#askjhn

[jh-newman-opn]

What happens in Eucharistic Adoration? My impression is that it's a bunch of people praying and otherwise being reverent in front of the Body, usually displayed in a monstrance, without eating it: is there anything important I'm getting wrong or missing?

Thank you for this ask! I'm a diehard Adoration fan so you've come to the right place. I also found it really bewildering trying to work out what Adoration actually was without actually going-- lots of fruitless googling and head-scratching about what one actually did in Adoration and why people would go.

You've got the basics down-- the church is quiet, the host is exposed in a monstrance on the altar for a period of time (typically 45-60 minutes before Mass), and you can go in and out freely to pray quietly. What you actually do is up to you-- some people read scripture, lots of rosary-praying, journaling, etc. I usually just head-empty-only-vibes it. Sr Clare Crockett said you should start Adoration with three minutes of looking at the host without thinking any thoughts, so I try to do that.

Often there's a bit more ceremony-- sometimes it ends with Benediction, where we sing some hymns (tantum ergo, adoremus, and o salutaris hostia in chant are the standard ones), the priest lifts the monstrance to bless the congregation, and then the Divine Praises are said (Blessed be God/Blessed be his holy name/etc). This is usually quite incense-heavy. Then you get events like 40 hours of adoration, which is exactly what it sounds like, and you need to get people to sign up for slots through the night to be with the Blessed Sacrament. There's an event (that I think started in Germany??) called Nightfever, which is a few hours of candlelit exposition in the evening with gentle hymns, where you invite people into the church to light a candle and it's glorious.

The implicit question about all of this is why. Tbh it's difficult to explain. Easiest way to find out is to just go. The atmosphere is profound. It's not just the reverence of everyone in there, there's a real sense of presence that's not really possible to describe. A non-catholic friend of mine went to adoration for the first time during a 40 hour exposition and cried when he came out because the vibe is so strong. I know another guy who converted to Catholicism after going to Nightfever. Someone else who said that the only time she's ever felt the urge to pray was when she came into adoration for a few minutes with me. I've personally spent an hour in there just ugly crying. Time goes really stretchy and weird in there as well-- sometimes I go in and start talking to God, and then before I know it the priest is taking the Sacrament away and I'm like nooo bring Him baaaackkkkk how has it been an hour already?? It feels like being so totally enveloped in God's love that you just want to be absorbed into it and never leave.

Straight up, if someone is having trouble believing in God or the Real Presence, go to Adoration and it will sort them right out. The important bit is just existing with the Blessed Sacrament in total peace for a while. I know it sounds a bit baffling in text, but just go and it will all make sense.

[jh-newman-opn]

The Moscow Fiasco

At the prodding of @quonunc, here is a quick overview of the incident I fondly referred to as "the Moscow fiasco" in a previous ask about the difference between Catholicism and Orthodoxy. It's a subject dear and horrifying to my heart after I wrote my undergrad dissertation on it.

In short: this is to do with how the Moscow Patriarchate (Russian Orthodox Church, hereafter ROC) is entirely in bed with the Russian government, and how Patriarch Kirill (of Moscow and All Russia) has been responding to the ongoing situation in Ukraine (and former Soviet lands more generally). Picture will make sense lower down the post.

The slightly longer short answer is that Patriarch Kirill is entirely in favour of the Ukraine war, and the ROC clergy are under significant pressure to support that as an official church stance-- my dissertation topic started to germinate when, completely by accident, I came across a 10-minute video of a ROC priest explaining very slowly and carefully that when he met the Pope, he did not talk about Ukraine. Will link this video if I can find it again, but at present it's proving elusive. (EDIT: found it!!! It was the Metropolitan Hilarion of Budapest and Hungary. This video looks like a hostage video honestly £10 says there's someone behind the camera holding a gun to this man's head for legal reasons this is a joke).

The foundation for this belief is obviously completely political (and the history of how the ROC and Russian state are completely entwined is long and complicated to say the least!), but officially the ROC stance is that it's about reclaiming the historic Slavic spiritual unity founded on the Baptism of Rus' in the year 988 by Vladimir the Grand Prince of Kievan Rus' when Slavdom become Orthodox. Proponents of this "Russian World" theory (Russkiy Mir') basically argue that it's the influence of the West that has fractured the unified Slavic people into different, opposing nations, and that by "liberating" Ukraine of this alien ideology of nationhood, the Slavic Orthodox world will regain its historic unity under the common banner of Orthodoxy. All I will say on this is that these people have a very rosy view of Kievan Rus', but that's a post for another day.

This has obviously caused friction within the Orthodox world. Ukraine now has two Orthodox churches-- the Orthodox Church of Ukraine, which is in communion with the Ecumenical Patriarch in Constantinople, and the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, which is in communion with the Russian Patriarchate. They are not in communion with each other, and Constantinople's decision to grant autocephalous status to the OCoU caused Moscow to schism with Constantinople. Constantinople is also accusing Moscow of heresy (specifically, ethno-phyletism). Moscow obviously denies this. Obvious question for the Catholics among us-- does this mean Russian Orthodox christians are no longer Orthodox? No, because schisms between Orthodox churches are not particularly unusual, and they remain within the general cloud of Orthodox communion links.

The whole mess is then immortalised in the absolute monstrosity that is the Main Cathedral to the Russian Armed Forces, which is what I wrote my diss on. The YouTube video linked there is promotional material from Russian military-themed TV channel Звезда, and is one of the better sources of info on it-- a lot of English-language sources contain a lot of incorrect information on it-- either because they don't understand the cultural background, or just straight up lies from the Russian govt propaganda arm--, so take anything they say with a grain of salt. Kirill then gives televised sermons from this cathedral in which he talks about the glorious Russian martyrs of the Ukraine invasion, does his best to harmonise Stalinism and Orthodoxy, and oversees military parades for national holidays. This cathedral has a huge amount of weird symbolism and imagery, and I am super happy to talk more about the mosaics and propaganda going on there, because it's a lot (to say the quiet part out loud: pLEASE ask me more about this cathedral because the more I think about it the more scream-worthy facts about it I remember).

You may have seen memes with this picture of the Virgin Mary (below). Yeah that's from this cathedral. And it's a really really fucked up image. Like, more fucked up than you may think. Could have written my entire diss on this image alone and how shockingly awful it is. western orthobro converts who keep reblogging it as if it's somehow cool and macho are just showing how little they know and it's embarrassing.

The militarism of the ROC since this whole thing has also gone bonkers and there's a huuuuuge amount of corruption and weird stuff going on. The tension between the clergy and the laity has been extremely high for decades, and has spilled over most notably in Pussy Riot's Punk Prayer stunt, an exhibition called Осторожно, религия! (beware, religion!), and some shenanigans in church-building more generally. On this particular incident I would point to the blessing of nuclear weapons and the canonisation of a patron saint of long-range nuclear missiles as key moments. The cathedral also has matching mosaics of Putin and Stalin, a fact that the Russian government very much wants you to think never happened (officially the mosaics were removed, but they absolutely were not-- muggins here found them and has the pictures to prove it).

The main takeaway from this topic is that situation is obviously complicated and the repercussions for everyone involved-- particularly Russian and Ukrainian laypeople-- are unpleasant to say the least. It gives something of a window into the Putin regime and its propaganda arm (Epiphany swim, topless horseriding pictures, Soviet-style policies, I could go on) more than anything else, because the situation inside the ROC is still quite obscure. From talking to people who know Kirill personally, it's not clear quite what he thinks is going on or why he's involved the way he is. Either way. Fiasco.

[jh-newman-opn]

I'm wondering what's the difference between Catholicism and other denominations, I know the main things are the pipe and the virgin Mary actually being respected, but I like to hear from someone whose passionate.

Also it's really funny to think someone going like "She's Jesus adjacent but she had an epidural from god so it's not that big a deal"

(I say godly epidural because how else is childbirth a silent night)

yoooo hello friend thank you for your message :))) assuming this is continuing in some sense from earlier things said whilst reblogging so I'm gonna approach it with that in mind

So there's two good ways of visualising the difference between various flavours of Christianity:

Firstly, as three paradigms, rather than specific Church Groups per se.

Catholicism is a unity-in-truth-variety-in-practice paradigm: we all believe the same things, united under one leader and a centralised way of forming beliefs. How exactly those beliefs are put into practice (eg in different liturgy styles) is more flexible, leading to a range of "rites".

Orthodoxy is a unity-in-practice-variety-in-beliefs paradigm: the liturgy and iconography and expression of the faith is critically important as practical modes of theology (much less written teaching than catholics!), and they have a sort of nebula of hierarchies that have variable relationships with each other and variable theological approaches to a given topic. Important to note that despite the slightly chaotic organisational structure, they have maintained almost exactly the same beliefs as Catholics, but verbalised differently, which leads people to think they're different beliefs (eg. Filioque, Dormition vs Assumption).

Protestantism is a non-unity-total-variety paradigm, wherein beliefs and practice are both determined on a micro-level, leading to a rather volatile structure where schism is common and somewhat expected-- practically speaking the laity get on with things without paying much attention to the schisms, forming what I affectionately call "the Protestant soup".

This paradigm problem broadly boils down to a problem of authority-- when there is a disagreement between two arguments (which may both be reasonably proven from scripture), who decides? and how can you trust the decision? We'd say that the Catholic Church continues to be guided infallibly by the Holy Spirit, just as the Church of the early centuries was guided to correct belief on 1) the trinity 2) the canon of scripture and 3) whether gentile converts should be circumcised. Protestants reject this but imho never came up with a convincing alternative, leading to the chaotic nature of the paradigm as a whole.

Secondly, and this is a biased opinion as someone who converted to Catholicism from a historically Protestant culture, it seems to me useful to consider how Protestant theology (paradigmatically) developed from Catholicism. I know it doesn't necessarily occur to people from Prot-majority countries that Catholicism is actually the default Christianity, and that they're the innovation, but it's a really elucidating realisation. You have to see Protestantism as inherently a reaction to Catholicism, and something that has to define itself in relation to Catholicism.

To summarise: the various strains of the Reformation (Calvinism, Lutheranism, Zwingliism, Anglicanism, etc) are all based off the assumption that Catholicism somehow had "too many" beliefs, that needed to be reduced to reveal a "purer" form of Christianity.

The truth is that while Catholicism seems very maximalist, and like it has a lot of "extra" things (saints, Marian devotion, feast days, confession, bigger bible, fasting practices, monastic charisms, etc etc etc), the truth is that all of these things form a very rich, interlocking system of theology, where every belief is dependent on every other belief. How you understand Mary's role as Theotokos is dependent on a correct understanding of Christ's dual nature, which depends on a rejection of Gnostic dualism, which then gives you a proper sexual ethic and an understanding of the Incarnation, which then links back to the Immaculate Conception, which gives you the Assumption, which explains why you need to go to confession before receiving the Eucharist, etc etc. It sounds a bit overwhelming but when it starts to fall into place you see that every single thing works in this tightly symbiotic ecosystem of doctrine, all of which works to magnify God. The "extra" things are enriching, not distracting.

So when you get the Reformation, and Protestants start subtracting things willy-nilly, the ecosystem starts to fall apart and mutate in strange ways. Protestant groups then separate and keep mutating based on what each one wants to subtract. The Anglican church is a good example of this-- they started by having Catholicism, but subtracting the idea that marriage is an unbreakable covenant (Henry VIII wanted a divorce). This leads to mutation in the understanding of marriage as a sacrament, leading to 2 sacraments rather than the traditional 7, which then nukes confession, holy orders, anointing of the sick, and confirmation. If you don't have holy orders, you lose the theology of the eucharist, which in a lot of Anglican churches is now seen as symbolic (or near enough). if you lose the real presence in the eucharist, your incarnation theology is now buggered. Similarly, as we were discussing in the other reblogs-- Calvinism and Lutheranism both lose the idea of indulgences, when then loses the idea of purgatory, which means you lose a proper understanding of sanctification (theosis), leading to once-saved-always-saved, meaning the Crucifixion, instead of being this great act of Love, is now a legal transaction of salvation, which reconfigures how guilt and contrition work, and which once again buggers your eucharistic theology because the emphasis on it as a one-time event means you've lost the mystical and constant resonance of calvary through all time. All of this then knocks onto how you build churches-- the altar is now no longer front and centre, because the Old Testament sacrifice is not present anymore, so you have a big-ass pulpit and the service is centred around preaching, not around the sacrifice of the Mass. Ironically, though the Reformers aimed to have a more Christ-centric Christianity, the change in how they fundamentally do church services illustrates exactly how you actually end up with a man-centric church that puts Christ off to the side. And that's not even getting into how Luther removed books from the Bible to support his own theology.

I would say that the continuous nature of Catholicism (and Orthodoxy, to a lesser extent) from a) the Judaism of the Old Testament and b) the church of the first few centuries is really very critical. John Henry Newman's Essay on the Development of Doctrine is the seminal work on this (very readable, 100/10 would recommend). The sacramental priesthood is a continuation of the Levitical priesthood, the sacrifice of the mass is the fulfilment of Temple sacrifice (SUPER important in the OT-- the Torah goes on for pages and pages and pages about it), the Pope is the continuation of figures such as Moses and David, who are also Christ-types. I've got a friend converting to Catholicism from Orthodox Judaism and she keeps pointing out to me similarities that I didn't even know existed. On the Early Church-- you'll see a lot of quote-mining from both sides, but the key points that are really indisputable are 1) the idea that the bread and wine literally transform in some mystical way and 2) that the Church is united in an episcopal structure, with an emphasis on Rome as primus inter pares (the first among equals). What exactly this second point entails is why the East and West split-- my view is that the current fiasco in Moscow proves that the Pope is necessary but that's another essay-length post.

Doctrinally of course there's a lot of haggling over specifics eg. the Virgin Mary, soteriology, eucharistic theology, etc etc etc and my impression is that Protestants generally try to justify their beliefs in two ways: 1) Rome is entirely wrong and we're not related to them in any way (really low church baptists, anabaptists, pentecostals, etc) or 2) Rome is wrong but also we believe the same things as Rome and are completely different to stereotypical Protestants (anglicans, lutherans, presbyterians). Both of these approaches IMO demonstrate the truth of Catholicism, because group 1 are just demonstrably so far away from OG christianity that they cannot reasonably argue that they're more authentically Christian than Catholics-- at best these two are equally bad and group 2 seem to implicitly know that Rome is right, because they justify themselves by disavowing anything that isn't ostensibly Catholic and allying themselves with Catholic beliefs as much as possible. The truth is that we can get really bogged down in the specific details of oh Calvin actually said this or maybe Augustine actually meant that, but it doesn't really matter when the overall paradigmatic approach is so far removed from the first 1500 years of Christianity. The idea that you can have multiple churches believing different things and all being equally authentically Christian is a total invention of the Reformation, and quite frankly, a disservice to the lay faithful who didn't ask to be bogged down in all of this anyway.

Finally, to round off this abhorrently long answer to your question (apologies!!!)-- sacramentality and the concrete motion of grace are really important concepts. For Catholics, the motion of God's grace and divine action are really concrete things. Grace comes through the sacraments, which are literally what they say they are. Mary appears sometimes and tells us things. Miracles literally happen. The saints are part of our community and you can talk to them and ask them for things. Their bones are pieces of that which is holy. The action of God is a very real and close part of the practice of the lay Catholic that can be studied and analysed in quite a scientific manner (look up how the Vatican approves miracles, for example!), and which the lay person interacts with in the same way they'd interact with any other part of their life. There's a quote from someone (Eamon Duffy??) that goes something like: for the mediaeval Catholic, Purgatory, Heaven, and Hell were places as real as Canterbury or Dover. Part of the Protestant paradigm involves spiritualising: Christ is not bodily present in the Eucharist, but spiritually, the saints are just any and all Christians, and heaven stays in heaven until you get there yourself. It's partly why Newman argues that this kind of spiritualised belief naturally tends towards atheism-- it's lost the sense of hard reality.

Hope that's at least somewhat helpful-- as I say, you can get bogged down in long lists of where beliefs differ, but I think given the rather broad and variable nature of Protestant beliefs, it's unhelpful to try to distill them down into A List. Similarly, because Catholic beliefs are so interdependent, it's really difficult to make the case for one belief without bringing in other parts of the network, which is why Prot-Cath dialogue often ends up going in circles quoting scripture or the church fathers and nobody wins. Feel free to ask further about anything if you can face another long answer (probably won't be quite as long as this!), and god bless you. I'll say a Hail Mary for you to find whatever it is that you need to find.

[jh-newman-opn]

What are the SSPX? I've been seeing the conversation around them but am unfamiliar with any of their beliefs or anything (tho them being called "modernist" definitely makes me think their heretics ofc)

It's a truth universally acknowledged that at every major council, a group splits off. At Nicaea it was the Arians, at Trent it was the Protestants, at Vatican I it was the Old Catholics, and at Vatican II it was the SSPX.

SSPX stands for Society of St Pius X, and they basically rejected a lot of the ecumenical and liturgical reforms, and then consecrated a bunch of priests and bishops in direct defiance of the Holy See. Lots of excommunications all round, bad time for everyone. Then a group split off from them for not being traddy enough, and they called themselves the SSPV (Society of St Pius V). Not wholly sure what they're doing now, but they're still around. The Palmarians (super weird cult with their own pope) are also an offshoot of this "Lefebvrist" movement (Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre being the founder of the SSPX).

Currently they're in a "canonically irregular" situation, where they officially denounce sedevacantism and call themselves Catholic, but in practice they don't submit to the Pope's authority, they don't accept the Ordinary Form of the Mass, and they have an entirely parallel structure of priests, bishops, and dioceses. Their sacraments are valid, but illicit (mostly-- they can do confession, baptism and marriage). Basically JPII, Benedict XVI, and Francis have made various moves to get them back in by lifting excommunications, changing rules around the EF, and allowing certain sacraments to be celebrated, but they're still firmly one foot out the door and refusing to budge, which for orthodox Catholics is already too many feet.

SSPX apologists will make all sorts of arguments to say that their rebelliousness is justified and that they're not in schism, but the long and the short of it is that a) every heretic group thinks they're in the right and b) the attitude of non-obedience is really spiritually dangerous anyway.

The "modernist" label is probably better explained by the great labeller, @paula-of-christ, but it's basically in reference to the fact that they think the Church ought to conform to their beliefs, rather than conforming their beliefs to the Church's teachings. It doesn't really matter whether your beliefs are uber traddy and your chasubles are really shiny-- if you're out of step with Rome, you are the problem.

[jh-newman-opn]

Asking a theology! 🤭 (Sort of)

What's your take on how Fruits of the Spirit show on everyday-busy-run or you're late-work-work-work life? ✨

hello friend thank you for your theology

I have two main thoughts on this subject in general, which really boils down to the idea that you've got to hold space for your faith if you want to hear God speaking.

the first is that modern life is very loud and very fast, and that neither of these things are conducive to one's relationship with God. Imo this at least partially accounts for people drifting from their faith and the vocations crises. You've got to carve out time for your faith life. There's no such thing as "finding time" or "waiting until you have time", you simply have to decide what your priorities are and make time for them. Mass every Sunday. Morning prayer. Evening prayer. Daily rosary. Weekly holy hour. Yearly retreat. Whatever floats your boat, just make time for that thing. God speaks in silence and so you've got to find time for silence. Daily examen is very good because it makes you stop and reflect on what's gone on during the day, and to prepare for the next day. The other thing to remember is that sometimes squeezing the thing in is better than not doing it at all. I spent last Lent praying all 7 offices every day (more or less successfully), and ended up praying a lot of psalms whilst walking somewhere, or while waiting for someone, or while making a cup of tea, etc etc. Similarly-- 4 decades of the rosary on the bus, crossing yourself before eating a biscuit, saying grace halfway through your meal because you forgot to say it at the beginning, Hail Marys whilst you brush your teeth, etc. The ruts of routine become the grooves of grace etc etc. Practising your faith shouldn't be a thing you do for an hour on Sundays, but the substrate in which you move through the world.

Secondly, finding God in everything that you do is quite important. I was at a lecture by Rowan Williams recently, and he was talking about a saint who correctly identified that everyone needs a "mother superior", ie, someone or something that can always put you back in touch with God. The example given was of daily frustrations, like being stuck in traffic when you're late and it's pissing it down with rain. In that moment, that thing causing you frustration is what can get you your of your own head and put you back in touch with God. Take a moment, and say "thank you, mother superior". In a similar vein, I was also listening to Jen Fulwiler talk about crises of faith on her podcast, and she talks about how the "language" God uses to speak to you might change as your life circumstances change, and that finding multiple "languages" in which you and God might be conversing is quite important over the course of your life.

I think that covers the general context of the question you're asking-- in terms of how the fruits of the spirit specifically manifest and can be better accessed in our 21st century lives:

Love -- love in the Catholic imagination is about self-giving for the good of the other. So St Therese of Lisieux's sacrifice beads might be a good devotion to cultivate this one. Reframing small irritations as opportunities to grow in virtue, like letting someone else have that thing you wanted, or being glad someone else got promoted over you because it benefits them.

Joy -- joy is often misunderstood as being the same things as happiness, but it's not really. Joy is more about a state of being that persists despite external circumstances. I think this is more to do with finding sources of joy (family, friends, community) and holding onto those when things happen that mean we can't be happy. The examen is probably a good way of cultivating this.

Peace -- personally, reaffirming my trust in God and His ineffable plan has been helpful for this one. When things don't go the way I want them to go, I think about the times that God has led me to where I was meant to be by a really baffling route, and I remind myself that He is much better than I am at knowing what's good for me, even if I don't get it at the time. Two prayers I love for this are Newman's prayer God has created me to do Him some definite service, and the line in Psalm 118 that goes "I was punished, I was punished by the Lord, but not doomed to die". It's really about being able to say to yourself, "this isn't ideal and may even be quite horrible, but God has a plan for me and things will be ok".

Patience -- goes with the above: modern life is constantly telling us that various clocks are ticking and that we need to go faster and faster to achieve the things we want to do and that there's always someone younger and faster and brighter and arg it's all too stressful you may as well give up now. God's timing is perfect, and if you trust Him and focus always on moving towards Him, you will be where you need to be when you need to be there. That may mean missing out on opportunities you wanted, or getting to life milestones frustratingly late, but God has a plan and it will be ok. Slower prayer cycles like the rosary, the liturgy of the hours, or the chotki imo are very good for slowing down and reminding yourself that time is a grace.

Kindness -- number one thing you can do here is to pray for other people. PARTICULARLY people you don't like. Light a candle for your shitty ex. Pray for that irritating work colleague. Pray for those who persecute you. Then, do some corporal works of mercy. Volunteer with the Companions of the Order of Malta, or a soup kitchen, or an old people's home or something. Go to Lourdes as a volunteer. Involve yourself in other people's suffering. Fix some problem in your parish. Give money to that homeless person who is definitely going to use it to buy drugs. Better to hurt the wallet than to hurt charity.

Goodness -- goes with all of the above really- the further down the list of fruits of the spirit you get, the more you realise they're all interlinked. Also, being attentive to other people's goodness is a good exercise. Notice when people do small acts of kindness for you, or for others, and ask God to bless that person. When I was at Mass yesterday, there were three girls in the row in front of me and their bloke friend who was clearly new to the whole Catholicism thing, so I thanked God for their efforts to include him, and asked him to bless their friendship and this guy's faith (if any).

Faithfulness -- keep your routines solid, obey the church even when you don't get it, and trust that God is working for our good as He has always worked. There's always a crisis in the Church-- being Catholic means trusting that it will prevail as it has always prevailed. If you fall into sin or laxity, then go to confession, and trust that you've been forgiven.

Gentleness -- controlling your knee-jerk responses is quite important here, I think. Forgive, forgive, forgive. If someone's being snarky, don't snark back. It's particularly tricky imo when people are being quite aggressive about the Church, because it's easy to want to snap back and get heated trying to defend your faith. The truth is that often people who are very angry and aggressive are coming from a place of woundedness, and being gentle and trying genuinely to understand where they're coming from does a lot more good than snapping back. The best examples of this I can think of off the top of my head are the Sidewalk Advocates, whose pro-life work is done on the basis of meeting people where they're at, and showing kindness. This interview from the ERI was a great illustration of the principle.

Self-control -- 90% of self-control in modern life comes from putting the phone down. Delete your twitter, touch grass, go for a walk. The devil lives in your phone and he's some basement-dwelling incel from the other side of the world named Jared. When someone else takes the last slice of cake, be glad that they go to enjoy it. The three evangelical counsels of poverty, chastity, and obedience are to do with your relationships with money, sex, and power, and if you keep in mind that lay people are meant to practice these counsels (to a degree reasonable to their lives) as a means to holiness, then it helps order your relationship with these three things, which are really the main sources of temptation and sin.

I think overall I would just round off by saying that everything is an opportunity to turn to God in prayer. Your train is delayed? Thank you mother superior, I now have time to pray a couple of decades of the rosary. Struggling to conceive? Thank you mother superior, I get more time with my spouse as a couple. Totally infertile? Thank you mother superior, I get to adopt a child who wouldn't otherwise have a home. You're dying, you're broke, and your house just got consumed by a tornado? Things may be shit but I get to rely totally on God now like Our Lady did at the foot of the Cross. Longer post needed about the "blessed are those who mourn principle" in this case, but it's always struck me that the people who have the least problems with the problem of evil are the people who are suffering the most. Jen Fulwiler's conversion story comes to mind again.

Hope that was somewhat helpful-- feel free to ask again if not. Thank you mother superior for letting me enjoy the sound of my own voice again and all that.

[jh-newman-opn]

happy birthday!!

thank you! I am agèd, decrepit, creaking

[jh-newman-opn]

Theology question:

I've heard there's no official teaching on "what happens to people in Purgatory at the Final Judgement?" I checked the Catechism's sections on Purgatory and the Final Judgement, and it doesn't answer this question; however, I heard that there was no official teaching from someone criticising the doctrine of Purgatory. So:

From a Roman Catholic who likes theology, is there an official teaching on what happens to souls in Purgatory at the Final Judgement?

If not, do you have any opinions on this issue, and if so, what are they?

To my knowledge there is no official teaching, and I have no strong opinions either. I imagine they just get purgated a bit quicker? Do the elect at the Final Judgement go through a really quick purgatory? Does purgatory exist in linear time anyway?

Tl;dr -- unclear.

Have you checked the Summa? St Thomas has probably said something about this, as he has about most things.

Second question-- how was this used as a criticism of Purgatory? I'd be interested to know what the underlying query was, because I've not heard this one before.

[jh-newman-opn]

Is the nation of Israel (now) equivalent to the kingdom of israel mentioned in the Bible?

No-- the Church is the new Israel.

Ad Gentes, article 5. : 5. "From the very beginning, the Lord Jesus "called to Himself those whom He wished; and He caused twelve of them to be with Him, and to be sent out preaching (Mark 3:13; cf. Matt. 10:1-42). Thus the Apostles were the first budding - forth of the New Israel, and at the same time the beginning of the sacred hierarchy."

[jh-newman-opn]

You mentioned in your post on Genesis 1-11 that early attempts at the Christ thing foreshadow a lot of failed messiah figures. Well, colour me intrigued! Could you tell me more about them?

yooo yes absolutely.

To clarify the statement quickly: there is one Messiah (Christ), but he is foreshadowed repeatedly in the Old Testament with figures who ostensibly have the potential to be the Jewish Messiah, but aren't. I'm not stating that God attempts to bring the messiah repeatedly and fails.

So if you're not already aware, Catholic theology loves a "type"-- ie, a thing in the NT foreshadowed and explained by a thing in the OT. Eve and the Ark of the Covenant are types of Mary. Israel and Noah's Ark are types of the Church. Etc etc etc. Like cutting a potato into a particular pattern and making as many prints as you can with one dob of paint: as a Dominican friar put it to me: "Jesus is the potato that came down from heaven", and each imprinted picture is a faded, incomplete image of that potato, but critically-- is not the potato itself.

Jesus, being the most important bit of the NT, has an awful lot of typological predecessors-- Adam, Abraham, David, Solomon, Moses, and so on. Figures that foreshadow aspects of Christ's Messianic nature as priest/prophet/king/saviour, but all fail in some way (for example, when Abraham sells his wife into slavery twice, lies, and distrusts God's promise to give him a son), so when Christ comes He comes as the perfect fulfilment of all of these aspects, as well as being the perfect human that Adam could not be, as the only one who never fails, distrusts God, or sins.

Now obviously the conception of the Messiah in Jewish thought takes a while to evolve. The idea that a Saviour is coming is not really present in the earliest days when humanity and Israel are being established (Adam, Abraham), but by the time we get to Moses we're seeing a theme of saviour figures with a special relationship with God. This idea then gets explored as the Jews keep writing, and by the Prophets the tendency is to anticipate a warlike king figure (like David) who will liberate Israel with military force.

I am personally of the opinion that you can read a "type" into most events and figures in the OT-- so Abraham seems to me to also be a type of Mary. Which in itself also prefigures the intertwined nature of Mariology and Christology! Aaaa!! Glory be and all that. But with Christological typology in particular what you're looking for is a person who has some kingly/priestly/prophetic/salvific role, who seems poised to liberate Israel in some sense, but falls short, whether by their sin or merely their own limitations. You can also look at types from the perspective of thinking, how would a Jew at this period expect their Messiah to appear? and then finding a person who fits that expectation. One of the wonderful mysteries of Christ is that he fulfils the typological requirements perfectly, while subverting the expectations of his status. He rides into Jerusalem, as David did, but on a donkey rather than a warhorse. He is born of David's line, but not as a king in a palace, but of a poor working class family in a stable.

Hope that helps! I'm regrettably not a chapter-and-verser, so we're a bit limited on the citations front, but that's the theory behind it.