Parochial Loneliness

juvenile wrens, bickering — Pray for Allie Hathaway, then click the picture for more quick takes at ConversionDiary.com

Sarah Reinhard wrote about being welcoming over at New Evangelizers the other day. Posts like hers always make me cry. The reason is because if I who should feel totally at home in a Catholic parish feel so utterly isolated . . . how on earth does everyone else feel?

Yeah. I just said that.

It’s not about the people. To a man my fellow parishioners, and everyone I’ve met in my diocese and anywhere I’ve traveled (except that one cranky priest one time, but come on, everybody has bad days) — everyone is really very nice. Kind, caring people. No complaints. None.

Still, it’s lonely.

And it isn’t a strictly Catholic problem. I’ve had multiple Evangelical friends — and if Catholics are a little shy and reserved, trust me, Evangelicals are not — I’ve had a number of non-Catholic friends wander from congregation to congregation in search of companionship. Someone to notice them. To care about them. To view them as something other than a potential nursery worker, or those people you smile at in the pews but really if they fell into a crevasse tomorrow, no one would much realize.

Part of the problem is geographic. I see church people on Sunday, but the rest of the week we retreat to our different neighborhoods spread throughout the city. I can distinctly remember the last time I ran into an acquaintance from church outside of Mass — it was several months ago, at Publix — and interestingly, the time before that was maybe six months prior, same lady, at the library. But they just moved to Seattle, so that’s over. Oh wait — and I ran into the dad of one of my students at McDonald’s this winter — I had turned to look because I was struck at how polite he was, the way he spoke to the counter lady.

Part of it is structural. Our parish has five masses in a weekend — if someone’s missing, for all you know they just slept in an hour, or decided they like the 8:00 AM organist better. You might see an announcement in the parish bulletin if someone’s dead or nearly dead, if the next of kin notified the parish office. For all I know, I run into fellow parishioners everywhere, and never even know it, because we aren’t at the same Mass.

Part of it is architectural. You want to say to hello someone after Mass, but they slip out the other door. I used to go down to coffee and donuts, but the room is acoustically alive — too loud and you can’t hear anyone, so conversation is strained.

–> Something my parish does right: We have a fabulous playground right next to the church building. So the parents of young children do have a natural way to meet up and chat after Mass. Which I love, and have made many friends that way.

Part of it is economic. I keep befriending people who move away. I’m sure it’s not me. Sometimes I when I introduce myself to someone, I feel like saying, “Are you going to move or drop dead* in the next two years? Because I’d sure like some friends that stick around.”

Part of it is personality and state of life. I’m an introvert. I want one-on-one conversations about substantial topics. Just throwing us all into the gym for a giant spaghetti supper or pancake breakfast, and calling it parish-togetherness because we’re all in the same room? No thanks. But I’m not at a stage in my life when it’s easy to get out for a small-group bible study, or meet someone for coffee, or pick up the phone and talk for ten minutes without having to break up three fights and answer seven urgent questions, two of which really were urgent, and one of which involved the dog throwing up.

Loneliness is no reason to leave the Church. It’s not a social club. It’s a place to worship the one true God, to prepare your soul for Heaven, to gear yourself up for serving others here on earth. The little Christs come to serve, not to be served.

And this is why I’m such a thorn in everyone’s flesh about solid theology programs. Because my goodness, I don’t care how wonderful your youth program is, or how great your ladies’ monthly luncheon is at making lonely widows feel at home, sooner or later as a Catholic you’re going to be in the pit. You’ll be the odd person out, the one nobody remembers to call, the one for whom there is no parish ministry that fits your life and your abilities.

Faith formation can’t be all about relationships and togetherness, or there’s no reason to stick around when the group doesn’t meet spec. If there’s one question religious ed needs to answer, it is: “Why should I bother coming to Mass when my parish is horrible?”

[My parish is not horrible. Far from it. I am usually so happy to be home after having to go visit some other place. Like the church with the horrid dentist-office decor, or the one with the oppressively low ceilings, or the one with no vacant seats up front . . . but I do kinda like the neon lights in the ceiling that change to match the colors of the liturgical season, out at my Dad’s parish in Las Vegas . . . though their traffic pattern for the communion line is inscrutable.]

Solutions, anyone?

I do feel an amazing kinship with the lady I always see at adoration and who I run into other places around the parish, even though we rarely get to talk to each other, but you can just tell she’s your friend, and she has masses said for everyone including my grandfather when he died, even though she’d never met or even heard of him before it was listed in the parish bulletin. Most of the time it is enough to just see familiar people, to have that sense of home, even if you don’t really know them.

But sometimes you want more. Real live friends that you see outside of Mass.

I know the playground-after-Mass method works. And I’ve made friends teaching religious ed, volunteering is good that way. Haunting the local Catholic bookstore will make you at least be friends with the owner there (they go to another parish). Slowly, slowly, we build up friendships with other families through trying to set up dinner together this week, a park date that week . . . but it’s long work, and we’re all so busy, and our lives so separate that every get-together has to be planned, and often the effort evaporates when some small thing throws a wrench in the works.

***

Anyhow, all that to say, that if we aren’t welcoming to our members — really welcoming, not just smile-smile handshake-handshake — how exactly are we perceived by outsiders? As with catechesis, so with relationships: The new evangelization starts in the pews.

*Pleasantly few people I know actually drop dead after meeting me. God bless modern medicine.

Freedom of Religion: The Right to be Wrong.

Several years ago a friend shared a frustration about her job as a public school teacher: She felt that in the faculty lounge she had to pretend to be pro-life, lest she lose her job. She worked in a conservative school district, and the other staff leaned to evangelical Christian (she did not). She felt persecuted, and she didn’t think it was right. I agreed.

Not because I was myself on the fence concerning abortion — I had always opposed it. But because it seemed to me that if you are a government employee, you shouldn’t lose your job for agreeing with the laws of the government you serve.

[I should clarify here: She was not complaining that she couldn’t share her views with students — she had no desire or intention of doing that; given her subject and the ages of her students, abortion was not ever going to be discussed in the classroom in any way. What she feared was that merely holding the beliefs that she did would cost her job.]

In studying history there comes an ugly moment when you suddenly understand how hopelessly immersed you are in your own culture. Future people will wonder why you did not have more courage to stand for what you knew was right. They will also wonder why you did not see how terribly wrong you were about principles that, to a later generation, seem entirely clear. But the pull of your own time and place is too powerful.

That is how I feel about the law.

Product of late 20th-century USA, having grown up on patriotic songs and the Pledge of Allegiance and trips to Williamsburg and copies of the Constitution handed out at the bank in 1987 to commemorate the bicentennial . . . I’ve got this obsession with the Bill of Rights. I am too late-century to believe it has been flawlessly administered, but I can’t shake the idea that it ought to be.

And enshrined in the 1st Amendment is the right to be wrong. We call it freedom of religion.

Even though Congress is not supposed to make laws prohibiting the free exercise of religion, of course it does. If your faith prescribes polygamy or ritual human sacrifice, no-can-do for you. Morality informs the law, and no amount of arguing that your religion required you to embezzle that money will get you out of jail. The majority will legislate the boundaries within which you may practice your beliefs. The majority of course, being composed of people who are sometimes wrong.

(Example: Slavery. Big mistake that one. No slaves were emancipated by arguing in Confederate court, “My religion tells me I shouldn’t have to be a slave.” But religious arguments — initially regarded as crazy fringe nutcase arguments — did eventually persuade the Union government to emancipate. No comment on the timing.)

And then there’s the taxes. We don’t get a discount for deciding we object to the nuclear weapons program or the latest foreign war. I suppose you shut your eyes and pretend your particular contribution is all going to food stamps, and someone else’s cash covers the objectionable stuff. Either that or you buy in to the whole “Whose face is on that coin?” thing.

[More limits on free exercise: We can’t even get out of the draft selectively — either you’re 100% pacifist, or you sign on for all wars at all times — no concept of just warfare as a religious principle to be actively lived by able-bodied men of military age.]

So what’s the big deal with the reproductive-services-funding mandate? Critics of the Church observe that the law is only asking for employers to pay for services that Americans overwhelmingly want, and that the medical industry considers perfectly good healthcare. You’ve got to be some kind of crazy fringe nutcase to object to wholesome American goodness like Sterilization and Apple Pie. (Correction: There might be a case for raising insurance rates on the people who eat the pie.)

And the answer is this: We grew up in late-20th America. We know freedom of religion isn’t perfectly administered, but we still believe in it. We practice it with compromises, but we do try to practice. Jews who actually keep kosher are not therefore excused from paying all their taxes, just because Federal cafeterias serve those scary puffed-up Not Hebrew National hot dogs. But we don’t therefore say the government has the power to require all employers everywhere pay for pork barbecue.

–> It would be understandable if some Jewish people found it objectionable to purchase a dozen bacon cheeseburgers for the guys at the sales meeting , even if there were other Jewish people who had no such reservations. We’d get it. We’d think that mandatory pork-purchasing — and being fined for failing to offer pork as a choice at the company cafeteria — was a stupid law.

We don’t think Chick-Fil-A should be required by law to be open on Sundays, even though other Christian businesses operate on those days. Likewise B&H Photo has a constitutional right not to process sales from Friday sundown till Saturday sundown. Even if there are employees who want to work during those times (and who need the hours!), or customers who wish to patronize the company during that time. We have a right to eat on Sundays, but the government doesn’t mandate that all grocery stores and restaurants be open on those dates.

The trouble with the contraception-sterilization mandate is that our government has decided these items are more like clean water or public safety, and further, our government has decided that every private employer in the United States is now the public agency tasked with delivering these goods.

The majority of Americans do not believe contraception and sterilization are immoral. They find the Catholic church is wrong wrong wrong on this matter. That is fine. But proper response is then, “Well, this is America. You have a right to be wrong.”

From the view of the majority, the next question is: “What will happen if we let these crazy fringe minority of people be excused from directly purchasing items they find objectionable?”

Our government says the answer is this:

Not directly purchasing your employees contraceptives would be like just giving them cash and saying, “Go buy your own bacon if it’s that important to you.”

And that would be wrong. Because there are limits on the freedom of religion. Your religion is known for not approving of certain products, but everyone else in America loves that product. Look, a lot of the people at your own house of worship are discretely eating the bacon, and usually the Rabbi doesn’t say much about it . . . you’re a threat to order and morality.

You must not just give your employees the cash. You must set up an account for unlimited purchases at Bacon Is Us. Or be fined. If you don’t like the stuff, don’t eat it.

Note that this is not about money. It would be entirely reasonable for the HHS to require that conscientious objectors simply pay their employees the necessary amount of cash to cover the cost of these services. That’s Living Wage 101, which the Catholic Church has been trying to explain since before ever the HHS saw light of day.

Employees could then purchase however much ~~bacon~~ contraception and sterilization coverage they wanted. Exact same amount of employer outlay. Exact same amount of contraception dispensed and reproductive powers eliminated. Only, it would respect the right of American citizens to practice their own religion.

A Recipe for Poverty

A friend of mine lives in one of those helpful European countries with nationalized health care and social services and everything you could want. And I know from experience that these systems can work pretty well for a lot of people. I understand the appeal.

But my friend’s recent struggles to get the care she needs (nothing wildly expensive) leads me to think nationalization of social supports is a very bad solution. Here’s why:

Government-run services are much harder to shut down if they become corrupt, incompetent, or unsafe. It takes, literally, an act of Congress. (And then some). In comparison, privately-run services can be boycotted by consumers, or in the case of safety-violations, legitimately shut down by government regulators.

When the system doesn’t work, there is nowhere else to turn. Taxpayer-funded, universal-enrollment systems squeeze out private providers. The money I could have spent on private fees has already been mailed to the government in taxes. I no longer have that cash on hand. The vastly diminished demand for privately-provided services also means therea are fewer private providers available to choose from.

“Universal” services shortchange the poor. The supposed reason for creating nationalized services is so that the poor have access to the essentials they need, such as medical care or education. The reality of government-run bureaucracies, however, is that they favor the upper-middle class — the people who have the resources and connections to work the system to their advantage.

How, then, to help the poor? By helping the poor.

Those who truly cannot provide for themselves do indeed need our assistance. One can reasonably argue that in a large, diverse, and mobile society, government-provided alms are a legitimate way of caring for those who might otherwise be overlooked by private charities.

But the whole nation cannot need alms. It is a mathematical joke. We cannot all be poor all the time.

3.5 Time Outs: Near Occasions of Sin

Thanks once again to our host Larry D. at Acts of the Apostasy, who is willing to count me among his minions, even though I’m also one The Jen F.’s minions, even if I did forget my 7 takes last Friday because I didn’t remember it was Friday. Nice thing about Fridays is you get a new one every week.

The people I’m trying to be nicer to are not helping me. You who chew with your mouths closed? I have no difficulty being nice to you. It is the people who pick fights at the breakfast table. Those people. I’ve had to switch acts of contrition, not just because I blank out in the confessional so I need something short and easy, but also because, well, I can’t exactly avoid “whatever leads me to sin”. No sense pretending. I think my pastor gets it. He can’t avoid me all the time either.

Speaking of bad influences: I was having some trouble with the new Mass translation at first, not because it isn’t beautiful and everything, but because the first time I heard “like the dewfall” during the consecration, I giggled. Not out loud. But my lips sort of twitched. I hope everyone else was looking at the altar. My trouble is the people I spend my days with. They are so . . . juvenile. It rubs off.

This morning I read the wrong day’s Mass readings. The page marked in my missal had both January 3 and January 4 on it, and did I know what day it was? No. I didn’t even wonder. I just read. But hey, you have good stuff to look forward to tomorrow.

–> First let’s just admit it, 1st John can be a little overwhelming, hmmn? Even if it does fit right in with that whole “resolutions” theme we’re all talking about. But I like this bit here, I think makes a good hinge for the could-be scrupler:

It was to undo all that the devil has done, that the Son of God appeared.

So that’s my consolation when I read in Psalm 97, “Let the rivers clap their hands,” and my brain goes all middle-school on me, not in a good way. But look, here’s a nice river picture to clean the imagination:

The funny thing about poetry and photography, is that they aren’t like the real world. Rivers don’t have hands that clap. If you stand in the Narrows of Zion Canyon, this picture is not what you see. The water isn’t all pearly and shiny. It’s wet and icy cold, and you aren’t thinking about how it looks (normal old water), you are thinking: Snowmelt. And the walls of the canyon are not so flat and washed out; they surround you, and make you forget the entire rest of the world, and you can touch them, and you would never have believed in them if you had not seen them yourself.

But people like the photo. I think because the shiny-pearly water makes it feel like fairlyand. Like rivers with hands that clap. Like the world as we know it is supposed to be, if only the wreckage were undone. Which is how you feel standing there in the canyon. You know that whoever made this is so much bigger than you. And entirely able to undo the madness. And that you were meant to be a part of that.

3.5

. . . sidewalks.

Please. Cut it out with the weird car ideas. Just build a sidewalk. A good one. Wide. With proper curb cuts. That goes all the way to store. Just like roads — we don’t build roads that stop abruptly because one of the neighbors didn’t want to cede a right of way, but hey, just drive over the grass and through the ditch, road picks up again in half a block. Real sidewalks. Don’t call yourself an environmentalist, or a fuel-security guru, and then make it impossible for people to walk places.

3.5 Time Outs: Seen On My Screen Porch

Thanks once again to our host Larry D. at Acts of the Apostasy, who has me so well trained I had this ready to go before even finding out if he means to continue. Updated to report: Yes! And check out the stylish Christmas theme:

This week we are Bunny-sitting. Cinnamon and Jenny-Bunny look delicious, but they are not for eating. We are working hard to avoid bunny-tragedy. The dog sits at the glass door looking out on the screen porch and whimpers. The cat sneaked in from outside when someone left the screen door open, and there was much bunny-scurrying in the cages. But bunnies remain both safe and entertained, because also on my screen porch is . . .

Ping Pong! I felt un-American, having no ping-pong table all these years. I still don’t, but I talked the 5-year-old into buying a package of balls for her brother for Christmas. (She bought her sisters scented hand lotion; I didn’t think He Who Is Doubtful About Bathing would want the lotion.) I sprung for two paddles. Christmas afternoon we set up my 2×5 folding table on the screen porch — true Table Tennis. Perfect size for children, and for adults who want to sit while they play, plus it is more compact than a regular table. And you don’t feel bad about eating on it. The balls don’t bounce well on the plastic table, so SuperHusband loaned us a sheet of luan plywood to place over top, and that both improved the bounce and gave us the happy ping-ponging sound.

The family is divided between the bitter minority that thinks we must have a net, and the large, superior-reasoning majority who observe that we’d just have 10,000 net balls. Screened porches are the ideal place for ping-pong, because the balls can’t get far. Plus, covered. No rain. But still outside. Children + Balls = Outside.

NEWSBRIEF: LIVE FROM BOY’S BEDROOM: DOGS EAT PING PONG BALLS. Don’t store them in the house. That’s the other reason dog sits whimpering at glass door. All those balls, bouncing back and forth, and that horrid glass between. It is the week of Dog Torment.

Also seen from the living room is this view, which I included in the homeschool photo-fest this past fall not because it had to do with homeschooling, but because I was so excited about my invention.

Screen Porch Laundry Tree — Taken in warmer months. It is not this green in December.

Here’s what happened:

Our dryer attempted death.
My dryer-repair guy was going to be preoccupied with gainful employment for a while.
No problem. Neglected laundry tree out in the back yard.
Wait. Rain.
Plus mosquitoes.
I’m not complaining just observing.
Did I mention dryer-guy not home to fix dryer?

Meanwhile, we had a patio table out front on the, er, patio. (Actually the driveway, but we don’t drive on that part so we call it The Patio. Pretend with us.) I pulled the umbrella out and stuffed it in the shed, then dragged the table into the screen porch. Placed the umbrella stand in position under the table.

I used tools we don’t want to talk about to dig the laundry tree out by its roots where it was determined to be permanently affixed in the yard. [If I have one superpower, it is furniture-moving. Laundry Tree you met your match.] Put old socks from the cloth bin on the pokey edges of the laundry tree, and very very carefully, with would-have-been-horrified-and-cringing spouse safely away in a neighboring state, erected the laundry tree in the hole in the center of the table where the umbrella used to live.

It works great! The mesh top of the patio-table is perfect for laying things flat to dry. Only caveat is that since the laundry tree is not in the ground, it stands taller than normal. I’m 5’7″ in a pair of sneakers and can reach fine, but it doesn’t work for shorter people. So now I’m commissioning child-height under-eaves laundry lines for the small people, because they seriously need a feedback loop about how much laundry they are generating. Plus, see “Decrepitude”, “Plague”, etc., I would get a much more reliable flow of smug superiority if my ability to hang laundry didn’t depend on standing* quite so much.

I think SuperHusband is willing to take the job, because now the dryer is getting serious about its death threats (it wails pitifully), and it pains the man to spend money on something you technically don’t need, plus costs more money to operate, when all that cash could be spent, on, say, camera lenses. He thinks that if we are serious about hanging out laundry all the time, maybe he can nurse the dryer along a few more years with urgent-case-use only.

3.5

So. Smug superiority. Hanging out your laundry, if you are the grumpy, complaining type, can make you downright peevish towards so-called environmental groups that are advocating for this and that alternative fuel, but can’t be bothered to push a serious campaign to cut American energy usage in very simple ways. Laundry lines being #1. And #2 on the list is

***

Something I’ll rant about next week. Hope your 12 Days are fantabulous — is anyone else having a Chocolate Year of Christmas? I’ve been getting the stuff from everybody. Let me just say: Best gift ever. Okay and single-malt scotch is right up there, but not everyone is the SuperHusband, and plus you don’t have to be so moderate on the chocolate.

*If you’ve been sitting on the edge of your chair wondering when on oh when I’ll post the next decrepitude-watch post, the short version is: All is way better than a year ago, not so good as two years ago. Reliably walking maybe 2 miles? And then I can fit in another hour or so of other house-yard-etc activity. Depending on your perspective, that either seems like an extravagant plenty or a laughable pittance. I agree. Anyhow, it is enough to hang laundry, plague not withstanding. I happen to love hanging laundry, so long as I can get the other people to leave me alone while I do it. Silence. It’s all about the silence.

Book Recommendation : 5000 Years of Slavery

I have been frustrated in trying to find a good book about slavery. Most in our library focus entirely on the history of slavery in the United States, with perhaps a brief mention in passing of the existence of slavery in other times and places. I find this limited treatment of the topic leads to some problematic misunderstandings — in many ways perpetuating the same racism that enabled American slavery and the subsequent post-emancipation civil rights abuses.

So I was glad to discover this book:

This is an introductory treatment, very readable and with lots of pictures, but it is not for young children. What I like:

Separate chapters on slavery in the ancient world, pre-colonial Europe, Africa from ancient times to present, in the Americas among indigenous tribes and states, in Asia, and in the modern world internationally.
Precise scope. Serfdom, for example, is mentioned only when the conditions truly amounted to slavery — mere garden-variety medieval serfdom is passed over in favor of actual slavery in the era. In the same way, contemporary slavery is restricted to true slavery — forced labor with no option of departure — rather than degenerating into a diatribe against poor wages and lousy working conditions. (Those are serious problems, but they are not slavery.)
Honest who-did-what-when reporting. No bizarre cultural biases or weird anti-European narratives.
Factual but not voyeuristic accounts. The realities of rape, starvation, torture, and the like are all mentioned where the historical record shows they happened, but there is no morbid dwelling on gruesome details.

What it amounts to is a book you can take seriously. Good starting point, though it certainly left me wanting to learn more. Highly recommended.

Forgiveness and Detective Work

Yesterday I finished my comments on the Penn State scandals by saying this:

Cultivating a heart of mercy and forgiveness is the only way bring ourselves to be willing to see that evil.

Today I want to elaborate.

***

When I talk about “forgiveness”, I don’t mean pseudo-forgiveness, in which we say things like “You didn’t mean to do it”, or “No harm done.” I’m speaking of actual forgiving, in which the guilty person has done something to injure, and the victim chooses to set aside wrath and revenge, and instead be at peace with the guilty one. It could be for a small matter or a serious one.

Why would forgiveness matter, when it comes to identifying egregious sins?

Short Answer: People who forgive are people who can see sin. People who do not forgive must necessarily overlook some amount of sin, or else go mad with loneliness and despair. Therefore, the habitual practice of forgiveness disposes one to more easily identify sin.

Long Version, Same Answer:

Here is how relationships work among people who know only condemnation:

The worlds divides into two groups: “good” people and “bad” people
The various things that good people do might be “wrong choices”, or “done in ignorance” or “under pressure”, or perhaps they are just “human nature”.
Someone caught doing something undeniably evil is a bad person. This boggles and overwhelms, when that person had heretofore been amongst the good ones, and furthermore the person still shows plenty of evidence of goodness.

Here, in contrast, is how relationships work among people who practice forgiveness:

The world doesn’t divide. People are people. We humans do a lot of good things, and some bad things, in varying portions.
There certainly can be mistakes and extenuating circumstances. But also sometimes we just plain sin.
Someone caught doing something undeniably evil is, well, just like the rest of us. The way is open for repentance and forgiveness, if the person chooses it.

I might be shocked or surprised when my dear friend sins in a way I would never have guessed. But that does not require me to condemn or reject, nor to make 1,000 excuses and insist such sin is impossible. Of course such sin is possible. I’m a rank sinner. Why shouldn’t other people be just as capable of evil as I am?

Forgiveness causes sanity. Habitually forgiving means no longer having to explain away one’s batty relatives, or tolerate spousal nonsense, insisting it’s “just their way.” Forgiveness means being able to say, “_______ was utterly wrong to act that way,” and still love that person, still maintain a relationship with that person.

Habitual forgiveness means being able to hear an accusation against a loved one, and be able to say, “Well, I don’t think so, but it is always possible. I’ll look into it.” There is no danger. If it is true, out of love for the other, you want the situation rectified. If it is false, better to know it. In either case, better to love honestly than to love a lie.

The irony of forgiveness is that one can better see sin, but also be less bothered by it. It is no longer necessary to put up with bad behavior by calling it good behavior.

***

The greatest hazard of condemnation is that it becomes impossible to see one’s own sins. To do so would be to condemn oneself.

This is a danger when it comes to protecting children from abusive situations. For if I convince myself of my own sinlessness, I must excuse the same bad behavior in others. And the more wrong actions I accept as good actions, the fewer clues I have at my disposal for detecting abuse. I’ve thrown out evidence.

***

As it happens, the habit of forgiveness also creates a family environment where children are more likely to tell their parents about abuse when it happens. And at the same time, the awareness of the signs of sin makes it less likely for parents to put their children into doubtful situations in the first place. Neither of those are magic force fields. Nothing parents do can keep children safe from all evil. But it helps. And when evil does strike, parents who have built that foundation of love and protectiveness have also given their children a place and a means for healing.

The Unbelievability of Sexual Abuse

[Note: I’ve changed minor details below in order to respect the privacy of the people involved. Also, this is a sensitive topic. Please skip this post if you suspect it may distress you.]

In light of the recent Penn State sex abuse scandals, Mark Shea wrote an excellent piece about Betrayal and the Power of Relationship, and Mary Graw Leary on Sexual Abuse and Moral Indifference. I agree with both. But I want to add one other observation:

Sexual abuse is very difficult to believe.

I once read about a woman who had murdered her school-age child. The neighbors were all quoted as saying “they couldn’t believe it,” she was, “Such a good mother.” They pointed to her diligence in making sure the child brushed his teeth — small things that showed her humanity and her visible love for her child. Whom she murdered.

Sin is like this. It is a corruption of something very, very good. Think of the devastation of a natural disaster — even after the land is ruined, there is still evidence of what once was. We see the few good and beautiful things that are left. We look for them.

It is a rare human (I have not met one) who is so consumed by sin that not a shred of goodness remains. And because sin prefers darkness, we all put our good parts forward, and conceal the rest. The more shameful the sin, the more diligently we cover it.

Sexual abuse violates something so sacred, so private and personal, that of course we want it hidden. Even the victim wants it hidden — that is, though of course wanting justice, does not want this very painful and intimate wound put out for the world to gawk at.

Because it is such a shocking violation of the one thing that should never be violated, it is difficult even for the victim to believe in it. Violent stranger rape? Yes, that is undeniable. But the subtle, groping hand of the pervert making his first tentative reach? It is easy to dismiss the internal shudder, the instinctive recoiling, as an over-reaction, perhaps a misinterpretation of a harmless gesture. The molester certainly wants it perceived that way.

I once had to review the background check of a creepy guy. You would not like this guy. Inappropriate comments, inability to hold down a steady job, lousy hair, a thousand clues that added up to one thing: Run a background check. I gave it a 75% chance he had a record. I didn’t know what — bad checks maybe? — but I knew it was likely we’d find something.

What we found was this: Lewd acts with a minor.

And it was hard to believe. Here was an obnoxious, unpleasant, barely-literate and sometimes-delusional jerk, but you know, he was also a nice guy. Held doors for people out of genuine consideration. Kept his work area neat and clean out of personal pride. Would do small kind things for others, expecting and wanting nothing in return. Original sin and personal sin corrupt, but they do not completely destroy all that is good and pure in a man.

I could have believed bad checks. I could have believed armed robbery. But lewd acts? Really?

Most of us understand greed, selfishness, foul temper, impulsiveness, desperation. We are tempted to pass our smallish 13-year-old off as two years younger, in order to get the child discount. Though we would never rob a bank, we can connect the dots and understand that a poorly-instructed man might fall into that temptation.

But sexual perversion is not a sin we understand so easily. That a man would hop in bed with a grown woman? Certainly. But not with a child. It is unthinkable. Men who have no qualms about murder, or robbery, or arson, instinctively and violently lash out against the fellow prisoner who is guilty of sexually harming a child.

How could you do that? It is like a lightning on a clear day, or a hurricane in a desert. We cannot believe it. It is utterly foreign to all that we know.

The abuser knows this. And so keeps it very, very hidden.

If someone had come to the officials at Penn State and said, “We believe the coach is embezzling,” or “Someone saw him doing crack in the men’s room,” there would have been an investigation. Reluctant, perhaps. But it happens — great men can be tempted in these ways. We understand it.

But sodomizing a young boy? It is easier to believe in a false accusation. That, after all, is motivated by jealousy or revenge or greed, emotions we all can understand. It is easier to believe my creepy, seedy colleague was victim of a viciously slanderous ex, than to believe he molested a child. How much more difficult to believe someone so polished, so successful, so good and kind on such a grand scale, could do something so vile?

Our culture doesn’t believe much in either sin nor forgiveness. Out of a desire to do what we like, we re-categorize sinful acts, calling them innocent so that we might indulge ourselves. Out of fear of condemnation, we justify yet more, giving them particular names that explain our extenuating circumstances. The person who questions immoral actions is the villain — called a prude, puritan, pharisee, or hypocrite — whatever can be made to fit.

How can we believe in unbelievable sins? We have to first believe in the smaller ones. And then we have to forgive — not excuse — those sins. Good, kind, lovable people do evil things. Cultivating a heart of mercy and forgiveness is the only way bring ourselves to be willing to see that evil.

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