Trigger Happy

It's been about two months since I left social media. Every now and then I will run across a Daily Wire article on my wife's phone, or rely on her to post something for me on Marketplace. But all in all, I've moved out of the furnace into more temperate mental climates. It's a little more boring with less drama, but I'm past the withdraw period and slowly gaining back some vacancy in my previously-packed brain.

In the thick of it, though, I would take on a lot of burdens and anxieties that, perhaps, I didn't have to. I bought a good hundred pounds of dried beans and lentils when I heard something about a meat-shortage on Facebook (that never happened). It's been a few months since the November election and while gas prices are creeping up, my family and I are not being hunted down and crucified in the street and my day to day hasn't changed much. It's not that there aren't dangers, of course (ie, the frog in hot water). It's just that the amplification of everything has...dialed down.  

Two nice things about having a non-monetized blog--I write what I want, when I want, and I never consider it 'work;' and I don't have to rely on click-bait to pay the mortgage. I'm not sure news outlets and political pundits--whether liberal or conservative--who are reliant on likes and scour the landscape for the next raging inferno to report on have this luxury, but it's also a chosen career where, I'm sure, they do pretty well.

But old ways die hard, and when I got the email from my employer for mandatory (virtual) "diversity and inclusion" training, my alarm bells went off. What would this entail, exactly? Will it be like a Clockwork-Orange, forced to have my eyelids held open and viewed against my will? Would it threaten my faith, put me in a precarious moral predicament, like stepping on the fumie? Would the content be objectionable? What if I refused? And should I on some kind of general religious grounds?

Since it was a slower day at work, I ended up logging in and going through the hour-long module on my computer to get it out of the way. I was bracing for the worst. In reality, it was relatively benign.

Was it PC? Sure. That's the point. Content wise, it ran the gambit-- stereotypes, racial discrimination and unintended bias and assumptions, 'micro-aggressions,' disabilities, issues of "privilege and power," identity, gender and sexual discrimination, and, yes, even religion. The thrust was that diversity is a strength to any organization, not a liability, and inclusion means fostering a welcoming environment in which to work.

Once I got past my initial 'lock the arms' defensiveness and relaxed a little, I realized something: I actually value these things too. Do I really want to work with all white, middle class Catholic men? Not really. Is there value in having different viewpoints, backgrounds, and perspectives? Of course. Do I want to work in an unwelcoming environment that would discriminate against me for maybe the most obvious source of identity in my case (religion)? No, I wouldn't. Do I value mutual respect? One hundred percent. Though I might not agree with all the assumptions, I found rather than being a kind of boogie-man, it was presented rather respectfully without any militant undertones. 

I have a bad habit of jumping to conclusions--when someone doesn't return a call or text, I think I did something wrong, or their lying dead in a ditch somewhere, when the simple explanation is they just might not have seen it, or been busy at the time. I also tend to think in worst-case, fatalistic scenarios.

I've always had a fear--maybe after reading too many Crisis articles or simply from being fanned the flames of incendiary rhetoric from conservative news sources--that is was just a matter of time before I was cornered into some kind of Title IX sting-op where I'd be forced to go against my faith and affirm something I didn't ascribe to against my will, and be disciplined or fired as a result. 

Even though I'm the only conservative I know on campus and person of faith that believes what the Church teaches (which can be lonely at times) I have a genuinely good working relationship with my team, with the faculty, the administration, and the students. I imagine most are left-learning. A fair number are gay. Because we are a public institution, we have to be inclusive, and there have been efforts to increase diversity as well. And I don't necessarily think this is a nefarious thing, if one operates under the assumption that it's not just lip service but that they are at least consciously devoted to some kind of common-good.

As Catholics, we belong to a "big tent" religion that is, in fact, diverse and inclusive, at least in the invitation. It's mission--to lead souls to Heaven through belief in the saving power of Jesus Christ--may be different from that of a place of employment, but we do see value in different rites, spiritualities, and ways of living out our respective vocations. Christ is the head, and we are His body. As St. Paul says, "There is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free, nor is there male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus" (Gal 3:28).

There's a balancing act that goes on when working in the world as a Christian. Diversity and inclusion is a double-edged sword--if you are required not to discriminate or stereotype minorities, or those who are disabled, or those who identify as gay or trans or whatever, it should be expected that Christians should not be either. 

We know it happens. We know we also gain merit when we are hated for Christ's name sake (Mt 10:22), and that our reward is not on this side of eternity. We are called to love, and respect the dignity of all men as children of God. One doesn't need to be ashamed of affirming this, as if they were a traitor to some kind of partisan litmus stick. We take our lashes with a smile, stand firm, tell the truth. But we don't need to egg on our perceived oppressors in order to earn the crown. If we are true to our faith, the time will come when God wills it, and He will give us the words to say at our trial (Mk 13:11). I try to keep an open-mind about things, though I know what I believe and where I stand, which makes it easier to do so, I think. I try not to judge people or make assumptions, anymore than I would like to be judged, but let things rest on their merits while valuing respect. I know all this sounds kind of hokey, but it is scriptural that "they will know us by our love" (Jn 13:35). 

I'm not trying to score any points with anyone here. Maybe if things took a more militant-bent of forcing ideologies, I'd be writing a different post. But in terms of this recent diversity and inclusion training, it wasn't anything to get up in arms about. We'll be ready for what comes if we cleave to Christ and our faith, and stand firm. But we don't have to be so taunt that we break at the slightest bow or perceived threat. Always be respectful, always smile, always tell the truth. Don't back away from anything, but don't give anyone who wishes to frame you ammunition to do so. I'm sure bigger things are coming down the pipeline. So pray, hope, and don't worry. Be wise as a serpent and innocent as a dove. And like Mother Teresa, always smile. They will know us by our love. 

The Dangers of the TLM Fight Club

I'm not a film buff, per se, but I do like movies that make you think outside the box. I can't always recommend them in good conscience, but at one point I was willing to look past the undesirable and objectionable parts if it was unique. Films like The Matrix, Kill Bill, Constantine, I Heart Huckabees--at least they got me thinking. Again, I can't recommend any of them because of their content, as I don't think the positives outweigh the potential negatives, but I'll give them credit for being unique. 

Fight Club was in this kind of cult category. I saw it maybe twenty years ago (I'm a huge Brad Pitt and Edward Norton fan as well). It's a hard movie to give a synopsis for but I'll try: The unnamed Narrator (Edward Norton) leads a life of emasculated, quiet desperation as a cog in the corporate wheel (essentially "a consumer," as he seeks to describe his existence and evidenced by his obsession with "completion" by way of his IKEA-manicured condo and soul-sucking business trips replete with "single serving" encounters). He's basically alive, but dead inside, not to mention suffering from insomnia.

The Narrator's alter-ego--the confident, virile, and violent hyper-masculine Tyler Durden--is everything the narrator is not. The Narrator likes control--Tyler tells him to "stop trying to control everything." He teaches him "rock bottom" lessons (like letting go of the steering wheel in the car and stepping on the gas, I presume to show him you can survive more than you think you can after they barrel roll over a median, blowing up the Narrator's condo (detachment) and pouring lye on his hands as a kind of pain-tolerance test).

Fight Club is the kind-of secret, underground after-hours movement that develops as a way for other emasculated men to come together and get out their repressed aggression--bare-knuckled fighting in basements. For the first time, they feel alive. This would be one thing, but Tyler sees it as a movement to free men from the drudgery of consumerism and founds Project Mayhem, a kind of domestic terror group spring from Fight Club with the ultimate goal of dismantling capitalism by blowing up the credit card companies. The movement grows; recruits stand outside the dilapidated mansion, which serves as home base in the sketchy outskirts of the city, without food or water and subject to hazing for three days to prove their meddle. Tyler becomes a kind of charismatic, fascist dictator in the process of taking things, well, a little too far. 

What does any of this have to do with the Traditional Latin Mass and the growing movement towards traditionalism in the Church, especially among young men? 

I'll grant that it might be an unorthodox way of developing parallelism, but I see a couple of cautionary points worth considering, if you're willing to think outside the box a little.

One: The post-conciliar Church is largely feminized and emasculated. This was my experience in the Novus Ordo, one I couldn't put my finger on for a long time. You can cite female lectors and EMs or overbearing Music Directors, or a ceding of paternal control to a largely female lay parish committee, or the hymns or the hand holding...the list goes on. What it boils down to is that, from my observations, the N.O. does not appeal to male sensibilities. 

Two: The vacuum will be filled one way or another. Either people leave the Church, with men leading the way out, or they will be brought back in by what appeals to those primal sensibilities. The rise of figures like Jordan Peterson and Fr. Ripperger are mobilizers in a way, to bring things back into right order and out of the chaos of the rubble when the Natural Law has been eschewed and inverted for decades.

At the TLM, the focus is not anthropocentric, but theocentric. The physicality and precision with which the sacrifice (the immolation of the Lamb, not a 'shared meal') is offered has a kind of military precision to it. It is unapologetic and uncompromising. In essence: it's not about you. And that is, I think, appealing to men. 

Three: It has the potential to go too far, when not tempered by virtue. When I attend monthly holy hour at the FSSP parish near us, fifty or sixty guys are praying the rosary and worshiping Christ. We gather in the basement afterwards for wings and beer, and a talk by the priest. It has a "Fight Club" type feel, without the Fighting. But this is because the priest is a sensible and level-headed shepherd that encourages virtue and discourages fringe-extremism. I think this is important. A charismatic but reckless priest has as much potential to lead men astray (by capitalizing on point #2, above) when his vision of the Church and holiness conflicts with the laws of the Church, prudence, temperance, and the other virtues, and/or ignores human freedom in favor of a kind of cult-like following. 

I have a real aversion to cults and cult-like thinking. I think cultish-traditionalism is as dangerous as hyper-emasculation. Younger men, especially those without temperance, wisdom, or good formation from their fathers, may be more susceptible to extremism. One young man who attended the TLM at our parish (which had nothing to do with our holy priest at the time, who unfortunately passed away from cancer two years ago, or our particular parish), spray-painted DEUS VULT and hurled a molotov cocktail at the local Planned Parenthood in an attempt to burn it down. I don't know what motivated him, but I think this is a unstable kind of zeal when it's not tempered. 

There's a way that men can get together and build one another up--even if it's in underground fashion in church basements in the sketchy part of town--without going completely Fight Club. Right Order=Right Worship, which is why I have hope that the traditionalist movement has potential to renew the Church, as long as it doesn't devolve into something antithetical to true Christian charity and the true nature of Christ as fully man, in all the best ways. We don't need Fight Clubs (nor do you need to watch the movie (please don't))--we need wisdom, prayer, and virtue, as well as priests to guide us without becoming cult-leaders--so that we can step into the roles we are called to as men, husbands, and fathers and lead our domestic churches in the home and renew the Church from the inside out and bottom up.

Humiliation

We live about fifteen minutes from the President's home in Delaware. I've biked and driven past it before, and have been to the church he calls his home parish. Around these parts, he's known as "good old Joe."

I've often wondered if I had the opportunity to encounter the President in passing (not outside the realm of possibilities), if I would be bold enough to speak truth to him. The plague of cultural, privatized Catholicism has probably done more damage to the Church and Her mission than any apostate or militant atheist could, because it rots Her foundations from the inside. Our President's profession of personal faith is not unique, but commonplace.

Last night I had a dream. I dreamed I was actually in this position of speaking the truth--not my own truth, but what the Church professes in terms of faith and morals--to one of the most powerful men in the world. It had the undercurrent of "The Emperor's New Clothes". Remember in the tale that it is a child who points out that, in fact, the Emperor sees through the nonsense and calls it as it is--the Emperor is, in fact, naked. 

Like a dumb child and without spite or malice, I point out the obvious to the POTUS in the dream: that men can't be women and vice versa; that abortion is the taking of an innocent life; that two people of the same sex can not constitute a marriage as it's meant to be. I can't remember his reaction, but I do remember the backlash. Of course it made the news. When people at work (whom I have a good working relationship with) found out about it, I was immediately fired and dissociated with. The shame was burning--I hadn't done anything wrong from a perspective of faith, but I was publicly anathema from respectable society. Of course it was only a dream. 

There's a reason why people don't speak the truth and the prophets stand alone. Elijah wanted to die rather than be tasked with what he was called to. Jeremiah, too. Jonah, Job--they all wished for death. Being a prophet is a heavy burden. Telling the truth comes with a high cost.

Catholicism still holds a modicum of respectability today; not in what it professes (which the world opposes), but as a mainstream religion. As long as it stays in it's lane. As long as it wears respectable clothes.

The theme of nakedness is prevalent in Scripture from the very beginning. Adam and Eve before the Fall were unaware of their nakedness and unashamed, but post-Fall they sought to cover themselves and hide. Shem and Japeth sought to cover their father Canaan's nakedness when he fell asleep drunk and uncovered.  

It is common practice to strip the clothes of those one wishes to humiliate. Jews were stripped of their clothes by the Nazis before they were sent to the gas chambers or executed. During the Armenian genocide women were stripped naked and crucified in public display. My friend Fr. David Nix notes in a video (since suspended) on his blog that Communists who level psychological warfare against those who oppose it do so at four levels: demoralization, dehumanization, crisis, and normalization.  

We see also in mediating on the Sorrowful Mystery of Christ's Crowing With Thorns this stripping of garments in public as a means of humiliation. His own clothes they stripped, and re-clothed him in their own clothes of mockery--a scarlet robe. Then they mocked him for his claims of being a King.

Just prior to the Lord's going before Pilate, we see Peter--whom we can all relate to and see ourselves in--denying his affiliation with Jesus. He wants to strip his identifying discipleship garments to blend in with the rest of the crowd.

One thing about humiliation and shame--it always seems to involve the public, or at least people outside of ourselves. Did Christ suffer humiliation? He does not regard the esteem of men, and is Humility itself, so I can't say the humiliations we may experience in our faith life are comparable. He knew who He was and who He belonged to. The searing of shame that we suffer in our humiliations is often in proportion to the degree of attachment to the esteem of men. 

In our faith, we often wear a cloak of our own choosing. We take the good, respectable parts of our faith--feeding the hungry, praying, going to church like a good citizen--and wear it like an identity badge. It allows us to worship within the bounds set by those in power, and live our lives relatively comfortably as "good people" without the weight of oppression.

But true, raw faith is naked, reserved for the Father's eyes only. If we do claim to be bold in proclaiming our faith publicly, we often do it on our own terms and of our own choosing. 

Stripping, however, is at the hands of others. As our Lord recounts to Peter, "I tell you the truth, when you were younger you dressed yourself and went where you wanted; but when you are old you will stretch out your hands, and someone else will dress you and lead you where you do not want to go." Jesus said this to indicate the kind of death by which Peter would glorify God." (Jn 21:18) 

The Wikipedia definition of humiliation is strangely in line with how a Christian would understand it as a vehicle towards the virtue of humility: "Humiliation is the abasement of pride, which creates mortification or leads to a state of being humbled or reduced to lowliness or submission."

The Litany of Humility is an antidote to the esteem of respectability we seek, both in our lives and in our public faith. Humility is the foundational virtue on which all other virtues build. When combined with prudence (knowing when to speak and when to keep silent), justice (God's eternal law), temperance (tempering our emotions and appetites), and fortitude (brave endurance in the face of adversity). So, we need to pray and ask for it. But be careful when you do; if it blooms within you, you might just suffer a prophet's fate as a result.

O Jesus! meek and humble of heart, Hear me.

From the desire of being esteemed,

Deliver me, Jesus.

From the desire of being loved...

From the desire of being extolled ...

From the desire of being honored ...

From the desire of being praised ...

From the desire of being preferred to others...

From the desire of being consulted ...

From the desire of being approved ...

From the fear of being humiliated ...

From the fear of being despised...

From the fear of suffering rebukes ...

From the fear of being calumniated ...

From the fear of being forgotten ...

From the fear of being ridiculed ...

From the fear of being wronged ...

From the fear of being suspected ...

That others may be loved more than I,

Jesus, grant me the grace to desire it.

That others may be esteemed more than I ...

That, in the opinion of the world,

others may increase and I may decrease ...

That others may be chosen and I set aside ...

That others may be praised and I unnoticed ...

That others may be preferred to me in everything...

That others may become holier than I, provided that I may become as holy as I should…

On Neglecting To Pray The Rosary

 I dream very, very rarely...maybe a few times a year at most. But the past two nights I have woken up from disturbing dreams. And I believe they were messages from Our Lady to convey the importance of relying on her in the final days when it is grace alone that will give us the final perseverance needed to sustain our faith to the end to teach me a lesson on not taking it for granted.

The dream I had the other night I was at a party. Since I had just been to Phoenix to visit friends and we had a great big Catholic party, maybe it was on my mind. But this party in the dream was dark in its pleasure-seeking hedonism. There was no faith, no virtue--only the pursuit of dark pleasure. I realized I was grateful for my Catholicism and my Catholic friends that we could have fun without sinning, but that without faith, the temptation to sin and subsequent misery in the world today is formidable. Our faith is holding back the tidal wave.

On to the second dream. I typically attend First Friday and First Saturday Masses as a devotional practice. Unfortunately, do to circumstantial events, I was not able to make it to Mass this last Friday. I did make it to Mass this Saturday morning, but while I typically take time to pray the rosary and spend 15 minutes keeping Our Lady company while meditating on the Mysteries (as part of the devotion) before Mass, I was a few minutes late, and had to leave right after Mass, so I was not able to do so in church. When I got home, I was tied up with the kids, and also wiped out, falling asleep on the couch in the evening but not before setting my alarm for 11:30pm to give myself time to do so.

I hit the snooze button when my alarm went off at 11:30 and went back to sleep, waking up a few hours later. I headed up to bed and lazily scrolled some YouTube videos. In the back of my mind, I was thinking, "I should pray my rosary, even though I'm dead tired." But I didn't. I fell back asleep a few minutes. Just before 3am.

The dream that took place is as I recount it, now, at 4:30am. I was traveling for work, and at a recruiting event in another city at a kind of convention center. At some point there was a commotion, and I realized there were crowds of students who were seeking reparations for something. Everyone in the area had fear in their eyes. The crowd of students about eight across and twenty or thirty deep were making a kind of wave towards where I was; I figured I would go out and meet them and try to reason with them. There was a militant, merciless fortitude in their eyes when I got to the front of the wave. 

Eventually they forced me back to a dark part of the convention center. They wouldn't listen to anything I had to say, there was no reasoning. They were intimidating, but I figured were just students, what could they do. They were militant in nature, something between the Nazis and the Black Panthers. I couldn't figure out what to do and not knowing what they really wanted. There were large TV screens in the convention center. "Cut to London" one of them said, eventually tiring of my efforts to ask questions or reason with them. The TV screens appeared with the chaotic and fire-charred outside streets of UK police groveling on their knees before the crowd. It panned over to the right to another smaller group of police officers who were not on their knees, but on their backs. One by one, the members of the mob were taking giant bolt cutters....and cutting off the police officers legs who refused to submit to them, one by one, at the knee cap. "If you won't kneel to us," one of them said to me as I watched in horror, "we'll make sure you can't kneel at all."

When I awoke from the dream, it was around 4am. I realized it is Our Lady who promises to those who devote themselves to her through the First Saturday devotion, "I promise to assist at the hour of death with the graces necessary for salvation." And I had lazily and foolishly neglected to fulfill it for no good reason.

The martyrs for the faith relied on grace to persevere to the end. In the dream, the woke mob was cutting off the legs of those who resisted them (police officers, no less) without mercy. I have no doubt many of the Christian martyrs had suffered such or worse fates at the hands of totalitarian regimes of merciless persecutors. It's happening today in Nigeria, in China, in the Middle East. Our Lady has come time and time again to warn us of what is to come and to prepare us, in this life with acts of mortification and prayer. When we engage neglectful excuses not to follow her heeding, should we be surprised then if we do not have the fortitude (a grace of the Holy Spirit) to resist apostasy when the instruments of torture--or even our warm, comfortable beds--call us to deny our faith without resistance? Our Lord and Our Lady have also come to Muslims especially in dreams, and many have come to faith in Christ by way of messages to them in such states when their conscious states were not fertile ground to receive it.

The children of Fatima saw a vision of Hell--the fate that hides beneath the surface of this world for those who deny its existence and refuse to repent--and would have died of fright had Our Lady not been there with them. In my dreams, it felt like I had been given a vision of my weakness apart from Our Lady's assistance at the hour of death should I continue to neglect to heed her call and make devotion to her Immaculate Heart a priority. 

I have been so lazy, so slothful, so presumptive. When we were contracepting for years not realizing the peril we were putting our immortal souls in, it was Our Lady who finally stepped into our lives (by way of the Miraculous Medal) to wake us up and convict us. We consecrated our family to the Immaculate Heart of the 100th Anniversary of Fatima and made the promise to pray the rosary every day, a promise I have been neglecting to fulfill here and there out of laziness recently. Because I'm so slow to realize things on my own, I don't doubt our Lady was sending me a warning by way of these dreams that we will not survive the coming days without her aid. The grace of final perseverance, after the gift of faith, is the most important grace. Because as Scripture recounts, "the one who perseveres to the end will be saved." (Mt 24:13)

Our Lady of Fatima, Our Lady of Kibeho, pray for us! And Lord, forgive me!

"I am coming soon. Hold fast what you have, so that no one may seize your crown." 

(Rev 3:11)

Why We Don't Attend The Divine Liturgy

 (I feel I need to start this post with a disclaimer to preempt any teeth gnashing and tomato throwing and also make mention that I do not like liturgy wars. I have inadvertently started them in the past and I find they never end on a palatable note. As I heard a priest once note, "There's a difference between liturgists and terrorists--you can negotiate with terrorists." I'm not a liturgist, nor do I have a strong affinity for or knowledge in all things liturgical either. I realize it is a tender area that deserves respect and sensitivity to write about. This is meant to be a largely dispassionate account of our personal and particular reasons for attending traditional Mass in the Latin Church, despite my being Byzantine by rite, not to highlight any perceived deficiencies in one liturgy or another)

Before I became a Catholic, I attended the Divine Liturgy. Though most people coming into the Church or discovering the Eastern liturgy for the first time find it exotic and other-worldly, the liturgical Church of the East was my first exposure to Catholicism before I even had any interest in the theological truths of the Faith. In other words, it was familiar and, I should say, commonplace.

My father was born to a mother who was Russian Orthodox and a father who was Ukrainian Catholic. My father was baptized as an infant at the Ukrainian Catholic Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception in Philadelphia. When he married my mother, an Episcopalian, faith was a wedge--there was no agreement as to what my brothers and I were to be raised; we were baptized in the Episcopal church as infants, attended an occasional Sunday school lesson, but any formation ended there. To avoid disagreements and arguments, my parents would attend their respective churches separately, and us kids were free to go or not go (aside from Christmas and Easter, when we would attend one or the other church as a family). 

Because I was close with my father, I would occasionally 'tag along' when he would attend the Divine Liturgy at the Ukrainian Catholic church not far from our house on Sunday mornings. Incense, the gold domes and vestments and iconostasis, crossing yourself three times (with two fingers and thumbed joined) from right to left, bowing, standing (rather than kneeling), and the prayers--this was my first exposure to liturgy (though to my mom's credit as well, hers was a high-church Episcopal that would probably today very much resemble a Mass at an Anglican Ordinariate). When we would visit my dad's great aunt up in coal-country for a funeral or something, it was usually at a Russian Orthodox church. Even today, before communion, I have the habit of beating my breast three times by way of habit, praying, "God, be merciful to me a sinner. God cleanse me of my sins and have mercy on me. Forgive me, Lord, for I have sinned without number." Because I never formally switched rites (the only time it became an issue was when I was discerning a monastic vocation), I sometimes have slight guilt about not observing the Byzantine fasts (no dairy, eggs, etc). But strict legalism has never been my forte.

My 'backdoor entrance' into the Church by way of the Byzantine rite was part the heritage of my father, and part happenstance. When I went off to college, my dad gave me a list of religious services at the university and pointed out the Catholic Masses on campus. As I have mentioned in previous posts, I had a strong ransoming conversion around age sixteen that got me thinking about the eternal, desiring the eschatological, and starving for lasting happiness. I showed up at a Catholic mass in the auditorium on campus--I believe it was my first Roman Catholic Mass. I was out of sorts--I couldn't understand the casual dress or what was going on at the altar. When I eventually approached a Roman Catholic priest to inquire about becoming Catholic, I was told about RCIA. As it turns out, I had "missed the cutoff" for that year. Patience not being one of my virtues, I sought out a local Ruthenien priest who came to campus once a month to celebrate the Divine Liturgy to see what my options were. He agreed to catechize me one on one. 

The priest himself was delighted to have someone looking to join the Church, especially in the Byzantine rite. Though the catechesis was more or less solid, the priest himself was clingy and seemed emotionally stunted. I became his kind of 'poster-boy' and while most of my now-friends went to the Roman Mass on campus, I was expected to attend the Divine Liturgy. A kind of unilateral co-dependency developed, and though I was confirmed, made my first Confession and received my first communion, I began to distance myself the priest and the liturgy, and try to attend the Latin Masses whenever I could. Maybe it was a latent and delayed rebellion of the traditional liturgy that I was exposed to (but never raised in fully). Ironic that the Novus Ordo would be the 'exotic' draw.

What I did appreciate, and ended up trading in tradition for, was a kind of universality of the largest rite within the Church. Because I did not have a refined liturgical palate, this was acceptable to me at the time and, I suppose, a concession. When I traveled throughout the world over the years, "the Mass was the Mass"--whether we were sitting on tree stumps instead of pews in Haiti or in the grand expanse of Sacre Coeur, there was a universal commonality. This seemed important, as I had a heart for evangelism ("telling the other beggars where to find bread") and there is strength in numbers. For the next twenty years I would traverse through the gamut of liberal Catholicism.

 When my parents moved and my dad left behind the Ukranian church he attended, I would invite him to Mass with us in their new town. The Roman church had become familiar territory to me, but was unfamiliar for him. The Liturgy for him was, I realized, a nostalgic and familial affair. It was his connection to his father, who died when he was 21 and left a deep hole. Though I told him of a Ukrainian Catholic church not far from our house he could attend, he has not yet. I'm not sure why.

I've wondered why we haven't either as a family. Our men's group took a "Sunday Field Trip" there a few weeks ago for the Diving Liturgy (I didn't attend, for whatever reason, maybe because it's not unfamiliar to me) and the priest was welcoming and excited to have newcomers exploring the Eastern liturgy. Though our parish home is now a diocesan Latin Mass parish, I am at least comforted that we have the SSPX, the FSSP, and the Ukrainian Catholic church all relatively equi-distant. 

But when you're making a home, I have to take my wife and family into consideration. My Filipino wife never really took to the Divine Liturgy, though she has attended it with me occasionally while we were dating at my dad's parish. Any Ukrainian heritage I have I don't feel particularly feel attached to. I don't speak the language. Though the liturgy itself is beautiful and full of 'smells and bells,' there is a nationalistic element to it (pierogie festivals, Ukrainian dance nights, old ladies who speak the language) that I just don't identify with. Ethnic 'ghetto' is too strong a word, but you get the idea. 

One thing about the Eastern liturgy I have grown to appreciate in retrospect, however, is that (like the Latin Mass) it appeals to male sensibilities. There is nothing effeminate or embarrassing about either Orthodoxy or Eastern Catholicism, and for that reason I would have no qualms about attending the Divine Liturgy over the Novus Ordo. From observation, there is also a subtle 'fluid' or relaxation (not casualness) I've noticed (again, in retrospect) to the liturgical posture of the priest when compared to the tight and focused precision in the Latin Mass. (Dr. Peter Kwasniewski notes these differences in liturgical expression in Let Latins Be Latins and Greeks Greek: On Remaining Faithful to Distinctive Identities (New Liturgical Movement) and here ("The Byzantine Liturgy, the Traditional Latin Mass, and the Novus Ordo--Two Brothers and a Stranger")

Where we "take refuge" in the Church is kind of like who you marry--there's no 'one reason,' but an amalgamation of factors and personal histories that goes into attraction. I dated a lovely Catholic girl in college who for all intents and purpose would have made a lovely wife. But the timing never seemed to work out with us, and that's really all I attribute it to. And thanks be to God. I have Latin friends who have found a beautiful refuge in the Byzantine Church and its rich liturgical tradition. 

For us, for whatever reason, we have made our home in tradition and in the West. I'm not sure I can go back to the Novus Ordo. Though one of these Sundays, I'm might just to have to get St. Nicholas to remember where I came from. For old time's sake.

You Have Ten Fingers

 

Twenty years ago while I was in Haiti, walking along a dusty road to Hinche, I came across two boys next to a bicycle. I asked them in broken French what was wrong, and they pointed to the snapped chain. Taking a closer look, I told them with an air of confidence, pas bien--no good. They would need a chain tool to repair it. I fiddled with it for about ten minutes while they patiently watched, eventually throwing up my hands in exacerbation. One of the boys stepped in, placed the link on a stone, took another stone in his hand, slammed it down on top of the link to set the pin, set it on the chainwheel, and rode off. Pas mal. I always remembered that humbling encounter of third-world ingenuity. 

In China, where Christians are regularly jailed for worshiping under a Communist regime, not having access to Bibles does not stop them from imbibing the Word of God. When they have no access to the physical bound text, they have small scraps of paper with scripture verses written on them and commit them to memory before they are confiscated, because "they can't take what's hidden in your heart." 

I turn 41 next week, and middle-aged malaise has set in. I'm heavier, and groan-ier. I used to eat whole cheesecakes without gaining a pound and biked across the United States in my twenties, averaging eighty miles a day. Now I'm proud of myself when I go to the Y once a week and swim more than 30 laps. I felt good when I went though, because for once I pushed through the myriad of excuses I come up with on a regular basis and just. did. it. Though the motivation may have been disgust with myself and a desire to change, the satisfaction of doing something physical lasted throughout the day. It even lasted into today, when I went for a (albeit, short) bike ride and even pushed it into the big ring for a bit near the end.

Even if I didn't have a pool to go to, or a bike to ride, I could just as easily do push-ups and sit-ups in my bedroom with no equipment needed. Often it's not the equipment we lack, or the tools we don't own, but the drive that's missing. And it seems to scale in direct proportion to what we have, and not what we don't.

When I undertook a brief trial in 'mini-retirement' in my late twenties (essentially being in between jobs for a couple months), I thought I would take the time to write a book. I had a whole writing studio set up--and hardly wrote a thing. 

Even now, working largely remote for the past year, I realized how much I don't need from my office--file cabinet and papers. Essentially, I can do all my work with a laptop and a kitchen table. Even the mouse I use is ancillary. 

When we consecrated our family to the Immaculate Heart a few years ago on the 100th Anniversary of Our Lady of Fatima, my wife and I and I committed to praying the rosary every day. And for the most part, we have kept that promise. Every now and then I will neglect it--either from tiredness or forgetfulness--but it's not often. When I do let my guard down, chinks in the armor often develop slowly and perniciously. 

The rosary is a spiritual tool, a weapon--but it's not just fancy crystal or amber or even humble wood beads strung together. The physical "scripture on a string" can aid us in meditation, but it is not ipso facto necessary. If we leave it at home or neglect to carry it with us, there's nothing--except our inner excuses--keeping us from using what we do have--our ten fingers--to pray. 

The Open Church

Continuing the theme of conversion, I wanted to touch on the topic of locked churches.

I’m in Phoenix for the week visiting friends and attending the local FSSP parish while I’m here. It’s a small mission church and like most traditional orders is in the ‘not-so-nice’ part of town, with lots of homeless people around. 

Whenever I travel, I have found refuge in the church (small c) in whatever town or city I found myself. I also heard from at least two people recently who had experienced conversions that the ‘unlocked church’—where they could just go into to sit or pray or experience some peace and quiet away from the world—was the catalyst for them coming to Christ and his Church. Which is why the idea of the ‘locked church’ (esp during the days of COVID) seems like such a tragedy.

Now, I understand the pragmatic reasons for keeping a church locked during the day especially in the ‘bad part of town.’ But I can’t tell you the times I’ve visited an adoration chapel in the middle of the night during a crisis, or was relieved to find a church open in off hours when I needed it most. How many people have experienced the still silence and opportunity to quiet the soul when they most needed it as well.

I was talking to a woman at work who brought her three kids to register at a local Catholic parish so her kids could attend school there. She was curtly told by the secretary (those formidable gatekeepers of all things parish and sacrament-related) that they only did registrations on such and such a day and time and that she would have to come back then. Instead, she took them to the public school down the street and was welcomed in to sign them up. And that was that.

The locked church is metaphorical also for the ‘locking out of the wedding feast,’ the despair one can feel when the one place of refuge and solace is not open to them. How many, I wonder, have been saved by finding an open, unlocked church and, simultaneously, grace? Similarly, how many unbelievers were set on a new path just from a happenstance stumbling upon an open church? Even if it’s not masses of conversions, finding it made a difference to that one. Had they found it locked, the course of their life may have looked very different and found perdition, rather than the gates of Eternal life.

“Whatever That Is, I Want That”

 I was watching a beautiful conversion story this afternoon of a post-abortive woman who was homeless at age 16 and who had no exposure or knowledge of God or Jesus Christ. When she observed her daughter (who went to a Catholic school) kneeling at her bed and praying, this woman’s spirit was moved and she said to herself, “whatever that is, I want that.”

For those of us who have come to the Faith from the outside looking in, it often starts with a gnawing for authenticity, love, peace, and a well to draw from that never dries up. For me, it was encountering a largish Catholic family, with a picture of the Sacred Heart on their wall (the first time I had seen such an image of Christ), who knew their identity and had something I couldn’t put my finger on. It was something I wanted and didn’t have.

I think this is really the rootstock of many conversions. If God is a lover of men, he draws us to a foreign love by means of attraction. And peace, goodness, trustworthiness...these are attractive features of Love itself, seeking consummation in the soul it draws. When one tip-toes toward it, and eventually becomes inebriated by Love itself as a all-encompassing, tidal force mist, we realize what we have been seeking our whole lives without knowing it was there all along, wanting to be found.

Our Lady too is a “beautiful Lady.” She attracts us by her goodness, her maternal care, her peace. She is not harsh or unsightly. We want what she has—which is Christ himself, her own flesh—and she leads us to him by way of attraction. 

When we knock, God answers, as scripture says. He who seeks will find. Divine Love is not gnostic in nature, reserved for only a few. It makes itself attractive because virtue and goodness is attractive by its very nature and is true to that nature. It wants to be wanted, pines for completion—to give a restless heart rest, to make it whole. 

Sometimes we don’t know what we really, really want until we see it somewhere—as in a passing glance at the elusive peace a child seems to easily possess while kneeling at her bedside in prayer, or a family that loves one another. But that love and peace...it comes from somewhere. It attracts and draws one out, as in a honeymoon—slowly from the shadows, until it can capture it completely with a commitment to say ‘yes’ to that love, so that whatever that is, that thing we want...it’s no longer hidden but has just waiting to be found this whole time. 

A Too-Planned Life

Life in the COVID era has been surreal. Masks are a pocket accessory as much as a cellphone or car keys. Assuming conversations about whether one has gotten the vaccine or not yet has become commonplace in everyday conversations, the way someone may talk about getting a UTI or being on birth control as if it were normal. Then there's that moment when you don't know what to do when you would normally shake someone's hand. Like I said, kind of surreal. "Normal" life seems like a dream ago.

One interesting aspect of the pandemic-age has been in housing. In some aspects, there has been a predictable rise in people fleeing major urban areas (70,000+ exodus from New York City alone costing the city billions in tax renevue) as many employers have gone to remote work. Other people more prone to prepping long for land and neighbors miles away.

In another sense, though, there has been the curious phenomenon of COVID creating a surge in demand for 'tiny homes'. Some on wheels, where you might have a Murphy bed or a composting toilet. Nano apartments less than 260 sq ft in Hong Kong which sell for around $650,000USD have also been on the rise. 

For our part, I have really appreciated having a little more space in our single family home--some extra rooms to escape to (no Millennial 'open concept' floor plan here in our 1950's split level), and without the need to constantly be cleaning and tidying up. 

Affordability may be part of it (though tiny houses are arguably a poor investment in terms of resale value and are more of a depreciating asset). But I think there's more to it.

Whether or not you ascribe to the idea of a global NWO, there seems to be an ideal of a more or less 'planned society' in the works. In Render To Caesar, I wrote, 

"Have you ever seen an architectural rendering? You know, one of those two dimensional stylized representations of a future reality that doesn't exist but SHOULD because it would be so awesome and would solve all of planet Earth's problems? Like a 200 story high rise that is covered with vegetable gardens, or a mixed-use space where young urbanites can live and work and play and shop in a walkable paradise? It doesn't exist yet, but 'build it and they will come.' 

I have an admission: I hate renderings. Why? I don't know. I just like life in the real world. I have a low bs threshold, and real life has a way of not always fitting into neat prescribed models. I remember watching Jurassic Park as a kid when it first came out and thinking, "this is a HORRIBLE idea!" And it was, in the end, as all the dinosaurs escaped or something and turned on people. Maybe it's my acute awareness of the Fall, not only the rebellion in my own life, but in the world in which we live, that is wary of such social utopias."

You know one thing that messes up best-laid plans (in the best possible way) and a perfectly manicured life where everything gets put away in its place, beds are flawlessly made, and everything serves a purpose and is kept only if it 'sparks joy'? 

Kids.

It's apparent that population-control advocates like Bill Gates see humans and future generations in terms of environmental liabilities rather than human worth and capital. In Children of Men, I wrote:

"We seem to almost be living in a science fiction novel today. 59 million lives have been lost to abortion since Roe vs Wade in 1973, and 1.5 billion worldwide since 1980. We manufacture human life in test tubes and freeze or destroy embryos, bank sperm, take a morning after pill to terminate a pregnancy after contraception fails. Governments enact policies to limit children to 1 per household and force sterilization and abortions when citizens don't comply, while black market surrogacy is thriving. Human life is commodified and exploited by merciless systems of production, and traditional nuclear families are in the minority. Meanwhile, Europe faces a population disaster due to plummeting birth rates, the economic implications of which are starting to be realized.

In short, we have taken human life for granted, and there will be a price to be paid.

A quote from the film that stayed with me was when Kee's midwife reflects on the beginning of the infertility crisis in 2009, when people stopped getting pregnant and giving birth. "As the sound of the playgrounds faded," she said, "the despair set in. Very odd what happens in a world without children's voices."

Admittedly, I do watch a lot of tiny house videos and things on YouTube, because I like learning about construction. Almost without exception, those enamored with the idea are single women or young couples sans children; additionally without exception, they have pets which they treat as children. 

I saw this meme once on social media. It was brutally jarring and uncomfortable, but I think it speaks a savage truth about how future generations are holding up and actualizing their ideals of a planned life:

I appreciate simplicity. I appreciate, to a degree, a minimalism in owning things and what we bring into our home (that often alludes me, despite my best efforts). What I appreciate most, though, is what most upends all of that: my children. And not just my children, in the possessive sense, but the children we have brought into the world (or, rather, that God has brought into the world using us as the co-operators in that plan) for the world's benefit. Not just "going forth and multiplying," as the Lord commanded (yes, commanded) us to do. But forming them, sacrificing for them, so that they can actualize the kind of world we as Christians see as the ideal. Which is completely at odds with the focus depicted in the graphic above.

Maybe the thing about COVID and all it brings with it is the unsettling sense of uncertainty and upending--when the pendulum swings, and in a vaccuum of faithlessness, and where the vaccine is the new secular Eucharist, people want more control, not less--from the top (the "global elites") on down to the couple that's okay with doing number 2s in a sawdust bucket toilet and owning two sets of dining utensils and living in 150 square feet--as long as children--the enemy of a planned future--don't come along and mess it up. Or if they do, that they factor in seamlessly to the well-manicured 'plan for life' they have laid out for themselves.  

It's one thing to have to live in a shoebox-type living situation by necessity in parts of the world like Hong Kong or Japan, or the slums of Calcutta. Millions of people do. But here in the West, the vast majority of us have the luxury of choice and space. The tiny house phenomenon may be a fad but it's a curious one and I think tells us about what those attracted to it prioritize. There is a happy medium between McMansions and cottages-on-wheels. It's where we find ourselves as a family, and happily so. We have room in our home and space in our hearts for children, for guests, for mess, for the (thankful) luxury of not having to be constantly cleaning and tidying and putting things away. 

I'm not sure what the future generations will look like in the "12...6...2...dog" projection, but it doesn't inspire confidence in a future that seems very much the opposite of 'sustainable.' In a too-planned life, there's no extra room in the inn, and not just in terms of square footage. We need room in our heart and lives for uncertainty (which necessitates faith); mortality (which inspires fear of the Lord); charity (which inspires virtue); and love and commitment (in marriage, which begets children). Or, as the wisdom of Scripture attests, “Where no oxen are, the trough is clean; but increase comes by the strength of an ox.” (Prov 14:4)

Looking In From The Outside

This morning my three year old son came down stairs as I was on the couch attempting to read and pray. His mother was at work on her overnight shift and hadn't come home yet. I was looking forward to him crawling up on the couch with me and nestling in. He took one look at me and asked, "Where's mom?" After telling him she wasn't home yet, but would be soon, his face dropped and he immediately began to cry. I was the consolation prize. 

Moments like these have been kind of demoralizing to me as a dad. Like most dads, my weekdays are spent working. On weekends like this one, when my wife is working her shifts, I'm spent at the end of the week, and don't have much energy for doing things with the kids. Truth be told, they spend most of their time with their mom during the week homeschooling, and as a result are very close to her.

It can be a challenge these days to find my role as a father beyond just providing a roof over everyone's heads. Mothers provide something all kids need--time and attention, nurturing and instruction. As a father, I know I have a role to play in all that as well, and things their mom can't provide. But I've been defecting more. I go out to the garage to wrench around; I sit on the couch while my son plays Minecraft, not knowing how to interact with him. I feel like I'm losing them and squandering opportunities. The COVID era doesn't make it easier, but it's not an excuse either. 

Middle age is a tough time for dad. You're so focused on your career and managing things that time is at a premium. I try to balance having time for myself (time that my wife usually doesn't have as a luxury, admittedly), time with other men, time with my parents, time with my wife, time with my kids, time writing, and time in prayer.  

My wife was chastising me a bit last night for not being present with my kids when I have the opportunity. She's not wrong. She is a 'be-er' and I'm a 'do-er.' Every time I do have the opportunity to just 'be' I end up 'doing' something instead. Everyone knows that you can't substitute time together with other things and expect to have a healthy marriage. And the more time you spend with someone, the more you get to know them, and want to spend time with them. I feel like my kids pick up on that I am not as present with them as their mom is, and so they turn to other 'things' to fill the vacuum that I could be filling if I was more present.

The less time I spend in prayer, the farther I feel from God. The same applies to my kids. I'm in a funky season right now, where my biggest sins and temptations come from a spirit of sloth and acedia, and it can be very hard to counter. I'm somewhere between a post-war father who detaches and a Millenial who is an 'active, involved father.' My wife and I have a more or less traditional delineation of duties where she teaches and cleans, picks up toys and shuttles kids to appointments, and attends to household duties, and I work full time (though I do cook) so that she can stay home for the majority of her time. I'm not emotionally distant, and I think I do spend time with them when I am able, and do help out around the house. But I have the 'dad-disposition' of having a role, and not knowing exactly how it is supposed to play out.

What my wife does naturally--being with the kids, being present, etc--does not come naturally to me. The older my kids get, the more I realize my laziness as a father is costing me opportunities to connect with them. Time is a currency, and I'm spending it on frivolous things rather then what's important. It's no wonder my three year old doesn't want to crawl up on the couch with me, and collapses in dejection when he realizes he's stuck with me rather than his mom. Or maybe it's just a natural season at his age, and I shouldn't be so hard on myself.

A movie I watched years ago that I found strangely moving (to tears) was The Wrestler, with Mickey Rourke. There's a scene where he's trying to reconnect with his adult daughter after years of not being there for her. "I'm just a broken down piece of meat, and I'm alone," he says to her. "And I deserve to be alone." 

There's an image I have, when I go out on the patio for some time to myself, of looking from the outside in while the rest of my family is inside. I've chosen to take time for myself, but I would be horrified if I tried to come back in the house and it was locked for some reason. Then you realize the place you really want to be more than anywhere, with your family, you're barred from, because of what you've chosen instead. I know it's just a moment but I don't want it to project as a future reality. Moments add up to days, and days to years, and before you know it if you're not careful, you can become a stranger in your own house.