I’ve been reading comments from what I can only describe as internet nuts, carrying on like the crazies they are about the horror of not holding church services.
I know that people are unaware just how crazy they sound when they tap out their basement thoughts on the internet. I’m also aware that most of them would not behave this way in person.
But it’s still disturbing, reading the things a few people give themselves permission to say on venues like Facebook.
The comments that I read today were a bunch of nutso blatherings about how it was necessary to “worship the triune God” (I am quoting someone here) and that to “deny” this “necessity” would be to “deny” Jesus Christ. Several other people were going on in a similar fashion, making public idiots of themselves. I read that stuff and I just shake my head and think, “well, for you guys, I guess the train really has left the station.”
Since most of these comments came from people who are aggressively Catholic (as in people who amuse themselves by jumping on other people they don’t even know about their weak and worthless Catholicism) I have to admit, although it embarrasses me, that, however nutty they are, these folks are also of my own tribe. I haven’t kept track of the comments of these specific people down through time, but I do remember a least a couple of them having the vapors over the notion that the Pope might allow married priests in order to provide the mass to Catholics in the Amazon.
The same folks who are now howling like a dog with its tail caught in a door because public mass is temporarily suspended for a few weeks due to a pandemic, were A-OK with permanently depriving all the Catholics in a vast region of the world of any access to the sacraments at all. It’s a little tiresome sometimes, interacting with holier-than-thou uber Catholics and their many contradictions and limitless self-absorbed self-congratulation.
That’s why I no longer allow comments on my blog. I’m too tired, sick and old for this nonsense.
Here’s my take on the pretend horrors of no-public-mass-to-save-lives deal. If you want to be holy, truly holy, do something kind for someone who needs it. It can be something as simple as pulling the trash down to the curb for the little old lady on the corner. Say something nice to somebody on the internet. Treat people as if Jesus is your Lord, and He really does love them.
Commit random acts of kindness.
Stay home in your peaceful country, in your cosy home, under your roof that doesn’t leak, with your refrigerator full of food, hot and cold running water, internet and cable tv and participate in mass from your sofa. You’re not deprived. This isn’t suffering. It isn’t denying Christ. It’s doing your part in a difficult situation to save lives.
Be a good citizen.
Be a nice person.
And stop posing and pretending that you’re the only person who loves Jesus in this whole country.
We’re down here in the pits together, sinners every single one of us. None of us is righteous. Not one.
Love God.
Trust God.
Accept His mercy that none of us deserve.
Know that you are blessed.
And show some gratitude.
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