Tuesday, January 13, 2015

Street People's Choir


"I am a member of the Street People's Choir" is the title of an article in the Catholic Digest. Pope Francis on his visit to the Flower Village while in Korea, in August of last year, arrived by helicopter. There to meet him were about 30,000 people. He transferred to an open car, during this time the Street People's Choir was singing, because of the noise, no one was conscious of their presence. 

The pope got out of the car and entered the vestibule of the building and took off his shoes. He was the only one who did, every body else walked in wearing  their shoes. The writer thought the pope's feet were hurting. The Street People's Choir was waiting for him and started singing again, but the noise from those in the building was so loud, the singing was buried in the noise.  

Behind the stage on which the Street People's Choir was singing was a placard written in Italian introducing them.  The pope saw the placard and looking towards the choir raised his two hands over his head and gave them a thumbs up sign telling them to sing louder. They were gratified by the sign of recognition.

The choir was from the Seoul railroad station where the writer of the article says she attended one of their recitals. She was surprised to see women in the group and was impressed with the director and accompanist. She wanted to join the choir to help them as an alto member, and asked one of the religious sisters who helped form the choir, and was accepted as a member. 

Because of the visit of the pope and the way the mass media carried the story, the difficulty of finding a place to practice was solved. This had been a problem in the past. After each practice there was a meal served which was appreciated by all. The writer mentions how she began a sponsoring group to help pay for the meals. She had some success, and hopes it will continue to grow.

She concludes her article with the words of Pope Francis:  "Important in helping the poor is not just  give a one time  monetary gift, but to join them to  become a member of the cultural life of society."  She would like these words to ring loud and clear throughout society.        

Monday, January 12, 2015

Is the Social Gospel Necessary?


The social gospel of the Church, in Korea like other countries of the world, is often misunderstood and  attacked. A priest in the Catholic Times gives us some  answers to many of the difficulties in his article. Those who are sensitive to issues of justice write and speak often on the problems they see, and this interest gives rise to much rebuttal, making the topic relevant.

Is the social gospel about problems in society? Why don't they see their own faults and those of the church instead of expressing criticism of society?  There are those who do not want to hear anything about politics, and want those  interested in the social gospel to go outside to make their opinion known. However, the Church exists in society. The social gospel is not only limited to society, humans need others to live, we were born to live with others, the social gospel helps us have a right relationship with God and our follow human beings.

Do you think the social gospel is something extra, good if we have it, and good if we don't? Our belief is made up of what we believe and what we need to do. What we need to do is the social gospel; it is not an extra but an integral part of the teaching. It is what I am called to do in my daily life.

There are those that bring in the separation of Church and State as a reason for not getting involved. We can't separate religion from life. The separation of Church and State is to prevent one Church becoming involved in the governing of a country. The Church is not to infringe in the proper field of the government but to teach the way of God. 

Many are those that think the social gospel has a leftist tendency and is part and parcel of the     progressive agenda. However, welfare and morality issues would be in most cases just opposite what the progressives desire and there is confrontation. On the other hand the conservative policies and directions in these areas would be more compatible. In examining society the social gospel may have many different opinions, but they are all based on Scripture.  It may seem at times to be similar to some special groups in society but it is based on the gospels which makes the difference.

A good gauge for the level of our religious life  will depend on our acceptance of the social gospel.  If we do not meet God in the Scriptures, pray, study and   do not share in the body and blood of Jesus at Mass, we will not be bearing the fruit of love. The social gospel is an important part of our faith life. When we have an antipathy or misunderstanding of the social gospel there is a serious problem with the teaching of the Church.  What is the reason for my misunderstanding, is it the Scriptures or the World? 

"So if the light in you is darkness, how terribly dark it will be"( Matt. 6:23).  

Sunday, January 11, 2015

Diocesan Plan for Evangelization

Today is the Feast of the Baptism of Jesus and the end of the Christmas Season. The Liturgical Year begins according to the Solar calendar but now we will be working with the Lunar Calendar. The first Sunday of Advent begins the liturgical new year at which time we try to convince ourselves of a need to change our minds and hearts to be more faithful to our call to discipleship. One diocese was written up in the Peace Weekly with their plans for evangelization for the new year. Evangelization is a work of the Church that is always on-going.

How do we  go about evangelizing? This is a question  pastoral workers and parishioners keep asking. The methods differ for the size of the parish, the number of Christians, and each parishes' environment. The diocese has made a manual with the consultation of the Christians to help the different parishes.

They divided the diocese into large, medium, and small, city parishes, and medium and small country parishes. They pointed out the problems in the large, medium and small parishes and what needs to change to better prepare to evangelize. The pastoral office in the diocese determined that the medium and small parishes whether in the city or country where similar.

 Large city parishes had a lack of team work: conflict and lack of unity. Dealing with the  strangers there is a stiffness in attitude and there is a lack of religion teachers and their quality needs to improve. To remedy the situation they recommended working to better the group activities, and the fellowship of the community.

 City and country middle size parishes had a lack of experience in evangelizing and a need for programs, material and tools. In the small parishes there was a problem with finances to invite speakers to instruct the community, and the age of the parishioners was a problem. This could be remedied with support from the diocese and the spread of information on evangelizing to these smaller parishes.

Despite the size of the parishes there is a lack of plans, workers, appropriate goals and the capability to deal with the parish situation. Hope is that each parish will have a mission committee and with the help of manuals give direction to the community. Starting in April they will have programs that will be prepared for the different environments of each parish. 70 percent will be the same the other 30 percent will fit the situation of the parishes. 

The diocese has the goal by 2019 to have 10 percent of the population Catholic which at present is only 7.4 percent, lower than the 10.4 percent in the country as a whole. Sunday Mass attendance is 27.7 percent which is higher than the average for the country which is at 21.2. 

Saturday, January 10, 2015

Faith a Great Gift

The magazine With Bible gives us a picture of life in an old Catholic family going back ten generations. The priest writer recounts growing up in a Catholic village. Up until the II Vatican Council marriages were always among Catholics so all his relatives were Catholic. Until the day he went to Elementary School he thought the whole world was made up of Catholics. In his class the only other Catholic was his cousin from his village. This was a bombshell to him, he had been deceived, using today's words it was a cultural shock.

From that time on he was embarrassed to be known as a Catholic. He would very surreptitiously make a small sign of the cross on his forehead before eating, and persecution had ended hundreds of years ago. 

One day his father went with a married Buddhist monk friend to a temple bringing him along, where he saw that the hands of the Buddha were bigger than the hands of Jesus, which caused some consternation, and he ate without any problem the rice given.

He envied the Buddhist children who did not have to do anything on Sundays. Mass was one of his biggest difficulties. He would with friends steal and eat the melons in the farms. He dreamed of time on Sundays to go catching frogs, and lamented being  born into a family of Catholics. He was dreaming of the day he would be able to skip Mass.

The day came one summer, he skipped Mass, and with a friend went prancing around the mountains and streams and came back for lunch. When he arrived the family was eating lunch and they all stared at him. There was no place at the table and his bowl was missing. His grandfather asked did he come to eat? There was no sympathy for him and he went outside under the eaves of the house wiping his tears. He hated everybody: God, Jesus,  his grandmother, the Blessed Mother-- from that day on he became a tepid Catholic. 

He dreamed of getting rid of his Catholicism. In the family they would have the morning prayers: for him it was the continuance of a bad dream; evening prayers a lullaby. The holy pictures on the wall would  be glaring at him, he was afraid of Jesus' family. After evening prayers there was the rosary and even at times the office for the dead.

This was not all, everyday three times you would hear the bell of the mission station calling him to pray the Angelus. Every evening he would have a string  rosary on which to pray, he would not get beyond the first decade. His grandmother told him if he fell asleep his guardian angel would finish it for  him. He says his guardian angel was was busy saying his rosaries. His family home was a monastery and he was a lonely tepid Catholic.

As the years passed he ended up in the seminary. How in the world he ended up in the seminary he doesn't know. When he finished his studies he went into the military. During that time he was at camp there was no opportunity to go to Mass, which he liked. He refused an appointment to work as a religious assistant figuring he would be doing that for the rest of his life. He was living the life of a tepid and was enjoying it. As long as God allowed him to do what he wanted all was well, and he feels this is common among the tepid.

Even after he became a priest he felt that his tepidity continued. The joy at ordination quickly left and he did not feel God's love. It was not easy to talk about God's love. When he was saying the breviary it was like the morning and evening prayers he knew as a child. He was curious about the things of the world.
He felt he received little from God. He tried to forget  the emptiness by filling it up with all kinds of works, not only by possessing material things but also knowledge, and working excessively with great pride: using God to grant what he wanted.

This all came to an end when after a year as an assistant priest he was sent overseas to study. During this time he found it difficult to breathe, and they did not know the origin of the problem; he was faced with a serious operation. Death became a possibility and he  began to see everything differently. He was looking for forgiveness. He wanted forgiveness and wanted to love.  It was at this time that he received the peace that he had never experienced before in his life. All the joys and sorrows of his life, his tears, regrets and worries were all washed away. Everything had changed. He had met God.

The article finishes with his gratitude for his gift of faith. It was packaged in a box that he opened when he faced death. God's love for him he saw with new eyes, and he wants to make this love known to others.

Friday, January 9, 2015

Returning to the Earth



This year is the International Year of Soils and the Catholic Times gave the topic a full page coverage showing the Church's teaching on the subject.  Ecology and poverty, the continual possibility of development and the food supply all depend on the earth. Solving the problems and showing concern for the earth are the reasons for the  proclamation of the Year of Soils.

Economic development and the accompanying slogans have helped to damage and destroy a great deal of our environment, The words from Scripture: Genesis 1:28,were not understood to take care of the earth, but misunderstood to mean subjugate. "This universality and, at the same time, this multiplicity of the process of 'subduing the earth' throw light upon human work, because man's dominion over the earth is achieved in and by means of work. There thus emerges the meaning of work in an objective sense, which finds expression in the various epochs of culture and civilization. Man dominates the earth by the very fact of domesticating animals, rearing them and obtaining from them the food and clothing he needs, and by the fact of being able to extract various natural resources from the earth and the seas" (Laborem Exercens #5).The effort to domesticate the earth is the origin for private property.

Pope Paul VI in Progress of Peoples: "Everyone knows that the Fathers of the Church laid down the duty of the rich toward the poor in no uncertain terms. As St. Ambrose put it: "You are not making a gift of what is yours to the poor man, but you are giving him back what is his. You have been appropriating things that are meant to be for the common use of everyone. The earth belongs to everyone, not to the rich."  These words indicate that the right to private property is not absolute and unconditional" Pope John Paul II in Centesimus Annus (#23).

In another article on the same page we hear about a priest who thinks highly of farming life. We have all come from the earth and we will all return to the earth. We have forgotten the importance of the earth on which we live. We do not need the Scriptures, he says, to teach us this very important lesson. Sadly in our economic system we see all values with a monetary measurement, land is object of barter and investment;  those that see it as a home for humans and an object to preserve are few.

As a city pastor he wanted to have the parish children get to feel and interact with the earth. A large plot of land was donated to the parish in the country and under the direction of the priest each week during the the farming season on Mondays and Tuesdays they make the trip from the city to their country farm. The farming is done in the primitive way following the ways of their ancestors.

He advocates that all the parishioners prepare one meal each day with their own hands. He hopes they will use their verandas and those with weekend plots of land to work to prepare this one meal. The future is going to be a time when we will be closer to the land than we are are now, he  believes, and he is preparing his parishioners for the day with the excursions to the county side. Since we have come from the earth he wants us to return to the earth for he feels this is what the future is calling us to do.                      

Thursday, January 8, 2015

Plans, Desires and Spring



We just finished an eventful 2014. There were many accidents and incidents that brought much sadness. We saw a breakdown of trust in our national systems, a minimum of concern for etiquette, and a lack of  shame, which gave rise to citizen's anger. Despite it all there was reason for hope in the visit of the pope.

A hope the new year will be better. A seminary professor who teachers Church History at the diocesan seminary, in an article in the Kyeongyang magazine, introduces us to three words which   prepare for the new year: plans, desires and spring.

Each  year we make plans and each  year we fail to carry them out. We decide to change some aspect of our lives, to do something we have never done before, and make some long range plans. As a Catholic we decide to become more involved in church life, take more interest in our spiritual life etc., but again we fail, however, the making of plans is a worthwhile exercise; we have the opportunity to look over our lives.

Failure comes because we don't reflect on who we are and make huge plans not proper to our situation. We need to have control over the plans and not be impetuous, true also in our growth in spirituality; not an area we can in a few moments of  time  hope to see renewal. Required is effort over a period of time to see results, and no need to despair when not attained with our time clock.               

We  all have dreams and desires that we want to see realized. Whether a person is religious or not is immaterial for desiring is part of our nature. These desires are varied: health, success, family peace, not achieved the past year we try again. We also have desires for the nation. However, we have to determine whether our desires are  opposed to what another person desires. Our desires can be fueling our greed. In God's providence the answer may come in a way we do not expect. If we do not get what we want no reason to hold God responsible nor despair but to remain patient and continue desiring.

When we followed the lunar calendar the New Year coincided with spring. The weather is not warm but we know that spring is close. Lunar New Year was often used interchangeably with spring. As we know from the winter solstice the days begin getting longer. The time for a take-off.

When no  hint of change is perceived it is easy to see only darkness, But the present continues to change. It is only a question of time before spring is here. This is nature's way. Our spiritual life is the same. No blossoming, we are faced with the fierce cold and recoil but with patience we know the spring will come.

The writer used these three words to urge us to see the new year in a different way. There are those who have no feeling one way or another with the advent of the new year, and those who have lost hope and with the above kind of talk greet it only with a cynical smile.

Even with this attitude, frustrated and lacking hope this planning and desiring are not useless. According to the law of nature spring will come. The new year will be different and our need to continue to hope.

Wednesday, January 7, 2015

A Church For the Poor



The visit of the pope to Korea is still vivid to the Korean Catholics. His words of appreciation and hope remain not only with the Catholics but with many of the citizens. He urged the Asian youth to let their faith be a light to the world. At the beatification ceremony he pointed out how the martyrs overcame the world and their age with their faith. Showed those hurting in society his solidarity with their suffering. Expressed great affection and friendship to the bishops of Korea but at the same time did not hide his concern with the challenges to the church of materialism and  secularization (worldliness). These are the words that begin an article in the Korean Times by a sociologist priest who is the head of the justice and peace committee in his diocese.

Secularization,he says, generally means the society and culture have abandoned religious systems and ways of thinking. Industrialization and the multiplicity of religions have become part of the society. The problem comes when the church and the people of faith are not conscious that they have become part of the secularization.

This is the temptation to worldliness. Instead of following the Gospel and the Church's tradition we follow the ways of the world The way we have  gone for big and splendid churches and concerned with the numbers of converts is a sign of this thinking, The  church is in search of efficiency like in industry. Our lives are judged by success and power. The church becomes a social gathering.

There is the movement towards making religion and the Gospel a private matter. We limit it to the private sphere and make it something for the individual. The public dimension of the Gospel is ignored, the church should only be concerned with the individual mind and soul. To criticize society and pick out problems in society is not permitted.

This secularization of religion makes it a private affair and makes for the marketization of religion, and the theology of prosperity. Consumers pick what fits their taste and this leads to a Jesus who will bring success and prosperity. Religions and the Church is no longer purifying us from boundless desires but instead urges on the craving. 

The pope made it very clear that this comes about when the church is no longer close to the people. In this case the church becomes a social gathering. We   lose the prophetic call. We become a church of the rich: a 'well-being' church. The pope showed the bishops where they must go.

"Solidarity with the poor is at the heart of the Gospel; it has to be seen as an essential element of the Christian life; through preaching and catechesis grounded in the rich patrimony of the Church’s social teaching, it must penetrate the hearts and minds of the faithful and be reflected in every aspect of ecclesial life. The apostolic ideal of a Church of and for the poor, a poor Church for the poor, found eloquent expression in the first Christian communities of your nation. I pray that this ideal will continue to shape the pilgrim path of the Church in Korea as she looks to the future. I am convinced that if the face of the Church is first and foremost a face of love, more and more young people will be drawn to the heart of Jesus ever aflame with divine love in the communion of his mystical body" (Talk of the pope to Korean bishops).