Not New But Relevant

I am reading a series of essays by James Hitchcock, about the Church in the 70s and 80s. For all that they were reactions to Vatican II (which took place during the 60s), they might have been written yesterday.

One essay about abortion, "Abortion and the Moral Revolution," is particularly interesting.

Hitchcock observes, " THe new orthodoxy (the new popular opinion) fits closely with the reality of class conflict, already discussed, in that this orthodoxy is essentially located in what has often been called the "new class" - those persons who regard themselves as enlightened and emancipated in their opinions and who are maximally receptive of new ideas. In essence these people believe that moral belief, although necessary to society, is also dangerous because of the passions it arouses. Publicly they espouse the idea of relativism and equal toleration of all opinions, in order to dampen possible outbreaks of moral passions of which they disapprove. In practice, however, they concede to themselves the sole right o have moral passions, the sole right to mount moral crusades. Moral passion is treated as a dangerous substance which must in effect be licensed."

As anyone who has ever expressed a non-PC opinion derived from a moral conviction knows, the writer is right on target here. This is particularly the case with abortion. But the writer goes on to discuss anti-abortion feelings and the political scene. This really struck home for me:

"Since the late 1960s there has been talk of a "conscience constituency": in American politics, meaning an element among voters which shuns traditional party loyalties and traditional considerations of economic self-interest in favor of political behavior based on the perceived moral importance of particular issues. These are issues - war, racism, poverty, ecology, the "Third World" - which ordinary politics either takes little interest in or seeks to avoid, precisely because they are emotional and divisive.

"The intense hatred which many "new politics" people have for the antiabortion movement stems form their feeling that the kind of people who are opposed to abortion, especially if they are demonstrably religious, have no right engaging in moral crusades. Such crusading is permissible only if directed toward subjects which have been certified as genuine issues of conscience. Conceiving themselves as authentic keepers of the public conscience, such people are rendered angry and frightened at the prospect of others - the wrong kind of people - claiming the authority of conscience for their own concerns.

"Those "single-issue" voters who have allowed their political loyalties to be guided solely by considerations involving, say, war or the Equal Rights Amendment, are commonly admired, within the "conscience constituency," for their purity, even if their single-mindedness is sometimes thought a bit short-sighted. Those who cast their ballots solely on the question of abortion, however, are accused of being dangerous fanatics and threats to the democratic system, the remedy for such a threat being a renewed sense of party loyalty, in which antiabortion voters would not hold politicians accountable for betraying them."

In this most recent election, I was pretty up-front about my inability to support Obama first and foremost because of his position on abortion. I had one very telling discussion with a man who, when questioned, agreed that late-term abortion was tantamount to murder. He agreed that if Obama supported it, he would have a problem with that. Even though Obama supported it verbally, and even though he promised to rescind the ban of partial-birth abortions as soon as he attained office, this man insisted that because Obama did not cast an actual vote (he politically voted "present" rather than go on record), he could not find Obama guilty of supporting murder.

Moreover, this man, and others, insisted that I was being dumb, irresponsible, and, as the article mentions, short-sighted by voting a single issue: abortion.

My answer? A respect for human life - a belief that human life is somehow more valuable than anything else on earth, and that it should always be protected - is central to all our other understanding of life, politics, culture, art - simply put, a valuing of human life is central to everything we do, are, stand for, and are likely to become. This is not to say that issues of war and ecology are not important - they are. But, particularly in the case of war, they are important for one reason: they are harmful to human life.

We might argue that our responsibility to manage the ecology transcends human life, and so it does. Still, absent human life, many of the most powerful destructive forces in the universe and on this planet - fires, volcanoes, tidal waves, comets, novas, and so on - would continue to kill, to change ecologies, and to punish innocent animal life, without our expert help.

But as to all the rest - I still maintain that if we truly respect human life above all, most of the depredations we so fear and loathe - murder, greed, theft, torture, war, and so on - would, if not disappear, be minimalized, without the need for political intervention.

Chicken? Or Egg?

It occurred to me a while ago that perhaps the reason there are so many Christ-like stories in world mythology is that we were designed to "recognize" that story - because it is the truth.

At Mass on Sunday another thought struck me - perhaps the odd fact that we must eat to survive is linked to our spiritual need to consume the body and blood of Christ. Why weren't we created to manufacture our food from the sunlight, air, and perhaps minerals from the soil the way plants do? Why this necessity to keep consuming plant and animal life? Many think it odd that Christians, Catholics in particular, "eat" their Savior. But maybe it's just all of a piece.

Interestingly, in Mere Christianity, which I am reading now (slowly - there is so much to think about!), C. S. Lewis points out that God did, indeed, choose to create us as creatures who must eat to survive, and must have sex to procreate. He might have made many other choices, but these are the ones He chose. That is simply the way it is.

So I can't help wondering if we (perhaps I should say, social and other scientists) persist in looking at things backwards: we don't discount the Christ story because it has been told in other cultures, but in fact we recognize the thread of human truth in it; we don't discount the Christian notion of Holy Communion as bizarre and superstitious but rather we see the perfect symmetry of our need to consume to live - both spiritually and physically. What other method might God have chosen in order to demonstrate to us our need for Him as the sustenance of our spiritual lives?

Icons

I had a new friend, and I went to meet his family.

The family were Catholic. So, nominally at the time, was I. Their house was full of icons: a cross on the wall, a statue of the Blessed Mother, an Infant of Prague stood in one bedroom.

Inwardly, I scoffed.

I had been trained to do this, but didn't realize it at the time. I was smart, educated, worldly. I read books, studied philosophy. This kind of thing - this "iconolotry" - was for peasants. Clearly, these people had a peasant strain in them.

Boy, was I wrong. Certainly not for the first time, and surely not for the last.

Of course, you have to be willing to submit yourself - without assurance, science, or proof positive - to a belief that there is something more to our existence than live, scramble for food, procreate (maybe), die, and disappear forever. But having once submitted, it isn't over. The submission, the surrender, is continual. It must be done again, and again. It's like love. Real love, of course, not "falling" in love. It must be done again and again, in the face of doubt, despair, anger, pain and sorrow. And while it's never quite as difficult as the first time (the submission), it never gets easy.

Icons, a particularly Catholic thing, are nothing more than signposts. They are like little arrows scratched on trees in the woods, assuring you that you're on the right path back home.

I recall one night driving from Geneva to Dijon. The road was rural, the night was dark, and we had no idea of where we really were. We drove along in the dark, hoping we were headed in the right direction. With welcome relief, we finally came upon a road sign with the welcoming arrow and kilometre measure. I can't tell you what a happy sight that simple sign looming in the headlights was.

Touching a rosary in your pocket, seeing a statue on your bedside table, or a little cross on the wall as you leave your house in the morning is the same sort of sensation. It's just a reminder that you're on a path headed somewhere, and that you haven't lost your way. It's a chance to refocus, to set your mind again on God, make that little act of surrender. Just for one more day.

Sinful Vote?

During the announcements at Sunday's Mass, our priest stood on the pulpit and explained to us that if we had voted for Obama in the recent election, we should go to Confession before we tried to receive Communion - he was unequivocal about the fact that by voting for a man who outspokenly defended and endorsed abortion (at any and all stages) we were committing a mortal sin. I was surprised, but I can only say that I am profoundly grateful that some of our priests and even some of the American bishops have found the courage to be forthright about our obligations as Catholics.

I just don't understand how anybody, Catholic or not, can think that unless we respect human life - at whatever stage - anything else matters.

Love and Kindness

I am listening to a book that compares the life and works of Sigmund Freud (atheist and father of psychoanalysis) and C. S. Lewis (Catholic apologist and noted author and scholar).

There is much more to say about the comparison, but I was struck by a discussion of C. S. Lewis' confrontation of grief (when his wife, Joy, passed away) and his eventual understanding of pain, life, and God.

I hope that I can do this justice in recollection:

God made the universe, and us creatures. As the Bible puts it, He "so" made the world - that is, He also created the laws that govern it. (In the Narnia books, as the White Witch and Aslan confront one another, they *must* adhere to the laws that govern even the magic.) And while God is omnipotent, there are things, as Lewis points out, that even God cannot do, such as answer nonsense questions. And in general, God does not interfere with the laws of the universe that He has created.

Wishing for us, his creatures, to choose to love and serve Him, God gave us free will, thus introducing the possibility of "un-good" into the universe. "Un-good," or evil, is choosing not to do the will of God.

Above all, God wishes to love us - that's why He created us. But He wants to love creatures that are worthy of that love. Now here is an interesting problem - modern culture tells us that unconditional love is the ideal. That is, "I love you just the way you are." And to an extent, that is true. If you love someone, you are supposed to love him without trying to change him.

But that is not the same thing as love which demands the best from the beloved - the perfection of the beloved. If I love you, and I see you gaining weight rapidly, I am concerned for your health and wish you to stop this. Or if I see you drinking excessively, I might interfere. And in both cases, certainly in the latter, if your behavior persisted I might withdraw my love - or at the very least the expression of it - if you could not stop the behavior.

Lewis points out that there is a difference between the human notion of "kindness" and the Godly idea of Love. Anyone who has contemplated the problem of human suffering and pain cannot have escaped the question: "How could a loving God permit such a thing? If God is truly all-powerful and all-good, why would He let His creatures suffer so?" I used to ask this question in terms of my own parenthood - "I would not let my children suffer like this, how can God?"

Lewis says that what we are experiencing is kindness, not love. Love, he says, is "more splendid and more stern." Love wishes to perfect the beloved. Love demands that the beloved be the best he can be - thus a parent who is being kind to his child might give way to his fear of the dentist, but a parent who loved his child would insist that he go and deal with the fear and pain.

So in our daily lives, we will experience pain and suffering, and we use this as a means of perfecting ourselves. We find the reason for it, or we endure it. The Catholic Church (at least, when I was a child) suggested that you "offer up" your suffering to the suffering Christ - Jesus suffered profoundly, and His human nature even cried out to God in despair as He hung on the cross.

So in our own lives we urge those we love to be their best selves, and we do nothing to interfere with them becoming their best selves. We do not use kindness as an excuse to fail in our love for them.

Nancy Pelosi: Hypocrit of the House

I'm both horrified and gratified. Horrified that Nancy Pelosi made such a stupid remark to Tom Brokaw on August 24th's Meet the PressI. I don't really need to to into the details, as it's been played repeatedly, and discussed repeatedly.

But I'm also gratified that it happened, for selfish reasons.

1. I was right in a post I made to this blog during the Pope's visit to the U.S. when I said that the behavior of Catholic politicians was tantamount to Henry VIII demanding that the Church bow to him. Catholic politicians are now stating "Church doctrine," which is not Church doctrine at all (in the first place), and is not their purview (in the second place).

2. The dispute is out in the open. Prior to this, most people who don't know what the Church teaches could be led astray with comments like Pelosi's.

3. The Bishops have actually had the strength of character and faith to actually confront her!

Now I only hope that they will go further and outright condemn this kind of c***.

Actually, I don't argue the abortion case on the strength of the human being having a "soul." I argue it on the strength that human beings are exceptional, self-aware creatures, and if we start categorizing them as "wanted" or "unwanted," how far are we from Nazi Germany?

I don't support the death penalty, either, but not so much because of the "worthy of life" argument. I think if someone has committed a truly heinous act (killing a little child, for example), they've pretty much made themselves unworthy to be among the rest of us. On the other hand, I don't want to give that kind of power to state. If we let the state decide who has the right to live and who should die... well, Nazi Germany again.

I think there is plenty of argument against abortion without bringing religion into it - and it's probably counter-productive when it is brought in, because then it is too easy for pro-abortion folks to dismiss the position.

Now, Pelosi has a point - the Church I grew up in did counsel us that we all have a free will and a conscience - it was hoped that this was a "Catholic" conscience, which would guide us along Catholic principles. So, if we were starving and had no money, would it be a major sin to take an apple? Probably not - but this would be an area for one's conscience. If I killed my child (at whatever state of development) is not a matter of my conscience deciding the right or wrong of the matter. This is a mortal sin, by any measure, in the Catholic Church.

I stopped practicing the Faith many years ago because I couldn't justify what I was expected to do, and I couldn't live up to it. I felt it would be hypocritcal to attend Mass and the Sacraments if I was not able to at least try to live up to the rest of the program.

Nancy Pelosi should do the same.

A New Catholic Blog

I've decided to create this new blog to give full attention to issue to do with matters catholic and Catholic. The Church had been a huge part of my life growing up, but thanks to Vatican II and more particularly the aftermath, I was disaffected for a long time. Thanks to the unswerving dedication of the SSPX (about which much more to come!), it again is a huge part of my life, Deo gratias!