Majoring In The Minors

 I'm preparing to give a talk this evening at our monthly men's prayer fraternity on the virtue of chastity, and in doing so was making various back-of-napkin notes. Every virtue has an opposing vice, and related to the virtue of chastity I wanted to discuss the vice opposed to the virtue of perseverance, which is mollities, or "softness." St. Paul uses this verb in 1 Corinthians 6:9 as it relates to the sin of sodomy. I think it really needs to be discussed in the context of the virtue of chastity because while sexual immorality is the one temptation we are instructed to "flee" from, there is still a good bit of fighting against the flesh that goes on. We run, yes, but we also must fight the temptation to indulge the flesh. For the man used to a pattern of self-abuse, putting a stop to it involves ardor, and to the degree that he shirks from that mortification and suffering betrays a kind of mollities spirit, whether he is heterosexual or homosexual. 

But there is something else I want to cover in this discussion on chastity, and I use it as a segway into what I want to discuss here, and that is that the external trappings of chastity (modesty of dress, fasting of the eyes, temperance, continence) are all servants of love/charity, the good and end of this virtue. 

I think St. Paul sums this up for me famously in 1 Cor 13:1-3: 

"If I speak in the tongues of men or of angels, but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. If I give all I possess to the poor and give over my body to hardship that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing." 

We've heard this passage so many times it tends to become white noise. But isn't it really the essence of Christianity, of our faith? Isn't it primary, served by all the secondary ends? Doesn't it deserve primacy of place in our spiritual lives, our praxis, and yes, our Lenten observance?

We can call into the same problem with fasting during this season--doing the exact thing our Lord warns us not to do: adopting a gloomy continence, or becoming preoccupied with the nuances of our fast or either self-congratulatory or self-condemning while neglecting the weightier things of the law--that is, the law of love. Our Lord admonishes the Pharisees for this "majoring in the minors" in Matthew's gospel, "For you tithe mint, dill, and cumin, and have neglected the weightier matters of the law: justice and mercy and faith. It is these you ought to have practiced without neglecting the others" (Mt 23:23).

I see this all the time in the online Catholic world. Whether it's a particular outrage du jour, or a pet project of picking apart some TV show as if our eternal salvation depended on such critiques, or even the insider baseball in-fighting over liturgical nuances, these things wouldn't be as much of a hollow gong if they did, in fact, communicate the love with which they supposed to be concerned with. Often what I see as an observer is the antithesis of charity--I see the Saul, the righteous Pharisee defender of religious orthodoxy, and not the Paul who becomes weak, "all things to all men," and boasts only in his weakness. Again, we hear it like white noise, but how much meditation have we lent to the continuation of Paul's letter to the Corinthians.

"Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres." (1 Cor 13:4-8)

Lent often degenerates for many people like myself because we neglect an elusive charity in our hearts in exchange for the tangible ticks and notches our forty days affords us--signs that we are progressing in the spirit, mortifying our flesh more, becoming more disciplined and hard-packed. But to what end? If we are not growing in charity, we are gongs. We forget our purpose, our Lenten raison d'etre. Like the chaste man who is cold in his heart, who has choked out love and openness and self-deference because he sees it as a threat to his tenuous virtue. Who is so consumed with tamping down the weeds of lust and avoiding occasions of sin that he forgets how to love. Because his heart has not been born again, but only patched on the outside. Chastity is really a matter of the heart, not the groin.

I had a therapy appointment yesterday, because I have really not been feeling myself since undertaking some of these disciplines--having gone cold-turkey off of nicotine a month ago, and coffee (switching to tea) a week ago, in addition to fasting every day and more severely on Wednesdays and Fridays...all potentially "good" things. But I'm sleeping 12 hours a day now, and feel a little...hollow. Not myself. It may just take some time to adjust, but my faithful Catholic therapist suggested it was too much taken on all at once, and encouraged me to "just have a freaking cup of coffee" if I need it. I was actually relieved to hear that, and I didn't take it as a free-pass but simply perhaps a bleed valve in case my charity grows too cold. If you're fasting and a jerk to your wife and family, you're not doing it right. I haven't taken that liberty of the cup of joe yet, but it's good to know that it's a minor thing in the shadow of the majors, which is namely, charity.

Increasing in charity is really a slow grow--you can't force it anymore you can get that orchid to bloom in time for your birthday. But you can practice in order to make it more....common for you. The way a bad habit needs to be replaced by a good habit, and aided by grace. Pray for an increase in charity, and then endure the hard work of self-deference of blessing someone when you'd rather curse them, praying for your enemies, giving alms when it hurts to do so and even when people are undeserving, making time for someone in need of a pep talk or tea at the kitchen table. Charity is the master, and these things its servant.

If you are deep in prayer and your neighbor in need knocks on your door in need, you are majoring in the minors if you piously refuse to rise and answer--not only the external door, but the door of your heart. For even the Lord healed on the Sabbath. He knew how to tell the meat from the bone, the major things from the minor ones, the purpose of the Law in addition to it's letter. He was so critical of the Pharisees because they were experts at "majoring in the minors." They converted no one, but set themselves up as judges and executioners of righteousness. Don't be like them, our Lord says. 

The Tertullians of our day are out there, observing and noting how we as Christians conduct ourselves. To the degree we give them pause and they note, "see how they love one another!" we are doing things right. To the degree we are focused on the minor barnacles of our faith when they do not serve the larger purpose of that love, we are missing the mark, gongs resounding from a shallow and hollow core.