So, picture this scenario:
Your boss calls you up and offers you a choice of three things you can do:
1) Single-handedly picket the Paris mosques wearing a sign that has a picture of Mohammed with a bomb turban.
2) Get shoved feet first through a wood chipper.
3) Write a response to the CCCB's pastoral letter on the government's embryo research regulations.
hmmmmm
toughie...
I think highly of your efforts Hilary. I'm a young lady in my early twenties. I think you make a difference in this world. I am also a devout Catholic. I understand your frustration with the way the world functions today.
ReplyDeleteI look up to you in many ways. My concern is it seems that to be a trad Catholic, or to be a real Catholic, one must also constantly criticize and be ready to fight. I'm not that kind of person, so when I read blogs like yours I wonder if perhaps I should change.
-Elizabeth
Actually Elizabeth, the real fight, the one to which all Christians are called as part of the Church Militant, is the internal one. Not many of us are called to the front lines of the culture war.
ReplyDeleteWhen the Church speaks of spiritual combat, she means the combat that goes on every minute of every day between your ribs. That is the Big War, the one that none of us can escape.
The small number of us who are called, or who fell accidentally or through lack of talent for real jobs, into what the magazines call the Culture War, are in it because we have been given certain gifts that make it possible. Mine was a deeply contrary and pugilstic nature that simply cannot turn down a fight. Much the same sort of spiritual gift that God in His wisdom and mercy made the defining characteristic of Siamese Fightng Fish and other lower life forms. That combined with the Irish verbal talents have suited me to what I do and I am grateful that I can do it for money, a bonus not enjoyed by many people in Canada.
In short, don't worry, it's no fun for me either, but I can't seem to help it. Be glad you are not so afflicted.