Tuesday, July 26, 2005
ADVENTURES IN CATHOLIC SPIRITUALITY ALA TED MEISNER
There is a link in La Ermita for a page devoted to Rodolfo Ponce. Reading it sheds considerable light on the ministry of Meisner and those working with him.
La Ermita is devoted to helping Hispanic migrant workers. Rodolfo Ponce was one of them who got to know this community in Macon, Georgia while his lukemia was in remission. When the lukemia returned, he went home to die, and Meisner went to El Llano to be with him when he died. His family home was very poor. It's a touching story.
In the story you will read this passage:
I celebrated Mass for them on Wednesday. We had to use a tortilla for bread and brandy for wine. His mother gave me a plastic champaign wedding glass to use as a chalice. That's all there was available. At the end of that Viaticum Mass Rodolfo got out of bed and hugged everybody present.
The tribute is signed "Ted." Is Ted a priest? If he is not a priest, what did he do to this Hispanic family and their dying son? Nowhere does Ted claim to be a priest. In his website he presents "Sunday Thoughts 2004 and 2005". Those Thoughts reveal his theology. On February 13, 2005 we can read:
One of the missions of La Ermita – The Hermitage is to try to unite again the Church of Peter and the Church of John. They were one at the time of Pentecost, but centuries have divided them. The Church of Peter, having become too ritualistic, needs the love and warmth of contemplative prayer and the gifts of the Spirit of the Church of John, and the Church of John needs some of the boundaries of the Church of Peter. They will be united when they return to be the Church of Pentecost. When we bring our love and devotion to the Church’s Liturgy and Sacraments we help restore that unity. That is part of our work. Be careful, however. Love is neither pushy nor demanding. The salt and light work gently. Love always respects where the other is.
Let us continue to work for Sophia, that all may be one in Love.
The so-called "Church of John"--the Johannite Church--is the church of the Gnostic heresy. This, then, is another gospel.
June 12, 2005:
We of La Ermita have come to know that our Father, Sophia and Jesus are only Love. Jesus was known to be a friend of sinners. He sent Sophia, the Holy Spirit, to all so that they too could know and experience Them as the God of Love. They are all compassionate, all forgiving, all forgetting, all loving. There is no way They can be vindictive, aggressive, revengeful, punishing, or demanding that we pay the debt. All these characteristics belong to us. They stem from the lack of love and our inner hurt of rejection. The three Persons of the Trinity do not have to worry about justice being done. Love does not demand justice. It only forgives. If They were to treat us according to justice we would be in a big mess.
God--the God of Ted Meisner--is not a God of Justice, and by extension I assume that he is also not a God of judgment. What scripture does Meisner use to come to this conclusion?
Certainly in the sexual abuse scandal, the bishops did not follow a God of Justice. Time after time "love"--the kind of love that called no one to responsibility--was all that motivated them. La Ermita, too, is motivated by a sweet, cloying, sentimental love that calls no one to responsibility.
May 1, 2005:
Love never makes us feel imprisoned, bounded, or controlled. Love frees us to live, rejoice and dance! We need to open ourselves to loving actions whenever we feel the need or urge to do these things. We need to invite Sophia, our God of Love, to touch us with Her Love so that we can reach out to the other with Love. The very love that we share with others that will bring healing to their wounded hearts is the very love that brings healing to our wounded hearts. My brothers and sisters, let us dance with joy and love. Let it bring unity within ourselves so that it can flow out of us bringing unity in others. Let us love our Beloved Lord God and our brothers and sisters with the same love that we have for and within ourselves.
The Love message is very strong in the February 6, the January 16, and the April 24 Sunday Thoughts. There is no evidence of a balancing influence that will counteract permissiveness stemming from love.
In the June 26 Sunday Thoughts, Meisner makes clear his opinion of pre-Vatican II theology:
However, many of us lived in the pre-Vatican Church and we now know that our present Christian way of life is far more difficult than the former. When we look back at how dedicated we lived then, and how our present dedicated brothers and sisters are living their faith, we see that there was and is something out of place. The virtue of love is secondary. The primary virtue was and is obedience and faithfulness to authority, to the Word of God and to the liturgy/sacraments. No spiritual person will deny that obedience is a necessary virtue. However, when it becomes by emphasis the primary virtue, it carries with it a hidden element of vainglory and pride. It creates a system of “we” verse “them.” And it will have behind its facade of virtue a pushy and demanding attitude that flows, not from compassionate love, but from the unseen pride of self-righteousness within.
Rules and obedience to rules are not his idea of what it means to be religious. Being concerned about how we relate to others so as not to hurt them is a primary entry in the examination of conscience in Meisner's theology. It would seem, in light of the above quoted passage, that his version of love would never remind someone that their actions were sinful since that would hurt them.
The June 5 Sunday Thoughts places Ted Meisner in the charismatic movement.
we have become aware that more dioceses in the United States are now turning over the parishes to lay persons because of the lack of priests. We have also realized that there is a tremendous exodus of Catholics from church. Their reasons for leaving are many. But we do not believe that these people have dropped the Lord out of their lives. Some have joined other churches. Some have not. It would seem to us that the greater part of our mission is to reach out to those who are no longer attending church. We need to invite them to come and share with us in our homes, to be a part of our community. If they are drawn to remain, we ought to pray over them for the “baptism of the Holy Spirit” so that Pentecost comes a living experience for them.
We come together for the breaking of bread in two ways: breaking open the scriptures to feed the spirit and breaking bread in remembrance of the Lord. The former is done by spending time in contemplative prayer and then sharing with each other what was learned and experienced with the Lord. The latter is a simple ceremony in which bread and wine is taken, broken and shared with each other. We are not playing “priest.” The Mass is for the ordained. What we do here is simply in remembrance of the Lord. We do not claim that the bread and wine becomes the Body and Blood of Jesus. What we do, we do with reverence and prayer, because it is done in remembrance of Him. As a result we spend time in silent prayer after partaking of the bread and wine.
With time, it is our fervent hope and desire that those who join us will eventually be able to return to the celebration of the Sunday Liturgy in church. This will be our little way of helping to bring renewal to the churches. Renewal is in the heart through a spiritual life of love, and eventually intimate love for the Persons of the Trinity.
On July 3 Meisner offers theology that sets up a dichotomy between asceticism and mysticism, and recommends that the former be abandoned in favor of the latter:
The ascetical way has a built in problem in so far as I, the one rowing, am choosing and doing the work of purification. Since I am constantly doing penance, mortification, prayer, etc., this can easily lead me into a hidden pride because my emphasis is on willpower. Control and fear are the biggest obstacles to spiritual growth. The mystical way, on the other hand, does not depend on my control. Neither is the purification of my sinfulness chosen by me. That is all under the direction of the Holy Spirit. All I have to do is surrender to the present moment that is producing a problem or conflict, and let the love within me bring about the solution. Conflicts are accepted as moments to love rather than moments to repress or control. Love draws one into daily contemplative prayer, and this form of prayer is constantly leading one into the healing of their fears and controlling elements within.
Are sinful inclinations to be repressed in Meisner's theology, or is an all-pervasive sentimental love to take the place of repression and control? When conflicts occur and we resolve them with sentiment, what will guide our actions if our inclination is toward sexual sin, particularly in this culture which equates sex with love? If this contemplative prayer heals the contemplative of controlling elements, is Meisner preaching the "Love and do what thou wilt" gospel of Aleister Crowley?
This daily contemplative prayer that love draws us into, is it to be regulated by doctrine? Are we to discern the spirit speaking to us in terms of the doctrinal teachings of the Catholic Church? If not, what guidelines and boundaries are we to use in discerning this contemplation?
If it isn't already obvious, the screwed up nature of Sophia theology is made quite clear on April 10:
We of La Ermita have come to know the Holy Spirit as the feminine part of the Godhead who wishes to be known as Sophia, a person equal to the Father and the Son....
Rose, our president, said one day in a discussion group, "Sophia is to the Holy Spirit what Jesus is to the Son of God."...this Sophia must be an angelic creature, the first created of all the angels. Jesus as a human being belongs to human creation. Both have two natures, one divine and the other created. Yet for both there is only the one person united with the two natures. Both are Divine and creature at the same time. No other created being is like this. Therefore, Jesus is truly the Son of God, and Sophia is truly the Holy Spirit. Knowing Sophia, the first angelic creature, who is also the Holy Spirit, is similar to knowing Jesus as the created man and who is also the Son of God.
Wow! The Third Person of the Blessed Trinity is really just an angel. You've read it here folks!
On July 17 Meisner talks about the imposition of hands and praying for the gifts of Sophia, the Holy Spirit. He argues that these charisms are a sign that the Holy Spirit is guiding the Church in the 21st century and that the lack of these charisms would indicate that Christ had withdrawn from creation. It does appear that the Christ of the Roman Catholic Church has withdrawn from Meisner's theology.
On January 30 he indicates that there is:
tremendous hope for Bolivia because the Charismatic Renewal and the Cursillo Movement are alive and growing. La Ermita and other spirituality movements are also present. All these groups have one primary objective, namely, to bring the healing power of the Holy Spirit into the daily life of the faithful, making it possible for them to love. These gifts also make the work of the Church, its administration of the sacraments and Liturgy, an experiential reality of the Love of our Father.
Let us pray that the new Pentecost already begun will continue to grow rapidly in Bolivia. In this way, her inner spirit will shine forth in beauty just as the material growth of the country is shining forth. May she, one of the poorest countries, become a glowing example for all the world in how the Kingdom of this world becomes the Kingdom of the Father.
If you want to recruit for the other Gospel, the Gospel of the Gnostic heresy, it helps to recruit among uneducated people such as migrant workers in Georgia or the poor and uneducated of Bolivia, who will not have the knowledge to challenge your theology. It is much more likely that the uneducated will be willing to accept these "gifts" of the Holy Spirit. July 24:
When this gift enters our lives we experience the greatest of truths as little children. Our groping around, looking for it, while still filled with the miraculous cloud of the presence of the Spirit, it is not by accident that the gift of tongues, which is to speak unintelligibly as a child, may be the first gift received and experienced.
Baltimore Catechism, #446: "Through the coming of the Holy Ghost the Apostles received the 'gift of tongues,' by which they could be understood in every language, though they preached in only one."
#447: "Such wonderful gifts accompanied Confirmation in the first ages of the Church to prove the power, truth and divine character of Christianity to those who otherwise might not believe, and to draw the attention of all to the establishment of the Christian Church."
#448: These signs are not continued everywhere at the present time, because now that the Church is fully established and its divine character and power proved in other ways, such signs are no longer necessary."
Catechism of the Council of Trent, p. 158: "For some time in the beginning of the Church, whenever these Sacraments were administered by the Apostles, the same miraculous effects were witnessed, and they ceased only when the faith had acquired maturity and strength."
Ted assures us on July 8 (which is designated July 10 in the index) that:
The word of knowledge, visions and revelations that are not discerned and administered properly can lead one astray, becoming a false prophet. That was the error of the Gnostics centuries ago
just in case someone might have heard about Gnosticism and recognizes it in his teachings. There doesn't appear to have been much discernment going on when he was formulating his Sunday Thoughts.
Is he a channeler? He might be. On June 19 he admits that:
There is not doubt that some one has entered into our life that was not there before. As we begin to contemplate the question, “Who are you?” an answer soon follows. “I Am Wisdom.” We immediately know this Wisdom-person is some one that sees and understands us better than even ourselves.
It seems that according to the May 22 Thoughts, Fr. Anthony DeMello, S.J. is one of his mentors.
All of that distorted doctrine is contained in the first seven months of 2005. (I have not yet looked at his 2004 theology.) It boggles the mind!
How common is this other gospel in South America where Pentecostalism has grown exponentially? Does a continent that once belonged to Christ now belong to the Gnostic Christ? It is spreading here. This community of La Ermita is located in Georgia.
On a side note, Ted Meisner made some comments in tribute to Matthew Shepard at this website. Does this reveal anything about Meisner that might be applied to his theology and the sexual abuse scandal in the Roman Catholic Church?
Our Lady of Fatima, pray for us!
