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March 7
Perpetua and Felicity, Ana Maria O'Neill, Thomas Keating, Thomas Aquinas, and the Condemnations of Paris
David Barnhart
March 07, 2025
Work and play in Bolivia, 2008. Own photo.
Some historians—somewhat ironically—mark this day as the anniversary of the birth of modern science, because in 1277 the Bishop of Paris, Etienne Tempier, issued several condemnations of Aristotle’s natural philosophy as heretical. Anyone reading or teaching them at the University of Paris would be excommunicated. Without ancient philosophical traditions as a guide, medieval scientists and theologians turned to observation and experimentation. Like the church’s condemnation of Galileo’s theories centuries later (which I mentioned the other day), this is a good example of how theocratic overreach often has unintended consequences.
Today is also the birthday of Thomas Keating in 1923, who revived the practice of centering prayer and has contributed to contemporary mystical Christianity. His theology would also likely be considered heretical to the Bishop of Paris in 1277.
Today also marks the death of Thomas Aquinas, in 1274. His feast day is celebrated on January 28.
Today is the feast day of Perpetua and Felicity, two women who were martyred in the year 203 for their Christian faith. Perpetua was a new mother, and Felicity was pregnant at the time of their martyrdom. Because of their devotion to each other even in death, they have also become modern icons of gay Christians’ faithfulness.
Today also marks the birthday, in 1894, of Ana Maria O’Neill, a professor and women’s rights activist in Puerto Rico. As the quotation below indicates, she was also something of a liberation theologian
Reflection:
In Ethics for an Atomic Age, Ana Maria O’Neill wrote:
Anyone who seriously studies Christianity as a historical event must come to the conclusion that there must have been a manifestation of power in Christ and the early Christians. The world was attuned to power, and only power could have gained a hearing. Christ’s power was, of course, a different kind of power from that exhibited by the Roman Emperor. The Emperor’s power was at its height destructive: a power that could torture and destroy individuals. Christ, on the other hand, could make sick men whole, and raise me from the dead. Between the Emperor’s power to kill and Christ’s power to heal, people chose the strongest power. When spiritual power penetrates the physical world and makes it move, then people realize that the world of spiritual forces is the reality and that the world of physical force is appariential.
Thomas Keating wrote:
The contemplative journey, because it involves the purification of the unconscious, is not a magic carpet to bliss. It is an exercise of letting go of the false self, a humbling process, because it is the only self we know. God approaches us from many different perspectives: illness, misfortune, bankruptcy, divorce proceedings, rejection, inner trials. God has not promised to take away our trials, but to help us to change our attitudes toward them. That is what holiness really is. In this life, happiness is rooted in our basic attitude toward reality.
Prayer: God of the True Self, help us to embrace the power of life you offer; not the power of vengeance and domination, but the power of letting go, of surrendering to a life that will overwhelm, heal, and transform. Amen.