By Dr. Jeff Mirus (
biography –
articles– E-mail ) | February 27, 2024
I think it’s time to be honest and pugnacious about something: whatever we may say about cultural adaptation in presenting the Catholic faith to the world, the one undeniable fact is that, in relation to the apostles, the The tone and substance of Catholic discourse has changed radically. Unfortunately, huge segments of Catholic leaders speak and act today exactly as only rogue and cowardly apostles would have spoken and acted in the first century. Think of the eleven or even the eleven plus Matthias, all witnesses to the resurrection of Christ. Now think instead of Judas, the worldly steward who always made deals with those he thought were more powerful than Christ.
What image does modern “dialogue” and modern proposals for change in the Church evoke?
In fact, nowhere in Scripture will you find a spirit of “dialogue” except with those who were seriously interested in the truth. You won’t find study groups set up to probe error for its vestiges of truth; nor will you find joint statements to highlight points that opposing groups agree on so that they can disagree in peace. Everything happens as if the Western Church, as soon as it became clear that it was no longer part of the dominant culture in the West, had decided to no longer preach the truth or denounce error, but to now courageously recognize that she approved of some contemporary secular ideas… while remaining silent about everything else.
Of course, there is nothing wrong with recognizing the good in other people, groups, and movements. But this recognition of a particular good does not replace the proclamation of the whole of the Good News. Christ came to bring a message of salvation to the world and establish a Church to proclaim that message throughout history. Blessed are those who find no scandal in Him (Mt 11:6)! Because anything that contradicts this message – this Gospel – is error. Unfortunately, many efforts to assert a few commonalities are just a modern way of taking offense at Christ.
The myth of accommodation
The Church today is largely (but not completely) dominated by a particular type of cowardice: the cowardice of those Church members who only wish to be part of the Body of Christ if they can be seen by the world as being one of the greats and greats. good. This is why so many Catholics, from bishops to politicians to professors to members of the media, consistently state that they support this or that aspect of the dominant culture’s morals and manners. To the extent that they are worldly, they wish (sometimes perhaps without realizing it) to recognize as good whatever the human culture on which they depend for their own acceptability recognizes as good. This is why they constantly distance themselves from any outspoken statements from other Catholics who support and expose the unpopular teachings of the Church.
Take the test: look at how many times too many priests, religious, bishops and even the current pope have made a point of criticizing those who try to defend the teaching of Christ, while accommodating those who deny it .
It is acceptable, for example, to applaud efforts to preserve material creation because the dominant culture favors environmentalism and ecology. But it is considered unacceptable to offer a cure to those who destroy themselves through sexual perversion, because the dominant culture does not recognize sexual perversion as evil. Therefore, we are encouraged and even taught within the Church to maintain a firm stance on only the minimal grounds that the dominant culture allows us, while we are repeatedly taught to treat false ideas about human sexuality as simple legitimate differences of opinion.
Or, to take an equally delicate question, we welcome the biblical commonalities we share with some Protestant groups, but we do not like to mention that the Body and Blood of Christ Himself is deliberately absent from their collective prayer, which seriously attenuates the meaning of being gathered together in the name of Christ. In this second case, what is such a small matter between friends? If the first case, why can’t we all get along? We seem to be confronted at every turn with a whole host of reasons why this is almost always a reckless policy… in fact.
There is, in other words, a popular mythology according to which we must build only on what we have in common, that is to say less and less, instead of offering others precisely what they lack. , that is to say more and more. The result, as the demons gain power over humanity again, is a constant accommodation with the demons. The situation has become so serious that a large number of Catholics no longer know what to do, even if they want to do something. Reflecting the attitudes of the dominant culture in order to find some acceptability for the Church seems to be not only the safest path, but too often the only approved path. The alternative is to risk summary rejection, which we have been raised for several generations to view as good neither for ourselves nor for our Church.
The problem is unfounded fear
I could say the problem here is that too many Catholics are afraid of the dominant culture. And that’s certainly true. But the reason we fear the dominant culture is that much of even the official Church has lost faith in Christ himself. The Christian of the world would just be happy to remain a Christian to the extent that Christ could gain the world simply by being Christ. But we imagine that our current culture is too sophisticated, or at least too powerful, for Christ to conquer without adapting to it. Therefore, the only hope that allows us to retain even a fragment of our ancient Christian dignity is the hope of a constant adaptation of the Church and its teachings to what the world accepts as true.
I don’t know how much of this is sincere and how much of this is deliberate pandering. But this is a powerful semi-Christian myth. The myth teaches that if only we behaved reasonably, we can indeed participate in hell on earth without losing the hope of a redefined paradise afterwards. So instead of clinging to the faith of the martyrs, we cling to the faith of those who are fleeing martyrdom. There is nothing at all about this that is difficult to understand. It’s just hard to admit.
But the whole great difference between our faith and the apostolic faith is that the apostles refused to adapt to the visible ungodly culture that surrounded them because they trusted in the invisible grace of God that surrounded them more closely ; as we place our hopes in human strategies that are continually and sadly visible because we no longer trust anything we cannot see. For our generation, the presence and grace of God are no longer just a promise, but an empty promise.
The difficulty with our avalanche of compromises, born of our fear of the power of lies and our silence about the power of Truth, is that we foolishly believe that we can thereby save something from the alleged continuing defeat of Christ. On the other hand, wherever grace is appreciated, men and women commit to one another, families grow, parishes become vibrant, and vocations abound – by which I mean that demonic sneers of a fallen world are banished by Christian joy. We may remember that Christ promised that we would experience the goods of this life “in the midst of persecution”; but we must also remember his promise of “eternal life in the age to come” (Mk 10:30). Perhaps too many people recognize persecution as far too mundane, but no longer recognize eternal life as far too heavenly. But when Saint Paul asked for relief from his own suffering, Christ gave him the same answer he gives us: “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness” (2 Cor 12:9). .
The lesson of the Resurrection is the lesson of a prodigious gift of grace unleashed by God’s own sacrifice. With Him, through Him and in Him comes victory – and for a very simple and certain reason. We must relearn to believe, as the apostles did, that Christ is the only man who cannot lose.
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