Lift up your hearts . . .

Outtakes from the January Emmaus Road Initiative session:

What is hidden from the proud and the haughty is revealed to the humble and contrite hearts of the spiritually childlike, and if people can be made to believe that deference, humility and the penitential spirit are signs of slavishness unworthy of serious adults, they can be effectively prevented from knowing God.

In addition to its doctrinal, intellectual and apologetic functions, catechesis has what one might call “liturgical” functions. It should not only spell out the Christian Truth but “put us in the mood for it.” It should inspire us to “drop our guard”: to approach Christian truth in a childlike spirit.

There is risk that our catechetical efforts will be too doctrinal and propositional, as was the rote Thomism of the Manuals well into the 20th century. In such cases, we may become intellectually fortified, adroit at marshaling “muscular” arguments and “equipped” for giving an account of Christian truth but lacking in the grace that Ronald Knox said is necessary to turn the water of conviction into the wine of faith.

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