{"id":9754,"date":"2014-06-23T11:36:45","date_gmt":"2014-06-23T15:36:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/?p=9754"},"modified":"2014-06-23T11:36:45","modified_gmt":"2014-06-23T15:36:45","slug":"discern-the-right-thing-pope-francis-bookclub","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/2014\/06\/discern-the-right-thing-pope-francis-bookclub.html","title":{"rendered":"Discern the Right Thing [Pope Francis Bookclub]"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

In 2014, I\u2019m reading and blogging through Pope Francis\/Cardinal Bergoglio\u2019s\u00a0<\/em>Open Mind, Faithful Heart: Reflections on Following Jesus<\/a>. \u00a0Every Monday, I\u2019ll be writing about the next meditation in the book, so you\u2019re welcome to\u00a0peruse them all<\/a>\u00a0and\/or read along.<\/em><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

In this week\u2019s chapter, Pope Francis uses the falling away of the church at Ephesus as an admonitory example for our own, personal attempts to follow Christ. \u00a0The Ephesian church didn\u2019t fall into heresy or disappear altogether, but, instead, it \u201cabandoned the love you had at first.\u201d \u00a0Initial passions don\u2019t persist, but Ephesus had failed to nurture their love into a subtler, mature devotion, and were being exhorted to do so before there was no embers left to stoke.<\/p>\n

Pope Francis then turns from the experience of a city to the disposition of individuals, and the ways we can quench our love, even as we think we\u2019re feeding and strengthening it.<\/p>\n

When people realize that they have lost the energy of their earlier passions, they respond in different ways. \u00a0Some try to perform \u201cplastic surgery of the soul\u201d: they seek to be like young people, adopting their styles of dress and speech. \u00a0Leaving aside the unfortunate cases, this is at best only a superficial solution, one that conceals the true challenge. \u00a0Other people, as they age, become fixed in external practices; they harden into a rigid posture that smacks of pharisaical negativity. \u00a0Questions of dress\u2013for example, cassocks vs. jeans\u2013may reflect inner attitudes, but what is at stake is something much deeper; it can be seen especially in our attitude toward work.<\/p>\n

The loss of our initial fervor may lead some of us into enthusiasm about what might be called \u201csecondary tasks\u201d or \u201cbusy work.\u201d \u00a0Whereas our mid-life crisis is an invitation from the Lord to become more practiced in the theological virtues, we often prefer to practice the \u201csecondary virtues,\u201d which are more suited to busy work. \u00a0Some of us become socially involved with such eagerness that we depart from conventional liturgical forms. \u00a0Others, in contrast, become exceedingly fussy in all that has to do with ritual. \u00a0In neither case is the real challenge being honestly confronted. \u00a0Our first love must undergo conversion, which means \u201cconcentrating on Jesus Christ alone.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

I could think of examples, from my own life and from those of friends, that matched Pope Francis\u2019s descriptions very well, so I read on eagerly, hoping for a description of rightly ordered love that would be just as vivid and practical as his portraits of stunted love. \u00a0Unfortunately for me, the example he turned to as a paragon was much farther from my life: Mary upending her jar of oil over Jesus to anoint him<\/a>.<\/p>\n

I could see how any of the previous examples could be earnestly, subjectively mistaken for Mary\u2019s act of love. \u00a0Policing Pharisaical strictures can feel like love, since you\u2019re offering something<\/em> (and, often, feel persecuted as a result). \u00a0In order to follow Mary\u2019s example correctly, Pope Francis recommends discernment, to better differentiate between our instinct to do\u00a0something<\/em> and our instinct to do the\u00a0right thing<\/em>.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m not very good at this, as of yet, so I went casting about for a crutch, and wound up thinking of the three questions that Richard Hamming used to go around asking people at Bell Labs three questions<\/a>:<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. What are the most important problems in your field?<\/li>\n
  2. Are you working on one of them?<\/li>\n
  3. Why not?<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    Hamming had a nice way of sneaking up on people. \u00a0We all have answers for why we\u2019re doing the work we\u2019ve taken on, so Hamming didn\u2019t bother asking\u00a0that<\/em> question. \u00a0He just asked what the most important thing would be, and why we aren\u2019t doing it. \u00a0When I\u2019ve reframed questions like this, sometimes it turns out not be impossible to offer\u00a0something<\/em> to the most important problem.<\/p>\n

    The oil Mary offered was expensive and extravagant. \u00a0She wasn\u2019t holding back what she had for other causes or tasks; she had discerned the most important thing in her life and offered everything she had, as beautifully as she could.<\/p>\n

    Writing this post, and applying Hamming\u2019s questions to my spiritual life, I could immediately think of some answers for question number one (\u201cWhat\u2019s most important?\u201d) for which my answer to the second question (\u201cAre you working on them?\u201d) would be \u2018No.\u2019<\/p>\n

    It\u2019s probably not the case that all my current answers to #1 are correct, but by actually engaging with them, I\u2019d have a better chance of finding out, and being changed. \u00a0As long as I hang back, spinning my wheels, it\u2019s hard to grow in the discernment that Pope Francis prescribes.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    In 2014, I\u2019m reading and blogging through Pope Francis\/Cardinal Bergoglio\u2019s\u00a0Open Mind, Faithful Heart: Reflections on Following Jesus. \u00a0Every Monday, I\u2019ll be writing about the next meditation in the book, so you\u2019re welcome to\u00a0peruse them all\u00a0and\/or read along. In this week\u2019s chapter, Pope Francis uses the falling away of the church at Ephesus as an admonitory […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":127,"featured_media":9755,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[177],"tags":[227],"class_list":["post-9754","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-spiritual-practice","tag-pope-francis-bookclub"],"yoast_head":"\nDiscern the Right Thing [Pope Francis Bookclub]<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"In 2014, I\u2019m reading and blogging through Pope Francis\/Cardinal Bergoglio\u2019s\u00a0Open Mind, Faithful Heart: Reflections on Following Jesus. \u00a0Every Monday, I\u2019ll\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" 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