In which I demand atheists defend the wearing of pants. I might just be depressed, or maybe I’m a dark-minded and morbid Catholic, but I can’t help but agree with Robert Browning: “There may be a heaven; there must be a hell.” I can enter into some solidarity with today’s atheist, that it’s difficult to know if there’s some absolute good in the universe, but we part ways totally when he claims that there’s no absolute evil. We may or... Read more
(Spoiler Alert: The Eucharist is God in the form of bread and wine.) To hear your average Catholics – alright, let’s be honest, to hear some Catholics who actually care about the faith – speak on the Eucharist, I would sympathize with the modern eavesdropper who would leave the conversation thinking that he had overhead a couple of junkies praising a life-consuming drug. Our phrases our peppered with a fiendish, ravenous hunger, from Flannery’s “it is the center of existence... Read more
Dear Rothoof, There’s just no other way to say it: You are an inadequate excuse for a demon. I told you which church to send him to, did I not? I told you that the ideal situation for your man to be in was one of considering Catholicism as merely another denomination, to see The Church as a church. This would have been delightful, as it subtly creates in the man a lack of commitment, a sense of well-I-can-always-leave-for-another that... Read more
Rule Number One: Use your eyeballs. Sorry I haven’t p-p-p-posted in like chika-chika-4 days. I have been white-water rafting in the grand canyon, killing bald eagles, and dressing in their skin. Actually I was at Franciscan University, which really amounts to the same thing, meeting new people, (including some fellow bloggers, like the ever wonderful Michelle who writes at Catholic Unveiled, and deserves your attention, AND support, for she is heading off to Mexico to live the Catholic missionary life) getting... Read more
Dear Rothoof, The first thing I would like to strike from your mind is the idea that, since your man is Catholic, you have to change your game. While it’s true, Catholics have infuriating quirks and delicious weaknesses that must be taken into account, the basics stay the same, the Infernal Catechism still applies: Make him sin. I took the liberty of checking your man’s file, and I see that upon becoming Catholic, he has made some renewal, some promise... Read more
Dear Rothoof, May I begin by saying you’re a damned fool? (The ‘damned’, of course, was my attempt at humor, for – as we all know – Our Kingdom Below is the only place where intelligence and sanity still reign, and really, it’s the Place We Left that holds the damned, under the iron rule of Our Stupid Enemy.) But you truly are a fool. Your man has become a Catholic, primarily as a result of your lazy negligence. I... Read more
I guess I never realized it, but our non-believing folk are quite excited about the idea of disproving the existence of God. Apparently, it will halt mankind from waging war, smoking, and feeling awkward about gay sex, while simultaneously leading to a brotherhood amongst men via increased time spent on the Holy Internet. But honestly – though these goals send shivers of warmth down my typing fingers – I would venture that the atheist is almost too excited, in that... Read more
Dear Catholic artists, musicians, filmmakers, writers, photographers, architects, bloggers, designers and everyone else. C.S. Lewis has something extremely important to tell you. Listen. Until quite recently – until the latter part of the last century – it was taken for granted that the business of the artist was to delight and instruct his public. There were, of course, different publics; the street-songs and the oratorios were not addressed to the same audience (though I think a good many people liked... Read more
So if everyone practices liturgy, as we began, and if the liturgical denominations have the most accessible and universal liturgy of them all, as we continued, and Catholics the Greatest Liturgy Ever in the Holy Mass (sorta snuck that in, didn’t I?), the question remains: why is it so great to have an accessible liturgy? Ignoring the obvious positives accessibility brings, surely that is not all liturgy is. The real question this time, I promise: what is liturgy? After all,... Read more
If, like I’ve shown, everyone practices liturgy, why then is there a distinction between liturgical denominations and Evangelicals? Why does the latter get grumpy with the former about all their rules, motions and symbols? Now, the common answer goes something like this: “Because, Catholic and Lutheran and all the rest, your ancient liturgy is overly complicated, elitist, snobbish, pretentious, and dripping with wealth. It is all high and detached, boring, old, stuck-in-the-pews, unrelatable to the modern age. The average human being must feel... Read more
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