Angelus News | September 20, 2019 | Vol. 4 No. 31
The “peace cross” in Bladensburg, Maryland. The U.S. Supreme Court’s recent decision in favor of preserving the historic cross-shaped memorial, saying it does not endorse religion, is just one example of the ongoing struggle to interpret one of our country’s foundational principles. But on Page 10, contributing editor Mike Aquilina explains why primitive Christianity — rather than America’s founding fathers — deserves the credit for one of humanity’s most radical ideas.
The “peace cross” in Bladensburg, Maryland. The U.S. Supreme Court’s recent decision in favor of preserving the historic cross-shaped memorial, saying it does not endorse religion, is just one example of the ongoing struggle to interpret one of our country’s foundational principles. But on Page 10, contributing editor Mike Aquilina explains why primitive Christianity — rather than America’s founding fathers — deserves the credit for one of humanity’s most radical ideas.
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PAGE 28: THE NEW <strong>Angelus</strong><strong>News</strong>.com<br />
ANGELUS<br />
CONSCIENCE<br />
&<br />
CHRISTIANITY<br />
Rediscovering the right<br />
to religious freedom<br />
<strong>September</strong> <strong>20</strong>, <strong>20</strong>19 <strong>Vol</strong>. 4 <strong>No</strong>. <strong>31</strong>
Contents<br />
Archbishop Gomez 3<br />
World, Nation and Local <strong>News</strong> 4-6<br />
LA Catholic Events 7<br />
Scott Hahn on Scripture 8<br />
Father Rolheiser 9<br />
East LA Catholic school gets a meaningful makeover 14<br />
John Allen: Why Pope Francis dropped the ‘s-word’ 18<br />
Kathryn Lopez: Thomism for the digital masses <strong>20</strong><br />
‘Anthems’ that get even Greg Erlandson to sing 22<br />
Can we really be ‘Happy as Lazzaro’? 24<br />
Heather King: A look at ‘Back Row America’ 26
ON THE COVER<br />
The “peace cross” in Bladensburg, Maryland. The U.S.<br />
Supreme Court’s recent decision in favor of preserving the<br />
historic cross-shaped memorial, saying it does not endorse<br />
religion, is just one example of the ongoing struggle to<br />
interpret one of our country’s foundational principles. But<br />
on Page 10, contributing editor Mike Aquilina explains why<br />
primitive Christianity — rather than America’s founding<br />
fathers — deserves the credit for one of humanity’s most<br />
radical ideas.<br />
SHUTTERSTOCK<br />
IMAGE:<br />
Archbishop José H. Gomez, together with staff and delegates<br />
from the Fifth National Encuentro of Hispanic/<br />
Latino Ministry, met with members of the Dicastery for<br />
Promoting Integral Human Development Friday, Sept.<br />
13, in Rome. Led by Archbishop Gomez, who serves as<br />
the vice president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic<br />
Bishops, the delegation was scheduled to present the<br />
“Proceedings and Conclusions” of the V Encuentro<br />
process to Pope Francis this week.<br />
PATRICIA JIMENEZ/V ENCUENTRO<br />
<strong>September</strong> <strong>20</strong>, <strong>20</strong>19 • ANGELUS • 1
FOLLOW US<br />
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<strong>September</strong> <strong>20</strong>, <strong>20</strong>19 | <strong>Vol</strong>. 4 • <strong>No</strong>. <strong>31</strong><br />
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POPE WATCH<br />
Seeds of hope in Africa<br />
Having gone to Africa as a pilgrim<br />
of peace and hope, Pope Francis said<br />
he hoped the seeds planted there by<br />
his visit would bear abundant fruit for<br />
everyone.<br />
Following in the footsteps of evangelizing<br />
saints before him, the pope said<br />
he sought to bring with him “the leaven<br />
of Christ” and his Gospel, which is<br />
“the most powerful leaven of fraternity,<br />
justice and peace for all people.”<br />
Speaking to some 12,000 people<br />
gathered in St. Peter’s Square Sept. 11,<br />
the pope recalled his fourth apostolic<br />
journey to Africa. He dedicated his<br />
general audience talk to a review of<br />
some of the highlights from his visit<br />
to Mozambique, Madagascar, and<br />
Mauritius Sept. 4-10.<br />
The pope said he wanted to “sow the<br />
seeds of hope, peace, and reconciliation”<br />
in Mozambique, which had<br />
experienced two devastating cyclones<br />
recently and 15 years of civil war.<br />
While the Church continues to guide<br />
the nation along the path of peace,<br />
the pope made special mention of the<br />
Rome-based Community of Sant’Egidio,<br />
which had facilitated the mediation<br />
process that resulted in the nation’s<br />
1992 peace agreement.<br />
He said he also encouraged Mozambique’s<br />
leaders to keep working together<br />
for the common good, and he noted<br />
how he saw that kind of cooperation<br />
in action at a hospital he visited that<br />
helps people, especially mothers and<br />
children, with HIV and AIDS.<br />
“I saw that the patients were the most<br />
important thing” at the Sant’Egidio-run<br />
center, which was staffed by<br />
people of different religious beliefs,<br />
including the director of the hospital,<br />
who was Muslim,” he said.<br />
Everyone worked together, “united,<br />
like brothers and sisters,” he said.<br />
Reflecting on Madagascar, the pope<br />
noted how beautiful and rich in natural<br />
resources the country is, but that it<br />
is still marked by tremendous poverty.<br />
He said he asked that the people<br />
there would be inspired by their “traditional<br />
spirit of solidarity” in order to<br />
overcome the obstacles they face and<br />
foster development that respects both<br />
the environment and social justice.<br />
In fact, “one cannot build a city<br />
worthy of human dignity without faith<br />
and prayer,” he said when he spoke to<br />
contemplative religious women.<br />
Francis said he wanted to visit Mauritius<br />
because it has become “a place of<br />
integration between different ethnicities<br />
and cultures.”<br />
<strong>No</strong>t only was interreligious dialogue<br />
well-established there, he said, there<br />
were strong bonds of friendship among<br />
the leaders of different religions.<br />
“It would seem strange to us, but they<br />
have this friendship that is so natural,”<br />
he said, explaining how touched he<br />
was to find a large bouquet of flowers<br />
sent to him by the grand imam “as a<br />
sign of fraternity.”<br />
He said he encouraged government<br />
leaders to stay committed to fostering<br />
harmony and protecting democracy.<br />
In his audience talk, the pope also<br />
explained why — before and after every<br />
trip — he always visits Rome’s Basilica<br />
of St. Mary Major to pray before the basilica’s<br />
Marian icon “Salus Populi Romani”<br />
(“Health of the Roman People”).<br />
He said he prays that she “accompany<br />
me on the trip, like a mother, tell me<br />
what I must do” and help “safeguard”<br />
everything he says and does. <br />
Reporting courtesy of Catholic <strong>News</strong><br />
Service Rome correspondent Carol Glatz.<br />
Papal Prayer Intention for <strong>September</strong>: That politicians, scientists, and<br />
economists work together to protect the world’s seas and oceans.<br />
2 • ANGELUS • <strong>September</strong> <strong>20</strong>, <strong>20</strong>19
NEW WORLD<br />
OF FAITH<br />
BY ARCHBISHOP JOSÉ H. GOMEZ<br />
Seminary is a time of conversion<br />
Editor’s note: Earlier this month,<br />
Archbishop Gomez presided at the<br />
opening Mass of the academic year at<br />
St. John’s Seminary. The following is<br />
adapted from his homily.<br />
Recently, we had our convocation of<br />
priests, about 350 of us gathering for<br />
prayer and reflection. It was a time of<br />
grace, a time of fellowship, renewal,<br />
and inspiration.<br />
I gave each of the priests who was<br />
there a copy of the recent letter to<br />
priests from Pope Francis.<br />
It is a beautiful reflection, with the<br />
Holy Father thanking priests for their<br />
ministry, for giving their lives to God<br />
completely.<br />
He encourages priests to be grateful<br />
for their vocation, to reflect often on<br />
those moments when we first knew in<br />
our hearts that the Lord was calling us<br />
to be with him, calling us to serve him<br />
and his kingdom. Pope Francis wrote:<br />
“Vocation, more than our own choice,<br />
is a response to the Lord’s unmerited<br />
call.”<br />
And I was thinking about this, as I<br />
was praying over the words of St. Paul<br />
that we just heard:<br />
“We know that all things work for<br />
good for those who love God, who are<br />
called according to his purpose. For<br />
those he foreknew he also predestined to<br />
be conformed to the image of his Son,<br />
so that he might be the firstborn among<br />
many brothers.”<br />
These words speak to us in a special<br />
way at the start of this new year.<br />
Brothers, you have been called “according<br />
to his purpose,” called from<br />
the loving heart of the living God.<br />
Your vocation is a gift of God’s generous<br />
love, a sign of his mercy and love<br />
toward you. Your vocation is a call to<br />
be “conformed to the image” of Jesus.<br />
And that is the work of a lifetime.<br />
Seminary is a time of conversion.<br />
More than the theological and pastoral<br />
training you receive, these years are<br />
a time of growing in your likeness to<br />
Christ.<br />
That means learning to live in his<br />
presence, learning to belong entirely<br />
to Jesus. This time of conversion also<br />
means being intentional about detaching<br />
ourselves from the ways of thinking<br />
in our society, some of the habits that<br />
even we grew up with.<br />
To be a priest is to belong to Jesus,<br />
and to “be” for others. For that, it is<br />
not enough to be a good person who<br />
works hard and cares for others. To be<br />
a priest means we need to be “another<br />
Christ,” a man of zeal, a man whose<br />
soul is on fire to share the Gospel and<br />
to bring others to Christ.<br />
And in many ways, that means standing<br />
against the trends in our culture<br />
today.<br />
You are called to live with humility<br />
and obedience in a culture that says<br />
“do your own thing.” You are called to<br />
live chastity in a culture of aggressive<br />
sexuality. You are called to be poor of<br />
spirit in a consumer culture that says<br />
happiness and success means having<br />
many possessions.<br />
So, let us pray for the grace today to<br />
continue this work of conversion, to be<br />
joyful in giving our lives for the love of<br />
Jesus and to imitate him and consecrate<br />
ourselves to him.<br />
This is a prayer for our seminarians,<br />
but really it is a prayer for all of us —<br />
priests, deacons, lay people, religious,<br />
faculty, administrators, benefactors,<br />
and supporters of this great seminary.<br />
All of us are entrusted with this mission<br />
of the Gospel. The whole Church<br />
is missionary!<br />
Each member of the Church is<br />
called to bring others to friendship<br />
with Jesus Christ and to do our part in<br />
the renewal of our politics, our society,<br />
our culture.<br />
And, my brothers, as seminarians, as<br />
men training to be his priests, you are<br />
called to follow him in the most intimate<br />
way. So in these years of training,<br />
stay close to Jesus. He will never leave<br />
you alone. Open your heart to do his<br />
loving will.<br />
As Jesus did, you need to stay close to<br />
Mary, who is the mother of Jesus and<br />
the mother of all of us in our priesthood.<br />
Our Gospel today was the story we<br />
all know very well — the miracle Jesus<br />
performed at the wedding of Cana.<br />
The words that Mary speaks today to<br />
the servants are the heart of her spirituality:<br />
“Do whatever he tells you.”<br />
These are good words for you, my<br />
brothers. As you begin this new year, I<br />
pray that you will renew your dedication<br />
to living in the presence of Christ,<br />
especially in the Eucharist.<br />
I pray that you will listen closely to<br />
his word, study his example, and continue<br />
this beautiful work of conforming<br />
yourself to his image.<br />
Let us ask our Blessed Mother Mary<br />
to be with us on this journey. May she<br />
inspire all of us to bear witness to Jesus<br />
and to the new life that he longs to<br />
bring to every person! Amen. <br />
To read more columns by Archbishop José H. Gomez or to subscribe, visit www.angelusnews.com.<br />
<strong>September</strong> <strong>20</strong>, <strong>20</strong>19 • ANGELUS • 3
WORLD<br />
Another Gospel town found?<br />
Archaeologists think they may be<br />
on the road to Emmaus.<br />
A team led by Tel Aviv University<br />
professor Israel Finkelstein uncovered<br />
the remains of a 2,<strong>20</strong>0-year-old<br />
fortified city on a hill outside of the<br />
Israeli city of Abu Ghosh. Located<br />
seven miles west of Jerusalem,<br />
the remains correspond with the<br />
description of the town of Emmaus<br />
found in the Gospel of Luke.<br />
Emmaus, famous for the story<br />
of Jesus appearing to his apostles<br />
following his resurrection, has<br />
long been lost. Two other sites are<br />
considered to be possible locations,<br />
but experts are especially intrigued<br />
about this find.<br />
“The finds at Kiriath-Jearim hint<br />
at its long-term role as guarding the<br />
approach to Jerusalem,” Finkelstein<br />
The hill outside Abu Ghosh that may have once been Emmaus.<br />
told Fox <strong>News</strong>. “This can be seen in<br />
the Iron Age, Hellenistic and early Roman<br />
periods. The Hellenistic and Roman<br />
period remains shed light on the<br />
much-debated issue of the location of<br />
the New Testament’s Emmaus.” <br />
THE KIRIATH-JEARIM SHMUNIS FAMILY EXCAVATIONS<br />
Ukrainian prelate: Married<br />
priests not the answer<br />
CATHOLIC NEWS SERVICE PHOTO / MARCO BELLO, REUTERS<br />
REALITY SETS IN — People board a ferry Sept. 6 at Marsh Harbour Government Port during an<br />
evacuation operation after Hurricane Dorian hit the Abaco Islands in the Bahamas. “We are still<br />
working through this,” Archbishop Patrick C. Pinder of Nassau told Catholic <strong>News</strong> Service. “We<br />
have only begun to understand the full depths of this catastrophe. This is a disaster on a scale<br />
that we have never seen before.”<br />
Would a married priesthood solve<br />
the vocations crisis? The leader of<br />
Ukraine’s Catholics doesn’t think so.<br />
The Ukrainian Greek Catholic<br />
Church, the largest of 23 eastern rite<br />
churches in full communion with<br />
Rome, allows for married priests. But<br />
according to its head, Archbishop Sviatoslav<br />
Shevchuk, the option to marry<br />
doesn’t translate into more vocations.<br />
Speaking to Crux on Sept. 11,<br />
Shevchuk said that if he could give<br />
some advice to the bishops meeting<br />
for this year’s Synod on the Amazon, it<br />
would be, “Don’t look for easy solutions<br />
to difficult problems.<br />
“The same church with the same<br />
way of living the priestly vocation in<br />
other countries around the world does<br />
not enjoy this quantity of vocations,”<br />
Shevchuk told Crux.<br />
“The familial state does not favor the<br />
increase in vocations to the priesthood,”<br />
he added. “This is our experience.” <br />
4 • ANGELUS • <strong>September</strong> <strong>20</strong>, <strong>20</strong>19
NATION<br />
Seattle bishop wants a rectory, not a mansion<br />
On his first day on the job,<br />
Seattle’s new Catholic archbishop<br />
told clergy he won’t be living in<br />
the 9,000-square-foot mansion that<br />
many of his predecessors called<br />
home.<br />
“I prefer to live a more simplified<br />
life,” explained Archbishop Paul<br />
Etienne in a Sept. 3 letter, adding<br />
that he was “exploring options on<br />
church properties” and hoped to<br />
find an alternative soon.<br />
The 60-year-old prelate took over<br />
this month for Archbishop Peter<br />
Sartain, who was forced to retire<br />
due to severe back problems.<br />
While he stresses that his decision<br />
“is not a reflection upon how<br />
the previous bishops lived,” the<br />
archbishop told diocesan magazine<br />
<strong>No</strong>rthwest Catholic that he’s “a pastor,<br />
not a prince,” and wants “to live<br />
in a manner that’s more reflective<br />
of how my people live.” <br />
Archbishop Paul Etienne will not live in<br />
Seattle’s “Connolly House.”<br />
CATHOLIC NEWS SERVICE/BOB ROLLER<br />
CATHOLIC NEWS SERVICE/KEVIN BIRNBAUM<br />
White House urged<br />
to let more people in<br />
A federal commission is warning<br />
against the Trump administration’s<br />
threats to cut the number of refugees<br />
it resettles in the U.S., potentially<br />
even reducing the number to zero.<br />
“Unprecedented numbers of individuals<br />
worldwide are forcibly displaced<br />
by religiously motivated conflict or<br />
persecution based on their religion or<br />
belief,” U.S. Commission on International<br />
Religious Freedom Vice Chair<br />
Gayle Manchin told the Washington<br />
Times, “[a]nd the United States<br />
should continue to provide safe haven<br />
to the most vulnerable among them.”<br />
The commission argues that the<br />
number of refugees resettled in the<br />
U.S. is at a record low, and that it<br />
should be raised — rather than cut —<br />
to the “previously typical” 95,000.<br />
“We strongly urge the administration<br />
to extend its admirable commitment<br />
to advancing religious freedom to<br />
its refugee resettlement policy,” said<br />
commission president Tony Perkins. <br />
FDA sues over abortion pills<br />
The FDA ordered them to stop prescribing and mailing<br />
unregulated abortion pills. They responded with a lawsuit.<br />
Aid Access, a European company founded by Austrian<br />
licensed physician Dr. Rebecca Gompers, prescribes and<br />
mails drugs required for medical abortions to women in the<br />
U.S. Following a March cease-and-desist order from the<br />
FDA, Gompers has filed a civil action lawsuit seeking to<br />
allow the company to continue business.<br />
Pro-life groups have criticized the lawsuit and the company<br />
Aid Access for the “service” it provides.<br />
“Far from being safe and effective, abortion pills from Aid<br />
Access have been shown to be damaged and contaminated,”<br />
Dr. Tara Sandra Lee, senior fellow and director of life<br />
sciences for Charlotte Lozier Institute, told Catholic <strong>News</strong><br />
Agency. “And these tainted drugs have caused serious, and<br />
sometimes even fatal, bacterial infections and excessive<br />
bleeding in women.<br />
“It is fully within the FDA’s jurisdiction to protect<br />
women from harm and prevent these dangerous abortion<br />
pills from getting into the hands of anymore women,” Lee<br />
continued. <br />
MINI YOUTH<br />
MINISTRY — Cub<br />
Scout Patrick<br />
McDonough<br />
participates in the<br />
presentation of<br />
the gifts during<br />
an evening Mass<br />
Sept. 11 at the<br />
Towers of Freedom<br />
9/11 Military<br />
Monument in<br />
Massapequa, New<br />
York. The liturgy<br />
was offered for all<br />
who perished in<br />
the 9/11 terrorist<br />
attacks, those who<br />
mourn their loss,<br />
and all who suffer<br />
from illnesses<br />
stemming from the<br />
attacks.<br />
CATHOLIC NEWS SERVICE/GREGORY A. SHEMITZ<br />
<strong>September</strong> <strong>20</strong>, <strong>20</strong>19 • ANGELUS • 5
LOCAL<br />
Bringing back the<br />
message of ‘El <strong>No</strong>rte’<br />
Catholic film director and screenwriter Gregory Nava<br />
described receiving holy Communion at the Sept. 7<br />
Mass for All Immigrants at the Cathedral of Our Lady<br />
of the Angels as “one of the most moving experiences of<br />
my life.”<br />
Nava made the comments in an interview with <strong>Angelus</strong><br />
<strong>News</strong> Sept. 10. A restored version of Nava’s classic 1984<br />
film “El <strong>No</strong>rte” screened at 2 p.m. on Sunday, Sept. 15<br />
in theaters around the country to mark 35 years since its<br />
original release.<br />
“El <strong>No</strong>rte,” which tells the story of a brother and<br />
sister’s perilous journey from Guatemala to the United<br />
States, is widely credited with helping prompt the U.S.<br />
government to action with the 1986 Simpson–Mazzoli<br />
Act, which extended the protection status for Central<br />
American immigrants.<br />
“We need to build bridges, not walls; we need policies<br />
of compassion, not cruelty,” said Nava. “That is the<br />
message of ‘El <strong>No</strong>rte,’ and it needs to ring loudly in our<br />
country once again.”<br />
You can read the full interview with Gregory Nava at<br />
<strong>Angelus</strong><strong>News</strong>.com.<br />
A pathway to success<br />
for single moms?<br />
Pro-life advocates are cheering the<br />
passing of a California law intended to<br />
protect parents enrolled in college.<br />
Signed into law by Gov. Gavin<br />
<strong>News</strong>om Sept. 6, Assembly Bill 809<br />
requires California public colleges to<br />
make Title IX protections available<br />
online and through campus health<br />
clinics for pregnant and parenting<br />
students. Kathleen Domingo, senior<br />
director of the Office of Life, Justice,<br />
and Peace for the Archdiocese of<br />
Los Angeles, thanked voters who<br />
contacted lawmakers to support the<br />
bill.<br />
“With your help, pregnant women<br />
on campus will now have access to<br />
their federal, legal protections. It will<br />
empower students to succeed at both<br />
parenting and learning for greater<br />
lifelong success,” she said.<br />
The bill was backed by groups<br />
including the California Catholic<br />
Conference and Feminists for Life. <br />
Police are<br />
investigating an<br />
overnight graffiti attack<br />
on San Jose’s Catholic<br />
cathedral that took<br />
place hours before<br />
Sunday Masses.<br />
Officials believe the<br />
attack on the Cathedral<br />
Basilica of St. Joseph<br />
happened in the early<br />
morning of Sept. 1.<br />
According to the San<br />
Jose Spotlight, “Satanic<br />
and anti-semitic graffiti<br />
spray were sprawled<br />
against the church’s<br />
outside walls, alongside<br />
taunting drawings of a<br />
ghoulishly painted<br />
smile below two<br />
windows and a two-toned<br />
colored pentagram.”<br />
The Diocese of San Jose said<br />
Church officials are working with<br />
Gregory Nava during the filming of “El <strong>No</strong>rte.”<br />
San Jose cathedral vandalized<br />
The Cathedral Basilica of St. Joseph in San Jose.<br />
police to find the vandals.<br />
Finished in 1885, the cathedral is<br />
listed as a historical landmark by the<br />
state of California. <br />
EL NORTE PRODS WIKIMEDIA COMMONS<br />
6 • ANGELUS • <strong>September</strong> <strong>20</strong>, <strong>20</strong>19
LA Catholic Events<br />
Items for LA Catholic Events are due two weeks prior to the date of the event. They may be mailed to <strong>Angelus</strong> <strong>News</strong> (Attn: LA Catholic Events), 3424 Wilshire Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90010-2241; emailed to<br />
calendar@angelusnews.com; or faxed to 213-637-6360. All items must include the name, date, time, and address of the event, plus a phone number for additional information.<br />
Sat., Sept. 21<br />
Eucharistic Ministry Training. Mary Star of the Sea,<br />
463 W. Pleasant Valley, Oxnard, 1-7 p.m. Cost: $15/<br />
person. Register at http://store.la-archdiocese.org/<br />
em-092119.<br />
Simple, Effective Yoga to Clear the Mind and<br />
Feel Better. Mary & Joseph Retreat Center, 5300<br />
Crest Rd., Rancho Palos Verdes, 9 a.m.-12 p.m. Yoga<br />
breathing and stretching to help refocus on what is<br />
important. Instructors have more than <strong>20</strong> years of<br />
experience, with focus on students ages 50+. Bring<br />
yoga mat, props, water, and small item for meditation.<br />
Cost: $25/person. Call Marlene Velazquez at<br />
<strong>31</strong>0-377-4867, ext. 234, for reservations or information.<br />
Foster Care and Adoption Information Meeting.<br />
Children’s Bureau, 27<strong>20</strong>0 Tourney Rd., Ste. 175,<br />
Valencia, or Andrew’s Plaza, 11335 West Magnolia<br />
Blvd., Suite 2C, <strong>No</strong>rth Hollywood, 10 a.m.-12 p.m.<br />
Discover if you have the willingness, ability, and resources<br />
to take on the challenge of helping a child in<br />
need. RSVP or learn more by calling 213-342-0162,<br />
toll free at 800-730-3933, or email RFrecruitment@<br />
all4kids.org.<br />
Sustaining Balance in Recovery: Addressing Challenges<br />
of Alcoholic and Addictive Families. Mary &<br />
Joseph Retreat Center, 5300 Crest Rd., Rancho Palos<br />
Verdes, 9 a.m.-3 p.m. Workshop will address how to<br />
live a balanced life of setting boundaries. Prayer and<br />
meditation will be practiced. Cost: $50/person and<br />
includes lunch. Call Marlene Velazquez at <strong>31</strong>0-377-<br />
4867, ext. 234, for reservations or information.<br />
Memorial for Sister Pat Krommer, CSJ: A Woman<br />
of Faith in Action. Ramona Secondary High School,<br />
1701 W. Ramona Rd., Alhambra, 9:30 a.m.-3 p.m.<br />
Celebrate Sister Pat with stories, networking for actions,<br />
and living out her legacy. Includes a vegetarian<br />
lunch. Freewill donations welcomed. RSVP to info@<br />
stcamilluscenter.org or call 323-225-4461, ext. 111.<br />
Padre Pio Testimony and Veneration of his Glove.<br />
Pauline Books & Media, 3908 Sepulveda Blvd., Culver<br />
City, 2 p.m. Consiglia Corretti, healed of cancer by Padre<br />
Pio, will share her experience and her friendship<br />
with Padre Pio, followed by a Q&A and veneration of<br />
Padre Pio’s glove. For more information, call <strong>31</strong>0-<br />
697-8676 or email culvercity@paulinemedia.com.<br />
Sun., Sept. 22<br />
Annual Pilgrimage to Virgen de los Remedios.<br />
Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels, 555 W. Temple<br />
St., Los Angeles, 2:30 p.m. Procession and Mass to<br />
celebrate the coronation of Virgen de los Remedios<br />
by Pope Pius XII in 1956. For more, email aguadelosangeles@aol.com<br />
or call 323-530-7652.<br />
14th Annual Korean Martyrs Day Celebration. St.<br />
Bede the Venerable Church, 215 Foothill Blvd., La<br />
Canada Flintridge. Mass at 5:30 p.m., reception to<br />
follow with traditional Korean food. All are welcome.<br />
Call Deacon Augie Won at 818-949-4300.<br />
Mon., Sept. 23<br />
Healing Mass. St. Cornelius Church, 5500 E.<br />
Wardlow Rd., Long Beach, 7:30 p.m. Celebrant:<br />
Father Bill Delaney.<br />
St. Padre Pio Mass and Healing Service. St. Denis<br />
Church, 2151 S. Diamond Bar Blvd., Diamond Bar. 6<br />
p.m. exposition of the Blessed Sacrament, 6:30 p.m.<br />
rosary, 7 p.m. Mass. Evening includes blessing with a<br />
St. Padre Pio first-class relic glove. Celebrant: Father<br />
Michael Barry, SSCC. Call 909-861-7106.<br />
Wed., Sept. 25<br />
Bosco Tech “Gear Up for High School” Information<br />
Night. 1151 San Gabriel Blvd., Rosemead,<br />
6:30-8 p.m. Free event open to elementary and<br />
middle-school students. Representatives from local<br />
Catholic private and archdiocesan high schools will<br />
provide information and answer questions. Call 626-<br />
940-<strong>20</strong>09 or email admissions@boscotech.edu for<br />
more information.<br />
Adoration/Benediction and Healing Service. Our<br />
Lady of Peace Church, 15444 <strong>No</strong>rdhoff St., <strong>No</strong>rth<br />
Hills, 7 p.m. Bring friends and family. For more information,<br />
call Deacon Celso at 818-667-8998.<br />
Thurs., Sept. 26<br />
Moses and Migration: The Radical Response of the<br />
Bible to a Modern Crisis. Holy Trinity Church parish<br />
center auditorium, <strong>20</strong>9 N. Hanford Ave., San Pedro,<br />
7-8:30 p.m. Led by professor Daniel L. Smith-Christopher,<br />
Ph.D., discussion proposes that the Bible has<br />
a surprisingly modern approach of compassion and<br />
concern about “the foreigner” among us. Open to all.<br />
Light refreshments after discussion. Call <strong>31</strong>0-548-<br />
65365, ext. 300, for more information.<br />
Sat., Sept. 28<br />
Feast of San Lorenzo Ruiz Regional Celebration.<br />
St. John Eudes Church, 9901 Mason St., Chatsworth,<br />
10:30 a.m. Procession immediately followed by<br />
eucharistic celebration with Father Joel Henson.<br />
Reception, fellowship, and program to follow. Call<br />
Patty Santiago at 818-472-4288, Dominic Mendoza<br />
at 818-687-4890, or Mia Macalino at 818-517-4300<br />
for more information.<br />
Life in the Spirit Seminar. Incarnation School auditorium,<br />
1001 N. Brand Blvd., Glendale, 8:30 a.m.<br />
For information or to register, call 818-421-1354 or<br />
email hojprayergroup@gmail.com.<br />
Spiritual Warfare: What You Need to Know. St.<br />
Edward the Confessor School gym, 33926 Calle La<br />
Primavera, Dana Point, 10 a.m.-4 p.m. Speakers<br />
include Father Bob Garon and Dominic Berardino.<br />
Topics include “Evil spirits — Are they for real?” and<br />
“Discernment of spirits.” Day includes Mass. Cost:<br />
$<strong>20</strong>/person (by Sept. 23), $25/person at door. Contact<br />
SCRC at 818-771-1361, email spirit@scrc.org,<br />
or visit www.scrc.org.<br />
Sun., Sept. 29<br />
Pechanga Resort & Casino Trip. Meet at Our Lady<br />
of Perpetual Help Church, 23233 Lyons Ave., Newhall,<br />
at 8 a.m., return at 6 p.m. Hosted by Italian<br />
Catholic Club of the Santa Clarita Valley. Coffee and<br />
donuts served before leaving, birthdays celebrated<br />
on the way home. Cost: $25/person and includes $5<br />
casino credit. Call Anna Riggs at 661-645-7877 to<br />
RSVP.<br />
Spirituali-Tea with Cheryl Zellhoefer. Mary & Joseph<br />
Retreat Center, 5300 Crest Rd., Rancho Palos<br />
Verdes, 2-5 p.m. Share generations of faith with one<br />
another and deepen relationships with Mary and<br />
St. Anne while sipping tea. Bring a teacup to loan<br />
to a fellow participant for the day, a picture of your<br />
mother, grandmother, or other mother figure, and an<br />
object from your history of faith. Cost: $25/person.<br />
Call Marlene Velazquez at <strong>31</strong>0-377-4867, ext. 234,<br />
for reservations or information.<br />
Mon., Sept. 30<br />
Junipero Serra High School: Dedication to Excellence<br />
and Celebration of the Arts. 14830 Van Ness<br />
Ave., Gardena, 5-8 p.m. Event honors poet, former<br />
chairman of the National Endowment for the Arts, and<br />
former California Poet Laureate Dana Gioia 1969. For<br />
more information, contact Vince Kates at <strong>31</strong>0-324-<br />
6675, ext. 3010 or email vbkates@la-serrahs.org.<br />
Woman to Woman Ministry: Gathered in Joy and<br />
Kinship. Holy Spirit Retreat Center, 4<strong>31</strong>6 Lanai Rd.,<br />
11 a.m.-1 p.m. Join other women to welcome the<br />
sacred gifts of autumn and winter. Suggested donation:<br />
$15/person. Email jmcbroehm@aol.com with<br />
questions and to RSVP. <br />
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and more. Your source for complete,<br />
up-to-the-minute coverage of local news,<br />
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<strong>September</strong> <strong>20</strong>, <strong>20</strong>19 • ANGELUS • 7
SUNDAY<br />
READINGS<br />
BY SCOTT HAHN<br />
Amos 8:4–7 / Ps. 113:1–2, 4–6, 7–8 / 1 Tim. 2:1–8 / Lk. 16:1–13<br />
The steward in today’s<br />
Gospel confronts the reality<br />
that he can’t go on living<br />
the way he has been.<br />
He is under judgment,<br />
and must give account for<br />
what he has done.<br />
The exploiters of the<br />
poor in today’s First Reading<br />
are also about to be<br />
pulled down, thrust from<br />
their stations (see Isaiah<br />
22:19). Servants of mammon<br />
or money, they’re so<br />
in love with wealth that<br />
they reduce the poor to<br />
objects, despise the new<br />
moons and Sabbaths, the<br />
observances, and holy<br />
days of God (see Leviticus<br />
23:24; Exodus <strong>20</strong>:8).<br />
Their only hope is<br />
to follow the steward’s<br />
path. He is no model of<br />
repentance. But he makes<br />
a prudent calculation:<br />
to use his last hours in<br />
charge of his master’s<br />
property to show mercy to<br />
others, to relieve their debts.<br />
He is a child of this world, driven by<br />
a purely selfish motive, to make friends<br />
and be welcomed into the homes of<br />
his master’s debtors. Yet his prudence<br />
is commended as an example to us,<br />
the children of light (see 1 Thessalonians<br />
5:5; Ephesians 5:8). We, too,<br />
must realize, as the steward does, that<br />
what we have is not honestly ours, but<br />
what in truth belongs to another, our<br />
Master.<br />
All the mammon in the world could<br />
not have paid the debt we owe our<br />
Master. So he paid it for us, gave his<br />
“Christ on the Cross,” by Rembrandt Harmenszoon van Rijn,<br />
1606-1669.<br />
life as a ransom for all, as we hear in<br />
today’s Epistle.<br />
God wants everyone to be saved,<br />
even kings and princes, even the lovers<br />
of money (see Luke 16:14). But we<br />
cannot serve two Masters. By his grace,<br />
we should choose to be, as we sing in<br />
today’s Psalm, “servants of the Lord.”<br />
We serve him by using what he has<br />
entrusted us with to give alms, to lift<br />
the lowly from the dust and dunghills<br />
of this world. By this we will gain what<br />
is ours, be welcomed into eternal<br />
dwellings, the many mansions of the<br />
Father’s house (see John 14:2). <br />
WIKIMEDIA COMMONS<br />
Scott Hahn is founder of the St. Paul Center for Biblical Theology, stpaulcenter.com.<br />
8 • ANGELUS • <strong>September</strong> <strong>20</strong>, <strong>20</strong>19
IN EXILE<br />
BY FATHER RONALD ROLHEISER, OMI<br />
The scent of humility<br />
According to Isaac the Syrian, a<br />
famous 7th-century bishop and<br />
theologian, a person who’s genuinely<br />
humble gives off a certain scent that<br />
other people will sense and that even<br />
animals will pick up, so that wild animals,<br />
including snakes, will fall under<br />
his spell and never harm that person.<br />
Here’s his logic: A humble person,<br />
he believes, has recovered the smell of<br />
paradise and in the presence of such<br />
a person one does not feel judged and<br />
has nothing to fear, and this holds<br />
true even for animals. They feel safe<br />
around a humble person and are<br />
drawn to him or her. <strong>No</strong> wonder people<br />
like St. Francis of Assisi could talk<br />
to birds and befriend wolves.<br />
But, beautiful as this all sounds, is<br />
this a pious fairytale or is it a rich, archetypal<br />
metaphor? I like to think it’s<br />
the latter, that this is a rich metaphor,<br />
and perhaps even something more.<br />
Humility, indeed, does have a smell,<br />
the smell of the earth, of the soil, and<br />
of paradise.<br />
But how? How can a spiritual quality<br />
give off a physical scent?<br />
Well, we’re psychosomatic, creatures<br />
of both body and soul. Thus, in us,<br />
the physical and the spiritual are so<br />
much part of one and the same substance<br />
that it’s impossible to separate<br />
them out from each other.<br />
To say that we’re body and soul is<br />
like saying sugar is white and sweet<br />
and that whiteness and sweetness<br />
can never be put into separate piles.<br />
They’re both inside the sugar. We’re<br />
one substance, inseparable, body and<br />
soul, and so we’re always both physical<br />
and spiritual.<br />
So, in fact, we do feel physical things<br />
spiritually, just as we smell spiritual<br />
things through our physical senses. If<br />
this is true, and it is, then yes, humility<br />
does give off a scent that can<br />
be sensed physically, and Isaac the<br />
Syrian’s concept is more than just a<br />
metaphor.<br />
But it’s also a metaphor: The word<br />
humility takes its root in the Latin<br />
word “humus,” meaning soil, ground,<br />
and earth. If one goes with this definition<br />
then the most humble person<br />
you know is the most earthy and most<br />
grounded person you know.<br />
To be humble is to have one’s feet<br />
firmly planted on the ground, to be in<br />
touch with the earth, and to carry the<br />
smell of the earth. To be humble is<br />
to take one’s rightful place as a piece<br />
of the earth and not as someone or<br />
something separate from it.<br />
The renowned mystic and scientist,<br />
Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, expressed<br />
this sometimes in his prayers. During<br />
the years when, as a paleontologist<br />
he worked for long stretches in the<br />
isolated deserts of China, he would<br />
sometimes compose prayers to God<br />
in a form he called, “A Mass for the<br />
World.”<br />
Speaking to God as a priest, he<br />
would identify his voice with that of<br />
the earth, as that place within creation<br />
where the earth itself, the soil of the<br />
earth, could open itself and speak to<br />
God. As a priest, he didn’t speak for<br />
the earth; he spoke as the earth, giving<br />
it voice, in words to this effect:<br />
Lord, God, I stand before you as a<br />
microcosm of the earth itself, to give it<br />
voice: See in my openness, the world’s<br />
openness, in my infidelity, the world’s<br />
infidelity; in my sincerity, the world’s<br />
sincerity, in my hypocrisy, the world’s<br />
hypocrisy; in my generosity, the world’s<br />
generosity; in my attentiveness, the<br />
world’s attentiveness; in my distraction,<br />
the world’s distraction; in my desire to<br />
praise you, the world’s desire to praise<br />
you; and in my self-preoccupation, the<br />
world’s forgetfulness of you. For I am<br />
of the earth, a piece of earth, and the<br />
earth opens or closes to you through my<br />
body, my soul, and my voice.<br />
This is humility, an expression of<br />
genuine humility. Humility should<br />
never be confused, as it often is, with a<br />
wounded self-image, with an excessive<br />
reticence, with timidity and fear, or<br />
with an overly sensitive self-awareness.<br />
Too common is the notion that a<br />
humble person is one who is self-effacing<br />
to a fault, who deflects praise<br />
(even when it’s deserved), who is too<br />
shy to trust opening himself or herself<br />
in intimacy, or who is so fearful or<br />
self-conscious and worried about<br />
being shamed so as to never step<br />
forward and offer his or her gifts to the<br />
community.<br />
These can make for a gentle and<br />
self-effacing person, but because we<br />
are denigrating ourselves when to<br />
deny our own giftedness, our humility<br />
is false, and deep down we know it,<br />
and so this often makes for someone<br />
who nurses some not-so-hidden angers<br />
and is prone to being passive-aggressive.<br />
The most humble person you know<br />
is the person who’s the most grounded,<br />
that is, the person who knows<br />
she’s not the center of the earth, but<br />
also knows that she isn’t a second-rate<br />
piece of dirt either. And that person<br />
will give off a scent that carries both<br />
the fragrance of paradise (of divine<br />
gift) as well as the smell of the earth. <br />
Oblate of Mary Immaculate Father Ronald Rolheiser is a spiritual writer, www.ronrolheiser.com.<br />
<strong>September</strong> <strong>20</strong>, <strong>20</strong>19 • ANGELUS • 9
SHUTTERSTOCK<br />
Who invented<br />
religious freedom?<br />
A new book addresses the issue at<br />
a time when ‘freedom of religion’ is<br />
increasingly set aside while ‘freedom<br />
from religion’ is advanced<br />
CATHOLIC NEWS SERVICE<br />
BY MIKE AQUILINA / ANGELUS<br />
10 • ANGELUS • <strong>September</strong> <strong>20</strong>, <strong>20</strong>19
Religious freedom is a hallmark of American identity.<br />
The United States fancies itself the “land of the<br />
pilgrim’s pride.” When we tell our story we begin<br />
with the Puritans, William Penn, and others who fled<br />
religious persecution. Our Constitution’s First Amendment<br />
guarantees: “Congress shall make no law respecting an<br />
establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise<br />
thereof. …”<br />
Where did the idea come from?<br />
The standard histories tell us that a right to religious<br />
freedom was first proposed in the aftermath of the Protestant<br />
Reformation and the bloody Wars of Religion. It<br />
was the only way, they say, to keep Christians from killing<br />
one another, and it had to be imposed by states that were<br />
indifferent to religion.<br />
Christianity, in this telling of the story, is inevitably prone<br />
to violent persecution of dissenters, and so it needed to be<br />
disciplined by more enlightened minds.<br />
Actual historical documents, however, present a different<br />
story, and it’s well told in a new book by Robert Louis<br />
Wilken, professor emeritus of history at the University of<br />
Virginia and the dean of U.S. church historians.<br />
In “Liberty in the Things of God: The Christian Origins<br />
of Religious Freedom” (Yale, $19), Wilken traces the idea<br />
not to the American founding, but rather to an African<br />
Christian of the late second century.<br />
Quintus Florens Tertullian was an intellectual of the first<br />
rank and an adult convert to Christianity. He wrote with<br />
concision and rhetorical force. He probably had training in<br />
law. Christians recognize him as the first to write theology<br />
in Latin. He is the earliest witness to the word “Trinity.”<br />
WIKIMEDIA COMMONS<br />
Quintus Tertullian, A.D. 160-2<strong>20</strong>, Church Father and theologian.<br />
SCREENSHOT VIA YOUTUBE<br />
Robert Louis Wilken<br />
Wilken, however, would have us remember him also<br />
as the first to advance the idea of worship as a matter of<br />
conscience. He emphasizes that he is speaking of religious<br />
freedom and not mere tolerance. “Tolerance is the<br />
forbearance of that which is not approved, a political policy<br />
of restraint toward those whose beliefs and practices are<br />
objectionable.”<br />
The Romans, as Tertullian knew, could be tolerant of foreign<br />
religions, but their tolerance was a concession. Only<br />
the emperor could recognize a god as suitable for worship.<br />
Most religions passed muster because, like the Roman religion,<br />
they permitted the worship of many gods, including<br />
those of the Roman pantheon.<br />
But Tertullian’s religion, Christianity, presented a special<br />
problem, because its God made an exclusive claim to<br />
worship. His first commandment forbade devotion to other<br />
gods. Since Roman religion was woven through so much<br />
of common life — the military, commerce, law, and even<br />
sports — Christians could not be assimilated in society.<br />
Thus their loyalty to that society was always in question.<br />
Rome found it difficult, if not impossible, to accommodate<br />
Christian religion. Persecution had legal precedent<br />
going back to Nero in A.D. 64. In the years following Tertullian’s<br />
conversion, the emperors of the Severan dynasty<br />
turned up the heat and enacted laws against conversion to<br />
Christianity. Thus, those already Christian were safe, but<br />
those who entered the catechumenate were committing a<br />
<strong>September</strong> <strong>20</strong>, <strong>20</strong>19 • ANGELUS • 11
capital crime.<br />
In making an appeal to Roman authorities, Tertullian<br />
knew that he could not appeal to Roman law or custom. So<br />
he cast his argument in terms of moral philosophy.<br />
To the proconsul of Africa, Scapula, Tertullian wrote:<br />
“It is only just and a privilege inherent in human nature<br />
that every person should be able to worship according to<br />
his own convictions; the religious practice of one person<br />
neither harms nor helps another. It is not part of religion<br />
to coerce religious practice, for it is by choice not coercion<br />
that we should be led to religion.”<br />
In another work he wrote still more forcefully: “Let one<br />
man worship God, another Jupiter. … For see that you do<br />
not give a further ground for the charge of irreligion by<br />
taking away religious liberty and forbidding free choice<br />
of deity, so that I may no longer worship according to my<br />
inclination, but am compelled to worship against it. <strong>No</strong>t<br />
even a human being would care to have unwilling homage<br />
rendered him.”<br />
With these passages, the idea of religious freedom “enters<br />
the vocabulary of the West,” Wilken says.<br />
A<br />
century after Tertullian, another Latin-speaking<br />
<strong>No</strong>rth African, Lucius Lactantius, would advance<br />
the argument. He asked again whether the gods of<br />
the Romans were truly honored by sacrifices that were<br />
forced. “Religion cannot be compelled,” he wrote. “It is<br />
by words rather than wounds that you must bend the will.<br />
<strong>No</strong>thing is so much a matter of free will as religion.”<br />
The words of these two men, Tertullian and Lactantius,<br />
would echo down the centuries, cited in defense of the<br />
primacy of conscience and the free exercise of religion.<br />
The principles were adopted by the first Christian emperor<br />
of Rome, Constantine the Great. In fact, they were<br />
enacted as law. The so-called Edict of Milan (A.D. <strong>31</strong>3)<br />
did not favor Christianity over any other religion. It simply<br />
SHUTTERSTOCK<br />
The “Metamorphosis Constantiniana” is a monument presented by the Catholic Church to the City of Niš for the 1,700th anniversary of the Edict of<br />
Milan in <strong>20</strong>13. It is the work of academic sculptor Dragan Radenovic, and presents the metamorphosis of Constantine the Great through different<br />
perods of his life.<br />
12 • ANGELUS • <strong>September</strong> <strong>20</strong>, <strong>20</strong>19
TYLER ORSBURN/CATHOLIC NEWS SERVICE<br />
A participant holds a sign at a Religious Freedom Rally in Washington, D.C., July 10. It was one of several rallies held the same day in cities around<br />
the country and sponsored by Save the Persecuted Christians.<br />
granted Christians the status already enjoyed by other<br />
cults, so that “each one may have the free opportunity to<br />
worship as he pleases; this regulation is made that we may<br />
not seem to detract from any dignity of any religion.”<br />
Constantine’s later edicts, to the Palestinians and to the<br />
Eastern Provincials, state with similar clarity: “Let no one<br />
disturb another. Let each man hold fast to that which his<br />
soul wishes. Let him make full use of this.”<br />
Wilken observes that Christian emperors and churchmen<br />
did not always live up to these principles. But St. Pope<br />
Gregory the Great used them when he counseled bishops<br />
to convert Jews by persuasion, not coercion.<br />
Later authors invoked them as they tried to curb the<br />
tyrannical acts of kings. When Charlemagne, in the eighth<br />
century, gave the conquered Saxons the choice between<br />
conversion and death, the leading scholar of his court, Alcuin,<br />
condemned him in terms that echoed the arguments<br />
of Tertullian and Lactantius.<br />
In the Middle Ages, St. Thomas Aquinas elaborated the<br />
principle of religious freedom and the role of conscience in<br />
its exercise. Medieval popes used these arguments to shore<br />
up the rights of Jews.<br />
Religious liberty was not, as some later commentators<br />
charged, a “loser’s creed,” a convenient argument for<br />
Christians when they were persecuted, but quickly forgotten<br />
once they gained power. It was a truth that Christians<br />
spoke to power, a limit on the authority any state should<br />
hold over persons.<br />
That is why Tertullian and Lactantius found a sudden<br />
utility in the aftermath of the Reformation. What would<br />
Europe’s new nation-states do now that Christianity had<br />
been fractured into a growing number of sects? For the sake<br />
of order, they declared that the religion of the ruler should<br />
dictate the religion of those who were ruled (“Cuius regio,<br />
eius religio”).<br />
To individuals who held to minority religions, this was unacceptable.<br />
In their defense they called upon the ancient<br />
Fathers. Catholics did this in Protestant lands. Protestants<br />
did the same in Catholic lands.<br />
The principle was congenial as well to the first thinkers of<br />
the Enlightenment, most of whom were agnostic or deist.<br />
Yet they were aware of Tertullian, and they recognized the<br />
truth of his argument for religious freedom.<br />
Wilken ends his book by showing us that Thomas Jefferson,<br />
himself a deist, copied out Tertullian’s argument at<br />
length, in Latin.<br />
It’s rare to find a “history of ideas” that’s also a spellbinding<br />
story anyone can enjoy. “Liberty in the Things of God”<br />
is just that kind of book.<br />
It is, needless to say, most useful at a time when “freedom<br />
of religion” is increasingly set aside while “freedom from<br />
religion” is advanced — using fake history as its justification.<br />
The state, whether in Rome or Washington or<br />
Sacramento, would prefer to recognize no higher authority<br />
than its own. <br />
Mike Aquilina is a contributing editor to <strong>Angelus</strong>. He is the<br />
author of many books, including “How Christianity Saved<br />
Civilization … And Must Do So Again” (Sophia Institute<br />
Press, $18.95).<br />
<strong>September</strong> <strong>20</strong>, <strong>20</strong>19 • ANGELUS • 13
‘The richness<br />
of Talpa’<br />
A Catholic school in East LA is counting<br />
its blessings from a much-needed facelift<br />
BY PABLO KAY / ANGELUS<br />
cutting it, they’re<br />
cutting it!”<br />
“They’re<br />
There were no local<br />
dignitaries, regional bishops, or long<br />
speeches on this <strong>September</strong> morning<br />
— just a nun with a big pair of scissors,<br />
and nearly 300 Our Lady of Talpa<br />
School students gathered around<br />
the door to their newly remodeled<br />
gym, many of them jumping up and<br />
down excitedly on the newly installed<br />
schoolyard pavement.<br />
It was the moment these Talpa<br />
Trojans had been waiting for after<br />
a busy summer. Thanks to a $1.7<br />
million grant from the Dorothy Shea<br />
Foundation — and a lot of parent<br />
volunteer hours — the Boyle Heights<br />
VICTOR ALEMÁN<br />
Our Lady of Talpa principal John Rojas and his<br />
predecessor, Sister Adella Armentrout, at the<br />
Sept. 10 ribbon-cutting.<br />
K-8 parochial school has gotten a<br />
much-needed facelift.<br />
“Our school has been the same<br />
for too many years. <strong>No</strong>thing had<br />
changed. It was always getting hot,<br />
and we didn’t have any air-conditioning<br />
vents, which now they added,”<br />
explained eighth-grader Delilah<br />
Anguiano.<br />
“To say ‘renovation’ isn’t strong<br />
enough,” remarked Daughters of<br />
Charity Provincial Supervisor Sister<br />
Julie Kubasak during a blessing ceremony<br />
Sept. 10.<br />
The upgrades include a state-of-theart<br />
STEM laboratory, freshly painted<br />
classrooms and hallways, new projectors,<br />
and a playground for its youngest<br />
14 • ANGELUS • <strong>September</strong> <strong>20</strong>, <strong>20</strong>19
VICTOR ALEMÁN<br />
Students wait outside to see the newly renovated Our Lady of Talpa school gymnasium.<br />
students.<br />
And, of course, that gym.<br />
“Our biggest need was to convert<br />
an auditorium that was not well-used<br />
and had been neglected for a long<br />
time into a functional gymnasium,”<br />
explained principal John Rojas.<br />
The remodeled space hosted the<br />
Tuesday morning blessing ceremony,<br />
which began with students singing<br />
“Talpa’s the school that the Lord has<br />
blessed” (a version of the popular<br />
hymn “This is the Day” rewritten for<br />
the occasion).<br />
Children, parents, and guests<br />
watched a video presentation of the<br />
project before Father Perry Henry,<br />
CM, led them in prayer and blessed<br />
VICTOR ALEMÁN<br />
Father Perry Henry, CM, read three short Scripture<br />
passages about the importance of “building”<br />
well to students before blessing their new gym.<br />
the gym with holy water.<br />
For Rojas, the gym’s state-of-the-art<br />
makeover is meant to make it the<br />
“pearl of our parish community.”<br />
Sixth-grader Arturo Medina had a<br />
different perspective.<br />
“I know they’re going to put a basketball<br />
court in, and I really love basketball,”<br />
answered Medina when asked<br />
what he was most excited about.<br />
The parish of Our Lady of Talpa<br />
was founded in the 19<strong>20</strong>s by<br />
families from the Mexican<br />
town of Talpa de Allende in Jalisco,<br />
driven into exile by religious persecution<br />
during the Mexican Revolution.<br />
In 1951, the parish opened the<br />
<strong>September</strong> <strong>20</strong>, <strong>20</strong>19 • ANGELUS • 15
PABLO KAY<br />
Our Lady of Talpa School’s new STEM lab.<br />
VICTOR ALEMÁN<br />
Students sing “Talpa’s the school that the Lord<br />
has blessed” at the Sept. 10 blessing ceremony<br />
for the new gymnasium.<br />
school, and since then sisters of the<br />
Daughters of Charity order like former<br />
principal Sister Adella Armentrout<br />
(the nun with the scissors) have helped<br />
staff the school, educating students<br />
from low-income immigrant families<br />
in the Boyle Heights area. (Today,<br />
there are fewer sisters, but the school is<br />
still “co-sponsored” by the order.)<br />
According to Rojas, more than 90<br />
percent of enrolled students currently<br />
receive help with tuition aid.<br />
That’s in part thanks to a firm mandate<br />
from the Daughters of Charity<br />
Foundation, which helps fund the<br />
school, to turn no family away, and<br />
to “trust in God that somehow, some<br />
way, we’ll make it work financially” for<br />
them, said Rojas.<br />
“The fact we can tell families, ‘You<br />
may not be able to pay full tuition, but<br />
this is your home,’ that’s why I think<br />
this place is a real beacon of hope for<br />
many people,” said the principal.<br />
As gentrification in the neighborhood<br />
pushes home prices higher and families<br />
into cheaper areas like the Inland<br />
Empire, schools like Talpa are under<br />
pressure not only to balance budgets,<br />
but to equip graduates for competition<br />
in a changing job market.<br />
That’s why the school’s new STEM<br />
lab (short for science, technology,<br />
engineering, and mathematics) is<br />
about more than letting students enjoy<br />
tinkering with Lego robots.<br />
“When you give a STEM lab to a<br />
school, it helps bridge not only the<br />
achievement gap, it also bridges the<br />
opportunity gap” for low-income family<br />
students, said Leslie De Leonardis,<br />
director of the Archdiocese of Los<br />
Angeles’ STEM network.<br />
“It provides students with the opportunity<br />
to not just learn skills like<br />
how to use a 3D printer or code and<br />
program robots, but how to apply those<br />
skills in the real world,” added De<br />
Leonardis.<br />
While construction on the campus<br />
16 • ANGELUS • <strong>September</strong> <strong>20</strong>, <strong>20</strong>19
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Church Keyboard Center celebrates the<br />
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St. John Vianney Catholic<br />
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buzzed away this summer, parents<br />
stayed busy, too, using their spare<br />
time to paint walls, move equipment,<br />
and wax floors before the school year<br />
started. In May, they helped organize<br />
a walkathon fundraiser together with<br />
the school’s Vincentian Marian youth<br />
group that brought in more than<br />
$30,000 in donations for the project.<br />
“These children come from poor<br />
families, but when it’s time to give<br />
and serve, it’s like the parable of the<br />
widow giving all she has,” said Belinda<br />
Pantaleon, vice principal.<br />
Pantaleon, who has worked at Talpa<br />
for <strong>31</strong> years, credits the school’s faith<br />
foundation and the dedication of<br />
parents to making “what seemed to be<br />
impossible become possible.”<br />
“What you see here is from parents<br />
giving everything they have. This is the<br />
richness of Talpa.” <br />
Pablo Kay is the editor-in-chief of<br />
<strong>Angelus</strong>.<br />
<strong>September</strong> <strong>20</strong>, <strong>20</strong>19 • ANGELUS • 17<br />
A Pilgrimage to Austria & Germany<br />
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Download brochure and registration form at:<br />
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Francis and<br />
the ‘s-word’<br />
Why the pope’s talk of schism<br />
means he understands what’s at<br />
stake in his push for reform<br />
BY JOHN L. ALLEN JR. / ANGELUS<br />
PAUL HARING/CATHOLIC NEWS SERVICE<br />
Pope Francis answers questions from journalists aboard his flight from Antananarivo, Madagascar, to Rome Sept. 10.<br />
ROME — In the beginning, some wondered if Pope<br />
Francis quite understood the consternation some<br />
of his words and deeds can arouse, and how much<br />
some sectors of the Catholic Church, especially those<br />
usually seen as more conservative or traditional, often feel<br />
aggrieved by the direction things seem to be heading.<br />
After Sept. 10, however, there can be no doubt: Yes, he<br />
gets it.<br />
Many of the most memorable moments of this papacy<br />
have come during airborne press conferences, and so it was<br />
on the pope’s return flight from a Sept. 4-10 trip to Africa.<br />
Talking about his critics, Francis actually used the “s-word”<br />
— schism — saying that while he doesn’t want one and<br />
prays to avoid it, he’s not afraid of it either.<br />
Historically speaking, Rome has feared schism like almost<br />
nothing else, because schisms have a tendency to split the<br />
Church into pieces that all the pope’s horses and all the<br />
pope’s men can’t put back together again.<br />
In recent years, that’s why, beginning with St. Pope Paul<br />
VI, every pope since the Second Vatican Council (1962-<br />
65) has bent over backward to try to heal the traditionalist<br />
rupture led by French Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre and his<br />
18 • ANGELUS • <strong>September</strong> <strong>20</strong>, <strong>20</strong>19
Society of St. Pius X.<br />
It’s also why the Vatican<br />
under St. Pope John Paul<br />
II went to such lengths to<br />
try to bring ex-Archbishop<br />
Emmanuel Milingo,<br />
nicknamed the “Zambezi<br />
Zinger” for his penchant<br />
for exorcisms, back into the<br />
fold. (That effort ultimately<br />
proved unsuccessful, but<br />
Rome’s anxiety about a<br />
widespread African schism<br />
led by Milingo never materialized.)<br />
In that context, Francis’<br />
indirect recognition that a<br />
schism is possible on his<br />
watch is striking, amounting<br />
to a clear signal that he<br />
understands the intensity of<br />
the reactions he’s generated.<br />
It’s also arresting, of course,<br />
that the line came in the<br />
context of a question about<br />
the criticism Francis sometimes<br />
gets from Americans.<br />
Francis had set things into<br />
motion Sept. 4 during his<br />
outbound flight from Rome<br />
to Maputo in Mozambique.<br />
As he customarily does,<br />
he made the rounds of the<br />
Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre in 1981.<br />
ring to the Roman Curia, the central<br />
administrative bureaucracy of<br />
the Vatican.<br />
So, is there a serious danger<br />
of a schism today? Probably, it<br />
depends on what one means.<br />
As any church historian will<br />
tell you, the formal sense of<br />
a “schism” is a break in communion<br />
with the leadership of a<br />
church, carried out by someone<br />
in a position to speak authoritatively<br />
for a segment of the faithful.<br />
In Catholic terms, that means<br />
to have a real schism you need at<br />
least one bishop to lead it. It’s not<br />
clear there’s any bishop prepared<br />
to formally reject the pope’s<br />
authority, and it isn’t clear how<br />
many people would follow him<br />
should one actually do it.<br />
In the United States, while there<br />
certainly are bishops who aren’t<br />
turning cartwheels over some<br />
aspects of Francis’ rhetoric and<br />
governance, there’s no one who’s<br />
even hinted at the prospect of<br />
setting up a rival church.<br />
Moreover, even after the clerical<br />
abuse scandals of the past year,<br />
polls show Francis still has the<br />
support of seven out of 10 American<br />
Catholics, which is the sort of<br />
press compartment on the plane to greet the reporters<br />
flying with him.<br />
One was a French journalist who’s just published a<br />
book with the provocative title of “How America Tried to<br />
Change the Pope,” about a purported effort by American<br />
conservatives, including EWTN and LifeSite <strong>News</strong>, to<br />
sabotage Francis’ agenda.<br />
In response to being presented with a copy of the book,<br />
Francis said he considers it “an honor when Americans are<br />
attacking me.”<br />
The line left people wondering what exactly Francis<br />
meant, which led to the question from English-speaking<br />
journalists on the flight back to Rome. Part of what was<br />
asked was whether Francis fears a schism.<br />
“On the question of schism. … In the Church, there have<br />
been many,” Francis said, giving the example of ruptures<br />
that followed the First and Second Vatican Councils,<br />
including the one led by Lefebvre.<br />
“There always is the schismatic option in the Church,”<br />
Francis said. “It’s a choice that the Lord leaves to human<br />
freedom. I am not afraid of schism … I pray for them not to<br />
happen, as the spiritual health of many people is at stake.”<br />
The pope acknowledged that Americans aren’t his only<br />
headache.<br />
approval rating of which politicians can only dream.<br />
The prospect of a schism in the full-blown sense, therefore,<br />
seems remote. Instead, what may already be in the<br />
works is a de facto, informal schism. <strong>No</strong> one walks out of<br />
the Church in a huff, but some — a relatively small minority,<br />
no doubt, but an influential and vocal one — practice<br />
a sort of internal exile. Some protest and complain, others<br />
simply hunker down and try to ride out the storm.<br />
Francis seems alert to this reality as well, telling reporters<br />
on the way back to Rome that today’s problem, as he sees it,<br />
is “rigidity” rather than schism.<br />
“Today we have pockets of rigidity, which aren’t a schism,<br />
but they’re semi-schismatic ways of life that will end badly,”<br />
the pope said, adding that bishops, priests, and laity who are<br />
“rigid” lack the “health” of the Gospel.<br />
<strong>No</strong>ne of that settles the debate over any specific aspect of<br />
Francis’ papacy. What it does resolve, however, is any lingering<br />
doubt about whether Francis understands that such<br />
a debate is raging.<br />
<strong>No</strong> pope uses the “s-word” without understanding what’s<br />
at stake. Francis also told reporters on the plane that if anyone<br />
has advice on how to avoid such a schism, he’s open to<br />
it, so now the drama may become, who’s going to take the<br />
pope up on that offer? <br />
“Criticism comes not only from the Americans, they’re<br />
coming from all over, including the Curia,” he said, refer-<br />
John L. Allen Jr. is the editor of Crux.<br />
WIKIMEDIA COMMONS<br />
<strong>September</strong> <strong>20</strong>, <strong>20</strong>19 • ANGELUS • 19
© THOMISTIC INSTITUTE<br />
Aquinas made easy<br />
Thanks to some creative friars,<br />
getting to know Catholicism’s bestknown<br />
theological heavyweight<br />
doesn’t have to be so intimidating<br />
BY KATHRYN JEAN LOPEZ / ANGELUS<br />
© THOMISTIC INSTITUTE<br />
Father Gregory Pine, OP.<br />
Just before the start of <strong>September</strong>, the Thomistic Institute,<br />
a project of the Dominican Province of St. Joseph,<br />
launched Aquinas 101, an online course in Thomism.<br />
Intended to be the very opposite of intimidating, Aquinas<br />
101 makes the best of Thomism accessible and digestible<br />
with short videos in small doses from dynamic Dominican<br />
friars, known for their preaching and teaching.<br />
To get a better sense of how this new initiative plans to<br />
reach hearts and minds, <strong>Angelus</strong> <strong>News</strong> spoke to Father<br />
Gregory Pine, OP, assistant director for campus outreach at<br />
the Thomistic Institute in Washington, D.C.<br />
<strong>20</strong> • ANGELUS • <strong>September</strong> <strong>20</strong>, <strong>20</strong>19
Kathryn Jean Lopez: People are busy. Why take time for<br />
an online course in Thomas Aquinas?<br />
Father Gregory Pine, OP: Ultimately, because we want<br />
to be wise, and we often don’t know where to begin. We<br />
wish we had the habits of mind and heart that would infuse<br />
a little contemplative verve into our lives, but we don’t<br />
know where to turn. Turn here.<br />
Lopez: What can I expect to learn from your videos?<br />
Pine: You’ll learn the essentials of St. Thomas’ teaching,<br />
which is a synthesis of the whole Catholic Intellectual Tradition.<br />
It was said of St. Thomas Aquinas that he seemed to<br />
have inherited the intellect of all.<br />
He is able to synthesize the riches of Scripture, tradition,<br />
Greek philosophy, Jewish and Islamic thought, the early<br />
Church Fathers, and his contemporaries in a way that is coherent<br />
and true and that give you a vision of all of theology.<br />
Lopez: What’s practical about St. Thomas Aquinas?<br />
Pine: St. Thomas sees all things in light of God. Whereas<br />
many today are tempted to reduce most considerations to<br />
politics, management, bureaucracy, or therapy, St. Thomas<br />
sees everything as proceeding from God and returning to<br />
him. He’s a real theologian, and he is able to communicate<br />
that wisdom in marvelous fashion.<br />
Lopez: What if someone reading this is generally intimidated<br />
by Aquinas?<br />
Pine: The point of the course is to overcome the intimidation.<br />
The goal is that, by the end, you’ll be able to read<br />
St. Thomas on his own terms. It fashions for you the tools<br />
of learning and you can do it in the privacy of your own<br />
home.<br />
Each lesson also affords you the opportunity to “Ask a<br />
Friar.” So, we’ll be able to walk you through it. Admittedly,<br />
St. Thomas seems intimidating: 13th century . . . jargon . . .<br />
speculative theology. The thing is, once you learn a couple<br />
of words and concepts, the whole thing opens up before<br />
you. It’s marvelous.<br />
Lopez: Do you have a favorite among his writings?<br />
Pine: There is really nothing quite like the “Summa<br />
Theologiae.” A few minutes each day with it are sufficient<br />
to have a habit of contemplative study, which deepens an<br />
interior life and enriches the life of prayer.<br />
Lopez: You’ve worked with college students. How can<br />
Aquinas help them with the challenges they face, beyond,<br />
say, a prayer before study?<br />
Pine: I think the university is a place of serious fragmentation.<br />
You can spend four years in an institution of higher<br />
learning and never broach the most significant questions in<br />
life. Who is God? Why were we created? What is happiness?<br />
What is distinct about the Christian claim?<br />
St. Thomas helps you to approach life’s most significant<br />
questions in a way that is attuned to what is. Truth, on St.<br />
Thomas’ terms, is the conformity of our mind to reality.<br />
St. Thomas has no interest in crafting an overly facile or<br />
elegant theory if it doesn’t correspond to what is. He knows<br />
that the truth serves only its slaves. And so, he is able to<br />
help those who follow after him to engage questions of<br />
deepest import with a fidelity to the real, as both revealed<br />
and reasoned.<br />
This is a salve for the sad, lonely, and anxious. It’s an invitation<br />
into a wider circle. It’s the beginning of communion.<br />
Lopez: How can Aquinas help us pray, particularly in the<br />
wake of tragedy or suffering?<br />
Pine: St. Thomas is a contemplative and would argue<br />
that every human person has a contemplative vocation.<br />
With the world in shambles around us, it’s easy to permit a<br />
frantic spirit to inform our apostolic labors.<br />
In St. Thomas’ understanding, God doesn’t need our<br />
prayers to achieve his ends. He could achieve all that he<br />
wills directly. Rather, our participation in his work is itself<br />
his gift . . . it makes us more like him, it affords us the<br />
opportunity to be more than mere recipients in the drama<br />
of salvation . . . to be also agents.<br />
And so, our prayers work within this contemplative vision.<br />
We learn what it is that God wants from us first by considering<br />
God, and then setting about the task.<br />
Lopez: How can Aquinas help us with those recent Pew<br />
Research Center results about Catholics not knowing and<br />
believing in the Real Presence of Jesus in the Eucharist?<br />
Pine: St. Thomas lived right after Lateran IV, which used<br />
the language of transubstantiation to describe the change<br />
from bread to the Lord’s body and from wine to the Lord’s<br />
blood. His treatise on the Eucharist is a masterpiece of<br />
philosophical and theological insight.<br />
I suspect many people don’t believe in the Real Presence<br />
because they don’t even understand the claim, much less<br />
the explanation. St. Thomas can help with both. He was<br />
known to have struggled with the issue. In times of difficulty,<br />
when writing the treatise, he was known to rest his<br />
head on the tabernacle itself. We would do well to follow<br />
in turn!<br />
Lopez: Does Aquinas have anything to offer the Church<br />
post-Theodore McCarrick?<br />
Pine: St. Thomas has a beautiful theology of the priesthood.<br />
In his understanding, a priest is ordained to give divine<br />
things. By baptism and confirmation, we are outfitted<br />
to receive divine things, but holy orders make a man suited<br />
to communicate them.<br />
And a priest is called to conform his life to the mysteries<br />
that he communicates in order to be a better sign of the<br />
realities he administers. This he does by his own ongoing<br />
conversion. So, yes, priests should be holy. That being said,<br />
St. Thomas is not scandalized by the fact of bad priests.<br />
God’s plans will ultimately not be defeated by bad priests. <br />
You can sign up online at aquinas101.thomisticinstitute.org<br />
Kathryn Jean Lopez is a contributing editor to <strong>Angelus</strong>, and<br />
editor-at-large of National Review Online.<br />
<strong>September</strong> <strong>20</strong>, <strong>20</strong>19 • ANGELUS • 21
City __<br />
INTERSECTIONS<br />
BY GREG ERLANDSON<br />
Anthems for eternity<br />
National Public Radio’s “All<br />
Things Considered” evening<br />
news show has a running feature<br />
called “Anthems.” It identified various<br />
songs from our collective memory<br />
that could be so labeled, from “This<br />
Land is Your Land,” by Woody Guthrie<br />
to “Get Together,” most famously sung<br />
by the Youngbloods. Nirvana’s “Smells<br />
Like Teen Spirit” even got a nod, described<br />
as an “anthem for a generation<br />
that didn’t want one.”<br />
What makes a song an anthem<br />
depends a lot on where you are coming<br />
from. “Born in the USA” by Bruce<br />
Springsteen had the rather odd fate of<br />
being an anthem both for those who<br />
sang the refrain with a certain post-war<br />
bitterness and those who sang it as the<br />
theme song of Ronald Reagan’s presidential<br />
reelection campaign.<br />
Anthems are songs that evoke a<br />
particular time or a particular emotion<br />
in the listener almost as soon as the<br />
first notes are heard, binding us to all<br />
who share a similar memory. Yet while<br />
anthems have the ability to speak to<br />
millions, the strings they pluck in each<br />
of us can be intensely personal.<br />
The same holds true for church<br />
music: I think we all have our personal<br />
church “anthems,” songs that can<br />
move us to tears or bring back a rush of<br />
memories.<br />
If I hear “Hail Holy Queen Enthroned<br />
Above,” for example, I am<br />
immediately transported back to my<br />
grammar school choir at Visitation<br />
Church in Westchester, looking down<br />
on a sea of bowed heads and veils from<br />
our lofty choir perch while trying to<br />
follow Sister’s earnest conducting.<br />
In church, singing isn’t entertainment.<br />
Whether we belt it out with<br />
abandon or simply move our lips as<br />
if we are in a Jimmy Fallon lip-sync<br />
contest, singing is praying. I’m more<br />
the lip-sync type, but there are certain<br />
songs that will actually compel me to<br />
join in, a sure sign it’s on my anthem<br />
list.<br />
For sheer exuberance, “All Creatures<br />
of our God and King” is one that will<br />
ring the church bells. Attributed to St.<br />
Francis of Assisi, it is a soaring, exultant<br />
entrance song, rife with alleluias. Yet<br />
deeply Franciscan, the sixth verse, for<br />
obvious reasons not sung very often, is<br />
an ode to Sister Death:<br />
“And you, most kind and gentle death,<br />
Waiting to hush our final breath,<br />
Sing your praises! Alleluia!<br />
You lead to heav’n the child of God,<br />
Where Christ our Lord the way has<br />
trod…”<br />
SHUTTERSTOCK<br />
Two ultra-traditional songs that have<br />
a solemnity and an elegance that make<br />
them classics are “Tantum Ergo” and<br />
“Pange Lingua,” both by St. Thomas<br />
Aquinas. But for me the “Salve<br />
Regina” has a special place because<br />
it reminds me of the Night Prayer, or<br />
Compline, at Mepkin Abbey.<br />
In a church lit only by candles, it is a<br />
final prayer sung before the monks are<br />
blessed and sent to bed with the song’s<br />
plaintive request: “Grant us after these,<br />
our days of lonely exile, the sight of<br />
your blest Son and Lord, Christ Jesus.”<br />
One song that won’t ever make any<br />
of the hymnals, but which I find very<br />
moving, is Leonard Cohen’s “If It Be<br />
Send m<br />
Name<br />
Addres<br />
22 • ANGELUS • <strong>September</strong> <strong>20</strong>, <strong>20</strong>19
© MEPKIN ABBEY<br />
The monks at Mepkin Abbey.<br />
Your Will,” particularly the version<br />
sung by the singer once known as Antony.<br />
It is an artist’s prayer, hauntingly<br />
beautiful, and beautifully haunted.<br />
Cohen himself described his songs as<br />
“muffled prayers,” and that certainly<br />
describes this one.<br />
But of all my church anthems, “The<br />
Servant Song” is at the top of my list<br />
these days. Composed by Richard<br />
Gillard, it has a monastic simplicity to<br />
it, a Gospel purity that cuts right to the<br />
heart of the Christian challenge:<br />
“Brother let me be your servant<br />
Let me be as Christ to you,<br />
Pray that I might have the grace to<br />
Let you be my servant too.”<br />
My regret is that I didn’t know “The<br />
Servant Song” when I got married. It is<br />
the one song my wife and I both want<br />
played at our funerals.<br />
Of course, when it comes to church<br />
music, everyone is likely to have an<br />
equally fierce idea about what they<br />
don’t like: the anti-anthems. My wife<br />
has a particularly strong antipathy to<br />
“On Eagle’s Wings,” for example.<br />
She has let it be known that if I allow<br />
it to be played at her funeral, she will<br />
come back from the grave and haunt<br />
me. I have a similar feeling about<br />
“Gather Us In,” whose cloying verses<br />
claim “we have been sung throughout<br />
all of hist’ry.” <strong>No</strong>t at my funeral,<br />
anyway.<br />
But instead of complaining about the<br />
music we don’t like, or complaining<br />
that Catholics can’t sing, or that no<br />
good music has been written in the last<br />
decades, or centuries, or millennium,<br />
let’s acknowledge the new classics and<br />
the old — our personal anthems. And<br />
the next time we hear it in church, no<br />
lip-syncing!” <br />
Greg Erlandson is the president<br />
and editor-in-chief of Catholic <strong>News</strong><br />
Service.<br />
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In praise of the<br />
‘Holy Fool’<br />
<strong>No</strong>w streaming: a foreign film that revives one<br />
of literature’s most uncomfortable character types<br />
BY ROBERT INCHAUSTI / ANGELUS<br />
The Italian film “Happy as Lazzaro”<br />
was a surprise hit on Netflix<br />
this summer. Yet I suspect many<br />
of those who saw it might have been<br />
disappointed. <strong>No</strong>t because it isn’t a<br />
fantastic movie (it won the award for<br />
best screenplay at Cannes last year, after<br />
all), but because it is a serious work<br />
that threatens to expose us for who we<br />
really are.<br />
Allow me to explain.<br />
Directed by Alice Rohrwacher, the<br />
films tells the story of its namesake, a<br />
young man who lives among a group<br />
of peasants living as slaves on a tobacco<br />
farm in rural Tuscany. The farm is<br />
owned by the Marquise Alfonsina de<br />
Luna and managed by her affable but<br />
manipulative farm administrator.<br />
Lazzaro, at first, does not seem like<br />
someone anyone would ever admire.<br />
Hardly a hero and more of a fool, he is<br />
neither intelligent, nor savvy, nor even<br />
particularly religious. He is content to<br />
do what his superiors tell him to do,<br />
however inane, and takes correction<br />
from everyone and anyone.<br />
His only remarkable feature is that he<br />
falls into a trance from time to time,<br />
a behavior described by the laborers<br />
he lives with as “staring into the void.”<br />
But one suspects there is more than<br />
“void gazing” going on here.<br />
One of the darkest and yet most prophetic<br />
scenes comes very early in the<br />
film, when one of the women taking<br />
care of the sharecroppers’ children<br />
tells a small child that his mother is<br />
dead.<br />
“Killed herself to get away from you,”<br />
she says. When he cries, she laughs<br />
and says, “How ugly he looks when he<br />
cries.”<br />
Such dialogue is depicted as sport —<br />
mere teasing; everyone here apparently<br />
does it. Besides, the woman thinks<br />
she is doing the boy a favor; he must<br />
get used to abuse like everyone else.<br />
Having already met the innocent,<br />
happy-go-lucky Lazzaro, the viewer<br />
shudders at horrors sure to come.<br />
The film begins as a work of social realism,<br />
documenting the class conflict<br />
and the effects of economic exploitation,<br />
then quickly evolves into a<br />
saint’s story along the lines of Gustave<br />
Flaubert’s “A Simple Heart” and I. B.<br />
Singer’s “Gimple the Fool.”<br />
All three of these works feature a<br />
“Holy Fool” as their central character,<br />
not an epic, comic, or tragic hero like<br />
you find in most popular fiction. Such<br />
heroic protagonists show us how to be<br />
24 • ANGELUS • <strong>September</strong> <strong>20</strong>, <strong>20</strong>19
“excellent,” “famous,” “lovable,” or<br />
“good.”<br />
Holy Fools serve quite a different<br />
function: They expose our pretenses<br />
and challenge our convictions. The<br />
conflict in such narratives does not<br />
hinge on the clash between good and<br />
evil, so much as on an interior struggle<br />
between compassion and indifference.<br />
When the spoiled son of the marquise<br />
fakes his own kidnapping to get back<br />
at his mother, Lazzaro helps him, not<br />
because he hates the upper class or has<br />
any grudge against the marquise, but<br />
simply because he likes his friend and<br />
wants to help. And yet in a mysterious<br />
turn of events, the self-kidnapping<br />
(of which Lazzaro is an accomplice)<br />
leads to a police intervention and the<br />
subsequent liberation of the entire<br />
tobacco farm.<br />
Adriano Tardiolo in “Happy as Lazzaro.”<br />
Still, the poor peasants find it impossible<br />
to benefit from this turn of good<br />
fortune, largely because they possess<br />
few skills and even less virtue to make<br />
a go of it in the city. Relying on natural<br />
ruthlessness, they become petty<br />
criminals, committing larcenies and<br />
inflicting their hardheartedness on one<br />
another and any innocent bystanders<br />
they may come across.<br />
The trick to grasping the allegorical<br />
elements in stories like these is for the<br />
viewer not to identify with the Holy<br />
Fool. After all, they are nothing like us.<br />
Rather, such tales ask us to see ourselves<br />
in all the “smart,” clever people<br />
who mock him or have contempt<br />
for his innocence, or try to manage<br />
or exploit it — people like the farm<br />
manager who have spent their lives<br />
learning the art of the deal, or the<br />
IMDB<br />
“polite” nun who scoots Lazzaro out<br />
of the cathedral during music practice.<br />
(I, for one, saw myself in the tragically<br />
hip, spoiled son of the marquise.)<br />
These people mirror our egocentric<br />
lives; the Holy Fool marks the contrast.<br />
In this sense, “Happy as Lazzaro” is a<br />
satire. There are no heroes here, only<br />
victims, dupes, and perpetrators. The<br />
rich exploit the poor, the poor exploit<br />
one another, while the middle class<br />
look after their reputations.<br />
If there is any thesis statement in this<br />
film, it comes in a scene where the<br />
marquise reads to her child and friend<br />
from the second chapter of Thomas<br />
à Kempis’ “The Imitation of Christ.”<br />
The irony of her reading such wisdom<br />
to her child reveals her self-deluded<br />
megalomania, and yet the words retain<br />
their power:<br />
“He who knows himself well is<br />
humbled in his own presence. And the<br />
praise of other men provokes no pleasure.<br />
If I were to know everything in<br />
the universe and scorned charity, who<br />
would bring me to the grace of God?”<br />
This film has stayed with me over the<br />
several months since I first watched<br />
it. It even got me looking forward to<br />
the many moments of correction in<br />
my life, however seemingly minor or<br />
unimportant.<br />
The day after watching it I was<br />
scolded by a dog groomer for my dog’s<br />
fleas and the thistle he found in his<br />
toe. And then my barber reprimanded<br />
me for not knowing the kind of haircut<br />
I wanted. “I don’t know; cut it like you<br />
always do!”<br />
Lazzaro’s good intentions, like all<br />
of ours, may be powerless against the<br />
treacheries of this world, and yet our<br />
failures to overcome those treacheries<br />
do not condemn us in the eyes of God<br />
but procure his mercy. And a man<br />
who knows this will be humble in his<br />
own presence, accepting the vicissitudes<br />
of Divine Providence with great<br />
joy.<br />
Perhaps this is what it means to be as<br />
happy as Lazzaro. <br />
Robert Inchausti is an author of several<br />
books and professor of English at Cal<br />
Poly, San Luis Obispo. His latest book<br />
is “Hard to be a Saint in the City: The<br />
Spiritual Vision of the Beats” (Shambhala,<br />
$16.95).<br />
<strong>September</strong> <strong>20</strong>, <strong>20</strong>19 • ANGELUS • 25
THE CRUX<br />
BY HEATHER KING<br />
© CHRIS ARNADE<br />
An image featured in the book “Dignity: Seeking Respect in Back Row America,” by Chris Arnade.<br />
A trip to ‘Back Row America’<br />
How drug addicts,<br />
prostitutes, and<br />
McDonald’s tell the<br />
story of modern-day<br />
America in ‘Dignity’<br />
“I because I was told not to.”<br />
first walked the Hunts Point<br />
neighborhood of the Bronx<br />
So begins “Dignity: Seeking Respect<br />
in Back Row America” (Sentinel,<br />
$18), a recently published photo essay<br />
collection by Chris Arnade.<br />
A former Wall Street bond trader,<br />
Arnade had achieved the American<br />
dream when in <strong>20</strong>11 he began to get<br />
restless. He’d always taken long walks<br />
around Manhattan, but now he started<br />
venturing into “the less seen parts<br />
of New York City, the parts people<br />
claimed were unsafe or uninteresting.”<br />
He found his way to Hunts Point, notorious<br />
for two things: drugs and prostitutes.<br />
Almost entirely black and Latino,<br />
26 • ANGELUS • <strong>September</strong> <strong>20</strong>, <strong>20</strong>19
oughly 40 percent of its residents live<br />
below the poverty line.<br />
He talked to whoever would engage.<br />
He brought along his camera and started<br />
taking portraits. To his surprise he<br />
found community, beauty, creativity,<br />
and a sense of place: barbershops, bike<br />
shops, pigeon keepers.<br />
He also found the addicts and sex<br />
workers, and found as well that they<br />
were accepted as part of the community.<br />
He befriended Takeesha, who’d<br />
been put out on the streets by her<br />
mother’s pimp when she was 12 years<br />
old. How did she want to be described?<br />
asked Arnade. “As who I am,” she<br />
replied, without missing a beat, “a<br />
prostitute, a mother of six, and a child<br />
of God.”<br />
By <strong>20</strong>15 he’d quit his job, left Hunts<br />
Point, and started taking road trips to<br />
towns across America hollowed-out by<br />
corporate greed, drug addiction, and<br />
white flight. He put 150,000 miles on<br />
his car and spent three years sitting beside,<br />
talking with, and listening to the<br />
stories of the people whom the mostly<br />
white elite purport to want to help.<br />
He has no particular “answers.” He<br />
has no axe to grind nor agenda to<br />
promote.<br />
He doesn’t romanticize the people of<br />
“Back Row America.” He gives faces,<br />
names, voices, and histories — dignity<br />
— to the otherwise unseen and<br />
unheard: in Selma, Alabama, where if<br />
you’re willing to ruin your hands, you<br />
can get a “slave labor” job chipping cement<br />
off old bricks for 10 or <strong>20</strong> bucks<br />
a day; in Portsmouth, Ohio, where a<br />
single, jobless father pushes his kids<br />
around town in a shopping cart; in<br />
Bakersfield, California, aka “McMeth,”<br />
statistically the most back row city in<br />
the country.<br />
He discovered that in dying towns all<br />
over the country, the local McDonald’s<br />
is the new town square. Retired gents<br />
in Gary, Indiana, meet for morning<br />
coffee and swap stories about the old<br />
days. Elderly ladies gather to play bingo.<br />
Homeless people can charge their<br />
phones, cadge sponge baths, ice and<br />
free refills, and sit for hours gossiping,<br />
snacking, or napping.<br />
The back row consists of individuals,<br />
not types. He finds Trump supporters.<br />
He finds those carrying placards reading<br />
“American was NEVER great!”<br />
AMAZON<br />
In the projects of Cleveland, he talks<br />
to a black man, smoking on his stoop,<br />
who observes, “You know what I think<br />
about Trump? He is so racist, he is past<br />
racism, into something we can’t even<br />
comprehend.”<br />
Wherever he is, he goes to “services”<br />
at the closest church each Sunday<br />
morning, and finds himself welcome.<br />
He makes this essential point:<br />
“Religion and faith are essential<br />
for surviving the streets of the South<br />
Bronx. … There are dirty Bibles in<br />
crack houses, Korans in abandoned<br />
buildings. … Rosaries, crucifixes, and<br />
religious icons are worn for protection<br />
and good luck. Pages of the Bible<br />
are torn out, folded up, and kept in<br />
pockets, to be pulled out and fingered<br />
nervously or read over in times of stress<br />
or held during prayers. ...<br />
“[C]hurches understand the streets,<br />
understand everyone is a sinner and<br />
everyone fails.”<br />
That the front row’s cultural disdain<br />
for religion constitutes a kind of reverse<br />
colonialism, in other words, is a notion<br />
lost on the elite. A second, related<br />
insight has to do with one of the front<br />
row’s favored solutions to poverty: just<br />
move.<br />
“Telling members of the back row<br />
that they should solve their own problems<br />
by moving is insulting, no matter<br />
who you’re talking to. But it is particularly<br />
insulting to African Americans;<br />
their entire history in the United States<br />
is of forced and coerced movement.”<br />
Everywhere Arnade finds a pride of<br />
place, an ache for family, a longing<br />
for home. Everywhere, he encounters<br />
people staying in blighted areas<br />
because they want to take care of their<br />
parents, stay close to their friends, raise<br />
their kids with the same food, culture,<br />
and community with which they were<br />
raised.<br />
Arnade understands this impulse to<br />
stay put stems not from laziness or fear,<br />
but rather a kind of stubborn love that<br />
the privileged — whose ties to friends,<br />
community, and family tend to be<br />
more attenuated, who unthinkingly<br />
pull up stakes in pursuit of high-paying<br />
jobs, who pride themselves on their<br />
“mobility” — can scarcely begin to<br />
understand.<br />
In the end, the real glory of “Dignity”<br />
may lie here: “The walks, the portraits,<br />
the stories I heard, the places they took<br />
me, became a process of learning in a<br />
different way. <strong>No</strong>t from textbooks, or<br />
statistics, or spreadsheets … but from<br />
people.”<br />
That’s the Incarnation in action. “Jesus<br />
knew human nature well.” Walking<br />
the hills, plains, temple plazas, and cities<br />
of his own time, talking to people,<br />
looking into their eyes, reading their<br />
hearts: that’s how he learned, too. <br />
Heather King is a blogger, speaker and the author of several books.<br />
<strong>September</strong> <strong>20</strong>, <strong>20</strong>19 • ANGELUS • 27
S<br />
T<br />
M<br />
The NEW <strong>Angelus</strong><strong>News</strong>.com<br />
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28 • ANGELUS • <strong>September</strong> <strong>20</strong>, <strong>20</strong>19<br />
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FR. SERAPHIM MICHALENKO, MIC<br />
Fr. Seraphim has been a priest for<br />
63 years and has spent most of his<br />
life spreading the message of<br />
Jesus, The Divine Mercy. He served<br />
for <strong>20</strong> years as Vice-Postulator in<br />
<strong>No</strong>rth America for the canonization<br />
cause of St. Maria Faustina, to whom<br />
Jesus entrusted the message of The<br />
Divine Mercy in the 1930’s.<br />
FR. JOSEPH AYTONA, CPM<br />
Fr. Joseph is the founder of the<br />
Spiritual Motherhood Sodality as<br />
well as the founder of Family<br />
Vocation Ministries, an apostolate<br />
that promotes vocations through<br />
the sanctification of families.<br />
FR. PARKER SANDOVAL<br />
Following his formation at St.<br />
John’s Seminary in Camarillo, he<br />
was ordained a priest for the<br />
Archdiocese of Los Angeles<br />
in <strong>20</strong>15 and coordinator of Adult<br />
Faith Formation in the Office of<br />
Religious Education.<br />
FR. ED BROOM, OMV<br />
He is a member of the Oblates of<br />
the Virgin Mary and was ordained<br />
by Saint John Paul II on May 25,<br />
1986. Fr Ed teaches Catholic<br />
Ignatian Marian Spirituality<br />
through articles, podcasts, a radio<br />
show, retreats and spiritual direction.<br />
PURISIMA NARVAEZ 818.543.18<strong>31</strong><br />
MARY WHITTLE 818.395.0143<br />
Please cut and mail bottom portion only.<br />
ESTRELLE MIJARES 562.972.5675<br />
BETH BASILIO 562.842.6910<br />
30 • ANGELUS • <strong>September</strong> <strong>20</strong>, <strong>20</strong>19<br />
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