Lin Wilder's Blog, page 18

Newman Centers- Lighthouses of Grace

Illustration of an old stone lighthouse at night during a winter storm. Newman Centers- lighthouses of graceNewman Centers-Lighthouses of grace

“My name is Matthew, and I am a senior at Cal Poly. Four years ago, when I arrived at the college, I found the ‘freedom’ of being away from home intoxicating…too much so, in fact.” Newman centers-lighthouses of grace.

The good-looking Hispanic young man looked out at the parishioners at St. Patrick’s Church in Arroyo Grande California. And then he explained, “In my family, the church was a Sunday morning event without any impact on the rest of the week. We talked about ‘Church,’ never about Jesus. It was at the Newman Center where I first encountered Christ. There, I have developed the strength to thwart the merciless pounding of the world about sex, abortion, alcohol, and drugs. At the Newman Center, we have begun weekly student chastity and pro-life discussion groups…One of my favorite Pope Francis quotes is the one he uses to describe our church as a ‘field hospital.’ “

I was not the only listener who was transfixed by this young man. We were riveted by Matthew’s frank and faith-filled counter-cultural story. The college senior credits the two priests who serve at the Cal Poly and Cuesta College Newman Center, Fathers John and Kevin, as the catalysts for life now back on track as a devout Catholic and the Newman Center for his development of an intimate relationship with Christ. 

I’ve written before about my grief on learning of the destruction of the classics by pseudo-intellectual faculty in a distressingly vast array of colleges and ivy-league universities. Matthew’s graphic “merciless pounding of the world about sex, abortion, alcohol, and drugs is amplified by radically Marxist faculty and can make us feel sad and angry.

And yet, Over 1000 college campuses have Newman Centers-Lighthouses of grace battling the secular storms cloaking our colleges.

Young men like Matthew show us that God will find a way to get through to those who are open to truth.

Could there be a better guide than St. John Henry Cardinal Newman?

Newman Centers were started in American Universities during the late 1800s.

St. John Henry Cardinal Newman was at the height of his academic success at Anglican, Catholic intolerant, Oxford University England, when he became a “papist.” A primary spokesman for the Oxford Movement of the Anglican Church, Newman’s study of church history convinced him that the true home of Christianity was the Roman Catholic Church. Two weeks after he published a document that argued the main doctrinal bases of the Anglican Church, could be interpreted in a way that supported the Roman Catholic Church., it was censured.

John Henry Newman’s conversion to Roman Catholicism ignited a storm of controversy and derision among his former colleagues. And cost him his entire career.

“Nothing is more common than for men to think that because they are familiar with words they understand the ideas they stand for.”“Alas! It was my portion for whole years to remain without satisfactory basis for my religious profession, in a state of moral sickness, neither able to acquiese to Anglicanism nor go to Rome. But I bore it, till in course of time, my way was made clear to me.”“To be deep in history, is to cease to be Protestant.”“We can believe what we choose. We are answerable for what we choose to believe.”“It is as absurd to argue men, as to torture them, into believing.”“Knowledge, the discipline by which it is gained, and the tastes which it forms, have a natural tendency to refine the mind, and to give it an indisposition, simply natural, yet real, nay more than this, a disgust and abhorrence, towards excesses and enormities of evil, which are often or ordinarily reached at length by those who do not from the first set themselves against what is vicious and criminal.”

When he was offered an opportunity to found a Catholic university in Ireland. Newman jumped at it because education had always been “his line.” His book, The Idea of a University remains a classic. In it he explains that the purpose of a university is liberal education.

By that phrase, however, Newman means, the cultivation of mind, “which enables a person “to have a connected view or grasp of things” and which manifests itself in “good sense, sobriety of thought, reasonableness, candour, self-command, and steadiness of view.”  It is “the force, the steadiness, the comprehensiveness and the versatility of intellect, the command over our own powers, the instinctive just estimate of things as they pass before us” that is the object of a liberal education…” Newman Centers- Lighthouses of Grace

When John Henry Newman was elevated to Cardinal, bypassing Bishop,

he was filled with “profound wonder and gratitude” at the decision of Pope Leo Xlll. In the Biglietto Speech, Newman wrote that unlike the saints, his writings had been filled with error. And yet he had been wholly dedicated to opposition of the “one great mischief: liberalism in religion.” Newman centers-lighthouses of grace.

Newman spent his life at Oxford and witnessed the decline into liberalism by faculty who considered themselves superior. Beginning with honest zeal, these men ‘reformed” Oxford, while falling victim to the “pride of reason.”

“Liberalism in religion is the doctrine that there is no positive truth in religion, but that one creed is as good as another, and this is the teaching which is gaining substance and force daily. It is inconsistent with any recognition of any religion, as true. It teaches that all are to be tolerated, for all are matters of opinion.

Revealed religion is not a truth, but a sentiment and a taste; not an objective fact, not miraculous; and it is the right of each individual to make it say just what strikes his fancy. Devotion is not necessarily founded on faith…it must be borne in mind, that there is much in the liberalistic theory which is good and true; for example, not to say more, the precepts of justice, truthfulness, sobriety, self-command, benevolence, which, as I have already noted, are among its avowed principles, and the natural laws of society.

It is not till we find that this array of principles is intended to supersede, to block out, religion, that we pronounce it to be evil. There never was a device of the Enemy so cleverly framed and with such promise of success.”

Asked to write more about his defintion of liberalism, Newman explained further:

Now by Liberalism I mean false liberty of thought, or the exercise of thought upon matters, in which, from the constitution of the human mind, thought cannot be brought to any successful issue, and therefore is out of place. Among such matters are first principles of whatever kind; and of these the most sacred and momentous are especially to be reckoned the truths of Revelation. Liberalism then is the mistake of subjecting to human judgment those revealed doctrines which are in their nature beyond and independent of it, and of claiming to determine on intrinsic grounds the truth and value of propositions which rest for their reception simply on the external authority of the Divine Word.

Newman wrote these words in the mid-nineteenth century. Newman Centers- Lighthouses of Grace in Secular Education.

October 9th was St. John Cardinal Newman’s feast day

Controversy about Newman extended into his canonization. Newman’s elucidation of the doctrine of papal infallibility caused consternation about his beatification by Pope Benedict on October 9, 2010, the day he became a Roman Catholic in 1847.

“Too argumentative”, “contentious” argued those opposed to Newman’s beatification. Using his limitations on papal infallibility by conscience as examples of Newman’s polemics.

“Was St. Peter infallible on that occasion at Antioch when St. Paul withstood him? ….or Sextus V when he blessed the Armada? or Urban VIII when he persecuted Galileo?  No Catholic ever pretends that these Popes were infallible in these acts.  Since then infallibility alone could block the exercise of conscience, and the Pope is not infallible in that subject-matter in which conscience is of supreme authority, no dead-lock, such as implied in the objection which I am answering, can take place between conscience and the Pope.” Newman Centers-Lighthouses of grace.

Newman reminds us of the exalted role of conscience in discerning truth: “Thus conscience, the existence of which we cannot deny, is a proof of the doctrine of a Moral Governor, which alone gives it a meaning and a scope; that is, the doctrine of a Judge and judgment to come is a development of the phenomenon of conscience…”

While in a 1947 German seminary, Joseph Ratzinger, the future Pope Benedict, found in Newman, a theology of conscience.

We had experienced the claim of a totalitarian party, which understood itself as the fulfilment of history and which negated the conscience of the individual. One of its leaders had said: “I have no conscience. My conscience is Adolf Hitler”. The appalling devastation of humanity that followed was before our eyes.

So it was liberating and essential for us to know that the “we” of the Church does not rest on a cancellation of conscience, but that, exactly the opposite, it can only develop from conscience.

Precisely because Newman interpreted the existence of the human being from conscience, that is, from the relationship between God and the soul, was it clear that this personalism is not individualism, and that being bound by conscience does not mean being free to make random choices — the exact opposite is the case.

The Theology of Cardinal Newman

This piece has barely touched the vast collections of the writings from the giant intellect of St. John Henry Cardinal Newman. Before I wrote it I thought I’d appreciated the gift we’ve been given. But as always, upon peeling back this, or any onion of wisdom, we see the enormity of what lies beneath. And understand we can never plumb its depths.

Newman Centers- Lighthouses of Grace

It was at the Newman Center where I first encountered Christ. There, I have developed the strength to thwart the merciless pounding of the world about sex, abortion, alcohol, and drugs. At the Newman Center, we have begun weekly student chastity and pro-life discussion groups…One of my favorite Pope Francis quotes is the one he uses to describe our church as a ‘field hospital.’ “

Newman Centers- Lighthouses of Grace

The post Newman Centers- Lighthouses of Grace appeared first on Lin Wilder.

Be Safe and Be Holy

hand in blue rubber glove holding blue microfiber cleaning cloth and spray bottle with sterilizing solution make cleaning and disinfection for good hygieneBe Safe and be holy

My friend Meg’s salutation on the update of her life I requested since we last spoke keeps ringing in my head: “Be safe and be holy.” That phrase, “Be safe,” has become endemic since the arrival of the corona virus and, to me, connotes the obsessive cleaning, masking and endless governmental mandates of the last three years.

Because I was mired in all the “c” stuff of her “be safe” phrase, her conjunction of safety with holiness didn’t make sense at first. Hence I replied to her FB message update this way: “The gap between safety and holiness seems very wide, maybe we must choose be safe or be holy?”

But then I thought of who Meg is. Throughout the many changes in her life, some difficult, painful and not of her choosing, I know her as implacably Christocentric. Without question, all things, events and people revolve about Christ, He is her anchor. And so I decided that Meg meant exactly what she said.

Because her phrase is so evocative, I put the piece I’d intended for today on hold for next week.

“Be safe and be holy,” my friend prays, because she knows that holiness is the only path to safety. All others are, at best, illusory, at worst, deception from the trickster, Satan. A recent Pauline reading in the Divine Office reminds us that we live in “later times— in the age of “plausible liars” [the St. Paul inspired title of my new novel:]

“The Spirit distinctly says that in later times some will turn away from the faith and will heed deceitful spirits and things taught by demons through plausible liars—men with seared consciences who forbid marriage and require abstinence from foods which God created to be received with thanksgiving by believers who know the truth.”

Everywhere we turn are the effects of people with seared consciences turning away from the faith to implement demonically inspired programs and policies. We’ve not yet reached the “requiring abstinence from foods God created to be received with thanksgiving.” But it may be close. A top “influencer/controller” of our culture has been opposed to the eating of meat for a very long time.

Regardless, “Be safe and be holy” is axiomatic for Christians universally.

Meg’s phrase cuts through “do we have a right to aim for holiness?”

I’m guessing your brain landed in the same place as mine: “I’m not holy!”

Or, “I’m weak, filled with doubts and flaws. How do I go about being holy?”

And then there’s, “There was only one holy person, Mary, the mother of God.”

As I think about personal holiness and look around at our world, the people in it—including, maybe especially, our politicians, I know: There’s only one answer: we’ve no other option. We’ve got to beg for the grace to become saints.

I know. Believe me I know all the reasons that this sounds audacious, presumptuous and downright terrifying. In the past, I’ve heard from far holier souls than mine, “I’m hoping I can just make it into Purgatory.” Or very holy women sharing powerful experiences in prayer and then diluting them with, “But I know I’m no saint!”

But here’s the thing. Actually, several things.

We’re chosen to be holy! St Paul exhorts the Ephesians and us{ “As he chose us in him, before the foundation of the world, to be holy and without blemish before him. In love he destined us for adoption to himself through Jesus Christ,in accord with the favor of his will.”Our main purpose in marriage is the sanctification of one another.Over and over we are told, “Ask and you shall receive.” Be not timid but persistent.Our citizenship isn’t here but elsewhere. “Consequently, you are no longer foreigners and strangers, but fellow citizens with God’s people and also members of his household, built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus himself as the chief cornerstone. In him the whole building is joined together and rises to become a holy temple in the Lord. And in him you too are being built together to become a dwelling in which God lives by his Spirit.”To Saint Faustina, He said,” “’Oh how much I am hurt by a soul’s distrust! Such a soul professes that I am Holy and Just, but does not believe that I am Mercy and does not trust in My Goodness. Even the devils believe in My Justice, but do not glorify My Goodness. My Heart rejoices in this title of Mercy.’”God calls us by name, Satan by our sins.It was just a few weeks ago that I wrote about St. Paul’s exhortation to Timothy,

but the actions of some of us are so crazed that a repeat is warranted. This time in even more detail, thanks to Dr. Brad Pitre. We’re speaking here of St. Paul’s exhortations to young Timothy about how Christians are to pray. Here’s that passage again:

“First of all, then, I ask that supplications, prayers, petitions, and thanksgivings be offered for everyone, for kings and for all in authority, that we may lead a quiet and tranquil life in all devotion and dignity. This is good and pleasing to God our savior, who wills everyone to be saved and to come to knowledge of the truth.”

Dr. Brant Pitre

Immersing us in the culture of the first century, Dr. Pitre observes that Nero, Calligua, and their cohorts-“These were not nice people!”

And yet Paul is teaching Timothy not only to intercede for them in prayer but to give thanks for them. And just as importantly, to live respectfully in their pagan culture.

Why?

Because God desires that all be saved and come to the knowledge of the truth. We are to intercede for all—believers and non, for that’s what Christians are to do.

We know, don’t we, that He can work through us only if we’re persitent in climbing the ladder of perfection.

Right, perfection. “Be perfect as your Father in heaven is perfect.”

Undeterred by our flaws, failures and weaknesses. Confident that despite our wretchedness, we expect everything promised to us by Jesus. He came to save the sick, each and every one of us.

We have our marching orders, we soldiers of Christ.

On cultures: Christopher Dawson:

From what source did humankind’s many cultures arise? Why, from cults. A cult is a joining together for worship—that is, the attempt of people to commune with a transcendent power. It is from association in the cult, the body of worshipers, that community grows…. Once people are joined in a cult, cooperation in many other things becomes possible. Common defense, irrigation, systematic agriculture, architecture, the visual arts, music, the more intricate crafts, economic production and distribution, courts and government—all these aspects of a culture arise gradually from the cult, the religious tie.“

Christopher Dawson: Wielding the Sword of the Spirit

Veritas- The Lord’s Prayer

A dear friend, now gone, introduced me to this magnificent interpretation.

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Hold Fast to Patience with A Silent Mind

A silent mind“Hold fast to patience with a silent mind.”

These words from St. Benedict’s fourth chapter on humility seem to burn through the muddled and distorted thoughts of a mind overwhelmed by the horrors of today’s politics, more accurately described by TV character Garrett Moore of Blue Blood’s wry comment to New York Police Commissioner Frank Reagan, than of statecraft:

“The circus came to town and they never left.”

But it is the contemporary climate of major universities that sears my heart and psyche even more deeply as I write on this cold morning…an apt metaphor for the wisdom eclipsed by a perverse racism. David Warren writes:

“Civilizations have come and gone.” The winter is upon this one now; our own death is constantly before us. What we glibly call “Western Civ,” once so powerful, is now under vicious, barbaric attack not only at frontiers but from within the very institutions it created. Those with the solemn moral responsibility to uphold them are instead wetting their pants.

The Catholic Thing

The grief and sense of loss I feel is deep. With ease I can recall the lure of those ancient Greek philosophers to my twenty-year-old mind, filled with the distractions and lies of another age. Although much of what I studied of Plato, Socrates and Aristotle was far too dense for total comprehension, the consolation of knowing that there were others who had loved wisdom was enough. Like many young people of every age, I had walked away from everything; it was these very studies that provided a grasp, albeit a tenuous one, on reality.

In “Wisdom From One of the Dead White Guys,” it was no exaggeration when I wrote…”while working my way through my undergraduate degree in pursuit of wisdom and truth, it was just those dead white guys who, in a very real sense, saved my life.

Reading Warren’s article brings back vivid memories of my lost years. Of course, I think about today’s young people who are asking the same questions that I did?

Where do they find wisdom?

It’s been four years since I wrote the above words

and now have an answer to that question I asked, “Where do they [college students now denied the ancient philosophers] find wisdom?”

The answer? The same source I did: God’s Grace.

It wasn’t the Greek philosophers who saved my life back during those dangerous years of unbelief.

No.

It was that yearning, sometimes yawning hunger, for truth.

He writes His Law into our hearts as conscience. But then we grow up and out of what we know and learn to rationalize our desires. And discover the most powerful force in the world: the human will. if we live in a culture and society that promotes the “rights” of our whimsical wills, we forget sin.

Professor J. Budziszewski lucidly explains the process in his piece, Revenge of Conscience:

As any sin passes through its stages from temptation, to toleration, to approval, its name is first euphemized, then avoided, then forgotten. A colleague tells me that some of his fellow legal scholars call child molestation “intergenerational intimacy”: that’s euphemism. A good-hearted editor tried to talk me out of using the term “sodomy”: that’s avoidance. My students don’t know the word “fornication” at all: that’s forgetfulness.

The pattern is repeated in the house of death. First we were to approve of killing unborn babies, then babies in process of birth; next came newborns with physical defects, now newborns in perfect health. Nobel-prize laureate James Watson proposes that parents of newborns be granted a grace period during which they may have their babies killed, and in 1994 a committee of the American Medical Association proposed harvesting organs from some sick babies even before they die. First we were to approve of suicide, then to approve of assisting it. Now we are to approve of a requirement to assist it, for, as Ernest van den Haag has argued, it is “unwarranted” for doctors not to kill patients who seek death. First we were to approve of killing the sick and unconscious, then of killing the conscious and consenting. 

And yet, atheists like this University of Texas philosopher—and me—get flooded with grace and mercy. And we listen…then shout, “Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father!”

When feeling overwhelmed by what we see and hear, what can we do?

Hold fast to patience with a silent mind. St. Benedict’s twelve chapter treatment of humility warrants all the time we can commit to ponder, pray, and use as lectio divina. The words of the fifth century saint’s Rule are a balm to our turbulent souls…reminding us that we are not God.

And that God knows what He is about.

The fourth degree of humility
is that he hold fast to patience with a silent mind
when in this obedience he meets with difficulties
and contradictions
and even any kind of injustice,
enduring all without growing weary or running away.

Moreover, by their patience
those faithful ones fulfill the Lord’s command
in adversities and injuries:
when struck on one cheek, they offer the other;
when deprived of their tunic, they surrender also their cloak;
when forced to go a mile, they go two;
with the Apostle Paul they bear with false brethren (2 Cor. 11:26)
and bless those who curse them (1 Cor. 4:12).

Is it mere coincidence that we’ve been given these four-legged companions to accompany us on this roller-coaster life? Of all creatures, dogs are the only ones who choose us over all other creatures. Are there more patient, trusting and silent partners than these?

Hold fast to patience with a silent mind
Speaking of a silent mind:

This past Tuesday, October 2nd, was the Feast of St. Francis. Since I was unable to find where the Franciscan blessings of the animals was taking place, Monsignor Flood kindly bestowed a blessing on Seymour.

The reading for that day is one well-known to us. Especially women, because written in our DNA is…”WHY ISN”T SHE HELPING ME?”

In the past, I’ve wholly sympathized and defended Martha. But now I see this passage differently.

Very differently.

This time, Jesus’s words to an “overburdened” Martha, “Martha, Martha, you are anxious and worried about many things, there is need of only one thing, Mary has chosen the better part and it will not be taken from her,” Full reading here, isn’t admonishment, but love.

There’s a whole world here in this deceptively simple scene: Eden revisited.

Making and then serving meals have a sacred foundation. The Michelin four-star chefs speak about the most critical ingredient of exceptional meals is love. They mean by that, an immersion into the process so complete that the self disappears. A love that dissolves with impatience and anxiety.

Of course, we can’t know why love collapsed for Martha. Maybe it was jealousy at her sister Mary’s absorption by Love Himself, fatigue, or both. But Our Lord recognizes the appearance of the wily serpent, “Martha, Martha, you’ve lost sight of what you are doing and why.”

O bread of angels, celestial manna, precious Evangel, sacrament of the present moment, you bring God to the mean surroundings of a lowly stable in a manger among straw and hay. But to whom do you gove yourself? God reveals himself to the hungry in small things—’He has filled the hungry with good things’ (Luke 1:53)—but the proud, who only attach importance to outward appearances, cannot see him even in big ones.

But what is the secret of how to find this treasure—this minute grain of mustard seed? There is none. It is avaliable to us always, everywhere. Like God, every creature, whether friend or foe, pours it out generously, making it flow throughout our bodies and souls to the very center of our being. Divine action cleanses the universe, pervading and flowing over all creatures. Wherever they are it pursues them.

The Sacrament of the Present Moment

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Leaning Into Crazy: Dealing With Impossible People

Rude man driving his car and arguing a lot// Leaning into crazyLeaning into crazy: dealing with impossible people

“Man, go ahead, beat me up! Shoot me! You’d be doing me a favor, please come over and hit me.”

Imagine saying that to this irate driver who looks like he wants to shoot you?

A response like this one not only calmed the raging driver down but totally turned him around. Dr. Mark Goulston explains.

If a dog has sunk his teeth into your hand, the key to getting him to release your hand is to push it even further into his mouth. When you do that, he’ll instantly let go. Why? Because he’ll want to swallow and to do that he’s got to release his jaw.The same rule applies when dealing with crazy people says Goulston. Not, of course, the serial killer type crazy but the guy who wants to murder you because you cut him off.

I’ve followed Eric Barker for years. Because he’s interested in the same stuff I am, not infrequently, I like one of his articles so much I write about it. Like this one on anger from several years ago. His pieces are guaranteed to be funny but also fascinating.

As usual, his latest, How to Have Emotionally Intelligent Arguments is jam-packed with good stuff. But you can read it for yourself.

It’s that opening gambit of Eric’s piece that hooked me. True I think because so many times in my life, I have believed that a simple explanation of the facts would mitigate the suffering of someone I loved. People get married to their opinions, even if there are volumes of facts to belie beliefs and behaviors which cause untold suffering. Thinking of these hurting folks as crazy never occured to me. Hence, it’s this guy, Mark Goulston we’ll visit today as he explains leaning into crazy: dealing with impossible people.

Practical and timely

A quick look at the Dr. Mark Goulston’s blog topics reveal timely, risk-taking topics, with practical advice. Like Surgical Empathy-The Save a Life Conversation. And How to be Thankful in a Thankless World.

Hence I downloaded the Kindle edition of his book.

To Goulston, these are the characteristics of “crazy:”

They can’t see the world clearly. They say or think things that make no sense. They make decisions and take actions that aren’t in their best interest. They become downright impossible when you try to guide them back to the side of reason.

Do you know anyone like that?

Maybe someone you love dearly?

The anecdote above actually happened to Goulston, after a terrible day.

He did indeed roll down his window so that he could hear the screaming man better.

And then said to the raging driver, ““Have you ever had such an awful day that you’re just hoping to meet someone who will pull out a gun, shoot you, and put you out of your misery? Are you that someone?”

His mouth fell open. “What?” he asked.

Up to that point, I’d been incredibly stupid.

But in that instant, I did something brilliant. Somehow, in the midst of my brain fog, I said exactly the right thing…

And I didn’t fight back. Instead, I leaned into his crazy and threw it right back at him.

As the man stared at me, I started up again. “Yeah, I really mean it. I don’t usually cut people off, and I never cut someone off twice. I’m just having a day where no matter what I do or who I meet—including you!—I seem to mess everything up. Are you the person who is going to mercifully put an end to it?”

Instantly, a change came over him. He switched to being calming and reassuring: “Hey. C’mon, man,” he said. “It’ll be okay. Really! Just relax, it’ll be okay. Everyone has days like this.” I continued my rant. “That’s easy for you to say! You didn’t screw up everything like I did…”

Goulston calls this technique “assertive submission.”This won’t come naturally.

Why?

When someone is screaming their head off at us,

our normal reaction is either fight or run…flight. If attacked, the part of our brains that’s fairly primitive wakes up and can take over. If we allow it to.

The “reptilian brain” or brain stem powers the parts of our bodies which operate autonomously. Included in the brain stem is what neurologists are now calling the limbic sysyem are two almond shaped and about the same sized groups of nuclei on the right and left sides of our brains. They’re the amygdalae and when we feel that nausea, dry mouth, rapid heart rate, they’ve been hijacked.

medically accurate illustration of the amygdaloid body

When our patterns of thought are ruled by our brainstem, we get to crazy. Whether because of early abuse, illness or a myriad of possible reasons, rational thought isn’t possible. Problem-solving is reduced to blaming others. Speaking facts and reason to a person either momentarily or habitually crazy doesn’t help. Instead, it can potentiate the craziness.

We’ve all seen this. Maybe in a boss or parent or friend.

The primary solution lies in recognizing the problem: this person is incapable of rational behavior. Ergo, leaning into crazy is the solution. Critical so that you won’t allow the crazy one to pull you into crazy behavior

Next, identify her “M.O.” There’s a pattern, maybe whining, coldly logical and practical, emotional are some of the nine “M.O.s” listed by the author. All employed to make you lose control.

Before engaging someone like this,

Goulston advises, first ask yourself why.

…Before you tackle the bruising challenge of talking to “crazy,” make sure you have a good reason to go there. Sometimes you may decide it’s better to stop trying to get through to the irrational person than to drive yourself nuts trying to get that person to accept reality.

Talking to Crazy

But if you decide you must do this to get it all out on the table, be sure to identify your own crazy. “Unless you’re the first entirely sane person on the planet, you’re carrying around your own suitcase full of crazy. And in order to successfully face down another person’s crazy, you first need to deal with your own.”

Huh?

If about to confront a spouse, son or daughter or parent, Goulston warns, be sure we understand ourselves. We can be sure our son, wife or mother knows precisely what to say to provoke us.

Goulston provides a bunch of practical techniques and then moves on to the oxymoron of assertive submission. The equivalent of the dog belly roll, precisely what he did to the screaming guy who wanted to murder him. Leaning into crazy.

One of my visions is that we can heal the world one conversation at a time. And every time you’re brave enough to talk to crazy, you help make that vision come true.

Talking to Crazy

How about asking for help from our and their guardian angel?

I’t’s not possible to end this topic, dealing with impossible people, without bringing in the reality of our guardian angels. Each one of the mega-gazillions of souls who ever existed has a guardian angel, including each of the many millions of children we abort.

These angelic beings “always behold the face of my father who is in heaven,” Jesus tells us.

Last Thursday was the Feast of the Archangels. And today is the Feast of the Guardian Angels. According to the Catholic Catechism,”the whole life of the Church benefits from the mysterious and powerful help of the Angels.” (334)
“…serving the accomplishment of the Divine Plan.” (332)
“From infancy to death human life is surrounded by their watchful care and intercession. Beside each believer stands an Angel as protector and shepherd leading him to life.”(336)

Are there better aids than they in Leaning into Crazy: dealing with impossible people?

“In Journal of a Soul, Pope St. John XXIII writes that he often sent his angel ahead to speak to the person’s guardian angel. This was particularly the case if he expected the meeting to be important or difficult….”

“…Even though we are children and have a long, a very long and dangerous way to go, with such protectors what have we to fear? They who keep us in all our ways cannot be overpowered or led astray, much less lead us astray. They are loyal, prudent, powerful. Why then are we afraid? We have only to follow them, stay close to them, and we shall dwell under the protection of God’s heaven.” St. Bernard Homily on Guardian Angels

Each of is here for a reason, a mission, despite or perhaps because of illness or infirmity:

Back during the years when I considered myself an atheist, I came across these words of John (now Saint) Cardinal Newman, and I believed them.

God has created me to do Him some definite service. He has committed some work to me which He has not committed to another. I have my mission. I may never know it in this life, but I shall be told it in the next.

I am a link in a chain, a bond of connection between persons. He has not created me for naught. I shall do good; I shall do His work. I shall be an angel of peace, a preacher of truth in my own place, while not intending it if I do but keep His commandments.

Therefore, I will trust Him, whatever I am, I can never be thrown away.

If I am in sickness, my sickness may serve Him, in perplexity, my perplexity may serve Him. If I am in sorrow, my sorrow may serve Him.

He does nothing in vain. He knows what He is about. He may take away my friends. He may throw me among strangers. He may make me feel desolate, make my spirits sink, hide my future from me. Still, He knows what He is about.

Angelic helping hands – cupped hands with finely detailed Angel wings on either side, on an intricate ethereal patterned background with a central light shaft and copy space

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I Have No Human Enemies: Don’t Demonize the Powerful

Enemy word on the red enter key-Concept of the enemy and the rivalry online on the Internet and social networks. I have no human enemies

“As a disciple of Jesus, I have no human enemies. As a disciple of Jesus, I am not allowed to have any human enemies. I might be theirs. They are not mine. They are just rebels. I have often in my life been a rebel. So have you. And you got won. And you probably got won by kindness, by someone who took the time to listen, by someone who took the time to care, by someone who might have provoked us to ask tough questions. But they did it in such a way that we weren’t condemned. We were not yelled at…”

It’s worth repeating Fr. John Riccardo’s advice as we close in on this fall’s election: The Enemy is the Enemy.

To ponder, share and practice the truths of the priest’s words.

“First, as Christians, as disciples of Jesus, the Eternal Son of God who became flesh to redeem the world from the power of Hell, it is paramount that we remember and understand who the enemy is. The enemy is the Enemy. Period.”

While with family a couple of weeks ago, I allowed myself to get pulled into judgement and acrimony during the after dinner conversation. I spouted off about public persons and complex situations that I know next to nothing about.

I know better. l have written before about the dangers of the untamed tongue.

But that didn’t stop me.

The minute I think I’ve got a bad habit—aka sin—like gossip and passing judgement, licked, back comes an opportunity to do it all again, this time with gusto.

It can be overwhelming, even depressing as I think of the ease with which I fall.

More on that momentarily.

Sometimes, there’s unmistakable “coincidence.”

Especially when striving to practice prudence, temperance, humilty—all the antidotes of sin. When Don’t Demonize—or Divinize—the Powerful showed up in my inbox, it felt like more than a nudge.

Maybe a shove: Listen!

Bishop Barron begins his sermon for last Sunday talking about Nietzsche.

Ummm, Frederich Nietzsche: “The God is Dead, he choked to death on theology” Nietzsche?

Yes, that Nietzsche.

How is a nineteenth-century-atheist sufficiently relevant to warrant a Bishop Barron sermon?

If I weren’t working on my newest novel, Plausible Liars, I’d wonder too. But in a strange coincidence, I too am engrossed in understandng ‘how we got here,’ so that a primary character’s investigative journalism piece on transgenderism titled [Creating Chemical Eunuchs: Androgynizing America’s Children] will be coherent. We’re tempted to think this all begin with the “sexual revolution” of the sixties, right?

But no, those of us who were kids in the sixties were merely continuing what had begun a couple of centuries before.

We’ve got to go back to the nineteenth century to understand how such radically destructive ideologies could be categorized as “woke” and become endemic in our culture and institutions. Precisely why Bishop Barron starts with Nietzsche in explaining why “woke” ideology—demonizing power— is incompatible with Catholic social teaching.

The readings from Amos and St. Paul’s Letter to Timothy are the springboards for this intruiging homily which highlights our obligation to pray—and be grateful for— for those in authority.

That we may lead a quiet and tranquil life

St. Paul’s language struck me [Pow!} when I heard the Lector read last Sunday.

“First of all, then, I ask that supplications, prayers, petitions, and thanksgivings be offered for everyone, for kings and for all in authority, that we may lead a quiet and tranquil life in all devotion and dignity. This is good and pleasing to God our savior, who wills everyone to be saved and to come to knowledge of the truth.”

Thanksgivings be offered for all in authority…not just prayers.

Ahem.

If I’d read and/or heard this passage before I’d not recalled it but it sure packs a whallop.

Or is it just me?

Bishop Barron’s discourse on why we never demonize power is arresting, even instructive during an era when many of us use power almost as an epithet. Especially his words, “Political power is a kind of participation in the power of God,” emanating from our belief that God is all-powerful. So how can power be bad?

St. Paul’s last sentence,”…this is good and pleasing to God…who wills everyone to be saved…” implies, suggests the bishop, that our own salvation depends on our carrying out this obligation. Bishop Barron packs this thirteen-minute sermon with a balanced but provocative look at power, authority and politics.

In very different ways, both Fr. Riccardo and Bishop Barron caution each of us. Certainly me. To be careful, prudent and seek His Good Counsel as we get closer and closer to what is already a mid-term election jam packed with controversy.

The ease with which I fall

In a recent piece, I wrote of a priceless piece of fifteenth-century wisdom, Spiritual Combat by Dom Lorenzo Scupoli. It’s just forty-six pages but I keep rereading the first ten because his advice is so:

Simple. Practical.Pithy.

Like this on page four:

“Some, who judge by appearances, make it consist in penances, in hair shirts, austerities of
the flesh, vigils, fasting, and similar bodily mortifications. Others fancy themselves
extremely virtuous when they indulge in long periods of vocal prayers, hear several
Masses, spend many hours in church . . . Others, and this does not exclude some of the
religious who have consecrated themselves to God, think that perfection consist in perfect
attendance in choir, in observing silence and in a strict observance of their rule.
Consequently, different people place perfection in different practices. It is certain that
they all equally deceive themselves.”

“Without Me, you can do nothing.”

A couple of weeks ago, I wrote a piece on His statement. Our Lord doesn’t say we can’t do much without Him, but states that without Him we can do nothing:

I am the vine, you are the branches. Whoever remains in me and I in him will bear much fruit, because without me you can do nothing.

John 15:5

Jesus, I trust in you.

Yesterday morning I had the privilege of attending morning Mass at the Mission of Divine Mercy. Mass was followed by a talk on St. Faustina as Prophet by Brother Mikael.

He covered a vast territory in under an hour: Here are only a few of his points:

The horrendous phsyical and psychological suffering of the young nun, Sr. Faustina.The trials of the Church a thousand years ago when its highest echelons were infested with pederasty and homosexuality.During the early nineteenth century, Warsaw, Poland was the only European city where abortion was legal—it was a “sanctuary” for abortion.After Pope Pius’ enthusiastic reception and support of Faustina’s writings ,two subsequent Popes declared them unapproved by the Church Followed by Pope John Paul ll’s lifelong cause of Divine Mercy, declaring the canonization of the Sister Faustina as the “happiest day of my life.”

The morning was perversely consoling in a number of ways. Primarily because my understanding that none of this evil is new has deepened. As has my conviction that we live during an extraordinary time of grace, when untold miracles of salvation are happening all around us.

Jesus. I trust in you.

Jesus, I trust in you.

Jesus, I trust in you.

Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.

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The Problem With the Catholic Church is the Crucifix

Christ of St. John of the Cross- Salvidor Dali 1951The problem with the Catholic Church

“So why did you become Catholic?”

After listening to my abbreviated conversion story, Bob explained that he’d born a Catholic but was now an evangelical Christian. Apparently feeling the need to defend his decision to leave Catholicism to a new convert, Bob declared that the crucifix is depressing and too focused on pain and suffering. After thinking another moment or two, Bob looked at at me and said, “The problem with the Catholic Church is the crucifix.”

I thought of that long ago conversation last Thursday, September 14th, the feast of the Triumph of the Cross. And I understand my friend Bob’s repugnance at the horror of our Saviour’s suffering and death. In most Catholic Churches, that crucifx is displayed prominently, making it difficult to ignore. Without the crucifix, it’s tempting to believe the gospel of prosperity. And to think that all the blessings of our lives are merited.

Bob’s pithy statement appears in my first novel:

“Lindsey could not deny the sense of peace she had felt
upon walking into St. Vincent de Paul Catholic Church at six
thirty that next morning. Kneeling next to Julie, who was deep
in communion with her God, she felt the silence as a tangible
thing. Lindsey finally risked a look up at the huge crucifix
dominating the altar of the church, realizing that she had
looked everywhere but up at that cross. As she stared at
that quintessence of agony and sacrifice, she thought of a
paper Julie had written the year before for her theology class.
Julie had started her paper with the sentence “The problem
with the Catholic church is the crucifix….Lindsey thought of the lovely filigreed gold cross her mother always wore; the cross without the dying Christ was the sanitized version, much more comfortable to contemplate than this God-man displayed in an attitude of such shocking powerlessness and hideousness. And she had found herself asking what on earth could require such pain and suffering and wondering what kind of God would require such an agonizing death from his own son.”

Why the crucifix and not just His cross?

Because the Apostle of the Apostles tells us to do so! St Paul tells us that we preach Christ crucified in the first and second chapter of Corinthians. “I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and Him crucified.” John Martignoni reminds us of St. Paul’s exhortion: ““O foolish Galatians!  Who has bewitched you, before whose eyes Jesus Christ was publicly portrayed as crucified?”  Did you catch that?  Jesus was publicly portrayed, before their “eyes”, as being crucified. Sounds kind of like they may have been looking at a crucifix, doesn’t it? ”

The reading for the liturgy of the Triumph of the Cross prefigures Christ’s crucifixtion. We travel back to the nation of Israel’s escape from 400 years of slavery in Egypt to a forty-year desert journey.

Complaining.

Again. Ignoring the facts that their clothes and sandals are not wearing out. Or recalling how they walked through the sea with walls of water on each side, saved from the pursuing Egyptians. Or that water appears out of a rock when needed by them and their livestock.

More and more, these readings about the ancient Israelites are like looking into a mirror. One that reveals my image and that of almost everyone around me. The complaints of the Israelites prokoke God’s wrath until finally they see.

“We have sinned in complaining against the LORD and you.
Pray the LORD to take the serpents from us.”
So Moses prayed for the people, and the LORD said to Moses,
“Make a saraph and mount it on a pole,
and if any who have been bitten look at it, they will live.”

Monsignor Charles Pope offers an intriguing meditation on the Triumph of the Cross.

“Now remember it was God who had said earlier in the Ten Commandments Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth(Ex 20:4). Yet here he commands a graven (a carved) image. Moses made it of bronze and showed it to the people who looking at it became well (Nm 21:9)

In a way, it is almost as if God were saying to Moses, “The people, in rejecting the Bread from Heaven have chosen Satan and what he offers. They have rejected me. Let them look into the depth of their sin and face their choice and the fears it has set loose. Let them look upon a serpent. Having looked, let them repent and be healed, let the fear of what the serpent can do depart.”

When we adore the cruifix, we face the awful

cost of sin. Mine, yours and those of the whole world: The problem with the Catholic Church is the crucifix.

“There it is, at the head of our processions. There it is, displayed in our homes. And we are bid to look upon it daily. Displayed there is everything we most fear: suffering, torment, loss, humiliation, nakedness, hatred, scorn, mockery,  ridicule, rejection, and death.

And the Lord and the Church say: “Look! Don’t turn away. Do not hide this. Look! Behold! Face the crucifix and all it means. Stare into the face of your worst fears, confront them, and begin to experience healing. Do not fear the worst the world and the devil can do for Christ has triumphed overwhelmingly. He has cast off death like a garment and said to us, In this world, ye shall have tribulation. But have courage! I have overcome the world. Monsignor Pope.

EWTN created an EBook called, In the Footsteps of Jesus for the Feast of the Triumph of the Cross:

“In the year 2000, the Great Jubilee, Pope St. John Paul II visited the Holy Land. In the welcome ceremony for this historic visit, he said, “Today it is with profound emotion that I set foot in the land where God chose to ‘pitch His tent,’ and made it possible for man to encounter Him more directly…Along every step of the way I am moved by a vivid sense of God who has gone before us and leads us on, who wants us to honor Him in spirit and in truth, to acknowledge the differences between us, but also to recognize in every human being the image and likeness of the one Creator of heaven and earth.”
The images in this eBook show some of the sacred sites that St. John Paul II visited during his pilgrimage. May it help you as you walk the footsteps of Christ during the Feast of the Exaltation, and may you find that common heart and love of Christ shared among all men and women of faith.”

[image error]In the Footsteps of Jesus eBookDownload

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The Battleground of Conscience

Businessman with chalk drawing angel and devil on his shoulders concept for conscience, decisions, uncertainty or moral dilemmaThe battleground of conscience

That phrase seems oxymoronic—contradictory—the battleground of conscience, I know. But once I began rereading Fr. Jacques Phillipe’s Searching for and Maintaining Peace, there’s no better metaphor.

But first, some brief background.

The first chapter of this Fr. Phillippe’s book says it all:

“Without Me you can do nothing….(John 15:5)

He didn’t say, you can’t do much without Me but you can do nothing.”

Searching for and Maintaining Peace

There are times that my sins, flaws, weaknesses, frailities, pick one or all, once confessed, I move on. There are others when those same sins, flaws, weaknesses can flatten me. Their memory a simmering echo in my head.

Until I reread Fr. Phillipe’s book, I’d not considered why.

True repentence has distinct signs.

The desire to correct ourselves, Persist in learning new habits is always gentle. Peaceful. Trustful.It is never discouraging, Paralyzing Or troubling.

In fact,

To preserve our hearts in perfect tranquility, it is still necessary to ignore some interior feelings of remorse which seem to come from God, because they are reproaches that our conscience makes to us regarding true faults, but which come, in effect, from the evil spirit as can be judged by what ensues. If the twinges of conscience serve to make us more humble, if they render us more fervent in the practice of good works, if they do not diminish the trust that one must have in divine mercy, we must accept them with thanksgiving, as favors from heaven. But if they trouble us, if they dishearten us, if they render us lazy, timid, slow to perform our duties, we must believe that these are the suggestions of the enemy and do things in a normal way, not deigning to listen to them. (The Spiritual Combat, chapter 25)

Searching for and Maintaining Peace

Wow.

The rub is maintaining peace.

It’s weird because we know!

Those of us who are Christian proclaim Jesus as our Peace. Either, we’ve known Him all our lives and if we’ve been blessed, loved Him all our lives. Or we’ve come to Him later, seeking peace and finding that the object of our search is Our Lord.

Still, those awful times of self-disgust or dislike can overwhelm. In thoughts like, “I just went to confession! How could I possibly…”

Or, “I can’t confess this again, I’ve done it the last umpteenth times…”

And then there’s “I can’t pray! How do I talk with Him when I did…and then….?”

That’s when it feels like a battleground—Combat—War.

Of course those thoughts aren’t from God!

So if they’re not from God, there’s only one other source, right? Hence, the battleground of conscience.

Father Philppe explains: “Our sins are a very poor pretext for distancing ourselves from Him, because the more we sin, the more we have a right precisely to approach Him who says: The healthy are not in need of a doctor — the sick are.… Indeed I came not to call the righteous, but sinners (Matthew 9:12-13). If we wait until we are saints to have a regular life of prayer, we could wait a long time.”

And then the priest calls on a spirtual master from the sixteenth century to reveal the all-importance of inner peace. “The devil does his best to banish peace from the heart…” This is so, declares the author of Spritual Combat, Dom Lorenzo Scupoli, because “he knows that God abides in peace and it is in peace that He accomplishes great things.”

Pray for the virtue of combative hope

Years ago, I walked into a southwestern boutique store not far from where I lived in Houston, Texas to see a compelling print of three intersected Indian profiles with 20-25 smaller figures of battling warriors sketched in each of their torsos. The print seemed to dominate the store and me. The artist calls his work, Our Battles Are Many.  That painting has characterized my life. After many moves, it’s back in Texas.

So I’m drawn to the war-like metaphors like those in the Rule of St. Benedict. Therefore we must prepare our hearts and our bodies to do battle under the holy obedience of His commands. And I smile broadly when thinking of Pope Francis’s wonderful oxymoron of combative hope.

The phrase is excerpted from his book, In Him Alone is Our Hope, a collection of talks given to fellow priests on the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius.

This spiritual hope is much more than mere optimism. It is not full of fan- fare, nor is it afraid of silence. Rather, it penetrates deep down within us, like sap in winter roots. Hope is certain, and it is the Father of Truth who gives it to us. Hope discerns between good and evil. It does not worship at the altar of success: falling into optimism; nor is it content with failure: wallowing in pessimism. Because hope discerns between good and evil, it is called to do combat. Yet it fights without anxiety or illusion, with the assurance of one who knows that he pursues a sure goal…

The battleground of conscience

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The Rule of Benedict: My School

Saint Benedict holding his staff, a book and a cup with a black background.The Rule of Benedict: My School

The Prologue of the Rule of Benedict contains some of the most lryical, lush and arresting prose ever written. These words from the 5th century summon, urge and admonish with utmost delicacy. The school of Benedict: my school.

L I S T E N carefully, my child,
to your master’s precepts,
and incline the ear of your heart (Prov. 4:20).
Receive willingly and carry out effectively
your loving father’s advice,
that by the labor of obedience
you may return to Him
from whom you had departed by the sloth of disobedience.

To you, therefore, my words are now addressed,
whoever you may be,
who are renouncing your own will
to do battle under the Lord Christ, the true King,
and are taking up the strong, bright weapons of obedience.

And first of all,
whatever good work you begin to do,
beg of Him with most earnest prayer to perfect it,
that He who has now deigned to count us among His children
may not at any time be grieved by our evil deeds.
For we must always so serve Him
with the good things He has given us,
that He will never as an angry Father disinherit His children,
nor ever as a dread Lord, provoked by our evil actions,
deliver us to everlasting punishment
as wicked servants who would not follow Him to glory.

Prologue-The Rule of Benedict

Even though it’s been over twenty years, I can clearly visualize that small red booklet,

The Rule of Benedict. Having decided to become a Christian Catholic at St. Benedict’s Abbey in Still Water, Massachusetts, I’d grabbed the red booklet from the Abbey gift shop to purchase and adopt as my own. Along with the two tomes I’d been assigned by Brother Andrew, the monk who was assigned the task of teaching me the rudiments of our faith, I was ready to work. I wanted it all: Now.

In those initial years, I bought at least five of those small booklets, each time, hoping that the words would make sense, that it wouldn’t feel like reading gibberish.

But they never did.

Of course not! I could barely spell Catholic. So easily I forget that I can’t do it alone, that the timing is not mine.

It would be another six years before the Rule became my school. Yes, school:

…And so we are going to establish
a school for the service of the Lord.
In founding it we hope to introduce nothing harsh or burdensome…

For as we advance in the religious life and in faith,
our hearts expand
and we run the way of God’s commandments
with unspeakable sweetness of love (Ps. 118:32).
Thus, never departing from His school,
but persevering…

During my years as a Benedictine Oblate, I’ve read the little rule over fifty times, for we read through the entire Rule three times each year. And yet each time we begin, I look forward eagerly to the Prologue. We began anew last Thursday, September 1st with the Prologue.

Always, it feels new. The school of Benedict: my school.

When it happened, my initial conversion to Christian Catholicism felt sudden. Even impetuous and precipitous-as if I’d jumped off a cliff. Think Harrison Ford:

Leap of Faith

That is until pondering all that came before and accepting that the real precipice had been the one of unbelief.

It’s odd, isn’t it, how clearly we can see when looking through the rearview window?

My favorite phrases in the Prologue?

“…by the labor of obedience you may return to Him from whom you had departed by the sloth of disobedience…my words addressed to you who are renouncing your own will to do battle under the Lord Jesus Christ, and are taking up the strong, bright weapons of obedience…

Therefore we must prepare our hearts and our bodies to do battle under the holy obedience of His commands; and let us ask God that He be pleased to give us the help of His grace for anything which our nature finds hardly possible. And if we want
to escape the pains of hell and attain life everlasting, then, while there is still time, while we are still in the body and are able to fulfill all these things by the light of this life, we must hasten to do now what will profit us for eternity.”

Obedience.

That word’s a lightning rod and has been for almost as long as I remember. But is there a more critical virtue?

Or habit?

Or practice?

It’s why He came, right? We understand and accept that only those who obey can believe.

He came to show us that the only path back to God the Father is obedience.

Maybe it’s easier for converts like me to grasp the need for ongoing conversion: Conversion as in repentance-rethinking. Especially so for those of us whose faith did not just become lukewarm, but we who decided that it was all a myth: the Bible, faith, God. And believed ourselves to be atheist.

I remember, as a brand new Benedictine Oblate, now almost eighteen years ago, being fascinated by the word stability. Axiomatic of Benedictine spirituality- a promise we make when we make our oblation, the word connotes stasis…an inner permanence despite external turbulence. We vow to stay put, regardless of what is happening in our marriage, our body, or our family.

To many in this change-loving culture of ours, this concept of permanence, of a changeless inner core, evokes constraint, regulation-lack of freedom, even that word we see everywhere: slavery. But I’ve learned that it is when I am most uncomfortable, even frightened, that if I stick there, accept the anxiety of all of it…that the view from the other side is breath-taking.

Only if, I look through His Spirit…desiring only His Will.

Renouncing my own will to do battle under the Lord Jesus Christ and taking up the strong bright weapons of obedience.

The rule of Benedict: My school

Do please take ten minutes to immerse your soul into the glory of O Magnum Mysterium, Morten Lauridson’s splendid chorale tribute to the miracle and mystery of the Incarnation of Our Lord.

.The school of Benedict: my school.

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How Many Will Be Saved? We May Hope Everyone

Sinner. A lonely sinfull man stands in front of a hell gates. Hell fire. Religious concept. 3d rendering.How many will be saved?

The question, “How many will be saved?” isn’t answered. Except through the admonition we’ve heard numerous times from Our Lord, “Strive to enter through the narrow gate.”

His implication clear. Many rush through the wide and inviting gate to where, exactly?

Here is the complete reading.

Jesus passed through towns and villages,
teaching as he went and making his way to Jerusalem.
Someone asked him,
“Lord, will only a few people be saved?”
He answered them,
“Strive to enter through the narrow gate,
for many, I tell you, will attempt to enter
but will not be strong enough.
After the master of the house has arisen and locked the door,
then will you stand outside knocking and saying,
‘Lord, open the door for us.’
He will say to you in reply, ‘I do not know where you are from.
And you will say,
‘We ate and drank in your company and you taught in our streets.’
Then he will say to you,
‘I do not know where you are from.
Depart from me, all you evildoers!’
And there will be wailing and grinding of teeth
when you see Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob
and all the prophets in the kingdom of God
and you yourselves cast out.
And people will come from the east and the west
and from the north and the south
and will recline at table in the kingdom of God.
For behold, some are last who will be first,
and some are first who will be last.”

It’s an unnerving reading and sets itself up, in my mind, to describe me.

Outside the locked door, hearing, “I don’t know where you are from.”

The years before my conversion weigh heavily. At times, oppressively so. Either my first or second spiritual director told me that we’re “redeemed sinners.” Apropos of our conversation following confession that morning, Fr. Roland continued,

“In my experience, cradle Catholics focus on the redeemed part of that ratio and converts on the sinner.”

Even after a couple of decades as a Catholic Christian, his observation about this convert still fits. One of the zillions of reasons I love praying the psalms of the Divine Office:

Guide me by your fidelity and teach me,

for you are God my savior,

for you I wait all the day long.

Remember your compassion and your mercy, O LORD,

for they are ages old.

Remember no more the sins of my youth;

remember me according to your mercy,

because of your goodness, LORD.

But Bishop Barron speaks of a specific message in this Gospel passage. He reminds us of our need to place the unnamed man questioning Jesus in the context and culture of ancient Israel. The man, according to Bishop Barron wasn’t asking a question. No, he was a Jew: one of the Lord’s Chosen People: the People of The Law.

God was theirs. And only theirs.

How many will be saved?This is an intriguing homily,

For a number of reasons. Foremost among them are Bishop Barron’s clarity in his discussion of hell, the fact of its existence and the Catholic Church’s position on eternal condemnation. Including Hitler, Mao, Stalin.

Does hell exist? “Well yeah, I’ve been there, most people I know have been there, the suffering that comes from resisting God’s love.” Is there a better definition of hell than that? “The suffering that comes from resisting God’s love. It begins here.”What about the eschatological hell? How many are there?“I don’t know,” he answers,” the church has a canonization process for those saints known to be in Heaven. There’s no corrollary for those in hell.To the oft-asked question of what about Hitler, Stalin and Mao, he asks, “Does any of us have a god-like view of what’s going on in the depths of their minds, conscience and hearts? Does any of us know if there was contrition, regret and/or sorrow at the time of their death?”And so Bishop Barron states, ” I’ve staked out the position that we may hope everyone will be saved…and quotes the catechism, “in hope, the Church prays for the salvation of all.”Quickly adding, that if you go online, you’ll see the energy, the strong opinions on this subject. Specifically the people who disagree with me ever since I’ve taken this position.

When I did just that, did a search online, “Bishop Barron on salvation,” wowza.

I can understand the hesitation with which he speaks on this. The vehemence of the negative opinions against him is startling. Not only from Protestants but Catholics.

One can get lost in these matters…

Bishop Barron gets out into the world. And is undaunted by speaking to secular audiences like Google employees about religion’s essential role in opening the mind– not closing it.

The bishop speaks on and about this and related questions about heaven, hell and salvation. In fact, he’s an apologist. Therefore he’s done numerous extensive videoed talks on the question of who can be saved. In the process, Bishop Barron explains that Vatican ll made clear the “rays of light” of participation in all relgions, including those who don’t know Christ. Until writing this piece, I’d not considered the breadth and variety of Bishop Barron’s audiences and subjects. Nor had I ever read the document from the Council of Trent as he suggests. Fascinating, albeit dense, read: Council of Trent.

It’s a stumbling block for many, this question of who can be saved. And most assuredly was to me. I remain grateful to then spiritual director Fr. Paul Mccollum for lending me his copy of Karl Rahner’s The Foundations of Christian Faith. Rahner’s notions of the anonymous Christian and reasons for the Reformation didn’t just serve as useful knowledge. But as a relief:

Anonymous Christianity means that a person lives in the grace of God and attains salvation outside of explicitly constituted Christianity — Let us say, a Buddhist monk —who, because he follows his conscience, attains salvation and lives in the grace of God; of him I must say that he is an anonymous Christian; if not, I would have to presuppose that there is a genuine path to salvation that really attains that goal, but that simply has nothing to do with Jesus Christ. But I cannot do that.
And so, if I hold if everyone depends upon Jesus Christ for salvation, and if at the same time I hold that many live in the world who have not expressly recognized Jesus Christ, then there remains in my opinion nothing else but to take up this postulate of an anonymous Christianity.

CS Lewis and Karl Rahner

I’m confident that Bishop Barron is well aware of Karl Rahner: Rahner was one of the early architects of Vatican ll. Most likely however, the bishop knows better than to affirm it in his talks. Rahner’s theories are as incendiary today as they were seventy years ago during Vatican ll.

Our little cramped sense of what is possible.

Just about halfway through his twelve-minute talk on who can be saved, Bishop Barron arrives at what he perceives as the point of this Gospel. The man asking will only a few be saved? Intending that we Israelites—we Christians—are the insiders, everyone else is doomed. However Christ’s own words belie any such concept: God the Father invites all of humanity to salvation.

“And people will come from the east and the west
and from the north and the south
and will recline at table in the kingdom of God.
For behold, some are last who will be first,
and some are first who will be last.”

Expand your imagination…maybe God’s mercy and generosity extend way beyond our little cramped sense of what is possible.

How many will be saved

Bishop Barron ends with this statement, “Maybe our hope should expand to the capaciousness of God’s mercy and goodness.”

When saying those words, perhaps even praying those words, the peace radiating throughout our minds and hearts is tangible.

Isn’t it?

Just one last comment, a personal one. Forgive the absent segue.

I am finally back writing my elusive novel, Plausible Liars. The subject matter is made clear by the cover.

In the research for the book, I’ve been led to Henri Lubac’s extraordinary, The Drama of Atheistic Humanism.

“Man is getting rid of God in order to regain possession of the human greatness that is being, it seems to him, unwarrantably witheld by another. In God, he is overthrowing an obstacle to regain his freedom…Modern humanism then begins with resentment and begins with a choice…It is antitheism…

It is not true that man cannot organize the world without God. What is true is that without God, he can only organize it against man.”

The post How Many Will Be Saved? We May Hope Everyone appeared first on Lin Wilder.

We Should Kneel Down in Gratitude!

We should kneel down in gratitude!

We should kneel down in gratitude!

McCoullough’s comment, “We should kneel down in gratitude!” applies, of course, to more than the personage of George Washington. Still, after watching and listening to McCoullough talk about our first president, I read 1776 a second time.

It’s an astounding read. The book reads like a novel as it reveals the immensity and impossibliity of the task looming in front of George Washington. In less than 300 pages, McCoullough relates the extraordinary events of the first year of the American Revolution: 1776. And does so in his classic understated prose.

When Washington took over the command of the ragtag collection of farmers, merchants and itinerants, the men had only enough gunpowder for nine rounds each.The “soldiers” were farmers, merchants, a far cry from the professionally trained British soldiers on warships surrounding Boston. A twenty-five year old bookseller named John Knox led a force to steal badly needed munitions and a cannon from New York. Along with the cannon, 58 mortars—120,000 pounds—of muntions from Fort Ticonderoga made the three-hundred mile trip in the dead of winter. It took two months. An incredible, impossible feat.The jubilance of the British retreat from Boston was followed closely by the calamitous losses in New York. We lost 25,000 men in the battle-one percent of the population at the time, a loss of more Americans than in any other war excepting the Civil War.

McCoullough’s summary of the first president?

“He was not a brilliant strategist or tactician, nor a gifter orator, not an intellectual. At several crucial moments, he had shown marked indecisveness. He had made serious mistakes in judgement…Above all, Washington never forgot was at stake and he never have up….Without Washington’s leadership and unrelenting perserverence, the revolution almost certainly would have failed….Especially for those who had been with Washington…at the beginning…the outcome seemed little short of a miracle.”

Indeed, we should kneel down in gratitude!

Like millions here and around the world, I’m a huge fan of David McCoullogh.

And was extremely saddened to read of his death last week, just two months after the death of his wife and best friend, Rosie. My introduction to the biographer occurred at a long ago book club. Truman was to be the read for the following month. Gasping at the size of his biography, Truman, I thought, “I’ll never get through this tome!”

But I did. In fact, savored almost every word of that 1000 plus page book. And then felt the same about John Adams, because I got hooked on McCoullough’s style, refreshing candor, and the sympathetic portraits of the times and their characters. McCoullough placed me there, taking me out of our 21st century comforts, conveniences, immediacy, and transporting me to an entirely different era.

In order to write his books, McCoullough needed to like and admire the person he wrote about. In the preface to his book on Adams, McCoullough said that he’d intended to write about Thomas Jefferson, until he began doing the research and learned that it was Adams, not Jefferson, whose principled brilliance and steadfast character built the foundation of this country while Jefferson was mostly in France.

Reading McCoullough’s books always feels like an experience. He has a gift of transporting our psyches into the guts of crises and events and making us feel we’re part of it all. Part of the successes and even more, the humiliations and gravely costly errors. We end each book with a bit of awe at the nobility of our brothers and sisters, a kind of pride in our shared humanity.

In a 1992 interview about his new biography,Truman,

McCoullough said something worth shouting from the rooftops:

“… always you have to keep in mind at every step along the way: What didn’t they know? To look at it from the mountaintop, so to speak, as many historians do, and to take the grand view is to have a huge advantage of hindsight, which they never had, which we don’t have right now. So to fault a figure in public life or to condemn a whole generation because they failed to know what we know is really, to me, it’s dishonest and unfair.”

Dishonest and unfair, indeed. There’s no shortage of dishonesty and unfairness in our world, is there? A seemingly universal refusal to appreciate historical and cultural context.

But guess what? There’s nothing new about that.

The last three of my novels were historical fiction. Hence extensive research was required. Because The Reluctant Queen was the third in my ancient novel series, I expected its writing to be simpler. After all, I was writing of the same period, give or take a couple of hundred years. But only when looking at the Greco-Persian wars through the Persian perspective did I learn that there’s nothing new about revising history to fit our biases and prejudices.

While researching and writing I Claudia and My Name is Saul, the thought that the ancients would be as tempted as we moderns to revise history never once occurred to me. But as I pondered that obvious fact, once more the distance between us and the ancients narrowed considerably. All of these challenges incited and excited me.

The Reluctant Queen

Ancient novel series

That’s the thing about history, isn’t it?

The only way to get even an echo of understanding for historical figures is to join them in their culture. What they knew and believed. And once we do, we find the most extraordinary thing, don’t we?

My sympathetic writing about the characters of Pontius Pilate and King Xerxes has yielded criticism. Both are men many in our culture-especially the scholars-think we understand. But that’s the thing about writing, the awful humility of it. If we’re honest, we learn that we don’t really know. Anything.

Gratitude

In the eigthteen minute video with McCoullough above, the author vehemently opines against those who think ours are the worst of times in America. At the time the video was filmed, the chasm between Democrats and Republicans was well on its way to apparent irreconcilability. But if you listen carefully to his remarks about the early years of this country, —better yet, learn about them for yourself—instantly, you know the foolishness of such statements.

Not just foolishness, McCoullough admonishes, but ingratitude.

Yes, the seeming incapacity to see the blessings we Americans have and do receive. In a world where want is the norm and clean water a precious gift, so many of us manage to be mostly unhappy. Mostly depressed.

Because I think about gratitude more than a little, I write about it. Often wondering, what is it?

As a child, I witnessed the mystery of gratitude and its absence. My non-church-going father seemed grateful. Tired, usually, but grateful for his work and the living it provided for him, his wife and girls. While my mom seemed mostly incapable of seeing the blessings of her life. Her lens revealed only a dirty house and Dad’s relentlessly oil-stained clothes and hands which bugged her, often making her angry.

All these years later I wonder about that: we should kneel down in gratitude! In my memory, admittedly faulty, the grateful person in our family was my father. The man who only began attending church after she died.

Weekly, I pray

the Patriotic Rosary for the consecration of our nation. It begins this way:

Come Holy Spirit
For the Conversion of our Nation’s Capital
The Apostle’s Creed
For the Holy Father
Our Father
For Bishops, Priests, Religious
Three Hail Mary’s
For the Conversion of our Country
Glory Be

Included in these magnificent prayers are those from five founding fathers upon the birth of this nation.

Each is sobering and haunting.

George Washington’s prayer precedes the first mystery for the Presidency of the United States. The man who made the momentous decision to step away from the presidency after two terms. An act, declares David McCoullough, that makes him worthy of being “our greatest president.”

The American Lucius Qinctus Cincinattus.

“No one can rejoice more than I do at every step the people of this great country take to
preserve the Union, establish good order and government, and to render the nation happy at
home and respectable abroad. No country upon earth ever had it more in its power to attain
these blessings than United America. Wondrously strange then, and much to be regretted
indeed would it be, were we to neglect the means, and to depart from the road which
Providence has pointed us, so plainly; I cannot believe it will ever come to pass. The Great
Governor of the Universe has led us too long and too far on the road to happiness and glory,
to forsake us in the midst of it. By folly and improper conduct, proceeding from a variety of
causes, we may now and then get bewildered; but I hope and trust that there is good sense
and virtue enough left to recover the right path before we shall be entirely lost.”
George Washington, June 29, 1788

We should kneel down in gratitude!

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