Our Vanished Vigils

“I miss all the Vigils. Why on earth were they suddenly suppressed?”

So wrote the 20th century's most famous monk, Thomas Merton, on December 7, 1959, which until recently had been observed as the Vigil of the Immaculate Conception. When Merton wrote that, today (August 14) was still the Vigil of the Assumption. Prior to the rubrical reforms of 1955, the Roman Rite had 16 vigils of varying rank. After 1955, the Roman Rite retained only 7 (those of Christmas, Pentecost, the Ascension, the Assumption, Saint John the Baptist, Saints Peter and Paul, and Saint Lawrence), suppressing the other 9 (those of the Epiphany, the Immaculate Conception, All Saints, and the Apostles Andrew, Thomas, James the Greater, Bartholomew, Matthew, and Simon and Jude.) But now, since the 1969 calendar reform, it has none at all. Not even Christmas Eve survived the bureaucrats' cut!

There are, of course, a great many factors (both liturgical and non-liturgical) that have contributed to the erosion of the liturgical calendar's impact on people's consciousness, and it is fair to argue that in a post-Christian culture the deck is already sufficiently stacked against a serious liturgically based spirituality. That said, the general flattening of the calendar, however modest a part of the overall picture, certainly hasn't helped.

Of course, what really gave vigils even greater salience well beyond the few faithful who attended daily Mass (and who might therefore have taken note of the vigils' violet vestments and their significance) was the practice of compulsory fasting and abstinence on at least the more important vigils. I am old enough to remember when fasting and abstinence were still observed on the vigils of Christmas, Pentecost, Assumption, and Immaculate Conception. My guess is that in an even earlier era fasting and abstinence were likewise observed on some of the other vigils as well. In contrast to today's almost uniformly flat weekly calendar, that widespread and recognized practice helped to highlight at least some of the greatest festivals as they occurred during the week. 

A story. On one December 7, not quite 60 years ago, My mother, my sister, and I went to Macy's on 34th Street to buy new shoes for Christmas. As we were being fitted by one of my mother's Jewish co-workers, she asked my mother what holy day it was that day. What had made her think it was a Catholic holy day? She had inferred that it was a Catholic holy day because so many people were eating fish in the local eatery! My mother explained to her friend that the next day was the actual holy day, and that what as being observed that day was the vigil (hence the fish). 

Can anyone imagine such a conversation occurring today? More to the point, when a major holy day occurs on a weekday, what are the chances of almost anyone even noticing at all?

The Politics of Emotional Intensity

Over at Marquette Warrior (http://mu-warrior.blogspot.com/2015/08/the-many-things-wrong-with-donald-trump.html), my old friend and colleague from my brief and now almost forgotten career in academia, Political Science Professor John McAdams, presents what might be called an "establishment," "conservative," "Republican" case against Donald Trump's candidacy. (The case as presented is largely cited from the blog of a lawyer and colleague of his, Rick Esenberg, whose full post can be found at http://sharkandshepherd.blogspot.com/2015/08/the-unbearable-silliness-of-trump.html.)

In contrast to those of us on the other side of the ideological divide, who who may be experiencing some Schadenfreude at the problems Trump has posed for his Republican rivals and, more to the point, who perceive in Trump's apparent excesses an unfiltered, unedited version of what American "conservatism" has become, Esenberg argues that such a view is "preposterous" because Trump "is not conservative. He is a big government crony capitalist who has fed at the subsidy trough and advocated for eminent domain abuse. He is a pro-choice (or was, until yesterday afternoon) and a supporter of Obamacare. He has contributed to Hillary Clinton."

Of course, all that is true. In the long run it may well weaken Trump with more establishment-type GOP primary voters and deny him the nomination. Time will tell. That said, however, at least in the short run all that likely matters a lot less than Esenberg seems to want it to. That is because the basis for the intensity of Trump's support in his distinctive constituency is, as everyone recognizes, primarily emotional and affective, not intellectual or even ideological. The essential emotion involved is anger, a powerful force in politics. And, as political scientists certainly know, intensity can compensate for any number of other deficiencies in a campaign. 

Trump the businessman is the archetypal capitalist - as his responses to the debate questions about his bankruptcies and his political contributions illustrated. Logically, that might make him an odd spokesperson for anti-elitist, "populist" rage. but, of course, in politics logic does not necessarily rule. One of the historical paradoxes of American politics has been the readiness of many ordinary Americans to admire and even identify with successful businessmen, instead of scorning the successful elites in whose interests the system seems so rigged.

The easy readiness of other Republican candidates to acknowledge that the Trump campaign is genuinely in touch with the feelings of a significant segment of society may not merit any of them a place in Profiles in Courage, but it does authentically reflect a certain political reality - including the reality of where their party is now after the years of political incivility and self-induced dysfunction.

A New World Day of Prayer for the Care of Creation

In an August 6 Papal Letter, addressed to Their Eminences Cardinal Peter Kodwo Appiah Turkson (President of the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace) and Cardinal Kurt Koch (President of the Pontifical Council for the Promotion of Christian Unity), Pope Francis has announced the institution of an annual World Day of Prayer for the Care of Creation, to be observed on September 1, following the practice of the Orthodox Church. The Orthodox connection is significant. The Pope begins his letter by stating that he is instituting this day "at the suggestion" of Metropolitan Ioannis, the representative of the Greek orthodox Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew, whose concern for the environment the Pope had already acknowledged in his encyclical Laudato Si'.

Our contemporary secular society seems inundated with all sorts of special thematic, days, weeks, and months. Some, like Mother's Day and Father's Day, are widely observed. Others have much more limited appeal and may only be known to a somewhat more limited audience. Some, like National Doughnut Day (the 1st Friday in June) may merit as much humor as serious observance. 

In recent decades, the Church too has begun to institute such special days, creating a kind of thematic calendar apart from the more traditional liturgical calendar. Thus we now have, for example, a World Day of Consecrated Life on the feast of the Presentation (February 2), a World Day of the Sick on the feast of Our Lady of Lourdes (February 11), and a World Day of Prayer for Vocations on the 4th Sunday of Easter - to cite three of the better known such special days. To these, Pope Francis has now added a new World Day of Prayer for the Care of Creation on September 1.

Such special days (both religious and secular) seem to be one of our modern ways of highlighting a particular cause or concern. So it seems especially fitting that the cause of the Care of Creation, so obviously an important preoccupation of the Pope as his recent encyclical attests, should likewise merit a day of its own. "The annual World Day of Prayer for the Care of Creation will," Pope Francis hopes, "offer individual believers and communities a fitting opportunity to reaffirm their personal vocation to be stewards of creation, to thank God for the wonderful handiwork which he has entrusted to our care, and to implore his help for the protection of creation as well as his pardon for the sins committed against the world in which we live." In giving the World Day of Prayer for the Care of Creation such an explicitly ecumenical context, Pope Francis is acknowledging and highlighting the fact that this is "a time when all Christians are faced with the same decisive challenges, to which we must respond together, in order to be more credible and effective."

Hopefully, this new Catholic and ecumenical World Day of Prayer for the Care of Creation will heighten the consciousness of Christians regarding the spiritual and religious dimensions of the world-wide environmentally related challenges outlined in such detail in Laudato Si' and will further foster the kind of spiritual and religious conversion of heart which alone can effectively respond to those challenges. 

For American Catholics, this new World Day of Prayer for the Care of Creation comes virtually on the eve of the Pope's pastoral visit to the United States, a further invitation to the American Catholic community to realign its priorities along the lines laid out in Laudato Si'.

The Rudeness Factor

The news continues to be dominated by Donald Trump's latest comments (in particular his post-debate onslaught against debate moderator Megyn Kelly) and by both media and Republican reactions Of course, to a certain extent this is what we have come to expect. The media focuses on that sort of thing, indeed thrives on it. One of the constants of American political campaigns is how journalists consistently distract the electorate with short-term "horse-race" comparisons, and an emphasis on "gaffes" and "inside-the campaign" news and "inside the beltway" concerns.

That said, Trump's litany of insults - beginning with his comments about Mexicans, then moving on to his dismissive characterization of Senator John McCain, and now his weird reaction to Megyn Kelly's questioning - may well be pushing the envelope of what is palatable political rudeness. But in doing so Trump is really reflecting two other already well established trends. The first is the long-term coarsening of our society, reflected in the increasingly rude and vulgar character of ordinary language. This has been going on since at least the 1960s, got a great boost first from the growth of cable TV and subsequently from the development of social media. There has always been vulgar talk in the world, of course; but 50-60 years ago there was also a standard for polite conversation. That standard has consistently been eroded in the past 50-60 years (along with any real distinction between polite and vulgar conversation), each generation further debasing what was left of the civil culture it inherited. What was once simply unacceptable in public is now normal.

But there is a second trend, which parallels the first and to some extent benefits from the first. That is the increasingly not just coarse and vulgar but spiteful and hateful character of political speech. This is not unprecedented either. Its antecedents can be detected int he early years of the republic. In the 1950s, it characterized Joseph McCarthy and his allies. In the early 1960s, it was associated with what was then labelled "the radical right." In the late 1960s and into the 1970s, it was the New Left. In recent years, it has been opposition to President Obama that has increasingly expressed itself in this way, what some commentators have called "Obama Derangement Syndrome."  Certainly, something - perhaps the election (and re-election) of a non-white President - seems to have traumatized certain segments in society, rendering them increasingly incapable of rational analysis and civil discourse (both prerequisites for any successfully functioning democratic polity). Trump and his admirers may be taking political rudeness and incivility to new heights, but in this the political Right in general and the Republican Party in particular are just reaping what they have been sowing for years in not distancing themselves from the debasing and destructive direction so-called "conservatism" has taken.

The Trump campaign may have become the latest vehicle for expressing the anger of some of those who feel left behind by the changing character of our society. As is often the case, however, their spokesman hardly fits into that category himself but rather represents extreme success. He is, after all, as his responses to the questions about his bankruptcies and his political contributions illustrated, basically a businessman. If there is an ideology there it is an ideology that values success and favors "winners" while disparaging society's "losers."

Lesson Under a Tree

There are times in life when nothing seems to go right, despite all our best efforts. We try our best, but our best just isn’t good enough. Too much is being demanded of us; too much expected of us. We get worn out and want to give up – just like Elijah in today’s 1st reading.

Elijah was maybe the most remembered prophet of the Old Testament. He appeared abruptly - as if out of nowhere to resist King Ahab and his pagan Queen, Jezebel, who had corrupted Israel’s religion with worship of the foreign god Baal.

In competition with 450 prophets of Baal on Mount Carmel, he had dramatically demonstrated God’s superiority over Baal. He had then executed the 450 pagan prophets, and God had finally ended Israel’s 3-year drought. But what should have been Elijah’s greatest moment of triumph ended in frustration as he then had to flee from the Queen, who was determined to kill him in revenge.  So he descended from the mountaintop of elation into the desert of despondency, which is where we encounter him at the beginning of today’s reading [1 Kings 19:4-8] - on the run, exhausted in body,  broken in spirit, filled with an overwhelming feeling of failure: “This is enough, O Lord! Take my life, for I am no better than my fathers.”

Most of us don’t lead such significantly public lives. So our own dramas of frustration and failure seldom seem so dramatic. Occasionally, the feelings of otherwise ordinary un-public people sometimes spill out in public - even erupting in violent acts such as so many of the ones we have witnessed over and over again in various cities around the country. At the other extreme, some try, with greater or lesser degree of success, to keep such feelings behind a defensive wall, in an attempt to insulate both themselves and society from their effects. In between these extremes, feelings of frustration and failure frequently spill out in bitterness, fury, anger, shouting, and reviling – malicious behaviors, which Saint Paul [Ephesians 4:30 – 5:2] said grieve the Holy Spirit of God.

In contrast, Paul instructed the Ephesians to be kind to one another, compassionate, forgiving one another as God has forgiven you in Christ.

Of course, that’s a lot easier said than done!

So how does one get from here to there?

Ready to give up, Elijah fell asleep under a tree. Awakened by an angel, he found the nourishment he needed (which he obviously would not normally have expected to find there in the desert), a sure sign that help was on the way. So depressed was he, however, that even after eating and drinking, he fell asleep again - only to be wakened and fed again.  Apparently, Elijah was ready to give up on God, but God was not willing to give up on Elijah.

God really was demanding a lot from Elijah. Hence, God’s unwillingness to let him give up, but hence also his readiness to help, to accompany Elijah on the way, personally providing him with what he would need.

None of us is Elijah, of course. Yet God does expect results even from us. Like Elijah, we too may be tempted at times to feel that much is being expected of us. After all, who can really be expected to be kind, compassionate, and forgiving – especially when it seems to produce few if any results?

Just as God was prepared to accompany Elijah and personally provide him with whatever he would need, he does the same for us on our own difficult, tedious journey.  As Saint Paul has reminded us, Christ loved us and handed himself over for us as a sacrificial offering to God. Paul’s reminder is always timely – but never more so than in those times and situations when we too feel discouraged and are tempted to give up.

As we have been hearing now week after week, Jesus, the Bread of Life, is our very visible food for the journey – our life-long journey out of the desert of bitterness, fury, anger, shouting, and reviling to the mountain where, having experienced for ourselves God’s kindness, compassion, and forgiveness, we can at least begin to become in turn people of kindness, compassion, and forgiveness for the life of the world.

Homily for the 19th Sunday in Ordinary Time, Immaculate Conception Church, Knoxville, TN, August 9, 2015.