"What profit, then, does a priest gain from contact with literature?" Quite a lot.
Purple Catholic Saturday Post
Good morning and happy Saturday. This is a Saturday Post from the Purple Catholic. I appreciate your bearing with me as I took a few weeks off from the Saturday Posts.
I have been brainstorming ways to better this publication for you, my readers, and some of the content and publishing days will change. These Saturday Posts will remain with headlines from the previous week and a liturgical look ahead to the next week.
My comments will be moving to another day and focusing specifically on the importance of being a “purple Catholic.” As I have written previously, we are in a very divisive time and must remember what is most important in our lives: following Jesus. It is fine and good to vote for a candidate, but that candidate (or country) is not the end of things. More on that in future posts.
This week, Pope Francis issued a letter proposing that seminarians, and indeed all who want to become better-formed Christians, should engage more frequently with literature.
The pontiff says:
Literature, then, sensitizes us to the relationship between forms of expression and meaning. It offers a training in discernment, honing the capacity of the future priest to gain insight into his own interiority and into the world around him. Reading thus becomes the “path” leading him to the truth of his own being and the occasion for a process of spiritual discernment that will not be without its moments of anxiety and even crisis. Indeed, numerous pages of literature correspond to what Saint Ignatius calls spiritual “desolation”. (Paragraph 26)
Reading non-fiction is good; that tends to be my genre of choice. But, I’ve read from some Catholic commentators who have argued that fiction is a waste of time since it doesn’t educate or inspire the reader to delve more deeply into a relationship with God.
Pope Francis is arguing the contrary here. It is not a waste of time; rather it can help us become better Christians because literature, fiction, can give us glimpses into the lives of others that we would not ordinarily meet in our day to day lives. The pope says literature is “essential for believers who sincerely seek to enter into dialogue with the culture of their time, or simply with the lives and experiences of other people.”
So you want to become a better Christian and a better evangelist? You want to better understand your neighbor? Pope Francis’ advice of the week: read a book.
Nineteenth Week in Ordinary Time
This week we are entering the Nineteenth Week in Ordinary Time. This Sunday we will hear readings from 1 Kings 19:4-8, Psalm 34, Ephesians 4:30-5:2, and John 6:41-51.
Here are some resources to help you prep for the readings this Sunday:
Take and Eat - Scott Hahn at St. Paul Center
The Eucharist and the Manna in the Wilderness - Karlo Broussard at Catholic Answers
In the Liturgy of the Hours, we are entering Psalter Week III and in the Office of Readings we will be continuing in Hosea and reading from the book of the prophet Micah.
Here is a calendar for the rest of the week:
Tuesday, 13 August - Memorial of St. Pontian, pope and martyr, and Hippolytus, priest and martyr (optional)
Wednesday, 14 August - Memorial of St. Maximilian Kolbe, priest and martyr
Thursday, 15 August - Solemnity of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary
Friday, 16 August - Memorial of St. Stephen of Hungary (optional)
I am the living bread which came down from heaven; if any one eats of this bread, he will live for ever; and the bread which I shall give for the life of the world is my flesh.”
John 6:51
In the news:
The United States
Iowa diocese pauses ‘healing services’ ministry due to ‘canonical concerns’ - Crux
South Carolina’s first Catholic college opens for 2024-25 academic year - The College Fix
The Vatican
Pope Francis issues letter on the use of literature in formation - Vatican.va
Heading to Rome for the 2025 jubilee? Be aware of blackouts - Crux
Does Pope Francis need a new batch of cardinals? - Ed. Condon at The Pillar
The World
At least 12 priests arrested in new surge of Nicaraguan repression - The Pillar
Statue of Virgin Mary destroyed by vandals at Westminster diocese church - Catholic Herald
Visually-impaired religious sisters giving witness to People of God - L’Osservatore Romano
Pro-lifers in Tanzania working to address declining birthrate, rise in abortions - ACI Africa
Vatican approves devotion to 16th-century Vailankanni Marian shrine in India - Catholic Herald
Have a good weekend,
Matthew