Category Archives: Christian Living

For My Friends That “Don’t Get Anything Out Of Mass” Because It Is Boring Or Confusing

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One of the most common complaints I hear from friends that left Catholicism is, “I just didn’t get anything out of going to Mass.”  Many of these friends now attend non-Catholic, Christian churches (if they attend at all).  Typically, the services they attend consist of music and a sermon.  No kneeling, standing up and sitting back down.  No confusing rituals or ancient traditions.  Just praise music, a sermon and some fellowship.  These days, there might be a video to watch, too.  Why complicate matters?

I have absolutely nothing against the old “K.I.S.S.” idea (Keep It Simple, Stupid!), although I don’t like the idea of calling anyone stupid.  That’s just rude.  But I do like for things to be straightforward and to-the-point.  I don’t like to complicate matters.  So, why do I like going to Mass when it seemingly complicates a very simple Gospel message?  It is because, although the Gospel is simple, it is also very deep and profound.  The Mass is also simple yet deep and profound.  The Gospel can be accepted by the simplest person, and it can also endlessly occupy and challenge the minds of the greatest theologians and philosophers.  In other words, the Gospel is for everyone, and so is the Mass.

The Mass proclaims the simple message to believe in Christ for the salvation of one’s soul.  The Mass also reflects 2000 years of deep theological reflection on salvation through Christ.  I would like to make an attempt here to explain the basics of the Mass in a way my friends can understand.  There is no way I can cover everything here, but the basics are enough for now.  All it takes to “get something out of the Mass” is an awareness of a few things.

 

  1. The simple message of the Gospel is typically right in front of you when you are seated in a Catholic church.  John 3:16 says, “For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son, that whosoever believes in him should not perish but have everlasting life.”  This is the verse that folks hold up at sporting events on big signs, right?  “John 3:16.”  A crucifix is simply John 3:16 in “picture form.”  When you are in a Catholic church and looking at the crucifix you are “seeing” the reality of John 3:16.  That is why Catholics have an image of Christ hanging on the cross.  It is also because of 1Corinthians 1:23 which says, “We preach Christ crucified…”  Jesus died for you.  Take a look.  Pretty simple, eh?  Yet, so profound!
  2. The first part of the Mass is the “Liturgy of the Word.”  We start with the sign of the cross.  That shows we believe in the Holy Trinity (One God, three Persons, Father, Son and Holy Spirit).  It also shows that we belong to God, not to ourselves.
  3. We ask God for forgiveness.  Ever hear people say, “Catholics don’t go straight to God with their sins?”  We do it all the time, at every Mass!
  4. Next, we read the Bible and preach from it.  There is usually a reading from the Old Testament, something from the Psalms, and the New Testament.  We stand up during the Gospel reading to reverence the story of Christ’s time here on earth.  Over a three year period, a faithfully attending Catholic will hear nearly the entire Bible.  Pretty simple, eh?  Catholics may not be good at quoting chapter and verse, but we hear God’s Word if we are listening.  Very profound!
  5. The second part of the Mass is the Liturgy of the Eucharist.  This is where we as Christians do what Jesus commanded us to do.  At the Last Supper, Jesus took bread and wine, blessed it, said “This is my body” and “This is my blood,” and told his followers to eat and drink it.  So, that’s what we do.  The priest, being ordained by the authority of Christ’s Church, stands in the place of Christ, and Christ’s words make the change happen (“Jesus told his priests, “He who hears you hears me.” Luke 10:16).  The bread and wine become Christ’s flesh and blood.  This has been the belief of the Church for 2000 years.  John chapter 6 shows how important this Eucharist is.  Jesus said, “Unless you eat my flesh and drink my blood, you have no life in you.  If you eat my flesh and drink my blood, you will have eternal life and I will raise you up at the last day.  For my flesh is real food and my blood is real drink.” (John 6:53-55)  Now, if you actually have the glorified Jesus Christ in the flesh right in your presence, it makes sense to show some respect and reverence, right?  So, we kneel down in worship.  Pretty simple, eh?  When we go forward for Communion, we accept Jesus into our hearts and also into our bodies.  Jesus wants to occupy every part of our being.  Now, that’s what I call Communion!  How profound, yet simple to do!  Anyone who believes can be fully united with Jesus!

 

Throughout these major parts of the Mass there are various hymns and prayers, including The Lord’s Prayer (The Our Father).  We are supposed to participate with and actively listen to these prayers and enter into the whole process of the Mass, not simply observe it.  The Mass is not a show to watch.  It is the way Jesus told us he wants to be worshipped.  A baptized Christian is part of the priesthood of believers.  We are supposed to be joining in with the worship and sacrifice, not watching a performance (1Peter 2:5).  Jesus is the High Priest, the earthly priest stands in for him, and we are the “living stones” of the “holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God by Jesus Christ.”  There is only one spiritual sacrifice acceptable to God by Jesus Christ; the sacrifice of Christ himself.  That’s why we lift him up in the Mass (John 3:14, 12:32).  That is also why people bow or genuflect towards the fancy, gold tabernacle in the church.  Some of the bread that has been changed into the body of Christ is kept in there.

The Mass is dismissed with an admonition to “Go.”  Christians are not supposed to be huddled up in their churches hiding from the world.  We are supposed to go to Mass, be nourished by Christ himself, and then take Christ out into the world we live in.  That’s not so hard to understand.

Like anything else in life, you get out of the Mass what you put into the Mass.  Remember, it is not there to entertain you.  It is also not an evangelizing service for recruiting new believers.  The Mass is there because it is how Jesus told us he wants believers to worship him and be fed by him.  The basics of the Mass do not change with the times.  Jesus never changes, and the way he told us to worship never changes.  That’s why the Mass is so ancient.  It was started by the unchanging Jesus 2000 years ago.

If there are things you don’t understand about the Mass, you can learn.  Ask questions, buy books, look up information on Catholic websites, whatever helps you to understand it better.  If you ask a question and don’t get a good answer, ask someone else who knows more.  Like anything else, once you know the basics, you wonder why it seemed so hard before.  The Mass is also very deep and profound.  The more I learn about the Mass, the more fascinating it becomes.  Every little action and word in the liturgy has deep meaning and purpose.

If you quit going to Mass because you were craving more fellowship, remember that Catholicism has other avenues for socializing.  It’s not enough to chat a few minutes before or after Mass.  If you really want the social interaction, you can find it in Catholicism.  Either find a more social parish or start a small group or event.  I recently joined a men’s group in my parish and it is helping me to be more social and involved.  You don’t need to leave Catholicism to have fellowship or to have a relationship with Jesus Christ.  Just imagine how vibrant and social your local parish and the entire Church would be if all those “former Catholics” saw the light and decided to return home to be fed by Christ himself!

The Real Transformers

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I never had a Transformer toy when I was a kid.  I spent some time playing with the ones my nephews had, though.  Some of them were easier to “transform” than others.  I remember watching some of the cartoons.  I liked the Transformers movies pretty well.  The mechanically inclined part of me always thought is was cool the way all those parts shifted around to create new machines with different appearances.  Appearance is generally what we think about when we hear the word “transformation,” like a magician changing a rabbit into a dove or something.  It’s different because it looks different.

A friend of mine shared with me how happy she was that her son had recently accepted Christ and was going to be baptized.  I rejoiced with her.  There is nothing better than eternal life.  After all, finding eternal life is what this present life is all about.  The next time I laid eyes on her son I saw a Christian where previously there was no Christian.  But, he looked like the same person.  He may have had a different expression on his face.  Maybe he got a haircut.  He may have been making better choices in his life.  He may have shown more joy than he used to, but I still recognized him as being my friend’s son, even though he had been “transformed.”

2 Corinthians 5:17 reads, “Therefore, if any man be in Christ he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new.”  He is a “new creature?”  Some translations use the words “new creation.”  Wow!  That is a major transformation!  In other words, what he “is” is not what he “was.”  But, to the human eye he still looks like the same person.  In fact, I would bet that, if looked at under an electron microscope, his skin, blood and bone cells would look like regular human cells.  He would still smell the same after a hard day’s work.  He would still taste like a man to any dog that bit him.  His vocal chords would still produce the same voice that his friends and family recognize.  And yet, he is “a new creature?”  That’s a more impressive transformation than Optimus Prime!  This must be some kind of supernatural process that changes the substance of something without changing the appearance of it.

I have yet to meet a Christian (Catholic or non-Catholic) that has a problem accepting Paul’s words “he is a new creature/creation.”  However, I have met numerous Christians that have a problem accepting the words of Jesus, “this is my body, this is my blood.”  Why do we take Paul at his word but dismiss the words of Christ?  Why can we so easily accept that we are transformed when we are saved but hardly accept that God transforms bread and wine?  Does Paul’s “is” have more power than Christ’s “is?”

We are transformed by Christ and made into new creatures, even though our outward appearance remains the same.  Bread and wine are transformed by Christ into himself, even though their outward appearance remains the same.  Both require faith in Christ to believe.  That which “is” is not what it “was,” even though it still looks the same.  This is the stuff of miracle, not metaphor.  The Spirit gives real, eternal life through faith, not symbols that we can only regard with “the flesh” of our mind and our senses (See John 6:63, 8:15).  Contrast what Jesus calls “the flesh” with what he calls “my flesh which I will give for the life of the world.” (John 6:51)

There is nothing better than eternal life.  Jesus said, “Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life; and I will raise him up at the last day.” (John 6:54)  At the Catholic Mass, the bread and wine looks, feels, sounds, smells and tastes just like bread and wine, but it is the body, blood, soul and divinity of Christ.  Jesus instituted the Catholic Mass at The Last Supper (Mark 14:22-24).  Christ’s transforming words still have the same power today.

Do we believe we are transformed into new creatures?  Why not believe the bread and wine are transformed into our Lord?  Lord, I believe; help my unbelief (Mark 9:23-24).

 

(This reflection was inspired by this post by Stacy Trasancos)

Please Don’t Pick Me, Please Don’t Pick Me…!

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Have you ever experienced the feeling of being called out in a crowd?  Do you remember hiding behind the head of the student in front of you so the teacher wouldn’t call your name to answer a question or solve a problem on the board?  Perhaps you have avoided eye contact with performers at a show as they scanned the audience for volunteers.  Maybe you have participated in a prayer group and secretly hoped the leader wouldn’t ask you to lead the group in a closing prayer.  There can be comfort in anonymity.  We sometimes prefer to be lost in the crowd and not called out.  The shadows feel safer than the spotlight.

There have been occasions when my enjoyment of a show turned to dread as the performers left the stage to wander the audience looking for a “victim” to become part of the show.  My mind was screaming, “Please don’t walk over towards me!”  All I wanted was to enjoy the show, not become part of it.  Of course, if I ever was chosen I would play along and make the best of it.  I’m a bit of a ham when I want to turn loose.  The discomfort is in that initial feeling of being plucked from the security of my shadow.  The heat of the spotlight burns a bit at first.

Think about all the crowds that followed Jesus around watching him perform miracles and listening to him teach.  Imagine being one of those people in the crowd.  There you are, listening to the power and impact of his words.  Maybe you were close enough to actually see him heal someone or drive out a demon.  What if you were among the crowd of five thousand people who were fed from a few fishes and loaves of bread?  Wouldn’t that be amazing?  What a show that would be!

As you stand on your toes and crane your neck to get a better view, you notice that Jesus has turned to face your direction.  He begins to slowly move towards where you are standing and you wonder where he is going.  “Wow,” you think to yourself, “He’s headed this way!  I’ll get an even better look at him!”  (You would be wishing you lived in the 21st century so you could pull out your smart phone and get a picture or even a video of him as he passes by).  The crowd separates and opens a path for Jesus as he draws ever closer to your location.  Now you can see the whites of his eyes.

As he comes closer you realize his eyes are looking towards where you are standing and you are curious about what he is looking at.  You look around and behind yourself to discern where he may be headed.  When you look back at him again it seems as if he is looking right at you.  At first you are somewhat amused.  Then, as it becomes apparent that he has made eye contact with you and is not looking away, your face become flushed and a sense of dread comes over you as the blood seems to drain from your body.  Slowly, yet quite intentionally, Jesus comes face-to-face with you.  He gazes into your eyes, raises his hand and says, “Come.  Follow me.”  The crowd is now staring at you.  They are waiting to see what you will do.

Now, let us travel to the present day.  You are sitting in a pew in a church.  There are many other people around you.  You sit through the service.  You listen to the readings and the preaching.  You sing a song or two.  You watch the activity in front of you.  Perhaps you even feel inspired.  When the “show” is over, you leave and go home.  Once again you have taken your place in the shadows.  You have remained anonymous.  You are comfortably lost in a crowd.  Or, so you think.

Jesus calls all of us by name.  He calls us out from the shadows.  As surely as he stepped into Peter’s boat, he steps into our lives and beckons us to follow him.  He calls us, not only to open our hearts to him, but to live life with him.  He calls us to participate, not to observe.  It is not a moment of acceptance he asks for, but a lifetime of conversion.  Do we avoid his gaze?  Do we hide behind the person in the pew in front of us?  He shines the light on us and says, “Come.  Follow me.”  What will we do?  The harvest is rich and the labourers are few.

What will you have me do, Lord?

Catholic Show And Tell

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When someone says, “Evangelization,” most people probably imagine some combination of preaching, door knocking, handing out Bibles and tracts, and asking people if they have accepted Jesus as their personal Lord and Savior.  Or, if one is less inclined to boldly approach people with questions about their inner spiritual life, there is always “lifestyle evangelization” which allows one to quietly go about living without all the awkward, confrontational aspects of talking to others about Jesus.  The hope is that someone will be inspired to turn to Jesus by observing a pious Christian life.  How do Catholics evangelize?

Saint Francis of Assisi is usually credited with having said, “Preach always.  Use words when necessary.”  We are to evangelize with a combination of lifestyle and words.  If we are not living a life of genuine, Christian love, then our words lose credibility.  We also need words to describe why we live as we do.  We need to be able to articulate Catholic Christian ideas.  We need to show and tell the world why it is important to be a Catholic Christian.  Anyone can be nice.  Atheists and Agnostics can be nice.  Why be a Christian?  Why be a Catholic Christian?  Now more than ever, it is necessary to use words.

Peter, our first Pope, said, “But sanctify the Lord God in your hearts: and be ready always to give an answer to every man that asks you a reason of the hope that is in you with meekness and fear:” (1Peter 3:15).  We don’t have to be out in the town square with speakers and a microphone, but we need to be ready to use words.  We need to know the Catholic Faith well enough to provide more than a blank stare or evasive maneuvers when someone asks us what we believe.  We need to know what we believe, why we believe it, and what difference it makes.

During my Evangelical Protestant phase things were a bit different.  All I needed to do was summon up enough courage to invite someone to church (not always easy for an introvert like me).  The preacher would generally take it from there.  The service was primarily focused on the sermon.  Most sermons contained at least some reference to the human need for salvation through Christ and, at the end, an invitation to pray “the sinner’s prayer” or come forward and “accept Christ into your heart” (like at a Billy Graham crusade).  The preacher did all the heavy lifting.  All I had to do was get a person to go to the service with me.

The Catholic Mass is not an Evangelical service.  Although the Bible is read and a sermon is preached, the focus of the Mass is the Eucharist.  Christ instituted Christian worship at the Last Supper.  The Last Supper was the first Mass.  Mass is the 2000 year old celebration of Christ’s sacrifice for believers to participate in, not an evangelical service designed to recruit nonbelievers.  Unless a Catholic is able and willing to explain the Mass to a visitor, that visitor is likely to be rather confused by the experience.  If more Catholics became adept at explaining the Mass, it would be more effective to invite people to church.  This, of course, necessitates Catholics themselves understanding the Mass.  Many simply do not understand.

Catholics need to get serious about living out the Faith.  As Pope Francis recently said, it does no good to simply wear Christianity as a label.  Catholics need to learn the Faith before we can live it out and effectively share it with others.  We are not ready to “give answers” if we don’t know the answers.  We can’t expect the clergy to do all the heavy lifting.  The Second Vatican Council was focused on getting the laity involved in spreading the Gospel, not just doing readings or distributing Communion or being ushers.  Catholics need to read the Bible and the Catholic Catechism.  We need to study our Faith either at home or in classes.  There are countless resources available to us in the form of books, DVDs, Bible studies and the internet.  We have no excuse for ignorance of our Faith.

We need caring and sharing.  We have to genuinely care about people and care about the Faith in order to share the Faith.  When we care about a person, we desire to know more about that person.  If we care about Jesus, we will seek to know Him more.  The best way to know Jesus is to know the Church.  As Saint Joan of Arc said about Jesus and the Church, “They are simply the same thing.”  Know the Catholic Church, know Jesus.

The best way for Catholics to evangelize is to begin by knowing what Catholics believe, why we believe it, and what difference it makes.  We can invite people to Mass, but first we must prepare to explain the experience.  If we have children, we must teach them what the Mass is about.  The best way to learn something is to teach it.  We don’t need to be theologians or clergy to evangelize others.  But we at least need to know the basics of what we are doing and why we are doing it.  Understanding the Mass is a good starting point.  By evangelizing others, we might find ourselves converted.

At the end of every Mass we are told to “go.”  Let’s go and make disciples.  Let’s do Catholic show and tell.

Doing Church A Whole New Way

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How do you like to worship God?  That question gets many different answers.  Some might say, “I like to worship God through music.”  Others might prefer to sit on the beach or hike through the woods observing the majesty of God’s creation.  Still others will relate how being at church or reading the Bible is their favorite way to worship God.  All of these are good.  God is certainly pleased by our desire to focus on Him in some way.  Now, let’s ask a different question.  How does God want us to worship Him?

We don’t have to read very far in the Bible before realizing that our worship preferences often depart from what God asks of us.  Cain killed Abel out of jealousy because God accepted Abele’s offering.  The Israelites made a golden calf as a form of worship.  Moses wasn’t allowed into the Promised Land because he departed from God’s instructions.  Saul got in trouble because he didn’t honor God the way the prophet said he should.  There are plenty of examples.  The point is that there is God’s way and there is our way.  We tend to do things our way.  Worship is no exception.

The other day I saw a yard sign that had been placed near a public park.  The sign was an advertisement for a church.  The sign said, “Doing church a whole new way.”  I understand completely the reason for the sign.  They are trying to attract people to their church through creative marketing and new methodologies.  I have been a board member and a minister in churches that were faced with the same challenge of how to increase attendance.  Many churches have tried creative things to draw people in.  While it is not bad to use creativity, it creates problems when God’s preferred method of worship is neglected, abused or even eliminated.

One problem is that we have become a society of spectators.  We like to sit in front of screens or stages and be entertained too much.  Hence, many churches are akin to attending a concert or going to a movie or a sporting event.  Get your coffee or other refreshment, take it with you into the venue, sit down and observe and listen.  Church has become primarily a spectator event.  Participation in such church events might consist of singing a song (if you feel like it) or maybe giving an occasional shout of approval.  But that is something one can also do at a baseball game.  One can sing the national anthem at the start of the game, sing Take Me Out To The Ball Game at the seventh inning and give a shout when one’s team scores.  And, of course, one can have a drink and a hot dog while enjoying the event.  This is what many churches have become modeled after: a venue for spectators to enjoy.

Worship is not for spectators.  Worship is for participants.  True worship also cannot be invented by us because it has already been instituted by God.  Jesus Christ Himself instituted Christian worship at The Last Supper.  He took bread and wine, turned it into Himself and instructed His disciples to eat and drink of His Body and His Blood (“this is my body, this is my blood”).  The Last Supper was the first Mass.

The Mass is not for spectators.  The believing Christian participates in every aspect of the Mass through his/her universal priesthood (not to be confused with the ordained priesthood).  Many Catholics don’t even realize that they are members of the priesthood of believers by virtue of their baptism.  We are not supposed to be merely observing the Mass and the actions of the ordained priest, but joining with the priest and every aspect of the supreme sacrifice of Christ (“through Him, with Him and in Him”).  The Mass unites us with Christ and with each other.  This is the worship that God wants from us.  He wants us to be conformed to Christ by partaking of the entire Christ (body, blood, soul and divinity).

People that are bored with the Mass do not understand the Mass.  The Mass does not depend upon the quality of the music or the dynamism of the preacher.  The Mass does not depend upon how well or how loudly the congregants sing.  The Mass does not depend upon how socially outgoing or how shy the people may be.  The Mass does not depend upon how entertained or inspired people may or may not “feel.”  The Mass is no place for coffee or other refreshments because the food that is offered is The Word of God made flesh, The Living Bread, Jesus Christ Himself.  You don’t need to bring your own food to a banquet supplied by God!

“The Mass” is the answer to the question, “How does God want the Christian to worship?”  The answer has been the same for 2000 years, ever since Jesus Christ instituted the first Mass in the Upper Room with His newly ordained priests.  Jesus showed them how He wanted them to worship, and they passed it down through the centuries.  No other form of worship needs to be “invented” by us.  Whatever we may come up with is less than what God asks of us.  Any other form of worship ultimately becomes more about us than about God.  We may even fall into idolatry as we seek our own worship “preferences.”

If we are in any way unsatisfied with God’s method of worship, the problem is with us, not with the worship method.  We don’t need to “do church in a whole new way.”  We need to be converted and see God’s true form of worship the way He wants us to see it.  Our creativity should be focused not on changing God’s method of Christian worship, but on finding ways to help people understand and love the worship that Christ instituted.

Help people understand and love Christ’s Holy Mass!  It will change their lives!

A Therapist’s Question

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The question that is famously associated with therapists is, “How does that make you feel?”  There is a time and a place for that question (or a variant of it), but answering it is certainly not all there is to therapy.  There are many questions to be asked and processed.  One question that seems to probe the heart of the matter quite often is, “What are you afraid of?” or “What are you afraid will happen then?”

So many people are driven by fear.  I don’t mean the healthy kind of fear that causes one to avoid genuine danger, but a nagging sense of emptiness or discontentment (I am not necessarily discussing anxiety disorders here).  It is a fear described by Tillich as a fear of “non-being,” although few people draw that conclusion as they move through their fearful lives.  People generally attempt to ease the fear by means of acquiring material goods, pleasures, or by investing in relationships.  Since people, pleasures and things are imperfect and finite, they will eventually disappoint, deteriorate or disappear.  Therefore, the fear remains below the surface.  It is Thoreau’s life of “quiet desperation.”

I have seen many couples, for example, that found in each other what they initially perceived to be the antidote to their fear of non-being.  Yet, they failed to resolve that fear in each other.  They discovered that it is not possible for one person to be “everything” despite what the lyrics of romantic songs may suggest.  They have somehow failed to “complete” each other and now they sit before me, their therapist, wondering what is wrong with their relationship.  Generally, each partner wants me to change the other partner into someone that will ease their underlying fears and make them feel whole.

One of the most repeated phrases in Scripture is, “Fear not,” or, “Do not be afraid.”  Having created us, God understands us to the core.  God also knows that our fear of non-being cannot be entirely eased by people, pleasures or things.  Only God can fill that void.  We are designed that way.  Hence, people of all places and times have turned to some form of religious expression.  As St. Augustine said, “We are restless until we rest in You, oh Lord.”  The admonition to “fear not” is a constant reminder to be adequately unattached to people, places and things, and to place our ultimate “OK-ness” in God alone.  Having placed our trust in God, we become free to fearlessly enjoy God’s gifts without desperately clinging to them as our source of being.  Relationships, pleasures, places and things take on new meaning.

The beauty of Christianity is not that it is one religion of many that seeks after God to resolve the fear of non-being.  The beauty is that through Christianity, God seeks after us.  God, knowing our fear, has revealed Himself to us as the antidote for fear.  We do not need to scratch and claw our way to the peace of God.  God has come down to us, embraced us, and told us to rest in Him.  Jesus shows us that we can live lives of faith, not fear.  There is more to our existence than this short life.  Through Christ we can live abundant lives instead of quietly desperate lives.

Christian Unity: When Will We Learn?

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My fellow Christians, why are we divided?  Do we not all believe that Jesus is the Messiah?  Do we not all have access to the same Bibles?  Do we not all know the Apostles’ Creed?  Do we not all read the words of Jesus and the Apostles?  Why are these things not enough to keep us united in spiritual battle?  What do we lack?  Why are we not “perfectly joined together in the same mind and in the same judgment” as Paul admonished us to be?

We lack that which transforms a great horde into a well-oiled, disciplined, effective army:  allegiance to a central chain of command.  We also lack the holiness that comes from being disciplined and united.  How can we preach holiness while maintaining division?  The two are not compatible.  A divided army simply does not fight well.  Holiness is what we use to wage spiritual warfare.  Division is not holy.  Our lips profess allegiance to Christ, but our actions show division, contention and strife.

When will we learn that Jesus established a visible Church hierarchy, a chain of command for all Christians to follow and be accountable to?  We cannot be united while preaching and teaching different doctrines.  We cannot be united while following leaders that oppose each other.  When will we learn that unity requires humility and the swallowing of pride?  Soldiers must learn to follow orders that they may not agree with or fully understand.  When will we learn that we cannot worship wherever and however we want?  Worship cannot be invented by us.  Christian worship has been instituted by Jesus Christ in the Eucharist.  We cannot effectively function as different parts of the same Body if we are not fully united to that Body.  When will we learn that being Christian is not about choosing one’s preferences from a smorgasbord of doctrinal options, but about being obedient to the Faith?  One Lord, one Faith, one baptism.

When will we learn that genuine Christian unity will elude us until we reverse the perpetual, explosive trend of protest and division and return to the central command of Peter’s chair?

Rom 16:17, 1Cor 1:10, 1Cor 3:3, 1Cor 11:18, Matt 16:18

So, What’s Your Opinion?

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Jesus called his Disciples to follow Him and they dropped everything and followed Him.  Then He spent three years teaching them.  I don’t recall Jesus ever asking His Disciples for their opinions.

I don’t see any indication that Jesus’ time with the Disciples was like many modern day Bible studies where people sit around sharing their own impressions of what this verse or that verse means to them.  I can’t imagine Jesus asking the Disciples for opinions on how to interpret Scripture.  If He did ask them, I certainly can’t imagine that Jesus would be satisfied with two or more opposing interpretations.  It is hard to imagine Jesus responding, “Well, that’s fine if you guys can’t agree on what it means, as long as it’s not essential to your salvation.”  It seems that Jesus taught them and they listened.  They may not have understood everything completely, but they had to accept what Jesus taught them.  Nothing was subject to personal opinion.  Even when Peter had the correct answer to a question (“You are the Christ”), Jesus didn’t say, “I like your opinion about me, Peter!”  Jesus didn’t give Peter any credit.  Jesus made it clear that God provided that correct answer, not Peter.

We need to have Jesus teach us while we listen.  That’s why Jesus gave us the Church.  He didn’t give us lots of different churches with opposing views and opinions.  Jesus gave us the Church with a successive hierarchy led by the Holy Spirit.  Jesus spent three years teaching His Disciples what He wanted them to know.  After Jesus ascended to Heaven, He sent the Holy Spirit to make sure that they (the leaders of Church) would be able to “connect the dots” and continue the process of teaching until the end of the age.  To listen to the Church is to listen to Jesus.  God still provides the correct answers.

There is nothing in the Bible that says, “And Jesus told them to go and write a book to guide people’s opinions after the Apostles die off.”  The Bible itself does not claim to be our ultimate guide and authority.  Obviously, having access to the Bible has not resulted in Christian unity or concensus.  There are too many opposing opinions in play.  I can’t recall Jesus ever being interested in everyone having a right to their own opinions.  He seemed very interested in obedience, though.

There’s an old hymn I recall from my Protestant days.  “Trust and obey, for there’s no other way to be happy in Jesus than to trust and obey.”  The key is deciding who, and/or what, to obey.  There are so many opinions.  There are so many churches teaching so many different things about Jesus and Scripture.  Jesus knew this would happen.  It’s human nature to muddy the water.  That’s why Jesus gave us His Church with a Spirit-led, successive hierarchy.  To obey His Church is to obey Jesus.  If we wait until we understand every teaching clearly, we will never step forward in faith.  Like the Disciples, we must accept things we do not fully understand.

Sound scary?  I have yet to know of someone whose life or soul was brought to ruin by faithfully following what is taught in the Catholic Catechism.  Challenged, perhaps, but not ruined.  It’s all about Jesus, after all.  And that’s more than simply my opinion.

Becoming One Flesh: Eucharist And Marriage

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Dr. Scott Hahn recently posted an excellent Facebook response to a question about the Eucharist being closed to non-Catholics.  His answer reflected on his own spiritual journey from Evangelical Christian to Presbyterian minister to Catholic.  Each step in his journey brought him closer to understanding the sacramental aspect of both marriage and the Eucharist.  Each relationship is a “one flesh” union requiring fidelity and integrity.

As I reflected on Dr. Hahn’s answer, it occurred to me that perhaps a lack of understanding about the Eucharist and marriage contributes to the wide acceptance of contraception.  For example, if marriage is not viewed as a sacrament, it becomes only a symbol and loses integrity.  It can be manipulated according to the will of anyone desiring to make use of its symbolism.  If Holy Communion is only a symbol, it loses any need for fidelity.  Anyone can “join in.”  There is no need for full union between participants.  The Eucharist becomes merely a symbol of common feelings rather than a reality of a “one flesh” union.  Since everyone “feels good” about Jesus, they should all be allowed to partake of the Eucharist, right?

Ironically, few married people would be comfortable becoming one flesh with someone they were not fully united to in marriage.  That’s called infidelity and it is rightfully frowned upon by most married people.  We don’t let everyone “join in.”  So, why should we be ok letting people “join in” the one flesh union of the Eucharist if those people are not fully united with Christ’s Church?

And why should we let people partake of the Eucharist if they don’t even believe that what they are participating in is an actual, “one flesh” union?  That’s like being in a contraception marriage.  There are lots of “good feelings” that feel like bonding, but there is not a one flesh union taking place in the marriage.  It is a lack of integrity.  The marriage is only symbolic of the feelings they have about each other.  They do not take the marriage to its full realization of a one flesh, life giving union.

One of the best ways for the devil to mess up our relationship with Christ is to promote the following errors:

–          The Holy Communion is only symbolic.  The bread and wine are not transubstantiated into the body, blood, soul and divinity of Christ.  We don’t need to become one flesh with Christ at Communion.  All we need is our good feelings about Jesus and the Bible.

–          Contraception is fine and even preferable.  Sex and marriage are mostly about bonding and “good feelings,” not primarily about becoming one flesh and creating new life.

–          Anyone that believes in Jesus should be allowed to participate in Holy Communion.  No fidelity to the Church or her Christ-given authority is necessary.

The two Sacraments of Eucharist and Marriage are intimately connected in such a way that an attack on one serves as an attack on the other.  A deeper understanding of one leads to a deeper understanding of the other.  “Becoming one flesh” is a critical theme that connects the two Sacraments in a unique way.

Catholics are not mean, snobbish “elitists” that refuse to let other Christians “join in.”  We simply hold to the understanding of Jesus and the Church Fathers who saw the need for covenantal integrity and marital fidelity within marriage and within the Church.

If It Ain’t Broke, Don’t Fix It!

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It took me a long time to see the light about the Church’s teaching on birth control.  Like so many other aspects of the Faith, the teaching holds both a simple beauty and a profound complexity.  There is still much I need to learn regarding the Theology of the Body.

If I had to sum up my thoughts on what the Church teaches about human sexuality, I suppose I might use the old adage, “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it!”  God knew very well what He was doing when He created our reproductive systems.  Healthy men and women don’t require medications, prophylactics or surgeries to fix or prevent anything.  Our reproductive systems need to be respected and managed, but not broken by being “fixed.”

The idea of natural family planning (NFP) was confusing to me for a long time because I did not grasp the “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” concept.  Why not use chemicals or devices?  These are just various ways of managing the body.  We do all sorts of medical things to manage our bodies.  What’s the big deal?  The big deal turned out to be that artificial birth control “breaks” something that is already operating in a healthy and normal way.  It repairs or enhances nothing.  When else would we go to a doctor and ask for a drug or device to break that which is healthy?  “Gee, Doc, my legs are working so well!  Can you put one of them in a cast for me, please?”  “I have 20/20 vision?  Hey, Doc, can I have some glasses to blur my eyesight and really give me some good headaches?”  NFP does not “break,” or interfere with, a healthy, normal human system.

Artificial birth control does not teach people responsibility.  It teaches people to try and have their cake and eat it, too.  It teaches people that the primary purpose of the reproductive system is pleasure, when in fact, it is procreation.  God was nice enough to make sex pleasurable.  He could have made it as stimulating as shaking hands.  Let’s not forget that those “feel good” nerve endings have lots of other equipment attached to them.  Those nerve endings are part of an entire system, not just “accessories” for us to bat around like cat toys whenever we want.  NFP keeps this in mind by respecting both the pleasurable and the procreative aspects of sexual design.  Everything remains intact, unobstructed and chemical free.  It all works like God designed it to work, baby or no baby.

Incidentally, some people argue that since post menopausal women can no longer conceive, then they should not be having sex if sex is all about procreation.  Again, menopause is perfectly in line with the natural design of human sexuality.  No pills have been taken, no condoms have been put on, and nothing has been unnaturally altered.  So, of course, post menopausal women are allowed to enjoy the natural pleasure of sex.  It’s only natural!  (There are also women that have had hysterectomies or other medically necessary procedures that have rendered them sterile without choice).  And, of course, there are the stories of Sarah and Elizabeth.  God can surprise us.

Much more could be said, but I think the primary motivator is fear.  People are afraid of the responsibility that comes with new life.  That is why we now exist in a culture of death.  People want to have lots of fun without “fearing” the responsibility.  The entitlement mentality and the contraceptive mentality are very close cousins.  Look at it this way: we are not likely to see NFP being used among the promiscuous population.  Not because it is ineffective, but because it requires responsibility, communication, commitment, self control and respect by both partners.  Artificial birth control does not require those qualities in partners.  It only requires a willingness to break a normal, working system by “fixing” it.

I’m not trying to lay a big guilt trip on folks.  I’m just trying to help expose the lies we have swallowed for decades.  Christians in particular should be concerned about whether or not they are actually becoming “one flesh” within their marriages, and whether or not their sex lives are in keeping with God’s natural law.

This is not just a “Catholic” issue.  It’s not true “because the Catholic Church teaches it’s true.”  The Catholic Church (like a voice in the wilderness) still teaches it because it is true and always has been true!  Catholicism refuses to allow society to dictate God’s truth.  Catholic reproductive systems and non-Catholic reproductive systems were all created and designed by the same God.  Artificial birth control affects us all the same.  The truth hits everybody.  The question is, “Are we responsibly honoring God’s creative design, or are we trying to play God with our bodies just to have some pleasure?”

Here’s an interesting website I found recently about NPF.

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