Tony Lusvardi, S.J.

The bodily resurrection of Jesus

Galleria degli Arazzi (Gallery of Tapestries), Vatican Museum: The Resurrection, Raphael, 1519

As we near the end of the Easter season, I’ve been reading the latest book of Fr. Robert Imbelli, Christ Brings All Newness (Word On Fire Academic, 2023). It is a fine collection of essays on everything from Vatican II to Dante, all held together by the wonder and uniqueness of the Son of God’s entry into the world. The title comes from St. Irenaeus of Lyons: “Christ brought all newness in bringing himself.”

To give a taste of the book–and as we approach the Ascension–I thought I’d share some of Fr. Imbelli’s words on the Resurrection from the essay “Resurrection and Real Presence.” Insisting on the bodily resurrection of Jesus–and not some watered-down academic knock-off–Imbelli again demonstrates a truly sacramental sense of the body’s importance, which I mentioned in another post a few weeks ago.

“Resurrection faith stretches heart and mind to the breaking point, as they stagger under the unbearable lightness of being. Is it any wonder that we frequently retreat before the mystery, reducing it to more manageable perspectives? And so, certain scholars contend, ‘He is risen into the kerygma’–betraying thereby their inordinate appetite for ideas. No resurrection there, only a ghostly apparition. Or, some ecclesiastical functionaries insist, ‘He is risen into the institutional church”–displaying, by the very contention, a rather petrified imagination. That would merely exchange one tomb for another. Or, others of more liberationist bent cry, ‘He is risen as the people’–manifesting their often havoc-wreaking innocence. A provocative resuscitation, perhaps, but no true resurrection. But against all infringement of the mystery, the angel stands adamant: ‘He is risen; he is not here!'” (pp. 158-9)

Popular piety and tradition in Sardinia

I was fortunate this year to have spent Holy Week and Easter in Maracalagonis, Sardinia, a small town about a 20 minute drive from the center of Cagliari. It was a good break from the classroom and a wonderful taste of parish life.

Chiesa della Santa Vergine degli Angeli, Maracalagonis, Sardinia

The religious atmosphere I experienced was both warm and traditional. Masses were full; I heard confessions all week long; I met deeply committed Catholic families. I was especially impressed by the enthusiasm for traditional popular devotions. Teams of parishioners take responsibility for organizing different devotions throughout the year. Of particular note during Holy Week were the su Scravamentu, in which the nails are removed from the Lord’s hands and feet and he is taken down from the Cross after the Good Friday liturgy, and the many processions through the town streets–Stations of the Cross, Palm Sunday, Holy Thursday, the Sorrows of Mary on Good Friday, and then the S’Incontru on Easter morning.

Sacraments, incarnation, and the body

Madonna of the Pilgrims, (1604-6) Caravaggio, Church of Sant’Agostino, Rome

I’ve shared the work of theologian Fr. Robert Imbelli before. Here is another piece from him about a theme near to my heart, the “sacramental sense,” a phrase he takes from St. John Henry Newman.

Imbelli makes a point that has struck me before as well, that our society’s neglect of the transcendent is oddly connected to an unease with the body. We see this unease with our own bodies in everything from the explosion in the popularity of piercings and tattoos to the growth of eating disorders. Sex-changes are perhaps the most dramatic example of turning against one’s own flesh.

One of the sad marks of our secular age is a paradoxical double loss. Not only do we struggle to find access to the other dimension, that is, the spiritual, but we also seem impervious to the true sense of the material. Our sacramental sense has atrophied. Indeed, these two losses may be intricately connected.

Imbelli quotes philosopher Charles Taylor to argue that secular people today live lives of “excarnation,” disconnected from the communities and traditions that bore them. We live increasingly rootless lives. In contrast to this “excarnation,” Imbelli quotes Jesuit poet Gerard Manley Hopkins and points toward our Eucharistic faith. He hints at the way that this sacrament directs us toward a relationship with creation–and our own embodied part in it– that is rooted, first of all, in gratitude.

Read the rest of Imbelli’s piece at the Catholic Thing.

Romano Guardini on the liturgy

In preparation for I talk I gave last week to a group of seminary rectors from Africa and Asia, I read Romano Guardini’s short but profound book Liturgy and Liturgical Formation.

Guardini was one of the twentieth century’s sharpest and most balanced theological minds, and his writings on the liturgy are particularly valuable. He understands the irreducibility of liturgy and liturgical symbols and has absorbed the way the Fathers experienced liturgy, best exemplified by the line from Pope St. Leo the Great’s Ascension homily: “What was visible in the Lord has passed over into the mysteries.”

Chapel of San Basilio, Maracalagonis, Sardinia

Here are a few gems from Liturgy and Liturgical Formation:

“Liturgy does not deal with knowledge but with reality. There is knowledge of the liturgical action, which precedes it and could be called liturgical knowledge. And there is knowledge within it; the liturgical event allows an insight into itself. To speak of this today is not easy because it has escaped our religious consciousness at large. The liturgy itself is not merely knowledge but a full reality, which embraces much more than knowledge alone: a doing, an order, and the being of itself.” (13)

Baptism of Desire and Christian Salvation — now in print!

After a few delays, I am pleased to report that my book is now officially in print and copies have arrived for those who preordered. It seems to have been released on Good Friday no less.

If you’re still on the fence about whether it’s worth the read, I thought I’d share the very kind words of endorsement from Fr. Joseph Carola, SJ, my colleague at the Gregorian University and expert in both the Church Fathers and Nineteenth Century theology.

So take it from Fr. Carola:

Jesus instructed Nicodemus that, “unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God” (John 3:5). Faithful to the Lord’s revelation, Christians have insisted for two millennia upon the necessity of baptism for salvation. But already in the ancient Church, salvation’s rough edges, as Father Anthony Lusvardi creatively calls them, have challenged believers. What is the fate of those who lived before Christ and therefore died without Christian baptism? What happens to the catechumen who dies unexpectedly before being baptized? Can unbaptized babies get to heaven? Is there any hope for the salvation of non-Christians? In his thoroughly historical and insightfully theological study of the baptism of desire, Father Lusvardi offers his readers a fresh perspective on this traditional notion often misunderstood and misapplied in contemporary theology and pastoral practice. Providing a convincing response to the challenges that the hard cases present, Father Lusvardi especially appeals to the Catholic Church’s lex orandi in order to establish the Church’s lex credendi that simultaneously upholds the necessity of baptism, the need for evangelization, and the nuances of desire. Historically informative, theologically rich, and occasionally even humorous, Baptism of Desire and Christian Salvation is a book not only for theologians, but perhaps even more so for pastors who labor on the rough edges of salvation.

Joseph Carola, S.J., S.T.D.

November 2, 2023

All Souls

The Pontifical Gregorian University, Rome

An event unlike any other

Homily for Easter Sunday 2024

What is a miracle? The word is used often and not always in a very precise way. A quick search on the Internet revealed exercises, mineral solutions, and even a perfume, all described as “miraculous.”

At least the word seems to be useful for advertising. Probably we have also heard stories from the Middle Ages or antiquity that tell of extraordinary events. And probably some are really miracles, others are legends. They are the special effects that storytellers from a time before movies used to make a story more fascinating, moving, or funny.

Speaking more precisely, a miracle is something that happens in this world caused by a power beyond this world. Miracles do not mean that the divine is absent from non-miraculous events, from everyday events. When a doctor uses his intelligence to save life, he is using a divine gift–intelligence–to cooperate with the purpose of God who wants to save life and not destroy it. When a woman gives birth it is not a miracle in the literal sense–it does not require a force beyond human biology–but I would say there is something divine about that event because it is a participation in the Creator’s work.

A miracle, however, requires a power that no creature possesses.

We know with certainty that there has been at least one miracle in the history of the universe, namely, the creation of the universe. No existing thing possesses the power to create everything from nothing. This power is the essence of a miracle. I haven’t smelled the miraculous perfume, but I doubt that it qualifies .

Today we celebrate the miracle of miracles–the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead. Since creation there has been no other event like this. It is the most important event in human history, an event so different from all other historical events that, even today, after almost two thousand years, it remains difficult to explain.

Homily for Passion Sunday

I recently read something in a book written by an American sociologist that struck me–and disturbed me. This sociologist is a very good scholar and has conducted studies in several different countries and written a number of topics. In one of these studies, as an aside, he mentioned that, in general, people care more about being normal than about being good. For the majority of people it is more important to feel normal than to be good.

This disturbing observation struck me because it seemed hard to deny. And the truth of this observation is evident on no other day more than on this one, Palm Sunday. The celebration begins with Jesus’ triumphal entry into Jerusalem. The people welcome him as a hero, as a king. They throw their cloaks before him and cheer him enthusiastically, “Hosanna!” And in the space of a week, the same crowd will shout with the same enthusiasm, “Crucify him!”

On no other day do we feel so acutely the fickleness of the crowd or the inconstancy of the human heart.

New journal!

It might seem that there’s nothing new under the sun in the world of theology, but that’s not the case. This spring, The New Ressourcement journal launched its first issue. The journal is sponsored by Word on Fire Academic, one of the many great ministries founded by Bishop Robert Barron. In fact, Bishop Barron has an article in the first issue. The editorial staff is an all-star lineup: Matthew Levering of Mundelein Seminary, Jonathan Ciraulo of St. Meinrad Seminary, and my own colleague at the Gregorian University, Aaron Pidel, S.J. The authors represented in the first issue can also all be fairly described as all stars.

Here’s a description of the journal from its website:

The New Ressourcement

is a quarterly journal of theology and philosophy published by Word on Fire Academic. It serves the Church and the academy by publishing scholarly articles that demonstrate the depth and relevance of the entirety of the Catholic tradition.

This journal aims to sentire cum tota ecclesia, to think with the whole Church as it has ever reflected on the mystery of the Incarnate Christ, as seen in sources that are biblical, patristic, medieval, as well as modern. The journal draws inspiration from, and seeks to continue the work of, previous generations of ressourcement theologians. It shares with them a conviction that the renewal of theology and philosophy occurs by returning to sources that remain inexhaustible. This ressourcement is “new” because we trust that this patrimony is fertile enough to encounter contemporary questions confidently and to illuminate the challenges and opportunities that shape the present age.
https://newressourcement.wordonfire.org

Serpents, Cyrus, and salvation

*Miracle of the Bronze Serpent*, Tintoretto (Scuola Grande di San Rocco, Venice, 1564-1587)

Homily for the 4th Sunday of Lent (B)

Today’s readings are a workout. The serpent in the desert, God’s love and the refusal of many to accept it, faith and works, the prophets, Israel’s exile in Babylon, and King Cyrus, a Gentile who saves the day. Getting through today’s readings means not just getting in your spiritual steps for the day—it’s more like earning a medal for the decathlon.

For a bit of mid-Lent spiritual exercise, the first image from today’s Gospel is a good place to start. At first glance, it might seem a bit obscure. What was Moses doing lifting up a serpent in the desert? Jesus is referring to an incident during Israel’s wandering in the desert found in the Book of Numbers. The Israelites, as seems to be their habit, complain against God and against Moses, saying “There is no food” and “We loathe this worthless food.” The complaint does raise the question, which is it? Is there no food or just food the Israelites don’t like? There seems to be a bit of manipulative use of language in the Israelites’ rebelliousness, perhaps even a bit of self-delusion. The phenomenon is not unique to the ancient world. Today our political and social divisions are often made worse because we use exaggerated terms to describe our opponents and their intentions—or to mask uncomfortable facts we do not want to hear—and then we start to believe our own rhetoric. The result is poisonous. And, in fact, in the Book of Numbers, God punishes the people of Israel for their rebellion by sending fiery serpents to bite them.