The Middle of What?

Have you ever asked yourself what the "Middle Ages" are supposed to be in the middle of? The answer tells us something about our biases.

See, at the time of the Renaissance and the Enlightenment (or, as my brother likes to call it, "the Endarkenment"), European intellectuals began to rediscover knowledge from the ancient Greeks and Romans that had been lost or neglected. They came to see themselves as heirs to this classical heritage, and looked upon their predecessors of the most recent centuries as poor benighted souls who had toiled away on matters that were at best insignificant and at worst frivolous superstition. So they termed the ancients as the "classical" period or "antiquity," and themselves as "modernity" or "the Enlightenment." And what was left in between? Those ho-hum "middle ages."

Basically, it's the historiographical equivalent of "flyover country."

Yeah, never mind that medieval Christian Europe invented the hospital, the university, and the fundamentals of the scientific method (thank you, Bishop Robert Grosseteste and St. Albert the Great). Never mind that they kept alive and furthered the thought of Aristotle. Never mind that they preserved the Roman legal system which still serves as the root of European law today. We'll just ignore all that. Silly moderns. What do they know anyway?

A Big Thanks!

If I wore a hat, I would tip it to Mark Shea for plugging my blog on his own; I may need to go get one just for the occasion.

For those of you who are new to my blog, here are a few more oldies but goodies:

--reminding journalists of a few basic principles of their craft, using the papal interview as an example

--on the proper usage of the word "tolerance"

--why rich people need our prayers

--salvation history in three minutes or less

--how words and phrases like "information," "takes one to know one," and "haters gonna hate" imply certain philosophical principles

Enjoy!

How Busy Are We?

We lead busy lives. We're constantly stretched and pulled by commitments here and there, by work and meetings and practices and rehearsals and events and parties and gatherings and projects. Our tools for making our lives easier, our smartphones and laptops and iPads and such, don't seem to ease our burdens, but rather multiply them. We don't finish our tasks and then relax--we make more things to do!

Let me offer a question for reflection, aimed as much at myself as anyone else:

To what degree are we busy... and to what degree are we distracted?

Yes, business and obligations and the never-empty email inbox can put a lot of demands on our time. But think: how much time during our "busy" days do we spend playing Candy Crush or Angry Birds? (Not my vice.) Watching YouTube videos of old Royal Rumble matches? (Guilty.) Binge-watching TV shows on Netflix? (Yeah, sometimes.) Writing posts for your rinky-dink blog? (Hey, wait a second!)

Now, there's nothing wrong with these activities in and of themselves. I'm not saying one is morally defective simply by doing any of these things. BUT if there are certain responsibilities we're shirking in favor of these activities, maybe we should think twice about how we spend our time?

My main candidate in mind for the neglected party is prayer. And I accuse myself first and foremost. I'm rubbish at making time for prayer during the day, and I tell myself, "Oh, I'm just so busy!" Really? Really? I managed to watch five episodes of Doctor Who in a day, but I couldn't spend fifteen minutes praying the Divine Office, or the Rosary, or just sitting in silence and opening my heart to God?

I know I can do better about this, and if this is an issue for you, dear reader, I know you can, too. All we have to do is do it. Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go trawl through my Facebook feed for an hour....

Preserved from All Stain: How's that?

Though December 8 is usually the Solemnity of the Immaculate Conception, this year, because the date falls on a Sunday of Advent, the feast is transferred to today, December 9. I'm sure you heard this at Mass yesterday, but it serves as a handy opening to this post, so indulge me, will ya? I just wanted to mention one aspect of this wonderful dogma you may not have thought of before.

First, though, the annual reminder: the "immaculate conception" refers to MARY being conceived without original sin. It does not refer to Jesus' virginal conception. I understand that some of our Protestant brethren regularly use "immaculate conception" to refer to the miraculous circumstances of Jesus' coming into the world--I guess they just liked the term and wanted to keep using it since they disbelieved in its original content.

Here's the problem with that, though: macula means "stain," or "dishonor," so an "immaculate conception" would mean "a conception without stain or dishonor." This makes perfect sense if we're referring to the stain of original sin. But if we're referring to the Virgin Birth of Jesus? What stain or dishonor has been avoided by that "immaculate conception"? It implies that the sexual act, which normally is that which produces a child but which was miraculously dispensed with in this case, is the "stained" or "dishonorable" thing. This puts the conjugal act in quite a negative light, doesn't it? Now that marvelous act in which a man and woman come together to cooperate with God in creating a new life suddenly is portrayed as a dirty and wicked performance of a duty necessary for propagating the species, but nothing more. This is hardly a fitting way to describe one of God's great gifts to humanity.

OK, so perhaps there were two aspects of this dogma I wanted to consider today. Here's the other. The Blessed Virgin Mary, by a singular grace of God, was kept free from the stain and the effects of original sin from the first moment of her existence. The Church believes, further, that she was preserved from all personal sin during her life. But hold on: if Mary never had any sin, and Jesus saves us from our sins, does that mean that Jesus is not Mary's savior? Does that mean Mary didn't need a savior? Does that mean "Christ died for all humanity... except Mary"?

No! Mary was indeed saved by the sacrifice of Christ on the cross, but in a unique way. An analogy would help here. Let's say there's a large pit in your path. There are at least two ways someone could be saved from the pit: 1) after someone's fallen into the pit, they are pulled out of it; or 2) someone is prevented from falling into the pit in the first place. Everybody falls into the pit of sin and needs to be pulled out by the cross of Christ. In Mary's case, though, the cross of Christ (that is, the grace of God merited by Christ's sacrifice) bars her way and prevents her from ever falling into the pit. Mary is saved by prevention, not by rescue.

Now, you might say, "How could Jesus have saved Mary before he was born?" Well, keep in mind that Jesus is identical to the Second Person of the Trinity, the Son of God, so He existed before His Incarnation. "Yeah, fine," you might reply, "but he hadn't died on the cross yet. How could the grace of the cross be applied to Mary before it had happened?" Time is no object to God. God does not exist in time. He does not experience time in a linear sequence as we do. All moments are present to God, so it is no more trouble for Him to apply the merits of Christ's sacrifice to Mary or Abraham or Moses or anyone else who lived before Christ than it is for Him to apply it to those who live after Christ. And He doesn't even need a ship sling-shotting at warp speed around a star or a TARDIS to do it.

Fun fact: some theologians in the Church's history have believed that St. Joseph, St. John the Baptist, and the prophet Jeremiah were all sanctified in the womb, having the stain of original sin removed after their conceptions but before their births. With the latter two, certain Scripture passages suggest this: for Jeremiah, "Before I formed you in the womb, I knew you, before you were born, I consecrated you" (Jeremiah 1:5); with St. John the Baptist, Luke 1:41 says that John leaped in Elizabeth's womb and Elizabeth was "filled with the Holy Spirit." And with St. Joseph, it seemed fitting to some theologians that he who was to be the guardian of the Virgin and the protector of the Christ Child should be strengthened for this task (and perhaps also prepared for the life of perpetual virginity he was to lead with his holy wife). Neat, eh?

Fake Grammatical Forms

There may be perhaps four other people in the world who will find this post interesting or amusing or engaging or not sleep-inducing, but the fact that they are few is no reason to rob them of their enjoyment. Here I present fake grammatical categories which label irregular but common usages of speech.

Interrogative Imperative: a command that looks like a question. Often used by annoyed teenagers.

Example: The question "Are you done talking?" is in actuality the command "Stop talking."

Interrogative Declarative: a statement that looks like a question. Often used by, well, everyone.

Example: "You're going to drink that expired milk? Are you stupid?" Here, "Are you stupid?" is meant to make the statement, "You are stupid."

Super-Comparative: a middle ground between the comparative (e.g. more fun) and the superlative (e.g. most fun). To be used when something is more fun than "more fun," but is still not the "most fun."

Example: "This is even more funner than the other ride!"

Hyper-Superlative: a degree beyond the superlative (e.g. most fun). To be used when "most fun" just isn't fun enough; often requires an irregular superlative (e.g. "funnest").

Example: "That ride was the funnest ever... but this ride was even more funnest!"

Semi-inclusive Pronouns: a pronoun which refers to some members of a group but not the entire group. Used by cliques of middle school girls.

Example: "We're going to the mall after this." "Oh, great, which mall?" "Oh, not you; we are."

And a serious grammatical question:

Why do the same people who insist on gender-specific terms in most cases, e.g. "Congress-person" instead of "Congressman," also insist on abolishing gender-specific terms when those terms come from another language? Why do we increasingly hear people refer to both males and females as "actors" or "rectors" when there is a specific term for a female in those roles, that is "actress" and "rectress"? (Thankfully we still have "waitress" in use.) Why do some get offended at "being called a man" in their own language but not in another? Perhaps they just don't know? Thankfully some people still use these nouns properly--my fiancee, when giving directions while I'm driving, insists on being called the "navigatrix."

Friends, what other fake grammatical forms are we missing?

Hits and Highlights from Christian Iconography

A few fun bits from class...

If you see a picture of a saintly figure with a dog's head, don't worry: it's not an attempted Christianization of the Egyptian god Anubis, nor a hagiographical depiction of the Wolfman, nor an early rendering of Chewbacca. It's actually... St. Christopher! No, seriously! See, apparently some translators at some point mistook the word that was describing him as a "Canaanite" (i.e. someone from the land of Canaan) to be calling him a "canine" (i.e. a cute little pooch). So, naturally, instead of thinking, "Hmm, did I translate that word correctly?" they concluded that St. Christopher was an overgrown Ewok. Other depictions of St. Christopher portray him more akin to Andre the Giant (or maybe Hillbilly Jim)....

Have you ever seen the pawnbrokers' symbol? Do you know where that comes from? St. Nicholas! According to the legend, there was a man who was too poor to be able to give his daughters in marriage (i.e. he had no money to provide a dowry for them). He was going to send them into prostitution. St. Nicholas, to prevent this, on three successive nights, dropped a bag of gold through the man's window, providing him the money to let his daughters get married. I think the connection with pawnbrokers is that, by doing this, St. Nicholas sort of "bought back" the daughters from prostitution. This also explains why St. Nicholas is the patron saint of prostitutes. No, seriously. Hey, everybody needs a patron saint, right? ....

You may have noticed that a fair number of saints are depicted together with weaponry of various kinds: swords, flaying knives, spears, arrows, etc. Not exactly the peaceful image of holiness, is it? Are they "soldiers for Christ"? Is this what we mean by the "Church Militant"? Ought we to picture roving bands of saints, armed to the teeth like a 19th-century street gang, laying the smackdown on all the pagans and sinners within arms' reach? No! They aren't showed with these instruments because they used them, but because they suffered by them. Martyrs are often shown with the instruments of their martyrdom, as a visible display of what they suffered for the name of Christ. St. Paul was beheaded by a sword. St. Thomas was killed by a spear. St. Bartholomew was skinned alive with a flaying knife. St. Sebastian was shot with arrows. These are the symbols of their victory over death in Christ. Actually, Christ himself is often depicted with the instruments of his torture: the scourge, the nails, the crown of thorns, etc. These are called the arma Christi, or "arms of Christ," because the serve as his coat of arms, his royal banner, displaying the weaponry by which he conquered Satan--not by using them, but by undergoing their torment. They remind us of the horror of the Passion, which makes the glory of the Resurrection that much more glorious.

A Plea to Pastors

Some recent news stories have reported an increase in the number of people going to confession since Pope Francis ascended to the Holy See. This is a wonderful thing to hear, and we ought all to pray that it continue. If the spiritual life is likened to the bodily life, then this sacrament is medicine for a sick soul, and all of us are suffering from one sort of spiritual illness or another. We all could use a little booster shot of God's grace now and then!

To extend the analogy, it would certainly help if the clinic were open more often. As much as we talk about the vital importance of this sacrament to the spiritual life, most parishes offer confessions very infrequently: most typically, for somewhere between 30 and 60 minutes right before the vigil Mass on Saturday afternoons. But life is busy, and Saturday afternoon seems a busier time than most: you might have to work, or coach a Little League team, or it may be the only time you can work on that home improvement project without the neighbors complaining. There are 10 thousand and eight reasons why any 60 minute block of time may be unavailable to you in a given week.

And in my experience, often the priest shows up 10 or 20 minutes late. Can you imagine a health clinic that only offered flu shots once a week for 45 minutes? Yes, most parishes also say you can make an appointment to have your confession heard. But have you ever tried actually doing this? Whatever time you suggest, odds are the pastor is in a meeting.

God bless our priests, they're often over-extended and over-worked, I know. My point here is not to blame them. My point is to say that if the Church is serious about its words on wanting the faithful to avail themselves of this sacrament more frequently, parishes should make this sacrament available more frequently. The Church teaches us that the Mass is the "source and summit of the Christian life," and it backs this up by offering four, five, six Masses during the weekend, giving people as much of a chance as possible to partake of the Supper of the Lamb. The Church also teaches that the sacrament of Penance is sorely needed for our spiritual health, and it backs this up by... 45 minutes a week? That doesn't add up.

The leadership of the Church knows this, I think. In his 2002 apostolic letter motu proprio Misericordia Dei, soon-to-be-St. John Paul II, as part of an effort to effect a "vigorous revitalization" of the sacrament, directed the bishops and priests of the Church to ensure that this sacrament be made more widely available to the faithful:

"Local Ordinaries, and parish priests and rectors of churches and shrines, should periodically verify that the greatest possible provision is in fact being made for the faithful to confess their sins. It is particularly recommended that in places of worship confessors be visibly present at the advertised times, that these times be adapted to the real circumstances of penitents, and that confessions be especially available before Masses, and even during Mass if there are other priests available, in order to meet the needs of the faithful."

Now, there are lots of reasons that the number of people partaking of this sacrament has been down in recent decades. The biggest, I'm sure, is the loss of the sense of sin, the dulling of our consciences, the defining-down of sinfulness to "I'm basically a good person... I mean, it's not like I kill people... often." This problem also needs to be addressed. But I'm convinced of the Field of Dreams Principle: "If you build it, they will come." If you offer confession more often, more people will participate. I know that priests are often extraordinarily busy, but would it be that much of a demand on your time to offer other half hour periods during the week, three or four days--heck, maybe every day? Look at it this way: if people come, fantastic, you've been a Good Shepherd and reconciled them to God; if people don't come, you can use the time as a daily period for spiritual reading, prayer, homily prep, etc. Work on your crossword puzzle if you want. But be there for us. You are doctors of grace and we need your ministrations.