The Last Pillar

If there is any testament to the work of grace, it is that people remain in the Catholic Church. 

Now, if one comes at this from a strictly sociological perspective, one could argue that it is not grace that keeps one in the Church, but a kind of spiritual Stockholm Syndrome. This phenomenon occurs when hostages or abuse victims bond with their captors or abusers and develop psychological connections over the course of the days, weeks, months, or even years of captivity or abuse and may come to sympathize with their captors. Then, even if one had the opportunity to escape, they may choose to stay instead.

Or, if one were to think of the faith as a "job" of sorts, why would one pledge loyalty to such a dysfunctional institution which is both spiritually and financially in the red, with a CEO that is cold and vindictive, where one lives under threat of being "canceled" at any moment? Is it cognitive dissonance to continue to devote one's life and talent to a post-conciliar Church which, as my friend Boniface aptly points out, flees from its call not because it fears failure, but because it fears success? 

This simple statement is perhaps the only one which makes sense to me at this point. Why else would we as the laity have our hands slapped for daring to proselytize, being gaslit with confusion for having the audacity to believe what the Church professes, or threatened with eradication by possessing the gall of desiring our spiritual and liturgical patrimony? If a secular company was abusing its employees and constantly shooting itself in the foot, hemorrhaging accounts and failing to grow capital, having company meetings modeled of this laughable "synodality" model, it would find itself six feet under at the end of the fiscal year. The Church is dysfunctional, inept, and rife with corruption. And yet She survives. Why?

When I reflect on Mother Teresa's words, "God has called us not to be successful, but to be faithful," I am in the habit of attributing that message to our individual lives as Christians. But perhaps it applies to the Church as a whole as well. Granted, the Church is not a business or an IPO, and the more She entangles herself with these worldly endeavors, the more She loses sight of her mission which is (or at least, should be) the salvation of souls. 

It's embarrassing to be a on a losing team. Look how the Pentecostals are swallowing up Latin America. Look how the Orthodox are manly and have liturgical integrity. Look how the Muslims are outbreeding the infidels. Why haven't we cut our losses and switched up sides when it's so obvious how limp wristed and socially retarded the Church of today is?

Unlike Protestants, we cannot think of our faith outside of the institutional Church. For better or worse we are wedded to the Bride of Christ as members of His body, that bride to whom He has consummated his very self in a divine covenant. Without the Bread of Life, we risk dying of hunger. Without the waters of baptism, we have no share in His inheritance. Without Confession, we are liars (1 Jn 1:8). 

The other day I was reading from the ninth chapter of Ezekiel. It's like something out of a horror movie:

Then I heard him call out in a loud voice, “Bring near those who are appointed to execute judgment on the city, each with a weapon in his hand.” And I saw six men coming from the direction of the upper gate, which faces north, each with a deadly weapon in his hand. With them was a man clothed in linen who had a writing kit at his side. They came in and stood beside the bronze altar.

Now the glory of the God of Israel went up from above the cherubim, where it had been, and moved to the threshold of the temple. Then the Lord called to the man clothed in linen who had the writing kit at his side and said to him, “Go throughout the city of Jerusalem and put a mark on the foreheads of those who grieve and lament over all the detestable things that are done in it.”

As I listened, he said to the others, “Follow him through the city and kill, without showing pity or compassion. Slaughter the old men, the young men and women, the mothers and children, but do not touch anyone who has the mark. Begin at my sanctuary.” So they began with the old men who were in front of the temple.

Then he said to them, “Defile the temple and fill the courts with the slain. Go!” So they went out and began killing throughout the city. While they were killing and I was left alone, I fell facedown, crying out, “Alas, Sovereign Lord! Are you going to destroy the entire remnant of Israel in this outpouring of your wrath on Jerusalem?”

He answered me, “The sin of the people of Israel and Judah is exceedingly great; the land is full of bloodshed and the city is full of injustice. They say, ‘The Lord has forsaken the land; the Lord does not see.’ So I will not look on them with pity or spare them, but I will bring down on their own heads what they have done.”

Then the man in linen with the writing kit at his side brought back word, saying, “I have done as you commanded.”

In this passage, only those who grieve and lament over all the detestable things done in the temple will be marked and spared. As Abraham negotiated with Yahweh in Genesis 18 over the fate of Sodom ("Will you wipe away the righteous with the wicked?"), he realizes he may lose the bargain if the terms are set at fifty righteous men. He talks the Lord down to ten--if ten righteous men can be found, the Lord will relent. And he still loses the wager, and Sodom is burned up in the Lord's wrath. Lot is a man who laments the wickedness of the perverts who visit his house; he is marked, and escapes the destruction.

The angels of the Lord are brandishing their knives. The words of the Baptist as well serve as warning, "His winnowing fork is in his hand, and he will clear his threshing floor, gathering his wheat into the barn and burning up the chaff with unquenchable fire." This winnowing is a separation of the empty husks from the grain of the wheat--the wheat is tossed in the air and the chaff is blown away, while the grain falls and is collected. The grace of God is present in this refinement and striping down of all things until only the pure ore of faith remains. Anything we are holding on tightly to will be ripped from our hands in exchange for the passover mark. 

Our attachment to the Church as we know it will be stripped from us. This may be the shuttering of our local parish where we had our children baptized and family marriages. Or it may simply be the illusions we have that the Church as a whole is committed to its mission of saving souls, or our affinity for this or that Holy Father. 

Our attachment to the identity of being Catholic as we know it will be stripped from us. Those of us who enjoyed the good name of a respected cultural affiliation will now find ourselves religious minorities as true believers, like Jews wandering in Egypt. 

Our attachment to the Sacraments and the Holy Mass, which we have for so long taken for granted, will be stripped from us. We may find ourselves parched and spiritually adrift for periods of time, and lament how many times we could have gone to Mass and didn't, or confessed our sins to a priest, and didn't. 

Our attachment to the comfort of our country as we know it and the "religious liberty" we hold dear will be stripped from us. We may find ourselves as lambs among wolves, believers among pagans. Even so-called "conservative" idols we have set up and mingled with our faith will be smashed and burned.

Our attachment to our particular faith communities will be stripped from us. As our little Catholic bubbles pop, we may find ourselves in a dark night of loneliness, in which those we broke bread with leave the faith, or fail to be there for us in our times of need, or simply let us down. "Even my close friend, someone I trusted, one who shared my bread, has turned against me" (Ps 41:9)

Our attachment to our celebrity idols, those online talking heads and commentators feeding us with opinion after opinion on this or that, will be stripped from us. The plug will be pulled, and we will find ourselves in the proverbial dark--with no one to turn to for advice or guidance, we will have to learn to trust in the dark and take responsibility for our own decisions. "It is a dreadful thing to fall into the hands of the living God" (Heb 10:31). 

Eventually, the whole temple of our Church, our community, our country, our identity, our pious clothes, our idols--it will all be torn in two, until not one stone will be left standing upon another (Mt 24:2) until one only thing is left for our faith to cling to, and that is Christ alone. Let it be a rebuke you take to heart for the salvation of your soul. This is the great and terrible grace of God working--that same grace that keeps us in the baroque of Peter despite all temptations to jump ship, despite all the abuse, the embarrassment of the hierarchy. Because it is not the Pope who steers the ship, nor the cardinals, nor your local priest, but CHRIST ALONE who commands our faith. “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and you will be saved" (Acts 16:31).

I am not Catholic because it's rewarding, or edifying, or encouraging, or conservative, or fun, or inclusive. I am Catholic because I have become a slave--not of the Church, not of the Pope, not of my community--but of Christ. And were it not for the grace of Christ, I would not remain. When everything is crumbling around you, the last pillar standing is Christ, in whom I have my faith.