Pray Tell what makes a good homily?

Last December, St. John's Seminary/School of Theology and Liturgical Press launched PrayTell - a blog devoted to things liturgical, which I've been enjoying. For someone who hears far more homilies than she gives, I've been thinking quite a bit lately about what makes a good homily. I finally sat down to write something and sent it to PrayTell, where it appeared today.

The hallowed dictum ex opere operato says that sacraments work automatically, apart from the dispostion of the minister or recipient, if the rite is done validly, because grace comes from Christ and not from human effort. Does ex opere operato apply to the homily? Could it be that it doesn’t matter how well or poorly prepared or preached a homily is, since the homilist is acting not as himself but in persona Christi (”in the person of Christ”)? That like baptism, or transubstantiation, it works, no matter what state the homilist – or the homily - is in?

I recently came across an op-ed in a Catholic publication that just brushed the edge of this argument. The quality of a Mass doesn’t depend on the homily, the writer suggested, nor should we should expect it to. To yearn for good preaching, to seek it out, undervalues the true point of the Mass, the Real Presence of Christ in the Eucharist. I was left with the vague sense that my desire to have an effective “living commentary” [GIRM 29] on the Scriptures was at best something of an imposition on busy priests, and at worst, a sign of failing faith in the Eucharist. It is sufficient that there is a homily.

I don’t buy it.......

Read the rest here.

Sustained Silent Reading

When my kids were in elementary school one of their favorite parts of the curriculum was SSR: sustained silent reading. They still both love to read, and much of their discretionary income goes to acquiring new books to read (come to think of it, that's where mine goes, too). The Boy is reviewing books for the local children's book store this summer, and Crash is in the midst of God is Not One.

Robin of Metanoia and I have started a blog dialogue about Into the Silent Land (see the first posts here and here), which turns out not to be the only book that's on both our reading lists.

I'm reading about silence in a sustained way this summer - partly to prepare for a course that I might (or might not) teach in the fall of 2011. So for what it's worth, here is what I'm reading - silently. If you have other suggestions for me, I 'd love to hear them...or if you're reading some of these, let me know what you think.

• Into the Silent Land by Martin Laird, OSA. Reflections on the contemplative Christian life.
• A Book of Silence by Sara Maitland. Travels to literally silent lands (the Sinai, a hermitage on a remote island). Read the NY Times review.
• Virgin Time: In Search of the Contemplative Life by Patricia Hampl. Another travelogue, this one goes on pilgrimage to trace the steps of saints Francis and Clare and to a monastery in California.
• In Pursuit of Silence: Listening for Meaning in a World of Noise by George Prochnik. A look at the sonic landscape from many perspectives, including the scientific.
• Being Still by Jean-Yves Leloup. An Orthodox theologian looks at the early roots of the contemplative Christian tradition. The opening stories of a young monk's training on Mount Athos which set the stage for the rest of the book are marvelous reflections in themselves.
• Earthen Vessels by Gabriel Bunge OSB. A Benedictine hermit reflects on the contemplative life, richly interwoven with bits from the desert fathers. Its subtitle — The Practice of Personal Prayer According to the Patristic Traditions — says it all.
• The Power of Pause by Terry Hershey. Practical suggestions for just stopping. Less academic and more advice driven.

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The photo is of my reading spot of choice - in my freshly weeded back yard.

Column: On the breath

I was fascinated with the most recent version of the Catechism of the Catholic Church, which only tangentially speaks to why anyone might pray - though does have much wonderful to say on the when, where and how....

Let everything that lives and that breathes give praise to the Lord. — Ps. 150:6


“Why do you pray?” My 16-year-old son posted this question on Facebook a few weeks ago. His English class was reading Night, Elie Wiesel’s powerful reflection on the Holocaust. Early on, Wiesel’s narrator poses this question and Mike used it as the frame for his project on the book.

Mike got an A+ on the assignment (yes, you can talk about God and prayer in public school), posted his video on his blog and is (I think) contemplating less heady questions these days, such as summer vacation. Me? A month after the project was due, I’m still thinking about how to answer his question.

My professorial persona kept trying to turn the question into an answerable one — why should I pray? But that’s not quite the question Mike asked. Why do I pray?

You might as well ask me why I breathe. I breathe so I can sing. I breathe to pause. I breathe, awake or asleep, whether I’m aware of it or not. I have many answers, but no single one that encompasses the whole of the mystery.

Over pizza last week, my friend Lisa and I tugged at the question for a bit. A couple of days later, she offered a forthright and wise question in return, “Why not?” Like Lisa, the psalmist implies we are created to pray. To breathe is to be called to prayer.

Poet Mary Oliver reflects that “Breath [is] our first language.” Though she is writing about metrical poetry, in noting how breath binds us to the rhythms of the world, signals our thoughts and moods, sets a tempo, flows and ebbs, repeats, she might well be writing about prayer.

Centuries earlier, St. Gregory of Nazianzus used the image of the ever present tempo of our breath to vividly underscore St. Paul’s exhortation to pray at all times: “We must remember God more often than we draw breath.”

The Christian tradition draws a yet deeper connection between breathing and prayer. Breathing is more than a model for how to pray. St. Anthony, a fourth century desert monastic, sometimes called the Father of Monasticism, advised his monks to “breathe Christ at all times.” To these men and women of the desert, prayer was not like breathing, it was breathing — prayer was God’s breath in us.

A millennia later, in a commentary on his Spiritual Canticle, St. John of the Cross speaks of prayer as an intimate encounter with God: “this breathing of God in the soul, of the soul in God.” For St. John, this joining of breath was transformative. Just as the physical act of breathing puts flesh on our bones, so God takes flesh in us in prayer.

Why do you pray? Mike had no answers, only questions: Do you pray for peace? For strength, for comfort, for understanding? There are many reasons, each true in any moment. In the end he echoes the desert fathers’ struggles with this particular mystery of our relationship to God and asks, “Or do you just pray?”

Why do I pray? I pray, like I breathe, for many reasons: to sing, to be still, to ask, to thank. But ultimately, I do “just pray” for the same reason I just breathe: to live.

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Breathe in me, O Holy Spirit, that my thoughts may all be holy.
Act in me, O Holy Spirit, that my work, too, may be holy.
Draw my heart, O Holy Spirit, that I may love only what is holy.
Strengthen me, O Holy Spirit, that I may defend all that is holy.
Guard me, O Holy Spirit, that I myself may always be holy.
— St. Augustine of Hippo

Coming and going

Math Man is a faithful second reader and critic of my writing (just don't ask him to check the spelling). Before I sent off the piece on urban legends of chemistry, he read through it and marked a line, "Alas, pride goes before a fall."

"Isn't that pride comes before a fall?" "No, goes." "Are you sure?" "Certain." Well, not that certain. I googled it. Math Man has Canadian roots. His pride comes before his fall. Where I come from, pride goes first.

So, we wondered, what would happen when my proverb met a British copy editor? Today my proofs came back and "alas, I must confess, pride comes before a fall"! Math Man feels quite smug about it all.

The whole thing reminded me of this Gershwin song I first learned from my mother: you say tah-MAY-toe and I say tah-MAH-toe..... (That would be /təˈmeɪtəʊ/ or /təˈmɑtəʊ/ for the linguists amongst us.)

Column: Elected Silence

A while back Cindy at artandsoul wondered if I would write more about what it is like to be on a silent retreat. And so I have. The column that follows is drawn from the twelve or so pages of vignettes I wrote while on this last retreat. Editing it down to fit my column without it becoming a laundry list proved daunting -- and the last bits were hard to prune. All my thanks to Cindy who was willing to cast her poetic eye over it and edit...

This column appeared in the Catholic Standard & Times on 17 June 2010.

He would withdraw to deserted places to pray.
— Lk. 5:16b

Earlier this spring, a friend wondered if I would write more about what it is like to be on a long silent retreat. This account of my travels to the silent land is an invitation to taste — or for those who have been, a reminder of — the graces to be found there.

Elected silence, sing to me
And beat upon my whorlèd ear,
Pipe me to pastures still and be
The music that I care to hear
— Gerard Manley Hopkins, S.J. from The Habit of Perfection

Tuesday, 5:45 a.m.: I posted this tidbit of Hopkins as my status on Facebook, then walked to the station, more lines of Hopkins’ running through my mind. In the warm stillness I sense the Holy Ghost brooding over the bent world, stirring day into being. It seems retreat starts now.

7 p.m.: We gather in the fireplace room, poised to begin in earnest. We pray, then stand for introductions. Silence already settling over us, we are spare of words. Our directors beckon, offer a brief reflection and arrange times to meet. I claim an afternoon slot, sheepishly confessing that I inhabit the night on retreat. We scatter and the silence descends.

Wednesday: Finishing my shower, I hear a plaintive, “There must be lights here somewhere.” I break my own silence to tell the anonymous questioner where to look. In this old house, higher up the walls than you would expect. This silence is not meant to be a burden, but a freedom.

1:15 p.m.: Meeting with my director for the first time, we speak about what brought me to retreat and how I approach prayer. I’ve forgotten a hat, and she loans me a battered baseball cap. A good director makes it easier to see — in this case both the ocean and God.

9:30 p.m.: A storm crashes in. I sit in the chapel, wrapped in my shawl, safe within its rocky fastness, then retreat to the dining room for hot chocolate. I scratch a few notes about my prayer as the wind rattles the windows. I wonder what things this retreat will shake up in my life.

Thursday, 12:20 p.m.: I page through my journal and sift through my prayer, looking for threads, jotting notes before I see my director. I stick them to the front of my journal, then never once refer to them in our half-hour conversation.

Friday, 4:30 a.m.: I wake with a start; dawn has just begun to color the sky. I grab my camera and clamber out onto the rocks. The dawn over the Atlantic is stunning. Yet when I turn it’s the moon, full and rose colored from the rays of the sun I do not yet see, that captures my attention — what marvels might I see, if I were to simply look at life from a different direction? Long after the sun has breached the horizon, I’m still there. Praying.

9 a.m.: The dining room is hushed, though a half dozen of us are sprinkled about the tables. I wait for the kettle to boil. Behind me I hear the water running into the coffee maker, the drip and hiss as it hits the pot, the metallic shru-ush of the bread descending, to rise again with a ding as toast. This is the music of Matins in this silent place.

5 p.m. Mass: We’ve struggled to master a haunting plainchant. Today the celebrant quips, “we’ll sing it Al Capone.” It seems a gentle way to say he expects we’ll murder it without the support of the piano. He counsels us to sing lightly, be attentive to each other and be willing to fish around a bit for the notes. We sound marvelous. On retreat profound preaching is not confined to the homily.

Tuesday, 3:25 p.m.: When the first raindrop falls I hurry inside. Never mind that I was settled into my chair; after a week, I’m attentive to the first stirrings of many things. Water sluices off the roof in shimmering sheets of silk. The waters of the cove emerge, then the shoal on the far side. Here we sit, drenched in grace, waiting for the veil to lift, for clarity.

10:40 p.m.: A last hour’s meditation in the chapel. Back in my room the bare flicker of the Presence Lamp seen through my window reminds that I sleep under God’s eye, here — and I realize, always.

Wednesday, 2:12 p.m.: On the train, headed home. A torrent of words pours forth from a man holding a battered tweed suitcase. From the cradled silence of the last eight days I am lavishly flung forth into the world.

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We are cradled close in Your hands — and lavishly flung forth.
— Rainer Maria Rilke, Book of Pilgrimages