09/06/2018 To The Heights . . . Dominican Order Of Preachers (Part 1)
https://www.dominicanajournal.org/to-the-heights/ To The Heights
Dominicana, presented this video series for the Year of Faith:
To The Heights.
The series begins by asking that most vexed question:
How can I be happy?
For nearly two thousand years, the Church has proposed one answer:
True and lasting happiness comes from union with God.
Yet, for many, this answer seems like a trite soundbite from a suspect source.
Why should one really believe in Jesus Christ today?
In these short videos, the student brothers seek to show how the faith offers compelling answers to life’s essential questions.
By grappling with common objections and challenging misconceptions, we hope these videos will encourage people to take another look at the Gospels, and deepen their faith.
To The Heights is meant for believers and non-believers alike.
You might watch them as a complement to your own reading, or send them to a friend to start a conversation.
The series could also be used in R.C.I.A. or religion classes, as a prelude to discussion of the mysteries of the faith.
To The Heights, follows the basic structure of the Creed, and each video concludes with the relevant reference to the Catechism of the Catholic Church.
The name of our series comes from a favorite saying of the famous Lay Dominican, Bl. Pier Giorgio Frassati, who always strove for great heights.
Whether in mountain climbing or in the pursuit of holiness.
We also drew inspiration from Msgr. Ronald Knox’s translation.
Baruch 5:5:
“Up, Jerusalem, to the heights!
Look to the sun’s rising, and see if thy sons be not coming to thee, gathered from east to west, joyfully acknowledging God’s holy will!”
Episode 1: The Perfect Day
Br. Tomás Martín Rosado, O.P., speaks about man’s desire for God (CCC, 27):
www.vatican.va/archive/ENG0015/__P9.HTM http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7EAoCUmGcTQ “Let the hearts of those who seek the LORD rejoice.”
(Ps 105:3)
Although man can forget God or reject him, He never ceases to call every man to seek him, so as to find life and happiness.
But this search for God demands of man every effort of intellect, a sound will, “an upright heart”, as well as the witness of others who teach him to seek God.
You are great, O Lord, and greatly to be praised: great is your power and your wisdom is without measure. and man, so small a part of your creation, wants to praise you:
This man, though clothed with mortality and bearing the evidence of sin and the proof that you withstand the proud.
Despite everything, man, though but a small a part of your creation, wants to praise you.
You yourself encourage him to delight in your praise, for you have made us for yourself, and our heart is restless until it rests in you.
St. Augustine, The Confessions
Catechism of the Catholic Church, 30
Episode 2: The Artist’s Signature
Br. Philip Neri Reese, O.P., speaks about natural knowledge of God
(CCC, 31–33):
www.vatican.va/archive/ENG0015/__PA.HTM http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8eK4ZA8tg1cThe human person: with his openness to truth and beauty, his sense of moral goodness, his freedom and the voice of his conscience, with his longings for the infinite and for happiness, man questions himself about God’s existence. In all this he discerns signs of his spiritual soul.
The soul, the “seed of eternity we bear in ourselves, irreducible to the merely material”, [Gaudium et Spes, 18] can have its origin only in God.
Catechism of the Catholic Church, 31
Episode 3: Divine Revelation:
The Revolution of Wisdom
Br. Edmund McCullough, O.P., speaks about divine revelation
(CCC, 50–53):
www.vatican.va/archive/ENG0015/__PE.HTM http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cq9ERGxDFsEBy natural reason man can know God with certainty, on the basis of his works.
But there is another order of knowledge, which man cannot possibly arrive at by his own powers: the order of divine Revelation.1
Through an utterly free decision, God has revealed himself and given himself to man.
This he does by revealing the mystery, his plan of loving goodness, formed from all eternity in Christ, for the benefit of all men.
God has fully revealed this plan by sending us his beloved Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, and the Holy Spirit.
Catechism of the Catholic Church, 50
Episode 4: The Message Needs an Interpreter
Br. Clement Dickie, O.P., speaks about Scripture, Tradition, and the Church (CCC, 80–87):
www.vatican.va/archive/ENG0015/__PL.HTM http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rNjt6Tuj2oM“Sacred Scripture is the speech of God as it is put down in writing under the breath of the Holy Spirit.” [Dei Verbum, 9] “and [Holy] Tradition transmits in its entirety the Word of God which has been entrusted to the apostles by Christ the Lord and the Holy Spirit. It transmits it to the successors of the apostles so that, enlightened by the Spirit of truth, they may faithfully preserve, expound and spread it abroad by their preaching.”
[Dei Verbum, 9]
Catechism of the Catholic Church, 81
Episode 5: Bound by the Holy Spirit
Br. Michael Mary Weibley, O.P., speaks about the library of Sacred Scripture (CCC, 105–114):
www.vatican.va/archive/ENG0015/__PP.HTM http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=URL3qPFBmfQ God is the author of Sacred Scripture.
“The divinely revealed realities, which are contained and presented in the text of Sacred Scripture, have been written down under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit.”
[Dei Verbum, 11]
“For Holy Mother Church, relying on the faith of the apostolic age, accepts as sacred and canonical the books of the Old and the New Testaments, whole and entire, with all their parts, on the grounds that, written under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, they have God as their author, and have been handed on as such to the Church herself.”
[Dei Verbum, 11]
Catechism of the Catholic Church, 105
Episode 6: The Proposal
Br. Peter Martyr Yungwirth, O.P., speaks about faith as man’s response to God (CCC, 153–165):
www.vatican.va/archive/ENG0015/__PX.HTM http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6ecxz3-TDccFaith makes us taste in advance the light of the beatific vision, the goal of our journey here below.
Then we shall see God “face to face”, “as he is”.
So faith is already the beginning of eternal life:
“When we contemplate the blessings of faith even now, as if gazing at a reflection in a mirror, it is as if we already possessed the wonderful things which our faith assures us we shall one day enjoy.”
[St. Basil, De Spiritu Sancto]
Catechism of the Catholic Church, 163
Episode 7: The Savior of the World
Br. Vincent Ferrer Bagan, O.P., speaks about believing in Jesus and belonging to the Church
(CCC, 166–169):
www.vatican.va/archive/ENG0015/__PY.HTM http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CK3Tmez-WyoFaith is a personal act – the free response of the human person to the initiative of God who reveals himself.
But faith is not an isolated act.
No one can believe alone, just as no one can live alone. You have not given yourself faith as you have not given yourself life.
The believer has received faith from others and should hand it on to others.
Our love for Jesus and for our neighbor impels us to speak to others about our faith. Each believer is thus a link in the great chain of believers.
I cannot believe without being carried by the faith of others, and by my faith I help support others in the faith.
Catechism of the Catholic Church, 166
Episode 8: Looking in the Mirror
Br. John Baptist Hoang, O.P., speaks about the God of truth and love (CCC, 214–221):
www.vatican.va/archive/ENG0015/__P16.HTM http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u3aLOk-rhn4God, “HE WHO IS”, revealed himself to Israel as the one “abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness”.
[Ex 34:6]
These two terms express summarily the riches of the divine name.
In all his works God displays, not only his kindness, goodness, grace and steadfast love, but also his trustworthiness, constancy, faithfulness and truth.
“I give thanks to your name for your steadfast love and your faithfulness.”
[Ps 138:2]
He is the Truth, for “God is light and in him there is no darkness”;
“God is love”, as the apostle John teaches.
[I Jn 1:5]
Catechism of the Catholic Church, 214
Episode 9: The Quest Stands upon the Edge of a Knife
Recently ordained Fr. Ambrose Little, O.P., speaks about the mystery of the Most Holy Trinity
(CCC, 232–237):
www.vatican.va/archive/ENG0015/__P17.HTM http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cuuncFM9XVcThe mystery of the Most Holy Trinity is the central mystery of Christian faith and life.
(End Part 1)