Ubi Petrus

Not that I’m surprised to have been struck by a quotable quote after only one night of reading C.S. Lewis, but this one caught my eye quickly. Towards the end of letter 21 of The Screwtape Letters we find Wormwood giving this advice:

We produce this sense of ownership not only by pride but by confusion. We teach them not to notice the different senses of the possessive pronoun – the finely graded differences that run from ‘my boots’ through ‘my dog, ‘my servant’, ‘my wife’, ‘my father’, ‘my master’, and ‘my country’, to ‘my God’. They can be taught to reduce all these senses to that of ‘my boots’, the ‘my’ of ownership. Even in the nursery a child can be taught to mean by ‘my teddy bear’ not the old imagined recipient of affection to whom it stands in a special relation (for that is what the Enemy will teach them to mean if we are not careful) but ‘the bear I can pull to pieces if I like’. And at the other end of the scale, we have taught men to say ‘my God’ in a sense not really very different from ‘my boots’, meaning ‘the God on whom I have a claim for my distinguished services and whom I exploit from the pulpit – the God I have done a corner in’.

Yeeps. That’s a rather scathing indictment of how people allow their laxity in language to transform itself into a laxity in understanding. We all at times are guilty of trying to turn God into someone we can control – sometimes by bartering, sometimes by berating, sometimes by what we think is manipulating. At the same time, despite the gravity of these problems it seems even more grave for those who think God is what they want Him to be and that there is somehow something God owes them for being, in their own definition, good. For those times we have taken God for granted, and for those who are blinded by their own ambition towards God we humbly pray.

I’ve assiduously avoided commenting on the Pope’s speech at Regensburg for several reasons, none of them particularly good. However, my Pope John Paul II quote-a-day calendar gave me a surprise the other day by addressing the “other” part of his speech – you know, the one not about Islam. The part that probably was intended to be to focal point of the speech, at least to the local audience to whom it was delivered.

Modern rationalism does not tolerate mystery. It does not accept the mystery of man as male and female nor is it willing to admit that the full truth about man has been revealed in Jesus Christ. In particular, it does not accept the great mystery proclaimed in the Letter to the Ephesians, but radically opposes it. For rationalism, it is unthinkable that God should be the redeemer, much less that He should be the bridegroom, the primordial and unique source of the human love between spouses. Rationalism provides a radically different way of looking at creation and the meaning of human existence. But once man begins to lose sight of a God who loves him, a God who calls man through Christ to live in Him and with Him, and once the family no longer has the possibility of sharing in the great mystery, what is left except the mere temporal dimension of life? — (Letter to Families for the International Year of the Family, 1994)

I am struck repeatedly by the similarity in thought between John Paul II and Benedict. While I knew the “God’s Rottweiler” routine was a joke at best I hadn’t expected this level of continuity. Looking back now, I have absolutely no idea why I thought that way – it seems positively silly. Unfortunately, I think many are still allowing themselves to be stuck in their preconceived notions of what this Pope and this pontificate will bring. I am heartened to see he has not allowed these short-sighted people to deter him from speaking what needs to be said

I finally finished Introduction to Catholicism from the Didache Series tonight, which I’ll post a more full note on later. Thanks to the convenient coincident timing of my birthday I had a gift certificate to spend so I picked up C.S. Lewis’ classic The Screwtape Letters and Butler’s Lives of the Saints (yes, I avoided the one from Richard McBrien if only on principal). These are a pair of staples in the library of any serious Catholic, and I feel like I’ve patched a major hole in mine that has festered far too long. Such are the trials of being a convert – you start so many years behind those blessed to be Catholics their whole lives.

As a parent, I’m often struck by the tendency of other parents to have the lives of their children laid out before them and to act as if their parental fiat is all it takes for this to be. But sadly, in this age of “wisdom” I have near-to-never heard a parent suggest they hope Sally has a calling to a religious life or that Johnny become a priest. I think it a reflection on our society that some bemoan and bewail the priest shortage, some to the point of referring to it as the crisis of our times, but yet are possessed of a blissful unawareness perhaps even an intentional unawareness of the role they can play as parent in the path of this contemporary crisis. “We need more priests,” they say. “But not my son,” they whisper. God calls whom he calls to what he calls them and in the way and time he calls, and woe be it to that person that would tempt God’s child from the path God has laid out before him.

I address you, Christian families. Parents, give thanks to the Lord if He has called one of your children to the consecrated life. It is to be considered a great honor – as it always has been – that the Lord should look upon a family and choose to invite one of its members to set out on the path of the evangelical counsels! Cherish the desire to give the Lord one of your children so that God’s love can spread in the world. What fruit of conjugal love could be more beautiful than this?
— Pope John Paul II, Vita Consecrata n. 107

As reported here and here, Cardinal O’Malley has dipped his toe in the blogging waters. We should all hop over there and check it out and offer our support for this endeavor. This is a truly great way to open up the Church and her leaders and make them more accessible to the 21st century man and woman. It’s my not-very-humble opinion that this type of real-time and honest communication is the beginning of the road out of the mess the child abuse scandal has caused. I think this is the type of openness the Second Vatican Council had in mind. Let us pray his endeavor meets with success and inspires more of our leaders.

With all the talk about excommunication these days (think of the river boat “priestesses”, Archbishop Emanuel Millingo and others for current examples) Dr. Ed Peters’ new book is extraordinarily timely. Before we engage in discussions about who should or should not be excommunicated and for which offense, it is helpful to make sure we know what excommunication is, why it is done and when it is allowed. While I haven’t had the privilege of previewing the book as yet, I trust his treatment of this subject is thorough and yet concise. At only 65 pages it promises to be a book you can read repeatedly as needed without worrying about losing years off your life.

Thanks to a reference from American Papist, I’ve added an “I Support The Pope” banner as you can (hopefully) see. His post on the topic is here: “I Support the Pope” banners. I like the idea of expressing our support for our Pontiff not only at times like this, with all the tempest in a teapot furor going on over his Regensburg speech, but in general. For a further show of support, send him an email – Michelle Malkin has his address here.

Over at his blog at Fox News, Father Jonathan wrote a thought-provoking piece on what this world could look like in 2051 if our culture of laissez-faire spirituality continues. The essence of the story is very true – if we forget why we care, if we abandon what is important in the name of relativism we lose our cultural soul.

While he frames this against the backdrop of the War on Terror, I think it also points to a more general truth which is equally valid in areas like our very own Catholic Church. If, for convenience or out of laziness, we allow ourselves to forget why we proclaim our faith, to forget the sheer greatness of our faith and fall into the well of “each religion is equally true and equally good” we begin to lose our faith not just in our faith but in God Himself.

A snippet to whet the pallet:

By 2025, Europe had officially denied its Christian roots. In the name of tolerance and diversity, it had separated human values from morality and morality from God. The result was a stifling dictatorship of moral and religious relativism. In the minds of the youth, there was now, in effect, no such thing as absolute good or bad. Democracy, for example, was optional like everything else, and then it just disappeared. At first, nobody seemed to care.

Diogenes has this story at CWN. I agree with several of the commenters – my appetite is absolutely lost. A snippet:

A single mum in Scotland is taking legal action to get 250,000 pounds from the National Health Service. Pregnant with twins at 16, she went for an abortion, and the Health Care Providers only succeeded in bagging one of the targets. The survivor is now five years old and starting school. A heart-warming story of safe, legal, imperfectly rare feticide, and its friends:

To quote Buggs Bunny, *twitch* *twitch*

From Brit Hume’s blog on Fox News:

Offended Christians have sent nearly 2,000 letters to The University of Virginia’s student newspaper, The Cavalier Daily, calling on the paper to apologize for a series of cartoons mocking their religion, including one portraying the Virgin Mary with an “immaculately transmitted” rash.

Editor-in-chief Michael Slaven says the paper will not apologize simply because someone is offended, saying newspaper policy allows cartoons to ridicule a group for it’s own “opinions or actions.”

But Slaven did issue an apology for a religious cartoon in February, after a widespread student protest. That cartoon poked fun at the Muslim prophet Mohammad.

Surprised? Neither am I. A sure sign of a sick and depraved society is when it hates itself. The title “Slouching Towards Gomorrah” comes to mind.