January 9, 2024
/We hope your winter break was filled with the love language of deep conversation and that the New Year is off to an invigorating and purposeful start for you! If you choose a word or phrase for the New Year (not resolutions, but a theme), what are you choosing for 2024? Mine is relational closeness (Vertical & horizontal).
—Oriana Li Halevy
on behalf of the Intra-Community Council’s CATH-Links team
If you are interested in submitting reflections, meditations, articles, book reviews, etc., see Submit Resources for Publication for submission guidelines. We look forward to your participation!
RECENT NEWS
Shia LaBeouf enters Catholic Church, considers vocation to the diaconate [catholicnewsagency.com]
On New Year’s Eve, Hollywood star Shia LaBeouf was received into the Catholic Church with the Sacrament of Confirmation at Old Mission Santa Inés Parish in Solvang, California, the Capuchin parish where LaBeouf first went to train for his titular role as a Franciscan friar in the film “Padre Pio”. LaBeouf revealed in an interview [youtube.com] (that has received over 2.3M views) that his on-screen portrayal of St. Padre Pio led him to a newfound love of the Catholic faith [ncregister.com]
On Fiducia Supplicans [usccb.org]
Bishop Robert Barron, the chairman of the USCCB’s Committee on Laity, Marriage, Family Life, and Youth, addressed questions and concerns that have emerged following the publication of Declaration Fiducia Supplicans On the Pastoral Meaning of Blessings [vatican.va]: “The blessings that it allows for those in irregular relationships are not liturgical in nature and hence do not imply any approbation of such relationships. Rather, these benedictions are informal and spontaneous, designed to call upon God’s mercy to heal, guide, and strengthen. Despite some misleading coverage in the press, the declaration does not constitute a ‘step’ toward ratification of same-sex marriage nor a compromising of the Church’s teaching regarding those in irregular relationships. Fiducia Supplicans is very much congruent with Pope Francis’s long-held conviction that those who do not live up to the full demand of the Church’s moral teaching are nevertheless loved and cherished by God and invited to accept the Lord’s offer of forgiveness.”
THOUGHT LEADERSHIP
Love to Overcome Hate—the need to empower the study of love [psychologytoday.com]
by Tyler VanderWeele, Professor of Epidemiology at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, and Director of the Human Flourishing Program [harvard.edu] and Co-Director of the Initiative on Health, Spirituality, and Religion [harvard.edu] at Harvard. VanderWeele holds degrees from Oxford, UPenn, and Harvard in mathematics, philosophy, theology, finance, and biostatistics.
Excerpt: Part of the difficulty of studying love is the diversity of ways that the word “love” is used and the diverse array of things that are sometimes said to be loved: family, friends, food, pets, country, justice, beauty, God, etc. In every case, however, love arguably has either a unitive aspect (our wanting to be with or united to what we love) or a contributory aspect (our wanting to contribute to the good of what is loved). These often co-occur, though sometimes only one or the other aspect of love is present. These different aspects of love, and the diverse range of objects we might love, can make the study of love challenging. At the Human Flourishing Program at Harvard, we have recently released a paper [jesp.org - content may download as PDF] arguing that whenever the verb “love” is used, one or both of these unitive or contributory aspects are in play … Some of the complexity of studying love is that either unitive or contributory love may be present without the other. Often in human relationships, however, we expect, desire, and hope for both to be present. We are currently using this characterization of love to try to empower a fuller empirical study of love.
THEOLOGICAL EDUCATION
Want to know the history behind the Feast of the Epiphany? [catholicnewsagency.com]
“In the Latin Rite of the Catholic Church, Epiphany celebrates the revelation that Jesus was the Son of God. It focuses primarily on this revelation to the Three Wise Men, but also in his baptism in the Jordan and at the wedding at Cana. In the Eastern rites of the Catholic Church, Theophany – as Epiphany is known in the East – commemorates the manifestation of Jesus’ divinity at his Baptism in the River Jordan. While the traditional date for the feast is Jan. 6, in the United States the celebration of Epiphany is moved to the Sunday between Jan. 2 and Jan. 8. However, the meaning of the feast goes deeper than just the bringing of presents or the end of Christmas, says Fr. Hezekias Carnazzo, a Melkite Catholic priest and founding executive director of the Virginia-based Institute of Catholic Culture. ‘You can’t understand the Nativity without Theophany; or you can’t understand Nativity without Epiphany.’”
SYNOD REFLECTIONS
Bishop Robert Barron Shares His Synod Experience [wordonfire.org]
“The summary statement very accurately expresses the fact that the overwhelming concern of the synod members was to listen to the voices of those who have, for a variety of reasons, felt marginalized from the life of the Church. This motif was the common denominator in all of the preliminary sessions leading up to the synod, and it was prominently featured in the working document that provided the basis for our discussions … I can assure everyone that their demand to be heard was heard, loud and clear at the synod. And I’m glad it was. The Church is meant to announce the Gospel to everyone (todos, todos, todos, as the pope rightly says) and to gather them into the Body of Christ. Therefore, if there are armies of Catholics who feel excluded or condescended to, that’s a major pastoral problem that must be addressed with humility and honesty. And I can say, as someone who has been a full-time ecclesiastical administrator for the past twelve years, I am delighted to receive the counsel of laity in regard to practically all aspects of my work. Expanding the number and diversity of those who might aid the bishops in their governance of the Church is all to the good, and bravo to the synod for exploring this possibility.
“A question that I raised several times in the small group conversations, however, was whether, in our enthusiasm to include people in the governance of the Church, we forget that the vocation of 99 percent of the Catholic laity is to sanctify the world, to bring Christ into the arenas of politics, the arts, entertainment, communication, business, medicine, etc., precisely where they have special competence. Generally speaking, I was worried that both the Instrumentum Laboris and the synod conversations were far more preoccupied with the ad intra than with the ad extra, and this despite the fact that Pope Francis has been consistently calling for a Church that goes out from itself…
“The very best part of the synod was, of course, coming into close contact with Catholic leaders from all over the world. In my various small groups—and during the very lively coffee breaks—I met bishops and laity from the Philippines, Indonesia, Malaysia, Lithuania, Hong Kong, Germany, Canada, Mexico, Argentina, Austria, Australia, and on and on. The four weeks in Rome was a uniquely privileged opportunity to sense the catholicity of Christ’s Church—and like it or not, this kind of encounter changes you, compelling you to see that your vision of things is one perspective among many. All of these ideas and experiences from the synod will continue in the coming year to percolate in the mind of the Church, in preparation for the second and final round next October. Might I invite everyone to continue to pray for the work that we synod members must do both in the interim and at the Vatican next year?”
BOOKS OF INTEREST
Living Better with Spirituality Based Strategies that Work [cognella.com] by our own Thomas G. Plante, Ph.D., ABPP, is “designed to serve as a practical workbook or companion book to Spiritually Informed Therapy that can be used by therapists with their clients, faculty with their students, or with the general public to put key evidence-based principles into actual practice. The workbook features numerous exercises and practical strategies that can help readers examine and implement core tenets from Jesuit spirituality into their everyday and contemporary life … The text features real-world case studies that demonstrate how Jesuit spirituality has helped individuals work through their challenges and discover greater overall wellness.”
