Catholics and the Ideology Trap

It's no secret that factions try to hijack Church teaching to either try to give their political platform credibility (if they are similar) or to discredit the Church (if they are opposed). For example, the Church teaching on caring for the poor is hijacked into either equating this teaching as a mandate to vote for a party platform or to indicate that the Church is being biased and therefore should not be heeded.

In America, both parties use both tactics, and some members of the faithful who want to promote a politcal cause will misquote Church teaching a way that makes it appear as if the Church is changing...either to praise the party or discredit the Church by accusing them of "becoming political."

For people who get caught in it, this is nearly an airtight trap. It leads one to either think that fidelity to one political faction is fidelity to the Church, or to claim that they are being faithful to Our Lord or the earlier Church over the Church today.

This happens in two different ways. In one case, we have obvious schizophrenia where the US bishops are simultaneously called left-wing and right-wing by foes of different positions. But a new tactic is emerging,  One where both factions react to accounts from the secular (and religiously illiterate) media and ignores what they ignore. As a result, people are ignorant of the fact that Pope Francis is just as firm in defending Catholic moral teaching as his predecessors, and his predecessors were just as firm as Pope Francis on social justice.

For example, I recall a debate on Facebook with a woman who angrily wanted to know why Pope Francis never mentioned the plight of Christians in the Middle East when he spoke about injustice.  She was shocked when I produced an address by the Pope pleading for the world to help these Christians and retracted her objection. She literally didn't know the Pope had spoken about this.

People forget that ALL news media is partisan. It's easy to deride "Faux News" or MSNBC, but the entire media is biased. If a person is unaware of this, they will not realize that a distortion IS a distortion.

The remedy for partisanship is to recognize that a political position must be judged by the Church,  NOT the other way around.  We must remember that deploring abortion is not "right wing" and deploring the treatment of migrants (legal or not) is not "left wing."

I believe that we must change our method of thinking. We must stop assuming that secular reports about Church teaching are accurate. We must first seek to understand what the Church intends to teach. We must reject an arrogant overconfidence in our ability to interpret what we think is the "plain sense" of a document (if I had a dollar for every time someone with a wrong interpretation appealed to the "plain sense" of the document,  my student loans would have been paid off years ago). We must realize that our perspective as 21st century Americans (or Europeans etc.) may lead us to interpret words in ways that the Church NEVER intended.

In such a case, the Church is not at fault for "speaking unclearly" (a common charge). Rather WE are at fault for assuming that the Pope is thinking like a 21st century American.  It's pretty arrogant to assume our cultural experience is normal.

I believe that, for us Catholics, we must step back from our dualistic political views where Left and Right become Right and Wrong. We must start thinking of the Church as Mother and Teacher again and apply her teachings to the issues of the World. That means rejecting the tendency to view Church teaching as a political platform and accepting the view that all politics need to be re-formed (and thus reformed) by Christian belief that doing good in relation to God, neighbors and self is to be sought and evil rejected.  When it comes to the parable of the Pharisee and the Tax Collector, we need to stop thinking like the Pharisee.

It means we must stop thinking of politicians as evil incarnate when they have the "wrong" letter (D or R) after their name and stop making excuses if they have the "right" one. Regardless of your opinions on Hillary Clinton or Donald Trump, we have to think of them as fellow sinners who God wishes to save as much as He wants to save us.

That means when the Pope shows compassion to a person on the "wrong side" of the political divide, we don't assume he is blessing the party platform of our opponents. It also means we don't assume he gives carte blanche endorsement to our political platform when he says something our party agrees with.

What it boils down to is that the Christian must constantly assess themselves, turning away from evil and back to God. It means we must pray that our hidden faults are revealed to us and for the grace to change our ways.

This, I believe, is the remedy to the trap of ideology.

Insightful Quotes

My laptop seems to have partially survived (thank You God) an involuntary attempt to install java (handle on a coffee cup broke, spilling the contents on the keyboard and requiring it to be left off for 72 hours). So I was able to expand my readings this weekend. Doing my readings, I found little nuggets of insight that I just want to share. It's a reminder of the treasure trove of graces that God provides us through His servants.

Cardinal John Henry Newman

You sometimes hear, for example, of Catholics falling away, who will tell you it arose from reading the Scriptures, which opened their eyes to the “unscripturalness,” so they speak, of the Church of the Living God. No; Scripture did not make them disbelieve: (impossible!) they disbelieved when they opened the Bible; they opened it in an unbelieving spirit, and for an unbelieving purpose; they would not have opened it, had they not anticipated, I might say hoped, that they should find things there inconsistent with Catholic teaching. They begin in pride and disobedience, and they end in apostasy.

(Discourses addressed to Mixed Congregations p162-163)

Pope John Paul I

A certain British preacher MacNabb, speaking in Hyde Park, had spoken of the Church. When he finished, someone asked to speak and said: “Yours are fine words. But I know some Catholic priests who did not stay with the poor and became rich. I know also Catholic husbands who have betrayed their wives. I do not like this Church made of sinners." The Father said: “There’s something in what you say. But may I make an objection?”—“Let’s hear it.”—He says: “Excuse me, but am I mistaken or is the collar of your shirt a little greasy?”—He says: “Yes, it is, I admit.”—“But is it greasy because you haven’t used soap, or because you used soap but it was no use?” “No”, he says, I haven’t used soap.”

You see. The Catholic Church too has extraordinary soap: the gospel, the sacraments, prayer. The gospel read and lived; the sacraments celebrated in the right way; prayer well used, would be a marvellous soap, capable of making us all saints. We are not all saints, because we have not used this soap enough.

(Audience,  September 13, 1978)

Archbishop Charles Chaput

Tolerance is a working principle that enables us to live in peace with other people and their ideas. Most of the time, it’s a very good thing. But it is not an end in itself, and tolerating or excusing grave evil in a society is itself a grave evil. The roots of this word are revealing. Tolerance comes from the Latin tolerare, “to bear or sustain,” and tollere, which means “to lift up.” It implies bearing other persons and their beliefs the way we carry a burden or endure a headache. It’s actually a negative idea. And it is not a Christian virtue. Catholics have the duty not to “tolerate” other people but to love them, which is a much more demanding task.

(Render Unto Caesar p. 145)

Pope Benedict XVI

...I would insist that statistics do not suffice as a criterion for morality. It is bad enough when public opinion polls become the basis of political decisions and when politicians are more preoccupied with "How do I get more votes?" than with "What is right?" By the same token, the results of surveys about what people do or how they live is not in and of itself the measure of what is true and right.

(Light of the World,  p.146)

Quick Quips: Bad Perspectives Edition

Just a Pinch of Incense, 2016 Style

I ran across comments attacking the Little Sisters of the Poor over their lawsuit against the Obama administration concerning the contraceptive mandate.  The derision comes from people who say that it is a lot easier to check a box than to fill out paperwork for a lawsuit.

That argument is remarkably similar to the one used by pagan Roman officials who argued that all a Christian needed to do was "burn a pinch of incense" before the state altars--that is, make a token acknowledgement of the values of the State.

The problem was, the pinch of incense was not a mere gesture.  It meant that the Christian was acknowledging the "gods" of Rome as equally valid as the God worshipped by Christians.  No Christian could do that without being unfaithful to their beliefs.

Similarly,  the "checkmark" is not a mere gesture. It is an action that makes the Little Sisters empower another group to do evil on their behalf.  They cannot do this without being unfaithful to the God they profess to follow.

In neither case can Christians accept the "accommodation" the State offers.  It is no accommodation at all. It is an attack on Christian belief and practice.

Rank Hypocrisy from the Rank and File?

Consider Tobit 4:15... "Do to no one what you yourself hate." I think we can apply it to cheering tactics we deplore when applied against our foes. Remember 1 Corinthians 13:6... Love  "does not rejoice over wrongdoing but rejoices with the truth."

I am saddened when I witness Catholics respond to the election news. I see Catholics who deplore the rudeness and racism of Donald Trump respond with racism and rudeness.  I am dismayed to see people who denounced violence at Trump rallies sneer when it comes to Trump having to cancel his appearance at a rally because of unrest.

I must ask these Catholics: If you recognize that what Trump does is wrong, why do you respond in kind and rejoice when he suffers the same?  Schadenfreude is no Catholic virtue!

One can justly oppose Trump's ideas, rhetoric and tactics (in fact, I do).  But when one embraces them or rejoices in them when directed against him, that is not Christian witness to virtue.  It's rank hypocrisy. Let's remember that, as Christians, we are called to witness the Kingdom of God in all aspects of our lives.

Tying it All Together

Both of these cases strike me as coming from an attitude of "do good to my allies and harm to my enemies." In other words, do what benefits me and to hell with you if you disagree.

To which, Our Lord Jesus replies, "For if you love those who love you, what recompense will you have? Do not the tax collectors do the same? And if you greet your brothers only, what is unusual about that? Do not the pagans do the same?" (Matthew 5:46-47).

All people are called to seek out the truth and to live it when discovered. That means discarding false slogans and ceasing to use/cheer immoral tactics even if they seem to benefit us.

Now,  we cannot compel people to choose good. We can only strive to create just laws and seek to show people why we ought to live rightly at the level they can understand. Sometimes people will refuse to listen. But let us reject the tactics of the World to achieve our goals. Otherwise they will simply see our beliefs as partisan and will not see the Truth Who powers them.

Brief Thoughts on Papal Gaffes and Non-Magisterial Statements

Read more »

When a Little Knowledge is Dangerous

When it comes to Church teachings that are unpopular, the common tactic is on one side of the coin to dismiss them as old teachings and point out how some teachings have changed from the past. People argue that If the Church changed teaching X, she can also change her teachings on contraception or divorce/remarriage. On the other side of the coin, when it comes to actions of the Church that people wanted to remain as they were, the common tactic is to appeal to the old writings and argue that they are irreformable and attempts to make changes are heretical.

These two attitudes demonstrate the truth of the adage, “A little knowledge is dangerous.” In both cases, the proponents cite a portion of a Church document with the intent to demonstrate that the Church has changed with the purpose of undermining the authority of the Church. The only difference between the two is that one cites it with the intention to alter other teachings (claiming that the Church’s refusal to change is unjustified) while the other cites it with the intention to reject changes they dislike.

I believe both groups display a lack of understanding about the Church and how she teaches. The fact is, when the Church teaches something is to be done or not done, we need to discern the moral absolutes that the Church holds always and the elements of what the Church mandates as how to follow the Church teaching when facing certain evils of a particular time.

The Case of Usury

For example, it is popular to cite the “fact” that the Church “changed her teaching” on lending money at interest. Since the Church seems to have changed from saying lending money at interest is a sin to saying it is not, the argument is that any Church teaching can be changed. The problem is this argument is based on a false understanding of what the Church taught. For example, Pope Benedict XIV wrote in the bull Vix pervenit (published in 1745) that, on one hand it is usury to loan money to a person in need with the intent of charging interest, but on the other hand he warned against extremes:

III. By these remarks, however, We do not deny that at times together with the loan contract certain other titles—which are not at all intrinsic to the contract—may run parallel with it. From these other titles, entirely just and legitimate reasons arise to demand something over and above the amount due on the contract. Nor is it denied that it is very often possible for someone, by means of contracts differing entirely from loans, to spend and invest money legitimately either to provide oneself with an annual income or to engage in legitimate trade and business. From these types of contracts honest gain may be made. (Vix pervenit #3)

 

 Claudia Carlen, ed., The Papal Encyclicals: 1740–1878 (Ypsilanti, MI: The Pierian Press, 1990), 16.

In other words, the Church did not change her teaching on usury. She merely recognized that there were some circumstances—not existing in the past—that permitted a legitimate return on investment. So, as I understand it, if somebody comes to me and says, “Dave, I need $20 for gas so I can drive to the hospital and see my sick child,” I would be committing usury if I said in reply, “Sure, just pay me back $30 next week.” But I wouldn’t be committing usury if I invested money in stocks or bonds, expecting interest in return. I’ll leave it to theologians to decide whether modern credit cards and payday loan companies commit usury (I’m inclined to think the latter certainly do), but the point is, the Church considered the changes to the ways economics worked and determined that investment was not the same thing as usury—though she would condemn usury disguised as investment.

It doesn’t always work that way. For example, in 1960, The Pill was invented. It worked differently than the traditional barrier methods of contraception, and people were asking whether that meant it was not contraception. So the Church investigated the question, “Is the pill contraception?” It soon turned out that the answer was yes. It still intended to take the sexual act and frustrate the potential of pregnancy. So Blessed Paul VI issued the encyclical affirming that all contraception was wrong. [†]

These examples are why I am not alarmed when Pope Francis calls for an investigation into an issue (for example, the question of Communion for the divorced and remarried). The fact that a question is asked does not mean that a change will be made. In fact, when it came to the question being raised at a press conference [*], the Pope replied,

Integrating in the Church doesn’t mean receiving communion. I know married Catholics in a second union who go to church, who go to church once or twice a year and say I want communion, as if joining in Communion were an award. It’s a work towards integration, all doors are open, but we cannot say, ‘from here on they can have communion.’ This would be an injury also to marriage, to the couple, because it wouldn’t allow them to proceed on this path of integration. 

For all of the fears and false hopes about the synod of the family changing Church teaching, it turned out that the Pope had no intention to change Church teaching from “X is a sin” to “X is not a sin.” He merely did what Benedict XIV and Blessed Paul VI did—he consulted with theologians to determine if the changing times involved new situations that were not covered by previous documents.

The Cases of Denouncing Recent Teaching from the Church

There are also cases where individual Catholics object to the teaching of the Church in the period from 1958 [When St. John XXIII was elected Pope] to the present, on the grounds that these things contradicted Church teachings from the past. It is argued that these earlier teachings were irreformable and therefore the changes must be heretical. This ranges across many issues. The Vatican II document on religious freedom [§], Blessed Paul VI making changes to the Mass and so on.

In these cases, people overlook the fact that even when the Church teaches on irreformable doctrine, there are elements where the Church is making disciplines which apply to certain times but the successors to the Chair of Peter can change if they determine a single dispensation or an overall change of practice is needed. For example, Benedict XIV ruled, “The Roman Pontiff is above canon law, but any bishop is inferior to that law and consequently cannot modify it.” (Magna nobis #3). Some two hundred years later, Pius XII would point out that when it comes to changing practices, “If it was at one time necessary even for validity by the will and command of the Church, every one knows that the Church has the power to change and abrogate what she herself has established." (Sacramentum Ordinis #3). [∞]

Here’s an example. In 1769, Pope Clement XIV issued a document on avoiding the appearance of simony, and seeking to reduce corruption in the Church. Now the evils of simony and corruption are not something which will change with time. If a member of the clergy demands money for performing a work of the Church, that is always wrong. [∑] However, the things Clement XIV discusses in Decet quam maxime involves all sorts of discussion of what sorts of fees could be collected and by whom. He talks about aureus and obols and junios. Coins were once used in the Papal States, but no longer exist (just try to work out the rate of exchange for an 18th century obol to a modern Euro for example). When a future Pope decides to make changes to the rules set in Decet quam maxime, he will not be changing the teaching of the Church on simony. He’ll simply be applying the teaching of the Church to the conditions that exist in modern times.

This is how changes can happen in the Mass. The Mass is of vital importance to the Catholic. No Pope could abolish the Mass or change the meaning of the Eucharist. But some people confuse the discipline of the Mass with the essence of the Mass. St. Pius V reformed the Mass in 1570, abolishing rites less than 200 years old (Quo Primum). Some Catholics interpret the words of this bull... 

Therefore, no one whosoever is permitted to alter this notice of Our permission, statute, ordinance, command, precept, grant, indult, declaration, will, decree, and prohibition. Would anyone, however, presume to commit such an act, he should know that he will incur the wrath of Almighty God and of the Blessed Apostles Peter and Paul.

…as if it meant that nobody in the Church could make any changes to the Mass. But his successors did make changes to the Mass. Changes were made in 1604 (Clement VIII), 1634 (Urban VIII), 1884 (Leo XIII made official the changes since 1634), 1920 (Benedict XV, completing the work of St. Pius X), 1955 (Pius XII, radically changing the Mass for certain holy days) and 1962 (St. John XXIII, implementing the changes of Pius XII). That’s not even counting the changes between the first century AD to St. Gregory the Great. Basically, it’s a cycle of changes are made, and then the missal is eventually revised to implement all the changes between editions.

The point is, nobody the time understood Quo Primum to mean the Mass was irreformable. The successors of St. Pius V did not consider themselves heretics in making changes. [ø]. The objections that “denied" Blessed Paul VI the right to make changes to the Mass tend to be ignorant of those facts.

A Little Knowledge is Dangerous

That ignorance is ultimately the problem. Both tactics try to create the appearance of a break where there is no break. The appearance of a break only seems to be there if one is not aware of all the facts of the case. The danger comes because the person who does not know all the facts is unaware of the fact that he or she does not know. When a person is aware that they do not know something, they can learn. But when a person is ignorant of the fact that they do not know, it never occurs to them to see what the facts are. Thus they can build elaborate theologies of dissent without ever considering the possibility that they are the ones in error.

The remedy is to stop assuming that one’s personal knowledge and interpretation of Church documents is sufficient to pass judgment on the teaching authority of the Church. When one sees a conflict, the first task is to see if one’s own understanding is correct. The next step is to determine what the truth actually is, and how the Church herself understands the document. Catholic theology is not done in the same way as “the plain sense” that some Protestants ascribe to Scripture. We believe that to understand a Church document, we need to read it in the sense that the Church understands it and not assume that the Pope and the magisterium has somehow forgotten or chose to ignore the older documents.

In the over a quarter century since I first began my studies of Catholic theology, one thing I have learned has stuck with me: Just because one cannot personally find an answer to a seeming conflict does not mean the Church has no answer. Sometimes it has taken me years to find the needed information, but I have always found out that the apparent conflict did not exist when studied. It was that searching that led me to realize that when I haven’t found the right answer yet, the solution was to trust that the Church had an answer which I had not discovered yet.

The reason for this is, instead of trusting in my own knowledge or in the personal holiness and wisdom of the individuals in charge of the Church, I trust that God keeps His promises to protect His Church. I have never been let down in this trust.

_______________________

Digressions

[†] Unfortunately part of the commission issued to study the issue exceeded their mandate and argued “Yes, it’s contraception, but the Church should change her teaching.” They had no right to do this and the Pope was under no obligation to make their abuse into Church teaching.

[*] Literacy and research skills seem to be lacking nowadays when people misinterpret these things. People tend to give full weight to the media rushing to scoop their competitors by sending out quotes without context, and then use those reports to interpret the actual transcripts that are released later when they should be evaluating the reports by the transcripts.

[§] Judging by reactions, people never bothered to read it. Otherwise they would have read the part in Dignitatis Humanae about:

First, the council professes its belief that God Himself has made known to mankind the way in which men are to serve Him, and thus be saved in Christ and come to blessedness. We believe that this one true religion subsists in the Catholic and Apostolic Church, to which the Lord Jesus committed the duty of spreading it abroad among all men. Thus He spoke to the Apostles: “Go, therefore, and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have enjoined upon you” (Matt. 28:19–20). On their part, all men are bound to seek the truth, especially in what concerns God and His Church, and to embrace the truth they come to know, and to hold fast to it. (DH #1)

 

 Catholic Church, “Declaration on Religious Freedom: Dignitatis Humanae,” in Vatican II Documents (Vatican City: Libreria Editrice Vaticana, 2011).

[∞] I have encountered some people who, legalistically, try to limit these documents to only applying to one specific case: the minimum canonical age for marriage (in Magna Nobis) or whether the imposition of hands was enough for ordination (Sacramentum Ordinis). However, in both cases, the Popes assumed that they had the authority to change how Church disciplines were to be applied in a given time.

[∑] I’m of the opinion that Pope Francis’ speaking about eliminating fees for annulments altogether is not just based on avoiding a barrier to getting an annulment but is also based on the concern that some people think of it as “buying” an annulment.

[ø] The principal weakness to the appeal to Quo Primum is that we have had these missals existing uncontested. If the Mass of 1570 was irreformable, then any changes by Popes would have been heretical. Some try to counter this by saying it was the same Mass since the time of St. Gregory the Great (Pope from 590 to 604) but this gnores the existence of valid Masses before his pontificate that had differences in form.

On Considering the Good and Evil Consequences

The thing that troubles me during this election season is seeing how many of us seem to be willing to set aside aside the obligation to discern the right and wrong of an issue. Instead our discernment involves stopping at the point where we find a justification for something we planned to do anyway or else we give only a superficial analysis and ends up overlooking things of importance that might have led us to a different conclusion. In writing this, I don’t intend to make myself the judge of how a specific individual formed their conscience. I only ask that people avoid being careless or otherwise flippant about their moral responsibilities when it comes to voting.

St. Thomas Aquinas once described the purpose of law this way:

Hence this is the first precept of law, that good is to be done and pursued, and evil is to be avoided. All other precepts of the natural law are based upon this: so that whatever the practical reason naturally apprehends as man’s good (or evil) belongs to the precepts of the natural law as something to be done or avoided.

 
Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, I-II q.94 a.2 resp).

The determination of good and evil is not a moral calculus where you decide to give a certain weight to some issues and a lesser weight to other issues. That kind of thinking usually ends up going in the direction the individual tends wants it to go in the first place. That’s rationalization used as a smoke screen because we tend to weigh issues according to our preferences, and not as they stand in God’s eyes.

The real question is whether this issue is good or evil in the eyes of God. Some things are evil by their nature and can never be justified regardless of circumstances. Other actions depend on circumstances and intention to determine whether an action is good or bad. What we need to do is to consider our actions in light of the way we are called to live and is made known to us by the Church. We should always keep in mind what Lumen Gentium said in ¶14:

All the Church’s children should remember that their exalted status is to be attributed not to their own merits but to the special grace of Christ. If they fail moreover to respond to that grace in thought, word and deed, not only shall they not be saved but they will be the more severely judged.

 

Catholic Church, “Dogmatic Constitution on the Church: Lumen Gentium,” in Vatican II Documents (Vatican City: Libreria Editrice Vaticana, 2011).

In other words, because we have a Church established and graced by God, we have no excuse if we live in opposition to what she teaches and claim to be obeying God in doing so. Because of this, we have an obligation to keep the love of God and the teaching of His Church in mind when assessing how to act.

Unfortunately, I think that we, as Catholics, forget this. We tend to approach the selection of our political leaders in terms of partisan preference. Something is considered wrong when it inconveniences us and right when it benefits us. The Church teaching is considered unrealistic or it is cherry picked to select the portions that justify what we were going to do anyway, or it is used to bash the person with a different opinion. That’s not listening and learning. That’s just quote mining.

What we have to do is look at the choices which are available—ALL of them, not just the palatable ones—and consider what we must need to do to remain faithful to Christ. Sometimes that means we have to choose an action that is good even if it costs us. Sometimes it means we have to accept suffering to avoid doing evil. But we must always remember that we may never choose evil so good may come of it. That’s why we should never be reckless or impulsive in choosing what to do.

That’s why the Catholic has to consider the realistic consequences of an action while avoiding putting God to the test. Sure, I could blow a thousand dollars on lottery tickets in the hopes of winning, but that’s not a realistic result and would likely leave me worse off than if I had not spent any money on the lottery in the first place. Trying to invoke God on a gamble is to try to place the responsibility on God where it is not His responsibility to act. If we have faith in God to deliver us from evil, part of the responsibility is to practice prudence so we don’t choose to get into situations that harm us.

If we seek to do good and avoid evil, we will consider the consequences of our actions to the best of our ability and determine whether the consequences of our action help build the Kingdom of God or whether it hinders this building. That means in terms of voting in the elections, we don’t vote our instincts or our politics. We vote with our faith to guide us. This means asking “Why?” Why do we hold to certain preferences? Do we always hold to our moral obligations? Or do we set them aside when it suits us?

I don’t ask this in the gotcha sense of “if you don’t agree with me personally, you’re a bad Christian.” I ask it in the sense of “how sure are you that you are following Christ instead of your own self will?” Self deception is easy. We need to pray that we be delivered from evil.

Quick Quips: "Parvus error in initio magnus erit in fine" Edition

Read more »