Contento

True happiness is only to be found in heaven, but real Mexican tacos come close. I'm writing now as Jake and I take a little time for siesta.

Earlier today, after waking up late, we wandered to the city center and visited the local Cathedral. It is a massive building resting atop the ruins of ancient Aztec temples. The missionaries did this quite intentionally. There would be no false worship or cannibalism under their watch. They unapologetically wiped out the ancient faith.

The Cathedral is a bit of an architectural oddity. The ancient Aztec city upon which the modern metropolis was built started out as a lake. The Spaniards and Aztecs filled it in. Unfortunately, the city is now sinking. The Cathedral is good example of this phenomenon. One have to step down nearly a foot from street level to enter the building. The plumbob hangs from the dome with marks in the floor below demonstrating the degree to which the building has sunk.

Having prayed for a time we wandered and decided to eat at the first restaurant we found. I ordered fried fish. It was not nearly so good as the fish I found in Poland but it was food at least. And we had complimentary chicharones (pork rinds) as we waited. From lunch we wandered a bit more and then caught a taxi to the Basilica of Our Lady of Guadalupe. She, more than anything else, symbolizes what it is to be Mexican. Her appearance in Mexico as a native woman marked the conclusion to the era of evangelization for this country. After her, everyone was Catholic.

She is beautiful. The tilma bearing her image remains fully in tact after 500 years. The shrine which houses it is enormous so as to fit the crowds who come to see her. The entire grounds of the shrine still atop the hill of Tepeyac where she first appeared, are well kept and lovely. We stayed at the shrine for a long time praying, taking the sun, and wandering shop after shop full of souvenirs. Subtlety is not one of the classic characteristics of Mexican decor. Much of what we looked at would likely be characterized by Americans as gaudy or garish. But it is deeply Mexican. I got a real kick out of it.

Our taxi ride back to our motel was expensive. The driver refused to negotiate. We probably should have taken the metro (there will still be plenty of time for that), but the taxi was faster. Aside from a near collision with a bus, it was relatively uneventful. The driver did his best to describe the various monuments to be seen along the way while evading death in the midst of Mexico City traffic.

Leaving the taxi, I spotted a taco stand where I thoroughly enjoyed some exquisite authentic food. And now, I'm going to take a nap before going out for dinner later.

Here are some pictures from today:

We Are Here

The idea of going to Mexico City was a plan that began to germinate nearly a year ago as I was surfing Orbitz and pining to take a trip. Almost ten years ago I spend ten weeks studying in the city of Cuernavaca and I have longed to return ever since. On a whim, I checked ticket prices to Mexico City. They were as cheap as I had ever seen, so I began looking for some traveling companions. Surely someone else wanted to go. I was mostly wrong. Apparently there is a drug was going on and travelers are likely to be shot at. "Nonsense," I would retort. "That's mostly on the border and in the rural areas. The center of the country is safe." Nevertheless, few were interested. By September I had found three willing participants for the adventure (none of whom are actually here with me), and ticket prices had fallen even further. I bit the bullet, bought tickets and waited for my would be companions to get on board. They largely failed to do so. Jake, who is currently sitting on the other bed in our motel room, came to my rescue. And so, here we are.

Our planes were mostly on time all day yesterday. Rapid City to Denver to Houston to Mexico City. Customs was a breeze. Our luggage was waiting for us and fully in tact. We exchanged money at the airport (a terrible exchange rate, but the best way to do it until we found an ATM). Taxi service to the motel (the motel reservation was arranged by personnel from the school where I studied when I was here before) was easily acquired. We were in our rooms by about 10:00 yesterday evening. Finally we ate at the motel restaurant. Sopes, one of my favorite Mexican dishes were on the menu. They are a thick fried tortilla with beans and chorizo, avocado, lettuce, Mexican cheese, and green salsa. They were heavenly. Jake ate a more modest pasta dish.

Supper eaten, bottled water acquired from the convenience store across the street, we updated Facebook as to our safe arrival and passed out.

Today is wide open. We will probably go visit the city center and see what's happening and have a slow day as we adjust to the altitude. A taco stand lunch and perhaps a visit to Our Lady of Guadalupe this afternoon. It doesn't much matter to me. I'm in Mexico where it is warm and sunny*. It feels like I remember. It smells like I remember. It is good to be here.

*Sunny is a relative term given the cloud of smog that covers the city on most days. The city sits in a bowl in the mountains. There is no place for the pollution to go.

The pictures are from outside our motel room window.

Mexico

It is warm in Mexico.  It almost never snows except high in the mountains and on the volcano tops.  They have good food.  They have tequila.  They have bullfights.  They have Our Lady of Guadalupe and Blessed Miguel Pro.  I am going there tomorrow.  I will return in a week.  I will try to post updates here.   

Making a Difference

An Unexpected Homemade Christmas Gift

There is virtue, I suppose, in doing something only because I must, not because I get something out of it.  Certain seasons, however, bring with them temptations to shirk one's responsibilities.  Advent and Lent, for instance, are the seasons during which parishes typically host communal reconciliation services.  Though I like hearing confessions, I really do not like these events.  They seem to foster the sentiment that confession is a simply a semi-annual event for which the faithful ought to save up their sins, and I dread listening to the droning homilies of my brothers as we go through the Liturgy of the Word at the beginning of each service.  Moreover, with the multitudes of penitents at these services, one becomes tempted, during regularly scheduled confession times, to sneak out a little early.  What difference will five minutes make?

In the last couple of weeks, five minutes would have made all the difference in the world.  On two separate occasions penitents came to the confessional after decades away.  Had I left early, and they found the confessional empty, they would likely not have come back.  I was there.  I freed them of their sins.  I made a difference.

Similarly, I went to the hospital to visit the mother of one of our RCIA candidates.  The daughter plans to join the Church at Easter.  Until my visit, her mother had no religious affiliation.  She is dying.  I offered that she could be fully initiated into the Church, receive the sacraments and be prepared to meet the Lord.  She accepted.  She is now a Catholic, and when she dies she will go to meet her maker having been fully prepared with every grace the Church can offer her.  She will receive a Catholic burial, even as her daughter still toils away in RCIA classes.  I made a difference.  

Perhaps most notably, this season, though, has been a young man with whom I am acquainted.  I am not sure what I did for him.  I just get a kick out of him.  A few days ago he brought me a gift he had made: a handmade pottery pitcher that his mother told me he had been working on for months.  It is beautiful, and the detail is painstaking.  The gift was unexpected, and to my mind undeserved, and yet, he gave it.  Apparently I made a difference.

In truth, though, it was not I who made the difference.  In each of these cases, it was Christ.  He, for reasons unknown to me, chose me to be a vehicle through whom He would work in the world.  All I have to do is get my own bumbling humanity out of the way and obey Him whose I have been made - to be there when I say I will be there - and Christ will minister to the hearts of His people.  And that makes all the difference.   

Merry Christmas 2012

This year's Christmas Letter: 

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Greetings,

Each year as Advent commences I find myself reminding parishioners that as Christians, we have spent more than two thousand years awaiting the return of the Messiah, the Holy One of God, Our Lord, Jesus Christ.  Two thousand years is a long time to wait, but as St. Peter reminds us in his second epistle, Our Lord tarries not because He is delayed, but rather, because the longer He waits in returning, the longer we have to take advantage of the invitation to grace He has extended to each of us.  Our waiting, then, is not marked by foot-tapping impatience, but rather, it ought to induce us toward the flurry of last minute preparations prior to the arrival of an honored guest.

It is not accidental that I use the word flurry; it seems well-suited to the style of life to which I am becoming accustomed in my new assignment.  The three parishes for which I now share pastoral responsibility with Msgr. Woster are exceedingly busy parishes.  With Mass schedules, confession schedules, meetings, social occasions, and the like, I find that I spend an inordinate amount of time behind my steering wheel.  I have grown to appreciate my day off in a way I had not known previously.  The needs of the parishes have, to my chagrin, preserved the lives of a great many trout and pheasants in the last several months.  In place of these pleasures, I have forgiven thousands of sins, I have fed multitudes with the Body of Our Lord, and I have escorted many of the dying to the gates of Heaven.  It seems a fair trade. 

It would be dishonest to give the impression that  I have had less than my fair share of leisure.  Several trips out to hunt, a fall vacation to Minnesota, and an upcoming trip to Mexico are more than the Lord affords to most people.  Likewise, I have been readily welcomed into the homes and into the lives of so many of my new parishioners.  I find myself remarking often, “Why wouldn’t everyone want to be a priest?”  Indeed, why would everyone not want the opportunity to witness God at work while sharing in the joys and heartbreaks of an individual or a family?

 

In the meanwhile, the Lord asks that I abandon myself more and more to Him.  As is typical, I hear the call and I resist, stubbornly insisting that I have everything under control.  How quickly I forget the abundance of the Lord’s generosity!  The Lord has never asked me for anything which, when given, was not rewarded with something better in return.  Why, hard heart of mine, do you resist?  And yet, I do resist.  The frailty of my humanity, burdened by the blindness of my sin and folly, knows not even how to desire the thing it wants the most.  Thus, our Lord tarries.  He waits for me to convert, to turn around, to embrace Him, just as when, in the fullness of time, He embraced my humanity when He condescended to be conceived in the womb of the Virgin and born in the poverty of a stable.

So, as Advent moves to Christmas, and as 2012 becomes 2013, and as I continue to try to become more and more the priest I have been called to be, know of my prayers for you.  Thank you for your kind sentiments, and your own prayers on my behalf.  You are among the countless blessings the Lord has given to me.  May all of God’s richest blessings be yours this holy season.

In Christ,

Fr. Tyler Dennis

A Post About Nothing

 
My mother hates Seinfeld.  Actually, my mother hates Jason Alexander and the character he played on Seinfeld, and thus, by extension, the whole program.  I cannot say that I disagree with her, though I find it somewhat absurd that she mutes the television whenever he appears on a program or in a commercial.  It is a show about nothing; they revel in this fact.  If one is going to produce something, it should have a point.  To whit, it has been weeks since I have published anything on this site.  It is not as though life is dull.  In fact it has been much to the contrary.  It is not as though I have no time to write.  There is always a spare moment to compose at least a few sentences.  Rather, I have experienced nothing particularly new nor sufficiently thought provoking to write about it here.  I do not want to write a post about nothing.

And yet, I find that "nothing" is precisely the substance of this little reflection.  I had a conversation with a friend recently, who bemoaned, as often my peers do, the fact that "he gets nothing out of Mass."  It seems as though many of my generation expect religious experience to be consistently deep, constantly engaging, sensually rewarding, and sentimentally provocative.  Religious experience, however, is not always all of or even any of these things.  Religious experience, in fact, is mostly quite dull.  God's relationship with man does not exist for the sake of man's amusement.  Just as I do not look to my food to be first and foremost a source of mirth, likewise do I not presume my spirituality and religiosity to be mostly a vehicle of entertainment and recreation (in the commonest sense of the word).

How, then, is one to understand religion?  In the Catholic tradition, it is understood as a virtue whose purpose is to render worship unto God who is the source of all being and the principle of the government of all things.   Its principle object is to offer Almighty God the homage demanded by His entirely singular excellence.  There is not a single mention of "fun" to be has in such a definition.  The thing about religion as understood this way is that it does pose within itself the possibility of monotony.

Thus, for one such as I, whose business is religion, I have had little new to write.  I teach, I preach, and I administer the sacraments, all in profound worship and praise of Almighty God.  These actions are, I suppose, quite profound, but they can be a dull source of inspiration for an author.  What can I say today that I could not have just as accurately said three weeks, or six weeks, or three years ago?  It is not that I find myself bored, but rather, that I fear my reader will be.  To have written more recently would have been much like describing the flow of a river.  It remains more or less the same from day to day.  Water from upstream flows downstream in a relatively steady progression.

Like the flow of a river, which over the millennia cuts a valley through granite mountains, religion also washes over its observer, incrementally polishing away rough edges and carving through the granite shell of the soul.  This process is surely not "nothing,' but it takes a long time, and it is not especially interesting to watch, except in time lapse photography.  I'll publish another post when I have more footage. 

A Homily About Voting

Msgr. Woster and I chose yesterday as the day to address the upcoming election.  I preached the following homily.  It was well received by many, and a source of deep anger to others.  Some have asked for a copy of my words.  Here they are:

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I have never liked math.  From the time I first began to learn long division, I knew that math and I would never be close friends, and though for a time we reached something of a fragile truce, it became immediately apparent to me that math and I were to be lifelong enemies when letters were introduced into the picture.  With all of the “x” and “y” and trains leaving stations, I could simply no longer make sense of it.  I suppose it was the fact that there were just too many variables, too many unknowns.

We live in a world today that is filled with variables, filled with unknowns.  It is an election year with Election Day less than one month away.  The economy is still awful, and many Americans are still without work.  Yet another war in the Middle East seems nearly inevitable.  At the same time, we live in a nation where, since the Roe v. Wade decision, fifty million children have died at the abortionist’s hand.  The culture in which we live is rapidly arriving at the conclusion that marriage is founded upon nothing more than a feeling of affection toward another person, and that its privileges should be extended to any combination of persons who experience such affection.  All of us look at these issues and wonder, “How are we to proceed?”

To my mind, the Scriptures today provide us with a way forward.  The first reading was about Wisdom.  The author comments that he prefers wisdom to riches or gold, and tells us that to be poor and wise is better than to be rich and unwise.  When we hear this word, “wisdom” I think we most often assume that the author is talking about some high degree of intelligence, or that to be wise is to be somehow brighter or cleverer than other people.  This, however, is not at all the way that the Scriptures portray wisdom.  Throughout the Old and the New Testaments, wisdom is described as the capacity to think with the mind of God.  Thus, for instance, it is wisdom that informs us that the most hardened criminal, the most vicious murderer, the perpetrator of the most violent terrorist attack is good.  He is good because God has made him that way.

When it comes to finding a way forward in our own time, wisdom has a great deal to say.  First, wisdom tells us that our actions in this life echo in eternity.  In other words, this means that someday, when we stand before God Almighty seated on His throne of judgment, we will have to defend the vote we cast this November.  Likewise, wisdom informs us that our vote is not simply about ourselves.  Because I live in a society, the results of my vote affect other people.  As a result, I cannot simply make my choice on the ballot because I am making less money than I made four or eight years ago.  I cannot simply vote based upon the fact that I am still looking for work.  My vote will affect the poor and the marginal.  Wisdom informs us that as Catholics, we cannot be single issue voters.  We must take into consideration all of the variables before casting a ballot.  Nevertheless, wisdom also tells us that there are certain things that can disqualify a candidate from our consideration.  An example of this is abortion.  Abortion is an intrinsic evil.  This means that there is no time, no place, and no set of circumstances under which it would be legitimate to procure an abortion.  It is always wrong.  If I vote for a candidate who supports an unfettered right to abortion, I become complicit in that evil.  I cooperate with it.  Likewise, embryonic stem cell research which similarly destroys a human being is an intrinsic evil.  It is never ok to suction cells out of a living child in order to put bit of them in other people.  To vote in support of such a thing is to cooperate with that evil.  

Wisdom teaches that there are other examples too, which, though perhaps not intrinsically evil, are nevertheless, profoundly important to Catholics.  In January, President Obama through his Secretary of Health and Human Services, Kathleen Sebelius, mandated that Catholic institutions would be required to provide insurance coverage for contraceptives, abortifacient drugs and procedures.  There was to be no exception.  This means that Catholic Hospitals, schools, universities, adoption agencies, and social service agencies would be required to provide these services.  If this mandate stands, many of these institutions will likely close their doors.  Even in our own diocese, Catholic Social Services, who serves thousands and thousands of people each year, may have to close their doors.  I know there are people sitting in this congregation who have turned to this agency in their need.  On Thursday night, Joe Biden stood before America and told us that none of what I just said is true, that no institution would be required to provide anything to which they morally objected.  So egregious was this lie that the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops issued a statement the following day correcting Biden’s error.

By this point I know that many of you are livid.  I know that many of you are wondering why priests cannot keep their politics out of their preaching.  Some of you wonder just who you need to contact at the IRS to have my tax exempt status revoked.  It is not my job to stand before you and tell you for whom to vote.  I cannot tell you the political party to which you ought belong.  Here’s the thing, though.  Someday, I too will stand before almighty God on his throne of judgment and I will have to explain why I did or did not help inform people’s consciences.  I will have to explain why I did or did not help people to sort through the issues of the day with the mind of God.  I will have to explain why I did or did not help us all become just a little wiser. 
        

The Rise of the "Nones" vs. The Rise of the Nuns

With what seemed to be an air of knowing condescension, a friend of mine sent a USA Today article via email announcing that thirty percent of Americans now classify themselves as adhering to no particular religious denomination, and that fifty percent of adults under the age of thirty classify themselves in this manner.  My friend, as best as I can tell, would likely also place himself in that category.  

I suppose that the article was meant to cause alarm.  In just a few decades, I will have become obsolete, going the way of the blacksmith.  America will have advanced beyond need for a priest.  There is clearly a trend away from organized religion in American (Western?) Culture, and to an extent, this statistical reality is much in keeping with recent history in this nation.  The United States is founded on the notion of individual liberty, and especially from the 1960's onward Americans have resented any force outside of themselves that would presume to make universal truth claims binding upon the consciences of every human being.  Likewise, Catholics, until very recently, have only tepidly responded to the call to arms issued by John Paul the Great, when he announced the need for a new evangelization of formerly Christian peoples.  To my mind, however, the issue of the "nones" presents no new challenge to the Catholic Church.

From Constantine until now, the Church has had to deal with nominal adherence to the faith.  What is different now is that people are simply freer to approach the question of faith with integrity.  It suits me just fine that people who were never really Catholic in the first place should find themselves now able to freely admit that they adhere to no religion.  To my mind, the days of the "baptized pagan" are nearly over.  Early in his pontificate, Benedict XVI commented that the Church would get smaller before she got bigger.  In saying this, he was suggesting that in the name of integrity and of self-preservation, Catholics would have to abandon what, since the Second Vatican Council, has become a terrible habit of trying to somehow accommodate all opinions, all lifestyles, all practices, and all beliefs under the single roof of the Catholic Church.  

The word "catholic," of course, means "universal."  It is universal in the sense, however, that what she believes applies to all people of all times.  It most definitely does not and cannot mean that everything goes.  Interestingly, many young Catholics are attracted to this reality.  Parishes rife with touchy-feely, "I'm OK. You're OK." save the whales homilies, are populated by aging baby boomers who, though large in number, are closer to their graves than they are to their baptisms.  For several decades, the American Church has operated in panic mode, doing nearly anything to keep this crowd from leaving.  By contrast, for several decades, religious orders such as the Nashville Dominicans, the Missionaries of Charity, and other conservative religious orders struggled to maintain sufficient vocations, but the world has changed.  Today, our youngest parishes are also our most conservative.  Our growing religious orders are those most faithful to the Church.  Seminaries are full of zealous men.  Bishops are increasingly more conservative in theological temperament. 

In the meanwhile, mainline Protestantism has attempted to keep up with culture, acquiescing to every whim of the masses.  And they are dying.  Why should I give myself to an institution that simply reaffirms what I already believe, challenges me to nothing beyond myself, and places me and my opinion as its central focus.  I want a religion that calls me to be better, not one that simply allows me to be recalcitrant.

So,while fifty percent of my generation may have no particular affiliation, there are still fifty percent of us who are faithful, and we have grown weary of the gruel religion has presented to us for the past fifty years.  We want truth.  We want transcendence.  We want what is real.  We want authenticity.  We want a faith that asks our willingness to sacrifice and die for it.  The Church will get smaller, but as she shrinks, her zeal will become concentrated.  Her missionary efforts will intensify.  Her ability to preach what she has always believed without constant interior turmoil will grow.  The number of her active members who actually know what Catholics believe will multiply.  And then the Church will grow.  

What USA Today and my friend both fail to recognize is that 2000 years ago, after the death of Christ, there were only twelve Catholics.  There are more than one billion today because those first twelve, though small in number, were zealous and committed.  And they preached a message that made sense in a world of suffering, violence, tragedy, and evil.  The Church is not dying, she is being pruned.  That strikes me as a good thing.  
                  

Minnesota

I write today form the abode of a dear high school friend who now lives in one of the suburbs of Minneapolis. A couple of months ago, another friend and I determined that it was time to see a baseball game at Target Field. I checked the Twins schedule and found that they would be playing the Yankees (without whom there is no such thing as baseball), and we arranged to make the trip.

So it was that I found myself making the long drive across South Dakota on Sunday afternoon having finished my Masses for the weekend and making a pastoral visit in Rapid City. Traffic was light, road construction was intermittent, and the highway patrol was otherwise occupied. These conditions not withstanding, I did not arrive in Golden Valley until nearly midnight Central Time. Brief greetings were made, and all of us made our way to our various makeshift sleeping areas (The trip, I suppose it must be mentioned, was equally meant to be a housewarming event. My friend has recently acquired this home, and as she is single, has little call for more than one bed.). Taylor claimed the guest room with its accompanying air mattress. I occupied the couch in the basement.

Monday morning arrived blissfully late. A cup of coffee and a short drive later, I found myself standing in the lobby of my alma mater chatting with the two resident Rapid City seminarians as we awaited the arrival of Mass time. It was great fun to enter the seminary sacristy as a cleric. I held none of the mild terror that accompanied my visits there as a student preparing to read, serve, or assist as a deacon. I was an equal. Nothing is quite so intimidating, however, as doing anything churchy in front of a group of seminarians. I was only a concelebrant, but was still a bit nervous.

Mass having been successfully accomplished, I was escorted to a nearby Chinese Buffet for a quick lunch with the guys. Back on campus, I caught up with one of the heirs of the Wall Drug Store dynasty, and then went to order clerical shirts at the local religious goods dealer.

By the time I was ready to return to the house, traffic had already become heavy. Why are so many people driving at 3:15 pm? I had expected this to be a harrowing experience given that I have not driven in traffic for some years, but with a large dent in the back of my trunk and a South Dakota license plate, the locals gave me a relatively wide berth. I walked into the house with just enough time to finish my Divine Office before I was whisked off to a dinner of Thai food. Briana and I came back to the house just in time for me to switch cars and head back into the city for drinks with Taylor and a friend of his. This was to become an hour long distillation of all I detest. We found parking near The Ice House, and upon entering I was immediately grateful I hadn't worn my collar. There was a five dollar cover just to have the privilege of sitting in the bar which throbbed with babble of youthful hipster voices, the clink of tiny glasses filled with impoverishingly expensive trendy drinks, and the stylings of a free form jazz group on the stage. The last of these was the worst. The drummer was simply obnoxious. Loud, without any discernible method to his playing, and a giant ham to boot, he made conversation nearly impossible. The group itself was simply awful. At a certain point they played a modified banjo that sounded a bit like a sitar. This, combined with the upright bass, left one with the impression that they were attempting to combine the theme music from Jaws and Slumdog Millionaire.

The party we were to join was composed of two couples, one of which had recently wed and seemed rather normal, the other of which was the coupling of a mohawked, fang-toothed drummer and she who is the third in command of Minnesota's DNC. Trendy, Hipster, Loud, and Liberal, I was for out of my own circle of comfort. Thus, in a certain wicked irony, I was grateful that the "music" permitted little conversation. Just as the set was ending, we decided to take our leave.

Minnesota is a study in contrasts I suppose. Minneapolis and St. Paul are called the Twin Cities, but they are estranged twins. One is subdued, largely homogenous, and seemingly wholesome. The other is loud, wild, and diverse. Most of the state is populated by stoic workers of the land, but they are often overruled in public affairs by those who dwell in the cities. Prince, the Cohen Brothers, and Bob Dylan were all born and educated here. Michelle Bachman represents them in Congress. I am driven mad by the crowds, the noise, and the politics. I love to take advantage of the art, restaurants, and the learning the aforementioned made possible. It is good to be here. 

We Are Sparta(ns)!

Mischief is in the air.

This week has marks the celebration of homecoming for both the local high school and Black Hills State University.  Apparently the high school homecoming king and queen were crowned last evening, and a number of Catholics were in the court.  Today, the school hosted a parade down Main Street (the college parade will occur tomorrow morning).  Spirits are high, as the football team is on a serious winning streak, and they are likely to make a long drive into the playoffs.  Everyone is excited, and the kids are full of mischief.  (I saw a handful of juvenile boys with water balloons strutting down the sidewalk as I watched the parade.  Such devices can only be used for ill.)  The chant up and down the street was something along the lines of:

We are the Spartans/ the Mighty Mighty Spartans. /Everywhere we go/People want to know/ Who we are/ So we tell them/ we are the Spartans . . . 

I am a sucker for a parade.  I was somewhat disappointed to find myself seated behind a group of second graders because when it comes to gathering candy, they are like vultures on carrion.  I knew I was not likely to collect even a single stray piece thrown from the floats.  Nevertheless, I did manage to capture a few pictures.     

Middle School Football

Varsity Football

Second Grade Candy Snatchers

 

Marching band

Good Luck tonight Spartans!

And All is Well With the World

Just moments ago, I updated my Facebook status to reflect the sentiment that titles this post. Thinking more about it, I suppose such a statement may seem incongruous at best given that today marks the eleventh anniversary of the infamous 9/11 terrorist attacks, that nearly one in ten Americans is unemployed, that American troops still stand in harm's way, and that Europe teeters on the brink of insolvency.

And yet, I could not help but smile as I passed the bicyclists making noise in my back parking lot as I strolled to the gas station for a Diet Coke. I did not even mind the overly familiar clerk who insists on commenting on my purchases each time I patronize her establishment. After all, the night is brisk, I have worked hard today, and a mere one hour ago, the God of all creation bestowed His blessing over His holy people in his Eucharistic form before permitting that I repose him in. His tabernacle. There He remains keeping watch over us tonight and always. Bombs may fall, teenage tragedies may unfold, and nations may collapse and yet, all is well with the world, as we prepare to commit ourselves for one more night to His almighty protection. God has granted me many precious consolations in the last few days. Those for whom I have prayed fervently are safe. Thus, Rosary in hand, I prepare for sleep altogether certain, all is well with the world. 

Doing History

Our Intergenerational Faith Formation program (GOF) this year will focus on the Church's history.  As this was my area of focus as I was pursuing my Masters, I have been designated the primary instructor for the program.  I cannot say I am disappointed at the prospect.  As my thesis director and academic adviser was wont to call it, these six half hour vignettes will constitute a frolicking romp through the centuries.

While telling the Church's story is a task in itself, and I will be busy enough keeping up with that, a part of me wishes that I could carry on a sustained conversation about the nature of historical study.  What follows is an amended version of a comment I left on a post from fellow blogger J. Thorp.

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Studying Church History in grad school, I grew weary of most history texts. It was not as though they set out to be intentionally critical of the Church, at least in the sense that the authors wanted to discredit the Church. It was, rather, the bias of what is considered academically normative and acceptable. The normal and acceptable approach is flawed.  It demands scientific objectivity where none can exist.  It demands the suspension of belief in the fantastical, when the foundation of human existence, from the Christian perspective, demands belief in the fantastical. One cannot assume scientific objectivity in the study of history in any context, and this is doubly true in the context of Catholic history.

As in all else relating to the Church, one must always approach her history through the eyes of faith. Thus, to approach her history as though it were simply the history of the Roman Empire or some other secular entity about which we might conjecture with little consequence is to do a disservice to the Church, the reader, and oneself. I began to philosophize thus as I prepared my thesis and was reminded time after time by my professor that as a historian, I was not at liberty to speak as to the authenticity of claims that the Blessed Virgin Mary has appeared in Mexico. I disagree. As a Catholic historian, I can and do say without apology that Mary did appear in Mexico, that she did leave her image on the tilma, and that those who deny these things are in error. Church history, though not strictly a theological discipline, lends itself to the service of theology; all realms of theology require a degree of faith.

To my mind, therefore, it is commendable that the Catholic historian relieve himself of strict adherence to the principles of historical study to which his secular comrades ascribe.  The Catholic historian can, perhaps ought, reject the otherwise unquestioned academic categories that insist that historical data must be examined without recourse to faith. This secular approach has become so prevalent in academia, that to question the conclusions of traditional histories achieved by these secular means is to abandon academic integrity. In other words, to my mind, the modern academic historian, to remain credible in the esteemed eyes of the academy -- to do authentic history as defined by one's peer reviewers -- must always leave the Church with egg on her face. 

How, after all, can one describe the importance and significance of the Inquisition unless one first accepts the importance and significance of maintaining proper belief for salvation? How does one deal with questions of Holy Wars or defend the Crusades if one cannot appreciate the notion that God uses kings and kingdoms to accomplish his own ends.  One might go so far as to say that some of what the Church has done is indefensible without faith. As a result, I simply cannot countenance the idea that faithless lines of examination are the only reliable means of doing authentic and objective research.

The Church is and has been for 2000 years the continued presence of Christ on Earth. Though one must always account for the "Judas factor," the Church and her history represent the manner by which Christ is bringing about the consummation of time. Thus, it seems to me that of necessity any accurate history of the Church will attempt to find a way to show God's providence shining through human sin and folly. This is not a bias; The Church either is what she says she is, or she is not. If she is the continued presence of Christ on Earth, it is simply disingenuous for a Catholic to try to absolve himself of the obligation to look at history from anything but a sympathetic perspective. Sin within the Church did her serious damage. We need not whitewash this fact, but we ought to see it in the best light possible. Likewise, charity demands that we approach with sympathy those who damaged the Church from without. But they were wrong - seriously wrong. We should make no bones about that fact.

The Church need not always fall on the wrong side of history.  This objective is accomplished easily enough if the historian, like every other lay-professional to whom I preach Sunday by Sunday, places his faith ahead of his work.

Distractions

In the course of celebrating any particular Mass, the priest is certain to experience any number of distractions.  For instance, I am convinced that a certain number of Catholics have never heard the introductory rites of the Mass.  They generally arrive somewhere during the opening prayer or first reading.  Likewise, there are babies.  Babies should be at Mass, and I have grown largely accustomed to the chorus of shrill and full-throated unhappy baby noises; they are par for the course.  I am typically undaunted by plastic dinosaurs, Lego men, cars, and baby dolls making war along the backs of pews.  I remain unflustered when servers occasionally pass out, and I maintain my calm when the elderly collapse in the aisle.

I am utterly ill-equipped, however, to deal with clowns.

In training to celebrate the Mass, we were instructed that the priest should generally not look at the people as he recites the prayers of the Mass.  These prayers, after all, are not addressed to the people, but to God himself.  Thus, one should choose a focal point somewhere at the back of the church and above the heads of the people.  God is "out there".  It is Him to whom we are speaking.  One cannot help, however, catching peripheral glimpses of other things.

Today, while celebrating the Votive Mass of the Most Sacred heart of Jesus at a local nursing home, as I prayed "Through Him and with Him and in Him . . ." I saw a glimmer of yellow hair and red polka-dots.  I ignored it.  Then a glimmer of bright red hair.  "What the Hell is this?" I thought.  "White face paint?  I must have lost have lost my mind," I conjectured.  The people responded "Amen!" and I looked down the aisle out the door.  I was right.  The place was infested with clowns -- Crazy hair, big shoes, and terrifying painted-on grins.  Why on earth are there clowns in a nursing home?  Images from the film adaptation of Stephen King's It danced through my head, leading me to speculate that the whole situation seemed like a macabre commercial for euthanasia.  By the time Mass was over, they had disappeared.  I found excuses to wait around, hoping they would reappear for interrogation.  They did not. 

Coulrophobia n. - an abnormal or exaggerated fear of clowns.

Wailing mourners, shrieking children, and tardy parishioners are one things.  But clowns?  I cannot abide clowns at Mass.