Servant of God Father Isaac Thomas Hecker, C.S.P.
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HECKER REFLECTION: NOT YET ANGELS

6/23/2014

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“He who does not pray, that is, has no desire to talk with God, is dead, and lacks both true life and real sense,”  Saint John Chrysostom.
 
“We cannot live on sugar alone however agreeable it might be to the taste, and so it is with the human heart which cannot long sustain so pure a communication with God.  We are not yet angels and until God condescends at times to our weaknesses, we should die with languor and desire.  If I pray for what God wills, I am sure to pray for what God wishes for me, if I pray for what I think God wishes for me: I am not sure I pray for what God wills for me.”
 
Isaac Thomas  Hecker CSP
 
A Response from Paul Robichaud CSP:
 
               Servant of God Father Isaac Hecker begins with a quote from a sermon of Saint John Chrysostom on the necessity of prayer.  When we don’t speak to God in prayer, we become spiritually dead.  For the great saint and bishop of Constantinople, prayer is the way to feed our souls and it nurtures the gift of eternal life that God grants us.  When we stop praying says the saint, eternal life begins to die in us.
 
               Father Hecker adds some interesting insight into the ups and downs of our prayer life as Christians.  We are not yet angels, so while prayer feeds the soul, it takes time in prayer to build up the intimacy that the angels possess when they speak with God. Prayer does not happen in one direction.  We move towards God when we pray and we hope God moves towards us.  Jesus teaches that God does move towards us.  When we fail, God moves toward us in forgiveness.  When we feel empty and tired, God moves towards us with strength and hope.  When we pray, God takes us where we are and brings us to where God is.  Not only is prayer a vehicle to speak with God, it is a movement of God towards us in faith, hope and love.
 
               Prayer is transformative,  In the last part of our Hecker reflection today Father Hecker speaks about the difference between what we hope God wants for us and what God actually wills for us.  If I pray for what God wills for me, I am asking God to bring out his plan in my life.  If I have already decided what I want God to do for me and think of it as what God wishes – what I want God to give me – then I may not be asking for God’s plan for my life.
 
               My advice about prayer is to just pray!  God is always happy to hear from us and prayer is transformative for we grow in prayer when God moves towards us.  In time our wishes bend to God’s will, our intimacy with God will deepen and while we may not yet become angels, we may come a few steps closer.
 
Paulist Father Paul Robichaud CSP is Historian of the Paulist Fathers and Postulator of the Cause of Father Hecker. His office is located at the Hecker Center in Washington D.C.
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HECKER REFLECTION: HEROIC VIRTUE

6/20/2014

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My God, a saint is like you, as far as it is possible for you to take on human form.  The saint alone is truly free, his actions are eternal and his life universal.  Who knows what sanctity is?  A saint is an” alter Christus” – another Christ.     
 
A saint is all through and all over “heroic.”  There is no exercise of “heroic virtue” without insurmountable obstacles.  Heroism that involves suffering surpasses all other forms of heroism.  This is the heroism that Jesus Christ demands of every one of his disciples. Christ said, “If anyone would be my disciple, let him pick up his cross and follow me.”  A Christian is one who suffers because of his vocation.  The saint lives for eternity in time and he lives for the spirit in flesh, therefore the saint must suffer.
 
Those with courage, aspiration, heroism can be satisfied to the full here.   For within you is the only true battleground; conquer there and you are greater than Alexander or Napoleon.  For vanity conquered one and ambition conquered the other.  But in vanquishing yourself, you vanquish the conquerors of Alexander and Napoleon.


- Servant of God Isaac Thomas Hecker

RESPONSE: REV. PAUL ROBICHAUD, CSP

Pope Benedict XIV (1740-1748) was a canon lawyer who reformulated the process for making saints. His definition of “heroic virtue” as cited here by Servant of God, Isaac Thomas Hecker in his reflection. This is the basic definition of holiness that the Vatican has applies to candidates for sainthood. Putting it in contemporary speech, we would say that heroic virtue motivates a saint is to act promptly, happily and without difficulty, even in the face of insurmountable odds. It is evident in the life of Father Hecker that he believed that God was at work in his life. He surrendered to God’s will; what he called “Divine Providence.” Hecker guided the Paulist Fathers as well as enthusiastically preached the Catholic faith at a time of great anti-Catholic feeling in America. He lived a life of radical hope.
 
Today Father Hecker reminds us that discipleship involves suffering. To live out eternity in our time, to live for the spiritual world in the world of the flesh involves suffering.  Most of us will never be canonized as saints but we like the saints live out our discipleship through our suffering. Hecker spent the last years of his life with what we believe was a form of leukemia that drained his energy. A man of great vision, he imagined projects that he did not have the strength to carry out. Yet despite his struggle with physical illness, he managed to write articles and a fourth or final book as well as address the American bishops at the Third Council of Baltimore and inspire his community to evangelize America. No matter how insurmountable the odds he encountered, Servant of God Isaac Hecker promptly and happily looked to the future with hope.

Paulist Father Paul Robichaud CSP is Historian of the Paulist Fathers and Postulator of the Cause of Father Hecker. His office is located at the Hecker Center in Washington D.C.
 
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HECKER REFLECTION: THE SCIENCE OF LOVE PT. II

6/2/2014

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The Science of Love: Part II



“Love” says Saint Thomas (Aquinas) “is a certain affection by which the lover is transformed into the object loved.”  Where two creatures in the same order of creation love each other, there will be a mutual transformation. If the object loved is equal in all respects to the capacity of the lover then a perfect love would give the lover, or if they are both equal to each other, would give the lovers both repose.  But man having something divine in his nature, therefore nothing created can give perfect repose but God.
 
Divine love first enters our souls as a thief; then becomes a tyrant; and finally bestows upon us as a superabundant benefactor a thousand-fold more than we ever had before with life eternal – a spouse. Saint Augustine (of Hippo) said, “Lord give me your love and do with me as You please.”  May we not say as well, “Lord, keep us from offending you, and then do what You please with Your servants.”
John Tauler beautifully says that divine love is a fire which consumes all terrestrial things and produces in man a happy desolation.  “Love consists in loving God without consolations.  One must overcome all to gain all; to gain that precious stone which is God.”

 
RESPONSE: REV. PAUL ROBICHAUD, CSP

Father Hecker begins his “science of love” with God.  Using the writing of Saints Augustine and Thomas Aquinas, Hecker believes that human beings are by nature spiritual beings.  God has made us in such a way that there is a part of us that cannot find peace unless we find it in God.  As we open our hearts to God’s love, our eyes to God’s presence and our minds to God’s word, the spiritual part of our being experiences a sense of purpose, a sense of peace and a true sense of fulfillment.  Our capacity for attraction begins in God.   Then as it grows and develops we begin to find God both around us and in others.

Father Hecker describes the dynamic of how God’s love enters our souls.  Divine love is the very life of God and has the capacity to completely transform us; making us into the person that God in our creation has called us to be.  God enters our souls like a thief in the night, when we least expect it.  God comes to overwhelm us and overcome our defenses.  God then becomes a tyrant, demanding that we change and open ourselves to grace. We are to belong to God alone and God is to be first and foremost in what it is that we do.   Finally when we yield, God becomes our spouse, filling us with his blessings and teaching us to become dependent on his faithfulness and his strength.  Father Hecker quotes the medieval mystic John Tauler, for the fire of God’s love is an internal desolation that burns down our defenses, our self-centeredness and our selfishness.  It cleanses and transforms us.

Paulist Father Paul Robichaud CSP is Historian of the Paulist Fathers and Postulator of the Cause of Father Hecker. His office is located at the Hecker Center in Washington D.C.
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