surrender cobra

from an ESPN report on a familiar scene in sports television:  a player or team makes an amazing play to win the game at last possible second and the opponents' fans stand, dumbfounded, with their hands on their heads.  It often looks like this:

Image courtesy Reddit.

A fitting image, especially when Catholic colleges make decisions and announcements like The College of Saint Rose did Friday, December 11, 2015:  twenty-three faculty positions cut and several programs and majors cut from across the curriculum.  Some of these were professional and graduate programs (e.g., Bachelor's program in Art Education and the graduate program in Communications), while others covered liberal arts subjects like Economics, American Studies, and....Philosophy and Religious Studies.  These last three are/were the majors my department offered.

The Sisters of St. Joseph, the women's order that founded Saint Rose in 1920, issued the following statement about the cuts:

Nearly 100 years ago, Sister Blanche Rooney, CSJ, and other brave Sisters of Saint Joseph of Carondelet saw a need and acted.

Inspired by the legacy of the original Sisters of Saint Joseph, who as women in 1650 took the radical step of going into the world to minister to the poor, the sick and the desperate of Le Puy, France, Sister Blanche envisioned a college that would teach and empower young women to be citizen leaders grounded in faith and dedicated to excellence and service.

In founding The College of Saint Rose, the local Province of the Sisters of Saint Joseph of Carondelet recognized that, just as they were responding to a need, fulfilling its mission would forever require the college to be alert and amenable to a changing reality in the larger society, and especially among its current and prospective students.

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In other words, to meet and serve people where they are.

This founding principle is why we support President Carolyn Stefanco, the Board of Trustees and all those on campus working diligently to lead our beloved Saint Rose in updating academic programs and priorities to meet the changing needs of students who count on the college to prepare them to succeed in a world they will inherit.

and then a bit later:

Change is upsetting for many in all walks of life, including our own. It creates anxiety and uncertainty, and can leave some feeling overlooked, forgotten, left behind. That is why it is so important in times of change to extend grace, love and affirmation to all in our community. Change also is an opportunity for renewal, and renewal is empowering. Responsible leaders are obligated to recognize the need for change and act carefully but resolutely.

Read the statement and you'll soon note what is absent:  any reference or indication of the College's founding as a religious endeavor.  It's utilitarian endeavor now;  what serves the greatest good for the greatest number of people.  A principle that many, including the Sisters themselves, would argue is not part of the Catholic social justice tradition.  And that is correct.

Quo Vadis?

Post title references Rome's Basilica di San Sebastiano and the nearby Quo Vadis chapel and this early Christian story about St. Peter meeting Jesus, post-Resurrection, just outside Rome.  The Basilica and church feature Christ's footprints captured in the stones he walked over to Rome itself.

But it refers to a question, posed rather directly, from a good friend this past July over dinner near Standish, Maine:  "Just who do you want to reach with that blog?"

Well, everybody, pretty much.

Except we all know it's not that easy.  First, St. Paul's argument notwithstanding, none of us can be all things to all people.  To the extent that any of us are is a gift from the Holy Spirit.  (Side comment: OK, Bishop Robert Barron comes awfully darned close.  There are others, too, such as Father Donio's Catholic Apostolate Center.)  Certain blogs will catch readers and audiences that others just miss.  That in itself is fine, insofar that the diversity of (Catholic) blogs all  intend the same end:  the building of the Kingdom, through the Church, here on earth. So, Artur Sebastian Rosman takes one approach, Deacon Scott Dodge takes another, while Elizabeth Duffy, Amy Welborn, and Elizabeth Reardon each take their own.  #allgood  #therearesomanyothers

So where's Spiritual Diabetes?

Certainly in an academic vein of the Catholic blogosphere, but one attuned to trends outside the Academy's walls as well.  Popular culture, popular spiritual trends, and politics all appear, but part of what generates this blog comes from the admittedly rarefied air of Catholic theological studies and, this is crucial, my particular location therein.  Other posts have addressed my conversion experiences and my own views on Catholic higher education.  Animating those posts, though, is the theme of spiritual hunger, satisfaction, and overconsumption.  That is, after all, how one contracts Type II diabetes--you eat your way into it.  At some point, and this determining factor differs for each individual, one's consumption outstrips the body's own abilities to process and burn sugar. The diabetic, once diagnosed, knows darned well what the stakes are and reduces consumption, but then it's too late. Thereafter, the bloodstream courses with more and more sugar, which causes both thirst and more hunger.  Increased high blood sugar leads to circulatory and tissue breakdown, hence the association of diabetes with blindness, loss of mobility, and even loss of limbs.

The reality that the United States faces, and has faced for almost two decades, a Type II diabetes epidemic seems an apt portal or theme for addressing similar questions of spiritual overconsumption.  As stated in one of my earliest posts, originally I saw this theme as a means to address spiritual overconsumption on what might be called "the right" politically and socially-speaking in the United States.  Almost three years of blogging has led me to conclude, though, that spiritual diabetes flourishes just as strongly on the Left.  (Although at times I have used the phrase "spiritual veganism" to address that side.  I do need a couple more posts to explore further that relationship.)

Recently a tectonic shift in Catholic blogging occurred when Elizabeth Scalia "The Anchoress," longtime portal editor of Patheos' Catholic channel, moved her work to Aleteia.  Katrina Fernandez, a fiery convert and blogger who works in North Carolina, subsequently announced the end of her blog "The Crescat," and Max Lindemann has toyed with doing the same at his "Diary of a Wimpy Catholic."  No blog runs forever, and perhaps we Catholic bloggers should know of and work with that realization more so than we and more so than blogs of other faiths (and no faith at all).  Don't worry, this isn't a resignation post--I'm not going anywhere just yet.  That being said, for all the refreshing, inspiring, and challenging voices within the Catholic blogosphere, it bears repeating that the Catholic social media presence--as diverse as it is--must never be mistaken for the Church.  Only there--and not here--may we discover (repeatedly!) the authentic remedies for spiritual diabetes.

Ecumenism, Unity, Rural Religion & Future Joy

Last month I posted a clip of my morning convocation at Bismarck's University of Mary in November, 2014.  That same evening I gave another lecture on ecumenical dialogue and Christian unity celebrating the fiftieth anniversary of Unitatis Redintegratio.

In light of the fiftieth anniversary of Vatican II's conclusion AND what Scott Eric Alt rightly calls "Pope Francis Derangement Syndrome," it seems important to reiterate the great evangelical call Vatican II issued.  The Holy Spirit calls the Church out into the world to proclaim the Good News.  This requires clergy, women and men religious, and, yes, the laity.  Everybody has a role to play, and, yes, some or perhaps most of us will fulfill these roles working with non-Catholic others.  Not everybody, though, of course:  some are called into an apostolate of prayer that staggers the minds of many, including many Catholics.  For the rest of us, though, as St. Josemaria taught, it's out into the world we go.


The beginning, though, features some impromptu remarks about my 2002 book Saving the Heartland.  Having grown up in the rural Midwest, I had found every American religious history course and text unsatisfying.  The only times my region appeared involved either some hideous, reactionary, anti-Catholic movement or a brief recognition of the Assemblies of God, a Pentecostal denomination now headquartered in Springfield, Missouri.  The reality I knew was much different and much more diverse.  I had seen black churches in Springfield, German Lutherans and even Waldensians near Monett, and, and this is where my book takes its roots, all sorts of Catholic Churches.  While driving around with my dad I used to ask him "Where'd this church come from? Where did that one?"  Finally, frustrated with my constant questioning, he said "Why don't you look it up at the library?????"  Several years later, while pondering the direction of my doctoral studies with my advisor, the mercurial James T. Fisher, I was given roughly the same answer.  In response to my questions about Catholics living in rural America, Jim charged me: "It's your region of the country, you write the history!"

There's a lot more to that history, but at least I contributed a small part.  And visiting UMary last year reminded me again of all that.  Earlier this year in a post about Catholic higher education I mention my impression of attending a campus Mass there.  Far from the usual poor attendance with daydreaming and smart-phoning students, Mass at Mary practically crackled with spiritual profundity.  It was also packed; I stood should-to-shoulder with students along the back wall.  So in these days of great consternation we should take, as Benedict XVI did when elected in 2005, comfort in the prayers and support of the Church's youth.  The Gospel springs ever anew with the joy of the Resurrection.

Can the Pope Reunite Christians?

Over the weekend Pope Francis visited the Lutheran community in Rome and expressed his enthusiasm for ecumenical dialogue.  This reminded me of 2014's fiftieth anniversary of Unitatis Redintegratio, the Second Vatican Council's decree on ecumenical dialogue.  This time last year, in celebration of that document, I had the opportunity to speak at the University of Mary in Bismarck, North Dakota.  Here's my morning convocation for students and members of the Christian Leadership Center.

Unitatis is, believe it or not, an underappreciated work.  It's also, as I detailed in the talk linked above, unapologetically Roman Catholic.  Far from giving away the keys to store, UR makes it clear:  Christian unity, ultimately, involves reunion with Rome.  So it's not "many paths to one center," because ultimately that center is Roman Catholic Christianity.  Furthermore, UR distinguishes between dialoging with Orthodoxy, where the conversation takes place among apostolic equals, and ecumenical dialogue with Protestants, where UR admits significant differences still exist.

That being said, in the intervening fifty years--and something I didn't mention last year in Bismarck, developments like the Episcopal-Roman Catholic Ordinariate indicate that progress is being made while still honoring and recognizing the ecclesial traditions of other Christians.  We all have roles to play in this journey towards unity, a unity that exists now (in and with Rome) and will exist more fully with God's grace.

Can we pleez stahp?

Liberal education:  have the kids take classes in a variety of fields, encouraging them throughout to drink deeply from the traditions in each discipline, push the boundaries of those traditions, and seek their intersections.  Thus the students become learned, truly educated citizens who in addition to training in particular disciplines (Psychology, Education, Business, the arts, etc.) possess broad familiarity in other disciplines (the arts, religion, politics, etc.).

And the telos--the end towards which all this energy and study is directed--is that these learned individuals will go into the world, go their various ways, pursue various careers, meet with various levels of success, and yet maintain an understanding and appreciation of humane learning--that which makes us human.  The arts--visual and performative, politics, contemporary trends, historical awareness, FOOD, for that matter, and yes even religion.

So the first question;  what should the kids read?

The second question stems from this first:  Do they need to read that?

It turns out Duke University required its 2015 freshmen class to read Alison Bechdel's Fun Home:  A Family Tragicomedy.  As expected, some students protested, calling it pornographic.  As also might be expected, others leapt to defend Duke's required reading.  It's not pornographic, the students protesting are just close-minded, precisely the people who needs their minds opened by such reading.  Thus, an impasse.

So what's the hubbub about?  From Amazon.com, the Publishers Weekly review:

This autobiography by the author of the long-running strip, Dykes to Watch Out For, deals with her childhood with a closeted gay father, who was an English teacher and proprietor of the local funeral parlor (the former allowed him access to teen boys).Fun Home refers both to the funeral parlor, where he put makeup on the corpses and arranged the flowers, and the family's meticulously restored gothic revival house, filled with gilt and lace, where he liked to imagine himself a 19th-century aristocrat. The art has greater depth and sophistication that Dykes; Bechdel's talent for intimacy and banter gains gravitas when used to describe a family in which a man's secrets make his wife a tired husk and overshadow his daughter's burgeoning womanhood and homosexuality. His court trial over his dealings with a young boy pushes aside the importance of her early teen years. Her coming out is pushed aside by his death, probably a suicide. The recursively told story, which revisits the sites of tragic desperation again and again, hits notes that resemble Jeanette Winterson at her best. Bechdel presents her childhood as a "still life with children" that her father created, and meditates on how prolonged untruth can become its own reality. She's made a story that's quiet, dignified and not easy to put down. 

Reproduced here without any claim to ownership.

So let's get this "straight" (bad pun, I realize):  Duke University, one of the nation's premier private education institutions, required its entire in-coming first year class (approximately 1600 students) to read a lesbian's memoir of her funeral-parlor-operating, closeted homosexual father.  Quite frankly, instead of decrying "pornography!" the students instead should have questioned the relevance of having to read this at all.

St. Maria Faustina Kowalska, Messenger of Divine Mercy

St. Maria Faustina Kowalska, Messenger of Divine Mercy



Feast day reflections by Jean Heimann at Catholic Fire.

New Liturgical Movement: A New Image of the Coptic Martyrs of Libya, by Nikola Sarić

New Liturgical Movement: A New Image of the Coptic Martyrs of Libya, by Nikola Sarić



an arresting new icon for the Coptic martyrs earlier this year.  Ora pro nobis!