By Gary Topping–
For several years now, my wife Marianna has been spending a February weekend with a friend of ours in Seattle. The primary purpose of the visit is to attend a weekend workshop on Shakespeare, where they study a specific play under the leadership of Fr. Stephen C. Rowan, a priest of the Archdiocese of Seattle and a professor at Seattle University. So far they have studied Much Ado About Nothing, As You Like It, The Winter’s Tale, and this year, Hamlet. Weekend Mass is part of the workshop, and this time Fr. Rowan wove insights from Hamlet into his homily so cleverly that Marianna asked him for a copy. My thought is that readers of The Boy Monk, who by definition are people of great intelligence, sophistication and impeccable taste, would appreciate excerpts from the homily.
“Of all Shakespeare’s characters, Hamlet seems to be the one most acutely aware of the importance of choosing what must be done for the sake of righteousness in one’s personal and political life. Whether an action is to be or not to be is of great importance. Whether we are to suffer a wrong or to fight against it, we need to reflect carefully, because actions have consequences for oneself and for others.
“Hamlet would have understood. . . that whatever we choose will be given to us—choices have consequences. He would have understood as well the teaching of Jesus that if we are really interested in eradicating violence, abuse of women, and false speaking from our own lives and from the body politic, we will have to go down to root causes and eradicate anger and lust and indifference to truth. Hamlet’s moral awareness is acute—and that is why his melancholy sits on brood—he is thinking it through until a thought hatches in his mind and an action comes forth onto the stage. . . .
“Jesus, far from abolishing the law, says that he has come to fulfill it—and he teaches even further that attention must be paid even to the roots of moral behavior. We have to eradicate dangerous attitudes, for example, the belief that a person is above the law and that the commandments are for sheep or for losers—which is a common view in the modern age—the time after Nietzsche, as translated to popular culture by writers like Ayn Rand and singers like Frank Sinatra: ‘I did it my way.’. . .
“The pattern of death and resurrection—self-giving and self-transcendence—is the norm of the Christian life, to which all moral behavior must conform, because if it does not, Christian life is just a pack of cards, ready to collapse under the slightest strain. . . .It is especially important to remember the pattern—and the mission in the world that it implies—when so much is said and done either to forget it or to show that the pattern has been effectively forgotten—for a long time. We do not need a ghost from the grave to tell us, ‘remember me.’ We remember at every Mass with words of faith that should stir us to thankfulness and action on behalf of justice, love, and peace: ‘Christ has died, Christ is risen, Christ will come again.’”
*Gary Topping is a writer and historian living in Salt Lake City, Utah. He is the retired archivist for the Catholic Diocese of Salt Lake City and has written many books and articles.
