Category: Catholic Topics

Books for people willing to be happy

Ooh I’m so excited.  Look what I got today:

 

Walked into church this morning feeling a little rumpled and not quite myself, and who had set up shop in the narthex? My favorite local catholic bookstore.  Which is sort of like running into the ice cream truck, Santa Claus and your best friend all at once.  Happy happy.  Tons of cool stuff on display, but I had to stop looking after I spotted Manalive and Julie Davis’s book.  Doesn’t do to spend too much on books when the spouse is so very nearby.

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So, about the book. (Happy Catholic’s — not the other one by the other happy catholic, because I haven’t read it yet, plus probably you have):

Apparently I have this secret fear that my favorite internet authors will write bad books.  I thought Eric Sammon’s book would be too hard for me, because he is so much smarter than me.  Not so.  I was sort of nervous about Julie Davis’s Happy Catholic book for the same reason.

I was double nervous about the Happy Catholic book because it is inspirational. And sometimes inspirational-genre books have heart-warming stories about boys named Johnny who teach their parents important lessons about The True Meaning of Christmas, and then the mother dog who sacrifices her life to save the puppies and three orphaned children . . . you know what I mean.  One takes ones chances.

Julie, on the other hand, tackles questions like: Why does Han Solo deserve our attention?  How shall we rank Oprah, Miss Manners, and Jesus?  And is it possible Monty Python is more catholic than we realized?  Even in The Life of Brian? Plus lots of Fr. Benedict Groeschel quotes, so that pretty well settles it.

Four-and-some reasons this one is a keeper:

  • It’s reliable.  Solid catholic thinking, neither to the right nor to the left.
  • Written for ordinary catholics.
  • You don’t have to read the whole thing.  You just open to a random page.  Better than a magazine.
  • It’s entertaining.  So you’ll probably mean to read just one quote-n-meditation, but then stick around for the next one.  Worse things could happen you know.

What I like most: Julie grapples with popular culture head-on.  Lots of quotes from popular books, TV shows, movies.  And she doesn’t always agree! Sometimes, there’s a quote that sounds good, the kind of thing that someone says at a dinner party and everyone’s nodding and agreeing with it, and you want to say something very uncharitable because really even though it sounds so wise, it’s just drivel.   Julie takes quotes like that and answers them directly:  What’s the underlying truth?  What’s the lie?  What’s a catholic to do with that sentiment?

–>  For this reason, I think this is a great book to keep lying around in reach of teenagers.  It’s a textbook on critical thinking in disguise.  Oh and a sermon or 200.  And a lot of Wizard of Oz.  With an index.

I give it an I’ll-think-you’ll-be-pretty-happy-with-it Recommend.

 

 

 

Repeat after me: “Murder is Never the Solution”

UPDATE: Fr. says I had it right:

Actually, you are correct.  If you murder your spouse, you are not free to marry.  You are impeded due to the fact crime and public propriety come into play in this situation.  It does not matter if you murder your spouse or another person’s spouse.
See how much simpler it is to just ask your pastor, instead of the internet?  Ha.  I’m practically a Luddite.  (Have I mentioned my parish gets all the best priests?  We get all the best priests.)
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Original post:

 

That was us last night in 5th grade.  Because we were learning about Marriage.

–> And it appears I misquoted canon law, just a little.  Request for help at the bottom.

It was all going so nicely.  Marriage as one of the sacraments of service.  Husband and wife, till death do us part, open to children = new eternal souls, responsibility to educate those children, teach them right and wrong, introduce them to the church, teach them their faith . . . we were on it.

Naturally divorce came up, as it ALWAYS does, I don’t care how many times I don’t mention it even once.  But hey, no problem.  Quick explanation of nullity on the one part and separation of bed and board on the other, these kids were sharp.  No worries.  Off we launch into Holy Orders, when I my new favorite student raises her hand, and whispers, “I have one more question about marriage.”

Sure, no problem, go ahead sweetie.

“What if you murder your spouse because you don’t want to be married anymore.  Can you get married again after that?”

I should have just whispered “No,” and gotten back to bishops.   But I am not so smart.  I let the whole class in our little conversation.  Boys start howling, thrusting invisible knives at each other, thinking up little kitchen ‘accidents’ . . .

And hence the chant.  Repeat after me: “Murder is Never the Solution”.  Replace one boisterous activity with another.  It’s loud (I wonder if anyone is listening in the hall), but it’s focused.  Class back on track.  Quick let’s find those bishops again before someone starts the “Is it a mortal sin?” scenarios.

So that was our class last night.  [Great talk on Holy Orders.  Only excitement was another new question: “What if you don’t like your Deacon?” We all agreed: Suck it up, get along.  Disclaimer: Our parish has awesome clergy.  It was a hypothetical question. Nice talk about how every single sermon might not be written especially for you personally, some weeks it’s your turn to sit quietly and pray.  And if you were up there preaching, not everyone would be so excited about you either.  Get over yourself.  The kids *totally* get this.  Love it.]

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Anyhow, speaking of bishops, I’m not sure I sure I got my murder question quite right. Here is canon 1090, which seems to be the one I had imagined:

Can. 1090 §1. Anyone who with a view to entering marriage with a certain person has brought about the death of that person’s spouse or of one’s own spouse invalidly attempts this marriage.

§2. Those who have brought about the death of a spouse by mutual physical or moral cooperation also invalidly attempt a marriage together.

So this is all about murder in anticipation of a particular future marriage.  Doesn’t say anything about murder just to generally open up your options again.

Someone help me here.  Was I wrong?  (I think so).  Right enough? (For practical purposes, don’t think any little children were led wildly astray of the narrow road.)

Opine, opine.  I’ll ask Father just to be sure.

Lent.

From a baptist missionary family that has come to love Advent, and is now digging into Lent:

We decided to give the “Lent” thing a whirl.  We were the first to admit that like Christmas, Easter would sort of land on us.  We’d walk into church, our hearts unprepared, and then try and take in within one church service the complexities and rich beauty of the cross and the resurrection.  Impossible.  We left kind of numb.  Perhaps a tad-bit moved.  But mostly overwhelmed and feeling a little let down.  Just as celebrating Advent completely changed Christmas for us, taking the weeks prior to Easter to really savor the story of Jesus’ death and resurrection has been life changing.  The gospel.  God’s great love for this world.  Our sin.  Redemption.  Salvation.  This undeserved gift.  What medicine for the soul.

The more the Lent the more the Easter.  You can read the whole thing here. As they point out (repeating one of my favorite priests), it’s not too late to have a great Lent.

my little blonde Therese icon

The Bun is six, which is never easy, but she seems to be suffering from sixness more than average.  I can’t remember how it all came to a head, but the SuperHusband and I agreed we needed to take drastic action.  Child would be sent to either Piano or Karate.

Piano won for a whole host of reasons.  But wow: Expensive.   (More so because for part of that host of reasons, we opted to go with Not the Cheapest Teacher.  Even though said teacher tells me we are getting a parishioner discount.  I don’t want to know what full retail is.)  Apparently I have been massively spoiled by our super-bargain activities up to now.

So the deal is, and it all fits with the Addressing the Sixness action plan, that the Bun will clean up the trash in our yard once a week, thereby earning $1.  And she will put that money in an envelope and give it to her teacher, and we will pay the balance of her tuition.  Her teacher is thrilled.  (Yay teacher!  This is why we picked you.  Plus you are a good musician, that didn’t hurt either.)  The children have pointed out:

  • It is hardly any money at all.
  • We, the parents, are paying her that money.
  • Which she then gives back to us.
  • So how exactly does that help?

The mother silenced this questioning from the masses with pointed observations about her powers to tax, commandeer, and empress.

But the mother feels this way herself.  Not towards the Bun.  We are extremely happy with the piano plan all around.  Our yard is cleaner (yay!); our six year old has two different fronts on which she is developing confidence, skill, and self-discipline; and she has a sense of ownership over her lessons.  She helped pay for it with her own labor.  It is valuable.

No.  The mother feels this way towards God.

The Bun correctly observes that her contribution is very, very little.  My contribution to the work of Jesus?  Very, very, very little.  (Technically: Even littler than that.)  Plus the other similarities: Everything I do give came from Him anyway.  And He has to hound me even more relentlessly than I have to supervise the piano-player.  And He’s perfectly capable of taking care of the entire universe Himself, so what use am I anyway?

And this is a great consolation.  Our era is awash with talk of greatness.  Jesus isn’t asking me to be great.  He knows I can’t be great.  He knows the size of the problem — our whole fallen world.  He knows that He has to carry the load.  But He’ll let me help him, if I’m willing.  He’ll let me really help, and it will be good for me, and it will be the amount that is the size for me.

So that’s what I’m thinking about lately.   Being more like the Bun.   I like it.

40 pictures = 40,000 words?

Hey and here’s more good new media, h/t to Fr. V.  I think this one fits into that whole ignatian-imagination-meditation topic we were on the other month.  I never really thought about what 40 days in the desert really looked like, until someone drew me a picture:

 

And I tell you I don’t watch TV.  Ha.  Yes I do.

Underrated Media

Julie D. at Happy Catholic reminds us to promote catholic media today.  I’m lousy at these coordinated things — such an excess of self-discipline and order required.  My thought one week ago, as I lay in bed calculating the hours until midnight:  It’s not necessarily that I am a slave to my passions.  Sometimes I’m just a very reliable servant.

But often, yes, slave.

Rather than be organized, then, I’m going to just give you a few of my top favorite underrated blogs.   My list of well-known favorite catholic sites is in the sidebar.

Brandon at Siris is not only much smarter than me, he is also the true boy scout of internet-philosophers.  Here is where he answers my question about Intentio.

John McNichol barely blogs, but that’s because he is actually writing books.  Which I guess makes him “old media”, but gee, who else out there is taking care of catholic boys in need of more action/adventure novels? Do you really want your son glued to some blog, when he could be reading chestertonian steampunk instead?

Christian LeBlanc explains the catholic faith to sixth graders, which I suppose makes him too smart for the internet, too. But since most of us internet Catholics really need a proper sixth-grade religious education still, he posts his lessons on his site, and also links them to Sunday Snippets.

And my last under-rated catholic blog to promote today is my friend John Hathaway’s.  If St. Therese of Lisieux were a married American catholic man with Asperger’s and Marfan syndrome, who really dreamed of being a missionary priest to Haiti but instead was homeschooling his four kids, teaching college English, and doing all things lay-carmelite, that would be John.  You begin to see why I like the guy.  (And his wife, but she is too sensible and too busy to blog.)

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Speaking of underrated means and methods, here’s this bit of reflection is from a non-catholic blog, written by an evangelical missionary in Haiti, whose husband has been in prison for 5 months now.  Could just as easily be the wife of St. Thomas More writing here:

What? Huh?  Glory in suffering?  But you know what, it’s true.  One thing I’ve noticed is when you are suffering God doesn’t usually take the problem away immediately.  He’s not a magic wand to take away all your troubles.  You suffer and you suffer more when you are a Christian.  I have suffered so much in the past 5 months.  However I have noticed that thru my suffering I have changed, how I react has changed, and how I communicate has changed.

Read the whole thing here.

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Catholic Media Promotion Day facebook page is here.  You can make your list on your blog and then post the link on their wall, or just recommend some links directly on the wall.

About the Required Penances

In reading and talking with assorted friends elsewhere, the details of the various lenten penances keeps coming up.  What if you’re a vegetarian, do you have to do something extra?  What if your favorite meals are meatless anyway?  What if you are forced to go to a barbeque buffet on a friday (social obligation, large gathering, no one studying your plate)?  What if your life is such absolute misery right now that though you had planned extra penances on top of the obligations, you are too sick to pull them off?

And meanwhile, here are the Orthodox, who don’t play around with their fasts.

My thought is this:  Just do what the Church says.

The church doesn’t ask the impossible.  We’re told when we fast, to eat enough to maintain strength.  There are exemptions for people with medical needs that prohibit fasting or abstinence.

The Catholic Church takes sort of an opposite tack from the Orthodox, but either approach makes sense.  Catholics are given a bare-minimum assignment, and reminded that we who can do more, should do more.  Always.  How we fill in that blank is up to the individual to discern.  The Orthodox go hard and strong as  a blanket policy, and then your priest directs you on how to modify your observance of the fast per your state in life and spiritual maturity.  Two sides of the same coin: What you can do, you should do. What you cannot, you cannot.

As Catholics, I think our Lent Lite approach helps focus us on one thing: Obedience.

Not creativity, not “spirit of the law”, not Who Can Be the Saintliest.  If you are vegetarian, it is easy to obey.  If you are at the barbeque buffet forced to eat nothing but rice and mushy greenbeans and the little protein bar you stuffed in your pocket because you knew this was going to happen, well that’s a little harder.  (The Orthodox are laughing at you, of course, as you offer up your macroni-and-cheese-eating, but never mind.  They are laughing at all of us.)

But obedience.  Simple, unfettered, unworried obedience. That seems to be message #1 the Church wants us to learn today.

Seems timely.

 

[And yeah, it makes people super mad when you admit to it: That you’ll change your life in some small way for no other reason than The Church Says So.  Which is kind of a perverse pleasure for us curmodgeons, thinking of who we can really shock and alarm by eating our tuna with such docility. Ha.  Lent has its upsides.]

 

 

 

Lent-o-rama: Please Advise

Bearing asks for advice on how to assist children with their lenten devotions:

. . . I was not a child growing up in a practicing-Catholic family.   I literally do not know how to encourage a Lenten devotion without becoming Lent Cop Mom.

Seriously.  Help me out here.  . . .

Since I know I have a few readers here who could answer this one, and because I want to know the answer too, please go read the whole thing and then inform us.

Thank you.

Opinions Solicited (How often does that happen?)

Hathaway’s looking for opinions on his Crash Course in Catholic Ethical Thinking .  I’m having my turn at the busy week, so I promised him I’d comment by mid-week or he should pester me.   But you, aren’t you looking for someone to argue with today?

Here’s his ending:

. . . The Church can have compassion for the person in the extreme without saying “this teaching no longer applies because there is this one extreme case, and the rest of you can go on and do whatever you want.”When someone’s holding a gun to your head, either literally or metaphorically, and you do something intrinsically evil, you’re not a sinner. If the Nazis are at your door, and you lie out of fear, that’s not heroic virtue, but it’s also not a sin.

Again, intrinsic evil just means that the act is always evil and can never be virtuous in and of itself. It does not mean that it’s as bad as something else or better than something else.

So:

1. Means, motive and end are all good? Act is virtuous.2. Means, motive and end are good, circumstances are extreme? Act is heroically virtuous.

3. Means are neutral or good. Intentions are good. There are multiple ends, at least one bad and one good? This is “double effect”.

4. Means are bad. Intentions are good. Ends are bad. Circumstances are extreme or person is ignorant? The act is wrong, but culpability is reduced, possibly to nothing.

5. Means are bad. Intentions are bad. Ends are bad. Person is ignorant or not acting in total freedom; and/or matter is not grave? Venial sin.

6. Means are bad. Intentions are bad. Ends are bad. Person acts in full knowledge and freedom. Matter is grave. Mortal sin.

It is really crucial to be clear on these distinctions. To say “X is intrinsically evil” is not the same thing as saying “Y is a sinner for doing X” or even to say that “X is always mortally sinful”. It’s just to say that the using X as a means puts the action under categories 4-6 above.

Read the lead-up.  Tell him what you think.  Friendly guy.