Category Archives: Theology

Eschatology, Theology

Falling through the cracks…the dissolution of self

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revstephenfreeman
-by Fr. Stephen Freeman

“… human nature is created and so, is unavoidably mortal; with death man’s entire psychosomatic being comes to an end. All of his psychological and mental functions cease to function: his self-conscience, reasoning, judgment, memory, imagination, and desire. Man is no longer able to function through the parts of the body in order to speak, to call to memory, to distinguish, to desire, to reason, to be impassioned, and to see” -St. Anastasios of Sinai (Odigos, Migne P.G. 89, 36).

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The first time I read the words of St. Anastasios, I felt like my life was falling between the cracks. To think of my self-consciousness, reasoning, judgment, memory, imagination, desire, etc., ceasing to function seemed pretty much like the end of existence. If I were to lack such things what or who would I be? Doesn’t the immortality of the soul promise the continuation of such things?

Time passes and many things begin to happen within self-awareness. I can begin to see that my memory is not so reliable. I understand that I remember the big things, and I’m not concerned with the small things – that I can’t remember why I originally came into a room doesn’t disturb me. What disturbs me comes more commonly from what I do remember. I like to tell stories. The point of an event has often seemed more important than the event itself. But careful reflection reveals to me that sometimes the stories are not quite accurate – and for the life of me – I cannot really tell whether the story that I remember and the event which occasioned it are the same thing. Worse still, I cannot recall the differences.

And what of desire and thought? They change from moment to moment. The desires that I carried to bed are never the ones with which I wake. Where is the center of the self? And what of eternal life?

But someone will say, “How are the dead raised up? And with what body do they come?” Foolish one, what you sow is not made alive unless it dies. And what you sow, you do not sow that body that shall be, but mere grain– perhaps wheat or some other grain. But God gives it a body as He pleases, and to each seed its own body. (1Co 15:35-38)

There is a drive to distance ourselves from the body – for we recognize that the body’s dissolution in the earth will betray us. It will cease to be “me,” and become some other dust. And so we put our hope in the soul, though we cannot fathom what we mean. But it lingers as a repository for the future, the guarantee of my continued existence.

Of course, I am troubled when I watch the occasional dissolution of the brain in this life – a friend who has suffered a stroke – a family member with dementia – and I see that a small insult to the brain removes almost everything I imagined to be the person. So what is the job of the soul and how does it relate to the frailty of my flesh?

Apparently what I really want is something to which I can point and proclaim that its survival guarantees my survival. Some speak of the soul and its immortality in a manner that makes our identity itself inherently immortal. But though the Church teaches that the soul is immortal – it does not teach that the soul is immortal by nature. Like all that is not God, the soul is a created thing. As created, it comes from nothing. Its nature would be – nothing.

The answer to these perplexing questions can be found only in God.

If then you were raised with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ is, sitting at the right hand of God. Set your mind on things above, not on things on the earth. For you died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ Who is our life appears, then you also will appear with Him in glory. (Col 3:1-5)

Apparently, I am already dead. Thus I am concerning myself with the wrong thing. If, in Christ, I am already dead, then what and who is my life that is now “hidden with Christ in God?”

I stand in a strange position. The identity I know, the memories I wish to retain, my self-consciousness, reasoning, judgment, imagination and desires, apparently belong to a dead man, while there is a stranger bearing my name whose life is hidden with Christ in God.

The Cross is the destruction of the ego. The memories, an edited selection of events assembled to tell a “story of me,” are apparently insufficient for the construction of a life. At present they construct a simulacrum, an inferior and insubstantial version of the real thing. The same is true of the desires and imaginations, the faulty reasoning and mis-judgments. They are not the treasures of an identity to be preserved at all cost. It is not the disappearance of these ephemera that will be marked by a tombstone. They were only feeble noises and sterile protests that longed for true existence. That ego wanted to belong, to be loved. It judged itself as wrongly as it judged others. It imagined injuries where none existed and desired lives that were never to be. The truth, were I to admit it, is that I would not want an eternity as such an ego. Just the few short years I have borne with it have been torture enough.

Eternity cannot be anything to be desired if it does not come with freedom. The ephemeral ego is not freedom – it is an impossible past and historical embarrassment.

Jesus answered them, “Most assuredly, I say to you, whoever commits sin is a slave of sin. And a slave does not abide in the house forever, but a son abides forever. Therefore if the Son makes you free, you shall be free indeed” (Joh 8:34-37).

But what about me? What will become of me? If the ego is lost what is saved? Who is this new life?

To him who overcomes I will give some of the hidden manna to eat. And I will give him a white stone, and on the stone a new name written which no one knows except him who receives it. (Rev 2:17)

If then you were raised with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ is, sitting at the right hand of God…(Col. 3:1).

For whoever desires to save his life (τὴν ψυχὴν = soul) will lose it, but whoever loses his life (τὴν ψυχὴν=soul) for My sake will save it. (Luke 9:24)

The hidden stone is the great treasure buried in a field, the which, if a man finds, he sells everything he has and buys it. So why do we labor for that which is perishing?

Addendum: The orientation of our life towards the past – the remembered self – is a sort of anxiety – a fear of death itself. The truth of our existence would seem to be in something that is yet to come – something towards which we are moving. Heaven is not the recovery of the past but “behold I make all things new.” It is rushing to meet us.”

Love,
Matthew

Christology, Cross, Ecclesiology

The Church is the Cross through history

revstephenfreeman
-by Fr. Stephen Freeman

“The Church is the Cross through history.

St. Paul wrote that he had determined to restrict his preaching to the Cross. (1 Cor. 2:2) This was not an effort to diminish the gospel. Rather, it was an effort to rightly understand the gospel. One of the great temptations of Christianity is to allow itself to become a “religion,” that is, to serve whatever role that religions of any sort play within a culture and the life of an individual. Despite every atheist protestation, religion abides – and if there is not one that is inherited, then a culture will invent new ones.

St. Paul’s concentration on the Cross – Jesus Christ crucified – was a direct affront to religion itself. To understand this, though, requires that we see the Cross for what it is. Christianity as religion reduces the Cross to a moment in time, a historical moment that is celebrated for its importance. On the Cross, Christ died for our sins. This simple statement, however, can itself be reductionist. “Christ died, I’m forgiven, now I can get on with my life.” St. Paul has something very different in mind. He says:

“I am crucified with Christ, nevertheless, I live. Yet not I, but Christ, lives in me. And the life that I now live in the flesh, I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me.” (Gal. 2:20)

The Cross is more than the single event in the life of Christ. It is the single event for every believer, lived moment by moment, at all times and all places. It is the very center of our being.

In Holy Baptism, we are not merely “joining the Church,” nor are we merely “washing away our sins.” Holy Baptism is not a rite of membership. Rather, Holy Baptism is being plunged into the death of Christ (Romans 6:3) and raised into the likeness of Christ’s resurrection. Believers are given a Cross to wear as part of their Baptism – a token to remind us that our new life is nothing other than living in union with the Crucified Christ.

That reality informs the commandments of Christ. We forgive our enemies because Christ forgave His enemies on the Cross (“Father, forgive them. They know not what they do.”) We share what we have with others (in the Cross we can live as though we own nothing). It represents the definition of love: “Husbands love your wives even as Christ loved the Church and gave Himself for her.” (Eph. 5:25).

It is the abandonment of the Cross (or its redefinition as “religious” event) that betrays the Church and its primary identity. It was inevitable, it seems, that the Church would eventually become the “religion of the empire.” It is a position that Christianity, in nearly every form, has endured since the 4th century. There is, of course, a critique of Christianity that its very essence was betrayed in the tolerance given by Constantine and his successors. I do not agree that the Church’s essence changed – but it would be dishonest to think that its essence was not tempted and tested. Some failed the test.

Power is an ever-present temptation in this world. It offers the notion that we can, by force (of arms or law), achieve our desired ends. That was true under emperors and tsars, and remains true within modern democracies. When Pilate questioned Jesus regarding the nature of His kingdom, Christ was very clear that His kingdom “is not of this world.” He adds that were His kingdom of this world – then His disciples would arm themselves and fight. That many Christians through the ages have imagined armed struggle to be an important element of the Christian life is a testament to our confidence in the weapons of this world and our lip-service to the Kingdom of God.

The Church is the Cross through history. The reality of the crucified life has never disappeared from among us. Before Constantine, God brought forth the movements of monasticism. While Bishops were facing the temptations of imperial blandishments, the monks and nuns were refuting every worldly option. At times, the presence of monastics created a tension within the Church. The crucified life is seen most clearly when it stands out against a background of worldliness.

I think that times of turmoil, such as we endure at present, have their own form of imperial temptation. We long for order, for normalcy, for stability. That longing can make us easy prey for the various solutions offered by the world. There is an interesting phrase in the Liturgy of St. Basil. The priest prays for God to “make the evil be good by Thy goodness.” The temptation within our hearts would likely rephrase that prayer – simply saying, “Make the evil be good.”

God has never offered us any solution other than the Cross. St. Paul readily admitted that the Cross appears to be “weakness” and “foolishness.” The Cross is a clown in a world of scholars. He nevertheless declares it to be the “wisdom and power of God.”

As we gather to recall Christ’s death on the Cross we should rightly recall the Cross within us. We should recall that the weakness and foolishness of God is the path we have been commanded to walk. If we tremble at the thought, even saying, “Let this Cup pass away from me,” then, it would seem, we will have gotten it about right.

The Church is the Cross through history. It is the only gate to Pascha’s (Easter’s) paradise.”

Love,
Matthew

Moral, Suffering, Theology of the Body

Suicide – Jn 11:25


-by Casey Chalk

“A new federal suicide prevention hotline has witnessed a significant increase in calls and texts, with 154,585 more calls, texts, and chat messages in November 2022 compared to the old national lifeline in November 2021, according to the Associated Press. This comes at a time when depression rates, overdose deaths, and suicide rates have all exploded.

When people think about Catholicism and suicide, it is often through lenses informed less by magisterial teaching and more by popular portrayals of how the Church has responded to those who take their own lives. I remember, for example, once seeing a cinematic portrayal of Vlad the Impaler (later mythologized into Dracula) that showed his first wife killing herself. Vlad’s realization that the woman cannot be buried in consecrated ground and that eternal damnation is her punishment drives him into darkness and evil. Alternatively, today, priests have been disciplined for even suggesting that hell might be the result of death by suicide, and many presume that all those who commit it must be mentally ill and those incapable of mortal sin.

Catholics (and all Americans) need a more coherent understanding of suicide—one that not only addresses the above misconceptions, but also takes full account of the human person and better protects those who are most vulnerable to being persuaded that death is the only or the best option for themselves. Thankfully, Catholic teaching offers quite a bit of clarity on the topic of suicide, prioritizing our dignity as persons, as well as our inescapable indebtedness to the divine—the “God factor,” as it were.

To properly contextualize this conversation, we need to start with God. For it is to God, not ourselves, that we owe our lives. Human life—pace atheists or transhumanists—is not solely our own, nor some sort of material product, to do with as we see fit. Yes, we possess freedom via our will. But our lives originate in the divine—indeed, even our wills are in certain senses circumscribed, because we are free to choose not anything, but only those things that our corporeal, intellectual, physical, economic, historical, and geographic circumstances allow.

It is God Who created us and sustains us, at every moment of our lives, in His omnipotence and omnipresence. We are entirely His, whether we believe it and act like it or not. As the Catechism of the Catholic Church teaches,

everyone is responsible for his life before God who has given it to him. It is God who remains the sovereign Master of life. We are obliged to accept life gratefully and preserve it for his honor and the salvation of our souls. We are stewards, not owners, of the life God has entrusted to us. It is not ours to dispose of (2280).

That idea runs counter to our increasingly post-Christian culture, which elevates autonomy as the greatest of all virtues. It’s also in tension with our culture’s acceptance of in vitro fertilization and surrogacy, which treat children not as gifts, but products. Parents can “produce” babies with preferred genetic traits and even declare fetuses faulty if they have some debilitating genetic defect. In that sense, our dystopian future is already upon us.

Yet if we can accept that our lives are first God’s, rather than our own, then the danger of suicide becomes more easily apparent. By taking our own life, we are destroying something that is not ours to destroy. Only God, in his infinite (if often obscure) wisdom and justice, has the right to take human life, or confer on his creatures that right (e.g., self-defense or just war).

There is more than this to the evil of suicide. Suicide, as St. John Paul II would say, encourages a “culture of death” that affects everyone. The Catechism explains:

Suicide contradicts the natural inclination of the human being to preserve and perpetuate his life. It is gravely contrary to the just love of self. It likewise offends love of neighbor because it unjustly breaks the ties of solidarity with family, nation, and other human societies to which we continue to have obligations. Suicide is contrary to love for the living God (2281).

It’s not just that suicide undermines love of God. It also undermines love of neighbor, the second greatest commandment. As Catholic philosopher Josef Pieper argued, each of us has obligations to one another, or pietas. We have obligations to parents, siblings, children, friends, neighbors, and fellow parishioners and citizens. We are obliged to love and serve them, and even communicate the love of Christ to them. In killing ourselves, we repudiate those duties.

To anticipate one likely objection, we should remember that this duty is reciprocal. In other words, our parents, siblings, children, friends, neighbors, fellow parishioners, and fellow citizens all have obligations to us, too. In destroying ourselves, we deny them the opportunity to love and serve us, especially when we are most in need of it. When we are depressed or diseased, or have some terrible, perhaps even terminal condition, that is precisely when those around us are most expected to exemplify both virtues on our behalf. If we are a burden, it is for their good.

It’s true that the Catholic Church has acknowledged that “grave psychological disturbances, anguish, or grave fear of hardship, suffering, or torture can diminish the responsibility of the one committing suicide” (§2282). Yet we should not allow that reality to persuade us into an indifference toward the dangerous threat posed by a culture that permits and even encourages suicide. The Catechism also teaches, “If suicide is committed with the intention of setting an example, especially to the young, it also takes on the gravity of scandal. Voluntary co-operation in suicide is contrary to the moral law” (2282). It is horrible indeed when some prominent figure or celebrity kills himself, inspiring their acolytes to consider the same fate.

Given the increasing frequency of suicide in our nation, readers may know someone, even a loved one, who has committed suicide. I know a few, including a close relative I never got to meet. It is a real possibility that such troubled persons are in hell, and that is a harrowing thought, indeed. But we cannot know the thoughts of the deceased, who may have repented even as they died, or may have lacked full knowledge of what they were doing. The Catechism itself gives us hope:

We should not despair of the eternal salvation of persons who have taken their own lives. By ways known to him alone, God can provide the opportunity for salutary repentance. The Church prays for persons who have taken their own lives (2283).

As serious (and evil) a thing as suicide may be, there remains reason to hope in a merciful God. Like so many other complicated areas of life, Catholic teaching navigates a middle path between unreserved contempt for those who kill themselves and, alternatively, eliding the real culpability we have for our decisions, even when there are mitigating circumstances.

Whether we have contemplated it ourselves or know someone who has, we must reject the lie that tells us our lives are solely our own, to keep or kill as we wish. It is a blessing, not a curse, that we are God’s from birth to death.”

Love, Jesus save me,
Matthew

Purgatory

Don’t forsake the dead


-by Sarah Cain

“Don’t say a eulogy at my funeral. Modern Catholic funerals can look a lot like Protestant variants. At first glance, that might not seem like a problem, but upon scrutiny, the profound disservice that is being done to the dead becomes clear.

Imagine attending a Catholic funeral. The pews are full, attesting to how the deceased had clearly reached a great number of people. Now, why are those people there, at a funeral Mass? They should be there for two primary reasons.

1. To join in solemn acknowledgment of Christ’s sacrifice and resurrection, which is what provides the pathway for us to enjoy eternal life.
2. To pray for the deceased’s soul.

We should grieve at the knowledge that it rarely happens that way. With increasing frequency, Catholic funerals take a different approach. “Progressive” priests give homilies that tell of the life that the deceased lived, the decedent’s love of various sports teams, and his family. They eulogize and label it a homily. After Communion, members of the man’s family are called to the pulpit to offer eulogies of their own. They postulate about what they believe their loved one is doing in heaven.

When I die, please don’t offer a eulogy at my funeral. It’s not because I’m inherently opposed to being remembered, and certainly not because I don’t want my loved ones to gain comfort from sharing stories that they may have. It’s because that’s not the place for those activities and because doing so undermines the purpose of having a funeral Mass at all. The funeral liturgy is an act of worship, in which the Church gathers to commend the deceased to God’s mercy. It’s not merely an expression of grief.

We pray for the dead in part because we acknowledge that people, no matter how much we love them, might not be in heaven. Thus, we pray for them, sacrifice for them, and offer Masses for them. Proclamations about what our loved one is doing in heaven undermine this. Recalling from the pulpit fond memories about the deceased distracts us from what is most important and from what our obligations are to the dead now.

Perhaps it seems harsh, as though this stipulation takes something from the grieving family members. But there is a helpful way to think of it differently. Imagine that you are in the casket. You are the deceased. How sure are you that you’ll go straight to heaven? Are you pure enough to stand in the presence of God, without hesitation, without shame or regret? Do you want your loved ones to presume that you are in heaven, or should they pray for your soul, so that if you are in purgatory, you might be helped? Only you and God know the tally of your sins; that is the case for each one of us. If it were my funeral Mass, I would want people to be reminded of the need to pray for the souls of those who have passed on—mine especially.

Catholic funerals are increasingly mirroring Protestant services, with differences between them barely discernible. One of those differences between our faiths—one of the chief ones—is our understanding of what happens after death. We pray for the dead because we know that they might be in purgatory.

If we don’t believe that they need this help, why even have a funeral Mass at all? Shouldn’t we merely clink glasses and say a toast to our departed comrade? If there is no liturgical response needed, then yes. We still have the vestiges of a time when we recognized the need, but the laity’s understanding of it is parched, so that even when priests seek to offer a reverent funeral Mass, they risk offending a grieving family that does not understand what should be taking place.

By all means, people can have gatherings in which speakers reminisce about the life of the dead, usually at the vigil (wake) or a funeral reception. This isn’t an attempt to deny family members their rightful grieving process; rather, it is to prevent the departed from being denied what he needs. It is tragic to witness a funeral Mass in which hundreds of people gather and likely none will pray for the departed’s soul, because they didn’t see the need and weren’t told of it.

The decision to remain silent on this topic is to forsake the dead in order to oblige those who might complain. Surely, we have exhausted the simplification of the liturgy to compensate for poor catechesis. It is not without its victims, even if they can no longer speak for themselves.”

Love,
Matthew

Heresy, Theology of the Body

Quid sit homo? – the body & human composting


-by Sarah Cain

“With its recent legalization of “human composting,” the state of New York joined California, Washington, Colorado, Oregon, and Vermont.

The process goes like this: the body of the deceased is placed in a metal vessel alongside wood chips, alfalfa, and other plant matter. A moderate heat is applied alongside extra oxygen to encourage microbial activity, and over a period of weeks, the human body breaks down into compost, which is then presented to the family. One cubic yard of dirt is given to them, or about three barrels full. Then, presumably, the family can get started with the cabbage patch they had been planning.

You wouldn’t be wrong to think that seems callous. Man as fertilizer cannot be an expression of man as one who shares in the nature of Christ.

Human composting is just one method of what are now being labeled “green burials.” Advocates boast that such methods “give back to nature.” Mushroom suits perform a similar function, wherein the deceased are placed in spore-ridden suits that will help to decompose them. “Alkaline hydrolysis” is all the rave in some (rather macabre) circles. That’s when the body is broken down in a chemical stew, to be disposed of like hazardous waste.

A vast array of disposal options might be helpful if you had a large, valueless item to get rid of. If the item was a broken refrigerator, there’s little to discuss regarding the morality of what happens after it is discarded. But this isn’t a discussion about refrigerators—it’s about human beings. By virtue of that knowledge, we must treat the body with respect, even reverence. Each person is made in the image and likeness of God; he bears a divine reflection. Even more so, by virtue of his baptism, a Christian is a member of the body of Christ. Human composting is a violation of the natural dignity of man and the supernatural dignity of the Christian.

Modern man has found himself back at an ancient question: quid sit homo? (What is man?) The answer that he has come to, if the actions are analyzed for what they imply, is “nothing.” Modernity asserts that man is nothing in his own right. He can and should be reduced to his utility. Thus, when he dies, he ceases to produce, and we can search for ways to use his body while making sure that it doesn’t take up too much space in the ground. It’s one last attempt to get another use out of it.

There’s an inherent shudder when most of us first hear of these ways of treating the dead. One of the consequences of living among (at least the ruins of) a Christian culture is that we “feel” that certain things are wrong even when we’ve lost the words to explain why. Part of the problem is that modern Catholics are too often divorced from the writings of the past to be able to answer the questions that man has long struggled with.

Our forebears knew, as we should, that man is different from animal. He has a higher nature. He has the capacity to reason. He has an immortal soul. He is made in the image and likeness of God, with a destiny to join in union with him. He matters enough to God for God to endure the Passion. Man is not trash, nor plant, nor mere animal, and he shouldn’t be disposed of as if he were. Man has dignity and value simply because of Who created him, Who willed him into being. The dignity that he holds is not contingent on how productive he is.

The secular understanding that deprives man of innate value leads down sinister roads. If he is defined by his output, what of those who are severely ill and thereby dependent? It naturally follows that the secular thesis deprives those people of their rightful protections and submits them to the whims of the capable—perhaps better labeled “the mob.” How about those with intellectual or developmental difficulties? Those still in the womb? All of these groups have little material output, and each has been targeted for termination by the secular world we inhabit, using a vast array of justifications.

Our respect for the totality of the human person necessitates that we treat the dead with dignity and charity. Further, it requires that we bury them in hope of the Resurrection. The act of burying the dead is a corporal work of mercy and recognition of the sacred nature of the body, which is “temple of the Holy Spirit” (1 Cor. 6:19).

One of the ways that our faith is distinguished from paganism is in the elevated placement of man on earth. It might seem paradoxical at first: as Christians, we recognize man’s fallen nature, thus placing him in need of a Savior, but we also value him as higher than other life forms, as each child is made in God’s image. In various pagan sects, nature is of higher value than man, and man becomes merely a parasite, plundering nature’s resources. Nature becomes worshiped as a deity. For these people, “mother nature” is not just a colloquial phrase. Other pagans refer to this false god as Gaia. To deprive man of his dignity and inherent value is thus both paganistic and sacrilegious.

We must do better than the world around us, which reduces man to utility, as in secularism, or to leech, as in paganism. A baptized person is a child of God. Even when the Church permits cremation, he must be set to rest in consecrated ground and buried in hopes of the Resurrection. He is not placed on display in the home, nor scattered because someone believes the act to be pretty. Those of us who live today have a profound obligation to honor the dignity of the man who can no longer speak for himself—certainly not by composting him, but rather by praying for his soul.”

Love & truth,
Matthew

Justification, Salvation

Justification


-The Harrowing of Hell as depicted by Fra Angelico, 1441-1442, please click on the image for greater detail


-by Karlo Broussard

“One thing that divides Catholics and some Protestants is the understanding of justification, a theological term that’s generally used to signify a Christian being in a right relationship with God—meaning he is no longer subject to condemnation on account of sin.

The Council of Trent taught that “not only are we reputed [that is, considered “righteous” or “just” by God] but we are truly called and are just, receiving justice within us” (emphasis added). The late R.C. Sproul, however, denies the latter part of Trent’s teaching, stating, “It is not the change in our nature wrought by regeneration [Trent’s ‘justice within us’] or even the faith that flows from it that is the ground of our justification [being declared justified]. That remains solely the imputed righteousness of Christ.”

What Sproul is saying is that God considers Christ’s righteousness as our own (“the imputed righteousness of Christ”) and thereby declares us just, and that’s the only way we can consider ourselves just. Whatever interior change happens within us—a change from a state of ungodliness to a state of godliness—it plays no role in our justification. That interior change would be regeneration, which results in a state of sanctification, something that Protestants like Sproul see as essentially different from justification. No, we’re justified only on God’s say-so.

So how can we defend the Catholic Church’s teaching on justification as regeneration? In other words, how can we back up our insistence that the interior change that happens within us when we become Christians plays a role in us having a right relationship with God?

A full refutation of Sproul’s view would require us to do two things: 1) show that the Bible sees the interior change that is wrought by regeneration at least as grounds for our justification, even if not the only grounds, and 2) show that the grounds for our justification are not the imputed righteousness of Christ. This would suffice to refute Sproul’s claim. Further argumentation, however, would be needed to fully prove the Catholic position that the interior change wrought by regeneration (via sanctifying grace, given initially in baptism) is the sole ground for our justification, or what the Council of Trent called the “single formal cause.”

Due to the limited space that we have here, we’re going to focus only on the first of the two parts of our refutation of Sproul’s view. The passage to focus on is Romans 6:17-18:

But thanks be to God, that you who were once slaves of sin have become obedient from the heart to the standard of teaching to which you were committed, and, having been set free from sin, have become slaves of righteousness.

The first thing to note is that the Greek word for “righteousness” is dikaiosunē, which is related to the verb (dikaioō) that Paul uses throughout his letter to the Romans when he talks about Abraham “being justified [Greek, dikaioō] by faith” (Rom. 5:1; see also 4:2), a faith that God reckoned as “righteousness” (Greek, dikaiosunē—4:5). So, for Paul, the state of being “slaves of righteousness” is a state of being justified, like Abraham.

Now, according to Romans 5:1, the justification that we Christians have in Christ is another way of describing the “peace” that we have with God—again, a peace similar to what Abraham had with God. Paul writes, “Since we are justified by faith [like Abraham], we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.”

What does it mean to have “peace with God”? It means to be in a right relationship with him. It means we’re no longer subject to condemnation from him.

So the state of being “slaves of righteousness”—the state of justification—is a state of being at peace with God, or having a right relationship with him.

The next thing to note about the above passage is that Paul describes two states, both of which are preceded by and contrasted with the same state of slavery to sin. First, he speaks of becoming “obedient from the heart,” as opposed to being “slaves of sin.” Second, he speaks of “slaves of righteousness” who were “set free from sin”—which is to say his addressees went from being slaves of sin to being slaves of righteousness.

Given this “common denominator” of slavery to sin, it’s reasonable to conclude that Paul is describing in two different ways the same state that is opposite of being a slave to sin. This being the case, Paul doesn’t see a hard divide between the state of “obedience from the heart” and the state of being “slaves of righteousness.” In fact, he conceives of them as one and the same.

Here’s where the Catholic understanding of righteousness (the interior change wrought by regeneration) comes into play. Consider that obedience to God (“obedience from the heart”) entails the mind and the will being rightly ordered to God’s will—being disposed to believe as true what he says and to do what he commands. That’s an interior state, a state that’s constitutive of our character.

It’s this interior state of the heart and mind, a state that God brings about within us by grace, that Paul identifies as the state of being “slaves of righteousness,” which, as we saw above, is a state of justification, like that of Abraham. Therefore, interior righteousness at least is a ground for our justification.

This interpretation of associating the interior state of “obedience from the heart” with the state of being “slaves of righteousness” is further supported by verse 7 of this same chapter. Paul writes, “For he who has died [the death of baptism] is freed from sin.” The Greek verb for “freed” is dikaioō. So, the text can be literally translated as, “he who has died [the death of baptism] is justified from sin.”

Here, Paul explicitly ties this freedom from slavery to sin, which, as we saw above, is the interior state of “obedience from the heart,” to the state of being justified. It follows, therefore, that in Paul’s mind the state of being justified is not divorced from the interior state of “obedience from the heart,” a state where our hearts and minds are rightly ordered to God, or what the Council of Trent called the “justice within us.”

We can agree to some extent with those Protestants who, like Sproul, say that God declares us just. As Trent states, “not only are we reputed [righteous, or just] but we are truly called and are just”—the implication being that we can affirm that God reputes or declares us just. It’s just that, according to Paul, such a declaration corresponds to an objective reality: our interior state of righteousness that God brings about within us—what Paul calls “obedience from the heart.”

Again, as mentioned above, it takes further argumentation to establish that the interior state of righteousness constituted by sanctifying grace is the sole ground of our justification, or the “single formal cause.” But at least we can say that Paul doesn’t draw a hard divide between our state of being justified (being at peace with God and thus having a right relationship with him, whereby we are no longer subject to condemnation) and our interior state of being rightly ordered to God in obedience. In fact, he conceives of them as the same. And if that’s how Paul conceives of justification, then so should we.”

Love & His peace,
Matthew

Eschatology, Hell

The Reality of Hell


-Medieval illustration of Hell in the Hortus deliciarum manuscript of Herrad of Landsberg (about 1180), please click on the image for greater detail


-by Pat Flynn

“The Catholic Church has condemned what is sometimes called strong or hard universalism, the idea that we know that everybody is saved. Perhaps weak or soft universalism may be true, which is to say, perhaps everybody, at the end of the day, just so happens to be saved, though it could have been otherwise. So far as I’m aware, Catholics can maintain the soft or weak (or hopeful) universalist view. Whether there are good reasons to is a debate I will not enter now.

On the other hand, there is “infernalism,” a pejorative term for the traditional doctrine of hell. But how can hell be compatible with an all-good God? Let’s see.

Some universalists suggest that hell is impossible because of infinite opportunities for people to repent. In other words, in some sort of war of attrition, God will inevitably win us over. But this ignores a classic position—namely, the postmortem fixity of the will. The idea is that we eternally separate from God and thus eternally will the consequences and punishments thereof. Thus, properly understood, hell is not an infinite consequence for a finite sin, but rather an eternal consequence for an eternal act (orientation) of the will.

In simple terms, the account of postmortem fixity is this: to change our minds, we must either come across new information or consider the information we have from a new perspective. But a traditional understanding of the human person maintains that neither of these conditions attains upon death, when the intellect is separated from the body. In effect, we “angelize” upon death, and the orientation of our will at that point remains thereafter. Nothing “new” or “different” is going to come along to get us to consider things afresh. Although God could perform a “spiritual lobotomy” on everybody who makes the faulty judgment of willing against Gain, God—in His perfectly wise governance—orders things toward their end in accord with their nature. And our nature is one of a fallible liberty—we are free, and we are free to make mistakes, which we do.

God is not going to constantly override our faulty (though culpable) judgments, as that would amount to the constant performance of something on the order of a miracle, which would make nonsense of generating nature (particularly human nature) to begin with. And God isn’t the business of nonsense.

In my experience of introducing the concept of postmortem fixity to universalists, several of them have not only seemed unaware of this traditional teaching, but responded by calling it “strange.” The teaching, however, is not strange; rather, it follows straightforwardly from a traditional metaphysical understanding of the human person, as Edward Feser explains in this lecture. It appears to be a highly probable, if not inevitable, consequence, of good philosophical analysis of the human person.

Now, I said that our nature is one of a fallible liberty, and this too is an important point. Only God (who is subsistent goodness itself) is his own rule; God alone is naturally impeccable, always perfect. Nothing else—neither man nor angel—is like this, and so every being of created liberty must be capable of failing to consider and subsequently apply the moral rule in every instance of judgment, and therefore be capable of sin. In other words, God could no more have created an infallible free creature than he could a square circle.

To appreciate this fact is to appreciate why God, if wanting to bring about creatures like us, necessarily brings about the possibility of our sinning and turning from him. In this sense, love—which requires the uniting of free independent wills—is inherently risky, especially when only one will (God’s) is incapable of sinning.

Now, if we apply the notions above—fallible liberty and postmortem fixity—to God’s mode of governance, we can see why God not only permits our moral failures in this life, but would continue to permit our moral failure to love him in the next life. God is under no obligation to override our moral miscalculation, even if he could. Nor is God any less perfect for not doing so, since it is a matter of Catholic dogma that everyone receives sufficient grace—that is, everything he needs to love God and reject sin. Nobody fails to love God because of what God doesn’t give him; people fail to love God because they indulge in voluntary and therefore culpable ignorance (that is, fail to consider what they habitually know, and really could consider), deciding instead to love some inferior good. If that is the final choice they make, God respects it.

Again, it is not enough for the universalist to dismiss these notions as seeming archaic or strange or what have you. The claim of many universalists, after all, is that universalism is necessarily true, but these notions show that that is not the case. If we have strong independent reason to think universalism is not true—say, from Scripture and Tradition—then all we need are possibilities (not certainties) for why God allows hell and its compatibility with God’s goodness. My suggestion is that a proper understanding of finite fallible liberty, God’s being a perfectly wise governor, and the possibility of the postmortem fixity of the will provide the necessary conceptual resources we need to show the compatibility between an all-good God and the doctrine of hell.

Let me address two other arguments. I’ve heard it said by universalists that God could not be perfectly joyful if anybody were in hell, but God is perfectly joyful; ergo, there can be no one in hell. But if this argument proves anything, it proves too much. After all, if God cannot be perfectly joyful if somebody is in hell, then how can God be perfectly joyful in light of any sin or evil? The answer, obviously, is that he cannot be, and so the position makes God dependent upon creation. If that’s the case, God is no longer really God , who should be in no way dependent upon creation for his perfection. So that argument is not a good one.

Finally, justice and punishment. Part of what motivates universalists are faulty (or at least non-traditional) notions of both. Traditionally, punishment, even eternal punishment, has been seen as itself a good, itself an act of mercy and justice. Boethius stressed this point strongly: it is objectively better for a perpetrator to be punished than to get away with his crime.

As put in The Consolation of Philosophy, “The wicked, therefore, at the time when they are punished, have some good added to them, that is, the penalty itself, which by reason of its justice is good; and in the same way, when they go without punishment, they have something further in them, the very impunity of their evil, which you have admitted is evil because of its injustice . . . Therefore the wicked granted unjust impunity are much less happy than those punished with just retribution.”

If Boethius is right, then hell could—perhaps even should—be seen as God extending the most love, mercy, goodness he can to someone in a self-imposed exile. Ultimately, what would be contrary to justice (giving one what he is due) would be for somebody to eternally reject God and get away with it.

PS: For an extended rebuttal of strong-form universalism, see my recent conversation with Fr. James Rooney.”

Love & His mercy,
Matthew

Apologetics, Trinity

Save your soul: study the Trinity


-Most Holy & Undivided Trinity, detail from the altar of St Ignatius Loyola by Andrea Pozzo in the church of Il Gesù in Rome, please click on the image for greater detail


-by Br Bertrand Hebert, OP

“Augustine occupies a privileged place among the Western Church Fathers that Aquinas invokes. Despite their affinity, some have proposed a division between these great theologians. Augustine’s theology is often characterized as “affective” while Aquinas is labeled merely “rational.” This distinction is misleading in many ways, and it implies that Augustine’s theology lacks reason or that Aquinas’s theology is lifeless.

For both of these theological giants, affection and reason belong together. Theology is not just something nice to think about. It matters what you think, precisely because our salvation is mediated through the mysteries of the faith.

We can see this approach in both Augustine’s and Aquinas’s writings on the mystery of the Trinity. Bridging the “gap” between reason and affect, Trinitarian theology is both an intellectual and spiritual exercise. Augustine and Aquinas both modeled this, as Father Gilles Emery, O.P. explains in his essay “Trinitarian Theology as a Spiritual Exercise in Augustine and Aquinas.” Both Doctors show how understanding the complexity of man’s mind and heart reveals an intimate relationship between us who know and love and God who is the Knower and Lover. This theological investigation can be difficult; it “exercises” the soul in a real sense. But it also prepares the soul for communion with the Triune God whose very being is Truth and Love.

For Augustine, elucidating the mystery of the Trinity requires great mental effort, but it also demands devotion. Our efforts to understand God must be informed by love because “the more one loves God, the more one sees Him” (Emery, 7). Because we are seeking the most supreme truth in such an endeavor, our souls must be trained through a kind of “spiritual gymnastics.” This theological regimen strengthens us to rise to the heights to see God and is purified through prayer, penance, and a life of virtue. Moved by God’s grace, theological study prepares us to see God in a limited way in this life and propels us to behold Him in the beatific vision. 

In his theology, Aquinas follows Augustine’s approach and builds on it. He delves into the mystery of the Trinity through speculative study, in order to enable believers to grasp the truth of God more deeply. Growing in knowledge of the Trinity both aids our contemplation and provides us with the means to defend the faith against error. Aquinas understands that by studying God, we come to recognize that our own knowing and loving is a mirroring of God Who is Knowing and Loving. This realization gives spiritual consolation to those who dwell in the darkness of this passing world, yearning for the light of the life to come.

As Augustine and Aquinas both demonstrate, true theology requires rational precision, but also an affective inclination to God. As the theologian—indeed any believer—rises to grasp the lofty mysteries of the Trinity he becomes ever more conformed to the God he seeks, and he receives already a foretaste of that vision he hopes to enjoy in glory.

Studying the Trinity stretches our minds. Theology that is both loving and rational lifts the soul in sacred study and puts one in contact with God. The shared theological approach of Augustine and Aquinas—integrating both reason and affection—is a model for teachers and students today. By seeking God through both wisdom and love, our deepest desire for God can be satisfied. God has made us for Himself, and both our hearts and minds are restless until they rest in Him (cf. St Augustine).”

Love,
Matthew

Moral, Theology

Self-defense


-by Karlo Broussard

“It’s immoral to kill an innocent human being. That’s because we all have a “right to life”—a moral claim on one another not to be killed.

But some might say that this approach creates a conflict with our general intuitions about justified lethal self-defense. Does the right to life extend even to an aggressor whose behavior will kill me (and I have no other means to effectively preserve my life)? It would seem so.

Think about it: if every human being has a right to life, and the aggressor is a human being, then the aggressor has a right to life. To deliberately kill him in self-defense, therefore, even if there is no other means of saving my life, would seem to be just as much a violation of justice as would be the deliberate killing of an innocent human person. And if that’s true, then it would be immoral to deliberately kill the aggressor.

For most of us, that doesn’t seem right. It runs contrary to our common intuitions. But long held intuitions are being washed away with the tides of modern thought—so we need to ground our intuition in something more stable. So why is it morally permissible to kill in self-defense?

We can start with an idea that we’ve looked at elsewhere: equality with other human beings in behavior that’s naturally consistent with the exercise of life, called the “equality of relations” (Summa Theologiae II-II:79:1), is naturally due to human beings. In other words, I owe it to you not to kill you—to be innocent in my behavior toward you. The same applies the other way around. St. Thomas Aquinas calls this the “equality of justice” (ibid).

Here’s where the rubber hits the road when it comes to self-defense. The obligation not to kill arises from an order of relationship that requires not only that we be innocent in will (what philosophers call “formal innocence”), but also that we be innocent in behavior (“material innocence”). When an aggressor attacks me with a behavior that by nature is going to kill me (even if the behavior is not voluntary, like in the case of a mentally crazed person), assuming that I didn’t attack him first, his behavior is no longer innocent. It has disrupted the equality in behavior that nature demands—in particular, the behavior that’s naturally consistent with the exercise of life. This being the case, the behavior is outside the order of the “equality of relations” that nature requires for the “equality of justice” and therefore is defective or disordered. How can I owe him anything then? The “equality of justice” rises or falls with the “equality of relations.”

Consider, for example, a father who tells his son, “Go into the store and steal me a beer!” Must the son obey? Absolutely not! Why? Because the father’s command is outside the proper order that nature requires for a father’s command—an order where the command directs his son to do good and avoid evil for his perfection as a human being.

And so, just as the son doesn’t owe obedience to the father’s disordered command, I don’t owe behavior that’s naturally consistent with the exercise of life as a response to the aggressor’s disordered act of aggression (an act of the kind that kills). In other words, it seems that I can defend myself by deliberately killing him without violating justice.

Not only does this seem so. It must be so. Why? To say otherwise would entail nature being defective with regard to necessary things. It would be self-defeating (Summa Contra Gentiles, 3.129).

Consider that if the aggressor’s right to life were so strong that I couldn’t kill him in the above scenario, nature would be practically safeguarding the aggressor’s behavior that thwarts the natural order for his life as a social animal. On this supposition, nature says that I can’t stop him. Remember: in this scenario there’s no other means for me to stop the behavior other than a lethal blow, and we’re assuming here that there’s no proper authority to turn to in the moment. And so there would be no one to stop the aggressor. That’s a self-defeating move: directing a human being to pursue his perfection as a social rational animal but also safeguarding him thwarting that perfection.

Also, the whole purpose of nature’s demand for another human being to refrain from killing me is to protect my life. If nature forbade me to kill the aggressor in the above scenario, then nature’s design would involve a space where there is no possibility for the protection of my life. That’s also self-defeating: setting out to protect my life while at the same time demanding that my life not be protected.

Someone might counter, “Well, there’s the possibility of proper authorities protecting your life.” But what if it’s those in authority who are trying to unjustly kill me? In this scenario, there would be literally no possible way to protect my life. My right to life would become a “duty to die.” And this would be due to nature’s design, which would be absurd.

Bottom line: it’s self-defeating for nature to give us a natural right we can’t protect. Philosopher Timothy Hsiao sums it up nicely: “If I possess the right to life, then I must also possess the corresponding right to secure or protect my life.”

Now, this doesn’t mean that I can kill an aggressor in any circumstance where his behavior violates the “equality of relations.” What I owe him (or don’t owe him) will depend on the degree of the inequality he creates with his attack.

For example, if the aggressor’s attack is such that it only limits my use of some good—e.g., he tries to steal my iPhone—I’m not thereby justified to kill him. The relation is unequal only with regard to the free use of personal goods—something that’s pretty far removed from the good of life. (Although it wouldn’t be just to kill him in order to get my iPhone back, it would be just to wrestle him to the ground [ST II-II:41:1].)

In other words, my defense must be proportionate to the inequality caused by the attack. As Aquinas puts it, “an act may be rendered unlawful, if it be out of proportion to the end” (ST II-II:64:7).

We started with the question, “Does the right to life extend even to an aggressor whose behavior lacks innocence to the degree that it’s not naturally consistent with the exercise of life?” As we’ve seen, human nature says no! The right to life extends only as far as nature allows it.

Nature sets boundaries that circumscribe a moral space in which another human being can rightly demand, in justice, that I not kill him—it’s a space of innocence, a space where there exists an equality of behavior that’s naturally consistent with the exercise of life. But those same boundaries reveal nature’s design for what I don’t owe the other person—namely, a duty to die.

So nature has given us a moral recipe for killing. Deliberately killing an innocent human being is an injustice, and therefore immoral. Deliberately killing an aggressor whose behavior will kill me, when there are no other means to preserve my life, is not an injustice—and, therefore, it’s morally permissible, and in some cases obligatory. Self-defense, therefore—even lethal self-defense—certainly can be compatible with the right to life.”

Love & truth,
Matthew

Sin

Preaching against sin


-by Rev. Jerry J. Pokorsky

“We used to laugh at a famous story about President Calvin Coolidge, a man of few words. After returning from Sunday services, his wife asks him about the preacher’s sermon. “Sin,” Silent Cal replies. His wife pleads, “What did he say about it?” “He was against it.”

Alas, modern culture no longer allows us to oppose sin, except for those politically correct transgressions such as being “judgmental” and emitting too much carbon into the atmosphere. But do priests and others have a choice to remain faithful to Jesus?

There is an interesting correlation between our culture—including Catholic parishes—and our recognition of sin. It was easier to talk about the wages of evil in a stable culture imbued with Christianity. As secularism crowds out the influence of Christianity on culture, some Church authorities—in response to the hypersensitivities of many Catholics—place too many restrictions on preaching sin and conversion from the pulpit. Whiplash changes in the culture often challenge the prudence of thoughtful Catholic preachers.

A century ago, Church authorities, including moralists and seminary professors, were reticent in speaking—even reading—about sexual sin. The four-volume Moral and Pastoral Theology manual by Professor Henry Davis, S.J. (first edition, May 1935) illustrates pastoral prudence in questions of human sexuality. In an otherwise easy read (in English) on the natural law and the Ten Commandments, Davis writes the chapter dealing with various types of sexual sin in Latin. The readers must be priests or mature seminarians trained in the mother tongue of the Church for their preparation as confessors. But a good confessor, though he always avoids impure speech, must understand—and occasionally carefully discuss—lascivious behavior.

As the sexual revolution of the 1960s transformed popular culture, orthodox Catholic moralists relaxed the prudential censorship and discussed the details of many sexual sins to confront pervasive errors. Pope John Paul II’s “theology of the body” formed the foundation of John Paul II institutes on marriage and the family in Washington, D.C., and Rome. The institutes taught and wrote freely, providing the clergy and laity alike a firm foundation on the Church’s teaching on human sexuality.

Dissident moralists went farther. Human Sexuality, published by Anthony Kosnik in 1977 under the auspices of the Catholic Theological Society of America, justified sexual debauchery ranging from contraception and masturbation to sodomy and even bestiality. Today, senior prelates and friends of the pope openly speak about the likelihood of segments of the hierarchy approving “gay unions” soon. Several German bishops, including high-ranking ones, have declared their support of overhauling Catholic moral teaching to approve unions based on sodomy.

At the same time, many orthodox priests feel pressure to dodge these topics. They often avoid the issues not only from the pulpit, but also in church bulletins. Indeed, the culture and senior Catholic churchmen place us at a disadvantage. Irish bishop Ray Browne’s recent public apology for the sermons of Fr. Seán Sheehy on mortal sin is baffling, incomprehensible. Cross-dressed and occasionally mutilated males (so-called “transgender females”) conduct drag-show displays for children. As senior Catholic prelates call for gay unions, old-fashioned pastoral decorum prevents orthodox priests from asking obvious questions in the same public forums. (Here is an example of a forbidden question, with apologies to Latinists: An commercium ani vel fellatio vetatur post unionem gay agnitam vel ante tantum? Our moral manuals need an update.)

It is important to remember that the protection of the innocent must be a prime objective of every priest. Such conversations from the pulpit do risk violating Catholic prudence, especially with children present. Fr. John Hardon, S.J., refers in his Catholic Dictionary to the “latency period”: “The term mainly applies to the years between five and twelve, when children do not unless abnormally and unwisely aroused, react to sexual stimulation. The Church advises parents to cultivate this period for teaching children the principles of faith and training them in the moral habits they will need as the foundation of their adult Christian life.” So care is certainly called for and recklessness to be avoided.

Jesus is prudent but doesn’t mince words: “But I say to you, that whosoever shall look on a woman to lust after her, hath already committed adultery with her in his heart” (Matt. 5:28). St. Paul provides a similar perspective: “The men also, leaving the natural use of the women, have burned in their lusts one towards another, men with men working that which is filthy, and receiving in themselves the recompense which was due to their error” (Rom. 1:27). He adds, “For the things that are done by them in secret, it is a shame even to speak of” (Eph. 5:12). And he divorces Catholics from those who shamelessly promote willful debauchery: “But now I have written to you, not to keep company, if any man that is named a brother, be a fornicator, or covetous, or a server of idols, or a railer, or a drunkard, or an extortioner: with such a one, not so much as to eat” (1 Cor. 5:11).

Hence, the venues of preaching against sin determine the propriety of the language of Catholic morality. One size doesn’t fit all. What a moral textbook, theological article, scholarly monograph, episcopal encyclical, or even a popular internet piece permits may not be suitable from the pulpit. But carefully using Scripture as a rhetorical template accomplishes much.

So it seems that warnings against contraception, fornication, adultery, mutilation, and the gay agenda are well within the prudential rhetoric of Jesus in the Gospel and Paul in his letters. We need not expand the vocabulary to include the intimate details of sexual behavior. Indeed, for the most part, penitents in confession need not go beyond confessing such acts. The priest does not need to know—nor should he inquire about—the details.

But it is a great disservice and a violation of the Gospel for a priest to neglect the condemnation of sin, especially mortal sins that lead to the fires of hell. It’s always best to measure our rhetoric by the words of Jesus and the New Testament letters. Calvin Coolidge’s example of direct simplicity helps, too.”

Love & truth,
Matthew