Discernment: What It Does and Doesn’t Mea

PIC wizard watching chicken

It does mean: The Holy Spirit works kind of like MSG, enhancing and heightening the “flavor” of the virtues that you’ve already worked to develop — virtues like self-control, prudence, mercy, and self-sacrifice.  After you pray for guidance, you’re probably not going to find yourself doing something utterly foreign to your normal nature or inclinations; but you may find that you have deeper reserves of patience than you expected, for instance, or a temporary ability to work harder than you’re normally able to work.

Read the rest at the Register.

Working moms: what would help?

Children are good for society, fiscally and in every other way. Children who are well-cared for, who aren’t forced to go to school sick or spend lots of time alone, and parents who aren’t utterly exhausted and wracked with guilt at all times, make families who give stability and peace to society as a whole. So even if we’re only looking out for our own self-interest, it’s best for everyone when parents are given as much freedom and flexibility as possible to devote to their children. Children are not a hobby or a side interest: they are life itself. It only makes sense for employers to take that into account.

Read the rest at the Register.

Power in the blood!

Remember when Ann Coulter pronounced missionary Dr. Brantly a big jerky, inconsiderate showboater for going into Africa to treat Rbola patients, like selfish, jerky showboaters tend to do with their “Christian narcissism”?  Remember how little good Brantly was doing, according to Coulter, with his thoughtless act of leaving his perfectly good country and then coming back home?

Well, guess whose blood is helping to heal the nurse who selfishly contracted Ebola while caring for a dying man in Dallas? Yarr, Dr. Brantly’s blood. Back in July, Brantly

“received a unit of blood from a 14-year-old boy who had survived Ebola because of Dr. Brantly’s care,” the missive said.

Now months later, Brantly, who has since recovered from his battle with the virus, has passed on the favor. A 26-year-old Dallas nurse named Nina Pham, who contracted the illness while treating the United State’s first Ebola patient, has received Brantly’s blood. It’s not the first time it has been used to treat Ebola patients. Recovered Ebola victim Richard Sacra got it, as well as U.S. journalist Ashoka Mukpo, who last night said he’s on the mend.

Injecting the blood of a patient like Brantly who has recovered from Ebola and developed certain antibodies is a decades-old, but promising method of treatment that, academics and health officials agree, could be one of the best means to fight Ebola. Called a convalescent serum, it might also save Pham, an alum of Texas Christian University.

A physician gives over his body to help the sick and dying, and through his blood, they are saved. I’m just going to let that sit there for a minute. Aw heck, I’ll sit here with Dolly Parton:

Don’t bubble-wrap your kids

PIC deformed tree

My son, who is twelve, recently wanted to buy a comic book, and as he leafed through the pages, he liked the story, but was disturbed by some of the gory images he saw. The comic book guy reassured him that he would get used to it over time. And I agreed. Sure, you can get used to it, and eventually it wouldn’t even bother you any more. But why would you want to do that to yourself?

Read the rest at the Register. 

Brilliant men in dark boxes

Anybody remember when this happened?

 

 

PIC statue behind box

 

This was back in 2011, when the NAACP hid a prominent statue of George Washington inside a wooden box during a MLK Day rally, offering the terminally lame excuse that the box that shielded the crowd from Washington’s face would make a more suitable backdrop for the rally’s speakers.   The NAACP denies any intention of disrespect, but their narrow view of history is no secret:  anyone who owned slaves is a racist, and anyone who is a racist cannot be called a great man.  This is what is taught in history class, and several generations have been nourished on these junk food ideas.

Students are taught that they must not squander their exquisite admiration on someone who owned slaves.  They are taught, by implication, that it’s not enough for a man to give up his family and his safety for the noble cause of independence.  It’s not enough to inspire and command.  It’s not even enough to triumph in a way that directly benefits millions of people today.

He must also be . . . EVERYTHING MAN.

He must leap out of his time, and see with the eyes of every possible future type of enlightenment.  Did he accomplish the massive victories that his generation desperately needed?  Not good enough.  We also require him to be the role model for solving any type of conflict that might ever turn up, or else he’s no good to us.  Into the box you go, little George.  You don’t impress us anymore.

Where else do we see this same lazy, self-absorbed analysis of history?  In the sour voices that grumble over John Paul II’s beatification.   He may have been good, they say, but oh, he was not great.  Oh, sure, he was very charismatic and all.  He clearly prayed a lot, and that’s commendable.  But what a hash he made of the Church!  It’s all his fault!  He’s the one who wrote all those lame hymns, he’s the one who offered free butch haircuts to nuns, if you’ll recall.  And who can forget those Woodstock-style World Youth Day rallies, where he encouraged the youth to hold hands during the Our Father?  Never mind that the number of Catholics worldwide grew from 700 million to 1.2 billion while he was Pope — the guy was a squish, a pushover, a washout.

Listen to me.  God sends certain men to achieve certain great deeds while they live.  They are not responsible for what future generations may require:  that is up to the heroes born of those generations.  Great men are great because they do what needs to be done at the time.  They put their own desires and frailties aside, and they make the world new with their particular strengths, their particular form of brilliance.  Heck, that’s what Martin Luther King Jr. did.  A holy man?  No.  He was a serial adulterer.  And Washington owned slaves, and John Paul II allowed the monster Maciel to flourish.

But they were great men.  They took their personal, God-given talents and turned them into something immense — something that made the world better.

It’s not just that we should forgive the wrong they did because they did so much good (although that is also true).  No.  I’m saying that these men were good in the way that they were designed to be good, great according to their own natures.  George Washington’s great strength wasn’t as an abolitionist, you know?  John Paul II’s great strength wasn’t as a disciplinarian.  It wasn’t his calling.

Do we criticize Fra Angelico for not figuring out how to split the atom?  Or do we sneer at Herman Melville because he couldn’t outrun Carl Lewis?  I mean, what do we want from these guys?  And can’t we even imagine that whatever  heroes we admire today may someday be judged harshly by our great great grandchildren — and wouldn’t that seem unfair?  Men are men, and they live when they live.   Who is good enough for us?  Who can escape our endlessly dissatisfied dissection?

There was only one perfect Man.   The other great men of the world — Washington, King, John Paul II, and any hero you can name — are only mirrors, who catch and show to us a little bit of His radiant light.  The world is dark enough already.  Let’s not become so enlightened that we spend our time setting up boxes around the brilliance of great men.

 

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This post originally ran in 2011.

No earthquake here. At the Synod, the Church teaches us how to dress for the feast.

pastoral earthquake

Yesterday’s second reading at Mass had two major ideas:

(1) God wants everyone.
(2) Not everyone wants God.

In this parable, the king has invited all the expected, honored guests to his son’s wedding, but they not only refused his invitation, but abused and killed the messengers who invited them.

This  is old news — as old as Adam and Eve, as old as the War in Heaven — and would not even be a story at all if the king didn’t then decide to do something scandalous and unexpected:  he invites people who normally don’t get invited to the king’s house:

Then he said to his servants, ‘The feast is ready,
but those who were invited were not worthy to come.
Go out, therefore, into the main roads
and invite to the feast whomever you find.
The servants went out into the streets
and gathered all they found, bad and good alike,
and the hall was filled with guests.

Good and bad alike, meaning cohabitating couples, second-marriaging couples, and people in love with a gay partner (not to mention people in “irregular” situations less familiar to first world Catholics! Remember, the Synod is for everyone, not just the Northern Hemisphere). People who aren’t living up to Church teaching, but who nevertheless want in to that gorgeous, beautiful, nourishing, splendid party hall, because they know a good thing when they see it.

The feast is ready. The king has got all this good stuff, and he wants to share it with someone, so why not open the doors wider? This is exactly what the king in the parable does does.

But then there’s this:

But when the king came in to meet the guests,
he saw a man there not dressed in a wedding garment.
The king said to him, ‘My friend, how is it
that you came in here without a wedding garment?’
But he was reduced to silence.
Then the king said to his attendants, ‘Bind his hands and feet,
and cast him into the darkness outside,
where there will be wailing and grinding of teeth.’
Many are invited, but few are chosen.”

This is the second part of what the Church has always taught: God invites, and we decide how far we want to respond to that invitation. What is implied in the story is that the guest knew very well that he wasn’t dressed properly, and doesn’t even have an excuse. He chooses  not to come prepared, or to make any changes. When we make no effort, show no signs of being willing to change or even defend our actions, then why should you be there?

This, too, is the message coming out of the Synod. An invitation is for something. It’s a beginning, and way to get people to put their foot in the door so we can figure out what they need next, and what is needed from them. If you do not invite them, you will never get to that point.

The mid-term report described as an “earthquake” is nothing of the kind. It’s a reassertion of the constant, consistent teaching of the Church, and even the constant, consistent teaching of God the Father toward His wayward people: Come to Me. Please, come to me. Yes, I want you to change, and I will demand things of you. But we can’t get anywhere unless you come to Me.

And once you do accept the invitation, the Synod is saying that pastors and deacons and RCIA directors and anyone involved with catechesis are to explain fully what it means to be a member of the Church — keeping in mind that probably the majority of Catholics in the world have almost none of even a basic understanding of what marriage is for, what sex is for, or what life is for. But a good many of them have good intentions, want to be good to each other, want to raise healthy families, and want to be loved. So that’s where you start: with the invitation.

The  Archdiocese of Philadelphia has published an official teaching document calledLove Is Our Mission.  It’s a short book designed to prepare us for the upcoming World Meeting of Families, and illuminates contentious issues like gradualism and the pastoral care of divorced Catholics. According to Archbishop Chaput, this catechetical document has ten steps:

 It starts with the purpose of our creation and moves into the nature of our sexuality; the covenant of marriage; the importance of children; the place of priesthood and religious life in the ecology of the Christian community; the Christian home as a refuge for the wounded heart; the role of the Church; and the missionary witness of Christian families to the wider world.

So, this is what the Church is doing: it is inviting people to the feast, and it is instructing them in how to “dress” the soul, how to behave as an honored guest so they can participate in the feast — so they can follow up on the invitation. In short, it is teaching us how to be a Catholic.

The Church, at the Synod, is doing its job, its one and only job of inviting and instructing. Tell me again how this is a problem — how it ought, instead, to be skipping straight to the “waling and gnashing of teeth” part that so many Catholics seem  to favor.

If a cohabitating couple shows up for a baptism, what do we do? Or if a couple with an un-annulled second marriage, or if a gay couple turns up wanting to lead some ministry, what do we do? Do you slam the door? No, we say, “Come in, and let’s talk about what you have right so far. Then we can figure out what’s  next.”

In other words, practice basic human psychology, never mind basic human decency.

I am well aware that people can twist the document to mean whatever they want to mean. If they think the Church should just be nice and friendly and not be so picky about all those stupid rules, then that is what they will see in the Synod. If they think the Church should be stern and exacting and spend most of its time driving people away because they’re not holy enough, then that is what they will see in the Synod.

This twisting of words, too, is constant and consistent. People have twisted the words of Jesus Christ from the moment the sound waves were still dissipating into the atmosphere of Jerusalem. But if you read the entire document, if you pay close attention and don’t get all your information from one ideological side or the other, it will be clear that all the Synod is saying is what the Church has always said: invite whomever you find, so you can teach them how to be good guests, so we can all enjoy the feast together.

Tell me again how this is a problem. And while you’re at it, tell the king.

Will I see you in Michigan this Sunday?

ekklesia project

Oh, time is getting away from me! I kept meaning to say, I will be in Williamston, Michigan on Sunday morning, speaking at  St. Mary Catholic Church for their Ekklesia Project series. There will be Mass at 9 AM, then breakfast, then my talk.

The topic is “One Weird Trick to Being a Good Catholic Family.” How to identify “one weird trick” thinking in your spiritual life, and what to do instead.

Hope to see you there! I may or may not be speaking at another event somewhere in the state of  Michigan on Saturday! I will let you know if I am!

The American Catholic Almanac is meaty and fascinating

If you’re like me and most of my American Catholic friends, any combination of the words “American” and “Catholic” gives you the heebie jeebies. Either you’re going to get one of those “Jesus was a republican, and food stamps are a mortal sin” tirades, or else we’ll be treated to another learned treatise on how the one thing the Pope needs to do right now, IF he’s really the Pope, is to pronounce anathema against people whose disgusting little irreverent offspring eat Cheerios during Mass.

Well, relax. This is not that.  Not at all. Instead,The American Catholic Almanac: A Daily Reader of Patriots, Saints, Rogues, and Ordinary People who Changed the United States does us a great service:  it reminds us, or teaches us for the first time, that the United States would not be the United States if it weren’t for all her Catholics.

The book is entirely factual, not pious, and will appeal to people who like history but are skeptical about the contributions of religious people. It’s a companionable, well-sourced antidote to the idea that Catholics are a monoculture of biddable, brainless sheep. You can’t read this book and not be impressed, at very least, by how much variety there  is in our complicated congregation, and how much individuality, not to mention courage, ingenuity, and good humor.

american catholic almanac 2

It’s my favorite kind of book these days: a one-a-day volume of 365 dated entries, each one highlighting some noteworthy American Catholic, place, or event.  Some of the folks profiled are famous (Norma McCorvey, Thomas Merton), but many are less so (songwriter Harry Warren, war hero John Basilone).  Some don’t act very Catholic at all (Justice Anthony Kennedy, mobster Dutch Schultz) and some, I had no idea were Catholic (Buffalo Bill, Clare Booth Luce).

The book also offers tidbits of history, anecdotes about cities and monuments, and stories of love, war, crime, politics, evangelization, and of course sports. In all, a fascinating, variegated, and informative book, and clearly a labor of love by authors Emily Stimpson and Brian Burch.

I love the idea of a return to the almanac. It’s suited to the short attention span of modern readers (*sheepishly raises hand*) but is written for adults or intelligent kids, and it is meaty. The American Catholic Almanac would make a nice Christmas present in case you crazy American Catholics are already thinking that far ahead!

At Synod, Sex-Obsessed Catholic Church Finally Talks About Sex, Finally

It is stunning that the Bishops are talking about sex! As long as you are the kind of person who wakes up stunned to see the sun rise, stunned to find that you have feet at the end of your legs, stunned to discover that the floor under those feet is still made out of wood, just like it has been for decades and decades.

Read the rest at the Register. 

PIC John Paul II waving

You don’t have to be crazy to be president of Russia, but it — oh, wait, you do.

And Vladimir Putin is so, so good at being the crazy, crazy president of Russia. Check out this birthday present he gave himself:

PIC Putin as Hercules

 

 

These are just two.  There’s a whole gallery full of paintings depicting him as Hercules, doing Herculean things.   I guess this was done voluntarily as a tribute to him from his admiring citizens. Much like when my husband comes home in the evening and we are all sitting on the floor wearing bowls on our head because the two year old told us to. It’s not that we are afraid of her! It’s really not. It’s just that . . . sometimes, it’s better to do what she says. And to like it!