Your Catholic Bubble

A few years ago I used to do street evangelization, which is just what it sounds like. I would set up with one of two other people on a busy street corner in town, put out a "Need Prayer? Catholic TRUTH!" sign, and hand out rosaries and Miraculous Medals trying to "fish for men." If people weren't Catholic, we'd ask them if they ever thought about the Faith. If they were Catholic, we'd ask where they attended Mass. If they didn't, we'd invite them to come home. Conveniently, we were set up only a block or two from the local parish we were attending at the time as a family.

It was hard work, honestly. Like my morning cold shower, it's uncomfortable to do this work and I never really looked forward to it. At the same time, it always gave you a kind of adrenaline rush and when the hour or two was over, you always felt somewhat elated. This was despite the constant rejection and being ignored, and despite the fact that the work of evangelization seemed so futile.

One of the highlights, though, was seeing the parishioners I recruited to help in this endeavor face their fears and hesitations and who subsequently experienced the 'rush' of the Holy Spirit in getting out of their comfort zone. They had never felt that telling people about the Kingdom of God was part of their calling as Catholics. "I've never done anything like this before!" they would marvel. It was really neat to see.

Catholics can get pretty comfortable in their safe spaces, which may be at Mass amidst like-minded people of the same faith, in our friend circles among other Catholics where we all speak the same language, in our mom's groups and men's groups where we take solace in our similarities. But we were not made for comfort, as Pope Benedict XVI famously said.

One tough thing about the street evangelization for me personally was when it came to situations in which someone was open to returning to Mass--where should they go? It was about this time I was becoming more uncomfortable with the antics in the Novus Ordo, and was being drawn to the Latin Mass. Almost every neighborhood parish was a mixed bag--if you sent an inquiry to one parish, he might be subjected to this or that awful RCIA program, a feminized liturgy, or just general lukewarmness--and then they may never go back. I suppose that is really in God's hands ultimately.

I had to leave the local street evangelization apostolate I started at that parish when we moved over to the Latin Mass at a different church. But there's a part of me that wants to get back to it, if anything for the discomfort and sense of exposure it entails. And if anything, now I have a solid parish to bring people into should they want to take the next steps to 'come and see' what the Mass is all about in its full glory. 

But there is also a part of me that feels that there's the potential to just trade problems. The vast majority of people at our parish are wonderful, and I think the online tradosphere skews the picture of TLMers as "rad trads" or "mad trads" or whatever the term is these days. But I also think there is a tendency to see the bubble that we are in (less than 2% of Catholic parishes in the U.S. are TLM parishes I believe?) as the be all end all. We get worked up about Pope Francis and this or that scandal or abuse in the Church or this or that nonsense coming out of Rome and have tunnel vision about it. When the fact of the matter is, almost 3/4 of the Catholic populace are not even aware of the restrictions on the Latin Mass. 

One of the things I do find somewhat tiresome about traditional Catholicism (and which I fall into myself) is critiquing everything outside this tunnel-vision. We get riled up about the minutia of liturgical rubrics, minoring in the majors, and this can fly when you are in your bubble. When you are speaking about evangelization and making disciples, though, I think Dale Carnegie has a good point here:

"Criticism is futile because it puts a person on the defensive and usually makes him strive to justify himself. Criticism is dangerous, because it wounds a person’s precious pride, hurts his sense of importance, and arouses resentment. …. Any fool can criticize, condemn and complain—and most fools do. But it takes character and self-control to be understanding and forgiving.

When dealing with people, let us remember we are not dealing with creatures of logic. We are dealing with creatures of emotion, creatures bristling with prejudices and motivated by pride and vanity.

The only way on earth to influence other people is to talk about what they want and show them how to get it."  

(How to Win Friends and Influence People)

I have always taken to heart what St. Paul says in his first letter to the Corinthians, 

"Be careful, however, that the exercise of your rights does not become a stumbling block to the weak. For if someone with a weak conscience sees you, with all your knowledge, eating in an idol’s temple, won’t that person be emboldened to eat what is sacrificed to idols? So this weak brother or sister, for whom Christ died, is destroyed by your knowledge. When you sin against them in this way and wound their weak conscience, you sin against Christ. Therefore, if what I eat causes my brother or sister to fall into sin, I will never eat meat again, so that I will not cause them to fall." (1 Cor 8:9-13)

His concern for the weakness of the brethren is moving, because it shows true charity and self-deference. I think in our zeal and love for the traditional Mass we can fall victim to this critical spirit which is looking for the wrong in everything outside of it (and even within it). Bad news sells, of course, and good news is often ignored or brushed off. 

How much of traditional Catholicism is love of the traditional Mass (which I have), and how much is the association with those of (traditional) like mind--e.g., our Catholic bubble? It's this second part that has me rethinking; am I simply getting too comfortable not being challenged? Am I really doing the work God is calling me and my family to? This doesn't mean leaving the TLM or the parish, but not getting so comfortable that we cling to it and sequester ourselves in it. I think it's natural to do that--just like it's natural to want to take a warm shower every morning. 

Don't take this as a criticism but as a challenge--to do the hard work, the uncomfortable work, the work that exposes you to the world and all it's messiness, the work that needs to be done and not simply what we prefer to do. That will look different for everyone, as St. Paul says, "And he gave some, apostles; and some, prophets; and some, evangelists; and some, pastors and teachers" (Eph 4:11).

There is still a lot of "normie" work to be done--care for poor and sick, outreach, teaching and catechesis, evangelization, witness. I hate to say it, but the Traditional Latin Mass is not all there is. To the extent that we neglect the other yokes of discipleship to stay comfortable in the walls of a church with our various devotionals and accoutrements (good as they are) is to be like the brother who says to the Father, "I will go" into the vineyard to work...and never goes.