Carl E. Olson's Blog, page 72

"In Defense of Sanity... and the Family" | Dale Ahlquist on G.K. Chesterton

Dale Ahlquist, President of the American Chesterton Society, recently sent out this letter:

Dear Chestertonian,

Some time ago, I had the privilege of editing a book called In Defense of Sanity – The Best Essays of G.K. Chesterton. Two distinguished English gentlemen, Joseph Pearce and Aidan Mackey, were joined by this undistinguished and troublesome American, in choosing the so-called “best” essays of Chesterton out of the more than 5,000 that he wrote. While we had no trouble defending the essays we included in the collection, we found ourselves unable to defend the essays that we left out! Fortunately, the book is not about the three of us defending our selections, but rather it is about Chesterton’s defense of all the sane and simple things that are under attack today in our insane modern world.[image error]
 
One of the primary things that Chesterton defends is. . . one of the primary things: the family. We included Chesterton’s classic essay on the institution of the family from his 1905 book Heretics. This is where Chesterton responds to those who attack the family for being  “uncongenial.” The surprising thing is that Chesterton actually agrees that the family is uncongenial, but that is precisely why it is so important. In a family, we have to get along with a group of people we did not choose to live with, which happens to be same situation in our relationship with the rest of the world: “The men and women who, for good reasons and bad, revolt against the family, are, for good reasons and bad, simply revolting against mankind. Aunt Elizabeth is unreasonable, like mankind. Papa is excitable, like mankind. Our youngest brother is mischievous, like mankind. Grandpapa is stupid, like the world; he is old, like the world.”
 
But the revolt against the family has continued for the last one hundred years. Thirty years after Chesterton wrote that essay, he found himself still defending the institution of the family in an essay for the Illustrated London News (an essay that we did not --but could have-- included in the “best” essays collection).
 
He points out that the family is the foundational human institution, more important than the State, more important than the social laws and customs and committees that have developed along with our society. Yet the family is treated with less respect than the any of those other lesser institutions. Even if we occasionally quarrel with the authority or the decisions of those other institutions, we don’t simply dissolve them based on our bad moods. And yet, in spite of the lip service we pay to the ideal of marriage, it seems that whenever a particular marriage hits a rough spot, when one or both spouse loses interest, changes their outlook, loses their desire or finds a different desire, when a marriage descends into pit of despair where husband and wife are uncommunicative, unsupportive, unfaithful, we sigh and say, “Well, it would probably be better if they just split up, so that they can start over.”
 
Chesterton says “Nobody dreams of applying that sort of washy sentiment to any of the other institutions. Nobody says that, so long as the sight of the policeman at the corner of the street still thrills me like the sight of a soldier watching, sword in hand, over the fatherland, so long and no longer I may tolerate the policeman and allow him to regulate the traffic; but if, in some empty and dreary hour, I grow cold towards the policeman, I feel no gush of inspiration at the sight of his boots, I even feel suddenly that I do not like his face - then, all is over between me and the policeman; I no longer recognize his function in the State; I become a philosophic anarchist and he becomes an unintelligible tyrant. Nobody says this; for the obvious reason that Government or the State would never have existed at all, for forty-eight hours, if it was dissolved by any change of emotion or the momentary loss of our purely imaginative appreciation of its value.”
 
Every human institution depends on “some rule of fidelity and continuity, that could be counted on to rise superior to mere moods and emotions.” It applies to the principle of private property as well as public order. If my neighbor loses interest in his garden while I gain interest in it, the garden does not become my possession simply because his admiration for it becomes intermittent while I lie awake thinking about it.
 
And yet, says Chesterton, “The Family is the only institution that is discussed in this senseless sentimental fashion; and, therefore, the Family is the only institution that has very nearly ceased to exist. Those other institutions, those much more official, oppressive, and even tyrannical institutions, do continue to exist. And that is because they have laws and loyalties that are supposed to survive changes of sentiment.”
 
All of Chesterton’s arguments in defense of marriage and the family are as valid and timely as ever. Just as we cannot use sentiment to do away with the institution of marriage with divorce, neither can we use sentiment to alter the institution of marriage by redefining it as a relationship that can exist between members of the same sex. As Chesterton points out, marriage precedes the State; it is a more primary institution than the State and has a more primary authority than the State. In the days ahead we must raise our voices in defense of this primary institution of marriage and prevent that other institution, the State, from collapsing and destroying its own foundations through the triumph of sentiment over reason. 

Dale Ahlquist
President
American Chesterton Society

Go here to learn how you can help support the American Chesterton Society.

And here is a full listing of the Table of Contents of In Defense Of Sanity: The Best Essays of G.K. Chesterton, edited by Dale Ahlquist, Joseph Pearce, and Aidan Mackey.

The Political Vision of J.R.R. Tolkien: CWR Interview with Dr. Jay W. Richards

The Political Vision of J.R.R. Tolkien | CWR Staff | Catholic World Report

The author of The Hobbit, says Dr. Jay W. Richards, "didn’t like concentrated political power, even when it could seem to be justified for noble purposes."

Dr. Jay W. Richards is co-author, with Dr. Jonathan Witt, of the new book, The Hobbit Party: The Vision of Freedom That Tolkien Got, and the West Forgot, published recently by Ignatius Press.Richards is Assistant Research Professor in the School of Business and Economics at The Catholic University of America, a Senior Fellow at the Discovery Institute, and Executive Editor of The Stream. He is author and co-author of several books, including the New York Times bestsellers Infiltrated and Indivisible, as well as Money, Greed, and God, The Privileged Planet and The Untamed God.

The Hobbit Party is a detailed study of the political principles and philosophy of J.R.R. Tolkien, focusing on how the famed author's beliefs about liberty and limited government shaped his work and grew directly from his theological vision of man and creation. “Richards and Witt have opened up an often ignored aspect of Tolkien's work,” states Dr. Thomas Howard, “namely the sense in which his myth bespeaks a political and economic order that stands in stark, even violent, contrast to the presiding power structures that dominate this unhappy globe. It should be made required reading in all courses in political philosophy.”

Richards recently answered several questions by CWR editor Carl E. Olson about The Hobbit Party, Tolkien, Western civilization, political philosophy, and Catholic social teadching.

CWR: Why have Tolkien's insights into political philosophy and related matters gone mostly unnoticed or ignored?

Richards: I wouldn’t say they’ve been ignored. There have been articles and chapters of books over the years discussing Tolkien’s political views. Unfortunately, he’s sometimes been called into the service of ideas (from environmentalism to Marxism) that he would have abhorred. This is possible because Tolkien is a rich and subtle thinker who can easily be misunderstood. Every interpreter is tempted to remake Tolkien in his or her own image. Our goal in The Hobbit Party is to provide a sustained treatment of Tolkien’s political and economic ideas on their own terms, and to correct some of the false readings of them. Tolkien insisted that his books were not allegorical, but he did allow that they had applicability to such questions.

CWR: There are many readers who refuse to acknowledge or pay attention to Tolkien's Catholic understanding of, well, everything. Why is that? How best to change the minds of such readers?

Continue reading at www.CatholicWorldReport.com.

New: "Catholic Literary Giants: A Field Guide to the Catholic Literary Landscape"

Now available from Ignatius Press:

Catholic Literary Giants: A Field Guide to the Catholic Literary Landscape

by Joseph Pearce

In Catholic Literary Giants, Joseph Pearce takes the reader on a dazzling tour of the creative landscape of Catholic prose and poetry. Covering the vast and impressive terrain from Dante to Tolkien, from Shakespeare to Waugh, this book is an immersion into the spiritual depths of the Catholic literary tradition with one of today's premier literary biographers as our guide.

Focusing especially on the literary revival of the twentieth century, Pearce explores well-known authors such as G.K. Chesterton, Graham Greene and J.R.R. Tolkien, while introducing lesser-known writers Roy Campbell, Maurice Baring, Owen Barfield and others. He even includes the new saint, Pope John Paul II, who wrote many literary and poetic pieces, among them the story that was made into a feature film, The Jeweler's Shop.

Joseph Pearce is the author of numerous literary works including Literary Converts, The Quest for Shakespeare and Shakespeare on Love, and the editor of the Ignatius Critical Editions series. His other books include literary biographies of Oscar Wilde, J.R.R. Tolkien, C. S. Lewis, G. K. Chesterton and Alexander Solzhenitsyn.

Praise for Catholic Literary Giants:

"In the years to come, Joseph Pearce will himself be better known as one of the literary giants of our times. Wisdom, wit, insight, original thought—it is all here. Pearce is more than an educated intellect. He is a mind awake."
— Michael D. O'Brien, Author, Father Elijah

"One is agog at the sheer 'achieve of the thing', as G.M. Hopkins would put it. Mr. Pearce covers the entire waterfront and more here. We have come to expect vastly astute, fair, generous and perspicacious work from Pearce, and this book crowns everything that he has written thus far."
— Thomas Howard, Author, Dove Descending: A Journey into T.S. Eliot's "Four Quartets"

"Pearce has woven a fascinating tapestry of literary criticism, history and ancient faith. It is very good to see the Catholic literary giants emerge from the shadows."
— Dale Ahlquist, President, American Chesterton Society

This book was previously published in hardcover under the title Literary Giants, Literary Catholics.

What is Culture War?

Left: Pro-life demonstrators gather outside the U.S. Supreme Court in Washington June 26, 2014 (CNS photo/Jim Bourg, Reuters); right: Eastside Catholic High School (Seattle) students display signs during a rally in December 2013. (CNS photo/David Ryder, Reuters)

What is Culture War? | James Kalb | CWR

The need for a sacred focus makes culture war inevitable when there are enough people who disagree strongly on the exact nature of that focus

A culture is a way of living, a system of habit and attitude, an orientation toward life and the world, that is shared and basically taken for granted within a community. It arises naturally when people live together, since we are social beings who need common habits and understandings to live together happily and productively.

That makes the idea of a “culture war” seem rather odd. How can there be a war over what is shared, habitual, taken for granted, and basic to social functioning?

The answer, of course, is that nothing human is automatic. Culture involves difference as well as agreement. Any moderately complex society has regional, class, and occupational variations. It has city people who differ from country people, and often migrants from elsewhere.

Most cultural differences reflect the fact that people live somewhat separately, a situation that reduces practical problems. When they do arise, something usually gets worked out through assimilation, accommodation, and sometimes mutual avoidance. A functional society is in everyone’s interest, so people normally adopt habits and understandings that keep their dealings reasonably amicable. Such things might involve standards like taking responsibility for one’s own, dodges like avoiding “hot button” issues in company, or acceptance that people differ in their virtues and vices, and find somewhat different ways to a good life.

A culture war arises when such habits and understandings break down, so that people constantly offend each other, points of contention cannot be negotiated, the limits of toleration are reached, and the society ends up in what amounts to a low-level civil war. Usually that happens when a new outlook and way of life arrives that’s at odds with the old on basic issues regarding what life is about and how we should live.

Culture pervades every aspect of human life, including our deepest concerns. Every culture has an orientation determined by basic commitments and views on what is most important and therefore sacred. A society needs to hold such things in common if it is to survive and remain functional in times of stress.

Continue reading at www.CatholicWorldReport.com.

The Freshest Love Story This Season Isn’t a Romance

The Freshest Love Story This Season Isn’t a Romance | IPNovels.com

Roger Thomas talks about sex, love, commitment, and his new novel, "The Accidental Marriage"

In the wake of theExtraordinary Synod on the Family, there has been a renewed interest in talking about marriage and family—especially marriages and families that are in irregular situations. In Roger Thomas’s new novel, The Accidental Marriage, he traces a coupling that follows a highly irregular path.

Scott and Megan are both involved in separate same-sex relationships. When Megan and her lover decide to have a child, Scott offers to help. But after Megan is abandoned, Scott comes up with an unconventional plan to help her in her time of need. As the two begin to mutually sacrifice their own desires to help one another, their friendship deepens.

Ignatius Press Novels talked with Roger via e-mail. You can find a previous interview with him here.

You’ve described your book as being a love story, not a romance. What’s the difference?

Thomas: There are many types of love, a topic covered masterfully in the classic The Four Loves, by C.S. Lewis. Romantic love, eros, is only one of them. There are also friendship, familial love, the kind of camaraderie that’s found when people are thrown together for a purpose, such as being shipmates. In The Accidental Marriage, the foremost type of love exhibited is friendship. This leads Scott and Megan to do some interesting things, some of which aren’t normally part of a friendship, but all that arises from the assumptions they’re making about the nature of life and human relationships. But the love they have is genuine, and ends up demanding a lot from both of them, even if it doesn’t fit the cultural concept of “being in love”.

Romance novels are immensely popular, including among Catholics and Christians. Some of these books, such as Fifty Shades of Grey, are obviously problematic for a whole host of reasons. But even more “chaste” romance novels and movies carry messages of “one true love” that seems to emphasize emotional satisfaction over a more sacrificial understanding of relationships. What ideas from this genre are ones that you think are harmful?

Thomas: I recently learned that there’s a whole sub-genre of books, mostly published by Christian publishing houses, known in the trade as “bonnet fiction”. These are romances set either a few generations back, or somewhere like Amish country, and thus are free of any hint of modern licentiousness. But even without any sexually explicit material, there’s still a danger to these stories. I remember being amazed when, a few decades ago, I was at a conference and a woman minister stated that romance novels can fill the same role for some women as pornography does for men. I asked my wife and she confirmed it, pointing out that even though the images are verbal instead of visual, the function is the same: creating false images to distract people from the reality they have to deal with in everyday life. Today there are lines of romance novels that have incorporated sexually explicit content, becoming in effect soft core pornography. But I think the core allure remains the same, whether the characters are wearing bonnets or nothing: the creation of a false reality in which the readers can live and indulge in fantasies about people and how they react.

Let me give an example. I’ve not read the Fifty Shades books and don’t intend to, but from the plot synopses they seem like a variation of a common theme in romance novels, the “Beauty and the Beast” motif. In these, there is some troubled man who just needs the love of a good woman to redeem him from himself. The man is often shown as having a beastly side and a noble side, and may have had very immoral relationships with other women, but in the story, by virtue of True Love, the heroine manages to eventually appeal to his noble side, even if she has to accommodate his beastly side along the way.

This theme represents a false understanding of human nature. I am a man who has dealt with men all my life. There’s a certain accuracy to the idea that we have a beastly side and a noble side, but I can assure all woman that the way to help us men isn’t by accommodating our beastly appetites. If a man finds a woman who’ll meet him on his beastly side, he will not be helped by that woman – instead he will drag her down to his beastliness. Women can help men, but by appealing to their noble instincts, by calling them away from their beastliness and into the responsibility and sacrificial love they were made to express.

This is where The Accidental Marriage differs. It isn’t a romance; Megan doesn’t set out to “redeem” Scott in any way. They’re two friends thrown together by circumstances which force Scott especially to step up to responsibility and duty in a way he has never had to before. Scott responds from his noble side, but the only pressure he feels is internal. In this, I’ve hoped to create a story that reflects how people actually are, rather than how we’d like them to be.

At the recent Extraordinary Synod on the Family, there was much controversy and discussion about some of the proposals regarding same-sex couples, divorced and remarried couples, and persons with same-sex attraction. Some critics believed these proposals showed a preoccupation with the symptoms of what is a deeper underlying problem—to quote the authors of the recent Ignatius Press book The Gospel of the Family: “If there is a pandemic, either you attack the hotbed of the infection or else any treatment will be useless.” What do you think the underlying problem is?

Continue reading at www.IPNovels.com.

How would Bilbo vote?

Co-authors provide insights into J.R.R. Tolkien’s political views in time for the midterm elections

SAN FRANCISCO, Oct. 28, 2014 – The midterm elections andthe final installment of The Hobbit film trilogy are just around the corner. It’s past time somebody asked the burning question: How would Bilbo Baggins vote? For the uninitiated, Bilbo is the title character of the J.R.R. Tolkien novel behind the films, and most people’s introduction to The Lord of the Rings, the grand sequel to The Hobbit.

To understand Bilbo, we need look no further than his creator, J.R.R. Tolkien. The clues are not only in Tolkien’s collected letters, but also in the novels themselves.

Bilbo’s nephew, Frodo, is a proponent of nonviolence near the end of The Lord of the Rings. Plus, Tolkien loved trees and detested the ugly side of industrialism. Surely if the Oxford don were alive today, the thinking goes, he would be a Prius-driving, organic smoothie-drinking, COEXIST bumper sticker-sporting liberal. Wouldn’t he?

But wait. What of all the stuff in his work about honor, chivalry, family, battlefield courage and moral absolutes? Focusing on this, some on the left have concluded that, no, Tolkien must have been an old-fashioned dead white male conservative.

Both views can’t be right. Is the truth somewhere in the middle? Was Tolkien a soft-edged moderate? Tolkien was a moderate beer drinker. He was a moderately good rugby player as a boy. But there was nothing moderate about his political views.

In the recently released THE HOBBIT PARTY: The Vision of Freedom That Tolkien Got, and The West Forgot, coauthors Dr. Jay Richards, a Catholic, and Dr. Jonathan Witt, an Evangelical Christian, show how Tolkien’s Middle-Earth novels championed liberty, trade and limited government, key issues in the upcoming midterm elections. They believe Tolkien’s novels of Middle-Earth draw us a map to freedom and liberty, and that perhaps brushing up on our Tolkien lore can help us prepare for this midterm election vote.

For more information, to request a review copy, or to schedule an interview with Jay Richards and/or Jonathan Witt, please contact Kevin Wandra (404-788-1276 or KWandra@CarmelCommunications.com) of Carmel Communications.     

CRUX's "spirituality columnist" slanders orthodox Catholics as "bigots"

CRUX's "spirituality columnist" slanders orthodox Catholics as "bigots" | Carl E. Olson | CWR blog

Margery Eagan "prays" that Francis will get rid of "anti-gay bigots". Here are 6 problems with her "arguments".

"Not only is it wrong to take the life of another, but it is also wrong to bestow the poison of anger upon him, strike him with slander, and speak ill of him." — Pope Francis, Angelus, Feb. 16, 2014

Margery Eagan, the "spirituality columnist" for the CRUX site, recently wrote a column, "My prayer: That Francis prevails over the bigots within the Church" (Oct 21), in which she uses a broad and sloppy brush to attack those Catholics who, in short, uphold Church teaching regarding the true nature of homosexual inclinations ("objectively disordered"—CCC, 2358) and homosexual acts ("grave depravity"—CCC, 2357). What is especially interesting to me are two things: the faulty assumptions and misleading arguments she uses and the apparent (if tacit) approval of the hierarchy at CRUX.

First, the assumptions and "arguments:

1). That the controversy over the passage in the "Relatio post disceptationem" was about being nice to homosexuals: "Nothing like the prospect of the Catholic Church 'welcoming' gays to cause hysteria in conservative ranks." This is nonsense. The problem was with the fuzzy language in the midsession repport suggesting that having an inclination toward homosexuality was somehow a positive and morally good thing:

Homosexuals have gifts and qualities to offer to the Christian community: are we capable of welcoming these people, guaranteeing to them a fraternal space in our communities? Often they wish to encounter a Church that offers them a welcoming home. Are our communities capable of providing that, accepting and valuing their sexual orientation, without compromising Catholic doctrine on the family and matrimony? ...  Without denying the moral problems connected to homosexual unions it has to be noted that there are cases in which mutual aid to the point of sacrifice constitutes a precious support in the life of the partners.

If we are to "value" the homosexual orientation, then what to do with the teaching that such inclination is disordered? Ignore it? Cut it out? If so, should we also expect to rexamine Church teaching about adultery and fornication? Pornography, masturbation, and cohabitation? And what of polygamy and those who might have an orientation to a "swinging" lifestyle? What gifts might such people bring into the Church solely because of their orientations? No reasonable person denies that every sinner has gifts and abilities. What puzzled and upset so many was the suggestion that the flawed orientation and even sinful actions somehow provide gifts and graces.

2). That there are only two possible approaches to those identifying as homosexual: complete and total acceptance of the orientation and lifestyle (that is, a celebration of the Reign of Gay), or homophobic hatred, bigotry, and intolerance on every level and in ever possible way. This is clearly the intention of Eagan's cherrypicking of certain anti-homosexual comments, as if comboxes are equal to the thoughtful and principled approaches to the topic that good Catholics have written. But, of course, this is how the Reign of Gay works: either bow and celebrate, or be damned to the darkened fringes of society. The truly Catholic option is the one that so many (although not all) homosexuals despise: love the sinner, hate the sin. Eagan, however, will have none of it.

3). The sloppy attempt to equate homosexuality with a morally upright cause:

Continue reading on the CWR blog.

Surprising Lessons from Ten Million YouTube Views

Surprising Lessons from Ten Million YouTube Views | Fr. Robert Barron | CWR blog

The printing press constituted a revolution, and something very similar, but even more explosive, is at work today

Just last month, my media ministry Word on Fire marked a milestone: 10,000,000 views on our YouTube channel. This achievement fills me with gratitude both to God and to the many people who have taken the time to watch one or more of the videos that I’ve produced over the past several years. It also provides the occasion for me to reflect a bit on both the pitfalls and advantages of evangelizing through the new media.

When we commenced our outreach through YouTube seven years ago, we did so in the manner of an experiment. YouTube had just come into being at that time, and it largely featured crude, homemade videos of cats jumping off the roof and babies gurgling for their mother’s camcorder. I thought that we should try to invade this space with the Gospel and so I resolved to make short video commentaries on movies, music, current affairs, cultural happenings, etc. We had absolutely no idea whether anyone would watch, and at first, our offerings garnered just a small audience. I distinctly remember being thrilled when one of our videos managed to pass the 500 views mark for the first time.

But over the months and years, word spread, and we began to build an audience. The first video of ours to go viral was my response to Bill Maher’s awful movie “Religulous.” In the course of a few weeks, it had been seen by 100,000 people, and it continues to perform well, even to the present. In fact, the atheists have been my most active friends on the Internet. Whenever I do a video on Maher or Christopher Hitchens or Richard Dawkins or Stephen Hawking, I get a strong reaction and lots of views.

One of the features of YouTube that I appreciate the most is its interactivity.

Continue reading on the CWR blog.

Hear, hear! Love of God and love of neighbor

"Jesus Walks in the Portico of Solomon" by James Tissot (1836-1902) [WikiArt.org]

A Scriptural Reflection on the Readings for Sunday, October 26, 2014  | Carl E. Olson

Readings:
• Ex 22:20-26
• Ps 18:2-3, 3-4, 47, 51
• 1 Thess 1:5c-10
• Mt 22:34-40

The “Shema” is the core Jewish declaration of faith, joining the statement, “Hear [shema], O Israel! The Lord is our God, the Lord alone!”, with other passages about the unity and uniqueness of God (Dt 6:4-9; 11:13-21; Num 15:37-41). The whole of the Shema, notes Jacob Neusner in Judaism: An Introduction (Penguin, 2002), “constitutes the creed of the Jewish faith.

The three elements of the Shema cover Creation, revelation and redemption, that is to say, God as creator of the world, God as revealer of the Torah and God as redeemer of Israel.”

Observant Jews have long recited the Shema each morning and evening. It was certainly well known to Jesus, who would have prayed it regularly. So when Jesus was tested by a scholar of the law with the question, “Teacher, which commandment in the law is the greatest?”, it wasn’t surprising he drew from the Shema, replying, “You shall love the Lord, your God, with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the greatest and the first commandment.” Those listening would not have quibbled with his statement; it was a common view among Jewish rabbis of the time. The identity of Israel and the core of Judaism were rooted in the uniqueness of God, his covenants and gift of the Torah, and his selection of the Jews as his chosen people. To be a Jew meant loving and fearing God, and therefore keeping his commandments (Dt 5:29).

What was distinctive about Jesus’ response was his subsequent remark: “The second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. The whole law and the prophets depend on these two commandments.” This likely turned some heads! “The whole law? Really?” This was startling. Rather than simply noting that loving one’s neighbor is part of the Law, Jesus declared it to be intimately bound up with one’s love for God.

The two can be distinguished, of course, but they cannot be separated. They are two foundations upon which true religion and authentic morality are established.

This is a good example of how Jesus, an observant Jew, deepened and transformed the teachings of the Law and prophets, but without doing violence to them. Or, as Pope Benedict XVI wrote in the introduction to “Deus Caritas Est” (“God is Love”), his first encyclical: “In acknowledging the centrality of love, Christian faith has retained the core of Israel's faith, while at the same time giving it new depth and breadth.” Jesus, the Holy Father notes, “united into a single precept this commandment of love for God and the commandment of love for neighbour…”

No longer is love merely a “command”, but the response given by man to God’s free gift of love. Yet, at the same time, love is the new commandment, as Jesus explained to his disciples in the upper room: “I give you a new commandment: love one another. As I have loved you, so you also should love one another. This is how all will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another” (Jn 13:34-35; see Catechism, par 1823). The essential difference is the person of Jesus Christ who is creator, the giver of the new Law, and the sole redeemer of mankind. He is the uncreated Son of God who through his death and resurrection offers to make us new creations, filled by the Holy Spirit with divine life and love (Gal 6:15; 3:26; 4:4-7).

This radical love distinguished the early Christians from their neighbors; it was not reliant on ethnicity, based in citizenship, or founded upon social status. It came from the love for God gifted to man by the God-man. Because of this love, wrote the Apostle Paul to the Thessalonians, “the word of the Lord has sounded forth” from Christ’s disciples. The Shema declared, “Hear, O Israel! The Lord is our God”; the gospel further declared, “Hear, O world! Jesus Christ is Lord and God!”

(This "Opening the Word" column originally appeared in the October 23, 2011, edition of Our Sunday Visitor newspaper.)

A Tale of Two Synods

(CNS photo/Paul Haring)

A Tale of Two Synods | Fr. D. Vincent Twomey, SVD | CWR

In a sense, there were two synods taking place earlier this month, one inside the Synod Hall and the other in the media

Last Saturday, the synod closed with the voting on the final report and with a final address by the Pope, which was greeted with a prolonged standing ovation. The week of high drama ended with a great sigh of relief: schism, which seemed imminent, had been avoided.

On most issues, a near unanimity had been established. The final report, with the exception of three paragraphs out of 62, had been approved by an overwhelming majority. The report is a impressive document, considering that is was the product not just of one but of several committees. Even more impressive was the closing message from the synod fathers to families, which is almost poetic at times. It is Franciscan in tone. Both it and the main content of the final report were almost totally ignored by the media.

Instead, the secular media highlighted the three paragraphs that did not achieve the required two thirds majority: in particular, the one dealing with same-sex relations (number 55). Some media coverage gave the impression that the extraordinary synod was primarily devoted same-sex relations. The one paragraph that did mention the topic rejected discrimination, as could be expected, and rightly called for sensitivity in dealing with persons in such relationships, but it also reiterated Church teaching on the matter, including the rejection of any attempt to equate same-sex unions even remotely with marriage.

What the media ignored was paragraph 56, which was approved by an overwhelming majority. It rejected, in effect, the attempt to intimidate Church pastors with regard to this question, as well as taking international organisations to task for linking aid to poor countries with legislation for so-called “marriage” of people of the same sex.

In a sense, there were two synods taking place over the past week, one inside the Synod Hall and the other in the media. And the media, whether secular or Catholic, cannot be entirely blamed for this. They had to interpret the selectively leaked information from what should have been an open synod – and naturally each side chose whatever fitted their own particular agenda or concern. Catholicism and sex is a heady mixture that fascinates the western media.

Media coverage can be like a hall of distorting mirrors.

Continue reading at www.CatholicWorldReport.com.