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.

Blog Versus: Architecture--Do We Need Tall Buildings?

Just for fun, a debate on our site. Today's topic is architecture. You can read the Faithful Skeptic's post here.

Here is the article comparing the Shanghai skyline circa 1987 to Shanghai's skyline now, and which is the sort of topic for our little versus symposium. My co-blogger is arguing the case for taller buildings, or really mourning that while everybody else seems to be building them, we've stopped (mostly). The tallest buildings will be in China and Malaysia and the Middle East: and, much as these city skylines provide a spectacular site, I say you can keep 'em.

Yes, it is a nice transformation which Shanghai has undergone, aided by some beautiful looking new buildings which stab more than scrape the sky. It's not just Shanghai, as China is building whole new cities. And many of these new cities which China is building are more-or-less instant ghost towns: fancy looking cities in which there is no real population, and to which nobody really seems to want to move.

In another couple of decades, these may be so many Chinese Detroits (or Siberias) save that whereas Detroit once was thriving and now is depopulated, these cities have never had much population to speak of. Perhaps this will be an improvement over Detroit, since what population is there is only helping to speed the city's (and the state's) demise.

There something to be said for smaller and simpler towns, even villages or hamlets, and against the fad of "progress" in architecture which is laid out by the urban planners and developers. Many of these great skyscrapers and high rises were designed according to a pattern which Russell Kirk called "the architecture of servitude and boredom," and while some of the newer building break the utilitarian box trend, they can't quite become free of the utilitarian mindset which went with it. Hence in China we see large, gleaming, and efficiently planned cities spring into being according to their planners' designs, but few people choosing to move there. The problem is that these cities are not really made for men, though more than a few planners would prefer that men be remade for these cities.

Though I've never been to Ireland, I can sympathize with those who remember Dublin city in the rare ould times: "The Pillar & the Met have gone, the Royal long since pulled down/As the great unyielding concrete makes a city of my town..."

The Faithful Skeptic brings up the then-soaring heights of the medieval Gothic Cathedrals. He might as easily have mentioned their scale in all directions, as one feels small in general inside of them. Well and good. But that style of architecture exists not only make man feel small, but to make him feel small in the presence of God. What do the modern towers do, then? They tower above even the tallest Cathedral (Cologne's Cathedral, Our Lady of Peace Basilica, and the Protestant Ulm Minster church all top out at just over 500 feet in the spires). Do the modern skyscrapers then say that it is the corporation or the state which really lifts man to the skies? Are these so many minarets to Mammon?

"Fare thee well sweet Anna Liffey, I can no longer stay
& watch the new glass cages, that spring up along the quay
My mind's too full of memories, too old to hear new chimes
I'm part of what was Dublin in the rare ould times"

The urban planners can build their towers of Babel, their Orthancs and Barad-dur's, their monuments to progress. I'll take my small town, my countryside cottages and village villas, my steeple-dominated skylines. Such are dwellings for men, houses meant as homes. From such homes and hearths spring the families which turn a neighborhood into a community.

Blog Versus: Architecture, Surrendering the Sky

Just for fun, a debate on our site. Today's topic is Architecture. You can read the Hopeful Pessimist's post here.

Here is an interesting comparison between 1987 and 2013 in two photos. It does seem like the US is slipping behind other countries in the "cool new buildings!" department. Granted, a few cities here have grown and gained some interesting skylines, but New York and Chicago have the two tallest skylines in the country. Two of the four tallest building in New York were built in the 1930s (though to be fair the World Trade Center buildings were taller than either, and the new World Trade Center building is even taller). Many of the tallest buildings are outside of the US, in rising countries like China (or, oddly enough, Malaysia), or oil-rich Middle Eastern countries.

To be fair, we've limited ourselves after the 9/11/2001 terrorist attacks, but still. The reason why I mention this at all is that there is some sense of wonder that goes with building taller towers and reaching higher heights. There is something to be said for the creative imagination of a civilization which bothers to build ever higher buildings, requiring ever more creative methods of engineering and architecture.

It is my opinion that some of the greatest architecture in the world is the Gothic style employed throughout Europe during the high Middle Ages, and a part of this great architecture was the use of the flying buttress to make ever taller buildings. These taller buildings, the skyscrapers of the medieval era, were a sort of prayer in stone and wood, pointing ever upward and drawing the onlooker's attention towards Heaven. Yes, there were other features than merely the impressive new heights achievable, but the ability of these buildings to make the onlooker feel small and unimportant, yet at the same time of infinite worth, this is itself a great feat. Nor was it a fad, as can be seen by the great Cathedral in Cologne, a project which spanned the centuries (began in 1284, complete 600 years later, albeit with some delays).

It's not just church architecture which has grown stale in the last fifty or so years: first the architecture was changed from fancy-looking art deco to boring box-like structures, then the heights became mostly lower. Where is America's Burj Khalifa, or Tapei 101, or Shanghai Tower, or Abraj Al Bait? There was a time when many of the tallest buildings of the world stood in America, and for over 40 years the Empire State Building held that distinction (only to lose it to the Sears Tower in Chicago, which held it until the construction of the World Trade Center buildings).

Small towns and country hamlets are nice and all, but building these newer and larger buildings hardly destroys these. If, as the Hopeful Pessimist claims, the people of the countryside aren't keep on moving into the cities to fill these new buildings, then no harm has been done here. And I'm not advocating that these new building be constructed in new cities, but rather in existing cities to which people are already moving. He should know something about this, living in a city which is experiencing a tremendous amount of growth, and which is in fact seeing rent rates and home ownership costs spike as the city's planners struggle to keep up with the housing demand. Would not building up rather than out help alleviate some of this?

The distinction of buildings which touch the sky once belonged to the US, but not that heritage is being surrendered to other countries, whether China or Malaysia or elsewhere. We have only one of the 10 tallest anymore, which is the building replacing the two WTC towers. We have only two more in the top 20 (though this is after losing the two towers). It is as if we have decided that taller is no longer worth the trouble. The twenty first century may be an era of architectural marvels, but it seems that America will not be home to them.