How we pray what we believe

Lex Orandi, Lex Credendi from Leo McDowell on Vimeo.


I’m not sure how many Catholics today have heard the axiom, “lex orandi, lex credendi”.
Last year, for Catechetical Sunday, the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops released a document, “Lex Orandi, Lex Credendi: The Word of God in the Celebration of the Sacraments”. Near the beginning of the document they write:

Literally translated, it means “the law of prayer [is] the law of belief.” This axiom is an adaptation of words of Prosper of Aquitaine, a fifth-century Christian writer and a contemporary of St. Augustine. The original version of the phrase, ut legem credendi lex statuat supplicandi (“that the law of praying establishes the law of believing”), highlighted the understanding that the Church’s teaching (lex credendi) is articulated and made manifest in the celebration of the liturgy and prayer (lex orandi).1 We understand this to mean that prayer and worship is the first articulation of the faith. The liturgy engages belief in a way that simply thinking about God or studying the faith does not naturally do. In other words, in an act of worship, the faithful are in dialogue with God and are engaged in an active and personal relationship with Jesus Christ, and every individual member of the liturgical assembly is connected to one another as members of the mystical Body of Christ in the Holy Spirit, as they look together with hope for the salvation promised in the Kingdom of Heaven. Theology, christology, ecclesiology, pneumatology, and eschatology are all expressed in word and deed, in sign and symbol, in liturgical acts.

Mother Teresa and Love of Christ

In August, we celebrated what would have been the 100th birthday of Blessed Mother Teresa of Calcutta. In September we celebrated the 13 anniversary of her death. The US Postal Service issued a stamp on that day in her honor. Most of us are familiar with Mother Teresa's story, but I want to hit a few highlights. Mother Teresa left home at age 18 to join the Loreto Sisters of Dublin. She soon found herself in India, teaching at a girls school. While teaching the more affluent families, she was constantly aware of the poor who were in the neighborhood of the school

In 1946, while on her way to make a retreat she heard what she later explained as “a call within a call. The message was clear. I was to leave the convent and help the poor while living among them.” She also heard a call to give up her life with the Sisters of Loreto and, instead, to “follow Christ into the slums to serve him among the poorest of the poor.”

After getting permission to leave the Loreto Sisters and start a new community, Mother Teresa took some courses in nursing and returned to India to take care of the "poorest of the poor". Mother Teresa did not care for them because they were poor, but because she could see Christ in each one of them.

As we grow in our love for Christ, we need to seek to recognize Christ where he is present. This means in the Eucharist, in the person of the priest, and in the others we see around us. It is easy to get caught up in our own world and not see Christ in the other. Take some time this month to step back and look.

Bishop Olmsted says ‘divisive’ attempted ordination of woman harms Church :: Catholic News Agency (CNA)

Thought I'd share this. Be sure to read the whole story at the link on the bottom of the post

he Catholic Bishop of Phoenix responded Wednesday to a priest’s reported participation in an attempted priestly ordination of a woman. Urging prayers for all involved, he said such actions are “divisive” and have “profoundly harmful consequences.”

Writing in a Sept. 1 letter published in the Catholic Sun, Bishop Thomas J. Olmsted informed Catholics in the diocese that a “schismatic group” in Tempe, Arizona called the Ecumenical Catholic Communion tried to ordain a woman. Fr. Vernon Meyer, a priest of the Diocese of Phoenix, reportedly participated in the alleged ordination.

Bishop Olmsted says ‘divisive’ attempted ordination of woman harms Church :: Catholic News Agency (CNA)