the courage to wander into the wilderness

I recently stumbled upon a blog called Catholic Phoenix that I really enjoy. It has lots of eloquent, thought-provoking contributors who write on everything from liturgy to poetry to teenagers to philosophy. And they're funny! You can't beat that. Anyway, I recommend this post on the Lenten longing for Easter. The author tells us how, after converting to Catholicism, he followed the older tradition of fasting the duration of Lent, which left him....hungry. Literally. And this hunger underscored everything he did for 40 long days. He writes

Penance during Lent seems to be the way that we submit to that [cleansing] purgative fire. Or rather, it is the way that we embrace it. We simply don’t get to the glorious promise of Easter until we have suffered, because the triumph of Easter was obtained only through Christ’s suffering. Indeed, His voluntary suffering. Fasting is difficult not only because constant hunger taxes our bodies. Fasting is difficult because it requires us to voluntarily suffer; we must choose to be hungry. In Practice in Christianity, Søren Kierkegaard (writing under the pseudonym Anti-Climacus) argues that Christian suffering is Christian precisely because it’s avoidable. All who suffer because of Christ could quit their suffering by quitting Christ. But those who subject themselves to suffering subject themselves to Christ, who is our ultimate example of voluntarily suffering. With imitation in mind, Christians strangely fight the impulse to flee the burning house. Christians instead walk headlong into the blaze, hoping that their loved ones are somewhere nearby, consumed by flames.

The sentiment reminds me of an absolutely breathtaking meditation on Jesus' seven last words from the cross called Death on a Friday Afternoon. I think I reread it every Lent, and each time I'm struck by the beauty and humility and sacrifice and love of our Lord, magnified and intensified under the lens of Father Neuhaus' incomparable way with words. Neuhaus urges readers to enjoy his book slowly, consciously digesting the implications of what happened on that Friday afternoon, rather than rushing headlong into Easter. It's so easy to just survive Lent, quietly checking off the boxes labeled "fasting" and "abstinence" and "prayer" without spending time savoring the taste of sacrifice while we hunger for our reward.

“Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil.” (Mt. 4:1) “If you are the son of God,” said the tempter, “command these stones to become loaves of bread.” (Mt. 4:3) Though “he was hungry,” Christ refused. Do you refuse? Or do you turn your stones into bread? Do you even have the courage to wander into the wilderness in the first place?

 Please say a prayer for me that I'll have the courage, and I'll say one for you.

Gives New Meaning to the Phrase "Going to the Dogs"

Uh yeah. There are really no words. Except, who else is not surprised that it's a female Anglican pastor?

Why was a dog in church in the first place?
First Things weighs in

Whoever's Afraid of Labor...

...should really fear the first 3 weeks. Yikes!

A Story

There is the story of a Franciscan priest who was desperately running to catch a bus. He made it up the steps just before the doors closed shut behind him and plopped down exhausted, proclaiming loudly, "God is good!" A little old lady sitting next to him smiled and said, "Yes... and He would be just as good if you didn't catch the bus!"

Low-Emission Unicorns were My Idea

Powered by rainbows.

The Great Angel Debate

My husband has been having a discussion on another Catholic blog and on his own site about the existence of angels. You can read Zach's post about his side of the debate on Civics Geeks. The friend with whom Zach was originally having this debate comments by saying:

Indeed one cannot be a Catholic and not believe in angels.

Now, the fact that you can't be Catholic and pro-choice I get. And agree with. But this? Ridiculous.

Rejecting angels is in a real way rejecting Christ.

Quite a charge, Zach.

The Bible tells us that there is a very real war being waged, and it worries me that professed Catholics could be so lukewarm about the existence and the nature of the enemy. It is terribly dangerous to see the opposition as simply "deep evil" rather than spiritual beings seeking nothing short of our utter despair and the resignation of our souls.

I don't see it as an either/or. I believe in deep evil that seeks our utter despair and the resignation of our souls; in short, death. I think I take evil much more seriously than people who simply believe in "angels" and "demons" and "possession" and all that. Such people rarely actually identify evil in the world. War? Just part of life. Poverty? We will always have the poor with us. And so on. Evil is not named as evil by the very people who profess to believe in the "demonic."

"For we are not contending against flesh and blood, but against the principalities, against the powers, against the world rulers of this present darkness, against the spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places" (Eph. 6:12).

I love this passage and believe every word of it. It's an important verse for Christian radicals. Dig a little deeper and you will find that this is NOT about "angels" or "demons."

And, lest someone be swayed by these comments, here is my response:

Firstly, according to the Fourth Lateran Council, belief in the existence of angels is a dogma of the faith. God "by His almighty power created together in the beginning of time both creatures, the Spiritual and the Corporeal, namely, the Angelic and the earthly, and afterwards, the human as it were a common creature, composed of spirit and body." As Peter Kreeft says in Catholic Christianity, his companion to the Catechism of the Catholic Church, "Angels are not mythical but real. They are not an optional addition to the Catholic faith...The life of Christ especially is surrounded by their work (see Catechism 333)" (51). He continues: If the devil is [and by extension, angels are] not real, the Bible lies (see I Pet 5:8), and Christ was a fool, for he certainly believed in demons and in Satan (see, for instance, Luke 10:18)" (52). So, to reject angels is in a very real way to reject Christ, or to at least claim intellectual authority over Him. If, for some reason, you are a Catholic who isn't compelled by dogmas of the faith, the revelation of God, or the testimony of Jesus Christ, ask yourself this: if you believe in God who is an invisible and purely spiritual Being, why would you refuse to believe in angels? if one purely spiritual being can exist, why not another?

Additionally, I'm confused about your statement that you "believe in deep evil that seeks our utter despair and the resignation of our souls." Evil isn't a "thing," because it wasn't created by God. In the way that darkness is a lack of light, evil is a lack of good. It is a turning away from the goodness of God. This turning away is a choice, thus there must be a chooser. As with human free will, angels have the capacity to choose evil (turn away from God), and to tempt and oppress humans (as demons). This is not so much an
argument for spiritual beings as it is an argument against your idea of evil itself seeking our souls.

Finally, I sincerely hope that you don't actually mean that you "take evil much more seriously than people who simply believe in "angels" and "demons" and "possession" and all that." This would be assuming the moral highground over the Church, Tradition, and Jesus Christ.

Lenten Links and Lofty Goals

I can hardly believe Lent starts tomorrow! It seems like it was just Thanksgiving, and then Christmas, and then New Year's, and then Valentine's Day...and suddenly, after months of excess and overeating, here we are. I don't know about you, but I'm the kind of person for whom deadlines are a double edged sword - they instill a creeping anxiety in me while simultaneously giving me the slap to the face that helps me get things accomplished. At the risk of sounding crass, Lent is like a term paper deadline for me. The thought that we are going to be celebrating the resurrection of Jesus in a little over 40 days is what I need every year to make me reevaluate the way I live my life and take stock of the material excesses and habits that serve to distance me from God. My plan for this Lenten season is:

- cut out watching any television during the day and to fill that time with prayer and/or daily Mass
- make daily prayer with my husband a priority
- eliminate all joking at others' expense (this applies to two particular people who shall remain nameless at this point) and gossip - actually think about what I say before I say it!
- spend free-reading time reading Catholic literature instead of Sherlock Holmes stories, etc.

So that's the plan. I think that making it "public" (for the 3 people who read this blog) will help me stick to it and achieve the personal conversion that is the heart of Lent. 

And to help you with your Lenten journey, here are some good links and articles I dug up while wasting time on the internet:

We Could All Use a Little More Deprivation
Recommended Reading for Lent
Fr. Euteneuer on Wasting Lent
All Your Lenten Questions Answered
More Lenten Reading
Death on a Friday Afternoon

Mind Control

As part of a New Year's resolution to become more familiar with the word of God, my husband and I have decided to start our own little Bible study. Our process is inspired by a combination of a blogpost on the First Things website and a talk we received from Lighthouse Catholic Media by Matthew Kelly called "Building Better Families." The First Things post is called "How to Change Your Mind," and its author makes the bold claim that following his four step program will transform your life - not in the way that a January detox program will rid you of non-organic toxins in your colon, or some "Auras for Dummies" book from the New Age section at BN will help you determine the color of your own chakra. Nope. Following his advice, he says, will transform your life by helping you to truly internalize the message that is meant to give us real peace and shed light on the real purpose of our lives. What are these magic 4 steps, you ask? Simple:

1. Choose a book of the Bible
2. Read it in its entirety.
3. Repeat step #2 twenty times.
4. Repeat this process for all books of the Bible.

Easy enough! As the author says, Christians often talk about having a Biblical worldview yet most have only a rudimentary knowledge of the Bible. They attempt to build a framework without first gathering the lumber and cement needed to create a solid foundation. The benefits of following this process should therefore be obvious. By fully immersing yourself into the text you’ll come to truly know the text. You’ll deepen your understanding of each book and knowledge of the the Bible as a whole. So true. And so simple. If you're going to have a religion based on the word of God, you should probably be familiar with that word. Just a thought.

Anyway, you can check out his post for more detailed info. about how to go about this process, and a list of of NT and OT books from shortest to longest. My husband and I have started with the Letters of John (since the author recommends working shortest to longest, NT to OT). We read all three of them last night, and will try to read them each night for a week, moving on to the next shortest book when this week is over.

For someone like me, who is torn between having too little familiarity with the Bible and being overwhelmed by the thought of plunging in, solo, on page 1, I think this little experiment is going to work really well - if my husband and I can just stick to the regimen. So what does God give us? A little encouragement - today's NT reading for daily Mass is from John's first letter. Looks like I might be on the right track...

Little children, you are of God, and have overcome them; for he who is in you is greater than he who is in the world (1 John 4:4-6).