Are you in San Antonio on Tuesday? I am!

I’ve just finished being interviewed on The Jennifer Fulwiler Show. Jen was kind enough to advertise my speaking engagement in San Antonio this Tuesday. I will be speaking on “Entrepreneurial Faith” to the Young Catholic Professional (YCP) group.

The event will be at Holy Rosary Church on Camino Santa Maria Street, 6-9pm. So, if you’re in the area and in your 20’s or 30’s, please feel free to come along – I’d love to meet you!

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Restless Heart: 12 – “Memento Mori”

Dad

Nessa and I could not meet up this week, so I recorded a solo where I talked about meeting Christ in my Father’s death.

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Episode 12: Memento Mori (Download)

 

— Show Notes —

* “Memento Mori” is a phrase in Latin which means “Remember Death”

* If you were wondering where Whidbey Island is, it’s here.

* The book I referenced was “Something Other Than God” by Jennifer Fulwiler:

“The Catechism explained that praying for the souls of the dead is a tradition going back to the first Christians and to the Jews before them… The living sent their love for the deceased into the spiritual world, like adding water to a stream that would eventually float their lost friends home

* Don’t believe me about the ninja boots? Here they are.

* The Psalm I quoted was Psalm 84:6

Blessed are the men whose strength is in [the Lord]… As they go through the Valley of Baca [weeping] they make it a place of springs; the early rain also covers it with pools.

* The poem I quoted at the end was “As Kingfishers Catch Fire” by Gerard Manly Hopkins:

…for Christ plays in ten thousand places,
Lovely in limbs, and lovely in eyes not His
To the Father through the features of men’s faces.

* A written version of what I said in this podcast is available on my blog.

Something other than God…

FulwilerAs you may well know, I’ve been working through a long list of books during my sabbatical. I recently finished one of them, Something other than God, written by Jennifer Fulwiler. Mrs. Fulwiler grew up an an atheist, but blogged her way into the Catholic Church.

I really enjoyed the book. It’s a page-turner and I finished it in short order. In it she discusses how she grappled with the philosophical arguments for the existence of God, the person of Jesus Christ, the problem of suffering, as well as the Church’s teachings of contraception and abortion. I’d say it’s a really good book to give to a real range of people, from atheist to fallen-away Catholic.

There were a couple of passages from Mrs Fulwiler’s book I just wanted to share in this post before I pass on the book to someone else. The first quotation is about Purgatory. I wanted to share it because she writes very eloquently about it, using the same line of argumentation I used in my earlier post about purification after death:

“The Catechism basically said: If you’re a believer and a jerk, you don’t walk right in to heaven after you die. ‘All who die in God’s grace and friendship, but still imperfectly purified, are indeed assured of their eternal salvation; but after death they undergo purification, so as to achieve the holiness necessary to enter the joy of heaven.” Heaven is the place of perfect good and perfect love. To enter it while in a disposition of selfishness or hatefulness or unkindness would be like entering into a gleaming clean house with muddy boots; the house would not be clean anymore” -Jennifer Fulwiler, Something Other Than God

The second quotation I wanted to share also related to the subject of the departed in faith, but in the case the practice of praying for them:

“The Catechism explained that praying for the souls of the dead is a tradition going back to the first Christians and to the Jews before them. On the walls of the catacombs, where the earliest Christians worshipped, there were scrawled prayers for friends who’d died during persecutions. The living sent their love for the deceased into the spiritual world, like adding water to a stream that would eventually float their lost friends home.” -Jennifer Fulwiler, Something Other Than God

Someone at our parish died a week or so ago and it was the first time I got to pray the Panachida, the funeral prayers of the Byzantine Church. After the service it’s traditional to sing the psalter (or at least as much of it as you can) over the body. Mrs Fulwiler’s description of praying for the dead perfectly coalesced with this quite moving experience, “adding water to a stream that would eventually float [our friend] home”.

Update on “Twelve for 2012″…

I was reading Jennifer Fulwiler’s blog entry The Mystery of the Catholic Book Buyer and it prompted me to write another update for my Twelve for 2012

Here are the finished books:

The Church and the New Media – Brandon Vogt
I’m Not Being Fed!  – Jeff Cavins
The Passion of Jesus Christ – John Piper
Father Brown of the Church of Rome – G.K Chesterton
The Story of Christianity – Justo Gonzalez
How To Listen When God Is Speaking – Mitch Pacwa, SJ
Godless Delusion – Patrick Madrid & Kenneth Hensley

Here are the bonus books/documents I’ve read which were not on the list:

The One Thing – Matthew Kelly
Pillar of Fire and Truth – Catholic Answers
Quitter – Jon Acuff
The meaning of Vocation – Pope John Paul II
Orientalium Ecclesiarum – Second Vatican Council
Deus Caritas Est – Pope Benedict XVI

I am currently reading:

Jesus of Nazareth – Pope Benedict XVI
Vatican II: The Crisis And The Promise – Alan Schreck (I’m reading this for the course I’m doing)

The books still to read:

Rediscover Catholicism – Matthew Kelly
Jesus Among Other Gods – Ravi Zacharias
Philosophy For Dummies – Thomas Morris
The Path of Life – Cyprian Smith OSB