Two people alerted me to the following article:

by Matthew McDonald

     If you can understand how a math minded Catholic thinks, you'll understand Pope Leo better.  You might understand me better too.  Recently and hopefully today, I will visit the other Trenton priest with a degree in mathematics:  Fr. Todd Carter.

     Many people do not like and are not good with numbers.  But math is more than numbers.  You start using letters when doing algebra.  With trigonometry, you start using Greek letters because you use Roman letters for sine, cosine, and tangent.

     Above is my favorite Greek alphabet song.  My nephew watched it plenty of times until he could sing it too.  Below is another Greek alphabet song but with a pronunciation closer to the common Greek that Catholics spoke in the first century A.D.  Once you know the Greek alphabet, you could start learning Biblical Greek.

     When it came to math, my mother sometimes said, "It's all Greek to me."  Well, Greek isn't that hard.  The foreign language I've been studying lately is Spanish.  I'm at the point where I can understand some simple sentences without having to translate every word into English.  It's quite a joy to begin to understand another language.

     Mathematics is like a language.  When you start to speak and understand math, it's quite a joy.  We speak English in order to communicate and describe the world we live in.  Similarly, when we speak mathematics, we can communicate and describe the order in the universe.  This mathematical way of thinking is about seeing how the universe is ordered.  With Pope Leo having a math background, he can see the order in God's creation and the Church in a way that non-math people would have difficulty doing.

     Mathematics also has an affinity with art because you can use mathematics to better appreciate the beauty of the universe.  For example, when things are asymmetrical, they tend toward disorder and ugliness.  When there is symmetry, they're more beautiful.

     I've included the two versions of the Greek Alphabet Song because of the connection to Biblical Greek, the language of the New Testament.  What if we could learn Biblical Greek as well as we know our native language (or even math), then our minds would open even more to the Good News.

     One of the features of Pentecost is that the disciples preached the Good News in Aramaic but everyone understand them in their own native languages.  The Holy Spirit helped the disciples to preach and the people to understand.

     Today, we have many people who have not learned the basic grammar of being a Christian.  Others have learned a malformed version.  The Holy Spirit can help us to proclaim the Good News to them and help them to understand us.  We might need to do some very basic things with them until they get the basic Christian alphabet and grammar.  Then a moment can come in which they get it.  They may not be fluent in Christianity, but it's a joyful moment when you begin to understand.  The Holy Spirit can give us gifts of knowledge and understanding.  When we use those gifts, we might then experience the fruit of joy.

      Let's intercede for others.

1)  For peace in war torn parts of the world.

2)  That Pope Leo may continue to be docile to the Holy Spirit.

3)  That the Holy Spirit will help us understand the Good News and share it well with others.

4)  For a greater understanding of mathematics for the purpose of better understanding God's creation and His plan for us.

5)  For greater respect for all human life.

God love you,

Fr. Jim