Our long journey through Lent came to an end with our Holy Thursday mass. We are now in the Triduum - Holy Thursday, Good Friday, and the Easter Vigil mass. It is seen as one continuous commemoration of Christ's passion, death, and resurrection. As we celebrate Holy Week, I was struck by one of the reflections in the daily prayers that I use each day in the publication Give Us This Day. They list a "Blessed Among Us". For this past Tuesday, the Jesuit priest and theologian Karl Rahner was chosen as the "Blessed Among Us". Rahner is consider one of our Church's most significant theologians of the twentieth century and the Vatican II era. Reading his theology is hard work, but the insights that he brings out are amazing. In The Word Among Us, it states that Rahner's quiet and methodical approach to theology bridged the gap between Catholic theology and the modern world more than any other theologian.
It is interesting how many in our secular world, and many in our government, now see the Church as the enemy and as irrelevant to the world. I never thought I would see such a thing in my lifetime. In the past fiver years in particular, I have seen such a change in the mentality of our world. Rahner tried very hard to implement the ideas coming out of the Second Vatican Council to the modern Church, and he expressed sadness as to how much of the promise coming out of the Council still remained to be fulfilled.
All of us as modern believers try are called to apply our faith in an attempt not only to understand the modern world, but to transform that world as well. I am thankful for examples such as Karl Rahner who help us and inspire us on our journey of faith.
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