Every Once in a While

Every once in a while, justice is served, and it is sweet. This time, it happened in Russia:

Russian citizen Andrei Filin challenged the Russian government to deny him his right to wear the trademark headwear of his pasta god’s church, the sacred colander. Surprisingly, the state allowed Filin to win.

But Russia, refusing to be made a fool of, found a way to keep Filin honest about his supposed religious doctrine.

“The next time he is stopped by the traffic police, if he doesn’t have a pasta strainer on his head, his license will be taken from him,” said Vladimir Kuzin, deputy chief of Moscow’s State Traffic inspectorate.

The pastafarians are a fake religion, whose purpose is to attack real religions and to make a mockery of religious liberty, largely so that it will be stamped out. It's nice to see them get served up a nice helping of justice on occasion.

On the Importance of Evangelization

Rebecca Hamilton has a nice post about the importance of evangelizing:

The memorial service was a crowded event, the building filled to overflowing. I walked out, gripping my husband’s hand, hoping that in those last extremities my old friend had finally turned to God. Did he go to hell?

I said it aloud when we got back to the car. Was he dead, really, eternally dead and gone to hell? My passionate, crazy friend — had he doomed himself to eternal death?

My husband was silent for a moment. Then, he reached out and squeezed my hand.
Probably, he said.

I changed again after that. My friend’s death shook me out of my somnambulance. I realized that being quiet about Jesus was the cruelest thing I could do to the people around me.

There is much to like in the Hon. Mrs. Hamilton's post. She hits on a few points which I have made in the past, in particular concerning evangelizing as opposed to merely proselytizing, and of putting party loyalty over one's Faith. This latter becomes especially damning when neither major party (and few if any minor ones) party is particularly friendly to genuine Christianity, though one is more openly hostile towards it (and the other possibly more cynical about it).

On the other hand, there is more than one way in which we can evangelize. To literally tells people about Jesus (of better, to do our best to show them in our lives) is of course important, even necessary. It is not, however, sufficient. The simple outreach which attempts to introduce people to Jesus is important, but then again so can be catechesis.

The goal is not merely to get people to proclaim Jesus as Lord, but to go the step further of getting them into right relationships with God, man, and self. Just helping a person to become "Christian" is good, helping them to "find Jesus" is good. But helping them to understand and then embraces the fullness of His teachings is also important, and can help to avoid what I might call the "accidental scandal."

Scandal is that which causes another to stumble, be it stumbling into sin, or stumbling out of the Church. Accidental scandal, for lack of a better phrase, is that which we cause by our own ignorance which then causes another to fall into sin; and falling into sin, to perhaps then embrace the sin, then deny the Faith, and finally to deny Christ. I think we manage that well enough without neglecting catechesis, through probably well-meaning but almost certainly misguided attempts at "pastoral care."

The road seems innocuous enough. First a "lesser evil" is tolerated, then encouraged, and then even embraced as a means of avoiding what was as best as could be discerned the greater evil. But then this "lesser evil" takes seed, festers, and grows; it is not uprooted, and so it takes hold, and while we seem to master teh greater evil we fall to the lesser one, which then leads to some other evil. As Chesterton warned, that road leads down and down.

A Few Good Links (vol. 17)

For some reason it's more difficult for me to post on Mondays on my current schedule. I don't know why, but it is.

1. Professor Robert P. George is leading a group of seven people who have offered to take 100 lashes each in solidarity with Raif Badawi, the Saudi Arabian blogger who was sentenced to 1000 lashes and 10 years in jail for violating sharia. The offered to take these lashes so that he wouldn't have to.
2. My co-blogger will probably be disappointed to learn that the video of the Danish archer is apparently more about audience gullibility than actual archery skill.
3. An interesting topic which I have discussed before is back on the blogosphere (kind of): Edward Feser and the Nicene Guys both discuss Monogenism and Polygenism and the question of human origins.
4. One problem with the modern view of the world is that it conflates vocation with career. The two are not identical.
5. President Obama continues his war against the middle class. Really, a war against anyone who didn't vote for him, which is in some ways actually worse than simply a war against the middle class, since that one is at least not in principle personal.
6. Vintage Christianity, summarized. I disagree with his assessment of how the Reformers went back to how the Church was in its earliest days (some may have thought that's what they were doing), but the rest is a good read.
7. There's nothing wrong with the "seamless garment" metaphor as applied to Catholic social teaching, but it is unfortunately used with some frequency as a cover for hypocrisy and intellectual dishonesty.

As always, I would lie to revisit some of these links--but I probably won't!

Blog Versus: Harmful Slogans--Come As You Are

Just for fun, a little debate on our site. Today's topic is "Annoying Catch Phrases/Damaging Slogans." You can read the post by my co-blogger, the Faithful Skeptic, here.

I've said before that the faith cannot really be reduced to a single slogan, catchphrase, or motto. There are some which certainly come close--"Truth," "Love/God is love," "Discipleship," "The two greatest commandments...(fulfill the Law)"--but these are still rough approximations at best, and generally only capture one facet of our Faith, or of our God. They are true as far as they go, but none can go far enough.

There are others which are arguably true to some extent, though not as far as they go, and yet which some people would make into a slogan for the Church, or even for a ministry (such as evangelization or Catechesis). Some of these do more harm than good, especially in the current culture, with the current zeitgeist. I can think of few (if any) as damaging as the phrase "come as you are" and its flip sides, "Judge not...", "Who am I/are you/are we to judge," and (more to the point) "Don't judge me..."

The thing with these phrases--and I hope it is understood that they collectively work together to form a sort of attitude, even a counterfeit worldview--is not that they are all untrue or mischievous in and of themselves. The deeper problem is that they leave a man where he is: they too often mean "stay as you are," which people are all-too-happy to oblige. "Who am I to judge" often means "What does it matter?", a rhetorical question to which the answer is supposed to be, "Not a whit!"

This phrase and its underlying attitude is both pernicious and ubiquitous, and is used to excuse (though never to forgive) much. I'll give an example of this kind of thinking:

"Every liturgy I ever attended was unworthy of Christ the Lord. I know that every liturgy I ever attend will be unworthy of Him, as well. What I have never seen, not once, was a liturgy that was unworthy of me.... 

I feel sorry for these people who spend all their time gnashing their teeth and getting all lathered up over what they see as the terrible liturgy. They are not only missing their blessing, they are taking their blessing and throwing it back into Jesus’ face. 

I thank God that we have priests who bring us Jesus at every mass, who consent to be conduits of grace. I have no desire to pick at them over how high they lift the chalice, if they allow applause and whether or not they pray the liturgy with the “proper” amount of gravitas.... 

If the mass and the liturgy are good enough for Jesus to be there, if we, with all our imperfections, are good enough for Him to love us and share Himself with us, then what’s our complaint?

There is, of course, some truth to this statement, just as there is to the idea that we should "come as we are." It's true that we will always fall short of perfection, that we cannot even be actually worthy of God, that it is God's grace and not just our own merits which make us into His friends, disciples, brothers, or children. However, just because we cannot do it all, doesn't mean that we should throw up our hands and do none of it. Just because we cannot be perfected, does not mean that we can be better than we are.

The philosopher Peter Kreeft once remarked that as a Father, God is easy to please and hard to satisfy. The meaning of this is that God is pleased with any small token gesture of worship or service or indeed of affection and filial love. However, He is not satisfied until we are full-blown disciples, is not content to let us stop at anything short of agape. This should be reflected in our liturgies, in the literal sense of the Mass and in the trans-literal sense of the work in our everyday lives [1]. We ask for our daily bread in the Lord's Prayer, and by this we mean on the one hand our "Bread," that is, the Eucharist, Christ's Body and Blood and the graces we receive from consuming it [2], and in another sense for the simple graces, the "strength" to go about our daily lives while striving to become saints.

My co-blogger mentions "Fear not" as the slogan which does the most harm, and I must agree that such a phrase is very harmful when used to undermine holy fear. "The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom," as the Bible tells us; but the end of wisdom, the thing towards which it is geared, is to love the things of heaven above those of earth, and above all to love the Lord our God [3]. One way which we show this love is in our reverent liturgy; another is in our daily lives.

Our Lord tells us that “If you love me, you will keep my commandments" (John 14:15). His beloved disciple further says that "If any one says, 'I love God,' and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen, cannot love God whom he has not seen" (1 John 4:20). It is true, therefore, that one part of showing love is merely to be inviting, that is, to invite a stranger to come to Mass with us, to "Come as you are." But that is not the end of Mass, or of evangelization. It's not to score one more point for Team God, to get one more butt in the pew at Mass and one more body in line for Communion. Those things are also a start, but they are not what the finished product--person--should look like.

And one way we can show our love for our brother is to offer fraternal correction when its warranted. Being nice is ok, being kind is better and also more demanding--but loving is the hardest and best of all, and it goes being "being nice," "being tolerant/accepting," or even "being kind." There is no true dichotomy between mercy and morality, or between love and the Law. Jesus is love incarnate, and yet He also was to fulfill the Law; He is infinitely merciful, and yet does not at all loosen the moral restriction of the day, but rather tightens them. Do not murder becomes do not hate others, and do not fornicate or commit adultery becomes do not lust.

"Come as you are," yes, of course. We all need to take that first step. But after the first comes a second and a third, and then the thousands of steps which we walk during a lifetime. Let us not sacrifice all of these latter steps for the sake of constantly repeating the first step.



-----Footnotes-----
[1] Trans-literal: liturgy translates to "work of the people." When we refer to the liturgy, we are literally talking about the Mass and to a lesser extent to the Daily office; but in another sense, we literally mean our daily work, the work of becoming moral, virtuous, of becoming in a word disciples of Christ.

[2] A few different Greek-speaking sources tell me that the literal translation is "Super-substantiated bread."

[3] This is also what is meant by St John when he writes that "There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear. For fear has to do with punishment, and he who fears is not perfected in love" (1 John 4:18). Perfect love is attained in heaven, where even filial fear become unwarranted: there, we need not fear that we will sin and thus offend God, and we need not fear that we will be told to depart from Him. Here, love may be in the process of being perfected, but it never completes that process. To that end, love here may ultimately cast our servile fear (fear of God's punishments) which moving us to filial fear (fear of losing God).

Blog Versus: Harmful Slogans--Fear Not

Just for fun, a little debate on our site. Today's topic is "Annoying Catch Phrases/Damaging Slogans." You can read the post by the other guy who blogs here, the Hope-filled Pessimist, here.

There are a few slogans which are used to deliberately undermine the Catholic Church. "Judge not" and its myriad derivatives, and its more inviting form "Who am I to judge,"certainly does a lot of work to undermine Christian morals, but morals, while important, are not the whole story of the Catholic faith. Actually, short of "God is dead", "Where is your God!?" and "There is no God [save Caesar, I guess]," there aren't many slogans which really attempt to strike hard and fast at the whole Catholic faith.

But these slogans are all obvious, and while their conclusions (implicit or explicit) are poison, it doesn't seem to me that they do much harm as slogans embodying attitudes form within the Church. It seems to me that the world may persecute the Church, but this is to be expected (so is the failure of the Church's members, I suppose). So maybe  Damaging Slogan should be something which encapsulates the attitudes of a number of people who claim to be Catholic (or even just mere Christians) and yet which both undermines the faith of fellow believers (because the slogan seems credible) and at the same time allows them to give scandal to infidelic non-believers.

Maybe it's because I was so recently watching this argument play out, but I think the nearest I can come to a slogan would be "Fear not!" with the attitude being that we are not supposed to have any sort of "fear of the Lord." Make it the attitude which says that fear of all kinds is bad, and that therefore the holy fear which is so often encountered in the Old Testament is at best a neutral thing which is waiting to be displaced by "respect,"or "love," or "relationship." The secondary attitude here is that the Old Testament shouldn't be read, because it has things like "fear of the Lord" or "The Wrath of God", things which have supposedly been replaced in the New Testament (nevermind that Christ tells us to fear the one who can destroy soul and not only the one who can destroy our body); or perhaps only because the actual "rules" of the Law are spilled out there, albeit in a mishmash of moral absolutes, ritual purification, and metaphorical prohibitions.

The other guy picked decided on "Come as you are!" as the most armful slogan in use today. I guess this is just another variation of "Judge not," and which does therefore work to undermine the Church's teachings on morals, and in particular about things like modesty or (less popular still) chastity. Damaging as that one is, and awful (and to be blunt, prideful and yet slothful) as the the attitude which underlies it is, it's an attitude which is often more obvious in those who hold it. It weakens the community as a whole, but "fear not" weakens the community as a whole by first weakening its individual members, one at a time, in isolation.

Fear not? Oh, what's to fear? Sometimes that little bit of fear is the difference between a good confession and a bad one, or for that matter between seeking out confession and avoiding the chore of it. Certainly it is there to avoid, for example, the prospect of taking communion while being knowingly in a state of mortal sin, because "Whoever, therefore, eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty of profaning the body and blood of the Lord", as we read in 1 Corinthians (11:28). If we cannot e brought even to the so-called "servile fear" of the Lord, fearing His punishments, then how will we be moved beyond this to merely fearing that we will displease Him? Why examine our consciences if there is no consequence either way?

When the New Testament is violently separated from the Old, as it is under the guise of "fearing not," the result is not a kinder and gentler New Testament, or at least not only that. It becomes difficult to make sense of Jesus "rougher" moments, when he chases the money-changers from the temple or calls the pharisees a brood of vipers. We are left then with "Buddy Jesus," and made to wonder why He would need to die on a cross--or why the powers of this world bothered to crucify Him. And that may seem comforting, but at the same time, it doesn't attract. Nobody takes up their crosses in life to follow a Man who says only to be nice to each other and not worry about being right with God.

Fear not: lay down your cross, your load, leave them there and carry them no more. Life as a Christians will then be easy, and the world will leave you alone or say nice things about you. If the world starts to persecute you, just bow to its demands and all will be well, and God won't mind. And so, of course, that is exactly what most Christians end up doing.

Freedom For Some Religions

The Supreme Court has decided two religious freedom cases this week. Neither one was the big case, and one is a de facto decision (for now) via refusing to hear a case, but:

1. The Court ruled that a Muslim prisoner had the right to grow a beard in accordance with his beliefs
2. The Court decided not to hear an appeal against a Louisiana court's decision that Catholic priests may be ordered to violate the seal of confession (thereby automatically excommunicating themselves).

The former case is a relatively minor decision, since Muslims don't actually have to grow beards (I've met a few who were beardless, and they weren't recent converts, and for that matter I think we have Muslims in our armed forces, which generally don't allow beards). Nevertheless, I think this is a generally correct decision, since the ban against the beard could violate this particular Muslim's interpretation of what Islam requires of him and since the ban doesn't really accomplish much in the way of maintaining control of the prison (beards must be kept short, so a to not alter appearance suddenly if cut off).

The second decision, or non-decision (it more-or-less amounts to the same thing, but without really setting any kind of lasting precedent) is clearly wrong. Priests are basically not going to be testifying about what they hear in confession, regardless of the law, and so this is just a convenient way of creating a vehicle for jailing priests. Even if priests could testify about what has been said in confessions, I doubt that such testimony would in principle be used to actually put away the "bad guys," at least not long-term. People who know that their secrets aren't the least bit safe will tend not to share those secrets. So this will mostly just cause people to stay away from confession--score one for Satan.

TMM: On Destroying Vocations

Ask, and you shall receive. A few days ago, I mentioned that I wanted to hear/read Fr. Zuhlsdorf's take on Cardinal Burke's comments about the Church's being overly feminized--and the reaction of a variety of folks to those comments. I also mentioned that he had already posted to the story, but offered little in the way of commentary (this was pre-update).

Well, somebody else delivered (though I give credit to the good father for finding this and pointing his readers, including me, to it). It turns out that another of my favorite current commentators, Prof. Anthony Esolen, has done the good work of defending the Cardinal. And he is pretty much spot on:

I sometimes wonder whether we Catholics actually want vocations to the priesthood. It’s reasonable to judge people’s intentions by their habitual actions. If I do something experimental in one of my college classes, and a host of good students flee the course, I might, if I were stubborn, try it again in modified form. But if it still happens that the good students flee, and I persist in what is an experiment no longer, a reasonable observer may conclude that I don’t care if they leave. It won’t matter if I express my supposed intentions all the time, crying out, “This course needs far more students in it, and far more of the best!” Why, I might pray for those students to enroll and to stay enrolled, just as reasonably as I might pray that I could keep banging my head against the wall and not have headaches. In fact, if my actions not only continue to fail me, but begin to hurt many others also, and I still persist, that reasonable observer may attribute to me more than incompetence or indifference. He may conclude that I really want the bad result; I am glad of it.


Our summer diocese, serving more than one hundred thousand Catholics, has no seminarians. I mean that literally: not one. They have ordained two men in the last ten years, one of whom has left the priesthood to get married. Churches are closing everywhere. The stalwart priest who is our pastor has had to say Mass for five churches scattered over twenty miles. The farther-flung diocese of Lincoln, Nebraska, serving not quite one hundred thousand Catholics, has forty eight seminarians, at least two priests in every parish, no churches being shut down, and plenty of schools. The obvious question is, “Why doesn’t everyone try at least a few of the things they do in Lincoln?” Or, more properly put, “Why doesn’t everyone stop doing nine or ten of the things they never have done in Lincoln?”

He then goes on to summarize a few things which can be done to further destroy vocations, not to mention (frankly) Mass attendance, or for that matter the faith of the average pew-sitter. The list includes:

• Dilute the faith
• Strip the altars
• Treat the Sacrament (Communion) like snacktime
• Be effeminate
• Shut down the schools
• Marginalize men

I can add a few more things, most obviously treating the sacrament of Reconciliations as therapy rather than penance, but I am up against the clock. Related.

Some Secularist Suggestions

Apparently, some secularists have attempted to write their own alternative version of the Ten Commandments. These attempts to improve on Gods' revelations never go well. This set of suggestions (they are hardly commandments) are not an exception. Mike Flynn and William M. Briggs each perform an autopsy. From Mr. Flynn's post:

One senses throughout the article that particular love of theory that is the root of all evil. Unlike the original Commandments, there is a steady whiff not of practicality but of theoretical bromides and academic huff-and-puffery that sound very kool until examined more closely.

It is not clear which of the original ten commandments they find objectionable. Even the commandment to avoid false gods is applied relative to things like White Race, the Almighty Dollar, the Fatherland, and other modern deities. And the commandment against false oaths is presumably acceptable as long as one does not believe they will be caught at it by an all-knowing deity. Otherwise, the court system collapses. Besides, we are all aware of the many words and phrases that Must Not Be Uttered in these, our modern times. Only the staunchest capitalist will demand that people work seven days a week. 

So perhaps they object to honoring their father and their mother.

Secularists are these days desperate to retain morality without God. Perhaps they have realized that some sort of morality, some ethics, is necessary for society to function. They are not anarchists as much anymore, but they cannot quite bring themselves to accept the rule of God. As Chesterton said,

Now who that runs can read it,The riddle that I write,Of why this poor old sinner,Should sin without delight-But I, I cannot read it(Although I run and run),Of them that do not have the faith,And will not have the fun.                              

Cardinal O'Malley on Priestettes

Should the Catholic Church begin ordaining women to the priesthood? No, if for no other reason than that it is beyond her power and authority to do so. I think that Sean Cardinal O'Malley has the right basic approach to this:

In an interview with “60 Minutes” on CBS that producers said took more than a year for them to persuade him to do, O’Malley seemed troubled by reporter Norah O’Donnell’s question as to whether the exclusion of women from the Church hierarchy was “immoral.”

O’Malley paused, then said, “Christ would never ask us to do something immoral. It’s a matter of vocation and what God has given to us.”

“Not everyone needs to be ordained to have an important role in the life of the Church,” he said. “Women run Catholic charities, Catholic schools …. They have other very important roles. A priest can’t be a mother. The tradition in the Church is that we ordain men.”

After O’Donnell pointed out that the Church doesn’t discriminate by race, only by gender, O’Malley smiled and said, “If I were founding a church, I’d love to have women priests. But Christ founded it, and what he has given us is something different.”

It's not about what we want. It's about adhering to what Christ established, ultimately about following Christ. If I or any other mere man were to start my own or his own) religion, then anything goes. Such a religion isn't seeking the good or the true, nor is it really even actually seeking self-fulfillment (an illusory concept), but rather it seeking self-gratification.

The Experts

The experts often agree that X, Y, and Z are all healthy, normal, ethical actions or beliefs, but the Church says that X,Y, and Z are sinful, disordered, or immoral. I hear "arguments" like this from time to time, covering a wide variety of topics: homosexuality, pornography, abortion, adultery, hook-ups/fornication, contraceptives... in our sex-saturated culture, it's pretty much any item on an exhaustive list of the sexual sins condemned by the Bible, by Tradition, and by the Magisterium which is brought into contention.

Often, the experts agree because consent is a criterion of becoming an expert. There are many examples of this. Students studying psychology and psychiatry are told that they cannot graduate or get licensed to practice unless they counsel a gay patient--and the counselling cannot be towards chastity. A sociologist publishes a peer-reviewed study with a large sample size which contradicts previously peer-reviewed studies using small and at times self-selected samples sizes, and brings upon himself the secular inquisition because his study found that children raised by heterosexual parents fare better in life than children raised by homosexual parents. And, to add one last recent example, the licensing practicum requirements in Britain to become an OB/GYN are prohibitive for Catholics and others of good faith:

Dr O’Donnell told the conference at Ealing Abbey, west London, on 17 May that a Catholic training to be a consultant in obstetrics and gynaecology would soon find he or she had conscientious objections to such tasks as prescribing artificial contraceptives, giving unmarried couples fertility treatment or Viagra to gay couples. 

To be a sound Catholic regarding sexual ethics it is not possible to train as a consultant obstetrician and gynaecologist but this is not because of discrimination against Catholics. There is a total conflict of culture of what is good sex, a dichotomy of belief between what we as Christians believe is good overall for the individual and what secular society believes.’

Indeed, there have been attempts in the US to require that all OB/GYNs either commit abortion themselves, or refer their patients to another doctor who would commit the abortion instead. And there are medical schools which have required "abortion training" as a part of their residency programs, not to mention some states which have toyed with making such training a requirement of all medical schools.

Is it any wonder, then, when the experts' opnions are at times unanimously on the side of evil?

Eye of the Tiber on the Black Mass

I've been very busy lately, so I haven't really had time for blogging. And apparently my co-blogger has been dealing with computer issues. In any case, we more-or-less skipped over the Harvard Black Mass debacle. I guess I have a few short reactions to it.

First of all, any claim that this is meant to be merely a cultural event, and not meant to offend anybody, is blatantly ridiculous. The claim might be made--albeit even then it would stretch the bounds of credibility--if this was, say, a pseudo-Black Mass, or if they skipped over the whole desecrating of the Eucharist part which is the the central aspect of a Black Mass. And they did, after all, initially make the claim to have obtained a consecrated Host for this express purpose. They retracted this claim later, of course, but why make the claim in the first place if not to specifically "offend" Catholics?

Second, I can't really give props to Harvard for not hosting this, because the university's response was at best tepid and seemingly forced. Many of the faculty and administrative staff have long since sold their souls, at least figuratively, and they seem to have backed down on this one only after strong public reaction against it. Even then, it doesn't seem to me that the university (or at least the university's president) really went so far as to say "no, we will not allow this on campus." The Canon lawyer Dr. Ed Peters rightly compares the university's president's reaction here to that of Pontius Pilate towards the crucifixion of Jesus. In some sense, Pilate's washing of his hands was a better reaction, in that he could at least claim (vincible) ignorance about Jesus.

Finally, Eye of the Tiber replies with a dose of parody, lest people argue that this is really just a "cultural experience" which is not meant to offend any particular group. But really, offending faithful Catholics is the least of the sins here.

Orthodox to Hold Pan-Orthodox Council

It's officially being called the "Holy and Great Synod of the Orthodox Church" and will be held in Istanbul in 2016. It will be presided over by the Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople.

Many sources are calling this an "Ecumenical Council," which is huge. We've had 21 of those in the 2000 year history of the Church, but the orthodox stopped participating regularly after the first seven (they sent prelates to the Second Council of Lyons and to the Council of Florence). They haven't had one of their own for 1200 years, under any name.

So, this is pretty big news. May God guide them.

Quick Link: Fr Z Tells It Like It Is--What is "Pastoral"

First of all, good for the bishops in general and Bishop Zubic in particular for continuing to stand against the tyrannical HHS mandate. I'm not necessarily expecting the good guys to win on this one, at least not in the short term. Perhaps it will be another nail in the coffin of civilization, another step closer to the abyss, another stumble into the outer darkness. I am expecting this to occur in my lifetime, so it's not merely an abstraction.

Second, Fr John Zuhlsdorf is spot on with this:

For liberals, being “pastoral” means compromising the Church’s teachings and lying to people. For liberals, being “pastoral” is like being “prophetic”. They proclaim themselves “prophetic” and then claim that their prophetic voice trumps what the “hierarchical” or “official” Church says and does....

Of course secularists and catholic liberals who run along with them don’t care that the Church will be driven out of providing health care for the poor.  They want more big government.

I've known a handful of liberals who honestly did care for the poor, and even a few who actually did more than caring in the abstract sense. Good for them. However, the tendency is often exactly as Fr Z calls it: clamoring for more government, even when big government is precisely the problem. And I have scarcely known a liberal catholic who can honestly claim to be really faithful as a Catholic. Doctrines matter. Morals matter. They aren't the whole of Catholicism; they aren't the only thing to Christianity. But neither are they irrelevant, and neither can they be discarded in favor of "social justice" or "being pastoral" or whatever euphemism they may concoct for the abandonment of the Faith.

Quick Link: What Am I Not Supposed to Judge

"Judge not, lest you be judged; condemn not, lest you be condemned." Yes, but what am I not supposed to judge, since elsewhere I read: "By their fruits you shall know them"? The answers might be: a person's "heart"/intentions; the state of his soul; his circumstances and struggles; or his knowledge of the sinfulness of his actions. On the other hand, the action itself must absolutely by "judged," as in evaluated: this is a good action, this is a bad action, this was a good deed, this was a vile sin. A man's "works" are his visible fruits, and we are instructed to pay at least some attention to these.

Sex and Religion

The title could as easily be "Sex and Irreligion," but many atheists aren't merely irreligious but rather anti-religious, not without God but rather against God. In any case, the Daily Mail has an article claiming that atheists have "better sex" than religious believers who are "plagued with guilt."

Of course, the headline is misleading (aren't they always), since the first line of the article is that "Atheists have far better sex lives than religious people who are plagued with guilt during intercourse and for weeks afterwards, researchers have found" (emphasis mine). I would think that this is a no-brainer: if you are feeling guilty while having intercourse, and then continue to feel guilty afterwards, that would tend to make the actual sex a bit less "good."


Drilling deeper into the article, we read that this comes from a study "Sex and Secularism." According to the Mail, the study found that

"But devoutly religious people rated their sex lives far lower than atheists. They also admitted to strong feelings of guilt afterwards.

Strict religions such as Mormons ranked highest on the scale of sexual guilt. Their average score was 8.19 out of 10. They were followed closely behind by Jehovah's Witness, Pentecostal, Seventh Day Adventist, and Baptist.

Catholics rated their levels of sexual guilt at 6.34 while Lutherans came slightly lower at 5.88 . In contrast, atheists and agnostics ranked at 4.71 and 4.81 respectively."

This interesting, but needs some clarification: what, exactly, is meant by having sex?

Of people raised in very religious homes, 22.5 per cent said they were shamed or ridiculed for masturbating  compared with only 5.5 percent of people brought up in the least religious homes.

Some 79.9 per cent of people raised in very religious homes said they felt guilty about a specific sexual activity or desire while 26.3 per cent of those raised in secular homes did.

Worryingly, children raised in strongly religious homes were more likely to get their sex education from pornography, as they were not confident enough to talk with their parents.

However, there was some good news for religious groups. People who had lost their belief and became atheists reported a significant improvement in sexual satisfaction.

So, apparently, the study is not just looking at sex, but rather is looking at sexual activities which various religions consider illicit or sinful. We don't know if any of this was sex within the bounds of marriage or not--a study which (if the last paragraph is indicative) is meant to promote secularism may deliberately blur the lines on issues like fornication or adultery; then again, they may not (the Mail doesn't seem to be interested in reporting this detail).
I have a few observations and comments concerning this article. First, I still stand by the question of whether it matters, in the long run, who has better sex. Back when US News and World Report had their own article stating that Catholics apparently have better sex, this was my reaction:

When a study like this is used to pitch conversion to Catholicism, it's somewhat akin to saying, "We can't know whether the Catholic Faith is true or not, we can't even know whether the Catholic Religion is good or not, but you should still join the Catholic Church because you'll likely have better sex. In other words, join the Church because it feels good!" "Because it feels good" is not sufficient grounds for making major moral decisions, and this is the very attitude against which Christianity in general (and Catholicism in particular) has to contend. This attitude is, in short, rather antithetical to a religion which claims to be followers of the Truth.... I will grant that no apologia alone can convert a person, and few can even get most people to stop and consider conversion, or even to consider simple fairness apart from conversion. But we live in an age where science is king (along with Sports and Sex), and where "Science" is invoked as a stick with which to beat the Church: namely, "The Church is against science and impedes scientific progress while supporting junk science." Therefore, when a study of dubious scientific quality is invoked as reason to convert to the Church, and when it is subsequently demolished by scientific-minded people from outside the Church, it reinforces in those peoples' minds their own chief (stated) objection to the Church.

My point, then, is that science can be an aide to (but not a cause of) evangelism, but only if done right. Studies like this might make a man stop to consider other claims of the Church--if the study is done well.

The shoe is on the other foot, and my reaction hasn't changed: this is a rather lampoon-able approach to prosylitization, whether employer by Christians or by atheists. It basically says, "believe this because it's fun, follow this because you'll feel good!" rather than "believe this because it is the truth, and follow this way of life because it is good."

Slanted Reporting: Excommunication Edition

Australia's laicized former priest*, Greg Reynolds, has been excommunicated--and not by his local ordinary. The excommunication comes from the Vatican, perhaps from Pope Francis himself. That is pretty much automatic when one has been laicized and one continues to celebrate the Eucharist--I'm not a canon lawyer, but I do believe that this is something like simulating a sacrament and celebrating an illicit Mass, which together carry the automatic penalty of excommunication, regardless of whether the man in question is also a "dissident" (he is) concerning serious matters of faith or morality (in his case, both).

Oddly enough, the article linked by New Advent has the same spin one would expect from the mainstream media: they never come out an say that the Vatican is wrong to laicize or excommunicate him. However, the implications are certainly there, and it is also implied that excommunication is something to take lightly (it is not):

Father Reynolds, who resigned as a parish priest in 2011 and last year founded Inclusive Catholics, said he had expected to be laicised (defrocked), but not excommunicated. But it would make no difference to his ministry.

''In times past excommunication was a huge thing, but today the hierarchy have lost such trust and respect,'' he said.

''I've come to this position because I've followed my conscience on women's ordination and gay marriage.''...

Father Reynolds is not the first Australian Catholic to be excommunicated. The best-known was Sister Mary MacKillop, who was excommunicated by her local bishop but was reinstated. In 2010 she became Australia's first saint.

Note the comparison: Sister Mary MacKillop was once excommunicated, and now she's a saint. The implication couldn't be clearer. However, in this case it's not the local bishop doing the excommunicating, nor is Mr. Reynolds likely to be reinstated anytime soon. Nor, for that matter, does one discern any heroic virtues about him, any sense of personal holiness, or of beatitude. I'm not saying that he can't be a saint, for we are all sinners and any man can repent; God's grace can seep into any soul which is open to it. However, Mr. Reynolds strikes me as being more sanctimonious than saintly, a saints do not typically show such selfish pride as to be deliberately dissident on matters of doctrine and dogma.

Heaven is not the home of those who are hellbent in their heresies to the point of obstinacy and final impenitence.


*Ordination leaves an indelible mark, so former priest may not actually be accurate here. When he dies, his soul will retain the mark of ordination, whether bound for purgatory and heaven or for hell.



Update: A palate cleanser from Dr Edward Peters.

Seven Quick Takes Friday (vol. 4): A Round-Up of Reactions

Maybe not a full round-up, but some reactions to the Pope's interview, which can be read in form approved by the Holy Father here. Erm, I agree with the other guy that what the pope is saying and what he's being reported as saying by the media are two entirely separate things, that the media's interpretation of the interview (and of what it means) are flat-out wrong, whether through their imbecilic ignorance or through their deliberate malice. Anyhow, here are a few reactions from around the web.

1. Father Z has an instant reaction and a fisking reaction, both worth reading:
   

   Through interviews – and the coverage of interviews – a “virtual Francis” is being created. An interview, by its nature, can only go so far. Short questions and short responses only go so deep. 

   We have to make sure that, with all the media attention, with all these interviews, that the “virtual Francis” is not stronger than the real Francis. 

   That is exactly what Benedict XVI – in his last days as Pope – said and warned about how the Second Vatican Council was interpreted. The media and others created a virtual Council.  Remember that? There is a Council of the Media and a Council of the Fathers. 

   Week by week a Francis of the Media is being crafted. 

2. Father Longenecker also has a reflection up, noting that some of what the pope is saying will be lost in translation simply because of the difference between the culture of Latin America (very Catholic culturally, perhaps a bit too clerical) as opposed to America and Europe (libearl Protestant/Post-Christian/anti-clerical).
3. Catholic vote notes that Pope Benedict said in his encyclical Deus Caritas Est pretty much the same thing as Pope Francis is saying in the interview. Also, this: "To read [the Pope's remarks] and say that the Pope wants to be accepting of abortion and contraception and gay marriage is like reading the story of Jesus and the Woman at the Well and say it shows how accepting Jesus is of adultery."
4. LifeNews read the same interview as all the mainstream outlets, yet it managed to come to pretty much the exact opposite conclusion. Might this have something to do with the fact taht there are actual serious and sincere Catholics on the staff of LifeNews, a thing which appears to be lacking among mainstream journalists?
5. Marcel Lejeune has posted a set of of seven things about the Pope which rub Certain Catholics (conservative, tradition-loving, orthodox, faithful) the wrong way, and then explains why each shouldn't. Eh, it's not a bad assessment, save that the part about being "pro-immigrant" lends itself to politically supporting amnesty (under any name) and other foolhardy endeavors which will create more problems than they solve.
6. The pope's interview comes as a bit of a communications blindside for the bishops, which will almost certainly result in a great number of Americans erroneously believing that he just overturned 2000 years of Church teaching on homosexuality, abortion, and contraception.
7. Finally, there is the reaction from the New Liturgical Movement, which is straightforward and thoughtful:
   

   Nothing in the Pope's words undo any Catholic teaching. What's more, he intends no change whatsoever. What he is bringing to these hot-button issues is a humane clarity that reflects an aspect of Catholicism that is frequently overlooked in the world at large. It is the most common perception in the world today that Catholicism is nothing more than a strict set of life rules and the Church herself operates as the more judge and inquisitor not only over its members but over the society at large.... 

   Pope Francis is next in line. With renewed clarity about doctrine, morals, and liturgy having taken place, and having inherited this template, he is interested in adding a crucial and critical pastoral and evangelistic element that he perceives to be lacking. His contribution is additive, not corrective. And what he has said is clearly true and introduces an element that has always been present but has too often been ignored by the press and the world. Further -- and this should not be forgotten -- he is speaking not as an infallible guide to all things but only as the pastor.

     Very well put.

Bonus: More reactions will come in, I'm sure, but this is already a lot for now. Also, this image from Catholic Memes:

Seven quick Takes Friday is hosted by Jennifer Fulwiler.

What Did the Pope Really Say?

With apologies to Fr John Zuhlsdorf (whose excellent blog can only accomplish so much [1]), if I had a lot more spare time (and if I read Italian fluently), I would probably make a knock-off of his blog which focused exclusively on the Media's coverage of the pope. Specifically, I would probably have a daily article similar to this piece on the Nicene Guys' site detailing that day's biggest media botching of the pope's latest interview/open letter/homily/Weekly Address.

This time around, we have the interview (a papal-approved version of which is in America Magazine), and then the New York Times' version of what was said in the interview [2]. Notice the early bait-and-switch in the NYT ("Hell's Handbook") version: the pope says that pastorally, the Church should not just focus on abortion/homosexuality/contraception as being so incompatible with the Church that she cannot welcome a person who commits those sins; the NYT spins this into saying that the Church preaches against these too much (when was the last homily you heard which focused on any of these things?); and then goes after the bishops for holding political campaigns against these things.

Here is the relevant section of the Pope's interview, with some of my emphases:

the thing the church needs most today is the ability to heal wounds and to warm the hearts of the faithful; it needs nearness, proximity. I see the church as a field hospital after battle. It is useless to ask a seriously injured person if he has high cholesterol and about the level of his blood sugars! You have to heal his wounds. Then we can talk about everything else. Heal the wounds, heal the wounds.... [ellipsis in original] And you have to start from the ground up.

“The church sometimes has locked itself up in small things, in small-minded rules. The most important thing is the first proclamation: Jesus Christ has saved you. And the ministers of the church must be ministers of mercy above all. The confessor, for example, is always in danger of being either too much of a rigorist or too lax. Neither is merciful, because neither of them really takes responsibility for the person. The rigorist washes his hands so that he leaves it to the commandment. The loose minister washes his hands by simply saying, ‘This is not a sin’ or something like that. In pastoral ministry we must accompany people, and we must heal their wounds....

A person once asked me, in a provocative manner, if I approved of homosexuality. I replied with another question: ‘Tell me: when God looks at a gay person, does he endorse the existence of this person with love, or reject and condemn this person?’ We must always consider the person. Here we enter into the mystery of the human being. In life, God accompanies persons, and we must accompany them, starting from their situation. It is necessary to accompany them with mercy. When that happens, the Holy Spirit inspires the priest to say the right thing. 

“This is also the great benefit of confession as a sacrament: evaluating case by case and discerning what is the best thing to do for a person who seeks God and grace. The confessional is not a torture chamber, but the place in which the Lord’s mercy motivates us to do better. I also consider the situation of a woman with a failed marriage in her past and who also had an abortion. Then this woman remarries, and she is now happy and has five children. That abortion in her past weighs heavily on her conscience and she sincerely regrets it. She would like to move forward in her Christian life. What is the confessor to do?

“We cannot insist only on issues related to abortion, gay marriage and the use of contraceptive methods. This is not possible. I have not spoken much about these things, and I was reprimanded for that. But when we speak about these issues, we have to talk about them in a context. The teaching of the church, for that matter, is clear and I am a son of the church, but it is not necessary to talk about these issues all the time.

“The dogmatic and moral teachings of the church are not all equivalent. The church’s pastoral ministry cannot be obsessed with the transmission of a disjointed multitude of doctrines to be imposed insistently. Proclamation in a missionary style focuses on the essentials, on the necessary things: this is also what fascinates and attracts more, what makes the heart burn, as it did for the disciples at Emmaus. We have to find a new balance; otherwise even the moral edifice of the church is likely to fall like a house of cards, losing the freshness and fragrance of the Gospel. The proposal of the Gospel must be more simple, profound, radiant. It is from this proposition that the moral consequences then flow.

“I say this also thinking about the preaching and content of our preaching. A beautiful homily, a genuine sermon must begin with the first proclamation, with the proclamation of salvation. There is nothing more solid, deep and sure than this proclamation. Then you have to do catechesis. Then you can draw even a moral consequence. But the proclamation of the saving love of God comes before moral and religious imperatives. Today sometimes it seems that the opposite order is prevailing. The homily is the touchstone to measure the pastor’s proximity and ability to meet his people, because those who preach must recognize the heart of their community and must be able to see where the desire for God is lively and ardent. The message of the Gospel, therefore, is not to be reduced to some aspects that, although relevant, on their own do not show the heart of the message of Jesus Christ.”

And here is how the NYT reports it:

Pope Francis, in the first extensive interview of his six-month-old papacy, said that the Roman Catholic church had grown “obsessed” with preaching about abortion, gay marriage and contraception, and that he has chosen not to speak of those issues despite recriminations from some critics...

“It is not necessary to talk about these issues all the time,” the pope told the Rev. Antonio Spadaro, a fellow Jesuit and editor in chief of La Civiltà Cattolica, the Italian Jesuit journal whose content is routinely approved by the Vatican. “The dogmatic and moral teachings of the church are not all equivalent. The church’s pastoral ministry cannot be obsessed with the transmission of a disjointed multitude of doctrines to be imposed insistently.  

“We have to find a new balance,” the pope continued, “otherwise even the moral edifice of the church is likely to fall like a house of cards, losing the freshness and fragrance of the Gospel.”...

The new pope’s words are likely to have repercussions in a church whose bishops and priests in many countries, including the United States, often appeared to make combating abortion, gay marriage and contraception their top public policy priorities. These teachings are “clear” to him as “a son of the church,” he said, but they have to be taught in a larger context. “The proclamation of the saving love of God comes before moral and religious imperatives.” 

 Notice the subtle shifts here, the things which are left out, the things which are ignored. The pope is speaking as a pastor, noting that yes, abortion, homosexuality, and contraception are all evil. They are all sins, and noting that those who deny this are in fact not being merciful, either. There is a danger of being too rigorous, which is that too rigorous (frankly, focusing on the sin without pastoral care or tact) tends to drive people away. This is unfortunate, and to be blunt it is every bit as much a problem with the person who turns away from the Church and frankly from Truth as it is with the confessor (or preacher) who presents this truth tactlessly or carelessly.

The NYT ignores this fact when it focused solely on its boo-group, the conservatives. We often run the danger of being to rigorous, but that danger is no worse than the danger of being too lax ("saying, 'This is not a sin,' or something like that"). That "This is not a sin" is exactly the message which the NYT is saying.

They also ignore that the whole part here is pastoral, since much of the focus is on the sacrament of confession. There are a few key things pre-supposed by this sacrament which are roundly ignored here:

1. That sin is a reality, and that we are do it
2. That homosexuality (meaning the acts and not just the disordered orientation [3]), abortion, and contraception specifically are among those things which are sinful
3. That confession requires an acknowledgement of the sin and repentance from it, meaning that the assumption is that the person in the confessional already knows that abortion, homosexual acts, and contraception are sins and is making a resolve to no commit them anymore
4. That the purpose of confession is to grant God's mercy and forgiveness through the absolution of sins.

 Most of the rest of the interview is stuff that not only the Pope but also the bishops, even the conservative ones, have pretty much always been saying. The whole concept of a seamless garment of life, for example, is not new to this papacy. The idea that there is some context to salvation is not something invented in the last few decades, let alone the last few years. It seems to me that the pope is here saying that the fundamental thing is the Gospel ("good news") of Jesus Christ and of our salvation--which, of course, implies that there is something (sin, damnation, hell) to be saved from--and that this should be the first thing upon which we focus. But notice that he does not stop there, despite the NYT's portrayal. To quote the pope again:

"A beautiful homily, a genuine sermon must begin with the first proclamation, with the proclamation of salvation. There is nothing more solid, deep and sure than this proclamation. Then you have to do catechesis. Then you can draw even a moral consequence."

Notice that all three of these things are necessary for a good homily, and necessary in the order listed: first the good news, then the (theological/doctrinal) catechesis, then the moral consequences. Yet, to read the media's coverage of it, it somehow becomes a clarion call to ignore catechesis and morality [4].

As for the pope, he is not ignoring the realities of sin, but rather is choosing to focus on the beauty of sanctity and of the Church, on the goodness of God's love and mercy, and on the Truth of the Gospels. The morality flows from first being drawn to the beauty of the Gospels, and then to the Truth of the Faith. There's nothing wrong with that, save what the media attempts to corrupt.

---

[1] Father John Zuhlsdorf, plus Jimmy Akin, and the folks at the Get Religion blog could all dedicate their lives to this and still not be able to undo all the damage which the mainstream media has done. 

[2] To pick just one single media hack job. There will be more, and worse distortions (I'm probably looking at you, Slate, Huffington Post).

[3] Has everybody already forgotten about the whole "gay lobby" thing? Or the fact that the pope quite clearly calls it a thing from the devil:

Let’s not be naive: This is not a simple political fight; it is a destructive proposal to God’s plan. This is not a mere legislative proposal (that's just it’s form), but a move by the father of lies that seeks to confuse and deceive the children of God. . . . Let’s look to St. Joseph, Mary, and the Child to ask fervently that they defend the Argentine family in this moment. . . .May they support, defend, and accompany us in this war of God.

How about his statements about the importance of the family, by which he rather clearly means the Traditional Family? Or the fact that in the first few months of his papacy, he mentioned the reality of the devil in more than a few of his early homilies/other addresses.

[4] Not to mention the NYT's rather pointed (and pointless) slight against those who like the Tridentine Mass.

Vanity and Pristesses

Via Elizabeth Scalia comes the story of another woman who thinks that we can declare herself a Catholic priest.

A Sag Harbor grandmother [Lorello] says she has become the first Long Island woman to be ordained as a priest in a group that seeks equality for women in the Roman Catholic Church....The Vatican does not recognize the ordinations as legitimate, and has said that the women automatically “excommunicate” themselves when they take part in such services....Lorello, who said she did not want her age disclosed, said she was dismissed earlier this summer by the diocese from her volunteer position as a lector at St. Andrew’s Roman Catholic parish in Sag Harbor.

Gee, I wonder why this "grandmother" doesn't want to reveal her age. Sadly, a few younger women have allowed their minds to be poisoned by this nonsense as well, but it's mostly folks in their 60's, 70's, or even 80's who are choosing to excommunicate themselves in this way.

Also, Ms. Scalia is spot-on with her analysis:

Let’s start with the vanity: there is a ton of it, threaded within an article full of self-involved, self-congratulatory “firstness” and “I-ness” and “Me-ness”. I have never met a great, pastoral priest who was all about himself, but this gal manages to communicate herself and her desires in her every sentence. Interestingly, she mentions “justice” and what she believes she is due, and she talks of Augustine and Ghandi and Martin Luther King, but never Christ Jesus or service or sacrifice or laying down one’s life, or denuding oneself interiorly and materially in order to pastor the sheep in need, which is what a good priest does — is called to do. 

Perhaps her “sacrifice” was being told she could no longer lector at Saint Andrews, except that she is not characterizing it as such. It’s just something else being denied her. Poor thing.... 

Her disingenuousness also seeps through the page, like the second person of a fabulist trinity, beginning with the notion that she can willfully separate herself from the church due to a principled disagreement, but should still be able to proclaim from its ambo. And then, per Newsday, She called herself “a faithful daughter of the Church…” without caring (or perhaps without realizing) that one cannot claim to be faithful in a relationship while stepping out from it, or breaking trust with it. This woman has done both. She can no longer say she is “faithful.” Nor can she claim “obedience”, which is one of the anchors of the Catholic priesthood — so heavy it helps to keep the entire church well-grounded. 

Finally, this woman is offensive in her thoughtlessness. To drag her priest and his canonical duties into her passion-play was gratuitous and unnecessary; it’s of-a-piece with her self-involvement, though. She was thoughtless to the pastor and priest who served her — I am sure very faithfully — the whole time she was collecting the theology degree that seems, to some women, to be all one needs to be ordained a priest (as though the credential proves the calling). 

That about says it. "She called herself 'a faithful daughter of the Church…'" Yes, and Anthony Wiener is the faithful husband of Huma Abedin, just as his friend Bill CLinton was the faithful husband of her friend Hillary, and for that matter King Henry VIII was a faithful husband to Anne Boleyn.

Seven Quick Takes Friday (vol 3).

--1--

I haven't been posting as much (or as lengthy, or in as high-quality) as I'd like, but I've become very busy all of a sudden. It's not just the start of a new semester (though this doesn't help). I can't really point to anything in particular, other than maybe exhaustion. A three-day weekend helped, but it was mostly spent baby-proofing the apartment, and I did not have any time for writing (and little for reading). Maybe it's that when I am home, I am instantly in charge of a very demanding baby, and when I'm at work there is no real down time on most days (including lunch-breaks, etc.). How I pine for a better work-life balance, but i also want a better life-LIFE balance. Some of what follows is a set of threads which I had wanted to make into longer posts, but which I don't have the time or the energy to tackle.

--2--

In the days of my youth I supported both the Iraq and the Afghanistan wars. I'm not sure that it was a mistake per se at the time (and certainly not the Afghanistan War), though now that I see how our country fights wars anymore, and how it botches the clean-up after the war, I'm certain that at the least I would have opposed the war as fought there. I have tried to learn a bit from my mistakes, and really also from the mistakes of others, so even had the pope been silent on Syria, even had the Syrian Christians said nothing, and even if I had more confidence that the President wanted the war for more noble reasons than saving his own credibility, I would be opposing a war in Syria. Alas, a number of Republicans (and a few Democrats, too) are not so opposed. We may well enter into an unnecessary war, and on the wrong side (if there is a right side), to save face for the President, thanks to a Congress which is less interested in doing what is right than in playing politics with lives. Feeling ruled, feeling insignificant? That because in the eyes of the "ruling class," you and I are.

--3--

"Love the sinner, hate the sin." This is a common saying for Christians, in particular orthodox Christians. However, "liberal" Christians think they love the sinner, and are utterly indifferent to the sin; some conservative Christians hate the sin but at times forget about the sinner; and "progressive" Christians celebrate the sin, but are indifferent to the sinner.

--4--

"Love the sinner, hate the sin." It's actually a sort of tautology: the Christian recognizes that loving someone means wanting what is right for them, and despising what is bad for them. The greatest good consists in beatitude and ultimately the beatific vision, that is, seeing God face-to-face, enjoying God. The supreme and ultimate Good is God. Sin is that which separates us from God. Therefore, sin, and its consequence (damnation, separation from God) is the greatest evil. Hence, we cannot love the sinner fully without also hating his sins.

--5--

Two thoughts on the pro-life front. The first is that neither party really stands against abortion as a priority, but it's obvious that one party is willing to go all-in to fight for abortion, whereas the other is not. There are very few genuinely pro-life politicians, but they are more rare on the Democratic side of the political aisle; Senator Bob Casey, for example, is not particularly pro-life, nor really pro-family. Neither party is perfect, and I actually mostly dislike both parties, but one party's platform is at least tolerable, and one party is clearly more pro-abortion than the other. The second thought is related to the first, which is that appalling few states actually ban abortion coverage in insurance outright, and far too few ban it in the state exchanges. A few "conservative," "red," "Republican-stronghold" states (*cough* Texas *cough*) lack such bans.  The pro-life issue has always been grassroots, but there are some frustrations with having little to no political leadership on this issue.

--6--

This series of posts by Mike Flynn on the Galileo Affair is fascinating reading. It's in three parts, though there are prequels. Among other things, it really brings out the personalities of those involved (and it was not just a matter of "Galileo vs the Church" as the modern scientistic-atheistic propaganda would have us believe). Among other things, there was no real reason to believe Galileo's (really Copernicus') model at the time of the Galileo Affair: there were simpler explanations which made more accurate predictions and which were less counter-intuitive. Actually, it seems to me that the main theoretical justification for heliocentrism is found in the laws of gravitation and in Newton's Laws. While two of Newton's Laws (the first and the third) were known prior to Newton, it was Newton who interpreted them into a coherent set of principles relating forces and momenta, and Newton who significantly advanced our understanding of gravity (since overthrown by general relativity). Newton, you will recall, was born in the same year that Galileo died.

Also worth highlighting is the irony that even in Kepler's model of the solar system (which is superior to Copernicus' model), there are still epicycles (e.g. the moon's orbit of the earth, and the orbits of the other planets' moons about their respective planets).

--7--

The Bad Catholic--that is Mr Marc Barnes, not Mr John Zmirac--has a post up about youth ministry and authority. I link to this both because I think it gives some sound advice, and because it relates to some other recent links about Millenials and the Church [1].

Anyway, the emphasis in Mr Barnes' post is on the importance of authority: and I think that this is actually exactly what our generation is looking for, whether from the Churches or from the culture. I rather hope more would find real and reliable authority from the former and not the latter.


[1] Millenials: didn't we used to be called "Generation Y?" I kind of liked that name, even if it was meant as a place-holder, "The otherwise-unamed Generation after Generation X," but it also worked well as a pun which really has so-far captured our generation: "Why?"
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Seven Quick Takes Friday is hosted by Mrs Jennifer Fulwiler at her Conversion Diary blog.