Skip to main content
Welcome to the program, everyone. I'll bet Rush Limbaugh says that a lot. I don't know; I'm not a loyal listener. My friend Deb thinks I'd do a great radio show. It would be fun. I think I have the voice...to be left alone. To write books. A voice for books, yes. I got the giggles the other week at Mass, and there was no stopping it. I felt awful, and yet, amused, of course.
The key to making others laugh is being able to make yourself laugh. If you think it's funny, well, you might be a sociopath, but odds are good other ordinary people will, too. Those times when we are glad no one can read our thoughts, aside from the evil things, a lot of the stuff is really funny. I think anxiety in the end is the inability to laugh. [I dunno; that anxious lady we know laughs a ton.--ed.] She doesn't laugh at life; she laughs at her escapes from it. Life is absurd as we find it often. Laughing or crying are often good choices. Drugs are not. Doctors can and should help many of us with mental things beyond our control. But the sheer number of people on medication for all sorts of things--a lot in recent times--suggests something is amiss. Rather than live our lives, we're content to survive them. I don't trust people who don't laugh or cry.
I have a friend I talk to fairly often. It amazes me every time how we can move seamlessly from funny things to serious things and back again. Christians who are funny are that way because they know God is in control, and yet they are not, in some sense. It's a freedom to know that not knowing is far from the worst case. To be unknown and unloved, that may be.
I was thinking that I am more than a part of me. My sexuality, for instance. Such as it is, really. As a single man taking up the adventure of chastity, it's nothing if not interesting. I think there's a 65.4% chance you should shut up if you are married and a single friend expresses his or her desire to be married, and you proceed to lecture them on patience and contentment. Odds are, you yourself were neither, and God gave you that vocation to the praise of His glorious grace. If you're 50, and/or my godparents or spiritual director, feel free to opine. Protestants are worse, though. Way worse.
On the other hand, I can think of hundreds of times where I said, "Unless this happens, I won't be happy." Which is by far the dumbest thing I have either thought or said. If I had been doing theology, I could spot that mistake on paper from 30 miles away. Funny thing about life, though: you find out what you really believe. At the moment, what I really believe is that (if you will pardon the bluntness) I don't need sex to be happy. I need to be loved, and to love in return. How that happens precisely is not for me--who spiritually and otherwise cannot see 6 inches in front of my face--to decide.
I know what you are thinking. Really, I do. "This all sounds noble and pious, but you don't know me or my struggle." True, not exactly. But I certainly do. Whatever detours or emotions are possible here, I've seen them all, if not directly, then close enough. You will never meet a person more ill-suited to this apprenticeship in loneliness than me. Don't even bother trying to tell me otherwise; I don't believe you. But the fact remains that God is Love, and He calls each one of us to be his sons and daughters. Really, what is greater than that? If I have a family and a wife, I think the secret is that this Love is for them, too. None of this is about me or you at all. We all forget sometimes. But it's still true.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

A Friend I Once Had, And The Dogmatic Principle

 I once had a friend, a dear friend, who helped me with personal care needs in college. Reformed Presbyterian to the core. When I was a Reformed Presbyterian, I visited their church many times. We were close. I still consider his siblings my friends. (And siblings in the Lord.) Nevertheless, when I began to consider the claims of the Catholic Church to be the Church Christ founded, he took me out to breakfast. He implied--but never quite stated--that we would not be brothers, if I sought full communion with the Catholic Church. That came true; a couple years later, I called him on his birthday, as I'd done every year for close to ten of them. He didn't recognize my number, and it was the most strained, awkward phone call I have ever had. We haven't spoken since. We were close enough that I attended the rehearsal dinner for his wedding. His wife's uncle is a Catholic priest. I remember reading a blog post of theirs, that early in their relationship, she told him of the p
Hilarious Com-Box Quote of The Day: "I was caught immediately because it is the Acts of the Apostles, not the Acts of the Holy Spirit Acting Erratically."--Donald Todd, reacting to the inartful opposition of the Holy Spirit and the Magisterium. Mark Galli, an editor at Christianity Today, had suggested that today's "confusion" in evangelicalism replicates a confusion on the day of Pentecost. Mr. Todd commented after this reply , and the original article is here. My thoughts: By what means was this Church-less "consensus" formed? If the Council did not possess the authority to adjudicate such questions, who does? If the Council Fathers did not intend to be the arbiters, why do they say that they do? At the risk of being rude, I would define evangelicalism as, "Whatever I want or need to believe at any particular time." Ecclesial authority to settle a particular question is a step forward, but only as long as, "God alone is Lord of the con

Just Sayin.' Again.

One interesting objection to this chart has been to say that one gets stuck in a "loop" that doesn't resolve. This is a thinly-veiled way of putting forward the argument that we don't need absolute certainty in religious dogma. But Fred Noltie already dealt with this in the comments on another post. And to the specific objector, no less. I'll be blunt: The only principled thing to do is put down your Bible, resign your pulpit, and lead tours in Europe. Because a man must be able to distinguish dogma from human opinion, and this epistemology doesn't allow us to do that. One of dogma's distinguishing characteristics is infallibility; another is certainty. Without this, essential characteristics of God Himself are put into question. If we say that the most important Person any person could know is God, and the content of that knowledge (doctrine) is the means by which we know Him, it must be certain. This Reformed argument that certainty is a dangerous or un