Flos Carmeli

Perhaps Two People Will Care

Perhaps Two People Will Care

Last night I was listening to a transcription of Scarlatti's Harpsichord music played on piano and I realized that as pleasant and appropriate as piano is for some things, we have lost a great deal with the fading popularity of the Harpsichord. So too with my other two favorite instruments--the lute and the mandolin. While the guitar is very nice, listening to Julian Bream playing guitar transcriptions of the Bach Lute Concertos was some hollow and empty. (I'm sure listening to a Lute transcription of the Aranjuez Concerti for Guitar, or parts of the Villa-Lobos Bachianas Brasilieras would be jolting). I've decided that in addition to drone instruments, I really like the "plucked" instrument sound. There's just about nothing so fine as the Vivaldi Concerti for Mandolin.

Also, I was listening once again to my Curved Air collection (a reference I expect about three people in the world to know) and wondered was there anything so fine, unusual, and fascinating as either "Vivaldi with Cannons" or "Ultra Vivaldi?"

From A Plumbline in the

From A Plumbline in the Wind to the Blessed John Soreth

Found this blog and from it a series of papers of later medieval early Renaissance (depending on the part of Europe you were in) Catholicism and particularly noted the essay on the Blessed John Soreth. If you visit the blogmeister, be sure to stop by his web-page as well.

Prayers Please For Bill White's

Prayers Please

For Bill White's new-born daughter who is back in medical care.

A Dylan Report I spoke

A Dylan Report

I spoke with Dylan last night and he is in spirits about as good as circumstances allow. He is optimistic that his stay will be shorter than predicted yesterday, but as with all such things there is no certainty. He was encouraged by the prayer support he has been receiving, and amused by the tales of blogdom--particularly my recounting of the current Limboing contest presented courtesy of Mr. da Fiesole at Disputations and other events in blogdom. If you have short messages of encouragement or something you would like to say--please feel free to comment or to send me an e-mail and I will see to it that Dylan gets the message. Gifts of poetry and prayers most welcome. And my thanks to everyone who shares in the support of one of St. Blogs own. Thank you, thank you, thank you!!

Dylan Update Courtesy of his

Dylan Update

Courtesy of his friend Heather:

On behalf of Dylan, let me extend heartfelt thanks to all of you who have been supporting him through this difficult time. For those of you who do not yet know, Dylan is in the hospital, and will probably be there for some time. I expect that he may not be leaving the hospital for at least a few months -- possibly as long as 6 months, depending on how things go.

Heather has a limited capacity to check e-mail, so while she is appreciative of all things sent for Dylan's benefit, she does ask that we try to limit our e-mail communication as it is entirely possible that e-mail will begin bouncing. I suspect that I will be writing and talking to Dylan from time to time as will a few of the rest of us. If there is something particular you would like me to convey, please let me know--I will be happy to do so. In the meantime, he has my assurances that we all think of him and pray for him regularly. Thanks to all who support Dylan in prayer.

PRAYER REMINDER: DYLAN NEEDS OUR

PRAYER REMINDER: DYLAN NEEDS OUR CONSTANT SUPPORT

Excerpt from a Book I

Excerpt from a Book I need to Obtain

A book reviewed by Fr. Redemptus Valabek O.Carm. in Carmel in the World attracted my attention.

from When I Cannot Pray Fr. Rudolf D'Souza

Prayer, therefore, is an inward, inner, general, essential, radical, permanent, constant, continuous, habitual and prolonged attitude. Thus, prayer eventually becomes identical with the essential attitude of our being in front of God and neighbour, an habitual attitude of reverent worship of the divine truth, a conitnuous state of being, a constant attitude by which we walk with God and live in Him and with others.

A Finitude of Annoyance--Perhaps Worth

A Finitude of Annoyance--Perhaps Worth It

Republication of one's Archives allows direct linking to work at least for a while. I've noted that republication may be necessary on a frequent basis, but I have yet to determine how frequent. I don't know if it is daily or weekly or what. However, I will endeavor to remember to republish the archive for the week a couple of times to try to keep the direct linkages working. What a pain! If this is Google's "improvement" to the blogging system, we would all do better without it.

One Darkest Night

The June/July Issue of First Things has a new translation of St.John of the Cross's most famous poem--here called "One Darkest Night." While the translation is in some ways a version that gives a far finer sense of the poetry of St. John than most previous translations, it has some minor flaws. The original Spanish is noted below for context. The majority of this critique will focus on the first stanza. (But this brief comment gives me the excuse to post the entire thing).

La noche oscura
St. John of the Cross

Canciones del alma que se goza de haber llegado al
alto estado de la perfección, que es la unión con Dios,
por el camino de la negación espiritual.

En una noche oscura,
con ansias en amores inflamada,
(¡oh dichosa ventura!)
salí sin ser notada,
estando ya mi casa sosegada.

A oscuras y segura,
por la secreta escala disfrazada,
(¡oh dichosa ventura!)
a oscuras y en celada,
estando ya mi casa sosegada.

En la noche dichosa,
en secreto, que nadie me veía,
ni yo miraba cosa,
sin otra luz ni guía
sino la que en el corazón ardía.

Aquésta me guïaba
más cierta que la luz del mediodía,
adonde me esperaba
quien yo bien me sabía,
en parte donde nadie parecía.

¡Oh noche que me guiaste!,
¡oh noche amable más que el alborada!,
¡oh noche que juntaste
amado con amada,
amada en el amado transformada!

En mi pecho florido,
que entero para él solo se guardaba,
allí quedó dormido,
y yo le regalaba,
y el ventalle de cedros aire daba.

El aire de la almena,
cuando yo sus cabellos esparcía,
con su mano serena
en mi cuello hería,
y todos mis sentidos suspendía.

Quedéme y olvidéme,
el rostro recliné sobre el amado,
cesó todo, y dejéme,
dejando mi cuidado
entre las azucenas olvidado.

First, a quibble--the translation does not include the famous header that is commonly called the "argument" of the poem. This is a standard literary device present in the poems of Milton and a great many others and it assists the reader in analyzing what follows. For this poem the header reads (in Kiernan Kavanaugh's and Otilio Rodriguez's translation):

Songs of the soul that rejoices in having reached the high state of perfection, which is union with God, by the path of spiritual negation.

The header tells us two things--that there is more than one song present here and the songs are about union with God. Now Kavanaugh and Rodriguez number the stanzas, as do other translations and manuscripts of the original. This tends to give the impression that each stanza is a song unto itself, which I suppose is one possibility--rather like a leider cycle. I tend to read it somewhat differently--I see two songs here that overlap at the fifth stanza. There appears to be a change of poetic direction so that stanza five ends the first song and gives rise to the second. At least the poem is intelligible read in that way. The author of the new translation has chosen to make the translation a single song--which, in fact is not antithetical to the original poetic intent despite the header.

Let's look briefly at a couple of more serious problems with the new translation. For some reason both the title and the first line of the first stanza are rendered "One darkest night." Literally the title is "The Dark Night" and the first line of stanza one is "On a dark night." There are two problems with this translation, one minor the other major. The minor problem is the disservice done to the English language. Darkest is a superlative. There can only be one such. Thus to say "One darkest night," has the flavor of redundancy and absurdity. Admittedly a small flaw, but a small flaw that has much more profound implications.

The implications come from the commentary on the poem. In The Ascent of Mount Carmel St. John of the Cross claims to be spelling out his theory of prayer and union with God in the form of a commentary on this poem. In fact the work comments only on the first two stanzas and then abandons the original structure. However, in commenting on those two John makes the important division between the active night of the senses and the active night of the spirit. Of this second, which he says was intended by the second stanza, he says that it is the darkest night of three--sense, spirit, and God. He likens the first to night with moonlight and starlight, the second to night without moon or any light at all, and the third to night beginning to be pierced by daylight. Thus, to say of the first stanza "One darkest night" gets around the use of the poem in The Ascent of Mount Carmel. I suppose this is only troublesome if the translation is used in conjunction with its commentary--nevertheless it is a flaw that would need to be remedied in order to make the poem useful for the commentary.

Now that I've quibbled it to death, I must say that the poem is refreshing. Let me quote the first full stanza to give you a sense of the rhythm and the beauty of the translation/paraphrase:

from "One Darkest Night" translated by Rhina P. Espaillat

One darkest night I went,
aflame with love's devouring eager burning--
O fortunate event!--
no witnesses discerning,
the house now still from which my steps were turning.

Now one could fault the choice of moving the action of the poem to the first line, but I see no real problem poetically with the choice--it is not literal, but it allows the poet to use the swinging rhythm caused by the gerunds in lines 2, 4, and 5. As you might well imagine, in Spanish nearly every line has a rhyme or a half-rhyme or at least an echoic phrasing. This translation very nicely captures the essence of that. I have a little problem with "no witnesses discerning" because of the connotative load of the word discern, but it is a choice I can live with for the sake of the overall effect.

In fact, despite my many quibbles here, I really like the translation and recommend it to everyone's attention. If you get First Things turn to page six and begin reading. Quiz in one week.

As Though You Needed to

As Though You Needed to See This

My F Score--Got in just over the line this time. Last time I was right on the border:

Your F Score is: 3.066666666666667

You are disciplined but tolerant; a true American.

However, please note, last time I scored a 3. Where then would I be on the scale. The little tag line didn't say because the owner confused it with fuzzy math:

2 to 3: A liberal airhead.

3 to 4.5: Within normal limits; an appropriate score for an American. (The overall average score for groups tested in the original study is listed in the 1950 publication as 3.84, with men averaging somewhat higher and women somewhat lower.)

Very, very sloppy to have such an ill-defined border. Obviously what must be meant is either :

2 up to and including 3

or

2 up to but excluding 3.

Or, more precisely:

[2, 3] or [2, 3).

Really, if we're going to rate facism, shouldn't we a trifle more disciplined about it?

Because I Am in Need

Because I Am in Need of Diversion

From Kathy the Carmelite's blog most recently, though I may have seen this in the past.

You're a pegasus. You're very calm and loving.
Something about you makes others want to get
close to you, whether or not you feel the same
way about them. You don't bond to others
easily, but when you do it's long-lasting. Your
alignment is *good*, but not so much that you
can't have fun.


What mythical beast are you?
brought to you by Quizilla

A Nontheological "Argument" for Why

A Nontheological "Argument" for Why We May Hope "That All Will Be Saved."

A recent article by Cardinal Avery Dulles has many asking "What is the population of Hell?" I am not a student of theology as such. Such understanding as I do have is remarkably crude and based on scattered reading and reflection, so I cannot pretend to offer anything that would remotely approximate a logical argument--only a series of impressions. I am certain that where these go astray, I can count upon the good members of blogdom to correct them.

The question boils down to whether theologians like Hans Urs von Balthasar and writers like Richard John Neuhaus are soft-hearted, soft-headed, or both. Many complain that modern theology tends to "soften up" God. And I wonder whether that is not also a legitimate development in our understanding of God. Christianity is a religion entering its "teen years" in many ways--perhaps it's a bit more like teens entering their twenties--but our understandings, mysteriously, are still forming. As one matures, one's notion of one's parents matures. When we are young we naturally love them, but they are a little frightening. They seem arbitrary and their rules are mysterious and ever in flux. As we mature into the teen years, they are even more arbitrary and deliberately designed to reduce our freedom and our ability to be ourselves. The twenties allow us to see parents in something approximating reality and realize that all of those actions were not so arbitrary as we would have it. Only after we have our own children do we begin to truly understand what our parents were about.

So it seems with religion. Early on our vision of God was of the Great Just Judge and Father. We love our Father, but we are frightened of the Judge that He is. One slip and we could be plunged into exile into Hell forever. Yes, we could repent and get another chance, but still and all, we constantly walk the precipice of his tolerance. And one could certainly support this view from scripture and from the words of Jesus. However, our human hearts tell us that this cannot be the truth. In our own parents, who are imperfect, justice does not trump love and compassion. They may be combined--but it is a rare parent who will permanently exile his or her child. It may become necessary for one reason or another and may happen--but it seems more likely to be a rare event. To use the tautology Jesus so aptly put--"If we who are corrupt and imperfect know how to do good things, how much more Our Father in Heaven does so."

Over time, we have become more aware of God's loving presence. It was always taught by the great saints and always offered to the church at large. However, the impression one gets of the Church through time is that it was regarded not so much as a loving steward of all that was good in faith, but as a sometimes quite strict teacher whose main interest was keeping everyone to the straight and narrow. The Church was a church of laws and rules and regulations, and mysterious, sometimes meaningless restrictions. In medieval times it was common church practice, if not church teaching to observe a relatively strict fast and abstinence during Lent, such abstinence also included marital relations and other odds and ends depending upon the local church officials.

The time of the reformation might be more correctly regarded as the beginning of the rebellious teens, in which the imperfections of the parent became glaringly obvious (the parent, in this case being the Church) and the only way to achieve any sort of autonomy was rebellion. Now, in some sense this was probably true. One cannot argue with the justice of many of the theses hammered onto the door of Wittenburg Cathedral--there were serious problems and injustices in the Church that needed to be addressed. Whether the reformation was the way to address them or not is speculative--it happened and its errors and progeny live with us today. But it does represent the maturing of faith through rebellion and reexamination.

Modern theology may be a further maturing of the Church. Yes, there may be an overemphasis in some quarters on the loving nature of God. But this may be a reaction to the near exclusion of such a nature in much that had come before. The real question comes down to the understanding one has of God. In some representations God seems more like an infinitely fickle prima donna than a loving parent. One wrong word, one wrong action, and you're out of grace--forget it buddy, you need not apply, etc. Obviously, that cannot be the case. Biblical revelation does not permit a view of God as capricious or touchy, He may be a just judge or a loving Father, but hardly finicky.

One returns to the human view--what would it take to alienate us from our own children. Surely not one ill-considered word or action. We might be miffed, but we aren't going to disown a child over that. Even a continued pattern of rebellion will try our patience and our willingness to endure, but it is unlikely to make us not love our child. To truly attain exile, the child must willfully choose it and continue in a pattern of deliberately alienating activity. Most children do not. Most return and apologize or make amends without necessarily ever admitting what was done was wrong. So too, it would seem with God. One wrong move and you're out isn't plausible. Neither is a lifetime of wrongs moves properly repented of--God is infinitely patient.

So it would seem to me that while there are some human beings strong enough to consistently insist upon their own way and to deny the loving nature of God, these would be relatively few and far between. Most of us do really stupid things and then repent even as we try to justify them. We know they are wrong and yet we cannot admit to being wrong so much of the time.

Does this say that we may hope that all will be saved? No--not really, that hope exists in addition to the argument here. All that I contend is that the ordinary nature of a human being is to return to love, and make some attempt to repair the breach. Moreover, we have Jesus' parable of the workers--those in the morning, those at noon, and those late in the evening--which seems to promise that at whatever time we come to our sense, God is there to receive us.

Two great thinkers have come to the conclusion that this hope is reasonable and valid and from what I know and understand of God, I choose this camp. Others rely upon somewhat darker scriptures that seem to promise damnation for many. But sometimes I wonder whether it isn't damnation, but an Earthly purgatory that is promised. Many point to the near certainty that Judas may be in Hell, because Jesus points out that it would be better for him had he never been born, and this could only point to damnation. But I would say that while that is possible, Jesus was also very aware of Earthly life, its shortcomings and disasters. And truly, to have lived the way Judas did in the short term after the death of Jesus was to live a hell on Earth--he could well have wished never to have been born. When Jesus says that narrow is the way and straight is the gate that leads to salvation, but the path to destruction is wide, it does not necessarily mean that everyone cannot enter by the straight gate--they must merely wander through the land of ruin for a while before they take their place in line. A narrow gate does not deny admission, but it does mean one must get into line eventually--some earlier, some later. There are other passages that suggest that others may not be present with God, and they cannot be so easily reasoned away. But was Jesus speaking of what was fact or what was potentiality? Many point to the visions of Hell at Fatima as support for the view of many entering Hell. But private revelation is not binding on the church, and who can interpret such visions clearly? I don't know what they mean, but perhaps they are along the lines of the vision in the Revelation of John--what exactly is the beast with seven heads and ten crowns?

The point is merely that while God is just, He is also loving. Balancing the two is very tricky, and often in the past it would seem that the predominant emphasis has been on His justice. And I suppose if you want to frighten "iffy" Christians into heaven, an emphasis on judgment would be salutary. For even if God is all-loving, one should not be presumptuous. One needs to return love for love, and attempt to love as one is loved. In this lies our hope that all may be saved. Humans gravitate toward love--we desire love and we are moved by love. We sometimes have a very unclear view of what constitutes love--but nevertheless, much of our lives is spent trying to define it, find it, live it and keep it.

Okay, so this hasn't turned out to be an argument so much as a special pleading based on limited human understanding. But I do contend that the perceived "gentling" of theology may be a legitimate development in theology as we come to understand better God's loving nature. Perhaps Christianity has begun to enter adulthood and now seeks true peace to live out its life. Or perhaps these theologians are simply soft-hearted and soft-headed. I do not have the wherewithal to discern the truth in this matter; however, God Himself desires that all will be saved, and in this also lies our hope. He did not make creation to damn it, but to love it into eternity. We may still choose a different path, but Grace is hard to resist, and God will constantly woo us back. Right now, my own temporal respite is this belief, and I hold to it closely.