What is Pope Francis’ Attitude Toward Pro-Life Issues?

Over a week ago, I received a number of calls and e-mails of people confused and upset over the news headlines: “Pope Says Church Should Stop Obsessing Over Gays, Abortion”; “Pope Francis interview: Forget homosexuality and birth control. He’s a flaming liberal”; etc.  I have to admit that even I had a difficult time making sense of the Pope’s comments.  (I really do not know any pro-lifer who thinks that abortion, same-sex marriage and contraception are the only issues.)  Even though I personally think the Holy Father could have been more fair in his assessment of his perceived excessive emphasis on these issues, he is really not saying anything new.  In fact, Carl Anderson (Supreme Knight of KofC) correctly notes that Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI said the same thing in 2006 — the only difference is that the mass media ignored it.  “Asked why [Benedict] hadn’t spoken about same-sex marriage, abortion, or contraception in a speech, he noted that ‘Catholicism isn’t a collection of prohibitions; it’s a positive option.’”

Fr. Frank Pavone, director of Priests for Life, highlights Pope Francis’ thought that the Church’s condemnation of abortion (and other anti-life practices) cannot simply stand alone but rather should be understood in the context of our teaching about who God is.  Fr. Pavone says, “This approach radically strengthens the Church’s opposition to abortion, because the Pope is saying not simply that it breaks the Fifth Commandment (‘You shall not kill’), but that more fundamentally it breaks the First Commandment (‘You shall not have other gods besides me’) and that to disrespect life is to abandon God himself.”  Funny enough, the day after the media reported all these outrageous headlines, they ignored Pope Francis’ speech to a group of Catholic gynecologists in which he said that abortion is a manifestation of a “throwaway culture” where the weak and vulnerable are simply discarded.  “Every unborn child, though unjustly condemned to be aborted, has the face of the Lord, who even before his birth, and then as soon as he was born, experienced the rejection of the world,” the Pope said.

This Sunday’s gospel on “Lazarus and the Rich Man” (Luke 16:19-31) is a warning against comfortable apathy in the face of extreme poverty and injustice.  The Catholic Church teaches respect for the sacred dignity of life from “conception to natural death.”  This does not just mean “being against abortion, homosexuality and contraception”; it means working towards employment for the jobless, assistance to immigrants, availability of healthcare, and gracious treatment of the elderly.  Certainly, we do what we can to find political solutions and we hope to influence our culture and society to help facilitate these ends, but ultimately we are responsible for our own attitude towards human life.  It starts by how we treat each and every person God puts on our path (Luke 10:33) or places outside our door (Luke 16:20).

The Advantages of Being Catholic in Leon County, Texas

Sometimes we can take for granted the blessings of our Catholic faith living in a quiet, rural part of East-Central Texas.  While Leon County has never been known to be a very Catholic part of our great state, there are surprisingly several options when it comes to the practice of our faith.  There are three Catholic churches in Leon County: St. Kateri Tekakwitha in Buffalo, St. Leo the Great in Centerville, and St. Thomas More in Hilltop Lakes.  (Interestingly enough, these churches’ patron saints are individuals from different walks of life, ethnicities and time periods in the history of the Church.)  These churches respectively serve the northern, central and southern parts of Leon County.

Over the course of a weekend, at least six Masses are being offered in Leon County all at different times to accommodate the faithful.  These Masses are being offered in English and Spanish, and once a month in Latin (Extraordinary Form at St. Kateri).  The 2010 census reports that there are 16,801 residents in Leon County.  According to the Diocese of Tyler statistics, there are almost 500 Catholic families in Leon County.  Hypothetically, if there were three persons per family, then there would be around 1,500 Catholics in Leon County.  Therefore, 8.9% of Leon County would be Catholic, which is probably a bit of a stretch.  Nevertheless, what a blessing to have three Catholic churches to serve such a small number of Catholic residents!  During the week, there are at least seven daily Masses, four Eucharistic Holy Hours, and five hours of confession times being offered.  All three churches have a faith formation program for students and adults as well as some form of sacramental prep.  In the last two years, St. Kateri’s and St. Leo’s were renovated and St. Thomas More in Hilltop Lakes was built.  Therefore, not only do Catholics in this area have places to offer a sacrifice of praise, but they have sacred buildings of inspiring beauty and tranquility in which to do so.  How lovely is thy dwelling place, O LORD of hosts! (Psalm 84:1).

The various Catholic churches in Leon County offer Catholic Charities, Project Gabriel (assistance to women in crisis pregnancies), the annual Life Chain (pro-life witness this year Sunday, October 6, 2:30-4:00pm) and support for the inter-ministerial alliance (collaboration with other Christian denominations in the county).  If you look around the church on Sunday, you will see white, Latino, black, and even Asian people filling the pews — a sign of the universality of the Catholic Church.  All these things make me proud to be a Catholic and a priest in service to Christ’s flock in this part of Texas.  Nevertheless, in my day-to-day activities, I continue to meet Catholics who do not practice their faith regularly or who have been away from the Church.  I encourage them to return to their faith, to strengthen their relationship with Christ through the sacraments and prayer.  It is a reminder that we still have much work to do as Evangelical Catholics in Leon County.  Are we prepared to share this great treasure of our faith?  Sometimes all it takes is an invitation.  People may be surprised to know not only what we offer, but Whom we offer.

The Two Brothers in All of Us

         Probably today’s gospel passage (Luke 15:11-32) is one of the most powerful images used by Jesus in His preaching.  The “Parable of the Two Brothers” (sometimes called “The Prodigal Son”) reveals the boundless mercy of God.  Some of the Fathers of the Church interpreted the younger son as the Gentile people and the older brother as the Jewish people.  The younger son represents a people who were welcomed into the Father’s covenant despite their infidelity and idolatry, whereas the older son represents those who were with the Father the whole time but were unfaithful to Him in their hearts.         Nevertheless, the most important dimension of this parable is what it says about the spiritual life, because everyone one of us here goes through phases similar to the younger brother and the older brother.  Firstly, let us look at the younger brother.  His life represents the sad effects of sin.  When we sin, we are abusing our freedom.  Freedom is our inheritance – our gift – from the Father, who lets us “do what we want” with this gift.  When we abuse this gift by “loose living” (that is, sins of the world, the flesh and the devil), we are left empty.  We find ourselves in slavery, especially when things are so bad that we are jealous of what pigs eat.  Sin leads to hell.  Yes, hell is where we will go if we do not repent, but hell is also a present reality.  When we live so selfishly that our lives become closed in on ourselves that we have no love to give — this is hell.  And ultimately, if this is how we live our lives now, God will give us what we want for eternity: separation from Him and His kingdom in sæcula sæculorum.

         However, this spiral of sin does not have to end here.  Like the younger son, we can turn back to our loving Father, who runs toward us to embrace us, to kiss us.  Msgr. Rubino in this month’s edition of Homiletic & Pastoral Review gives a profound insight: “A significant break with Middle Eastern custom was the father’s action upon seeing the son. In the Middle East culture, old age was seen as a blessing, and reflected certain cultural norms, and ways of behavior.  Seeing his son in the distance, he runs to embrace him. He does not walk; he runs. For an older person to run was a significant loss of status, rank, and dignity as the father would have had to pull up his tunic, expose his bare legs, and run. The father’s behavior was totally beneath the understanding of how ‘senior citizens’ behaved. Surely aware of the customs of the day, he still ran to his prodigal son, risking harsh criticism from his guests for his behavior.” This is where the sacrament of confession comes in: Once the Father has run toward us after our inner detestation of sin, verbal confession is the Father throwing His arms around us; penance is the Father’s kiss.

          But what about the older son?  How do we see him in our spiritual life?  Those of us whose faith becomes simply a Sunday obligation are like the older son.  We go through the motions, but our hearts are far from the Lord.  We prefer entertainment to prayer; we prefer our political leaders over Christ (or our political parties instead of our Church); we are neither hot nor cold – just lukewarm.  As the “older brother,” we can learn something from the “younger brother.”  We need to repent; we need to ask for the gift of fervor from the Father; we need to ask Him to set us on fire for our faith.  As we approach the holy altar this Sunday, we thank God for slaughtering the fattened calf – the Lamb of God – who stands on the altar slain but living.  Let us, who have been lost, be found by the Father in the Son and through the Spirit. Amen.

It is Reasonable to Be Pro-Traditional Marriage

A few days ago, I was watching an interview with an Evangelical couple who owned a bakery in Oregon.  They had to close their bakery because, after refusing to bake a cake for a lesbian wedding, the community turned against them and boycotted their business.  In the interview, they cited their Biblical belief in marriage and, despite being persecuted for their belief, they accepted the consequence and trusted in God’s providence.  I was impressed with their solid faith and their willingness to stand up for their belief on national television.  However, I worry sometimes that supporters of traditional marriage can come off sounding as if this is only a religious belief.  Marriage between one man and one woman is certainly Biblical, but almost all cultures and all religions in all times have valued this understanding of marriage.  Even under the pagan law of ancient Rome, marriage was defined as “a union of male and female.”  Pagans knew this – not because of an awareness of Jewish values – but because of natural law, the moral law God has imprinted on the human heart (Romans2:15).

Because Catholics and Evangelicals are united on the Biblical understanding of traditional marriage (the sacramentality thereof notwithstanding), I encourage my Evangelical readers – and Catholics curious about how to address this topic with unbelievers – to consider the natural law arguments and those coming from science.  The Catholic tradition, utilizing faith and reason, takes all that is good from pagan philosophy and natural theology, and also does not reject evidence coming from the human sciences.  One year ago, Most Rev. John J. Myers, Archbishop of Newark, wrote a masterpiece on the reasons why the Catholic Church is against so-called “gay marriage” and why it is bad for society.  I invite my readers who are serious about this subject to read the letter online.  Of course, he covers the Biblical view and makes use of Christian tradition, but the most impressive part of his letter is his application of natural law, biology and secular studies to make the case that “same-sex marriage” is detrimental to civilized society.

The ideology behind support for “same-sex marriage” is a denial of objective morality, which has always been a slippery slope for humanity.  Archbishop Myers writes, “It is so important in our times for us to recognize and to overcome false and ultimately destructive ideologies that deny what thinkers from Plato and Aristotle, to Cicero and Aquinas, to the American founders, to Martin Luther King and Mahatma Gandhi all affirmed: that objective truth exists and it is our task to discover it, be formed by it, and to conform our lives as individuals and communities in accord with the truth. We should want what is good, but something is not good simply because we want it. . . Such is the case with marriage. Many today believe that it is an arbitrary thing whose meaning and purpose is imposed by political or juridical fiat. It can mean one thing now and another later. But this has never been the case.”  The issue of re-defining marriage is larger than I can cover in this forum, but my point is that there is great support for our position outside of Biblical references.  As we continue to be maligned as “bigots” or “homophobes” by a hostile world for our sensible position, it is good to know that divine revelation and nature are on our side.

“Oh Lord It’s Hard To Be Humble”

In 1980, country music singer Mac Davis composed a light-hearted song about how vanity and popularity can go to one’s head.  The refrain is probably the most recognized and amusing part of the song: “Oh Lord it's hard to be humble / When you're perfect in every way. / I can't wait to look in the mirror / Cause I get better looking each day. / To know me is to love me / I must be a hell of a man. / Oh Lord it's hard to be humble / But I'm doing the best that I can.”

Although most of us are not this vain (at least we won’t admit to it :-), we all struggle with the capital sin of pride in its various manifestations: thinking we are better than others, refusing to admit when we are wrong, ambitious to get ahead, insistent on “having the last word,” and not respecting the opinions of others.  Indeed, it is hard to be humble.  The good news is that our Blessed Lord knows this.  And whether or not we want it, He will teach us the virtue of humility in one way or another.

In the gospel of today’s (Sept 1) Mass, Jesus watches how guests at a Pharisee’s home presume seats of honor (Luke 14:7-14).  Our Lord takes the opportunity (as is often the case when He observes vices) to give a parable — a parable concerning the conduct of invited guests and hosts: Guests of honor should be humble enough not to presume seats of honor; Hosts should be humble enough to invite those who do not present a social advantage.  For a challenging take on this teaching of Christ, I recommend Happy Are You Poor (Ignatius Press, 2003) by the late Fr. Dubay, S.M.

So, what is Jesus teaching about the nature of humility?  True humility is not timidity or mediocrity; it is not opposed to legitimately desire personal advancement, professional prestige and well-deserved recognition.  However, the humble person does not “show off” and knows his purpose in life is not to be praised but rather to carry out a mission for God and for others.  We might take an opportunity this Sunday to reflect on how the Lord might be asking us to practice this virtue in our particular state in life.  Do we have a puffed-up view of ourselves that needs to come down a few notches?  Do we refuse to apologize when we are clearly in the wrong?  Do we justify our own sins in order to avoid the confessional?  It is much easier to see these vices in others, but humility helps us see them in ourselves and to humbly ask for the Lord’s help in overcoming them.

It is hard to be humble, but a daily examination of conscience keeps our feet on the earth and our heart in the Lord’s hands.  God alone is perfect, and He wishes to perfect us in our weakness with His healing grace through the Cross of Christ.  [M]ay I never boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world (Galatians6:14).

Dare We Hope “That All Men Be Saved”?

The Swiss theologian, Hans Urs von Balthasar, wrote a book in 1988 that expressed optimism for the salvation of many at the Final Judgment.  The basis for von Balthasar’s book is a quote from St. Paul: [God our savior] wills everyone to be saved and to come to knowledge of the truth (1 Timothy 2:4). “The question is whether God, with respect to his plan of salvation, ultimately depends, and wants to depend, upon man’s choice; or whether his freedom, which wills only salvation and is absolute, might not remain above things human, created, and therefore relative” (Dare We Hope, 15).  Von Balthasar examines the tension that can sometimes seem to exist between God’s justice and His mercy.  “On his earthly pilgrimage, man is . . . placed between fear and hope, simply because he is under judgment and does not know” (Ibid., 27).

While theologians have the license to debate the perceived harshness of God’s judgment (or the softness of His mercy), the official doctrine of the Catholic Church is not universal salvation.  In other words, the Catholic Church does not teach that everyone is going to heaven regardless of the lives they led or the god they worshipped.  “Believing in Jesus Christ and in the One who sent him for our salvation is necessary for obtaining that salvation. Since ‘without faith it is impossible to please [God]’ and to attain to the fellowship of his sons, therefore without faith no one has ever attained justification, nor will anyone obtain eternal life ‘but he who endures to the end’” (CCC 161).  But what about those who have never heard the gospel of Jesus Christ?  Does this mean they are damned?

The Second Vatican Council reflected on this question and formulated a response that must be understood in its proper context: “Those also can attain to salvation who through no fault of their own do not know the Gospel of Christ or His Church, yet sincerely seek God and moved by grace strive by their deeds to do His will as it is known to them through the dictates of conscience. Nor does Divine Providence deny the helps necessary for salvation to those who, without blame on their part, have not yet arrived at an explicit knowledge of God and with His grace strive to live a good life. Whatever good or truth is found amongst them is looked upon by the Church as a preparation for the Gospel. She knows that it is given by Him who enlightens all men so that they may finally have life” (Lumen Gentium, 16).  Notice: Vatican II does not simply say non-Christians are going heaven; it reminds us that we still have the important task of evangelizing them.  (I will write on this in the future.)

Over the last few Sundays, we have been hearing many gospel passages in which our Lord is reminding us of the need to be vigilant and to persevere (Luke 11-13).  If we are all just going to go to heaven regardless of our relationship with Christ and our moral choices, it would not matter whether or not we persevere.  However, Christ reminds us in the gospel this Sunday (August 25): “Strive to enter through the narrow gate, for many, I tell you, will attempt to enter but will not be strong enough” (Luke 13:24).  God does will that we all be saved and come to the knowledge of truth, but He will not force us.  He gives us free will to cooperate with His saving grace.  If we do not enter through the narrow gate, we have only ourselves to blame — not God.  Christ is the narrow gate, and if we commit ourselves to Him, we do dare to hope that we will all be saved.