Fathers For Good

Bishops Talk Chastity

The Canadian bishops have jumped right to the heart of our sexualized culture with a pastoral letter on a topic that has rarely been breathed about from the pulpit or in the schools: chastity for young people.

How quaint, some may say.

Yet there are indications that youth today are open to the chastity message, after seeing the ruin that premarital sex has made of so many lives – an epidemic of sexually transmitted diseases, teen pregnancies, abortion and mistrust of commitment. Today, chastity may just be the kind of countercultural message that kids are looking for. It can be presented as the ultimate way to "die for the one you love," while remaining alive.

The "Pastoral Letter to Young People on Chastity" was released January 27th by the Commission for Doctrine of the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops (CCCB). It does not draw much from the popular idiom or hip phrases that some chastity speakers use, those who reference the street language and music of youth.

Rather, the pastoral letter presents human sexuality as an adult topic that young people need to be initiated into. The opening words set the tone: "Living a life of chastity is an ongoing journey which requires both guidance and encouragement." The Canadian bishops will provide "some words of direction and support" for the difficult task of remaining chaste in a culture of temptation.

The letter draws from traditional Church teaching and the sections on chastity and purity found in the Catechism of the Catholic Church. The body is the "temple of the Holy Spirit." Sexuality is "a gift from God and a fundamental part of what makes us human." The virtue of chastity "involves the integration of the powers of love and life placed in us." Chastity is "difficult for everyone: single, married or consecrated."

There are few concessions to youthful exuberance over sexuality. "The body is our doorway to salvation, and so how we treat it matters."

There are sections on chastity for singles, married couples, consecrated religious and priests, and a very helpful section on recovering the virtue of chastity after premature sexual activity. Then the letter ends with a presentation of a role model, St. Augustine, who had a longtime lover and fathered a child before his conversion. Also held up for emulation are Blessed Kateri, Blessed Pier Giorgio Frassati, and St. Gianna Beretta Molla.

It will be interesting to see how the letter is received by the young people to whom it is addressed, since it doesn’t speak the language of youth. It seeks to elevate the discussion to a level of maturity and presents the truth without apology. But maybe that’s what young people are looking for – a serious discussion on sex without the sugar coating, that is very obviously meant for their own good.

Read the pastoral letter on the CCCB website.

See a YouTube video presentation of the pastoral letter.

Reverend King

How old was Martin Luther King Jr. when he was shot down tragically in 1968? I was 10 years old when he was assassinated, and remember the day well, yet I was surprised today when I realized that Dr. King was only 39 when he died.

He was born Jan. 15, 1929, and was killed in Memphis, Tenn., on April 4, 1968. If still alive, he would just have celebrated his 81st birthday. It seems amazing to me that my father – who marked his 84th birthday on New Year’s Eve with a party at his nursing home bedside – is older than the great civil rights leader would have been.

I recall King as a wise and venerable figure on the TV news and the front pages of daily papers. Although young, I read his words, and knew that they made sense. Black people are equal and should be treated as such in law, and in the hearts of all Americans. Our nation betrayed the spirit of its founding and the dictates of the Christian religion by allowing slavery to persist under the Constitution. It took a Civil War to eradicate slavery, yet it took another century and a leader of peace to wrench segregation from the heart of America. Like so many men of peace throughout history, King was met with violent resistance and a violent death.

He seemed always a man not only older than his age, but wiser than his time. He won the Nobel Peace Prize at the age of 35. He trusted God and spoke in prophetic terms. He also trusted, in a qualified way, in the American people and the spirit of our nation’s founding. This trust allowed him to see a day when that spirit would overcome segregation, and allowed him to cite the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution in his great “I Have a Dream” speech during the March on Washington in 1963. It allowed him to conclude that prophetic speech by seeing a day:

“when all of God's children, black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual:  Free at last! Free at last! Thank God Almighty, we are free at last!”

I picked up a children’s book yesterday at our local library about Martin Luther King and the Civil Rights Movement. I want my two grade school boys to know something about those days, and to know how important they are in our nation’s history, and in my own life.

As a father, I want them to be men of strength and conviction, yet men of peace, and not follow the way of the bully.

Time after Time - 1/11/11

If I believed in some sort of harmonic convergence in the universe, I would post this blog entry at 11:11 a.m. That would make the time stamp 11:11 on 1/11/11. I am sure bloggers all over the world are having fun with these numbers.

But I am not numerically inclined, and certainly not superstitious in this way. Still, I think even Catholics committed to Christ can find a lesson in the fact that the world is set up naturally to have these kind of diverting convergences of date and time. After all, God created the world and set in motion the sun, stars and planets, and mankind has discerned a pattern in these to organize his days.

We are not deists who think the great watchmaker has set the world in motion and gone away, leaving man to make the best of it all. We are Catholics who believe in the Incarnation, that God has come into his world as a man and staked his claim on this earth and in our lives. According to the Greek word used in John's Gospel, he has "set his tent" among us. A wonderful image for God dwelling with us.

So as we check our watches and cell phones today, waiting for 11:11 at morning and night, let's remember who put time in motion and brought us to this minute. Just as "every hair on our head" is counted, so God saw this time from all eternity, and he blesses us in it. How will we use this moment?