The Eighth Day

by Laura Flanagan

This poem almost wrote itself after an experience of the Eucharist at Mass. I was struck by the hope present of those around me who were offering up their struggles, some of which I knew as a member of the community, immersed in the parish life by virtue of my work. I looked around at the people praying through the Eucharistic prayer, and recalled their sufferings: work with disabled family members; prostate cancer; recent miscarriage. Yet all were here, and praying hard. What did they find here?



I spent some time after the initial outflow of words with tweaks and improvements, but mostly did not make any materially major changes. The image of the Composer is not in any way original to me - I am fully aware that the influence came from the opening of J.R.R. Tolkien’s Silmarillion.

As I once wrote, T.S. Eliot makes me feel inadequate as a writer. This ain't no Eliot. I'm basically cribbing Scriptural lines, as you may often notice with my posts. But I still like it, and therefore I share. The difficulties which I currently must offer may be made explicit in future posts, but I hope as I grapple with them that I can continue to recognize this oblative perfection amidst imperfection, and give eucharistia for it. The final line of the poem is one of my favorites in Scripture for its truth and its hope, but it can be hard to say right now.

The Eighth

Lord, I am not worthy, but only say the word…
All that is broken, even just that which twinges
On the marble before us
Rich with precious metals, richer with love
No matter how unworthy the offerers or offering
All
Offered up, transfigured
And in the offering and by the offering
We dispose ourselves to love again, love better
Disposed to see those to whom we have been blind
     (The blind will see and the lame will walk)
     (If not this time, then perhaps next)
Disposed to hear the notes of how to Love as I AM Love
As I have Loved you
We learn the song gradually
     We learn the notes slowly (like the first hearers)
And each member of this Body adds his own strain
As the Composer intended
Intended from eternity
Go forth and sing

And each time
Caught up in the only time
Each time there is the promise
The radiance of hope, if we will see it
All that has not yet been done
All that has not yet been healed
All that has not yet been transformed
All that has not yet been redeemed
Will, in the end
Be made
Glorious

O death, where is thy victory?

Catholic, Independent, Moderate, Voter

by Dan Masterton

As our country moves through utterly deep political polarization, weathering a government shutdown more focused on blame-placement than political solutions, we have a party in power that has lost its soul.

Initially, the Republican Party likely expected that Trump’s foray into the election would be dispatched by the usual weeding-out of primary season. Instead, it watched in paralysis as more conventional candidates were rendered also-ran’s by Trump’s repeated victories. With sufficient delegates in hand and the nomination imminent, the Party declined parliamentary notions and other interventionist technicalities in its convention, perhaps hoping its institutional might could shape the candidate to be a legitimate standard-bearer for the general election. Trump went forward with the full formal support of the party, eventually naming its chairman his chief of staff, and the party took no action to constrain its candidate.

In Congress, the Republicans’ Speaker of the House, Paul Ryan (R-WI) and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) sold their souls for the prospect of legislative might that could come with a Republican in the Oval Office, and Republican members of Congress across the party variably lent support and endorsements to their candidate. This has continued into Trump’s presidency, where even as he acts not just incourteous but malicious, cruel, and inhumane, many of his supporters can’t bring themselves to jump off the train.¹ While some politicians, like Senator Jeff Flake (R-AZ) have decided to pre-retire and use their platform to be overtly critical, too many have remained silent, made lukewarm non-apologies, or even defended President Trump. This is unacceptable.

As Catholics, we believe in a moral theological tradition which teaches that the ends do not justify the means. One cannot morally do something evil in order to accomplish a good end. Circumstances can provide a context that lessen one’s blame for an evil action, but no circumstances can justify an evil action. When facing the harshness of reality, like that of American politics, moral decision-making often must involve some degree of pragmatism. So when it comes to voting, and even to political activity more broadly, Catholics are often forced into tough decisions. While some make a perfectly valid argument that we should simply not vote, that is not a path I am comfortable taking. So here, I’ll offer my perspective on how to engage, especially in a climate where the major party in charge has reached this state.

As a Catholic engages conscientiously with political realities, he or she will never find a perfect fit in either party or perhaps even with any individual politician.² So as one searches for a party to affiliate with, a politician to support, or a way to engage with the process, I think one is best served by honestly surveying the contemporary context of the election and acknowledging the realities of current issues, viable options, and potential consequences of elections.

To tackle a perennial issue, consider abortion: I am not a one-issue voter and will not support or oppose a politician on this issue alone, grave as it may be, for it’d all but lock me into rigid, straight Republican balloting; however, as I vet pro-choice candidates, I want to see at least some limitations in their approach, such that the candidate does not support unrestricted abortion on demand and preferably holds a view that desires explicitly to reduce the number of abortions. When I vet pro-life candidates, I want to see that they are not hiding poor respect for life in narrow opposition to abortion -- Do they oppose the death penalty? Do they support affordable health-care and education initiatives? Will they support reasonable gun control? Show me a bigger something in support of life. Rather than dismiss or endorse a candidate in a quick glance at one item (important as it is), I want to broaden the lens and look at more of the candidate.

So, for me, this means I’m usually voting split ticket. I have variously opposed and voted for Democrats and Republicans for President, Senate, House, and state assembly for different reasons. And in the case of this current political climate, I am preparing to tilt the balance much further against Republicans and in favor of Democrats versus my more typical even weight.

Republicans have had several moments at which they could have divested themselves of their then-candidate, then-nominee, and now-president before they got in so deep, throwing their lot in with a man who so comprehensively disrespects his brothers and sisters and their human dignity and instead focuses entirely on power and wealth; they declined to do so, and it has soiled their whole party. While Trump’s administration may have helped Republicans achieve corporate tax cuts, a desirable Supreme Court appointment, and arguably stronger national security and safety,³ the toxicity of his influence and behavior is unacceptable, and, often, evil. Plus, his political clumsiness jeopardizes any likelihood that desirable ends may even be achieved. While I would not rule out voting for some Republicans in various races, I will need to see substantial evidence that they do not support Trump and are not interested in a party whose track he recklessly dictates with his fickle, backwards direction.

Some suggested, via the too oft-repeated phrase, to “hold your nose and vote for Trump.” As I’ve stated, I think political conscientiousness is a tightrope walk for Catholics, but anytime one’s evaluation reaches this extreme, a different course is needed: vote third party; lodge a protest vote for the opposition; abstain from that line of the ballot. I think to some small extent I understood, if disagreed with, those who voted for Trump and other Republicans at the time of the election, but now I think Catholic voters need to reconsider how they can support a party that either tacitly or explicitly condones the behavior of a reckless, erratic president who does not even consistently commit to the scraps of policy that enticed some Catholics to vote for him. I think today’s context calls for more than simply the repudiation of an individual man. Even more, it calls for a profoundly raised bar that demands that Republicans who wish to govern and lead based on more consensus principles distinguish themselves clearly from the “populism” of Trump and his allies. I saw promising glimmers of such rationalism in the two dozen or so senators who cooperated to help end the shutdown stalemate, using Senator Susan Collins (R-ME) as a Switzerland of sorts to team up as the “Common Sense Coalition” and work out a small path forward.

Overall -- and I’m biased in this as it is the path I’ve personally chosen -- I feel that a Catholic is best served as an ideological moderate and a political independent, affiliating only loosely or perhaps temporarily with a party. While I acknowledge the value of party membership, I think maintaining a particular affiliation for too long makes it likely that one has to compromise one’s positions substantially to remain a party member. I do acknowledge the need for engaging in the political system in which we have only two parties, but I think one’s conscience and engagement is best served by remaining independent and/or affiliating only impermanently and nimbly. Unless something foundational changes, which is very unlikely, we are only going to have two parties. So in this reality, we need two robust, responsive parties that are affected by democratic pressures and reflect the social need to uphold human dignity and solidarity. This seems more likely if citizen members, especially large, active blocs like Catholics, are willing to pressure their party to the point of disaffiliation.

So I’ll remain a moderate, and, at this point, an independent.

I’m bent left by the desire for immigration reform with amnesty for undocumented people who are here, and just parameters to sustain people who qualified for DACA, for basic social safety nets for the homeless, unemployed, and economically struggling among us, for reasonable gun control laws, for an end to the death penalty, and for affordable healthcare for all people, and more.⁴

I’m pulled to the right by my desire to protect unborn people and support a culture of family life, to preserve end-of-life ethics against assisted suicide and flimsy arguments about dignity, to uphold religious freedoms and reasonable, respectful, open religious practice, and more.

And I find myself in the middle, wanting reasonable but sturdy tax rates that support basic government programs and social services and safety nets but that keep enough money in my pocket for me to control, spend, and donate as I’d like, wanting pilot programs of school vouchers and tax credits that continue funding public education but create greater choice and market for private education opportunities, and more.

This means taking issues, candidates, and elections on a case by case basis, and it means finding ways to stay active beyond the traditional partisan engagements. In this moment in politics, it means holding the Republican Party’s feet to the fire for repeatedly declining opportunities to repudiate one of their members and for its members holding their noses and following him to where we are now. It means seeking out leaders who are willing to maintain their independence from Trump and try to preserve a semblance of legitimacy as a party and as political leaders.⁵ And it means giving a greater chance to the Democrats’ candidates, hoping they can approach life issues with greater consensus sensitivities and continue their strong championing of marginalized people in their political action. The Republicans’ majorities are due to take a beating, if history is any indication, and it will be up to voters to overcome midterm election malaise and mobilize to make a statement at the ballot box.

2018 may stink, but I will not be holding my nose as I read, discuss, reflect, and vote. Bring it on.

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1 In this article, I mean only to describe and characterize the politicians and other public figures who have endorsed, supported, and/or encouraged Trump. I do not mean to lump in private citizens with them, and I don’t seek to make major judgments on people’s conscientious voting decisions and party affiliations statuses here. I will just offer my personal outlook on how I choose to respond to this quagmire.^↩

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2 And, frankly, I don’t think really any individual finds a perfect fit. To some degree, most every party affiliate likely has some degree of compromise in their affiliation to address some gap between a personally held position and the wider stance of the party at large.^↩

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3 From a Catholic Social Teaching perspective, I’d say stoking nuclear tensions, targeting and discriminating against vulnerable international populations (like Salvadorans, Haitians, etc.), and destabilizing American membership in multi-national organizations (ex: the UN, NATO) and agreements (ex: the Paris agreement, the Iran deal) have all hurt our national security and made us poor international citizens.^↩

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4 For additional excellent reading, throw it back to convention season in 2016 when Tim O’Malley wrote about leaving the Democratic Party after one last straw broke the proverbial camel’s back. Echoing many of these thoughts, a wise blogger recently commented, “A Catholic is a pilgrim without a sure home in modern politics.”^↩

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5 Personally, I’m a big fan of the consistent, stable, smart leadership of Governor John Kasich (R-OH). I also find similar qualities in Mitt Romney, Evan McMullin, and handful of others who seem to have resisted the delirium of Trump’s new right to retain more rational center-right and/or conservative principles.^↩

My Experience of Spiritual Imposter Syndrome

by Tim Kirchoff

When I applied to be a campus missionary with FOCUS, I did not particularly expect that they would accept me; I imagined the typical campus missionary as zealous and gregarious and thought of myself as cerebral and introverted. I figured that, even if I were not the right fit for them, the application and interview process might help me learn something about myself. I remember praying several times for the courage to be truthful instead of giving the interviewers the answers I thought they would want to hear; I thought that striving for honesty would make me more open to receiving whatever lessons God wanted me to learn from the interview process.

As I had guessed, I was not the right fit for FOCUS, but instead of emerging from the experience with greater self-knowledge, I found myself wracked with self-doubt. I had been persuaded that, not only did I not have the right personality to be a campus minister, but I lacked the kind of personal relationship with God that was a fundamental prerequisite for any kind of Christian life.

My final interviewer was the one who put this suggestion in my head. He thought that my responses in the previous stages of the interview process—including my personal testimony and answers to questions about my background and faith life—did not seem to indicate that my thoughts and actions stemmed from a personal encounter and relationship with Christ, a concept which he explained with a series of impressive-sounding quotes from Scripture and elsewhere. I could not be a campus missionary, leading college students into a loving personal relationship with Jesus, if I myself did not have that kind of relationship: as he put it, I could not give what I did not have.

After this conversation, I joined the other interviewees in the chapel, where we had time for personal prayer and reflection. When I arrived in the chapel, the daylight was beginning to fade; by the time we left the chapel for dinner, night had fallen. My thoughts followed a similar trajectory.

What were my reasons for going to Mass, or studying and defending the Church’s teachings? As far as I could tell, I hadn’t been acting out of a fear of Hell or desire for Heaven, but if I wasn’t acting out of a genuine love of God, either, then my motives must have been vain, selfish, and worldly. I may have wanted to think that I was serving God, but I must have been acting out of a self-righteous desire to do the right thing, or the inability to seriously contemplate any worldview other than the Catholic one, or a lazy refusal to abandon familiar surroundings and religious practices, or perhaps in order to surround myself with the sort of wonderful people I’d met in Notre Dame’s Catholic subculture—and in order to fit in, I fooled them as well as myself into thinking I was a good Catholic, when really I lacked the sine qua non of the Christian life.

Before I knew it, I had dismissed as vanity every attempt I had ever made to follow God’s will and concluded that any subsequent effort I could make would be equally vain. The only thing that could make my efforts meaningful was an encounter with Christ, something I could not provide for myself—and something which did not seem to be forthcoming on God’s end, either.

Some people come to know God through a single moment, a profound encounter with the person of Christ that is a wellspring for their faith for the rest of their lives. It is a gift that gives them both motivation and direction. It is a gift that I thought I needed.

I don’t know how many times in the next few months I tried to open my heart to God, but to no apparent effect. The thought would leap from the back of my mind— “is it finally going to happen?”—and derail my attempt at prayer.

I tried to keep going in my daily life as I had before the interview, but my confidence and motivation slowly diminished. I thought that further discerning or realizing my vocation was dependent on developing a relationship with God. The longer I waited, the harder it became to find joy or meaning in activities I had previously found fulfilling, particularly writing and attending daily Mass.

That summer, I discussed my interview experience with a few close friends. They managed to persuade me that the interviewer was both theologically and morally wrong to question my status before God in that way, and that I did not actually need the particular kind of divine encounter and conversion experience that the interviewer had in mind—yet my prayer life still did not return to normal, and in some dark corner of my psyche, an insidious doubt remained and festered, and it has emerged periodically to haunt me.

To give just one example: At a parish town hall meeting about what we wanted from a new pastor, I heard a number of fellow parishioners talking about continuing existing programs, or getting young people back in church, or getting the word out about the church, or various issues related to management and maintenance. Nearly every comment seemed oriented more toward sustaining the institution, or, at best, Catholicism as a tradition, rather than serving and being accountable to Christ.

I itched to stand up and point out that pattern, but I was afraid that I would not be able to give voice to my instinct that the institutional focus was insufficient without giving some sort of validation to the faulty view of relationship-with-God that the interviewer had imposed on me almost two years prior. I decided it was wiser to stay silent, but afterwards, I still wasn’t sure whether my thoughts about my fellow parishioners made me a hypocrite.

This past summer, two and a half years after the interview weekend, I received the closest thing to an answer to my doubts, the closest thing to consolation that I expect to receive in this life. It was an experience of God’s presence of an intensity that I had not felt since before the interview. The chief effect of this experience was the restoration of my confidence that God’s grace was at work in my life. This, in turn, gave me an odd sense of gratitude for everything I had endured as a result of the interview.

The sense that God had been with me throughout my period of doubt and struggle did not change the fact that I had suffered, but it did give meaning to the first few months of suffering and the following two years of doubts. God allowed me to suffer these doubts, but, through God's grace, I was protected from deeper doubts about either God or his Church. Moreover, God continued to work through me even as I doubted, and could turn even my doubts into tools by which I might serve the Kingdom. Carrying this burden has made me more capable of understanding—and hopefully making lighter—the burdens others carry.

This includes understanding, if only to a limited extent, why people who have suffered spiritual trauma sometimes have difficulty coming back to Church. Despite telling myself over and over again not to hold a grudge against FOCUS as a whole for the words of one member, or even a grudge against the interviewer himself, I still don’t know how I feel about that organization, and that was the primary reason I did not attend a conference they were hosting in my home city that I had no reason to doubt would be excellent. But even setting FOCUS aside, I felt uneasy even this past fall when I heard a homily that stressed the importance of a relationship with Jesus.

I suspect that, regardless of the status of my relationship with God, I will continue to have a strained relationship with that particular pastoral approach. The language of personal encounter and relationship—the language used by FOCUS and other evangelical-influenced circles within Catholicism—is still foreign and unnatural to me, and I suspect that many who embrace it are not sufficiently aware or wary of its shortcomings.

I do not tell my story simply to offer it as a case study about the potential pitfalls of integrating elements of evangelical spirituality into Catholic pastoral practice, but I think my story does serve that purpose. If sharing my story in this way helps to temper and nuance this increasingly common pastoral approach, it is just one more way in which my suffering can be made to serve a good purpose.

The kind of personal encounter and relationship which the interviewer so prized is a gift—but it is not a gift that God gives to everyone just for the asking. Some of us may, in the end, have to be content with forming our consciences according to the Church’s teachings and trusting that we are receiving God’s grace through the Sacraments.

When we open ourselves to God’s grace, we will not always recognize how or when He enters into our lives and work, and recognizing it in the same way evangelicals do ought not be a prerequisite for considering oneself a faithful Catholic or a follower of Christ.

Beauty beyond Aesthetics

by Jenny Klejeski

Perhaps you, like me, have participated in discussions regarding beauty in the liturgy. Perhaps, also, it has been your experience that these conversations often devolve into superficial arguments about the right vestments to be used, the type of music that is appropriate, and whether or not we should hold hands at the Our Father. Of course, these discussions have a place, as nothing in the Christian liturgy should be seen as incidental. However, when the argument deteriorates into the “progressive” Catholics accusing the “traditional” Catholics of being out-of-touch, materialistic, and stodgy and the “traditionals” accusing the “progressives” of being touchy-feely, modernist, and iconoclastic, the point has been missed entirely.

In considering the role of beauty in the liturgy, I would like to look at beauty as more than merely aesthetics—rather as an unseen reality that finds expression in the visible. The invisible God is in Himself, Truth, Goodness, and Beauty, and yet we only know of these things through concrete manifestations. The Vatican II document Sacrosanctum Concilium states that within the Church “the visible [is directed and subordinated to] the invisible” (§ 2). The document does not say that what is visible is unimportant, arbitrary, or unnecessary, but only that what is visible must be ordered toward the invisible.

Humans are both physical and spiritual beings. It is natural for our brains to respond positively to that which is aesthetically pleasing, but we also know instinctively that true beauty is something that goes deeper than externals. If you were to show this picture of Mother Teresa to any number of people and ask them if them if it is beautiful, I think you would be hard-pressed to find someone who said no, not simply because people are afraid of being perceived as wicked, but because they actually perceive something beautiful in it, even if they have difficulty naming that beauty.



If this image is beautiful to us, we must concede that external beauty (at least as it is commonly defined by society) is not the only measure of true beauty. What we see here is a moment of love–a tender embrace, a concerned expression, a certain humble simplicity. And, of course, most people who see the iconic face of Mother Teresa immediately call to mind what they know of her: a life of service that witnessed to a great inner beauty.

If you were to perform a similar experiment with a picture of St. Damien of Molokai, you would perhaps have a different experience.



The natural instinct when looking on this picture of the leprosy-stricken Damien is probably pity, perhaps even disgust. While his story is somewhat known among Catholics, his face is likely not recognized by most (in contrast to the image of Mother Teresa). If, however, one is to learn Fr. Damien’s story–how he devoted his life to the care of the lepers of Molokai, how he offered hope to the outcast, how he sacrificed himself in service to others–perhaps, then, one would admit the image to be beautiful. The horrible deformities on his skin, the pained look on his face, the cage under his clothing, are all marks of love. As we learn his story, our idea of beauty shifts. The internal, invisible reality of sacrificial love that Fr. Damien lived out became incarnate through the scars borne on his body.

Beauty, then, it seems can present itself paradoxically. That which at first does not strike as beautiful can become so when paired with Truth and Goodness. This is what Christ shows us in the Eucharist; there is nothing spectacular or eye-catching in what appears to be a small circle of bread. And yet, we know in faith that it is through the liturgy that “the work of our redemption is accomplished” (SC §2). The invisible reality of our redemption, the highest love, the most beautiful Truth, is made visible in Christ.



This image is, by most standards, repulsive. There is nothing externally beautiful about a man covered in wounds, nearly naked, suspended by nails in his hands. Those of us who know the story, however, and have been touched by the reality it expresses, recognize the most profound beauty of this image. It is Beauty incarnate.

Christianity, in its own paradoxical way, asks us to reexamine our paradigm of beauty. It does not ask us to abandon what we know by instinct is beautiful–the symmetrical, the proportional, the grand. Rather, it asks that we expand our definition of beauty. It is not a matter of either/or, but both/and.

Is beauty necessary in Christian liturgical practice? If, by beauty, is meant our feeble (though admittedly important) efforts to add material beauty to the liturgy, then no. We should always strive for the externals of the liturgy to worthily express the unseeable reality; however, even the most transcendent painting, the most ethereal singing, the most beautifully orchestrated motions cannot amply express the beauty inherent in the work of our salvation. The most ornate and the most sparse liturgies are both beautiful, by virtue of the fact that we have partaken in the work of our salvation.

The Interminable Parade of Plastic, Glass, and Aluminum Nickels… (Or, Why Spiritual Direction is Well Worth Your Time)

by Rob Goodale

When I was a kid, we had these massive trash cans in our garage, each roughly the size of a rhinoceros, where we would keep empty cans and bottles. These bottomless containers would collect cans and bottles for months at a time, their capacity mysteriously incongruous with their apparent size.

One of my favorite things about growing up in Iowa was that these empty cans and bottles were each worth a nickel. (This should show you how few noteworthy things there are about growing up in Iowa.) Legend has it this policy was the remnant of some long-forgotten state initiative to cut down on littering, or something like that.

When those preposterously large trash cans finally filled up, we would make pilgrimage to the local grocery store and insert all of our cans and bottles, one by one, into a machine that would count them for us and then give us five cents for each empty. This interminable parade of plastic, glass, and aluminum nickels routinely took the better part of an hour, and the machines were notoriously temperamental -- a slightly-too-crunched can or a bottle without the label could set them off, blinking and hollering and causing a scene. In the end, though, and after much drudgery, we floated on a feeling of ragged and hard-won triumph to collect our reward.

(My parents would often send us kids to make this menial sacrifice to the recycling gods, promising us that we could keep whatever money the machine gave us. I’m fairly certain that, when our miniscule profits were split three ways, we were barely within shouting distance of minimum wage. My parents, in their desperate desire to get us out of the house, were from time to time somewhat unscrupulous.)

Once, though -- and for the life of me I cannot remember what movement of heaven and earth prompted this deviation from the norm, though I know for a fact it was once and only once -- we took our semi-annual stockpile of cans and bottles to a redemption center on the other side of town.

We hauled these great massive balloons weighed down with empty pop cans and wine coolers in from the trunk of my car, prepared to do battle yet again with the electronic receptacle.

Only there was no receptacle, or at least not an electronic one. Instead there was a man, a lone grizzled warrior who seemed to live behind his work station. He heaved the elephantine sack of empties up, nearly over his weathered head, and dumped the entirety of our collection out onto the table before him.

I’ll never forget what came next: this old man, the sort of man who communicates largely through grunts and vague gestures, began rifling through the empties, sifting and sorting with hands like hummingbirds. I remember staring at him, wide-eyed and open-mouthed, as he performed a one-man symphony -- aluminum there, glass there, plastic there -- barely seeming to allow the dang things to touch his fingers before they were flying through the air to their proper places, and always finding their proper places.

The entire ritual lasted for less than five minutes, and then we were left to shuffle back to our car in dazed silence. It took longer for me to process what I had witnessed than it took for him to sift and sort six hundred containers and pay us our thirty bucks.

* * *

Most of the time, I treat the stories of my life like empty cans and bottles -- once they’ve been duly enjoyed, I toss them into a mammoth container in the garage, and once or twice a year (usually at the behest of a particularly zealous retreat director) I begrudgingly work my way through them, one at a time, in search of whatever value they might still have. The payoff usually doesn’t seem worth the effort.

My first experience with spiritual direction was not entirely unlike that fateful childhood trip to the redemption center. Instead of shoving one beleaguered story through the machine at a time, hoping it didn’t cause me too much trouble, I watched as a trained master dumped all of them out on the table at once, and began the hypnotic ritual of sifting and sorting.

It is a scary thing, to offer all my empties to somebody else and trust him to sort through them with me.

But, my oh my, what a marvel it is to watch. And I’ve discovered things I didn’t know were there, discovered numerous forgotten stories that have subtly shaped who I am. Armed with the knowledge of what my life has been, and the understanding of how each story connects with the others, I have come to see my life in a brighter light. It’s marvelous.

Spiritual direction isn’t therapy, and it’s not just for “holy people.” Anyone who has empty cans in their garage could use some help going through them. Sure, you could try trudging through them all by yourself, one-by-one, and you might even get something out of it. But entrusting an expert with your junk -- that’s when it really pays off. Those empties are valuable, you know. Even if you didn’t grow up in Iowa.

Nobody Will Share: Navigating a Pastoral Problem with Teens

by Dan Masterton

Author's Note: Ironically (or perhaps unironically), the crafting of the post was a bit rushed as I squeezed in writing around directing an overnight retreat. The content of this pastoral episode certainly warrants maximum context and nuance, and I hope other ministers will weigh in. That said, the shape and clarity of the post may leave a bit to be desired, but I hope the meat of it can evoke some dialogue. The process of these kinds of issues would be well suited to a podcast, or better yet a campus ministers' happy hour! Thanks to Restless Heart Tim for merciless editing in my aid while approaching deadline.

Two and a half years ago, when I started my current job, I was getting the lay of land, learning about norms and expectations for liturgies, service, and retreats. As someone with high expectations and the desire to make campus ministry a robust presence at a school, I have found things to be frequently lacking in schools’ retreat programs. I was also spoiled by my alma mater’s campus ministry, as our retreats were well-oiled machines with strong cultures of leadership and a tradition of student buy-in.

This is what I wanted for my students, so I dug into our retreats to try to sculpt them toward these ideals. Some of the things that are really important to me are peer leadership and student leadership formation, incorporating a creative mix of individual, small-group, and large-group discussion and activities, and making direct connections to our faith and what we believe. To help secure these goals and the strength and stability of the retreats for the school and students, I leaned on my adult colleagues by making them a part of the small-groups. I had seen this done when I was on high school retreats as a student, and I had participated in retreats as an adult in my first two high school ministry jobs. I believe so strongly in peer ministry, and I felt adult support in the small-groups gave student leaders a greater chance to succeed.

As our Kairos team approached our retreat, we started to dig into the major prep work -- sharing stories, choosing talk topics, writing and crafting talks, practicing discussion facilitation, and, of course, creating small-groups. I guide my student leaders through a process for forming groups, moving from randomization to the final product via group discussion based on students’ and adults’ insights into social dynamics and personalities; as usual, this process went nicely. But then the group then got tripped up by the row of the spreadsheet that denoted each group’s adult. They were not into this.

I had learned over the course of the school year how it was not the norm at this school to have adults in small-groups on Kairos (or in retreat small-groups in general). In fact, in the past, the Kairos schedule and leadership manual (if one could loosely call it that) were quite open-ended, and discussions unfolded quite sporadically with the adults spending that time totally separated from the small-groups. The students were used to their discussions happening with no adult presence, and they felt that including an adult in the room would ruin the conversations. “They’ll stay for our discussions!?... Nobody will share… It will make them feel uncomfortable…” The Student Leaders were nervous that retreatants wouldn’t share anything vulnerable with an adult present and worried that this would stonewall any chance to foster trust and openness in their small-groups.

The kids of Springfield unify against the adults in a fight against excessively strict curfews.
Our students were much more respectful and did not compose a song to antagonize us.

In the weeks leading up to this moment of reckoning, I knew that I wanted to change this norm but knew we had to proceed carefully. I had spoken at length with my two colleagues who were supporting me as director with the retreat team, and I picked their brains about past practices. Without blackballing anyone who had contributed in prior years, it seemed like adults’ not being in small-groups was largely about the laissez-faire style of direction in the past and less about any intentional decision to give the students freedom to share. Most importantly, it seemed like the reporting process in place for adults to refer students to counseling and school services for situations involving harm left much to be desired.

Rather than jumping the gun unilaterally, I reached out to a bunch of my friends who work in pastoral ministry with teenagers and neutrally asked for their opinion and rationales. Their replies were unanimous in support of adding adults to small-groups. Here are a few of their reasons, echoing much of my rationale and articulating more:

• "There is a tendency for groups to easily get off track and lose the essential integrating purpose of those sessions, and that has far-reaching effects. Likewise, an adult is much more prepared to handle and report disclosures of abuse, etc. I have also observed that an adult in the small groups reassures the student leader and allows them to meet and exceed their personal expectations as a facilitator."
• "I think it is nuts not having an adult in a small group. The student leaders are not equipped to handle mandated reporter type revelations that might come forth from students in the small group. I operate with the understanding that if a student reveals something, they are crying out for help. The adult leaders are all trained, mandated by the Archdiocese, to be mandated reporters. The adults are also not trained to counsel the students, but rather function more as first responders."
• "There are other sensitive issues that could come up that might have social implications on the kids. An example of this would be if a kid comes out as LGBTQ. Having an adult in the small group is a form of pastoral care for the students."
• "If you include faculty as participants, there is much more of a sense of being on the journey together, as opposed to them babysitting [the students]. They should [participate in] everything, while not monopolizing."
• "I think this all fosters a significant bond between students and faculty that can have long-lasting positive effects when everyone is back in the classroom or school building. Plus, I got great feedback from the adults that shaped how I prepared the schedule, trained leaders, etc. [for future retreats]."
• "I think that if adults are in the group, it should be an all or nothing sort of thing. If they're not present for all small group sessions, they don't fully immerse themselves in the retreat and group dynamic and may miss significant sharings that shape the group's character for the entire retreat."

Needless to say, I went forward with it. The leaders were quite upset initially, and after we had created the small-groups, they were definitely brooding. Sensing a divide emerging between the adults (who were on the same page with me now) and the leaders (who were clearly grumbling against us amongst themselves), we called an extra meeting to hash it out. It was one of the most combative teacher-student meetings I’ve ever been in. Everyone got to say their piece -- adults to explain much of the rationale outlined above and students to express their concern about openness -- and we parted to think on it.

Gradually, the leaders warmed up to it. Honestly, I think they still would have preferred to go on their own, but they understood our reasons and settled into the new norm. My big takeaway as a director was that, though they were worried about people remaining open and trusting with an adult, they also felt threatened in terms of their leadership of the group. While I needed to make the adults a part of their groups, I concluded that I needed to do it in a way that intentionally respected their autonomy. So we talked some more as an adult team, and we settled on parameters for our school’s new norm: adults would never be referred to as leaders in any of our binders, schedules, announcements, or directions; adults would be referred to as Adult Partners only, and when we referred to the Student Leaders and Adult Partners together, it’d be as the Leadership Team.

Our students go through applications, interviews, and prep work to become Student Leaders, and this new way of explaining and unfolding the adult role not only respected that intensive process but upheld the importance of student leadership in the way we hoped it would. Adults are asked to take a backseat to student leaders. Students are the primary discussion leaders and are in charge of facilitation. Adults are expected to honor that and, while sitting with the group and accompanying them through the elements of the retreat, only make periodic contributions that help the students lead effectively. We hope Adult Partners will offer conversations ahead of the retreat to establish a dynamic, contribute sporadic follow-up questions during discussions on retreat, offer debriefs after discussions to affirm and mentor leaders, and, overall, serve as an understated but affable presence to help ensure the direction of the group as they engage with the retreat.

This new definition both affirmed our students with more formal recognition of their primary role in the retreat and helped our adults, who wanted to be involved in retreats but sometimes bristled at having too much asked of them, another ask heaped onto the busy day-to-day life of teachers.

That first crew of adult-partnered Student Leaders did fabulously, and while they certainly retained some doubts about our change, they did appreciate the new dynamic for various reasons. I think they overall felt less pressure and more support, and as the retreat unfolded, the reality that students were developing comfort, sharing vulnerably, and participating fully allayed their initial concerns. While they may have missed the old dynamic, they rolled with the new way smoothly and utilized their adult partners effectively. Over two years later, this is now the norm on our retreats, and the different groups of participants, student leaders, and adults are working well together.

I’m grateful to friends and colleagues who expressed support when I reached out to them, grateful for their rationales that went beyond simply agreeing sycophantically. But I’m also grateful to those Student Leaders. They knew what they wanted and had the conviction to explain why. Their openness helped us make an informed decision and craft our new approach with their concerns in mind. While not a literal meet-in-the-middle compromise, it felt good to make a change that didn’t just impose an adult’s decision but considered the input of teenagers. We then implemented an approach that ultimately affirmed them in their peer leadership role.

On Parkinson's Disease

by Dave Gregory

This is one of those self-indulgent posts, one of those things that’s more therapeutic for me than for anyone reading. Please know that this isn’t an invitation to a pity party; hopefully I’ll come to some worthwhile conclusions by the end of this.

Over the course of the next eight months, Dave Gregory, Jr. (me), will be going through a bunch of life changes that should really be undertaken over the course of several years: getting married, moving into a first house, maybe starting grad school again (that is, if the local public university’s education program would be willing to tolerate somebody working on a dissertation in theological curricula), sponsoring his wife-to-be as she converts to Catholicism, and having his parents follow him across the country from their home in Queens that’s been passed down through five generations of family.

As with the vast majority of things in life, it’s a weird mixture of mourning and celebration, of moments radiating consolation along with deep troughs of darkness. Part of me wonders if I should be seeing a therapist for all the stuff that’s going on right now.

Fifteen years ago, my father, David, was diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease, a reality which he kept secret from the school at which he taught labor and employment law for three decades. Three years ago, his university put on a dinner to celebrate his many years of service to the school. As the Dorothy Day Professor of Labor and Employment law, my dad had founded a center for the study of such, run countless conferences on the intersection of Catholic Social Teaching and the law, and had most notably raised hundreds and hundreds of thousands of dollars for student scholarships. At the event, friends and former students roasted him (which included donning shaggy grey wigs and his characteristic Hawaiian shirts), and by the end of the evening, he remained glued to his seat. Parkinson’s has the tendency to cause “freezing,” so they brought the microphone to him for some closing thoughts.

“I hope I’ve taught my students how to live,” he remarked, “but a number of years ago I was diagnosed with Parkinson’s, and now I hope to be able to teach my students how to die.”

Parkinson’s Just Sucks

Three months ago, David walked into a hospital with some fluid in his lungs, only to contract two urinary tract infections in rapid succession and totally lose all mobility. Beyond debilitating a person’s capacity to get around, Parkinson’s also impairs the ability to speak, and a substantial minority of patients also get a weird form of dementia. Rather than destroy the memory, Parkinson’s dementia brings on perpetual hallucinations and delusions. While my dad had been seeing cats and dogs for some time, and would occasionally attempt to escape a restaurant because he thought terrorists were in the building, the urinary infections and his hospitalization intensified these psychotic episodes, making them almost constant. I flew back to New York a couple of times, only to find that the man I once knew could no longer walk, communicate, or maintain a connection with reality. A feeding tube had been inserted in his stomach, in order to avoid the aspiration of unwanted matter into his lungs, and thus one of David’s chief joys -- eating -- has been stripped from him.

Two weeks ago, David arrived at a Portland nursing home by air ambulance; my mom climbed out of an ambulance’s passenger seat on the rainy evening of December 18th, and medics rolled him out of the back. Wide-eyed and fearful, David surveyed his new surroundings, and once he gained an awareness of his whereabouts, he was happy to see me. He fell asleep as my mom and I took inventory of his belongings. In sum, all this means that the rhythm of my life now changes: almost every day, I’ll be spending a couple of hours at the nursing home after school, and much of my weekends as well.

The Temptation to Despair

The temptation to despair lurks in the midst of all this. My mother, Garris, a living saint -- to use a contradiction in terms -- has spent every day of the past several months with her husband. Spending time with David can be immensely frustrating; given that he’s generally almost impossible to understand, you’ve got to close the door and mute the television before leaning down next to his face to hear his words. Your nose meets the putrid smell of a mouth that’s difficult to clean (given the risk of aspiration, the staff avoids putting liquids in his mouth unnecessarily), and the words he struggles to get out often make no sense. His most persistent delusion is that he’s on a boat. I mean, the dude used to love boat and ferry rides, so I hope this is a welcome delusion. Nonetheless, all in all, it’s not fun. Here’s an example of one conversation, which is rather typical:

David: I won the Academy Award two years ago for best acting.
Garris: You mean from the American Academy of Arbitrators?
David: No.
Me: Like the Academy Awards for movies?
David: Yes.

In the midst of seeming madness, there are moments of lucidity, for which we must remain grateful. A few days after settling into the nursing home, my dad awoke from a slumber and asked me, “Did I flip?” In a rare moment, his face seemed at peace; his facial muscles did not distort, his jaw did not tremor, his tongue did not loll out, and he looked at me calmly. “Yeah,” I responded, and proceeded to tell him that he was in Portland, so that I could visit him every day.

It’s not that David forgets anything or fails to recognize the people around him, it’s just that he often believes things that simply aren’t part of reality. Last Wednesday, in one such brief period of clarity, when the disease loosened its grip on his body and mind, the following conversation went down:

David: So this is it?
Garris: Is what it?
David: Is this how my life ends? I have to eat this terrible food? What if I want a turkey sandwich or a good steak?

And he began breaking down. His face resumed distortion, though not thanks to the disease. Sadness filled his face, and he wept.

The Practice of Dying Well

In my freshman philosophy class, my professor wisely remarked that philosophy is the practice of dying well. That’s why I became a philosophy major, I think. I want to die well. My friend Eric offered the insight -- quite truly -- that having my dad out in Portland will provide me closure as he approaches the end. And while this is completely accurate for me, I’m not so sure it’s true of my dad. All the friendships and acquaintances we make fade into the distance as life draws to a close. The significance of our worldly accomplishments mean little when eclipsed by adult diapers, sponge baths, Hoyer lifts, and tube feedings. These miniaturized crosses cast a grim shadow over all that anteceded them. This is the nature of things. The years wax and wane, and the relationships we’ve forged wane more so than they wax. Loneliness settles in, and we realize that we die as we are born: largely alone.

In the aforementioned conversation, my dad tearfully acknowledged that Ingrid, my parents’ housekeeper of almost two decades with whom they’ve become quite close, had visited him more than anyone else in New York. He wasn’t placing fault or blame, I don’t think, but rather coming to grips with the situation.

David has repeated on several occasions that he wants to die. I don’t know if he has months or years to live (at least, I don’t think he’s on the brink of death), though I do know that our souls and our bodies are intimately connected. In some mysterious way, our bodies respond to our minds. Maybe this desire for death will speed the shutdown of his body.

I just hope that I am enough.

I hope that I can help him die well.

I hope he still has things to teach me.

A God of Surprises

by Erin M. Conway

One of the things I love the most about working with high school students is the way they surprise and delight me every day. There is no greater evidence of God’s presence in my life than the young men and women who enter my classroom and invite me to share in their journey. Whether it is through their unsolicited hugs, their indulgence in my less than hilarious jokes, their thoughtful writing, their courage in the face of a society that seeks to tear them down, or their simple willingness to show up day in and day out, they show me God’s love on a daily basis.

In his new book Barking to the Choir (my chosen Christmas break reading),¹ Father Greg Boyle, SJ writes of the homies he works with at Homeboy Industries: “I enjoy their company, for it is light and affectionate, and charming and good for the soul. To be with them ignites the contagion of God’s own tenderness. I never once feel them less than bright, wise, and courageous.” He says again later, “to sit at their feet has been nothing short of salvific.” The same can certainly be said of my students.

A group of students from the Saint Martin de Porres Class of 2018.

This year, I’ve been particularly surprised by the young men in my classroom. Although Saint Martin is co-ed, girls outnumber boys in our school at an almost 3:1 ratio by the time senior year comes around. On more than one occasion I’ve had only 2 or 3 boys in a classroom of 20 or more. During my first two years at Saint Martin, this skewed ratio meant that the girls in my classroom not only outnumbered the boys, but they also out-talked and out-shone them. I had such strong young women in my classroom that their male counterparts simply faded into the background and were rarely heard from. Even in their writing, the girls outshone the boys.

It would be insincere to say that at least a part of me didn't love the fact that young women were unafraid to speak their mind and take charge in my classroom. High school age girls often fade to the background in their classrooms, afraid of being perceived as “too smart.” However, I quickly discovered that the almost complete lack of male opinion or voice in our conversation was perhaps more harmful than helpful. A good classroom – and community – requires a diversity of voices and opinions.

The Class of 2018 has provided that diversity. In addition to the thoughtful, compassionate, and mature young women I’ve been blessed with as in the past, this year my classroom has benefitted from a group of young men who are unafraid to witness to their faith, make their voices heard, show compassion, share their stories, and challenge the conversation.

Recently in his writing, Nicholas,² one of these young men, described himself as “a kid who is trapped inside of an almost full, grown body.” He continued, “I’m full of so much energy, it is ridiculous. My energy comes from me wanting to see everyone happy.” I was floored when I read those words. I couldn’t have described him better if I had tried. He is unabashedly and delightfully himself. Every day when he passes me in the hallway he calls out “Conway!” and gives me a high five, usually with a plaid scarf tied around his head. His joy at seeing me never ceases to make my day, it delights and surprises me every time.

Earlier in the year, another teacher was asking Nicholas if he was still up to his old games – goofing off with friends and struggling to get work done on time (not because he couldn’t do it, but because the allure of just being that kid trapped inside an almost full grown body was too much). “Not this year! I’m killing it in Theology class” he proclaimed excitedly. “Tell her, Ms. Conway!” he called, looking down the hallway to me for assurance. I confirmed his words, grateful to be drawn into God’s own tenderness.

A senior and freshman pair up and talk about life
during a Big Brother Big Sister meeting.
Seniors have a chance to mentor and share their wisdom
with a new generation of Lions.

Lloyd is one of those young people who’s so much smarter than his peers that it sometimes gets him into trouble. He sees through the bullshit and is willing to call you out on it, teacher or not. But if you are real with him, if you listen, his words will astound you. He is, after all, just a kid, trying to navigate a world stacked against him. He wrote recently, “The countless pitfalls implanted in my community makes everyday a dice roll. I remember feeling trapped in a place that was slowly brainwashing me into believing that this was the only way to survive, but there's an entire world outside of mine. One where violence isn't a normality. I will not let my upbringing stop my uprising.” Nothing less than bright, wise, and courageous.

I breathed a sigh of relief this year when our college counselor told me that Lloyd called my class “one of the classes he actually likes” (can you hear the surprise in his voice?). I knew I was really “in,” however, when Lloyd borrowed, or more accurately, stole, my sunglasses off my desk one day and proceeded to wear them in all of his remaining classes. I was told after school that he had been telling his classmates that he picked them up “on our trip to Paris.” How could I not take delight in that? Light and affectionate, certainly good for the soul.

Perhaps the biggest surprise of my year has been a young man named Bernard. When I met Bernard at the start of the school year I expected a knucklehead. I can’t pinpoint my thinking precisely, perhaps it was because he reminded me of one of the middle school boys I taught in Baltimore or because I’m more judgmental than I’d like to admit, but if I’m being truly honest, I didn't expect much from Bernard. Thankfully, God knew better.

Pieces of my students' mission statements

that now hang on the wall of our classroom

as a reminder of our goals.

Bernard has proven himself time and again as a young man willing to feel and share emotion. One day during prayer intentions he shared a story of his neighbor who was had been diagnosed and was suffering from HIV/AIDs. Bernard’s voice caught as he shared his concern for his neighbor and asked for our prayers. His willingness to show vulnerability was a beautiful reminder God’s presence among us.

Perhaps the moment that will stick out most to me about Bernard, however, is his response to our final project of the semester. As the conclusion to our unit on vocation, I asked my students to write a mission statement describing who they believe they are called to be and what they are called to do in their lives. On the day the assignment was due, we had a Coffee House Reading where each student read their work aloud to their classmates while breaking bread (muffins) and drinking hot chocolate together.

Bernard began his own reading with the following words: “Before I became the man I am today, I was once a reckless, irresponsible, hell-raising, and immature teenager. Until the day I realized that there was an ounce of hope for me, and an ounce was all I needed to strive for this change.” Not only did Bernard’s mission statement blow me away with its thoughtfulness, but I was also touched by his response to the words of his classmates. He recognized the sacredness of the moment and was moved by it. “We should do this more often,” he told the class, “I love this.” Sitting at his feet was truly salvific that day.

Delight. Joy. Awe.

All of these young men, reminders of how much God loves me.

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1 Perhaps the only surprise in this revelation is that it took me over 6 weeks to start reading this book.^↩

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2 I’ve changed students’ names to keep them anonymous, but all the stories are as true as my memory allows them to be.^↩

The Gift of Obligation

by Laura Flanagan

Welcome to 2018! Whether you fully subscribe to the idea of a new calendar year as an opportunity for renewal, or simply prefer the excuse for celebrating the passage of time, I pray that your calendar year may be blessed as the beginning of new things.¹ In liturgical terms, this freshest day of the year is also the Solemnity of Mary, the Mother of God… which is nearly every year a “holy day of obligation.”

Obligation. Ugh. Everything else about today could be so exciting, and the Church has to throw in the term which draws from lips young and old the phrase, “Do I have to?” A hesitance to acquiesce quietly might resonate especially with anyone who was awake anticipating midnight and/or imbibed a bit much the evening prior.

Obligation has an unfortunate connotation in our modern parlance. In the terms of moral theology, Catholics specifically do not subscribe to a “morality of obligation,” where the laws of morality exist arbitrarily, merely so that there may be laws or authority established. As I tell my RCIA or Confirmation candidates, ours is rather a “morality of happiness,” where the rules exist in order to bring us all to a joy intended for us by the Lawgiver, who most definitely knows more about joy than we do. So into which category does the “holy day of obligation” fall?

A favorite phrase of St. Thomas Aquinas’ in the self-debate of the Summa Theologiae is whether something is “fitting.” Essentially, those beliefs which are “fitting” just make clear sense; they “fit” well within the framework of all else that God has revealed. Many doctrines from our Tradition are less biblically cited and more “fitting” with what God has revealed through Scripture, such as our few definitive doctrines about Mary. Although she is not technically the mother of the divine person who has existed from all eternity, that divinity has made himself unified with and inextricable from the human being she did carry in her womb, and so it is “fitting” that we can call her the Mother of God, and celebrate that gift of God’s self today.

It is fitting that we celebrate these great feasts in our Church with offering the Mass -- a week ago, Christmas; today, the feast of Mary, the MOG²; in six days, our weekly day of the Resurrection. What better celebration is there than the source and summit of our faith, and the communal offering of the Body of Christ? Where else should we be on a day made sacred? It is what is best for us. It is the nearest we come to heaven on earth, even when we fail to recognize it. It is what builds the Kingdom of God, especially if we do it with a joyful heart instead of dragging our feet.

It is fitting that we are obligated to confess to a priest to receive absolution (except in the most dire of situations), because we are physical beings who need to physically speak aloud our sin to another person to fully acknowledge it, and who need to physically hear the words of Christ, “I absolve you from your sins.” The obligation is for our benefit, not God’s. It is to make full use of our whole person as we were created. The sacrament is most fruitful when we do it with recognition of the physical catharsis as well as spiritual forgiveness it is intended to be, instead of dragging our feet.

Nothing universally mandated within our faith is a requirement merely for its own sake. The obligation is the Church’s way of telling us just how important and beautiful and joyful the occasion should be, and it is up to us to have the attitude to match.

Mustering that attitude is hard. As C.S. Lewis puts it in The Weight of Glory, “It would seem that Our Lord finds our desires not too strong, but too weak. We are half-hearted creatures, fooling about with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea. We are far too easily pleased.” ³ Truly accepting my Catholic obligations requires the humility to say to God and to his Church that I trust the obligation is intended for our good; indeed, for our great benefit; in fact, for a benefit greater than which I could have imagined. This is a concept at which we tend to recoil; per modern wisdom, no one knows what is best for us better than ourselves.

When in Echo, the program mandated that I have a spiritual director. I am sure that was the wisest practice, but the mere fact that it was obligatory seemed to me a huge overreach into my personal and spiritual life. I lost any joy in the process of finding one, and delayed it over and over again.

Now, as I find myself telling my two year old in my head, “If you would just listen to me when I ask you to do something, things would be so much better for you! For instance, we could have spent more time at the park if we had spent less time fighting the obligation to put on our shoes to go there.” Then I reflect on how God must feel this frustration constantly with us.⁴

I’m sure there are many things the average person would be perfectly pleased to do with the hour they’re obligated to spend at Mass, even those of us who should know what’s offered by the Mass. It was especially difficult to explain to the RCIA group -- i.e., those who are soon entering the Catholic Church and previously unused to such obligation - that this year’s abbreviated fourth week of Advent meant that two Masses “in a row” were required for the solemnities celebrated both on December 24 and December 25. There was even some general confusion among the parishioners.

“Really? We have to go both on the 24th and 25th?”

“Well, you could do the Saturday vigil on the 23rd and then a vigil on the 24th or during the day on the 25th, but essentially, yeah.”

Per the Catholic Memes Facebook page:⁵



We don’t ask for this double-decker offering at any other time (mainly because the only greater feast, Easter, is always a Sunday), so the fact that Mass was obligated both for Sunday and for the adjacent Christmas solemnity should not be seen as a burden which may interrupt our usual family traditions, but rather as an indicator of just how important are both our weekly oblation on Sunday and the extraordinary Christmas solemnity.

The Church likes to interrupt our complacency -- to surprise us out of worshiping our lesser idols -- even when the idol may be as well-meaning as “family time” or “tradition.” The fact that we are so pedantic as to maintain these Mass obligations as obligations when “people have stuff going on” is not pedantic at all, but radical. And radical is by nature difficult to accept. It’s hard when you’ve never seen the ocean.

This picture is of my niece and nephew exemplifying what is meant by the offer of a "holiday at the sea."

God has given us the reasoning behind it when we wouldn’t get there on our own. Our job as catechists – the job I tell the parents is also theirs as primary catechists - is to ensure that reason is sufficiently and actively echoed to our children and our neighbors. We must offer a joyful witness in fulfilling our obligations, as well as actually explaining the joy intended behind the obligation.

There were those at the time who couldn’t accept Christ’s obligation to lay down his temporal life for their eternal lives, because it wasn’t what they had hoped from the promised Messiah. It certainly was not the nationalistic champion for which they hoped - it was better. The plan of God was less instantaneous in gratification, but infinitely greater in value than they could have dreamed. In their disillusionment, they blinded themselves to the incredible possibility of the full Kingdom of God. They preferred their mud pie. While they saw themselves as radicals, they could not accept how radical the Messiah actually was.

Accepting our obligations cheerfully is a road to where we can see with new eyes. Saint Paul references Psalm 19 as he prays for the Ephesians (as he is wont to do with all his Christian communities): “May the eyes of your hearts be enlightened, that you may know what is the hope that belongs to his call, what are the riches of glory in his inheritance among the holy ones, and what is the surpassing greatness of his power for us who believe.”⁶

If you are in the habit of making resolutions at this time of year, perhaps resolve to find the joy intended behind the practices you currently do out of obligation.⁷ And next year, when the Solemnity of Mary, the Mother of God is again obligatory, go and celebrate with even greater fervor than you rang in the New Year.

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1 For me, possibly the beginning of all sorts of things - I’m three days away from my due date, which any doctor or mother would simply put in probability terms as “could be any day now.” Perhaps it is this day where our family grows to four persons easily visible.^↩

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2 If this acronym makes you balk, it probably should. Our parish secretary once found BVM as the acronym for “Blessed Virgin Mary” in our liturgical desk calendar, and thought Mary deserved better than the appellation “BVM.” So naturally, we joked about her other titles, such as the MOG… a shorthand which often appears in a different context entirely. Yet... Mary is also very much the Mother of the Groom, if you think about it.^↩

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3 Based on previous RH footnotes, this quote is apparently a shared favorite with Rob.^↩

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4 Then I realize I have compared myself to God, and feel terribly uncomfortable. He is the one who gave us the image of God as a parent, though, so I’ll let it be.^↩

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5 This meme would be a bad example for me personally -- I enjoyed organic chemistry both in high school and college.^↩

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6 Ephesians 1:18-19a^↩

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7 Honestly, I'm grateful for the clear direction provided with this particular obligation of Mass. Christ and his Church also obligate us to serve the poor, steward creation, and recognize the human dignity of each person, and I have a far murkier picture of how best to go about fulfilling those. ^↩