In his response to the Lenten spiritual exercises lead by Cardinal Ravasi, Pope Benedict pointed out that 'the medieval theologians translated the word "Logos" not only as "Verbum" [Word], but also as "ars" [art]: "Verbum" and "ars" are interchangeable. For the medieval theologians, it was only with the two words together that the whole meaning of the word “Logos” appeared. The "Logos" is not just a mathematical reason: the "Logos" has a heart, the "Logos" is also love. The truth is beautiful and the true and beautiful go together: beauty is the seal of truth.'
Evil, of course, is always intent on spoiling creation and defacing it, but cannot succeed. 'The incarnate Son, the incarnate "Logos" is crowned with a crown of thorns and nevertheless is just that: in this suffering figure of the Son of God we begin to see the deepest beauty of our Creator and Redeemer; in the silence of the “dark night” we can, nevertheless, hear the Word. And believing is nothing other than, in the darkness of the world, touching the hand of God, and in this way, in silence, hearing the Word, seeing love.'
Throughout his pontificate, and right to the very end, this Pope has spoken of the Logos and helped us to see the meaning and beauty of the truth revealed in Christ. The 'Pope of the Logos' teaches that faith, reason, and beauty converge in love.
Saturday, February 23, 2013
Friday, February 15, 2013
Pope Benedict: Freedom in orthodoxy
When Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger was elected Pope on the 19th of April 2005, I rejoiced and was glad. I knew what a great theologian he was, and that he was the person who understood most profoundly the mission of his predecessor, who poured himself out to the bitter end for the Church they both loved.
I rejoiced too because I had happened, a few years earlier, to observe the new pontiff at fairly close quarters, at a liturgical conference he helped to convene in the Abbey of Fontgombault in France. My husband had been asked to give a paper, and I accompanied him as his interpreter. The proceedings were held in the guest-house. The trouble was, no one at this traditionalist monastery had told us that this was technically within the enclosure. As the dreadful realisation that I was distinctly de trop in this highly clerical setting hit me, I was ready to trade my soul for a cloak of invisibility, but it was too late to leave. 'Your Graces, Fathers, Brothers and... sister!' was how Cardinal Ratzinger opened the proceedings, with a kind, if amused, glance in my direction.
I was not the only recipient of the future Pope’s warm courtesy. When he first arrived, a group of families gathered shyly on the far side of the square outside the monastery. He immediately walked over to greet them, smiling, chatting and blessing the children, before turning back to greet the monastics waiting in a patient semi-circle outside the abbey church. But most remarkable of all, as the days of the conference unfolded, was the way the Cardinal led the discussions about the relevance of the old rite of the Mass, amidst a group of participants who were not at one on the issue. It was a foretaste of things to come: his wise sense that both liturgical extremes must give way to a historically informed sense of what the old could contribute to the new, if only they were given the space to co-exist as living forms.
In a homily on the feast of St Mary Magdalene (he insisted on keeping the date from the new calendar), the Cardinal pressed home his central point. It was all too easy, he warned, to become liturgical Marthas, preoccupied with one agenda or another. This happens when even legitimate concerns seep into the liturgy in an attempt to make it politically ‘relevant’. But it happens just as much when attempts to keep the liturgy beautiful and sacred give rise to a formalism that locks out the presence of God. The answer lies in a spirit of loving contemplation: Mary’s ‘better part’.
This nuanced way of reasoning about liturgy is characteristic of Pope Benedict’s theology. Even leaving aside his considerable writings from before he became Pope, his first encyclical, Deus Caritas Est, is a catechism in a nutshell. The social teaching of Caritas in Veritate flows on from it. Benedict is truly a model of how to do theology on your knees. His trilogy, Jesus of Nazareth, is a master-class in lectio divina, taking into account modern biblical criticism, whilst maintaining an authentic vision of faith in the God-made-man who does not fit into reductionist categories. The balance he has restored to biblical scholarship may be one of his most lasting legacies. Again and again, I have been blown away by the charity-infused clarity of the man who has steered the barque of Peter for the last eight years or so.
And yet this most ‘traditional’ of Popes has shaken the Church and the world to its roots by suddenly renouncing the papacy. Why has he done this? We can be sure that he has a very good reason, or he would never have broken with the precedent of nearly six centuries. He touched on this situation in The Light of the World in 2010, where he spoke of the Pope’s obligation to resign if he felt he was no longer capable of handling his duties. As it says in the Pastoral Rule of St Gregory the Great, the pontiff must be “a man whose aims are not thwarted by the frailty of his body.” Some have speculated that the present Pope’s decision implicitly criticises his predecessor. However, Benedict knows that the aim of Blessed John Paul II was allow the frailty of a once strong body to give witness to the value of weakness, in a culture which despises it. Like every Christian, each Pope has his own particular mission.
I would guess that this sensitive and humble man has finally felt his aging mind and body outrun by the sheer volume of issues needing the attention of the chief shepherd. The demands on the papacy in the age of the internet and fast-moving media, not to mention global travel, have vastly increased in the last few decades. Also, we should never forget that holy people are the subject of intense supernatural attack, which combined with physical frailty is exhausting. After years of contemplating betrayal by his own men, whether in past horrors now revealed, or present jostling for power (and the tragic case of the leaking butler is surely a consequence of this), Benedict XVI may have decided that the most radical, and thus the most faithful solution is the one that makes room for a man who has the strength to govern what is threatening to become an ungovernable body.
While some are jumping at the opportunity to make critical comments, those who know and love this Pope are wondering what will we do without him. The beauty of it is that we don’t have to - he will still be there. For his successor, it will be hugely comforting to know that this most fatherly of priests is on his knees somewhere nearby, praying for him, not interfering, knowing exactly what he is having to contend with. And the need for prayer is above all what this stepping down signifies. Only in a constant re-centering on Christ can the dead hand of the lust for power be defeated. This principle of freedom in orthodoxy is one of the remarkable traits of this papacy, as it was of the last. By doing what he has done, the Holy Father is preaching the most powerful homily he could possibly have given us as we enter Lent.
I was not the only recipient of the future Pope’s warm courtesy. When he first arrived, a group of families gathered shyly on the far side of the square outside the monastery. He immediately walked over to greet them, smiling, chatting and blessing the children, before turning back to greet the monastics waiting in a patient semi-circle outside the abbey church. But most remarkable of all, as the days of the conference unfolded, was the way the Cardinal led the discussions about the relevance of the old rite of the Mass, amidst a group of participants who were not at one on the issue. It was a foretaste of things to come: his wise sense that both liturgical extremes must give way to a historically informed sense of what the old could contribute to the new, if only they were given the space to co-exist as living forms.
In a homily on the feast of St Mary Magdalene (he insisted on keeping the date from the new calendar), the Cardinal pressed home his central point. It was all too easy, he warned, to become liturgical Marthas, preoccupied with one agenda or another. This happens when even legitimate concerns seep into the liturgy in an attempt to make it politically ‘relevant’. But it happens just as much when attempts to keep the liturgy beautiful and sacred give rise to a formalism that locks out the presence of God. The answer lies in a spirit of loving contemplation: Mary’s ‘better part’.
This nuanced way of reasoning about liturgy is characteristic of Pope Benedict’s theology. Even leaving aside his considerable writings from before he became Pope, his first encyclical, Deus Caritas Est, is a catechism in a nutshell. The social teaching of Caritas in Veritate flows on from it. Benedict is truly a model of how to do theology on your knees. His trilogy, Jesus of Nazareth, is a master-class in lectio divina, taking into account modern biblical criticism, whilst maintaining an authentic vision of faith in the God-made-man who does not fit into reductionist categories. The balance he has restored to biblical scholarship may be one of his most lasting legacies. Again and again, I have been blown away by the charity-infused clarity of the man who has steered the barque of Peter for the last eight years or so.
And yet this most ‘traditional’ of Popes has shaken the Church and the world to its roots by suddenly renouncing the papacy. Why has he done this? We can be sure that he has a very good reason, or he would never have broken with the precedent of nearly six centuries. He touched on this situation in The Light of the World in 2010, where he spoke of the Pope’s obligation to resign if he felt he was no longer capable of handling his duties. As it says in the Pastoral Rule of St Gregory the Great, the pontiff must be “a man whose aims are not thwarted by the frailty of his body.” Some have speculated that the present Pope’s decision implicitly criticises his predecessor. However, Benedict knows that the aim of Blessed John Paul II was allow the frailty of a once strong body to give witness to the value of weakness, in a culture which despises it. Like every Christian, each Pope has his own particular mission.
I would guess that this sensitive and humble man has finally felt his aging mind and body outrun by the sheer volume of issues needing the attention of the chief shepherd. The demands on the papacy in the age of the internet and fast-moving media, not to mention global travel, have vastly increased in the last few decades. Also, we should never forget that holy people are the subject of intense supernatural attack, which combined with physical frailty is exhausting. After years of contemplating betrayal by his own men, whether in past horrors now revealed, or present jostling for power (and the tragic case of the leaking butler is surely a consequence of this), Benedict XVI may have decided that the most radical, and thus the most faithful solution is the one that makes room for a man who has the strength to govern what is threatening to become an ungovernable body.
While some are jumping at the opportunity to make critical comments, those who know and love this Pope are wondering what will we do without him. The beauty of it is that we don’t have to - he will still be there. For his successor, it will be hugely comforting to know that this most fatherly of priests is on his knees somewhere nearby, praying for him, not interfering, knowing exactly what he is having to contend with. And the need for prayer is above all what this stepping down signifies. Only in a constant re-centering on Christ can the dead hand of the lust for power be defeated. This principle of freedom in orthodoxy is one of the remarkable traits of this papacy, as it was of the last. By doing what he has done, the Holy Father is preaching the most powerful homily he could possibly have given us as we enter Lent.
Wednesday, February 13, 2013
Beauty in the Word - review
The following review and summary appeared in the journal First Things in December 2012, by Stephen Richard Turley, who teaches at Tall Oaks Classical School in New Castle, Delaware, and at Eastern University.
Beauty in the Word, Stratford Caldecott’s sequel to his Beauty for Truth’s Sake, surveys not the historical outworking of the liberal arts tradition but rather the inspiration that lies behind it. Specifically, the author—the director of Thomas More College’s
Center for Faith and Culture in Oxford and editor of the journal Second Spring—raises the notion of an educational “Trivium” composed of grammar, dialectic, and rhetoric. This Trinitarian structure requires that we remember that we come from the Father, that we think in accordance with the Son the Logos, and that we communicate in the communion of the Holy Spirit.
In the classroom, this scheme would result in a via media between the two teaching approaches that have tended to dominate educational theory over the last century, what Caldecott terms “romantic” and “classical” tendencies; educational projects that are either child-centered or teacher-centered. Both approaches err by failing to conceive of the child as a “person,” he says.
Personhood, in contrast to individualism, “means the human being determined in his identity. . . by relationships both chosen and unchosen.” Thus, he sees the central dynamic of education as involving a reciprocal relationship between the student and teacher that manifests a third, namely, the Truth that is implicit in the relationship itself.
Caldecott suggests a curriculum grounded in the philosophy behind the Trivium but not limited to its three elements. The fine arts, for example, could associate grammar with music and dance, dialectic with the visual arts, and rhetoric with drama. He also pays heed to the role of the family in education, particularly in relation to the formation of the child’s moral imagination. The ultimate goal is an “education of the heart,” which “represents not merely a training of the emotions, but an integration of feelings and thoughts into a higher unity.”
This book provides a rationale for a liberal arts education that taps deep, even forgotten, arguments with a richness that well-intentioned slogans about the importance of cultural literacy cannot convey. Although Caldecott’s arguments sometimes meander, and each chapter would have been strengthened if he included an introduction of some sort, this is still a book that stands apart in its genre.
Wednesday, February 6, 2013
Oxford Tolkien Spring School
Oxford University is offering a Spring School devoted to J.R.R.Tolkien on 21-23 March. Details here.
Saturday, February 2, 2013
What's All About Students All About Anyway?
I have been meaning and meaning to write about the Virginia Governor's 2013 education agenda, Part I and Part II, and so I will (belatedly) and unlike my response to his education agenda last year, it will be brief (mercifully).
First of all, as it's sprinkled liberally throughout his agenda, it seems that the Governor hasn't received the memo on the term "achievement gap." Even TFA got that memo and has responded with a good ol' liberal arts-style deconstruction (not that I would ever in my wildest dreams imagine that a Virginia GOP political leader would be caught dead reading such a thing).
And speaking of TFA. . .
1. Teach for America Act (HB 2084):
You probably already know what I think. I have written about TFA before. It's my most popular piece.
The only thing new I have to say is: Why does Virginia need TFA? There are budget and teaching positions being cut across the state and I hear it's hard for our college graduates to get teaching positions. Where is the evidence that there's a teacher shortage anywhere in Virginia? And if there is one, why don't we have a Teach for Virginia instead? Teachers who are being laid off could be given incentives to go and teach in hard to staff areas. Top students at Virginia colleges and universities, especially ones seeking a teacher's license, could also be granted incentives to start their careers in these supposedly "hard to staff" places.
Otherwise, it doesn't seem like anyone's fighting it, so meh.
2. 2% increase for Virginia Public School Teachers
I don't know any other way to say this, so here goes: This is a lie. The governor is pledging a one-time grant of 58.7 million dollars to contribute towards a 2% raise. That means the state will only fund a certain percentage towards the 2% increase and will not re-new that funding next year. Basically, the governor is promising a raise that he doesn't really plan on paying for in any sustainable way. So he's making promises on behalf of broke localities.
3. A-F School Report Cards (School Grading Bill - HB 1999)
This is just a ridiculous idea and unlike some of these other bills, no one else in Virginia supports it--for example, the VEA, VSBA, VASS and the VA PTA are all opposed to it-- except for Jeb Bush. Oh wait, he's not a Virginian.
If you want to read why school grading bills are a bad idea (and hear a more nuanced version of "ridiculous or "bad idea"), read here and here.
4. Stem-H Incentives
This grants extra money to "high quality people" (um, I think you meant to say highly qualified individuals, Mr. Governor) teaching math, science, technology, health, and engineering. Yes, it's harder to find people able to teach those, but I'm not sure a one-time grant of $5,000 will make the difference. If we raised the stature, education, and pay of ALL teachers, we might stand a chance.
5. K-12 Red Tape Reduction (SB 1189, maybe)
Yeah! Red tape reduction! Wahoo! Because who likes red tape, right?
Wait a minute. The explanation on the VDOE site says, "Local school divisions may be released from Board of Education-approved regulations and standards of quality requirements." Well, which regulations and standards of quality? If it's something stupid, by all means, let's get rid of it. If it's a standard that says all elementary students must have a certain amount of art per week, I'm not so sure I want my kids' school district getting a waiver from that.
6. Strategic Compensation Grant Initiative
7. Staffing Flexibility for School Divisions (I think this is HB 2098 or 2066 or both)
From what I've read, this seems to make sense, though if someone can tell me why it doesn't, please speak up in the comments.
8. Educator Fairness Act
The VEA (Virginia Education Association) thought this was a grossly unfair educator fairness act and it seemed so to me, too. Since then a deal has been agreed to that all parties seem happy with, so I will say no more. (But, readers, speak up, if you feel or have evidence to the contrary.)
9. Teacher Cabinet
I'm all for a teacher cabinet to advise the governor.
10. Governor's Center for Excellence in Teaching
As long as this is to promote excellence in teaching and not excellence in testing, I'm all for it. The proof will be in the pudding, though.
11. Reading is Fundamental Initiative (HB 2114)
Ugghhhh! Again with this reading stuff! Yes, dear readers, that is the sound of my head banging against the wall. I can not get anyone in this state to hear me on this.
I have written about this even more than I have written about TFA. And it's a place where I find common ground with some in reformy pro-TFA factions. If you don't want to take the time to read what I've written, watch this and read this.
The idea behind this is well-intentioned but terribly misinformed. They think that kids can't learn about science and social studies until they can read, that they have to focus on reading as a skill and then learn content. Yes, kids need to learn to decode. Decoding is a skill. Yes, kids should be presented with one-time mini lessons on reading strategies. But reading comprehension is not a skill; it's not transferable. Reading comprehension depends on knowledge. So, if we cut science and social studies and other subject matter "to focus on reading," the kids will not progress. They "can't read" mostly because they're not being taught about enough stuff. They will learn that they are bad at reading and that school is not interesting.
12. Literacy and Algebra Readiness Initiative (HB 2068)
As long as they avoid the pitfalls mentioned in item 5 above, this isn't so bad as far as I can tell--it targets grades K-2 which are the younger de-coding grades.
As for the algebra part, I happen to be in the pro-algebra group, as in, I think it is necessary and I think people do use it in their everyday lives. Otherwise, I don't know as much about math education except to say that the Math SOLs seems to be far superior to the Language Arts ones. If you have thoughts, speak up (though I'm decided on algebra, so don’t waste your breath there).
13. Funding for Reading Specialists
Meh.
By now, you already know how I feel about teaching reading as a subject past second or third grade and why I think so many American kids struggle with reading, so I'll spare you.
14. Kindergarten Readiness
I'm all for giving teachers for information and diagnostic tools to help them figure out where their students are, but I'd have to learn more about these particular tools and how long they take, if they're developmentally appropriate, and if there a part of our wrong-headed accountability structure.
15. Effective School-Wide Discipline
I'm in favor of giving teachers more training and practice in classroom management, but I don't know what the particulars are of this disciplinary program.
Blah, blah, blah, achievement gap. Blah, blah, blah, innovation. Blah, blah, blah, school choice.
This is All About Reforminess a la Jeb Bush, Michelle Rhee, and ALEC.
Updates to original post:
I. I’m not sure why I didn’t notice this in the Governor’s agenda, but thanks to Kirsten Gray, a parent of two Richmond Public School students and board member of the Alliance for Progressive Values, I just became aware of HB 2096, part of the goal of which is to create an “Opportunity Education Institution.” In any case, this bill seems like bad news. As Kirsten commented,
I do not trust this bill. This “board" is appointed. This "institution" is created by the governor and can take over any failing school (based on data from tests is my guess). We know most of these "failing" schools are predominately in poor areas serving families without means. The charters this "institution" puts in place aren't likely to be charters created by parents and communities. No they are likely to roll in the "for profit" charters. I think they are banking on it. Read all the stuff in yellow in the second half of the bill.
"B. The Board shall supervise and operate schools in the Opportunity Educational Institution in whatever manner that it determines to be most likely to achieve full accreditation for each school in the Institution, including the utilization of charter schools and college partnership laboratory schools."
"B. The Board shall supervise and operate schools in the Opportunity Educational Institution in whatever manner that it determines to be most likely to achieve full accreditation for each school in the Institution, including the utilization of charter schools and college partnership laboratory schools."
II. Then, there's SJ327 (which seems related but maybe isn't--thoughts, readers?) According to the VSBA blog, this is another bad bill:
SJ327 is a constitutional amendment that would allow for state takeover of public schools that are denied accreditation. The constitutional amendment does not set forth specifics for such a state takeover, thus giving the General Assembly broad authority to devise a state takeover in future years. Most importantly, the constitutional amendment would allow the state to take not only the state share of per pupil funding but to also take the local share of per pupil funding for each student in a school that is taken over. In other words, this constitutional amendment would force localities to send local dollars to a state-run entity without any control over what the state does with those local dollars.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)