Te bendecimos a Ti, Señor del tiempo y de la historia, Dios Santo, Rey Eterno, porque has querido que, a través de la intercesión de nuestro Santo Padre Felipe Neri, la acción del Espíritu Santo nos impulse al encuentro de tu Hijo Jesucristo.

Tú convocas día tras día a la Familia Oratoriana, para que fiel a la senda recorrida por San Felipe Neri y los que han seguido sus huellas, responda con prontitud de corazón y pueda caminar hacia la santidad en la humildad, sencillez y alegría.

En este tiempo de preparación al Jubileo del nacimiento de tu Hijo, concédenos congregarnos como familia en México para escuchar tu palabra que nos impulsa a evangelizar nuestras culturas, reflexionar sobre nuestra misión en la historia de hoy, celebrar tu amor y revivir el carisma oratoriano que nos ha dado para servicio de tu Iglesia.

Suscita en todos los hermanos reunidos por el espíritu y enseñanza de San Felipe Neri, el gusto de encontrarnos contigo y con los hermanos en la comunión de una misma familia.

Te lo pedimos por intercesión de la Santísima Virgen María de Guadalupe, Madre del Redentor, luz de San Felipe Neri y Estrella del Oratorio.

¡Oh Padre!, te lo pedimos a Ti, en el nombre de Jesús tu Hijo, que contigo y el Espíritu Santo vive y reina por los siglos de los siglos.

AMEN.

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INTRODUCTION

Why a MEMORY? Each on of us, the participants of the II ENCUENTRO INTERNACIONAL ORATORIANO MEXICO 1998, could ask ourselves.

Involved as we are in the postmodern context at the end of the millennium, living in the vortex of speed; impelled lack of time, almost suffocating by the immediate experiences that are layered one over the other without waiting to be barely comprehended assimilated much less and projected within a structured plan and progressive existence; enlightened by the impeccable coming of persistent and boisterous novelty that diffuse; confused and fiery by the ghosts in our lives that exist without a form or a defined face... to make MEMORY would make us want a definite contrast superficial and superfluous past of living in the opening of the Third Millennium.

We do not intend to stop time, while being in a state of nostalgia and melancholy of past events, that were already conjugated in the past preterit tense. Also, we do not intend to focus on the memories of the past in such a way that they will impede the agile movement to continue with our current experience or to close the doors on the excitement of the future.

This MEMORY desires the conjugation of the three tenses of past, present, and future. We pretend to surpass the triple temptation of pessimistic existence that despises the past because it no longer exists; that saddens for the present that is considered a non-stop passing movement; and that which discourages an unknown future. In contrast, our MEMORY intertwines with the triple optimism of the past that is the foundation and explanation of the present; of the present; like an undeniable reality of its evidence; and of the future, our compromise that is preparing with responsible and vigorous optimism of the present.

Our MEMORY does not reduce itself to a simple and clear telling and retelling of the “before” our today, nor the “yesterday” of tomorrow. Rather, it is a certainty of what we live by, the raw material of our current essence and the force which impulses us to construct from the acquired experience.

With the same joy and hope with which this oratorian experience was received and begun, that same filled heart of content and hope is offered in its MEMORY.

This MEMORY is the live testimony that the I ENCUENTRO ORATORIANO DE SAN FELIPE NERI, in Pilas, 1992, Seville, Spain, did not remain passively forgotten, like the dead in its tomb, in the last archives of consciousness, only that this II ENCUENTRO INTERNACIONAL ORATORIANO DE SAN FELIPE Neri, Mexico, 1998 has gathered like a ripe and delicious fruit of a loving and planted seed. In this similar consequential logic, the sowed oratorian experience in this MEMORY seeks to be the live sowed seed in the fertile field of the oratorian world that, congregated by the divine spirit in Oaxtepec, Morelos, Mexico, 1998, will know how to respond “promptly with heart”, to the challenges that the thresholds of the Third Millennium will establish and that without a doubt, requiring them to be awake in the present time.

THE CALL AND RESPONSE:

How, when, where and who initiated the oratorian adventure that this MEMORY generously offers, which ripe fruit of the day?

Let us be like a reference point of what R. P. Antonio Ortega Franco, Attorney General of the Mexican Federation of the Congregations of Oratories and General Coordinator of this II ENCUENTRO INTERNACIONAL, said in the letter sent to all the Congregations of the Oratorian Confederation and was reported in the elaborated brochure by the Coordinating Commission: “When the Oratory of the Mexican Federation, in the past congress celebrated in Rome(October 1994) accepted the possibility of creating the II ENCUENTRO INTERNACIONAL ORATORIANO, there was an initial stage of euphoria. Afterwards, came a time of reflection, dialogue, and uncertainties in reference to the economical, political, and social crisis that the country is facing. Finally, the Mexican Federation decided to accept the realization of this great event and elected a Coordinating Commission formed by priests and laymen, who elected the central motto Prompto Corde Respondeant and a general trinomial theme Evangelio, Cultura y Oratorio.

The how, when, and where of the initial paths are clear and defined in the paragraph above, but we wanted to say an honest, franc, thankful, respectful and humble word with regards to “the who”. Not because it is incorrect or wrong what was said by P. Toño in the above mentioned letter, but because we think that it is incomplete and it gives us a moral duty to allow us to complete this response. Especially when we have succeeded in reaching a goal, we would like to render publicly and openly the first place of honor in inspiration and realization to the Holy Ghost and Our Blessed Mother. We, the Congress of the Confederation, the Mexican Federation, the Coordinating Commission and everyone who in one way or another has contributed to the realization of this sublime experience of oratorian fraternity, are merely human instruments cherished by the soft hands of the Divine Providence and the loved children embraced on the lap of Our Gracious Mother.

It is clear, that if our work would have been only humanly initiated rather then by inspiration, and in the matter of divine love, “it should have perished, it should not have been preserved, it should have been aborted”.

Along with the “initial euphoria, the time of reflection, dialogue and uncertainties”, the Mexican Federation, which is formed of the “laity and the ten Congregations of the Oratories of Saint Philip Neri, believing in a Provident God, decided to accept the realization of this great event, the II ENCUENTRO INTERNACIONAL ORATORIANO, which was proposed by the General Congress of the Oratory of Saint Philip Neri, 1994, in Rome, Italy with joy.”

MAKING A PATH:

Once accepted and decided to take on the responsibility of the realization of the Encuentro, we began the long, and not always simple, and sometimes fatiguing stage of preparation. The spirit that has accompanied the pilgrimage can be explained by the concise words of P. Toño, in the letter mentioned before: “we have been preparing with joy and dedication, as best as possible, for this important event for everyone, this is why we see it’s realization with optimism.

The realization of this Encuentro has been proceeded by a long and hard preparation, but always within the spirit of joy sustained by the hope of “receiving you with open arms, to share our Christian faith, sharing our cultures and living the beautiful experience of being Oratorians on the road to Third Millennium.”

The Coordinating Commission, Commissions, and the Commissioners

It is well known by the foreigners that the Mexicans possess a characteristic of being ¨ party people ¨. But along with these festive, happy, and enthusiastic characteristics, that was the first reaction during the General Congress and that which P. Antonio expresses like a burst of euphoria. It is not less certain that we had to put our feet on the ground, such that our fireworks displays was accompanied and followed the previously mentioned ¨ time of reflection, dialogue, and uncertainly ¨.

Ours was, not in any way, the optimism of the ingenious and irresponsible , but the optimism of those that know the efforts, the necessities of the organization, the planning, the projection, of persevering in the attainment of the proposed goal.

The election of P. Antonio Rios Chavez as a Delegate of the Holy See for the Oratory-La Profesa, is for us a matter that is read with the sight of faith and was a sign of divine preference and confidence in part by all the congregations of the Confederations. In this occasion, represented by its respective delegates as a clear sign of times that demands a well read, comprehended, interpreted and assumed w grateful evangelic spirit, not only for him, but for us (members of the Mexican Federation of the Oratory).

Certainly the previous has been an occasional deed, but it has surely been a prophetic calling from God for the actual P. Delegate , Mexican , and for us the Mexican Oratorians a manifestation of the designated mysteries of God.

The proposition, the acceptance and the assumption of this noble and in the same way, a serious task, by the Mexican Federation, brought along a whole world of demands not ever thought of by any of us before the Congress. Nevertheless, once we have swallowed the bittersweet drink of the first movement we began, or how we say ¨shoemaker to your shoes¨, and we started the organization process, that how we said previously, branched the formation of a Coordinating Commission, with the P. Antonio Ortega as General Coordinator of the Encuentro. This one, formed by the laymen and Priests of each corresponding Congregation & Oratories of : Guanajuato, Gto.; Leon, Gto; Orizaba, Ver.; La Profesa, Ntra. Señora de la Paz, and San Pablo Tepetlapa, all in the Federal District; San Miguel de Allende, Gto.; Pharr, Tex. (USA).

The same Federation invited some laymen and priests to conform the initial Coordinating Commission, the one that with the passing of time was being completed according to the existing circumstances, especially the rhythm with which they were multiplying and stating precisely the commissions.

In the following, we present a graphic outline of ¨Oratories, Commissioners and Commissions¨ with which the Encuentro was obtained its organization and its development.

For the members of the Coordinating Commission, this long road has signified a complex and enriched experience that faced many challenges. One principal challenge and its explanation derives from the fact that none of us are experts in coordination, organization, and the conducting of groups. But after many reunions, (30 monthly meeting and now more often) God and St. Philip Neri placed in our way Esteban Bulnes, an ex – novice of the Oratorian Congregation of La Profesa. With his experience in entrepreneurial organization, we really took the moderation and programming of our reunions which began since March of the present year.

On the other hand, in Mexico, we say ¨ there is no more wax than that which burns¨ and it is not that we devalue ourselves, but the challenge of the Coordination of the Encuentro opened the windows of initial imagination and it awakened the spirit of adventure. We can really describe ourselves as an adventurous group, because we have made a breakthrough, especially with regards to the work of the Mexican Federation. This is the first event that we, the Congregations and the members of the Oratories of Mexico, organize at such a level.

We also say that we have invented, because those responsible of the different commissions did not have a definite plan. Nor have we taken the different responsibilities according to our particular abilities. We have begun to sense, try and expose our ideas, origins and also the corrections of our failures. It has been a really great challenge of thinking and carrying our ideas, initiatives and attempts. We have always held a strong conviction that this had to come out right; regardless of any difficulty, questions, and tensions that formed part of the overall experience.

One of the only reasons that our delegates, Assistants of the General Congress in Rome spoke out was to refuse the fast and spontaneous development of this Encuentro. Due to the uncertain economical situation of our country. However, once the offer was accepted, we utilized the same spirit of brotherhood and solidarity so that we could host the best possible for everyone. We had already vowed to be with the Hotel Del Prado that is located in Cuernavaca, Morelos, (information that you received in your brochures).When the monetary devaluation occurred it made us rethink our situation and we were compelled to change the place of the Encuentro, obtaining its change of location to the Centro Vacacional Internacional of Oaxtepec, Morelos. Nevertheless, this change did not reduce the initial plans we had in services we were offering our guests. As a matter of fact we lucked out with our decision, because we managed to lower costs considerably. As we previously mentioned, these changes did not affect the quality of our efforts; rather, it gave the Commission flexibility with respect to new tasks.

We have had to overcome several obstacles, especially with registration cards that were late in arriving; although several arrived on time.

As you have been able to observe as a participant of this Encuentro, Oaxtepec is a tropical paradise with exuberant vegetation and with several attractions. Everything in Oaxtepec is extensive, although, kind of far away, but available to see with the greatest panoramic view from any angle. In regards to food, we have made an effort to provide the most essential. Similarly, we say of all our activities that encompass our Encuentro. And since our work has been one of teamwork, with different commissions in different tasks, we have managed to devote our hearts as hosts. We are living in a strong experience of solidarity in charity and corresponding in everything.

We have provided each participant this MEMORY in diskette, because it seems like a better option instead of getting it in printed form.

With the data we have recorded from electronic mail from the participants, we have reached a realm of possibilities of world intercommunications due to the medium of new and innovative technology. Therefore, by way of the Internet web page, each one of us can access, and interchange ideas and experiences as journey together like brothers and sisters of the world. The world service Internet page for the Oratory can be found in www.oratorio.org.mx.

May God grant that this II ENCUENTRO INTERNACIONAL ORATORIANO, whose undertaking by the Mexican Federation has been without precedent and which has affected us deeply, has awakened in each and everyone of us the opportunity to walk with greater faith and a decision to confront with greater intelligence the challenges, which the Third Millennium brings us.

From participating in the conferences and workshops we offer in this MEMORY, we urgently need time, the church, and mankind to respond with promptness of heart .

We only desire the ability to raise our grateful hearts to Our Dear Father Jesus Christ, the Holy Ghost that has given us the light, and the Eternal Word incarnate in the Person of the Lord Jesus, for allowing us to conceive the grace of finding our brothers and sisters of the Oratorian world, to carry on in our lives the beautiful and evangelic face of the spirituality of St. Philip Neri, with his pedagogy of a loved child of God. He impulses us to be true and right as apostles of liberty, happiness and hope in our surroundings. Surely in our minds and goodwill we respond to the sentence of the wise monk, Agostino Ghettini, who said this four centuries ago to a Roman Apostle, “Your people are in Rome”, but they are in our personal calling, “Poland Oratories, your people are in Poland; South Africans, your people are in South Africa; Costa Rica, your mission is in Costa Rica,...”. And it has been directed to you and me personally, so we can be Oratorians of the Third Millennium; where the divine providence has let us be born and live.

Now we embrace each other with affection and commitment to give the Oratory a joyful face and dedication to the Third Millennium.

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INAGURATION

SPEECH OF SOCHITL DURAN

7/13/98

Buenas Noches Damas y Caballeros,

Para muchos de ustedes han tenido que viajar muchas y muchas millas. Algunos de ustedes cruzaron el Atlántico, Pacifico y otros viajamos menos, no importa la distancia, estamos aquí como Iglesia hermanos y hermanas en Cristo y en la alegría de San Felipe Neri. Se personalmente que muchos de ustedes pasaron por muchos obstáculos en su preparación para hacer este viaje, por ejemplo en tratar de obtener visas, otro la situación económica. Sin embargo, con todo esto, pongámoslo en el pasado y disfrutar el momento. Siendo que este es el ano del Espíritu Santo, el verdaderamente esta trabajando muy duro, con todos nosotros aquí presente. Somos un regalo especial que poco a poco se va desenvolviendo y solo se va revelando con una persona, una sonrisa, un saludo, un abrazo o al compartir. Estoy mas que segura que San Felipe Neri esta muy contento viendo esto pasar. Con mucho orgullo puedo decir que México y su gente/pueblo se le conoce por su hospitalidad. Y es por eso damas y caballeros departe de lo que formamos la Comisión Oratoriana de este personalmente a Oaxtepec, Morelos, México a su II Encuentro Internacional Oratoriano. Deseamos que tengan una feliz estancia, Gracias y Dios los Bendiga.

SPEECH OF P. ANTONIO RIOS CHAVEZ, D.A.S.S.

Rev. P. Eduardo Cerrato, General Procurator of the Oratory Confederation of Saint

Philip Neri, R.R.P.P. Permanent’s Deputies, Priests, Oratorian Laity, Nun Present.

You´re welcome,

The 1^st International Meeting of the Oratory in Sevilla, Spain; “Oratory, Intuition of St. Philip”, is now in Oaxtepec, Mexico, a invitation to answer with heart.

The Cardinal James F. Sttaford, president of the Pontifician Council, in the eve of this year, 1998 Pentecost in St. Peter Plaza, being the Pope John Paul II with more of 300 thousand persons pertaining of 56 different eclessial movements, well mentioned to St. Francisco de Asis and to our Father, St. Philip Neri, like the greatest laity promotors.

The Cardinal Newman, with his thoughts and writings, make to the Vatican Council II, know the authentic Church’s concept, determining the laity’s roll in the Church and in the world.

Well, now, we have the chance of being witness of the ones that met Cardinal Newman, that are guided by him, to the knowledge of the Oratory of St. Philip , and so, some congregations had born and others Priests and Laity Fraternities, that live of his spirit and have him like patron.

In the III Christian Millennium threshold the old Oratory’s trunk sprout out and we cannot ignore the reference that everyone make, ones dispose to make success balance or at least, want to learn the history lessons, others augur a great future, we are not indifferent to the important things that establish the measures, always conventional, of men’s way, along the time.

But we add to the merely terrestrial valuations, the idea of eternity, of faith and hope in God and then results that all the measures disappear and the time born, flies, and converts our life in a mystery kept by God´s hands and that non-stop fluidity of time and hope, is record in the eternity. We step on the way of time that passes and we admired to discover a globality that has everything.

The Providence perennity, God that accompanies us and the faith, makes us to think that we are not going to God but we come from him.

This obligate us to the gratitude, to confess him like our Father that mate everyone in Jesus Christ, his son.

Saints make that way, that converting their time in eternity , take the Heaven in their soul, like our St. Philip to whom the cycle started in earth.

We want to reach that, and learn how to communicate to everyone by the ways of time, but convinced that we are in the eternity.

The time looses all it measures and every day everything starts again, but only stays what is eternal and come from God. The happiness is to know that God possess us, the love is know to be thankful and the force is to share it.

We wish each of you this happiness, the one of our prophet, St. Philip.

We hope this 2^nd International Oratorian Meeting, organized with a lot of pledge, with such an illusion, by the designed committee of the Mexican Federation, that preside the M.R.P. Antonio Ortega Franco, National Procurator; impel us with the prayer, the conferences and with the movements of Oratorian recreation to answer vigorously and quickly with the heart.

Well, be everyone welcome.

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MONDAY, July 13

Chronicle

Our way of making memory can not remain “in a simple narration of what we have done”, but to recognize how the Spirit requires to manifest before different circumstances, with the desire to show us the best path.

Well, “we are now finding ourselves”, and we now want to make it a reality, although we are in a hurry and surely because of the expectations, what we need to remember in our hearts that every oratorian member: that St. Philip Neri be, the inflamed Spirit, our pedagogy light towards and to the Third Millennium.

To us, like St. Philip Neri, the story tells us, and urges that, his example always, allows us to respond “with Promptness of the Heart”, since with this we play with our Oratorian identity.

We ought to live our experience, from this opening day, like the “inauguration” of a new era, which remains by the imagination of St. Philip Neri, opens our hearts to hope, based on our joyous experience that Our Dear Loving Father demonstrates to us.

This first day allows us into what we hope, bring us faced forward to the Third Millennium, the awakening of the laymen. Unfortunately, we have not manifested this desire, with the forces of the “Spirit times” and in great part it depends on the fact that we still live in the clergies way. Let us not dwell on God’s Spirit, which made his heart joyous and illuminated St. Philip Neri’s intelligence, in the fear, of feeling “displaced” for those who are in our congregations, the authentic reflection of where can locate our real image, our clearest identity.

Let us make an Oratorian liturgy, that is to say, “happy and committed”, of the discussions made on this first day.

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TUESDAY, July 14

Chronicle

Today we awaken with a lot of energy to give the best of ourselves. And if we are talking about the Coordinating Commission, all the participants of this II Congress have offered us their best expression and heart for the initial activities.

We anxiously awaited the discussion that was going to be offered by Dr. Mariano Gonzalez Leal, for which must have been a demonstration of a broad coverage of history, he brought out a lot of interest and everywhere we could see a clique of individuals that were spontaneously offering and defending all the conflicting reactions. During lunch time we had our grandest meal, not including our favorite dessert. The comments fluctuated from the absolute failure and unconditional support. This “Memory” that we have in our hands allows us to value, with a forged spirit from the battlefields what we now have in this Congress, the importance of this Conference.

We believe that it was this “provocation” that at the time of the panel discussions we asked for a space to share from what we have learned from the conferences, since the panel focuses mainly on the conclusions from the workshops.

In the workshops where we held round table discussions, we could appreciate the passion of other people’s opinions, that although they wanted to offer their opinion from the spur of the moment.

We should appreciate and recognize the effort of many who have had to move from their habitations to the sight of the workshops and the restaurant. We also appreciate the service that many have offered with their cars to help transport people’s needs.

St. Philip Neri has accompanied us, with his unconditional spirit, in all the activities. That is the way he is, always an unconditional friend, “how can he not be since he is encouraged by the Spirit of Jesus Christ.

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CONFERENCE: The Oratory and the Postmodern Culture

Dr. Mariano Gonzalez Leal

Laymen

Thank you gentlemen, first of all I would like to thank for the very deep honor for allowing me to participate in an encounter that is so important. In what is really significant, this is the only commitment that can move good people especially the lay people that are in daily contact with the family. The most important values of cultures and especially because very few times we have a chance to have a lay person speak in front of priests for natural reasons and logical reasons. The priests have a culture education preparation in this topic and they can address daily or weekly. The laymen, a slay person, we do not have the opportunity very often. I thank God for this opportunity and also thank God and the people that honored me with the invitation, the people of Gto and Leon.

The reflections that I will draw upon have an essential purpose to ponder and to be on guard regarding whatever threatens our Christian culture. From the viewpoint of the Oratory with two essential values: humanity and joy. From the universal view point of Christianity understood as a Catholic a humane value as well as an omnipresent value. As we said before, a universal value, I will specifically refer to what happens in the particular case of Mexico. However, we will not be able to void making reference to similar phenomenon that I have had to witness abroad. Also, one way or the other remains today, yesterday, and for a long time they have attained to wear the values of our civilization day by day. Also using sophisticated methods and consequently more dangerous methods. As I have stated I want to refer specifically to the case of Mexico, the reason of Catholic routed in Mexico to what created our way of being. The testimonial that I have been recently had as the different dangers, that have been present around our religious identity. And have different masks along the century to hide the same enemy.

Mexico is the country that is culturally the child of Spain. The essential attack to the Mexican identity, as Anacleto Gonzalez Flores said has been historically focused upon attacking our culture Hispanic affiliation because through this culture Hispanic affiliation we are facing to the Christian Western Culture. Of course, we have an historic fact that is constant and that happen around 1873 coming always from the same place from the North. And has devalued generation after generation and gradually progressive and dangerous the way of the family, nation, country and its relation to God and Christian values.

Why do I state that the beginning of every attack that is found within sectors of the church itself here and elsewhere in the world especially the Spanish Americas? They been an attack to the Spanish affiliation Poinsset, the great enemy of Mexico, already Wilson and Monroe when they were asked when will we be able to absorb Mexico to Poinsset, the first ambassador to the United States in Mexico, he answered: the day when Mexico stops being Spanish. A day when Mexico stops being Catholic because of the way of being in Mexico is the way of being of the Ausburgs. And the way of living in the Ausburgs was the way of living of the Catholic King and Queen in the culture mixture that we are going through are exploiting in its negative side. Furthermore, as syncretism, as the modalities of the New Age, will go beyond mestizo cultural origins, through eventually having highly dangerous syncretisms. This does not only happen in Mexico, in happens in Spain, England, Italy, where as syncretism in relation to the Old Celtic religion or the old magic practices of the druids.

If Spain is a country that essentially was made during the seventh century, the Reconquest, we will find that the way of being in Spanish nation, logically and naturally be evangelization. I have always thought that all the people of the World and I refer specifically to Europeans because I can not think of the Middle Ages outside of Europe. I believe the Middle Ages are a strictly European phenomenon. The Middle Ages is a historical moment when the Christian culture is an essential center in life and facts. And the Middle Ages has been said to be a dark age, when really the Middle Ages should be the centuries from making Christianity, the structure of faith, as the rest should be a super structure. Today it seams that the essential structure, according to Marxism’s economy is to others super structures. We will speak about this later on.

But there is no doubt that the Reconquest is a medieval phenomenon and it’s a Spanish phenomenon. The Reconquest isolated Spain from participation in the Crusades. Why? It is because Spain was going through its own crusade. The expulsion of the Moors from the peninsula and this began with don Pelayo in the seventh century and ends January 6, 1492, in Granada. We have to quickly, fast and equally assess the Reconquest period, which is the prologue of our ideological conquest. This is the way of being as a Spanish nation. I think that in Europe each country has had a historical vocation and they have lost this. There has been a devaluation and degeneration on the loss of those countries. Also, you can simple analyze an example, in the case of Italy. The vocation in Italy has been art and it has been a country that has produced great sculptors, musicians and writers but Italy goes into politics. It fails and becomes disintegrated with no identity at all and that loses importance in the story’s context. Thus, we can mention the historical vocations of England, France, etc. Spain did not significantly participate in the Crusades to Jerusalem because it was living its own crusade and Reconquest. That was the reason to be a Spanish nation and it was the reason for the Reconquest, to expel from its land and to get the unity of a Catholic nation that is making of the Spanish religion. Consequently, the vocation of the founding people and children of Spain; in addition, the vocation of Mexico along with Peru they were preferred children of Spain. Such that for many years our nation was known as the New Spain and to be congruent with this modus vivendi, a year had not yet passed from the end of the Reconquest when Spain discovered the New World. What would have happened if the Catholic monarchy had had an heir, if Don Juan would have lived longer and the Spanish dynasty would have failed? We do not know however, we know that in these difficult years of the seventeenth century some referred it as the end of Middle Ages. Others began to talk of new ideas. I also do not believe that Middle Age end on an exact date or that they start in such. I believe every country and every cultural region of the World has its history and talk about the Middle Ages in America or in Asia is absurd, that the Middle Ages is a European phenomenon, but that the same Middle Ages were presented in different stages and styles in Europe.

What causes the end of the Middle Ages? We have always been told that it is the Renaissance in Italy. Personally, I believe that this is only the Renaissance there during that time. Even though, they say that in Spain the Middle Ages ended with the Reconquest, I believe that the fundamental legacy of the Spanish Middle Ages is the University of Salamanca and its great authors: Fernando Lopez, Francisco de Vittoria, Francisco Suarez and Domingo Soto. They are the great scholars and if scholastics were the fundamental product of the Middle Ages that flourishes in the sixteenth century in Spain. It is clear that while there was an advance Renaissance in Italy in the search for pagan style, with the excuse of the reconstruction of legendary art in Spain. You can barely ideologically consolidate the Middle Ages with the scholastic philosophy that did not culminates in Spain, but in Portugal with Francisco Suarez is the University of Coimbra. At the same time in the North, another phenomenon was developing that many consider proper of New Age; the Reform, Antichrist, that they mention in the Apocalypses, has existed in different faces with respect to the change of times. I think that the Reform by Luther and the Calvinistic pragmatism, later the Enlightenment, the Realism, Marxism and today Liberalism, has been no more then the styles adapted to the changes of time. Also, the historical circumstances to fight differently every time, but with the same denominator, the Western Christian culture. This reminds me of the cartoon where they showed Marx pushing a giant rock to the abyss, and the devil laughing at him saying, "this idiot thinks he can push it, I have tried to twenty centuries and I have not accomplished it".

The history of Spain and Islam, the Reform in the history of Great Britain the Anglicanism, the Calvinism and the growth of these two mentalities that defined the beginnings of our own history in Mexico in 1998, two years before the end Millennium. That is to say that spiritual mentality of the Catholic Monarchy, the acquiring of Indies of Philip II, the battle of Lepanto, of the spiritual conquest of America and also the cold pragmatism that is calculating, metallic and Anglo Saxon. So well represented like Anacleto Gonzalez Flores said discussion in 1923, that he named "our vocation and race"; the two great enemies, Reform and Countereform, that is Philip II of Spain and Elizabeth I of England. Those are the end poles.

Let us talk about what is important of our nation’s history and ancestral cultures. Philip II, following and taking the maximum of the ideals of Mexico’s tradition converts to the Catholic church in the Escorial, the beginning of the Countereform and the beginning of the irreconcilable fight that we live in our territory. The conquest has been slandered by the Anglo Saxons (the sons of Elizabeth I), a destruction. No, the English initiated the destruction in the United States. We are not to fall in the traps of Poinsset, the game of Elizabeth I of England, we should not continue thinking that the recovering of the Indies of Spain. It had the same spirit of the English nobility, the Calvinistic pragmatism, is whom ever assaults the most and brings the most gold to the English crown et more of the noble title they will receive. It was not the case in Spain, where knights came with a vision of evangelization that required the sword but never forgot the cross; the clearest test in the group of judgement that were made to all the authorities that made public charges in the New Spain. The punishment that was given to people like Nuñez Guzman, the viceroy of Branciforte, that were traitors of the house of Ausburg, taking of the Indies beginning of the mestizos, were the principle objective was to give the indigenous the dignity to be human. Abuses were made, but we need to remember that a death penalty continues to exist that prohibits abortion. Then, it is imperative to understand then go in their historic moment, because if we come out of this moment to judge the things with our own opinion of another history moment, we will fall in serious injustices.

With this spirit we create, Spanish American and Portuguese American with the other one we make North America. A North America that has a clear theme derived from pragmatism. The Calvinistic pragmatism, condenses in "manifest destiny", "I am richer, more powerful, more privileged and also I am the preferred son of God and God gives me the right to annihilate when ever is inferior to me because God loves me more then another". Great Britain conducted itself with this philosophy, with this philosophy their sons follow. On the other hand Philip II followed the philosophy, "I have a vision to administer the land by divine order and because of that order my obligation is to respond beyond this world", the ability to have extended Gods word. Vasconcelos said, " the World does not divide itself between whites and blacks, nor rich nor poor, nor aristocrats or peasants. This artificial separation we as humans separate in what we believe is the end of mankind and those that believe that there is some thing more in this World, the ones that to accomplish this here, the ones that believe that this is the route to obtain some thing different. Spain used this mentality; however, the pragmatist’s cold and Anglo Saxon conduct is what should be done here, that ended with an appetite for material objects.

The house of Ausburg disappeared in Spain, and had been, however, such a legacy that during their reign they created the values that informed all of our civilization the three traditional values. They were taught to us in past eras: religion, nation and family. These are the three values for which so many heroes gave their life during Christianity what we learn from Don Anacleto Gonzalez stores and the great wise men. In the North these are the three values that should be promoted as a matter of fact with the coming of the House of Bourbon, what happen? In Europe, the French revolution, that under a mask of equality, liberty and fraternity principles committed the most atrocious crimes in history of Europe, the same as those that were committed of the revolution of 1910, liberty, equality, fraternity, are concepts that are absolutely philatropic but divorced Catholic of a believing conception; absolutely linked with material things; of that same mask you can see a projection of Enlightenment, Rationalism and Positivism that took place during the last century, destroying the transcendental values, "I can not believe what my senses tell me". Of course, with respect to experimental science we can not deny that during the past century there was a big apogee. But, what happened with the metaphysics, theology and with the non-experimental sciences? A step backwards that had to convert heroic a positivism that produced great wise men, but had the most of them divorced from a Christian way of life.

Here in America it happened. That is the same year (1813) the Baron of Humbolt published his political essay things about the New Spain that was known since then in the United States. A United States that saw itself deeply influenced by its own pragmatic ideology, Calvinism in life and for its French masonry they had made the revolution. What happened was they did not know there was wealth in the South and there was a possibility of exploiting them, but there was a major impediment: Catholicism, the heirs of Philip II. So then they asked themselves, could we make it all our way? And the answered themselves that it would be the day they stopped being Hispanic, so it meant the day the would stop being Catholic American so, in the laps of thirty years all the revolutions for independence were carried out and the doctrine of Monroe was promoted, whose theme, "America for the America". This message began to immediate translate into perfectly clear aspect. First, the independence and later what Poinsset concerned in a perverse manner way. It is necessary that the Hispanic America be racial against themselves and see us as superior. The easiest manner was to make the Hispanic America loose their identity making them believe that they were children of a murderous, violating Father and of an ignorant, indigenous, violated, and abandoned mother; not permitting them the honor of feeling as descents of someone like Pelayo or El Cid, or of heroes like Moctezuma and Cuachtemoc, not permitting them to understand that mestizos was created painfully because it produced two other nations, that is where a violation of racists began for which the United States practices. And so, in the distraction of our own governmental system already initiated in the Bourbon reforms. If you compare the first Constitution of 1824 with the United States Constitution of 1774 you will find literal translations (the case of giving the president of Mexico the right to give patents for death, something never done in Spain and that it is an English statue inherited by the United States and translated to Mexico’s Constitution). To this followed the destruction the town’s memory of the system of learning. Then the arbitrarily separated the country from the monarch tradition with wise. The pure and impure systems of aristocracy introduced the idea that the systems were strictly North American with lies to the scholastic philosophical and aristocratic tradition and they began to confuse the monarchy with the Absolute to help eradicate any European influence. In this Monroe doctrine the United States will considered an aggression to the moment if any European or Spanish intervention to Reconquest their colonies, wait a moment gentlemen. These were never Spanish Colonies there is a Spanish legislature that says that these colonies were from Spain. This is an Anglo Saxon term referred to as ultramarine province the colonies were Anglo-Saxon. Then, the introduction of the term "Colonies" is made with the intent to make us overlook ourselves to renounce our own traditions as so to eliminate our own Western Christian Culture.

One first step was given (Independence) after the penetration of the Bourbon’s in Spain that came to unsettle itself and that in Mexico with respects to Lodges you see the two great movements, that is to say, the division of parties. The two programs Poinsset was to make Mexico a divided nation that had been a unified monarchy. The first Lodges that were created in Mexico were from the Scottish and Yorkshire and from then on it has not been a unified nation. The parties separate because they divide a nation; make fragments of a nation and impede a universal understanding of the nation that has a monarch system, where you can govern with a laborer, a conservative or syndicalist. Because, there is always a guard that signifies the unity of the nation and is the national symbol that exists further beyond the interest group. Here in Mexico, the president, is still considered the first “Panista” or the first “Perredista”. Are we not all Mexicans? The party vision that was introduced in the first century has been forming their different mask; according to, the historical eras, Yorkshire and Scottish, liberals and conservatives. Furthermore, there is intent to modify when it triumphs liberalism and then the alienation of the last monarchy said, ”Mexico will never be a nation if it does not accept to work under the same nation of the liberals and conservatives”. That is why he formed a governmental body in here there was liberals and conservatives. The phobia was so great within the liberals against the conservatives; that, among themselves intended what they ended and wanted to unify. The liberals triumphed and, like always, the United States stayed behind and it created a more liberal regiment that supplied weaponry to both armed forces. And when don Porfirio finally understood that this was more than a mere liberal regiment; it was necessary, for it to separate from the dependence of North America. On the desk of Ambassador Wilson, a plan was created to stop economical problems of Mexico, which were the products of real estate, and at the same time, constitutional norms were perfected. Nevertheless, all these strategies of making us renounce our own fathers existed a fundamental value of family. The generation of liberals that were appearance oriented was followed by the generation of Post-Revolutionists; however, the Mexican women continues to exist in the family.

The last outbursts and for me the only authentic patriot, was the Christianity of 1926. It was completely destroyed, betrayed, and sold by the famous arrangements of 1929 that gave the amnesty for the “Callista” government to the Christian leaders where there was more deaths during this war.

What followed was a demoralization that began to live in a Catholic memory. You add to this the development of the media and technology, the sophistication that keeps getting more and more dangerous. Today, the enemy has a theme in our homes, televisions; that is, the central location of the house. And is the cheapest nanny that shares its doctrine with “The Simpson’s”, soap operas, and all types of magazines that would never compare to the great novels and works of art of yesterday.

In this society there is an urgency to recover the role of priests in society that it will once again take its central role in Christian communities. So, let us not let down our guard! We still have time to do it.

I would like to conclude with this expedition that it was more of an enumeration of historical phenomenon, leaving as testimony that the enemy is not new; that, the Antichrist, to my judgement, has always existed. I have referred to him in relation to our own history. Marxism ended, one of its masks, but it now has another: Neo-liberalism, annihilator of the family, convictions and national convictions that have sold us the fatal idea of the globalization as it was an irreversible phenomenon that we can not stop. This globalization is another lie, that we have to be the same as everyone else, in order to loose our sense or patriotism. The worst is the reaction against this, which is that it has been sold with force and like language and unique monotony they unite. It is the fundamentalism that here Mexico that is present as the indigenous fundamentalism. From this globalization, we pass to the extreme reaction of fundamentalism without an understanding of our mestizaje; that is, our identity, nor right nor the political parties, but in the transcendental senses of mankind.

I would like for us to remember, those of us who are parents and priests, that there is a focal point superior to society. The focal point is the priest. I think, he should be the point of reference to the Christian culture (like it used to be). The confinable counselor of families, he should be a man that, because of his culture, and because of his attire and physical presence inspires respect, love, protection, and a sense of superiority for us who are the church. So we can ascend to our highest cultural level instead of our spiritual guides to fall like my previous dioceses.

I would like to ask that you orient us, the lay people, to assume a role in society and Christian culture so it does not fall under the attack of the Third Millennium. It is nothing new; it is the same as always. The enemy that is always present and now has a name frightens us with the New Age and Millennium, but the phenomenon is the same as always. Let our own family, churches, and dioceses in our own communities live a Christian Life.

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SEMMINAR: PROPHETIC AGENS OF THE ORATORY

Prophetic existence

Philip Neri: The Prophet

Prophetism in Lain America

Prophetic elements of Philippian Spirituality

The Prophetic role of the Oratorian Woman in L.A.

Proposal as to how the Oratory can penetrate today, its prophetic dimension in L.A.

Workshop:

Exposition

Work Groups:

Reflection and Commentaries:

What are, for you, the three central characteristics if St Philip Neri’s prophetism?

What facilities do you find for living the oratorian prophetism? Mention two

What difficulties do you find for living the oratorian prophetism? Mention two.

Plenary

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1.- The prophetic existence.

God acts in the history gearing the human freedom; and the means that uses to act about the human freedom, respecting it, is the word. God directs the word to his people througt men chosen form the people: The prophets. They are messengers of the word of God in the history. God the flame messengers and his witness, sentries.

The prophets didn't arise at random; they sprang from the suffering and mistreated floor of the poor of the Earth. The prophets appeared in the most critical and difficult moments in the history of the town of the Bible; when they arose: the monarchy, the kings, the false religion to the service of the dominant power.

The prophets are the spokesmen of the pains, of the fights, of the hopes, of the dreams of men and women of the field and of the suburbs of the cities. They rise, they leave the anonimity, moved by an absolute and loving fidelity to Yaveh. The cradle of the prophecy is not the temple neither the sacred habit, but the squares, the streets of the city, the market, the lands and the villages of the interior where it is the life hard and suffering of the town. The prophecy is the voice that God has lent to the silent agony, to the plundered poor.

The prophet above all is a call, she is a person possessed by the Spirit of Yaveh. His vocation is also born to the interior of a town elect. Inside this town it is necessary to assist the sense of the prophetic vocation: to Guide Israel so that he walks in faith and obedience in presence of the Lord.

The prophets are men of the word. This means that they must put to disposition, mainly, their language. As if they had to give the meat and blood, the life and expression of their language, so that in them the word of God is embodied. The prophet never got used to consider the divine word as the creation of her own spirit. The typical of the prophetic conscience is that the communicated word always comes from wanting living off God.

The prophets speak the language of the poor. Their language is direct and to the point. Their word is impactante and it penetrates in him but deep. The prophets felt calls, almost forced, to make that it was heard the interpellation and demand from the alive God to their town.

They don't live off the privileges of the power. They challenge to the whole country: kings, priests, false prophets and to the whole nation. Their declared enemies are those that explode and they dominate. The prophets are amid the conflicts and they don't escape from them, neither they hide them. They expose them. Their conscience is critical, lucid, concrete and militant. They know how to discern by the light of the Spirit of God. They are not apolitical neither neuter. They don't live outside of the reality. They have concrete and historical projects. They take party being placed with determination on the side of those impoverished. Their screams resonate in all the layers of the society.

The prophets denounce with clarity the injustices and they point out their causes. The fundamental injustice is the alignment of the conscience of the poor: they were imposed a conscience of inferiority. The unjust system of the kings transformed the poor person into an inferior being, an indolent one, a sinner that didn't deserve a life better than which had. This way, the rich one could be calm in the possession of their wealth for that the poor person, and not other, he was the culprit of their own poverty.

The prophet non single accusation the injustices and the errors, neither so alone it stimulates to the town to be solidary; he announces, especially, the central certainty of the faith: God is with us! He hears our scream!

This way, the prophet contributes to raise in the town a new conscience that it is born of the source of the life: The love of God. They are people of hope. Amid the most seriuos accusations, they open roads and horizons to the life. They are solidary men until the last consequences, with the cause of the poor of the earth.

The mission that the prophet completes is unpleasant to him and repugnant to the other ones. The prophet supports scorn and reproach (Jer. 15,15). He is had as a lunatic by their contemporaries. Soledad and misfortune were part of their recompense, to side of the jeer and the persecution.

The true prophecy is only possible in the solidarity with the poor. To be prophet it is necessary to break up with the dominance structures. The memory of the past as experience of fidelity to the Alliance is one of the approaches but important so that the town can discern if a prophet is false or true.

The Father has been revealed through the prophets like the God that acts in the history and transforms it in favor of the life of the poor, of the weak ones. He is the God that makes alliance with their town, that is related and it commits, but also who corrects and denounces their weaknesses and injustices. However, walking of the prophecy of th O.T. leads us to Jesus. The revelation arrives to its fullness in its Son. (Hb.1, 1-2).

Jesus of Nazareth is the Father's correspondent (Mc.1, 9-11), to announce the arrival of the Kingdom (Mc 1,14-15) establishing it from the experience of God like Father, as the Abba.

Jesus announced with words and actions the Kingdom. It proclaims the good one new at the pobres(Mt.21, 23-25). He carries out the promises of the Alliance (Mt 1,22-23). He forgives to the sinners (Mt 9, 10-13), he reinstates those excluded (Mc 1,26-28). He renovates the Alliance (Mt 21.1-17). He manifest from the present that the salvation has arrived that God wants the life for all.

Jesus transforms the scream of the poor in call of God. Most of their time cohabits with those who don't take place in the society, with those excluded: sinners, prostitutes, sick, settle, children, women, foreigners, poor.... in other words, the simple town. They are the privileged addressees of their announcement (Lc. 4, 18-19) and they are those that recognize in The to a prophet that speaks with authority (Mc 1,27). In Him they find their past, with their mission, with their God. With Jesus the town recovers their dignity.

In a same way Jesus will denounce the justification of a society oppresive and unjust, on behalf of God. He will expose everything that that goes against the Father's project that gives death to the human being that removes him life to the town and he makes them slave and the neighbor's enemy (Lc. 6, 24–26; 11,37 ss). This unchains the fury of the groups or classes: scribes, pharisee, priests, rich and rulers that represented and they exercised some type of power in the society. The controversies that will have will be around the law and to the temple in whose name the society was configured.

The salvation-liberation work of Christ will necessarily go by the conflict, the persecution and the cross (Lc. 19, 45–48) but it is in fact the road for which will be carried out the messianic hope, the project of God: the resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth is nothing less than the approbation of his life and work for the Father.

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2.- Philip Neri: The prophet

To speak of Philip Neri's profetism is to speak of the word that God says on the history, about the reality that the town lives, and in this case, in a special way, the Roman town.

The time that Philip Neri lived (1515-1595), it is marked by a strong dynamism in all the aspects. Some of them are:

- Scientific and cultural discoveries as the compass and the printing.

The arrival in America.

The Renaisance: it will mark an alive sense of the freedom and of the personal conscience.

The social class of the bourgeoisie emerges.

The nationalities and the absolute kings begin to offer new political possibilities.

The fights for the hegemony in Europe between France and Spain and the constant threats of the turks.

The mundanización of the papacy (Alejandro VI, Julio II and León X) and of the high clergy; the relaxation of the first floor clergy.

The spirituality is marked by a practical intense, but feeble devocional, encouraged by an obsession atmosphere by the sin and fear to the eternal condemnation, fear to the demon, etc.

Two reformations are contemplated: the Protestant and the Catholic. The Protestant is a desire to return to the gospel and a reaction against the Roman church. The Catholic includes a turn to the gospel and a reaction in front of the Protestantism.

The council of Trento. This was imposed the task of extirpation of the errors and the safeguard of the Gospel. A more spiritual papacy arises; the bishops return to their residences; the Seminars begin for the formation of the Clergy; a liturgical reformation begins. The inquisition arises.

Wars, pests and widespread poverty.

It is amid this reality that Philip feels the call of God and the seduction of the Gospel and it is where it is called to carry out his mission.

We will try to meditate on the features that make of Philip Neri a prophet, a Witness of God: I Announce of the Kingdom and accusation of the anti-Kingdom, the solidarity with the poor and the persecution, the conflict.

2.1. announce of the Kingdom and accusation of the anti-Kingdom.

Philip enters in a dialogue with God and his town.

The wars had left to their step poverty, illness and death and addet to that the corruption of the authorities, they made of the poor person, of the weak one, prey easy of the desperation and of the injustices. Philip will see in them to the same Lord Jesus and his mission, to likeness of him (Lc. 4, 18) will be to take the Good News to the poor that God is with them and that its project is that they have abundant life. (Jn. 10, 10).

Their announcement will not only carry out it in the temple but for the streets and squares, in the houses, hospitals, etc.

For the poor the message is of hope for that God takes care of them and because their situation will change. But for the rich and powerful his announcement becomes accusation, because it unveils the interests that govern to the society and the injustice with which is knitted.

The announced God, the God of the Gospel, will be source of a new conscience in the listeners, because it is a God that assumes the pains and sufferings of the one rejected, ignorant and impoverished; that enters in the history and it transforms it. He is the God that comes to them, who it cures them the wounds, who forgives them and gives them hope. (Jn. 10, 1-15). Philip will create spaces where it is listened and meditate the word of God: The Oratory. And other community spaces where the evangelical values are lived. And in Jesus' practice he will find the one on the way to arrive to the human being and to make him brother and son of God. (Lc. 19, 1 and ss.).

Although the ignorance of the clergy in this time and its little pastoral action took to the error to the faithful ones, Philip announces the Gospel using everything, all available resources at every possible occasion. The word of God will be within reach of how many they treat it. Their simple treatment captured people, besides his clear and direct language. He knew how to communicate with the young and children, the same as with the adults and old, it didn't matter the social class to which belonged, he took them freely for the one on the way to the exhortation to love to God in the impoverished siblings.

His contemplation of the reality discerned by the light of the Gospel, prepares him to accompany, to guide and to give advice to the men and women of his time.

2.2. The solidarity with the poor

Philip, when opting to follow Christ, will opt to be poor, to stay with the poor and to serve them. For him, the solidarity with the orphans, prisoners, beggars, sick and heretics, gipsies, etc. became more and more urgent for the situations of misery and injustice that prevailed, which led him to work in favor of the impoverished brother's life.

It is a solidarity that unifiles, thant mates able to feel the neighbor's pain and of acting in consequence for love and in justice to the example of the one Crucified who assumed the pains of his town. Philip, therefore, won't fear to defend the poor, to the prisoners and the heretics when it is necessary and of preaching to all the love and the mercy of God for the human being. In a same way he will look for projects that demonstrate this solidarity. For example: The Brotherhood of the pilgrims and convalescent. He will look for through the God of the gospel, to dignify and to humanize the man.

The pain, the suffering and the poverty that Philip assumes in solidarity with the town and I eat evangelical demand, (Mt. 25, 31 ss.) will be a scandalous accusation to a society that produces poor and that it is identified with ‘wordly values’.

2.3. Persecution and conflict

Philip's action was not very seen by all. In 1559 Cardinal Espoletto had low control during months Philip's work and summoned him many times to declare. It was reproached to him to found a new sect and they criticized him introducing so many novelties: Lay that preached in the churches and the meetings of the oratory, so much in the church as outdoors.

It was prohibited to him the confession, the pilgrimage to the Seven Churches, (to consider that they could finish in rebellion). Time later these prohibitions were lifted.

In 1567, under the Pope Pío V, resolved to close the oratory, but Cardinal Borromeo was able to avoid it.

The visit to the heresy convicts brought to Philip that in 1569 the Pope sent two dominicos to the oratory to listen to what was preached and then to inform him; but they liked what they heard and found not anything to condemn.

Philip defended himself without fear in front of his opponents and he prayed for them. He considered that the persecution and the conflict were against same God and not against him that alone it obeyed him.

CONCLUSION:

THE PROPHETISM OF ST. PHILIP NERI, AT THE SERVICE OF THE REFORMATION OF THE CHURCH

Philip loved to the Church and correspondent went to her to announce the Gospel in a moment of rigidity in the face of the rupture changes with the Protestants. There his tender and simple figure makes return the eyes to the message of God, to the project of the Kingdom.

The step of the Spirit reformed to the Church, calling it to the conversion from the announcement of the Gospel. The Word of God will reform to the Church, he will give new life when being announced as Good News to the poor, sick and sinners and when assuming its necessities, sufferings and weaknesses. From the most fragile, from the poor, the Church will be reformed.

This word of God wil be strengthened by the lay ones, it will make them subject inside the Church; their paper won't already be of mere spectators and receivers, neither they will be afraid of God, they won’t take refuge in idolatrous practices . They will be enabled to hear the Word of de God, its meditation and preaching and will also have the mission to build the Kingdom of God, transforming society and makin it more humane..

For the hierarchy of the church, Philip will be an example of how to live the priestly ministry and where the announcement of the Gospel, the service to the poor and the being shepherd of the community, are basic and indispensable elements.

The word unites people, the one that forms community, but a community whose characteristics are: prayer, sharing, solidarity, love and forgiveness.

This step of the Lord in a time of division goes reconstructing the unit, from the far away, from those forgotten, a communion that has to go by the solidarity with those that suffer.

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3.- Prophetism in Latin America

3.1 The prophetic dimension of the Christian life in Latin America.

The profetism is inherent to Christ's following. His life is framed in the announcement of the Kingdom of God.

The memory of Christ’s death and resurrection is a continent whose characteristic is the growing breach between rich and poor, the injustice, exploitation and violence, question us deeply. Latin America suffers the impoverishment of millions of people and they continue to increase day bay day. Our Bishops have denounced this situation in the Episcopal Conferences of Medellin, Puebla and Santo Domingo (n.179) as well as court neoliberal's politics that has brought death, exclusion, and quick impoverishment of the majorities and the wealth without limits of some.

The clamor of the poor town has arrived to God and his answer in favor of the life sprouts in our lands with urgency and from the place where the human being life is threatened of death. In the face of the victims we have recognized the one Crucified (Puebla n. 31; Sto. Domingo n. 178) and this has challenged and it continues challenging us as Christian, because it is the fruit of a history of oppression that continues until our days. The oppressors have changed but the victims not: the indigens and the women are those most affected ones; they have supported per centuries the exploitation, humiliation and oppression.

For the church, assuming the pain of the poor town has been to recover the gospel and to assume the Christian commitment of continuing Jesus Christ mission saving-liberating (Lc. 4,18-19). It is worth to mention that some sectors of the church has been assumed this responability, however, a great majority has stayed to the margin.

3.2 Features of the prophetic-transforming presence in Latin America.

Latin America looks for to reach the development, the democracy, the total emancipation. It is in a stage Of strong transformation that is given among tensions and conflicts that have left in their step a lot of blood of innocent spilled. The prophetic-tranforming presence of the church in this reality:

- Had had the necessity to know more than close the reality of the town that suffers, of to analyze it and to be sensitive to the situation of misery and oppression in that are the majorities. A reality that is view and discerned communitily by the light of the Gospel.

- Has made center of their life the Word of God and unavoidable commitment of taking the Good one New to the poor, to announce them the proximity of God (Mc. 1, 15) and their preference toward them (Stgo. 2, 5-7). This announcement has dignified men and women, has brought the hope among those that suffer and it has liberated them (Puebla n. 267 and 268).

An announcement that has become accusation of all that is opposed to the Kingdom of God, as the injustice, corruption, exploitation, violence, drug traffic, etc. (Medellin II, 20-21) and the same neoliberal system implanted in our tweets, deepening the distances in the society. While some enjoy the big scientific, technological and cultural advances of our time, millions of people lack the necessary one to live worthily: feeding, dilutes, light, education, etc.

The Church, in the face of the rolling force of the structure of the sin, has become voice of those that don't have voice, it has defended the life of the oppressed, defenseless and excluded.

- The church has assumed the human promotion as logical consequence of the evangelism that offers to the person's integral liberation (EN 29-30). Promotion that should take from less human conditions to more human conditions.

Inside the field of the Human Promotion we find the topics:

Human rights

Earth

Impoverishment and solidarity

Ecology

Work

Migration

New economic order

Latin American integration

Family and life

This has taken to the organization of the town in cooperative of production, consumption and services; in committees of: Defense of the vote, health, alternative medicine and others. It leaves impelling the concientización and participation of the lay ones in the politics, in the search of the very common one (Medellin 14), of the democracy, of the defense of the human rights and the solidarity with those impoverished.

- The church has wanted to promote a new evangelism in-cultural that offers the Gospel valuing and promoting the values of the towns indigenous Afro-American and also of the mestizos by means of a respectful and fraternal dialogue with them. In a same way goes supporting the efforts to have their rigths recognized and uniting with then their vindicating struggle for: Freedom, health, earth, education and others. It has also promoted an in-culturation of the liturgy.

Their purpose is to promote the integral development that favors a fair and solidary society, where the values of the Kingdom are lived and the community dimension of the town is recovered that walks with its God in the history.

It is necessary to emphasize that in Latin America, the prophets are par excellence the poor; they constantly interpellate for their scream against the injustice and in favor of the liberation; for the demand of solidarity that their misery causes; for their participation will to be subject of the history and of ecclesiastic community.

3.3 Sanctity and martyrdom in Latin America

The town of God is called to the sanctity. A sanctity as Jesus Christ style; He is the source of where the Christian feed. It is the Sacred Spirit that guides and continues the revitalizing action and liberadora of Jesus in the history.

The sanctity is not another thing that to participate of Jesus' mission and to follow road. This path implies to announce the Kingdom of God and to denounce everything that is opposed, standing by the impoverished, promiting the life, and looking for the justice; in an other words, to be configured around Jesus and his Kingdom and to assume the conflicts, the persecutions and the cross.

Following Jesus in L.A. has led God’s people to commit themselves to ther evangelizing mission and fulfill it in a conflictiving reality where poverty is not a natural phenomenon but an historical truth, bruougth about by the opression of a small group on the majorities. This is precisely there where the latinoamerican is called to live the sanctity. Under the light of the Gospel, that situation has been declared as sin structure (Medellin: Dcto. PEACE) and like challenge to the evangelism.

Latin America lives the persecution for decades, a structural, anonymous and collective persecution as answer of a system that is threatened and that it defends its privileges violently. Behind only problems of political, economic, cultural and military order are not; there is also, a theological problem, because it is destroying to the same town that is poor and Christian for many that are also considered Christian.

Many Christian: lay, religious, priests and bishops have suffered and they suffer persecutions that include from the levelling to the home, humiliations, jail, tortures until murders, libels, threats of death, attacks. It doesn't care the means; everything is part of oneself project. For that they use the whole dominant structural apparatus (judicial, legislative, executive, media, military etc.). This persecution is systematic, intentional and constant. It tries to confuse, to distort and to divide; it presses to the ecclesiastic organization and all those that unite with it.

The persecution and repression to the Church perpetuated in the poor and believing town, have for objective to brake and to annihilate the concientización processes and liberation of the town.

Certainly, the martyrdom produces fear in somebody and in other many it confirms the following Christ and it consolidates to the community, it maintains the hope and the love increases, because Jesus' resurrection assures that it is not the tomb the destination of those without future, but the full Life, the Life in abundance.

4.- Prophetic elements of the spirituality philippian

- It doesn't only announce in the Temple, but, preferably, in the squares and streets, there where is the life hard and suffering of the town.

- It announces and it denounces through the ministry of the word. We are men and women of the Word.

- Our language is simple and direct, moving away from everything that unnecessary that only serves to distract and to give shine, to Jesus' way.

- We preach a near God, full with fondness, merciful, being sowers of hope.

- We try to give a message in-cultural, since Philip Neri was teacher in being made “everything to all, to win it to all.”

- It Searchs of alternative projects as fruit of the solidarity to give answers to peremptory necessities, always trying to humanize and to dignify the man.

- It assumes the conflicts with the powerful ones (Lc. 6, 24–26) that the mission bears. It overcomes the natural fears that means to have difficulties, to enter in difficulties to help the poor, as the Good Samaritano. This courage that characterized Jesus and his pupils, fruit of the Spirit, also glowed in Philip Neri.

- We live with joy of the life of the Resuscitated. “My peace leaves you, my peace gives you” (Jn. 14, 27; 20, 20). Philip Neri lives in that spirit from Resuscitated Jesus when revealing the peace and the happiness that come from God. For this reason also is recognized as the Prophet of the Happiness (joy).

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5.- The prophetic paper of the oratorian Woman in L.A.

The paper of the woman oratoriana in Latin America is taken when assuming the suffering of the poor, as demand of Christ's following, of making own the Father's project. And it is translated in evangelical option for the poor.

Her profetism is the defense of the life and the accusation of all that takes or cause the death. Therefore, she promotes and it impels everything can increase, develop and take care the life of the unprotected in the society. She will promote the alternative projects, the political formation, the defense of the human rights, etc. It is a profetism taken root in the history, in awareness and solidary with the poor and excluded. She searches an alternative society where everyone has a place amd cam have a worthy life.It is loaded with hope for those impoverished, because God has made his habitation among them and He is the one that has the last word on the history.

The Good New of the Kingdom of God it is taken by the streets, homesteads and where they are the far away. The Ecclesiastic Communities of Base are impelled (CEBs) as focuses in those that one lives in community and in service to the neediest siblings. This same Announcement takes us to live in community and to live among them; it demands us to qualify us in all the aspects, to analyze the reality and to discern the signs of the times.

The oratorian woman that lives her prophetic paper is a gift of God given in gratitude to his town, to his Church that favors the community that works to achieve the integral formation and the participation of the lay ones in the society and Church. The profetism is to participate of the word of God and of the pains and sufferings of the town. It constitutes our happiness and our commitment of being witness of the Kingdom. And this is not possible if we don't stay in constant conversion and road.

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6.- Proposal of how the Oratorian today can embody their prophetic dimension in L. A.

Philip Neri sees in the one Crucified the pain and the injustice that they are object many human beings. This made him look for their erradication and he makes it loving and serving the poor of their time.

Also today, as Oratorians, we are in front of the Christ that suffers in our siblings. The crucified of our towns, we find them in the thousands of unemployed rushed to desperate situations; in the traveling salespersons, the clean one–windshield, and it swallows–fires; in the not well paid workers and in the stopped peasant and indebted; in the migrants treaties as criminals and in the youths bordered to the suicide by not having access to the education and a work; in the women and children slaughtered to yearn a better future, and in the natives forced to take the weapons so that their demands are listened and resolved; in the political prisoners, in the beggars, etc.

The faces sufrientes of our towns are many; in them same Christ speaks to us. And the spirit that guided Jesus, the same one that received Philip and that we receive us in the baptism, he sends us to prophesy: to announce the liberation to the captive ones, the hope to the poor... (Lc. 4, 18 – 19). This Spirit invites us to enter there in the history and being witness of God.

For we require to make it of the FAITH a liberation motor and a factor of critic of the effective, perverse and inhuman order, for so many millions of people. For this reason we propose:

To recover and to deepen in the historical Jesus that is the Christ of the FAITH, to continue him with fidelity in this reality that played us to live. In a same way, to reread Philip Neri: his life and mission inside his historical context, to drink all the wealth that God gives us in his person.

To know the phenomenon of the historical dependence of the Continent that gave origin to the oppression and, at the same time, the desire of autonomy and the liberation process.

To analyze the permanent reality and to discern it by the light of the Gospel. To be modernized in all the environments in order to be able to dialogue with the men and women of our time.

To study and to meditate the Vatican II, the documents of the CELAM: Medellin, Puebla and Sacred Domingo, among other, to be able to have a clear posture in front of the situation of injustice and oppression that lives Latin America and power to give an evangelical word, a responsible word, in favor of the life of millions of human beings live in infrahumans conditions.

To promote an incultural evangelism that allows to the town to be expressed with their symbols, with their code, inside the ecclesiastic space and to safeguard the cultures of their total destruction. An evangelization that opts for the life and offers in the lay ones an integral formation and impel their participation in the transformation of the society, so that inside the new social relationships is generated more justice and conditions of life for all.

To form communities in the neighborhoods, where the Word of God is listened. To take the Good one New to those more far from our colonies, neighborhoods, ranches etc.

To announce the Gospel leaving of the reality of the Latin American town that expresses their yearnings and sufferings; that calls to the conversion and the search of a fairrer society, especially for those that are tramped.

The insert of our religious communities in popular and excluded means.

To foment the solidarity and communion with the fights of the oppressed ones: indigenous, peasants, unemployed and women, etc. creating concientización spaces and of service to the poor and of participation in the search of the very common one. Without the real actions in favor of the poor life, of the victim, we won't participate of the cause of God (Mt. 25, 31ss.) .

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CONCLUSION:

One of St. Philip Neri's favorite sentences that expresses with simplicity what there was in his heart is: “WHEN we BEGIN to MAKE GOOD ?”, a goodness that it constituted his prophetism and that it was translated in the announcement and in the permanent service to all, but especially to the poor. Today Jesus Christ, in Philip Neri's person makes us the same invitation that made to people from Rome.

Philip's answer today in Latin America we can envisage it for his answer in Rome. In this Continent crucified by the power oppressor's injustice, it will have a word of hope for the poor, it would stay with them and it would put on to their service; it would take care of them and it would defend them. But he would also have an accusation word and call to the conversion for those that now they laugh and they feel sure in their wealth or comfort. Yes, Philip would cry to see crucified the Son of God in many our brother and he would start to get him off the timber.

Our answer to God and the history, we have it....

Sisters Violeta Gutíerrez,

Carmen S. Palmenr

y Ma. del Carmen Romero.

RR.FF.

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SEMMINAR: Postmodern Culture and the Challenge of the Protestant Sects

Dr. Albert Holder

Pharr, Texas.

Introduction

I have been asked to comment on the “phenomenon of the Protestant sects in the context of postmodern culture” and to bring to light “the challenges this phenomenon presents to Christian life.” In some ways I am an unlikely candidate for such a task for I am no expert in postmodern culture and I never belonged to what maybe properly called a “Protestant” sect. To rectify my ignorance of the former, I shall rely on the readings I have done on my own sense of the postmodern scene; as for never having been a Protestant, I shall assume that experience in a Christian sect of any sort parallels in some of its essentials the Protestant experience.

In the few moments we have together, I would like to explore with you six elements that relate to the sectarian phenomenon: 1) the common philosophical roots of post-modernism and sectarianism; 2) postmodern culture; 3) sectarianism as both reflection of and reaction to postmodern culture; 4) the sectarian mind-set, a personal view; 5) historical development of Mormonism as a model of sectarian development generally; and finally, 6) the challenges which sectarianism presents to Catholic Christian life.

At the risk of oversimplying or even ignoring many facets of sectarian phenomenon, I shall use in sections four and five my own experience as a member of a small church called the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, one of two main branches—the other being the Mormons—of the ´Restoration´ movement.

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1. Philosophical Roots of Post-modernism and Sectarianism

Neither postmodern culture nor the Protestant sects can be understood without considering briefly developments in human thought that accompanied the Protestant revolution of the 16^th century. The schoolmen of the middle ages preceding that fateful century took it as a given that truth was one, whether revealed truths of the Faith or natural truths discoverable by human reason: both were rooted in the one God of truth and could, therefore, never be in real conflict with each other. The belief, of course, remains the faith of the Church to this day.

About a century after Martin Luther produced his religious revolution, however, Rene Descartes effected a philosophical one: he split revealed or religious truth from natural truths by declaring their link, metaphysics, to be incapable of producing scientific truth about God.

Descartes taught that true knowledge was that produced by reason alone, operating on observable nature through the new mathematics which he himself would help to formulate. Thus, he reduced religion and faith to mere sentiment incapable, in his view, of producing true knowledge (Chervin and Kevane 211-12). Descartes remained a devout Catholic throughout his life, but by bracketing out or compartmentalizing religious truth he unwittingly laid the groundwork for subjectivizing it. After Descartes, there was no philosophical reason why religious truth as perceived by one person should not be very different and equally valid to that perceived by another.

Before Descartes, theology was regarded as the queen of the sciences, and philosophy her most important handmaiden. Philosophy and metaphysics had served the ultimate truths of the Faith by unifying all knowledge in God. After Descartes, religion, philosophy, and metaphysics will be forever barred from the consideration of those who seek a scientific knowledge of God based on human reason.

Philosophy, after Descartes, will never escape the effects of his truncation of faith from reason. However various the philosophical systems developed by his successors, men like Spinoza, Kant, Shopenhauer, Hegel, Marx, or Sartre, they will all bear the common mark of human thought divorced from God.

Immanuel Kant completed the subjectivizing tendency in Descartes’ thought by effecting what has been called his ‘Copernican revolution’ in philosophy. If Descartes made it impossible for human thought to ascend via metaphysics to God himself, Kant made it impossible for man to grasp objectively even the cosmos around him; for Kant, “the human mind does not discover truth, but makes it, like the divine mind” (Kreeft 18). A century and a half later, John Paul Sartre, foremost spokesman for atheistic existentialism, recognized his own philosophical lineage by declaring that Descartes' formula, "I think, therefore, I am", already contained the fundamental truth of modern existentialism: that man is a creature whose existence precedes his essence, who has no human nature except that which he invents for himself by his own actions (Holman and Harmon 193).

Thus, Descartes and Kant laid the philosophical groundwork for the moral subjectivism inherent in secular existentialism and observed increasingly in the youth of today. To illustrate, U.S. News and World Report for July 21, 1997 carried an editorial untitled “A no-fault Holocaust” by John Leo, who cites several examples of what he calls ´absolutophobia´, “the unwillingness to say something is wrong”. Consider, he says, the experience or Professor Robert Simon of Hamilton College in Clinton, N.Y. Simon relates that, with increasing frequency, his students are unable to pronounce a moral judgment on horrors such as cannibalism, human sacrifice, or even the Holocaust of World War II.

Mr. Leo continues by citing the experience of another teacher and free-lance writer, Kay Haugaard, who has taught creative writing at Pasadena City College in California since 1970. In an article for the Chronicle of Higher Education, she writes that her students nowadays have trouble making moral judgments about human sacrifice. The subject comes up regularly in her discussions of Shirley Jackson´s The Lottery, a novel about a small American farm town where one person, chosen by drawing lots, is sacrificed each year to make the crops grow. In class discussions, the immorality of such a practice never surfaces even under Haugaard´s persistent questioning. Asked if she believed in human sacrifice, one student replied, “I really don’t know. If it was a religion of long standing...” Haguaard was stunned, for this was the same student who wrote passionately about saving the lives of the whales and preserving the rain forest. What is the cultural milieu which has produced this moral confusion?

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2. Postmodern Culture: What is it?

Descartes dreamed of a science based on analytic geometry, his new mathematics, with a potential for total control of the natural world. Others followed in his stead who would found the new sciences and develop the technologies that would fulfill his dream, the technology-driven modern culture of the past 150 years. But modern culture has also led to the catastrophes of the World Wars and other horrors of the twentieth century. Paradoxically, it would seem, man has cast his web of rational technologies over Nature only to find himself entangled in its mesh, a victim of his own sport, for modernism knows no Savior beyond man himself. Its world has been cut off from God by the philosophies which dominate its peoples.

Like modernism, post-modernism knows no hope beyond man himself. Yet the post-modernist insists he will not bow to uncontrolled Frankenstein monster of modern technology. In a world dominated by ideas of productivity and efficiency which deploy man’s rational powers in the service of what Henry Kariel calls “an unrelenting utilitarianism” or “instrumentalism”, the post-modernist looks desperately for some space in which he may experience the freedom of ´play´(Kariel 8-9).

In his 1989 book, The Desperate Politics of Post-modernism, Kariel catalogues the mindset of the post-modernist. The post-modernist...”keeps struggling against the conviction that God or Nature has determined [his] schedule” (45). He is convinced that modernism (slavish devotion to a runaway technology) produces cultural amnesia because uncontrolled technology at the service of consumerism takes every cultural icon and trivializes it to the point of meaninglessness. The TV Burger King commercials featuring cartoon drawings of Camelot dragons grinning vacuously at a child gobbling his hamburger and the failed attempt to mold Mother Teresa´s face on bakery buns leap to mind. Because nothing is sacred, soon nothing will have meaning.

Postmodern artists like Christo create inane art as if to counter this. Christo produced a ´white fence of sheet plastic´ that meandered for miles across the California landscape and terminated in the waters of the Pacific. The artistic point was not the throw-away plastic itself but the collaboration elicited from various landowners and local governments who allowed his ´artwork´ to be erected on their land. Such artists hold out “no hope, [but] merely intensif[y] the elements of a world caught up in an ungovernable, self-enacting process” (38). For those who are truly hopeless, perhaps inanity is next to sanity!

The post-modernist inhabits a world of “unbridled social subjectivity” and believes he has license to reject any and all scripture as holy (Kariel 85). He embodies the attitude recorded by Hannah Arendt of those who survived the Holocaust: they cannot accept any “a priori God-given code for human conduct;” their only given is “men’s disposition for action” in which men must devise not only “new laws but ... find and devise their very measure, the yardstick of good and evil, the principle of their source” (89). Reading this, the Catholic hears echoes from Eden of the serpent’s voice, The post-modernist does not accept the existence of an ultimate Being behind the “variable appearances”[of reality] (90).

Most chilling for the Christian, Kariel tells us that the ´telos´ or end which inspires the post-modernist is to bring to the fullest expression every possibility of human conduct, for he refuses to recognize any definitive lines between good and evil: “Nothing is disqualified by virtue of some unchanging a priori category”(90).

Post-modernists reject the idea of any law rooted in a divine Being: “socially enacted laws alone organize our affairs... We ourselves are responsible for... postulating points of entry and exit, birth and death”(91). If we doubt whether this view of life colors the vision of ordinary citizen or belongs, rather, only to an academic elite, we have only to ask ourselves how many juries, drawn from citizens in every walk of life, have failed to convict Dr. Jack Kevorkian for his role in assisting people who wish to commit suicide.

The post-modernist affirms the “dramaturgic view” of life: “life is serious but it is only appearance... and should not been taken too seriously...” (93-94). There is no significant difference between appearance and reality. Dramaturgy, therefore, views the world as a stage and life as a play in which, though we be constrained to take it seriously, we know it, nonetheless, to be only a play. This view characterizes those epochs in which historical events, e.g. the Holocaust, Vietnam, Cambodia, etc., are so inexplicable as to explode the prevailing value system in which they occur. Finally, the post-modernist views every ´law´ whether social, moral, or physical as tentative: it holds only for the moment in question (94).

The atheism of postmodern culture, while avowed explicitly by only a few, like Kariel of the intellectual elite, nonetheless pervades postmodern society with an attitude which ignores rather than denies the existence of God. God simply becomes irrelevant. The new Catechism of the Catholic Church refers to this as a “practical atheism, which restricts [man’s] needs and aspirations to space and time” (paragraph 2124). This is the cultural ambiance, then, in which the Church must confront an ever-growing number of sects.

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3. Sectarianism: A Reflection of and Reaction to Modern and Postmodern Culture

Modern and postmodern culture contain the precise mix of elements necessary to the rapid formation of new sects: religious subjectivism, moral relativism, technologically-driven utilitarianism, and, consequent upon these three, the threat of a meaningless world, anomie.

Martin Luther set out to make every man his own pope, authorized by the Holy Spirit to decide for himself the meaning of Holy Scripture. Luther eventually drew back from the implications of the right of private interpretation of the Bible, but the genie of religious individualism had already escaped its bottle and, joining forces with a secular philosophy of subjectivism and a moral relativism, awaited the coming of the twentieth century revolution in communications to produce ever more rapidly the bewildering array of modern sects. If man himself is the measure of religious and moral truth, then license is given the more charismatic among men to gather around them followers. From this perspective, the sects mirror modern society: today estimates of the number of sects range as high as 28,000 with new ones forming as we speak. The old joke about how a small American farm town rated a first Baptist, a Second Baptist and a Third Baptist Church makes the point: First Argument, Second Argument, Third Argument!

But the sects form not only as a reflection but also as a reaction to postmodern culture. As I noted above, post-modernism itself is a reaction against the tyrannous technocracy of the modern world. The formation of religious sects is a reaction against both, for in both the solvent of an overpowering technology dissolves man’s sense relationship of his fellowman, to his past and his future. Modernism deploys man’s rational energies toward the strictly instrumental end of increasing efficient production of goods and services. The question that prevails ultimately in such a system is not whether something should be done but whether it can be done. Enamored of such technical power, society empties itself rapidly of meaning.

Post-modernists react to meaninglessness by enacting the dramaturgic view of life: true, they say, life has no meaning other than the one we invent for it, but we will enact all of life that we can by making of it a play, a drama, and thus put on it the best face we can. In this they resemble the ancient Stoics who, oppressed by their own philosophy of deterministic monism, decided manfully enough that a stern virtue ought still to be their aim in life. The postmodernist, as we saw earlier, has given up on virtue, having opted for ´play´ instead.

But human nature still exists and it demands of life a religious meaning expressed in a social context. When a culture no longer supplies that meaning and context, as it once did in the Catholic Middle Ages, the alternative is anomie, or meaninglessness, leading directly to apathy, despair, and even suicide. Hence, sectarians react to the threat of meaninglessness by gravitating toward whatever charismatic leader or group speaks clearly and strongly enough to provide meaning for life and a demanding social context within which to incarnate it. Writes Dean Kelley, “We are inveterate meaning-mongers. We try to make sense out of experience, even if we have to resort to non-sense to do it”(Kelley 38). He cites Emile Durkheim´s study of suicide in which most suicides were “caused by anomie (anomy) or ´normlessness´: in our terms a malady of the absence of meaning”(40).

Of course, human nature, devoid of Catholic truth, cannot guarantee that the religious meaning adopted will be either reasonable or rooted in the faith given ´once for all´ by revelation through Christ. Consider the snake-handlers of West Virginia, the perfervid antics of Jimmy Swaggart, or the serio-comic assertions of the ´flowing-water Baptists of Brazil, among countless others. The latter proclaimed the inefficacy of multiple baptisms in a Church font since the water would get dirtier and less purifying as more and more sins accumulated in it! The solution: baptism only in rivers or streams.

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4. The Sectarian Mind-Set: a Personal View

How does the member of a sect experience the meaning of life?

There may be, of course, as many answers to that question as there are sectarians, but some elements of experience will be common to all. Perhaps, my own experience in a small sect will be illuminating.

I was raised a second-generation ‘cradle’ Reorganized Latter Day Saint, a small off-shoot of the movement founded by Joseph Smith in 1830. Though about 20 times smaller than the Mormons, our 250,000 member church (in 1960) was the largest of the 15 or so groups which, after the assassination of Joseph Smith, refused to follow Brigham Young west to Utah. Our claim to legitimacy over the Mormons consisted in having the sons and grandsons of Joseph Smith as ‘prophets, seers and revelators’ to guide our movement. The first hundred years of the RLDS church were spent trying to establish our claim as the ‘true’ Restoration in contradistinction to the polygamous branch in Salt Lake City, which also claimed legitimacy through Brigham Young and his successors. Dean Kelley, in his sociological study of contemporary churches, places the RLDS church, accurately I believe, on the liberal side of the spectrum and the Mormons on the conservative side (31, fig. 14).

Like many young people in sects of this sort , I experienced a conversion to Christ when I was sixteen. Looking back, I can see quite clearly that that experience (it occurred at a week-long youth camp) constituted a clear call from our Lord to commit my life to Him. In a way similar to John Henry Newman’s youthful conversion while still in an Anglican, my own experience removed from my mind forever the questions whether God existed, whether He loved me, or whether He had a particular destiny for my life. But I also see that Christ’s call to me was highly colored by the lens of the RLDS faith. My conversion experience also settled for me what should have been a more objective question: Which church was the true church of Jesus Christ? At the time I could not separate commitment to Christ from commitment to the RLDS faith in which I had been raised.

Therefore, I became an avid, but uncritical, reader of RLDS church Scripture and history. One of our books, The Doctrine and Covenants , records Joseph Smith’s instructions to Oliver Cowdery, an early convert, about how Cowdery could test the truth of a doctrine:

“... you must study it out in your mind; then you must ask me if it be right, and if it be right, I [God] will cause that your bosom shall burn within you; therefore, you shall feel that it is right; but if it is not right,... you shall have a stupor of thought, that shall cause you to forget the thing which is wrong.”

Doctrine Covenants 10: 3b-d, RLDS edition

The ‘burning of the bosom’ as authentication for religious convictions has become the hallmark of the Mormon invitation to believe their doctrines. For a young RLDS like me, it also had great force, though it would be gradually attentuated as our church moved further toward the liberal side of the religious spectrum.

As a youth, to read our church history and unique Scriptures with this ‘burning bosom’ mentality was to be in a state of almost continual religious excitement. In addition to the Inspired Version of the Bible and the Doctrine and Covenants, I read my mother’s copy of the Book of the Mormon (700 pages in length) at least five or six times in the year that followed my conversion, interspersing it with repeated readings of the first volume of our church history, a tendentious work recounting the miracles, prophecies and persecutions of the Restoration movement from 1830 to 1844, when Joseph Smith was killed. The point illustrated in countless different ways in these readings was that Joseph Smith was a true prophet sent from God to restore Christ’s true church and gospel after a lapse of some 1,200 years during which its place had been taken by the apostate Roman Catholicx Church. Such heady reading by a young lad earnestly seeking to identify the meaning of the life did, indeed, produce the promised ‘burning in the bosom’.

But authentication of one´s religious convctions by means so highly subjective as the 'burning in the bosom' or the ‘inner light’ or the charismatic ‘ gifts of the Spirit’ would seem to be a recipe for religious anarchy: the ultimate do-it-yourself religion. Indeed, RLDS history records the fractious disputes which often erupted among the brethren whose fires of religious imagination burned almost as hotly as Joseph’s. It also records the intense and prolonged efforts required of Joseph Smith to ensure that the doctrines authenticated by the burning in bosom would be those promulgated by his own revelations.

Still, the highly subjective experience of authentication tends to be held in check by the human need for religious experience within a social structure, Thus a polar tension exists in sectarian individualism which tends, in spite of itself, to coalesce around some leader or group through a process of surreptitious identification with God. A conversation I had with my lady barber illustrates the point. I came in for a hair cut to find her poring over a tattered and much-marked Bible. Settling into the barber chair, I asked what she was doing. “Preparing for my Sunday School class,” she replied. “How do you decide what to teach?” I asked. “Oh,” she said, “ I find that if I read the Bible prayerfully, ideas come to me which really help the kids I teach.” Then, abashed at the assertion of her own competence, she humbly averred, “It’s not really me, you know, but the Lord.”

Sectarians generally identify themselves with God through direct inspiration, and they, like my lady barber, remain unconscious of this identification because it is camouflaged by a humility, which masks two uncomfortable facts: 1) the presumptuousness of having made themselves the arbiters of religious truth and 2) the discomfiture of knowing that the real source of most of their opinions lies in the group they belong to. Yet one can hardly fault the devotion and very real Christian love exemplified by the lady barber, or of many other fundamentalists like her. Such self-identification with God finds its philosophical grounding in the Cartesian rationalism and Kantian subjectivism we have already discussed.

The Quaker’s inner light, the Pentecostal’s ecstatic speaking in tongues, and the Mormon’s “burning of the bosom” and even the dry Bible proof-texting of the Jehovah’s Witness are all variations on the same theme: identification with God through personal experience which authenticates for the individual the religious tenets of his sect.

The sectarian mind-set which I inherited as a part of my religious upbringing presented me with a real conundrum when I began my approach to Catholicism. Having lived long enough to see the futility of attempting to authenticate the Church by subjective tests, I seemed to have no other way to arrive at a decision. I wrote to a friend, Sheldon Vanauken, who gave me a curt, no-nonsense reply: “If the Faith makes sense to you, then you may choose to believe it.” Not without the help of God’s grace, of course.

How different from my former religious experience! There I endured a continual restless search for fresh ‘spiritual experiences’ of every variety—dreams, visions, prophecies, healings, serendipitous coincidences—each one treasured as further evidence that belonged to the true Church of Jesus Christ but none alleviating permanently the restless itself.

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5. The Historical Development of Mormonism as a Model for Sectarian Development Generally

The way in which the two main branches of Joseph Smith’s Restoration Movement have developed over the past 154 years provides an illuminating parallel with the development of Protestant sects generally. The Mormon church and the RLDS both spring from common source: the Restoration church founded and led by Joseph Smith, Jr. for fourteen years until his death in 1844. All the mainline Protestant sects likewise spring from a common source: the Roman Catholic Church of the sixteenth century. Allow me to trace briefly the history of these two Mormon sects.

Since Joseph Smith’s central tenet was rejection of all Christian bodies as mere offshoots of the great apostate Roman Catholic Church, authentication of his movement would depend on his personal charisma, prophetic gifts, and miracles. Nothing from the past, neither the Bible nor the early Fathers nor any development of doctrine such as the Trinity, could be accepted as untainted by the great apostasy until Smith had ratified it anew through a revelation of his own in which, often as not, it would undergo some modification.

After his death, the process of codification of doctrine within the movement assumed two different forms: the conservative approach of the Mormons, whose apotheosis of Joseph Smith meant that anything the prophet said, no matter how personal, or speculative, or bizarre, must be regarded as directly inspired by God; and the more liberal approach of the RLDS church which early on insisted that only those of Smith’s doctrines which he formally presented to the church for ratification should be regarded as inspired. Most of Mormonism’s peculiar doctrines regarding Adam-God worship, spiritual wifery, polygamy, blood atonement, priestly exaltation, eternal progression, etc., arise from Smith’s statements recorded in his diary, in private letters or in speculative writings he never published.

Ratification of the prophet’s declaration meant something quite different to each group: for the Mormons, ratification meant formal acceptance in much the same way that the ancient Israelites accepted God’s covenant through Moses. Faced with a declaration coming straight from God through his prophet, Mormon legislative conferences do not quibble: their alternatives are to submit or to rebel. We RLDS often sniffed that their assemblies were mere rubber-stamp operations.

For the RLDS church, ratification of a prophetic declaration was, indeed, attended by a sense of religious awe: after all, our prophets, until recently at least, always prefaced their revelations with “Thus saith the Lord”. But for us, ‘ratification’ carried a democratic overtone. Joseph himself had ‘revealed’ that proof of divine inspiration would be evidenced when the various quorums of priesthood--eleven in all—unanimously agreed to his ‘revelations’. Among the RLDS assemblies, a true democratic scrutiny always preceded ratification.

It is instructive to note the difference these two approaches have made during the 154 years since Joseph Smith’s death. Both sects inherited an authoritarian and priestly structure centered in a prophet-president of the church believed to be as directly inspired by God as were the apostles of Christ. Yet, today, each church presents a quite different face to outsiders.

Following the democratic impulse which requires their prophets to submit inspired documents to a church assembly for approval, the RLDS church has moved rapidly toward rapprochement with the American cultural milieu. Democratic debate became the Trojan Horse which introduced dissent into the heart of the church and undetermined its faith heritage. On every moral issue debated in U.S. and Western society today, the RLDS church has accommodated itself to the social currents of the society at large. This holds for moral questions like divorce, contraception, abortion, or homosexuality as well as doctrinal questions like women priests, inspiration of Scripture, or inspiration of the prophet himself.

Thirty years ago, Time magazine characterized the RLDS church as a “fossilized sect”. The characterization remains accurate today if by fossilized we mean a church that has lost its mission of proclaiming the restoration of the gospel as it once understood it. Today, the RLDS is a negative growth organization that appears to be dying slowly. It fails to attract new members because it no longer proclaims passionately the meaning of life contained in its original ‘gospel’ and is moving toward accommodation with its social environment.

If rapprochement vis-à-vis the rest of the world marks the RLDS church, resistance to the world marks the Mormons. Even though they have reached accommodation with American culture on major issues like polygamy (officially banned in 1890) and a segregated priesthood disavowed in 1978), the Mormons continue to make their mark on the United States and the rest of the world. The bizarre roots of many of their beliefs have been exposed repeatedly, even by some of their own historians. Yet they continue to flourish with one of the highest growth rates of any religion anywhere. Why? And why has the RLDS church, springing from the same historical roots, failed to flourish?

Sociologist Dean Kelley offers a plausible explanation:

Contrary to the impression given by many contemporary churches, the true business of the genuinely religious organization is not baby-sitting or entertainment, not social work or social action, not even what passes for religious education or theology, unless these activities are the means for acting out or otherwise communicating the meaning of life which the religious group wants to proclaim.

Kelley 136

The simplest rationale for the vigor of the Mormon church as for the limp performance of the RLDS church during the last 50 years lies in the strictness or leniency with which each church has treated its faith heritage. The Mormon church has been unwilling to be “diverted from its distinctive mission in the realm of meaning” (Kelley 138). However absurd its beliefs, however poorly rooted they may be in history or Biblical revelation, however much of the Book of the Mormon may fly in the face of archeology, the Mormon church confidently continues to offer a meaning for life.

Through participation in its priesthood, temple worship and proxy baptism for the death, Mormonism offers the hope of exaltation in the next life to its adherents. The Mormon church hierarchy takes its beliefs seriously enough to require two years of self-paid missionary service from every faithful young Mormon male, seriously enough to define terms for faithful membership in practices such as abstinence from smoking and drinking and the ten percent tithe of gross income, and seriously enough to shun or expel members who publicly flout its beliefs and practices. In short, it imposes a meaning on life which actively resists secular culture’s prevailing tendency toward anomie.

Even the manner in which Mormons reached accommodation with American culture on the questions of polygamy and segregation is illuminating when contrasted with accommodation as practiced by the RLDS church regarding the feminist issue of women priests. There is no record of a prolonged and open debate or dissent within lay circles of Mormonism or even within its hierarchy about the evils of polygamy or segregation. Discussion there must have been. But the discussion and decision to make a change was restricted to the highest level of leadership, announced to the church by its prophet as “new light” from God, and accepted docilely by most Mormons. The few who continued to disagree after some formal efforts toward reconciliation were simply cut off.

In contrast, for nearly 20 years, the RLDS hierarchy allowed open debate and dissent from the received tradition of the male priesthood among laity and priesthood alike, before proclaiming “new light” through its prophet authorizing women’s ordination. Not just the decision but the entire decades-long process employed to reach that decision mirrored democratic processes in secular American culture. Once ratified, the decision was enforced and approximately one third of the membership broke away into plethora of schismatic groups. And now, while the RLDS hierarchy entertains debate on new social issues like the acceptability of the gay ‘lifestyle’, currently agitating American society, the growth of the church has stopped dead in its tracks.

The historical development of the two branches of Mormonism provides us with a paradigm for the way in which the Protestant sects in general reflect and react to postmodern culture. The RLDS church is a study in miniature of the mainline Protestant sects that began almost five centuries ago. Like them, it showed initial vigor from its inception in 1860 until 1960, when its leaders allowed members and ministers alike to begin a process of dissent from its faith heritage in a attempt to reach accommodation with American society. Dean Kelley shows convincingly that this same pattern, extending over a somewhat longer time-frame, represents the experience of the American Lutherans, United Methodists, Episcopalians, Anglicans, Presbyterians, American Baptists, the United Church of Christ, and the Unitarians. These are churches whose religious beliefs have become secondary to another goal: ecumenical harmony with each other, social action, and accommodation to the prevailing culture (88-89).

Mormonism, on the other hand, provides us with a model for those Protestant sects which have refused to abandon their distinctive belief systems, which make consistently high demands on their members, and which have shown a willingness to shun or expel those who openly dissent. Most of these groups are of more recent vintage. The Jehovah’s Witness, Evangelicals, Pentecostals, Assemblies of God, Churches of Christ, Seventh-Day Adventists, and Southern Baptists. Among them will also be found tiny sects, too numerous to mention here, some of only short duration.

I believe that the Protestant sects which have become ecumenical and social-action oriented represent a challenge to the Church quite different from those which follow the Mormon pattern of development. The former, Dean Kelley calls “lenient churches” and the latter, "strict churches” (120-21). Interestingly, Kelley places the Roman Catholic Church exactly in the middle of his gradient illustrating the descent from strictness to leniency. Catholics, he says, seem to have found their way around the dilemma of leniency vs. strictness facing Protestant churches. Catholics have both. They have ecclesiolae within the ecclesia (114-15).

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6. The Sectarian Challenge to the Christian Catholic Life

Since Vatican II, the Catholic Church has committed itself to ecumenism. Pope John Paul II in Ut Unum Sint devotes his entire encyclical to underscoring the Church’s commitment to it as an a outgrowth of our Lord’s priestly prayer, “May they all be one, Father, as you and I are one.” “Believers in Christ [of whatever persuasion] cannot remain divided. If they wish to...effectively oppose the world’s tendency to reduce to powerlessness the mystery of redemption, they must profess together the same truth about the cross”(UUS 1).

The first challenge we face, therefore, is not how to confront the welter of sects around us but how to confront with them the ‘mystery of lawlessness’ which tends to void the power of Christ’s cross in the secular world. We must learn, says the Pope, to pray together: common prayer is “the soul of the whole ecumenical movement and can rightly be called ‘spiritual ecumenism”(UUS 21), because it centers us, in spite of our differences, on the Lord and the Master of us all.

Second, we must pursue ecumenical dialogue. The Pope sees opportunity in the very subjectivism I have been criticizing above. “The personalist way of thinking...is linked to the Christian truth [about Man who ] cannot fully find himself except through a sincere gift of himself” (UUS 28). The true role of the subject, it seems, is to serve as a point of departure in a dialogical search for truth. Humility and mutual regard must inform this dialogue. Nor will it be permissible to alter “the deposit of faith, changing the meaning of dogmas, eliminating essential words for them, accommodating truth to the preferences of a particular age...The unity willed by God can be attained only by the adherence of all to the content of revealed faith in its entirety” (UUS 18). One of the first fruits of dialogue conducted with prayer will be a searching examination of Catholic and Protestant consciences to arrive at the truth of our mutual offenses and seek the forgiveness that not only heals but opens our hearts to trust one another as we seek reconciliation in Christ (UUS 33).

Finally, prayer and ecumenical dialogue must lead to practical cooperation among Christians in service to humanity. We have described above the phenomenon of cultural amnesia which permeates western societies; cultural icons lose their meanings by being trivialized and made to serve an ignoble commercialism. Moral values become more and more confused as sexual libertinism of every variety is encouraged under the banner of ‘alternate life-styles’. The litany of modern and postmodern ills is all too familiar: divorce, contraception, narcissism, abortion, euthanasia, suicide and assisted suicide, child abuse, sadism, and, most lately, Satanism. With the exception of contraception, here are social evils which Christians of every persuasion can address with common action. The Pope sees such ecumenical cooperation as a “true school ecumenism, a dynamic road to unity” (UUS 40).

I suggested above a distinction between lenient and strict sects. The opportunities for ecumenical prayer, dialogue, and cooperation are largely confined at the present time to the former. The virulent anti-Catholicism with which they began has largely spent itself, and the philosophical currents and social forces of modernism and post-modernism have eroded their own confidence in some tenets of their faith. In spite of this, they still retain elements of Christian belief and practice and are especially open to collaboration with the Church in the effort to achieve unity. For them, the Pope’s three steps toward unity in Ut Unum Sint will be fruitful approach.

But what of the strict sects? Most if not all of these are still infected with various strains of anti-Catholicism, some more virulent than others. They stand apart not only from what they see as a corrupt society but also from the blandishments of the Whore of Rome, as some of them are pleased to call us. Nonetheless, some evangelicals and fundamentalist have joined hands with Catholics on numerous occasions to oppose anti-Christian social practices and legislation: Abortion and gay rights issues have probably produced more ecumenical efforts between Catholics and these groups than even those produced by cooperation with the so-called ‘lenient’ churches. Such efforts must be pursued, but I believe something more is demanded of us if we are to confront the challenge of the strict sects.

Many of the strict sects proselytize aggressively among Catholics; they still see Catholics as non-Christians who labor vainly in the toils of idolatry, mariolatry, and a gospel of salvation by good works: all of the old Protestant canards against Catholicism still resonate in their souls. Why is this so? Especially after two centuries in which the Church has given up territorial rights, has relinquished privileged political influence in country after country, and has publicly asked forgiveness on more than one occasion for sins committed by Catholics in the past. Chesterton’s trenchant remark springs to mind: “To cease hating the Church is to begin loving her.” There seems to be no middle ground.

Our response to these strict sects, while prompted by a charity not less fervent than that which animates Ut Unum Sint, must, I believe, take a different tack. In the first place we must not allow our respect for other Christians and our desire for ecumenical cooperation, perfectly appropriate when these are reciprocated, to paralyze us when we are faced with those who see us only as the enemy. This will not happen if we heed the Pope’s admonition not to indulge a false ecumenism which dilutes doctrine for the sake of shallow agreement.

Second, we must not underestimate the danger these sects present to the Church. Estimates run as high as 8,000 Catholics each day who leave the Church for one of these sects. That works out to nearly 3 million each year. Central and South America, especially Brazil, seem to be the most prominent targets for prosyletization, but the effort is global in extent. It is fueled by moneys garnered from Protestants in the United States and projects itself across borders and oceans via television and radio.

If we can avoid the danger of underestimating the problem or misdirecting our efforts, we must take three vital steps directed toward our own laity to stop the advance of the sects among them: 1) kerygma; 2) catechesis; and 3) apologetics.

A strong proclamation of the original kerygma of the Gospel, a complete catechesis of Church doctrine, and a Bible-based apologetics which provides specific answers to biblical attacks on Catholic beliefs and practices is the recipe for turning back the sectarian tide. This is not a three step program as such; rather, like a recipe, these three elements must be blended together so as to inform the way all of us communicate the faith in casual conversations, in classroom settings, in debate, and most crucially for priests, in the pulpit.

Too often, cradle Catholics practice their faith seemingly unconscious of the marvelous grace won for them by the Lord Jesus Christ and proclaimed in the kerygma, the Good News of the Gospel. Often catechized in a strictly rote fashion, they have never heard the earth-shattering news that if anyone is “in Christ, he is a new creature” (II Cor. 5:17). Catholics produced by lifeless catechesis, never see life with the eyes of a reborn Christian who knows that the “world with its lust is passing away” (I John 2:17). They have been taught to do their duty but have yet to discover, in the words of C.S. Lewis, the delight for which the duty has been imposed. They have absorbed a ‘getting-by’ Gospel, sufficient at one time perhaps, to keep them from mortal sins but insufficient to impress the image of Christ on the world around them. It has never occurred to them that they must stand up in the public square and risk themselves as living witnesses of the Lord Jesus. The proclamation or kerygma of the Gospel demands conversion of heart, not just in turning from sin but in turning toward Christ as the center of our hopes and affections.

Kerygma and conversion must inform catechesis. Pope John Paul II writes that catechesis has:

The two-fold objective of maturing the initial faith and of educating the true disciple of Christ by means of a deeper and more systematic knowledge of the Person and the message of our Lord Jesus Christ.

But in catechetical practice, this model order must allow for the fact that the initial evangelization has often not taken place. A certain number of children baptized in infancy come for catechesis in the parish without receiving any other initiation into the Faith and still without any explicit personal attachment to Jesus Christ; they only have the capacity to believe placed within them by Baptism and the presence of the Holy Spirit; and opposition is quickly created by the prejudices of their non-Christian family background or of the positivist spirit of their education...Again, many pre-adolescents and adolescents who have been baptized and been given a systematic catechesis and the sacraments still remain hesitant for a long time about committing their whole lives to Jesus Christ... Finally, even adults are not safe from temptations to doubt or to abandon their Faith, especially as a result of their unbelieving surroundings. This means that catechesis must often concern itself not only with nourishing and teaching the Faith, but also with arousing it unceasingly with the help of grace, with opening the heart, with converting, and preparing total adherence to Jesus Christ [for those]... still on the threshold of faith. Cathechesi tradendae 19.

The Pope tell us that Christ is both the Teacher and the Taught in all true catechesis (CT 6). He points out that catechesis can never have its full impact unless it is imparted by those who live a Christ-centered life. What the catechist has been taught as a doctrine must be experienced as a life-giving encounter with Christ through prayer and the sacraments. In the hackneyed phrase of evangelicalism, the Gospel, like the common cold, must be ‘caught’ as well as ‘taught’.

Proclamation of the kerygma within catechesis implies a greater familiarity with and reliance upon Holy Scripture read with the mind of the Church than is common among many catechists today. Too often, catechesios is performed in one of two ways: either an accurate but rote presentation of doctrine addressed to students who have never experienced conversion to Christ, or reliance on Bible teaching in the Protestant fashion which brings the student to Christ, almost devoid of commitment to Church and Magisterium as his living voice.

The corrective for both deficiencies may be found in the model of catechesis presented to us by the new Catechism of the Catholic Church. It combines a Christocentric presentation of doctrine with overwhelming reliance upon Bible passages and the writings of Church Fathers and Saints. A perusal of this wonderful gift to the Church leaves one with the impression that it is a pastiche of Biblical passages carefully coordinated to bring to light the key doctrines of the Church as developed down the centuries. Pope Benedict XV in his 1920 encyclical commemorating the fifteenth centenary of the death of the great Bible scholar, St. Jerome, said, “So convinced indeed was Jerome that familiarity with the Bible was the royal road to the knowledge and love of Christ that he did not hesitate to say: ‘ignorance of the Bible is ignorance of Christ’” (Spiritus Paraclitus 35). Talk to former Catholics who have been drawn away from the Church into one of the sects and they will often tell you that one reason they joined was that , for the first time, someone opened up the Bible and helped them to discover Christ in its pages.

Traditional catechetics using short questions and answers as a means of presenting the doctrines of the Faith will always be necessary, but it must be supplemented by relevant Bible readings which will allow the Holy Spirit to speak through the inspired Word, investing the doctrines with drama and power. Catechists must know their Bible. Yet many Catholic Bible study courses compound the student's ignorance because their approach to Bible study is so mired in the technicalities of biblical criticism as to be useless to students who wish to read the Bible with the mind of the Church.

Very different is an approach to the Bible now coming out of Franciscan University at Steubenville, Ohio from Dr. Scott Hahn and other Bible scholar there. He calls his method “canonical criticism” which, in essence, allows the Bible text to speak for itself but always in the context of the entire canon of Scripture and the faith of the Church. In conjunction with Eternal Word Television Network, he and Mr. Jeff Cavins have produced a thirteen hour video course in how to read the Bible as a Catholic.

Furthermore, apologetics must be reinstituted at the parish level where it has almost disappeared during the past thirty years, perhaps because of a misguided ecumenism. St. Peter long ago expressed the essence of apologetics when he counseled the laity to be “always prepared to make a defense to any one who calls you to account for hope that is in you, yet do it with gentleness and reverence (I Peter 3:15). Here we encounter another obstacle: ignorance of anti-Catholic sects. Aside from some more remarkable doctrine or practice which may have caught their attention, Catholics simply do not know what their sectarian neighbors believe or where they have come from.

Today many materials are available. The laity need to have access to periodicals and books which provide solid arguments for the faith and information about sects. In the United States at least, there are a number of apologetics periodicals like This Rock and Envoy which provide Catholic answers to objections currently raised by anti-Catholic sects. Most Catholics and even pastors remain woefully unaware of their existence. A number of authentic Catholic publishing houses offer a wide selection of books, tapes, and videos, and teaching programs in apologetics. How many have ever heard of Ignatius Press, Franciscan University Press, St. Joseph’s Communications, Tan Book Publishers, the Daughters of St. Paul, or Catholic Answers. These and more carry materials for training in the defense of our Faith.

Finally, the kerygma we announce, the catechesis we give and the defense we offer for the Faith must be imbued with Christ’s vision of the world: “lift up your eyes and see how the fields are already white for harvest. He who reaps receives wages, and gathers fruit for eternal life, so that sower and reaper may rejoice together “ ( John 4:35). Only when Catholics, equipped with the tools for the harvest, begin to view the world as the place they are called to labor in witness for Christ, will they know the joy of laying down their lives in service to the Master. And that vision is the ultimate answer to the challenge of the sects and of the postmodern world we inhabit.

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Works Cited

Benedict XV. “Spiritous Paraclitus”, Daughters of St. Paul, Boston, MA. 1920.

Chervin, Rhonda and Kevane, Eugene. Love of Wisdom, An Introduction to Christian Philosophy. Ignatious Press. San Francisco, 1988.

Harmon, William and Holman, C.Hugh. A Handbook of Literature, 5^th de.

John Paul II, “Catechesi Trandendae”. Teaching the Catholic Faith Today, Twentieth Century Catechetical Documents of the Holy See. ed. Msgr. Eugene Kevane. Daughters of St. Paul, Boston, MA. 1982.

John Paul II. “Ut Unum Sint” The Pope Speaks. Vol.40, No. 5. 1995.

Kariel, Henry S. The Desperate Politics of Post-modernism. University of Massachusetts Press. Amherst, MA, 1989.

Kelley, Dean M. Why Conservative Churches are Growing, A study in Sociology of Religion. Mercer University Press. Macon, Georgia, 1972.

Kreeft, Peter. Everything You Ever Wanted to Know about Heaven , but never dreamed of asking., Ignatius Press. San Francisco, 1990.

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SEMMINAR: L’oratorio e l’arte

P. Paolo Zanutel D. O - Vicenza – Italia

“L’ arte occupa un posto principale tra le diverse manifestazioni della cultura postmoderna. Filippo, al suo tempo, seppe porre l’arte al servizio del Vangelo. Oggi, l’Oratorio ha saputo dare continuità a questa eredità e come?

Il tema che mi è stato assegnato si propone di illustrare uno degli aspetti della forte personalità di Filippo Neri sul quale, nonostante la ricca bibliografia, non solo agiografica, divulgativa ma anche eccellente da un punto di vista scientifico, di cui gode oggi il Padre è stato a lungo sottaciuto.

Ma in occasione del recente IV centenario della morte di Filippo (1995) la grande mostra “La regola e la fama”, organizzata a Roma ha richiamato prepotentemete l’attenzione sia del mondo scientifico che della opinione pubblica sull’impegno del Neri e dei suoi preti dell’Oratorio circa l’arte come mezzo di educazione pastorale. Perché essenzialmente di questo si tratta. Non un’espressione e realizzazioni (architettoniche, pittorico-figurative, musicale= belle, egregie fine a se stesse, ma strumento per un’elevazione dell’anima e un affinamento del gusto spirituale secondo, ovviamente, i canoni del tempo dominati dalla riforma del Concilio di Trento, conclusosi proprio mentre il Neri vive la stagione della maturità ed è prete da poco più di un decennio.

Credo che la grande mostra romana rimanga come una delle migliori testimoniaze celebrative del centenario che in questo modo ha voluto essere non una serie di manifestazioni effimere ma aiutare davvero a riscoprire la figura di Fillippo, ponendolo all’attenzione degli storici dell’arte e alla rinnovata devozione dei fedeli, non solo di quelli che gravitano attorno ai nostri Oratori.

Bene quindi ha fatto la Commissione coordinatrice di questo incontro a inserire un gruppo di lavoro per riflettere sul tema del rapporto Oratorio-cultura a servizio dell’uomo conteporaneo.

Richiamo brevemente alcuni punti utili alla discussione e alla nostra attenzione, facilitato in questo dal fatto di parlare, tutto sommato, in un incontro di fligi di san Filippo.

Sappiamo come sia stata originale la sua proposta nella Chiesa e come essa, nella sua articolazione (Oratorio, Congregazione, pastorale, ecclesiologia) derivi e sia fortemente improntata dalla persona del Neri.

Do quindi per scontata la conoscenza della sua biografia: anche in questo caso premessa non solo necessaria, ma addirittura indispensabile per carpirne l’opera allo stesso modo di quella di un letterato, di un artista, di un filosofo ecc., senza il pericolo di cadere in un forzato riconoscimiento di meriti non dovuti e mezzo, la biografia, per conoscere aspetti del carattere che determinano le sue espressioni. Per essempio, non è possibile capire il tormento dell’arte di Michelangelo, o il pessimismo del Leopardi, l’impronta cristiana del Manzoni, o l’opera di Teresa di Calcutta, o il pontificato di Giovanni Paolo II se non se ne conosce l’esperienza di vita.

E’ ormai acquisita la formazione unamistica (per il latino, la filosofia), ancorché non sistematica, del Neri. Ne abbiamo testimoniaze da chi ben lo conosceva, ma soprattutto dalla sua ricca biblioteca, il cui inventario fu steso dal padre Prometeo Pellegrini due giorni dopo la morte di Filippo per incarico della Congregazione di Roma. Un copioso elenco di 516 opere a stampa e una trentina di manoscritti, certamente in maggioranza di argomento ascetico-spirituale, ma nel quale figurano anche classici della letteratura cristiana come le Collazioni e le Istitituzioni di Cassiano. Ed è certo che dei suoi libri era geloso tanto che rifuggiva dal darli in prestito sicuro che sarebbero stati difficilmente restituiti (vedi CISTELLINI; Filippo Neri, in Dizionario degli Istituti di perfezione).

Sono libri, come dice il Taguri, che il Padre non custodiva certamente come soprammobili di scansie, ma consultava continuamente per prepararsi alla predicazione anche se volle sempre che questa si mantenesse semplice e familiare, caratteristica che si trasmise nell’oratoria dei suoi figli. Non una predicazione sciatta, perché ben preparata, ma senza l’apparato erudito che invece intaccava l’oratoria sacra contemporanea. I preti dell’Oratorio dovevano parlare all’anima più che all’intelletto degli uditori.

L’ amore per il Filippo lo assorbe giovinetto presso i <domenicani del convento fiorentino di San Marco, dove il beato Angelico ha profuso il meglio della sua pittura, frequentando i corsi per i fanciulli organizzati per la loro educazione dalla Compagnia delle laudi che si faceva carcio della loro educazione. E l’amore per il bel canto e per la musica sappiamo che improntò tutta la vita del Nostro fino a trasferire a Roma la Lauda come egli l’aveva appresa, da principio con semplice stesura melodica omofona, destinata ad arricchirsi di concertazione polifonica per il concorso di insigni musicisti, confratelli dell’Oratorio, come Pier Luigi da Palestrina, tanto da farlo divenire un nuovo genere musicale.

Parsimonioso e severo con sé stesso, tanto da vivere in dignitosa personale povertà, appena ottenuta l’assegnazione della piccola chiesa di Santa Maria in Vallicella, non esita a fare abbattere l’edificio per aprire il cantiere della Chiesa Nuova che vuole ampia, splendida e ricca nella sua architettura, senza risparmio di energie e di mezzi che confida di ottenere dalla bontà dei benefattori, strumenti tangibili della Provvidenza in cui confida senza limiti.

E l’iconografia filippina, dovuta alle scelte dei Padri, che si erano formati alla sua scuola, dimostrano scelte ben precise di artisti spesso fra i più affermati o che attraverso la loro arte, stimolata dall’Oratorio, divennero famosi: Reni, Barocci, il Pomarance, il Cortona, il Piazzetta, il Guercino, il Dolci, lo Zucconi, l’Aleradi, il Messina.

La Congregazione che nasce quasi suo malgrado e con fini prettamente apostolici, eredita tuttavia da filippo l'amore per lo studio. Più di trecento autori di discipline agiografiche, storiche, teoogiche, dal Baronio, al Rinaldi, al Bozzi fino a tutto il Settecento inoltrato con la ricca schiera dei corrispondenti del Muratori nella compilazione dei Rerum Italicarum scriptores la rendono benemerita e distinta nel campo della cultura italiana ed europea, instaurando, fra i Filippini, una tradizione bruscamente interrotta, purtroppo, con l'avvento della stagione delle soppressioni ecclesiastiche per le note legislazioni laicistiche. Eppure compariranno ancora personaggi di rilievo come il Newman la cui figura e le cui opere sono oggi oggetto di attenti studi.

Non ostante le traversie della storia che ridimensionano la presenza dell'Oratorio soprattutto nei paesi della vecchia Europa, anche là dove le Congregazioni non sono più attive rimangono testimoni di una tradizione artistica filippina, le belle chiese e gli Oratori edificati nelle varie città.

Basta scorrere a annotare con attenzione il diffondersi delle congregazioni ad instar che documenta la monumentale opera Memorie historiche della congregazione dell'Oratorio di G. MARCIANO, Napoli 1693 - 1702, in 5 volumi, per constatare come gli insediamenti oratoriani occupino localmente, nel contesto urbanistico, un posto di rilievo per i loro pregi artistici.

Certamente Filippo e i suoi Padri risentono del gusto artistico dei loro tempi, in prevalenza il barocco, ma le esigenze dell'arte non sopraffanno mai il fine proprio dell'edificio di culto che mira soprattutto a creare l'atmosfera adatta alla celebrazione della liturgia, alla preghiera individuale, al rapporto con dio. Tutto, come per esempio, rileva il grande storico dell'arte, l'Arsalan nella sua Guida alle chiese d'italia, non solo l'armonia delle linee architettoniche concorre a creare il clima del sacro, ma anche le spesso ricche tavole, pale d'altare, statue hanno funzione didattico-pedagogica alla preghiera. Non esistono pittori adolcinati nelle chiese filippine, ne s'insinua una pietà del terrore attraverso immagini troppo crude anche per quel che riguarda il tema della morte, caratteristico della predicazione Secentesa.

Nell'Oratorio come nella chiesa filippina predomina la cattedra per la predicazione: ma non è l'impegno principale quello dell'annucnio del Vangelo e dell'istruzione dei fedeli?

Doppo questa premessa, fatta senza scopo di completezza, ma solo per giustificare con la riscoperta delle nostre radici il magistero di Filippo Neri, passo a riflettere sui tre punti che, mi pare emergano chiaramente dal suo approccio con la cultura e che egli ci ha lasciato in eredità preziosa:

L'amore o meglio l'esigenza dello studio

Confronto con l'arte

Confronto, in particolare, con la musica

Lo studio cui alludo dà per scontata la preparazione prevista per il sacerdozio o, per il laico, per il conseguimento di un riconoscimento universitario alla professione.

Oggi è opportuno che ciascun Oratoriano impegnato ad essere "apostolo" curi un continuo aggiornamento nel campo delle così dette scienze umane che curi l'approfondimento, in particolare della pedagogia, della psicologia, della sociologia religiosa.

Certamente impeganti nella pastorale, queste scienze ci offrono utili strumenti per essere in grado di capire, ascoltare guidare coloro che frequentano le nostre chiese e i nostri oratori. Soprattutto i giovani che sono oggi tanto bombardati dalle nuove culture. E' necessario conoscerle per poter dare delle risposte (penso alla New Age, alle nuove proposte religiose, mentre diminuiscono i segni del sacro).

Secondo le culture correnti è innegabile la perdita progressiva della salvezza in senso teologico di azione di Dio per l'uomo e lo sviluppo di vari concetti di autosalvazione, ottenuti con lo sviluppo della mente e del potenziale umano. Si tratta dunque, in fondo, del processo in atto di crescita di una "fede senza dogmi", una forma di transreligiosità, in cui si riscontrano scambi reciproci tra movimenti religiosi volti alla scoperta del proprio mondo interiore nelle sue potenzialità e nei suoi limiti.

Pertanto, credo opportuno suggerire la constante lettura personale di riviste specialistiche di cui abbonda il mercato editoriale sia nel vecchio che nel nuovo continente: permettono di conoscere gli apporti più recenti sui vari problemi (di teologia, di pastorale, di morale ecc.), sono certamente strumenti più agili dello studio di specifiche che sarebbe auspicabile trovassero posto in un'aggiornata biblioteca della comunità o dell'Oratorio, incoraggiando anche i laici a consultarle, studiarle per essere collaboratori preparati.

Curare poi iniziative d'incontri culturali, secondo le specifiche esigenze locali, ricorrendo anche all'apporto di persone particolarmente preparate, specie su temi di grande attualità come la bioetica, la genetica ecc. Mi sembra conserverebbero quell'impronta del primitivo oratorio, non solo scuola di preghiera ma anche di formazione umana e cristiana.

Dopo adeguata preparazione, sarà possible aprire a dibattiti e confronti i raduni dei nostri oratori in cui ciascuno porterà il proprio contributo alla discussione.

Nei nostri Oratori un posto privilegiato dovrebbe essere riservato alla lettura e allo studio della Parola di Dio (Nuovo e Antico Testamento) che Filippo Neri rese possibile ai laici nel momento in cui si tornava ad un esclusiva lettura chiericale della Sacra Scrittura, anticipando atteggiamenti del Concilio Vaticano II!

b) Nei confronti dell'arte un primo e particolare dovere, penso, debba vederci impegnati in una gelosa conservazione del patrimonio artistico delle chiese e delle case delle nostre congregazioni che abbiamo ricevuti come preziosa eredità da chi ci ha preceduto.

E' spesso un "obbligo" pesante, per l'impiego di mezzi finanziari, superiori alle forze e alle entrante delle case. Qui occorre pertanto prima conoscere le possibilità che le leggi locali, regionali, statali offrono a salvaguardia del patrimonio artistico e quindi, con pazienza e tenacia, "opportune et importune", compiere tutti gli iter burocratici necessari ad ottenere contributi. Le nostre chiese, soprattutto, sono spesso delle vere pinacoteche; le strutture murarie necessitano continui restauri; i fondi antichi delle nostre biblioteche bisognano di disinfestazioni e cure. Sono problemi enormi, se affrontati da soli: occorre creare solidarietà ampie intorno ad essi per giungere a dei risultati. E qui un ruolo prezioso di aiuto può venirci proprio dai laici che si facciano carico con noi dei problemi accennati. (Qui parlerei dell'esperienza vicentina: una casa senza mezzi, con padri anziani, sei partito con il restauro dei due organi del De Lorenzi; hai cominciato le stagioni di concerti d'organo che si sono inserite fra le manifestazioni culturali della città, imitate poi da iniziative che hanno contagiato anche chiese della città.

In pochi anni, perseguendo l'obiettivo del restauro della chiesa settecentesca sei riuscito nel'intento, non solo, ma è stato il primo grande restauro delle chiese cittadine che è stato elogiato per la riuscita e ha dato vita ad una gara di emulazione promuovendo lavori di restauro in numerose chiese della Città che da ultimo ha coinvolto anhe la cattedrale. Un progetto che sembrava "pazzesco" ma che preparato e maturato clle

nell'opinione pubblica ha saputo riscuotere il contributo e l'appoggio di tante persone e degli enti pubblici).

I beni artistici sono un patrimonio comune non solo dell’Oratorio: ci sono affidati, e la loro conservazione interpella la coscienza di tutti preti e laici. Solo creando questa cosciente responsabilità saremo in grado di far fronte ai nostri impegni in questo delicato campo. Se la chiesa è funzionante, decorosamente tenuta anche punto di rifeimento per i fedeli, ne stimola la frequenza nella scia della tradizione filippina.

E fra le arti è scontato dire quanto fosse amata dal Neri la musica. Non solo ne fece uno dei motivi caratteristici dell'Oratorio, col canto di Laudi e canti devoti ma, dietro il suo insegnamento, venne curata soprattutto in funzione dell'uso liturgico. Per esperienza personale, ma anche per numerose pubblicazioni, posso attestarvi la ricchezza dei fondi musicali delle antiche biblioteche dei vari oratori italiani, testimoni di un fervore e di una ricca creatività compositiva musicale. Basta poi scorrere qualunque manuale di storia della musica per rendersi conto dell'importanza che in questo campo hanno avuto gli Oratori filippini.

Una sola gloria del passato? Posso tranquilamente smentire. La maggior parte delle nostre case anche oggi cura con passione il canto liturgico, privilegiando il suono dell'organo, ache se non disdegna forme moderne di melodie (ricordo che la prima messa con le chitarre, e allora fece epoca, fu eseguita nel nostro oratorio del Borromini a Roma agli inizi degli anni Sessanta).

E' necessario mantenere alta questa nostra tradizione nei confronti della musica sacra, tanto più ora che si va riscoprendo che, forse troppo frettolosamente, ci si era aperti ad una musica" facile di accordi strimpellati, non adatti alla celebrazione liturgica.

Canto e musica devono essere espressione gioiosa dell'animo ma consoni al tempo e al luogo. Tenute presenti queste premesse, canto e musica richiedono diligente preparazione.

Perciò il nostro impegno deve mirare alla educazione delle voci attraverso la creazione di scholae cantorum o di cori i cui componenti sappiano anche leggere la musica, si sentano consapevoli del servizio prezioso che svolgono nelle nostre assemblee quasi investiti di un ministero.

Deve continuamente essere arricchito il nostro repertorio, soprattutto ora che la liturgia in volgare permette un coinvolgimento totale del popolo, con l'adattamento di facili melodie, che tuttavia non cadano nella sciatteria.

Ma la musica è soprattutto mezzo di avvicinamento ai giovani: il nostro sforzo deve essere quello di capirne i gusti, educarne le "mode", far gustare la gioia dello stare insieme, esprimerla attraverso il canto.

Quante volte, per scacciare la malinconia, o riprendere coraggio, bastano una chitarra e tre giovani che cantano!

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WEDNESDAY, July 15

Chronicle

Wow, the Philipenses´ gaiety is manifested with grandeur! Today, we have showed our best face so that we could leave it on a historical photograph. There is no doubt that the Philipenses’ liking is projected every moment and that every distinct language is not an obstacle for us. A great way to begin this day is by taking a photograph!

It is very important to see people visit the Sacred Temple in their chapel. Having Him as the Sacrament of the Love of the Father, we are going to look for Him in the Sanctuary to share our efforts in the making our Congress, a demonstration of our enthusiasm. Also, to project the Oratory as a real and authentic alternative for our present time.

There is no doubt that the value of “family life” in the Oratory can be fulfilled with enthusiasm and hope in this new era that we currently live in and that needs traveling witnesses of the Philipense spirit. Today’s conference requires that we confront this virtue that every Christian should live by. In the Oratory, it is imperative, especially if we want to really support the growth of a new epoch that is marked by Christian virtue, especially, the virtue of love.

The workshops, today, have really ignited the Oratorio family as an assistant in this Congress. The “Prophet of Joy” calls us to the prophecy, vocation for the intrepids that are capable of audacity and originality, to teach a World that debates between monotony and ambulism.

The Eucharist celebration has been the source and culmination of all our work. Tiredness, there, becomes a redemptous sacrifice and it stays closely united to God’s Mystery of Love.

At the end of the day we still had enough energies to become observers of a Folkloric Ballet, allowing us to sleep in a typical Mexican style.

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CONFERENCE: THE ORATORY IN THE CHURCH TODAY

Pbro. Gustavo Felten

German Villa, Chile.

If we compare the Oratory with other congregations, our institute seems little thing. The Priest Theo Gunkel, founder of Leipzing, used to say that it was a marginal note in the life of the Church. Others ask": What is happening with the Oratory that doesn't grow more? Is it antiquated? Does it need a better organization?

Doubts as these can compose a phenomenon that I would like to call the “oratorian’s inferiority complex." I consider it a dangerous illness that needs an urgent treatment, because easily it could paralyze the sick person. Let us begin to analyze its external aspect.

We are a family

It is true that in comparison with congregations like the Jesuits and Salesians, we are a tiny minority, but we have something very big: we are a family.

According to St. Philip´s explicit disposition, each oratory constitutes a family, and a family is more than an army, because only in the family life is engendered. The family, although it is only composed of three people, it is of another category, it is more than all the social entities. For that reason, let us dedicate to what is our first vocation: to be family and to live in family.

We are old but not antiquated

There is another mistake in the diagnosis of our illness that says that all that is worth has to be new. It is not enough to be modern, it has to be postmodern. The old thing is identified with that antiquated, and the Oratory is old, although it has been founded at the beginning of the modern time, in the Renaissance. With this it shares the desire of a new birth, but it had to be a Renaissance. It is not born from nothing, but of something old that is worth and that it can be the base and norm of the new. The Oratory is not old, but rather it maintains a great appreciation of the old.

St. Philip was probably the first one that included the history of the Church in the liturgy and in the spiritual life. The Cardinal Newman insisted in a concrete and historical road toward God[1]. And Baronio, successor of St. Philip, wrote the first great history of the Church[2]. Which is the great problem of the modern catechizes? That the tradition of the faith has been interrupted from a generation to another. And this, mainly, in the countries of the biggest and old cultures.

This lack of transmission of faith in our time is intimately bound to the weakness of the family. In the moment in that the chain of this transmission is broken it coincides with the collapse of the family inside the modern civilization.

The famous conference of Beijing[3] has made all the possible to avoid in its documents the word " family ". It has dared to throw this front attack against the family after the collapse of the authority of the history and the tradition. If the history is only an accumulation left-overs of the past, one can make with it what is wanted and the surest pillars in the human culture are broken.

These last events show us where does a culture direct that is taking away its own history. It is truly, as tells the Gospel, a house built on sand that doesn't resist the storms of the modern time. With pride and responsibility we lift our head for, with San Philip, with Baronio, with Berulle and with Cardinal Newman to glory us of our big traditions.

We feel the urgent necessity of make them present in our time and our atmosphere, because we are convinced that the humanity cannot live without family neither tradition. I say this with more security in Mexico, where the traditions (older than in the European world), mark until today the life. Its enough with the visitor’s view to the most modern buildings to verify that they receive their greatness and dignity from their Aztec or Mayan inspiration.

We are different

Even more admirable it is that these cultures, until recently, have stayed without verbal testimonies. The alive tradition is transmitted through many conduits. The spirit is more important than the remains of the past. This can be clarity observed with St. Philip, because he didn't write almost anything. The rule of the Oratory has not been possible to formulate before his death and, apart from some fundamental principles, approved by the Pope, it contained only the customs of the Rome Oratory.

What has marked the Oratory until today has been the figure, the spirit, small aphorisms, his person's memory and his originality. The greatest of the history mark their times through their life, they are their pupils those that write it and code, because of that their pursuit or influence goes a lot beyond an institution that they have been founded. It would lack to write a book talking about St. Philip’s influence in so many aspects, a lot beyond a congregation. Philip was limited directly to the Oratory of Rome, he was reticent with new foundations. He surely rejected the foundation of a Oratory in Milán, because its famous bishop, the Cardinal Carlos Borromeo, had an entire program of tridents reformations that limited the free development of a Oratory.

A foundation in Naples that was wanted by several of his pupils, it seemed to him problematic, because it absorbed many own forces. But Philip, with the time could not prevent that new Oratories were born, each house quite different from the other one because the rule defined few things, the rest, depended of the circumstances and the genius of each congregation. It was not this way surprising that the Oratory was developed in several ways and that, truly, each house was and called itself, a congregation.

Philip trusted the Holy Spirit a lot, he had not only received it in the catacombs of St. Sebastian, but rather he left him the development of the things that the he was not able to define. Because of it, he always remitted the question on the founder of the Oratory to the Holy Spirit.

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1. The Variety of the Philipian Charisma

The independence of each Oratory, wanted emphatically by the Saint, facilitated adaptations that went beyond of what had been developed under Philip’s conductive spirit in the Oratory of Rome. As examples I present you two types of life philipian , near to the Oratory philipian, but with own characteristic and that can be paradigmatic for others:

The French Oratory

The French Oratory, was born in 1611, almost the same year when the statutes philipian were approved (1612), and it presents a very different image from the philipians. The Priest Auvray writes (famous exegetic of the French Oratory), About his origin and characteristics in comparison with the philipian: The first house was founded by the Priest Berulle in Paris and each new house adhered firmly to this origin and so the French Oratory extended this way very quick as a hive of bees. When Cardinal Berulle died, in 1629, France was already covered for sixty Oratories to whose head was the general superior who had to assure the uniformity[4] .Differently from the philipian Oratory that doesn't recognize a central authority and it respects more the autonomy of each house.

The philipian Oratory can be compared with a beautiful flower, deployed under the Roman sky that has spilled their seeds on the world and it has made other many flowers to born that are developing like the first one, without being part of it. (He refers to the quick extension of the Oratory in the XVII century in Europe, arriving until Ceylan in Asia, Mexico and Lima in America and now Sudafrica).

"Very different it is the French Oratory that resembles a tree whose roots produce new buds that they grow attached to the trunk. They are two very different images: on one hand multiple, independent and free oratories; on the other hand an unique, centralized congregation, made up of solidary and legally united houses." [5]

In spite of that great difference, the two institutions don't cease of proclaiming their common features: “A common dependence of St. Philip to who both recognize as their founder and inspiring; the lack of votes and the basically secular character of their institutes; a common spirit of happiness, spontaneity and freedom." [6]

The common characteristics come from certain historical continuity. In the first place, personal contacts existed between Berulle and the Oratory of Rome, where have participated, Baronio, Juan Ancina and, in less direct form Francisco de Sales; propitiated by adjacent geographical and cultural areas as Switzerland and the South of France; besides a certain historical proximity, because the events were developed in few later decades to St. Philip’s death.

Now, where do the differences and separations come from? The P. Auvray explains to them, also certain fortuitous historical circumstances and the different character of the towns and people main characters, mainly for the different political situation of the countries.

Italy was subdivided in a quantity of principalities and kingdoms, while France, since in that time, was united under one only king. Berulle also wanted to protect the Oratory against the changing interventions of the bishops that depended from the king and could deform the essence of the Oratory, Berulle, a very provident and retailer man, saw indispensable a stronger organization of the Oratory for its foundation in those circumstances. He was explained saying: St. Philip has adapted his institution perfectly to the necessities of his city, Rome. But, in consequence, he had to leave to the communities of other cities a certain freedom to make the necessary adaptations to their situation. Here was made the principle of the communities independence."[7]

In its concentration in France, the French Oratory has been able to make a great contribution to the history of the Church in its earth. And its founder has been decisive for the beginning of the “École Francaise", the great school of the spirituality from the XVII century. The renovation of the French clergy from inside, is especially because the activity of the French oratorians in the seminars.[8]

After having underlined some features both from the philipian and the French Oratory, I want shortly to characterize a feminine congregation, this time from Spain.

The Philipian sisters. Missionaries of teaching

The Philipian nuns present an interesting example, not only to translate the philipian experience, up to now masculine, in form of life for women, but also to transfer it to another country (Spain) and another time.

It was born in the half of the last century amid the industrial revolution with all their social problems and in a labor atmosphere, in Mataró, coastal city of Catalonia. This situation conditions its apostolate, directed to the woman, workers and maids, without formation and in moral danger.

The Holy Spirit was served as two brothers: Marcos and Gertrudis Castañer, to welcome this restlessness and to transform it in practical measures. The P. Marcos says his plans presentation: “The faith was getting lost every day, to the step that the implety and demoralization were taking roots; that the bad customs extended in all the classes of the society; that the bad doctrines went capturing the youth of the weak sex, singly of the labor class of this city, and that the dance rooms went being increased and they were very converged, and that on the other hand a big and guilty ignorance of the Christian doctrine was seen; that they had many outrages and scandals caused by the factories hard-working youths when leaving them, singly at night."[9]

The two brothers put to disposition of their plans their house and their inheritance and, step by step, they introduce the following initiatives: for the young girls, they organize meetings at nights for the catechizes and the basic teaching, as to read and to write, for bigger, exercises for almost the whole week; they form a congregation of ladies to help the apostolate. Late born also a school. But the apostolate was larger: “to reform women from the childhood, until the last age." In view of the woman's exploitation, it was necessary to occupy Sundays for the Christian doctrine.

Now, when seeing the dimensions of the begun work, the Castañers took conscience that their company needed more solidity: the Bishop's recognition, of the government and of the Pope (Pious IX) and a congregation with votes. This last point gets the attention, because, at the same time, they opted for St. Philip Neri like their spiritual guide, and St. Philip had prohibited to his the votes.

The founders had taken contact with the oratorians, first in Barcelona, later in Rome, where they also knew the Oblatas. Great part of the rules of these and of the Oratory they entered to be part of the new institution, for example, the superior was called ‘Preposita’.

The Barcelona’s ‘Preposito’ had certain authority on the sisters, but more important it was the influence on its spirituality: St. Philip’s figure with their happiness and their apostolic zeal; the primate of the preaching of God’s Word, the mental prayer, etc. It was evident a certain convergence between the inspiration of the Castañers and the spirituality and St. Philip’s apostolate, mainly with regard to the important Sunday’s Oratory and in the great concern of the poor. The only thing that misses inside this process of assimilation is the votes. It gives the impression that the Philipians felt their necessity to be stabilized in front of a very threatening situation. The still woman's weak social position, the convulsions of the political life in the Spain of that time and the responsibility for the many poor that began to depend on them.

Summarizing, we can say that the foundation of the Philipian Sisters shows the width of possibilities of philipian life. St. Philip is not their founder, but their teacher, father, patriarch and boss; tittle that reveal the great esteem and adoration that they has among them and that makes them belong to the philipian family. Other philipian congregations will have elements in common with them.

Relationship and Comparison

All of us that are present in this congress, have received part of St. Philip Neri's spirit together with other influences and in diverse forms, according to the historical situations that we have to live. Nobody has the monopoly and to anybody it lack. It concerns us the responsibility for what we have received and to take care of our inheritance but, like in the parable of the talents, without to bury it neither to hide it, but with happiness and courage to work with it.

These three examples of oratorian vocation are the better known ones and that they have looked for contact between them, especially in the congresses. They are several types of oratorian life and you could compare their relationships with a certain ecumenism. The Philipian Oratorians will be as the Catholics in the apostolic succession, for them, worth their constitutions of 1989 that unite them in a confederation of oratories. Others have a more direct relationship with St. Philip, they can lack elements that were essentials from Philip, and, on the other hand, they have sometimes received other additional influences as, for example, Cardinal Berulle list in the French Oratory or Castañers’ one in the case of the Philipian Sisters. But all of you that have come to this congress, many times with big sacrifices, take with all spirit’s genuineness, the philipian name.

The existent differences don't impede that the values, ideals and the spirit, be elements shared by all. That shows that St. Philip's influence goes a lot beyond an organizational historical dependence, because Philip is not sacred because of founded the Philipian Oratory, in consequence the saint is not exclusive property of this. It has been the town of Rome the one that has promoted his canonization and testified his sanctity. The Oratory is his favorite son, but his irradiation and his work go more beyond than his own intentions, so he didn’t consider himself a founder. He was mainly a great pastor and the men's friend, true humanist and humanitarian, he had people's gift, he made feel well to the other ones, especially to the weak ones, he was a true " father " and in function of this passion for the man, the oratory was born. He made it in the road, almost without wanting it.

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2. The Secular Oratory

Now what Philip began, was not in fact none of the oratories commented until this moment, was rather the Oratory that describe the philipian constitutions in N°2 with these words “the fraternal union of the faithful ones that follow St. Philip Neri's prints and that look for what he taught and he made, to form a single heart and a single soul." [10]

In and after the N°5, it start to speak about the Oratory Congregation as a group, constituted from the beginning to the service of the Oratory. "The members of the congregation should worry about the external faithful, especially those that have been organized as Secular Oratory and participate in their activities."[11]

The old constitutions extend thoroughly on the organization and subdivision of the secular Oratory, while the version of 1989 is much briefer in this point and it insists in their rules should be adapted to today's lifestyle. The Secular Oratory maybe is not the most appropriate name, because it spreads to separate too much the lay to the clergy, while in this last, for lack of votes, it is in fact considered as secular priests. All the members of the Oratory are in a way secular, inserted in the world to their service.

This Oratory’s Secularity has already stood out in another context. It is famous Philip's answer, when they asked him, when he had left the world. He said: “I didn’t know I have left it”.

In this world’s integration, perhaps could also find an access to the base communities, with strong presence in this continent. Of its secularity doesn't fit doubt. But the concern of its sense of the transcendent exists. But a fiber of the oratorian vibrates with them. The width of the Secular Oratorian concept also allows to integrate activities of other organizations or movements that show certain likeness with the style of the Oratory. We have good experiences with the charismatic communities and catecumenals: they can be different Secular Oratory sections or types that would give it a bigger wealth and variety.

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3. The Oratory’s Force

The Stability of the place

The diversity of the philipian charisma and their decentralization could weaken their influence, in effectiveness. From the point of view of the effectiveness, in fact they are problematic. But this category in what refers to the life of the family or the faith, it is very questionable. Although the originality of houses or people can sometimes be extreme and bothersome, we live it like a wealth. But this wealth also has its price.

As in each family, there are enough conflicts. In the Oratory have to be much more, since we lack the knots of the blood and the alternation that takes place with the exit of the children. The only exit of the Oratory, apart from foundations that are exceptional, is the death (like in the marriage that lasts until the death separates them).

To be an oratorian, it is a big and demanding vocation, like in the marriage. This so much more than the oratorians practically doesn't know transfers. In other congregations the problems are solved separating the parts in conflict. We have the stability of the place. One stays in the same Oratory where enters. This point wakes up strangeness to the outsiders. It is important to discover their deep value.

Historically it is San Benito's inheritance and it marks the transition of a church Itinerant to a sedentary church. Already in the Gospel prints of this process are noticed in the first generations. Today we are in a society tremendously motive that affects stable structures as the family where virtues like fidelity and loyalty, perseverance and patience are needed.

The fact that are difficult it doesn't remove them their full validity, today more than ever. On the contrary, it shows more the important of our mission of being family in support of so many families on the edge of the separation. To live in community has always been difficult, but it has always been indispensable.

The lived Gospel is as the oil in the motor of the human society. This is our vocation and not only the philipian Oratory’s ones, that we have it written with big letters in our constitutions, but of all those that want to follow St. Philip. It can be that they sometimes have reasons of exceptional changes, but they should never be “because they don't understand each other", like is said in these cases.

The Family’s Cross

If we want to live as family in the Oratory and because of vocation, is unavoidable the stability of belonging. You cannot have one without the other one. It is a cross, Yes, it is! but the world has been saved by the cross and the one that wants to save the world without the cross, not only makes a mistake, but rather denies to Jesus Christ.

St. Pablo had to learn this lesson in Athens and he says at the end to the Corinthians: “of here ahead don't want to know anybody, but to Jesus Christ, and he crucified”.[12]

Brothers, I invite you to take conscience of this logic to assume this family’s cross. When having opted in the oratorian vocation for the family life, we have opted for its cross. If today the family fails it is because its cross has been rejected. Let us renovate the option of our life: for the family, for the cross. Being Christian is to assume Christ's cross. Being Christian in family is to assume the cross of family coexistence. It is our common destiny with all the families of the earth.

But those that don't know the Gospel of the glorious cross, won't be capable of the fidelity until the death. For that reason the urgent necessity to evangelize people, the culture and, overalls, the family like cell of the human life. Our tradition and the historical hour that we live, impose us this mission.

The Pope has written him encyclical about Gospel of the life; but to talk about life is to talk about family, because in it the life is gestated. We are the first called to announce this Gospel, we that live in family and that we know the difficulties of the family life for own experience. But we have God’s inexhaustible source of energy of faith and love. This impedes that we expect a human love that could give us the life.

Don't many marriages fail because they demand a lot of each one? They demand a love that God can only give: Our experience and the suffering of the Christian love, give the weight to the announcement of the Gospel. They give it the testimony character. How could we give testimony of God’s love power, if we are not capable of endure the crises of the love without separating?

We live and suffer them in flesh and blood. If we don't know how to live in family communities or do we change from house to another, what moral authority will we preach in the families and to the marriages the love of God with?

The task urges. The Christian family, today more than ever, needs the resolved and effective support of the Church, because it has lost the support of the society. The few children that are, contribute to the cohesion of the family. The work that before was a family company, today it separates to the marriage if the two spouses work for separate (what today is in the majority case). The intimate life of the family is cause both of attraction and escape in one. It attracts for the indifference and anonymousness of the atmospheres, as the work or the civic life. And it is an escape cause for the demanding that it is the intimate life as deep encounter and people's stable union.

The first condition for the pastoral family is that the pastors live in family. If the Oratory was not an encounter place and resembles more a pension, it would not be only a danger for the vocation, but rather it would disable us the task. The other way around, our oratorian coexistence, will also give a family touch to our pastoral style.

The new parish concept like “community of communities” goes well with our personality. The force of the primitive Church was the domestic Church, family Church, where they are welcomed to those without family, where they learn from the faith the family virtues. It should be the style of the secular Oratory. Instead of having many groups or sections separated according to sex, age or other approaches, are preferable heterogeneous groups. Inside this atmosphere of faith, makes us well to the celibate ones to share with people of the other sex.

Inculturation

But the family stability is also fundamental for the pastoral today's demand. Our congress has like topic “Gospel, Oratory and Culture", or also “Oratory and Postmodern Culture." Together with the importance that today is given to the culture like addressee and evangelization atmosphere, much of inculturation is spoken.

Without place to doubt, the inculturation is a slow process that demands a long presence inside a certain culture. What better than the Oratory? Our mission is not in the high level, but in the concrete life of the town. More important than talk about inculturation it is to make the inculturation like people, like house, as Oratory.

St. Philip has always looked for people's proximity. He is the example of a base pastoral. Our contribution to the inculturation of the Church is to submerge, to be embodied in a certain social-cultural atmosphere. Not to visit it, neither to make it a mission, but to be identified and to stay. Equally in the society. Non point to organize big campaigns, protests or massive acts, but sharing the necessities of certain people or families, to see their face, their personal individuality.

The old monks, after a period of being moving, began to transplant or to implant the Christianity. We today, as pastors, have certain easiness of to enter in new atmospheres and to toss roots.

In Chile, where the Oratory arrived thirty two years ago, we are in the same place from 1968 and we have our experience. We know on one hand that to make inculturation means to die, to lose the life. Little it is read of this aspect in to the literature. But it is also a to resuscitate as other, more open, tolerant, with more horizon. Today we are like one more in the diocesan clergy, in many opportunities the oldest. Apart from being parish priests, we occupy diocesan positions, as dean, instructor in the diocesan Seminary, youth pastoral. In the municipality one illustrious son has been named. They are small, but significant things for us that are accepted and, without this, there is not evangelization.

Prove of this it is also. That now vocations of our parishes are coming out. I have reached the conclusion that the stability is an important requirement for a solid pastoral. If not, the successor undoes his predecessor's work and in this way, is a continuous begin of zero. A level of faith is not reached and of ecclesiastic life that would present with more fullness what is truly the work of God.[13]

The parish priest old immobility didn't only have disadvantages. We like oratorians are inamovibles. This inamovility also gives a more concrete base to the celibacy. With Biblical base one can say: “The apostle, as the boyfriend's friend and in their representation, marries to his parochial community with Christ and he takes care of it zealously. The pastor is not single, but rather he is married with his Church. And this bond is not an ideology, but concrete knots of loyalty with a community that is composed of well-known people, families, youths, children and old men.

All this combined of factors integrates the atmosphere of the Secular Oratory. Now, inside this it should not lack a thing, without which would not be oratory: The Oratory of the Word or, like it tells the old tradition, Tractatio familiaris verbi Dei"

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4. The Life’s source: The Oratory of the Word

Their elements

This exercise embraced the following elements: Reading of a religious, amusing book, later four sermons, the first one supported in a text base and developed in improvised form and with passion. Then, two more formal speeches, one on some Saint, the other one always of the history of the Church, usually in charge to Baronio. The last word had it St. Philip, summarizing, clarifying, deepening and taking to the practice. All this accompanied, and continued with songs and music. Many times, especially on Sundays and parties, continued with visits to another Churches or the sick persons.

We find many elements of this Oratory of the Word common and well-known today. However it was not this way in Philip's time. It should have been something very novel that woke up until suspicions in the high spheres. But perhaps more important than the novel of the content, was the style and the atmosphere that made feel well to the participants, supported in the faith of the Church, in the love of God and the brothers. For that reason always they returned and little by little they conformed a defined group with a small nucleus from the priests to their service, the Oratory.

Essential aspects

What was it and does it continue being typical of these meetings? I enumerate some aspects:

To read the Bible like Word of God. Without denying the human aspect of the Bible, what is truly questioned and it reaches until the deepest, it is the encounter of God. The Bible is the testimony of a town and, inside this, of people that have met with God in human history. To make of this history and its wealth it would be, being against its own dynamics. It would be a non justifiable reductionism. The tradition of the Church, the same canon of the Bible, speak another language. For that reason it is not necessary to talk about the Bible, but allowing to speak to the Bible the Word of God. Word directed to me, with my authority, that questions and save me. I have seen that the biblical circles don't last and they don't move. The critical or historical study can only be the second plane.

The Word of God like Word of the Church. The tradition of the Church and its liturgy always presents the Bible in the group of other texts, songs, images, witness of its faith. Philip has never left this mark. The Bible, before being the humanity's great inheritance, is a book of the Church, of the town of God that lives it and makes it live. The Bible cannot become emancipated of the Church.

In the Oratory we have a family treatment with the Word of God. This factor is the most specific in the oratorian reading. " Familiar " means a reduced group, with a family tone", without a lot of scientific or scholastic luggage, with active participation of all, in a atmosphere of discretion, ease and peace.

The Word of God like Gospel. Although they didn't lack in the Oratory the escatology, death and last trial, the call to the conversion, Philip's presence always guaranteed a tone of hope and happiness. For that reason it could not lack the music.

The Word of God welcomed in silence and responded in prayer. Today seems more important than before the silence, in a saturated world of noises and with an uninterrupted transmission of words and sounds, it cannot lack the benefit of the silence and like soul’s prayer. It is expected from us that are teachers of the prayer, as well as the pupils that saw Jesus praying and they felt the desire to enter in it. If in a Oratory this atmosphere is given that is look for many, it doesn't fit doubt that they will enter. For the neediest of this food, Philip had another encounter in the night. Don't fit doubt that today there is a great demand of this atmosphere, How many look for it until in other continents, because they don't find it among us! After a long time of rationalism it exists a strong search of other experiences that is summarized in the new postmodernism concept, in which the irrational prevails, because the rationalism had left the man, too dry and sterile. St. Philip surely knew this hole. His boredom is known with the study and its search of the concrete man and of the God of the life that was revealed as the Holy Spirit. It is not that he looked for the irrational. But his experience had taught him that his presence in the men breaks the limits of the rational that intercedes with wailing " ineffable " (Rom 8,26) and what he more had to highlight in the catechizes of the Oratory, was the passion. Equally his practice and insistence in the charity works show a certain distrust of the intellectual. The root of the sin was in the mind, as he always said, touching his front with three fingers.

Final invitation

Now, if what we have gathered as “Oratory of the Word” is it so essential that without it, it would get lost the right of calling itself oratorian or Filipino, it is presented for all us the question; Which is the reality of this demand in my home? For the Philipian Oratory it doesn't fit doubt on its obligatory character, daily. For the other philipians I don't dare to say it with the same clarity. But the name that they take, the tradition to which they are owed and to the necessity that has the Church today of this service of the Word, That invite you to make the same question: Are we Oratory, or do we take only the name? Does it really exist among us the Oratory of the Word in the full sense of the philipian tradition?

If the answer is negative, it is necessary to think about possibilities of its realization. Where anything is similar, it is necessary to begin of zero, what has its advantages. Where communities that carry out great part of the Oratory, already exist, it is necessary to guide them to their fullness and to give them a clearer oratorian identity.

I finish with some appointments of Talpa, pupil still of St. Philip and founder of the Oratory of Naples. He said: “The ministry of the confession, first principle and foundation of St. Philip's work, have their continuation in the daily and family exercise of the word of God." "A thing desire, without which seems that they are destroyed all the other ones, because it is reformed, it must no longer be the to be sons of the B.P. Philip, or what is the same, not belonging to the Oratory. The Institute of the Oratory consists mainly on announcing the word of God daily in simple and family style. That, although to more than this our Sacred Father introduced the frequency of the sacraments and other spiritual exercises, however, as own and peculiar exercise of our institute he chose the Word of God, treated daily and colloquially."

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SEMMINAR: ORATORIAN HOPE AND FREEDOM

In the listened conferences we have taken the pulse to our historical moment deeply pulled for a postmodern philosophy that impregnates the cultural reality of our world. We have been able to know about the challenges and tasks that it offers us. We have been claimed by the oratorian vocation. We want “prompto corde respondeant.”

With this study we will try to contribute, creatively, as sons of the Holy Spirit, St. Philip wanted this way, to be the voice of hope and freedom in a tired and sceptical culture as ours.

They belong to our culture the experiences of the solitude and of the unsolidarity, consequences of a radical self-determination and independence, and the lack of utopias that take to trust to a better future. The categorical statement of Ortega y Gasset, “the man is future”, seems to advice of the intensity with what is wanted to live the immediate, like to take out the whole instant profit, annulling horizons to the future.

This immediacy lived daily, confusing the pleasant with the good, it takes to a desire to enjoy the present moment vertiginously for pure satisfaction of instincts and passions driving to the great risk of falling in a culture of the hole and of the dependence. They are “the experiences of the vertigo, those that make us enter in a hairspring that doesn't generate but more and more anxieties. These experiences give everything at the beginning but they remove everything at the end, they leave without future to the man and they submerge it in the tragedy of a frustrated life” (Professor López Quintás). In that way, the longing of happiness without limits always leaves annulled. And the man is submerged hopelessly in a world without hope.

The rational man, has made crisis front the postmodern man, but in definitive, it continues living submerged in three basic experiences that manifest their indigence:

Their growing conscience of cannot defend themselves in the face of their own power and creativity.

The experience of the failure of the freedom in the achievement of a fair and blissful coexistence where the power of the capital achieves its best victories.

The yearning of a fullness that the satisfaction of its necessities transcends and that it always maintains the supreme queries present and definitively fundamental that sprout of the bottom of the conscience: why do we live? What do we look for? What are we called to? What to make with the death? What do they mean the big words of freedom, emancipation and social well-being? Where is our yearning of justice for all, alive and dead? We need to know from where and toward where of our existence.

In this world of the postmodernity, as well as all the times, the hope appears like historical force that energizes the present. The true hope is not drained in any historical program, since none of them is able to establish a definitive, free society and jousts, neither to give answer to the thirst of the human being transcendence.

The hope is vital ingredient so that the person can develop his existence in his margins of the ecological balance of the security, of the freedom and of the love in which is building his personal history in the History, and the same History. The hope transcends the own limits, it opens answers to those supreme queries and it configures, in front of the “culture of the hole, of the disenchant and the dependence”, (Professor López Quintás). The hope gives the possibility to always look for, it qualifies for the opening and the intercommunication, it engenders patience and it is atmosphere of the love, it makes possible to believe, to grow and to fight. The man of hope knows who is, how ago, toward where he goes. The hope is impulse toward the transcendence.

“You cannot continue this way”, the desperate man says.

“You can continue this way indefinitely”, the hopeless man says.

“It seems that something can change”, the hopeful man says.

The hope is synonymous of cure, there is only this way illness recognition. Our culture is sick but it is not considered this way.

To believe in God is to be hope. The Christian have to “to give the heart of our hope”, (1 Pe.3, 15) to present a reasoned faith, and at the same time lived cohesively that it takes us to the solidarity, the utopia and to the stable ethical commitment. Our hope has its reason of being, there where finishes and all human hope fails.

Arrived here, we the believers put name to our hope, Jesus' follower's essential characteristic as appears in the NT. Our hope is Jesus Christ (Col.1, 27). He found a hope without limits because he conquered to the death and he already enjoys life next to the Father, in the Heaven. Our destination is Jesus' same destination. That is the root and the foundation of our hope, as special as the faith and the love, in such a way that cannot have faith or love without hope.

What is able then, to propose the Church?. The Church can offer an alternative culture based on the hope and in the freedom, a way of being person, it can already present to the hopeful man as project of the well-known in some thinkers like the “Fifth man” (Prof. C. Valverde).

What Jesus was but person's model that embodied the culture of the love and of the life like answer free to the Father's will that he wants that “all the men to be save.” (1 Tm.2, 3) liberation hope for those that lived under the yoke of the oppression and of the slavery? He was divine opportunity, kairoj, as well as the ones that follow him must be, in their historical moment. Opportunity to return to the world created by the desires of God on him, and to guide the man toward their full happiness that consists on the encounter of friendship with their Creator. It is to make possible to the dreamt world for God, dream always present for Him “a thousand years are as one day and one day like thousand years.” (2 Pe.3. 8) “the glory of God is that the man lives” (S. Ireneo).

The cultural proposal of the Church must point toward the recovery of person's concept like unique being and irrepetible, image of God called to the fullness and the sanity and guest to participate in the construction of his Kingdom, pawning in the remeet of the men in the love. I love then I am.

Urges today to wake up the utopia. It is the horizon toward which spread, stimulus to fight.

Urges the appearance from the new man to Jesus' style that refuses to make a pact with the “bourgeois” and the materialistic current and hedonist of the vertigo and that on the contrary it hugs the project of a solidary and fraternal world where it becomes comprehensible to God because we show his face of understanding, pardon, mercy, fondness, happiness of giving... “Donated God that is revealed this way making us arrive his attention and his special presence. The face appears as the place of the special revelation of the internal movements of the spirit: anger, happiness, laugh and cry; so that way, is manifested in the face of God that is love. And in view of the love they begin to shine the faces of the men” (J. Moltmann).

Urges, therefore, an anthropology based on the love that is always new and creates new cultures based on being more than in being able to, to have or to seem. Until arriving to “to have the vision of God and to be similar to Him “(1 Jn.3, 2) and “to contemplate his glory” (Rm.5, 2; Col.1, 27) fullness of the life.

The Holy Spirit in whose year proposed by the Church to have it specially present, we celebrate this Encounter, He is creative of hope here and there, he makes arise people, groups, communities from the love and for the hope. He engendered the Hope in that young nazarena, Maria, like He raised in the Florentine youth, Philip Neri, the only reason of his hope: Jesus Christ. “the one that wants another thing that is not Jesus Christ, he doesn't know what wants; the one that looks for another thing that is not Jesus Christ, he doesn't know what he looks for; the one that doesn't work for Jesus Christ, doesn't know why he works.” The same Spirit that has congregated us like oratorian family call us to answer today knowing and interpreting the signal of the times, keys of the contemporary culture, accepting the genuinely human values and presenting, with the testimony, the force humanizing and evangelizing of the Gospel, avoiding the deviations that can transform to the religion into any form of personal or collective alignment.

I mention some words of the now recently deceased rewards Nobel of Literature 1990, Octavio Paz, essayist and Mexican poet: “Our history is mainly passed and present. The past discover us and the present interrogates us. The true presence challenge us.”

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The past discover us.

Our past, as oratorian family, has a name, Philip Neri. His spirit and his mood discover us.

The values that can offer the Oratory in our cultural moment come from its spirituality. Speaking in a Christian way, it cannot have but spirituality that the one that comes from the Holy Spirit, he formed Jesus in Maria breast, the day of the Announcement; in the primitive community, the day of Pentecost; and in each one of us in the day of our baptism. He is the soul of the Church giving it life, illuminating it with his gifts and enriching it with his charisma so that it can give testimony of Christ through the History. He is the incarnate love of God; the one that transforms and it purifies the hearts changing them of selfish and cowards in generous and valiant, of straits and calculators in open and removed; the one that lit in the home with their fire of to the Church the flame of the love to the needful until giving them life.

The Holy Spirit doesn't narrow but rather it dilates, it doesn't contain neither it encapsulates but rather it pushes and send toward the service of the love.

Although it seems weak among the big powers of the alone world the love is strong. It is not a vague feeling, ineffective, neither of empty sentences, but of works of charity creative, practice and effective that promoted the big men and women of the love that were the saints, as witness and instruments of the Holy Spirit. But we cannot produce this love, neither to replace it with technical psychological, ideological, rationalists or only impulses. We must go with our persevering prayer to the Holy Spirit so that He lights us in the fire of his love, so that we see the poor person as Christ see him, let us love him as Christ loves him and let us serve as Christ would serve him in his time, and he wants to continue making it in ours, now by us.

Philip Neri sensed this deep mystery of love and he didn't cease of requesting it. “The love of God has been spilled in our hearts thanks to the Holy Spirit” (Rm.5, 5). That Pentecost day of 1534 in the San Sebastián catacombs, Philip will become exceptional temple of the Spirit; How it was? we have left his “my secret is for me.” Everything the rest will reveal it to us his life like fruit of the Spirit.

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Philip embodies a model of being person.

The title of the last work appeared on St. Philip Neri: “La Conquista de la libertad. Vida de San Felipe Neri” it can be good to synthesize the spiritual mood of his life and to know his more intimate aspirations. Anyone of the two phrases had been valid because St. Philip's life was not but the search of the freedom of the God’s sons.

The freedom is specifically a quality human “the man cannot be guided to the good but freely” (GS, 17) that is developed in two intimately related planes: coercion freedom and action freedom. Without freedom it is impossible the happiness, neither the sanctity and both are to look for them in the Truth. Jesus Christ is the Road, Truth and Life. In Him we are free.

The freedom trains when we choose a project of life in the one that feel ourselves, guided toward the essential but always in solidary attitude with the other ones. The true freedom commits in an freedom action making of the man instrument of freedom, generating around it spaces of freedom so that they reach who don't still enjoy it.

Philip is a teacher in this. He wants the freedom of himself to meet with the Father's will who we only have to wait the maximum good. Nobody can want bigger good that God for ourselves since is Love in his essence and ‘He cannot refuse to itself ' (2Tim 2,13). In Him he will put all his trust and he will live the life like gift and like grace. He doesn't trust neither of himself.

The humility that was also one of its spiritual characteristics, will have to understand it from this ‘distrust in himself ', synonymous of the conscience of its own limits to rest in the Almighty. The humility opens the way to the hope in that the action of God has freedom power.

The humility adorned him of a spontaneous, simple and natural mood. It was the way of make relative everything that is not but appearance and vanity and that it sterilizes the life. His jokes and his fine humour, his extravagances and his eccentricity, those that are applied to himself and those that applied to his penitents, are not but occasion to remove the importance of himself and not to lose the essential sense.

The fruit will be the happiness and the party of which is happy with simple and little things. A saint, also utopian, they say that they are the ones that move to the world, Tomás Moro, with certain English humour he also knew how to discover this reality: “Blessed who know how to laugh of themselves because their amusement won't have end “.

His experience tells him that it is not easy to be liberated personally of the ties and external slaveries (family, social, political…) neither of the interns pursuit (complex, ambitions, personal insecurity, immaturity…) that coerce our longings of authentic happiness and they prevent us to locate us its way. The rupture with the human or social conditions and also with clergy conditions are not but show of wanting to run in the clear words of the Gospel and this seems in him a clear goal.

To be happy in God is his great desire and his great election. To strengthen and to purify those yearnings search the elected solitude. Friend of the sea is made, of the mountain, of the stars of the sky… he enjoys the fraternity with the nature, he speaks to the flowers and he caresses the animals as God’s sons, and he should dream of flying as the birds. He frequented the coexistence with them and the coexistence in them.

The search of the essential, of the important, was a constant in his life from very young until his death. He was to find the fair value of each thing and to locate it regarding the absolute value of the only thing in what he discovered what is worthwhile because he gave satisfaction to his most intimate yearnings: God.

To be free of as much as it hindered him to carry out his project he becomes poor, he lives in a continuous detachment attitude and austerity. Coarse with the necessary. The rest, generously shares it.

To be free he frequently celebrates the sacrament of the Penance that reconciles him with the Father, with the brothers, with the creation. The pardon created fraternity, space to live the love, and it guides the human being deep desire making encounter of its maximum aspiration of happiness: to love and to be loved.

To be free he chooses not to accept anything that it can injure his prophetic voice neither in the society of their time, very generating of appearances and of anxieties characteristic of a culture of the vertigo, for the man's ‘without-measure’ exaltation trying to give him his roll in the History; neither in the Church: he chooses to be secular, and when for obedience priest is ordered, he chooses to be forever it without more additions (to be cardinal, declined several times).

For what we see that he carries out with the other ones we can sense that his interior motor was to return to the Christian sources, to the lifestyle of the first Christian and of the martyrs to offer in his historical moment a cultural alternative to the humanist movement of the Renaissance.

In Jesus' first followers he saw how they loved each other and how much the value should be of what they waited: Jesus Christ that should come for second time to meet with its established Kingdom, Kingdom of peace and justice, of life and truth, Kingdom of grace and of love, Kingdom that has begun already, Kingdom that won't have end. And in the catacombs of the Church and from the catacombs of his spiritual interior he prayed and prayed requesting the Spirit of love that would make him live the other fundamental dimension of his freedom: to be free to love.

Then the happiness overflows and it arrives to its fullness when his life, fed daily by the Eucharist, he can make life for the other ones and his paschal life is made face of God, embodied and universal charity for everyone need it: sick, pilgrims, young, penitents, gypsies, artists, workers, bankers and managers, religious, cardinal and also Popes. Everyone! Subject of his love, none objects of his love.

The man is not free to fall of his psychological or spiritual narcissism but to be owner of his own acts and to reach his maturity that makes them to be able to make relative of every human project without transcendence.

The love that irradiates and distills life, generates a space, the Oratory, that will be prayer school, of freedom and of love, of learning and of happiness, where to find in a festival way the game of the sense of the existence: school of hope.

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The present interrogates us.

Until the year 1983, the Pope John Paul II, has put to the Church in state of New Evangelization, in mission state. The Pope has not ceased of explain the contents, the reasons and the ends of this renovated evangelization the entirety of the documents that he offers to the Church from that date.

The New evangelization obeys the ‘without christian faith’ situation of nations with Christian roots. It is a renovated evangelization: in the announcement kerigmatic of the Gospel, in the call to the conversion, in the aggregation and dynamism of the communion, in the internal reordering and missionary of the Church and its institutions, in the setting-up of the God’s Kingdom in the heart of the society, as soul of the civilization of the love. It is not to begin again, neither of repeating the road already journey, but of giving a new ardor, method and expression to the evangelization work, of re-doing the union of the ecclesiastic communities and the offer of the Christian lattice of the human society. This novelty is a biographical event in who welcome, live and irradiate it. “This new evangelization, not directed only to each one of persons, but also to whole groups of populations in their most varied situations, atmospheres and cultures, it is dedicated to the mature ecclesiastic communities formation, in which the faith is able to liberate and to carry out all its native meant of adhesion to Christ's person and his Gospel, of encounter and Eucharist communion with Him, of existence lived in the charity and in the service” (ChL n.34).

For the Third Millennium evangelization, John Paul II proposed to Philip Neri like model of evangelizing in the message directed to the Oratorian Family with reason of the IV Centennial of his ‘Dies Natalis '. The evangelization understands a series of varied and integrated elements: the humanity's renovation, testimony, explicit announcement, heart adhesion, entrance in the community, welcome of the signs and apostolate initiative.

The current moment to which we have come closer in these days claims us, it interrogates us and it expects from us.

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The True Presence challenge us.

The offer that like oratorians must propose to the Third Millennium society sunk in the disenchant and in the utopia lack it must necessarily pass by the force of the personal testimony, of the creativity and of the love, manifesting the being's primacy on the view; of the community about the individualism, of the progress based on ‘the peace, justice’s work' (Is 32,17) about the pillaging and the inequality born of the hedonist's selfishness, ‘cancer of our biosphere ' (Jesús Mosteria, journalist), of the hope on the disenchant.

Our proposal must be the offer of a project that it advances a better, possible, and be able to realize future: Jesus' project, the Kingdom of God.

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TOOLS OF WORK

Texts:

ALEIXANDRE V. Mis poemas mejores

ELLACURIA I. Utopia y profetismo en América Latina.

PABLO VI. Evangelii Nuntiandi. N. 21

JUAN PABLO II Redemptor Hominis. N.15

JUAN PABLO II Christifideles Laici. N.16

JUAN PABLO II Tertio Millenio Adveninente. N.46

LOPEZ AZPITARTE E. Etica y Vida.

Dialogue on:

Signs of hope that we discover in our culture

What liberation movements the Christian should collaborate with

Space and actions that the Oratory can offer to respond to the call of the of Third Millennium Church.

I – Have hope (poem).

Do you understand it? You have understood it.

Do you repeat it? And you repeat it again.

Sit down. Don't look back. Ahead!

Ahead. Get up. A little more. It is the life.

It is the road. What do you take the forehead covered with, perspiration, thorns, powder, bitterness, loveless, without tomorrow…?

Continue, continue ascending. It lacks a little. How young Oh you are!.

How young, what so young that recently born. How ignorant.

Among your hair gray dead on the forehead your clear blue eyes shine,

With so vivacity, your slow pure eyes, there down some veil.

Oh, don't hesitate and still run. What do you want?

Take your stick of white ash-tree and lean on. An arm at your side wanted.

Look at it.

Look at it, don't you feel it? There, all of a sudden it is still. It is a silent bundle.

Hardly the color of its tunic denounces it. And in your hearing a non said word.

A word without music although you are listening to it.

A word with wind, with fresh breeze. The one that moves your worn-out dresses.

The one that smoothly airs your forehead. The one that dries your face,

the one that dries the rake of those tears.

The one that trims, hardly touches now your gray hair in the immediacy of the night.

Catch to that white arm. To that that you grieve you know but that you recognize.

Rise and look at the blue line of the incredible twilight,

The line of the hope in the limit of the earth.

And with big sure steps, straighten out and, there, leaning, confident, alone,

throw quickly to walk….

(ALEIXANDRE V. Mis Poemas Mejores. Gredos, Dol. Antología Hispánica, No.6)

II–

The utopian ideal of the full human freedom for all is not possible more than for a liberation process, so that it is not primarily the freedom the one that engenders the liberation, but rather it is nevertheless the liberation the one that engenders the freedom, the mutual relationship among the two moments.

There is not real and full freedom for all if it is not a liberation process. The problem of the priority of the justice or the freedom is solved for the unit of both in the liberation. Justice cannot be given without freedom, neither freedom without justice in real terms, although there is a priority of that envelope this, at least understood both in a social and political sense. The liberation that looks for the freedom in all way of oppression, anyone that is, it is as a process of ‘justification', the real way of powering the freedom and the conditions that make it possible.

To want to outline the problem of the freedom to the margin of the liberation is to avoid the problem of the full freedom and of the freedom for all:

Personally, the freedom is not modernized fully, but for laborious liberation processes in front of all luck of interior and external slaveries.

But it is so undoubtedly that the called freedom of the liberalism, it is only available for who has with what to exercise it (company freedom, press freedom, political pluralism, etc.)

The liberation understands as liberation in all way of oppression and liberation for a shared freedom that allows us liberation forms. It is not very sense to speak of freedom when the space of its bring up to date is reduced by the unsatisfied basic necessities, for drastic limitations of real possibilities among those to choose and for impositions of all nature, especially the leaning in the force and the terror ones. It is not enough with the liberation - of and a liberation is required - toward or for the freedom already modernized, but this freedom or it is shared with everybody or it necessarily implies dominance forms. It is not enough with the freedom of one sustained in the slavery of all, neither the freedom of someone sustained in the no - freedom of most, but the freedom of all in the world (and not only in some rich nations) without dominance of anybody. It is a march toward the utopia of the freedom that it would imply the liberation of the sin, of the law and of the death (Rom 6-8) and whose goal is to be revealed what is to be God’s sons, the freedom and the glory of God’s sons by a liberation process (Rom 8, 18-26), reproducing, , ‘its Son's features, so this was the one bigger than a brothers multitude' (Rom 8,29)

(ELLACURIA I. Utopia y Profetismo en América Latina. En la obra colectiva Utopia y Profetismo.Evangelio y Liberación, Madrid, 1989 pp. 92-93

III–

Let us suppose a group of Christian that inside the human community where they live, they manifest their capacity of understanding and acceptance, their communion of life and destination with the other ones, their solidarity to the efforts of everything in everything that exists of noble and of good… Let us, also, suppose that they irradiate in a simple and spontaneous way their faith in the values that go beyond the average values, and their hope in something that is not seen and in what they would not dare to dream… this testimony already constitutes by itself an effective proclamation of the Good News. Let us conserve the sweet and soothing happiness of evangelizing… it is the biggest happiness in our lives surrendered to God and God willing! the current world that sometimes looks for, with anguish, the Good News can receive it not from sad and discouraged evangelizers, impatient and broken-hearted, but by servants of the Gospel whose life irradiates the fervor of those that have received, before anything in themselves, Christ's happiness.

(Evangelii Nuntiandi no. 21; 80).

IV-

Our time’s civilization progress of the technique and the development that it is marked by the domain of the technique, demand a proportional development of the morals and of the ethics. Meanwhile, this last one seems, unfortunately, to have been behind. For that reason, this progress ,apart from this, so wonderful where is difficult not to also discover authentic signs of the man's greatness, that have been revealed in their creative germs in the pages of the Genesis book, in the description of the creation, it is not able to less than engendering multiple restlessness. The first restlessness refer to the essential and fundamental question: Does this process, whose author and instigator is the man, make the man's life worthier? It cannot be doubted that, in many aspects, I make it this way. Nevertheless, this question is made obstinately regarding the truly essential: if the man, as soon as man, in the context of this progress, is made seriously better, that is to say, more mature spiritually, more aware of his humanity's dignity, more responsible, more open to the other ones, particularly to the neediest and the weakest, more available to give and to lend help to all. This question that the Christian should be made, because Jesus Christ has universally sensitized this way them around the man's problem. The same question should also be formulated all the men, especially, those that belong to the social atmospheres that are devoted actively to the development and the progress in our times.

(Redemptor Hominis, No. 15)

V -

The life according to the Spirit whose fruit is the sanctification (cf. Rom 6,22; Gal 5,22), it raises and demands from everyone and of each one of those baptized the pursuit and Jesus Christ imitation, in the reception of their blessedness, in listening and meditating the Word of God, in the conscious and active participation in the liturgical and sacramental life of the Church, in the individual, family and community prayer, in the hunger and thirst of justice, in taking to the practice the commandment of the love in all the circumstances of the life and in the service to the brothers, especially if it is the smallest, of the poor ones and of those that suffer.

(Christifideles laici, N. 16)

VI–

In this escatologic dimension, the believers will be called to discover the theological virtue of the hope about which ‘was already instructed by the Word of the truth, the Gospel ' (Col 2,5). The fundamental hope attitude, of a part moves the Christian not to losing of view the final goal that gives sense and value to its whole existence and, of other, it offers him solid and deep motivations for the daily effort in the reality transformations to make it according with the project of God.

As the apostle Pablo remembers: ‘Because we know that the whole creation groans until the present and it suffers childbirth pains. And not only it, but also us that possess the Spirit’s first fruits, we groans in our interior yearning the rescue of our body. Because our salvation is a ‘hope’ (Rom 8,22-24). The Christian are called to get ready to the Third Millennium Great Jubilee renovating their hope in the definitive coming of God’s Kingdom, preparing it day to day in their heart, in the Christian community to which they belong, in the social context where they live and also in the history of the world.

It is necessary also, the present sings of hope to be considered and deepened in this last century end, in spite of the shades that frequently hide them to our eyes: in the civil field, the progresses carried out by the science, by the technics and mainly for the medicine to the service of the human life, a more alive sense of responsibility in relation to the atmosphere, the efforts to reestablish the peace and the justice where they have been violated, the reconciliation and solidarity will among the diverse towns, in particular in the complex relationship between the North and the South of the world…; in the ecclesiastic field, a more attentive listen to the voice of the Spirit through the welcome of the charisma and the promotion of the laicity, the intense dedication to the cause of the unit of all the Christian, the open space to the dialogue with the religions and with the contemporary culture…

(Tertio Millenio Adveniente, N. 46)

VII–

The immediate concern doesn't consist in how to feed, at the moment, to all the guests to the table, but in the unjust and dramatic distribution that we have made with the diners although the nutritious production is, at the moment, more than enough to maintain the world population, near 730 million people don't feed the necessary for a normal work and other 340 millions don't have the vital minimum of calories.

The injustice of the distribution is too evident. The richest countries that constitute the population's 25%, consume near 90% of the matters (...)

In the London Conference of 89 it was showed the antagonism of the interests: the one of the industrialized countries that want to preserve the health of their inhabitants now prohibiting the production or use of polluting elements, or the one of the Third World countries that underline the injustice of these measures when the rich ones have based their well-being on this spoil of the nature and now it is prevented the poor to alleviate in something their misery with the same methods of those that they took advantage. The surpass of this enormous imbalance would not be possible but for the communication of goods among all. But does exist any country willing to give up its level of life partly to share it with others?

(LOPEZ AZPITARTE E. Etica y Vida. Paulinas, Madrid, 1990, pp. 314-315).

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SEMMINAR: THE PEDAGOGY OF SAINT PHILIP NERI [14]

P. Jacques Bombardier

Nancy, Francia.

Introduction

As always, when we want to treat a Philippine topic, we must look at St. Philip actions, to answer the question that we put here. Some maxims will serve us to illuminate the facts of the life of our Saint Father, but it is essentially while looking at it him, that we will understand him.

Saint Philip in the culture of the Renaissance.

What did he find?

The city of Rome, where St. Philip arrives in 1532, was a city in crisis: the traumatism of the Pillage marked deeply the spirits, but produce all fruits of conversion imaginable ! In a certain sense, all the antiques costumes were corrected, the ones of the faithful as the ones of the members of the hierarchy that inhabited the country.

Of one coast, the decadent estheticism of the oldest.

St. Philip found in the oldest of his time a culture completely aesthetics (as he had known in Florence): « Of this new epicureism, Léon X had shown the gentleness better than anyone and he had let see his fragility. A correct moral life, blameless, that was only a supreme elegance; to give up to passions repels to the dilettante, such in love with the harmony. But so that one so frail obstacle is sufficient, it is also necessary that the weariness of a race and the early sclerosis of a civilization, that decline of its own refinement, deadened appetites of the flesh and concerns of the esprit » (Louis Bouyer LB,20)

In the other hand, in youth, a very real paganism.

A new, infinitely more disturbing paganism that the elder. « For those Christian of atavism, to who were revealed the human's magic, nothing more but human, the defended field of the flesh appears under a veil of nostalgia, as a lost paradise of the spirit. This paganism is enveloped of beauty, and in it, the most perverse sin will only be a weird experience» (21). What is more admirable, it is «the faculty inexhaustible to try all promise of senses or heart. To act, without judging if the action is good or bad. To prove without getting worried if that is good or bad » (21).

Because this reason, this paganism is a « neon-paganism » post-Christian that it is more disturbing and more perverse than the one of the antique. These Christian that don't feel the attraction of God's spirit anymore, the depths that he dug in the changing sensitivity of the caves where resound enormously the most common voices of the instinct » (21).

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1. The pedagogy of St. Philip

What did he make?

The Institutions of Christian reconquest of previous age, tempted him maybe one moment but no one kept him definitely, even the admiration for Savonarola ! Florence's political events[15] convinced him that cannot exist a Christian State anymore and that it is necessary henceforth to worry of people and hearts, to forge the Christian people who will inspire the government of the Christian State and will enliven ‘the inside city’. Even the new foundation of St. Ignace, in spite of the esteem that he has, didn’t attract him, probably because it was so institutional to his eyes[16].

And it is without know, without even wanting it, - because St. Philip lives without refined in advance project– in the fidelity to his interior inspirations that our Saint Father is going to invent his manner, so particular and so original to undertake the new evangelism of the Roman society of his time.

« At the encounter of the Renaissance paganism and its subtle seductions, he will advance without other weapon that the most powerful seduction of the purity and the truth » (23). The enterprise was delicate : « attack the demonic forces, as those that snake under flowers of the Renaissance, by the only charity... to expose to its disturbing prestige, a simplicity in appearance without weapons » (26). But « its scandalous method will make of it the victorious apostle of Rome paganism» (26). He doesn't condemn any other method: but they aren’t to him!

« He lets to all immediate accesses to his thought and his heart... Everything will be soul of his singular tactical and he will try to his fight won’t be refused and he will fight to evade his dialogue influence » (23) He has easy contact: « He make circle with the poor multitude, he is called and answers without getting tired, he gives to one a good word, to the other a gesture accomplice of his diaphanous hand, he has always a smile for everyone because he considerates to each one a person » (p.11). « He goes right to the youth, of which he feels father and he feels they are lost for Christ. He is going to the reconquer of the ones that were faraway and now are coming, seems to let see his incomparable beauty » (22).

« Look at him, now, like a Socrates[17], once again, he seems to have nothing to do but to wander through the Roman streets. (...) With a joke while passing, what surprise the most and maybe enveloped his life, was a great perception of a singular shrewdness. In a man’s word, the man himself, is revealed to him, Philip discovered him incidentally and his own penetration in the intimate of souls and the Christ's love that burned in him for the others...

Let's notice that St. Philip doesn't teach any particular doctrine, don't impose any special practice... the most he does is to suggest... But ... can’t live some time with him without becoming another person. Oneself will impose changes that Philip didn't even propose... This apostate almost vain that begins like a simple friendship and that finishes in the same way, but between both all the life of a soul is communicate to the other one, it is, already, the character that will remain like the most constant of oratorian methods forever» (24-25)

His model is certainly the Priest Pievano Arlotto « Did he found in him his own manner, rush, natural and slightly gracious, to make relationships with things and people that are adapted with a perfect goodness of soul ? » (p.17)

Questions

A so original apostolic manner is not without of being questioned ! « Didn’t Philip give up, merely, to the optimism of the Renaissance? Didn’t his apostate based in confidence and freedom forget the original sin? Didn’t his religion without tears, leave the human nature, abandoned in its forces, what the grace must conquer with the ascetic? (25-26)

His method is audacious but it rests on Philip's interior life « He hid jealously to those that believe the witnesses of all his existence »(26). This let us think that when he describes, in one of his maxims, the three spiritual life degrees[18], he delivers his own path and makes us confidence on his interior state: « the third degree can be called angelical life; it is to this life that arrives who after being exercised a long time to defeat their passions, receive of God a restful, calm and nearly angelic life, because in this world, we don’t feel more but obstacles and problems. It is good to arrive to the second of these three degrees and to persevere there because God will grant himself the third when he will judge convenable »[19].

« After being exercised a long time to defeat their passions»... Let's not forget the penitent period of the beginnings in his stay in Rome and his style of life that manifest to him: a frugal and simple life, alone prayer life in catacombs, churches, streets of the city and his readings of ‘desert’s Fathers’, « the oldest of my temper » as he will tell later to Gallonio.

This interior life is connected, surely, to a very original place that St. Philip « visited during 10 years »[20]: catacombs of St. Sebastian, the only ones known then in Rome and that were called « the grotto ». « His amazing freedom in the frivolous world where so many others, and so many saints even, don't dare to adventure without multiples parapet, has its dark root in the sacred catacombs’ world » where God filled him of his presence « when He judged favorable ». This is, exactly, what he declared in his Maxims, before mentioned: in the catacombs « he received of God a restful, calm and nearly angelic life, even in this world ».

And also, the way borrowed by St. Philip for himself is like a times’ symbol: the via Appia is a mortuary avenue, broadside of the two sides by tomb of the Roman pagan that fascinated too much to the Renaissance Roman[21]. St. Philip cross it to restore to Christian necropolis of catacombs; in this pagan Rome, he was going there to look for the faithful brothers, who had given everything, who had lost everything because of Christ ! «Streghthen in the martyrs communion, overwhelmed of these virginal sources of an entirely Christendom completely died to the world for live in God, he will be able to live in this world as already being beside God, use this world, according to the apostle’s word, as if he don’t use it, as being so concient of the future world that in having this world, he abandon it... After the penitent years, saturated of night, his soul died and born again in the resurrect Christ during the day » (20-30)

It is in this place frequented each night where is located the event that marks interior life of St. Philip: the Pentecost of 1544. This is the narration of Galloni : « Philip also had a daily habit of pray, specially to the Holy Spirit and to ask him with humility His graces and grants... While he was praying, a day of the year 1544 with big fervor, he felt suddenly in his heart such an explosion of the love of the Holy Spirit that it flooded, that the heart started beating so strong in his chest that it could be hear from outside. It seems like if this big love wanted to take his heavy body to the Heaven » (Vita, p. 21 ss. ) Capecelatro, his biographer of the 19^th century wrote: « His prayer was overflowing of love, but the love never is enough, he prayed, asking for more and a bigger love... God’s love overflowed from his soul, it spilled in his body and it flow blood toward his heart with such a strength that it made him to be illuminated. Eyes, mouth, forehead... everything was illuminated... With that experience, Philip was full of happiness, a happiness that born of God’s love.

The Result

« To his disciples, St. Philip didn’t bring the only triumphs of the Spirit over the floored flesh but the victory more secret and higher that gives back the real love to the same flesh of the heart purified. This success is definitely the highest of Philip... This miracle, has no key, nor method to arrive there, it has no practice to capture it, otherwise the depth of this absorption in the Holy Spirit gotten by the calm perseverance of a faith immediately engage. » (72).

In this context takes sense the choice of the church for the reading of the Mass of St. Philip[22]. St. Paul frequently berates the paganism of his edge (see for example, the Roman Epistle) and invite to take in account, in the grace, the best of the pagan inheritance of his edge. It is what made St. Philip; far to be a condemnation of the paganism, his life was an assumption in the purification of the grace, of the best of his edge. Let's notice finally that the paulinienne invitation to his disciples (v.9) to imitate him, is worth also for St. Philip and his sons!

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2. The Oratory as common fulfillment of the pedagogy of St. Philip.

All this experience of St. Philip will find again in the Oratory.

In the Oratory, our Saint Father will want to communicate to his sons his spiritual experience. To keep them free in the world as he was, he will transpose common and usually what was his personal experience.

This is what justifies the means use with his sons: times of prayer and silent prayer, the devotion to the Holy Spirit and the Sacred Virgin, pilgrimages to saints, the brotherly and happy life, his short prayers that projected his soul, the ascetic advises (in particular the struggle against self-esteem) the Maxims and memories, the reading of Saints Fathers of the desert... and even the Laudes that will serve to express joy that overflows with hearts lived by the Holy Spirit.

For St. Philip, the Oratory of the afternoon, has a special place, where the crowd meet. The one of the Sunday (in particular the walk) is only an approach of soul; the one of the afternoon forms them to the sanctity! (see Ponelle p. 349)[23]. The Oratory in the night is for the intimate, like a conclusion of the day.

Indeed, the Oratory is founded by Philip to pull « to the quarter inhabitants » to God's oblivion, to the ignorance, to blindness and seduction of the sin. His alone and amorous contemplation of God made born his compassion that carries him to make all possible to save the neighbor. The objective of the work is, therefore, the conversion and the sanctification.

This central preoccupation explains the style convenient of the work. If there is brotherly life, if there is active apostate (predication, catechism, meetings) is in the orientation of the conversion and the sanctification. But the apostate is like an overflow of the calm of soul of St. Philip that has communicated to his neighbor. It is this brotherly sanctification the one evangelizer, as by addition, by emanation, by contagion ! ... without notice it! St. Philip converted Rome without particular project, without even thinking it. He tried merely to convert his neighbors, to drive them nearer as possible to the Lord in the certainty that saints sanctify those that get approach and they push to their neighbors toward God. Baronio will insist with strength in the act that the Oratory is the imitation of the primitive church, where faithful only had one heart and one soul. It is while living in a perfect charity that the Oratory attracted and evangelized.

This central preoccupation of the conversion explains as the central place of the penitence sacrament (receipt every day for the nearest disciples), of the common spiritual direction in the Oratory, prolonged by the direction spiritual more personal. Is evangelized by the baptism, and is re-evangelized by the sacrament of penitence.

This is the result : the evident testimonies of the variety of people won to God by this Philippine pedagogy: « The Oratory, from now on is provided of a variegated clientele. Old colleagues of the Pilgrims Trinity,... courtly people recently free of the world’s corruption, scholars and physicians accustomed to bourgeois meetings; Florentines tradesmen; druggist ; people of profession, a tailor, a painter... By a luck that will be judge later as providential, a musician made part of the troop, the famous Giovanni Animuccia. He entered to the Oratory the same year when he followed to Palestine in the responsibility of the Chapel of St. Peter. He attracted fellows, and with his arrive, every Oratory day was visited by a lot of singers to add a polyphonic anthem meetings (...) There is no doubt that Philip was delighted with this diversity and enjoyed this confusion of lords and craftsmen, of literate and of simple... Philip searched, he accentuated contrasts. It is necessary to notice more that all his recruits were lays» (Ponelle p. 123-154). St. Philip take out the man’s badness while develop the goodness in him (in particular by the sacrament of penitence); he doesn't invite lays to follow him to come out of the world (except those that have God's specific call) nor to change garment or profession, or to conform themselves to a unique model: he invites them to make a stop in their life, rejecting the bad and developing the good, to last in the fidelity to God thanks to the Oratory and to follow each his grace. This is how St. Philip converted his generation and kept the better of the Renaissance. But notice well, that all these people that convert were near to Mr. Philip: take care of those that are « near of his hand », of those that can often meet, daily, freely. He doesn't believe he can take care of the ones that are far of him.

The radiance of the Oratory is fundamentally hold to the quiet certainty that lives in St. . Philip and that radiates to those that approach him. This quiet certainty comes, as we have seen, of his lone contemplation in catacombs or, later, on the roof of his home; it also comes from his theological study: just what he did, because too much science swells... just what he did!, Philip always astonished, even to the most scholarly, because of his extreme precision and his big quality of documentation, as well as because the shrewdness of his theological developments[24].

This quiet certainty also comes from the quality natural development of the man, and of St. Philip, of course! As said in the epistle to the Philipians read in his Mass. « Everything what is of truth, of noble, of just, of pure, of agreeable, of honorable, everything that is virtue and of human praise, is what we must take care of. Everything you learned, received, heard and noted in me, is what you must exercise, and then the God of the Peace will be with you » (4,8-9)

But all the means practiced within the Oratory (prayers and short prayers, study, pilgrimage to saints, in particular to martyrs, devotion to the Holy Spirit and the Sacred Virgin, natural virtues...) are not realized to them been taken in the grace of sacraments, in a big love of the church, and they also radiate in an active charity to the sick and poor. It is especially understood the important place that had the Eucharist, in the frequent communion either in the worship, as good as in the life of St. Philip as in the life of the lays that surrounds him. It transforms their flesh, it unifies their persons, it establishes them in God.

« Concentrate us completely in the Divine love, entering in the living source of wisdom, hiding ourselves in the injury chest of our Divine Savior, is how we can forget ourselves and our own love and to become incapable to find our road out of this Sacred injury »[25].

It will be so true for St. Philip, that at the end of his life, he will stay so in the Eucharist which he will need a lot of hours to celebrate the Mass and that he will celebrate it alone.

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SEMMINAR: MARIAN SPIRITUALITY IN THE ORATORY

P. Alberto Venturoli

Roma

THE SACRED MATERNAL VIRGIN MARÍA’S FIGURE, AS SIGN OF THE CHURCH IN THE ORATORIAN SPIRTUALITY

INTRODUCTION

To love Maria is insurance sign of eternal life. Now then, such a love, it is not limited to only beautiful words, but rather it should be proven with the facts that take us to forget our own interests, to look for the well-being, the happiness, the dear person's glory. The love to a person is manifested in the degree in that we are able to sacrifice us for her. "None has a bigger love that this: to Give the life for the own friends" (Jn. 15,13). The love toward the Sacred Virgin is proven by the capacity that we have of sacrificing us for her love! Maria is our Mother and our Lawyer. Jesus is who has given her to us... (Jn 19,27). And God orders us to honor Our Mother... to be able to attract us the celestial blessings, to be able to have long life (Cfr. Former. 20,12), to be able to have Eternal Life in the heaven. To the foot of the cross Maria was given as all the men's Mother, but in a very special way she was given as Mother of Juan... of us the Padres Filipenses, of us those that we follow the spirituality oratoriana. Sacrosanct our duty is the one of honoring in a very special way to Our Sacred Mother: “Be devote of Maria" (St. Philip Neri). Now then, to love Maria, it mustn’t be enough to speak well of her, to exalt her virtues, to pray many prayers... because to the Mother, more than for the beautiful words of the children for their works, for their behavior, e.g. : St. Philip Neri, the Oratory, the Congregation, the Chiesa Nuova, etc.

It is with this purpose that when writing the following reflections, more than theological and mystic reflections, I have considered practical conclusions... that they drive our ministerial-pastoral life, all our way of thinking, of judging, of speaking and of serving in the best way possible to the way of thinking, of speaking and of acting of Our Mother Maria. Are not we, all of us, children of her predilection? It is not our duty, ‘a filial duty’, making all this to example of St. Philip Neri, in such a way that our work serves only to surrender honor and glory Her? We will only this way become sign, emblem or prophecy of Maria in the Church. We will only this way express their maternal figure in the Church - Town of God. To look at Maria, Virgin and Mother, and to present it as the ideal figure and the Maximum expression of how the Church should welcome Jesus Christ to be the true Flock of God: “Like in fact, the Mother of God and the intact Virgin took in her arms to the True Light and she came closer to those that were in darkness, likewise we... should go to the encounter of That that is the “True Light" (LG 55ss). The eternal predestination of the Incarnation of the Verb was, at the same time -the LG declares - the predestination of the Sacred Virgin Maria to be the Mother of the Church. In her, by means of the Oratory, we are covered in the divine Maternity.

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THE MATERNAL FIGURE OF THE SACRED VIRGIN MARIA

On Maria, maternal figure of the Church, the Vatican II gives a teaching of high level " Mariológic ", of a clear pastoral orientation, of firm ascetic dimension. In the nums. 63-65 the LG speaks expressly of Maria, figure of the Church and, of Her, as Virgin and Mother." In the Mystery of the Church, which is also exactly called " Mother " and " Virgin ", the Sacred Virgin Maria has been presented, in an eminent and singular way, as Virgin and like Mother, since for her faith and obedience engendered on the earth to the same Son of God without male's intervention, but covered by the shade of the Holy Spirit. As well as Jesus' Mother, glorified in body and soul in the heaven, is in this way image and beginning of the Church that she will have her fullness in the escatologic, in the earth she shines presently, before the town pilgrim of God, as sign of sure hope and comfort, until the Day of Lord arrives (Cfr. 2 Pe 3,10). Now then, this singular figure of the Santa Church is alive in the oratorian " soul ", stiller, She is uncannily active and she has pastoral effectiveness. As well we know it, St. Philip chose as emblem of our Congregation, the Virgin's divine Maternity. Such a symbol is reproduced in an image (bajorrelieve) in the facade of the Chiesa Nuova or Saint Maria in Vallicela; which causes a continuous evocation of thoughts and of personal and community initiatives; such a symbol full with deep meaning all pedagogic apostolic activity. Unfortunately, the few documents written by St. Philip Neri about Maria’s maternity, they could make think, at first sight that the marian aspect of its spirituality was rather weak. Still when his writings were destroyed voluntarily, his works - as the popular organization of the devotion to the Virgin, the Oratory, the daily preached Word of God, the Sacraments, the confession box, their influence exercised on their spiritual children and on eminent characters and saints, the foundation of the Congregation - they demonstrate the deep marian witnesses in St. Philip Neri's activity and his influence in the Roman spiritual life of his time and of the successive centuries. As already shortly have described it, Pippo Buono's devotion toward the divine maternity, acquires life in its works. Our Saint said, in an ironic and amusing language:” Oh, oh, oh, I speak a lot and I make little!”. In the process for the aggregation to our Institute, according to a well founded primitive tradition and unfortunately today a little careless, we find that, for who sought enters in the Congregation and therefore to enter to the oratorian spirituality, he should make a general confession and to accept the Sacred Virgin as Mother and Lawyer. It was in this way, like it consented to the taking of habit and with this the guarantee of the perseverance was acquired, consolidated by such a consecration. I find that it would not be bad recapturing this practice so eloquent and devote instituted with such an ardor by the founder, with which Jesus' words directed to the Apostle Juan would be completed very well: “Son, there is your Mother... and from that moment the pupil took her to his house" (Jn 19,27). The Sacred divine Maria’s maternity should be the presentation letter for us the oratorians. We should, and people that we guide spiritually, to always find Jesus, as they made it those famous shepherds among his Mother's arms in Belén, and as they also found it so many people by means of the pastoral activity and mystic of “our Parents”. The maternal figure of the Sacred Virgin juts out in a singular way in the practice of the charity. This charity was for St. Philip Neri quasi-embody, perennial example and norm of life. For St. Philip Neri, such a charity became emblem and bond for all the members of the Oratorians Congregations. But dispose us, now to see, in a concrete way, how Sacred Maria maternal Charity extended in the Oratory.

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MARIA’S CHARITY AND St. PHILIP NERI’S

The Arcangel Gabriel had removed Maria all concern, assuring her that the Divine Omnipotence would transform her into Mother of the Redemptor without damage some of her virginity; and to give Maria a test of the divine Omnipotence, he communicates her that her cousin Isabel, although already of very advanced age, has conceived and in three months she will give to light a boy:” There is that Isabel, your cousin that also in her age, has conceived a creature, and she already is in the sixth month, the one that was sterile, since anything is impossible for God" (Lc. 1,36-37). Hardly some days after the enunciation, Maria went hasty to visit her cousin Isabel: For those same days, Maria went as quickly as possible for the mountains to the city of Judá, and entering to the house of Zacarias greeted Isabel. And it happened that as soon as Isabel received Maria greeting the boy jumped of joy in her breast; Isabel get full with the Holy Spirit (Lc.1,39-41)... and Maria stayed with her for about three months and later she returned to her house (Lc.1,56).

It is necessary to say that Maria was not invited by anybody... and nevertheless she put on quickly in road to offer their services to Isabel!. Attention to this: she had not been invited, but she well knew that in the days when a woman is to give to light, any help for small that is she falls very well, one stiller has necessity of it, the future mom needs of the fineness of a help as much for her as for the prospective or recently born creature; there is that Maria prepares with great readiness, with all humility to offer her services to her cousin Isabel. Hardly little time before the Virgin had said: “The slave of the Lord and we watch her now as the men's slave!.

The true love toward God behaves in such a way that takes to the charity toward the neighbors. In fact, to love to God in the brothers. In fact, like our dear Father Philip who said made and acted: “I don't want to have time for me." The true love behaves this way toward God: it doesn't pass the time in doubts, but rather it prepares quickly to make arrive its services to anyone that need it; it doesn’t make wait, to want, to call, to beg a thousand times... but forgetting itself for to put on in prompt disposition to the service of the other ones.

This way the charity behaves toward God: it doesn't fear the annoyances and the personal sacrifices... and even when to do a very big favor it has to undertake a long trip on battered roads and on foot ascending and lowering mountains, it doesn't surrender and it rushes until the bottom just as Maria made.

There is like the true love behaves toward God: it Sanctifies to whom offer it, like to who receive it, as well as the Virgin sanctified Isabel and her creature even not born: Juan the Baptist.

The love behaves this way toward God: it is discreet as it was it the Virgin. Once finished the service in the neighbor's benefit, either that it has been requested or spontaneously offered, finished the reason of being of our presence in such a place... the true charity retires with the same simplicity with which it had come to serve. Do I understand that if I truly love to God, I should, to imitation of Maria, to also love my neighbor... and that if I don't take the love seriously to my neighbor, it means that my love for God is not sincere?

Do I undestand that if I really love to God, I should, as soon as it is possible, to imitation of my Sacred Mother to spread to the other people's necessities, and not to wait begged the service a thousand times... and that if I give myself to want and to beg... it means that my love that I say to have to God is not sincere?

Do I understand that if I really love to God, I should, to imitation of Virgin Maria not to avoid to any annoyance or sacrifice to make to my neighbor any service... and that if I fear the sacrifice and I rather look for my own comfort... is false my love to God? The Apostle from Rome exhorted: “ Go quickly, as soon as called by the Sexton (Sacristán), leaving any other personal activity."

Do I understand that if I truly love to God, I should, to imitation of Maria, in offering my services I sanctified to the people around me, I am sign of sanctity for those who observes me and dialogues with me, either with the words or with the works... and that if I don't make that way,I scandalize my neighbor, and that my love toward God is not sincere and my charity is a lie? The Father Consolini when he had to pay to a person, he gave the money required without delay and without bargainings. This behavior was noticed by the Priest, and the Father replied: “I prefer them to owe me and not in the other way."

Do I understand that if my love toward God is true, I should look for in the treatment with my neighbor to please to God and not another goal; that I should be discreet in making the well; and that if I don't make in such a way, I don't look for to God but to myself... and that then my love toward God is a farce?

You give us many and admirables teachings, Oh, Mother of God!, with your example, but help us to understand well like you already made with Our Brothers that have preceded us and they sleep in the dream of the peace acquired by their works, that the love to God should take us to the love for the neighbor, going to his necessities, serving him with magnanimity and with spirit happiness; that anything should reserve ourselves with such of making the goodness; that in serving we should build as much with the word as with the example. Be the Sacred Virgin the sign of my charity, of a prompt charity, without reservation, discreet!

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HOW IS MY CHARITY?

Frequently one is worried for knowing if know how to love to God, if God loves us or not; we want to love so much to God but we don’t know how.

To this restlessness is the same Jesus who responds us: Do we Love or not to God, do we love or not to Jesus?

"Who keeps my commandments and completes them he really love me. "(Jn.14, 21).

“Am I or I am not loved for God; am I or not loved by Jesus? “.

"Who loves me, my Father will love him, and I will love him" (Jn.14,21s).

“ We want to love so much to God, we want to love Jesus so much, and we don't know how to make it?

Make it double our diligence in the observance of Jesus' commandments!

"Who knows my commandments and completes them, he loves me"

"I give you a new commandment: “Love each other, like I loved you " (Jn.13,34). "This is what I send you: “Love each other like I loved you " (Jn. 15,17).

Jesus could not speak to us in a clearer way! His commandment is the love and the fraternal charity. Of his observance we will show Him our love; increasing our charity, we will increase our love to Him; and loving in a perfect way to the neighbor, we will love Jesus perfectly, we will be sacred, we will be authentic children of Maria!

Then, finally go to the practical field: Do I love Jesus? Do love God? Yes, if I love the neighbor. Do I love the neighbor? Yes, if I imitate Maria my Mother. But unfortunately I am very far from to be her true son.

Maria, without been invited, went to make like a maid for almost three months... and I even when I am requested, I don’t know how to make any favor, to serve my brother, to my sister! I never go to assist the necessities of the other ones! I don't worry about their necessities!

Maria didn't look for her own comfort, but Isabel's well-being... and I that don't look for but in myself, and that a little or anything sacrifices myself in favor of my neighbor!

Maria didn't make boast of the weight that meant the service that she lent; and I that boast of how much difficult is any borrowed service, and this way, instead of encouraging that, that should help I cause him a bigger concern!

Maria in her service, sanctified with her presence, she built with her words to who had close... and me that with my impatiences, with my critics and gossips I make damage and I sow the darnel!

Am I discreet in the good that I offer with simplicity and with true charity, my services..., and if they are not well accepted, don't I become obstinate?

Do I realize that in insisting too much on making a good, I cause the anger in that, that I want to benefit... and that with my fatuous insistence, I lack to the charity?

This delicate charity was had, for comfort and our glory, by many of those that followed the oratorian spirituality included the inspirer of it. Of the processes of canonization of the Saint: “Gives charity to the hospital of S. Giacomo; coordinated by S. Camilo De'Lellis; sends charity to the Jesuits, Teatinos and to other religious; institutes gifts and aids the prisoners; gives the gift to some youths; gives the gift to the daughter of a poor librarian; sells their books to help the Sirleto (Cardinal) and to poor students; sends help where ever some necessity exists; has a list behind their door of his chamber, with the places and people to aid.

Of the life of the first members of the oratory:

The Devout Ancina externed his knowledge wrapped by a very exemplary charity; the Cardinal Francisco Maria Tarugi, didn't live but for the charity and all their works were directed by it. He said: “The charity that I show with my words I show it in the facts, since every day a hundred poor are eating in the morning, and great quantity of money is invested in help to all the monasteries, places of pity, and where is necessity, which are many. I am shame to say single words to the one who needs facts."

Cardinal Baronio prayed this way to the Sacred Virgin Maria:” Oh Mrs., I will never abandon this penitence, until you don't deign of assisting to so much calamity." And in another part he added: “It is better to give charity to somebody although it is not really poor that to deny it to any one that truly has necessity, since in this case the mistake is for pity."

Alejandro Fedeli said: “The abandonment of the prayer didn't bring damage to the charity." This way he made St. Philip Neri's sentence of him: “That is necessary to leave God for God."

The P. Angelo Velli advised:” In everything, to abandon to God."

The P. Tomas Bozio, following the Virgin Mother's example, he affirmed:” Our goal is the exercise in the service of God, for helping people, and not look for the fame of the Institute. However, it will be very good to get a deep humility, by the exercise of the charity among us, and preparing to the neighbor's good with the good works, with the interior virtues, don't apparent, because is God who gives the growth.

The P. Julio Sabioli had as something very important that the members of the Congregation had good treatment and when he was confessor of the Priest and of the Brothers of the Congregation frequently he commended to the Minister: ”I beg you to treat them well and do it by charity in a way they don´t suffer.” He makes him pupil of all, “for make himself nice to them”; and “Not be so delicate, but suffer for the love of God and of our Sacred Mothers."

The P. Antonio Gallonio felt a matter affection to those Saints that had been famous for the virtue of the purity and specially, the Pure Virgin.

The P. Agustín Manni remembered to the Sacred Virgin that: “She was the Mother of God, but at the same time, also Mother and all the sinners' lawyer, which, he was considered to be the first one, and he reminded her that to her had been confident the administration of the Kingdom of the mercy, and because of that to the maternal bowel of her pity he took charge the interests of his soul and of the ones that were in his care." He invoked her in this way: “Mother of God, my comfort."

The P. Juan Matteo Ancina said:” Christ's cross, is a red cross in a white field; that is to say, when the cross is accompanied of the innocence; the one of Maria, adds the blue background for its co-participation."

The P. Pedro Consolini “had great devotion and trust in Sacred Maria and he tried to all be equally devote; but mainly the Priests to whom the grace has been granted of liking the beautiful fruit of her vestal breast daily, on the altar; he added by intermediation of Her, the Priests should aspire to a great heart purity, and he said that this single reason should be enough to bring happiness to a faithful one, that is to say, the knowledge that he has before God, the Virgin Maria that intercedes for him.

The Brother Bernardino Corona was a man of great prayer; a man of a great charity, in such a way that he distributed all his earnings to the poor, without not even leaving a cent for him."

Imitating the Mother of God, which didn’t save her own son for our salvation. St. Philip Neri said: ” I would want to request a cent of charity and not to find who gave it to me."

Juan Bautista Guerra: “He was for a lot of time like porter, and with supreme charity he received to all those who arrived, and he offered them good service."

Juan Bautista Flores: “He had great estimate to all their neighbors to all those that were simple people, with which tried frequently, to the waiters or stiller the ones of lower condition, because he had enough that they were image of God and Temples of the Holy Spirit, with them he passed the time willingly and it treated them with great respect and education."

The Brother Julio Maccaluffi: “He had as something very personal taking care always the God’s House was respected”.

The Brother Egidio Calvelli: “He didn’t want, in his congregation, to know about other rules outside of the charity. And narrating a fact of a Cistercian monk that wanted to know the rules of Our Institute requesting them to the Saint, he told him that he had given only one rule, the one of the charity. The Monk, thinking, that St. Philip hadn’t understood his question, he made it again; and the Saint replied several times the same thing: that the single and only rule was the one of the Charity. He was devote in singular way of the Sacred Virgin and he said that She was the founder of the Congregation of the Oratory; because he had never thought to found a congregation but the Virgin was.

The Brother Taddeo Landi: ” It was difficult to find another Brother that get tired more than him, and who talk so little than him. He was devote of the Sacred Virgin and he spent complete days in tender and affectionate view toward Her; and since he was in charge of the kitchen chores, he always had on a table next to the fire prepared 63 sticks, and without interrupting his tasks he spent the time praying rosaries, praying an Ave Maria for each one of them.

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CONCLUSION

I have wanted to finish with these phrases of the first Priest and Brothers of the Oratory with the purpose of capturing the uninterrupted Spirit of the Institute as it sanctions it the Council Vatican II in the document Optatam Totius: “To Progress according to the spirit of the Institute”, put in evidence too by Our P. Philip Neri and for his first pupils."

The P. Nicoló Gigli: “If we know how to know our state, since we should not envy in anything to the religious, having such a Sacred and so beautiful Institute; and if we don't have votes like the religious, we have the charity that is superior to all the votes, we know then, Brothers, to know the Congregation."

Juan Bautista Guerra exhorted: “My Brothers, the Congregation to which God called us and for us not very well-known it is really a paradise; we know how to know, already to take advantage of such a grace that God has made us and let us correspond to our vocation, and blissful us if we are able to know it."

The Brother Egidio Calvelli frequently repeated St. Philip's verses:

Facts, facts, no words,

makes the one who wants to serve to God,

much is for the pleasing one the desire,

but working more than anotherthing,

He wants"

Our Founder urged to be devote of Maria: “Be devote of Maria, I know what I tell you, because only looking at the Mother's of God maternal figure, her virginity, and only looking at her as a sign, we will be able to stay in the Oratorian Spirit that is and it will always be it, the CHARITY."

The only rule and highly evangelical to the which, in the last Centennial of Our Sacred Father Philip Neri, the Pope John Paul II has called us in the this way call " quadrilateral ": the CHARITY. It always stays like a solid base, in which to support the interior building of the personal spiritual life. And then the devotion to the Mistress, a model and true cause of our happiness, whose maternity discovers our personal vocation and our task is to carry it out in deep harmony with Her, the design of the salvation for all her children. Her maternal mission is received as mysterious, multiple, and inefable sign, with which Maria regenerates us like new men -sons of God. We don't get however, to measure her, as it is not possible to measure the mystery; we are only able to hardly describe her with an analogous language that is worth more for that that allows to have intuition that for that that is able to express. The Church calls to Maria’s maternal mission, “virginal sign ", picking up the suggestion that offer us Jesus' words: “There is your Son... there is your Mother " (Jn.19,25-27).

Maria’s maternity consists on helping us to enter and to move in the life of God; to make us participate of the simple experience of His life, where is given kind of an identity among running of the daily things and its entrance with sure step in the mystery of the Father's love. By the unquenchable flama of the charity fed by the Holy Spirit and by our Institute, She cooperates with Mother's love to the regeneration and the formation of the faithful ones (L.G. 63).

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BIBLIOGRAPHY

INCISA DELLA ROCCHETA GIOVANNI-VIAN NELLO-GASBARRI CARLO, Il primo processo per San Filippo Neri, Città del Vaticano, 1957-1963, V-IV.

URBANO VIII, Bolla: Rationi congruit, Bollario Romano, 1623,

BACCI PIETRO GIACOMO, Vita di San Filippo Neri, Roma, Andrea Brugiotti, 1622.

GALLONIO ANTONIO, Vita del Beato Filippo Neri, Roma, Luigi Zanetti, 1601.

ARINGHI PAOLO, Le vite e i detti di Padri e Fratelli della Congregazione dell'Oratorio, Venezia, per Hertz, 1676.

APOLLONI ANTONIO, Vita di San Filippo Neri, Venezia, da Innocente Alessandri, 1743.

VALLIER AGOSTINO, Il dialogo della gioia cristiana, Brescia, La Scuola, 1975.

TESSERIN GONTRANO, Sulle orme di Filippo Neri, Chioggia, Oratorio Secolare, 1994.

MARINO FILIPPO, Farsi fanciullo coi fanciulli sapientemente, Reggio Calabria, Falzea, 1995.

BARBIERI COSTANZA-BARCHIESI SOFIA-FERRARA DANIELE, Santa Maria in Vallicella, Roma, Fratelli Palombi Editori, 1995.

MARANZANA MARIO, Santa opera buffa, Dattiloscritto, 1995.

MEZZASALMA CARLO, Un germoglio oratoriano nella Firenze del '700, Congregazione Suore di San Filippo Neri. Duecento anni di vita (1794-1994), Firenze, Cultura Nuova Editrice, 1994.

FERRARI G., Sermoni dell'Oratorio di P. Peppino, Roma, 1996-1997.

ZANUTEL P., La Chiesa di San Filippo Neri a Vicenza, Vicenza, Oratorio, 1991.

CERRATO A., Esercizi Spirituali, Roma, 1997.

LANDO G., Il Maestro della perfetta allegria "Pippo buono", Guardia Sanframondi, Istituto Anselmi, 1980.

TESSERIN G., Filippo Neri il santo della gioia, Taglio di Po (RO), Arti Grafiche DEMME snc, 1995.

RIETI P., Dialoghi vari sull'Oratorio di S. Filippo Neri, Roma 1997

La divozione a San Filippo Neri, Milano, Serafino Majocchi libraio editore, 1874.

VENTUROLI A., L'attività apostolica di San Filippo Neri, Città del Vaticano, Libreria Editrice Vaticana, 1997.

VENTUROLI ALBERTO, San Filippo Neri, Vita, Contesto Storico e Dimensione Mariana, Casale Monferrato, Piemme, 1988.

Idem., San Felice da Cantalice, Casale Monferrato, PIEMME, 1995.

Idem., Paradiso! Paradiso!, in Osservatore Romano, maggio, 1995.

GASBARRI CARLO, Lo spirito dell'Oratorio di San Filippo Neri, Brescia, Morcelliana, 1949.

MARCIANO GIOVANNI, Memorie Historiche della Congregazione dell'Oratorio, Napoli, De Bonis, 1693-1703, v. I-7.

Ammaestramenti, ricordi e detti di San Filippo Neri, Milano, presso Serafino Majocchi Libraio Editore, 1874.

NEWMAN JOHN HENRY, La missione di San Filippo Neri, Bologna, Oratorio, 1994.

Idem., Lettera ai Filippini, Roma, Oratorio, 1958.

FINOTTI GIORGIO, San Filippo Neri, Bologna, Oratorio, 1994.

Idem., Il carisma della Congregazione dell'Oratorio di San Filippo Neri tra memoria e profezia, Bologna, Tip. Grafica Emiliana, 1989.

Idem., Gli amici dello sposo, Parma, Quaderni della C.I.S.M., Regione Emilia-Romagna, Tipolitografia Benedettina Editrice, 1992.

Turks Paolo, Filippo Neri una gioia contagiosa, Roma, Città Nuova, 1991.

LANDO GIUSEPPE, Sulla scia del Neri, Guardia Sanframondi, Scuola Tipo-litografica, Istituto Anselmi, 1980.

Idem., Il Maestro della perfetta allegria "Pippo buono", Guardia Sanframondi, Scuola Tipo-litografica, Istituto Anselmi, 1992.

MAGNANO CORRADO MARIO, Padre Mariano Patané e il suo tempo, Roma, Palermo, grafiche Renna, 1992.

ABBIA VEGA GEMMA, Fuego, Amor, Vida....!!! Huella de San Felipe Neri en el IV Centenario, Madrid, Publicaciones Claretianas, 1994.

RUSSO-BONADONNA MARIA TERESA, Sulle tracce di San Filippo Neri dal centro alla periferia, Strenna dei Romanisti, Roma, Amor, 1995.

Idem., S. Filippo Neri da San Girolamo alla Vallicella. Encuentro Internacional Oratoriano de San Felipe Neri, Sevilla, Pilas, Settembre, 1992.

PETROCCHI MASSIMO, Storia della spiritualità italiana, Roma, Edizioni di Storia e Letteratura, 1984.

Biblioteca Sanctorum, Roma, Istituto Giovanni XXIII della Pontificia Università Lateranense, 1964, v. I-XII.

Dictionaire di Spiritualité, Paris Beauchesne. 1982.

GIOVANNI PAOLO II, Lettera al P. Delegato Apostolico nella ricorrenza del IV Centenario del "Dies natalis" di San Filippo Neri.

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THURSDAY, July 16

CONFERENCE: THE ORATORY, LOCAL COMMUNITY IN THE CONTEXT OF POSTMODERNISM

P. Raúl Herrera Cervantes C.O.

Guanajuato, Gto. México

¿ Where is God ? I will tell you. We have killed Him, you and I ! (...) But, how have we done this? How have we been able to empty the sea ? Who gave us the sponge to erase the horizon ? What have we done by freeing the earth from its sun ? Whither does it move now ? Whither do we move ? Is there still a top and bottom ? Do we not wonder as across an infinite nothing ? The grandeur of this act, is it not too grand for us ? (...) Those that are born after us will belong, in virtue of this act, to a history different to the previous one.[26]

None, like Nietzsche foretold so profoundly the paths that a pretendedly modern culture would lead and the birth of a new man: the man of postmodernism.

“Philip’s legacy to his Congregation (Oratory) has not been so much a rule, but more a “certain spirit” Therefore, an Oratory that loses its vigor is condemned to die as if it were under a natural law of dehydration. The Oratory cannot be a stereotyped copy of past situations because, as something spiritual, it distinguishes itself and adapts to the new given situations. It is a soul without a body, the different circumstances are its body. This is its peculiarity, the efficiency of its work is exactly here.”[27]

P. Faber of the Oratory of London is one of the few who has been able to capture the always permanent novelty of the work of Philip Neri. The Oratory is not on abstract essence applicable in every circumstance, nor much less a method that would have to be followed to the letter.

“And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the desert, even so must the son of man be lifted up, that those who believe in him may not perish, but may have life everlasting”. (Jn. 3, 14-16)

Surely, no one likes the Lord Jesus Christ, was able to capture what God had imagined for men and our world.

It would seem that these three quotations have nothing in common. Nevertheless, I have mentioned them with the intention of demonstrating that which Goethe said; between saints and philosophers there is so much distance as the peaks of the mountains but also as much nearness as their base. More over these three quotations will from the beginning orient our reflections on what we are pleased to call: The Oratory local community in the context of postmodernism. In effect, we will try to follow the appearance of the Oratory as an alternative of christian life for the modern society with which it was born, and confront it with the new emerging postmodern society, so that we may propose some updated forms of the spiritual patrimony we have received.

As it is already known to many, this third conference in our International Reunion had been entrusted to P. Claudio Pegoraro of Sao Paulo, Brazil but since his illness has prevented his coming, it has left me no choice but to follow the popular sayings: “For lack of horses the burros trot” and in times of war, any hole is a trench”. May these lines remain as my effort to join in the concert of voices of all those that struggle to make their christian and oratorian lives an alternative for the men and women of the Third Millennium.

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1. The Oratory, the alternative to modern christian life

The Spirit of God invades the Church, and men and women revive the fundamental christian experience: the experience of being children of God and brothers. At all times, this experience of New Live originates in the Church informs of life that strive to maintain such and experience, above all when the ecclesiastical community is diverted from its true path, when structures appear that drown the Spirit. In this sense, any Founder of a christian life movement must have as his goal the renewal of the christian experience in its historical context. In the words of the historian on religions life, Jesus Alvarez:

“The history of religions life demonstrates that the different forms of religious life cannot evolve with a univocal definition, because they are existential experiences and, therefore, unique and unrepeatable, that have been marking a series of turns and crossroads that correspond to many other new social cultural and ecclesiastical situations that, since they are the bearers of new demands, they must be given new answers.”[28]

Taking into consideration the above, the first task we must face is to place Philip Neri’s proposal in the course of the History of the Church. Its only in this way that his proposal becomes comprehensible and not sectorial.

1. Monasticism.

Primitive christian communities perceived life as a life of suffering, for them being a christian was equal to being a martyr. The incipient organization of the Church and being driven by persecution, made any form of institutional life unnecessary. Institutionalized religious life surged forth precisely when the spirit of martyrdom began to weaken, after the “Constantinian peace” .[29] The beginning of the institutionalizing of the Church coincided with growing groups of christians that decided to return to the origins of christianity.

The premonastic asceticism of the Eucratites, the Montanists, the Consecrated and Continent, is the antecedence of the marches to the desert to protest the neutralization that the official Church offered. This phenomenon received the name of Monasticism. From everywhere men came forth, mainly leymen, and in reclusion (monks) settled in the deserts of Egypt, Siria and Asia Minor; the purpose was a geographic and socialistic separation from “the world, a renouncing of material goods, a form of independent manual labor, a life of solitude and celibacy. From the anchoretic life of Anthony and Pachomies, from the great Stylites to the cenobital life already organized by Basil, they were marked by the profound conviction of renewing the Church from its origins[30].

With the passing of time, through the intervention of Augustine of Hippo and Benito, monastic life gradually become institutionalized and clericalized, ending in a betrayed of its original intention. The old small monasteries were transformed into large abbeys that monopolized culture, the arts, religion and the economy. Once again it become necessary for the Spirit to come forth in a new context different from that of the Lower Middle Ages.

2. The Canons Regular and the Mendicant orders

The first attempt to reform monastic life was, without a doubt, the so called Canons Regular. Their origin developed with the great social-religious movement that surged forth towards the latter part of the 10^th century and reached its fulfillment with the reform of Gregory VII. The congregations of Crodegango de Metz, of Rufo, of Victor, of Bernardo, constituted a new form of christian life directed to the exercise of on organized apostolate. In addition to this were the Fraternity of Hospitallers[31],the military orders[32],and orders for the redemption of captives[33].

The orders of the Canons regular made their contribution but the situation demanded more. The feudal world of the Abbey in which the Emperor was subject to the Pope, the nobles to the kings, the people to the nobles. philosophy to theology, reason to faith, in which everything was perfectly organized like a society” baptized, but scandalously christian”[34],was coming to an end. A new age was beginning. The fief gave way to the free villa, new trades were created, such as commerce and banking and there also arose a desire for a culture that would decentralize the control of the Clerics.

As a result, new forms of christian life emerged: the orders of Mendicants. Domingo de Guzmán and Francisco the Asis, among others, took upon themselves the task of proposing a new style of life based on: A responsive poverty that would become excessive, pour and itinerant preaching, a decentralized organization, close. Contact with laics, the promotion of culture and the insertion in the city. Thus, the XII and XIII centuries witnessed, in the embrace of San Francisco and Domingo, the birth of a new Church.

The process, however, was halted by another hour of darkness. The Franciscan and Dominican reform had ended with Francisco & Domingo. In effect what a great difference between the genuine dominican Spirit and the taking of faith by force with the supported by his followers and the Inquisition. What a difference between the humble man of Asis and his third order and the controversies of the fraticelli, and above all with the rich franciscon Popes, avid for power, as before .The church needed the Spirit to come forth again, but this was late in coming. A new social cultural change was necessary, it was now the turn of the “Devotio Moderna”, the Renaissance and Humanism

3. The Regular Clerics.

3.1 A New Context: Modernism

Then Devotio Moderna as a spiritual movement appeared at the end of the XIV century in opposition to the ways of medieval religiousness, and this was mainly the work of Gerardo Groot and his disciple Florencio Radewijns and may be considered the background of the reformation movements of the Church in the XVI- century.[35]. This devotio moderna was only one of the many expressions of the new social-cultural context: The Renaissance and Humanism were the door to modernism.

A new cultural climate arose, a nostalgia for Greek antiquity. Marsilio Licino, Dante, Petrarca and Bocaccio, among others, initiated the recovery of the ancient classics. At the root of this spirit was the opposition to medieval feudalism which had created a society excessively elite and hierarchic . A new form of science, also appeared, not based on scholastic abstractionism but on the desire of proving the hypothesis based on the induction of experiences (Roger Bacon).This return to Greek antiquity also developed new forms of political and economical life. The power of the Papacy with the Emperor had waned. Democracy and the Republic, together with the fall of the fiefs, made possible the birth of the first cities and the transformation of the educational system.[36]Furthermore, new discoveries (of continents, planets) and inventions, abruptly changed the cosmovision of medieval man.

If we add to this the rise of Protestant Christian Reformation of Erasmo of Rotterdam, Juan de Hus, Ulrich Zuinglio and of Martin Luther with their traditional principles of one Faith, one Grace and one Scripture; badly assimilated by the Roman Catholic Church’s counter reform, we obtain the profile of the modern man.

The importance of all this is that the Renaissance gave way to a new understanding of the individual, man is understood, more and more as one who through the use of his reason can understand and transform reality. Now man is the center of interest and you can speak with propriety of a new man, no longer under God’s tutelage but with his emancipated reason11 “a new era was born, the modern era and new forms of christian life were necessary”.

3.2 The new foundations of Regular Clergy and the concept of specialization.

Without a doubt, the orders of the regular Clergy born during the XVI century, with their solemn vows, life in common and specific apostolic activity, have caught the most attention from historians. The regular clergy did not break with forms of consecrated life but they constituted a novelty: clericalism and the priesthood were definitely bound to the religious life, to the point that all that is clerical is identifies by it; and the laity passed to a second level. The Theatines, Barnabites, Somascos. the Pious Schools, but above all, the Society of Jesus, were attempts to create an alternative form of christian life that could respond to the emerging new era. The search of each of the founders are methods born from the confrontation of their christian experience with their contemporary life. The specialization of their apostolate, was without a doubt, an answer to what they considered a major urgency.

3.3 The Oratories of Divine Love

But even then, not everyone believed in a reform by the clergy. In addition to the congregations of observant and the regular Clergy, there arose groups of laics and secular clergy that combined love and popular piety with charitable actions toward the poor and the sick. It appears that these fraternities that received the name of Oratories of the Divine Love, were inspired by Fray Bernardino de Feltre[37] (l439-l494) who had established throughout Italy, companies with this orientation. There is no doubt that the spirit of these companies prevailed in the confraternity of St. Jerome and in the Hospital of St. Jacob, where Philip attended13. The number of its members was limited (36 laymen and 4 priests) each with an independent life, without a mayor pretense of vows and dedicated to the care of the poor and the sick.

The above leads us to believe that the movement released by Philip has notable antecedents, and a whole social-cultural and ecclesiastical context that makes his proposal comprehensible.

An effect Philip was familiar with the benedictine monastic life of Montecasino14 , the conventual life of the Dominicans in San Marcos15 and the clerical life of various religions orders of his time; especially the Jesuits, he decides not to belong to any of them but he critically assimilates what he considers of value. Philip lived his experience of the Spirit THE FIRE OF LOVE. As Moses experienced the presence of God in the burning bush, as the disciples with the tongues of fire, as Jeremiah carried within a burning fire, as Isaias with his burnt lips, Philip also burned and did all possible so that others would also become inflamed.

As a man of the growing modern era, Philip offered an alternative to christian life whose legitimacy was a return to its origins. His proposal, in addition to reuniting various elements that were already in force in the Church, such as attention to the sick, to pilgrims, the reading of scripture, eucharistic practices, etc. was without a doubt, the spontaneous compromising participation of the Laics. The Oratory was created for and by laymen; no “fuga mundis”, no monasterius, no convents, no rule, no superior, no vows...Only christian life in the century.

Philip saw that the alternative for a growing modernistic Church, was the small community with a plurality of laymen living in liberty, very closely linked to the chain of love that made them happy to live in this world. Any other anecdote of his life must have this background.

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II - Postmodernism a new context for the Church and the Oratory

The Oratory appeared in the context of the birth of modernism, it was created and designed for men that were initiating what C. Geffré called “the age of reason”. We are present, nevertheless, at the end of modernism and so we can not help but ask ourselves if the Oratory will also loss its force. If not, what would be the permanent elements it can continue to offer our postmodern era. Before we answer these questions, it is necessary that we go around to describe this new age.

1. The crisis of modernism

To see the vagueness that still exists with regard to the concept to of postmodernism, allow us now to cite a text from Kolakowski.

“For lack of a clear idea of what ‘modernism’ is; we have recently attempted to avoid the question and have gone ahead speaking of ‘postmodernism’ (...) I do not know what ‘postmodern’ is and how it differs from the ‘premodern’, nor do I feel that I should know. And what could come after the postmodern? The post-postmodern, the neo postmodern, the anti-modern? If we set aside the headings, the authentic question remains: Why is the feeling of depression so widespread in the well-being of modernism and where are the sources of those aspects of modernism that make the feeling of depression so particularly pain full.16

It is not the time to make a detailed review of the phenomenon of modernism, we content ourselves with only some of its more important elements, so that we can later make a description of the phenomenon of postmodernism.

The fundamental convictions of modernism can be summarized as follows:

a) The emancipation of reason as an expression that man, as a subject of reason, is the measure of all things.

b) The mathematization of reality that led to the ingenious attitude of thinking reality only within the parameters of the exact science..17

c) The process of secularization as autonomous of the subject, disenchantment with the world and democratization of reality. If certainty lives in the subject, then he can independently make a decision on any extrinsic instance; the ultimate sense of reality is played and lived in this world, and everything should be subject to public debate18.

d) The meta -narratives of the progress of techno -science and the constellation of social utopias, but above all the industrial revolutions gave birth in modern man the fantasy of an always happy progress19

What has happened with modernism? The absolutist pretension of the experimental scientific knowledge has been proven wrong in its perspectives, the hope placed on technology has been defrauded, it has turned against man and his natural environment, social utopias have evaporated. These occurrences have produced in the everyday man, a true disenchantment and disillusion, bringing about new lines of opposition and excellence to “the tragic immediate past” 20

2. Postmodernism in the religious ambit.

Although it is impossible to trace and provoke an agreement with regard to the theoretic genesis of Postmodernism,21 following , we will risk a cursory description of postmodernism in the religious ambit22.

Without a doubt, in this last years we have seen a religious “boom”, a resacralization of the world. The very turbulent “announced death of God” by modern atheism has not brought about such a effect; at least not until now; the modern myth of the disappearance of religion has been disavowed: ‘the human pilgrimage has undertaken the return from the secular city to the sacred city’23. Words that at another time would produce rashes among many and were judged as belonging to an immature age of history, such as “miracle”, “God”, “soul”, “spirit”, etc., are now in every ones lips and in all circumstances. What is happening ? Are we becoming more religious, more cristians? We can not declare victory, we are facing a new religiousness that possesses very defiant characteristics. We will describe some:

A desinstitutionalized religion

More and more, in christianity and out of it, religious movements have become independent of the institutions; temples and other “bureaucratic” controls are becoming unnecessary. We are facing a phenomenon in which religion’s principle protagonist is not the institution but the individual: people gather to “pray” in homes, in clubs, fields, etc. In the words of Mardones, we are in front of a “process of a mercantilism of creeds that consist in that each one can come and takes what he needs, in a religion “á la carte”, with no commitments or obligations24. In a moment when economical growth is drowning, the psychological development becomes relevant, the consuming of the conscience becomes a new bulimia: yoga, psychoanalysis, corporal expression, zen, primal therapy, group dynamics, etc. It is all good as long as it is not institutionalized25.

b) A religion without norms

As a result of the deistitutionalized religion that we have ,mentioned, the normative function of religion is more locking each time. The contribution of sense and regulation that religion offered at another time, is now being offered by other social instances. Normatinity is now in the hands of a globalizing apparatus that has no concrete face: means of communication. Its normative significance is evident: “put this on”, “buy this”, “throw out the other”, ironically they tell us: “if you want to be different do what everybody does”.

c) Social ritualism

Since official religion has been displaced and lost its normative character, among all that is offered by the mass-media, some social realities have taken the place of religion. Phenomenons that have ended by camouflaging ritualism in our western societies such as sacred exaltation of all that is civil, music, football, the body, all deserve attention.

In effect, the vertiginous consecration of time (sacred holidays) of places, of persons (untouchable presidents, monuments), writings (irreformable Constitutions) are a method of sacralization of our collective selves. In the same manner, the cult trough music. In the grouping of masses, the fascination with the rite and the lights, the awakened emotions by the quasi-god man, that is named the preferred artist, these are other indications of social ritualization.

Footballmania with its multiple events becomes on occasion a national celebration. Disenchantment with political and religious ideologies? Creation of stereotypes of the media? Compensation for the dissatisfaction with everyday life? Whatever it is, behind the sport-spectacle the man of today assists in a weekly liturgy in which united with a flag, a shirt, with a symbolic language, looks for a minimum bond of union with others. Limited religiousness but effective.[38]26

The fascination with what we see and where it send us, has developed in us an almost ritual dependence of the body; in it sacredness is manifested. We are unable to resist omitting one more text of Mardones.

“(...) In the apotheosis of the cosmetic, in the obsession of “being in shape”, in the diverse exaltations of the young body, the smooth, stretched skin, well molded, perfumed, flexible, perfect...The gymnasiums, jogging, aerobics, microbiotic...with their purifying rituals and their “sacramental” diets of proteins, carbohydrates, calories, etc. are their merciful manifestations. 27

d) The new religiousness

Nevertheless, the displacement of the institutional and normative character of religion, it remains in force acquiring each time a more precise configuration.

1) Mystified and eclectic Religiousness. Who has not noticed that the success of todays video-clips is based on the strange mixture of beautiful faces, provoking bodies, saints, crosses and candles? A religion in a friendly relation with science and the most advanced technology, in a plural attitude leading all religions on the same path towards God; religion that offers salvation via the harmony with the interior self and with the all esoterically announcing the arrival of the new era, an era of Acuarius and has taken the form of the New Age. 28

2) Ecological Religiousness a cult to nature: The resacralizing of nature is also a specific note in the new religion. The ecological disaster provoked by scientific-technology has brought about a new ecological conscience -in some cases, frenzy- in the present individual. The “herbal miracles”, but also alternative medicine, homeopathy or integral, vegetarianism, increasingly form an integrable part of our culture. Mother nature once again offers her divine manifestations and a sacral flourish, untouchable; she is once more the object of veneration and cult. We belong to her and being one with her, it is not licit to violate her. This, in great part, explains the triumph of the oriental religions in the west and the revaluation of popular medicine, 29

3) Concubinage between the modern and 6the old. One more characteristic of contemporary Religiousness is the strange mixture that has a tendency of showing up between quasi-primitive religious beliefs and the instruments of advanced technology. The reappearance of archaism religious expressions such as horoscopes, tarot, ouija, cards, etc. coexist with the latest technological inventions: magic has a date with electronics, modern horoscopes are computerized. 30

4) Privatization of Religion.. The consequence of all this is what the sociologist Th. Luchmann called the privatization of religion as a corresponding phenomenon of a deinstitutionalization. In effect, in the center of all these religions offerings and pluralistic ideology, religion has become an object of free election and each time it remains more in the private sphere. In other words, since religion has lost its role in providing perception and normativity for universal human acts, it retreats into the private lives of individuals where it still offers consolation, comprehension or legitimacy.31

J.M. VELASCO synthesizes this in the following manner:

“Thus, the capacity for providing perception has manifested itself in different forms of social presence all through human history and leading to new forms derived from de acts of emancipation of the different spheres of social and personal life and the consequent pluralism. The result in which this process seems to end is a new form of presence of the religious factor that leads to the privatization of religious exercise, its reduction to the private spheres of life and its transformation into an invisible religion with the consequent desinstitutionalization of religious institutions” 32

Thus, this new religiousness is more like a “practical atheism” or indifferentism than a negation of God in the style of modern the cool rejection of a personal God by postmodern religion, more than an affirmative search of oneself, it is a search for a “religious tranquillity”; the believer a la carte mixes the Gospel with the Koran, the Zen or hinduism as long as he doesn’t have to make a commitment; spirituality has been substituted by the religious selfservice super market. 33 We are facing the new death of God, not in the hands of a theoretic subject but a subject with will power.

In the somewhat disconcerting words of H. COX.

“What the bourgeois did to God (...) in comparison with what Nietzsche said with regard to the assassination of God almost appears as an act of kindness. At least, in the celebrated narrative of Nietzche there is blood and cruelty... an even a dead body: ¡God is dead because you have killed him! However, in the situation that now holds our attention, there is no passion; there is only prudence. God no longer is assassinated, but “castrated”. What have you done to God? Nietzsche would have had to ask the patrons and their accomplices. “You have caged, tamed and domesticated him and the priests have docile helped. The furious bull has become an apathetic ox. ¡You have castrated God! 34

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III - The Oratory in the context of postmodernism

The time has come to ask ourselves if the Oratory in this new context of postmodernism is valid. First, we must briefly recover the challenges that this new cultural climate offers the christian faith and therefore the Oratory.

1. Challenges and struggles of postmodernism.

As you may have notice, it is very difficult to reduce to a few lines the challenges that confront christian faith, contains by postmodernism, but we cannot avoid this.

1.1 The rejection of all types of Institutions.

The challenge of postmodernism with regard to the deinstitutionalization of religion, cannot be overlooked. We should ask ourselves if many of the christians that abandon our Church, do so because of Christ’s rejection and his message, or is it an attempt to be independent of an institution that they full is asphyxiating. Is it not necessary to recuperate the desire, the aesthetic, the experience, the imaginative, the spontaneous and the ludicrous of the christian faith?

1.2 The desmonopolization of the divine.

With the deinstitutionalization of religion numerous religious movements are appearing. The resurgence of oriental religious and the advent of multiple religious movements are in style; and what makes then very attractive is that they are not institutionalized. Is it not necessary that we refrain from emphasizing the pretension that God is reduced to our ecclesiastical institution.

1.3 The democratization of reality

For some time the areas of social and religious life have not been considered untouchable. At the risk of falling in an anachronism and in the ghetto, everything, absolutely everything should be the object of public debate Wouldn’t it be necessary to create christian communities in which everyone participates in the decisions that affect everyone?

1.4 The demands of the unheard voices.

In intimate connection with the above, we find the challenge of those who for a long time, have not been subject to the christian faith with all its implications. In the civil area we are also conscious of the need of participation of those who have been considered “minorities, also in the religious ambit we hear the voices of the poor, the indigenous, of women and, above all the laic.

1.5 The ecological challenge

We cannot overlook the postmodern criticism of the instrumental rationality of modernism often hidden in the defense of nature. Can we not create christian communities that can form a part of the numerous efforts to preserve and protect our environment so devastated by modern technology?

Therefore, the challenges that postmodernism present to christian life can be summarized into what I call the necessity or a new comprehension of the human subject capable of overcoming the modern conception of man as pure rationality.

In effect , postmodernism, above all, should be understood as a criticism of “despotic reason” (Kolakowski) of modernism that pretends to reduce all reality, including God, to an objetive idea. An effort must be made to construct a rationality not so argumentative, sith regard to narrative, that can bring justice to humanity in its totality.

But , postmodernison also runs the risk of weakening the subject by the simulated empire. In other word, the modern man with his absolutist pretensions has given way to the “weak” or “diluted” postmodern subject.35 And this is more than just a simple theory. Without a doubt, we are assisting in this “death of man” in the hands of the “simulated empire”.36, to the triumph of appearance over being; of the photocopy over reality, and this is thanks to the massive means of communication that have made of our world a small global village. (T. Luchmann).

We are living in a time in which the deceptions of technological progress and the lack of confidence in the institutions have given birth to narcissistic individuals with hardly any obligation to the community. Globalization tends to annul concrete faces, makes human subjects no more than simulations; the mass that makes individuals become anonymous.

“He is all indifference, the postmodern desert is very distant from passive nihilism of his sad delight in the universal emptiness, as active nihilism, and of his self destruction. God is dead, the great finalities have been put out, but no one cares that is the joyful novelty, that is the limit of Nietzche’s diagnosis with regard to the european darkness. The emptiness of the sense, the sinking of ideals, have taken us, as it was expected, to greater anguish, more absurd, more pessimistic”.37

The Oratory was formed by Felipe Neri as an alternative life for modern men and women. Does it continue to be an alternative life for the postmodern men and women? What perennial elements does the Oratory offer that may continue creating a christian community that can respond to the “new signs of the time?

2. The Oratory, local community in the context of postmodernism

We now want to remake the oratorian experience in our new context. Modernism has reached its end, and gives way to postmodernism. We, as oratorians must keep alive the memory of the one who has left us a spiritual patrimony.38 With the global postmodern culture, that erases concrete faces, our hypothesis is to consider the Oratory as a local community in which persons form their identity in relation with others.

2.1 The construction of a local identity by relation

We have mentioned that modern man as well as postmodern man equally suffer the illness of anonymity and the massification that makes him victim of the “empire of simulation” of the mass-media. This has happened, without a doubt, by the conception excessively “substantialistic” and individualistic that we have of man. A new conception of a man is urgent.

Man experiments himself as an ego incarnated, corporeal, within the human community and of the historical world in which he is inserted. However , besides being aware of himself in this determinate historic surrounding, he is only and in front of and in relation with as determinate human community. ‘I am if I have the privileged of finding myself with other human or finding myself with them. This means only that I can myself as I, in relation with a you, in the mutual and free meeting where also the you identifies himself with my I.

This happens because of the challenged glance of you with whom I meet and that turns in a interpretation key of my identity, and the I of his: The historical ego extends himself by the conscience of the claim that provoke the meeting with the other39. And because the meeting is free, the construction of the subjects’ identity is given in the contour of freedom: “ the experience of the meeting is the fact of being aware that I am thank to you, that you gave me the knack of being-freedom so I can be more free; that you liberated me for you, when you wanted to be liberated by me40.

In this new terminology being a person would mean the auto presence as a search of the own identity starting from the point of the relation to others and to the world41.

Man is, then, tension considering that the realization of his ones’ own does not gives itself, it can not be given without the alterity; ‘ is this alterity that coming into and becoming viscera in the onea’ own, constitutes it extends it at the same time, and so creates that tension of the absolute, last root of all the human being work. 42

This that it is heard too abstract, Philip instituted it perfectly. In effect, for him the alternative did not consist in the formation of great religious movements as the style of the religious orders of his time, he mistrusted always of the ‘mass’ and delight himself in the small community of his room. The Oratory, before being an anonymous ‘mass’ phenomenon, was a small group of persons with concrete faces gathered by the bond of love. In such groups, the members use to discover his identity and his project in relation to the others, a family where the diversity of his members was not adulated by a monopolized methodology.

Philip understood clearly that a community built communion ties, not only for having a geographic location43, but before all due to the establishment of personal relations through which his members identify themselves.

In the “global civilization” in which we live, that uniforms and depersonalizes and has caused frontiers to fall, the voice of the Oratory is added to ,many other voices in defense of minorities and their identities, because it proposes an alternative communities, groups with few members, respect for the differences of each one, equality among its members and a relation united only by love, is its guarantee.

Our contemporaries, thirsty for communion that wonder in the world without a fixed goal, the Oratory would suit them well. Its marvelous respect for variety and the simple affective relations, make it a space of mutual recognition, as is expected of any christian group:

“In effect, in the middle of a world, frequently deeply divided and all the brothers in the faith (the forms of religious life) give testimony to the real possibility of placing their possessions in common, of loving fraternally, of following a common project of life and activity (...) Reunion of builders and not only consumers of the community to be responsible for the development of others (...) While western society applauds the independent person, capable of fulfilling his own needs, the individual sure of himself, the Gospel demands persons that, like the grain of wheat, know haw to die within themselves to be re borne to a fraternal life”44

2.2 The Oratory an alternative to the challenges of postmodernism.

The local oratorian community, of which we have referred, is faithful to its commitment, generating concrete spaces to face the challenges of postmodernism and critically assumes them as the “signs of the time”

We will enumerate some:

1. The challenge of deinstitutionalization.

We have already mentioned the process of deinstitutionalization of which we are a part in postmodernism, above all in religious matters. Our contemporaries have a sense of drawing in any structure that has not been produced by the members of the community to which it applies.

Philip, enamored of liberty and spontaneity, noticed how dangerous an institution or a Rule could be. He was in favor of a “deinstitutionalization” of the Church, introducing laymen as subjects of faith and christian celebration. In a plural world where religions offer more alternatives and the imminent weakening of our Church, Philip’s call to have small Churches (oratories) without so many hierarchical pretensions, with a minimum of institution is still actual. Small communities of laics that live in plurality and in liberty without any major hierarchical control, and where the authority is at the service of the construction of the fraternity 45

2. An integral understanding of the subject.

It is not longer possible to continue insisting, like modernism, in that the peculiarity of man is his pure rationality; this insistence has led to the ravages of two World Wars and to the ecological collapse. Postmodernism is a strong call of attention to reevaluate other human elements such as emotionalism, the will, pleasure, etc. It is therefor urgent that we have a more integral comprehension of the human being that will not diminish his capacity to create ideas.

Those who were at Philip’s side, saw in him - as we ourselves have recently seen in Nietzche- a critic of reason that for him it meant a “simple three fingers of forehead” and needed to be subdued. Philip was aware of the danger of a unilateral insistence of the human rational capacity, that would lead a man “unidimensional” as Marcuse would later call him, thus being a true prophet of postmodernism. It was thus that Philip in his Oratory integrally promoted human dimensions: to the rational discourse of Baronio, he would also add the spontaneous narrative of the life of Saints; to the highly structural music of Palestrina, he would add vernacular songs; more than rigid formulas of prayer he preferred emotional repeated short prayers. Philip knew that although “pure reason” was important, it was not sufficient, for that reason he was a promoter of emotion, of humor, of determination, aspects uncared for by modern man.46

From that, also derived his impulse for a “new approach to the Bible” and a new method of making theology. In effect in the modern mania of the critical reading of the Bible, the oratorians should recover the “familiar treatment of the Word of God” and with respect to the modern and medieval mania of making the discourse of God (theology) a clear and distinct argument, the Oratorians should recover the discourse of God as a narrative of experiences. Therefore approach the Word so that we may not only be inquisitors, but also listeners; a theology that besides being discursive is also narrative.

For the postmodern man, bored with modern rational speeches, the Oratory would be a very appropriated place, for there he would find more argumentative discussions, spontaneous and emotional narratives of the experiences lived in the community.

3. The reevaluation of the ludicrous.

To the cold and programmed man of modernism who does not know how to laugh47, postmodernism has the opposite festive man with a happiness somewhat empty. Philip’s Word is still in forced with regard to his proposal of a happy christianity as the fruit of a transcendent vision of history credited him with names well known to us, such as the buffoon of God, the joy of God, smile of God, etc. his singular character and his very peculiar jokes, are the consequence of the practice of living in the liberty of the children of God. He who goes crazy for having found the only thing that is worthwhile: Love. His joy is the expression of a moving “Pentecost” of some one who lives in the security that God loves him and whatever he does will be considered as an effort to be better and to make other better as well; perhaps here is the root of the triumph of his educational and pastoral method48

The postmodern man, tires, esceptic, and with inane humor, in our western civilization has lost his capacity for fantasy and feasting, Philip raises his flag in favor of “The madmen’s metaphysic” as H. U. Von Balthasar,49 called it, of those that know how to laugh because they know that though there are many reasons to be indignant, there is one reason more powerful for being happy, the promise of God that we will be fulfilled, that know -as Newman later said- that a “thousand difficulties do not constitute a doubt” It is urgent today that men and women, in spite of everything, continue to sing the joy of living

“If the man of the XX century succumbs and loses the last residues of his faculties for feast and fantasy, the result would be disastrous. The nucleolus of the religious vision of man and world , specially in its chistian version, would be destroyed. In the same manner, if in some way we are to win the battle for the humanization of man, a religious vision, highly festive should have an important role in this victory.”50

In this context, the praxis of what we today call popular religion promoted by Philip Neri acquires notable significance.

We refer to the practice of the Visits to the large Roman Basilicas, to the Eucharistic devotions and, above all, to what Cistellini called “The Open Oratory” Dominical reunions in which musical works and theater were represented and then were converted into pilgrimages to the Churches and ended in a great banquet in the open country provided by burros previously loaded with food and drink51

“Also in this reunions of the Oratory in the open, Philip remained faithful to his principles, to take joy to the people, in the beauty of nature and the beautiful melodies of great musicians, it was the true happiness of those who are at peace with God.”52

There are more than a few authors that bet on popular religiousness as an alternative for there Christian life of the XXI53 century because of its festive character. A popular religion not very institutionalized includes emotion and the feast to christian life and cult, but is also compromised with the present social situation. This was the popular religion that Philip promoted:

“ In the will of his promoters, the 40 hours were united to the personal devotion to Christ and to a more frequent communion (...) we should not consider the devotion of the 40 hours in the light of a later certain private piety, extremely introspective, separated from daily life. In Philip’s time, it was associated with a new moral responsibility and with the personal discovery of the contemplative prayer in its most simple and most literal form, open to the poor and ignorant (...) it was a means of expressing love. Those who prayed before the sacred host were those who went to work in the hospitals of the incurables”54

4. The ecological challenge

The rescue of nature so predicted by postmodernism is also a sign of the times that the Oratory can critically assimilate.

Being happy, Philip becomes friends with the sea, the mountain, the stars in the sky, he enjoyed the fraternity with mother nature, speaking to the flowers and caressing the animals; he frequented the company of her and in her. Giving joy to the people, in the beauty of nature and with the beautiful improvised melodies, was one genial way of being in peace with God, and reconciled with the rest and with nature. As in so many times, Philip knew how to unite in serene harmony religion, culture, a nature.

5. The primacy of experience over reason.

All of the before mentions depends on what I call the fundamental Oratorian conviction ,facing postmodernism: the conviction that the experience has preeminence over “ratio”. That is to say, that being a christian or an oratorian or whatever, is above all, a matter of an experience and of a discourse. How actual this is today! When our people are full of argumentative discourses of stories that tray to prove or legitimize ones own position, it is very actual, the memory of that one who before an organized method, proposed shoring a common experience: Here is the knot of the question, for each one of our Oratories the matter is not so much in importing schemes or the application of an oratorian “pretended essence” to our diverse circumstances, but on the courage to start an exodus of liberation based on the experience of God in the style of Philip in our own ground.

6. The defense of the minorities.

It is not possible to leave this matter at this point. I wish to end this exposition, bringing to memory that Philip is also tuned in with the postmodern voices of the defense of the minorities. To remedy poverty, illness and death that the pillage of Rome had left, was his first commitment. His message was not realized only en the temple, but in the streets and plazas, in the homes the Papal court and the hospitals. His style of life was a “clear option for the minorities”. He was poor and he remained with the poor to serve them, solidarity with orphans, prisoners, mendicants, the sick, heretics, gypsies, etc. His Oratory was, since its beginning, on attempt to assume with solidarity the pain of those who suffer, as an evangelical demand.

In our country where 10 million persons exist in conditions of extreme poverty, in our Latin America where more than two thirds of the population are on the margin of the processes of modernization, the oratorian communities cannot be silent. Here where people live in distrust and disillusion with political projects that have promised, over and over again, a better future, if the Oratory is not an alternative community to promote the integral liberation of our brothers, it will be failing in its date with History and above all with the God that speaks from history.

“An Oratory that offers the world a Church that prays, that is active and missionary, in which prayer, contemplation and even ecstasy is in the function or our brother towards a responsible presence, as long as it is opportune and responsible in the quality or service....”55.

.....It would be a true Oratory in the context of postmodernism.

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Romano, Tesis presentada en la Pontifica Universidad Lateranense,

Perugia, 1974

NIETZSCHE F. Froh Wissenschaft. III, fr, 25 (NW, Vol V-2)

ORIGENES Hom. In Jerem. IV, 13. En PG (Migné)

PRONZATO A. Felipe Neri: La seriedad de un santo festivo. Trad. MARTINEZ

A. Latina Imprenta, México, s/f

REALE-ANTISERI Historia del Pensamiento Filosófico y Científico. Herder,

Barcelona, 1988

RORTY R. La filosofía y el espejo de la naturaleza. Cátedra, Madrid, 1983

TREVOR M. San Felipe Neri, Apóstol de Roma (1515-1595) Trad. BOIX A.

Sal Terrae, Santander 1986

TURKS P. Felipe Neri, El fuego de la alegría. Guadalmena, Sevilla, 1992

VATIMO G. El fin de la modernidad. Nihilismo y hermenéutica en la cultura

posmoderna. Planeta-Agostini, 1994

VELASCO J.M. El malestar religioso en nuestra cultura. Paulinas, Madrid,1993

VEGA ABIA M.G. Fuego, Amor, Vida...!!! La Huella de S. Felipe Neri, en el

Cuarto Centenario. Claretianas, Madrid, 1994

VERNETTE J. “Le Nouvel-Age” .En NRT, 111 (1989)

Vida Fraterna en Comunidad Nos. 10,24 y 25

WEBER M. Ensayo sobre Sociología de la Religión Vol. I Taurus, Madrid, 1983.

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SEMMINAR: THE ORATORY IN THE MEXICAN COLONIAL ART

P. Luis Avila Blancas

La Profesa Oratory, Mexico

This work tries to present some of the more important characteristics that can be identified in the Oratory’s houses that were founded a long of the 300 years of Spanish domination, from 1521, when Mexico-Tenochtitlan, the Aztecs’ empire capitol fell, to 1821, the year when the Independence finished. This topic has not been handle in a special way until now, but in general way, by the religious art’s skillful, wishing that anyone of them can handle this topic with the deepness and the amplitude that it needs.

The Oratories founded in the New Spain are, in it’s chronological foundation order: Puebla, Mexico, Guadalajara, Oaxaca, San Miguel El Grande (Allende, Gto.), Orizaba, Veracruz, y Querétaro.

‘Herrerian' Facades. The ones derived from the Spanish style made by the architect, Juan Herrera: La Concord, Puebla, Pue.

Baroque Facades. Guadalajara, Jal. St. Philip Neri (1752). San Miguel de Allende, Gto: La Salud (18^th century)

Exuberant Baroque Facades. Oaxaca, Oax. St. Philip Neri (1702-1728). San Miguel de Allende, Gto. St.’s Philip Neri’s Oratory (18^thcentury)

'Estípites' Pilasters Facades. Mexico, city; St. Philip Neri “El Nuevo”, (the new) (1753). Orizaba, Ver. The Concord, (1725-1762).

Movable Grooves Baroque Facades. Mexico, city; St. Philip Neri “El Viejo” (the old) (1687). Querétaro, Qro. St. Philip Neri (1786-1804).

Facade with carved relieves. Guadalajara, Jal.; St. Philip Neri

Hollows Facade. Mexico, city; St. Philip Neri “El Viejo” (the old). San Miguel de Allende, Gto. Wealthy Temple.

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I- “The Concord”, Puebla. (18^thcentury)

At the beginning, it was a hermitage of the “Santa Veracruz’s Fraternity”. Re-built in 1545, the temple was use like cathedral during the fixes that were made to the old cathedral between 1556-1588.

In 1660, it was given to the “Venerable Concord of Ecclesiastic Charity”, established in Puebla in 1652 under St. Philip Neri’s sponsorship. The current Temple was form 1676. It has a latin-cross big aisle with a shaft dome and an enormous octagonal cupola.

It is a very serious ‘herrerian’ style facade. It is formed by ‘pilasters dóricas’ with granite, between them, in each hollow are white- rock, St. Pablo and St. Pedro statues. In the high center, a big rectangular window is used like a niche to the white marble’s St. Philip figure. The facade ends with a hollow in a trapezoid form that shows a ‘Ntra. Sra. de los Angeles’ relief as is venerated in the Chiesa Nuova, see of the Roman Oratory Congregation.

The spiritual exercises’ house, next to the temple shows one of the most beauty colonial backyards, abundantly decorated with ‘talavera poblana’ of the 19^th

Century’s beginnings. The cloister, father’s antique home with great and beauty archery, it is, at the present time a school.

Four chapels are opened in the Church’s interior, two at the beginning and the others immediately to the transept with exuberant baroque facades and adornments of smooth cantons. The pulpit, the Presbyterian front part and the sacristy fountain are important, made of marble of ‘onix de Tecali’ (17^th century).

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II- St. Philip Neri’s Churches in Mexico, city (17-18^th century)

The St. Philip Neri’s Church, “El Viejo” is an unique case in the Spanish-American architecture, called this way because of its antiquity and for distinguish it from the new one of the 18^th century. What happened is that, started the Congregation in 1659, like a priest fraternity, titled “Venerable Union” by the Presbyterian Antonio Calderón Benavides, in charge of take care of the sick persons. Then, them chapel was growing in extension and in importance as the community and the faithful were incrementing, due its rebuilt to the architect Cristobal de Medina Vargas and the Dean D. Diego de Malpartida y Centeno’s length it is dedicated to St. Philip Neri in June 12, 1687. But, because of being an interior chapel, it is necessary a facade to be shown in the street that exist up today, with a funny tower and facade inside a great arch with St. Philip Neri’s relief covering his congregates under his mantle; and so, the recourse of waves in the gable’s arms and the column’s grooves in all its length, making to jet out this facade of the others of the 18^th century’s beginnings.

The second church of St. Philip Neri, called “El Nuevo” was started in the middle 18^th century, in the architect Ildefonso de Iniestra y Vejarano management, who following as the epoch like, brought from Spain by the decorator Jeronimo de Balbás who made the ratable, “Los Reyes” in Mexico’s Cathedral, made a facade of two bodies and three divided streets by ‘estípites pilasters'. Over the principal door he carved the Oratory’s shield and up the cornice has a great niche that shelter “Ntra. Sra. de las Nieves” virgin image and the ones of the patrician Juan and his wife to whom the Sacred Virgin appeared asking them for a Temple in the Roman Esquilino Mount; covered with snow in August 5, 359, a piety history of the Middle Ages. Today is known as “Basilica de Santa María la Mayor”, in Rome.

This three sculptures like the Temple stayed unfinished when was gave to the Viceroy’s Government Congregation and with St. Philip Neri “El Viejo” and home, that has been damaged by the April’s 1767 earthquake, in change of the Jesuits’ Temple and Profesa, recently expelled by Carlos III from the Spanish Empire.

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III- St. Philip Neri’s Oratory in Guadalajara, Jal. (17-18^th centuries)

With the permission of the Bishop of New Galicia, D. Juan de León Garavito, with see in Guadalajara, Jal, city in the occident of the New Spain, started this Oratory in a Fraternity and Priest Union like the ones in Puebla, Mexico and Oaxaca while the Bula was obtained, that finally was expel by Inocencio XII Pope in Rome in March 2, 1702.

The St. Philip Neri’s Temple built during the first middle of the 19^th century, has only one aisle with transept, with quarry adornment that correspond as the epoch’s like (of the same century’s endings) introduced in the New Spain by the architect and sculptor Manuel Tolsá, who lived in the viceroy’s capitol.

The gray quarry facade looks a Renaissance’s light, until it’s abundant baroque adornments. In the left side of the facade it was arose a great tower of two bodies, quadrangular and the second, of eight angles giving to it a great look.

The antique residence of the priests, with a splendid cloister; at the present is a school.

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IV- St. Philip Neri’s Church in Oaxaca, Oax (19^th century)

This Congregation that was started like priest’s Concord since 1661, as Puebla’s, was consolidated until 1750 when was elected like prepsosit the P. Guillermo Ignacio de Mier. Obtained Clemente’s XII bula and Felipe’s V slip for the construction and foundation of the Temple, by Dr. Juan Saénz de Leyva, the Bishop’s General Vicar.

The St. Philip Neri’s Church in Oaxaca is presented to us like one of the most beautiful examples of the regional architecture in the South of the New Spain, and like the maximum exponent of the ‘diochesco’ baroque called ‘churriqueresco’, because of its dazzling golden adornmentss specially the one dedicated to St. Philip Neri, that make it a church-museum.

In the facade made in green quarry, the bas-relief with the Oratory Founder Saint’s figure in complete body with cap in the head, heavy shawl and book in hand seems like made in wood, because of the yellowish quarry.

Its is very important, the facade too, because it has pilasters abalaustradas in the three bodies that make it, in which are four principal parts: one third of timber and adorn with relief; then, two bulbous bodies united by their more bulky parts and separated by a bulky rope of the last timber fragment, that has elicoidales grooves.

Five adornmentss complete the aisle with other four of fine elaboration, being the biggest one of a better elaboration.

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V- St. Philip Neri’s Oratory in San Miguel de Allende, Gto. (18^th century)

This Oratory, famous because of the “San Francisco de Sales School that has had in its management, because one of its principals was the Dr. Juan Benito Díaz de Gammarra (1783) reformer of the philosophic studies in New Spain; and one of its members, the venerable P. Luis Felipe Neri de Alfaro was the author of the Atotonilco Sanctuary in which it’s Temples’ walls, and chapel were painted “Jesus Christ, Our Lord Passion” by the muralist Miguel Antonio Martínez de Pocasangre, with verses of P. Alfaro, who death with sanctity fame in March 22, 1776.

The 1714 Temple, with only one aisle with transept, should have baroque golden-wood adornments , like seen in an epoch’s ex–vote, when the high altar is adorn with some sculptures that today are in the currents neon-classic adornments.

In the left Oratory’s transept Temple is a beauty facade with a couple of golden salomonics columns as entrance to “Santa Clara de Loreto” of beautiful boudoir with golden and carved adornments. The north Sacristy’s wall is covered by a painting represented the Sacred Heart signed by Andrés López.

In the exterior, the Oratory has an original baroque facade in pink quarry. In the annex it can be admired, in a living room, the wealthy collection of the most important provost and priest pictures.

Between the Oratory cloister and the building that was the “San Francisco de Sales School” is the “Wealth’s Virgin Chapel” which it’s facade (18^th century’s endings) of black quarry is under a big shell that seems a big hollow.

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VI- Concord Church or Guadalupe’s Sanctuary in Orizaba, Ver. (18^th century)

Founded the Congregation in 1767, the construction of the Temple was started by its founder, P. José Ancermo , using his own goods. The two bodies’ facade and a curved-line end is formed by two pairs of estipites pilasters to each side of the principal door, and the hollow of the highest part has a medallion with Guadeloupe Sacred Virgin, carved in 'onix de tecali', to who the temple is dedicated, The eight-angles tower’s basis mark the facade.

In the Temple’s interior, that has only one aisle without transept, can be looked two baroque adornments that were fixed after the earthquake in 1866. The painting of Guadeloupe Sacred Virgin, painted by the new-Spanish, Nicolás Rodríguez; is venerated in the neon-classic high altar having at its sides St. Philip and St. Sebastian Valfré pictures.

The residence, next to the Temple, with spiritual exercises’ house, trough the time has been used as a quarter, a hospital and now is a regional museum.

Currently, the Parish-Sanctuary is attended by priests of the Jalapa’s Diocese.

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VII- St. Philip Neri’s Temple, today Cathedral of Querétaro. (19^th century)

Put the first tone of the temple in December 8, 1786, in the Congregation’s founder times, the venerable P. Marcos de Ortega, was dedicated in honor of St. Philip Neri until September 19, 1805 with the presence and blessing of Miguel Hidalgo y Costilla, future initiator of the Mexican Independence, due to the P. Dimas Díez de Lara’s pledges, who before entering to the Oratory, had been acted like Priest of Santiago Tianguistengo, Edo. de México, fact to which it can be attribute the similarity between the two churches.

Let us explain some differences and similarities between them: in the two facades, the walls were covered with ‘tezontle’ (a porous stone esteemed for building in Mexico), at the principal’s door sides, the architect built three columns. In both groups, the central column is the highest being separated in a 'bent shape' way that passing for the cornice separating one body from the other , struggling them, what does not happened with the other group that elevate it without break it. All of them ends in Corinthian capitals. In them are different compositions. The Santiago one has the pontiff tiara, meanwhile the one of the Oratory represented St. Philip Neri’s sponsorship to each one of his Congregation like St. Philip Neri’s “El Viejo” in Mexico city, facade.

The Temples’ drawing, latin cross, with only one aisle and a single copula, has in its interior neon-classics adornments. In the funeral chapel which its enter correspond to the left transept’s wall, are the priests founders Congregation remains until its foundation since its extinction in 1916, with the death of the last Priest. In 1920, because of the Holy See’s bula, it was considerate as a Cathedral.

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BIBLIOGRAPHY

DE LA MAZA Francisco El churriguresco en la Ciudad de México. F.C.E., México, 1968.

Ib. La ciudad de México en el siglo XVII. F.C.E., México, 1969

Ib. San Miguel de Allende. México, 1972

OBREGON Gonzalo San Felipe Neri, de Oaxaca. Departamento de Monumentos coloniales, 1968.

PRIMER ENCUENTRO NACIONAL DE HISTORIA ORATORIANA. México, D.F., 18-20 de octubre de 1983.

SEGUNDO ENCUENTRO NACIONAL DE HISTORIA ORATORIANA. México, D.F. 15-17 de octubre de 1985.

NOTICAS Y DOCUMENTOS. Organo de la Comisión de Historia de la Federación de los Oratorios de San Felipe Neri de la República Mexicana. Número 1-18 correspondientes a los años 1980-1989

RAZO OLIVA Juan Diego Atotonilco. Y JOSE DE SANTIAGO SILVA. Gobierno del Estado de Guanajuato, 1985.

TOUSSANT Manuel La Catedral y las Iglesias de Puebla. Porrúa, S.A., México, 1954.

VARGAS-LUGO E. Las portadas religiosas de México. Instituto de Investigaciones Estéticas. UNAM, México, 1969.

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SEMMINAR: THE ORATORIAN PARISH

P. Hugo Zolaque

Cali, Colombia

INTRODUCTION

The Parish after the Vatican Council II

The New Challenges of the Parish like Local Community

The Oratorian Pastors’s Profile and The Oratory

The Oratorian Parish that We Want to Be

The Oratorian Pastoral of the Parish

V.1 The Educational Pastoral

V.2 The Ludicrous Pastoral

Introduction

The Church comes from the Trinity, it is structured at its image and it walks toward the execution of the history. To come of up high, Oriens ex alto, , to be moderated from above, (L.G.3), and in road up, the Church cannot decrease to the coordinates of the history, of the visible, neither of the available. The Church comes from Trinity, is the project of the Father's universal salvation, (L.G.2), the Son's mission (L.G.3), the saint work of the Holy Spirit, they found the Church like mystery, divine work in the men's time, gathered by the embody word (Ecclesia creatura Verbi), vivified continually by the Holy Spirit (The Church = Temple of the Holy Spirit).

The Church is icon (eikon) of the Holy Trinity, it is structured in its communion, to image and likeness of the Trinitarian communion. Its communion reflect the Trinitarian communion. The Church is ONE in the variety of the local Churches, of the charismas and of the ministries (L.G. cap.2-6).

The Church goes toward the Entirety, it belongs to pilgrims, that prepares now the final Glory, through a conversion and a reform.

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I - The Parish after the Vatican Council II

The Parish of the Council of Trento and of the Code of D.C. of 1917, (can 216) they gave us an image of Parish, the same one that has existed until today. The territory was the principal element of the parish. It was identified with “The Parochial Church”, with its goods and their business books.

The parish priest person was the parochial lifelong head: The Parish was visualized more from the parish priest person than from the community. The cura animarum understanded mainly like the sacrementalization, was the fundamental activity of the Parish. The ideal of the good Christian was the “believer and practitioner.” The priest was seen specially like administrator of sacraments, he celebrates masses, he confess, he baptizes, and buries to the deads. The relationship with the local Church and the Diocesan Church, was only administrative, very weak or almost non-existent from the theological point of view.

With the advance of the current century and the emergence of totally new situations, the Parish begins to be shown unable to give answer adapted to the man's multiple problems, of the woman and of the society on the whole.

More than community, there was mass, mass of Christian. There was not authentic missionary opening; the Evangelization was bounded to the environment of the parochial Church.

The reality of the local Church, the Diocesan one, was completely unknown as reference place and origin of the parochial eclesiality, ruled over the centralism of the Parish priest person with the exclusion of the other Priests and of the faithful ones as agents or main characters of the pastoral action, a Christian life founded in the sacramental practice and inspired by the obligation, without a truly community celebration, let entered to the religious individualism: it was spoken of “to save the soul” and “to save souls.”

It can be say that starting from the Vatican II and of the postconciliar period, the renovation currents have been happened almost uninterruptedly. This renovation has felt with urgency because the Parish has been the only structure pastoral with which we counted to organize and to promote a pastoral action. It can be say, during the present century, the history of the Parish has been a succession of renovating intents.

Some have been partial as the movement of Liturgical Pastoral that wanted to revitalize the concept of Parish like cult community. The theology of the mission and the movement of the missionary pastoral developed in France, intended to make of the Parish the main evangelizing structure of the environment. Other intents have been more global overalls starting from the Vatican II. The conception of the Parish like COMMUNITY OF COMMUNITIES united and revitalized all the previous intents.

Many good things have been achieved: to locate the Eucharist, overalls the Sunday one, in the center of the parochial life; new parochial horizons have opened up to the Evangelization (The new Evangelization); fomentation and animation of small communities; renovation of the pastoral theology (without pastoral theology it cannot occur authentic pastoral action); the limits have been enlarged from the pastoral corresponsability to many new agents.

The New Code of D.C. of 1983 (c.515-552) picks up the eclesiology of the council and the pastoral praxis of the last years. “The Parish is a certain constituted Community of faithful Christian in a stable way in the particular Church...” Although this code has enlarged with a great flexibility the forms of understanding the parish and the exercise of the priestly ministry, we find in it some lagoons, because it is considered that it doesn't respond to the current reality of the Church.

Among these lagoons we can point out:

The Communitary sense and the corresponsability stay in the level of the concepts. It is continued centering the Parish in the Parish priest person, to who seems to continue corresponding the whole action of the Church. The theology of the Lumen Gentium and the ecclesiological language are not fully present. It proposes an image of Parish made from an Europe stops. There is a despise between the experience of the lived Church and the code: it doesn't seem to have place for the movements, communities and groups that have arisen after the celebration of the Vatican II.

The vision of the Parish continues being mainly cultural. There is a too unilateral emphasis in the territory like approach of Parish; neither reflective appropriately the different situations of the Christian in the rural and urban world, the problems that it outlines the religious pluralism, the secularization processes. A single model of Parish cannot be the one that better responds to all the current circumstances.

The same topic of the “community of communities” it doesn't have bigger theological development neither pastoral. The theology of the parish, the being and the chore of it, continue being task to carry out; however, the silence of the new Code can be interpreted as a to leave open to the pastoral creativity of the Church local.

We believe that since the topic of the local Church, authentic rediscovery of the Vatican II, the theology of any other reality infradiocesan must start. The Parish receive from the Diocese its eclesiality and the Diocese belongs to the Parish its concrete task of building the Church.

The Local Church commends to the parish:

The globality of the pastoral action: The Parish is the place or space in which one lives the eclesiality in global form.

The Parish should give EVERYTHING to ALL... if it makes it, the Parish becomes a cell of the particular Church, in its being's basic unit, in the most significant public and visible expression of what is to be Church. This way, the Parish has the capacity to show the universality of the mission of the Church. To belong to a Parish is to belong to a Church and to be in Communion with the rest of Churches.

The territoriality: the territory sums up the reality of the Christian community.

The spiritual maternity of the Parish, today it has a great capital importance, the topic of the Christian initiation. Of it, the pattern of Church, the evangelizing mood of the faithful ones and the truth of a life and of alive Christian community. The Parish is very especially manifestation and realization of the ecclesiastic maternity that it engenders continually new members of the community.

This means that the Parish should take care, with pastoral care, the catechetics and catecumenals processes and that the initiation in the faith finds its manifestation and last realization in the Sunday’s Eucarist, true heart of the presence of the parochial life. In it, it is manifested and lived the globality of what is the Church. The presence and Lord Jesus' paschal ministry continues being in the Eucarist the reason of the community, the force for the evangelization and the thing that configures its life, because of it feeds it.

Rules for the parochial Renovation:

The Synod of the lays requested the renovation from the sacramental practice, the community and missionary sense, and the Christian formation. The Exhortation Apostolic Christifideles laici picked up and it enlarged the proposition of the Priest.

There it is affirmed that the Parish is not the only pastoral structure neither ecclesiastic, that which doesn't subtract it importance to the Parish according to the Synod, is one of the most valid structures for the local construction of the Church. The Parish is, then, a necessary, but not absolute structure.

It is the Theology of the mission. The first and main approach to evaluate the action of the Parish; it is not the sociology, because this never replaces to the theology. All parochial structure should be built from and on, theological approaches.

To value the world today and the present moment. Today's world: the today´s men and women who the Parish has to Evangelize. This implies proximity, incarnation, syntony with their problems, to speak the same language, encounter with the men and with their world.

Healthy practice of the profetism. Announce and denounces.

Great Pastoral activity. That it impacts in everybody, that has enough Evangelizing deepness.

Not to work from the individualism, neither of closed postures. Any pastoral agent, and much less a Parish priest should make it. The Parish cannot be conceived as a closed and absolute space of pastoral. The Parish is a valid structure and necessary, but not absolute.

The Parish priest is not the Parish. It has to be conceived and contemplated from the community and not from the Parish priest person. As much the parochial Vicars as the pastoral agents are not the parish priest servants but of the community.

The “Cura Animarum” cannot be continued understanding from the sacramentalization.

The Parish cannot close on the environment of the parochial Church. It has to Evangelize the atmosphere inside which it is in.

The Parish cannot forget neither to ignore the diocesan reality. The local Church, as reference place and origin of the parochial eclesiality. Each parish should have very clear conscience from its ownership to a local Church.

The Parish should offer a solid spirituality (doctrinal) and intense. But no avoid “to the man and the woman from the wish, a spirituality that guides the human desire toward the seduction of God in Jesus.

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II – The New Challenges of the Parish like Local Community

It is urgent to activate in each Parish the missionary dynamism to make arrive the Gospel’s message to those who are not participating, people's great majority.

The Parish should promote in its faithful a real sense of belonging to the ecclesiastic community, where the person participates regulary to the Eucharistic community and feel welcome and accompanied by the community.

We have to energize the communion structures and participation at parochial level: Coordination Team, Pastoral Council, Pastoral Assembly, Parochial Pastoral Assembly, and give them a true sense of participation.

Facing to all the tasks, is necessary to prioritize our pastoral work by means of a real pastoral planning.

The participation of the lay ones in the different pastoral tasks requires a systematic and permanent formation that many times surpass the Parish capacity.

More and more, we need urgently a pastoral group with clearly defined pastoral approaches and accepted by the different Parishes and Church movements .

In the rural and suburban Parishes, the local community occupies an important space in the parochial structure. In the urban Parishes also exist other approaches, not merely territorial, but of belonging to certain parochial community. The work with specialized groups and the pastoral of movements breaks easily the mark of the territorial Parish in the city.

It is necessary to think for the urban pastoral, in responsible sectional that know to welcome to new neighbors on behalf of the Parish, and to take in the strong times of the year a message on behalf of the Church to the families, for example: with occasion of the Lent, Christmas, Saint Patron party, some death, marriage, baptism, etc.

The experience of a PAROCHIAL MISSION can help us to find new opportunities of Evangelization in the sectors: for example family´s mission or anniversary of the Parish.

Above any legalism, it should be the attention to people and the concrete families, to make them feel God´s grace and fondness towards each one of them. This is then, the necessity of embodying the pastoral of the good Samaritan inside the reality of our parochial communities.

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III – The Oratorian Pastor’s Profile and the Oratory

We, the Oratorians, want to be, in the modern times, a sign of love of God and of the presence of the Holy Spirit, as St. Philip was in his time. The Oratory is called to take the Gospel in the modern world with its proposals of love, simplicity, happiness and of authentic sentence. To attend more efficiently to the mission of the Church in the world, it is indispensable for the Oratory to know the own charisma like a Gift of the Holy Spirit, to valorize, to power and to announce it.

The secular Oratory was born in needy times of a radical reformation of the costumes, Christian open wings to the more modern initiatives of charity, pastorals, cultural, recreational, musical... after having tempered the spirit with the prayer and the sacraments, it was propose to create a true Christian community that served as ferment in the own atmosphere, that instructed and formed pleasing. Original method, in which assiduous and familiar treatment with God’s Word, the prayer and the human encounter, take the individual's integral formation.

St. Philip also commissioned to the lays to commented God’s Word. The great novelty of the Oratory was its spontaneity and the task that the lays carried out. He didn't direct the Oratory, but it was his inspiration. In the Oratory, the first was the conversion on God’s Word, in a simple way, in a family climate, where none felt strange.

Philip knew the Writings deeply, because of his reading and meditation. The Oratory always keep esteemly the knowledge and the meditation of God’s Word and the announcement of the “Good New” was the main way of renovation of the Christian life. St. Philip didn't want to be Bible theorist, but rather it transmitted in his soul, the experience that the Holy Spirit suggested him. There is where resides St. Philip’s originality.

The charity works were of the meditation on God’s Word. No one can know God like father neither the universal fraternity of the men without feeling as own the sufferings of the other ones. The charity works meant to put into practice the sufferings of the other ones, they meant to put into practice as much as learned. All those things were conversion signs, they were those “words” they became “life.”

“Who wants another thing that is not Christ, doesn't know what wants; who looks for another thing that is not Christ, doesn't know what demands: who acts and doesn't make it because of Christ, doesn't know what is making.” This radical Christ-center is a fundamental fact of St. Philip’s spirituality.

“None true son of St. Philip can be said, but it is humble.” “Be humble, ben down.”

The oratorians cannot forget:

That the secularity, so much, the pastors one as the secular Brothers one consists in: with missionary heart to inhabit more inside this world, with its restlessness, temptations and ferments to help it to find itself in Christ.

That the typical Philip’s work and the one specific of the congregation of the Oratory it is the Secular Oratory, born in needy times of a radical reformation of the customs, Christian communities open to the most modern initiatives of charity, pastorals, cultural, recreational, musical, etc., after having formed the spirit with the prayer and the Sacraments.

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IV – The Oratorian Parish We want to Be

Thinking in a model of Church we are projected to a practical description that helps us to define the behavior relationships and of belonging. Our ideal of Church is to end up being:

An Evangelized and Evangelizing Church that allows the option for the poor, giving testimony of evangelical poverty and of commitment.

A community that liberates of personal and social sin, besides their consequent unfair structures, looking for a full participation and communion in the Church and in the world.

A community that in the liturgy celebrates the salvation and become the seed of God’s Kingdom.

For this model of Church can embody in the reality, it is necessary to promote the ecclesiastic communities in our Oratorian Parishes, with some concrete characteristics:

Them to be constituted in a place of Evangelization.

Them to favor the experience of new interpersonal relationships in the faith.

Them to promote people's active participation in the ecclesiastic tasks.

Them to be able to unite the reflection and the action, the living of every day and the Christian faith; the personal, the pastoral and social action.

Them to define the commitment with the family, the work, the neighborhood and the local community.

Them to acquire a bigger commitment with the social justice and the transformation of the world with an eye toward the Kingdom.

The ecclesiastic communities, end up building a more apostolic model of Church that the one of the traditional Parish; a more community, missionary, prophetic, liberator and more open to today's world Church.

A present Church in the human community where the lays participate actively, with a missionary dynamism and at the same time Evangelizing; open to the problems, to the challenges and the hopes of people and the town, always giving signs of fraternal communion.

At the present time, the sense of belonging to an ecclesiastic community doesn't exist; a very fragile life experience of the internal love exists only, of that “look how they love each other” that was so characteristic of the primitive Christian communities that are described in the Acts of the Apostles.

Belonging to a Church implies to feel member of this Church that on the other hand it sustains and support you. It is a mutual relationship between the person and the group with which both are strengthen and feel committed. The lack of belonging and of life experience of the ecclesiastic community in the environment of our parochial communities is manifested, at wider level, for the lack of an effective pastoral group in the big sectors.

There are other many factors, not less differ and important, in the lack of sense of effective belonging of many Catholics to their Church, because of the superficial Evangelization and the little instruction of the Christian doctrine that convert many of our parishioners, in “very easy prey”, of the proselytizing attacks of great quantity of Protestant sects.

The council Vatican II, in its dogmatic constitution Lumen Gentium illuminated this aspect of the Church like community. The place where it is expressed and it is manifested in an unequivocal way this community of faith and of life, it is the Eucharistic Celebration.

In the Eucharistic’s bread fraction, really participating of the body of the Lord, we rise to a communion with Him and among us. Being a single bread, we all form a single body, because we all participate of oneself bread. (1 Cor.10, 17; L.G.7).

The Church is carried out in a concrete and tangible way, in the community that celebrates the Eucarist. Theologically we can say that is in the parochial community that celebrates the Eucarist, where the Church is constituted locally. St. Domingo's Document say: “The Parish is not mainly a structure, a territory, a building, but the family of God, like a fraternity encouraged by the unit Spirit. The Parish is founded about a theological reality because it is a Eucharistic community.” (SD 58).

Because all of this an important question that interests us to develop does arise: How live in today's world, and mainly in the city?, this faith and life community, that is the Parish, according to the concepts mentioned previously.

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V – The Parish’s Oratorian Pastoral

1 – Educational Pastoral

It is not a chaplaincy in a traditional way this is a religion class, a chat, a Eucharist the time in time, but of beginning the children in the knowledge of the true God, of Jesus Christ, Person Divine and only Lord; to raise in their mind and in their heart the certainty of the love of God; to help them to discover their condition of human beings with vocation to the transcendence, or the ethical dimension and religious of a truly integral education; everything can achieve if today's school and that of tomorrow, is thought, it is conceived, it is structured, it place, a space is made, in which is not only spoken or things are said, but overalls in which something is made, some experiences are lived and in the one which the entirety school- life (we are speaking of a global conception of the school life), PEDAGOGY is MADE, and in our case, PEDAGOGY OF RELIGIOUS VALUE.

In this context we can affirm that the religion professors including the Pastor, should be all and each one of the educators that work in an educational institution, so that the traditional conception of “religion professors” has to give the place to the one of Christian educators. which are presented as what they are and that they affirm with respect, but without complex, their Christian condition. Just this way, some day, it will be achieved the school’s lifetime lived with authentic evangelizing sense, so that with all right and true realism can be spoken of a Evangelized and Evangelizing school, avoiding for this road, that the religion class becomes a monologue of a single professor inside a school classroom and during the classic “religion class.”

As pastors we should make possible that our educators end up being owners of a great capacity, themselves to be the manufacturers of a thought and a pedagogic practice that converts or make of the school life a pedagogy of values with Evangelizing force. We need, inevitably, our educators to be it for vocation and not simply salaried; only when the work is carried out for vocation it is possible to play a decisive paper in the achievement of the human quality of the educational task; in a same way it would make possible to act with a clear conscience that as much the family as the school are the first responsible for the image of the Christianity and of its credibility in front of the children and the youths; it is possible to understand the value and the function of the personal testimony in terms of Christian life, the value and the Evangelizing function of the training.

It doesn't fit doubt that in the general atmosphere of the school, the activities of all and each one of the educators influences in the mind and the heart of the children in a much more positive way that a religion class, a sporadic Eucharist, some coexistence, or the same religion class. In our Parishes, the schools and the colleges should have the kind, helpful presence, and without pretenses of a pastor that Evangelizes the school and that knows how to be integrated to the school life, to encourage it and to enrich it with the testimony of their personal life and their lighty word, and all this in the mark, in a clear option for the children and the youths, the school life acquired without place to doubts an effective evangelizing dynamism.

The Oratorian Pastor’s mission in the school should not be the one of dictating the religion class, neither that of some sporadic services but his inspiring presence, his contagious happiness, his capacity and his disposition of making friends and his love for the children are what the school of the new millennium waits and needs from him.

The oratorian should create spaces, instances that can help as much to the children as to the youths to discover and to assimilate the idea of a personal God, and to start a relationship, in Jesus Christ, and for Him; and this as starting point of a future synthesis God–human Life, God–human Culture.

We have to think of a school that Evangelizes with force, and with evangelizing intention, that is to say, a school life that announces the “good new” of God in Jesus Christ and never a religious teaching with their methods and their objectives as if it was any school discipline. In any moment this style contradicts the juridical classification of religious freedom in force because the religious freedom doesn't mean no-religion.

A school that works for the human integral formation, IS NOT ABLE TO DECLARES NEUTRAL, NEITHER ATHEIST, NEITHER AGNOSTIC.

An educational institution in which the children and the youths are stimulated to discover the true sense of the life, to humanize and to dignify their person, to grow in humanity; cannot make of their Institutional Educational Project an option for not- being, or for nothing; if it makes it, it would be refusing to itself as school, denying their mission and true reason of being. Neither the atheism, neither the agnosticism, neither the existential hole of Sartre fits in the conception, neither in the daily life of a school that should be instrument in the children's hands and the youths to discover the sense of the human life and to end up being fully men, fully women.

We must not forget that the Oratorian is forced to also take the entirety of the Gospel to the school and in a modern world with its proposal of love, of wisdom, simplicity, of happiness, of testimony and of authentic sentence. On the other hand, we are forced to serve as ferment in the own atmosphere instructing, forming and pleasing: it is fundamental the assiduous and family treatment of the God’s Word, the prayer and the human encounter in order to achieve the individual's integral formation.

V. 2 – The Ludicrous Pastoral

Let us remember that all our pastoral mission in the Oratorian Parish should embody St. Philip´s spirit who affirmed that the happiness will be eternal inheritance for the fair ones but already from this life the presence of the Holy Spirit give a premature pleasure of the paradise. Our Saint was invaded of the Holy Spirit and he expanded around him an intense perfume of happiness “The Lord love to who gives with happiness”. Philip wanted, also, communicate this fruit of the presence of the Holy Spirit of the other ones.

The happiness is contagious, it is the best discipline to progress in the way to the spirit, while the melancholy and the sadness are not but obstacles. Philip’s sharp, humorous and brilliant personality overcomes any idea that one can make of its happiness. Today we have to apply in our parochial pastoral that statement that has acquired axiom character, that the children learn playing then it is very possible and important that through the ludicrous can induce as much in the children as in the youths, and also in the adults, the idea of God and in particular of his love for us.

We can take advantage of the song, the game, the theater, the marionettes, the music, the drawing, a good selection of dynamic, etc., like didactic help to energize the process of an evangelization that takes the discovery of God progressively and that it stimulates the relationship with Him in Jesus' person.

They are many the audiovisual and the materials that can be used with success in the parochial environment and that they would be able to wake up a great sympathy and it influences in the mind and in the heart of an entire parochial community, since all those materials present the Christianity, the Christian faith, like an authentic party and to Jesus like who comes to encourage that party in their hearts.

Usually today neither to the children, less to the youths, and to the adults don't like to distribute long sentences, but it satisfies them and they love to sing, to dance, to act, and to be creative. All these reasons in front of the new millennium to think of the projection of a ludicrous pastoral like important element for an effective evangelization. Inside a formation spiritual chord with the times should take us to the conviction, that a possible ludicrous pastoral should serve for that to develop the conviction gradually that any man, any woman will be able to spend playing a lifetime, less when what is in the middle it is the personal relationship with God.

Inside the pastoral reality we should be convinced at least in our Latin American towns that we are in the obligation of fomenting as much the art as the culture but it is necessary to look for an appropriate pedagogy that combined with the love and the culture characteristic of each town lands us in the reality of the new millennium.

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Bibliography

BRIGHENTI AGENOR Metodología para mí, proceso de Planificación. 1998

CELAM Documento de Puebla 1979

CELAM Documentos de Santo Domingo 1992

COD.DER.CAN.1983

FLORISTAN CASIANO Dicc. Abreviado de Pastoral, Verbo Divino 1988

JUAN PABLO II Chistrifideles Laici 1989

JUAN PABLO II Exhortación apostólica, Os Daré Pastore

SOBRINO JHON Resurrección de la verdadera Iglesia 1981

VATICANO II Constitución Sagrada

VATICANO II Constitución Litúrgica

VATICANO II Constitución Decreto sobre el Apostolado de los

Seglares 1965

VATICANO II

Gandium et Spes (Iglesia de un mundo moderno) 1990

VELA JESÚS ANDRÉS Proyecto Educativo de la Escuela 1980

P. CARLOS MARÍN Los valores del Evangelio

N.I.P. y Proyecto Pastoral

Diócesis De Ipiales

CINEP

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SEMMINAR: TOWARD AN ORATORY IN MEXICAN CONTEXT.

P. Ramón Martínez Cardoso C.O.

P. Raúl Herrera Cervantes C.O.

To speak about the Mexican[39] and the oratorian is equal to be introduced in the endless polemic of the construction of identities[40]. That is to say, it would be to confront the challenge of specifying, if it is possible, what is the Mexican and what is the oratorian?. To this it would also be added the endless discussion of how ‘two identities ' enters in relationship?.

So, the first thing that it is necessary to make is to verify that if we consider in abstract as much the Mexican as the oratorian, these concepts don't say for themselves mutual relationship. It is only when, abandoning the mere concepts and when considering both, rather, like a historical – existential reality, we notice of a possible relationship. This constitutes our search, that is to say, trying to propose a hypothesis of how the oratorian and the Mexican can be bound by virtue of becoming historical of the symbiosis process that has been started from the 16^th century, of these two realities.

Then, our objective is to present the Mexican as a cultural mosaic and its respective relationship with the oratorian through our history.

In other terms, it is to try to respond:

What is the Mexican identity? and how this identity is it built?

What is the oratorian? and how this identity is it built?

Finally, How is it possible that both identities enter in relationship?

It is then when we will be able to also wonder: if the oratorian spirit has penetrated until the center of the Mexican culture; if the Oratory in Mexico is a “Mexican oratory”; Which process has it followed the Oratory in Mexico regarding the Oratory in Europe: imitation, transplantation or assimilation? or if its mexicanity has followed another way of conformation, Which!

Paraphrasing Carlos Fuentes, we intend to think and to dialogue on if like oratorians and as Mexicans we have really made the oratory in Mexico to be Mexican Oratory; if we have made the effort because it is it, and if the effort has been worthwhile, if along more than three centuries of oratorian life in Mexico we have copied without judge a foreign model of oratory; if we have been able to invent our own model of Mexican oratory.

I - The Mexican

1.1. The position of the matter.

About the Mexican identity several things have been said. How does the Mexican nation emerge? Which are the elements that constitute it? The problem of the conformation of the national identity is one of the most polemic cultural knots in the history of our country, like we suppose of any other one. The first approaches to this question go back until Francisco Xavier Clavijero works, Servando Teresa of Mier and Carlos María Bustamante. The annals of the memory cultural Mexican have cultivated this intense and complex polemic around the sense and to the value of what could call national identity. During our century the Matter recovered its encouragement after the episodes of the revolution of 1910. Diverse authors renovated the debate around the meaning of the Mexican. From divergent positions were planned multiple definitions and hypothesis to decipher or to understand the signs of identity of what was also denominated the ‘querella de Mexico[41]. Writers like Alfonso Reyes, Martín Luis Guzman, Samuel Ramos, José Vasconcelos, Octavio Paz, Carlos Fuentes, Carlos Monsivais, among other, undertook the search of the origins and the content of the Mexican identity.

Let us stop only in some of these more representative authors with their different positions.

The defense of the pluriculturel.

Carlos Fuentes says:

“Everybody has several faces in Mexico. It is Indian, it is Spanish, it has much of the culture and French ideology, and it also has a modernization varnish that are put one in another, so it is very difficult to try to discover our true face.” “Mexico is characterized by the coexistence of diverse cultures, from the Neolithic until the modern industrial culture”[42].

The defense of the unique character of the Mexican.

To the question of if a peculiar way exists of belonging to the Mexican, Raúl Bejar Navarro assures that it can be spoken with wide certainty of the existence of a personality of the Mexican. If the character of the Mexican exists, it should, as specifically Mexican, to have been formed by the inhabitants from Mexico, for the interaction of the Mexican town, what doesn't exclude, evidently, the external influences[43].

The defense of the renouncement to affirm an identity of the Mexican.

He can have reason more or less, Fernando Benítez, when he says to seem him futile to study the being of the Mexican. For him, and not only for him, it is very difficult to say who a Mexican is. This difficulty faces it equally, although possibly not in the same degree, the Americans to describe or to understand the American; or the Canadians the canadian ; or the French the French, etc. ... For this same author, the question of the being of the Mexican, it cares little, he finds it irrelevant. He affirms that “we (the Mexicans), are a country pluriculturel that offers a very wide range of humans”[44].

The defense of the identity for the customs.

Carlos Monsiváis says that “ That there is it a group called national identity: language, religious beliefs, customs, food, literature, music, interrelation forms, etc. But of these common knots doesn't come off a singular caracterology (the ontology of the Mexican)” [45]

The defense of the uncertainty of the identity.

At final, Samuel Ramos affirms that: “Who seeks to make a serious investigation on the Mexican culture, he will find a field full with uncertainties. To his look will offer a wealth of works made by Mexicans in which he won't be able to discriminate against original qualities that authorize to proclaim the existence of a vernacular style. And, however, when works exist, their lack of originality doesn't mean that the town where they have appeared it lacks an own culture. We consider that the essential of the culture is in a way of man’s life, even when in this, a creative impulse doesn't exist. In the way that, in absence of an objective culture, that culture can exist in another form, that is to say, subjectively. Then, a priori, we are not able to neither to affirm neither to deny the existence of a Mexican culture”[46].

1.2. Position of an alternative.

The matter that is to the base of most of these proposals is the effort of building an identity starting from the difference so wanted by the modernity. But in our times of planetary civilization, of irruption of the minority identities, of borders and nationalisms falls the question for the identity has been unimportant .

Until now, it has been clear that to approach the problem of the identity is to challenge all budget of esencialism that seeks to understand the identity like something static and definable; that to seek to narrate the memory of a homeland as if an unique itinerary that ends up being a narration that legitimates the history of the powerful ones, what it is impossible. It urges, rather, a history of the collective identities that shows how the human groups have assumed diverse exegesis of themselves in the becoming of their history[47].

Now then, How is it that the human groups, had conformed their identities, in their history becoming? Is it question only of a shared geographical space?, Or is it perhaps question of sharing some same institutions?

The hypothesis that here we advance, based on the philosophy of the alterity[48], it is that the identification process of the human is granted thanks to the relationship with the other one been founded in a shared experience. Indeed, ’I know who I am’ because the word of the other one that reveals my being in a shared experience; that makes that the other one and me have possess an identity it is that both participate of oneself history that other have given us[49]. In words of P. Ricoeur, the experiences given to a human group are a hermeneutic mark in which we interpret the reality that identifies us and in which we interpret the new experiences that we are receiving[50].

Based on this we can affirm that to speak of a Mexican identity has so much of ambiguous as of dangerous. As, we said, Samuel Ramos point to a multiple Mexican identities based on the diverse experiences that have lived and shared the different human groups of the geographical region that today knows as Mexico. So we can talk about several ‘Méxicos': the modern Mexico that participated in the independence experience, the revolutionary Mexico that has lived of “the rents” of the Mexican revolution; as well as of the indigenous Mexico that has lived at the margin of the modernization and revolution processes; etc...[51]

That makes to each one of these ‘Méxicos' possess an identity, because of the different experiences that have shared in becoming of their history.

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II- The oratorian

To talk about the oratorian face us in the same difficulty and demand of understanding with which we face talking about the Mexican.

If it has been clear that an identity is built from the experiences shared by a human group in becoming of its history, then also when referring to the ‘oratorian identity ', we must recover that experience that gave origin to the religious movement that today calls Oratory. It urges, then, to return to the origins, to return and to make present the experience of a man, called Philip Neri that knew how to share it giving, this way, life to the Oratorian phenomenon. And is that, indeed, the Oratory is not another thing but the intent of maintaining alive this man's experience, Philip Neri.

The founder experience.

The Spirit burst into the Church, he makes it born there where men and women live the experience of being God’s sons and brothers between them. In all the times this experience of New Life burst into males and women giving origin to forms of life in the Church with the purpose of maintaining this authentic experience of borninig Church[52].

Why continue entering the Spirit in the Church? We should recognize it, the Ecclesiastic community has been generated institutions and control forms of this experience that cause a breathlessness of the Spirit. Indeed, when men and women notice that the organization of its community has established behavior patterns that darken, when they don't avoid, this original experience, they are given to the task of returning to the origins of this experience. So all movement of spiritual life in the Church is understood as a claim to live the genuine experience of being God’s sons. Any founder of a religious movement of the Church try to make enter again in his historical moment an experience that he fully has lived, the experience of being son[53].

The same thing happened in the case of Philip. Indeed, when a man or a woman let that the Spirit enters in its experience of being sons, of being loved by God, the minimum thing that they can make it is to consecrate all their forces so that everybody that surrounds him, experiences the same thing, for that reason they are men of creative imagination, for that reason they invent forms and methods so that all the other ones can participate of his experience. These forms and methods are bounded in the historical context that have played them to live; they feel that their time urges them to express them spiritual experience responding to the necessities of their contemporaries. For the same thing, the movement that Philip Neri started also has antecedent notables and an entire socioculturel and ecclesiastical context that makes comprehensible his proposal.

Then it must be clear that the founder experience of the Oratory movement, that happened in Philip Neri's life, is not another thing but the same Christian experience fed by the freshness of the primitive Church. Philip's experience is the life experience of ‘to be born of the Spirit ' (Jn 3), of being sealed by the Spirit (Ef 1,13), of being baptized in the Spirit (2Cor 1,21-22); of being recognized by the Father like son that lives the freedom (Rom 8,14-25).

The project - oratory, fruit of an experience.

Christ's love urges us. Philip, having lived the experience off being son, he confronted it with the historical context of their time; with the social and economic situation, with the ecclesiastic, cultural and religious situation. And then, he started to express his experience through a project: the Oratory.

Philip that had been born in Florencia in 1515 was broadly influenced by this whole context of religious movements that tried to give new life to the Church. The political and economic problem that lived beside their family in Florencia (cradle of the Renaissance), until their direct contact with San Marcos’ dominicans[54], the Benedictine of Montecasino[55], the Jesuits of the Sapienza and the Augustinian in reason of his philosophy studies and theology, granted Philip a very wide vision of the reformation that was happening in the Church.

Most of the authors are agree in that a deep experience that Philip lived, there where he liked to frequent the tombs of the martyrs columns of the primitive Church, fanned him to propose his own project.

After abandoning his studies, a search life began. He prayed in the Churches of Rome, he visited the big sanctuaries, the famous basilicas and, mainly, he became fond to go to the Catacombs of San Sebastián, the only ones knew in his time. It was here where that of the fire[56] that lodged in his heart happened: tremor, ardor, throbs are all them forms of trying to narrate the inexpressible of the experience of being son of God, of the love of God that makes clamor: “it is already enough, Lord. I don't tolerate more.” The one that has experienced the experience that founds the Christian existence, that is to say the experience of being son of God, for the stamp of His Spirit, is not able to but affirming as San Pablo: “Christ's love urges us” or like Philip “I am wounded for the love.”

This way, Philip puts on in search of an opted ministry and reasoned. He/she didn't register in a religious order among the numerous ones existent in their time, neither he/she wanted to be ordered priest, but rather in a movement of spiritual spontaneity he/she rushed to assist the multiple necessities of the Rome of then. He/she was devoted to the attention of the pilgrims and under the care of the sick persons, he/she enrolled in the Oratory of the divine Love of San Jerónimo[57], where the Christian life was fomented of lay and clergymen, the attention to the needful and eucharistics devotions; He founded the Fraternity of the Sacred Trinity for the Pilgrims and Convalescents (1550) and only later he was ordered priest residing in the only place that accommodated to his restless freedom spirit: San Jerónimo.

Almost everything arose discreetly and like something very natural. Around him begun to gather all kind of people and social condition, for spontaneously to read the Word of God and to comment it, to program an activity in the needful favor, to share cheerful and simply their Christian experience, without reformation pretenses. This stranger mixes of different elements makes to notice how Philip took of where he could to transmit his experience; this method of knowing how to unite the beauty, the nature, the human genius, with the religion and the art, wisely reconciled by a festival climate, attracted quickly to many. Philip's piece became too small to welcome the group in quick growth and he had to look for wider spaces[58].

Of all the above-mentioned it is that as well as when referring to the Mexican identity it is necessary to understand it as a mosaic of diverse ‘Méxicos ' fruit of the different experiences that have had the different fellows relationship; likewise to speak of ‘oratorian identity ' it is necessary to refer to a shared founder experience, Philip Neri’s experience that we have proposed as experience of being son from the way and like Philip forged it. In other terms, the oratorian identity of some men and women, it is built in the effort of making present in becoming of the centuries and in the different geographical contexts the founder experience that Philip shared to those that formed the First Oratory.

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III–The Mexican and the oratorian, identities in relationship.

1. A first approach.

It has been, verified that the Oratory was born of St. Philip Neri's inflamed heart, in the Rome of the 16^th century, in the European Continent, in the Renaissance Italy, in the Rome of the ‘Saqueo’, impregnated of the Florentine spirit of “Pippo Buono.”

Meanwhile, beside the big ocean, a new culture was being born, a new spirit was gestating, a different race was arising, some new relationships were interweaving: the Mexican culture. Although the earth that covered it didn't have the name of now: Mexico.

We bring the synthetic description that Marciano presents us: The Oratory and the Congregation of the Oratory,

“It had its principle in some spiritual practices still had among lays, and to other devote limited exercises to the four walls of our sacred Father Philip Neri small room; but growing later happily, it has not only become big in Rome, stiller which tree without measure has extended its branches until the confines of the sea, and from the Tíber it has dilated them to the four points of the earth, penetrating until in the ‘Indias’ and the New World”[59].

Hardly had lapsed thirty years of Philip Neri's canonization, by the Pope Gregorio XV, in the 1621, when the first steps were taken to settle down in the New Spain, congregations of secular priests that tried to live inside the evangelical spirit and with a constitution, contents in the rules of the Oratory that had been approved by Gregorio's XIII papal authority in 1575.

Speaking of how the Congregations of St. Philip Neri's Oratory arose in Mexico, the P. Francisco Aguilera, in the introduction that makes to the book “Oratorios de san Felipe Neri en México y un testimonio vivo en la fundación del Oratorio de San Felipe Neri en la Villa de Orizaba”, says:

“this work allows us to peek in the fog of the past to appreciate the work and historical projection of a clerical institute that was born to impulse of the Holy Spirit, and whose practical ideals surpass the outlines of its time and three centuries more, (the one) it germinated spontaneously in the fertile lands of the New World, participating in an active way in the evolutionary process of the new-Spain society of 16-18^th centuries....[60]

The houses of the Oratory in Mexico was formed from the beginning with arisen elements of the clergy diocesan resident, creole priests in their immense majority that group and organize under the aegis from St. Philip Neri to the one who take like model of priestly life, to carry out a work of specific mercy.

The Oratory, like it left the inflamed heart and of St. Philip Neri's intelligence it takes, as the water, the form of the recipient that contains it. This way, we can know what we are referring when we say “the Italian Oratory”, “the French Oratory”, “the Polish Oratory”, “the Spanish Oratory”, “the Colombian Oratory”... “German”, “sudafricano”, “Brazilian”, etc. ... “the Mexican Oratory”, because each one of them takes the mark of the Italian, of the French, of the Polish, of the Spanish, and so forth.

2. The position of a hypothesis.

Although, the Oratory arrived in Mexico, through the foundation of Congregations of the Oratory, we consider a real danger for the Mexican Oratory, the belief that for the simple fact that congregations of the Oratory exist in Mexico, for it same it exists “a Mexican Oratory.” I find that we must go more to the bottom of the things, going into in an attitude of more serious reflection, for not falling in the nets of the artificiality, of the superficiality, of the caricaturel. To speak of Oratory in Mexico it is not only enough that the Congregations of the same name, were born in Mexico for Mexican founders, it is also required that, the Oratory in Mexico has a essential hipostatic character, formed by the foundry of two identities: the oratorian and the Mexican.

For that reason it is necessary to continue wondering how in a symbiosis way they have cohabited these two identities, the Mexican and the oratorian?

About the Mexican it must already be clear. First, being Mexican is not only for being born in a certain geography, neither only to live in some certain institutions, nonetheless to possess documents that credit it; but -and together with all the above-mentioned- somebody is Mexican because of sharing common experiences in relationship, in certain moments.

Second, and in the above-mentioned consequence, given the diversity of human groups settled down in the Mexican geography and their diverse experiences in becoming of their history, Mexico has many faces. And any identity that seeks to enter in connection with the Mexican, will make it specificity with one of so many faces.

2. In reference to the oratorian must be also already undoubtedly to talk about an oratorian identity it is equal to recognize a process of maintaining alive the experience that gave him origin, Philip Neri's experience, of being son of God. And it is like the P. affirmed Faber:

“What Philip left in inheritance to his Congregation (to his Oratory), it has not been so much a rule, but rather a ‘certain spirit '. For that reason, a Oratory that loses its vigor is condemned to die as if it was down the natural law of the dehydration. The Oratory cannot be stereotyped copy of last situations because, as something spiritual, it is distinguished and adapted to new given situations. It is soul without body, the different circumstances are its body. This is its peculiarity. The effectiveness of its work resides exactly here[61].”

Then, like Newman said: ” The Oratory is an idea that is embodied in the diverse situations of the human, because of that it is impossible to speak of a precise and prefabricated structure of the oratorian that has to be repeated in the diverse places where there is such Oratory. The Oratories are not born as arising of a great stub, as the foundations of branches of a transnational one, they arise rather, of the experience of men and women in a certain existential situation that try to share an experience as Philip’s experience.

Therefore, it is not the same thing to say, ‘Oratory in Mexico ' that ‘Mexican Oratory '. The Oratory exists in Mexico, but also this it should be Mexican, that is to say it must have one of the several Mexican faces, it must have Mexican dresses, Mexican characteristics.

3. In Mexico we can speak of Mexican identities - different, peculiar, singular oratorians. This way, it is not the same thing to speak of a Oratory with Mexican face of the modernity, think for example in the Oratories arisen in the Valley of Mexico that to speak of Oratories arisen in the Mexico postrevolucionario of the ‘Bajío’, think for example, San Miguel Allende, Guanajuanto, León, etc.

The difference arises of the diverse participation of two autonomous experiences that build two different identities: the Mexican and the oratorian[62].

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CONCLUSION

In front of the Third millennium, and inside this Great International Oratorian Encounter, is necessary that we take, the Mexican oratorians, the challenge of giving to the Mexican Oratory its authentic identity of the oratorian and of the Mexican, that which demands from our behalf an entire work of responsible creativity.

With Samuel Ramos we say that the activity of thinking is not a deluxe function, but a vital necessity for the human, for the man and the woman oratorians, and that is what we intend to make in this studio, not only to look at our history of Mexican oratorians, but also projecttoward a future, the face future to the third millennium. It is that, by virtue of the thought, our oratorian life is not only pass, but also present and future. The thought on the oratorian and the Mexican, means us the possibility to take advantage of the memory of our experiences in favor of the present and also, the organ for the forecast of a better future. This reflexive activity, allows to notice our position with the current moment; it is it the one that allows not to get lost in our march, but rather for it we can know which is the road that we have to travel.

It corresponds us to understand the oratorian from the Mexican point of view, so that it is embodied appropriately in our cultural mosaic. We have to think, to project, to carry out the oratorian from our Mexican identity. In other words, our enormous task is ‘mexicanizar’ the oratoriano.

As Mexicans, as French, as Italian, etc. ... we are not able to neither we should think the oratorian like a strange reality, of import in our own country, but to act and to carry out the oratorian in Mexico, thought and acted by Mexicans, from our Mexican perspective, with the reality material, spiritual, cultural Mexican reality. The universal of the oratorian was made mexican with the peculiar of the cultural mosaic of the Mexican.

Our task is, then, important, and it consists on responding us to the questions of how it has really been, how it is at the present time and how the experience Mexican oratoriana will be; which are the real possibilities of the oratorian existence in Mexico.

The measure unit within our reach is the Mexican reality and the spirit genuinely oratorian, just as it arose of St. Philip Neri's prophetic heart.

We want to be critical, with an objective critic in the most possible, appealing to the constructive critic but at the same time demandingly responsible.

We want to be aware of our true relationships with the native Oratory, with St. Philip Neri's genuine spirit, with his founder project, liberating us, if it existed, of all inferiority complex or of menial obligatorily to a foreign model of oratory, to take an attitude of responsibility with the Mexican Oratory, with what requests us the existence and life of the Mexican Oratory.

So for the Oratory in Mexico being truly Mexican, us, the Mexicans, need to know ourselves in our own identity, to know our history, our character, and to welcome the task of being Mexican oratorians with love and responsibility.

It is, in our case, of finding the Mexican physiognomy of the oratorian, or the face of the Mexican oratory. We want to already find that face in our tri-century oratorian life in Mexico; until what degree the Oratory in Mexico is a Mexican Oratorian, because we want it, and because we can make it as soon as he lacks that Mexican identity; which are the authentic values of the oratorian, values of universal reach that have been, are and they can be lived in respectful and deep dialogue with the Mexican.

We only propose some hints of what it could be universal values of the oratorian to be embodied in the diverse Mexican faces:

A small community of lay that feed of the spirit of Philip's founder experience.

A community in the plurality and in the freedom. Where the love of God has been experienced, it is also experienced the benevolence to respect the process of each who is in his search of God. The conscience that the community is constituted starting from the difference of its members that not all must make the same thing, but rather all making their own things must collaborate to make grow this all filiation experience. To be son of God means to be to each other brothers, it means that I am such always in relation to others that build me my identity; that together are making an experiment of new life. The processes of new life in the Church.

But to speak from the difference always implies a margin of freedom; of feeling sure of proposing a message with the freedom of being sons. Philip Understand very well this and so, he was a freedom lover. He left that each one proposed something according to his experience, always respecting the difference from each one to the degree of being able to desist of their own project: think, for example, in the variety of the elements that forged the Oratory, in the spontaneity of their meetings and the lack of a definite outline; in considering the freedom as entrance door to the Congregation (no votes); and mainly in their strange capacity to determine everything that he makes but not to be determined by anything; in his capacity of not being still anchored by what he did. At the end of their days, the Oratory was even something provisional. And it is that, who has experienced to be son of God and not his servant, begins to live the freedom that it grants him the Spirit in his heart. Philip before being prophet of the happiness, is prophet of the freedom.

Closely bound community by the love’s bond. Philip that had experienced the love of God was not able to but making it verifiable in the love to the brothers. This way, he made a climate of love - affectivity among his mates. He was not that who wanted to win the prize of popularity and he had subordinate that completed his orders.

The result: spontaneous happiness to live in the world. The consequence of this innovator practice of life Christian was the one of causing a climate of true freedom that was reflected in the happiness of its members.

We continue wondering, if we have not imitated blindly a foreign model of the oratorian, drowning the development of the mexican native potentialities native Mexicans this way, and falling in an useless irrational imitation, characteristic of an infantile age.

Coyoacán, Mexico, D.F. at June 3, 1998

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FRIDAY, 17

Speech of P. Antonio Ortega, Procurator Nacionaly.

I wish from the bottom of my heart to speak as a sole expressionist, but to appoint myself as speaker of the Coordinating Commission of this II International Oratorian Congress, Mexico 1998; but especially of the Mexican Federation. The current times urge us to pay attention, compromise and to have audacity. This is only possible if we direct our hearts to the findings of goodness and the intelligence of the finding of truthfulness. In other words, the accurate and necessary response of the great Philipense family upon the challenges of the current World is the foundation of the chosen theme for our Congress: “Prompto, Corde, Respondeant”.

Of course the acceptance, the long preparation and the development of our Congress has been possible because the love of the Mexican Oratories has always believed in the utopias that are inspired by the Divine Holy Spirit.

Or isn’t the Oratory of St. Philip Neri the same realization of a utopia that is inspired by the Holy Spirit that found an echo in the hearts, well disposed, by the Apostle of Rome?

La autonomy of the Oratorian Congregations has been invited to unite in an authentic spirit of liberty, that as such it can be the foundation of an expression of the maturity that defeats the insecurities and the isolations. We are talking about an enclosed Autonomy that is capable of allowing each and every one of us a beneficial and common work.

In the Oratorian universe there is a Sun that is promisingly and insists in inviting us to walk guided by its splendorous and amicable light.

I end my speech with confidence that this privileged experience that has reunited us in Oaxtepec, has inflamed our hearts with the warming flame that is capable of inspiring and allowing us to respond with Promptitude of Heart to the arrival of a new and most precious Oratorian life.

“PROMPTO, CORDE, RESPONDEANT”

THANK YOU.

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Official notices of Santa Sede

POSTE ITALIANE - SERVIZIO TELEGRAFICO

ZCZC RMHOO8 P 3335967E 020/6B/55500068802384 10350

IGRM CO IGRM 102

00120 CITTADELVATICANO 102/95 26 1030 DEVIE

PADRE EDOARDO CERRATO (HOO8)

PROCURATORE FENERALE ORATORIO

VIA SAN GIROLAMO DELLA CARITA ´63

00186 ROMA

SU SANTIDAD JUNA PABLO SEGUNDO SALUDA CORDIALMENTE A LOS ORGANIZADORES Y PARTICIPANTES EN EL SEGUNDO CONGRESO INTERNACIONAL DE LA FAMILIA ORATORIANA QUE TIENE LUGAR EN OAXTEPEC, A LA VEZ QUE LES ENCOMEINDA EN SUS ORACIONES PARA QUE DICHO ENCUENTRO CONTRIBUYA AL BIEN DE LA IGLESIA DE LOS HOMBRES DE HOY HACIENDO PRESENTE LA EXPERCIENCIA ESPIRITUAL Y FORMATIVA DE SAN FELIPE NERI. CON ESTOS SENTIMIENTOS, EL SANTO PADRE LES IMPARTE DE CORAZON LA IMPLORADA BENDICION APOSTOLICA, QUE COMPLACIDO EXTIENDE A LOS MIEMBROS DE LA FAMILIA ORATORIANA.

CARDENAL ANGELO SODANO

SECRETARIO DE ESTADO DE SU SANTIDAD

26/06 15:15

NNNN

Dal Vaticano, 24 giugno 1998.

Prot. N. 43255/98

Reverendo Padre,

In occasione del II Convegno Internazionale Oratoriano che si terrà dal 13 al 17 del prossimo mese di luglio ad Oaxtepec di Morelos in Messico, questo dicastero per gli Istituti di vita consacrata e le Società di vita apostolica è lieto di far pervenire ai partecipanti l'espressione delle propri felicitazioni per la lodevole iniziativa, auspiciado che l'importante incontro delle varie Congregazioni dell'Oratorio susciti in voi tutti, Figli di S. Filippo Neri, Chierici e Laici, un rinnovato inpegno di amore e di Fedeltà al suo stesso ideale da voi liberamente abracciato.

Nell'ancor vivo clima del Concilio Vaticano II, che nel promuovere l'aggiornamento della vita religiosa ed apostolica esortava gli Istituti di vita consacrata e le Società di vita apostolica alla riscoperta delle loro origini, l'imminente Convegno vi offre l'opportunità per un'attenta riflessione risalente fino alle sorgenti del vostro movimento per riscoprirvi e se necessario recuperarvi quei valori che nella seconda metà del secolo XVI determinarono il sorgere della vostra Società.

Le Congregazioni Oratoriane nacquero infatti nel clima della grande riforma post-tridentina e dal diffuso bisogno di un ritorno alla pratica genuina della carità e dell'umiltà evangeliche. II movimento che prese l'avvio da S. Filippo Neri, modello di vita interiore e di apostolato, ebbe numerosi e ferventi seguaci e si diffuse rapidamente in Italia e all'Estero, fino alle Americhe e all'India, dando alla Chiesa Sacerdoti e Fratelli che, dediti alla preghiera e alle più svariate forme di apostolato, si distinsero nel campo della predicazione della Parola di Dio, dell'amministrazione dei Sacramenti, del Culto Liturgico, delle missioni e delle opere caritative, non meno che nel settore della Cultura,

__________________________________

Reverendo Padre Edoardo A. Cerrato

Procuratore Generale della Confederazione

Dell'Oratorio di S. Filippo Neri

Via S. Girolamo della Carità, 63

R O M A

I Figli di S. Fillipo Neri, impegnati da sempre nell'appasionata ricerca della verità e nello zelo per la propria ed altrui santificazione, emulando la generosità del Fondatore, ne fanno rivivere con giogia tra la gente gli esempi altamente virtuosi. Notevole, perciò, è stato ed è il contributo che voi Oratoriani, da più di quattro secoli, avete dato e continuate a dare nella promozione umana e cristiana specialmente della gioventù. Ed oggi, di fronte alle transformazioni profonde della società verificatesi un po' dovunque negli ultimi decenni, alla vigilia del Grande Guibileo del 2000 e del terzo Millennio, il vostro apporto al rinnovamento delle coscienze, come già a partire dalla metà del sec. XVI, sarà tanto più efficace quanto più autenticamente evangelica sarà la vostra testimonianza.

D'altra parte, la storia del vostro Movimento mostra che, come Fligi di S. Filippo Neri, avete tutti i requisiti per inserirvi a pieno titolo nel processo della "nuova evangelizzazione" voluta dal Sommo Pontefice Giovanni Paolo II. Ben venga dunque il II Congresso Internazionale Oratoriano, affinchè, come discepoli di S. Filippo, vi possiate arricchire ancor di più alla sua scuola per rispondere "promto corde alle sfide del Terzo Millennio, con amorosa fedeltà alla Chiesa".

Con questi auspici, implorando dal vostro Santo Fondatore che vi ottenga di poter continuare a servire il Signore con rinnovata gioia e generosità, saluto titti cordialmente.

Vaticano, 17 giugno 1998

Reverendo Padre,

Con lettera del 10 u.s. Ella aveva la cortesia di segnalarmi il Segundo Encuentro Internacional Oratoriano de San Felipe Neri che si svolgerà nel prossimo luglio in Messico, chiedendomi altresì una parola di saluto.

Volentieri aderisco alla sua richiesta, lieto dell’opportunità di esprimere, nella mia qualità di Presidente del Pontificio Consiglio per i Laici, l’augurio di un felice incontro ai laici appartenenti all’Oratorio.

“Pippo il Buono” vi riunisce nell’accogliente terra messicana per chiamarvi ad una verifica, quanto mai opportuna alle soglie del terzo millennio, del suo e vostro carisma proprio. Nella gioia del ritrovarvi insieme, possiate riscopriere 1’importanza di mantenere vivo nei vostri cuori e nella Chiesa lo spirito dell’infanzia, memori della parola del Vangelo: “Se non diverterete come i bambini non entrerete nel regno dei cieli (Mt18,3).

La vittoria su un mondo cinico e scettico si può fondare solo sulla mancanza di ogni difesa, sulla debolezza, sulla notte dell’anima e del corpo. E’questa la più vera e viva immagine del cristiano oggi: colui che nella sua debolezza si rivolge a Dio, ai suoi santi e alla Chiesa invisibile, e soprattutto alla Vergine Maria, l’Immacolata nata senza peccato, l’ultimogenita della razza umana.

Possa la Vergine di Guadalupe, che affettuosamente invocate nella vostra preghiera, esservi compagna e guida nei vostri lavori, affinché da veri discepoli di San Filippo, siate capici di rispondere prompto corde alle sfide dell’oggi, condividendo le gioie e le speranze, le tristezze e le angosce del mondo.

Con la mia benedizione mi è grato assicurarvi delle mie preghiere e dei miei auguri per il pieno successo del vostro incontro

___________________

R.P. Eduardo CERRATO, C.O.

Procuratore Generale Oratoriani

Via S. Girolamo della Carità, 63

00186 ROMA

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ANTHEM

¡Juventudes! Felipe nos llama
a vivir un Evangelio de esperanza,
de alegría de fe de amor
¡Responded con el corazón!

Oaxtepec, hospedaje nos da
sonriente brinda, su eterna primavera
que nos transporta a los verdes jardines
donde Felipe adoraba a Dios.

En sus encuentros se hacía oración,
cantaban salmos con gran devoción;
declamaban, jugaban felices
invitando a una vida mejor.

¡Juventudes! Felipe nos llama
a vivir un Evangelio de esperanza,
de alegría de fe de amor
¡Responded con el corazón!

Filipenses aquí congregados
en este Encuentro Oratoriano
hagamos nuestros los sabios consejos
que en su ejemplo Felipe nos dio.

Renovar nuestra vida cristiana
que en el diario correr del camino
se traduzca en fe y humildad,
compromiso como hombres de bien.

¡Juventudes! Felipe nos llama
a vivir un Evangelio de esperanza,
de alegría de fe de amor
¡Responded con el corazón!

Marchemos juntos con gran entusiasmo
llevando dentro a Jesús y a María,
surja en el mundo un cambio profundo,
que nuestra fe sea un canto a la vida.

Siempre alegres como María
habrá armonía, perfumes y flores
habrá belleza, paz escondida
en los hombres que llevan a Dios.

¡Juventudes! Felipe nos llama
a vivir un Evangelio de esperanza,
de alegría de fe de amor
¡Responded con el corazón!

Hoy cantamos con el corazón
nuestro himno que es voz del espíritu
exaltando los grandes ideales
del maestro sencillo y alegre.

Caminamos al año 2000
con la mente abierta hacia Dios
y sembrar una dulce esperanza
para hacer un cielo en la tierra.

¡Juventudes! Felipe nos llama
a vivir un Evangelio de esperanza,
de alegría de fe de amor
¡Responded con el corazón!

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BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTES, APPOINTMENTS AND REFERENCES

[1] C.S. Dessain Vida y pensamiento del Cardenal Newman. Paulinas, Oxford, 1980

[2] Cesare Baronio (1538-1607), tras veinte años de trabajo publicó Annales ecclesiastici (1588-1593). En 12 volúmenes, continaudos y reimpresos muchas veces, valorados por la riqueza de sus fuentes documentales.

[3] IV Conferencia de las Naciones Unidas sobre la mujer, titulada Igualdad, desarrollo y Paz; se realizó entre el 4 y el 15 de septiembre de 1995 en Beijing, China.

[4] Paul Auvray, Communiautré de l’Oratoire de France, Paris 1978. De saint Philippe á Berulle. Les origines de l’Oratoire de France, p.173

[8] Cfr. Diccionario de Espiritualidad. Herder, Barcelona, 1983. Berulle Pierre de, p.246, I.

[9] Padre Marcos Castañer en Juan Manuel Lozano Las religiosass de San Felipe Neri.Claret Tarrega 1970

[10] Constituciones et Statuta Generalia Confoederationis Oratorii Sancti Philippi Nerii, Romae, die 21 Novemberis 1989.

[14] Of the book of Louis BOUYER Un socrate romain, saint Philippe Neri. Paris, SOS, 1979 96p. We have decide to quote a lot of times this author because he presents to us a deep vision of the phillipian pedagogy.

[15] Of 1527 to 1531, the Medici has been expelled from Florence and the Republic was established, the troops of the Count of Borbone had left free Florence and they went to Rome to pillage it. In Florence was a great religious fervor, the Savoranolas’ shadow, the last try of convert in a villa “institutionally”. February 19, 1518, Jesus Christ, was proclaimed Florence’s King. During the villa’s occupation (Oct. 14, 1529-Aug. 12, 1530) the fervor increased: they both got excused, they fasted and made processions. The St. Mark Convent, so loved by Philip, was the soul of the Resistance. The villa capitulated in July 16, 1531 and Philip left it definitely in 1532.

[16] It can be notice his repel to enter to the Jesus Company in 1535.

[17] The denomination “Sócrates romano” becomes of the Cardinal Valier, contemporary of St. Philip, author of a ‘Platon style’ dialogue, titled Philip or the Christian Happiness.

[18] These are the three spiritual life degrees: The first can be called The animal life; it is the life of the ones that run toward the sensitive devotion that God gives, generally to the beginners to take them out of the world by the attraction of the sweet pity as the animal is attracted by an object that like to it (19-06). The second degree can be called The human life; it is the life of the ones that doesn't taste the ‘dolcezza sensibile’, but, straight by the virtue, fight their passions (20-06). Maximes.

[20] The testimony of a diminician of Minerva, noticed by TÜRKS (p.27).

[21]“ Exist a peculiar anecdote in the Inocencio XVIII’s kingdom that illustrates wonderfully the great exaltation when an antique rediscover sunk to the Christian souls... in the surrenders of the via Appia the workers had put a circle to a roman young. ‘Giulia Claudii Filia’ said the inscription over the marble. The open tomb had the intact body of a young with a weird beauty. When they take it to the Capitol, the newness of the great and lugubrious discover was extended rapidly in the city, then was created an incredible mess: the death young seems to attract to her all the city, all the love and enthusiasm of the hearts. There were mixed poets and artist, the town went for satisfy his hungry of the disappeared divines and of the immortal spring. The Pope surprised and terrified, order to take the body in the night and buried secretly far away of the Pincio”. (Louis Bouyer 21-22).

[23] PONELLE – BORDET Saint Philippe Nerí et la société romaine de son temps, 1515-1595. Colombe, 1927

[24] PAPASOGLI Giorgio Philippe Neri, un homme dans son siècle. Tequi, 1991.

[26] NIETZSCHE F. Fröh Wissenshaft. III, fr. 25 (NW, Vol. V-2) p. 158s.

[27] FABER F. The Spirit and Genius of St. Philip Neri.London, 1850 p. 741

[28] 3 ALVAREZ G. A. Historia de la vida religiosa. Vol.1 Clarctianas, Madrid. 1987 p. 33

4 Puede verse: Carta a Diogneto V, 12-13 También ORIGENES Hom.In..Jerem.IV,3.

5 Cf ALVAREZ G.A. Historia de la vida religiosa Vol.I PP.131 ss.

[31] Hospitalarios de San Juan del Espíritu Santo, de San Antonio,etc.

[32] La de San Juan de Jerusalén, los Templarios, los Caballeros del Santo Sepulcro, etc.

[33] La orden de la Santísima Trinidad, de Nuestra Señora de la Merced, etc.

10 Maybe, the works most important of this spirituality is La Imitación de Cristo de T. Kempis

11 11 Cf. REALE-ANTISERI Historia del Pensamiento Filosófico y Científico T.II Trad. IGLESIAS J.A. Herder.

[37] l2 Cf. ALVAREZ G.J. Historia de la vida religiosa Vol. 3 pp. 72 ss. Otros refieren su nacimiento a Ettore Vernaccia. Cf. CISTELLINI A. San Filippo Neri. L’Oratorio e la Congregazione Oratoriana. Storia Spiritualita. Morcelliana, Brescia, 1989 pp. 27-28.

13 Cf. Ibid p. 28

14 Here, Philip is fulled of love at liturgy, at Fathers of desert, the comnunitary life and the important about stabilitas lici.

l5 Certanly, everybody know the atraction of Fr. Savonarola.

16 KOLAKOWSKI L. La modernidad siempre a prueba. Vuelta, México 1993 p. 14

17 Cf. HABERMAS J. Ciencia y Técnica como ideología. Taurus, Madrid, 1984 pp. 3-11

18 Cf. WEBER M. Ensayo sobre Sociología de la Religión. Vol I Taurus, Madrid, 1983 pp. 19 ss.

19 Caso típico es el libro de HUXLEY A. Un mundo feliz. EDESA, México 1983

20 CF LIPOVETSKY G. La Era del Vacio. Ensqyos sobre el Individualismo Contemporáneo. Anagrama, Barcelona, 1983 pp. 14 ss.

21 Everyone make its options own. Así, IZQUIERO A. “Perfil del posmodernismo” en Ecclesia VII/2 (1994) pp. 183-196. DIEZ ARNAIS R. “La experiencia religiosa en la postmodernidad” En Mayeutica 21 (1995), Marcilla, Navarra, pp 161-190 VERGAUWEN G. “Faire la théologie aojourd’hui.Le catholicisme en condition de postmodernité. En GISEL P.-EVRARD (Eds). La théologie en postmodernité.Labor et Fides, Geneve, 1996, 232-8. MARDONES J. M. Postmodernidad y cristianismo. El desafio del fragmento.Salterrae, 1988 pp. 33-43, KÜNG H. Proyecto de una ética mundial Trad. CANAL M. Planeta Agostini, México, 1994 pp. 17-41

22 I don’t ingorant of another boundary Cf. HERRERA R. Hablar de Dios en Paslabras de Mujer. Castellanos, México, 1998.

23 Cf COX H. La religión en la ciudad secular. Trad. GARCIA-ABRIL. Sal Terrae, Santander, 1985 p.18

24 MARDONES J. M. ¿ A dónde va la religión? Sal Terrae, Santander, 1996 p. 21

25 CF. LIPOVETSKY G. La era del vacío ... p.54

26 MARDONES J. M ¡ Adonde va la religión?... p. 37-38

27 27 Ibid. p. 39. LIPOVESTKY se refiere a lo mismo en la era del vacio... p.60 ss.

28 VERNETTE J. “Le nouvel-Age”En NRT, 111 1989, pp. 879 ss.

29 Cf. MARDONES J.M. ¡Adonde va la religion? ... pp. 40 ss.

31 Cf. MARDONES J.M. Postmodernidad y Cristianismo. El desafío del fragmento. Sal Terrae, Santander. 1988. p. 22

32 VELASCO J.M. El malestar religioso en nuestra cultura... pp. 29-30

33 Very interesting it’s the analysis of BEUCHOT M. Postmodernidad, hermeneutica y analogía. Porrua-UIC, México, 1966 pp. 113 ss.

34 COX H. La religion en la ciudad secular... p. 190

35 Cf. RORTY R. La filosofía y el espejo de la naturaleza. Cátedra, Madrid, 1983. VATTIMO G. El fin de la modernidad. Nihilismo y hermenéutica en la cultura postmoderna. Planeta-Agostini, 1944 y BOUDRILLARD J. Las estrategias fatales. Anagrama, Barcelona, 1984.

36 BOUDRILLARD J. Las estrategias fatales... p. 9

38 In the spiritu of Concilio Vaticano II, Perfectae caritatis, 2e

39 Cf. ANDRADE B. El camino histórico de la salvación UIA, México, 1990 pp. 35-3

42 KURI NICOLAS G. El hombre, un ser en vías de realización... p. 12

43 It’s expecting a discution about stabilitas loci

46 Like a ‘modern Socrates’, someone say, like a “Pascal postmoderno” I say.

47 Nietzche decía que ‘el espíritu de la modernidad es el espíritu del diablo, de la severidad’ Puede verse la magnifica conferencia de PRONZATO A. Felipe Neri: La seriedad de un santo festivo. Trad. MARTINEZ A. Latina Imprenta México, s/f.

48 Cf. MENGARELLI A. La pastorale de Philipo Neri. Giovanne Fiorentino e Sacerdote Romano Tesis presentada en la Pontífica Universidad Lateranense, Perugia 1964

49 Cf. BALTHASAR H. U. Gloria: Una estética teológica Vol. V Encuentro, Madrid, 1985-1989 pp. 135-193

50 COX H. Las fiestas de locos Taurus Madrid 1972 p. 32

51 CF CISTELLINI A. L’Oratorio e la congregazione oratoriana ...pp. 93-96

52 TÜRKS P. Felipe Neri. El fuego de la Alegría. Guadalmena, Sevilla, 1992 p. 72

53 El ya citado COX H asi lo piensa en La religión en la ciudad secular Sal Terrae, Santander, 1985

54 TREVOR M. San Felipe Neri Apóstol de Roma (1515-1595) Trad VOIX A. Sal Terrae Santander 1986 p 58

55 VEGA ABIA M. G. Fuego, Amor, Vida...!!! La huella de S. Felipe Neri, en el Cuarto Centenario. Claretianas, Madrid, 1994 p. 103

[39] Until the begining, we introduce this abstract term of ‘the Mexican’ for not to give a motiffs to bad readings about the ‘Mexicaniy’; concept that agree with the specialists’ use, name the idiologic current of some groups that pretend erase the XV to XX centuries’Mexico, with the intention of regain what is supossed specificliy mexican, independent of foreign’s influence. This idologic current insist to avoid the ‘malinchismo’ ( to prefer the foreign) but, it ends to a ‘xenofismo’ ( to repel the foreign) Cf. CRUZ RUEDA E. “Una visión de indígena: un nuevo proyecto de nación”. En Christus, Año LXII, 699, México, marzo-abril de 1997. pp. 49-54 y GARZON VALDES E. “Cinco confusiones acerca de la relevancia moral de la diversidad cultural” En Este País, No. 73, México, abril de 1997 pp. 59-61

[40] Today is more adequated, to talk about identities than essence (quid)

[41] CASTAÑEDA Carlos “Arbol genealógico” En Nexos, Año 21, Vol. XXI, No. 244, México, abril de 1998 pp. 89ss.

[42] Citado en : MEJIA PRIETO JORGE. Citas y Frases célebres de Mexicanos. Panorama, México, 1997(3), p. 101 y 107.

[43] Cf. BEJAR NAVARRO RAUL, El Mexicano. Aspectos culturales y psicosociales, UNAM, México, 1994⁴ pp. 33-94.

[45] Cf. MEJIA PRIETO JORGE, op. cit. P. 109.

[46] RAMOS SAMUEL Obras completas I UNAM, Col. Nueva Biblioteca Mexicana, No. 41, México 1990, P. 96.

[48] We are refering, overalls, to LEVINAS E. Totalidad e infinito. Ensayo sobre la exterioridad. Sígueme, Salamanca, 1995.

[49] GADAMER H.G. Verdad y método I Sigueme 1993 y FOUCAULT M. L’archéogie du savoir Galimard, 1969; have already said that every human community is identify by the use of some linguistic signs that conforms a range of sense in base of shared reality experiences.

[50] Cf. RICOEUR P. Finitud y culpabilidad. Madrid 1982

[51] Cf. BONFIL BATALLA G. El México profundo. Una civilización negada.Grijalbo, México, 1990

[52] Cf. BOOF L. Eclesiogénesis.Sal Terrae, 1986

[53] Cf. ALVAREZ G. A. historia de la vida religiosa. Vol.1 Claretianas, Madrid, 1987. “The history of the religious life shows that the different kinds of religious life can not be develop in only one definition, because they are existencial experiences then, are unrepeatable and uniques, that have marked series of twist and puzzles that correspond to other new social- cultural and religious situations that are carriers of new demandings, so it is necessary to give them new answers.

[54] The paintings that the controversial and mystic Fray Angélico have left in that convent should have caused a big influence in St. Philip. But was the savonarola’s picture painted by Fray Bartolomeo the one that impressed more to the Saint. Savoranola was burned in 1498 in the public plaza of Florencia because of denauncing without piety the Church’s corrution and exhorting the town to the penitence. His reform instruments; the Bible and the conversion, make over Philip an influence that was reflected in his life. The assidous participation in the ‘laudes’ (mornings prayers), harminized with popular songs and string instruments was something prefered by him. Show of this, is the Jacopone de Todi’s popular song, “Vanità di Vanità ogni cosa è Vanità” that was famous in the Oratory’s meetings. And also, the diminican spirit of humility and the opening to the town, reflected in children processions promoted by Savonarola, make understand why Philip Neri being old said: “All the good things that are in me, I have recieved them from the Dominican Fathers of San Marcos”.

[55] Frequenting this monastery, was rooted in the young St. Philip the love for the liturgy, and for the Father’s life of the desert, for the communitary life and he guessed the importance of the place stability.

[56] Some persons said that Philip was 29 years old.

[57] CISTELLINI A. L’Oratorio e la Congregazione oratoriana. Storia e spiritualità. Vol. I Morcelliana, 1989 p.27

[58] We all know CISTELLINI’s clasification of the Oratory: the big one, the small one and the open one. Cf. L’Oratorio e la Congregazione... pp. 75-116

[59] Cf. MARCIANO Juan, Memorias Históricas de la Congregación del Oratorio, Trad. por el P. Félix Cumplido, S.J., Tomo I, Madrid 1853. PP. 13-14.

[60] Cfr. Oratorios de San Felipe Neri en México y un testimonio vivo, la fundación del Oratorio de San Felipe Neri en la Villa de Orizaba, Centro de Asistencia y Promoción, A.C., México, 1992, pp. 5-6 y 27-28

[61] FABER F. The Spirit and Genius of St. Philipp Neri. London, 1850 p.74

[62] The congregations of the Oratory in Mexico are of diverse periods of the mexican identities’ formation: Until the Colonial Epoch (16-18 ^thcenturies), Puebla, San Miguel Allende, La Profesa, D.F., Guanajuato, Orizaba; the independence epoch (19^th century), León; and the Modern Mexico (20^th century) San Pablo, Tlanepantla, Nuestra Señora de la Paz y Pharr Texas U.S.A.