Monday, July 15, 2013 - Litany Lane Blog: Vigilant, Psalms 124, Exodus 1:8-14, Matthew 10:34-11:1, Pope Francis World Youth Day Events - Visits citizens of Castel Gandolfo, St. Bonaventure, Latium Italy, Catholic Catechism Part Three: Life In Christ Section 2 The Human Communion Article 3:3 Social Justice - Human Solidarity and In Brief

Monday,  July 15, 2013 - Litany Lane Blog:

Vigilant, Psalms 124, Exodus 1:8-14, Matthew 10:34-11:1, Pope Francis World Youth Day Events - Visits citizens of Castel Gandolfo, St. Bonaventure, Latium  Italy, Catholic Catechism Part Three: Life  In Christ Section 2 The Human Communion Article 3:3  Social Justice - Human Solidarity and In Brief

Year of Faith - October 11, 2012 - November 24, 2013

P.U.S.H. (Pray Until Serenity Happens). It has a remarkable way of producing solace, peace, patience and tranquility and of course resolution...God's always available 24/7.

The world begins and ends everyday for someone.  We are all human. We all experience birth, life and death. We all have flaws but we also all have the gift of knowledge, reason and free will, make the most of these gifts. Life on earth is a stepping stone to our eternal home in Heaven. The Seven Gifts of the Holy Spirit: wisdom, understanding, wonder and awe (fear of the Lord) , counsel, knowledge, fortitude, and piety (reverence) and shun the seven Deadly sins: wrath, greed, sloth, pride, lust, envy, and gluttony...Its your choice whether to embrace the Gifts of the Holy Spirit rising towards eternal light or succumb to the Seven deadly sins and lost to eternal darkness. Material items, though needed for sustenance and survival on earth are of earthly value only. The only thing that passes from this earth to the Darkness, Purgatory or Heaven is our Soul...it's God's perpetual gift to us...Embrace it, treasure it, nurture it, protect it...~ Zarya Parx 2013

"Raise not a hand to another unless it is to offer in peace and goodwill." ~ Zarya Parx 2012

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Prayers for Today: Monday in Ordinary Time

Rosary - Joyful Mysteries

Divine Mercy Chaplet

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 Papam Franciscus
(Pope Francis)

Pope Francis July 15 World Your Day Events:

Visits Citizens of Castel Gandolfo 

(2013-07-15 Vatican Radio)

“I have come to spend a day meeting with the citizens of Castel Gandolfo, with the pilgrims and all the visitors who justly love this place, who are enchanted by its beauty”, said Pope Francis to the employees of the Pontifical Villas of the small town where the popes traditionally spend the summer. The Holy Father expressed his gratitude to the employees and their families for the work they carry out in the service of the Holy See.

The meeting took place on the terrace of the apostolic palace at Castel Gandolfo and was attended by Bishop Marcello Semeraro of Albano, the diocese to which Castel Gandolfo belongs, Saverio Petrillo, director of the Pontifical Villas, and the mayor of Castel Gandolfo, Milvia Monachesi. The presence of the bishop enabled the Pope to greet with affection the parish community of Castel Gandolfo and the religious communities in the area, and he encouraged them to “renew with joy and enthusiasm the commitment to proclaiming and witnessing the Gospel”. In his address to the mayor he invited the citizens of Castel Gandolfo “to be a sign of hope and peace, always attentive to those people and families most in difficulty”. He added, “This is important! We must always be a sign of hope and peace at this time. Open the doors to hope, so that hope might continue to work towards peace, for ever”.

Pope Francis then mentioned John Paul II and Benedict XVI, who used to spend part of the summer there. “Many of you had the opportunity to meet and welcome them, and conserve dear memories of them. May their witness always encourage you in your daily fidelity to Christ and in your continual efforts to lead a life consonant with the demands of the Gospel and the teachings of the Church”.

Finally, he entrusted those present to the Virgin Mary, who two days later would be commemorated as the Virgin of Mount Carmel, beseeching her to watch over them and their families. “I beg you all to pray for me too, and for my service”, he added; “I need your prayers”.

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Liturgical Celebrations to be presided over by Pope: Summer

Vatican City, Summer2013 (VIS)
Following is the calendar of celebrations scheduled to be presided over by the Holy Father for the Summer of 2013:

JULY

The Prefecture of the Papal Household has released Pope Francis' agenda for the summer period, from July through to the end of August. Briefing journalists, Holy See Press Office director, Fr. Federico Lombardi confirmed that the Pope will remain 'based ' at the Casa Santa Marta residence in Vatican City State for the duration of the summer.

As per tradition, all private and special audiences are suspended for the duration of the summer. The Holy Father's private Masses with employees will end July 7 and resume in September. The Wednesday general audiences are suspended for the month of July to resume August 7 at the Vatican.

Pope Francis will travel to Brazil for the 28^th World Youth Day in Rio de Janeiro from Monday July 22 to Monday July 29.  

Reference: 

• Vatican News. From the Pope. © Copyright 2013 - Libreria Editrice Vaticana. Accessed 07/15/2013.

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July 2, 2013 Our Lady of Medjugorje Message to the World: "Dear children, with a motherly love I am imploring you to give me the gift of your hearts, so I can present them to my Son and free you – free you from all the evil enslaving and distancing you all the more from the only Good – my Son – from everything which is leading you on the wrong way and is taking peace away from you. I desire to lead you to the freedom of the promise of my Son, because I desire for God's will to be fulfilled completely here; and that through reconciliation with the Heavenly Father, through fasting and prayer, apostles of God's love may be born – apostles who will freely, and with love, spread the love of God to all my children – apostles who will spread the love of the trust in the Heavenly Father and who will keep opening the gates of Heaven. Dear children, extend the joy of love and support to your shepherds, just as my Son has asked them to extend it to you. Thank you."

June 25, 2013 Our Lady of Medjugorje Message to the World on the 32nd Anniversary of the apparitions: “Dear children! With joy in the heart I love you all and call you to draw closer to my Immaculate Heart so I can draw you still closer to my Son Jesus, and that He can give you His peace and love, which are nourishment for each one of you. Open yourselves, little children, to prayer – open yourselves to my love. I am your mother and cannot leave you alone in wandering and sin. You are called, little children, to be my children, my beloved children, so I can present you all to my Son. Thank you for having responded to my call.”

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Today's Word:  vigilant  vig·i·lant [vij-uh-luhnt]  

Origin:  1470–80;  < Latin vigilant-  (stem of vigilāns ), present participle of vigilāre  to be watchful. See vigil, -ant

adjective

1. keenly watchful to detect danger; wary: a vigilant sentry.

2. ever awake and alert; sleeplessly watchful.

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Today's Old Testament Reading - Psalms 124:1-8

¹ [Song of Ascents Of David] If Yahweh had not been on our side -- let Israel repeat it-

² if Yahweh had not been on our side when people attacked us,

³ they would have swallowed us alive in the heat of their anger.

⁴ Then water was washing us away, a torrent running right over us;

⁵ running right over us then were turbulent waters.

⁶ Blessed be Yahweh for not letting us fall a prey to their teeth!

⁷ We escaped like a bird from the fowlers' net. The net was broken and we escaped;

⁸ our help is in the name of Yahweh, who made heaven and earth.

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Today's Epistle -  Exodus 1:8-14, 22

⁸ Then there came to power in Egypt a new king who had never heard of Joseph.

⁹ 'Look,' he said to his people, 'the Israelites are now more numerous and stronger than we are.

¹⁰ We must take precautions to stop them from increasing any further, or if war should break out, they might join the ranks of our enemies. They might take arms against us and then escape from the country.'

¹¹ Accordingly they put taskmasters over the Israelites to wear them down by forced labour. In this way they built the store-cities of Pithom and Rameses for Pharaoh.

¹² But the harder their lives were made, the more they increased and spread, until people came to fear the Israelites.

¹³ So the Egyptians gave them no mercy in the demands they made,

¹⁴ making their lives miserable with hard labour: with digging clay, making bricks, doing various kinds of field -- work -- all sorts of labour that they imposed on them without mercy.

²² Pharaoh then gave all his people this command: 'Throw every new-born boy into the river, but let all the girls live.'

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Today's Gospel Reading - Matthew 10:34 -11:1

Jesus said to his disciples: 'Do not suppose that I have come to bring peace to the earth: it is not peace I have come to bring, but a sword. For I have come to set son against father, daughter against mother, daughter-in-law against mother-in-law; a person's enemies will be the members of his own household. 'No one who prefers father or mother to me is worthy of me. No one who prefers son or daughter to me is worthy of me. Anyone who does not take his cross and follow in my footsteps is not worthy of me. Anyone who finds his life will lose it; anyone who loses his life for my sake will find it. 'Anyone who welcomes you welcomes me; and anyone who welcomes me welcomes the one who sent me. 'Anyone who welcomes a prophet because he is a prophet will have a prophet's reward; and anyone who welcomes an upright person because he is upright will have the reward of an upright person. 'If anyone gives so much as a cup of cold water to one of these little ones because he is a disciple, then in truth I tell you, he will most certainly not go without his reward.' When Jesus had finished instructing his twelve disciples he moved on from there to teach and preach in their towns.

 

3) Reflection

• In May of last year, the V Conference of Latin American Bishops, which was held in Aparecida in the north of Brazil, wrote a very important Document on the theme: Disciples and Missionaries of Jesus Christ, so that our peoples may have life”. The discourse of the Mission of chapter 10 of the Gospel of Matthew, offers much light in order to be able to carry out the mission as disciples and missionaries of Jesus Christ. The Gospel today presents to us the last part of this Discourse of the Mission.

• Matthew 10, 34-36: I have not come to bring peace to the earth but the sword.  Jesus always speaks of peace (Mt 5, 9; Mk 9, 50; Lk 1, 79; 10, 5; 19, 38; 24, 36; Jn 14, 27; 16, 33; 20, 21. 26). And then, how can we understand the phrase in today’s Gospel which seems to say the contrary: “Do not think that I have come to bring peace on earth; no, I have not come to bring peace but the sword”. This affirmation does not mean that Jesus was in favour of division and the sword. No! Jesus does not want neither the sword (Jn 18, 11), nor division. He wants the union of all in truth (cf. Jn 17, 17-23). At that time, the announcement of the truth that He, Jesus of Nazareth, was the Messiah became a reason of great division among the Jews.  In the same family or community, some were in favour and others were radically contrary. In this sense the Good News of Jesus was truly a source of division, a “sign of contradiction” (Lk 2, 34) or, as Jesus said, he was bringing the sword.  In this way the other warning is understood: “I have come to set son against father, daughter against mother, daughter-in-law against mother– in-law; a person’s enemies will be the members of his own household”. In fact, that was what was happening in the families and in the communities: much division, much discussion, the consequence of the announcement of the Good News among the Jews of that time, because some accepted, others denied. Today the same thing happens. Many times, there where the Church renews itself, the appeal to the Good News becomes a ‘sign of contradiction’ and of division.  Persons, who during years have lived comfortably in their routine of Christian life, do not want to allow themselves to be bothered by the ‘innovations’ of Vatican Council II. Disturbed by the changes, they used all their intelligence to find arguments in defence of their opinions and to condemn the changes considering them contrary to what they thought was the true faith.

• Matthew 10, 37: No one who prefers father or mother to me is worthy of me. Luke gives this same phrase, but much more demandino. Literally he says: “If anyone comes to me and does not hate his father and mother, his sons and brothers, his sisters, and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple” (Lk 14, 26). How can this affirmation of Jesus be combined with the other one in which he orders to observe the fourth commandment: love and honour father and mother? (Mk 7, 10-12; Mt 19, 19). Two observations:  (1) The fundamental criterion on which Jesus insists always is this one: the Good News of God should be the supreme value of our life. In our life there can be no greater value. (2) The economic and social situation at the time of Jesus was such that the families were obliged to close themselves up in themselves. They no longer had the conditions to respect the obligations of human community living together as for example: sharing, hospitality, invitation to a meal and the acceptance of the excluded.  This individualistic closing up in self, caused by the national and international situation produced distortion: (1) It made life in community impossible (2) It limited the commandment “honour father and mother” exclusively to the small family nucleus and no longer to the larger family of the community (3) It prevented the full manifestation of the Good News of God, because if God is Father/Mother we are brothers and sisters of one another. And this truth should be expressed in the life of the community.  A living and fraternal community is the mirror of the face of God. Human living together without community is a mirror which disfigures the face of God.  In this context, the request of Jesus: “to hate father and mother means that the disciples should overcome the individualistic closing up of the small family on itself, and extend it to the community dimension. Jesus himself put into practice what he taught others.  His family wanted to call him to close himself up in self. When they told him: “Look, your mother and your brothers are outside and they are looking for you”, he answered: “Who is my mother, and who are my brothers?” And looking at the persons around him he said: “Behold, my mother and my brothers. Anyone who does the will of God is my brother, my sister and my mother” (Mk 3, 32-35). He extends the family!  This was and continues to be even today for the small family the only way to be able to keep and transmit the values in which he believes.

• Matthew 10, 38-39: The demands of the mission of the disciples. In these two verses, Jesus gives important and demanding advice: (a) To take up the cross and follow Jesus:  Anyone who does not take his cross and follow in my footsteps is not worthy of me. In order to perceive all the significance and important of this first advice it is well to keep in mind the witness of Saint Paul: “But as for me, it is not of the question that I should boast at all, except of the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom the world has been crucified to me and I to the world” (Ga 6, 14).  To carry the cross presupposes, even now, a radical drawing away from the iniquitous system which reigns in the world. (b) To have the courage to give one’s life: “Anyone who finds his life will lose it; anyone who loses his life for my sake will find it”.  Only the one, who in life has been capable of giving himself totally to others, will feel fulfilled.  This second advice confirms the deepest human experience; the source of life is in the gift of life. Giving one receives. If the wheat grain does not die … (Jn 12, 24). 

• Matthew 10, 40: The identification of the disciple with Jesus and with God himself. This human experience of donation and of the gift receives here a clarification, a deepening:”Anyone who welcomes you welcomes me: and anyone who welcomes me welcomes the one who sent me.”  In the total gift of self, the disciple identifies himself with Jesus; there the encounter with God takes place, and God allows himself to be found by the one who seeks him. 

• Matthew 10, 41-42: the reward of the prophet, of the just and of the disciple. The discourse of the Mission ends with one phrase on reward: “Anyone who welcomes a prophet because he is a prophet will have a prophet’s reward; and anyone who welcomes an upright person because he is upright will have the reward of an upright person If anyone gives so much as a cup of cold water to one of these little ones, because he is a disciple, then in truth I tell you, he will most certainly not go without reward”. In this phrase the sequence is very meaningful: the prophet is recognized because of his mission as one sent by God. The upright person is recognized by his behaviour, by his perfect way of observing the law of God. The disciple is recognized by no quality or mission, but simply by his social condition of being least among the people. The Kingdom is not made of great things. It is like a very big house which is constructed with small bricks. Anyone who despises the brick will have great difficulty in constructing the house. Even a glass of water serves as a brick for the construction of the Kingdom.

• Matthew 11, 1: The end of the Discourse of the Mission.  The end of the Discourse of the Mission. When Jesus had finished instructing his twelve disciples he moved from there to teach and preach in their towns.  Now Jesus leaves to put into practice what he has taught. We will see this in the next chapters 11 and 12 of the Gospel of Matthew.

4) Personal questions

• To lose life in order to gain life. Have you had some experience of having felt rewarded for an act of donation or gratuity for others? 
• He who welcomes you welcomes me, and who welcomes me, welcomes the One who sent me. Stop and think what Jesus says here: He and God himself identify themselves with you.

Reference: Courtesy of Order of Carmelites, www.ocarm.org.

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Featured Item of the Day from Litany Lane

Our Mother of Perpetual Help Ipad Cases by LitanyLane

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Saint of the Day:  St Bonaventure

Feast Day:  July 15

Patron Saint:  Philosophy and Scholasticism

Attributes: Cardinal's hat on a bush; ciborium; Holy Communion; cardinal in Franciscan robes, usually reading or writing

Saint Bonaventure

Saint Bonaventure, O.F.M. (Italian: San Bonaventura; 1221 – 15 July 1274),^[1] born Giovanni di Fidanza, was an Italian medieval scholastic theologian and philosopher. The seventh Minister General of the Order of Friars Minor, he was also a Cardinal Bishop of Albano. He was canonised on 14 April 1482 by Pope Sixtus IV and declared a Doctor of the Church in the year 1588 by Pope Sixtus V. He is known as the "Seraphic Doctor" (Latin: Doctor Seraphicus). Many writings believed in the Middle Ages to be his are now collected under the name Pseudo-Bonaventura.

Life

He was born at Bagnoregio in Latium, not far from Viterbo, then part of the Papal States. Almost nothing is known of his childhood, other than the names of his parents, Giovanni di Fidanza and Maria Ritella.

He entered the Franciscan Order in 1243 and studied at the University of Paris, possibly under Alexander of Hales, and certainly under Alexander's successor, John of Rochelle. In 1253 he held the Franciscan chair at Paris. Unfortunately for Bonaventure, a dispute between seculars and mendicants delayed his reception as Master until 1257, where his degree was taken in company with Thomas Aquinas.^[2] Three years earlier his fame had earned him the position of lecturer on the The Four Books of Sentences—a book of theology written by Peter Lombard in the twelfth century—and in 1255 he received the degree of master, the medieval equivalent of doctor.

After having successfully defended his order against the reproaches of the anti-mendicant party, he was elected Minister General of the Franciscan Order. On 24 November 1265, he was selected for the post of Archbishop of York; however, he was never consecrated and resigned the appointment in October 1266.^[3] It was by his order that Roger Bacon, a Franciscan friar himself, was interdicted from lecturing at Oxford and compelled to put himself under the surveillance of the Order at Paris.

Bonaventure was instrumental in procuring the election of Pope Gregory X, who rewarded him with the title of Cardinal Bishop of Albano, and insisted on his presence at the great Council of Lyon in 1274. There, after his significant contributions led to a union of the Greek and Latin churches, Bonaventure died suddenly and in suspicious circumstances. The Catholic Encyclopedia has citations which suggest he was poisoned. The only extant relic of the saint is the arm and hand with which he wrote his Commentary on the Sentences, which is now conserved at Bagnoregio, in the parish church of St. Nicholas.

He steered the Franciscans on a moderate and intellectual course that made them the most prominent order in the Catholic Church until the coming of the Jesuits. His theology was marked by an attempt completely to integrate faith and reason. He thought of Christ as the “one true master” who offers humans knowledge that begins in faith, is developed through rational understanding, and is perfected by mystical union with God.^[4]

Feast day

Bonaventure's feast day was included in the General Roman Calendar immediately upon his canonisation in 1482. It was at first celebrated on the second Sunday in July, but was moved in 1568 to 14 July, since 15 July, the anniversary of his death, was at that time taken up with the feast of Saint Henry. It remained on that date, with the rank of "double", until 1960, when it was reclassified as a feast of the third class. In 1969 it was classified as an obligatory memorial and assigned to the date of his death, 15 July.^[5]

Theology and works

Writings

Bonaventure was formally canonised in 1484 by the Franciscan Pope Sixtus IV, and ranked along with Thomas Aquinas as the greatest of the Doctors of the Church by another Franciscan, Pope Sixtus V, in 1587. Bonaventure was regarded as one of the greatest philosophers of the Middle Ages.^[6]

His works, as arranged in the most recent Critical Edition by the Quaracchi Fathers (Collegio S. Bonaventura), consist of a Commentary on the Sentences of Lombard, in four volumes, and eight other volumes, among which are a Commentary on the Gospel of St Luke and a number of smaller works; the most famous of which are Itinerarium Mentis in Deum, Breviloquium, De Reductione Artium ad Theologiam, Soliloquium, and De septem itineribus aeternitatis, in which most of what is individual in his teaching is contained. German philosopher Dieter Hattrup denies that De reductione artium ad theologiam might be written by Bonaventure, claiming that the style of thinking does not match Bonaventure's original style.^[7] His position is, however, no longer tenable given the research by Benson, Hammond, Hughes and Johnson in vol. 67 of Franciscan Studies (2009).

For St. Isabelle of France, the sister of King St. Louis IX of France, and her monastery of Poor Clares at Longchamps, St.Bonaventure wrote the treatise, Concerning the Perfection of Life.^[1]

The Commentary on the Sentences remains without doubt Bonaventure's greatest work; all his other writings are in some way subservient to it. It was written superiorum praecepto (at the command of his superiors) when he was only twenty-seven and is a theological achievement of the first rank.^[6]

Philosophy

St. Bonaventure receives the envoys of the Byzantine Emperor at the Second Council of Lyon.

Bonaventure wrote on almost every subject treated by the Schoolmen, and his writings are very numerous. The greater number of them deal with philosophy and theology. No work of Bonaventure's is exclusively philosophical and bear striking witness to the mutual interpenetration of philosophy and theology which is a distinguishing mark of the Scholastic period.^[6]

Much of St. Bonaventure’s philosophical thought shows a considerable influence by St. Augustine. So much so that De Wulf considers him the best representative of Augustinianism. St. Bonaventure adds Aristotelian principles to the Augustinian doctrine especially in connection with the illumination of the intellect according to Gilson.^[8] Augustine, who had imported into the west many of the doctrines that would define scholastic philosophy, was an incredibly important source of Bonaventure's Platonism. The mystic Dionysius the Areopagite was another notable influence.

In philosophy Bonaventure presents a marked contrast to his contemporaries, Roger Bacon and Thomas Aquinas. While these may be taken as representing, respectively, physical science yet in its infancy, and Aristotelian scholasticism in its most perfect form, he presents the mystical and Platonizing mode of speculation which had already, to some extent, found expression in Hugo and Richard of St. Victor, and in Bernard of Clairvaux. To him, the purely intellectual element, though never absent, is of inferior interest when compared with the living power of the affections or the heart.

Like Thomas Aquinas, with whom he shared numerous profound agreements in matters theological and philosophical, he combated the Aristotelian notion of the eternity of the world vigorously. Bonaventure accepts the Platonic doctrine that ideas do not exist in rerum natura, but as ideals exemplified by the Divine Being, according to which actual things were formed; and this conception has no slight influence upon his philosophy. Like all the great scholastic doctors he starts with the discussion of the relations between reason and faith. All the sciences are but the handmaids of theology; reason can discover some of the moral truths which form the groundwork of the Christian system, but others it can only receive and apprehend through divine illumination. To obtain this illumination, the soul must employ the proper means, which are prayer, the exercise of the virtues, whereby it is rendered fit to accept the divine light, and meditation which may rise even to ecstatic union with God. The supreme end of life is such union, union in contemplation or intellect and in intense absorbing love; but it cannot be entirely reached in this life, and remains as a hope for the future.

A master of the memorable phrase, Bonaventure held that philosophy opens the mind to at least three different routes humans can take on their journey to God. Non-intellectual material creatures he conceived as shadows and vestiges (literally, footprints) of God, understood as the ultimate cause of a world philosophical reason can prove was created at a first moment in time. Intellectual creatures he conceived of as images and likenesses of God, the workings of the human mind and will leading us to God understood as illuminator of knowledge and donor of grace and virtue. The final route to God is the route of being, in which Bonaventure brought Anselm's argument together with Aristotelian and Neoplatonic metaphysics to view God as the absolutely perfect being whose essence entails its existence, an absolutely simple being that causes all other, composite beings to exist.^[4]

Bonaventure, however, is not merely a meditative thinker, whose works may form good manuals of devotion; he is a dogmatic theologian of high rank, and on all the disputed questions of scholastic thought, such as universals, matter, the principle of individualism, or the intellectus agens, he gives weighty and well-reasoned decisions. He agrees with Saint Albert the Great in regarding theology as a practical science; its truths, according to his view, are peculiarly adapted to influence the affections. He discusses very carefully the nature and meaning of the divine attributes; considers universals to be the ideal forms pre-existing in the divine mind according to which things were shaped; holds matter to be pure potentiality which receives individual being and determinateness from the formative power of God, acting according to the ideas; and finally maintains that the intellectus agens has no separate existence. On these and on many other points of scholastic philosophy the "Seraphic Doctor" exhibits a combination of subtlety and moderation, which makes his works particularly valuable.

In form and intent the work of St. Bonaventure is always the work of a theologian; he writes as one for whom the only angle of vision and the proximate criterion of truth is the Christian faith. This fact influences his importance for the history of philosophy; when coupled with his style, it makes Bonaventure perhaps the least accessible of the major figures of the thirteenth century. This is true, not because he is a theologian, but because philosophy interests him largely as a praeparatio evangelica, as something to be interpreted as a foreshadow of or deviation from what God has revealed. In a way that is not true of Aquinas or Albert or Scotus, Bonaventure does not survive well the transition from his time to ours. It is difficult to imagine a contemporary philosopher, Christian or not, citing a passage from Bonaventure to make a specifically philosophical point. One must know philosophers to read Bonaventure, but the study of Bonaventure is seldom helpful for understanding philosophers and their characteristic problems. Bonaventure as a theologian is something else again, of course, as is Bonaventure the edifying author. It is in those areas, rather than in philosophy proper, that his continuing importance must be sought.^[9]

Places, churches, and schools named in his honour

• The town of Bonaventure, Quebec, Canada
• Bonaventure Highway in Quebec
• Place Bonaventure and the adjacent Bonaventure Metro Station in Montreal, Quebec
• Bonaventure Island and the Bonaventure River in the Gaspé Peninsula Region of Quebec
• St. Bonaventure's College, a private Roman Catholic school, in Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada
• St Bonaventure's Catholic Comprehensive School, in Forest Gate, London, England
• Mission San Buenaventura and the City of Ventura, California, officially named San Buenaventura, United States
• St. Bonaventure High School in Ventura, California, United States
• St. Bonaventure University, a Franciscan university, in Allegany, New York
• The Municipality of Buenaventura on the Pacific Coast of Colombia
• The cities of San Benaventura in Chihuahua and San Buenaventura, Coahuila in Mexico and State of San Benaventura
• Barangay San Buenaventura, a village in San Pablo City, Laguna, Philippines. Three small chapels can be found within the village in honour of Saint Bonaventura
• St. Bonaventure's High School, a school in Hyderabad, Pakistan
• St. Bonaventure's Church, a 16th-century Portuguese church is situated on the beach in Erangal near Mumbai. The annual Erangal Feast held on second Sunday of January, celebrating the Feast day of St. Bonaventure, attracts thousands of people of all faiths to this scenic spot. The Birthday Of St. Bonaventure is celebrated on the 15th of July every year.
• St. Bonaventure Parish, Balangkayan Eastern Samar, Philippines
• Bonaventure Hall, in Sacred Heart Parish Catholic School, in Patterson, California, USA

Works

• Saint Bonaventure, The journey of the mind into God (Itinerarium mentis in Deum), London, 2012. limovia.net ISBN 978-1-78336-015-4
• Defense of the mendicants, translated by Jose de Vinck and Robert J. Karris, Bonaventure texts in translation series vol. 15, (Saint Bonaventure, NY: Franciscan Institute, 2010)
• Life of St Francis of Assisi, TAN Books, 2010. ISBN 978-0-89555-151-1
• Collations on the seven gifts of the Holy Spirit, introduced and translated by Zachary Hayes, Bonaventure texts in translation series vol. 14, (Saint Bonaventure, NY: Franciscan Institute Publications, 2008)
• Disputed questions on evangelical perfectiontranslated by Thomas Reist and Robert J. Karris, Bonaventure texts in translation series vol. 13, (Saint Bonaventure, NY: Franciscan Institute Publications, 2008)
• The Sunday sermons of St. Bonaventure, edited and translated by Timothy J. Johnson, Bonaventure texts in translation series vol. 12, (Saint Bonaventure, NY: Franciscan Institute Publications, 2008)
• Commentary on the Gospel of John, translated by Robert J. Karris, Bonaventure texts in translation series vol. 11, (Bonaventure, NY: Franciscan Institute Publications, 2007)
• Writings on the Spiritual Life, Bonaventure texts in translation series vol. 10, (Bonaventure, NY: Franciscan Institute Publications, 2006) [includes translations of The Threefold Way, On the Perfection of Life, On Governing the Soul, and The Soliloquium: A Dialogue on the Four Spiritual Exercises, the prologue to the Commentary on Book II of the Sentences of Peter Lombard and three short sermons: On the Way of Life, On Holy Saturday, and On the Monday after Palm Sunday.]
• Breviloquium, translated by Dominic V. Monti, OFM, Bonaventure Texts in Translation series vol. 9, (Franciscan Institute Publications, 2005)
• Commentary on Ecclesiastes, translated by Campion Murray and Robert J. Karris, Bonaventure texts in translation series vol. 7, (Saint St. Bonaventure, NY: Franciscan Institute, St. Bonaventure University, 2005)
• Itinerarium Mentis in Deum (Journey of the Soul Into God), (†)Philotheus Boehner, OFM, Franciscan Institute Publications, 2002. ISBN 978-1-57659-044-7
• St. Bonaventure's Commentary on the Gospel of Luke, translated by Robert J. Karris, 3 vols. Bonaventure texts in translation series vol. 8, (Saint St. Bonaventure, NY: Franciscan Institute, St. Bonaventure University, 2001-4)
• On the Reduction of the Arts to Theology (De Reductione Artium ad Theologiam), translated by Zachary Hayes, Franciscan Institute Publications, 1996. ISBN 978-1-57659-043-0
• Collations on the Ten Commandments, translated by Paul Spaeth, Bonaventure texts in translation series vol. 6, (Saint St. Bonaventure, NY: Franciscan Institute, St. Bonaventure University, 1995)
• St. Bonaventure’s Writings Concerning the Franciscan Order, translated by Dominic V. Monti, OFM, Bonaventure texts in translation series vol. 5, (Saint St. Bonaventure, NY: Franciscan Institute, St. Bonaventure University, 1994)
• St. Bonaventure's Disputed Questions on the Knowledge of Christ, translated by Zachary Hayes, Bonaventure texts in translation series vol. 4, (Saint St. Bonaventure, NY: Franciscan Institute, St. Bonaventure University, 1992)
• Bringing forth Christ: five feasts of the child Jesus, translated by Eric Doyle, (Oxford: SLG Press, 1984)
• Saint Bonaventure’s Disputed Questions on the Mystery of the Trinity, translated by Zachary Hayes, Works of St. Bonaventure, vol. 3, Franciscan Institute Publications, 1979. ISBN 978-1-57659-045-4.
• The soul's journey into God; The tree of life; The life of St. Francis. Ewert Cousins, translator (The Classics of Western Spirituality ed.). Mahwah, New Jersey: Paulist Press. 1978. ISBN 0-8091-2121-2.
• The mystical vine: a treatise on the Passion of Our Lord, translated by a friar of SSF, (London: Mowbray, 1955)

References

1. ^ ^{a b} M. Walsh, ed. (1991). Butler's Lives of the Saints. New York: HarperCollins. p. 216.
2. ^ Knowles, David (1988). The Evolution of Medieval Thought (2nd ed.). Edinburgh Gate: Longman Group. ISBN 978-0-394-70246-9.
3. ^ Fryde, E. B.; D.E. Greenway, S. Porter and I. Roy (1996). Handbook of British Chronology (3rd ed.). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. p. 282. ISBN 0-521-56350-X.
4. ^ ^{a b} Noone, Tim and Houser, R. E., "Saint Bonaventure", The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Winter 2010 Edition), Edward N. Zalta (ed.)
5. ^ Calendarium Romanum. Libreria Editrice Vaticana. 1969. pp. 97, 130.
6. ^ ^{a b c} Robinson, Paschal. "St. Bonaventure." The Catholic Encyclopedia. Vol. 2. New York: Robert Appleton Company, 1907. 5 Jan. 2013
7. ^ Hattrup, Dieter (1993). Ekstatik der Geschichte. Die Entwicklung der christologischen Erkenntnistheorie Bonaventuras (in German). Paderborn: Schöningh. ISBN 3-506-76273-7.
8. ^ Brother John Raymond, "The Theory of Illumination in St. Bonaventure"
9. ^ McInery, Ralph, A History of Western Philosophy, Vol.II, Chap.5, "St. Bonaventure: the Man and His Work", Jacques Maritain Center, Notre Dame Univ.

 This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press.

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Featured Items Panel from Litany Lane

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Today's Snippet I:   Latium, Italy

Abraham Ortel's 1595 map of ancient Latium

Latium (Latin: Lătĭŭm [ˈlatiʊ̃]) is the region of central western Italy in which the city of Rome was founded and grew to be the capital city of the Roman Empire. Latium was originally a small triangle of fertile, volcanic soil on which resided the tribe of the Latins. It was located on the left bank (east and south) of the Tiber river, extending northward to the Anio river (a left-bank tributary of the Tiber) and southeastward to the Pomptina Palus (Pontine Marshes, now the Pontine Fields) as far south as the Circeian promontory.^[1] The right bank of the Tiber was occupied by the Etruscan city of Veii, and the other borders were occupied by Italic tribes. Subsequently Rome defeated Veii and then its Italic neighbors, expanding Latium to the Apennine Mountains in the northeast and to the opposite end of the marsh in the southeast. The modern descendant, the Italian Regione of Lazio, also called Latium in Latin, and occasionally in modern English, is somewhat larger still, but not as much as double the original Latium.

The ancient language of the Latins, the tribesmen who occupied Latium, was to become the immediate predecessor of the Old Latin language, ancestor of Latin and the Romance languages. Latium has played an important role in history owing to its status as the host of the capital city of Rome, at one time the cultural and political center of the Roman Empire. Consequently, Latium is home to celebrated works of art and architecture.

Geography

Earliest known Latium was the country of the Latini, a tribe whose recognized center was a large, extinct volcano, Mons Albanus ("the Alban Mount", today's Colli Albani), 20 kilometres (12 mi) to the southeast of Rome, 64 kilometres (40 mi) in circumference. In its center is a crater lake, Lacus Albanus (Lago Albano), oval in shape, a few km long and wide. At the top of the second-highest peak (Monte Cavo) was a temple to Jupiter Latiaris, where the Latini held state functions before their subjection to Rome, and the Romans subsequently held religious and state ceremonies. The last pagan temple to be built stood until the Middle Ages when its stone and location were reused for various monasteries and finally a hotel. During World War II, the Wehrmacht turned it into a radio station, which was captured after an infantry battle by American troops in 1944, and it currently is a controversial telecommunications station surrounded by antennae considered unsightly by the population within view.

The selection of Jupiter as a state god and the descent of the name Latini to the name of the Latin language are sufficient to identify the Latins as a tribe of Indo-European descent. Vergil, a major poet of the early Roman Empire, under Augustus, derived Latium from the word for "hidden" (English latent) because in a myth Saturn, ruler of the golden age in Latium, hid (latuisset)^[2] from Jupiter there.^[3]

History

The region that would become Latium had been home to settled agricultural populations since the early Bronze Age and was known to the Ancient Greeks and even earlier to the Mycenaean Greeks.^[4] It was populated by a mixture of Indo-European and non-Indo-European language speakers. The name is most likely derived from the Latin word "latus", meaning "wide", expressing the idea of "flat land" (in contrast to the local Sabine high country) but the name may originate from an earlier, non Indo-European one. The Etruscans, from their home region of Etruria (modern day Tuscany) exerted a strong cultural and political influence on Latium from about the 8th century BC onward. However, they were unable to assert political hegemony over the region, which was controlled by small, autonomous city-states in a manner roughly analogous to the state of affairs that prevailed in Ancient Greece. Indeed, the region's cultural and geographic proximity to the cities of Magna Graecia had a strong impact upon its early history.

One of the earliest recorded non-Etruscan settlements in Latium is the quasi-mythical city of Alba Longa located somewhat southeast of the present-day city of Rome. According to Livy and other ancient authorities, it was here that the Latin League was founded, a coalition of city-states intended as a bulwark against Etruscan expansion.

The city-state of Rome emerged as the dominant political and military power in the region, following Rome's destruction of Alba Longa in the middle of the 7th century BC.

The emperor Augustus officially united all of present-day Italy into a single geo-political entity, Italia, dividing it into eleven regions. Latium – together with the present region of Campagna immediately to the southeast of Latium and the seat of Naples – became Region I.

After the Gothic War (535–554) A.D. and the Roman conquest, this region regained its freedom, because the "Roman Duchy" became the property of the Eastern Emperor. However the long wars against the barbarian Longobards weakened the region, which was seized by the Roman Bishop who already had several properties in those territories.

The strengthening of the religious and ecclesiastical aristocracy led to continuous power struggles between lords and the Roman bishop until the middle of the 16th century. Innocent III tried to strengthen his own territorial power, wishing to assert his authority in the provincial administrations of Tuscia, Campagna and Marittima through the Church's representatives, in order to reduce the power of the Colonna family. Other popes tried to do the same.

During the period when the papacy resided in Avignon, France (1309–1377), the feudal lords' power increased due to the absence of the Pope from Rome. Small communes, and Rome above all, opposed the lords' increasing power, and with Cola di Rienzo, they tried to present themselves as antagonists of the ecclesiastical power. However, between 1353 and 1367, the papacy regained control of Latium and the rest of the Papal States.

From the middle of the 16th century, the papacy politically unified Latium with the Papal States, so that these territories became provincial administrations of St. Peter's estate; governors in Viterbo, in Marittima and Campagna, and in Frosinone administered them for the papacy.

After the short-lived Roman Republic (18th century), the region's annexation to France by Napoleon Bonaparte in February 1798, Latium became again part of the Papal States in October, 1799.

On 20 September 1870, the capture of Rome, during the reign of Pope Pius IX, and France's defeat at Sedan, completed Italian unification, and Latium was incorporated into the Kingdom of Italy.

Modern region of Latium

Latium, often referred to by the Italian name Lazio, is a government region, i.e. one of the first-level administrative divisions of the state. There are twenty regions in Italy. Originally meant as administrative districts of the central state, the regions acquired a significant level of autonomy following a constitutional reform in 2001. The modern region of Latium contains the national capital Rome.

References

1. ^ Cary, M.; Scullard, H. H. (1975). A History of Rome: Down to the Reign of Constantine (3rd ed.). New York: St. Martin's Press. p. 31. ISBN 0312383959.
2. ^ Aeneid, VIII.323.
3. ^ Bevan 1875, pp. 530–531
4. ^ Emilio Peruzzi, Mycenaeans in early Latium, (Incunabula Graeca 75), Edizioni dell'Ateneo & Bizzarri, Roma, 1980

 

Bibliography

• Bevan, William Latham; Smith, William (1875). The student's manual of ancient geography. London: J. Murray.
• Strabo – Geographica (Strabo) book V chapter 3 – Rome 20 BC
• Athanasius Kircher – Latium – 1669 – Amsterdam 1671
• G. R. Volpi – Vetus Latium Profanum et Sacrum – Rome 1742
• T. J. Cornell – The beginnings of Rome: Italy and Rome from the Bronze Age to the Punic Wars – London 1995
• C. H. Smith – Early Rome and Latium. Economy and Society, c. 1000 – 500 BC, "Oxford Classical Monographs" – Oxford 1996

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 Catechism of the Catholic Church

Part Three: Life in Christ

Section One: Man's Vocation Life in The Spirit

CHAPTER TWO : THE HUMAN COMMUNION

Article 3:3   Social Justice -Human Solidarity

SECTION ONE

ONE MAN'S VOCATION LIFE IN THE SPIRIT 
1699 Life in the Holy Spirit fulfills the vocation of man (chapter one). This life is made up of divine charity and human solidarity (chapter two). It is graciously offered as salvation (chapter three).

CHAPTER TWO

THE HUMAN COMMUNION

1877 The vocation of humanity is to show forth the image of God and to be transformed into the image of the Father's only Son. This vocation takes a personal form since each of us is called to enter into the divine beatitude; it also concerns the human community as a whole.

Article 3

SOCIAL JUSTICE

1928 Society ensures social justice when it provides the conditions that allow associations or individuals to obtain what is their due, according to their nature and their vocation. Social justice is linked to the common good and the exercise of authority.

III. Human Solidarity

1939 The principle of solidarity, also articulated in terms of "friendship" or "social charity," is a direct demand of human and Christian brotherhood.John Paul II, SRS 38 40; CA 10

An error, "today abundantly widespread, is disregard for the law of human solidarity and charity, dictated and imposed both by our common origin and by the equality in rational nature of all men, whatever nation they belong to. This law is sealed by the sacrifice of redemption offered by Jesus Christ on the altar of the Cross to his heavenly Father, on behalf of sinful humanity."Pius XII, Summi pontificatus, October 20, 1939; AAS 31 (1939) 423 ff

1940 Solidarity is manifested in the first place by the distribution of goods and remuneration for work. It also presupposes the effort for a more just social order where tensions are better able to be reduced and conflicts more readily settled by negotiation.

1941 Socio-economic problems can be resolved only with the help of all the forms of solidarity: solidarity of the poor among themselves, between rich and poor, of workers among themselves, between employers and employees in a business, solidarity among nations and peoples. International solidarity is a requirement of the moral order; world peace depends in part upon this.

1942 The virtue of solidarity goes beyond material goods. In spreading the spiritual goods of the faith, the Church has promoted, and often opened new paths for, the development of temporal goods as well. and so throughout the centuries has the Lord's saying been verified: "Seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things shall be yours as well":Mt 6:33

For two thousand years this sentiment has lived and endured in the soul of the Church, impelling souls then and now to the heroic charity of monastic farmers, liberators of slaves, healers of the sick, and messengers of faith, civilization, and science to all generations and all peoples for the sake of creating the social conditions capable of offering to everyone possible a life worthy of man and of a Christian.Pius XII, Discourse, June 1, 1941

IN BRIEF

1943 Society ensures social justice by providing the conditions that allow associations and individuals to obtain their due.

1944 Respect for the human person considers the other "another self." It presupposes respect for the fundamental rights that flow from the dignity intrinsic of the person.

1945 The equality of men concerns their dignity as persons and the rights that flow from it.

1946 The differences among persons belong to God's plan, who wills that we should need one another. These differences should encourage charity.

1947 The equal dignity of human persons requires the effort to reduce excessive social and economic inequalities. It gives urgency to the elimination of sinful inequalities.

1948 Solidarity is an eminently Christian virtue. It practices the sharing of spiritual goods even more than material ones.

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