The Place of the Apocalypse

Last year came and went without any recognized appearances of Our Lady of Fatima to either encourage or discourage the world, something I found disappointing but not surprising. The wild-eyed events of St. John’s Apocalypse do not seem to be transpiring, but Christians all over America still look for the Second Coming around every military action, every papal inscrutability, and every presidential tweet.

The Apocalypse has not received a great deal of respect in the history of the Church. The early Fathers hotly debated its authenticity and thus its canonicity. It rarely appears in liturgical texts, Western or Eastern. (The Sanctus is originally from the prophecy of Isaias.) Even the old Catholic Encyclopedia deconstructs it into its component parts with no veneration shown to its inspired character. Scott Hahn’s more recent exposition of the book as a mirror of the liturgy—and the Novus Ordo, at that—has not especially increased its prestige.

The Jesus that appears in the Apocalypse is not entirely recognizable as the Jesus of the Gospels, at least at first glance. And different indeed is this picture of Christ from the effeminate Jesus of women mystics like Maria Faustina Kowalska and Julian of Norwich. He is completely glorified: surrounded by seraphic hosts, simultaneously grotesque and beautiful, clothed in immense power, and arrayed in mind-breaking symbols. Very far is the King of Kings trodding the winepress of his Father’s wrath from the mild Infant of Bethlehem.

St. John’s authorship has been questioned by many, some finding a middle ground by arguing that the “Seer” of the Apocalypse is the fifth or sixth “John” or “Johaninne community” to write Scripture. The difficulty of its authorship is increased by uncertainty about the biographies of the Apostles, many versions containing some odd chronologies if not outright impossibilities. The author names himself John but does not claim apostolic authority. Still, if this John was the brother of James, the first-martyred of the Apostles, it would add a certain poignancy to the vision of the souls of those slain for God under the celestial altar.

The visions recorded in the book are alternately exalting and incomprehensible. There appears to be little chronological coherence, and most exegetes posit that the same period of time is simply repeated with different emphases. The moral judgments upon the seven churches in the early chapters are the most coherent parts of the book, but even those tend to be allegorized into the Ages of the Church.

The citizens both of Heaven and Hell are monstrous. The human events on Earth too are couched in bestial and Babylonian imagery. Symbols are multi-layered and opaque. Some passages that seem straightforward, like that of the 1000 years, led to serious doctrinal error when read plainly.

Yet, the Apocalypse records some of the kindest words of comfort in all of Holy Writ. Promises of God’s good will toward his people abound, and the final chapters are the most tangible representations of eternal beatitude ever inspired. The book also shows the most terrible punishments against the wicked, and is perhaps not unlikely to inflame an uncharitable glee in certain minds.

Is this book something best left unread by the unready, as the ancient Jews were said to forbid younger men from reading the Canticle of Canticles? Who can say? Catholic theologians tend to gravitate towards books of clearer doctrine and surer usefulness. It is not without its difficulties, and its rewards are ambiguous. But if this book is dangerous, let us not pretend that the rest of Scripture is safe and cannot be twisted by heretical graspers. Always keep in mind that the best defense against errant readings is a strong orthodox reading. How can we develop that if we do not study the book at all?

I'm Going to Die

As November, a time for prayers for the faithful departed, draws to a close and Advent, a time for consideration of the Second Coming, draws nigh, it benefits us to think more carefully about our own lives, our use of time, and how the good Lord will judge us when our number is called and we cry ne me perdas illa die.

I had the unusual experience of walking through a cemetery near one of my normal haunts, Cafe Pretensé. I had not been in a cemetery in years. The ones I knew in my home area in Connecticut were almost all religious, affixed either to old Congregationalist churches or explicitly Catholic ones. The passing of years imbued the headstones with a mossy dignity befitting of an angel or a crucifix, whatever religious iconography had been selected as a memorial for the departed, so his loved ones could remember him until they finally stopped making their once-a-year visits and all remembrance of that individual had passed to ashes. This graveyard did not evoke the same ethos. Headstones, some looking quite expensive, reminded me of just how much effort people expend on creating meaning in their lives while ignoring the greater meaning.

At least a third of the graves in this cemetery bore Freemasonic imagery, the square and the compass. Others had more entertaining icons of life: guitars, musical notes, a Bible; one entire headstone was a comically proportioned fish flapping about in a sea of stone. These images are not necessarily who these people were, but who they tried to be and who they wanted to be remembered as being.

We are children of God, made in His image and His likeness, possessing a mind and a will, but, like the lower animals, a body as well. Through Adam we are fallen and flawed. Nothing will raise us from that state except the waters of Baptism and the embracing love of Christ. The state of the man outside the Church is not that of Calvinistic wretchedness. Privately I would describe the average man of irreligion to be an unfulfilled person. Many of material success are content, many are not. None, in my experience, are ever very satisfied, even those who get their proverbial kicks by dominating the politics and associations of a work environment. In the lower realms of the socio-economic ladder, fissiparous activities—strange vacations, poor music, substances—perform the same function. Very few of the self-described "spiritual" people of today spend time meditating on the source of their displeasure, merely assuming that it originates in an unmet goal rather than an unmet person, the Life Bestower.

I have always harbored a mild sympathy, but never an affinity, for romantics. Fr Chadwick spends considerable time promoting Romanticism, although I suspect his conception of it and my own differ. The Romantics were soul-searchers who felt that the old social trappings of art and religion had failed them, and who could not accept the modern paradigm of business and material success. Some of them seemingly yearned for a simpler, more adventurous past (considerable American literature in this mode) while others proactively repelled rationalism, all the while too influenced by modernity to embrace the mysticism of the Christian age. There were Christian Romantics; Newman may have been one of them, at least until he went through disillusionment and accepted the reality of the Church. Romanticism was not an explicitly Christian movement, but it may have been the last trend in the West that promoted implicitly Christian ideas about nature, art, literature, morality, and friendship. They were the last genuine soul-searchers before the middle class was born and dissuaded the lost sheep from searching for their Shepherd.

Admirable, but myopic?

I recently finished Hemingway's first bestseller, A Farewell to Arms. At some level I think Hemingway, despite his propensity to philander, was a genuine lost soul who, like those resting in the graveyard down the road from Cafe Pretensé, pursued happiness when he should have pursued satisfaction. Hemingway was involved in both World Wars, in no small part due to boredom, he lived in pre-Castro Cuba where he enjoyed big fishing, and he loved bull fighting. War, taunting raging animals, and oceanic hunting bring one to the point of death where one shivers with life. Had he been born a century earlier and on the other side of the Atlantic, Ernest Hemingway may well have been a Romantic.

The fact is that I am going to die. No, I am not in immediate danger of death, but I will, at some point, be just as dead as those in the cemetery near Cafe Pretensé. Relatives will dote flowers on my grave for a year after my death. Then it will be once a year. The following generation will forget me and any strange sculpture on my headstone. I will be quite dead and quite in the ground. And none of it will matter. At the moment of my death I will stand before the "awesome judgment seat of Christ" and have to answer to the two greatest commandments. Did I love the Lord God with my whole heart and whole soul? And did I love my neighbor as myself? I may turn into a reputable bull fighter, guitarist, or fisherman, but none of it will save me on the last day, nor will it give me satisfaction in this life, only moments of happiness.

When Newman came into the Church he was unwelcomed by the Ultramontanists and never as happy as he was in his naive days as an Anglican, when everything ancient was new. In the Church Newman did find the continuance of the "organ and oracle.... of a supernatural doctrine." He was home. He found happiness with the Oratory and with the Church he found the path to eternal life in the One he sought since childhood.

This reflection may all be for naught. My last visit to a night club convinced me that there are still some lost souls in the world, but the great majority have been conditioned to dissolution, [un-]comfortably numb to greater realities. Eventually all of us will die and move to what comes next. Happiness on earth derives from things on earth. Satisfaction on earth descends from heaven.

Petrus Romanus: Will the Next Pope Be the Last?

According to the supposed Prophecy of St Malachy
the next and last Pope will, like St Peter, "feed his sheep."
source: 16th century icon of Peter from Mt. Athos

As of late there has been a lot of interest in a prophecy that supposedly predicts the next Pope will be, in either name or deed, Petrus Romanus, Peter the Roman, the last Pope of Rome before the end of the world. As this sort of thing has dynamic potential for the wanton speculation and fear, I will simply post here my response to an inquiry sent by e-mail.

The inquirer asks:

On a slight tangent, my [someone I know] is now convinced the world is going to end or some mumbo jumble like it, since the resignation of a pope is written in some prophecy by some guy (clearly I've not been paying attention). All I heard was Petrus Romanus (which means Peter the Roman?) and something something something...

My response:

12th century Irish bishop, St Malachy
source: wikipedia

You're thinking of the "Prophecy of Popes," by St Malachy, Archbishop of Armagh. These prophecies were actually published in the 16th century, although the saint lived in the 12th, making their historicity somewhat dubious, but not impossible. According to this supposed prophecy Benedict XVI is the penultimate Pope of Rome before the end of the world as we know it. The supposed prophecy gives names or titles which are supposed to correspond to attributes of the then-Pope. For instance the charismatic, intelligent, brilliant, and mystic Pope Pius XII would correspond to "Pastor Angelicus" ("Angel-like Pastor"), John XXIII—who was patriarch of Venice before becoming Pope—would be "Pastor et nauta" ("Pastor and sailor") etc. Benedict XVI's place corresponds to "Gloria Olivae", Glory of the Olive, a reference to the Olivetan Order (Benedict XVI took his name after the monk St Benedict, an Olivetan, and his Papal motto). The next Pope would be Petrus Romanus (Peter the Roman), meaning he would be a fiercely Roman Pope in fighting and uprooting anti-Catholic evils, but eventually meet the last great persecution of the Roman Church, through which he would guide the Church:

" In persecutione extrema Sanctae Romanae Ecclesiae sedebit.  Petrus Romanus, qui pascet oves in multis tribulationibus: quibus transactis civitas septicollis dirvetur, & Iudex tremedus iudicabit populum suum. Finis"

"He will sit [meaning "reign"] during the final persecution of the Holy Roman Church. Peter the Roman, who will feed his sheep through many tribulation, and when these thing are finished the Seven hills [in the City of Rome] will be destroyed and the Tremendous Judge will judge His people. The end."

Wikipedia actually has an accurate page on this topic. It's been getting a lot of traction lately.

Sounds like great stuff. I would not worry about this sort of this too much, though. Our Lord Jesus said "But of that day and hour no one knoweth, not the angels of heaven, but the Father alone." Similarly, all we can really do is make sure we are growing in holiness and in good standing with God. Natural death is a greater possibility than the Apocalypse.