Red Mass in Brownsville, 2014

Thanks to all who participated in the 21st annual Red Mass in the Diocese of Brownsville. This year it was held in Cameron County. 

It started with a beautiful procession from the County Courthouse...

...Complete with marching drummers and the Knights of Colombus.

Into the Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception.

The Mass was indeed a significant event as we prayed for all public servants and those who serve to help administer justice in our community.

Father TJ Martinez, SJ, was given a special recognition during the Mass, and Sister Norma Pimentel, MJ, was recognized during the banquet that followed the Mass. 

Both Fr. TJ and Sister Norma are much loved in the community, giving faithful witness to the service of others. Fr TJ has worked tirelessly for education of under-served youth, and Sister Norma has worked tirelessly in serving the needs of unaccompanied minors entering the Rio Grande Valley from Central America. 

We were honored to welcome as our featured speaker, Justice Eva Guzman, pictured at the left, currently serving on the Texas Supreme Court. She spoke movingly on this year's theme "Let us remain true to Faith, Integrity, and Justice."

I am very grateful to the Red Mass Committee, for making possible such a beautifully spiritual event. 

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Pro-Life Rosary in Harlingen

Thanks to the many friends who participated in the Pro-life rosary at Lt. George Gutierrez Jr. Park in Harlingen, Texas, this Saturday. 

October is respect life month, and among the activivities here in the RGV this month was the pro-life rosary in Harlingen. Reflecting on the fifth joyful mystery of the Rosary, I thanked the participants for their witness and made three points: 

1. The search for Jesus at the temple by Mary and Joseph was an anxious one. They could never have thought anything could be more important than finding him. Their journey was no longer about getting home after a pilgrimage, it was about finding him. The urgency bears similarity to that of Mary Magdalene searching for his body in the tomb. It was not there. "Where have you laid him?", she asked the gardener. And it was like the search of the beloved in the Song of Songs, seeking the face of the long-awaited bridegroom. 

2. Seeking Jesus is for the believer the most important aspect of our life's pilgrimage. We MUST find him. Jesus is never that hard to find. He wishes to be found. Two places always give us the joy of encountering him. He is in the Eucharist. "This is my body," he said. We must seek Jesus in contemplation before the Eucharist. He is there to be found. And he is also in the vulnerable and those relegated to non-importance in the eyes of the world. "What you do to the least of mine, you do to me," he said. The Church's witness to the dignity of the unborn child is an evangelical witness to the truth that Jesus is in the most vulnerable. And we say to the world, "come seek his face in the poorest, starting with the child, the elderly, the sick, all those whom the world often sees as expendables." But if you cannot see Jesus there, because you do not share our faith in Christ, at least acknowledge that you see a brother and sister there. Stand up for them with us. 

3. Jesus was found disputing with the elders and doctors of the law. They marveled at his wisdom, though they might have wondered where his gracious responses came from. We too must engage the learned and the elders in our culture, who too often have grown old not with years but with cynicism about life. 

Jesus at 12 years old shows us the convincing power of the heart of a child, innocent, and willing to speak. Our young people can show us the way to a renewed respect for life in our culture. As Pope Francis says, it is not progressive to say a child must die for us to live as we want." Take courage, the young at heart hear this, and know it is true. May this witness to the joy and goodness of life, bear fruit in the Rio Grande Valley. 

Please participate in the political process, be informed with a Catholic conscience, share your conscience with others, talk to those who run for office about the importance of defending the defenseless. Vote. 

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On the Poverty of Indifference and The Joy of the Gospel, without intending to offend Arturo Pérez-Reverte

The Holy Father speaks often of the culture of indifference. It is a culture that neither hears the cry of the poor, nor sees their suffering. What is this phenomenon of indifference? Surely, at the bottom of indifference is an attitude that says: If it does not affect me, I don’t really care. There is a Chesterton verse that has some applicability here: meanwhile the cold queen of the north is looking in the glass; the shadow of the Valois is yawning at the Mass.[1] It is an attitude as old as Cain who asks if I am my brother's keeper. And it is as calculating as the doctor of the law who asks Jesus who is my neighbor. Still, it would be worthwhile to dig a little deeper in search of the roots of modern indifference, because I think that there are new elements operating within much of the indifference we see today.

Recently, I read a novel by the noted Spanish author Arturo Perez-Reverte, entitled El pintor de batallas, (The painter of battles).[2] It is readily available in English. It is the story of a war-correspondent, photographer, who spent his adult life traveling to places of violence and conflict across the globe taking pictures, so the general population could see images of war. It is a difficult book to read. The narrative pulls the reader through paths that pass through the bloody conflicts of the last decades of the 20th Century: Somalia, Bosnia, Croatia, Beirut, Gaza, and countless others. At his prime as a photographer he retires from the public eye, he buys an abandoned light-house on a secluded beach and begins to paint upon its interior walls a dramatic scene of the final apocalyptic battle of the world.
 

The drama of the story is in the dialogue between the photographer turned painter and a man who at the beginning of the novel appears and announces that more than likely he will conclude his visit by killing the painter. The man is someone the painter recognizes but had never met; he is a veteran of the conflict between Croatia and Serbia whom the painter had once photographed. The photo made the man’s features famous on magazine covers around the world. The visitor intends to kill the painter, but not before explaining to him how the photograph altered the course of his life.
 

The novel is a brutal narrative of how this modern man had insulated himself from pain. He had prevented the suffering he observed so close at hand from causing him to form any real relation to the persons suffering. Our photographer could not make sense out of the suffering he chronicled, so he cut himself off interiorly from the possibility of any relation to those affected, and from the possibility of assuming any responsibility for what they were suffering.

Without giving you the ending, you should know that the dialogue between the painter and the man he photographed engenders in him a more profound self-awareness. He realizes that a life cut off from the suffering of others produces a pain as cruel as the cruelty he photographed from his objective, impersonal and comfortable distance.

I (not the author of the novel) would call this effort to prevent personal connections with people bearing intense suffering an attitude of “relational contraception”. Human encounters and the relations between persons they generate open up a space for compassion and a kind of response; but we know that to open ourselves to compassion implies a willingness to accept in some way to suffer also, with another person. In order to prevent this possibility of life, a human being can hold himself at a distance from the suffering of others. In fact, this mentality prevents the generation of authentic societal life.
 

Such perhaps is a way to understand the individualism and indifference of many in contemporary society. It is the disciplined indifference of those who would rather avoid the pain of hearing and seeing and thus relating to those who suffer. The painter of battles lives a self-imposed exile from relationships in a futile attempt to build a private space where the pain he witnessed could not touch him. He lives within the reduced horizon of the modern windswept world, where he is alone with absurdity. He sees this private space as not much, but in the end all he could hope for. It is a pitiable stance, and in some way ought to generate compassion. He too suffers.

The novel reminds me of Cardinal Ratzinger's remarks somewhere in Dogma and Preaching that modern atheism is largely an armchair and television phenomenon. Looking at a television or computer screen, people say look at all that suffering, how could a good God exist and let such things happen? Let us make sure it never comes here. But, as the future Benedict XVI emphasizes in that essay, the people who actually work with others to alleviate suffering are usually the ones with deepest faith.[3] And often the people living in the poorest regions of the world are the ones who maintain the liveliest faith in God, and they are often the most generous to others in need.
 

A world hiding behind objective indifference needs the joy of the Gospel. We can be credible evangelizers if we first open ourselves to human encounters, seeking to embrace other persons and to alleviate the suffering they experience.  The Lord is present with those who suffer; we believe this. But, it is somewhat difficult for the modern world to believe in the Good God; it needs help. Out of compassion, we have to show with the work of the Gospel that God is not found on a screen while one sits on a sofa. He is present in the poor, and in those who offer themselves for the good of others.
 

But the world will not believe us when we say God is to be found there, in that place where a brother or sister suffers, unless they see the Church in that place where prevails the human encounter and the helping of one another to carry the Cross. To announce the Gospel is equivalent to saying to the indifferent: Come with us to meet the Christ present among those who suffer. I think this is what Pope Francis means when he speaks of evangelization and says he wants a church which is poor and for the poor.[4]

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^[1] See Lepanto, first stanza.

^[2] Arturo Pérez-Reverte, El pintor de batallas,  (Alfaguara, 2006).

^[3] Ratzinger. Dogma and Preaching, 2nd Edition, Good Friday. (Ignatius Press, 2011).

^[4] Evangelium Gaudium, 198.

Sobre la indiferencia moderna y la alegria del Evangelio, sin quierer ofender a Arturo Pérez-Reverte

El Santo Padre habla a menudo sobre el tema de la cultura de indiferencia. Es una cultura que ni oye el llanto de los pobres ni ve sus sufrimientos. ¿Qué es este fenómeno de la indiferencia? Claro, en la base de la indiferencia existe la actitud que dice “si no me afecta, no me importa”. El famoso Chesterton compuso un verso aplicable al fenómeno: Mientras tanto "la reina fría del norte mira, atenta, el cristal; la sombra del Valois bosteza, pasando páginas de su misal".(1) Es una actitud tan antigua como la de Caín preguntando si a caso soy yo el guardián de mi hermano. Y es tan calculada como la actitud del doctor de la ley preguntándole a Jesús: ¿y quién es mi prójimo? Sin embargo, vale la pena buscar las raíces más profundas del fenómeno así como se manifiesta hoy en día. De hecho, pienso que existen elementos nuevos en la indiferencia actual.

Recientemente, leí una novela del autor español Arturo Pérez-Reverte, titulado "El pintor de batallas".(2) Es la historia de un reportero de guerras, un fotógrafo, que había pasado su vida adulta viajando a las zonas más violentas del mundo, tomando fotos para que el public pudiera ver las imágenes de guerra y conflicto. Es un libro dificultoso para leer. El esfuerzo narrativo arrastra el lector por los senderos de los conflictos sangrientos de las últimas décadas del siglo 20: Somalia, Bosnia, Croacia, Beirut, Gaza, y muchos otros. Al culmen de su carrera el fotógrafo se retira del público; compra un faro abandonado en una playa aislada, y empieza a pintar sobre sus paredes una escena dramática de la última batalla apocalíptica del mundo.

Lo dramático del cuento surge del dialogo entre el fotógrafo vuelto pintor y un hombre mal-afeitado quien al principio de la novela aparece y anuncia que tal vez termine su visita con matar al pintor. El visitante es alguien reconocido por el pintor, pero que jamás había encontrado; es un veterano del conflicto entre Croacia y Serbia quien el pintor había fotografiado. Por medio de las portadas de las revistas mundiales, la foto hizo famosa la cara del visitante. El croata tiene intenciones de matar al pintor, pero no antes de contarle como la foto había cambiado el curso de su vida.

La novela propone al lector una narración brutal sobre cómo este hombre de nuestra época actual se había protegido del dolor. Había impedido que el sufrimiento que observaba de cerca le causara formar una relación real con las personas sufriendo. Nuestro fotógrafo no hallaba sentido en el sufrimiento que encontraba, y por eso se había separado interiormente de la posibilidad de relacionarse con los afectados, y de la posibilidad de sentir alguna responsabilidad por lo que ellos estaban padeciendo.

Sin revelar la conclusión de la novela, sepa Ud. que el dialogo entre el pintor y el hombre que había fotografiado sí engendró dentro del pintor un autoconocimiento profundizado. Se da cuenta que una vida separada del sufrimiento que viven otras personas produce un dolor tan cruel como la crueldad que el señor había fotografiado desde su distancia objetiva, impersonal y cómoda.

Yo (el autor de la novela no lo diría)  llamaría este esfuerzo para prevenir lazos personales con personas viviendo el sufrimiento intenso una actitud de “anticonceptivo social”. El encuentro personal y las relaciones entre personas que engendran abren espacio para la compasión y un tipo de respuesta; pero sabemos que abrirse uno a la compasión implica aceptar sufrir de alguna manera con la otra persona. Para evitar esta posibilidad en la vida el ser humano puede mantenerse a distancia del sufrimiento de los demás. Realmente, esta mentalidad previene la generación de una autentica vida social.

Quizás la novela nos ayude a entender algo del individualismo y la indiferencia en nuestros tiempos. Es una disciplinada indiferencia que prefiere evitar el sufrimiento que surge cuando uno toma la opción de relacionarse con los que sufren. Es un exilio autoimpuesto con el fin de construir un espacio privado donde el sufrimiento no nos puede tocar.  El pintor vive dentro del horizonte reducido del mundo moderno y azotado por el viento, donde se encuentra sólo con lo absurdo. Él reconoce que este espacio privado no ofrece mucho consuelo, pero al fin de cuentas piensa que no hay mucho más que esperar. Es una postura de vida lastimosa, y debe engendrar compasión. También él sufre.

La novela me recuerda de algo que dijo el Cardenal Ratzinger en su libro Dogma y predicación.(3) Observa que el ateísmo moderno es en gran parte un fenómeno de sillones y pantallas. El hombre moderno, sentado y mirando la pantalla, dice: Mire todo el sufrimiento en el mundo. ¿Cómo puede existir un Dios bueno que permite tales cosas tan horribles”? Hay que prevenir que tal sufrimiento venga para acá.  Pero como enfatiza el que eventualmente tomaría le nombre de Benedicto XVI, los que actualmente salen a trabajar para aliviar el sufrimiento de otros suelen ser los que tienen una fe profunda. Además, las personas que viven en regiones de pobreza y sufrimiento son los que con más frecuencia mantienen una fe viva en Dios, y suelen ser los más generosos con otras personas pasando por dificultades.

Un mundo buscando esconderse detrás una indiferencia objetiva e impersonal necesita la alegría del Evangelio. Sólo podemos evangelizar con credibilidad si primero nos abrimos a los encuentros humanos, buscando como abrazar a la personas y como aliviar el sufrimiento que viven. El Señor está presente con los que sufren; esto sí creemos. Pero es algo difícil para el mundo moderno creer en el Dios bueno; necesita ayuda. Por compasión, tenemos que enseñar con la obra del evangelio que Dios no se encuentra en una pantalla mientras esté uno sentado en el sillón. Está presente en los pobres, y en los que se entregan para el bien de los demás.

Pero el mundo no nos creerá cuando digamos que Dios está entre los pobres, en ese espacio donde sufren nuestros hermanos y hermanas, si no ve a la Iglesia presente en ese espacio donde domina el encuentro humano y el ayudar unos a otros con cargar la Cruz. Anunciar el Evangelio equivale decirles a los indiferentes: Vengan con nosotros a encontrar al Cristo entre los que sufren. Pienso que esto tiene mucho que ver con lo que piensa el Papa Francisco cuando habla de la evangelización y dice que “quiero una Iglesia pobre, y para los pobres”. (4)

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^[1] See Lepanto, first stanza.

^[2] Arturo Pérez-Reverte, El pintor de batallas,  (Alfaguara, 2006).

^[3] Ratzinger. Dogma and Preaching, 2nd Edition, Good Friday. (Ignatius Press, 2011).

^[4] Evangelium Gaudium, 198.

Books and Persons in Relation: What I learned from the University of Dallas

Together with Doug Lattner and John McCaa, two very distinguished gentlemen, I was honored to receive the University of Dallas' Distinguished Alumni Award. I am deeply grateful to the University of Dallas for the education I received there between 1981 and 1987. And I am grateful for the honor they presented to me this year. Ordinarily I would speak from notes at such an event, but in the interest of saying something in a concise manner, I actually wrote my remarks in advance. I present them here now. 

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"Every time I open a book-- or click on my e-reader, I think of UD. It is a habitual thought, so engrained that a conscious image arising in the mind is not needed. 

This is so not because UD taught me to like reading. I already did. Rather, it is because the University taught me that a book lives to be in relation to other books. The grace of the education was not just in the books we read, but in the act of reading, at the same time, other books that seemed unrelated.

We read Aristotle and Conrad at the same time; Augustine and the Federalists; Saint Thomas and Flannery O'Connor. Gilson and Rahner; Dante, Euclid and Husserl. And we did this while in conversation with other students coming from varied and diverse backgrounds. And, of course, we did this with teachers who had read and lived much more than we had.

By this we discovered that the human terrain is fruitful when it seeks to relate the apparently un-relatable.

Persons write because what is human cannot really be limited to a lifetime. The dialogue of books is a dialogue of persons, and the perduring character of the cross-generational relation is as near a reflection of eternity in time as we shall find. It is intentional memory, confided not just to a single mind, much less a computer, but to peoples and the cultures they engender. 

But books are but one way that we gain entry to persons, persons of flesh and blood, who lived, thought, laughed and argued, loved and wept. Relating to persons, human and divine, is the aim of all our human endeavors.

If books are written to relate to others in a perduring way, it is because persons are made for relation. And this is so because we were made in the image of a God who lives an inner life of pure personal relation. 

If books cannot be put into relation, into conversation-- as is sometimes accepted as the de facto case in modern education-- it is a sad and acquiescent surrender to the notion that people can only relate and really converse with people who are already like them. 

But it is an affront to the Gospel itself to acquiesce to such a weak and diluted view of ourselves. If we stop trying to cross over the wall that separates us from the apparently un-relatable, we wither away in self-satisfaction, and we die.

The Lord came to give access to all to the mystery of the Godhead, and in doing so inaugurated a vigorous grace, an impulse in favor of human beings consciously relating one to another in a full and universal open-handedness. 

This is the deepest Catholic impulse: no person and no thought was foreign to Christ Jesus, thus no person or thought can fail to be received and engaged hospitably by us. 

It is particularly close to the heart of Pope Francis that the Church never fail to give witness to this universal openness to others, no matter how unrelated they may appear. The sphere of this witness cannot be limited to one ambit or another. It belongs in education, in our homes and in our politics, in our charitable endeavors, in our defense of human dignity, all for the sake of our quest to become a more compassionate and just people. 

To this day I read several books at the same time: Tolkien, Susan Collins, Ratzinger and Mario Vargas Llosa; Pope Francis and Arturo Perez-Reverte; Chesterton, Isabel Allende, Graham Greene and Jim Butcher. 

This multi-faceted openness to many books is what UD gave to me, and no doubt continues to give to many others. In the same breath it gave us a multi-faceted impulse to relate without fear to the world of other people as they are: limited, wounded, torn and hopeful, lost yet gallant, thoughtful, impetuous and impulsive. Jesus, after all, liked people, all kinds of people, and he sought them out. And he would have us make every effort to do the same. I say this not so much because I am a bishop, but because I want to be a disciple of the Lord Jesus. 

Thank you very much for this generous recognition of the fact I was blessed to go to UD. May the University of Dallas continue to be an instrument in the work of the Lord."

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