Our Authentic Heritage

This past weekend, white supremacists, homegrown admirers of Hitler, waving Nazi and Confederate flags, chanting the Nazi slogan, "blood and soil" and anti-Semitic slogans, rallied in Charlottesville ,Virginia to protest, in then name of defending their "heritage" the removal of a statue of Civil War general Robert E. Lee.
 
It's somehow fitting that this past weekend's shocking, disgraceful and ultimately murderous "Unite the Right" protest by the so-called alt-right (aka white supremacists), Klansmen and neo-Nazis occurred during the same week that as Catholics we remember and honor the memory of two heroic saints who died at the hands of the Nazis.

On August 14th, 1941 Fr. Maximilian Kolbe was put to death after volunteering to take the place of another Polish prisoner sentenced to death.

On August 9th, 1942 Sr. Teresa Benedicta of the Cross (Edith Stein) was gassed at the Auschwitz death camp with hundreds of other Jews deported from the Netherlands.

The Nazis, through-going racists and anti-Semites, rationalized their genocidal campaign to eradicate completely the Jewish people as an act of "self-defense" against a Jewish world conspiracy that existed only in the depraved imagination of Hitler and those who lent their support to his murderous racist ideology.

They regarded Poles and Russians as racially inferior people,"useless eaters" destined to starve to death or work as slaves as their German overlords saw fit.

St. Teresa Benedicta and St. Maximilian Kolbe were among the millions of  Jews and peoples such as Roma/Sinti, Poles, Russians and others that the Nazis considered to be sub-human and not deserving to live, by Germans and others who cynically regarded themselves as the master race.

The message of the gospel, which they embodied, is simple: Jesus teaches us that every person and all peoples are loved, cherished and redeemed by God; that all men and women are brothers and sisters; that love is more powerful than hatred.

Despite our own faults, failings and sins, as disciples of Jesus, as Catholics, this is our authentic heritage.

Let us resist with all of our strength the pathetically ignorant but pernicious pathologies of white supremacy, racism and anti-Semitism.  

Let us pray for the conversion of those who have given themselves over to the service of such vile, hateful and sinful ideas.

Let us work together for a better, more just and more equitable society that we can take pride in again.

Blessed Are the Merciful

Coptic Fresco of Christ Pantocrator, Monastery of St. Anthony, Egypt

There has been another attack against Coptic Orthodox worshippers in Cairo, in the chapel of St. Peter and St. Paul adjoining the main cathedral and seat of the Coptic Orthodox patriarch, Tawadros II. Coptic Christians make up an estimated 10-13% of Muslim majority Egypt's population of 82 million souls and are the largest Christian community in the Middle East.

Although Coptic Christians are understandably angry about the failure of the government and security forces to adequately protect them from violent attacks and the ongoing discrimination they face, what is striking is that there have not been reprisals by Christians against their Muslim neighbors.  Not in 2011 when the cathedral in Alexandria was attacked, not in 2013 when Coptic churches and neighborhoods were burned by angry mobs after the coup that removed President Morsi from office and not in the aftermath of this deadly suicide bombing that killed 24 worshippers at the Divine Liturgy, mostly women and children.

In the face of such terrible provocation, these Egyptian Christians are adhering to the teaching of Jesus: to love your enemies, to do good to those who hate you, to imitate Christ's own example on the cross when he forgave his tormenters. They confess Jesus, including his non-violent love, even for enemies, during this terrible time of persecution and fear.

Let us pray for their perseverance in the way of Christ and his gospel.  Let us commend ourselves to the holy prayers of the clergy and faithful of this martyr Church, to intercede for us so that we might not be mastered by our own fears and anxieties in these uncertain and unsettled days in our own country.

And Now the Hard Part Begins

The Execution of Marshall Ney by Jean-Leon Gerome (1868)

Pondering the election Tuesday of Donald Trump and the defeat of Hillary Clinton and her progressive coalition, seems to me like another chapter (a dark and dangerous one, to be sure) in the contest for ascendancy between those who support self-described progressive spiritual, social, political and cultural revolution that began in the 1960's (or 1860 or 1789 or even 1517, depending on how far back you want to go) and those who oppose the overthrow and destruction of a spiritual, social, political and culture order they cherish and believe in.

In another bitterly divided society, following the defeat of Napoleon at Waterloo , the exiled Bourbon monarch Louis XXVIII and his supporters took power and proceeded (not suprisingly) to exact revenge on those who had supported the French revolution and then the self-styled 'Emperor' Napoleon.  Marshall Michel Ney, who had rallied to Napoleon when he briefly seized power in 1815, was convicted of treason on December 6th, 1815 and executed by firing squad near the Luxembourg Gardens the next day.  He was the most prominent of those who were executed or forced into exile after the Bourbon restoration.

Talleyrand, commenting on the restoration of the Bourbons famously said: "They had learned nothing and forgotten nothing."  Our new President is not Louis XXVIII and our outgoing President is not Napoleon, but for the side which is ascendant comes the temptation to remember every insult, every slight and every injury and punish those believed to be responsible.  The temptation for the side which is now subordinate is stop listening and refuse to face up to the weaknesses and failings that led to their defeat.

This may be the way of the world, but is not the way of the Gospel. As Christians we must work together for justice.   Of course we must be adamant in our unconditional repudiation of racism and of hatred of immigrants and Muslims, our unflagging defense of the creation and our solidarity with those who are impoverished, vulnerable and on the margins.  

But Gospel teaches us that only the love of Christ, made incarnate in this fallen world by our admittedly imperfect magnanimity, forebearance, forgiveness, humility and mercy, has the power to truly transform our lives and this world, whether we find ourselves as his disciples (temporarily) in power or out of power, politically, socially or culturally.  

It is easy comfort to recognize and denounce the blindness, failings and offenses of  our neighbors.  It is much more difficult and humbling to try to see one's own blindness, failings and offenses against our neighbors and repent of them.  

That's the hard part.