St. Peter Canisius Apostolate

As I noted in Saturday’s “Diverse Deliberations,” I sadly discovered (or finally accepted) that I can no longer read popular fiction. It makes me want to write it. While reading and writing fiction isn’t a sin, it is something I believe the Lord is asking me to sacrifice. What do I mean by this?

Fr. John Hardon said that all the creatures in our lives can be put into one of four categories: things to be enjoyed, things to be endured, things to be removed, and things to be sacrificed:

Some of these persons, places and things, some of these thoughts and desires are to be enjoyed. We’d better, we’d better identify which of these persons, places and things God wants us to enjoy. And, thank God for providing these enjoyable creatures in our lives. But first, make sure you know what persons, what places, what books, what experiences God wants you to enjoy.

God puts into our lives, hear it, deliberately, this is God, God puts persons, places and things into our lives that He wants us to endure. Father, are you saying there are persons in our lives placed there by God for us to endure? Yes! And we’d better know which creatures God wants us to endure. After today’s sessions, you wives, please don’t go back to your husbands and tell them, “I learned something I never knew before. God put you into my life, that by enduring you, I might reach my heavenly destiny.”

There are creatures in our lives that God wants us to get rid of, remove. Why? Oh, they may be very pleasant, but they are the occasions of sin. Find out what are these creatures? What thoughts, what desires, what reading, what radio and television programs are occasions of sin and remove, and the word is remove, these creatures from your life.

And finally, what creatures does God want me, not to remove because they are occasions of sin, but that God wants me to sacrifice, to give up. Not because I have to, but because out of love for God, I surrender, give up, in other words, sacrifice.

What I’ve learned is that to sacrifice a good requires, well, sacrifice. It’s not easy to sacrifice something we want to keep. If the sacrifice were easy, we’d have to wonder about the it’s quality. True sacrifice hurts. That’s what makes it so difficult.

Note: This is a repost from July 31, 2008.

A few years ago I began wondering what the Church’s position was on Friday abstinence outside of Lent. I searched, but I couldn’t find a clear answer; but gradually I came across different texts and articles that helped clarify what the Church of us regarding Friday abstinence. What I’d like to do in this post is simple cite two of the best texts I’ve read on the subject with the hope that this post might be a “one-stop” post for some who, like me a few years back, was looking for clear guidance on Friday penance.

This first text will deal with what exactly is the Church’s current teaching on Friday abstinence. It’s from an article by the late Fr. John Hardon — “The Practice of Penance”:

One aspect of the practice of penance has to do with the proper observance of Fridays. I am afraid there is some misunderstanding on the subject. In 1966 when Pope Paul VI issued his Constitution on Penance, he did not change the essential meaning of Friday as an obligatory, yes, obligatory day of penance to be observed in union with the passion of the Savior. Fridays were, and they remain, mandatory days of penance. A Catholic has no option as to whether he will do penance on every Friday. This is a duty specified by the Church. The only option is the kind of penance one performs.

At the risk of being technical about this important matter, let me explain. Each member of the Church should be united with his fellow Christians in offering reparation to God for sins. We can choose to do penance on any day and in any way that appeals to us. A work of penance is always pleasing to God. To do penance is a divine law. But besides the divine law, there is an ecclesiastical precept, a law of the Church to practice penance on certain days and in the manner the Church requires. What was formerly given as the second precept of the Church could now be modified to read, “to fast and abstain, or do some act of penance approved by the Church, on the day commanded.” The question may be asked, “In place of abstinence on Friday other forms of penance are mentioned by the Church. Are these of obligation or merely a matter of counsel?” The answer to this question, is that a person who avails himself of the choice of eating meat on Friday is not merely advised to undertake some other form of penance; he is bound to do so.

Friday penance, therefore, is not a matter of mere counsel, but of actual precept. In plain language, a Catholic commits sin if he or she allows a Friday to pass without an act of penance.

The final sentence of this excerpt makes the Church’s teaching crystal clear: “a Catholic commits sin if he or she allows a Friday to pass without an act of penance.”

If the first passage explained the Church’s teaching, this second passage will give us the how-to’s of keeping Friday a day of penance. It’s from Fr. Fernandez’s In Conversation with God, Volume 3, p. 557:

The Church reminds us frequently of the need for mortification. If any man would come after me…. In particular she has set aside one day in the week, Friday, as a day on which we are to consider the need and efficacy of denying ourselves and practicing some special mortification: abstaining from flesh meat, or doing something we find rather difficult (like finishing our work more perfectly or making life more pleasant for others), or performing some pious act: doing some spiritual reading, saying the Rosary, paying a visit to the Blessed Sacrament or doing the Stations of the Cross. We might also perform one of the corporal works of mercy: visiting the sick, spending some time with a person in need, or giving alms. However, we ought not to be content with just a weekly penitential act as a reminder of our Lord who suffered and died for us, and taught us the value of sacrifice. Each day God expects us to deny ourselves in little ways, in things which will enliven our soul and make our apostolate fruitful.

This passage is little more than an elaboration of what we find in the Code of Canon Law. Canon 1249 states:

The divine law binds all the Christian faithful to do penance each in his or her own way. In order for all to be united among themselves by some common observance of penance, however, penitential days are prescribed on which the Christian faithful devote themselves in a special way to prayer, perform works of piety and charity, and deny themselves by fulfilling their own obligations more faithfully and especially by observing fast and abstinence….

By way of summary, we can say this: First, Catholics are obliged to engage in penance every Friday of the year in commemoration of Our Lord Jesus’ sacrifice, and second, on Fridays outside of Lent we are free to choose the act of penance we wish to perform.

From In Conversation with God: Volume One: Advent and Christmastide, First Sunday of Advent:

“At that time, Jesus said to His disciples: Take heed, watch and pray; for you do not know when the time will come … Watch, therefore — for you do not know when the master of the house will come, in the evening or at midnight, or at cockcrow, or in the morning — lest he come suddenly and find you asleep. And what I say to you I say to all: Watch!” (Mark 3.33-37)

To maintain this state of alertness we need to struggle, for we all have a tendency to live with our eyes fixed on the things of the earth. Especially during this time of Advent let us not forget that our hearts are darkened by gluttony and drunkenness and the cares of this life, and so loose sight of the supernatural dimension which every action of ours should have as its milieu. St. Paul compares this guard over ourselves to that of “the well-armed soldier who does not allow himself to be taken by surprise.” This adversary tries to wreak havoc in whatever way he can; and since he does not devise his tactics without attention to detail, neither should we.

We will remain at the ready if we are attentive to our personal prayer, which enables us to avoid lukewarmness and the dwindling and cooling of our desires for sanctity. We will be constantly on the alert if we do not become slipshod about those little mortifications which keep us awake to the things of God. We will remain attentive through a refined examination of conscience, which makes us look to those points at which, almost without noticing it, we are departing from our path.

We normally don’t think of Advent as a penitential season. In fact, I must confess that in past years Advent for me has been little more than a countdown to Christmas.  This year, however, I’m making a point to be more serious about entering into the spirituality of the season itself — to live it as a time of anticipation and preparation. I found that the above passage not only provides the rationale for such an attitude (we are tempted by many things during this time of year, and therefore we must pay attention to the details of our spiritual life), but at it also offers some solid points on how to live this season (an attentiveness to prayer, mortification, and our examination of conscience).

If there’s any point in the liturgical season during which the Church calls us to an attitude that is at odds with our culture, it is Advent. Society, in general, is focused on slowing down for the holidays and putting off things until next year, whereas the Church calls us to be more attentive to the basics of the spiritual life. And during a time in which we are to make lists of “all the things we want,” part of our meditation is on a family who had so little that their first and only child had to be born in a cave, swaddled in rags, and placed in a trough for a bed.

Though I’m not sure how I’d change my family’s celebration of Christmas — with a wife and kids, not to mention grandparents and two aunts, I can’t just call it off — but I am thankful for feeling ill over how far removed our Western culture in general and my own circumstances in particular are from the spirit of Advent. Perhaps that’s how it should be.

1. The What and Why of Mortification by Fr. John Hardon. Short, sound, and basic. A great piece for anyone who feels called to enter the life of mortification, but is unsure what exactly to do. An example:

We can practice mortification by giving up some delicacy in food or drink or some pleasure that we could legitimately have. But we also practice mortification every time we patiently accept whatever trial or pain He sends us and every time we faithfully carry out whatever His mysterious providence commands of us. It is this second kind of mortification that Jesus had in mind when He told us that “anyone who loses his life for My sake, will find it” (Matthew 16:25).

2. Seeking Sanctification Through the Practice of Mortification by Fr. Roger J. Scheckel. A longer and far more detailed essay on the what and why of mortification. It seeks to show that mortificaiton is necessary if you want to be a saint. Necessary, yet not exactly fun, reading. An example:

The Christian must continually seek to crucify and put to death that dimension of our self that remains under the influence of the fallen state of the First Adam into which we are conceived and born. After our baptism, the imputed sin of our First Parents is washed from our life; however, a residue or stain of the Original Sin remains with us, what is known as concupiscence. The effects of this residue or stain are experienced primarily in our will, tending in the direction of a love of self rather than a love of God. This is what is meant by a “disordered will.” This disorder can be expressed through our external senses as well as the operations of our soul, e.g., the imagination, memory and intellect. Mortification seeks to address these manifestations of the “disordered will.”

Sacred Tradition expressed through the lives of the saints provides innumerable accounts of the necessity and importance of the practice of mortification. I would direct you to the lives of the saints listed below, although there are many more that could be included as well: Ss. Jerome, Francis of Assisi, Thomas More, Ignatius of Loyola, Catherine of Sienna, Teresa of Avila, John Mary Vianney, Therese of the Child Jesus, Padre Pio of Pietrelcina, Jose Maria Escriva, and also Blesseds Junipero Serra, Matt Talbot, and Mother Teresa.