On Who I Is

Last weekend I went to see the rebooted Spider-Man movie. SPOILER ALERT: At the end of the movie there's a great line from a completely ancillary character (a high school teacher), who says, "I had a professor in college who told us that there were basically 10 plots in all of fiction. I disagree. There is only one: 'Who am I?'"

Okay, fine, so the spoiler is that I'm a nerd who went to see the rebooted Spider-Man movie.

Why is identity the fundamental question of fiction? Because art imitates nature and the fundamental question in all of our lives is who I am.
Let me tell you a story. It's a quick one, and, as usual, it's about me. Last Saturday I was visiting with a priest friend of mine, wasting time and playing guitar. He is an excellent singer, so the two of us were messing around with some harmonies on old folk songs (nerdtacular enough yet?)

That's me, on the right. Behind the fence and running into the house to get my ear plugs.

At one point, Fr. made the drastic mistake of thinking we actually sounded good and pulled out a recorder. When we listened to the playback, it was clear that we did not sound good. Or, to be more precise, that I did not sound good. Now let's back up a moment.
I, in an attempt to "improve myself," have been taking singing lessons once a week for roughly the last five months. Over that time, my teacher has repeatedly told me that I've shown marked improvement (I can only assume that where I started was disastrous indeed). On top of this, I've been belting out lyrics to turned-up radios and in showers since I was old enough to realize that music is awesome (i.e., since the fetal stage). I taught myself to play guitar in high school so that I could play at open mics, and I've played in a couple of bands over the years, doing backing vocals here and there. Realizing that through all of this I've probably sounded like a cross between Bullwinkle and a rock compressed retroactive embarrassment for nearly a decade of public humiliation into about 30 seconds of listening to myself.
Now, this isn't one of those "oh I hate myself so much and you should feel bad for me and please tell me about how much you've loved my singing over the years" moments. This is an honest assessment of my singing abilities (no, I will not put up a recording of myself to prove it).
After that, I had another series of revelations: I'd thought I was at least a decent singer, which turned out to be false. What else had I been thinking about myself without any basis in reality? For on thing, I've always liked to think of myself as a writer. Poetry, short stories, essays, etc. They all roll off the tip of the pen (or the underside of the keyboard) like a greased turkey down a steep hill.

I say! Err, well, I suppose I write.

Reality check: I've written nothing in the past year except this blog and my MA thesis, and have never been published beyond college reviews. Therefore I am not a writer.
I also like to think of myself as a runner. I've run two marathons and a half marathon and numerous 5k's. As a matter of fact, I just ran a 5k last Sunday.

There I am! About 30 people back on the left, and not actually in this picture or this race.

Reality: While I did run this last Sunday, prior to that I hadn't run since my last 5k, in December. And before that it had been over a year since I'd been out on the road for anything even resembling a jog (still finished in 27 minutes, though. Nowhere near anything that could be considered 'good,' but still not my worst). Therefore I am not a runner.
I also love reading books. When I was a kid, I'd tear through several a week, no problem. I read the 7th Harry Potter (okay, fine, I wasn't a kid when that came out) in 18 hours straight. I've also been known to devour books on philosophy and theology, as well as the classics.

I would never even dream of owning a Kindle. They just don't smell the same.

Reality: while I've always got a book or two on hand, I've also got shelves and shelves of books that I haven't read yet. Seems I've fallen more into collecting books than actually reading them. And I can hardly go a day without someone going slack-jawed with a "You've never read Brideshead Revisited?!" or a "Seriously? You only got 100 pages into Infinite Jest?" (more like Infinite-ly Boring). What can I say? I was a Lit. major back in the fore-years. Therefore, despite past conquests, I am not a reader.
The list can go on (and on and on). I'm not a songwriter, I'm not an artist, I'm not a poet, I'm not a leader, I'm not a good cook, I'm not very well groomed, I don't have a nice wardrobe, and I still haven't figured out where I can buy mustache wax so I can do those little curly-ques on the ends.

Awwwwww, yeah.

But don't get me wrong here. I'm not saying "Oh my life is so terrible and I'm such an awful failure!" It's such an odd reaction in our society that when we try to talk about faults and finitude, people will inevitably think to themselves "In order to be a good friend, I must contradict him when he admits to not being perfect," then say something to the effect of "Oh, Inkler, I've read your poetry, and it's quite good!" That's not my point. And if any of you think to say, "But Inkler, I've seen you, and you're not really so terribly groomed after all..." I shall strike you from my friend list. NOT MY POINT.

What then is my point? My point is that my identity can't come from anything I do myself. Even if I were really good at these things, I still would not be the best. The simple truth is that the pool is far too big for me to be the best at anything (particularly if we include not only all 7 billion people alive today, but also all the people who have lived). Now, I know, I know, statistically someone has to be the best there is at some activity. Someone out there can lift more weight than anyone else. Someone is better than anyone else at identifying types of brachiopods. Someone really was the quickest draw in the West. But is that enough for an identity? Would you walk up to someone at a party and say "Hi! I'm the guy/gal who read the Webster's Dictionary cover to cover in 4 minutes, 3 seconds"? Sure, you might, but that's only a conversation starter, it doesn't encapsulate you.

You may also, conceivably, introduce yourself as a fan of polka, though this may be a second- or third-meeting type of conversation rather than a right-off-the-bat statement.

And my goodness, this post is already rather long. Get your head in the game, Inkler! (And now I'm talking to myself...)

The point is this: if I am not defined by my actions, even as admittedly mediocre as I am at them, then who am I? This is the fundamental question of fiction because it is the fundamental question of our hearts. This question masks a deeper one though, one which is much more frightening: am I worthy of love? Why be the best guitarist? Why be the funniest comedian? Why be the greatest writer? In order to be loved. It's just like the animal kingdom - I must be the best (at least within a certain radius of distance) in order to attract attention. But if I can't even define myself with any sort of accuracy, can I be loved? Who am I? Is that person who I am worthy of love?

I will give you the easy answer, but by starting it this way, I am telling that it will be a struggle. The easy answer is yes - I am the beloved. I am made for love. Before I moved or breathed God knew me and loved me. Before I could do anything productive for my parents, before I could speak, before I could even understand or recognize them, my parents loved me. I know that I am lucky in this, but I'm sure I don't know how lucky.

That is the easy answer, and it is true. Before we are anything, we are loved. Without questioning the truth of this as the basis of all human being and loving, I must say that this is a struggle to believe. This is a struggle to accept. It is so tempting to try to define ourselves, to hold up our accomplishments and actions as badges of our worth. It is so tempting to believe that love must be earned, by behavior, by avoiding sin, by making sacrifices in order to receive that love. That's where the terrifying image of God as judge who keeps a tarry card of our sins and good deeds comes from. It is terrifying because we cannot outsmart God. We cannot weigh the scales in our favor.

This is so tempting, and I can guarantee that 100% of the despair in our world springs from this question of who I am, and whether that person is worthy of love. Knowing that it is only love that defines us does not relieve us of the terrible question, the terrible doubt. It is one thing to "know" something intellectually, it is an entirely different thing to live that knowledge, to be that knowledge. It is a different thing, and it is a constant struggle to allow God's love to define us. But that is what life is: one long, long lesson - one long, long love letter - in allowing ourselves to be loved first, and living out our response to that.

Ah, the good old days.

On Prayer

First, let me be the first to say that I am one of the least qualified to comment on prayer. I'm still a baby in the spiritual life, and make no claims to any sort of prayer "experiences," nor to having any particular insights. Neither do I pretend to have any sort of sanctity - I am only a weak and fallen man, but one who lives in the hope of love. Secondly, what I have to say about prayer will likely be nothing new, and it may be that it won't even apply to you. There are as many ways of praying as there are people because prayer is communion with God, and - to steal a phrase from Bl. JPII - each of us is made to commune with God in a "radically unrepeatable" way.
In fact, if it's not clear already, I'll just come out and say it: I'm a little leery of giving pointers on prayer because prayer is such a fundamentally important activity, and because I am no expert. Further, no one has ever asked me for pointers, which may be enough of an indicator to most of you that you may without guilt stop reading now.

On the other hand, if you're from Cleveland, you may be familiar with this delightful little piece of graffiti. Also, heed the imperative.

So with that disclaimer out of the way, I'd like to offer just a few straightforward bullet points regarding prayer. I have found these points helpful, but even more so, I continue to find them helpful, because as I said, I'm still feeling my way along in the dark.

1) Consistency

There is no relationship that has ever been built, thrived, or even survived which does not require consistency, which is really commitment. In the case of prayer, from God's side the relationship already exists: we are the beloved daughters and sons of the Father, brothers and sisters of the Son, through the power of the Spirit, effective in our lives. From our side, though, the relationship needs to be nurtured. It's not that we need to "build" a relationship - we're already loved. But we do need to learn that love. We need to learn that we are loved. We need to learn that God's heart is one that beats with love for us. And not just for us, but for you in particular. But learning this is like lovers learning each other: it takes commitment and consistency. I've listed this one first because it's probably the most important - our spiritual director at the seminary would often say that half the battle is just showing up - and being the most important, it's also the easiest one to violate. So show up. Set a daily schedule for prayer, whether 5 minutes, 10 minutes, or an hour. I'm not saying that you only pray during the allotted time. Think of a couple who is dating: throughout the day or week they'll probably talk to each other in a less than formal way, but if they are serious about their relationship, they'll also need to set aside real time to be with each other. Think of prayer in much the same way: yes, we should be "praying unceasingly" and "preaching the gospel at all times," even occasionally using words to do so, but we'll also need to give God real, committed, dedicated time, consistently.
(I'm not speaking from a high horse here, I've missed the last three days of my prayer schedule, and consistency is often the thing I struggle with most, because there's always something else which seems more important. I've even got a mantra that I repeat to myself all the time - "Prayer comes first," but as my spiritual director pointed out to me not too long ago, even a brief look at my actions shows that this simply is not the case in practice. Why am I telling you this? Because I am a weak-willed and fallen man who is constantly disproving his belief in his own perfection. Some days the realization that I'm not perfect hurts like a knife to the heart of my pride, but it's actually good news. It means I need Christ.)

2) Humility

Speaking of prayer as a relationship gives an unfortunate impression that it is just like any other relationship, which involve actual dialogue. In our common experience, when the other person in a relationship is silent or outright ignores us, it usually means that something went sour. When a woman gives me the cold shoulder or introduces me to the friend zone (I know, shocking, but it happens to even me), I usually take this as a sign that she is not interested in spending any more time with me. Prayer is not like this. Prayer for me has been a long history of silence, a lot of wondering if I am sitting in an empty room all alone. When I am at my most prideful, I think "This is a waste of my time! If I wanted to be ignored, I'd go hang out a singles bar" (I'm not alone in this - St. Teresa of Avila complained that while she was always so busy with God's work, it was a great disappointment that God would seem to withdraw at precisely those times that she had set aside to pray). Other times, I imagine that Jesus is in a coma and I am sitting with him because I love him (I'm not alone in this either - St. Therese of Lisieux wrote that Jesus was so often asleep in the boat when she prayed, reminding us of the gospel passage where the disciples cried out in the midst of the storm, "Lord, do you not care that we are perishing?!").
Regardless of how my heart behaves during prayer, it takes humility to keep me sitting in that chair - it takes accepting that my time is not the most valuable thing in the world, that I am smaller than God, and that the work of God is not always "productive" in any sense that I can comprehend. It's remarkably difficult to break the American "time = money" mindset, especially for a person who finds value in production. 
While I'm sitting here typing away about how humble I am, that's not my point. My point is that we must be humble. Prayer requires humility because prayer is continually presenting ourselves, our hearts, our lives, and our attention to God, and if we are sincere, prayer will break our hearts of stone and form us continually into the image of Christ even in the silence and apparent abandonment.


3) Use your humanity

When we see something like this, why does our very human heart swell? (well, at least mine does, though I admit that it's dependent on taste, experience, and etc. But bear with me) There is something about the physical presence of the building, the lighting, the arches, the soaring ceiling, the muted colors that speaks to us. Why? Because we are not angels. That is, we are not detached from materiality, nor should we desire to become so. Prayer is the response of our whole being to the gift of our whole being from God. As such, it should involve our whole humanity. This is one of the geniuses of Catholic spirituality (though certainly not limited to Catholics) - in liturgy, we don't pray simply by sitting and turning our mind to a long mental recitation, but by standing, processing, kneeling, bowing, prostrating, striking our chests, making the sign of the cross, listening, receiving, looking, and on and on. Why? To draw on our physicality, and to offer our bodies up in prayer, to pray with and through our bodies, because our bodies are ourselves.
Thomas Merton writes, 

The salvation of man does not mean that he must divest himself of all that is human: that he must discard his reason, his love of beauty, his desire for friendship, his need for human affection, his reliance on protection, order, and justice in society, his need to work and eat and sleep. A Christianity that despises these fundamental needs of man is not truly worthy of the name. (Life and Holiness) 

With that in mind, here is the directive: find what you are attracted to, and use it in prayer. I sit in my holy hour with an icon of Christ. As I've written before, this teaches me humility because I do not understand it, but I trust the Church. Because I love reading, I also utilize the writings of the saints or other sure spiritual guides in prayer. My mind is a part of my person that God has gifted me with, and I want to offer it back to Him in praise. Maybe for you it's taking a walk, or appreciating Nature, or sitting in the silence of a church, or painting or writing. 
Regardless of what you choose, remember that it is not about you, it is about offering glory to God. I admit that I occasionally did homework assignments in the chapel under the excuse that I was "praying." No doubt, this is one of the things I will come to answer for in the last days, and it's only because I trust in the mercy of God that I can be flippant about this (I expect I'll answer for my flippancy too). Prayer is not about finding an hour or however long just so we can do something that we like to do. It's about sitting with Christ, who is Lord of our lives. But because He is Lord of our whole life, it is not appropriate to shut out all feelings, thoughts, emotions, memories, and desires. Prayer does not mean becoming a robot. It means offering all of ourselves to Christ, and that includes our thoughts, feelings, and desires, which He will purify and direct to their true goal, Himself.


4) Find a friend

Another genius of the Catholic faith, and there are many, is the adamant belief that we are not alone. While of course there is no substitute for Christ or the power of God the Father active through the presence of the Spirit in our hearts, the communion of saints is made up our brothers and sisters who have allowed Christ to live His life in the world through their own actions, thoughts, and loves. The saints are those who have lived, like Paul, "no longer I, but Christ." This is mystical and mysterious, but it is above all human - to believe that holiness is only for a select few or that it somehow requires us to repress our humanity is to disbelieve the Incarnation. The Word became flesh so that we might become one with Him, and the saints are people who have allowed their lives to meld with His, to become words, speaking the Word.
With that in mind, the saints are very real role models for our lives of faith. This does not meant that we must become another Therese or another Augustine or another Julie Billiart or any of the others. We must become other Christs, not secondary versions of our brothers and sisters. Even so, the saints are our friends and guides, still present with us by virtue of the fact that they are united to Christ, who is with us "to the end of the age." 
So the directive is this: introduce yourself to the saints. There are certainly enough of them that you will find a very dear friend among them. Three of my favorites are St. Therese of Lisieux (as if you didn't know that already), Bl. Charles de Foucauld, and St. Thomsa More. A Carmelite nun, an ex-Trappist hermit and missionary, and a British layman martyr, all living very different lives, all giving themsleves completely to Christ, and living God's life in the world. But the point is not to read up on the people that I've found helpful, the point is to find the saints who resonate with your own experiences, and to let them bring you to the love of their hearts, who is Christ.


Late Addition: My pastor is famous for giving long, loooong homilies. So long that he'll preach for 20-25 minutes, then sit down, pray the rest of the Mass, and before the closing prayer he'll get up and say "Another point I forgot during the homily is..." and go on for another 5 or so minutes. Luckily for us, it's all fantastic stuff. I don't know if this is fantastic, but here's a point I'd meant to make in this post and forgot.
I'm constantly asking people to pray for me, and promising my prayers for them in return. It's gotten to the point that one of my seminarian friends accused me not long ago of wishing for "magic" - basically, of trying to control God by getting as many people as possible to pray for me. I'd like to make two quick points with regard to this:


1) Prayer is never about controlling God. Even at those times when we are asking for something (intercession), what we are really asking is not for God to change His mind, but that He may change our hearts. Look at Christ's prayer in the Garden: "May this cup pass from me, but not my will but yours be done." This is the perfect form of intercessory prayer: My God, here is what I want, here is what I recognize as being good for me, but I am submissive before what you have in store for me because I trust that you love me and will only my good. This is sharing our heart with God, naming our desires (which is very important), and recognizing our own finitude. It is not enough to simply suppress all desires and attractions: God wants to use those as tools to draw us into communion, especially when that communion means subsuming those desires for God's glory.
2) When I ask for prayers, I have two motives. One is sneaky: any opportunity I can invite someone to pray for any reason is an opportunity I will take. Yes, praying for me may be a superficial and quickly disposed prayer, but it is prayer. It is far more important to me that people pray than that I receive something - asking people to pray for me is really just an easy way of asking people to pray. The second is more theological: if prayer is union with God, then it must also be union with each other. That is, if you are united to Christ in your prayer and I am united to Christ in my prayer, then we are necessarily united with each other. So asking  someone to pray for me is asking them to share my life. Asking someone to pray is asking them to share intimacy with Christ and to be drawn into their life as well. This is why prayer is effective, because its goal is union with Christ, who is the linchpin, who draws all into one in Him. Because, as my good friend Flannery wrote (following Teillhard de Chardin), everything that rises must converge. So asking for prayer is not just asking for a few words, or asking for some magic. It is asking for a sharing of life, for the intimacy of the shared union with Christ. It is asking for Heaven, here and now.

On the Side of Christ

The other day a priest friend of mine mentioned that a woman had recently come into his office, seen his San Damiano crucifix, and remarked, "That's not what Jesus looks like. Jesus is whole and loving and at peace now." It struck me how strange it is that people so often experience symbols, representations, and even actions of love as accusatory. While it's not false to say that Jesus is whole and loving and at peace, it is still by his stripes that we have been healed, still by his blood that we are saved. In fact, if you happen to believe the Gospels, Jesus' resurrected body maintained the marks of crucifixion - holes in his hands and feet, wound in his side. 

Why do we see the Cross as accusation? I'm sure there are many reasons, but one of them is the "good person" complex we've allowed to creep into our modern consciousness. The thought goes something like this: I'm a good person. I don't harm anyone on purpose, I don't drink excessively, I don't use drugs, I pay my taxes, I am a contributing member of society. I just want to be happy and not get in the way of anyone else's happiness. Isn't that enough? Can't you just leave me alone, like I'm leaving you alone?

No doubt. Also, word.

When this mentality encounters the Cross, it is confronted with a radically different view of human loving, which functions as challenge. According to the Cross, love is not staying out of each others' way (so long as no one is being overtly harmed). The Cross tells us that love is sacrifice and selflessness, even up to and including being pierced. In other words, love is being bound up in the community, pouring ourselves out for each other, not in order to be good, but because we are in love. More and more I am convinced that I must conform my life to that of the Lover - not performing actions because they will gain me attention, help me to progress along some path, or even because they are good, but because I am in love.
This is a subtle distinction. Of course I ought to perform actions that are good, and of course I ought to be aware of which actions are good and which are bad. But no one has to tell a man who loves his wife that he must not murder her. The rule has no relevance to him because he loves. Likewise, no one needs to tell one in love with Christ that he or she must pray, must go to Mass, must love others.

As Thomas Merton put it in his excellent (and excellently short) Life and Holiness, the Holy Spirit takes the Law and internalizes it - makes it internal to the Christian. The one who is in love no longer responds to the laws and rules, but acts from the internal impetus of the Holy Spirit, driving and enlivening love within them.

On the other hand, just as there is a danger of being turned off by the challenge of the Cross, there is a perhaps even greater danger of oversimplifying the whole spiritual life, as I have just done in the last few paragraphs. It is true to say "all we must do is love Christ," but there is no practical directive there. And why did I entitle this post "On the Side of Christ"? (back when I was in seminary, there was a retired priest who would get up to give a homily and say a few sentences, then say "Now where was I going with that?" & expect us to answer him. He played this off like he was trying to make sure we were paying attention, or trying to lead us to realize a point on our own, but the suspicion was always that he really didn't know where he was going with it and needed ideas to finish it off).
The side of Christ - that gaping wound into which Thomas was invited to put his hand - in some sense, this is our goal.

Now, I know, I know, I just used this image last week. But I just love it so much, and I've spent the whole week turning it over and over and trying to come up with something worth saying about it. That or I'm running out of ideas, you decide.

Why is this our goal? Because it is through Christ's sufferings that we are drawn to his heart. It is by being drawn through his side, as it were, uniting our sufferings to his, that we are drawn into the communion of his heart with the Father's, in the Holy Spirit. But he is not dead, but lives! - it is not just our sufferings that we must unite to Christ, but our joys as well. Christ's resurrected flesh maintained these wounds because they were no longer wounds but marks of love - not accusation, but the expression of his person, directed infinitely to our good and longing infinitely for our hearts. 
And so must our hearts! In giving ourselves away, in allowing the Spirit to direct our lives in humility and love, the very wounds of our hearts will be sources of joy as well, to the extent that we have given them to Christ. But there is no way to give ourselves to Christ except by giving ourselves away to each other. And there is no way to do this except through the Spirit, which is to say that it is mysterious, and dependent on our vocation, which is the call of the Father to our own hearts through the whisperings of the Spirit, to be united to his Son. 
From this perspective - the lens of love, which is not a question of lists and balances - questions of being a "good person" disappear. Read any of the saints, and they will tell you that they no longer matter (Paul - I now live no longer I, but Christ lives in me; Therese - I will spend my Heaven doing good on Earth, because I will be in union with Christ, who is at work in our hearts) - no saint has ever come to the end of their life and wondered whether they were a "good person." Instead, like St. Thomas More (whose feast we celebrate today), they very often died with a realistic understanding of their own sinfulness, but with an even greater trust in God's loving mercy. Before his execution, More wrote to his daughter from prison, "Although I know well, Margaret, that because of my past wickedness I deserve to be abandoned by God, I cannot but trust in his merciful goodness..."

The Mass, the sacraments are our salvation, not because they are objects, or forms or actions we perform in order to "get" salvation, but because they draw us to the heart of this man with the wounded side. Better: salvation is not a question of reaching a destination ("Heaven" as if it were a place), but of surrendering ourselves into the wounded yet glorious side of Christ, into that love for which we were made. Because, as Benedict XVI has said, Heaven is not a place, but a Person - Jesus Christ.

On Sex and Death II

Remember when I said I'd try to post Part II the next day? I hope you haven't been holding your (collective) breaths, because I'd have a lot less friends by now. Well here it be: DEATH.

Okay, so do I tell them now or later that this whole 2-part post was conceived of as an excuse to use this image? Later. Definitely later.

We'll pick up right where we left off: death is all around us, especially in the spiritual life, and that's not a bad thing.
Why do we look for fulfillment in sex? Because it is easier than the alternative. That is, it is easier to believe that some object can fulfill us (sex here being conceived as an object rather than as a personal, relational action) than it is to come to terms with the fact that no object can fulfill us. If it's so false of a notion, why do we want objects that can fulfill us? Because we get to control them. If we can earn happiness or use some object to find fulfillment, then we are saved from the terrible existential anxiety of being in a world that cannot fulfill us.
But this is the particular burden of human being: dogs, cats, snails, sea cucumbers - they fulfill their purpose by eating, growing, reproducing, and dying. If we were like every other animal in the universe, we would be fulfilled by objects - by food, by reproducing, by having shelter during storms, etc.

I shall shortly become the most self-actualized person on the planet! As soon as I eat my way to the other side of this table.

The simple truth, however, is that we are not fulfilled by these things, or by any other thing. Why? Because we are not things, and we are not made for things. We are persons, and that means that we are made for love.

Side note: I googled "made for love" and got this. Oh Yanni, tell me about love.

The death is in accepting this, which is a remarkably difficult thing to do. One of the effects of our concupiscence is the overarching urge for control, to make ourselves the center of our sphere of action, and in this case that plays out in this desire to be fulfilled in objects, in things that we control. But admitting that we cannot be fulfilled in objects means having this control torn out of our hands. Or better, this admission means letting go of this control, which will otherwise be torn away in one way or another.
Death is the ultimate horizon, the final denial of all of our claims to control, because, as they say, Death waits for no one.

And this would all be terribly sad if we were indeed objects. That is, if we were like the animals, looking for fulfillment in what we could get and survival, then death would only be the terrible thumb of the universe coming down and laughing in our face as it squelched out all dreams, hopes, and desires. Luckily, however, we are persons, and Death is an ally.

So much of the spiritual life may be summed up in one simple action: the death of the self-will. From where I sit in my current spiritual journey, it is becoming clearer and clearer that this is at least 92-97% of the work that must be done in my own heart. Allowing this "I, ME, MINE" to die is the simplest of all actions, but also the one against which our hearts buck most rebelliously. I say that it is the simplest because it is accomplished through one single action: love. It is also the one against which our hearts rebel because it means one single thing: death.

This is akin to what Christ says in the gospel: He who saves his life loses it, he who loses his life for my sake saves it. Why? Because this "saving" of my own life means grasping and ordering my life according to my desires and thoughts of fulfillment, but this "losing" of my life for Christ's sake means losing myself in Christ. But being united to Christ often feels like death - we are united not only to His resurrection, but to his death as well - to His sufferings, to His longing for union, to His fear, His thirst, His submission to the Father.

Now you're probably thinking things like, "gosh you're depressing, Inkler," and "why the heck did I read all that?" and "I'm bored, I wonder what's going on over at the Comics Curmudgeon." As I've warned you, I am prone to windbaggery and beating-around-the-bushitis. Hopefully I'll tie this all together neatly in just a moment and we can all go on with our days.

What is the good news in all of this? Look back at the gospel: he who loses his life for my sake will save it. That is, to be lost in Christ is to be saved. To be lost in Christ is to be found. Why? Let's go back to the object vs. person dichotomy.

If in fact we are persons, it is only because we are made in the image and likeness of the Persons (Father, Son, Heiligen Geist) - in fact, the very concept of "person" was invented first to speak about the Trinity during the Council of Nicaea in 325 AD. If our personhood mirrors the Persons of the Trinity, then our fulfillment must also mirror God. See Gaudium et Spes 24: "Man is the only creature on earth which God willed for itself, [and he] cannot fully find himself except through a sincere gift of himself." Why? Because the Trinity is a communion of Persons fully and sincerely giving themselves to each other. Christ realizes this self-gift of the Trinity perfectly on the Cross, giving himself for us all.

Fulfillment then is not to be found in an object, of any sort. If it were, salvation could not have come through the Cross. If fulfillment were in an object, God would actively be giving us things, rather than actively stripping us of them. This is the "gospel of prosperity" preached by some, and which imagines blessing as consisting of receiving material wealth. If this were true, Christ could not have called the poor blessed. 

Fulfillment is rather found in this self-gift, this pouring out of self and death of will, giving ourselves over to God and to each other. This is often experienced as death, and what a blessed death this is!

Oh sweet death, to lie at the foot of the cross and be washed in the Blood.

Just to pull things full circle, let's go back to sex for a moment. I wrote in that last post that sex will be disappointing and addictive when it is conceived of as an object, a "thing," an action that gets us something for ourselves, "fulfillment," as it were. But this is not the only approach to sex. Bl. John Paul II's great Man and Woman He Created Them shows us an entirely different and much more fruitful picture of sexuality. To actually go into that will have to be done in another post (thankfully, I really am winding down now), but the point is that in enfleshing the sacrament of marriage, husband and wife realize this self-gift in their very bodies. It is not that sex is inherently bad - in fact it is inherently good. So good in fact as to be a place of sacred encounter with another person, and ultimately with God, not only for the married couple, but for everyone around them as their love bears fruit. So my professor was correct: anything which does not acknowledge sex or death is kitsch, and therefore is not worth my time. May we always be dying, and may we always be loving.

Oh sweet life of death and love, to be drawn into the side of Christ!

On Sex and Death I

Once again, a week has gone by without a post. All I can say is

Anywise, I had a poetry professor in college who told us adamantly that whatever did not acknowledge sex or death was kitsch and therefore not worth his time. What resulted was a slew of either hyper-sexualized or mopey poetry about cats dying. My professor seemed rather pleased with this, but I can't help thinking that his statement was considerably more true than even he seemed to realize. This will be a long post, so I'm going to break it up into installments. Hopefully just two, but I do have an easy tendency toward windbaggery, so we'll see.
First, I know I'll have to argue about what "sex" is. I know this because I am a red-blooded 'Murican who has grown up watching tv and movies and listening to music and being exposed to advertising and reading books and driving on highways and opening magazines and walking down city blocks and being told how to look in order to be "attractive" and having unbridled access to the internet and watching friends try to "be cool" and (when I got old enough) walking into bars and (yes, I admit it) clubs and going to high school and going to college and pumping gas and going through drive thru's and looking both ways before crossing the street and being a runner and telling jokes and etc. etc. etc. etc. etc.
The point is that no matter what, no matter what, we are bombarded with Sex, and a particular idea of it.

Did I mention how much I love love love Mary Worth? Well I do. And I'm getting to it, Mary.

Sex has been commodified into an easy equation which, baldly stated, goes like this: sex = fulfillment. This idea is used first and foremost as a manipulative means of selling products. Look at nearly any advertising, whether it be for body spray or a car. The way it works is to tell the viewer that if they purchase this product, achieve this look, smell like this, grow or don't grow their hair in this way, wear these clothes, eat this food, drink this beer, etc, they will be fulfilled. We all want fulfillment. We will spend our lives seeking that fulfillment. The problem with advertising is that it very, very often resorts to the clear lie that (usually casual) sexual intercourse = fulfillment. How do I know this is a lie? Because if it wasn't, it would be the absolute last  thing the advertising industry would want to rely on. Advertising does not want to sell us happiness. It wouldn't work - we'd all buy the product and never have to buy anything else again. Advertising wants to lie to us: "buy this product! It will make you happy!... Oh, you're right, that didn't make you happy, did it? Well, buy this other product!" Or "Buy this product! It will get you sex! Wait, you're not happy yet? Well it can't be us, there must be something wrong with you, so, um, buy this other product!"

Entertainment works the same way. Why are casual sexual encounters so popularly depicted in movies, tv shows, books, etc? Precisely because they are not fulfilling. They bring us, the viewer, back for more. If pornography were fulfilling, how could it so often turn into addiction? This is the lie: fulfillment is to be found in this thing. It is an object. It is something that you can get for yourself, if only you could get just enough of this thing. Imagine any substance other than sex here. To the addict, this sounds perfectly reasonable. To the non-addict, it sounds perfectly insane. Then why is sex any different? We come across all sorts of examples in entertainment where characters think that if they just have sex, they will be happy/better/more fulfilled. 

For instance: I, like most people, was super happy, at least initially, with Fox's show "New Girl" starring Zooey Deschanel and several other fantastically talented actors. 

What was great about this show was the characters. The writing is hilarious and clever, the actors are engaging, and the show at first felt very refreshing. What's the problem? After a few episodes like this, every one of the characters is openly and apparently happily having sex with various and sundry. There was one point in an early episode where one of the characters makes a really lame comment and another character looks at him in dismay and says "You really need to get laid."

So what's going on here? Sex is an activity that people perform in order to achieve other ends, regardless of the person they are performing this activity with. Why have sex? So that you can stop being lame and be a better you. The absurdity here is the exact same with advertising: there is no thing that will fulfill you. As long as sex is conceived as a "thing," it will be disappointing, addictive, and depressing. 

Let's take a step back for a second and talk about sex. 

(I was about to google for an image to use after that sentence, then realized such an action just wouldn't be any good for my immortal soul)

We're told since health class in sixth or fifth or whatever grade (or earlier if our parents were irresponsible enough to let us watch MTV) that "sex" = ...well, I don't need to tell you, we're all adults here, right? RIGHT?! But the modern conception of sex is a shockingly narrowed one.

No, no I haven't. Maybe because they never gave me healthy idea of sexuality. 

Sexual intercourse? I hate to break it to you, but you and I are having sexual intercourse right now. How so? Because we are sexed beings - our sexuality is fundamental to our personhood, to our being created in God's image and likeness. Hopefully I'll talk about that more in a later post; it's already late and I've got much more to say here. But the point is that reducing sex to merely an activity separates our identity from our being. Too philosophical? This reduction and separation means that men can have surgeries to become women and women can have surgeries to become men. Because if sex is an activity that = fulfillment, it has nothing to do with how we have been created. The thought that identity follows being (in other words, that our personal identity is fundamentally related to how we have been created as sexed beings) requires humility and submission, two qualities that our modern minds buck against almost immediately.

Now, I know I've straw-manned this pretty terribly, but it really is that simple. But just because it is simple does not mean that this thought that sex = fulfillment is negligible. Take St. Augustine, for instance. After years of sleeping around, he realized that he wasn't being fulfilled. How did he react to this? Eventually he stopped, but not before praying "Lord, make me chaste, but not yet."

Why did he pray this? Because he wasn't done with the lie. He knew it was a lie, he recognized how unhealthy and harmful it was, but he couldn't help but continue to seek that fulfillment in the lie. What then is the answer? See his other, greater prayer: "Our hearts are restless, Lord, until they rest in you." We can know this, we can desire this, we can even long for this rest, but still the lie will be there to whisper that there is an easier way to be fulfilled than by resting in Christ.

AND HERE IS THE DEATH!!! Apart from actual ceasing of body functions such as breathing and heart pumping cellular regeneration and etc, death permeates our lives, and not at all in a bad way, either. But this is quite long enough for now. Hopefully I'll write Part II tomorrow, but I wouldn't hold my breath if I were you.

On Religion In America

I know it's not generally within my ken to comment on political matters, but I have been known to do so in the past, particularly when the issue is not simply politics, but anthropology. As of Monday, 43 Catholic entities, including several dioceses, a number of universities (including, shocker! Notre Dame University in South Bend), and other institutions have filed 17 separate lawsuits against the federal government concerning the HHS Mandate. The Franciscan University of Steubenville has announced that they will no longer provide health insurance for their students, nor will they require that students actually have insurance (see badcatholic's as usual high-quality post on it here - in fact, I kind of want to stop this post right now since badcatholic has already done it, and I'll never be as cool as that guy - but nay, I press on!). I was talking about this with my mom yesterday and we came to rather disheartening conclusion: either something big is going to happen, or the whole thing will just get swept under the rug.

There, that's better. Now all I have to do is never move this rug.

Here's what concerns me: we're in America. In many ways, this is an excellent thing. In some ways, it's even the best thing. But in a lot of other ways, it is not a good thing at all. For example, after the announcement of the HHS Mandate, there was immediate pushback from a number of bishops. In response, Nancy Pelosi made a statement that she would  "stand with her fellow Catholics" - and support the president's policy.

I am Nancy Pelosi! I am a credible authority on all things Catholic, especially where people disagree with the teaching authority of the Church on fundamental matters of faith and morals! Thank you! Goodnight!

I realize this is something of an old statement to be commenting on, but it's what's at root that really concerns me. What's implied is that the Church may be easily divided: those who support the mandate de facto, and those who do not merit comment. In another statement, Congresswoman Pelosi said that as a devout Catholic, she "supports the bishops when they are my pastor," but not when they are functioning as "lobbyists" in Washington.

Now of course there are a number of things I could say about such a thought. The real problem, though, is that she may be right. Not in a "truth is the mind conforming to reality" kind of way, but in a simply practical way.

While I have yet to see any sort of data showing that Catholics in general support the administration's policy in this area, I also have yet to see much to the effect of Catholics protesting en masse. Sure, the bishops are raising their voices (and thank God!), but let's take a sober look at the situation.

President Obama has moved to make a policy decision which ought to be found morally abhorrent by more than a fifth of his constituents (that's just counting Catholics), even as he ramps up for re-election. There is no conceivable reason he and the Democratic party would risk alienating that much of their electorate unless they truly believed that it did not matter. That is, that regardless of what the bishops may say with regard to the morality of the mandate, the average Catholic voter would take no notice.

The wrench in Obama's plan is the fact that it is very likely unconstitutional. I commend the bishops for taking that tack and challenging the mandate on legal grounds as that's the only practical way of stopping it. At the same time, part of me laments that the issue has been so reduced. 

Yes, it needs to be answered in the courts, but what seems to be happening now is a much, much wider issue. The administration is attempting to frame the debate as an issue of women's health, whereby those who disagree are excoriated as desiring to oppress women. At the root of this debate are several fundamental questions: what is freedom, yes, how can freedom of conscience be applied, yes, but even more important is the question of what it means to be a human being. Is contraception a "reproductive right"? Is refusing to pay for it somehow an attack on women? Are women the only type of people who are affected by intercourse? Is pregnancy itself an attack on women? Is sex without the risk of reproduction the only possible way for a woman to have dignity, or does this idea itself imply a gross undervaluation of her person? Is the physical act of sexual intercourse a "right"? Is human happiness truly reducible to the ready availability of recreational intercourse?
(On the more immediate level, there are other questions I'd also like to see answered, especially concerning the reasoning and motivations behind the government's definition of contraception as a fundamental issue of healthcare. Is pregnancy to be considered an undesirable or unhealthy state?)
Regardless, if we allow the issue to be merely one of legality ("lobbying" vs. "pastoring," as Pelosi would have it), we have missed a great opportunity. Just like with abortion, the legal issue is important, but what is even more important is converting the hearts and minds of those who do not see the issue in terms of human dignity. This is not an issue of "right vs. wrong" or any of the other accusatory or divisive labels that have been applied already and will be applied in the future (presuming that President Obama is wrong and the issue garners any sort of attention). The issue is, like all matters of import, a question of salvation. But the first question is whether we, the faithful, will see it as such. Are we on a plain between the two horizons of life and death? Or are we merely Americans, whose faith has been subtly but successfully divorced from policy?

I have to admit that these questions leave me with a pretty bleak picture. While the legal approach is necessary, what is really needed is conversion. Which leaves me with only one conclusion: we must be saints. Not for ourselves, not even for the good of our Church, but for the good of the world. For the love of God and for the love of our brothers and sisters. Sanctity, the living of God's own life in our world, is the only way to bring about conversion. It is only God who can move hardened hearts, and so sanctity is all the more necessary, if only to allow the opportunity for the encounter with God.
Believe me when I say that I speak as a sinner and not as a saint, but as a sinner who longs to live united to Christ's life, love, and will. This question of healthcare and contraception should be huge. It should be the occasion of massive public attention because of its constitutional nature. It is also a grace-filled opportunity to speak about human dignity, and it would be a shame to let that pass. But most of all, it is a deep and generous invitation and call for sanctity. Let us then be saints, and let the trees and rivers clap their hands.

St. Thomas More, patron of politicians, pray for us, that merrily we may meet in Heaven!

On Putting Christ in the Friend Zone

Well, apparently I've cut down my posts to a bi-weekly standard, which is unfortunate, since I have great thoughts pretty well all day long, but am too selfish to share them with the world. On the other hand, most of my thoughts end up looking like this, so maybe it's actually better for y'all. At any rate, I've got a bit of an excuse this time: last week I graduated with my MA in Theology, which brought my dad and brother in town for the week, which was, of course, awesome. And now I'm a Master, so you can expect my words to carry a lot more weight. Just the other day I settled a dispute in the supermarket checkout line concerning the divinity of Christ.

How did I do this? Merely by announcing my credentials, presenting my diploma, and declaiming "Jesus Christ is LORD." It was that easy, thanks to my multi-year schooling. Now all I have to do is buy a wallet big enough to fit my diploma in. Or maybe just hang it around my neck.

It'd look something like this. Except that Flav is a far snappier dresser than I. And yes, I've only just learned how to add text to pictures.

So congrats to me! And on to the thought of the week(s):

Having been out of high school for nearly 10 years now, I've only recently come across the verb to "friend-zone" (what can I say? I was only relatively recently disabused of the thought that the word "leggings" referred to those frilly knit things girls in the 80's used to wear on their lower legs sincerely and girls in the 00's wear ironically. Not the case. Those are "leg warmers." I hope you're taking notes). Wikipedia, that fount of knowledge, defines the "friend-zone" thusly:

"In popular culture, the "friend zone" refers to a platonic relationship where one person wishes to enter into a romantic relationship while the other does not. It is generally considered to be an undesirable situation by the lovelorn person."

Thankfully, the wikipedia article also points out that the term was only popularized in nineteen-ninety-freaking-four. So I've only been out of touch for nigh on 20 years. Whiiiiiiiiiiich I'm totally fine with.

I'm not particularly interested in the application of this concept in human-to-human relationships, as undesirable as it may be. I don't give dating advice, I'm a theologian (and a Master, at that). But it struck me that this same sort of dynamic is often present in our relationship to Christ.
There come times in our faith life that demand commitment, maybe more than we are willing to give. Those are the times that I think we can tend to relegate Christ to the friend zone, to think to ourselves "Me and Jesus? We're buddies! It's cool, he's a great guy, but that doesn't mean he can make any demands on me."

The problem with this, of course, is that Jesus doesn't want to be our friend. Jesus wants to be our lover. He doesn't want a piece or a part of our life, he wants our life. He wants to give us life, but the only way he can do that is if we give him our lives. Giving our lives to Christ is as easy and natural as falling in love, which is to say it is the most difficult and run-from experience in our modern world. 
Why? There are too many reasons to list, and this blog is already overlong, so I'll just suggest one: we're afraid. We think that if we can just keep Christ in that friend zone, we've got him contained, and those of us living the general human way of being in this day and age will always contain or run from that which will change us in unpredictable ways. We're far more likely to try to change ourselves in ways we have control over (e.g. weight-loss, "self-help" books, exercising, all in the mistaken belief that we can form our own perfection). Call me male, call me American, call me twenty-something, but submitting to a higher authority scares the bejeezus out of us.
So when those hard times come in our faith (and they will, and if they've already come and gone, they will be back), when being conformed to Jesus demands something from us other than a vague fuzzy feeling and a commitment to "not harm other living beings," we are very often afraid. Look at Scripture, and the many times when God, whether through angels or in the person of Jesus, says, "Do not be afraid." Why is this repeated so often? Because God knows what a knee-jerk reaction it is for us. 
What if we fail? What if other people were turned off by our faith? What if being loving opened us up to criticism and mockery? Are we really capable of loving? Does love exist? Does God really know us personally? Can God really will the existence of a sinner like myself? What if we really are the failures we believe ourselves to be? What if God really knew the depths of our hearts and how dark those depths are or can be? 
Those are some of my fears, and just like the early disciples, I know that it is a constant struggle to act from love instead of fear, because love demands that we be lost, while fear demands that we draw back and hold onto ourselves at all costs. Luckily, the great John Paul II reminds us that even in the face of our very real limitations and failures to love, "We are not the sum of our fears and failures. We are the sum of the Father's love for us."

Look at that frickin' Mr. Coolguy McPope.

We are not defined by our sins. We are not defined by our fears. We are not defined by the eyes which look at us in criticism and judgement, even if they are our own. We are defined only and solely by love. The more we realize this, that we are defined by God's love for us, and not by our actions, however good they may be,  the more we will be able to let go. Realizing that we are loved first is an act of submission that demands all of our being because it means that we have utterly no control over God. Which is a very, very good and freeing thing indeed.

P.S. one of my readers pointed out that even though this blog is called "Inklings of Cleveland," there's precious little on here about either Inklings or Cleveland. Please see the below picture and eat your heart out. Thank you. More Cleveland flavor in the future.

No way! That's waaaaay too pretty to be Cleveland!

On Leaping

Now, I know that two weeks ago I'd said I had returned to blogging. Unfortunately, I've been lax. Oh, Discipline, why are we not yet friends? Anywise, here's my thought for the week:

Most everyone has a cool cousin, someone super awesome at all times. Mine is a great out-doorsy type: he's rock climbed in Patagonia, ridden his bike down the Western seaboard, rafted the Grand Canyon several times, and led Outward Bound wilderness excursions for 50 days at a time. He told me story a while ago about a visit to Guatemala. He was backpacking around Latin America and visiting all the places I wasn't cool enough to see when I was down there for a month that same summer. One of the places he went was a system of caverns.

There are tour guides who take groups of people through these caves by candlelight. In places they wade through water, there are all sorts of creeping things about, and they squeeze through tight cracks and such.

Well that looks neat.

Cave spiders? Not so much.

At any rate, he said that they got to one point where the guide gathered them all together and had them blow out their candles so that they were in complete darkness. Then the guide took them each one by one to a place in the dark and said "Jump." He didn't say jump over or jump through or jump up or jump down. He just said "Jump." So my cousin jumped. He said it felt like he fell 8 or 10 feet and landed in water, which sucked him under and shot him into a river outside the cave.

I think about this story all the time. When I heard it, my first thought was, 'Isn't that a lot like faith?' We're lead to a place in the dark and we hear a voice we do not know say "Jump," and we're faced with a choice: to trust that voice without any assurance or vision of where it will lead, or to back away and stay in the dark, where it isn't comfortable, but at least we can feel the ground. What do we allow to rule our lives? Trust or fear?

They say that priests preach first to themselves, and it strikes me how much this story touches the nerve of one of my many habitual sins, which is to try to understand everything before committing, in the attempt to control all possible outcomes. If I can just see and understand all ends, I can choose correctly. It is a perpetual failure of mine to believe that I can choose my way to Heaven. But this thought neglects the leaping that is fundamental to the life of faith.

Goodbye, cruel world! (Why hello, nice ocean!)

Why is leaping fundamental to faith? Because it takes the ground out from under us. It is the surrender of the attempt at control. There will always be times that we meet with mystery, with our finitude, and need to make a choice, trusting in God's grace more than our own lights. That's why I've titled this entry "On Leaping," not "On the Leap." Despite what some of our beloved separated brothers and sisters may insist, there is no definitive personal proclamation of faith. Yes, you will leap, definitively, and then you will find that you must leap again. And again. And again. This is the life of faith, and if we continue to place our toes at the edge and trust that voice, it will be the life of growing in sanctity. Why? Because sanctity is nothing more than giving over our authority and control, and acknowledging Christ as the Lord of our hearts. Which is really the most freeing thing possible, because for such were we made. There is no freedom possible except the freedom for which we were made, which is the freedom to love. Anything less than love is a binding, a backing away from that edge, and a desire to remain in the dark where we can at least feel the walls, even if we can't see. And love itself will always be a leap in the dark, a trusting in the Mystery who is another person. So we need to ask ourselves: are we leaping?