Thursday, July 30, 2015

The Thing That Would Not Die!

     Those who know me well are aware that I have an...odd sense of humor. However, even the most cynical among you might not have anticipated its most recent manifestation.

     I was at morning Mass just a little while ago, listening to Father Charlie sermonize about the Parable of the Good Fish, when I heard him commit a blasphemy. What? Yes, a Catholic priest, my very own pastor, spoke scandalously, right from the pulpit! Well, I knew I had to say something about that. So I approached him after Mass, wearing my most solemn expression.

     With one look at me Father Charlie knew at once that the subject was grim. “What is it, Fran?”

     “Father,” I intoned, “as a priest you’re aware that to violate one of the really serious Commandments imperils one’s immortal soul. Thou shalt not murder, thou shalt not commit adultery, thou shalt not steal, thou shalt not serve red wine with fish or wear white after Labor Day –” that got a start out of him – “yet what did I hear this very morning, from your own lips!”

     His eyes widened as I paused for effect.

     “ ‘Someone has gone out of their way to help you’ –? Really, Father?”

     When he’d ceased laughing – it took a while – I grinned and said “I edit as well as write, you know.”

     Yes, friends, Pronoun Trouble afflicts even the Catholic clergy. Watch for signs of it in your parish. Remember always: Eternal vigilance is the price of gender!

     (Bruce Jenner’s notions notwithstanding.)

Transgenderism

     As if the Sturm Und Drang over ever more strident, ever more demanding homosexuality weren’t enough, the relatively new phenomenon of transgenderism has gone public, with 1976 Olympic gold medal decathlon winner Bruce Jenner for its poster boy/girl.

     Trust me on this, fellow Catholics: you’re going to get asked about it. You’re going to be treated as if your personal reaction will be the reaction of Catholics everywhere – indeed, as if whatever you say is Church doctrine on the whole miserable subject. And no matter what you might say, your interrogators will be merciless in demanding justifications, rationalizations that conform to Church doctrine on homosexuality, arguments about what “Natural Law” means when “everything that occurs in Nature is natural,” and so forth.

     I asked my parish pastor if he knows Church doctrine on this subject, and he allowed that he doesn’t. Indeed, the phenomenon is new enough that the Holy See might not have addressed it yet. If it hasn’t, I have little doubt that it will do so quite soon.

     My opinion, though definite, doesn’t matter. (It’s more or less what you might expect.) Unless you’re a cardinal, and moreover one on the committee tasked with the elaboration of Catholic teaching, neither does yours. But it would be well to remember that you don’t have to submit to interrogation, on this subject or any other. In that regard, it’s well to remember that the most effective response to a hostile question is a question, as sharp as the one posed to you if not sharper. An example:

     Interrogator: So, I’ll bet you papist types are all agog over Caitlyn Jenner. Has the pope condemned him to Hell yet?
     Catholic: I didn’t know Jenner is Catholic. Did he consult his pastor about his intentions before he set out on them? Or don’t you know? Or are you just being obnoxious?

     (The above response should be delivered in a soft tone, and through a gentle smile. Be sure not to omit the smile. It unnerves them.)

     If the Church should express a doctrine on transgenderism, it would be well to know it, but it will never be your responsibility to defend it to those who have rejected it. A faith is a freely chosen allegiance. Yours and mine is no exception. Moreover, we have been cautioned against judging others for declining it by the Founder Himself.

Sunday, July 26, 2015

To See And Yet To Disbelieve

     Gather round, Gentle Readers, for I have a story to tell. It’s about youth, and age, and an unusual collision between them. It’s about rebellion of the most pitiable sort: rebellion against one’s own potentialities and virtues. And it’s about things that were, and are, not of this world, yet were clearly seen...and were rejected by him who saw them.

     It’s about a man, but ultimately, it’s about fallen Man.


     He was young, and old. He had known both hardship and comfort, in approximately equal amounts. He knew a great many things, but practically nothing about himself. If he had a mission, it wasn’t the one he imagined.

     He was noted by one and all for his seriousness, his intensity, and his concentration on faith and the things of the spirit. Such matters were never far from his thoughts. He kept them close even as he studied the most mundane of subjects. Throughout his youth they undergirded his world and lit it from within. He was often derided as a “junior mystic.” He took no notice of it.

     It was his habit to speak seriously. Though he had not yet passed his twenty-first summer, he conversed with peasants and philosophers, commoners and kings, with equal ease. Despite his seeming youth, his elders never dismissed him or took him for granted.

     He trusted his reason and the evidence of his senses. Let’s give him that much, though his trust in those things lapsed when it ought to have been at its peak.

     The first cusp of his life came at a party. He was deep in conversation with a somewhat older woman. The talk had covered several subjects, and he spoke seriously about them all. As the hours passed, others gathered around them, though none of them spoke. Evening had given way to night, and a brief lapse in their exchange had come, when the conversation took an unexpected turn. “I’ve been studying palmistry,” she said, though their chat had not come near to any such topic. “May I take a palm print from you to study later?”

     He thought about it for a moment, could find no harm in it, and assented. As one of their hosts went to fetch an ink cartridge, she reached for his right hand. He turned it palm upward to her, and she gasped.

     She stared wide-eyed at his palm for several seconds, in complete silence. “You must be about two thousand years old,” she said at last. “I can see that you’ve got a lot of work ahead of you.” She released his hand and silently retracted her request for a palm print. The party broke up shortly thereafter.

     The incident shook him to the core. Somehow she had seen deeply into him – far more deeply than he had ever permitted anyone, even his parents, to look. Others had twitted him about his perpetual seriousness, how he treated his life as if it were a problem to be solved when his coevals treated theirs as a frolic in the sun. The advice he’d heard most frequently, from persons young and old, was to “loosen up.” He had always dismissed such prescriptions, but he hadn’t forgotten them.

     Only one person, his parish pastor, had spoken to any other effect. But he’d allowed a distance to form between them that dimmed the luminance of his pastor’s counsel, all the way to invisibility.

     In the firestorm her remark had ignited within his skull, he drew the wrong lesson.


     It was only much later, after two decades of heedless self-indulgence and reckless adventurism that had nearly cost him his life twice before, that he recalled that evening and her words. It may have helped that he was far from home, and that recent developments and encounters had shaken him as deeply as that earlier conversation had done.

     She was right. I knew it at the time. I turned away from it even so.

     He strained to find the reason for it.

     Was it a form of delayed-action peer pressure? Or sudden revulsion at the idea of a life focused on studying, learning, and pondering? Or was it just a suppressed adolescent rebellion that had finally built up enough steam to force itself forward at last?

     He could not know. The young/old man he’d been was as alien to him as he’d been to himself at that time. Perhaps too much time had passed. Perhaps he’d seen too much, had been wounded too many times. It didn’t matter. A second cusp, more pronounced than the first, was upon him.

     I knew better even then. I knew better, but I did worse. The very epitome of folly. But what now?

     The years he’d squandered could not be regained. All he could do was mourn them. Yet he knew he’d had an epiphany. Though the habits of the twenty years behind him inclined him to dismiss it, his reason remained intact. He resolved that this time, he would believe what he saw all too plainly.

     He embarked upon a project few men ever dare to undertake: the complete reconstruction of his life. He knew how it must begin: the component he’d first sloughed must be the one first restored.

     He returned to faith in God.


     We are frequently told to maintain a healthful skepticism, even about what we see with our own eyes, hear with our own ears, and reason out with our own minds. It occurs to few persons that the popularity of such primary-color cynicism isn’t a perfect justification for it. Why not trust the evidence of our senses? Why not believe that the world is as it appears? Why not entertain, if only for a moment, the possibility that he who tells you not to trust your own eyes, ears, and reason might not be your friend – that he might have motives of which he dares not speak?

     Siddhartha Gautama, the Buddha, was quite explicit about it:

     Believe nothing, no matter where you read it, or who said it – no matter if I have said it! – except it agree with your own reason and your own common sense.

     That applies just as strongly to epiphanies – private, internal experiences – as to external ones that others could share. For we have senses that go beyond the conventionally enumerated five: the kinesthetic senses of our bodies, the probabilistic, inferential, and inductive senses of our minds, and the moral sense that emanates from our souls. These are no more to be disregarded than the reports of our eyes and ears.


     I’m inclined to think that epiphany is more common than most of us imagine, which might be a part of the reason many persons dismiss theirs. Internal experiences are difficult to discuss with others. Many persons are embarrassed to mention them. The secularity and overall cynicism of our era makes it harder still. An industry has emerged that’s powerfully biased against accepting them; its practitioners charge hundreds of dollars per fifty-minute “hour,” which inclines their clients to privilege their opinions above others.

     A few persons who’ve had epiphanies have told me about them. Most of them pledged to accept their internal revelations and to act accordingly. They’ve all benefited thereby. Most of those who’ve dismissed them are still on the sunny side of the sod, so who can say what might arise to change their minds?

     Sometimes what changes a mind is the sudden, event-triggered perception of wasted years, as was the case for the subject of the brief tale above. I almost succumbed to the impulse to call such an interval “years spent wandering in the wilderness,” but realized that that kind of wandering almost always has a cleansing, healing effect. Provided you don’t starve or get mauled by a grizzly bear, of course.

     To sum up:
     Trust your internal senses.
     Trust your facility of reason and what it tells you.
     Be prudent, but don’t be paralyzed; you are more than even you can know.
     Remember how much of your “knowledge” is really confidence derived from past experiences: in other words, faith.

     May God bless and keep you all.

Saturday, July 18, 2015

Heated Irons

     You’ve been thinking maybe the time has come to speak. After all, if the Planned Parenthood scandal won’t open people’s eyes, they can’t be opened, right? Right?

     Beware. Sometimes, the best thing to do when an opportunity such as this arises is nothing at all. This is such a time.

     Be yourself. No, really.

     I know, I know: plenty of sententious phonies have told us to “Be yourselves.” What they meant by it, I can’t imagine. What I mean by it is somewhat simpler: Be untroubled. You have no part in this obscenity. As a Catholic, you’ve been opposed to the root of the thing, the genesis of all that’s followed, from the very first. Your conscience, therefore, should be clear.

     If you can simply maintain your convictions and an appearance of serenity, you’ll influence far more minds than could any amount of verbal preachment. Open sadness at this development? No, not even that. This was easily predictable from the beginning of the abortion-on-demand regime. Of course if you’re asked for your opinion, you should give it, but in a humble and restrained manner. Perhaps you might say “Some people saw this coming long ago” – but no more than that. Avoid told-you-sos or anything else that would reek of an attitude of moral superiority. You, too, have sinned; we all have.

     It’s much easier on the conscience of a sinner to know that others who have avoided his particular sin will accept him anyway. Not the sin, but the sinner. Those who have supported abortion on demand, whether verbally, electorally, or by partaking of the practice, will find it easier to repent if we refrain from catechizing them.

     Say nothing. Approach no one. Let them come to you. They’ll know where to find you.

Monday, July 13, 2015

Your Mission...

     ...should you choose to accept it...no, wait, wrong TV show.

     If you’re a lone Catholic, or one of a tiny minority of Catholics / Christians, in your family / job / neighborhood, you are a de facto missionary. Mind you, the position is unsalaried, comes with no perquisites, and is likely to be fraught with danger (to your self-regard, at least). But take heart: there are no quotas, no job description, no performance reviews, and the single-layer Management is as well-disposed toward you as you could imagine. Also, you get to set your own hours.

     Wait: that last bit is a little off-center. In point of fact, you’re pretty much on the clock twenty-four hours per day. But as all you’re required to do is to be a Catholic, the duties shouldn’t exhaust you.

     There’s a lot of loose talk about how American adolescents are under terrible “peer pressure” to conform to the latest trends, adopt the latest fads, and express the au courant opinions. Why the “peer pressure” on a teen should be so terrible, I can’t fathom. After all, isn’t he a peer? Can’t he press back? Yes, I do know that my readers are almost entirely adults, and I am consciously writing for that sort of audience, but even so, it’s worth considering your isolation, whether it’s relative or absolute, from the same standpoint: opportunity as well as discomfort.

     Like as not you’ve never thought of yourself as a missionary. In this regard, the Mormons have an edge over us, as they require their allegiants to do missionary work. (I think the same is true for the Jehovah’s Witnesses, though I can’t confirm it.) Christians of the more conventional sects aren’t taught to think in such terms. Nevertheless, it’s the case: your contacts with non-Christians are opportunities to exemplify your faith: its beauties, its benefits, and its promise.

     I’ve received wake-up calls about this from several sources: persons who’ve written to tell me of how the examples set by sincere Christians who live their faith – they don’t find it necessary to preach the Gospels by “using words” – have influenced them toward the embrace of faith and other significant adjustments to their lives. Saint Francis of Assisi must be proud of those evangelists-by-example; I certainly am.

     Pope Benedict XVI told us, quite explicitly, to be not afraid. To live in fear is to be perpetually miserable. It’s especially tragic when what’s feared is the disapproval of others who hold to lower standards. Disapproval should flow in the other direction, shouldn’t it? No, you needn’t express it where others can hear. Indeed, you mustn’t.

     Try thinking of yourself not as an object of derision or a victim of ostracism, but as an example to others. Among other things, it will strengthen you in times of darkness and doubt. Isn’t it the case that we rise to the occasion with more determination when there are customers lined up and waiting?

Friday, July 10, 2015

The Challenge Part 2

     Of course, the best defense to any sort of attack is a counterattack:

     Catholic: But tell me please: why don’t you believe?
     Secularist: Oh, come on! Why should I?
     Catholic: Well, there’s documentary evidence. We call it the New Testament.
     Secularist: You think that’s evidence?
     Catholic: On what basis do you believe in the destruction of Carthage? The Peloponnesian War? The great run of Philippides from Marathon to Sparta? Written historical records, right?
     Secularist: Well, yes, but that’s secular history.
     Catholic: My friend, until about the end of the seventeenth century, all history was the work of religious scholars and people we would today call “mythmakers.” You prefer to...how would you put it...to privilege these other bits of history on the grounds of your preferences.
     Secularist: Well no other histories speak of miracles, and resurrections, and the like.
     Catholic: Are you telling me that you expect those things to be commonplace?
     Secularist: No, not at all, but—
     Catholic: Now, now! The essence of the refusal to believe is the refusal to believe evidence that falls short of absolute proof. So it would seem that you don’t disbelieve; you refuse to believe.
     Secularist: (silence)
     Catholic: It’s easy to refuse to believe something that can’t be absolutely proved, especially if it cross-cuts your preferences. But bear in mind that among the men who knew Jesus personally, virtually all of them accepted martyrdom, often by torture, rather than renounce their faith – and those events are well documented both in the writings of pagan, polytheistic historians and in the New Testament. Do you really think those men would willingly have accepted death by torture for a lie, when all they would have had to do to save their lives – and perhaps to gain a high place at some ruler’s side – is to renounce it?

     Have fun with it. I do.

Thursday, July 9, 2015

The Challenge

     How important it is to remember your options!

     Secularist: Prove that God exists.
     Catholic: I have no need to do that.
     Secularist: Hah! Then you admit that God doesn’t exist!
     Catholic: Nothing of the sort. Are you claiming that you can prove He doesn’t exist?
     Case 1:
     Secularist: Uh...
     Catholic: Because if you can, I’m ready to listen.
     Case2:
     Secularist: Why bother? There’s no evidence that He exists.
     Catholic: Aha! So you can’t prove it!
    Secularist: I don’t have to!
     Catholic: Yes you do, if you want me to accept it. Otherwise, your position is an article of faith...just like mine.

     The most important of all human characteristics is freedom of conscience. Never forget it – and never forget that your position doesn’t require proof, so long as you accept it as an article of faith.

Tuesday, July 7, 2015

That Awkward Moment

     It comes when relatives or friends who’ve been talking about their adulteries, or abortions, or self-absorbed, irresponsible fornications realize that you’re within earshot.

     Or when they joke about something else they’ve done that’s baldy immoral, like stealing from an employer, and catch your look of astonishment, and fall immediately silent.

     Or when one of them makes a remark that connotes contempt for someone because of his religion...maybe for your religion, or for you.

     And such is the tenor of our time that you know, with the degree of certainty that was once reserved for God is watching, that you can’t say anything, of any sort, about their exchange. What ever you might say would result in making you “the bad guy” for making them feel bad about themselves.

     So you pretend you didn’t hear them. Maybe you pretend that their conversation didn’t register because your mind was far away. Or maybe you say nothing and try to slip away.

     But no matter what you say or don’t say, do or don’t do, it doesn’t matter. In their eyes you’re already “the bad guy. They already resent you for making them feel bad about themselves, because you have higher standards than they do, and they know it.

     They have one recourse, and one only: to take offense at you. Sometimes it isn’t expressed where you can hear. Sometimes it takes the form of insinuations such as “He acts holier-than-thou, but give him a reason and I’ll bet he’d just as low as anyone.” And in an irony of ironies, the kinder and more courteous you try to be, the more they’ll resent you for it.

     This is the price of having "old-fashioned" morals and ethics in an age of widespread moral nihilism. Anyone who lets it be known that he’s a Catholic and serious about it will pay that price at some time in his life. These days, even others who identify as nominal Catholics can make you feel it. That’s how bad things have gotten.

     Yet in times past, your standards were effectively universal throughout the West. Those who were found to have transgressed those standards were expected to admit their fault and try to be better thereafter. Even those known to practice the most egregious vices were expected to maintain a veneer of propriety and to promulgate the Christian moral-ethical code to their children. Today this is called “hypocrisy,” and condemned as if it were a greater fault than open venality and debauchery.

     If there’s any comfort to be had, it must reside in this: You’re not alone. No matter how isolated you are religiously, you can remind yourself that there are others in your situation all over America and Europe: people who are resented for maintaining moral-ethical standards that everyone was once taught from childhood and expected to maintain lifelong.

     You have the right of it – and whether the others like it or not, God is watching. So stay strong.

Sunday, July 5, 2015

Family Gatherings

     I’m the lone Catholic in a family otherwise composed of secularized Jews. My wife, her daughters, and all her other relatives have left faith entirely behind. That’s not all: a hefty fraction of those relatives – though not my wife, thanks be to God – hold all religions, including mine, in contempt, and take delight in showing it.

     I, too, was secular when we married, decades ago. Though I was raised Catholic, I fell away as a young adult. I returned to the Faith only after my wife and I had been together for a number of years.

     You can imagine the stresses that have accumulated since that momentous decision.

     I don’t know if it would be better or worse were my wife and in-laws Christians of some other denomination. I know tensions exist between Catholics and some of the Protestant sects. Somehow I doubt they’re quite as intense as these

     I bear some of the blame for it. At least, that’s what my in-laws would say. I reproved them for cracking anti-Catholic jokes at a Thanksgiving dinner under my roof. The resulting rift has never been bridged. I have no idea how to go about it...or whether I should try.

     The consequences include family gatherings: we don’t have any. As my family is entirely deceased, it makes holidays something of a strain.

     But faith, like everything else worth having, bears a price. That price varies from one person to the next. Like all good things, either you pay the price, or you do without.


     The Sunday Mass I attend is populated mainly by older persons – don’t get the wrong idea; I’m an older person too – and they tend to come and go in twos: husband and wife. But there are always a few younger congregants who come and go alone. This morning I found myself thinking about those others, whether they’re isolated as am I, and if so, how they cope.

     Family can be a source of sustenance and comfort, but religious tensions can turn it into a battlefield. The wounds can be especially painful when one is among families not riven by such divisions. It’s a terrible irony that that should be the case at Mass.

     This morning I pray for the comfort of all such isolated Catholics, but especially for the younger ones: the young adults who have embraced the Faith and have found that part of the price is the astonishment, the cynicism, and perhaps the open derision of those who share their blood. Theirs is a hard road to travel, much harder than mine, for I am inured to it. I pray that He who spilled His blood for our sakes will grant them the grace they need to remain strong, especially in remaining staunch before the urgings of the secular world.