Hope, with Faith and Charity, is a theological virtue that should neither be allowed to become an illusion or be abolished. We used to sing at school and in our parish churches All my hope on God is founded, he doth still my trust renew, with a fine tune by Herbert Howells. Were we to lose all hope, we would also lose the taste of life and our vital life energy. We would die spiritually as did many of the inmates in the Nazi concentration camps and Gestapo torture chambers. You destroy a man by taking away all hope and meaning.
Discovering that many of my own thoughts and experiences resemble those of the French existentialists, I took a book out from my bookshelves – Andrew N. Woznicki, Karol Wojtyla’s Existential Personalism, and have decided to read it again. I tried it about 20 years ago, but I could not relate to Pope John Paul II’s philosophy or even descriptions of it. Perhaps, now, I am more ready for the kind of thought that sustained the former Pope and Archbishop of Cracow through the twin scourges of Nazism and Communism. One result of modern life and bad experience is alienation. Perhaps psychologists have a name for it, but it is above all a spiritual problem. We lose contact with people who have been good to us. We feel different, chased away. We have no rudder or compass and are disorientated. We cannot imagine being able to relate to any community or belong to it. The titles alone of two books by Jean-Paul Sartre, La Nausée and Huis Clos, indicate the state of mind. It is in the second work that we find the famous quote L’enfer, c’est les autres (Hell is other people). Alienation is a serious spiritual affliction.
If we lose all hope, life also loses its meaning. This is the case for scores and hundreds of young men in our city suburbs burning cars, stealing and making their neighbourhoods no-go areas even for the police. They do not care about anything. They are nihilists, and their state of mind is beautifully portrayed in Dostoevsky’s The Possessed, a novel. Surely someone who finds himself that far down the road already tastes the bitterness of hell itself!
The real issue for us is having realistic hopes in things that are at least probably attainable. Perhaps there are things we thought were attainable, and they turned out not to be. That is one of the risks of life. There are many things in life that give a sense of meaning and fulfilment – which can involve our job, relationships, helping people, sports, hobbies, anything. The essential thing is being realistic, and doing what we can do, and do well, where we feel confident and in control. That is not a sin, as long as not everything has to be like this little world of “can do”.
Many people have very bad experiences of churches, church schools and clerics. I will not talk about the sexual abuse issue that has become big business for the less scrupulous members of the legal profession in America. Simply, people have been made to feel unduly guilty and are oppressed with a low self-esteem and a feeling that all they deserve is divine punishment. These are dark thoughts within us, and there are mischievous spirits around who revel in our self-destructiveness and bring us black thoughts.
Yet, let us realise that there are darker forces within the mind encouraging our self-condemnation and that we can gain some control over these. Just as we can receive creative inspiration from a higher source, so we are capable of receiving destructive impulses from a lower one. We talk about endgames and battles for ordinariates and the survival of our priestly vocation, when the fray is fought within our own souls. And that is precisely a battlefield where we can win.
Our spiritual lives are one thing. The Church – or churches in which the Catholic Church subsists – are also in crisis as each one of us is to some extent or another. Churches have not been emptying only since Vatican II or because the rite of Mass was changed. The problem goes much further back, as testified by the harrowing Diary of a Country Priest (Journal d’un Curé de Campagne) by Georges Bernanos, portraying an unhappy priest in the 1930’s. You can see the film here in French with English subtitles (115 minutes). We are looking at an era when Europe was recovering from World War I, the waning effects of French anticlericalism, the grotesque hypocrisy of French bourgeois religion in its dying embers and the effect on all that on a young man in poor health.
Here in France, the statistics of religious practice are not encouraging. The percentage of Catholics in the French population is 51% compared with 64% in 1994. Broken down, Catholics who believe in God are 27% of the French population, agnostic nominal Catholics are 15% of the French population and atheist nominal Catholics are 9% of the French population. About 5% of the total Catholic population go to Mass each Sunday. Secularisation is one explanation. Another might be that people have access to a diversity of views and no longer adhere to an official Church. Many believe without belonging, or think they can adhere to a spiritual dimension in life without being part of an organised religion.
For so many people, why has organised religion lost its appeal? Obviously, there is the abuse issue, but the problem goes back much further. Fundamentalism does more harm to the credibility of Christianity than anything else, fundamentalism being understood as literalism in matters of biblical, ecclesiastical and canonical texts – and intolerance more than anything else. Some believers are seen to lack spirituality, are self-righteous, are judgemental and go by double standards or simply are hypocrites. Hypocrisy is one characteristic that most decent people find absolutely intolerable in the religious. It suffices to talk with most ordinary people to find these reflections.
Incoherence and contradiction in doctrine and moral standards drive people away in a very sure way. I can think of many clear examples, but will not mention them here. Many truths are so badly expressed that they seem to make no more sense than fairy stories for children! Grow up – it’s time to put all that stuff away, as many suggest. Intolerance and hypocrisy are not mere moral weaknesses, but are signs of real evil. Most of us are unable to cope with such things. Today, we see things differently from the period of the Enlightenment and the exaggerated sense of entitlement of the clergy in the eighteenth century, as the Enlightenment itself is discredited as nearly all systems of human thought.
What most people look for in spirituality is what can enable them to discover their inner beings in a way that psychology alone would be incapable of doing. Outside of organised religion, some people practice various forms of meditation in order to “connect” with their deeper selves, other people, the world and universe and God. Would anything bring such people back to the community dimension of Christianity?
The liberal agendas do nothing or little to restore the confidence of the cynical. Fundamentalism in its various “traditionalist” and “evangelical” forms is growing, but it only attracts people of a given and stereotyped temperament. There are certainly characteristics I think would make a difference for many people. In particular, I would name the witness of personal experience (a near-death experience for example), tolerance of diversity, compassion and the banishing of ideology.
Religions die when they have lost the spirit that gave meaning to their words, texts and rites. Perhaps we see all the indicators as down – the engine running on fumes, the life-support system nearly exhausted, etc. – because there is nothing to be saved of that particular religious system. Will it be spared for ten just men or the five that could not be found when the chips were down? New wine needs new bottles, but the “new stuff” we have been served with by all the western churches over the past forty or more years was not that new wine. It wasn’t even clean drinking water! We cannot put new wine into the bottles of hypocrisy, intolerance and cruelty, but into truly moral and spiritual virtues.
Certainly, the future is not in the kind of communities we try to build, because their institutionalisation is the seed of their destruction in the present conditions. No stone will stand upon a stone, Jesus said referring to the Temple of Jerusalem. It all has to begin with ourselves. That is probably the most difficult battle.
” I think would make a difference for many people. In particular, I would name the witness of personal experience (a near-death experience for example), tolerance of diversity, compassion and the banishing of ideology.”
“Religions die when they have lost the spirit that gave meaning to their words, texts and rites.” …
“New wine needs new bottles, but the “new stuff” we have been served with by all the western churches over the past forty or more years was not that new wine. ”
Dear father Anthony is true what you say … I have seen this wine in a new seed of the church that I’ve seen happen in my life: the Holy Spirit inspires new beginnings in the church, always.
The movement to which I belong, like others, are “creative minorities” ( as Pope Ratzinger says) in which “the witness of personal experience …, tolerance of diversity, compassion and the banishing of ideology” are happening now.
My heartfelt wish is that even the ordinary can belong to these creative minorities and also that you can, through it, belong to this new beginning of the church.
In Christ
Flavio
As our Italian friend Flavio is pushing Communione e Liberazione here, I would encourage readers to look at this page. I have no personal experience of this movement, but it seems quite close to Opus Dei in certain respects, and the Catholic answer to the American seeker-orientated purpose-driven mega-church. Is Communione e Liberazione totalitarian and secretive? Perhaps not. I want to make no accusations, but I am suspicious of the “breezy” managerial style found in some new “creative minority” movements, together with a distinctly bourgeois feeling as in some of the French charismatic communities.
A tree is judged by its fruits, and I would encourage these movements to those for whom this kind of religion is their cup of tea. I don’t personally feel attracted to them, but that doesn’t mean they are not good for others. I am suspicious of all forms of Enthusiasm (cf. Mgr Knox’s book). They are part of the diversity. Pietism and enthusiasm are a part of western religion over the past few hundred years as Christians could no longer relate to the world of liturgical symbolism and sacramental theology. Perhaps it is the way forward. I have no idea.
Dear father Antony,
my interest is not first of all of pushing the movement, as to testify that the Spirit works through this and other movements NOW, that Jesus is a presence within the Church encounterable NOW.
As Deborah said in the older post our Hope is in Christ, we must look to what he is doig now.
I don’t know if we are enthusistic… I’m not so young and with a rationalistic temperament (or habit?).
Giussani said that our movement does not have a particular charism, but tries to live the fundamentals of the faith … I apologize if it seemed that there was a different kind of interest (proselytism is not in my strings ). I apologize too for my poor english from Google translator…
With friendship
Flavio
PS If someone is interested here there is CL website
http://www.clonline.org/FirstPage.htm
I know some wonderful folk in Communion and Liberation and hope to get to know more about the movement soon. Last night I went to an Opus Dei recollection for women, something I do from time to time with a friend, and many of the good, faithful Catholics I know in all walks of life are part members. There are lots of places where the Church is in renewal; Flavio is right. I see it here in Canada in the Companions of the Cross, a relatively new order of priests. And Famille Marie-Jeuness, a new religious order that began in Quebec but is spreading. The worship styles may not be traditional but the doctrinal beliefs—and practice—are rock solid.
We must keep our eyes on Jesus, who is our hope.
There’s a gospel tune by the title “Standing on the Promise.” The chorus simply and unsurprisingly runs:
“Standing on the promises of Christ my Savior.”
Good advice.
But the rub comes in that the promises must be properly theologically, historically and linguistically understood if one’s standing (ie hope) is truly to hold.
Unfortunately, the word hypocrite is generally synonymous for the word man excepting only a very few individuals; and these few are the ones who inspire conversion and faith, often times in the face of the rank hypocrisy and wickedness of the rest. Sadly this almighty rankness, this awe inspiring stench, this firmament-clogging rottenness is most abundantly observed among the elites – the leadership. (Oh, and did I mention there’s unholy retribution against plebes who frankly speak of it!) When’s the last time your local leader, church or civil, cared for the sick, cast out demons, raised the dead, led by example, sacrificed, shed bitter tears for their own sins or genuinely gave a crap? Those who begin fearlessly Christian or fearlessly patriotic do not desire to become hypocrites; but if they do it is the hypocrites who, like scum, almost always seem to rise to the top. St. James warned us, “be not many masters, knowing that we shall receive the greater condemnation.” We greatly err when we raise ourselves up from the mire and clay: it is Christ’s prerogative to lift us up. Only He can keep us from bringing the toxic sludge on the bottom with us as we arise. By His fiat, we stand on true promises that cannot give way.
Where are the divinely choosen leaders? Ah, but Jesus who chose the twelve chose one a devil! Has He in our times chosen more than one? Are all bishops called through inspiration of the Holy Ghost? I recollect the bishops who condemned St. Joan of Arc to burn and who withheld the Sacrament from her; and of those in our present day who are guilty of far worse.
Are we better off not expecting anything from our leaders?
It then becomes very hard to be disappointed.
Our Lord said that the good shepherd, the true shepherd, leaves the ninety and nine to seek and save the lost sheep. That shepherd is the one among thousands who is not a hypocrite or hireling – he is a saint in our midst! The rest can be seen to grin like dogs and grudge if they be not satisfied. A friend of mine sometimes quips when presented with a late breaking scandal, “He’s no more an heir to the Apostles than the man in the moon!” It always gets a chuckle from listeners because the best humor is often rooted in some truth. Real people expect and need more, much more, than canonical integrity. Im going to go out on a limb and say that nobody, and I mean nobody ever became a saint through strict obedience to canon law. Rather, “By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another.”
I need to often remind myself of St. Paul’s curative:
Charity suffereth long, and is kind; charity envieth not; charity vaunteth not itself, is not puffed up, doth not behave itself unseemly, seeketh not her own, is not easily provoked, thinketh no evil; rejoiceth not in iniquity, but rejoiceth in the truth; beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things.
Here’s Fanny’s song:
Smiling, listening to this. Reminds me of my Baptist days.
“Resting in my Savior as my all in in all.”
Amen! (Ah-men, not Ay-men!)
Deborah
I certainly understand the alienation. I experience it myself often enough. Nor do I think the enthusiasm of the Mega-church Evangelical types transplanted into a Catholic context is a very helpful answer. On the other hand I do really like the Chuck Wagon gang (although it’s not music I would associate with the liturgy). While we live in the most difficult of times, especially in terms of finding a place for our beloved tradition in the context of the Great Church, I am not in a state of hopelessness. My despair, I find, comes when I start to take myself too seriously. There is another side to modernism, if you will, and there is a lot that is modern and liberal that is worth keeping, especially in old-fashioned liberalism of the kind I experienced in college. Sadly liberalism has degenerated into the current Neo-Stalinism which manages to carry on with the illusion of coolness and openness, but is anything but. It was partially in reflection on this dilemma that I published the recent essay on my blog, “Liturgical Cool” , http://traditionesanglicanae.blogspot.com/2011/07/liturgical-cool.html >. In fact I think we have a lot to offer to the post-modern anxious world, but we have a great task before us, chiefly to find that peace in our own souls that will put us in the position of being able to preach by the graciousness of our own lives. But this is an ascetical problem, and one thing the Anglican tradition has taught me is that once I can reduce a problem to its ascetical dimensions, I am more than half way to facing it in a constructive manner.
What a beautiful comment! I realise that our problem is not relating to the people of our times but to the Church institution that tends to say “Our way or not at all“. I dare not say here everything I am thinking. Whatever, it is true that we must find spiritual healing, part of which are our fundamental human needs of life in relationship and community. I see little of either in many powerful churchmen, but that is neither here or there.
Michael,
You wrote: Nor do I think the enthusiasm of the Mega-church Evangelical types transplanted into a Catholic context is a very helpful answer.
This begs more questions than answers — the first question being, why not? The enthusiasm of the megachurches is what seems to have existed in the apostolic church of the period that began on Pentacost, when the church was growing by leaps and bounds. Perhaps the lack of that zeal and enthusiasm is why we are not growing by leaps and bounds today, and why so many have fallen away over the past several decades. Perhaps, on closer examination, this zeal is precisely what we need to recover.
You wrote: On the other hand I do really like the Chuck Wagon gang (although it’s not music I would associate with the liturgy).
Again, why not?
In the sacred constitution Sacrosanctum concillium on divine worship, the fathers of the Second Vatican Council, desiring to open the door to reforms rather cautiously, spoke with forked tongue:
And again:
They also spoke specifically to the situation in mission lands, but similar circumstances exist among the unchurched of western culture today:
It’s also useful to bear in mind the norms in the same document for sacred art:
I’m not suggesting that we should scrap any traditional style of litugical music, but I am suggesting that we should not hesitate to adopt contemporary styles of music that will bring people into our communities of faith. In the big tent which is the Catholic Church, there’s plenty of room for both.
You wrote: Sadly liberalism has degenerated into the current Neo-Stalinism which manages to carry on with the illusion of coolness and openness, but is anything but.
Sadly, this comment hits the nail on the head.
You wrote: It was partially in reflection on this dilemma that I published the recent essay on my blog, “Liturgical Cool” , http://traditionesanglicanae.blogspot.com/2011/07/liturgical-cool.html >.
Your essay on “Liturgical Cool” raises many valid points. Indeed, every pastor would do well to take heed!
That said, I must add one caveat. We all have a different concept as to what is “cool” and what is not. There’s a tremendous pastoral danger in trying to impose one’s own concept of “cool” on others whose perception is different.
As part of my work for a Master of Theological Studies (MTS) in pastoral ministry, we had to take three “personal growth” seminars. At the time (late 1980′s), two psychological tools that categorized types of personalities — the Myers-Briggs Type Inventory (MBTI) and the Enneagram — were “in vogue” as foundations for such seminars. In the respective seminars, we discovered that people who fell into different categories would experience, and thus would approach, God and prayer, including the liturgy, in different ways. Culture also plays a significant role in this. A pastor has a pastoral duty to do what will nourish his congregation rather than simply following his personal preferenes, especiallh in the public forum.
From your linked blog article: However, it is not really any longer cool to be an Episcopalian: it has become, or is becoming, terribly PC and narrow and intolerant, not to mention cruelly nonsensical as a religion.
A pastor friend is fond of saying that we tend to become what we despise. If we despise narrowness and intolerance in others, we tend to become narrow and intolerant. Anglo-Catholics who come into the Catholic Church to form ordinariates under Anglicanorum coetibus will need to be on guard to counter this natural tendency.
Norm.
Fr. Anthony,
Thank you for these complementary and very thought-provoking articles discussing both sides of this issue. Both articles make very profound points indeed!
I’m especially amused by your comment in the earlier post about rearranging the world around us to conform to our tastes. My alma mater chose a beaver as our mascot precisely because a beaver, moving into an area, rearranges the whole ecosystem to suit its own purpose, with no regard whatsoever for the impact of such actions on other creatures.
Hmmm… time for some introspection….
Norm.