Super Bowl Sunday

Unlike the overwhelming majority of my fellow citizens, I do not worship at the altar of our national religion of football; but even I am not free to feign indifference to our civil religion's supreme annual ritual, the Super Bowl. So, when the Kansas City Chiefs met the Philadelphia Eagles in New Orleans for Super Bowl LIX yesterday, like most Americans my community celebrated with a Super Bowl party. Inevitably I attended. That said, my priorities, in order of interest, were, first, the pizza, second, the half-time show, third, Taylor cheering her boyfriend. The game itself, however, held absolutely no interest for me. In that, I do not think I was alone (although admittedly a minority) among the game's 100 million + viewers.

Whatever one thinks of football, however, it is incontrovertibly our preeminent national sport, bordering on obsession. And the Super Bowl is our civic religion's preeminent annual ritual. Watching the Super Bowl (or at least participating in a Super Bowl related event) is perhaps one of the few things most Americans still do together. The Super Bowl is our great unifying tradition - being performed at a time when nothing seems to be unifying anymore, when our national life has increasingly been emptied of its hallowed traditions.

This was Super Bowl LIX, the Roman numerals presumably reflecting the immense self-importance attached to the event. I am - I say with a sigh - old enough to remember the first Super Bowl on January 15, 1967, before the Super Bowl Party had become a semi-obligatory ritual of our civil religion. At that time, of course, we still had a common entertainment culture. Most people watched the same things on TV (or at least chose from a very small menu of alternatives) and so could talk to one another about their favorite shows at school or work the next day. Sadly, all that has largely been lost - with rare exceptions such as the Super Bowl. Much as I couldn't care less about the game itself, I certainly recognize the need for more such commonly experienced civic rituals.  

That said, the pizza, wings, and guacamole were all great. The 5-Grammy winner Kendrick Lamar put on a spectacularly energetic half-time show. President Trump showed up with his daughter and grandson. Lots of other celebrities did too, including Sir Paul McCartney. The game itself was lopsided from the first, with the Eagles comfortably winning 40-22. 

And thus passed Super Bowl LIX.

Beyond "Ordo Amoris"

 

When trying to understand the apparently empathy-challenged Trump presidency, I am reminded of Dr. Seuss's famous description of the Grinch in his 1957 children's book, How the Grinch Stole Christmas.

The Grinch hated Christmas! The whole Christmas season!
Now, please don’t ask why. No one quite knows the reason.
It could be his head wasn’t screwed on just right.
It could be, perhaps his shoes were too tight.
But I think that the most likely reason of all
May have been that his heart was two sizes too small.

The Grinch, of course, was a fictional character. but there is nothing fictional about the Trump presidency, nor about its increasingly pernicious effects on American society and its increasingly corrosive effects on American religion. 

Consider, for example, the recent argument about Vice President J.D. Vance about order amoris ("rightly ordered love"), which began as a twitter debate between Vance and British Tory politician/podcaster/public Christian intellectual Rory Stewart.

The 2024 election was, for all the talk about the price of eggs, also very much a culture-war election, and this seemingly arcane religious debate actually goes to the heart of that cultural conflict, which has to do with our capacity to care for one another - or, to use Dr. Seuss's imagery, the size of our hearts.

The ordo amoris argument arose when Vance claimed that Christians have a hierarchy of moral obligations, with their special moral relationships with their family and their communities exercising a certain priority. In response, Rory Stewart highlighted John 15:12, where Jesus says that the greatest love entails laying down one’s life for others. He also emphasized Jesus' apparent ambivalence about family connections and suggested that the Christian tradition has been detrimentally over-influenced in this area by classical pagan philosophy.

Of course, there is a sense in which what both are saying is partly true.

In the natural order, which includes the family and the political community (about which classical pagan philosophy has had a lot to say), we have obvious natural obligations to those with whom we are specially connected. The Kingdom of God does not extricate us from those natural relationships, and in some cases actually affirms the obligations they entail. Examples include the fourth commandment, "Honor thy father and they mother" (Exodus 20:12), "Let every person be subject to the governing authorities" (Roman 13:1), "So then, as we have opportunity, let us do good to all, and especially to those who are of the household of faith" (Galatians 6:10). 

It is likewise obvious that, while scripture and tradition reaffirm our natural obligations and connections, they clearly command us - not as citizens, but as disciples - to strive to go beyond them. Hence, Saint Paul: "I still live my human life, but it is a life of faith in the son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me" (Galatians 2:20). Discipleship does not abolish family and civic ties, but it does definitely relativize them. Jesus famously did this when he asked, “Who is my mother, and who are my brothers?” (Matthew 12:48). And, of course, there is the expansive judgment scene in Matthew: "Truly, I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these my brethren, you did it to me." (Matthew 25:40).

This is an old argument, which goes back to the debate between Jesus and the lawyer that led to the parable of the Good Samaritan (Luke 10:25-37). Pointedly, Jesus did not actually answer the lawyer's question, "Who is my neighbor?," a question which reflects the natural order of things by seeking to set limits and boundaries to our obligations to one another. Instead Jesus answered in the order of grace by exemplifying instead what it means to behave as a neighbor towards others, illustrating how such localized limits are transcended.

Again, Vance is correct in suggesting that, as family members and citizens, we do have special moral obligations to fellow family members and fellow citizens. It is with these obligations that civil society and its laws are primarily concerned. Thus, as Vice President, Vance has specifically sworn an oath to "support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic."

But Stewart is also - and maybe more importantly - correct in that, as disciples, we must never remain satisfied with those limited natural obligations and must constantly expand the borders of our moral community to include others outside those limits as well. This is primarily a religious rather than a civil obligation, but inasmuch as the natural order is inherently ordered to grace, those who recognize that they live in the order of grace must act accordingly. Examples of religiously motivated efforts to act within the political order to care beyond the boundaries of family and civil community can take many forms, including government-funded programs, e.g., George W. Bush's (now possibly endangered) PEPFAR, which has provided funding for HIV/AIDS treatment, prevention, and research and has been the largest global health program focused on a single disease in history prior to the COVID-19 pandemic.

As limited human beings, with limited resources, our ability to keep expanding the borders of the moral community of those we care about will also always be limited, quite apart from the consequences of sin which will always further limit our actual desire and willingness to do so. Like the Grinch, our natural hearts may always be two sizes too small, even in many instances at the level of family and nation, let alone as disciples of Jesus and citizens of his kingdom. The lifelong challenge of discipleship and allegiance to Christ's kingdom is to allow our hearts constantly to be expanded by God's grace - even as the Grinch's heart tripled in size thanks to his experience of Christmas.

The Brutalist (The Movie)

 

Because of its extreme length (3 hours, 35 minutes), I hesitated at first to see The Brutalist (nominated for ten Academy Awards, including Best Picture), but I was eventually persuaded - by the presence of a 15-minute intermission - to allot the time and give the film a chance. Watching it is still a challenge on multiple levels, but definitely worth the time and the effort. The film seldom drags the way some other long movies do, but the Intermission is a true blessing, which makes it easier to appreciate the film in all its sumptuous scope.

The film depicts a previously successful Bauhaus-trained Hungarian architect, László Tóth (brilliantly portrayed by actor Adrian Brody), who immigrates to the U.S. as a Displaced Person after his having survived the Holocaust in World War II Europe. Even under better circumstances, immigration is inevitably an experience of loss and opportunity. Tóth experiences both. One gets a vivid sense of the once-successful architect's stressful sense of loss - of menial jobs, soup kitchens, and even drug addiction - as he struggles in a new society where he can always sense that, as a Jew and a foreigner, he may be unwanted, even if America does also offer amazing opportunities. (These opportunities are exemplified in the first part of the film by his assimilated cousin, Attila, with whom he first finds temporary, if stressful, shelter.) There is also the not unrelated subplot of the toll the experience takes on all of Tóth's relationships - especially with his immediate and extended families.

By chance, Tóth gets to remodel an old library in a rich patron's palatial residence. At first his patron is unimpressed, and Tóth is impoverished again. But then the rich man realizes the value of his new library, because pictures of it have been published in a magazine, and he learns more about his architect's fame. One wonders why these considerations should have so changed the rich man's judgment, why they made the architect's product suddenly more beautiful - or perhaps just more commercially valuable.

The film's title and the preeminence of architecture in the story inevitably invites comparisons with the "brutalist" architectural style, which disfigured so many buildings (including, alas, even churches) in the 20th century. One can, of course, see in such "brutalism" a metaphor for the ugliness and brutality of so much of modern life - a brutality which the movie dramatically depicts in human terms in the course of Tóth's own life, both in the war in Europe and the Holocaust, and (within the film itself) in Tóth's up-and-down life in the U.S. He eventually does get to continue his self-expressive artistic path, but he must do so within the constraints of modern capitalism and commerce, which he finds increasingly challenging, and which take their toll on him personally as well as on his family and few friends.

While relatively understated dramatically, the (initially secret but eventually exposed) rape scene seems to symbolize so much of the tension at the heart of the story, and particularly the cruelty and corruption embedded in capitalist commercial culture, in spite of all its real opportunities and potential benefits.

It is a very long film with many intersecting themes. Among them is the post-Holocaust restoration of Jewish nationhood in the creation of the state of Israel (which, as it turns out, is the principal place in the world where the Bauhaus architecture in which Tóth trained in pre-war Germany has continued most strongly). Tóth's niece and her husband choose to join the Jewish immigration to Israel, while he and his wife continue to make their up-and-down way in the U.S. This may reflect a real debate that occurred in certain circles between the two primary post-war Jewish destinations, the presumably easier U.S. and the more difficult, challenging new state of Israel. The film leaves open whether in Tóth's case the U.S. really was easier, or whether Israel. might have been a more fulfilling option.

Yalta + 80

 

The most famous of the several Allied World War II summit conferences began 80 years ago today, February 4, 1945, at Yalta in Soviet Crimea.  Stalin, the great winner in the European war, insisted on his Allies' coming to him. Hence, the terminally ill President Roosevelt's 14,000 mile trip to Soviet Crimea, to which he referred in his last speech to Congress, which was also his only acknowledgment of his disability in public.

Especially during the Cold War, the legacy of the week-long Yalta Conference was much debated. It seems to me that two things can be true at the same time. On the one hand, President Roosevelt seemed to have a higher than was warranted view of his own ability to charm Stalin. His aide Harry Hopkins seemed to be much more trusting of the Soviets than seemed warranted. And both would have done better to have taken Churchill's worries about Soviet expansionism more seriously. Certainly Stalin, both before and after Yalta, exploited these weaknesses in his Allies. At the same time, however, it remains true that the Western Allies depended for much of the war on the Russians to hold off the Germans in the East and only opened a second front in the West in 1944. The Soviet Union lost some 27 million dead during the war against Germany, compared to the much more modest Allied death toll. Everyone at Yalta had to be aware of that disparity and equally aware of the Soviet determination to guarantee its future security in eastern Europe, as a buffer against any future German invasion. And, of course, everyone also knew that that Soviets now occupied the countries they had liberated from the Germans - including eventually part of Germany itself. Add to that the nearly universal expectation that the U.S. would again abandon Europe in two years, which only added to Churchill's wariness, and the Allied desire to get Soviet support in the still continuing war against Japan, which turned out to be unnecessary in the end but which no one foresaw at the time. All of that makes it difficult to imagine an outcome all that different from what emerged at the end of the Yalta conference.

That said, the resulting division of Europe proved disastrous, an outcome famously described by Churchill a year later as an "Iron Curtain." (I remember as a child hearing that phrase on the nightly radio news and wondering what an "Iron Curtain" might look like.) After ostensibly opposing the Cold War's division of Europe for decades, while largely accepting it in practice, the West finally legitimized it in the Helsinki Agreement (the "Final Act of the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe") in 1975, which ironically and completely unexpectedly in turn set in motion the Human Rights movement that contributed eventually to to undoing of Soviet dominance in eastern Europe and of Communism itself in the Soviet Union.

Against all odds, Churchill hoped for a restored European balance of power. Hence his support for a re-empowered France and a genuinely independent Poland. He got the former, but, although the UK had gone to war in 1939 ostensibly to guarantee Poland's territorial integrity, he lost the latter. It is debatable whether, if FDR had been more willing to be more confrontational with Stalin (had he not still wanted to gain favor with Stalin to get his support for the United Nations and his assistance in the Pacific War), whether that might have made a difference. The fact remains that the Soviets were already in control of Poland militarily. While General George Patton did propose that the Allies finish the job, so to speak, by going to war against the Soviets in eastern Europe, neither the U.S. nor its Allies were realistically ready for or politically disposed to undertake such a military adventure in 1945, which is what it would have taken to dislodge the Soviets from Poland. In fact, Stalin only pushed his advantage up to a point. He honored his earlier agreement with Churchill about Greece and did not try to advance further west in Norway or Denmark. But where it mattered most (the buffer states between Germany and Russia) and where he already had the military upper hand, Stalin pressed his advantage, and there was little the western Allies could have done to alter Stalin's strategy.

Those old debates are now the stuff of history, but they defined the politics of the post-war world, and can still teach us some important lessons. What, for example, would a realistic Ukrainian settlement look like? Like Stalin in post-war Europe, Putin seems unlikely to be dislodged from either Crimea or eastern Ukraine. That may be lamentable, but it seems inescapable. The unforgettable lesson of Yalta remains one of the oldest lessons of international politics - that the correlation of forces on the ground remains one of the primary (if not always the primary) factor to be considered in any negotiation. 

In the end, Yalta paved the path for a military stalemate in Europe, with the continent (and the symbolic city of Berlin) left divided between east and west, with both sides tacitly accepting the division and unwilling to push each other too far. Perhaps that is what we can best hope for in international politics, and we must then count ourselves fortunate to have been born on the western side of that division.

A Light in the Dark

 

The familiar carol stops at day 12 but today is in fact the 40th day of Christmas. It marks the definitive completion of the Christmas season. Especially in Catholic countries, the nativity scene typically remains in place in church until today. Thus, in January 2012, when I was studying saint-making in Rome, I had almost a full month to visit the various presepe – some monumentally elaborate, some surprisingly simple – on display in Rome’s many churches. 

 

In the western, Latin Church, today is currently called the Presentation of the Lord, but for several centuries it was also known as the Purification of the Blessed Virgin Mary. According to the Gospel we just heard, Mary and Joseph took the infant Jesus to Jerusalem according to the law of Moses, in order to observe two important religious obligations. The first was the ordinary obligation to be purified after childbirth. This reflected ancient beliefs about the sacredness of blood, and the requirement of ritual purification after any direct contact with blood. The second obligation concerned the special status and religious responsibilities of a first-born son (because of God’s having spared Israel’s first-born at the time of the Exodus). Jesus, Mary, and Joseph’s participation in these rituals highlights for us, first, the inviolable sacredness and dignity of all human lives, and, secondly, the special status (and corresponding responsibilities) which now define our entire lives, because of our relationship with Jesus.

 

Whatever the official title, however, the most common popular title for today’s celebration in the West has consistently been Candlemas Day, because of the Blessing of Candles and the Procession - originally in Rome an early morning, pre-dawn procession, originally somewhat penitential in character – with which today’s Mass begins. This replaced a pagan Roman custom, in which the Romans honored Februa, the mother of Mars the god of war, by lighting the city with candles and torches throughout the night. of that day. In the 7th century, Pope Sergius decreed that the faithful should instead honor the Christ and his mother on this day by lighting up the whole world with lamps and candles.

 

The name Candlemas calls attention, obviously, to the blessed candles, but also to their light – and to Jesus the One whom that light symbolizes. In the Gospel, the aged Simeon prays, “Now, Master, you may let your servant go in peace” and calls Christ “a light to reveal you to the nations.” In the Roman Rite, this prayer, known as the Nunc Dimittis, is recited daily at Night Prayer (Compline).

 

A secular version of Candlemas is “Groundhog Day.” Not so long ago, everyone in the western world knew about Candlemas Day. Today many may have forgotten Candlemas completely. Yet even those who may never even have heard of Candlemas can recognize the folklore that connects the day with the change of seasons. While the temperature is still decidedly wintry, the days are getting noticeably longer. Whereas Christmas comes at the mid-point of the winter’s darkness, with the year’s shortest day and its correspondingly longest night, Candlemas comes at the mid-point between the winter solstice and the spring equinox, the transition (according to one ancient way of calculating the seasons) from winter to spring. Soon, day and night, light and dark will be equal. Thus, this last of the great winter light festivals invites us to look ahead to what these ancient seasonal feasts are meant to symbolize.

 

Today we recall with joy the Lord’s entry into his Temple: and suddenly (so says the prophet Malachi) there will come to the temple the Lord whom you seek. At the same time, we hear, in wise old Simeon’s words to Mary, the first reference to what lies ahead, the first reference to the cross. Behold, this child is destined … to be a sign that will be contradicted – and you yourself a sword will pierce – so that the thoughts of many hearts may be revealed.

So, even as we take one last look back at winter and Christmas, Candlemas looks ahead to spring and Lent and reminds us that the point of Christmas is Easter, as Simeon and Anna’s encounter with the infant Jesus in the Jerusalem Temple points us toward our own encounter with the Risen Christ here and now.

 

Since 1997, Candlemas has also been observed as the World Day of Consecrated Life. Just as on this day candles are blessed symbolizing Christ who is the light of the world, so too religious priests, brothers, and sisters in the various Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life are called to reflect the light of Jesus Christ to all peoples. It is obviously an especially appropriate day to pray that God will continue to bless his Church with abundant vocations to these communities so critical to the life of the Church. 

 

For me at this stage in my life, there is a joining of images and themes. Spending their lives in the Temple, Simeon and Anna seem to me to signify religious life in an obvious way. But they are also - and very pointedly - presented as old, about to retire from their earthly service to God.  Obviously, while their age makes them representative figures for Israel's long wait for the Lord, at the same time they easily elide into representatives of so many religious priests, brothers, and sisters (among whom I must include myself) who are also old, who have spent so much of our lives in the Temple, and are now preparing to pray our own final Nunc Dimittis.

 

This feast which seems to have so many names is also known, In the Eastern, non-Latin Churches, as the Encounter, the Feast of Meeting. Today, Christ comes to meet us, and we in turn get to meet him. Every Christmas we encounter Christ in a special way in the image the infant Jesus in the manger. When we encounter the infant Jesus in the nativity scene in church and at home, we appreciate anew the great mystery of the incarnation of God’s Son. When Simeon and Anna experienced in the infant Jesus the human face of God, they spoke about the child to all who were awaiting the redemption of Jerusalem. They hastened to proclaim and share their good news. That remains our task today – to take the light of these candles out into our spiritually still so very dark world, and so to share with all the light reflected in our own lives from the brightness of the human face of God

 

Homily for the feast of the Presentation of the Lord (Candlemas Day), Saint Paul the Apostle Church, February 2, 2025.