The Good, The True and the Beautiful

Very early in my school career, perhaps already in first grade in parochial school in Minnesota, I learned my first German Christmas carol and exclusively in German. Usually in America for school pageants, people teach children "Silent Night" in a half dozen languages, including German, but always after they are well acquainted with the English version. That was not how it went with "Ihr Kinderlein kommet". Why? We'll blame it on the dear sisters and leave it at that. This carol forms a very cherished memory of back when and  holds a bright place in my childhood chronicles.

This little carol, which lends itself in a particular way to Christmas pageants, is what could be the object of the quest by German speaking ideologues for that something they peg under the heading of "volksnahe". I'm not any sort of a lefty sophisticate, and as such "Ihr Kinderlein kommet" learned by a little American boy from a melting pot background and living a mixed ethnic Catholic parish tradition speaks to my heart just as the great mystery of Bethlehem is supposed to, "volksnah" or not. It disposes well for properly receiving those tidings of great joy to all peoples, even though my formal German studies didn't start until age 14. The proof would be that the carol works across language boundaries and works best with children and most probably with tenderhearted grandmas.

The Good, the True and the Beautiful

Blame me if what follows seems a bit of a jump and sort of rings "stream of consciousness", but the Christmas carol came to mind as I read a great piece by Judy Roberts on the blog Rorate Caeli, entitled "Is the Church Crisis Driving the Faithful to the Latin Mass? An Interview with Dr. Kwasniewski". Peter has written much about the beauty of the tradition, especially in liturgy, and he makes no small amount of effort here and elsewhere at accentuating the integrity or wisdom of the Mass of the Ages, and perhaps thus its higher claims to being a place where truth is to be found in privileged fashion. Pointing to the good of it all, it would seem, is no small challenge. Even in another recent piece, entitled "For a Darkening 21st-Century Church, the Light Is Tradition", the appeal or claim would be for the truth and for beauty. (See also here)

Settling on the good of it all, despite the demands of culture, is settling on God alone, as we know from the words of Jesus Himself (God alone is good). A recent contribution by Joseph Shaw on LifeSite News helps point the way. In case you don't go there, the last part of the article is too good not to quote:

"Consider prayer. Praying will help you get to heaven, not as performing a chore will enable to take the afternoon off, but because the imperfect union with God which prayer in this life is, is, when perfected, what salvation is. Prayer brings us salvation not as an instrumental means to an end, but as a means which is partially constitutive of the end.
"Issues like effective communications are of no small account, and certainly the Catholic Church has not done very well in such matters. But they are not fundamental, and the Church’s problem is deeper than social media incompetence. The fundamental problem is that the Church is no longer using, in an effective way, the evangelical tools which are not merely means to an end, but actually constitute end: not only private prayer, but the public prayers of the Church—the liturgy—and the sacraments.
"Plenty has been written about the liturgy and the sacraments, and they have been changed radically in an attempt to make them more effective: an attempt which does not seem to have borne the fruit which was expected. I would suggest that this discussion and these changes have not been successful because what I have just argued was not kept in mind: that these things are not instruments to be adapted to bring about the desired result, but things which bring about in the worshipper a state of (imperfect) communion with God.
"It is not about finding the answers to the questions we want to ask, or in having an emotional experience of a particular kind, but of a profound contemplative communion with the divine. That is what we are going to be doing in heaven, after all."

 "Ihr Kinderlein kommet" is an endearing catechesis on how to assist at the manger in Bethlehem; it is a school of prayer, contemplative prayer for little ones, which should further communion with the Divine. It deserves to find its source and high point (fons et culmen) in the liturgy, not nailed down and thematized, but chocked full of those pregnant silences which gave place to hearing angel choirs, regarding that Beautiful Baby with Mary and Joseph in attendance.

I think I know where the beautiful universe is to be found; it cannot deceive or thwart that which we seek, namely, the encounter with the divine, the breaking in of all that is glorious and truly good.