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Updated to add additional information I did not know existed when I published this \u2013 spd<\/strong><\/p>\nThe Catholic Church is wild about credentials. For instance, you cannot call yourself a theologian without a licentiate or doctorate<\/a> in theology from an approved university. You would be silly to listen to anyone pontificate on canon law who did not have a canon law degree.<\/p>\n You cannot even call your nonprofit \u201cCatholic\u201d without permission from the local bishop. I know because when my parents founded a Catholic nonprofit in the 1990s, they did not ask permission, and ran afoul of our bishop. They renamed it after a saint. Even that still requires episcopal permission, which they finally got.<\/p>\n Yet, modern Catholics have a penchant for chasing after people who are manifestly unqualified for the positions they hold, or the authority granted to them by the public. Consider the devotion conservative Catholics have for President Trump, a serial adulterer, two-bit grifter, failed casino owner, and reality TV star. Conservative Catholics have a higher regard for him than they do for Pope Francis.<\/p>\n On a somewhat smaller scale is Matt Walsh, a writer who purports to speak authoritatively on Catholic issues, but who brags about<\/a> his lack of a college (or any other) degree, and who is chiefly known for misogyny<\/a>, sneering at celebrity\u00a0suicide<\/a>\u00a0victims<\/a>, and lying about<\/a> authentic Catholic social teaching.<\/p>\n Then there is the satellite channel EWTN, which calls itself \u201cThe Global Catholic Network\u201d and is treated as its own Magisterium by many Catholics, but which actually is run by a lay board of directors<\/a>.<\/p>\n Regarding the media, I wonder how many of the newspapers or magazines or websites who call themselves Catholic actually have episcopal permission to do so? Probably not many. I am going to assume Catholic Digest<\/em>, published in the United States, has this permission, because its parent company, Bayard U.S.<\/a>, is owned by the Augustinians of the Assumption.<\/p>\n I single out this publication because it published, recently<\/a>, an interview with one Leila Miller, editor of a new book, Primal Loss: Now-Adult Children of Divorce Speak<\/em>.<\/p>\n Besides Primal Loss<\/em>, Ms. Miller\u2019s published books<\/a> include Raising Chaste Catholic Men\u00a0<\/em>and Made This Way: How to Prepare Kids to Face Today\u2019s Tough Moral Issues<\/em>. Her Webpage<\/a> also includes her current blog and archives of her old blog.<\/p>\n Ms. Miller bills herself as a \u201cCatholic Author.\u201d I\u2019m Catholic and I write. I don\u2019t know whether I\u2019d call myself a \u201cCatholic author\u201d or \u201cCatholic writer.\u201d I\u2019m a writer who happens to be Catholic, like J.R.R Tolkien and G.K. Chesterton. And that\u2019s good enough for me.<\/p>\n I also don\u2019t pretend to be an expert on anything. I write about what interests me: politics, the arts, literature, issues in the Catholic Church, and so on. But Ms. Miller, through her book titles, presents herself as an expert on marital relations and child rearing. So, because she\u2019s a \u201cCatholic Author,\u201d and because the Catholic Church is wild about credentials, it is only fair to ask: how much moral theology has Leila Miller studied? Does she have a degree in therapy or psychology? Is she a licensed marriage counselor?<\/p>\n Nowhere\u2014her blog or her Facebook page\u2014does she list any. Blurbs on the back covers of her books tell us she\u2019s a \u201cpopular writer and speaker\u201d who\u2019s been on EWTN and in other Catholic media. She has \u201ceight children and several grandchildren.\u201d These aren\u2019t credentials, except maybe in the circles to which she seems to want to appeal.<\/p>\n Marriage and raising children are serious issues, so I would advise Ms. Miller\u2019s audience to find experts to listen to and to stop reading Ms. Miller. Because she gives bad advice and seriously misrepresents Church teaching. For instance, this:<\/p>\n There are very few marriages that won\u2019t go through a time of serious crisis. It\u2019s about pushing past it. Even if separation is necessary because of danger, the Church says that until reconciliation can happen, and the conjugal life can be restored, this should be pushed through because there\u2019s something on the other side. But you must get through the cross. Sometimes people\u2019s entire marriages are a cross.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Encouraging people to \u201cpush through\u201d serious crises and remain in abusive relationships is probably the worst thing about this quote, but that\u2019s not all that\u2019s wrong with it. What struck me was how blithely she says, \u201cSometimes people\u2019s entire marriages are a cross.\u201d<\/p>\n No, no, that\u2019s not how it works. Of all the sacraments, holy matrimony is the only one specifically ordered to human happiness, both emotional and physical. A marriage that is entirely a cross is not to be celebrated. It is to be ended, if the things that make it a cross are serious enough. Also, Jesus died on the cross so we don\u2019t have to. Yes, we can and should unite our sufferings to his, but suffering remains an evil. Ms. Miller\u2019s advice is a grave distortion.<\/p>\n Let\u2019s look at Ms. Miller\u2019s next answer:<\/p>\n St. Ignatius said that when you pick a state in life, you must assume you\u2019re picking something permanent. The \u201cd-word\u201d cannot be on the table. If it is, then in that first crisis, the devil gets his foothold and he\u2019s going to make you think you can leave. The dysfunction doesn\u2019t end with divorce; it just gets exponentially worse.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n When a victim of abuse escapes an abusive or chronically unfaithful husband or wife, it gets exponentially better for that victim, and for the children. In abusive or unfaithful relationships, by the time the \u201cd-word\u201d is on the table, it\u2019s not the first crisis. It is not even a crisis. It follows a series of crises, crises that leave permanent scars, internal and external, on the victim and the children.<\/p>\n Next:<\/p>\n The sacrament is presumed indissoluble. We must stop thinking, Maybe I don\u2019t have a valid marriage. Go back and look at the vows. You\u2019re vowing 50 percent bad: sickness, bad times, poverty. You\u2019re agreeing to stay through some pretty bad things until death. Go back and revisit those vows and think, This is what Christ meant. He knew everything, and he still said no divorce. Start believing that divorce is a sin. We\u2019ll solve a lot of our problems.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Of course the Church presumes marriages are valid. That\u2019s how due process works. But who is Leila Miller to tell people they have a valid marriage no matter what? Each situation is different, and anyway that\u2019s why dioceses have marriage tribunals: so professionals can determine the validity of a marriage. Also, Jesus did not say \u201cno divorce.\u201d In Matthew 5:32, he allows it for infidelity.<\/p>\n I am not enough of a theologian to know whether, \u201cStart believing that divorce is a sin\u201d makes Ms. Miller a heretic, but I know enough to know that this directly contradicts Catholic teaching. The Catechism of the Catholic Church deplores divorce, calling it \u201ca grave offence against the natural law.\u201d But it also tells us<\/a>, \u201cIf civil divorce remains the only possible way of ensuring certain legal rights, the care of the children, or the protection of inheritance, it can be tolerated and does not constitute a moral offense.\u201d<\/p>\n The rest of the interview is more of the same: Ms. Miller telling spouses to stay in abusive marriages (\u201cSometimes living out that vow is painful. That\u2019s what a vocation is.\u201d) and calling evil good (\u201cIt\u2019s the very thing that will make you holy.\u201d).<\/p>\nCatholic media<\/h4>\n
Stop following pied pipers<\/h4>\n