|
Journal of Spirituality N. 2
Introduction
Chapter I, “Charity” and “Communion”
Chapter II, Hospitaller Spirituality in the Middle
Ages
Chapter III, Charity and Communion
Chapter IV, The spirituality of Communion
Chapter V, Charity in Action
Chapter VI,
Charite et Communion
Introduction
The
first Journal of Spirituality of the Order was dedicated to the
Apostolic Letter “Novo Millennio Ineunte”. While encouraging
charitable outreach and indeed a ‘new creativity in charity”(nr50),
the Letter also extended an invitation to form a resolute commitment
te communion and a call to promote a spirituality of communion (nr
45). Since these exhortations should not be overlooked by members of
the Order, the purpose of the current issue is to underscore the
vertical aspect of communion with God and find there the basic
motivation which should animate both the interior life and
charitable works of the Order of Malta al various levels and help to
overcome the danger of the “temptations of selfishness”. What is
more, the two themes of charity and communion often converge and
intermingle.
Therefore next to the theme “Toward a Spirituality of Communion” is
the subtitle “Charity and Communion.”
Following a short analysis of these two words it seemed imperative
that we turn our attention next to the New Testament in order to
uncover those elements which provide the foundation and inspiration
for the issues of “charity” and “communion”, theme of chapter 1
(nr1) by the Prelate of the Order.
It
was then considered worthwhile to examine the internal or
conventual’s life of our Order in its earliest stages. This has been
provided for us with his customary skill by Jonathan Riley-Smith,
Dixie Professor of Ecclesiastical History at the University of
Cambridge, in an article which allows us to enter into the world of
the Orders’s first century in Jerusalem and grafts the demanding
spirituality which sustained the members in the service of the sick
(nr. 2).
Cardinal Pio Laghi, Patronus of the Order of Malta and Archbishop
Maurice Couve de Murville, Chief Chaplain of the British Association
of the Order, deal with authority the theme of the present Journal,
drawing inspiration from the Apostolic Letter ‘Novo Millennio
Ineunte” (nr 3 and 4).
The
article by Count Neri Capponi, the Order’s Delegate for Florence,
calls for a practical reflection on charity in action specially in
the Pilgrimages with the sick (nr 5).
Finally two brief extracts, which have lost none of their relevance
for today, were included from addresses given in Lourdes by the late
Prince Guy de Polignac, for many years President of the French
Association (nr6)
Top
Chapter I
“Charity”
and “Communion”
By
Angelo Acerbi,
Prelate of the Order of Malta.
Exploring the index to the documents of the Council, one finds that
the words “caritas” and “communion” are employed in various ways.
Caritas/charity on one hand is broad and comprehensive in that it
covers the whole of Christian life, while on the other it can have
very particular meanings.
God
above all else is love and caritas is the expression of the
Trinitarian love of God. Charity is consequently the constitutive
form of the Church since it was Christ who established it as holy, a
community of faith, hope, and charity. We may also look at the word
“charity” in its connection with the sacraments. Christian
perfection, and so forth. From a practical perspective, or in other
words from the standpoint of charity put into practice, it is
realized especially in works of mercy which can even be structured
according to the circumstance in ways that will to ensure its
effectiveness. For its part, the Order of Malta has had such a
lengthy experience with this “active charity” that its achievements
in this field have become an integral part of its very life.
The
Vatican Council used the word “communion” frequently and in various
ways. In fact, as a general concept it obtains its meaning only in
relation to a particular reality (communion of the faithful,
Mystical Communion, hierarchical communion …). The background to the
conciliar declarations is the biblical and early Christian concept
of “communion”, created from on high, of persons united one with
another as members of the Church by the Holy Spirit and his gifts –
a communion which is to continue in the daily life of the community
by participating in the needs and the sufferings of one’s neighbour.
The vertical communion brought about by God in Jesus Christ is thus
reproduced horizontally in relations with the brethren and in
service of the needy.
A few
themes and passages from the New Testament
In
the Gospels
The
motto of the Order, obsequium pauperum, translates into a
charitable commitment that can be realized in various ways and
through diverse initiatives ranging from aid for the sick and the
poor to relief in times of natural disaster. A reflection therefore
on the evangelical notion of charity witch ought to motivate and
sustain these undertakings is more than appropriate.
A
scribe put to Jesus a question that was much debated at tat time:
witch commandment in the Law was the greatest. Jesus replied, “You
shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and all your soul,
and with all your mind. This is the greatest and first commandment.
And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbour as yourself.
On these two commandments hang all the Law and the prophets” (Mt
22:37-40). The two objects of love, God and neighbour, cannot be
separated and neither can one take the place of the other. One
necessarily comes first and the other second, and between them there
is a difference of intensity: the first object is loved with all
your strength and the second as yourself. We must love God totally,
above everything, and our neighbour as ourselves, Between love’s two
objects there is an inner connection. Both are preceded by God’s
love for us. He loved us first.
The
discourse on the Last Judgment (Mt 25:31-46) does not speak of love,
but of the works of love each person has done or failed to do. Here
we find a clear statement that Jesus is present in the needy: in
coming to the aid of the poor and the afflicted, we come to the aid
of the Lord. To love one’s neighbour in this way is to love Jesus
himself and the two objects of love thereby converge.
The
parable of the Good Samaritan (LK 10:29-37) answers the question:
who is my neighbour? The neighbour in the parable is an unknown
person, lying half dead in the road, robbed and beaten. The
Samaritan becomes his neighbour, demonstrating by his actions that
one’s neighbour, demonstrating by his actions that one’s neighbour
can even be an unknown person. In the details of his caring which
Jesus describes, the Samaritan reveals the nature of his love. This
is underscored again in the question Jesus puts to scribe: ‘Which of
these three, do you think, proved neighbour to the man who fell
among the robbers? “ Put this way, the question calls for a complete
reversal of one’s outlook: the good Samaritan is the one who makes
of himself a Neighbour. There is a great
lesson here and cause for reflection on the part of all who words in
the field of “obsequiun pauperum” on behalf of sick, the poor, the
marginalised: it is important not only to do good for he needy, but
also with loving care to be there neighbour.
Saint
John
bore
engraved on his heart the words of Jesus at the Last Supper: “A new
commandment I give to You, that you love one another: even as I have
loved you, that you also love one another”(Jn 13:34).
The
apostle transmitted this testament of Jesus to the first Christian
generations for whom the precept of charity succeeded in becoming a
norm for the life of the community. The object of his teaching is
based on his knowledge and experience of the love of the Lord Jesus:
“having loved his own who were in the word, he loved them to the
end.” Augustine assures us, that John, who laid close to the breast
of Jesus at the Last Supper, drew from it as from a fountain. John
had experienced the dept of that love at the foot of the cross of
his Lord and, in his first Letter, wrote “by this we know love, that
he laid down his life for us”. John based fraternal charity upon the
cornerstone which is Christ, “and we ought to lay down our lives for
the brethren. “ Love is the distinctive sign of the Christians, the
sign of the last days, inaugurated and revealed through the death of
Christ Jesus.
In
the discourse on the vine and branches given at the Last Supper (Jn
15), where the depth of Christian life joined to Christ is revealed,
Jesus concludes by indicating that fraternal charity is to be the
result of abiding in him: “This is my commandment, that you love one
another as I have loved you” (Jn 15:12). Thus a new commandment, the
distinctive sign of the Christian and of the Christian community, is
the Condition for being with God. “If we love one another, God
abides in us and his love is perfected in us”(1 Jn 4:12).
Christian communities where mutual love reigns at all
times are to be a concrete sign in the world of the love of God.
In
Saint Paul
The
Pauline epistles draw liberally on the theme of charity, making
frequent use as well of the term koinonia (communion). The
Letters to the Galatians, to Corinthians and to the Colossians
confront those ecclesial communities as well as our own with this
issue. Saint Paul is anxious that love of neighbour be evident in
the churches, To the Galatians he writes, “For the whole law is
fulfilled in one word, You shall love your neighbour as yourself.
But if you bite and devour one another take heed that you are not
consumed by one another”(Gal 5:14-15). And the admonition continues,
“Let us have no self-conceit, no provoking of one another, no envy
of one another”(5:26).
The
words of Saint Paul will serve for an examination of conscience in
any community including the Order seeking to discover whether the
temptations to which the faithful of Galatia were subject may also
be lodged in there own hearts. One snare above all is singled out
for its power to destroy – self-conceit or vainglory – because it is
based not on the Lord but instead on nothing and leads to fruitless
exaltation of the self in contrast to others.
Although the community at Colossae has long since passed into
history, in Paul’s Letter it belongs to every age: “Put on then. As
God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassion, kindness,
lowliness, meekness, and patience, forbearing one another and, if
one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other: as the
Lord has forgiven You, so you also must forgive. And above all these
put on love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony”(Col
3:12-14). For Saint Pal, virtuous behaviour includes mutual
forgiveness in the measure each one receives it from the Lord and
charity becomes the Bond of Perfection which binds together
individual virtue and communal relations.
In
the face of the divisions which threaten the Church at Corinth,
Saint Paul exhorts them to harmony: “I appeal to you, brethren, by
the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that all of you agree and that
there be no dissensions among you, but that you be united in the
same mind and the same judgment”(1 Cor 1:10) and he invites them to
look upon Christ who suffered crucifixion for all, On these
Christological basis, the Apostle resolved all conflicts and
tensions which formed in the communities he founded and visited.
The
hymn to charity is found in chapter 13 of the first Letter to the
Corinthians. Even as he wrote this extraordinary passage, Saint Paul
had the community in mind with all its various problems, especially
those which touched its inner life. These he addressed not in an
exhortative manner, as on other occasions, but in the language of
poetry in which problems and difficulties are transformed by love
alone. Negative elements or pressures which permeated the community
at Corinth could overcome by a love presented not as an abstraction
but instead as something positively constructive: “Love is patient
and kind; love is not jealous or boastful; it is not arrogant or
rude. Love does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or
resentful; it does not rejoice at wrong, but rejoices in the right.
Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things,
endures all things”(4-7). Then a brief final stroke: love never
ends, because it leads to the vision of God.
In
the early Christian community
The
early Christian community arose around the apostles and mother of
God and was confirmed in unity by the Holy Spirit on the day of
Pentecost. According to Saint Peter, this mother Church of Jerusalem
began its journey enriched with nearly three thousand sours,
Consider then the Acts of the Apostles where we read that they
devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and fellowship (koinonia
/ communion), to the breaking of bread and the prayers (2:42). “And
all who believed”, Acts continues, “were together and had all things
in common and they sold their possessions and goods and distributed
them to all, as any had need”(2: 44-45). Their communion was made
manifest in attention to the teaching of the apostles, sharing of
goods, attending the temple together and breaking bread in their
homes. What then was the spirit that reigned in that early
community? The answer is that their “glad and generous hearts’ so
shone in the world outside that they “favour with all the
people”(2:46-47). And again, “the company of those who believed were
of one heart and soul, and no one said that any of the things which
he possessed was his own, but they had everything in common”(4:32).
At
the same time, the example of Ananias and Sapphira demonstrates that
not even the early Christian community was exempt from the
temptations of selfishness. The gravity of the punishment the couple
received for there insincerity is a symbol of the authenticity which
is required in relationships.
Persecution overtook the community, but the Acts tell us with what
generosity of spirit these trials were endured, in dealings with one
another, in forgiving the persecutors and in the courage to profess
the Christian faith.
The
Jerusalem community recalls the issue of the “collection” proposed
by the Apostle Paul. At the time of the Council of Jerusalem, James
and Peter and John, who were reputed to be pillars, gave to Paul and
Barnabas the right hand of fellowship, that they should go to the
Gentiles; “only they would have us remember the poor, “ the Apostle
added, “which very thing I was eager to do”(Gal 2:9-10). The
collection is an explicit sign of the communion of the churches
which arose between the Gentiles and the mother Church of Jerusalem.
Paul’s intentions were not simply to promote a collection of money
but rather a “communion of service”. It is good to recall that
the Order Of Malta, which founded and maintains a hospital in the
city where Jesus was born, is united in communion of service with
the land where it has its roots.
A
simple and elementary conclusion can be drawn from this summary
excursus on certain parts of the New Testament. Charity has a
vertical dimension: the love of God for us revealed in Christ Jesus
expects a response of love from us. This vertical dimension should
be present in our relations with out neighbours, not only though
charitable activity in taking responsibility for the needs of the
poor and the sick, but also and above all in relationships within
our own community. At the practical level, the quality of the
relations between various groups in the Order of Malta is also a
measure of our effectiveness in serving our neighbour in fulfilment
of the motto “obsequium pauperum”; in so far as it is a sign of the
God who is love, it contributes most assuredly to the spread of the
faith which is the other great duty of the members of the Order.
(Cf. the following
publications: Scheffczyk, L., Aspekte der Kirche in der Krise, Um
die Entscheidung für das authentisch Konzil.
Wuaestiones non disputatae, Bd.1, [ F.Schmitt ] Siegburg 1993; Aa.
Vv., La Carità e la Chiesa, virtù e ministero. Disputato 005, G.
Ambrosio, de., [ Glossa ] Milano 1993; Aa. Va., Ministero e
ministero della koinonia. Parola Spirito e Vita n.31, [ Edizioni
Dehoniane ] Bologna 1995).
Angelo Acerbi
Top
Chapter II
Hospitaller Spirituality in the Middle Ages
By:
Prof. Jonathan Riley-Smith
The
spirituality of the Order of the Hospital of St John of Jerusalem
was founded on a radical notion of the lordship of the poor.
Although in time the concept was supplemented by the broader one of
the lordship of the sick it remained the bedrock on which everything
the order did was based. It was expressed through caring for the
poor when they were ill, burying them when they died and protecting
them – and by extension the whole of Christianity – when they were
in danger of being physically assaulted.
The
care of the sick was the responsibility of the brothers (and at
first also sisters) who served in the great hospitals built
alongside the order’s headquarters in the Levant and in a few
subsidiary hospitals as well. The patients, male and female, Muslims
and Jews as well as Christians, were given the kind of treatment
only great princes could have expected. The burial of the dead is
the least known of the Hospital’s commitments, but it was taken very
seriously and demonstrated a determination to maintain its care for
the poor to the grave. The order had its own cemeteries outside
Jerusalem, where the crypt of its church just south of the city
survives with its charnel pits still visible, and Acre. Military
activities, begun in the mid 1120s, grew in importance because of
the expenditure of effort and resources required, because they had a
particular attraction for benefactors and recruits, and because the
situation facing the Christian settlement in the Levant became
progressively more precarious. But the Hospitallers remained
professed religious first and brethren-at-arms second: in their
great castles one can identify the areas of enclosure in which they
lived, isolated from the mercenaries and servants on whom much of
the day-to-day working of the fortresses depended.
A
treatise written by a German cleric in the 1180’s provides us with
an insight into the practical application of the Hospitallers ideal.
The author used the hospital in Jerusalem as an outstanding example
of Christian charity and from it, and from scattered references
elsewhere, a picture of a luxurious establishment comes into focus.
There were in the hospital separate beds for the poor, with regular
changes of sheets, and in an obstetrical ward little cots for the
babies; a meat diet supplemented with whit bread and an
extraordinary rang of vegetables and fruits; the attention of teams
of physicians, surgeons and male and female nurses; a large
orphanage, an ambulance service and a mobile field-hospital. When
the hospital was overcrowded the brothers surrendered their beds an
slept on the floor. When horses were needed to transport the injured
form a battlefield the brothers, even the noble ones, gave up their
chargers, ‘thus openly showing that they have not appropriated them
for themselves, but that they and whatever they have belong entirely
toe the sick’.
At
first sight the Order’s calendar looks quite well populated, but the
lives of medieval Hospitallers saints present us with acute
hagiographical problems. Three holy woman are secure, although only
one, St Flore (or Fleur), a sister at the nunnery at Beaulieu whose
cult developed soon after her death in 1347, was indisputably
professed into the order. St Ubaldesca, a peasant girl from
Calcinaia, seems to have been a servant in a hospital run by nuns in
Pisa which became attached to the order while she was there; the
holiness of the life was recognized even before her death in 1208.
St Toscana was a widow who served in the thirteenth-century
hospital in Verona as a consoror. The founder, Bl. Gerard,
was certainly an object of veneration in the thirteenth century;
indeed the continuing well-attested existence of his relics suggests
that his body had been carefully abstracted from Jerusalem when the
city was lost to Saladin in 1187. Although the cult of St Hugh, a
commander of Genoa, is not attested until two and a half centuries
after his death in 1233, it was apparently based on a collection of
material made by the archbishop of Genoa at the time and sent te the
pope. Hugh’s service in his commandery’s hospital and in the burial
of the dead was said to be rooted in fervent prayer, in particular
in the recital of the office.
On
the other hand, Bl. Nuño Alvarez Pereira, who had indeed been a
knight and prior in the order, is venerated more for his later
career as a Carmelite lay brother. Some individuals (bl. Gerard
Mecatti of Villamagna who was a Franciscan tertiary and Bl. Gerland,
who had probably been a Templar) seem to have been appropriated and
the cults of others (St Nicasius and Bl Pietro Pattarini of Imola)
are possibly fabrications.
The
calendar owes much to the systematic work (and in some cases
imagination) of Giacomo Bosio and others in the late sixteenth
century. Its unreliability, however, has a consistency about it
which is revealing. With the exception of the founder Gerard these
men and woman are depicted gaining a reputation for holiness not in
the Levant but in western Europe. Hugh’s life was used but his
biographer to show that while the brothers in the Levant fought the
Muslims, their confreres in the west supported them by engaging in
their own spiritual battles ‘against invisible enemies’. The church
has always found it difficult to sanction officially the martyrdom
of warriors and this obviously presents problems when considering
the lives of brothers-at-arms, although the order on Malta developed
its own martyrology. And anyway the names of brothers once known in
the east for their holiness may have been lost, since their cults in
Jerusalem an Acre could have evaporated once their tombs could no
longer be visited.
It
should be remembered, however, that the lives of brothers in the
Levant were not typical. Most members of military orders never
served in the east and never expected to do so. In Europe they
resided in religious communities, usually called commandery’s, which
had originally been established in imitation of Benedictine priories
and had spread out from centres like St Gilles in southern France.
In 1288 the pope assumed that there was an average of twenty
brothers living in the larger ones, but such numbers outside
provincial headquarters must have been unusual and houses sometimes
had as few as three residents. Nevertheless, all commandery’s were
proper religious communities, in which life was punctuated by the
office, said according to the liturgy of the order’s original mother
church, the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem, interspersed on some days
by lections of Our Lady or St John. The brothers originally slept in
dormitories, but by the early thirteenth century they were beginning
to have individual cells. They always ate in common in refectory,
although they were subject to quite stringent abstinences and fasts.
Many early communities had been mixed, but from the 1170’s the
sisters were being gathered into separate nunneries in which, as
enclosed canonesses regular, most of them devoted themselves solely
to prayer, although, like their male counterparts, they were also
responsible for providing for the upkeep of the convent in the east.
Nunneries provides the backdrop to the lives of Ubaldesca in Pisa
and Flore at Beaulieu.
In
their commandery’s the Hospitallers managed the great estates which
provided the money and materiel which enabled the convent in the
east to carry out its tasks. Their estate-management was relatively
efficient, but there must have been plenty of time for them to
develop their spiritual lives. Not enough attention has been paid to
the fact that recruits to the orders found supporting roles in the
commandery’s spiritually satisfying, at least until the numbers in
the European communities began to decline in the later middle ages.
Life in a less active ambience in Europe perhaps enabled members of
the order to achieve sanctity better than in the bustling
environment of the compounds and castles in Palestine, Syria and the
Dedecanese. There were, of course, occasional scandals, but it is
clear that the order, which was freed from the oversight of the
bishops because of its privilege of exemption, took the spiritual
formation of its members seriously. The houses scattered throughout
Europe were gathered into provinces under priors, the better of whom
seem to have monitored the lives of their subjects scrupulously. In
this respect the Hospital of St john is to be distinguished from its
sister order the Temple, in which the administration had become
chaotic by the time of its suppression
Jonathan Riley-Smith
Top
Chapter III
Charity and Communion
By
Cardinal Pio Laghi
Tor
this second booklet on Spirituality, addressed to you who are
members of ou Order, a topic was chosen which is very close to the
heart of Pope John Paul II. In fact, he dedicated numbers 42 and 43
of the Apostolic Letter Novo Millennio ineunte to the theme
“Charity and Communion”, two terms which challenge the faithful to
be responsible not only at the level of the universal and the
particular Churches, but also at the level of an order like ours,
Like all types of religious associations, the fundamental reason
that our Order was created is charity, that is, the love of God and
neighbour, One of the primary expressions of this love is the
communion that exists among our members and also with all people.
As
the Holy Father stated in the above mentioned Letter, communion “is
the fruit and demonstration of that love which springs from the
heart of the Eternal Father and is poured out upon us through the
Spirit which Jesus gives us ((cf. Rom 5:5), to make us all ‘one
heart and one soul’(Acts 5:32)”(n.42).
If we
apply what the Pope said to the Church and to our Order to be
faithful to the plan of God and to respond to the expectations of
the society of which we are a part and which we serve, we must make
our own Order into, to use the Pope’s expression, “a home and school
for communion”(n.43). But to do that our starting point should be
the promotion of an authentic “spirituality of communion” among
ourselves, emphasizing it as one of the fundamental educational
principles in our Priories, in our Associations, including to
Sovereign Council, and among all of us.
In
the article which follows, you will find in Archbishop Couve de
Murville a true Pastor, whose wisdom gained throughout his years of
service to the Church is reflected in his presentation, as he
explains to us the essential elements of a “spirituality of
communion”.
Before turning to him, I would like to summarize the four “stages’
of the path which the Holy Father proposes in order to have a true
spirituality of Communion:
-
“A spirituality of communion indicates above all
the heart’s contemplation of the mystery of the Trinity dwelling
in us, and whose light we must also be able to see shining on
the face of the brothers and sisters around us”.
-
We must develop “an ability to think of our
brothers and sisters in faith within the profound unity of the
Mystical Body, the Church, and therefore as ‘those who are a
part of me’. This makes us able to share their joys and
sufferings, to sense their desires and attend to their needs, to
offer them deep and genuine friendship”.
-
“S spirituality of communion implies also the
ability to see what is positive in others, to welcome it and
prize it as a gift from God: not only as a gift for the brother
or sister who has received it directly, but also as a ‘gift for
me’”.
-
“A spirituality of communion means, finally to
know how to ‘make room’ for our brothers and sisters, bearing
‘each other’s berdens’ (Gal 6:2) and resisting the selfish
temptations which constantly beset us and provoke competition,
careerism, destrust an jealousy (par. N. 43).
Cardinal Pio Laghi
Top
Chapter IV
The
spirituality of Communion
By
Archbishop Maurice Couve de Murville
One
of the most significant passages of Novo Millennio Ineunte is
to be found in section 43, where the Holy Father gives his teaching
on the Spirituality of Communion.
He
introduces it by saying that creating such a spirituality is the
first thing to do, even before we formulate any plan for action. The
Pope says: …our thoughts could run immediately to the action to
be undertaken, but that would not be the right impulse to follow.
How accurately John Paul II describes our impulsive reaction,
always ready to exteriorize, to produce blue prints and to tell
other people what to do, because it is much easier to behave like
this than to seek inner conversion. Yet inner conversion is
essential for the effectiveness of a Christian, because it puts God
at the centre of what we are tying to de, It is his action, his
grace, his effectiveness which are at the centre of the work of
salvation on which we are embarking. The Pope comes back to this
introductory comment at the end of section 43, when he writes:
…unless we follow this spiritual path, external structures of
communion will serve very little purpose. They would become
mechanisms without a soul, “masks” of communion rather than its
means of expression and growth.
So
what is the right spiritual path that the Pope talks about? What is
the communion whose spirituality is crucial?
At
this point the Pope drops a small spiritual bombshell, He says: A
spirituality of communion indicates above all the heart’s
contemplation of the mystery of the Trinity dwelling is us. How
amazing that the Pope makes contemplation of the greatest mystery of
the Christian faith the condition of any truly effective apostolic
work! The Trinity is so difficult to explain; it is impossible to
understand fully because it is a mystery. We priests and deacons
tend to preach on it once a year on Trinity Sunday, and are glad to
limit ourselves to more approachable topics the rest of the time;
what the pope sys opens a new vista.
Giving and receiving
Let
us look at it this way. The perfection of God within himself is a
perfection in giving and receiving. In fact it is the greatest
possible sharing. The persons of the Trinity give the godhead in its
entirety to each other and receive the godhead in its entirety from
each other. Each of the three persons is wholly and entirely God.
But each of the persons is distinct; in fact its individuality (if
one can call it that) is constituted by the relation it has to the
other persons. If we want to use imaginative language, which is not
really suitable when talking of God but which can bring one to us
what we are talking about, then we could say that the divine persons
are fiercely individualistic, because they are actually constituted
by what distinguishes them form the other two persons; and we could
also say that they get on extraordinarily well, because they think
and act as one, since they are actually one at the level of their
one, divine nature.
At
first reading this may sound very abstract. In our weaker moments,
we might wonder why Jesus has gone to the trouble of revealing the
existence of the three persons of the one God. It is something we
can never wholly understand in this life; in fact in terms of human
logic it is contradictory. Is also causes difficulties in relations
with Jews and Muslims who accuse us of worshipping three gods. We
are tempted to ask: “Could our Saviour have kept the truth about the
Trinity until we actually get to heaven and receive the beatific
vision?”.
Love
and the arts
But
the Holy Father says quite clearly (and I repeat his words): A
spirituality of communion indicates above all the heart’s
contemplation of the mystery of the Trinity dwelling in us. Why
is that? The answer must be that belief in the indwelling of the
Trinity indicates the resolution of the chronic difficulty of all
human experience – the relation of the one and of all human
experience – the relation of the one and the many. It is part of
human experience that love urges us to seek communion but that human
beings find it very difficult to reach a satisfactory from of that
union. Ever since the European novel took shape in the 17th
century (one thinks of Mme de La Fayette’s Princesse de Clèves)
nearly all amorous literature has turned around that problem. As the
18th and 19th centuries progressed, the
outlook presented by the arts seemed to become steadily more bleak.
By 1925, Alban Berg’s opera Wozzeck centred on the tragedy of
an ordinary man in a way that has become symbolic of the alienation
of the 20th century. Soon the Existentialist philosophy
of the 1940s, expressed in plays and novels such as those of
Jean-Paul Sartre and Albert Camus, promoted the doctrine that the
life of man is meaningless and is not even enjoyable (Sartre’s
dictum “L’Enfer cést les autres ‘). Since then Berthold Brecht and
Samuel Beckett, in the “theatre of the absurd” and the “theatre of
despair”, have continued to proclaim that the search for love and
communion is vowed to frustration.
When
I was chaplain to students at Cambridge, a young couple came to have
their baby baptized. They were research students, working on their
doctoral dissertations, and, when I asked them what name they wanted
to give to their son, they said “John Paul”. “Ah”, said I
pleasantly, “after Pope John Paul, I suppose”. “No”, they said
“after Jean-Paul Sartre”. I thought that really runny at the time;
but looking back on it, I see it as a portent. Our task is to
replace the influence of Jean-Paul by that of John Paul, and we must
remember that the Pope is also a philosopher, in some ways the
greatest philosopher of them all. He is not afraid, in spite of all
the horrors of the 20th century, to point to an equally
valid experience, inter-personal communion, which introduces us to a
happiness which is open to a transcendent dimension. No wonder that
he takes the Trinity as the starting point for his meditation on the
kind of activity to which we are called.
Acceptance and the Trinity
A
spirituality of communion, says the Pope, enables us to see the
light of the Trinity shining on the face of the brothers and
sisters around us. The resolution of the problem of the one and
the many, as revealed by the gospel in the inner life of God, is
proclaimed to mankind as part of the Church’s faith. The “use” of
that doctrine, if one can put it that way, is that it does not only
tell us something about God; it tells us something about ourselves.
The perfect self-giving and the perfect acceptance of others in the
Blessed Trinity is an explanation of what we are seeking in our
relations with other human beings on earth, We see “the light of the
Trinity shining on the face” of others when we are conscious, in our
relations with them, of the God who is leading us to become, in some
way, like him.
The
Pope continues: A spirituality of communion also means an ability
to think of our brothers and sisters in Faith with the profound
unity of the Mystical Body, and therefore as “those who are part of
me”. Just as the unity of the persons in the Trinity allows
Jesus to say: “The Father is in me and I am in the Father” (John 10,
38), so our belief in the Trinity gives us the certainty, through
our faith, that “those are part of me”, i.e. the brothers and
sisters who surround me in this life. We are still at the level of
faith here, but the firm belief in such a deep unity now allows us
to emerge at the level of conscious experience, as the Pope goes on
to say: This makes us able to share their
joys and sufferings, to sense their desires and to attend to their
need, to offer them deep and genuine friendship.
A
change of heart
Such
a description of what the spirituality of communion means in
practice is particularly relevant to us as members of the Order of
Malta. Traditionally the eight pointed cross of the Order has been
seen as a symbol of the Eight Beatitudes, the summary of the Sermon
on the Mount. The Beatitudes are a perfect expression of the change
of heart that is especially required from members of a religious
order. To be humble, poor in heart, a maker of peace, gentle, poor
in spirit, to be prepared to suffer in the cause of right – all
these are only possible if we have been touched inwardly by the
wonder of God’s love, a love that comes to meet us and asks for our
love in return, It is the miracle of conversion.
The
habits of religious orders are an outward sign of that inner change
of heart. They are a reminder that a religious is a new creation in
God, a creature which has love at its centre. Without love, the
religious habit would be merely outward show, a “mask” as the Pope
says. So, wearing the black cowl and the white cross must cause a
regular examination of conscience. It is not only a reminder: it can
be a reproach if we do not make love our priority, as the Beatitudes
require.
Making room for others
This
is precisely what the Pope asks of us in the section of Novo
Millennio Ineunte which we are examining. A spirituality of
communion implies also the ability to see what is positive in
others, to welcome it and prize is as a gift from God: not only as a
gift for the brothers or sisters who has received it directly, but
also as “gift for me”. A spirituality of communion means, finally,
to know how to “make room” for our brothers and sisters, bearing
“each others burdens” (Gal 6,2) and resisting the selfish
temptations which constantly beset us and provoke competition,
careerism, distrust and jealousy”. How sad it is when divisions
and jealousy are fond among the followers of Christ, as they have
been too often in history. It is particularly sad when this happens
within a religious order. Although most of us in the Order of Malta
are not professed religious, we have the privilege of being
spiritual fruits. What John Paul II says about the Trinity as the
starting point of our “heart’s contemplation” give us the starting
point for the programme of conversion which must precede the
practical work that the Order is called to undertake.
St
Bernard and the thrity-three
I
want to give an example of such a programme of conversion actually
taking place and I quote the history of the origin of the
Cistercians. Actually their beginnings coincide in time with those
of the Hospitallers of St John of Jerusalem. St Robert of Molesmes
founded the Abbey of Cîteaux in 1098, a year before the capture of
Jerusalem by the First Crusade. St Bernard entered the novitiate at
Cîteaux in 1098, a year before the capture of Jerusalem by the First
Crusade. St Bernard entered the novitiate at Cîteaux in 1112, a year
before Pope Pascal II gave to Blessed Gerard the Bull Pie
Postulatio Voluntatis. which confirmed us as a religious order.
When St Bernard knocked at the door of Cîteaux, he brought with hem
his uncle, some of his brothers and a group of Burgundian noblemen.
There were thirty-three of them altogether and this launched a
previously unknown community on an explosive career of expansion. By
the time of Bernard’s death in 1153, there were 400 Cistercian
houses throughout Europe and 700 monks at Clairvaux alone, Bernard’s
own abbey. What was remarkable about these early Cistercians was how
they loved one another, which in practical terms means how well they
got on together. It was good to be with them because they were
attentive to each other. There was no rivalry or jealousy between
them. Because they were humble men, there could be a tremendous
corporate feeling among them. They thought of the good of the
community before they thought of themselves, they lived out those
words of St John; “anyone who loves God must also love his
brother”(1 John 4,21). The Cistercians were thus off to a flying
start, because many people wanted to join such an attractive group.
Goodness attracts, and it is the goodness of God that shines out of
those who are really committed to him.
There
is a message for us in the history of our early contemporaries, the
Cistercians. If we want our Order to grow today, we must imitate
those companions of St Bernard. The Order will attract if it is
attractive, and it is the charity which governs the relations
between its members which will make it so.
Maurice Couve de Murville
Top
Chapter V
Charity in Action
Count
Neri Capponi
The
Order’s Delegate for Florence
The
Pilgrimage in the spirituality of the Order of the Hospital, known
as Malta.
The
History
The
Order of the Hospital of Saint John of Jerusalem is “born” on
pilgrimage and around pilgrimage; it can be said that this is the
devotion it is founded on.
If it
is true, as it seems, that it was a group of Amalfi merchants,
oblates of the Santa Maria Latina monastery at Jerusalem, who took
the trouble to give accommodation to the crowd of pilgrims at the
guest quarters of the Monastery, this shows that they followed what
Saint Benedict says in his Rule (which in turn was borrowed from the
New Testament) according to which the guest is Christ himself. In
this way this group of oblates took on a more committed sequence to
Christ, giving life to a new religious order that made its first
scope that of providing assistance to pilgrims: firstly by being
‘hoteliers’, then by being ‘Hospitallers’, given the large number of
sick and wounded pilgrims that filled the streets to and in
Jerusalem, then as soldiers to defend both the pilgrims as well as
the places which were the destination of the pilgrimages, for then
to pass to the defence of the Faith and consequently to the defence
of Christianity, without, however, ever forgetting the commitment
towards the sick. It is therefore on pilgrimages and assisting the
sick the Order is founded.
The
Pilgrimage
The
meaning of the pilgrimage is well-known: it signifies, in a symbolic
form, the life of the Christian that begins with its spiritual
rebirth in this world (Baptism) to arrive at its second birth in
heaven. The house from which it begins is this word, the journey is
life itself, the sanctuary of arrival is heaven, the beatified
vision. It can also mean, in a more intimate way, a totally
spiritual walk stars from an external reality to arrive, without
leaving the world, at a contemplation of God, even if imperfect due
to the wall of flesh that separates us from the Lord. It can also
mean, seemingly in a more banal way, a walk that brings one from sin
to repentance and to the resurrection. In any case it is always a
spiritual and ascendant walk that to be fully understood takes on
the form of a real and concrete journey towards a privileged place
of prayer, a sanctuary. A pilgrimage is not only a means of renewing
our being in the light of Faith, but if public and set in a
framework of visible signs of Faith, is also a testimony; to
proclaim openly that we are Christians and that we want to live as
Christians in a visible way to distinguish ourselves in the world
and to separate ourselves from the world. The pilgrimage of the
Order of the Hospital, known as Malta, has a further meaning. The
assistance for Our Sick Lords is, as we have seen, one of the
primary goals of the Order, the other being the defence of the
Faith. By carrying the sick on a pilgrimage the Order not only
renders visible one of its primary purposes but also brings with it,
as a flag, the actual picture of the suffering Christ, The Order’s
pilgrimage with the sick is therefore not only a service towards the
sick, as in other organizations that carry out this act of faith and
of charity, but is a public testimony of that which the Order stand
for, of its very essence. For this, whilst other organizations
drastically reduce the staff responsible for the assistance, the
Order urges everyone to participate as it is not only a pilgrimage
for the sick but a pilgrimage with the sick and with the latter in a
privileged position surrounded by an active court as befits the
representatives of the great King.
The
Presence of the Sick
The
pilgrimages of the sick are therefore a way of visibly and tangibly
accomplishing the two aims of the Order. With the pilgrimage in
itself and with the participation in the solemn and public religious
services (processions, solemn masses, etc.) that represent the
culmination of the cult of the pilgrimage, the Order bears witness
to its Faith and in bearing witness it defends it. In fact today
next to the evangelization though the word ( to which the Order is
also called), the testimony, totally open, that Christ is the only
Saviour, acquires much importance in a world that is deaf and
secularized. At the same time though the presence of the sick in the
pilgrimage the order scope of the Order is accomplished: the
Obsequium pauperum, the assistance to the poor and to the sick,
It is important here to remember that it was the Great Master Frà
Angelo de Mojana that with brilliant and deep intuition brought back
the Order, with the pilgrimages of the sick, to the original
charisma of Blessed Gerard.
Testimony of Faith
The
pilgrimages of the sick, besides being a witness of Faith and of
charity, are also the means of obtaining personal sanctification. In
the first place, though the Sacraments, In fact a pilgrim, a sick
person, a stretcher bearer of a nurse, would have little sense if he
did not receive the Eucharist several times, or if it were the case,
go to confession during the pilgrimage, The Sacraments are the
cannels of the grace of God, without which everything that is done
is spiritually useless. Once we have received the grace of God we
must put it into practice continuously with prayer, that is, with
the answer that we give to God who consults us and who calls us to
do his work and to identify ourselves with him. On the two pillars
of the Sacraments and of prayer the pilgrimage of the Order must
implant catecheses, both devotional and informative, in order to
return home more holy and more conscious of our faith than when we
started out.
At
this point it is opportune that besides the solemn manifestations,
more space is given to prayer and to private meditation than that
which is the custom in pilgrimages today; the calendar, in fact, of
public engagements is very full, especially at Lourdes. At the same
time a rationalization of the religious engagements is necessary.
Style
of Behaviour
Due
to the fact that in the pilgrimage of the Order there is a public
testimony of Faith, our behaviour must be in keeping with what we
profess, otherwise we are Pharisees. The Order of Malta enjoys great
prestige so the octagonal cross, symbol of the Beatitudes, often
becomes a sign of vanity instead of a sign of Christian commitment.
The same thing can happen in the pilgrimages, so one must be careful
that the pilgrimage of the Order does not become the “Malta Show”,
an exhibition of vanity, of worldliness, a procession that one
participates in to meet important people or in order to be noted and
then boast about it. He, who goes to Lourdes or Loreto with these
feelings and does not change on the way, does not bring any benefit
to his spirit nor to that of others because not only goodness but
also badness is spiritually contagious. Also very important are the
relationships between the participants of the pilgrimage and their
behaviour. First of all there must be a seriousness that does not
mean a false devotion or long faces (Saint Filippo Neri was famous
for his genuineness and his joyfulness, and also for his pranks),
but the ability to distinguish between moments of relaxation, that
are always necessary, from those of service. Secondly the
relationships between all those involved in the pilgrimage must be
based on charity, charity above all towards Our Sick Lords, the
toward those colleagues in the personnel (which does not always
happen), between the staff and superiors and Vive-versa. Charity
demands a willingness and availability which when one is called to
carry out a service, must prevail above everything and when the sick
are involved must be absolute in every moment. Charity and
commitment are also promoted by good example, good example which is
a duty above all of the older people towards the young, superiors
towards those under them; for example, a wheelchair pushed by a
professor of dignitary of the Order is worth more than lots of
speeches!
The
Aim of the Pilgrimage
Man
is composed of a soul and of a body, the elevation towards God, the
holiness that a pilgrimage must produce, must translate itself in a
style and language that must be in harmony with this effort to be
holy. Often the lack of style, of order or an inappropriate language
hide a lack of depth, a lack of depth that like a snake that bites
its tail, is nourished by the style, by the inappropriate language
and by disorder, damaging not only the individual but also others
who can take this bad example. With this we do not want to say that
everyone must behave like “little saints”, which is something above
all that can create hypocrisy, but that nothing be exaggerated, that
there be discretion and balance, and above all that no bad example
is given, taking into account that not everyone is the same and what
can seem normal for some can be a cause at scandal for others, The
behaviour towards Our Sick Lords must be even more restrained
because they are not only the image of the Lord but they are people
who are suffering and a lack of style and frivolousness can not only
be offensive but also cause sadness.
Relationship with the members of the Pilgrimage
Those
who in the pilgrimage are called to exercise authority or
decision-making at any level are expected to be charitable, humble,
as well as being steadfast and firm: those under the superiors are
expected to be humble, readily and enthusiastically obedient, and of
course charitable. The superior, above all in a religious order,
must totally forget himself and think only of being an instrument of
the Lord so that everything can go ahead with order and with that
harmony which is the fruit of charity. Everyone must remember that,
whatever role they carry out in the pilgrimage, they are at the
service of the sick and at the service of God, and that superiors
must be prayed for so that they become holy. Avoiding the dangers
that can accompany the use of power even if limited. Pride and
selfishness etc., lurk in all hearts, and we all need the prayers of
each other, especially in a devotion so important as a pilgrimage.
Neri
Capponi
Top
Chapter VI
Charite et Communion
Réflexions du Bailli & Prince Guy de Polignac
Président de Association Français
En ce
moment de l’histoire de l’Ordre Souverain, auquel j’appartiens
depuis l’âge de 25 ans, je me réjouis de penser qu’autour du Prince
et Grand Maître, les Grands Prieurés, les Prieurés, et les
Associations nationales de l’Ordre Souverain constituent une grande
famille unie.
Qu’est-ce qui, à mon avis, caractérise une famille unie?
C’est
que les membres dune famille unie sont convaincus de leur solidarité
du besoin qu’ils ont les uns des autres, de leur communauté
d’aspirations et de destin; ils savant se pardonner, se rendre
service réciproquement, et ils savant renoncer á leurs intérêts
particuliers pour sauvegarder leur unité.
Une
famille unie est une communauté d’affection et de soutien
réciproque, source permanente de joie, de paix et d’épanouissement
personnel de chacun de ses membres.
Ce qui
constitue notre grande famille, chers Confrères et amis, ce qui en
constitue l’essence profonde, c’est bien sûr la réalité spirituelle
– fondement de l’Ordre Souverain – á laquelle tous ses Membres
adhèrent volontairement en s’engageant dans l’Ordre.
A notre
époque, croyez-moi, des familles aussi nombreuses et unies que la
nôtre, il y en a peu. La nôtre est pour le moins exceptionnelle. Et
ce n’est pas une famille figée. C’est une famille qui se développe
continuellement, tant par son recrutement, ses activités
hospitalières et ses multiples interventions humanitaires, que par
sa présence dans un nombre de pays toujours plus grand.
Or,
l’unité d’une famille, d’une famille aussi diverse et grande doit
s’affirmer au fur et à mesure qu’elle se développe.
Certains
vont sans doute penser que je manie le paradoxe, mais á une époque
où les combats pour l’homme et pour le maintien de sa dignité, pour
le service de ceux qui souffrent et de ceux qui sont abandonnés,
sont plus nombreux et plus violents chaque jour, il me semble en
effet que notre grande famille doit se resserrer. Se resserrer
plutôt que de s’éparpiller. Se resserrer autour de son Grand Maître,
afin de marquer son unité – la diversité dans l’unité – tot en
conservant, bien sûr, ã chaque membre de la famille – c’est-à-dire à
chaque Prieuré et Association nationale – son autonomie d’action
indispensable dans le cadre juridique, social et politique de chaque
pays.
(extrait
du discours prononcé à lourdes, mai 1981)
Il est
indéniable que notre mission charitable, comme celle d’autres
organismes catholiques nationaux et internationaux, est une œuvre
d’Eglise. L’Eglise, comme le rappelle le récent décret sur
l’apostolat des laïcs, << tient aux œuvres charitables comme à une
partie de sa mission propre, et comme á un droit indéniable >>.
Comme au temps des premières communautés apostoliques, le Saint
Père, Jean-Paul II, demande à ses fils – ne sommes-nous pas parmi
ses fils privilégiés ? – d’exercer la charité dans toute son
originalité et sa profondeur évangélique, afin de témoigner, au
milieu de ce monde, de la priorité de l’assistance aux pauvres, aux
plus pauvres, aux nouveaux pauvres….
Comme
membres de notre grande Communauté rassemblés sous la croix á huit
pointes, il vous faut veiller á ne pas isoler la Charité des autres
exigences des Béatitudes/ en termes plus prosaïques, je veux dire en
particulier à nos jeunes, mais aussi à de moins jeunes, que les
devoirs d’un Membre de l’Ordre de Malte ne se résument pas à la
seule participation à ce Pèlerinage annuel, aussi beau, aussi
profondément vécu soit-il ; notre pèlerinage, comme notre engagement
Chevaleresque (même si le mot peut apparaître de nos jours comme un
peu désuet). Sont du domaine de la permanence et de la quotidienneté
de notre vie. Nos malades comptent sur nous pendant toute l’année,
sur nos prières et sur notre présence ; nos œuvres multiples, nos
activités au service de l’Ordre Souverain, nécessitent plus que
jamais une unité totale de vues, d’action, de pensée, dans notre
monde profondément bouleversé, à la recherche de valeurs sûres, à la
recherche d’idéaux et de fraternité.
Que la
vierge Marie nous éclaire et entretienne en nous tous le feu de
l’amour, entretienne ce que l’un d’entre nous, aujourd’hui français,
appelle << la maladie de l’Ordre de Malte >>, Que L’Esprit Saint
nous unisse, Membres de l’Ordre de tant de pays, dans le cœur unique
de Christ, et nous donne la force d’accomplir ensemble et
confraternellement notre mission multiséculaire.
(extrait
du discours prononcé à Lourdes, mai 1983)
Top |
