Fathers For Good

This First Father's Day

What do fathers want? This is the topic chosen for June by visitors to the Fathers for Good website.

 

Of course, there is not just one answer to the question. Fathers want a number of things, and different fathers may want the same thing in different ways. Yet I think the question is important because it directs attention on the heart of a father. The question is important not so that fathers can get things, but rather that they can know themselves better.

 

What’s inside a father’s heart? What is his deepest desire?

 

Now, I think, the answers become fewer and more focused. A father wants to know his children, in a personal way that only the man who helped to generate their lives can know them. A father wants to know his wife, also in a personal way that only a man who has “forsaken all others” for this one woman can know her, including in “the biblical sense.”

 

Now we are talking about big issues, because we are talking about the one truly important issue. We are talking about love.

 

If your mind goes kind of fuzzy and your heart bounces in all directions and your emotions run in contrasting colors and contradictory directions at the thought of love – in other words, if love means to you a bunch of competing and contrasting things that never seem to fit, don’t worry. Love is like that. It is like that because love is the one thing that can truly hurt us, and the one thing that can truly heal us. (See the article on this site, “Love – It’s a Guy Thing.”)

 

Yes, there are a million things that can go wrong in a father’s life. So many today are divorced, sometimes against their own will. So many are separated from their children. Some fathers just don’t know how to be good fathers. All of us, I think, are anxious about our own inadequacies and concerned about the future. We live in stormy times and amid economic upheavals, when the certainty and security we had planned seem to be blowing away.

 

Yet fatherhood can at times be very simple. Sometimes when I am most anxious and wondering what the future holds, or filled with anger over some incident at home or in the world, one of my young boys will sit in my lap with a book or pull my hand to go outside and play. The problems and challenges don’t disappear, but they appear in a different light.

 

Fathers for Good was launched last August, and this is our first Father’s Day as an online community, through the sponsorship of the Knights of Columbus. As editor, I wish you all a happy Father’s Day, and thank you for being a part of Fathers for Good.

 

Let’s meet together often.

Year for Priests

In the next few days we Catholics will receive a great gift, and a teaching moment. That is, the proximity of the opening of the Year for Priests (June 19) to Father’s Day (June 21).

 

Of course, Pope Benedict XVI did not have this convergence in mind when he declared the Year for Priests. He was tying the celebration to the feast of the Sacred Heart, which this year is June 19. Yet so often what the Church does has unforeseen effects, like when the Scripture reading cycles for Mass bring together two passages that just speak to the heart on one particular day.

 

So this weekend, as we inaugurate the Year for Priests, we are offered the chance to ponder why we call priests “Father.” They do not generate offspring like the fathers we will celebrate on Father’s Day – yet they have every right to the title “Father” because they generate (or regenerate) souls for heaven.

 

Through the sacrament of confession only priests can administer, they loose the bonds of sin and prepare us for heaven. Through the celebration of Mass and confection of the Holy Eucharist – which only priests can do – they bring heaven to earth and give eternal life into the hands (and mouths) of the faithful.

 

St. Paul writes that all fatherhood gets its name and identity from God the Father. Our Father in heaven created us “to love and obey him in this life and to live eternally with him in the next life,” as the Baltimore Catechism begins. The priest is most like God the Father in his ability, through the sacraments, to bring the people of God the gifts of God that will prepare them for life with the Father in heaven.

 

For this reason, we should hold priests in high esteem and offer them our love as children of God. Let’s remember our priests in this providential Year for Priests.

Stronger Than Porn

The power of porn to corrupt and destroy is great. But as the Fathers for Good special section on pornography declares, “Men Are Stronger than Porn.”

 

There are many resources on this site to help men, women and families combat this evil that has burst out of the “unmarked brown wrapper” of magazines and spread like a virus on the internet. We have a story about how porn can ruin marriages and lives, and a podcast with a Catholic deacon who overcame his porn addiction.

 

Please become informed about porn and do all you can to resist this insidious evil – and most of all keep it away from children, who can access it so easily – even by chance – on the computer.

 

For us men, the temptation is great – right there with computer screen pop-ups and ads that show pretty women with intriguing smiles and the promise of chat or dates. Whenever I see these enticements on my screen, I think of the deception and lies behind it all, and the corruption the porn industry breeds. I think of the harm to the women who are involved in it, the sad lives of those who engage in it, and the power and money I would hand over to this evil industry if I were to click just once.

 

A man at the screen with his hand on the mouse is involved in the great drama of our age – the type of drama that inspired the “psychomachia” plays of medieval days, with an angel on one shoulder whispering “don’t do it!” and the devil on the other saying “C’mon, no one gets hurt.”

 

Just one click and your life can change for the worse! Tread carefully.

 

We will have more in coming days on the theme “Men Are Stronger than Porn!”

 

Stay tuned.

 

 

The Curious Case of Father Cutié

The story of Father Alberto Cutié, the Florida media priest who was caught in tabloid photos cavorting on the beach with a young lady, presents a number of lessons that have been given scant attention in the widespread coverage of the case. Like a highway collision, many wrong turns have been made and Father Cutié, unwittingly or not, has involved many innocent bystanders in his personal crack-up.

Indeed, weeks after the affair was made public, Father Cutié careened further from the road and renounced his priesthood and the Catholic Church, entering the Episcopal Church in Florida with the woman who is now his fiancée.

Thus, sexual scandal has led to schism, and it is no secret that men have trod this path before. In fact – I hope I am not indelicate to point this out – the whole Episcopal (Anglican) Church was founded on the lust of a powerful man who wished to break his (marriage) vows. Call it “The Way of Henry VIII": A man cannot keep his sexual promise and ends up blaming the Church and her authorities for the stringent rules.

Call It Infidelity

At the heart of the case is infidelity, plain and simple, though the term is rarely heard in connection with Father Cutié. Rather, somehow the fact that a priest was unable to keep his promise of sexual continence has resulted in a renewed round of criticism of the discipline of celibacy, proving once again that celibacy is a sign of contradiction, unacceptable to our hyper-sexualized age.

In following the case in the media, I have had a few recurring thoughts:

1. What about the woman? Has anyone thought about the plight of the young lady who apparently has fallen in love with a priest and gained his love in return? Has anyone suggested to her that a man who would break a sacred, sacramental vow before God related to his priesthood might be prone to break a sacred though non-sacramental vow related to his marriage? (Marriage is not a sacrament in the Anglican tradition).
2. Whither the Episcopal Church? It seems beyond strange that the Episcopal bishop in Florida who received Father Cutié and his fiancée into the Anglican communion would give him immediate faculties to preach, with an eye toward ministerial ordination. Is there no thought that Father Cutié has acted hastily and is fresh from breaking promise after promise to his Catholic bishop and the Catholic Church? The bishop’s stance seems to be that any behavior that rejects sexual restraint and glorifies the self is to be praised and accepted. But I guess that has been the direction of the Episcopal Church for years.
3. Both Father Cutié and the Episcopal bishop acted irresponsibly in relation to the Catholic Bishop of Miami, John Favalora, who was kind enough to grant Father Cutié a leave of his duties and time to reflect after the beach photos were published. According to Bishop Favalora, Father Cutié never informed him of his decision to abandon his priesthood and the Catholic Church, though the priest had promised loyalty and obedience to his bishop at ordination. Likewise with the Episcopal bishop – he never consulted Bishop Favalora about receiving this high-profile Catholic priest into the Episcopal fold.

The big loser in all this, of course, is Father Cutié. He remains a priest of Jesus Christ, with the indelible mark on his soul from his Catholic ordination, yet he is giving up the privilege of consecrating bread and wine into the true Body and Blood of Jesus, for in the Anglican tradition he will no longer intend to do this.  

My hope and prayer is that Father Cutié will come to his senses, if nowhere else, at least on his deathbed. As he faces his final moments, may he call for the anointing of a Catholic priest.

Happy Birthday, Dear Church

Up until this point in our liturgical celebrations, it has been all about Jesus. His death, burial, Resurrection and Ascension into heaven. Now with the rushing of a strong wind -- whoosh! -- the focus shifts for Pentecost.

Fifty days after the Resurrection; ten days after the Ascension. The Holy Spirit comes with power upon the Apostles and Mary. It is the birthday of the Catholic Church. The time after and the time before -- between the Ascension and the Second Coming. This is the time we live in, when the Holy Spirit leads the Church into all truth.

It is a time most hopeful (our great Love will return!) and a time most painful (we live amid weakness and sin). For many, hope has given way to despair, and despair to disbelief, or vice versa. How can we hope so much as to believe that God in the flesh rose from the dead and will return? Why should we rejoice in Him who comes to judge the living and the dead? Not as a helpless babe who warms the hearts of all, but next time as an Omnipotent Judge to cull the wheat and burn the weeds.

Our lack of hope spurred Pope Benedict XVI to write a whole encyclical on the subject, Spe Salvi (In Hope We Are Saved). In brief, he says that much of mankind has lost hope because it does not expect good things to come from Jesus. They have lost true faith.

Let us look at the first Pentecost to recover some of the faith and hope that can make all the difference in life. St. Luke, author of the Acts of the Apostles, describes a dramatic scene. The Apostles and disciples gathered in one place and "a strong driving wind" filling the room, with "tongues as of fire" settling above each one, and the Holy Spirit coming upon them all (Acts 2:1-4).

The first effect is that they all begin speaking in different tongues, different languages. The obvious reason for this miraculous occurence is that the Apostles must preach the Gospel to the whole world, and need to be understood in all languages. The first effect of Pentecost is the preaching of the Word of God.

Peter, the chief Apostle, explains the happenings to the strangers. Jesus Christ is the Savior promised to Israel; though crucified, He rose from the dead and is exalted at the right hand of the Father. And now the Holy Spirit is poured forth on all who believe and are baptized.

About 3,000 persons were baptized that day!

Peter preached faith and hope at a time when there was little of either in an aging classical culture. Today, we face what some call a Post-Modern, Post-Christian, post-something world that -- even amid the wonders of new technology and prosperity -- seems lonely, lost and cynical. 

There is a solution, the answer of Pentecost: do not despair; preach the breathtaking newness of the Holy Spirit! Make this Pentecost the new day of your faith -- as fresh and inspiring as when the Spirit first descended. You may not have the eloquence of Peter to convert 3,000 listeners on the spot. But share your joy, and give an account of the hope that you hold. Dare to tell a friend or neighbor: He is Risen!

  

Come, Holy Ghost

The Catholic school gym sported shiny yellow floors, cinder-block walls smoothed with dull, industrial paint, grey folding chairs that clanged and screeched, and a stage at the far end for school plays and assemblies. The pastor blew a whistle: girls on one side, boys on the other, find your partner, size order.

 

It could have been my own Confirmation 40 years ago, so many things looked and sounded the same, right down to red robes and nervous banter of the students waiting for the bishop to arrive. But this scene occurred only yesterday, at St. Eugene’s Parish in Yonkers, New York, where I served as Confirmation sponsor for my good friend’s daughter, Marie-Therese.

 

Yes, there were some differences from my day. For one, we did not have sponsors back then, when each boy and girl stepped up alone to face the golden-robed bishop, holding out a card with his or her Confirmation name. We joked about getting “slapped” by the bishop, referring to the “tap” on the cheek that had been a part of the Confirmation rite for so many generations but was removed years ago.

 

Another more noticeable difference were the kids and adults checking cell phones and sending text messages, and the girls wearing more make-up than I ever remember adorning the faces of grade school kids.

 

Yet it was inspiring to see the bright, freshly scrubbed seventh-grade faces of the boys and girls, full of hope and ready for life. Tall, short, shy, outgoing, of many different ethnic backgrounds and nationalities – they are the people of tomorrow, and this day they were to become young adults in the Catholic faith.

 

Trying to bring a theological truth down to earth, I told a bright-faced Marie-Therese that there was nothing to worry about. “The great part about the sacraments is that God does all the work and all we have to do is say yes.” I am also her godfather, having stood at the baptismal font with her parents 12 years ago when the waters of salvation were poured upon her head.

 

“I am so proud of you,” I told her. “Now I must pray for you twice, once as my goddaughter and once again as a Confirmation young lady.”

 

At last, the altar boys appeared to light the incense as the pastor, in his monsignor’s cassock with royal purple piping, led the way up the stairs to the church. Cameras flashed, proud parents beamed and waved. The bishop processed, with miter and staff, as the choir sang a Holy Spirit hymn.

 

When the time came, I placed my right hand on Marie-Therese’s shoulder, as the bishop marked her forehead with holy oil, saying, “Be sealed with the Holy Spirit.” The bishop had told the candidates that the true effect of the sacrament will be found in the days to come, in virtuous acts performed and moral choices made, in temptations avoided and resisted, and in a long life walking in the Spirit, close to Jesus and on behalf of others.

 

As we processed out, I thought of the continuity of the Church, the passing on of this great faith from generation to generation and the never-extinguished hope of the Holy Ghost.

 

The great Jesuit poet Gerard Manley Hopkins wrote:

 

Because the Holy Ghost over the bent

World broods with warm breast and with ah! bright wings.

Month of Mary - Time for Faith

May is for Mary.

In our monthly topic on Fathers for Good, we look at Marian apparitions and their application to Catholic life today. After all that the Blessed Mother has done and said, it is a great wonder that there are lukewarm and poorly formed Catholics today.

Just think: the Mother of God has appeared on earth -- a lady from heaven has come to speak to humanity. She has given a consistent message of prayer, penance, sacrifice and love.

Just consider --

In Guadalupe, Mexico, in 1531, she left her own image on the garment of Juan Diego, and her appearance was the inspiration for the conversion of millions of indigenous people! Her image still is clear on the tilma almost 500 years later, and science cannot explain it!

Can we see that image and fail to believe?

In Lourdes, France, in 1858, Mary appeared to Bernadette and revealed herself as the Immaculate Conception, the only human conceived without Original Sin. She also instructed Bernadette to uncover a hidden stream of water that has swelled into a stream where today millions flock for the healing powers. Miraculous cures have been documented, with no medical explanation. My own son was healed there in 2001 of a heart ailment (see previous blog entry).

Can we look at the waters of Lourdes and fail to believe?

In Fatima, Portugal, in 1917, the Blessed Mother made a series of dramatic appearances to three shepherd children, and gave dire warnings about the coming of World War II and the sufferings of the Church and the Pope.

The last of the visionaries became a religous nun and died just a few eyars ago. Sister Lucy was a constant witness to the presence of God and the message of Mary.

Mary's three Fatima "secrets" have been revealed, but most important were her calls for prayer, penance and charity. She concluded her monthly appearance with the "Miracle of the Sun" which was reported by secular papers of the time.

Can we hear the Fatima message and think about the Miracle of the Sun and fail to believe?

Tomorrow, May 13, is the feast of Our Lady of Fatima, marking the first appearance of Our Lady to the shepherd children. Let us take her message to heart, and turn to Jesus for the rest of our lives.

Fireproof - The Catholic Version

If you have not seen the movie Fireproof, make every effort to do so. My parish rented the DVD and played it one evening for about 20 couples who showed up for the free screening. A low-budget film produced by two evangelical brothers and their Georgia congregation, Fireproof sends a powerful message about the sanctity of marriage and the need to invite God into this bond between man and woman.

The plot hinges on the troubled marriage of Caleb (Kirk Cameron, the only professional actor in the film) and Catherine, a young couple who are wedded more to their own ambitions and interests than to one another. Caleb is a man of strength, a firefighter captain in a small town who does heroic deeds and is respected by everyone except his wife. The source of her rejection of him is his internet porn addiction.

Catherine works as a publicist in a local hospital who takes off her wedding ring one day and becomes increasingly open to the advances of a tall, handsome doctor.

With the guidance of his father, Caleb embarks on a program called "The Love Dare," designed to save failing marriages through prayer and following a day to day routine to win back the spouse and "fireproof" a marriage. As the movie says, "fireproof" doesn't mean the flames won't touch you, just that you'll withstand them.

To learn more about the plot, you can visit the movie's website.

Here I want to make a few comments from a Catholic perspective. After all, the movie has a strong evangelical Christian message that pretty much begins and ends with the need to accept Jesus as your personal Lord and Savior. Of course, we do need to accept Jesus into our lives in that way. Yet while focusing on this theme, the movie avoids or passes over some very basic issues that are key to the Catholic view of marriage.

My first reaction after watching the movie was: where are the children? Caleb and Catherine are childless after 7 years of marriage, yet there is no suggestion that this could be a source of grief or frustration in their relationship. This is a key issue, especially in our time when so many couples go to great lengths and expense to conceive, and many childless couples are heartbroken. Yet the movie makes not one allusion to children or the desire for them.

The other issue is more basic to a Catholic mind. Have they been trying to conceive, or have they been contracepting to avoid children? Of course, Protestants generally do not view contraception as sinful, but it is totally unrealistic for anyone to think that contraception has no effect on a couple's relationship. As Christian moviemakers, they should have let us know whether Caleb and Catherine are open to new life or not. But, again, not a hint.

Of course, the movie has great strengths. It provides a subtle yet powerful study of temptation and sin, and the weakness of the flesh when the will is deformed. There are wonderful heart-rending and heart-lifting scenes, and talk about love that you'll rarely hear in church, let alone on a movie screen. Love is sacrifice; love is giving even when the other person rejects; love is not emotions; love comes from God.

Guys will love the scene when Catherine, finally won back and repentent over her scornful ways, appears in red-dress beauty at the fire house garage, and tells Caleb, as the wind billows her hair - If I never told you that you are a good man, I do now. It was lump in the throat, hold back the tears time for me -- every guy wants to hear from the woman in his life that he's a good man!

The final scene is sweet but falls short. Caleb and Catherine renew their marriage vows before a preacher as a lifelong "covenant" and not simply as a civil contract. Their friends and family gathered around the idyllic lakeside scene applaud and join in their happiness as they start anew, but something was missing.

How fulfilling the movie would have been if after the ceremony a friend had hugged Catherine and said, "I'm so happy for you and Caleb, and the news about your pregnancy!"

But that would be Fireproof - The Catholic Version.

Mercy Sunday

One of the most telling passages in the New Testament comes in the Acts of the Apostles, Chapter 17. Paul, the newly Christian itinerant preacher, visits Athens, the center of intellect and culture. Looking about at all the stone idols and gods, he becomes agitated and starts talking in synagogues and public squares about Jesus and the Resurrection.

The Athenians become agitated as well by his words and bring him to the Areopagus, the place where great ideas were debated, for as it says in Acts "Athenians as well as the foreigners residing there used their time for nothing else but telling or hearing something new."

Paul rises to the occasion before the assembly, hoping to win hearts and minds with warm words. "You Athenians ..." he begins and then proceeds to flatter them by calling them "very religious" by evidence of their many gods. He then refers to an empty altar dedicated to "the unknown god," and concludes with dramatic flair, "What you unknowingly worship, I proclaim to you." He tells them about Jesus.

We can picture brave Paul straining to make a connection with those who thought of themselves as the great intellectuals of the age, citing the words of a Greek philosopher, pulling out what he thought to be an ingenius logical argument. After all, he begins with what the Athenians were familiar with (the "unknown god") and relates their uncertain worship to the God whom he will reveal to them -- Jesus. Surely, the men of Athens will be moved by such rhetorical art!

But they are not. They are interested in "new things" but evidently not in the new life that might force them to rethink their assumptions.

"When they heard about resurrection of the dead, some began to scoff, but others said, 'We should like to hear you on this matter some other time.' And so Paul left them" (17:32-33).

You can almost hear the soft, derisive laughter, the suppressed guffaws, the knowing winks among men of great thought who were not going to sit and listen to child's tales about a dead man rising. Scoff!

They feign politeness, asking him to return "some other time," a phrase similar to our "I'll get back to you," or "I'll call you."

How telling is the scene: a courageous witness to the hope of all mankind (that this life is not the end) is met with the apathetic intellectual sloth of Athenians who only wanted to listen to what amused or flattered them. They dismissed Paul as a zealot or miscreant, but deep down they must have known that if what he said was true, they would have to change their lives, and make room for a new reality that was more than just talk.

How do we respond to news of the Resurrection? When the Paschal candle was lit at the Easter Vigil, did we simply watch, or did we let the fire of Christ's new life burn into our hearts, and enter our souls?

Are we living new lives now? Or has another Easter passed with us saying, by attitude and deed, "We will hear about this some other time"?

Be of good cheer. After the searing joy of the eight days of Easter, we have Divine Mercy Sunday. It is time to confess that we are not worthy of the death and Resurrection of our Lord. It is time to say how weak is our faith and how failing are our efforts.

The time is now, not "some other time," to hear the Good News and to rely solely on the mercy of Jesus.

Your Body Will Rise

Like a good who-done-it detective story, in Christianity there is always a body involved. Just consider the central tenets of our faith:

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Incarnation

Nativity

Crucifixion

Resurrection

Ascension

Assumption

 

On each of these great Christian feasts, a body is central to the plot, being conceived, born, killed, raised or glorified. That is why the Catholic Church has always been opposed to the generalized spiritism of each age, unwilling to wish away or dismiss the flesh as a mere appendage of the superior spirit.

 

The Catholic mind has always kept body and soul together, going so far as to claim that where one or the other is lacking, there is no human person.

There are souls in heaven, hell and purgatory, but human persons – body and soul -- are found only on earth. In fact, death is defined as the separation of the soul from the body, and we are told by saints as great as Thomas Aquinas that even a soul in heaven is incomplete, longing to be reunited with its body on the last day.

Which brings us to the topic of this Holy Week: the Resurrection of the Body.

 

A campus chaplain once explained to a group of students that Easter was the most perplexing of Christian feasts, though we're told it's the central celebration of our faith. After all, he said, we all can relate to the birth of a baby at Christmas and the suffering that comes with death on Good Friday.

But a body rising from the dead -- who has ever seen or experienced that? Where do we go to find an example?

 

With the Resurrection, we enter the realm of true faith – "the assurance of things hoped for and the promise of things not seen" (Hebrews 11:1).

Indeed, at the center of our Catholic faith is an event that even those who saw the risen Christ did not at first dare to believe. Mary Magdalene came to the tomb to wrap the body of the Crucified One, and when she found the tomb empty and Jesus standing nearby, she did not see that it was He. Only when He utters her name are her eyes opened to the living Christ.

“Why do you seek the living among the dead?” the angel said to the woman at the empty tomb.

Thomas doubted when he heard that Jesus was alive. Jesus appeared to show him his wounded hands and side, and Thomas said what we all should say in awe as Jesus comes to us at Mass in the consecration, “My Lord and my God.”

Jesus did not rebuke him for doubting, but said, “Blessed are those who have not seen and yet believe.”

That’s you and me.

We have not touched his sacred hands or side, nor have we seen Him walk through the door into our midst – yet we believe. That’s our Easter faith, based not on a vague, pervasive “spirit of life within us,” as the New Agers might have it, but based on a body. A body that was dead and laid in the tomb and was seen after three days to be alive again.

Yet there is a persistent claim in some Christian circles, dating back to the time of St. Paul, that Jesus did not really rise bodily. He rose “in the hearts of his disciples” and “his spirit lives on in his believers.” The Catholic faith is totally opposed to this notion, this heresy.

Yet St. Paul writes,  “If Christ is not risen, then your faith is in vain” (1 Cor. 15:14).

We are all about the bodily resurrection. We profess explicitly that the soul of Jesus was reunited with the same body that hung on the cross and lay in the tomb. In rising from the dead, his body is glorified, but it is the same body that was born of Virgin Mary.

Catholics often are accused of despising the body by denying its pleasures, and it’s true that the body and its sensual appetites must be placed under the control of the rational soul. But, in the end, it is the Catholic Church that is the great defender of the flesh, declaring that the body is not only an earthly good but a heavenly presence. It has a dignity that will last for an eternity.

As surely as we will die, we will rise again on the last day, when Jesus will judge the living and the dead. We will rise not as souls alone, but as human persons, body and soul, and we will live forever in our own skin – in heaven, we hope, with God’s grace.

This is our Easter faith. We are Catholic: matter does matter, and bodies do rise.

(Check this blog after Easter for a further reflection.)