Quick Quips: Faithfulness, Messy Church, Failure to Respond

I thought I would try something different today. Instead of trying to create a long article out of one of the ideas bouncing around in my head and losing much of the other ideas in the process, I thought I’d try posting some short reflections under the heading of Quick Quips. 

Whoever is Trustworthy in Small Matters...

Our Lord has some things to say which seem especially fitting for our time and the attitude of rebellion which we are facing. In Luke 16:10, He tells us, “The person who is trustworthy in very small matters is also trustworthy in great ones; and the person who is dishonest in very small matters is also dishonest in great ones.”

I was struck by this passage the other day when seeing a large number of Catholics on Facebook objecting to Pope Francis’ upcoming encyclical Laudato Si. One of the objections which was voiced was the complaint that, “Why is the Pope focussing on something so insignificant, compared to all the other issues out there?” Some have gone so far as to say that the Pope is neglecting souls while speaking about the environment.

But instead of cataloging and refuting every objection that is made, I’d like to point out one thing here. If you think that the moral obligations towards the environment is an insignificant matter compared to other issues that trouble you more, why not just seek to be faithful in these “small matters” instead of using your belief that it is “unimportant” as a justification to ignore the moral teaching an encyclical involves?

After all, if a person is faithless in what they see as a small matter like heeding the moral obligations of Catholics in regards to the environment, then why should he or she be seen as trustworthy when it comes to teaching the faith in greater matters? If a dissenter sees you rejecting the authority of the Church in a matter you disagree with and find unimportant, then why should this dissenter respect the authority of the Church in a matter he or she disagrees with?

Now I don’t mean we have to hold to a scrupulous or pharisaical legalism, in obedience. But, when the Pope says “We have this obligation,” why not say “OK,” instead of looking for ways to justify disobedience?

The Church is a Mess? Why do you say this like it is Something New?

Dissenting Priests, whacko nuns, bishops who seem weak in the face of sin, corruption and defiance. Such things do scandalize the Church today. But, when you read the unabridged Lives of the Saints, a history, or other works from the past—back before Church teaching was considered debatable—you can see that the Church was always a mess because the Church is made up of people who see things differently on how things should be done, even when they are acting out of good faith.

Sometimes a saint was opposed by a person who misunderstood their calling. Sometimes a person dissuaded a saint from something they wanted to do to keep them on track. Sometimes opposition was rooted in heresy or schism. Sometimes it was rooted in natural disagreements. But when you read the lives of some saints in past centuries, the situations they faced sound remarkably similar to the situations of today.

But there’s a myth today that back in the pre-Vatican II Church, the Vatican stopped every dissent and disobedience cold. Actually, no. Heresies lasted for hundreds of years, kings tried to impose their will on the Church in their realms, people took a lax view towards their faith, and allegations about the immorality of clergy circulated as widely then as now. That’s why the Church back then needed saints who were preachers and confessors in the nations who had formerly embraced the faith.

But I think we need to ask ourselves a couple of things here—Are we willing to answer the call (as opposed to waiting for someone else to do it)? And are we willing to work with the Church (as opposed to treating the magisterium as an adversary)?

What Can Separate Us From the Love of Christ? Nothing—But that Doesn’t Mean We Won’t Fail to Respond.

I was reading Romans 8 this morning and was struck by a thought. When St. Paul was speaking about not fearing the trials and tribulations, it struck me that he was talking about the fact that in the battle for our souls, nobody is going to defeat Our Lord and steal us away from Him against His our will. It’s not going to be a case of Our Lord being left defeated on the battlefield, scratching His head and wondering, “How did that happen?"

So if this is the case, how do people go to hell? I would say that the devil works by convincing people that they don’t need to fight and don’t need to change. Whether he does this by persuading people to reject religion, or to practice religion in a way which is focussed on the self instead of God, he deceives us by having us put our own will first while making what God calls us to be a secondary matter,  Our Lord’s words on straining the gnat and swallowing the camel (Matthew 23:24) come to mind here. We focus on things that may be good in themselves, but do it in a way which neglects the bigger picture—like focusing on liturgy and neglecting social justice; or focussing on social justice while neglecting the moral issues.

In other words, when we make adherence to only part of God’s teaching while choosing to ignore the rest, we are failing to respond to God’s love as we are called.

Thoughts On Bigotry and Bigoted Defenders of "Tolerance"

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Thoughts on the Preemptive Dissent Against Laudato Si

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A Little Knowledge Is a Dangerous Thing: Reflections on an Anti-Christian Meme

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TFTD: I Am the King of America! A Reality Check on "Self-Identity" Claims

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"...To Which All Are Compelled To Assent..."

(See: Failing to Make the Moral Case for Marriage | Catholic World Report - Global Church news and views)

It has been a common tactic by those dissatisfied with how the bishops are handling the case of the judicial diktats against our religious obligations is to accuse them of retreating from the moral teaching of the Church to the issue of religious freedom. The argument basically runs along the line of saying that the point of religious freedom has failed so far to persuade people and uses the hypothesis contrary to fact to claim that things would be different if the bishops would just make their case to the morality of the issue.

I think that such an argument, while it recognizes that we need to keep in mind the big picture of the culture war we are in, tends to miss the point about the current battle we are in, assuming a “one size fits all” approach to our opponents. The problem is, as I see it, we are facing an opponent who believes that our moral beliefs are rooted in ignorance and intolerance. In other words, they believe our religious beliefs themselves are “immoral.” As a result, they will not listen to explanations about why certain actions are always wrong—if we don’t share their views, we are just seen as trying to “explain away our bigotry."

St. Thomas Aquinas, in his Summa Contra Gentiles, wrote about the problem of disputing with groups who reject our sources of authority for assessing the truth, pointing out that we need to start by appealing to where we agree:

it is difficult to refute the errors of each individual, for two reasons. First, because the sacrilegious assertions of each erring individual are not so well known to us, that we are able from what they say to find arguments to refute their errors. For the Doctors of old used this method in order to confute the errors of the heathens, whose opinions they were able to know, since either they had been heathens themselves, or had lived among heathens and were conversant with their teachings. Secondly, because some of them, like the Mohammedans and pagans, do not agree with us as to the authority of any Scripture whereby they may be convinced, in the same way as we are able to dispute with the Jews by means of the Old Testament, and with heretics by means of the New: whereas the former accept neither. Wherefore it is necessary to have recourse to natural reason, to which all are compelled to assent. And yet this is deficient in the things of God. [Sum. Cont. Gent. 1.2]

We are dealing with a Court of Law which seems bent on denying that laws based on the Judaeo-Christian moral beliefs have any constitutional standing—and therefore such laws affirming the nature of marriage as between one man and one woman are considered a violation of the so-called “separation of church and state.” Under such (spurious) principles, government employees and business owners are denied the right to refuse to do what is contrary to their moral obligations in the eyes of God.

So, we have to start with a common reference. Because the Constitution is being held up as the standard to which these attacks are being made. The argument is that laws against “same sex marriage” violate the rights of a segment of the population, so that is where this particular battle has begun, and we have to address the attacks being made there. It does make sense to appeal to the people of good will who may not recognize the truth about sexual morality but do want to seek the right thing. Of course, we cannot stop there. We have to show why our teachings are true. But first we have to get them to listen.

St. Justin Martyr recognized this concept when he wrote his First Apology. In writing to the Emperor, he started by appealing to the shared value between Christianity and the Stoics—justice and doing right:

Reason directs those who are truly pious and philosophical to honour and love only what is true, declining to follow traditional opinions, if these be worthless. For not only does sound reason direct us to refuse the guidance of those who did or taught anything wrong, but it is incumbent on the lover of truth, by all means, and if death be threatened, even before his own life, to choose to do and say what is right. Do you, then, since ye are called pious and philosophers, guardians of justice and lovers of learning, give good heed, and hearken to my address; and if ye are indeed such, it will be manifested. For we have come, not to flatter you by this writing, nor please you by our address, but to beg that you pass judgment, after an accurate and searching investigation, not flattered by prejudice or by a desire of pleasing superstitious men, nor induced by irrational impulse or evil rumours which have long been prevalent, to give a decision which will prove to be against yourselves. For as for us, we reckon that no evil can be done us, unless we be convicted as evil-doers, or be proved to be wicked men; and you, you can kill, but not hurt us.

 

[Justin Martyr, “The First Apology of Justin” Chapter II, in The Apostolic Fathers with Justin Martyr and Irenaeus, ed. Alexander Roberts, James Donaldson, and A. Cleveland Coxe, vol. 1, The Ante-Nicene Fathers (Buffalo, NY: Christian Literature Company, 1885), 163.]

However, just because we have to start there, in this battle, does not mean we have to remain there. St. Justin Martyr started his defense of Christianity by pointing out that justice forbids punishing a man just because he is a Christian, pointing out that punishment must only be meted out for the wrongdoing. He establishes this point before attempting to show the righteousness of the Christian faith. He knows that Christianity, as a persecuted religion, has no standing in the eyes of the rulers of the empire. 

I think it is safe to say that in the eyes of lawmakers and judges, Christianity has no standing, and its teachings—or, rather, the misinterpretations of Christian teachings—are seen as repugnant. So, we must start with the values they claim to recognize (in this case, the Constitution) and show that the actions they are taking go against these values. St. Justin Martyr would point out that if those who he addressed refused to do what was just, they would betray what they stand for. Ultimately, that is what we must do when those in authority are hostile to us. We must point out that if they truly value the Constitution, they must respect it when it comes to the freedom of religion, and not treat our religious obligations as contrary to the Constitution.

As St. Thomas Aquinas pointed out when it came to using reason, this is deficient in the things of God. Likewise, merely reaching out to them at the level of the Constitution is deficient. We do need to go beyond the issue of the Constitution when it comes to preaching the Gospel and explaining why we must avoid certain acts. The Church does do this. But I think that the people who charge that the bishops are “retreating,” need to realize that those who refuse to listen to our teachings must be reached out to in ways where they might listen.

If they don’t (and it happens—there’s a reason that we refer to St. Justin as “St. Justin Martyr”), then it means we will have the harder task of evangelizing under a soft persecution, where the courts and lawmakers determine that they can set aside their laws arbitrarily. But, we certainly should reach out to people of good will beginning with the grounds they have in common with us. If we don’t, then we will be retreating.

"Those Who Cannot Remember the Past..."

The old quote of Santayana goes, Those who cannot remember the past are doomed to repeat it. That certainly seems to be the case here where, in the name of equality, the secular society has invented virtues for itself which matches what they think their society should be. Historically speaking, whenever a society identifies with their self-invented virtues, they tend to be very hostile towards groups that exist within their society which already has virtues they refuse to give up. In fact, such groups tend to be viewed as the enemy of the state and are targeted because they refuse to surrender their beliefs.

Once upon a time, America recognized the freedom of such groups to do what they felt morally obligated to do and limited the power of the state to dictate behavior that went against the moral obligations of the person. In short, when a religious group held, “I must not do this,” the state recognized that it had no right to force a member of this group to do what he believed was morally wrong. This was in contrast with other nations where the government could compel membership in one religion and forbidding membership in a different one (the State Church of England for example), or the attempt to control a religious denomination’s schools and appointed ministers (the Kulturkampf of Germany). To drum up support for the attacks, the state would focus on the behavior of members of the Church who were living scandalously and seek to transfer the disgust over their behavior into an indictment of the whole Church.

America recognized those behaviors by government as something condemnable and, even if a majority of the population disapproved of a religion, it never directly sought to control what religious behaviors were acceptable, dictating to the Church what beliefs could be followed or not. That’s why what is happening to America today is so tragic. In seeking to promote certain “virtues,” the government is seeking to force the disagreement by members of certain religious bodies out of the public square and into a ghetto of “freedom to worship.” But Freedom of Religion ≠ Freedom to Worship.  Freedom to Worship is part of the Freedom of Religion, but the Freedom of Religion is far more than worship.

America has a rather ugly tendency nowadays to deny the freedom of religion to individuals who run a business or work for the government. Such people are told that their wish to refuse to do certain things that they believe are morally wrong is a violation of the civil rights of others. To justify their position against religious freedom, people dredge up the segregation in the South, with the “Whites Only” establishments, separate drinking fountains etc. It is argued that the religious faith of business owners and government employees that forbids them to do something is the same motive used by segregationists to bar non-whites from their establishments.

But this is a false analogy. The appeals to religious freedom by the business owner or government employee is not rooted in a prejudice against a certain subset of people. It is rooted in the belief that We may not participate in something we believe to be morally wrong—not at all the same thing. That is apparent by those targeted businesses which say they are perfectly willing to serve a person whose moral behavior they believe is wrong in the normal course of business—but they are not willing to have their business cause scandal by appearing to approve of something the business owner thinks is morally wrong.

In other nations, priests and even bishops were imprisoned or even martyred because they would not compromise with what was wrong—a virtue widely recognized even here except when it comes to the Catholic Church living that way. Then it is labeled as a case of being “rigid” or “bureaucratic” or “hateful.” But that is just propaganda aimed at encouraging people to think of the Church as harmful and needing to be opposed.

America claims to remember the lessons of history. Yet the behavior exhibited here shows that our nation seems to be doomed to repeat the mistakes other nations have made—mistakes it spoke out against in other contexts.