Gloom and doom

There is a lot of it about these days. And it isn't completely crazy. As pointed out by Jonah Goldberg and others, there is a neo-fascist spirit abroad in the world and it is conceivable that the day will come again when we see horrors done. It might happen but it probably won't. A more realistic fear is that progressives will bring about a new Victorianism in which we all go to great lengths to protect the tenser sensibilities (often imagined tender sensibilities) of others. And I'm not entirely convinced that would be a horrible thing.

In any case, this is perhaps a good time to remind ourselves of some inspiring words spoken by a sainted man in the first year of my life:

It often happens, as we have learned in the daily exercise of apostolic ministry, that, not without offense to Our ears, the voices of people are brought to Us who, although burning with religious fervour, nevertheless do not think things through with enough discretion. These people see only ruin and calamity in the present conditions of human society. They keep repeating that our times, if compared to past centuries, have been getting worse. And they act as if they have nothing to learn from history, which is the teacher of life, and as if at the time of past Councils everything went favorably and correctly with respect to Christian doctrine, morality, and the Church's proper freedom. We believe We must disagree with these prophets of doom who are always forecasting disaster, as if the end of the world were at hand.

That's from John XXIII's introductory remarks to the Vatican Council. I can't speak to the quality of the translation as I have only enough Latin to understand a few basic prayers I know by heart. It matches what other writers I trust have said. In any case, he's right.

We can also, of course, be too optimistic. Here is some more for your consideration:

But at the present time, the spouse of Christ prefers to use the medicine of mercy rather than the weapons of severity; and she thinks she meets today's needs by explaining the validity of her doctrine more fully rather than condemning. Not that there are no false doctrines, opinions and dangers to avoided and dispersed; but all these things so openly conflict with the right norms of honesty and have borne such lethal fruits that today people by themselves seem to condemn them and in particular forms of life which disregard God and his laws, excessive confidence in technological progress, and in a prosperity consisting only in the comforts of life. More and more they are coming to know that the dignity of the human person and his appropriate perfection are a matter of great importance and most difficult to achieve. What is especially important is that they have finally learned from experience that imposing external force on others, the power of weapons, and political domination are not at all sufficient for a happy solution if the most serious problems which trouble them.

That last sentence, read today, seems ludicrously optimistic. It's a bit jarring to consider that John XXIII was speaking in living memory of WW2. He had seen at first hand the brutal suffering that was imposed on others. He knew that some of the men in the audience listening to him had suffered. ANd yet he, along with many others, saw reason for hope.

Often our fears for the world are really just a projection of our fears for our world onto everything else. The professor of Classics who sees declining enrolment in her field, the union boss who sees the waning influence of the union movement, the taxi driver faced with Uber and the journalist seeing that their industry is rapidly shrinking will all have a tendency to imagine that the whole world is going south and not just their corner of it. They will do this because they will fail to see that there comes a point to get off a sinking ship.

To their numbers we should now add some kinds of conservatism including traditionalist Catholics. Yes, there was much good about the movement. Yes, they were unfairly attacked. Yes, much evil was done in the "spirit of Vatican II". But the traditionalist response to the Novus Ordo was always an over-reaction and the fight to establish socially conservative moral values in law and politics was always doomed to fail. That the walls are now crumbling is a good thing.

Reception

Today is the feast day of Saint Bartholomew. To which the vast majority of Catholics are going to answer, "Who is Saint Bartholomew?" In one sense, the answer to that is easy. He was an apostle. In another sense, it is very difficult for no one has the slightest clue as to who he was or what he did. We know only two things about him for certain: his name and his status as apostle.

And yet, of the four tiers of feasts in the Catholic Church—Optional Memorial, Memorial, Feast and Solemnity—Bartholomew rates the second highest. The obvious question is, "Why?" I'm going to ignore that question and wonder more about the issue of reception because it's one that intrigues me lately.

Bartholomew is remembered because he was received by the early church. The only thing that was received for certain is his name which appears in all three Synoptic gospels. That's nothing to sneer at. The gospels are grimly economical texts. Not a word is wasted. Anything that gets mentioned there does so because it was important. We can reasonably question what the role of the apostles was and we can reasonably question whether there really were exactly twelve of them. Questioning that Bartholomew was one of them in the memory of the early church is far tougher.

And, whatever the apostles were, they were very important.

Beyond that, however, the question of reception gets tricky. Further stories and traditions about Bartholomew are very thin on the ground. He may have done heroic things or he may not. Either way, not enough people were interested in passing them along. And not many people came along after the fact to make things up about him either. In any era, the willingness of other people to preserve, polish, embellish and create stories to tell about you is the key to your being received into the culture and that is just as true of the culture of the Church as any other. And Bartholomew has, for the most part, not been received.

Two groups of people have bucked this trend and they have done so largely on the basis of Bartholomew's credentials. If you have an image at all that goes with Saint Bartholomew, it is most likely an image of an Anglican Church or a hospital in England. And the reason for this is that he is in the Bible. The strong Calvinist streak in the Church of England discouraged naming of institutions after saints unless those saints had impeccable scriptural credentials. And poor Bartholomew doesn't have much but he does have that. The second group to preserve his memory have been members of the Catholic hierarchy. They have not done so with any great enthusiasm but they have done it. For Bartholomew has hierarchical credentials in that the Bible doesn't just mention him but also says that he was an apostle.

Beyond that, however, not much reception has taken place. He isn't part of Christian lore. Lore was passed on, and, in some cases, created, but it didn't take root.  That may be a good thing. It could also be a bad thing. It may be that very important truths were lost along with Bartholomew. One of the unquestioned responsibilities of the Church hierarchy is to counter reception. On the other hand, one of the important roles of the laity is to counter potential abuse of power by the hierarchy by being selective about what we choose to receive. Both side are capable of corruption. If the Holy Spirit is not influencing the process, then everything we do as Catholics is in vain.

Finally, spare a thought for Saint Bartholomew today. He was a real man who believed and acted on his beliefs, whatever he did and he was there at the beginning.

Bridal mysticism and Catholicism's man problem

Picking up from last week, one of the possible explanations of the low appeal that Christianity has for men is that it is, or has become, a feminized religion. One issue unique to Catholicism is what is called Nuptial or Bridal Mysticism. It's an idea with deep roots: the old testament talks about God marrying Israel and Paul uses marriage as a metaphor to explain the union between Jesus and the Church.

The thing to remember is that this only is a metaphor, only one metaphor of a number that appear in the scriptures. We also need to be careful about how metaphors are used. It's one thing, as the old testament and Saint Paul do, to speak metaphorically of God marrying a community and another thing altogether to speak of the sought for bond between individual Christians and God as a marriage. If nothing else, the second choice suggests vanity on a very grand scale.

It's also individualistic. Like the beatific vision, bridal mysticism suggests and intense bond between two beings. It doesn't require anyone else. It's weird that we're to spend our lives showing love for Jesus in the way we treat others only to enter into a state where others are irrelevant.

Finally, and most pertinent to the subject at hand, there are all the implications that go along with the word "bridal". It's not just that it suggests that feminine receptivity is the only legitimate spiritual life. Think of boys. Thirteen-year-old girls will sit around and gossip about their imagined wedding day. Boys will not.

If we look at what goes on in the church, I see enough smoke that I begin to think there must be a feminized Catholicism fire somewhere.

Consider the extremes of high Mariology. The major sin that turns Mariology into Mariolatry is when people forget that Mary is a member of the Church and make her representative of the Church. You get a lot of clergy who understand their vows as a commitment to Mary and not Jesus. They always subtle language to create enough nuance to avoid open heresy but you don't have to spend a lot of time with priests and lay people who have strong Marian devotions before you begin to see that a significant subset of them have made her into something she is not.

Consider also the sheer number of gay priests. Rates of sexual abuse in the Catholic Church are about the same as you find in your average school board but there is one huge difference in that the same-sex abuse is far more prevalent in the Church. The very highest estimates for the number of gay men in the overall population run at about 4 percent. The number of gay priests is much higher. What is it about the Catholic priesthood and religious that attracts a disproportionate number of gay men? And there is good reason to suggest that this has long been a problem. In his rule, St. Benedict sets very clear lines for the allotment of beds for young monks. It was already an issue in the sixth century.

Mary Magdalene

I've been away a while on retreat, just returning last weekend, which is why there hasn't been a lot of posting here. One of the things that happened while I was away was the first full feast of Mary Magdalene, which had only been a memorial until now. This created a dilemma for a lot of Catholics. On the one hand, Mary Magdalene is a saint and much beloved one. She plays a significant role in the gospels, much more significant than many apostles whose only role in the gospels is to be name-checked. On the other hand, it causes considerable uneasiness in that the move to raise her day to a full feast raises her status in a way that challenges the way people think about women and their role in the Church.

Some critics raise concerns about what this having taken so long says about the Church's treatment of women, and they are entirely right to do so. That it has taken this long to recognize her special importance is a scandal. It is still a scandal that Saint Martha day is not a feast and that her sister Saint Mary of Bethany has, who also merits a feast, for all intents and purposes, no place in the calendar.

Others resist this, fearing that elevation of Mary Magdalene and other holy women who served Jesus will open the way for female priesthood. The problem with this fear (it hardly deserves to be called an argument) is that it inadvertently undermines their side. For a male priesthood, founded on a notion of separate but equal roles, is undermined if we treat these women as second-class, and therefore not equal. To repeat, remember that all we know about for certain about saints Matthias, Bartholomew, Simon and Jude is their names and they all rate a full feast.

I think, however, there is another fear on the part of those who resist the full recognition of these holy women of the gospels and that is that it could change the way doctrine about Mary, the Mother of God is received. It does not change what is taught and believed about Mary but it could change the way it is received in the prayer and devotion of Catholics.

I'll come clean about this and admit that I think (and I very much emphasize that "I think") this would be a good thing. Mary, as was made clear by the Second Vatican Council, is a member of the church. She does not stand over and above it. Look at the calendar, however, and she has been, until this year, the only woman to rate a feast. All others receive only a memorial. When we think about feminine virtue, Mary is such a large presence as to overwhelm all others. This needs to be corrected.

I could say more and perhaps will some day.

Does Christianity have a nice guy problem?

The good folks at the Art of Manliness have begun a series on a subject near to my heart, Christianity's manhood problem. Christian churches attract more women than men and the men they do attract often seem less that manly. It's not necessarily a new issue and some might argue that it's not even a problem. Since at least the 19th century there have been churches that attracted more women than men and some of these churches were at the forefront of the movement to abolish slavery in the US and the movement to allow women to vote everywhere in the west. You could easily turn the problem around and ask not what is wrong with churches but what is wrong with the men who go to them?

I think the question should be, "Why don't men see anything in Christianity for them?" That's a question that could go either way. We might conclude that something is wrong with men that they cannot accept the message. Alternatively, we might conclude that there is something wrong with the message.

In line with the latter possibility, I wonder if the message of Christianity hasn't become what Dr. Robert A Glover calls a covert contract with life. A covert contract is an imagined deal. It's not a contract at all in that only one party knows about it. Give-to-get is a good example of a covert contract. I do something nice for someone and expect that they will return the favour. I don't actually mention this to them. You can see how that might not work out. A covert contract with life would be to generalize this and to believe that the world is set up such that things will ultimately work out well for nice guys.

A bit of interesting background, Dr. Glover used to be the pastor to a Baptist congregation. He became aware of the nice-guy syndrome when he saw it in himself. Ultimately he left the ministry and practices no faith today. He has occasionally expressed admiration for the new age, sex-and-God views of David Deida. He probably doesn't sound like a good example for any Christian man to follow.

I'd argue, however, that his book No More Mr. Nice Guy is one of the best books about manhood currently available. And much of Christian moral teaching does seem to offer exactly the sort of covert contract that Glover rightly describes as crazy. "Join our community and follow the rules and you'll be happy." For a lot of people this works out pretty well. I've seen people who had chaotic lives benefit from joining a church. On the other hand, I've seen a lot of lonely, miserable young men in Christian churches unable to connect with women. And I've heard a lot of women complain about the mopey weak men who pursue them. Is there something fundamentally wrong with modern Christianity? I think there is.

The big challenge, and something I'll explore in coming posts, is Saint Paul. He often says things that sound like nice-guy thinking: "be all things to all people" and "put others needs before your own".  The way to redeem St. Paul is, in a sense, straightforward: to argue that this isn't a covert contract but a very overt covenant with God.

I appeal to you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. Do not be conformed to this world but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that you may prove what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.

And that is right but it's something that is easy to forget. It's particularly easy to forget in the face of the challenges of the community. The community necessarily needs to make rules to accommodate all its members and to help everyone get along when there isn't complete agreement on what is acceptable praxis. It's easy to mix up these rules with the will of God; it's God's will that the community live in love but not necessarily his will that a certain rule about what happens when one person's ox gets gored be applied for all time in all situations.

More to come ...