Crazy Kids

There's a strange impetus in our modern society against the idea that marriage really lasts till death. After all, only 50% of marriages do. What does that make the people who try and get married, who try and make it last? It seems like it makes them a bunch of crazy kids, setting themselves up against the "wisdom" of the world that these things just don't last. Even The Office, one of the more optimistically romantic shows on television, has an episode where a character in relationship with another, upon hearing that her parents are getting divorced, remarks that it was her parents, or his. Now it's true that in this case the good doesn't last forever. Marriage was only designed to last until the Resurrection. But it's nothing but cynical to say that the good shouldn't be expected to last as long as it ought to last, that is, until one partner is dead. It betrays a despairing lack of hope for the Sacrament of Marriage, and the love that can flourish between two people even in today's "modern world." I'm on the side of the crazy kids--the ones who say "one partner, one marriage, we'll make it till the end," and whether or not I ever become one of them I will remain on their side. Now it's true that perhaps marriages are more in danger nowadays, but that's a reason for caution, for being properly crazy and not marrying based just one one's feelings, for actually making a commitment to routinely take care of each other. It is not a case for despairing of actually making that lifelong commitment; that despair is the abdication of responsibility, not the sign. So I'm going to stay on the side of these crazy kids, warring against this Satanic cynicism that's been somehow disguised as wisdom.

Christian Carnival 359 up at Parableman

Check it out here. Will edit this post to reflect reactions.

Barry Wallace's post just makes me glad for purgatory and absolution.

Diane R's post mostly depresses me. In particular the section where 89% of evangelicals disagreed about the importance of preaching and sacraments. Of course, to a certain technical degree, I kind of have to disagree too--the sacraments, aside from baptism, are thing you receive after a decision to convert; only Baptism is really part of what most people are probably thinking of as the conversion.

Jacob's Hip

In John 20:29 (NIV), John tells his disciples, “Because you have seen me, you have believed; blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.”

One thing that seems to be said by this passage is that a faith that does not require proof is a great gift. But what if there is a secondary blessing in not having tangible proof? When God touches people in tangible and measureable ways, the stories are scary. I sometimes wish I could have been there with Jacob, the Apostles, or Padre Pio, but to be there may have been too much for me.

There seems to be a horror in the Holy. Something in the Sacred can scar us. Perhaps we sinners are unfit to see or experience God as heavily as we sometimes do in this life. Maybe this is why the Saints who are closest to God so often carry symptoms which appear as misery to the world. Maybe if they have any misery left, it is not in reality a sickness or a stigmata, but complete conversion to Christ that cannot choose anything but faith and joy.

Dan Indulges in Dark Theological Humor

The Dutch did not bring their kleats to the slippery slope. (See the Groningen Protocol if you don't believe me.)

But it's not like anyone else wants onto this slippery slope. Oh, wait...

Well, at least it hasn't made its way to the United States yet. Crap, I guess we lost that one. And where I live, too. Darn.

What's left now but to run out the clock on being European and see just how horrific things get before someone in the public arena stands up for life?

Apparently, more horrific than they have.

All aboard for the train of tenderness, folks! Next stop is the slippery slope! Hope you brought some good climbing gear.

Christ Jesus, and Mary and all the other Saints in heaven, pray for our world today.

Christian Carnival for Wednesday, November 17 (UPDATE: Late Submissions!)

Hey y'all, welcome to this week's Christian Carnival! I'm afraid I'm on a 1:30-10:00 PM schedule this week (the next few weeks) and I haven't really had time to read all the entries, but what I've read, I like.

ON the other hand, deo gratias, I got a job!

Spiel, shamelessly copied from the Google Group:

The Christian Carnival is open to Christians of Protestant, Orthodox, and Roman Catholic convictions. One of the goals of this Carnival is to offer our readers to a broad range of Christian thought.

Posts need not be of a theological topic. Posts about home life, politics, or current events, for example, written from a Christian worldview are welcome.

As the goal of this Carnival is to highlight Christian thought in the blogosphere, entries will be limited to blogs that share that goal. Blogs with content that is focused on a business, that has potentially offensive material Christians may not want to link to on their sites, or has no reference to distinctively Christian thought may not be included in this Carnival. There are other Carnivals that would be a more appropriate venue for that material. I realize that this will be a judgment call on the part of the Carnival administrator, and being human she may make mistakes. However, as the Christian Carnival is getting quite large, and it is sometimes questionable whether the entrants are seeking to promote Christian thought, I find this necessary.

We also expect a level of discourse that is suitable for a Christian showcase. Thus entries may be refused if they engage in name-calling, ad hominem attacks, offensive language, or for any similar reason as judged by the administrator.

Ali presents Christians, Entitlement and Political Action. posted at Kiwi and an Emu.

annette presents November 11, 2010 - A Lesson posted at Fish and Cans.

Matt Rawlings presents If Some Christians are Blue like Jazz, then I?m Red like Metal posted at Pastor Matt.

Madeleine Flannagan presents Bovine Faeces and the Sexual Proclivities of Rocks at MandM.

Scottyi presents An Ideal Life posted at Sacred Raisin Cakes.

Russ White presents First Things First posted at Thinking in Christ.

Tom Gilson presents The Truth Holds Us (Short Version) posted at Thinking Christian.

Ridge Burns presents Revelation 2:5 posted at Ridge’s Blog.

Jeremy Pierce presents NIV 2011 and the singular "they" posted at Parableman.

FMF presents If You Want to Be Wealthy, You Need Understanding posted at Free Money Finance.

And I present an audience-participation-mostly post here called Canon Without the Canon. Please feel free to join in!

A Late Submission (or at least, I got it late):

Fadi presents Modern Day Prophecies posted at INSPIKS.

A Very Late Submission (Post was dated in October)

CChisholm presents God’s Existence: Proof from Biological Information | The Chisholm Source posted at The Chisholm Source.

Canon Without the Canon

An old theology professor of mine used to talk about the "canon within the Canon"--those books we prefer implicitly over others in the Bible. Anyone out there have a "canon without the canon"--books they un-prefer over others? And willing to say what it is in comments?

Mine's Romans. Could also be said to be certain OT books, but that's mostly for lack of having read the OT all the way through in a comprehending fashion.

"You're Going to Hell"

Most Christians should meet somebody who will tell them: "You are going to hell."

I say most because I don't know if we're all strong enough to handle it, but I think it would be healthy if we got a taste of how it is to be on the other side of our own beliefs about the afterlife.

I have many friends who are atheists or agnostics of some kind from college, and all through college I held to pretty conservative views of salvation. Still do. Now they've been tempered for a long time by a more inclusivist strand of thought, and an emphasis on not judging anyone's individual salvation. Still, I can't imagine I never inadvertently insulted anyone simply by believing what I did, which boiled down to, qualifiers or no, all other things equal: You're going to hell.

Don't get me wrong, I'm well aware that there are people who think I will spend my eternity in torment because I am a Christian. Oddly enough, though, the more memorable times I've actually gotten a full, realization kind of taste of it, have been on the Protestant-Catholic divide. The first time was back in high school when one of my Catholic friends made some comment (which did then, and still does, strike me as kind of theologically simplistic) that it would be necessary for salvation to believe that the Eucharist was really the Body and Blood of Christ.

And now that I am a Catholic, and I do believe all this nonsense about the Eucharist and Communions of Saints, etc., it's not even so much a moment, but merely having a friend who desperately tried to talk me out of it (actually, someone close to him did, but I don't think he disagreed), and whose church would seem to be teaching him--if it mentions the Papists at all--that my salvation is dubious. Now granted, that's just part of the divide that is a consequence of choosing communion with Rome. I should say that I am grateful and touched that he, and his friend, were loving enough and caring enough about my spiritual health, to say what was said. But it introduced a palpable divide that I can feel every time I see him, an awkwardness introduced into all those situations, that wasn't there before. And the phrase "you're going to hell" was never even used, or even necessarily implied. Just there, under the surface, a highly uncomfortable possibility for me in the theology of the other.

Now I always felt a little bit awkward if I knew I'd said anything directly to any of my non-religious friends about the afterlife. But I do wonder whether the way I feel around my friend now is the way they sometimes felt around me. It's a feeling of being on the other side, of knowing someone is seriously concerned about the state of your soul (in a way they wouldn't normally be, that is a healthy concern after all.)

And I wonder if maybe it's not a good healthy experience that most Christians should have, to go out and meet someone who makes them realize--not just know in some academic sense, that someone believes they are going to hell.

Thoughts from Theology on Tap (10-22-2010)

Warning: I'm writing this, and I'm not a sacramental theologian. My thoughts are somewhat scattered; this should be taken as a slightly frustrated set of thoughts, and not as a well-structured argument. Please do not attempt to engage this as if it were argument.

Went to Theology on Tap tonight. Lots of good discussion. The priest who gave the talk that night was discussing the Eucharist and the Mass. Now one thing he'd said struck me wrong, which was that he almost seemed to suggest that the Eucharist being an object of adoration was wrong. (Someone, much to my relief, asked about this, and I was delighted by his clarification which seemed to suggest that he was more against people going to Mass just to adore the Eucharist and ignoring the fact that (a) it was also to be received, and (b) the Mass is not merely to be observed and wondered at but also taken part in. There was a lot of spirited debate because he said some things (not all of which were correct, or correctly phrased, in my mind) that seemed to denigrate the Tridentine Latin Mass. People of course stood up in defense of the TLM, and there was a lot of debate about things that in my mind don't hold so much water either way--things like how many of the faithful want, or would want, a TLM if it were offered at their parish, etc. Those things are important, but not the most important thing, I don't think. And I don't want to give the impression that I think only the TLM defenders were contributing to discussion that may or may not have been entirely fruitful. Lots of things the speaker said seemed questionable and were very hard to interpret charitably coming from where even I am coming from--and I am no Traditionalist.

At one point I have written in my notebook, from sometime in that whole exchange:

I wonder:

Would this be such a problem if were simply willing to fall in love with Jesus?

By "this" I think most of what I meant was "all this liturgical business about the N.O. vs. the TLM, etc. etc." I'll get back to that later.

Now to give some background, about a week ago a Deacon gave a talk on everyday spirituality. Somehow or other this connected with something G.K. Chesterton once said about St. Francis, in his biography of the same, which I remembered only imperfectly at the time but which I quote in full below:

The practical reconciliation of the gaiety and austerity I must leave the story itself to suggest. But since I have mentioned Matthew Arnold and Renan and the rationalistic admirers of Saint Francis, I will here give a hint of what it seems to me most advisable for such readers to keep in mind. These distinguished writers found things like the Stigmata a stumbling block because to them a religion was a philosophy. It was an impersonal thing; and it is only the most personal passion that provides here an approximate earthly parallel. A man will not roll in the snow for a stream of tendency by which all things fulfil the law of their being. He will not go without food in the name of something, not ourselves, that makes for righteousness. He will do things like this, or pretty like this, under quite a different impulse. He will do these things when he is in love. [...St. Francis] was a Lover. He was a lover of God and he was really and truly a lover of men; possibly a much rarer mystical vocation [...] as Saint Francis did not love humanity but men, so he did not love Christianity but Christ. (Italics mine, copied from an electronic copy on this webpage)

Chesterton recognized that the oddity in much of Francis's behavior was that it was something one did when one was in love. So I'm trying to adopt this quality, to make it my own, to cultivate the quality of being in love with God and with the world. Going to Mass is one definite way of doing this, and surely a huge expression. If one believes that Christ is truly and specially present at the Mass, and one is in love with Christ, surely one goes where one's beloved will be? Would I not do this for another human being, if I felt I were in love with her? Why not, then, for God?

Quite frankly, I'm not a Traditionalist. Though I do consider myself pretty conservative, and my ballot will probably wind up backing that up. But I'm not really a TLM kind of guy. I have some Sundays--not all--that I like Holy Rosary's 11:00 AM Novus Ordo Mass in Latin, but that's not the TLM. I'd be lying if I said my reasons for the other Sundays got much holier than "some Sundays I like a folksy Mass" or "some Sundays I want a slacker Mass that lasts forty-five minutes and is said in words I understand immediately." At the same time I know some people prefer to meet Jesus in the TLM, and that's their deal. I'm not going to intrude, and it bugs me when other Novus-preference people want to, because they call it the Catholic Church for a reason. It's universal.

Anyway, I said I'd get back to that original note I made. So here goes:

Is it naive of me to believe that maybe if we all--that means people who are more liturgically 'liberal' and those who are more 'conservative'--simply focused on loving the Eucharist, with only a secondary focus on those technical details which pertain strictly to licitness, that much of this logistical debate would go away? That maybe a Church-wide revitalization of that reverence could be--even if saving the liturgy could help it--part of the process that catalyzes us to save the liturgy in the first place?

Of course, Legitimate concerns about validity of sacraments go strictly under reverence for the Eucharist and for God; an invalid Mass is not proper reverence. Legitimate concerns about licitness are also quite pertinent but sometimes get overstated in my book. Thus, I risk undervaluing them here because sometimes I think they just lead us to legalistic conversations and debates about pastoral needs that nobody in the audience or anyone speaking can verify. Maybe the new translation will help some. I hope it does, and maybe I'm overthinking the debate that happened tonight. It was certainly helpful and informative, and I don't mean to suggest that debates like that are useless. But I'm not entirely sure it was the most productive debate we could have had, and it seems like maybe the one guy's question about whether we should adore the Eucharist was the main point at which the more debate-like questions actually worked towards deepening our understanding of what happens at the Mass.

Of course I have relatively useless theological things I like to debate all the time, so maybe I've got some work do to, too.

Those are some thoughts Theology on Tap brought out for me tonight.

In Which I Respond to John Meunier's Question

John Meunier has a good question up which I think is kind of a good one if we're at all trying to navigate the postmodern wilderness that is the world.

I invite anyone reading this to make their own response to my response, or to Meunier's question, here or on their own blog. (But if not here, please let me know where because I want to see it.) I of course invite the other KBT to respond with their own posts if they want.

[Later edit:] The question is "If you had the opportunity to preach to a crowd of nominal Christians or non-Christians in an informal setting – like John Wesley’s field preaching – what would you preach?"

Here's my response:

Ask yourself this question: "Am I good?" And if you answer yes, justify it. Without appealing to grace or any coherent and concrete concept of goodness that does not change with culture and goes beyond just what we think it is. 

If you justified yourself, you probably don't really believe in good at all, at least, not good with a meaningful meaning. Maybe you're good thinking that goodness is relative, something that's not inherent in anything, or something we have to make for ourselves, but I'm not. It's not meaningful meaning if we can change it as we please.

If you couldn't justify yourself, then I guess you'll need some help to be good. Christ can help you with that. Sorry state that I'm in, you should see what state I get into when I close myself off to Him. And if you're at all interested in being good, even if you already think you're justified on that front or that all I'm saying is twiddle-twaddle, you owe it to yourself to see what kind of change Christ might make in you. 

So really, just try and live like Him. Try and fall in love with Him, even if--right now--you don't know what you believe about Him. 

I think you'd be surprised to see the difference.

Bad Christians

In my view there are two ways to be a Christian.

(A) Be a bad Christian, and recognize and work to change it.
(B) Be a bad Christian, and deny it or downplay it.

I'm sure all of us do a little of (A) or (B) at some point in time.

I'm also pretty sure that (A) is the road to being like Christ, and (B) is the road to a complacent and dead spiritual life, if not, and we should hope not, an actual spiritual death.