Setting forth the truth plainly we commend ourselves to every man’s conscience… A Consideration of the Church’s Role in the Public Square

In much of the heated public debate on the HHS mandate (that the Catholic Church pay for contraceptives, abortifacients, and sterilization) and over gay “marriage,” there is a strain to the conversation, that somehow, the Catholic Church is trying to force people to follow what she teaches.

To think that we have such power is fanciful, but the charge comes up a lot and in different forms. Consider the following comments I gleaned from the combox of a Washington Post article submitted by me and the Archdiocese of Washington on the topic of gay “marriage.” These are just a few excerpts that illustrate that some see us as trying to use power to force others to do what we want. (I have added a few responses in Red just because I can’t resist):

  1. Translation [of your article]: Of course we do not want to make you a Roman Catholic, only that you will be governed by the pope in Rome…. He, and we, don’t have that power.
  2. Inasmuch as we can neither prove nor disprove the existence of God, everyone should be free to follow their own path as individuals. You are. I don’t have the power to force you to do anything. But you are going further than “following your own path.” You are asking for legal recognition of something that has never been recognized before. Expect a little push back. Further, the Catholic Church does not only appeal to God and the Bible but also to Natural Law because we recognize that not everyone sees the Scriptures with the kind of reverence we do.
  3. When it comes to owning a business that accepts public funds and which will employ believers of every stripe as well as non-believers, the owners have no right dictating the choice of others Actually is the Government that is dictating choice. In the HHS mandate, only the government has the power here to compel and punish non-compliance, and they are saying that we must give contraceptives free to anyone who asks for them. The “mandate” says that Catholics, and anyone who objects to sterilization, to abortifacients and contraceptives, (for it is not only Catholics), must pay for them whether they like it or not. As for Gay “marriage,” it is once again the Government that is requiring everyone to recognize what has never been recognized before, that same-sex couples are “married.” And, by gosh, if we don’t recognize them and treat them as married then we will be decertified from adoption services and have to stop providing marital health benefits for our married employees (as happened with Catholic Charities). So there IS a lot of forcing going on here, but it isn’t the Church. We don’t have that power, the State does. And frankly that should make everyone sober, even those who don’t agree with us on these specific issues. EVERYONE ought to be mighty concerned when the State seeks to compel people to act against their conscience.
  4. Just one more example why one should never vote for a Roman Catholic politician who would more likely march in lockstep to the dictates of the Church than follow constitution. Whew! Dream on, we have the opposite problem. Very FEW Catholic politicians live their faith when it comes to political agendas. And if they do, they, like anyone else, they have to face the voters every few years. Further, why is it wrong for politicians to follow, say, environmental agendas, or homosexual agendas, or social justice agendas, but it is WRONG for them to follow religiously inspired agendas? Since when do people of faith have no voice or seat at the table in the world of politics? Are we not citizens who have the right to petition the government for redress etc?
  5. This is about the Catholic church demanding that people who do not have any allegiance to that church or its dogma live by its rules. We don’t have this power. It is the State (and you?) who are instituting that we pay for what we consider wrong. Why should I have to pay for your contraceptives? Why should you simply demand to get them free?
  6. Today, they are gunning for the gays. Next will be your birth control. We don’t have this power. What we are asking is that we not be compelled to pay for things we consider wrong and sinful.
  7. In pushing your definition of marriage on to all other people and churches, you are in fact trying to ensure that Catholic law remains state law. We don’t have this power. As citizens, and for principled reasons rooted in Scripture and Natural Law, we argue that the law that Has ALWAYS been the law in this land, remain unchanged. We have a right as citizens to be part of the political process. One side is going to win, right now it looks like the pro-gay marriage folks. How would you feel if I said, “You are pushing your definition of marriage and trying to make it State law?” Why don’t we just admit that we both have a right to be in the public square and advocate for what we think is right? I think you’re wrong headed and confused about marriage and your type  loves to call me intolerant and bigoted. I’ll see you at the ballot box. Oh! but wait a minute! Here in DC your advocates on the DC Council would not allow a referendum. And, gee, when we do win at the ballot box as we have in several states, your side runs to a judge and tries (usually successfully) to overturn the will of the voters. Hmm….who is throwing power around here? Who’s pushing whose definition on whom? Hmm…?
  8. the church will be better off the more that it gives up its hold on political power. What power? If we’re so powerful, why is the moral meltdown so advanced? Again, are you simply striving to say we should have no voice in the political process? We have a right as citizens to try and influence outcomes, just like you. Frankly we haven’t been very successful lately. I’d love to find out where all this political power we theoretically have is hidden.

OK, well you get the point. A LOT of people think we have a lot more power than we do. Frankly it’s laughable to think think the Catholic Church has all this power. We can’t even unify our own believers. I have written before (with love) that unifying Catholics is like herding cats! I would to God that we could really unify around anything. Then we might be a political force to be reckoned with. And as citizens we would have every right to be such a force. But as it is, we are (sadly) a rather divided lot, even on abortion. I can assure you , most Catholic politicians do NOT have a hotline to the Vatican or take even a scintilla of advice from the Pope or Bishops. And even if they accidentally agree with the Pope or the bishops, for most of them, it is because the politics make sense, not that the faith has “compelled” them. No, don’t worry too much about the “power” of the Church.

That said, I have already commented above (in the red remarks) that Catholics, as citizens of the Untied States of America have the same rights as any other citizen to petition the government, to seek to enact laws that reflect our values and concerns. But we have no more or less power or voice than any other citizen of this Land. We, like others, often band together with coalitions. But again, if this is somehow wrong, then why is it not wrong for feminists, or environmentalists, or unions, or advocates of any number of hundred of other causes to do the same? We are Americans with rights. And people of faith have just as much right to be in the public square and the public conversation as any one else.

Some of the commenters in the Washington Post Combox, not listed here, wanted to recite grievances from the Middle Ages about Church power then etc. Why not leave the 14th Century politics in the 14th Century, and let’s stay in the 21st Century. There was a LOT of bad stuff in the old days. It wasn’t just the Church, governments too were different then. Modern democratic republics were unknown in those days. Today the political landscape is different. And if the Church ever did have all the power (and some of the claims are exaggerated and the Inquisition is often cartoonishly portrayed) that is not the case today. For our purposes we are in the 21st Century West.

Finally, I think a quote from St. Paul rather well distills what we, as a Church, and as believers, seek to do in the public square of America. More than acquire power (which is not easy in a wide and pluralistic culture), we seek to commend ourselves, and our message to everyone’s conscience. St. Paul says,

Rather, renouncing secret and shameful ways; we do not use deception, nor do we distort the Word of God. On the contrary, by setting forth the truth plainly, we commend ourselves to every man’s conscience in the sight of God (2 Cor 4:2)

Yes, frankly we do have vigorous disagreement with secret (and not so secret), shameful practices. And we will not, in order to be popular or conformed to these times, distort or misrepresent the Word of God. Abortion is wrong. Fornication, adultery, and homosexual acts are wrong. Divorce, and chosen single parenthood, and so called gay “marriage” are wrong. Contraception, sterilization, embryonic stem cell research, euthanasia, wrong, wrong wrong.

But I cannot force you to obey me. Rather I commend myself to your conscience. And even if Scripture will not be acceptable to you, I will have recourse to Natural Law. I, indeed the whole Church, will continue to commend myself to your conscience. And even though the gospel is currently “out of season” (cf 2 Tim 4:2) and you laugh at me and call me names like intolerant, bigoted etc., I will continue to commend myself to your conscience.

As long as I live I will speak the truth in love. And however you choose to understand me I will continue to speak. You may wish to call me hateful. I am not. I invite you to conscientiously consider what I say. I cannot command you, so do not fear me. But I do commend myself to your conscience.I will meet you in the public square, for that is my right as much as yours. But in the end, mandates and forced adherence are not in my power. I commend myself to your conscience, I do not, I cannot,  command you.

Here’s a video I put together of the World travels by the Pope as seeks to commend himself to everyone’s conscience. Johnny Cash supplies the musical theme: “I’ve Been Everywhere!”

Sowing in the Wind and Reaping the Whirlwind (or) "Don’t wake up in a roadside ditch". A meditation based on a clever new T.V. Commerical

The video at the bottom of this post is a humorous commercial that depicts how things, when unaddressed, can pile up and get out of hand. The commercial depicts a man who becomes angry, and how this anger eventually leads him to wake up in a roadside ditch. The commercial of course presents an intentionally absurd, and therefore funny, chain of action.

But in a real and far less funny way, bad things unaddressed do tend to pile up in our life and lead to ever deeper “ditches” for both individuals, and our culture. St. Augustine famously wrote:

Because my will was perverse, lust came forth, and lust yielded to habit, and habit not resisted, became necessity.” (Confessions Book 8.5)

Biblically we are admonished: They sow in the wind, they shall reap the whirlwind! (Hosea 8:7)

Yes, terrible addictions, bad habits, and serious consequences can result from long chains of decisions, wherein one bad choice or premise, leads to others, and ultimately to a real mess. Things tend to pile up. The commercial below admonishes us: “Don’t wake up in a roadside ditch.” Of course their solution for us is to buy DIRECTV.

But Perhaps too there is a lesson for our culture here. For, to a large extent, we have woken up in a roadside ditch. We have sown in the wind, and now we reap the whirlwind. Many of us who are a bit older remember a world that was quite different, and wonder how we got into this roadside ditch.

To some extent, while admitting the danger of oversimplifying, we can see our current malaise has often resulted from certain basic premises that have now reached “full flower.”

Consider two “thought chains” similar to the commercial below, as our culture “thinks out-loud” It may help you to watch the video first so you can see what I’m trying to imitate and can hear the voice.

Scenario one: The roadside ditch of sexual confusion

  1. When you’re lustful you say, Sex is just for fun. It really has no relationship to the procreation and rearing of children at all, unless the couple wants it to have that meaning. So sex is just for fun.
  2. And when sex is just for fun you say, “So what’s wrong with contraception? Bring it on!”
  3. And when you bring on contraception you think you can have free sex without consequences.
  4. And when you think there are not consequences you start to discover sexually transmitted diseases, exploding promiscuity, teenage pregnancies, skyrocketing single motherhood rates, higher divorce rates, plummeting marriage rates, terrible abortion rates, broken and incomplete families.
  5. And when you have these things, you don’t connect them to contraception because lust has darkened your intellect.
  6. And when your intellect is darkened you loose your ability to see even the physically obvious facts about human sexuality and start to say that there is nothing wrong at all with homosexual acts.
  7. And when your darkness is light, how deep will the darkness be!
  8. Don’t wake up in a deep darkness. Buy a Catholic Catechism and the Holy Bible. Get them today.

Scenario two: The roadside ditch of Marital destruction

  1. When you are a baby boomer you say, “The purpose of marriage is the happiness of the couple….Children are merely a way of accessorising the marriage and are not essential.
  2. And when you think this way, you contracept and have few children.
  3. And when you have few children, they are less of a priority in terms of money and decisions.
  4. And when you run into difficulties, as most marriages do, you don’t say “Let’s work it out for the sake of the kids.” After all there’s only one or two of them, and the purpose of marriage is the happiness of adults. Kids are just an accessory and can be raised well in any circumstance.
  5. And when you think this way you get lots of divorces.
  6. And when you get lots of divorces, marriage starts to look like a flimsy social fiction that exists only for adults, rather than a sacred trust oriented toward the raising of children.
  7. And when marriage looks like a flimsy social fiction, the homosexual community comes to you and says, “You mean that the purpose of marriage is just for two adults to be happy and is not linked to the procreation of children? Then Why can’t Gays be married?”
  8. And when they ask this you have nothing to say.
  9. Don’t wake up with nothing to say. Get a biblical and Catholic understanding of marriage that links it to the mutual support of the spouses AND the procreation of children. Do it today.

Just something to consider, based on a creative commerical. The critical among you, will cry “simplistic.” But I already admit that, so chill. These chains I have constructed are influenced by a lot of other things too. But it’s fun to follow some of our often unquestioned premises through to their end in a roadside ditch.

Don’t wake up in a roadside ditch. Examine your premises now.

Raising Boys in A Culture that is Often Alarmed By Them

I read an article over a year ago in First Things by Sally Thomas entitled: The Killer Instinct. The article ponders the modern aversion to the male psyche. Young boys are full of zealous energy, full of spit and vinegar, and have a a proclivity to rough and even violent play. Many modern parents and educators seem troubled by this and often attempt to soften boys, make them behave more like girls. Sadly there is even an attempt by some to diagnosis typically rough-house and energetic boys as having ADHD and they are put on medicines to suppress what is in the end a normal male energy. I do not deny that there can be a true ADHD diagnosis in some cases, but it may also be a symptom of an increasingly feminized culture that finds normal male behavior to be violent and a diagnosable “disorder.” What I have said here may here may be “controversial” but in the finest male tradition, remember, we can always “spar” in the comments section!

I’d like to present excerpts of the article here and then add some of m own comments in red. You can read the whole article by clicking on the title above.

The default mode of many parents is to be as alarmed by [the] proclivity in their sons [to shoot and stab at things and be aggressive]…..An obvious fascination with shooting things might seem like one of those warning signals we all read about…It used to be that parents waited for Johnny to start torturing the cat before they worried. My generation of parents seems to worry that owning a rubber-band shooter will make Johnny want to torture the cat. A friend of mine told me that he and his wife had decided not to give their boys guns for toys. What they discovered was that without the toy everything became a gun: sticks, brooms, scissors, their fingers. In the end, they “made peace” with the fact that boys love guns and swords and stopped worrying about latent tendencies to violence. Somehow it was in a boy’s nature and they couldn’t “nurture” it away.

As a toddler, one of my sons liked to stand behind his baby sister’s chair and pull her head back as far as it would go, to watch it spring up again like a punching bag on its stem….and then she screamed….From my son’s point of view, it was altogether a gratifying exercise. My intervention was always swift and decisive…I implored my son, “Don’t be rough. Be gentle.” …I am struck, now, by the strangeness of what I said to him. We don’t tell someone struggling with lust simply not to want sex; we don’t tell a glutton that his problem will be solved if he stops being hungry. Yet, I might as well have said, “Stop being a boy.”…. What I think I have come to understand about boys is that a desire to commit violence is not the same thing as a desire to commit evil. It’s a mistake for parents to presume that a fascination with the idea of blowing something away is, in itself, a disgusting habit, like nose-picking, that can and should be eradicated. The problem is not that the boy’s hand itches for a sword. The problem lies in not telling him what [the sword and itch] are for, that they are for something. If I had told my aggressive little son not, “Be gentle,” but, rather, “Protect your sister,” I might, I think, have had the right end of the stick.(This is a very brilliant insight. It is essential that we not try to destroy the innate gifts that God gives us in order to “control” them. We must learn to harness them and sublimate them so that they achieve the end to which they are intended).

Anne Roche Muggeridge, who reared four boys in the 1970s and 1980s, observes that

prevailing society now thoroughly regards young men as social invalids. . . . The fashion in education for the past three decades has been to try to make boys more like girls: to forbid them their toy guns and rough play, to engage them in exercises of “cooperation and sharing,” …to denounce any boyish roughness as “aggressive” and “sexist.”

Muggeridge writes of a visit to a doctor who urged on her a prescription for Ritalin, saying that a child as constantly active as her two-year-old son must be disturbed. “He’s not disturbed,” she responded. “He’s disturbing.” It is to realize, as Anne Roche Muggeridge did while watching her sons take turns throwing each other into a brick wall, that what you have in your house is not a human like you but a human unlike you. In short, as Muggeridge puts it, you are bringing up an “alien.” Yes, it has been very frustrating to be a man in the modern age let alone have to grow up under the tutelage of social scientists and education bureaucrats who scorn and suspect your very nature. Boys are aggressive. That is natural and good. They must be taught to master it and focus the energy of their aggression on the right object, but they should not be scorned for who and what they are. Such scorning has become for too many a sense that they are socially “enlightened.” It is time to see this attitude as a the type of bigotry and sexism that it too often is. To many women (and some feminized men) a boy in his raw state may in fact seem like an alien, but even aliens deserve respect 🙂

[There is an] initiation rite, devised and performed by our parish’s young priest twice a year in the church. This rite involves a series of solemn vows to be “a man of the Church,” “a man of prayer,” and so forth. It includes induction into the Order of the Brown Scapular, the bestowing of a decidedly manly red-and-black knot rosary, and the awarding of a red sash. What the boys look forward to, though, with much teasing of soon-to-be inductees about sharpened blades and close shaves…is the moment when a new boy kneels before Father and is whacked smartly on each shoulder with a large, impressive, and thoroughly real sword. Great idea. I’m going to work in my parish about initiating something like this.

These Holy Crusaders are, after all, ordinary boys—sweaty and goofy and physical. For them to take the Cross seriously requires something like a sword. For them to take the sword, knowing what it’s for, requires the Cross. …A boy’s natural drive to stab and shoot and smash can be shaped, in his imagination, to the image of sacrifice, of laying down his life for his friends. In the meantime, this is the key to what brings these boys to church. It’s not their mothers’ church or their sisters’ church; it is theirs, to serve and defend. Yes, yes! Amen. Greater love hath no man that to lay down his life for his friends. Christian manhood needs to be rediscovered in some segments of the Church. Too many men stay away from Church because it seems feminine to them. Sermons about duty, courage and fighting the good fight have given way to a steady diet of compassion, kindness, being nice, getting along, self actualizing and, did I mention being nice? These are not wrong virtues but they must be balanced by virtues that call us to stand up and speak out with courage, accepting our duties and fighting the good fight of faith, if necessary unto death. Men respond to the call when it is given in a way that respects their manhood. Balance is needed in the preaching and teaching of the Church and it seems that in recent decades we may have lost this in many settings, IMHO. If you think I’m crazy, remember this is a conversation. Hit the comment button and have it.

Sally Thomas, a contributing writer for FIRST THINGS, is a poet and homeschooling mother in North Carolina.

Here’s a video summoning boys unto manhood:

The Bigotry Question Goes Both Ways – Confronting the Media on their Line of Questioning, and the Questions they Fail to Ask.

The early Christian martyrs were charged with a rather unusual crime: “atheism.” They were called such by the civil magistrates, and and many of the pagan Roman citizens, since they refused to worship the official gods of the Roman Empire. Further, in calling Jesus “Lord” they were directly indicating that they were at odds with the official declaration of the Senatus populusque Romanus (the Senate and the Roman People), that Caesar was “lord.” Their use of the word Evangelium to reference their sacred writings was considered a usurping of a word associated with divine emperor, who alone could utter an Evangelion, a word that was good news of great joy that will be for all the people (cf Lk 2:10).

Yes, the opinion of many at the time was that these Christians were trouble makers who upset the civil balance. They were considered impious and unpatriotic in failing to worship, and thus placate, the gods. Their “atheism” could bring forth bad things for the civil order. They were therefore unjust in their failure to recognize the political, social and sacred order. The Emperor too, was seen as a mere man. This might undermine the authority and respect he both had and was due.

Hence to withstand the Christians, and to attempt to force them to comply with the “just” demands of the law, was seen as a virtuous and praise worthy stance by many in the Roman world. Whatever penalties, might be necessary to compel Christian observance of these “just” norms was seen by many as necessary and good. Further, ridicule, persecution and even death were seen as something these unjust and unpatriotic people deserved. The sporadic persecutions that broke out against the Christians flowed essentially from this mentality.

Today, many of the same ingredients are setting up against Catholics, and other Bible-believing Christians, who have not simply caved and accepted all the increasing demands of a secular culture. And this secular culture has developed a kind of religious fervor around its central dogmas of abortion on demand, the Gay (LGBTQ) agenda, Gay “marriage,” Gay adoption, embryonic stem cell research, euthanasia, separation of Church and State, and the removal of all religious influence from the public schools, and public squares.

This agenda is presented with a dogmatism far more severe than the religious opponents they accuse of being inflexible dogmatic. The PC police will immediately swoop in any even mild transgressions of the secularist sensitivity code. Even an unintentional lapse of the tongue must be punished with immediate resignation or forceable removal, no matter how sincere the apology, or how significant the context of the remarks.

And those Christians and others who fail to adopt this new secularist and sexually revolutionary social order are called: hateful, bigoted, harsh, intolerant, reactionary, homophobic, and just plain mean. Many of these extreme secularists consider themselves not only permitted to speak of us in this way, but see themselves as righteous in doing it. Further, any attempts to eject or exclude us from partaking in the public discussion, exercising our right to free speech, and having equal access to public monies or grants to serve the poor, are seen by the extremists, not only as permissible exclusions, but righteous ones.

For in a way we are “atheists” to their new secularist dogma, which many of them hold with religious fervor.

And while many of them accuse us of “imposing our values” on others, it is really they who, now gaining significant power and influence, are imposing their values far more than they imagine. They not only demand tolerance but insist on approval, and dramatic changes in civil law and longstanding cultural norms. And anyone, like the Catholic Church, that will not conform, must be legally compelled in stages to comply through desertification, exclusionary policies, defunding, endless legal challenges, and so forth.

And all the while the extreme secularists call us bigots, refusing to see their own bigotry. They refuse to accept, for even a moment, that our opposition to much of their agenda is rooted in principled, sincere adherence to long standing religious teaching, a teaching that we believe to be given us by God himself. No indeed, not only will they accept our sincerity, but the Scriptures themselves are openly ridiculed and scorned. Never mind that we consider the Scripture to be sacred. That does not stop increasing numbers of supposedly “open minded and tolerant” secularists and others from spoofing, mocking, ridiculing and scorning Scripture. They also misuse it, quoting verses out of context and in ways that give no acknowledgment of long held interpretive principles.

But yet, we are somehow the bigots, somehow, we are the insensitive and intolerant ones who seek to impose our agenda. Well look again oh ye accusers, and heal yourselves. For despite all the talk that the Gay Lobby, and the Secularists have about their status as victims, they look awfully powerful, influential and well ensconced in high places.

I will not tell you there are no bigots in any Catholic or Christian Church. In what may be as many as 1.5 billion Christians on this planet, you just might find a few. But simply refusing to burn incense at the new altars of secularism, does not simply equate with bigotry, and it is time to stop labeling Christian opposition to the radical secular agenda that way. And if their are any true bigots among Christians, shame on them. Any Catholic should read the Catechism at #s  2357-2359 to discover a proper and balanced view.

But it is also time for many of the extreme Secularists, the abortion advocates and extreme members of the Gay lobby to see their own bigotry as well. Who is asking them questions, and having them render an account for their pressure tactics and ridicule of Christians and the Christian faith? They have every right in this Country to differ with us and to take part in the public discussion of moral issues. But the ridicule of the Christian faith and the use of terms such as hateful, intolerant etc., and the use of legal pressure to force compliance bespeaks a bigotry and religious based discrimination and it ought to be confronted for what it is.

In this video Newt Gingrich turns the tables on the media that, to my mind, have a one-sided view of this issue. My use of this video should not be equated as an endorsement in the current political campaign. This blog does not, and cannot take specific stands on particular candidates, other than to comment on things they have said related to the faith. In this matter I wholeheartedly agree with Mr Gingrich’s articulation of the matter and appreciate him confronting the media on their line of questioning, and also the questions they fail to ask.

"Stop eating that!" On the food moralizers and some Biblical advice about food

So, a guy goes to the doctor and says, “Doc! I’ve eliminated 99% of the fat from my diet, I’ve stopped drinking, no desserts or candy, and I only eat meat once a week! Will I live longer?” And the Doctor says, “No, it will only seem that way.”

Some years ago I read a book by a doctor who was summarizing the latest findings of medical science. But in the memorable opening line of the book he issued a “pastoral” caution, writing: Americans enjoy the best health and the longest lifespans in our history. Yet…we worry more about our health than ever before [1].  He went on to urge the reader to keep things in perspective, and to remember that health is about a lot of things in combination, not just one or two things. To reduce it simply to what a person weighs or what they eat, or how much exercise they get, is to fail to realize that there are many people who are overweight, but healthy, thin but quite ill, who eat all the wrong things but are quite healthy, who get little exercise but stay fit. Again, health is about a lot of variables interacting in a myriad of ways, to include genetics and even intangibles like one’s sense of well-being.

Anxious about food! I like you have come through the Christmas holidays, of which food is a very big part. Not just the food itself, but many of the parties and rituals surrounding it. And, as I, like you, sat at a few tables I noticed how anxious many are about what is being eaten, and what effects it might have.

Pass the Salt! To illustrate, a few nights ago, sitting at one restaurant table of a good number of friends I noticed how much of the conversation was nervously opining on what was good for you, or what was loaded with fat, or how this might have too many calories, or too much of this or that. Mischievously I asked in a rather audible voice if someone would please pass the salt. This led to a variety of largely negative reactions from laughter, to actual shock. “You know Father, you really need to stay away from that salt!” Reassuring them that my blood pressure was normal, I wondered aloud why we have all become so very anxious about food, that we don’t really seem to enjoy it. Everything is guilt ridden, and we so often moralize and even scold one another.

I wonder what it’s all about? I wonder if, a hundred years ago, people sat about anxiously opining about and discussing food’s effects, or if they just gratefully dug in with a little gusto?

It is a true fact that most Americans are overweight. Hence moderation is a good goal for most of us. But all the guilt and fear mongering is, on the one hand not very helpful, and the other hand, seems to lack appreciation for God’s gifts. There are a few Biblical lines that come to mind here about food that I would like to recall in order to make this point.

1. Let no one pass judgment on you in matters of food and drink ….why do you submit to regulations as if you were still living in the world? “Do not handle! Do not taste! Do not touch!” These are all things destined to perish with use; they accord with human precepts and teachings. While they have a semblance of wisdom in rigor of devotion and self-abasement and severity to the body, they are of no value against gratification of the flesh. Col 2:16, 21-23).

Most generally, when Paul is talking about food in his letters, he has in mind the rather complicated situation of that time, when certain foods (especially meat), sold in the public markets had been dedicated or offered to the pagan gods. Christians seem to have been divided over whether they could eat such food. St. Paul was of the school of thought which permitted Christians to eat such food, since the gods to whom such foods had been dedicated were naught, and the Christian himself had not made the offering. But there were other Christians who were very alarmed and scandalized by any Christian eating such food. While insisting on Christian freedom to eat it, St. Paul also cautioned charity and advised that if eating such food (dedicated to the gods) in the presence of a fellow Christian would cause grief or scandal, one should, in charity, refrain. He says elsewhere Therefore, if what I eat causes my brother to fall into sin, I will never eat meat again, so that I will not cause him to fall (1 Cor 8:13).

Now while the context of this passage is specific, its principle is general: charity and freedom in matters of food. Thus, we ought to avoid some of the more extensive moralizing and scolding that goes on at many tables today. There may be times when, due to a special relationship with a person, we may wish to remind or encourage them in good practices. For example, they may wish us to exhort them and help them lose weight, or avoid foods that are problematic for them (e.g. sugar in the case of a diabetic, salty food is the case of hypertension). But the general norm to be observed, according to this passage, is charity, respect for freedom, and the gratitude and joy that are proper to receiving God’s gift of food.

Another thing the passage eschews is an attitude of moral superiority in matters of food. For some, who have read up on nutrition, or have recently lost weight, or who have success in staying thin, are forever preaching and moralizing and proffering unwanted advice. St Paul speaks of what they say as having the semblance of wisdom, in rigor of devotion and self-abasement, and severity to the body but he goes on to warn of the pride that underlies many such methodologies, and plagues the dogmatic preachers of them, for: they are of no value against gratification of the flesh. In other words, the real enemy proceeding from the flesh (the flesh is our sin-nature, not the body per se), is pride. Better to be overweight and humble, than thin but full of pride.

Further, even if we interpret “flesh” here to mean merely the body, rigorous practices, inflicting severity upon the body, often set up opposite reactions. We see this in a lot of the yo-yo dieting common in our culture. Shaming or fear mongering the overweight into dramatic and severe programs is seldom helpful in the long run.

2. One man’s faith allows him to eat everything, but another man, whose faith is weak, eats only vegetables. The man who eats everything must not look down on him who does not, and the man who does not eat everything must not condemn the man who does, for God has accepted him. Who are you to judge someone else’s servant? To his own master he stands or falls. (Rom 14:2-4)

Here is similar advice as to what is above in the first quote, but there is also a much clearer condemnation of pride insofar as food is concerned. Notice too, that things are a bit reversed here from our experience. For, it is those of the expansive diet that tend toward pride. But the “no meat” group also fall prey by “condemning” those who do eat meat. (Remember the context wherein most meat from the local markets had been declared sacred by the pagans to the gods).

But again note that Paul emphasizes freedom and charity. In other words, Paul says, “lay off on all the food moralizing and respect your brother’s freedom, don’t let food become a matter for either ridicule or lots of excessive rules.” Hence, toward those who follow careful diets, (e.g.vegetarian diets), there ought to be no scoffing of them for this. But neither is all the moralizing and demonizing of entire food groups (and those who eat of them) proper either.

3. They [certain heretics]….order [others] to abstain from certain foods, which God created to be received with thanksgiving by those who believe and who know the truth. For everything God created is good, and nothing is to be rejected if it is received with thanksgiving, because it is consecrated by the word of God and prayer. (1 Tim 4:3-5)

Here again, Paul’s main concern in religious, and thus he warns of certain gnostic tendencies and perhaps teachings of Judaizers too, who forbid entire food groups as intrinsically evil. St. Paul is clear, all foods are clean (cf also Jesus at Mk 7:19) and should be received with thanksgiving from God who made them.

Again, the demonizing of certain food groups in our culture, either by vegetarian or the “healthy eating police” is to be questioned by a passage such as this. That some need to moderate regarding certain food or even wholly refrain from them due to medical conditions is granted. But the problem isn’t the food per se, it is the medical condition. St Paul says elsewhere: As one who is in the Lord Jesus, I am fully convinced that no food is unclean in itself (Rom 14:14).

Some question the Catholic practice of abstaining from meat in Lent based on this text. But note an important difference, we do not abstain from meat because meat is bad or evil, but because it is good. Thus it is a worthy sacrifice to set it aside for a time. We do not reject meat, we enjoy it. That is why it is a sacrifice to abstain from it.

So food ought to be enjoyed. And, to be critiqued are the modern tendencies to fret excessively about foods, categorically demonize them, scold others who enjoy them, moralize and give frequent and unwanted advice to others for their food choices, and especially doing this at the very time of communal eating. Frankly, some of these tendencies, especially when done in at the table, are rude and insensitive. If someone asks for salt, cheerfully oblige him. You are neither his doctor, nor in possession of his medical records. So smile, and as you pass the shaker say, “Ah, salt! The spice of life!”

Disclaimers:

  1. Some will say, “But Father, but Father! You must speak more about gluttony, it is a sin!” Yes, but another time. If you insist, then here:  “All things in moderation!…including moderation (for there is a time to feast).
  2. Someone else may say, “Really Father, you must say more about obesity, and how deadly our American eating habits are in terms of heart disease, diabetes, and stroke. You must give equal time to such important considerations!” Ah, yes again, but please understand, this post IS equal time. I rather doubt that anyone who has read this post hasn’t had an earful of warnings from many segments of our culture about all the medical complications of obesity.

Hence, this post IS the balance, wherein I say merely, Relax a little and enjoy life too. Food is good, excesses cause problems to be sure. But don’t work so hard to stay alive that you forget to live.

Mangia!

No Christmas is Complete without the Jesus Toaster.

Have breakfast with Jesus every morning! In the past you’ve had see him with eyes of faith. Now you can seem him right on the toast! It’s the Jesus Toaster! Just $31.95 plus shipping and handling.

No Christmas is complete without this fine new toaster.

Was not Jesus born in Bethlehem which means “House of Bread!?”

So celebrate Christmas all year long!

Did Jesus not leave his face on Veronica’s veil? Now you can see his face and eat it too!

With the Jesus toaster you just never know where Jesus will pop up!

Legal disclaimer: this toaster does not convey true presence and the bread coming forth from it is not to be adored. Do not try true presence at home which leads to idolatry. True presence is brought about only by trained priests in the careful conditions of the Catholic Mass.

Blogger Disclaimer – No disrespect is hereby intended in this post. But sometimes things are in such bad taste that the absurdity is best illustrated by being absurd, as I have been here.

Here is the  CNN report:

What if the Same Rude and Inconsiderate Anti-Christmas Tactics Were Used Against Secularists?

It’s getting close to Christmas so it must be time for the war against Christmas by certain extreme secularists. There are the usual demands to banish the word Christmas in favor of “Holidays” (but remember Holidays is just a mispronunciation of Holy days). There is the utterly silly banishment of the colors red and green in certain public schools. And even further, are the outright insulting attacks on both believers and Christmas traditions. Here are just two of the insulting ones:

1. SANTA MONICA, Calif. (AP) — Jesus, Mary, Joseph and the three wise men are being crowded out by atheists. Most of the Christmas nativity scenes that churches had placed in a Santa Monica coastal park for decades have been displaced by non-religious displays….One display reads: “Religions are all alike — founded upon fables and mythologies. — Thomas Jefferson.” And another display with photographs depicting King Neptune, Jesus Christ, Santa Claus and Satan reads, “Million Americans know MYTHS when they see them. What myths do you see?….[1]

2. People stopped to stare and voiced their disapproval about the strange red-coated skeleton that appeared on the courthouse grounds in Leesburg over the weekend….The crucified Santa had drawn the immediate attention of community residents, resulting in a barrage of complaints to county officials, according to Julie Withrow, assistant to the county administrator…..[One woman said], How offensive to children, especially, to see a beloved symbol of the holidays crucified!” [2]

OK, here’s your disclaimer – They have a right to free speech.

That said, the extremists who do things like this are rude, insensitive, discourteous, and ill-mannered and unneighborly. Using people’s religious holidays to ridicule them is lacks class.

Grouping Jesus with Neptune and Satan and calling him a myth (even considered only from his human nature, he changed world history) is ignorant, ungracious, and borders on bigotry. As for the Jefferson quote, it is also and simply ignorant. Any trip to the Jefferson memorial will show how out of context their little pull quote is. Jefferson had high regard for the necessity of religion in society and frequently references God whom he acknowledges to exist. He wouldn’t appreciate their little stunt. And while Santa isn’t a religious symbol per se, lots of kids have a place in their heart for him, and the inconsiderate, no-class protestor ought to be ashamed of himself. Nobody likes ugly or mean.

Note too that Chanukah was not targeted. There are no cries to rename the Menorah a “Holiday Candelabra” and no one hangs skeletons in Jewish prayer shawls from the Menorah. And imagine the uproar if, during Muslim holy days, the Prophet Muhammad were hung in effigy anywhere, let alone the courthouse lawn. I can assure you, no county official would even allow such things to see the light of day. In the end this hatred is about Christ, public enemy number one, to the militants who do such indecent things.

I wonder how the secular extremists who do such things would react if the tables were turned? What if, on Earth Day, a high holy day for most of them, they were to observe roving bands of  “Christians” descend on their festival on the Mall and start burning leaves? What if all throughout the country, by the thousands, we staged a counter-demonstration by cutting down trees just for the heck of it, merely to signal our dis-satisfaction at their celebration? What if, while the thousands of trees were being felled, other on-lookers shook signs that read, “Take that you tree-huggers!” or “Earth-day is a pagan myth,” or “CO2, We’re for you.” At what if at the end of the demonstration the signs and the felled trees were burned? What if thousands of believers, just to counter demonstrate, turned on every light in their house, for six hours and idled their cars in their driveway, just for the heck of it? What if all this was done on earth-day for the sheer purpose of counter-demonstrating in the most offensive ways possible.

How do you suppose the devotees would feel on that day? How would the media cover it? Would “free speech” in America be celebrated? Would the media indicate that some people obviously have legitimate grievances against the declaration of a certain day as “Earth Day” and that we must understand their concerns? Rather unlikely I think.

But of course we don’t things like this on Earth Day, do we? To do so would be to lack class, and have the same rude, ill-mannered, and impolite attitudes that anti-Christmas extremists have, and get away with. But just for a moment it might be good to call the question on the secularists and media sympathizers, “What if, on Earth-day the same sort of tactics were used that are used against Christmas? How does it look? And how is it so different from what is increasingly happening at Christmas?”

"Neither shall you tattoo any marks upon you: I am the LORD." A Brief Rant on Tattoos

Sometimes I admit to feeling very old. I am only 50, but I find myself horrified by so many cultural trends. High on my list are the freakish (according to me) “body art” trends which involve piercings that make me wince when I see them. Lips and noses, tongues, cheeks, eyebrows (and other body parts I cannot mention on a family blog) are disfigured by unattractive “hardware” that interferes with their God-given purpose, and which also must be horrible breading grounds for bacteria and infection. I wince when I see it.

Tattoos as well, once thought of as the implements of drunken sailors and tramps, have become the common fare of many people. They remain to me (apparently an old fogie at a mere 50), a sign of grave immaturity and make me question the person’s judgment. I also find them disfiguring and disturbing in that they cannot (until recently) be removed. What a terrible thing to disfigure one’s body permanently in a moment of poor judgement and youthful folly. Sorry that’s just the way I see it, it is an innate response.

One sad and poignant moment I remember from about ten years ago was when a very pretty bride and her groom came in for marriage prep. I thought she was so pretty, and then she took off her jacket, and lo, and behold, two of the largest tattoos I have ever seen on both her upper arms. I mean they were big, and nasty blue. They would have shocked Popeye the Sailor. I had to ask her, but she just shrugged and said I sounded like her father. At the wedding she decided that big blue tattoos and a sleeveless wedding gown didn’t look traditional enough (I’ll say!), and so she tried to cover them over with makeup. But it was a hot a humid day, and before you knew this very pretty girl took on the appearance of a longshoreman. So sad. I can’t imagine what she was thinking when she did something so awful to her body.

You may say, keep your opinions to yourself Father, tattoos are way cool. But actually it is not merely my opinion. For God too looks askance at the practice, and actually forbids tattoos in one place. As the practice became widespread in the 1990s I often reminded people from my pulpit and the bulletin of the scripture forbidding of the practice:

You shall not make any cuttings in your flesh for the dead, neither shall you tattoo any marks upon you: I am the LORD. (Leviticus 19:28)

It would seem that God did not intend for the skin to be a canvas or a bill board. It is a shocking thing to permanently alter ones appearance, particularly when we consider that our bodies are not our own to simply do with as we please. For again, Scripture says,

Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own; you were bought at a price. Therefore honor God with your body. (1 Cor 6:19-21)

Some may wish to argue that the Levitical outlawing of tattoos was more a concern for idolatry than tattoos per se. But then I must ask, Is not the modern faddish practice rooted in a kind of idolatry all its own? It is all the rage, and the obsession to fit in, (no matter what God might say, or that the body belongs to Him and is his masterpiece), is a kind of idolatry all its own.

I realize that many who have tattooed themselves acted in ignorance of the Leviticus text. But it is not a text simply to be ignored, and once it is known, it seems to me that we ought to accept that God is not pleased with the practice of tattooing, and cease practicing or praising it.

Imagine then my delight to read that tattoo removal is now becoming easier and more requested by those who realize they made a huge mistake in getting a tattoo. From today’s Washington Post:

She arrives quietly, coming in from the rain after work. She lies down on her stomach atop a sleek, white reclining chair. She lifts her shirt and tugs down her jeans slightly….to unveil a large pink flower tattoo with fat, webby green leaves, which she’s here to have lasered off her lower back. She wants to become a mother someday, and she doesn’t want her children to see this…..she starts crying. “I was only 18. It was a homemade tattoo done at a party…..I wasn’t thinking about what it meant, you know? Little did I know it meant something else — like people calling it a ‘tramp stamp.’ I’m a Pentecostal, and the body is a temple. And I felt really ashamed.”

If tattoos are the marks of an era — declarations of love, of loss, of triumph, of youthful exuberance or youthful foolishness — then tattoo removals are about regret, confessions that those landmarks are in the past. They’re about the realization that whatever you believed in with such force that you wanted it eternally branded on your skin is now foreign to you.

Getting a tattoo, once the province of sailors rather than suburbanites, is so mainstream that tats are inked at the mall and seen on everyone from Middle American mothers to H Street hipsters to Hollywood starlets.

Perhaps not surprisingly, a parallel trend is emerging: tattoo removal, with dozens of businesses and training schools opening across the country…..Tattoo removal by a super-powered laser seems like a facelift for young people, a chance to start over, erase, rewind. Like deleting a bad photo from a digital camera or defriending a Facebook friend.

While older lasers burned off the skin, Slavin’s new model interacts only with the ink and “makes it shake and makes it break,” he says. But it still hurts — it feels like hot rubber bands snapping against your skin, most removers say — and often is more painful than getting a tattoo.

“When it’s all said and done, I’m just not that guy anymore,” says Corey Newman, 29, who is getting married in May and wanted to get three tattoos removed: …He is spending $2,500 to take off tattoos that cost $600 to put on. “I am starting a new life now,” he says. “There’s a big difference between being 19 and 29.”

During a recent week, Saler’s appointment book included distraught mothers dragging their daughters in; ex-gang members with street tats who don’t want to be killed; professional women who are applying for office jobs…..aspiring CIA and FBI agents, along with other law enforcement operatives.

Burly, tattoo-faced Wayne Stokes, 34, arrives. He’s on his sixth session of a removal that might take up to 25.

He has tattoos on his face, neck, hands and chest. Both eyes are encircled by a black leopardlike….design….I wanted to look tough,” he says. “People ask me every day, ‘Why did you do it? Why did you put yourself through that pain of tattooing your entire face?’ I’ve realized I don’t have to keep that trauma on my body.”…when the tattoos are off, he wants to mentor abused kids.

Now that the painful decision to get rid of the tattoos is over, the physical pain begins. ….He gets into the chair and squeezes a ball as the laser hits his skin, turning parts of it red and then frosted white as the ink crystallizes into smaller particles that will be removed by his body’s immune system….Stokes says. “Sometimes I do dread coming in. But it’s the end result. “I want to look in the mirror and see myself again.”

These are excerpts. The Full Article is in the Washington Post is here: Rethinking the Ink

To this new procedure I can only say, thank God. And I hope the procedure will become less painful, less expensive, and that people will run (not walk) to avail themselves of it. I live for the day when the terrible era of “body art” (both piercings and tattoos) will be over. We are wonderfully and fearfully made from the hand of God. I only wish God had sent along a little tag: “Do not cut, pierce or ink, you’re fine the way I made you.”

A little make up and little work with the hair, fine, that’s working with what you have, but permanent alterations, cuttings and piercings that interfere with function are rejecting what God has made. We ought not do it.

I do expect an interesting comment thread! Have at it.


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