Speaking in Tongues

[thistle]

Ohana, you have no reason to send a “mea culpa” - rather, I thank you for rebuking Rainaldo, and we probably should include Thistle. Having done a search on the latter, he has 115 posts against speaking in tongues. Wouldn’t you think he’d give up the ghost already? As if those who received this gift are going to be put off by his comments?

I always marvel that people who do not have the faintest idea about the gift, nor have received it personally, apppoint themselves as masters in judging God’s activity in others.

None of them have such a gift. They are fakes. Only the Church can discern if a person has such a gift and they are all too scared to submit to the Church. They say we should simply believe they have it. What arrogance!

 

[Sirach2]

The church does not require anyone to submit their prayer in front of a judge and jury to determine if their prayer language is authentic. No panel would be able to discern, since it is prayer made to God alone.

I agree that gifts such as healing and miracles would need to have validation, and those thus gifted have no problem with that. Sr. Briege McKenna is an excellent example of someone who not only submitted, but has full approval, and ministers world-wide in the name of Christ and His Church.

Hold onto your rigid stance, Thistle, lest you be found wrong. Heaven forbid. Remember the certainty you had with regard to St. John the Baptist? Your priest finally corrected you, but until then, you were absolutely confident your truth was above reproach.

If you have not the assurance from the Holy Spirit that this is NOT his work, then I refer you to the words of Brother JR to keep it to yourself.

 

[Petersmate]

I first went to a Charismatic prayer gathering about 6 months ago and saw the “praying in tongue” laying on of hands people falling down slain in the spirit ( I’ve since found out thats what its called) I left that gathering thinking they had all flipped their butch.

That was at the start of doing a " life in the spirit seminar". Now I’m part of that Charismatic community, I don’t have the gift of tongues though. Well not yet apparently.

 

[Sirach2]

So, my friend, the Spirit caught you? Try not to be concerned about not having the gift of tongues - or any other gift for that matter. The important matter is that you recommitted yourself anew to God and the working of His Spirit within you, which is what the Renewal is all about. I never really understood why they called it “charismatic.” Perhaps due to the enhanced ability to let the Lord’s gifts operate fully in their lives and in service to the Church. Some of the less showing charisms, such as administration, are very much needed by those entrusted with authority and who need to make wise decisions on behalf of others.

 

[Rainaldo]

by all means lets use nightline and utube as definitive studies! Maybe CBS,NBC and ABC and FOX can do replicative studies!

You can misrepresent me all you like.

By the way, what does the hardware company have to do with anything? (“UTube”)

 

[grannymh]

I agree.

I don’t know about Church judgment on tongues in the sense that you mean, but some of these people have submitted themselves to linguists and neuroscientists. A news show did a report concerning the latter: Nightline, Sunday July 27, 2008: youtube.com/watch?v=NZbQBajYnEc and the Penn Medicine study uphs.upenn.edu/news/News_Releases/oct06/glossolalia.htm

I do not have sound on my computer.

Thank you for the link to Susanne Hartman’s interesting story about the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine brain research on five subjects and glossolalia. It costs $31.50 to get a copy of the actual paper. Fortunately, a brief abstract and the comments (in Hartman’s story) of Andrew Newberg MD, principal investigator, give a few clues as to what was happening. I was reminded of questions often asked about what is known as the common gift of prayer tongues as compared with the classical list of nine Holy Spirit gifts mentioned by St. Paul.

Dr. Newberg is director for the Center for Spirituality and Mind at Penn. I do not have enough information to comment on this Center of dedicated people. However, when reading brain research which seeks information about “spiritual” activities, I like to verify which religion, if any, is being used as a basis for information. The abstract’s broad definition of glossolalia leads me to believe that what the Catholic Charismatic Renewal considers as common knowledge is not so common when one is doing research on the brain.

Now, if anyone who has read the link has specific questions about the news story in relationship to the Catholic Charismatic Renewal, I will be happy to answer them as best I can.

Blessings,
granny

The human person is worthy of profound respect.

 

[Sirach2]

Hello Granny,

Frankly, I couldn’t see anything objectively wrong with Penn’s research on the brain.

Our finding of decreased activity in the frontal lobes during the practice of speaking in tongues is fascinating because these subjects truly believe that the spirit of God is moving through them and controlling them to speak. Our brain imaging research shows us that these subjects are not in control of the usual language centers during this activity, which is consistent with their description of a lack of intentional control while speaking in tongues.”

Newberg went on to explain, “These findings could be interpreted as the subject’s sense of self being taken over by something else.** We, scientifically, assume it’s being taken over by another part of the brain, but we couldn’t see, in this imaging study, where this took place**.

Silly ones! They never will be able to see, for whenever it is truly prayer in the Spirit, nobody can x-ray or capture the essence of pure spirit on machinery. Spirit is not part of a bodily function. The only active bodily parts are the vocal chords and the lips. Maybe they could x-ray them, too? I would also add that it seems perfectly logical that when the Spirit prays within them, the language center would be dormant, since man’s effort to compose and utter it would be inactive during the person’s prayer. Unwittingly, Rainaldo has submitted another proof FOR rather than against praying in the Spirit.

 

[BDEklof]

None of them have such a gift. They are fakes. Only the Church can discern if a person has such a gift and they are all too scared to submit to the Church. They say we should simply believe they have it. What arrogance!

Please sir, qive us some substantiation which leads you to believe as you do, and so strongly!
You are in direct oppossion to Blessed John Paul II’s thoughts, words, and actions. PLEASE say WHY!! Or are you afraid to say why? Because you are jealous of those who have the gift, perhaps??
You are a rude and poor forum elder.

 

[Lochias]

I don’t have a problem with the Charismatic stuff in and of itself, and I see a number of posters here that (in my opinion) are well-grounded in the entirety of their faith and don’t take it too far.

I have seen other posters who have gone as far as to imply that their faith is imperfect without a second baptism in the Holy Spirit, and I think those people have been blinded by a sort of spiritual pride.

Personally speaking, I don’t go in for the classical, Protestant-ish trappings like speaking in tongues, and falling on the floor in convulsions. Those things shock and agitate newcomers more than anything else, it seems. I saw a “slaying in the Spirit” once as a kid, and I had nightmares about it for months. (It was at a Protestant church that was giving out free food that my family needed pretty bad, but you had to sit through a two-hour-long charismatic shout-fest first.)

If someone offered to pray for me, I would gladly accept their prayer in whatever form they deemed most comfortable, though, as long as it was true to the teachings of the Church.

Ultimately, questions like the OP’s should be asked to a priest…that’s one of the reasons we have priests, after all.

 

[Lochias]

Please sir, qive us some substantiation which leads you to believe as you do, and so strongly!
You are in direct oppossion to Blessed John Paul II’s thoughts, words, and actions. PLEASE say WHY!! Or are you afraid to say why? Because you are jealous of those who have the gift, perhaps??
You are a rude and poor forum elder.

Calling thistle jealous of something you apparently possess and he (she?) does not is just as arrogant as thistle’s blanket statements.

 

[Ohana]

Ohana, you have no reason to send a “mea culpa” - rather, I thank you for rebuking Rainaldo, and we probably should include Thistle. Having done a search on the latter, he has 115 posts against speaking in tongues. Wouldn’t you think he’d give up the ghost already? As if those who received this gift are going to be put off by his comments?

I always marvel that people who do not have the faintest idea about the gift, nor have received it personally, apppoint themselves as masters in judging God’s activity in others.

Thanks Sirach2 I think I did go off a bit and may have been wrong, particularly on the Penn study. That one seemed to support rather than disprove the gift of prayer in tongues. It does not prove it either, but one really would not expect that.

Another poster (Grannyh?) noted that sense of not being in control when praying in tongues - that is when the Spirit takes over. Kind of a “cloud of unknowing”. That is probably not a good description but sort of fits. Other times I am very aware of the person I am praying with/for. Again, I think that is the Spirit’s care of us. Well that is one reason I like to be in a spiritually secure place when praying in tongues. That is, surrounded by others in prayer or in a holy place of some kind.

 

[Ohana]

None of them have such a gift. They are fakes. Only the Church can discern if a person has such a gift and they are all too scared to submit to the Church. They say we should simply believe they have it. What arrogance!

Well Thistle, the conferences I have been to have been well attended by priests, deacons and even a bishop. I don’t think much fake stuff is going on. Yes, people are in different stages of spiritual development, but are are trying to grow and doing so in a spiritually supportive environment. In fact, they have more in common with some contemplatives I have been with that with any “razzle-dazzle” groups. Try to be a little more broadly informed.

 

[Linusthe2nd]

Didn’t St. Paul warn his converts not to speak in tongues unless there was an interpreter?
I think he also warned those who " spoke in tongues " to be silent unless an interpreter is present to tell what is said. 1 Corinthians 27-28. Also Chap 18 & 19 generally. Also he advised them to do all things " with edification. " Chap 19, verse 26. I would discourage anyone from doing these things to me, I would just tell them to pray for me quietly but not to be demonstrative about it.

 

[april32010]

 

[Lochias]

Well Thistle, the conferences I have been to have been well attended by priests, deacons and even a bishop. I don’t think much fake stuff is going on. Yes, people are in different stages of spiritual development, but are are trying to grow and doing so in a spiritually supportive environment. In fact, they have more in common with some contemplatives I have been with that with any “razzle-dazzle” groups. Try to be a little more broadly informed.

Emphasis mine.

By this, do you mean that those who have not had a second baptism in the Holy Spirit and are not manifesting gifts like tongues, are at a lesser stage in their spiritual development than others who have?

 

[grannymh]

Didn’t St. Paul warn his converts not to speak in tongues unless there was an interpreter?
I think he also warned those who " spoke in tongues " to be silent unless an interpreter is present to tell what is said.

This issue is what makes the Catholic Charismatic Renewal important in that it has specific norms for the two different gifts which St. Paul calls “speaking in Tongues.”

What is basically wrong with the brain study, posts 17 & 26, is that the general term glossolalia (see abstract) is as far from the Catholic Charismatic Renewal as the moon is from earth. Glossolalia is often the cause of confusion when it comes to St. Paul.

But even before a discussion of the employment of Tongues, one should try to understand the personal commitment to Jesus Christ which is part of the experience of the baptism of the Holy Spirit in the Catholic Charismatic Renewal. In the first centuries of Catholicism, this commitment to Jesus as Lord of our lives would accompany, not take the place of, the three initiation Sacraments given to adult converts. The two charismatic Tongues gifts flow from this commitment to Jesus and to His Catholic church. Today, we see a similar commitment in the rejecting of Satan and his works.

Please note that this basic commitment to Jesus Christ and His church is the foundation for all forms of spirituality from St. Francis to St. Ignatius and on down to St. Faustina, St. Padre Pio, our own parents, family, friends, and hopefully ourselves.

Catholics have brought back into modern Catholicism, the original commitment to Jesus, obviously not the only commitment, that was part of the lives of ordinary folk during the first centuries. This also meant that Catholics had to re-study St. Paul in order to understand the charismatic gifts which were present along with the personal commitment to Jesus.

The two gifts employing Tongues are described by St. Paul in 1 Corinthians, chapters 12 and 14 because he was writing to a community which had gotten off track. We need to realize that the people St. Paul was writing to were already familiar with these particular gifts. Today’s Catholics have not been brought up with an understanding of these gifts. This is why it is important not to take verses from Chapters 12 and 14 out of context. Most of the heated debate on the two Tongues gifts comes from the fact that it is very difficult to understand St. Paul’s writing apart from the Catholic Charismatic Renewal.

There are many Catholics, mature in their faith, who have already committed their lives to Jesus in other forms of spirituality. Considering the variety of saints and the variety of human personalities, we must not consider one or the other form of commitment to Jesus as superior.

There is a thread in this forum which shares personal experiences of the baptism of the Holy Spirit, Catholic Charismatic Renewal. The experiences are not all that different from experiences of various saints. Nor are they really different from the basic experiences of Catholics who do not have contact with the Catholic Charismatic Renewal. For example, one of the purposes of the Sacrament of Confirmation is to be a “soldier for Christ”. Do we receive the Sacrament of Confirmation more than once? Should we continue to commit our lives to Jesus on a regular basis?

When possible, readers should check out the thread What does “Baptism In the Holy Spirit” mean?

forums.catholic-questions.org/showthread.php?t=708265

Personally, I believe it is up to the individual to seek the common prayer gift which employs Tongues. If a person decides on a different form of prayer which she or he feels called to – that is great because all of us need to become closer to Jesus.
However, I would like the person to understand the two gifts which employ tongues so that any decision is an informed one.

 

[grannymh]

Emphasis mine.

By this, do you mean that those who have not had a second baptism in the Holy Spirit and are not manifesting gifts like tongues, are at a lesser stage in their spiritual development than others who have?

There is only one Catholic Sacrament of Baptism received only once.

There are many rituals which accompany this Sacrament. For example, a candle, a white garment or cloth, using oil, blessings of parents, renouncing Satan, etc. Hopefully, post 36 will be a start in understanding what the Catholic Charismatic Renewal means by the experience of committing one’s life to God – often called baptism of the Holy Spirit because the Holy Spirit is renewing a person’s life and the graces received in the Sacraments of Baptism and Confirmation. I doubt if there is any one of us who does not need some kind of renewal. Getting to the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass on time to sing the entrance song is a needed “renewal” for me.

 

[Lochias]

There is only one Catholic Sacrament of Baptism received only once.

There are many rituals which accompany this Sacrament. For example, a candle, a white garment or cloth, using oil, blessings of parents, renouncing Satan, etc. Hopefully, post 36 will be a start in understanding what the Catholic Charismatic Renewal means by the experience of committing one’s life to God – often called baptism of the Holy Spirit because the Holy Spirit is renewing a person’s life and the graces received in the Sacraments of Baptism and Confirmation. I doubt if there is any one of us who does not need some kind of renewal. Getting to the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass on time to sing the entrance song is a needed “renewal” for me.

As always, granny, your posts help sort things out a bit. Thanks for the info.

 

[ThomasMartin]

Emphasis mine.

By this, do you mean that those who have not had a second baptism in the Holy Spirit and are not manifesting gifts like tongues, are at a lesser stage in their spiritual development than others who have?

Just a quick thought about this.

I would hate to call this “lesser” or “higher” spiritual stage or development. A priest, leader of the community I am a member of, often says, that if a man at the baptism of the HS starts speaking in tongues, propheting, healing, making miracles… then he leaves the room and acts as a terrible person, withouth charity, without love, without good will - he puts down the meaning of his charisms.

"Everything must be done so that the church may be built up." (1Cor 14:26) Even the gifts that are for your growth, as the prayer in tongues can be used to pray for others - to build up the Church. Everything. Even the silence, “the dark night of the gifts” perhaps, when there are no great natural/supernatural aspects around the prayer. Everything is to build up the church.

So no, people who experienced the Charisms are not somehow supreme. It is all about the building up of the Church. And one can always do that, somehow, with the help of the Lord.

Some story to this: I go to the same church every friday, around 6 pm. Every week there is this old lady on a wheelchair, sitting in the front row, quietly, sometimes empty-handed, sometimes with glasses and a little paper with a prayer that she prays after she receives the Eucharist.
I can’t help myself, but I just admire her and I always think about what I have seen as a (part-time) charismatic, what I have heard, what gifts did I receive… all of this is just so tiny compared to this lady, sitting there, every friday. Maybe she is ill, maybe she has many other problems. But the peace that is around her! It is something amazing. Also her grandson who after Mass comes to her, asks her if she wants to go, and then he takes her away.
I do not think, that our faith is about the level of spiritual development, we are not searching for experience or some kind of enlightenment. But for love and salvation. And that is what charismatics are searching for, if they are truly sincere.

 

[Ohana]

Emphasis mine.

By this, do you mean that those who have not had a second baptism in the Holy Spirit and are not manifesting gifts like tongues, are at a lesser stage in their spiritual development than others who have?

No, that is not what I meant. I meant that all of us are on a path to union with God in Heaven hopefully. I do think there are stages of development on that path, just as there are in our physical/psychological growth here on earth. I don’t think it is a matter of arrived/not arrived, more of a process of growing. And we grow in different ways. Tielhard du Chardin talked about differentiation and becoming more separate, more individual as we mature. He used that example probably out of his biologic point of view. The doctors of the Church also describe growth and individuation.

So God may select different “paths” for us and each of us grow along those paths. I don’t think we can judge others paths or their place upon it. That is what spiritual direction helps us to do for ourselves.

I probably still have not said it well, but I did not mean a judgemental comment, more a recognition that we are all on a journey and we need to help, not judge.