{"id":1101,"date":"2014-01-16T12:03:46","date_gmt":"2014-01-16T17:03:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/crywoof\/?p=1101"},"modified":"2014-01-15T14:04:20","modified_gmt":"2014-01-15T19:04:20","slug":"eitheror-bothand-this-then-that","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/crywoof\/2014\/01\/eitheror-bothand-this-then-that\/","title":{"rendered":"Either\/Or, Both\/And, This-then-That"},"content":{"rendered":"<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC \"-\/\/W3C\/\/DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional\/\/EN\" \"http:\/\/www.w3.org\/TR\/REC-html40\/loose.dtd\">\n<html><head><meta http-equiv=\"content-type\" content=\"text\/html; charset=utf-8\"><meta http-equiv=\"content-type\" content=\"text\/html; charset=utf-8\"><\/head><body><p><a href=\"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/384\/2014\/01\/origin_5615480036.jpg\" class=\" decorated-link\" target=\"_blank\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/384\/2014\/01\/origin_5615480036-282x300.jpg\" alt=\"\" title=\"origin_5615480036\" width=\"282\" height=\"300\" class=\"alignright size-medium wp-image-1103\"><\/a> I frequently read on one blog or another that Catholics aren\u2019t either\/or, we\u2019re both\/and.  And this is true: not feasting OR fasting, but feasting AND fasting, each in its proper season.  Not celibacy OR marriage, but celibacy for some AND marriage for others.<\/p>\n<p>I ran into another example or either\/or thinking recently during an on-line discussion of the man who was shot for texting during a movie.  I see two facts, here:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li> A man was texting during a movie, which is rude; the light from the phone distracts other patrons.\n<\/li><li> Another man shot him for it, which is murder, and completely disproportionate to the offense.\n<\/li><\/ul>\n<p>The facts of the situation are somewhat unclear; it seems that the texter was texting a babysitter during the previews, before the movie actually began; and there\u2019s some indication that the killer might have felt threatened by the texter\u2019s response to being asked to stop.<\/p>\n<p>At least one commenter insisted that the texting wasn\u2019t a bit rude.  The texter was texting a babysitter, which is reasonable, and it was during the previews, not during the actual movie.  I would disagree; I rarely go to the movies, and I like to watch the previews; and while distracting me during the previews isn\u2019t as bad as distracting me during the movie, it\u2019s still rude.  But I got the sense that for this commenter, to accept the rudeness was to somehow partially justify the killing.  Possibly I\u2019m misreading her.  But I see this sort of thing often: both parties are in the wrong, but people champion one or the other and insist that their party did nothing wrong, as if to say otherwise was to give aid and comfort to the enemy.<\/p>\n<p>But we\u2019re a both\/and people, we Catholics; we should have no trouble pointing out that neither party\u2019s behavior was above reproach.<\/p>\n<p>Once one does that, though, people start shouting \u201cmoral equivalence!\u201d and asking how we can equate rudeness with murder.<\/p>\n<p>But we\u2019re not simply a both\/and people.  We\u2019re also a this-then-that people.   Rudeness is wrong, and murder is wrong, and murder is much worse than rudeness.  We\u2019re not equating them; we\u2019re recognizing them for what they are, and then putting them in proper proportion to each other.<\/p>\n<p>Life is more complicated than either\/or; and it\u2019s more complicated than both\/and.  We need a sense of proportion.<\/p>\n<p>____<br>\nphoto credit: <a href=\"http:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/danzen\/5615480036\/\" class=\" decorated-link\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\">Dan Zen<\/a> via <a href=\"http:\/\/photopin.com\" class=\" decorated-link\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\">photopin<\/a> <a href=\"http:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by\/2.0\/\" class=\" decorated-link\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\">cc<\/a><\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I frequently read on one blog or another that Catholics aren\u2019t either\/or, we\u2019re both\/and. And this is true: not feasting OR fasting, but feasting AND fasting, each in its proper season. Not celibacy OR marriage, but celibacy for some AND marriage for others. I ran into another example or either\/or thinking recently during an on-line [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1131,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[43],"tags":[208],"class_list":["post-1101","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-deep-thoughts-from-the-doghouse","tag-sense-of-proportion"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v21.1 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Either\/Or, Both\/And, This-then-That<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"I frequently read on one blog or another that Catholics aren&#039;t either\/or, we&#039;re both\/and. 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