Yesterday's Aquinas Lecture

The video is available online - Aquinas Lecture 2013: Fr. Augustine Thompson, OP "Baptismal Theology and Practice in the Age of St. Thomas Aquinas"

Liturgical Piety

Someone has uploaded Fr. Bouyer's Liturgical Piety to scribd.

More on Fr. Ashley

Sacred Page - OP official

Tonight

At the DSPT (7:30 P.M.): Aquinas Lecture 2013: Fr. Augustine Thompson, OP "Baptismal Theology and Practice in the Age of St. Thomas Aquinas"

I probably won't be going given the journey that it requires, but the event will be available livestream.

thomistica.net

More on Prayer from an Orthodox Perspective

Pravmir: The Holy Fathers on Prayer

Deacon = Servant [of Works of Charity]?

Internet Archive: November 2006 issue of the Pastoral Review: Deacons and the Servant Myth by Anthony Gooley

It is frequently argued that the distinctive character of deacons is that they are servants called to the charitable and social justice ministry of the Church. The belief that service is distinctive of deacons is the servant myth. It is based on a false reading of Acts 6 and it has consequences for the way in which the Church receives the ministry of deacons. Breaking down this myth is the first step in restoring an authentic diaconate in the life of the Church. Anthony Gooley is a deacon and Ministry Development Officer in the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Brisbane, Australia.

A proper understanding of what the order of the diaconate is necessary to address the question of whether there can be "ordained" deaconesses or not.

If we take the Greek text, as it is reproduced in RSV, we are able to construct a better picture of what is really happening in Acts 6.1-7. The Greek speaking Christians are complaining that their widows are being neglected in the daily diakonia. In Acts the diakonia is the proclamation of the Gospel.3 They are neglected for two reasons, the Aramaic speaking Apostles predominantly concentrate their proclamation in the Temple and the widows, who cannot comprehend the language and for social reasons are mostly restricted to the home, are overlooked in this daily diakonia. The solution proposed by the Apostles and agreed to by the whole Church is to appoint seven from among the Greek speaking community to do that daily diakonia in the homes of the Greek widows or as the expression in the Greek has it, to minister tables.4 Both the Apostles and the Seven had been entrusted with the same diakonia which is to minister or proclaim the word. To underscore this interpretation we see that Stephen immediately commences to proclaim the Gospel to the point of giving witness with his life (Acts 6-7.50) and Philip commences his diakonia of the word in proclaiming the Gospel, catechising the Ethiopian and baptising (Acts 8). The laying on of hands becomes the concrete sign that the ministry entrusted to the Apostles is to be entrusted to the Seven. The one thing we do not see the Seven do is charitable works or distributing food or funds to the widows, in fact we do not see anyone in the New Testament with the title of diakonos engaged in a specifically charitable service activity. This should give us some clues as we address the servant myth.

Would we have needed the development of the mendicant orders and their emphasis on preaching if we have a living, energetic diaconate at the time?

Related:
International Theological Commission - From the Diakonia of Christ to the Diakonia of the Apostles (2002)

Unlocking Divine Action: Contemporary Science and Thomas Aquinas

DSPT: Book Launch: “Unlocking Divine Action: Contemporary Science and Thomas Aquinas” by Fr. Michael Dodds, OP - Tuesday, April 23, 7.30pm

CUA Press

Related:
The Nature of Scientific Explanation by Jude P. Dougherty

Fr. Ashley's last? book: Healing for Freedom: A Christian Perspective on Personhood and Psychotherapy by Benedict M. Ashley, OP

The Scale of Perfection by Walter Hilton

Currently on sale at Ignatius Press. (web edition)

I had not heard of him before...

THE SCALE OF PERFECTION: INTRODUCTION
Gloriana.nu
EWTN

CCEL

Pope Benedict's Final Angelus Address

Benedict XVI: I am not abandoning the Church (YT)

Último Ángelus Benedicto XVI - 24-02-2013
Ultimo ANGELUS di BENEDETTO XVI - VERSIONE INTEGRALE -
[HD] - Ultimo Angelus Del Papa 24022012 Last Angelus Pope

Pope Benedict XVI's farewell Angelus: I will never abandon the Church
Catholic World Report
Zenit: On the Transfiguration
The Lord is Calling me to Scale the Mountain,

Pope's last Angelus: I will not abandon the Church. I will serve in a different way
Saying Farewell to Benedict XVI in his last Angelus

Related: Benedict XVI: A Brief Theological Appreciation
Pope's Address At Conclusion of Lenten Spiritual Exercises

Fr. Benedict Ashley, O.P. Has Passed.Into Eternity

Notice from Communio.

Requiescat in pace.

When Fr. William Wallace meets His Creator and Savior, who will be left to represent the River Forest School?

I didn't know Fr. Ashley had written an autobiography.

More:
How the Great Books seminar turned a radical poet into a philosopher and priest. by Benjamin Recchie, AB’03 (Ordo Praedicatorum)

The Dominicans
St. Catherine and Contemporary Spirituality

The Dominican Friars of the Province of St. Albert the Great
Aquinas Institute

Related:
Credo: Timothy Danaher finds rich rewards in austere monastic life

Less Than a Week to Go

Rome Reports: Benedict XVI finishes spiritual exercises, enters last phase of pontificate


Pope Benedict changes rituals for new pope's inauguration

Bishop Emeritus of Rome

Rome Reports: Top ranking cardinal reveals future title for Benedict XVI

Zenit: Pope's Reflection on Vatican II

Parts 1, 2, 3, and 4

Book Collects Ratzinger 'Communio' Articles

More from Crisis on Benedict XVI

Benedict’s Intellectual Mentors and Students by Tracey Rowland
The Strange World of Garry Wills by Tom Piatak
Will the Next Pope Oppose the “Dictatorship of Relativism” as Fiercely as Benedict? by Dr. William Oddie

Metropolitan Hilarion Interview

in which he discusses the abdication of Pope Benedict XVI.

MosPat: Metropolitan Hilarion’s interview with the Vesti v Subbotu (News on Saturday)

The metropolitan's remarks make for a contrast with the pleas by Roberto de Mattei and Enrico Maria Radaelli - Last-Ditch Appeal: The Pope Should Withdraw His Resignation. The two traditionalists seem to have a very "high" conception of the office of the pope, but I wonder if their conception is really warranted by Sacred Tradition, or if it is tied to a brand of ultramontanism.

Two from Ethika Politika

Monks Still Matter by J. L. Liedl
With Love as Our Byword: Ecumenism, Asceticism, and the Common Good by Dylan Pahman

Tracey Roland on the Pontificate of Benedict XVI

The Pope and the Philistines by Tracey Rowland
Benedict XVI’s papacy has been one of imagination and urbanity hampered by bureaucracy

A Piece on David Schindler

Philosopher of Love by Jeremy Beer
David Schindler has a remedy for the religious right

For the orthodox Christian, is doing one’s public duty more or less reducible to voting for the most socially conservative Republican on the ballot—and then shutting up about whatever misgivings one might have? Surely not. Yet for many election cycles, this has been often implied by the self-appointed guardians of practicality and political realism. It is even increasingly heard from the pulpit.

The assumptions that lurk behind this idea are that when it comes to ordering public life, modern liberal democracy in its best sense has things basically right. America rightly understood is the highest exemplar of this kind of liberalism. And the Republican Party is our best reasonable hope for defending this liberalism’s political, economic, and cultural accomplishments from its enemies. To question these assumptions is to be naïve or—a favorite epithet—utopian.

Is it truly the case...

that Latin theology has been deficient in comparison to Eastern theology with respect to the Holy Spirit (until, maybe, rather recently)? Were the medieval theologians, both the scholastics and the monastics, lacking with respect to Pneumatology? How good, then, is Yves Congar's I Believe in the Holy Spirit?

How about the place of the Holy Spirit in the Roman-rite liturgy, which is said to be more Christocentric than the othe rites of the Church given its antiquity? (I believe this is the thesis established by Fr. Jungmann.) In contrast, could it be said that the Byzantine rite is more "Trinitarian" (or, perhaps, it gives attention or invokes both Christ and the Holy Spirit in the worship of the Father)?

Is it possible for the Roman rite to "organically" develop in such a way that it retains the Christocentric texts for certain parts of the liturgy while other texts are added or emphasized in order to draw our attention to the work of the Holy Spirit in the liturgy? (I am thinking beyond the addition of a [quasi-]epiclesis to Roman rite.)

Related:
Fr. Hunwicke: The epiclesis of the Roman Rite
Fr. Z: QUAERITUR: Epiclesis in the Roman Canon
Hogardelamadre
Discussion at the Byzantine Forum.

Orientale Lumen XVI

Someone alerted me to the fact that the audio files for Orientale Lumen XVI are available. The theme of the conference was "Theology of the Laity."