Member
quote:
On the one hand, you seem to be saying that you love the Church. On the other hand, you seem to be saying that you are afraid of the Magisterial arm of it. How can love coexist in a situational context of fear?
As it did in Bethlehem or the Garden of Gethsemane.
There are many emotions which color all of our relationships, whether between parents and children, between spouses, between teachers and pupils, between bosses and employees, believers and God. These emotions make for a strange admixture, no doubt. In love, we aren't dealing only with emotions, or even only memory and understanding, but rather with a matter of the will (which trumps emotions every time).
The visible structure of our Pilgrim Church, like any individual in relationship to another, asks of us: Be patient, God isn't finished with me yet. We are all, indivdually, on journeys of transformation. Is it not to be expected then that, collectively, we also journey as a People of God? Thus, we love the Church with all of Her imperfections, just like we love our spouses, children, teachers, neighbors and friends. We look forward to the purging of every element of fear, of alienation, of estrangement and where every breach is repaired.
Certainly, our relationships will remain tainted by fear, by anger, by guilt, by pain, by loneliness, by dejection and rejection, and so on and so forth. True enough, love on planet Earth does indeed coexist in many contexts with wide-ranging human imperfections. So, too, in the Church.
There is a certain measure of pie in the sky idealism that we don't want to let go of that, if nurtured properly, can keep us focused on our beatific vision and keep us grounded in true beatitude. An imbalanced measure, however, can degenerate into an ever-elusive romanticism that remains jaded and disaffected, so scandalized by the human condition that it, like Judas and the Zealots, misses the message of the Incarnation. We are a holy and beloved people. Love coexists with every form of evil. Forgiveness is that aspect of love that conquers the evils of estrangement, alienation and disaffection. These are elements that make a loyal opposition possible.
The problem, under consideration presently in other threads, is well set forth in Catholic Theologians & Academic Freedom by By James E. Biechler. Some very edifying responses to the problem are set forth in To Norway with Love: Toward the Kindom of God and in Why I’m Still A Catholic by Andrew Greeley, who uses the more genteel term, corrupt thugs, rather than something as scathing as fascists.
This is not to say that some people who may have been so wounded by a relationship (parental, spousal, ecclesial) should not get out and get and remain far away in order to heal. This is just to shed some light on why some people remain in the Church and thrive there despite its imPerFEcshUNZ. The gifts of Eucharist, Reconciliation, the spiritualities of the Jesuits, Carmelites, Benedictines, Dominicans, Franciscans et al, the Thomistic metaphysics, the soaring liturgies and hauntingly beautiful chant, the iconography and folk songs, the universal catholicity and beautiful diversity, the approach to scriptural exegesis and scientific endeavor, and on and on and on and on --- She, alone, has these Words, to whom can we go?
The trick is to drop the false dichotomies that suggest the Incarnation is too scandalous to believe, to recognize that His Eucharistic Presence in this or that imperfect person is an invitation for our own embrace and to let every imperfection become a signpost to He, Who, alone, is perfect. That's Why You Can Disagree and Remain a Faithful Catholic.
I hope we can thus move beyond this consideration of our Editors' psychological states and take them off the defensive for their anonymity. Meanwhile, back to why we disagree on the Church's teaching regarding ABC. Please.
Dutifully,
momZ
[This message was edited by Momz on November 29, 2002 at 12:12 PM.]
[This message was edited by Momz on November 29, 2002 at 12:15 PM.]
