Several people complimented me on my attempt at "theodicy" last week.
The consensus seemed my description of the Christian God, in the person of Christ Crucified, was compelling. But how to reconcile so innocent a head with so concupiscent a body, the church? Defending religion today is a fool's errand, yet I am compelled to do it. For Mother Church, bruised, broken, and often ugly, is still at all times my superior, my ward, and my bark on the voyage to heaven.
Again, churches are not clubs of do-goodery run by earnest or prudish types.
Particularly in the case of Roman Catholicism, the word cult is more appropriate, for we are overly devoted to particular persons, God and the saints, as well as willing to partake in things that will earn us scorn or death, sacraments and public acts of faith. Indeed, papist belief rests on these two realities at all times: the persons who imitate Christ and the conduits that deliver His grace.
The underlying theme throughout the Roman Church is that of a journey - we walk with Jesus in His ministry, up Calvary, and finally to His Ascension. Mary and the Apostles then lead the procession, along with all the clergy and saints down through the ages, whose words and deeds, both in life and long after death, provide illumination on this perilous path. Finally, respite, as well as the food for the journey, is found within Mother Church's seven sacraments.
Many mistakenly believe the saints or papacy separate Catholics from other Christians but truly it is the idea of sacrament - a powerful, guaranteed connection to God's grace. This is our pearl of great price, both the theological and personal reason to rouse ourselves for Mass.
For the Roman church, the sacraments come from imitating Christ's words and deeds: Jesus was baptized, confirmed young and old, blessed a wedding with far too much wine, appointed a successor in Peter and the Apostles, heard confessions, anointed the sick using His spit mixed with dirt, and gave us His body and blood at the last supper on Holy Thursday. It might occur to many reading this list that "cult" was actually too weak a word for this barbarity.
But if one can grasp the Catholic idea of sacrament, at least in part, then the mystery of why we remain in a belief system with more sins and baggage than perhaps any other begins to unravel.
Our mother church has the audacity to claim it was founded by God Himself; that it is His bride, despite its many infidelities and that it remains the arbiter for the economy of grace on earth, the sole provider of God's real flesh and presence in the Holy Eucharist.
I'll pause here to freely admit "this is a hard teaching. Who can accept it?
Many people turned from Christ based on these same claims - how much more so a scandalized church?
The issue of corruption must be given proper attention in its own column. For now, I will only posit my own understanding of the sacraments: I truly believe they are bigger than we are; indeed, these conduits to God don't require us, but we desperately need them for our sick souls.
It also seems clear from scripture and tradition that we are judged on our conformity to the sacraments and our forbearance in the very trials they may cause, even if they lead to our suffering and death. In The Lord of the Rings by Catholic author J.R.R. Tolkien, Frodo speaks for all of us, wishing he did not have to carry the One Ring.
Gandalf sympathizes, but says, "all we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us."
All believers face this dilemma.
Every mass is a journey, from the history of faith to the climax of the consecration.
Each season is marked by the heroes and origins of our beliefs.
All of us one billion Catholics are on a particular journey, asking "Mary, all the Saints, and you my brothers and sisters to pray for me to the Lord Our God."
Thus, I abide in mother church and it in me. How can I abandon it?
