoused to the Church.  Let us thank them for their continuous prayers for all and let us offer prayers of thanksgiving for their living and modeling lives of holiness for us all.  May we be inspired to follow their joyful assent.

The sisters recently appeared on Oprah, and I must say, it is the first time I have watched an 'Oprah youtube video'.  It was a very good interview.  The Archdiocese of Washington blog by Laura Ferstl has a writeup and links to the youtube videos.  More information on the Sisters can be found on their website.

Year For Priests

This post is really quite late, but this blog did not exist at the time of the ordination of these 7 new Priests for the Archdiocese of Portland, OR last year.  Being a relatively new Catholic, this was my first Ordination Mass, and it was simply an amazing and inspiring experience.  Our Parish, St. Juan Diego, was blessed to have one of these Priests, Father Eric Andersen (being ordained by Archbishop John Vlazny to the left), serve as our Deacon the previous year.  Thanks be to God for these wonderful men who have listened to and answered His call to the priesthood and given their lives to serve the Church.  I shot the few photos here, and I found a wonderful full length video of the Ordination Mass below at http://www.gloria.tv.

Let us not forget to pray daily for all of our priests in this year designated as the Year for the Priests by our Holy Father, Pope Benedict XVI.

Prayer for Priests by
St. Thérèse of Lisieux

O Jesus, eternal Priest, keep your priests within the shelter of Your Sacred Heart,
where none may touch them. Keep unstained their anointed hands, which daily touch Your Sacred Body. Keep unsullied their lips, daily purpled with your Precious Blood. Keep pure and unearthly their hearts, sealed with the sublime mark of the priesthood. Let Your holy love surround them and shield them from the world's contagion. Bless their labors with abundant fruit and may the souls to whom they minister be their joy and consolation here and in heaven their beautiful and everlasting crown.
Amen.

Fr. Neuhaus on Life

I came across this speech by the late Father Richard John Neuhaus while browsing the online forum at the American Lutheran Publishing Board.  I won't go into the full details here, but before I get to the 'life article', let me say that Father Neuhaus is possibly THE reason I am Catholic today.  I happened to hear an short interview with him on C-SPAN in 2005 at a very critical time in my faith life life as a Lutheran.  In the course of that interview I was overwhelmingly convicted that I must look into the Catholic Church.  To make a long story short, I did, and my family and I went through RCIA, and entered into full communion at the Easter Vigil in 2007.  I thank God daily for leading me to what Fr. Neuhaus described as, and I truly believe to be, "the Church of Jesus Christ most fully and rightly ordered through time".  Like Fr. Neuhaus, I remain thankful for my upbringing in the Lutheran Church, where I was taught the Creeds and the faith and received grace. Fr. Neuhaus did not know me, but he changed my life.  I finished reading his wonderful book 'Catholic Matters' just days before his passing in Jan 2009.

Father Neuhaus was raised Lutheran and became a leading Lutheran Theologian.  He marched with Dr. King and fought for justice and truth tirelessly his entire life.  Later in life, this included justice for and the protection of the most vulnerable among us, the unborn.  You can read about the role of abortion in his transformation here.

First Things is reprinting the following speech from Fr. Neuhaus on each anniversary of Roe-vs-Wade.  In this 2008 speech, Father Neuhaus said the following:

"The culture of death is an idea before it is a deed. I expect many of us here, perhaps most of us here, can remember when we were first encountered by the idea. For me, it was in the 1960s when I was pastor of a very poor, very black, inner city parish in Brooklyn, New York. I had read that week an article by Ashley Montagu of Princeton University on what he called "A Life Worth Living." He listed the qualifications for a life worth living: good health, a stable family, economic security, educational opportunity, the prospect of a satisfying career to realize the fullness of one’s potential. These were among the measures of what was called "a life worth living."


And I remember vividly, as though it were yesterday, looking out the next Sunday morning at the congregation of St. John the Evangelist and seeing all those older faces creased by hardship endured and injustice afflicted, and yet radiating hope undimmed and love unconquered. And I saw that day the younger faces of children deprived of most, if not all, of those qualifications on Prof. Montagu’s list. And it struck me then, like a bolt of lightning, a bolt of lightning that illuminated our moral and cultural moment, that Prof. Montagu and those of like mind believed that the people of St. John the Evangelist - people whom I knew and had come to love as people of faith and kindness and endurance and, by the grace of God, hope unvanquished - it struck me then that, by the criteria of the privileged and enlightened, none of these my people had a life worth living. In that moment, I knew that a great evil was afoot. The culture of death is an idea before it is a deed."

Sadly, I have heard this 'subtle eugenics' argument often, including from my brother and sister Catholics. The argument is that many 'unwanted' children are brought into this world, and that abortion is somehow a solution to pregnancies that would bring a child into 'unfavorable situations'.  The argument is that their lives 'may not be worth living'.  Then I ponder the setting and family into which our current President was born in Hawaii in 1961 (before Planned Parenthood existed on the campus of the University of Hawaii which came to Hawaii in 1966). One has to wonder if the Mother of our current President would have made the same 'choice' that she did in 1961 today.  After all, his Father and Mother had just met at the University of Hawaii, his Mother, Ann Dunham, was barely 18 when she became pregnant, his Father had another pregnant wife and children back at home, and they were three months pregnant with our 44th President when they got married in 1961.  It would be very difficult to convince me that this was pregnancy was "planned parenthood" on their part.  According to the wiki source, Ann was a single mother by January 1962 when Barack was just 4 months old.  She enrolled at the University of Washington and her parents helped raise Barack as she pursued her studies and career.  Now under the circumstances, how many freshman 18 year old college students today, finding themselves in an unplanned pregnancy, would be persuaded to simply 'plan parenthood', and make a 'choice' to have the 'problem' go away?  How many lives of important historical figures have been shaped under difficult and uncertain circumstances similar to the early life of our President?  How much did the parents and other responsible adults charged with the care of these children grow in virtue as they 'did their best' to give birth and raise them?  How truly sad it is that we have become a country that has so little hope and faith that we feel the choice of death is favorable to life.  Lord, have mercy on us, and awaken in us a zeal for life.  Grant us the gifts of hope and faith which we so desperately need to embrace life and support all Mother's who are tempted, mislead, or coerced to believe that their only 'choice' is abortion.