www.byzcath.org Forums Mysteries: The Life of Worship Vespers, Matins & the Divine Liturgy The Revised Divine Liturgy Why the translation of the Creed must be corrected

Although I had put this in another thread, it deservers its own post. This is the reason why the Creed must be corrected!

http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/john_p...amilies_en.html


Quote:
The Great Mystery

19. Saint Paul uses a concise phrase in referring to family life: it is a "great mystery" (Eph 5:32). What he writes in the Letter to the Ephesians about that "great mystery", although deeply rooted in the Book of Genesis and in the whole Old Testament tradition, nonetheless represents a new approach which will later find expression in the Church's Magisterium.

The Church professes that Marriage, as the Sacrament of the covenant between husband and wife, is a "great mystery", because it expresses the spousal love of Christ for his Church. Saint Paul writes: "Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the Church and gave himself up for her, that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word" (Eph 5:25-26). The Apostle is speaking here about Baptism, which he discusses at length in the Letter to the Romans, where he presents it as a sharing in the death of Christ leading to a sharing in his life (cf. Rom 6:3-4). In this Sacrament the believer is born as a new man, for Baptism has the power to communicate new life, the very life of God. The mystery of the God-man is in some way recapitulated in the event of Baptism. As Saint Irenaeus would later say, along with many other Fathers of the Church of both East and West: "Christ Jesus, our Lord, the Son of God, became the son of man so that man could become a son of God".

The Bridegroom then is the very same God who became man. In the Old Covenant Yahweh appears as the Bridegroom of Israel, the chosen people�a Bridegroom who is both affectionate and demanding, jealous and faithful. Israel's moments of betrayal, desertion and idolatry, described in such powerful and evocative terms by the Prophets, can never extinguish the love with whichGod�the Bridegroom "loves to the end" (cf. Jn 13:1).

The confirmation and fulfilment of the spousal relationship between God and his people are realized in Christ, in the New Covenant. Christ assures us that the Bridegroom is with us (cf. Mt 9:15). He is with all of us; he is with the Church. The Church becomes a Bride, the Bride of Christ. This Bride, of whom the Letter to the Ephesians speaks, is present in each of the baptized and is like one who presents herself before her Bridegroom. "Christ loved the Church and gave himself up for her..., that he might present the Church to himself in splendour, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish" (Eph 5:25-27). The love with which the Bridegroom "has loved" the Church "to the end" continuously renews her holiness in her saints, even though she remains a Church of sinners. Even sinners, "tax collectors and harlots", are called to holiness, as Christ himself affirms in the Gospel (cf. Mt 21:31). All are called to become a glorious Church, holy and without blemish. "Be holy", says the Lord, "for I am holy" (Lev 11:44; cf. 1 Pet 1:16).

This is the deepest significance of the "great mystery", the inner meaning of the sacramental gift in the Church, the most profound meaning of Baptism and the Eucharist. They are fruits of the love with which the Bridegroom has loved us to the end, a love which continually expands and lavishes on people an ever greater sharing in the supernatural life.

Saint Paul, after having said: "Husbands, love your wives" (Eph 5:25), emphatically adds: "Even so husbands should love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. For no man ever hates his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, as Christ does the Church, because we are members of his body" (Eph 5:28-30). And he encourages spouses with the words: "Be subject to one another out of reverence for Christ" (Eph 5:21).

This is unquestionably a new presentation of the eternal truth about marriage and the family in the light of the New Covenant. Christ has revealed this truth in the Gospel by his presence at Cana in Galilee, by the sacrifice of the Cross and the Sacraments of his Church. Husbands and wives thus discover in Christ the point of reference for their spousal love. In speaking of Christ as the Bridegroom of the Church, Saint Paul uses the analogy of spousal love, referring back to the Book of Genesis: "A man leaves his father and his mother and cleaves to his wife, and they become one flesh" (Gen 2:24). This is the "great mystery" of that eternal love already present in creation, revealed in Christ and entrusted to the Church. "This mystery is a profound one", the Apostle repeats, "and I am saying that it refers to Christ and the Church" (Eph 5:32). The Church cannot therefore be understood as the Mystical Body of Christ, as the sign of man's Covenant with God in Christ, or as the universal sacrament of salvation, unless we keep in mind the "great mystery" involved in the creation of man as male and female and the vocation of both to conjugal love, to fatherhood and to motherhood. The "great mystery", which is the Church and humanity in Christ, does not exist apart from the "great mystery" expressed in the "one flesh" (cf. Gen 2:24; Eph 5:31-32), that is, in the reality of marriage and the family.

The family itself is the great mystery of God. As the "domestic church", it is the bride of Christ. The universal Church, and every particular Church in her, is most immediately revealed as the bride of Christ in the "domestic church" and in its experience of love: conjugal love, paternal and maternal love, fraternal love, the love of a community of persons and of generations. Could we even imagine human love without the Bridegroom and the love with which he first loved to the end? Only if husbands and wives share in that love and in that "great mystery" can they love "to the end". Unless they share in it, they do not know "to the end" what love truly is and how radical are its demands. And this is undoubtedly very dangerous for them.

The teaching of the Letter to the Ephesians amazes us with its depth and the authority of its ethical teaching. Pointing to marriage, and indirectly to the family, as the "great mystery" which refers to Christ and the Church, the Apostle Paul is able to reaffirm what he had earlier said to husbands: "Let each one of you love his wife as himself". He goes on to say: "And let the wife see that she respects her husband" (Eph 5:33). Respect, because she loves and knows that she is loved in return. It is because of this love that husband and wife become a mutual gift. Love contains the acknowledgment of the personal dignity of the other, and of his or her absolute uniqueness. Indeed, each of the spouses, as a human being, has been willed by God from among all the creatures of the earth for his or her own sake. Each of them, however, by a conscious and responsible act, makes a free gift of self to the other and to the children received from the Lord. It is significant that Saint Paul continues his exhortation by echoing the fourth commandment: "Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right. ?Honour your father and mother' (this is the first commandment with a promise), ?that it may be well with you and that you may live long on the earth'. Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord" (Eph 6:1-4). The Apostle thus sees in the fourth commandment the implicit commitment of mutual respect between husband and wife, between parents and children, and he recognizes in it the principle of family stability.

Saint Paul's magnificent synthesis concerning the "great mystery" appears as the compendium or summa, in some sense, of the teaching about God and man which was brought to fulfilment by Christ. Unfortunately, Western thought, with the development of modern rationalism, has been gradually moving away from this teaching. The philosopher who formulated the principle of "Cogito, ergo sum", "I think, therefore I am", also gave the modern concept of man its distinctive dualistic character. It is typical of rationalism to make a radical contrast in man between spirit and body, between body and spirit. But man is a person in the unity of his body and his spirit. The body can never be reduced to mere matter: it is a spiritualized body, just as man's spirit is so closely united to the body that he can be described as an embodied spirit. The richest source for knowledge of the body is the Word made flesh. Christ reveals man to himself. In a certain sense this statement of the Second Vatican Council is the reply, so long awaited, which the Church has given to modern rationalism.

This reply is of fundamental importance for understanding the family, especially against the background of today's civilization, which, as has been said, seems in so many cases to have given up the attempt to be a "civilization of love". The modern age has made great progress in understanding both the material world and human psychology, but with regard to his deepest, metaphysical dimension contemporary man remains to a great extent a being unknown to himself. Consequently the family too remains an unknown reality. Such is the result of estrangement from that "great mystery" spoken of by the Apostle.

The separation of spirit and body in man has led to a growing tendency to consider the human body, not in accordance with the categories of its specific likeness to God, but rather on the basis of its similarity to all the other bodies present in the world of nature, bodies which man uses as raw material in his efforts to produce goods for consumption. But everyone can immediately realize what enormous dangers lurk behind the application of such criteria to man. When the human body, considered apart from spirit and thought, comes to be used as raw material in the same way that the bodies of animals are used�and this actually occurs for example in experimentation on embryos and fetuses� we will inevitably arrive at a dreadful ethical defeat.

Within a similar anthropological perspective, the human family is facing the challenge of a new Manichaeanism, in which body and spirit are put in radical opposition; the body does not receive life from the spirit, and the spirit does not give life to the body. Man thus ceases to live as a person and a subject. Regardless of all intentions and declarations to the contrary, he becomes merely an object. This neo-Manichaean culture has led, for example, to human sexuality being regarded more as a area for manipulation and exploitation than as the basis of that primordial wonder which led Adam on the morning of creation to exclaim before Eve: "This at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh" (Gen 2:23). This same wonder is echoed in the words of the Song of Solomon: "You have ravished my heart, my sister, my bride, you have ravished my heart with a glance of your eyes" (Song 4:9). How far removed are some modern ideas from the profound understanding of masculinity and femininity found in Divine Revelation! Revelation leads us to discover in human sexuality a treasure proper to the person, who finds true fulfilment in the family but who can likewise express his profound calling in virginity and in celibacy for the sake of the Kingdom of God.

Modern rationalism does not tolerate mystery. It does not accept the mystery of man as male and female, nor is it willing to admit that the full truth about man has been revealed in Jesus Christ. In particular, it does not accept the "great mystery" proclaimed in the Letter to the Ephesians, but radically opposes it. It may well acknowledge, in the context of a vague deism, the possibility and even the need for a supreme or divine Being, but it firmly rejects the idea of a God who became man in order to save man. For rationalism it is unthinkable that God should be the Redeemer, much less that he should be "the Bridegroom", the primordial and unique source of the human love between spouses. Rationalism provides a radically different way of looking at creation and the meaning of human existence. But once man begins to lose sight of a God who loves him, a God who calls man through Christ to live in him and with him, and once the family no longer has the possibility of sharing in the "great mystery", what is left except the mere temporal dimension of life? Earthly life becomes nothing more than the scenario of a battle for existence, of a desperate search for gain, and financial gain before all else.

The deep-seated roots of the "great mystery", the sacrament of love and life which began with Creation and Redemption and which has Christ the Bridegroom as its ultimate surety, have been lost in the modern way of looking at things. The "great mystery" is threatened in us and all around us. May the Church's celebration of the Year of the Family be a fruitful opportunity for husbands and wives to rediscover that mystery and recommit themselves to it with strength, courage and enthusiasm.

Question I'm still trying to understand: we should refer to women as men, so that we understand the difference between the two? or is the problem that the change in the Creed is presumed to be made by individuals who are trying to confuse masculinity and femininity? Does referring to women as men really make the men more manly and the women more feminine?

I would have thought that the objection to "for us" was that it seems to downplay the very concept of a common human nature - on other words, that is sees men and women as too DIFFERENT to subsume under a common term.

Yours in Christ,
Jeff Mierzejewski

Jeff,

I really don't understand your comment.

The reason "men" was left out of the Creed is to make the Creed comport with modern American pc speech. That speech is a direct result of modern rationalism and a failure to recognize the fundamental truth about man, created male and female. IN the secular world, those who want to get rid of the word "man" in the English language are those reject the Church's teaching on human sexuality and meaning of matrimony. If you don't see that, I can't help you.

Fr. Petras, the only one who has attempted to defend "inclusive language" on a theoretical basis, said this:


Fr. David and I agree here. He continues:


.

There has been enormous social displacement and violence, Principally against the unborn. Far more lives have been lost in modern America than the persecutions under the Soviets and Nazis. Although I don't think Fr. Petras was referring to that violence which in fact is a reslut of modern rationalism.


Well, yes; and it has resulted in the violence of which I spoke because modern men and women don't understand the truth about their bodies or themselves. They are first and foremost called to be mothers and fathers and live in communion with one another instead of in a war of the sexes.

The Commission didn't need to change the Creed or the Divine Liturgy, they needed to educate people about the fundamental truth expressed in Genesis and Ephesians. An authentic translation of the Creed is only the beginning.

Words that ring so very true!

Jeff,


I think I now see the import of what you are saying above. "For us" does downplay the very concept of a common nature, and I would add, under a common term, "man." But "for us" also actually minimizes the difference in bodies between men and women, which difference bespeaks a certain knowledge of God in his creation of man. The complimentarity of men and women is shown in our very bodies, in our emotional dispositions, and in our persons.

The competing worldviews are between one which sees complimentarity which is lifegiving and another which looks towards a certain androgenous "nature" which exists beyond our bodies. This is the new Manichaeanism of which JPII speaks. This new Manichaeanism does not recognize that we truly are enfleshed beings. Hence the new Manichaeanism also rejects the incarnation, that Christ became man--bridegroom. For the new Manichaean, He became a "human being" not a man. But under the Church's true teaching He became a man, but not a human person. Nevertheless, the manhood of this Divine Person, in a very real sense, encompassed all of humanity for his Personhood is beyond our mortal nature.

The beauty of "for us men...he became a man" expresses the whole truth about the creation of man. Man was created to reflect God's glory even in his body, which God made, male and female. But in relationship to the Bridegroom, the Church and each soul is like a bride.

When we change the traditional language of the Church which has been handed down to us from the apostles, we never know the ways which we fall into error. Such changes will either be a true development in doctrine or reflect an error. The new Creed reflects a very modern error, but an error which strikes at the truth of creation which was from the beginning.

It is interesting to note at the beginning of section 19 of JPII's letter to families the Pope states:


One author I am reading on the Theology of the Body maintains rather forcefully that the Theology of the Body is in fact now part of the Ordinary Magisterium of the Church to which all Catholics must give their assent. The Pope in that passage above seems to suggest it.

It's not only Manichean but it is the source of all gnostic dualisms that separate the person from nature. My sexuality and your's are an integral part of our personhood. Our nature is our reason for being...not some vat of "nature-schtuff" that we each get drawn out of like candles hanging on a wick...with some wicks being longer than others....eh?

Mary

Your comments reminded me of this paragraph in Deus Caritas Est by Benedict XVI:

I would emphasize this part of JPII's letter


The rejection of this "great mystery" is the reason why the world has adopted so called "inclusive language." We must not imitate the secular world in our Creed or our Liturgy. There is nothing organic about this change in language of the secular world. In fact this language indicates the very opposite of organic growth; it is the "fruit" or consequence of the culture of death.

This is from paragraph 20 of JPII's letter to families:


It is clear from the juxtaposition of the above documents, that we are not to make the "world's language" our own. The message which comes with the "world's language" is contrary to message of the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

Paragraph 28 of Liturgiam Authenticam is also highly relevant:


A text cannot speak for itself when words are dropped...and the dropping of texts speaks volumes.

One of the ways that proponents of horizontal inclusive language respond is to ask how we think all this theology is contained in one word or two in the liturgy? How is calling women "men" going to teach them the magisterial theology of the Body? Sound familiar?

What happens is that as the liturgy changes, so also does the catechesis change. So these lessons are not inherent in the language of the liturgy, and they are not taught in the parish halls either. The lessons make their way out of the catechetical materials, rather than flowing from the liturgy to the kitchen to the classroom and back full circle. And since there are no prompts in the most common daily prayer of the people, not even they will raise the questions.

BUT when the time comes to teach morality the only place to go now for material is the secular world, the academy, and common sense.

Pagans are always filled with common sense, natural knowledge, and it works, even to their salvation, if you read the Apostle Paul. It works because they are invincibly ignorant of revealed truth.

Do you suppose our leadership, as a class, is invincibly ignorant?

That would be the only reason to take a "fallback" position, don't you think?

Mary

Let me respond by quoting LA (paragraph 43) again.


Maybe, like Augustine, all the Bishops really need is an angel from a window crying, "Tollo lege! Tolle lege!"

And let me quote paragraph 50 of LA:


The Catechism of the Catholic Church sets forth the Nicene Creed:


Tolle lege! Tolle lege!

Hello. Can I learn about byzcath theology from the Catechism of the Catholic Church? Will this be the authoritative text for thos comparing their faith to the byzcath fold? I believe the orthodox do not have the Catechism of the Catholic Church and they still are able to teach Esatern theology. so my college friends in religion studies say. Are they permitted to continue teaching Eastern theologies without adopting the Catechism of the Catholic Church? how do they do it? Wouldn't there be confusion if the Orthodox continue to teach and preach without the authoritative text?

My co-religionists want a good book to read about Eastern Christian theology. is this the book for them to read?

Eddie

This really makes no sense, and really, questions about the faith should be directed to the Faith and Worship section.

Alexandr