Category Archives: Spiritual Life

Friday Internet Fast

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In the post earlier today, I said, “the next time God’s Word seems sour, you’re probably allowing your pride to sour it.” Well, I ran into that this morning. On one of the social network sites I frequent, someone linked to these rules for engagement for Catholics on the Internet. The post is a little over a year old, but is worth reviewing due to the encouragement by the bishops and the Pope to evangelize via the new media.

Anyone who is actively discerning God’s will knows that He speaks through Scripture and Tradition, but also through others. In this case, I feel that God was speaking right to me through rule #6: Take at least one day off a week from the Internet.

“Preferably Sunday. Remember that man was not made for the Internet, but the Internet for man. If you feel you need to be on the Internet every day, then you are showing signs of a dangerous addiction. This is unhealthy, even if the sites you go to are not harmful themselves.”

That sat with me wrong. I remembered the night before when someone called just as I was about to spend an hour playing an Internet-based game. Instead of welcoming the call and enjoying the visit, I became annoyed because he had interrupted the time I planned for this game. I had that sour feeling that comes when encountering an unpleasant aspect of God’s will. My spiritual life and my intellectual development were suffering because of too much time on the Internet. Something has to change.

Something will change, effective today. I’m pledging here and now to fast from using the Internet for social and entertainment purposes on Friday, and offering this very small sacrifice for the end of abortion, euthanasia, and respect of all human life. This doesn’t mean a complete cut-off, as the Internet is still a tool which I do use daily as part of my ministry. Blog posts will continue on Friday, as I email them through Posterous. Email will be used as needed for priestly duties and responsibilities. Also, research, looking up addresses and phone numbers, and so on will continue as needed. What won’t be happening is visiting comic websites, social networking (Facebook, Twitter, etc.), online games, or any other social and entertainment uses.

I’m posting this for two reasons. First, accountability. If you see me on social networking sites on Friday, yell at me! Second, as a challenge. I’m challenging more Catholics to do the same. Pick a day and fast from the Internet for the respect of all human life, peace in the world, or whatever you feel is something worth offering the sacrifice.

“What should I do instead?”, you might ask. Spend time in prayer, especially at your local parish (if it’s not locked all the time) in front of the Blessed Sacrament. Find some good spiritual reading and sit down with a cup of coffee, tea, or hot chocolate and read it. If you can, visit someone you haven’t spoken to in a while, especially if they’re homebound, or pick up the phone and call a friend or family member. If the weather’s nice, go for a walk or a leisurely bike or car ride. There truly is lots to do that doesn’t involve “http://www” addresses, and I’d like to hear how you’d spend an Internet-less Friday. Of course, I won’t see them until Saturday, but I still want to hear them.

NEWSFLASH!!! Catholic Church full of hypocritical sinners!

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I know this is going to be a shock for many people, so you might want to sit down. Ready? OK, here it is: the Catholic Church has people who are (*gasp*) SINNERS! Yes, it’s true!

How do I know, you might ask? Well, it’s rather simple: I’m a Catholic and a sinner. Not only that, but they actually made me a priest! Yes, I know, scandalous that a sinner like me – and I am a sinner – was named a priest. Apparently, Anne Rice thinks so:

For those who care, and I understand if you don’t: Today I quit being a Christian. I’m out. I remain committed to Christ as always but not to being “Christian” or to being part of Christianity. It’s simply impossible for me to “belong” to this quarrelsome, hostile, disputatious, and deservedly infamous group. For ten …years, I’ve tried. I’ve failed. I’m an outsider. My conscience will allow nothing else.

You know what, maybe we should just follow her lead and bail from the Church. After all, why would we want to associate with a bunch of hypocritical sinners? In fact, let’s take it a step further:

In honor of Anne Rice, I’m never using banks again, because some people steal. (Tom Wilson via Twitter)

All sarcasm aside, sounds absurd, doesn’t it? It sounds as absurd as leaving Christianity because Christians are sinners. Yes, Christians are sinners, because all humans are sinners. We all are! Every single solitary one of us! If you think you aren’t, let’s start with the sin of pride, shall we? How about being selfish and self-centered? Yes, those are sins, and we all have to deal with them every day of our lives. We have to face sin in our lives during our time here on earth, both personally and communally.

Does this mean that people in the Church are “quarrelsome, hostile, disputatious, and deservedly infamous”? Absolutely! It also means we have liars, thieves, cheats, adulterers, and all other sorts of scandalous characters who may even be the little old ladies and gentlemen who attend daily Mass at parishes throughout the world. What Anne Rice fails to see is that the Church is “a hospital for sinners, not a museum for saints.” Every single member of the Church, with the exception of the Blessed Virgin Mary, throughout Her 2000 years of existence has been a sinner. Does that mean the Church should have never existed? No, quite the opposite! The Church exists precisely because we are sinners in need of Jesus’ guidance and forgiveness. The Church does not exist to make us feel good or cater to our whims and fancies, but to educate us with Our Lord’s teachings, offer His forgiveness when we fail to live up to those teachings, and feed us with the Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of Jesus, the Son of God. Without the Church, we poor sinners would be completely lost and wander through this world just as the Israelites wandered through the desert for 40 years.

And what about Anne Rice’s statement, ‘I remain committed to Christ as always but not to being “Christian” or to being part of Christianity’? By the very definition of “Christian”, you can’t follow Christ without being a Christian. The word Christian means “follower of Christ”. If you follow Christ, you are a Christian, period!

How about this idea of leaving the Church to follow Christ? I’m not going to spend the energy to refute that faulty logic, because it starts with a false premise of the Church and Christ’s purpose for establishing Her. Instead, I’ll let the Curt Jester take that one. In short, you leave the Church, you leave Christ. She claims that her conscience won’t allow her to remain in the Church. I would argue that she’s operating with a poorly formed conscience, and needs to have it properly formed through the teachings of the Church.

So, is the Church full of sinners? Yes, and we should rejoice that Christ gave us the Church to lead us through our sinful lives to His salvation!

Hitting for the Sacramental Cycle

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With my new assignment, I’ve been joking that I’ve “hit for the cycle” in my first month. For those unfamiliar with baseball, a batter who hits for the cycle gets a single, double, triple, and home run in a single game. Since starting here in Malta on July 1st, I’ve baptized an infant, had a wedding, performed Anointing of the Sick, and had a funeral. This means in my first month here, I’ve performed the rites that nearly all Catholics receive throughout their lives.

Sadly, for many Catholics, these are the only rites they receive, not making regular attendance at Mass or reception of Confession a part of their lives. While they may be Catholics by baptism and Confirmation, they do not practice their faith. When challenged on their lack of practice, they might say something like, “I don’t need to go to church to find God,” or, “I’m a good person. I’m fine with God.” For those who seek to follow Our Lord and realize that being a “good person” is not enough, these phrases sound like trite excuses justifying laziness and pridefulness, with good reason. Sadly, this isn’t an isolated problem, but infests the Church throughout the United States and the rest of the so-called developed nations.

The challenge for us as Christians is to open these lukewarm souls to the fire of the Holy Spirit without coming across as condemning and turning them even farther from God. As Christians, we must pray for those souls and seek to cooperate with Our Lord in calling them back to His Church. We also must seek to always invite these lost souls into a deeper relationship with Christ and His Church. We do this first and foremost through our example of life, but we also must be willing to reach out and invite them to join us. Of course, approaching someone and extending the invitation is not a comfortable action, but Jesus didn’t promise us comfort in this life. Are you willing to get uncomfortable and invite someone to step beyond merely “hitting for the cycle”?

Do you really need to work on Sundays?

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From St. John Vianney’s Little Catechism, Part I, Chapter 7:

You labor, you labor, my children; but what you earn ruins your body and your soul. If one ask those who work on Sunday, “What have you been doing?” they might answer, “I have been selling my soul to the devil, crucifying Our Lord, and renouncing my Baptism. I am going to Hell; I shall have to weep for all eternity in vain.” When I see people driving carts on Sunday, I think I see them carrying their souls to Hell.

Oh, how mistaken in his calculations is he who labors hard on Sunday, thinking that he will earn more money or do more work! Can two or three shillings ever make up for the harm he does himself by violating the law of the good God? You imagine that everything depends on your working; but there comes an illness, an accident…. so little is required! a tempest, a hailstorm, a frost. The good God holds everything in His hand; He can avenge Himself when He will, and as He will; the means are not wanting to Him. Is He not always the strongest? Must not He be the master in the end?

There was once a woman who came to her priest to ask leave to get in her hay on Sunday. “But,” said the priest, “it is not necessary; your hay will run no risk.” The woman insisted, saying, “Then you want me to let my crop be lost?” She herself died that very evening; she was more in danger than her crop of hay. “Labor not for the meat which perisheth, but for that which endureth unto life everlasting.” [Jn. 6: 27].

What will remain to you of your Sunday work? You leave the earth just as it is; when you go away, you carry nothing with you. Ah! when we are attached to the earth, we are not willing to go! Our first end is to go to God; we are on the earth for no other purpose. My brethren, we should die on Sunday, and rise again on Monday.

Sunday is the property of our good God; it is His own day, the Lord’s day. He made all the days of the week: He might have kept them all; He has given you six, and has reserved only the seventh for Himself. What right have you to meddle with what does not belong to you? You know very well that stolen goods never bring any profit. Nor will the day that you steal from Our Lord profit you either. I know two very certain ways of becoming poor: they are working on Sunday and taking other people’s property.

I would add to the great St. John Vianney that we should not be encouraging Sunday work by doing our shopping or other errands on Sundays. We have 6 days in the week to buy groceries, fuel up the car, and the like. There should be only one focus on Sunday: God.

Questionable Apparitions

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As Catholics, we believe that Our Lord Jesus Christ and His mother, the Blessed Virgin Mary, have regularly appeared to various saints throughout the world. Many of those apparitions have been approved by the Church and continue to feed and strengthen the faith in Our Lord throughout the world.

Sadly, there are also supposed apparitions which have been either discouraged or outright discredited. Recently, one such “apparition” was declared by the bishop of Cleveland, OH, to be without supernatural origin. In response, the “seer” of this “apparition” (and yes, I’m putting them in scare quotes on purpose) published a message which speaks of disobeying the local ordinary.

If you want to know whether an apparition is valid or not, look at how the visionaries respond to criticism from their bishops. In every legitimate apparition where this has occurred, Our Lord and the Blessed Virgin Mary have counseled the visionary to remain faithful and obedient to the legitimate Church authority. In fact, obedience to local ecclesiastical authority is a requirement for approval of an apparition. It becomes 100% crystal clear that this is a fraud when a “visionary” reports that he or she has been told by Our Lord or Mary to disobey the bishop or pastor. Our Lord would never ask for disobedience against the authority of bishops which comes from Him, and Mary would never go against the will of her Son.

As a priest, my advice would be to avoid any apparitions which have been disapproved by their local ordinary, even if there’s some question to whether the bishop’s decision was the appropriate one. Devotion to approved apparitions is a good and laudable action, and I would highly encourage all Catholics to learn about the legitimate apparitions, such as Our Lady in Lourdes and Fatima, the Our Lady of Guadalupe image, and the Divine Mercy. In these apparitions, among many others, Our Lord and Mary encouraged the visionaries to obedience. May we be willing to be obedient as well.

Update: Patrick Madrid answers on EWTN’s Open Line radio program regarding the “good fruits” at Medjugorje.

Update 2: More on Medjugorje: Note the position of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith in the last three paragraphs.

Technology Addiction and the Spiritual Life

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I don’t think it’s an overstatement to say we’re surrounded by technology in most of the so-called “developed world”. In fact, ‘surrounded’ might be an understatement in countries like the United States. ‘Inundated’ might be more accurate and with the technology comes noise, both literally and spiritually, that can and does drown out the voice of God in our lives.

This isn’t to say that all technology is bad or demonic or anything like that (though it does seem to be possessed by a demon when it begins to malfunction). Technology has brought great advancements to our health and way of life. The problem comes in when we allow that technology to overwhelm and run our lives.

As much as I enjoy technological advances and having the latest gadget, I’ve become more concerned about how technology controls our lives. From the alarm clock which wakes us up in the morning, to the cell phone which interrupts our personal conversations, to the computers we use for work, education, and entertainment, technology has a hold on major aspects of our lives.

By overrelying on technology, our attention span, the length of time during which we can focus our attention on one particular person or thing, is diminishing dramatically. Likewise, the incivility and division we see in politics today is greatly influenced by television and other communication technologies that support and encourage that kind of behavior.

This became more clear to me on Saturday as I was listening to an interview program on EWTN Radio called “Faith and Culture”. The interviewer, Colleen Carroll Campbell was speaking to Eric Brende, who wrote a book Better Off: Flipping the Switch on Technology, about technology addiction. Mr. Brende and his wife spent 18 months in a community with almost no modern conveniences. No electricity, no indoor plumbing, and a few old-fashioned manual or horse-powered machines to aid in housework or farm work. His point was that our overreliance on modern technology has upset our natural balance, both on an individual level and on a communal level.

At first, I was disagreeing with Mr. Brende, but the more I thought about it, the more I found myself agreeing with him. Why? Let’s look at something so ubiquitous as as an alarm clock. Like most animals who are active during the day, we are naturally predisposed to go to sleep when the sun sets and rise when it rises. Since the advent of electric lighting, we are no longer dependent on the Sun to be the major source of light, which allows us to function much later after the Sun has set. This might not be a bad thing on it’s face, but it actually works against our natural cycle of rising with the Sun and sleeping once the Sun has set. For many of us, this means that we need an electronic gadget, an alarm clock, to alert us when it’s time to rise and face another day.

Again, this isn’t to say that technology is bad, and we need to revert to a pre-Industrial Revolution state. Like any tool, technology has its uses. As I was writing this on a Sunday evening, a series of severe thunderstorms were moving through my area. I had advanced warning about these storms due to the satellite, radar, and radio technologies employed by the National Weather Service. Anyone who has ever survived a tornado or hurricane is likely very grateful to the NWS’s use of technology to get the warnings out with time to spare.

As a priest, my concern with technology is the effect it has on our spiritual balance, to take it a step further than Mr. Brende. To truly enter into a conversation with God, we need silence, but much of the technology that we employ in our daily lives do a lot to constantly disturb that silence. Cell phones, television, radio, and computers, among other things, provide distraction after distraction that keep us from focusing our attention on what God is saying to us. Instead of taking time for prayer, we surf the Internet, watch TV, listen to the radio , or talk on the phone.

Is the answer getting rid of technology all together? No , but sometimes the monks on “Into Great Silence” seem to have the right idea. The Carthusians live very austere lives, with only a bed, a desk with chair, a wood stove, and a kneeler for prayer in their cells. Most of us are not called to that level of austerity, but we still need to keep technology in its place. Technological advancements are tools that can be very beneficial for our lives, but will seriously affect our well-being if we allow them to control us.

The challenge for us is finding the balance between using technology for our good and allowing technology to control us. If you don’t think you’re controlled by technology, turn off the TV, computer, and cell phone and see how long you can go without turning one of them on. For most Americans, I would venture to guess that they would not be able to go more than an hour or so with at least the cell phone.

If you’re one of the millions of “technology addicted”, as I likely am, what do we need to do to overcome that addiction? Our natural, and more importantly spiritual, lives hang in the balance.