A Reply to a Dear Friend

A good friend of mine recently forwarded me a couple of articles. She's a very intelligent person, but sadly misled by contemporary thought. Below is my reply to her (with assorted HTML links added for emphasis).

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Meine Liebe Freundin,

Thanks for the article. It's hard to know where to start. But at the center of this article is the author's misunderstanding of the truth of the Faith. (The other article, by Hitt, sets up a strawman Jesus who isn't anything like the real one; and Hitt's favored Jesus isn't much like the real Jesus, either.)

Jesus is neither conservative nor liberal, at least not as we contemporary Americans understand those labels. Jesus taught; he taught in parables, and sometimes he taught directly (as in, "I tell you that anyone who divorces his wife causes her to commit adultery" and "forgive your brother seventy times seven times"), and he founded a church that continues to this day. He didn't say when he was about to ascend, "I'm going to the Father, and leaving you this cool Bible, every word of which is literally true, at least if you use the King James Edition (TM)." In fact, the New Testament wasn't even fully formed until near the end of the Fourth Century.

And in choosing his disciples, he didn't say, "Peter, you're the smartest person in the room besides me, so you're in charge." He asked: "Peter, do you love me?" Three times. And then he gave Peter his duty: "Feed my lambs."

Now, arguably, Peter was the dumbest disciple: he consistently says exactly the wrong thing when Jesus tries to teach the disciples something, but Jesus chose him anyway, saying "upon this rock I will build my church."

What does that tell us today? I think it should be very humbling for those of us who are blessed with intelligence and advanced college degrees:

Intelligence is less important than faith and love.

As a well-known Catholic writer likes to say, human history can be summed up in two questions: "What can it hurt?" and "How were we supposed to know?" And for the record, the Catholic Church does accept homosexuals and every other type of sinner. The Church teaches that it is homosexual acts, not persons, that are disordered.

But here's the catch: everyone is called to turn away from sin, take up his Cross, and follow Jesus. We are very emphatically NOT called to say, "Lord, I know you're okay with my sins, because I'm not really hurting anybody;" or "Lord, I demand that you affirm me in my okayness." Those are paths to destruction.

I am as sinful as any man; indeed, I am more sinful than many. My sins are no better than anyone else's. But I do not clamor for my sins to be accepted and blessed. That's an important distinction.

It would be easy for me to sit here in comfort and rationalize why my sins are okay. It is, in fact, much easier to do that than it is to take up the cross. And that is what I am trying to do. Sometimes I fall, as does everyone; we are limited by our human flesh ("The Spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak" -- also v. important) and we can only attain perfection after death.

The important thing is, we have a Redeemer who blesses and sanctifies that human flesh because he took it on himself. Jesus was not just a "hell of a teacher," as the article states; if that were all that Jesus had been, the Faith would be long gone by now. Remember Gamaliel's words to the council in Acts 5:28ff: If [this new faith] is from God, you cannot overthrow it, lest you find yourselves fighting against God.

I realize I am laying out here, in poor and halting fashion, a case for the truth of the Christian faith. But my main points are these:

1) Jesus entrusted his teaching to the apostles, not to the most intelligent or the highest-class people around. (Remember that the first people to be told of the Nativity were shepherds -- the dregs of society.)

2) The smartest people aren't necessarily right about anything. I always have to remind myself of that when I am tempted to think I know better than what the Church teaches. Smart people like Margaret Sanger, who wanted to annihilate the Negro and Asian races because she considered them inferior (look it up if you don't believe me); smart people like Josef Goebbels, whose practices are still quietly studied by modern spinmasters; smart people like Peter Singer, who has successfully rationalized zoophilia, necrophilia, and the murder of the disabled. They're all very intelligent.

3) The drive to give the seal of approval to the Péché du Jour is nothing new; it has been going on from the beginning. Remember that Adam shifted the blame for his sin to Eve, who shifted hers to the serpent. It's ingrained in us pretty deeply all these generations later.

4) Don't trust your intelligence; trust in God. (Closely related to point 2).

You and I disagree pretty fundamentally about a lot of things, I know. And I am a poor ambassador for Christ or his church, but when I read things like this, I have to say something. I feel immeasurably grateful that God has given us a means to know him and serve him (the Church) and that he works through imperfect instruments to achieve his ends (as the new Pope said in his first words from the balcony last Tuesday).

People can legitimately come to differing conclusions about politics. I'm not at all comfortable with the GOP's positions on a lot of issues; but more of their positions reflect mine at the moment than do the DNC's. The GOP isn't going to do anything to reduce abortions because *they don't care* about all those snuffed-out lives. Politicians care about being in power, not about serving God.

I value your friendship and I value you as a person; that's why I'm writing this to you, because sometimes education is really more like seduction: they come from the same root, but one means "to lead forth" and the other "to lead astray."

When I was a graduate student, my opinions were much like yours today. But I have spent the last several years (since nearly jumping ship to the Lutheran church for the sake of expedience) reading, studiying, praying, and trying to do better. My thought has certainly changed in that time. And for Catholics, that means *not* demanding that God accept my thinking, but trying to conform my thinking to God's.

So anyway! I probably haven't done much to improve my future business prospects with you today, or the condition of our friendship. But I care about you too much to conceal the truth to spare your feelings. Believe me, it's hard to keep my mouth shut sometimes.

I'll just close with this citation from that dreaded 'enforcer of doctrinal purity,' Benedict the Sixteenth:

Are we not perhaps all afraid in some way? If we let Christ enter fully into our lives, if we open ourselves totally to him, are we not afraid that He might take something away from us? Are we not perhaps afraid to give up something significant, something unique, something that makes life so beautiful? Do we not then risk ending up diminished and deprived of our freedom? And once again the Pope [John Paul II] said: No! If we let Christ into our lives, we lose nothing, nothing, absolutely nothing of what makes life free, beautiful and great. No! Only in this friendship are the doors of life opened wide. Only in this friendship is the great potential of human existence truly revealed. Only in this friendship do we experience beauty and liberation. And so, today, with great strength and great conviction, on the basis of long personal experience of life, I say to you, dear young people: Do not be afraid of Christ! He takes nothing away, and he gives you everything. When we give ourselves to him, we receive a hundredfold in return. Yes, open, open wide the doors to Christ – and you will find true life.

SO! Are we still on for lunch or what?

See you next week.

Your friend,
God's Own Fool

Cool Blog!

Petra at Lumen de Lumine has an interesting post on the question of Theodicy. Of course, Theodicy was much discussed after the tsunami in December and January, and it was the occasion of much breast-beating in the secular press.

Typical question: "How could a loving God allow people to suffer like that?"

Petra's post sums it up nicely, however: The Christian Faith IS the answer to the Theodicy question.

She also closes with an amusing observation:

The same people who are unsatisfied that God is sympathetic, but does not intervene, immediately begin to defame him as an unscrupulous ruler and dictator as soon as he *does* intervene.

Alles Gute Petra!

Papst Benedikt XVI.

For all us German-speakers, this is thrilling on one level -- we now have a German-speaking Pope. I've heard on Radio Stephansdom some excerpts from talks that Johannes Paul der Grosse gave, and his German was excellent, if accented: I was able to understand every word. Of course, as a fellow foreigner, it is always easier to understand another non-native speaker.

But Josef Kardinal Ratzinger is a surprise, a shock, a eucatastrophe if you will. I never expected he would be elected. But I confess to wishing fervently that he could become Pope when I heard his beautiful, magnificent homily at Johannes Paul II.'s funeral Mass.

My former pastor, an aging 60's hippie who once screamed obscenities about 'all the [expletive deleted] right-wing bishops' and called Johannes Paul II. a 'moron' in front of the altar girls (sadly, yes, we have those in my diocese), must be seething in impotent, aging-hippie indignation. I hope he is reconciled to a long, fruitful papacy for the Panzerkardinal!

And waiting in the wings, if Kdl. Ratzinger is called home sooner, rather than later:

Christoph Kardinal Schönborn.

Es lebe der Papst! Es lebe Benedikt der Sechzehnte!

Or, as our liberal friends would say: "The Wurst is yet to come."

John Paul the Great

In listening to the Litany of the Saints during the funeral for John Paul II, I was struck by the invocation of saints who were also popes. But I was also struck by two names at the head of that list:

Sancte Leone Magne, ora pro eo.
Sancte Gregorie Magne, ora pro eo.

And it seems to me that, even if only two other Pastors of the Church have been named "The Great," this pope certainly deserves the title. His reign was long, and fruitful, and challenging to the hard-hearted as well as to the pious.

I can't really put into words how I felt about the man, but there is no doubt in my mind that he was a powerful witness for Christ and his church.

I'll always remember the picture of JPII holding - and kissing -- the baby who had AIDS back in the 80s, even after his posse had told him it was dangerous, because they didn't know then exactly how it was transmitted.

Of course, my last pastor described the Pope as a "moron" and a "troglodyte," among other things; and sadly, there are many like that one in the priesthood today. Fortunately the younger ones coming along are those who were inspired by JPII and his personal witness of faith, and the seemingly electric connection he had with the young. He exemplified what a loving father should be.

John Paul made many political enemies on the left and the right; the left hated him because he wouldn't go with the flow on abortion or on ordaining female priests; the right hated him (at times) because he opposed the practice of capital punishment and the waging of, as he saw them, unnecessary wars. I am praying for a holy and reverent choice for the next Pontifex Maximus. As Catholics, we believe God guides his church. No matter who comes next, this one will always be the Pope who comes first in my heart.