Author: D. Sader

Am I Strong Enough?

The tradition of the Catholic Church lists seven gifts of the Holy Spirit.

Each gift is  a part of what St. Paul calls the greatest spiritual gift – the gift of love (1 Corinthians 13:13)

  1. Wisdom “You can recognize a wise person by …”
  2. Understanding “You can recognize an understanding person by …”
  3. Counsel (Right Judgment) “You can recognize a person with the gift of counsel by …”
  4. Knowledge “You can recognize a person with the gift of knowledge by …”
  5. Fortitude (Courage) “You can recognize a person with the gift of fortitude by …”
  6. Piety (Reverence) “A pious person will …”
  7. Fear of the Lord (Wonder and Awe in God’s Presence) “You can recognize a person with the gift of fear of the Lord by …”
    • Proverbs 19:23“The fear of the Lord is life indeed; filled with it one rests secure and suffers no harm.”
    • Job 1:13-22“Would Job worship Satan if he got nothing out of worshiping God?”
    • Exodus 3:4-6“Here I am!”
    • Luke 5:12-14“He would withdraw to deserted places and pray.”

 

Response Idea #1:

Low tech (pencils, paper, bible, people): Divide class into 7 groups and assign a gift to investigate. First, investigate and explain what each gift is. Then, read and discuss each scripture reading accompanying that gift – summarize each story and tell how the gift is presented in the story. Then, write a complete sentence or two completing the phrase next to each gift.

Response Idea #2

High tech (computers, blogs): Collect words/phrases exploring a gift to create a Word Cloud: https://tagul.com/

Upload and embed your word cloud in a blog post with a write-up of Idea #1.

Create a hyperlink list of all 7 gifts (link to any 6 of your classmate’s completed posts on their gift).

Response Idea #3

High Tech: Listen to “Strong Enough?” by Matthew West. Read the lyrics from the google. Write a post discussing the gifts of the Holy Spirit. How do the gifts of the Spirit make us “Strong Enough”?

Response Idea #4

High Tech: Listen to “You Say” by Lauren Daigle. Read the lyrics. Write a post discussing the gifts of the Holy Spirit. How do the gifts of the Spirit make us “strong when I think I am weak”?

Response Idea #5

High Tech: Listen to “Even If” by MercyMe. Read the lyrics. Write a post discussing the gifts of the Holy Spirit. How do the gifts of the Spirit “give me the strength”?

What do they expect of me now?

What do they expect of me now?
Write about yourself as you enter into Grade 8.

Consider these questions to get you organized in your writing:
Are you excited or worried? What does being in Grade 8 mean to you?
Who are the people in your life that have expectations of you this year? What do you think they expect of you?
What about you is just fine the way it is? What about you do you want to change? What about you do you want to leave behind?
What expectations do you have for yourself for Grade 8? Are they the same as your parents, teachers, friends’ expectations of you? How are they the same/different?

Share your writing with your teacher by submitting a google doc.

Who is my family?

Humanity holds a special place in this work for the world. We humans are not just statistics, we are creatures with an infinite dignity conferred on us by the Creator.

So much of the discussion of climate change and how our responsibility to the planet involves dry statistics that are easy to ignore. Less easy is ignoring statistics with faces: the poor at our doorstep, the workers in farms, fields, and factories whose standard of living is low because ours is high. Pope Francis calls on us all to remember the human part of this equation – we are all important in God’s eyes, and it is our responsibility to care for one another in new and more intentional ways.

 

Ponder

What does my local homeless shelter need for its guests? What can I provide?

 

Pray

God of creation, when riches for one mean poverty for another, help me seek the welfare of all.

Conscience

Survey:

 

Bible Readings:

Skim these Scripture passages. Pick one that appeals to you and

  1. summarize its main point,
  2. tell how it relates to the theme “Understanding Conscience”,
  3. list one or two thoughts that entered your mind when you read it.

Reflect:

The reflection will take effort, but it is an effort to focus – for yourself – an ego-conscience. If that’s not worth the effort, you will always have a personality, but it is unlikely you will ever develop character.

Draw a line down the center of a piece of paper. On one side of the line, list the do’s and don’ts your parents, teachers, and media (other external forces) have taped on your Superego that you have already checked against reality and find are now wrong – or at least far too simplified. On the other side, write the elements of your Superego that you now see for yourself are valid.

Quotable Quotes:

“Faith, hope, and love; and the greatest of these is love.” – 1 Corinthians 13:11-13

“The more a correct conscience prevails, the more do persons and groups turn aside from blind choice and try to be guided by the objective standards of moral conduct.” – The Church in the Modern World, 16

“Return to the root and you will find the meaning.” – Sengstan

“A man’s action is only a picture book of his creed.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson

“Rather fail with honour than succeed by fraud.” – Sophocles

“In matters of conscience, the law of the majority has no place.” – Mohandas Gandhi

Activity:

Choose:

  1. Roughly how many of your peers do you guess cheat routinely on homework, quizzes, and tests? What are the reasons most would give for doing that? Why is “Well, everybody does it” not a legitimate excuse? If trust and honesty are the glue that holds together the web of our human ecology, what is the effect of widespread cheating on the web of society?
  2. When schools discover that a great deal of cheating is going on, the administration frequently will encourage teachers and exam supervisors to have greater vigilance and require strong punishment when someone is caught cheating. Similarly, with the increase of crime in our cities, the almost automatic response is to call for an increase in the number of police. What would be a better way to attack the problems of cheating and crime at their roots?

What Being Human Means

Survey:

[polldaddy type=”iframe” survey=”408C13A7B8C3327D” height=”auto” domain=”dsader” id=”being-human”]

Discuss

Explain these statements:

  • All other natures on earth are commands; only human nature is an invitation.
  • Guilt is one of the many qualities that separate humans from beasts.
  • Baby : cub = acorn : marble
  • Whatever makes us grow as knowers and lovers is good; whatever makes us shrivel as knowers and lovers is evil.
  • Unless you choose to know and love, you automatically choose to be less than human.

Ruby Petunia Fawn felt less than human, even though objectively she surely was human. What is the difference between “feel” and “be”?

Why is guilt often a very good thing?

What objective norm would tell you whether guilt is appropriate or inappropriate?

What makes humans specifically different from all other species?

 

Bible Readings:

Skim these Scripture passages. Pick one that appeals to you and

  1. summarize its main point,
  2. tell how it relates to the theme “Understanding Humanity”,
  3. list one or two thoughts that entered your mind when you read it.
  • “The Good Samaritan” Luke 10:30-37
  • “Come Higher!” Luke 14:15-24
  • “Different Gifts” Genesis 49:1-28
  • “The Giving Soul” Hebrews 5:11-14
  • “Degrading” Isaiah 1:2-6

 

Reflect:

No human is merely a higher-level animal. Each human has the potential – which no animal has – to be far far more.

  • What is the difference between being human and acting human?
  • What test is there that you can apply to an entity to see if it is human – and not something less?
  • When does a baby start being a human entity?
  • When does a person in a coma stop being human?
  • People in mental hospitals, children who murder without any remorse, mob hit men – are all less than fully human, but are they less than human?

 

Quotable Quotes:

“What is man that you think of him; mere man that you care for him?” – Psalm 8:1,3-9

“No man is free who is not master of himself.” – Epictetus

“I am the master of my fate; I am the captain of my soul.” – William Ernest Henley

“Vision … It reaches beyond the thing that is, into the conception of what can be.” Robert Collier

 

Faith reflection

The psalmist described the dignity of humans this way:

Psalm 8:1, 3-9 http://bible.oremus.org/?ql=385540891


You have set your glory above the heavens. 
When I look at your heavens, the work of your fingers,
the moon and the stars that you have established; 
what are human beings that you are mindful of them,
mortals that you care for them?


Yet you have made them a little lower than God,
and crowned them with glory and honour. 
You have given them dominion over the works of your hands;
you have put all things under their feet, 
all sheep and oxen,
and also the beasts of the field, 
the birds of the air, and the fish of the sea,
whatever passes along the paths of the seas.


O Lord, our Sovereign,
how majestic is your name in all the earth!

Pope John Paul II echoed that human dignity when he addressed the united nations in 1979. He said:

It is a question of the highest importance that in internal social life, as well as in international life, all human beings in every nation and country should be able to enjoy effectively their full rights under any political regime or system.

If reason alone and Scripture and the church attest to the dignity of every human being, what effect does that have on arguments about abortion, war, capital punishment, and euthanasia?

 

Activity:

Choose:

  1. Read aloud – or even memorize – Shylock’s response to Salanio and Salarino an The Merchant of Venice, Act 3, Scene 1, that begins “To bait fish withal…” What is Shylock trying to justify? What arguments does he use to justify it? Debate the points for and against Shylock’s argument.
  2. Lord of the Flies embodies the thesis: Human beings are evil at the core, and the only things keeping humans from open savagery are control by civilized society and its law enforcement agencies. Catcher in the Rye embodies precisely the opposite thesis: We are all born innocent and are corrupted – or even driven mad – by the wickedness of the society we are thrust into. Which thesis is true? Why? Or are they both true? Why?
  3. Explain these statements:
    • All other natures on earth are commands; only human nature  is an invitation.
    • Guilt is one of the many qualities that separate humans from beasts.
    • Baby : cub = acorn : marble
    • Whatever makes us grow as knowers and lovers is good; whatever makes us shrivel as knowers and lovers is evil.
    • Unless you choose to know and love, you automatically choose to be less than human.

Whose Truth?

Survey:

[polldaddy type=”iframe” survey=”6D15FDCCC3F1EF7C” height=”auto” domain=”dsader” id=”whose-truth”]

Bible Readings:

Skim these Scripture passages. Pick one that appeals to you and

  1. summarize its main point,
  2. tell how it relates to the theme “Understanding Epistemology”,
  3. list one or two thoughts that entered your mind when you read it.

The Wealth of Wisdom Proverbs 8:1-10

Nature and Gods Will Job 38:1-7

Solomon 1 Kings 3:6-14

Balaam Numbers 22:22-35

God’s Will Everywhere Acts 17:22-28

Reflect:

Most likely you’ve been in an argument with your parents – or with somebody – when suddenly it all became clear: They’re right.

But you keep arguing. When that happens, you’re not honestly looking for the truth. What are you looking for? Why?

Quotable Quotes:

“Truth is to be sought in a manner proper to the dignity of the human person and our social nature. The inquiry is to be free, carried on with the aid of teaching … and a dialogue. In the course of these, we explain to one another the truth we have discovered, or think we have discovered, in order thus to assist one another in the quest for truth.” Vatican Council II, Declaration on Religious Freedom, 3

Activity:

Bring to class some object whose purpose you are betting no one else in the class can guess. Whoever in the class stumps everybody else, including the teacher, wins a prize.

Concern for the Poor

Virtually all climate scientist are making it plain that the time for drastic action on the environment is now, and they caution that it may already be too late to stop some of the change. Some people reject the scientific consensus and say we need more time to study the problem. Pope Francis says that attempts to discredit calls for radical change come from the same forces that keep the world from addressing the issue of global poverty. Poverty has many faces – neglect of nature leads to neglect of humanity. He urges us not to continue our blindnesss but begin to reach out in love and compassion to the poor.

Ponder
Who and where are the poor where I live?

Pray
God of creation, break the hardness of my heart so that I may hear the cries of the poor and then do more to work on their behalf.

The “Doctrine of Discovery” and Terra Nullius: A Catholic Response

Source: http://www.cccb.ca/site/eng/media-room/statements-a-letters/4446-catholic-responses-to-truth-and-reconciliation-commission-call-to-action-48-and-questions-regarding-the-doctrine-of-discovery

The Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops regarding the Catholic responds to the Doctrine of Discovery.

The text considers and repudiates illegitimate concepts and principles used by Europeans to justify the seizure of land previously held by Indigenous Peoples and often identified by the terms Doctrine of Discovery and terra nullius.

Both documents appeal to all Catholics — laity, members of institutes of consecrated life and of societies of apostolic life, deacons, priests, and Bishops — to make seven commitments in order to “continue to walk together with Indigenous Peoples in building a more just society where their gifts and those of all people are nurtured and honoured.” These commitments include:

  • Working with Catholic educational institutions and formation programs in telling the history and experience of Indigenous Peoples
  • Working with seminaries and other formation centres to promote a “culture of encounter” by including the history of the Indian Residential Schools and of Canadian missionary work with its “weaknesses and strengths”
  • Encouraging partnerships between Indigenous groups and health care facilities
  • Encouraging a restorative justice model within the criminal justice system
  • Supporting the national inquiry into missing and murdered Indigenous women
  • Deepening relationships, dialogue and collaboration with Indigenous People
  • Inviting Catholic parishes and institutions to become better acquainted with the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples

March 31, 2016