Every vocation is a gift from God. I have reached this far in my formation journey primarily because of God’s grace. He has infused an attitude of perseverance and gift of consolation into me. According to Pope Francis, perseverance is “patience; the ability to support, to remain faithful, even when the weight seems to become too big, unsustainable, and we are tempted to negatively judge and abandon everything and everyone,” and consolation is the “grace of knowing how to welcome and show in every situation, even those largely marked by delusion and suffering, the presence and compassionate action of God.”
These are only a few of numerous proofs that, indeed, God is a loving and compassionate God. Perseverance and God’s consolation have helped me a great deal in fulfilling the demands of formation. Moreover, He is also infinite in His generosity for He provided people who served as His instruments in helping me develop my character as a person and as a religious of the Congregation of the Blessed Sacrament. Hence, I extend my humble appreciation and immense gratitude for these people to whom I owe so much.
In his address to the participants of a convention on the occasion of the 50th anniversary of the conciliar decrees “Optatam Totius” and “Presbyterorum Ordinis,” Pope Francis said “priests, who are taken from among men and ordained for men …, nevertheless live on earth with other men as brothers.” He exhorts priests “to serve your brothers and sisters. The images of Christ that we take as a reference for the ministry of priests are clear: He is the ‘High Priest,’ close in the same way to God and to mankind; he is the ‘Servant,’ who washes feet and who becomes a neighbor to the weakest; he is the ‘Good Shepherd,’ who always has as his goal the care of the flock.”
To the Triune God – the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit – the source of my vocation, who provided all the means so I could attain this moment of grace. Be Glory Forever.
Jesus said: “The harvest is great but the laborers are few”; may this privileged grace of ordination move me with greater passion to labor with and for the Church that I love.
— Fr. Alde Bureros, SSS
I usually find it a bit problematic when a certain terminology in the Church’s teaching is mistaken to be of the same meaning as another during discussion by people who are not familiar with theological expressions. This is often the case with the terms “DOGMA” and ‘DOCTRINE.” Some professors in Fundamental Theology presume that their students are fully aware of the distinction between a Dogma and a Doctrine, as they may proceed using these terms altogether in the course of discussion. But honestly speaking, there are some students of theology (possibly, even priests) who still fail to clearly differentiate between these two terms and how they relate to each other when it comes to discerning the essential Truths of our Catholic Teachings. Since this matter is not a new thing, let the basics of definition help us clarify what we already know about Dogma.
The term “DOGMA” refers to the Church’s belief that in scripture and tradition (this term will be clarified in succeeding articles) God’s intention for humankind has been revealed to the ecclesial community, i.e., the Church, and that the community’s leadership can authoritatively interpret and promulgate this truth. Thus, a Dogma is essentially operating within the context of Revelation, but not coincident (not in the same level or nature) with Revelation. Dogma is rather one manner in which Revelation is explicated. Functionally then, Dogma fulfills the same purpose as revelation: engagement of one’s entire person, mind, feelings and body in an encounter with truth.
I consider it equally important to include here the brief background on how the term “dogma” started its use in the Church. In the New Testament, there is only one instance in which the term dogma is used to denote a decision rendered by authority. It is found in Acts 16:4 – the one referring to the decisions of the Council of Jerusalem concerning the admission of Gentiles to the community: “As they
visited one town after another, they passed on the decisions [dogmas] reached by the apostles and elders in the community, with instructions to obey them.” This text clearly relates the fact of a decision based on how the apostles and elders had received God’s revelation in Christ. In short, the meaning of the term “dogma” was used in the apostolic period to denote Christian belief as a whole as well as a specific teaching of the Church. It was, however, a term that was least used by the scholastics, including Saint Thomas Aquinas, who preferred to use the term “articles of faith” to refer to dogmatic reality.
Historically, the term dogma had stirred the interest of many about its meaning, particularly in the late seventeenth and early eighteenth century. This was especially challenged during the Age of Enlightenment, questioning the teaching authority of the Roman Catholic Church. For this reason, the meaning of the term dogma reached some forms of modification without denying the meaning it had attained earlier. The present understanding of what a dogma is clearly reflects the attempt of the Church to stem the tide of rationalism caused by the Enlightenment. Thus, dogmatic statements became identified with syllogistic reasoning proportionally expressed. This understanding of dogma grew in direct proportion to the development of the Papal Magisterium, a theology which was also conditioned by the Enlightenment. Now, Karl Rahner defines the current understanding of dogma as “a proposition which the Church explicitly pronounce as revealed by God, in such a way that its denial is condemned by the Church as heresy and anathematized (cf. CIC, canon 751). It must be emphasized that to be considered dogmatic a proposition must be set forth explicitly, and must pertain to divine, public and official Christian revelation, that is, Sacred Scriptures and Tradition. Nonetheless, Dogmas remain intended as the early Church knew so well, that is, to communicate Truth to the Church in order that the Church as a community and each person within the community could become existentially engaged with God’s truth.
Finally, let me briefly define the essential distinction between Dogma and Doctrine. In ordinary conversations, the two terms are often used interchangeably. Technically, however, according to the New Dictionary of Theology (edited by Joseph Komonchak et al.), there is a difference. Dogmas relate the Truth of Revelation. Doctrines, on the other hand, explain and teach how a particular dogma may be understood. There may be several acceptable explanations or doctrines surrounding a single dogma. For example, in the case of the Dogma of Mary as Mother of God (Theotokos) – the theological explanations used in support of this dogma are called doctrines. Therefore, it is on the level of Doctrine that the Church admits pluralism, but not on the level of Dogma.
For your guidance, please refer to the following related sources:
- The New Dictionary of Theology, edited by Joseph Komonchak et al.
- Faith and Theology by Yves Congar, OP
- Method of Theology by Bernard Lonergan, SJ
- Sacramentum Mundi, edited by Karl Rahner, SJ
- Revelation and Theology by Edward Schillebeeckx, OP
(Note: This is the first of a series of articles providing a review of some very important matters of our Catholic Faith. Nothing in here is my personal opinion; nor do I presume there is nothing written on my topic elsewhere before. You will find properly cited references to acknowledge my sources and give credit where credit is due, as I do not wish to seem an expert on the matter. I will endeavor not do sound academic, but just practical enough to help us appreciate the fact that faith and reason find their perfect unity in the Catholic Church’s Teaching. – MBAdona)
FEAST OF THE PRESENTATION OF THE LORD
22nd WORLD DAY FOR CONSECRATED LIFE
HOMILY OF HIS HOLINESS POPE FRANCIS
Vatican Basilica
Friday, 2 February 2018
Forty days after Christmas, we celebrate the Lord who enters the Temple and comes to encounter his people. In the Christian East, this feast is called the “Feast of Encounter”: it is the encounter between God, who became a child to bring newness to our world, and an expectant humanity, represented by the elderly man and woman in the Temple.
In the Temple, there is also an encounter between two couples: the young Mary and Joseph, and the elderly Simeon and Anna. The old receive from the young, while the young draw upon the old. In the Temple, Mary and Joseph find the roots of their people. This is important, because God’s promise does not come to fulfilment merely in individuals, once for all, but within a community and throughout history. There too, Mary and Joseph find the roots of their faith, for faith is not something learned from a book, but the art of living with God, learned from the experience of those who have gone before us. The two young people, in meeting the two older people, thus find themselves. And the two older people, nearing the end of their days, receive Jesus, the meaning of their lives. This event fulfils the prophecy of Joel: “Your old men shall dream dreams, and your young men shall see visions” (2:28). In this encounter, the young see their mission and the elderly realize their dreams. All because, at the center of the encounter, is Jesus.
Let us look to our own lives, dear consecrated brothers and sisters. Everything started in an encounter with the Lord. Our journey of consecration was born of an encounter and a call. We need to keep this in mind. And if we remember aright, we will realize that in that encounter we were not alone with Jesus; there was also the people of God, the Church, young and old, just as in today’s Gospel. It is striking too, that while the young Mary and Joseph faithfully observe the Law – the Gospel tells us this four times – and never speak, the elderly Simeon and Anna come running up and prophesy. It seems it should be the other way around. Generally, it is the young who speak enthusiastically about the future, while the elderly protect the past. In the Gospel, the very opposite occurs, because when we meet one another in the Lord, God’s surprises immediately follow.
For this to occur in the consecrated life, we have to remember that we can never renew our encounter with the Lord without others; we can never leave others behind, never pass over generations, but must accompany one another daily, keeping the Lord always at the center. For if the young are called to open new doors, the elderly hold the keys. An institute remains youthful by going back to its roots, by listening to its older members. There is no future without this encounter between the old and the young. There is no growth without roots and no flowering without new buds. There is never prophecy without memory, or memory without prophecy. And constant encounter.
Today’s frantic pace leads us to close many doors to encounter, often for fear of others. Only shopping malls and internet connections are always open. Yet that is not how it should be with consecrated life: the brother and the sister given to me by God are a part of my history, gifts to be cherished. May we never look at the screen of our cellphone more than the eyes of our brothers or sisters, or focus more on our software than on the Lord. For whenever we put our own projects, methods and organization at the center, consecrated life stops being attractive; it no longer speaks to others; it no longer flourishes because it forgets its very foundations, its very roots.
Consecrated life is born and reborn of an encounter with Jesus as he is: poor, chaste and obedient. We journey along a double track: on the one hand, God’s loving initiative, from which everything starts and to which we must always return; on the other, our own response, which is truly loving when it has no “ifs” or “buts”, when it imitates Jesus in his poverty, chastity and obedience. Whereas the life of this world attempts to take hold of us, the consecrated life turns from fleeting riches to embrace the One who endures forever. The life of this world pursues selfish pleasures and desires; the consecrated life frees our affections of every possession in order fully to love God and other people. Worldly life aims to do whatever we want; consecrated life chooses humble obedience as the greater freedom. And while worldly life soon leaves our hands and hearts empty, life in Jesus fills us with peace to the very end, as in the Gospel, where Simeon and Anna come happily to the sunset of their lives with the Lord in their arms and joy in their hearts.
How good it is for us to hold the Lord “in our arms” (Lk 2:28), like Simeon. Not only in our heads and in our hearts, but also “in our hands”, in all that we do: in prayer, at work, at the table, on the telephone, at school, with the poor, everywhere. Having the Lord “in our hands” is an antidote to insular mysticism and frenetic activism, since a genuine encounter with Jesus corrects both saccharine piety and frazzled hyperactivity. Savoring the encounter with Jesus is also the remedy for the paralysis of routine, for it opens us up to the daily “havoc” of grace. The secret to fanning the flame of our spiritual life is a willingness to allow ourselves to encounter Jesus and to be encountered by him; otherwise we fall into a stifling life, where disgruntlement, bitterness and inevitable disappointments get the better of us. To encounter one another in Jesus as brothers and sisters, young and old, and thus to abandon the barren rhetoric of “the good old days” – a nostalgia that kills the soul – and to silence those who think that “everything is falling apart”. If we encounter Jesus and our brothers and sisters in the everyday events of our life, our hearts will no longer be set on the past or the future, but will experience the “today of God” in peace with everyone.
At the end of the Gospels, there is another encounter with Jesus that can inspire the consecrated life. It is that of the women before the tomb. They had gone to encounter the dead; their journey seemed pointless. You too are journeying against the current: the life of the world easily rejects poverty, chastity and obedience. But like those women, keep moving forward, without worrying about whatever heavy stones need to be removed (cf. Mk 16:3). And like those women, be the first to meet the Lord, risen and alive. Cling to him (cf. Mt 28:9) and go off immediately to tell your brothers and sisters, your eyes brimming with joy (cf. v. 8). In this way, you are the Church’s perennial dawn. You, dear consecrated brothers and sisters, are the Church’s perennial dawn! I ask you to renew this very day your encounter with Jesus, to walk together towards him. And this will give light to your eyes and strength to your steps.