Ironic it is how a former altar boy, Brett Kavanaugh, now Mass lector at the Shrine of the Blessed Sacrament in Washington, D.C., and embattled Supreme Court nominee, has in one fell swoop taken the heat off the Church, as headlines — far bigger headlines than those that recently and for a similar reason afflicted the Church — fall in his direction. Time flies and so does the pirouetting news. We pray for the Spirit of Truth — simply that: truth, in these woefully spun times. It nearly seems like months now since the uproar ensued following a grand jury report in Pennsylvania. “Put falsehood and lying far from me,” says the First Reading this morn.
When it comes to the Church, one is best served by approaching it as it started: mystically. While it’s right to be prudent (when it comes to miracles), an overly restrictive approach has amputated the Mystical Body — placed it in a stranglehold. It is a struggle between the Surficial Church and the Mystical one.
That’s not to say we believe everything; nor form cults; nor seek another divide (just the opposite); and certainly not to let down our guard against masquerading sprites, who can wreak real harm. But let us heed today’s Gospel and the words of Pope Urban VIII (1623-1644), who reportedly said:
“In cases which concern private revelations, it is better to believe than not to believe, for if you believe, and it is proven true, you will be happy that you have believed, because your Holy Mother asked it. If you believe, and it should be proven false, you will receive all blessings as if it had been true, because you believed it to be true.”
Those with such a mystical perspective are less prone to fall into a panic when scandals and other issues arise; deep mysticism prevents discouragement. The question is whether we expend as much time praying as we do chatting (over scandals and personalities). How crowded is the soapbox. A good recipe might be: spend at least ten times more time praying than on punditry.
—————–
We face a societal tsunami. Christians need to be united. There is no room for “inside baseball” talking. Is the situation as dismal as portrayed by Catholic/Orthodox/Christian writer Rod Dreher in his book, The Benedict Option? Writes Rod:
“Nobody but the most deluded of the old-school Religious Right believes that the cultural revolution can be turned back. The wave cannot be stopped, only ridden. With a few exceptions, conservative Christian political activists are as ineffective as White Russian exiles, drinking tea from samovars in their Paris drawing rooms, plotting the restoration of the monarchy. One wishes them well but knows deep down that they are not the future.”
Someday, though, it will return to that — if the Church returns to its supernaturalism. As Rod points out, there have been times in the past when “the entire universe was woven into God’s own Being, in ways that are difficult for modern people, even believing Christians, to grasp. Christians in the Middle Ages took Paul’s words recorded in Acts — ‘in Him we live and move and have our being’ — and in his letter to the Colossians — ‘He is before all things and in Him all things hold together’ — in a much more literal sense than we do.”
That is the root of the current crisis. A tizzy we are in! The sky falls! Anyone who reports revelation is a phantast?
Mysticism sees a larger picture, lives always with the knowledge that earth quickly passes, possesses an intuition of course (as in how to handle crises), and is repulsed by every cardinal sin.
A solution as simple as elusive — elusive except, again, for that simple solution: far less talk and far more prayer. The Psalm to take to heart in these raucous times: “Besides restful waters He leads me; He refreshes my soul” (Psalm 23:2-3).
[resources: Michael Brown retreat, Connecticut and One-hour talk on Church crisis, prophecy, current times]
–
–
–
–
–
–
–
–
–
–
–
–
—