Given by Dr Christopher Ruddy
Catholic University of America
2nd – 4th June 2020 at Pluscarden Abbey, near Elgin
Tuesday 2nd June at 3.00 pm
Context: An Age of Agitation, Anger, and AcediaWednesday 3rd June at 10.30 am
Creator and Creation: The Affirmation of DependenceWednesday 3rd June at 3.00 pm
Christ and Church: “In the midst of the congregation I will praise you” (Ps 22 [21]:22)Thursday 4th June at 10.30 am
Consequences: A Praise-Filled Life
Each year the Abbot and Community of Pluscarden Abbey sponsor a series of four lectures by an invited Theologian on an aspect of Catholic Theology. Previous Lecturers have included Fr Aidan Nichols OP, Fr Thomas Weinandy OFM Cap, Fr Anthony Meredith SJ, Fr Paul McPartlan, Prof. Carol Zaleski, and Dom Erik Varden The Lectures are held on the Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday after Pentecost in St Scholastica’s Retreat House at the Abbey. They are open to all who wish to attend and are free. Limited accommodation is available at the Abbey and those who wish to stay should book as soon as possible. There are also many places to stay in the Elgin area: contact the local tourist office: 01343 542666.
The Lecturer
Dr Christopher Ruddy
Dr Christopher Ruddy is associate professor of systematic theology at The Catholic University of America. He was formerly associate professor of theology at the University of St Thomas in St Paul, Minnesota, and taught also at St John’s University and the College of St Benedict in Minnesota. A graduate of Yale College and Harvard Divinity School, he received his doctorate in systematic theology from the University of Notre Dame.
His two books are The Local Church: Tillard and the Future of Catholic Ecclesiology and Tested in Every Way: The Catholic Priesthood in Today’s Church (both Herder & Herder). His articles and reviews have appeared in America, Christian Century, Commonweal, Ecclesiology, Heythrop Journal, Horizons, Irish Theological Quarterly, Josephinium Journal of Theology, Logos, Nova et Vetera, Origins, Theological Studies, The Thomist, and Worship. His theological interests include ecclesiology, Vatican II, the nouvelle théologie and ressourcement movements, and the relationship of Christianity and culture. New York natives, he and his wife, Deborah, have four sons.
The Lectures
“‘It ain’t no sin to be glad you’re alive’:
Praise in an Age of Agitation”
“To praise you is the desire of man”
(St Augustine, The Confessions)
We live in times marked by the omnipresence of agitation—political, religious, economic, cultural, ‘virtual’, psychological, familial. Anger and unsettledness are everywhere. And, yet, the first words that the Church speaks every day are: “Lord, open my lips, and my mouth shall proclaim your praise!”
These lectures will suggest that much of our agitation is rooted in a rejection of the goodness of being, in a self-hatred that leads ineluctably to death.
Praise, rightly understood and lived, is not escapism, irresponsibility, or even complicity in oppression. It is the highest possible affirmation of God’s goodness and—in the words of the American musician Bruce Springsteen—of the joy in being alive.
Lecture 1: Context: An Age of Agitation, Anger, and Acedia
Agitation flows partly from anger as a rejection of dependence, and from acedia as despair before God’s goodness. Divided against God, others, and ourselves, we fall into aggression, distrust, hyperactivity, listlessness, and sterility.
Lecture 2: Creator and Creation: The Affirmation of Dependence
Praise involves an assent to the Creator and to being created. The refusal to praise stems from a rejection of creatureliness, divine filiation, and the goodness of being itself. Praise, as Josef Pieper wrote, is “impossible to the naysayer.”
Lecture 3: Christ and Church: “In the midst of the congregation I will praise you” (Psalm 22 [21]:22)
Jesus offers perfect praise—in his words, his deeds, his very self—to his Father. He experienced evil like no one else, yet died with praise on his lips. The Church’s “intimate vocation,” in the words of Vatican II, is likewise to be a community of praise.
Lecture 4: Consequences: A Praise-Filled Life
Being a person or a people of praise involves, among other things, habits of worship, prayer, humility, and true leisure. Praise flows ultimately from being able to see reality clearly and fully—and thus to affirm it as good. A praise-filled life leads one to say, in every circumstance, “Master, it is well that we are here.”
For further information contact the Abbey at monks@pluscardenabbey.org and to book accommodation at the Abbey contact the Guestmaster at guestmaster@pluscardenabbey.org.