Thursday, October 8, 2020
Wednesday, October 7, 2020
Tuesday, August 25, 2020
Wednesday, July 1, 2020
Thursday, April 30, 2020
Saturday, March 28, 2020
Dealing With the “Roads They Have Made Crooked”
Their feet run to evil,and they hasten to shed innocent blood;Their thoughts are thoughts of wickedness,violence and destruction are on their highways.The way of peace they know not,and there is no justice on their paths;Their roads they have made crooked,no one who walks in them knows peace.— Isaiah 59:7–8 (NABRE)
Can you imagine carrying on with the struggles of partisan life in the midst of a crisis? Unfortunately it's not unusual for people to put self interest above the common good, even in the worst of times. This was actually the premise of a British crime series—Foyle’s War—where the lead needed to solve murders instead of working to defeat the Nazis because the criminals were acting despite—or sometimes taking advantage of—the time of national crisis. It certainly was necessary, but since it required diverting resources from the main goal, that led to an added sense of irritation in dealing with these cases.
This is about how I feel when I encounter certain people who take advantage of our current crisis to push their own agendas. We see pro-abortion supporters saying that even though there is a crisis going on, the “human right” of abortion needs to be “defended.” Or the atheist who takes advantage of the COVID-19 pandemic by saying that the Pope should be donating money instead of calling for prayer. And when the Pope purchases 30 respirators to donate to places most badly in need, they respond by saying “Why didn’t he do it sooner?”†. That’s not to mention the usual antics of Anti-Francis Catholics who use this crisis to attack the orthodoxy of the Pope and bishops for responding to the pandemic by calling the Church closures as a “lack of faith,” or do the “business as usual” accusations that the Pope is a heretic or “confusing.” Or the usual antics of the “you’re only anti-abortion, not pro-life” crowd who confuse Catholic social teaching with whether the plan is sponsored by someone with a -D or an -R after their name.
Adding to that, we are often faced with the challenge of “why are you worrying about that at a time like this?” when we do respond… usually by the one who started the attack in the first place.
Yes, it’s necessary to refute their attacks. Error does not cease to be error in times of crisis. But the irritating thing is that we shouldn’t have to be dealing with it. There’s a battle going on and, in this time of self-isolation, those who blog or make podcasts or use other means of Catholic outreach, would rather work to help comfort those who are dealing with the fear of what might happen with COVID-19, and encouraging them to act faithfully and trust in God.
Yes, People will continue to spread their “thoughts of wickedness.” We’ll have to address them. But, if we get a little annoyed at people who take advantage of this time to push their agendas, it’s understandable.
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(†) As a matter of statistics, the Vatican (population ~1000) purchasing and donating 30 respirators would be the equivalent of the United States (population ~327 million) purchasing and donating 9,810,000 respirators (based on the fact that the Vatican purchased an amount equal to 3% of the population.)
Monday, February 10, 2020
Saturday, January 4, 2020
Saturday, November 30, 2019
Saturday, November 9, 2019
They Aren’t Remembering History. Will They Repeat It?
Progress, far from consisting in change, depends on retentiveness. When change is absolute there remains no being to improve and no direction is set for possible improvement: and when experience is not retained, as among savages, infancy is perpetual. Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it§.—George Santayana, The Life of Reason, volume I
4. The root of this schismatic act can be discerned in an incomplete and contradictory notion of Tradition. Incomplete, because it does not take sufficiently into account the living character of Tradition, which, as the Second Vatican Council clearly taught, "comes from the apostles and progresses in the Church with the help of the Holy Spirit. There is a growth in insight into the realities and words that are being passed on. This comes about in various ways. It comes through the contemplation and study of believers who ponder these things in their hearts. It comes from the intimate sense of spiritual realities which they experience. And it comes from the preaching of those who have received, along with their right of succession in the episcopate, the sure charism of truth".(5)
But especially contradictory is a notion of Tradition which opposes the universal Magisterium of the Church possessed by the Bishop of Rome and the Body of Bishops. It is impossible to remain faithful to the Tradition while breaking the ecclesial bond with him to whom, in the person of the Apostle Peter, Christ himself entrusted the ministry of unity in his Church.(6)
—St. John Paul II, Ecclesia Dei