~ READINGS & REFLECTIONS ~
(08-15-2010)
THE DESTINY OF ALL MORTAL FLESH
The celebration of today’s feast on a Sunday is unusual on our Roman Catholic calendar. Our observance of the Lord’s Day is held in such high esteem that few other feasts replace it. Occasionally there is a feast—usually of one of the saints—in which the saving power of God in Christ is so uniquely focused that the Roman rite deems it worthy of celebration on the Lord’s Day. Today is such a feast. Yet some are surprised at the brevity of the dogma in its entirety: “We pronounce, declare and define it to be a divinely revealed dogma: that the Immaculate Mother of God, the ever Virgin Mary having completed the course of her earthly life, was assumed body and soul to heavenly glory.” The Roman Catholic Church never defined any specifics or particulars about the event itself. It is not in the scriptures. There are no verifiable eyewitness accounts. At its core, the dogma reveals in Mary the destiny of all mortal flesh, and reinforces our creedal belief in resurrection of the body. This feast strengthens our faith, defined last week in Hebrews as the realization of things hoped for. We find, in Mary, that realization of what we all hope for, what Paul today affirms: “In Christ shall all be brought to life” (1 Corinthians 15:22).
SAINT PIUS X (1835-1914)
August 21
Presidential vetoes we understand. But imagine vetoing a papal election! Yet in the conclave of 1903, the Archbishop of Cracow (ironically, a predecessor in that office of Karol Wojtyla, the future John Paul II) vetoed the leading candidate on the order of the Austro- Hungarian emperor. Instead, the cardinals elected Giuseppe Sarto of Venice as Pius X, the first pope, after a succession of nobles and diplomats, to hail from humble origins. Nor did the papacy alter his endearing simplicity. Tailors eventually made his cassock cuffs detachable because he absentmindedly wiped his fountain pen on them, forgetting that his old black cassock had been replaced by papal white! Taking as his motto “To restore all things in Christ” (Ephesians 1:10), Pius condemned the theological innovations called “modernism,” yet dramatically altered the then-common practice whereby people rarely received Communion for fear of unworthiness, mandating early First Communion and urging everyone to frequent reception. Refusing to bless troops assembled in Saint Peter’s Square—“I bless peace, not war!”—he died brokenhearted as World War I engulfed “Christian” Europe despite his peacemaking efforts.
—Peter Scagnelli, © Copyright, J. S. Paluch Co.
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