The Unforgivable Sin

Christianity is a religion of mercy and forgiveness. The great truth that Christianity captures is the fact that, despite our rebelliousness against God, despite the fact that we are owed absolutely nothing, God gives us his grace anyway. We believe that there is no bound to God’s mercy, and at least in theory, there is no sin that God could not forgive. There is nothing that could keep us out of God’s love.

As I continue to grow in faith, working out my own salvation daily and training to help others in theirs, I have found otherwise, at least in practice. While God’s mercy may abound, the Church’s understanding and ability to express it does not, and we are left with one seemingly unforgivable sin.

Which one, you ask? Some point to Mark 3:29, and say that blasphemy against the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven. I’m not entirely sure what that would mean, but am sure that even the worst blasphemies are balanced with one’s faith at the time (“how could they even know what they’re saying?”) and can be forgiven. Others point to truly heinous crimes against humanity, e.g. genocide, or affronts to the most vulnerable, e.g. abortion, as sins that cannot be forgiven. Surely these are terrible sins, but with God’s boundless mercy in mind and the presentation of a truly contrite heart, the Church has a way for truly remorseful sinners who looking for a way back to God to repent and be readmitted into full communion. Sexual abuse must be what I’m getting at, then, right? Still no. Even in the case of priests and religious who have be defrocked and removed from active ministry–serious punishments for a serious sin–God’s mercy still allows that these men and women receive grace, and the Church has a way for them to be readmitted into full communion.

In each of these cases, blaspheming the Holy Spirit, abortion, genocide, and sexual abuse, there is a process by which one can be readmitted to the Eucharistic table and receive the sacraments of the Church. For some divorced and remarried Catholics, though, this process does not exist, and many people find themselves permanently unable to take part in the full life of the Church. For many, remarriage after divorce, at least in practice, is an unforgivable sin.

Maybe some theological background would be helpful hear. In the Catholic Church, marriage is not a simply civil contract between consenting parties, it is covenant before God. Like the covenants of the Bible, marriage is transformative, meaning that the relationship is different in nature than it was before, and indissoluble, meaning that its character is permanently established. Prior to being married, the bond between the couple is based on their will and love for one another; after being married, the bond, now sacramental and covenantal in nature, is based on God’s will and love for the couple. To turn away from this in divorce, or to break this covenant by trying to enter into it again with another person, is obviously problematic.

But the fact of the matter is, regardless of theology, people in the Catholic Church get divorced at the same rate as any other religious affiliation. And while divorce in itself is not sinful and does not remove one from the life of the Church, getting remarried without a declaration of nullity (showing that the sacramental bond never took place because of lack of consent or deceit on behalf of one of the parties) is a serious problem. How can one be in full communion if they break a covenant made before God and try to enter into another one? The Church “welcomes” these people, but does not allow them to fully participate in the life of the Church, i.e. they may not receive Eucharist at mass.

And on the one hand, it makes sense. Marriage is not taken seriously by many, and in many cases, is broken because of “irreconcilable differences” or because the couple doesn’t have the same love it used to. This is seriously upsetting, showing that the couple never quite understood what they were entering into when they made a solemn oath before God. To willfully and even casually jump from one marriage to another does remove one, to some extent, from the body of Christ.

On the other hand, to what extent is this selfish and even sinful act determinative of the rest of someone’s life? You will not find many people in the Church saying that divorce and remarriage is a good thing, but the situation many people face is one without a way out. What solution do we have for people who admit to this sin? Right now, the only solution is an annulment.

But let’s say there is a couple that gets married when they’re 24. They are both well-informed Catholics who know what they are getting involved with and enter into the covenant validly. Five years into marriage, though, they have a low point, let their tempers get the best of them, and say and do things that cannot be reconciled at the time. Without much prayer or consult, they rush into divorce, and choose not to speak again, moving on to other relationships. Looking back on that situation ten years later, one or both of them may see the error of their ways. They may see how selfish they were and how quickly they removed God from their lives. They are truly contrite, and wish that they had not acted thus. But now they are 39, far-removed from one another, and are both in, healthy civil marriages, raising children and teaching them the Catholic faith. What can they do? An annulment is not possible: the marriage was valid and they know it. Getting back together is not possible: they are too far removed, and now have children and lives with other people. They are stuck in a situation without a solution, removed from the body of Christ with no way back in.

This is not an unusual case. This is becoming commonplace in our churches.

When I think about the incredibly high number of people that are in this exact situation, and lament over the droves of people each year that leave the Catholic Church for another Christian denomination, I am reminded of the situation that Jesus faces in each of the Gospels. Weighed down by the heavy burdens of the Pharisaical law, entire groups of people find themselves outside of ritual worship with no way in. The shepherds who witness the Nativity in Luke would not have been allowed in the Temple; the woman suffering from hemorrhages for twelve years in Matthew would have been an outcast in society; the centurion who gives the final and most prophetic pronunciation of Jesus’ identity in Mark was unwelcome in the community; the woman at the well in John, a perfect example for this discussion, was rejected not only by the Jews but her own people. In each of these cases, and really, in almost every single case in the Gospels, Jesus forgives the sins of those unable to enter, reestablishes them within the worshipping community, and tells them to sin no more. He does not criticize the law, nor does he say what they had done wasn’t bad. He simply shows mercy and removes the impediment that keeps them from worshipping him fully with the rest of the faithful.

Isn’t that, ultimately, what we wish of all people? That no one wishing to enter, showing contrite heart and willing spirit, be denied entry into the life of the Church. For blasphemy, genocide, abortion, and sexual abuse, terribly heinous acts that are entirely against God’s will and pull our human family apart, there is no impediment for the Church to grant absolution if the right conditions are met. For divorced and remarried Catholics, the solution is not quite as clear.

So what is it that we do? How do we act as Jesus did, revealing the unbound mercy of God in our world? Some say that we should just stop putting so much emphasis on the whole issue, accept that divorce is natural, and allow it without consequence. Others hold firm to the theology, and, taking the stance of the penitentials of the first millennium of the Church, believe that people should simply understand the gravity of their error and live ascetically for the rest of their lives. For me, neither of these solutions are sufficient because neither capture the redemptive love and transformative grace that Jesus showed in his life.

The great truth of our religion, the “Good News” as it were, is that God humbled Godself, even died upon the cross, to give grace to even the least-deserving. The message of the Gospel is not one of excluding all but the perfect, but rather inclusion of the most imperfect. If we believe that salvation is from our Lord, and that the grace he gives is freely given to unmerited sinners, then we must believe that there is no sin that God cannot overcome. It is with great hope and anticipation, then, that I follow the current Synod on the Family, and pray that we may find a way to serve and welcome those who feel that they are unforgivable… Just like Jesus did.

 1 Comment

 Posted on October 10, 2015 by

 Ministry, Theology

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Martha and Mary

So it’s Tuesday. You know what that means! Another segment of Ask Br. Casey! Except it doesn’t. While I have posted a video each week for the past six weeks, and had planned on doing the same today, I simply didn’t get it done to my liking last night and chose to scrap it for the week.

But that’s not what this post is about. At least not directly.

This semester has started off as one of the more stressful semesters of my life. As I think I’ve mentioned before, four out of five of my professors have required weekly, or even daily, reflections on readings. That is beginning to take a toll on my free time, free time that I have quickly filled with anything and everything: making a video for the provincial fraternal days, agreeing to give a 30 minute talk to teenagers about the mass, sitting on two committees in our house, starting physical therapy for my shoulder (helpful, but still time consuming!), and, wait for it, professors are beginning to want final paper proposals (which in themselves, are not really that bad… it’s the final papers that generally follow that is quite the annoyance!) Add a weekly video segment and the normal goings of friar life to that mix, and you’ve got yourself a pretty busy life.

Trust me when I say that I’m not complaining, and I am certainly not bragging; so many people have to do much more than me with a lot less than I have. I say all of this to point out that, while this particular load of work may be a bit tedious at times, pushing me just beyond my threshold of stress, it is something that I took on, accepted, and want to live with. The fact of the matter is that I like to be busy. Doing something, even if fairly stressful, is better than not doing something.

And while I don’t discount some level of neurosis–“I must be doing something or I’m not happy”–I think my biggest motivation is that I feel that I am doing the work of the Gospel… or at least work that will prepare me to live the Gospel better. In my school work, I am preparing to be a priest for the people of God; at home, I am trying to build up our fraternity for the sake of the Kingdom; in my professional work, I believe I am using media to connect with people on a level I wouldn’t otherwise. Everything I do, I do for God and for the life of the Church. I am like Martha in our Gospel today at mass: frantically working, sometimes over my head, for Jesus.

Then there’s Mary. There she is, just sitting at Jesus’ feet enjoying his company. And Jesus has the audacity to say that she has chosen the better part? Doesn’t he know how hard I am working for him?

I have no intention of debating Jesus’ words or to enter into any sort of discussion as to which is better, the active or contemplative life. What I do want to say is that this Gospel reminds me that there is a difference between doing something for someone, and spending time with someone. Doing something for another is detached; it may benefit the person we love, but it does not facilitate any real interaction. Doing something with another is intimate; it may not benefit the person we love in any real practical sense, but it is, for me, the foundation of the relationship. It is the time that we spend with those we love that makes us want to do things for them in the first place.

In everything I do for Jesus, I need to be constantly reminded to actually spend time with Jesus. Without prayer, without time to be with our Lord in an intimate and quiet way, free from all of the things I have filled my life with, I will eventually forget why I do what I do, allow the stress to overwhelm me, and ultimately, lose sight of what it is I am actually working for: a world in which others know the love of Christ as I do today. Without prayer, I may be running at 100 mph, full of zeal for where I’m leading people, but in the wrong direction. Sometimes, it means stepping back, putting the mission on hold, and being with the one who calls us to mission in the first place.

For all of us working for Jesus, especially those of us who find life to be quite overwhelming, our highest priority must always be to make time with Jesus. As a friar of ours says: “You should pray privately for thirty minutes every day. When you’re busy, you should pray for an hour!”

 7 Comments

 Posted on October 6, 2015 by

 Uncategorized

Who is the “Real” St. Francis?

St. Francis is probably the most popular, widely recognized, and most misunderstood saint in the Church’s history. It’s not that people don’t know a lot about him, it’s the opposite: since there have been so many stories written about him over the past 800 years, everyone knows something, but it can be difficult to separate fact from folklore.

As someone who has studied the early sources of his life, it can be frustrating sometimes to see how his name is used or what people are saying about him. Take the “Prayer of St. Francis.” It’s a nice prayer, but those who have read Francis’ actual writings know that it sounds absolutely nothing like him. Dig a little deeper and you’ll find that it was a prayer for peace written during World War I.

Francis preaching to the birds is another example. Did Francis preach to the birds in a literal sense? Maybe. We do have one or two references to it in his early biographies. But what’s interesting is that so many other saints before him were also said to preach to animals, and that, for some, the birds represented the many types of people of the world. And besides that, he did and wrote about many other things; preaching to the birds is something he never mentions, and is really insignificant to all of the other more important things he said and did. And yet, he is the man of the birdbath.

These are just two examples of the many ways the image of Francis has been misunderstood throughout the years, and it’s no wonder that he can be found promoting such vastly different causes. Once, for instance, our novitiate class was forced to attend an etiquette because, as the friar hosting it said, “Isn’t this what Francis would have done?” An etiquette workshop. Right.

That’s the feeling that Rob Goraieb, OFS had a few weeks ago when we were preparing for the feast of St. Francis, coming up this weekend. How could we deal with this frustration in a positive way? Like the 40 minute video we filmed a few months ago about vocations and church in the modern world, we decided to just sit down and talk about it on camera. What things frustrated us? What aspects of Francis’ life are often overlooked or forgotten? What do we as Franciscans want the world to know about St. Francis?

We sat for about an hour on camera and we hardly scratched the surface of what we wanted to say. In fact, both of us were initially left dissatisfied with what we had done. The fact of the matter, as we realized, is that there is no way to totally encapsulate the inspiration of the life of Francis, and in some ways, we didn’t even want to try. But we did want to share with you what we found most essential to Francis’ life and what it might mean to follow Francis today.

Happy Feast!

For those on email, the link is here.

 1 Comment

 Posted on October 2, 2015 by

 Discernment, Favorite, Fraternity, Ministry, Poverty, Prayer, Video

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What’s the Difference?

There are more than a few types of religious Orders in the Catholic Church: Franciscans, Dominicans, Jesuits, Carmelites, Benedictines, Paulists… you get the picture. What many don’t get, though, is how we differentiate between each other.

As far as externals go, the habit is the easiest distinguisher because we all have slightly different styles: Dominicans are white, Jesuits have a formal cassock, Carmelites are brown with a scapular and leather belt, Benedictines are black, and the Paulists have a cassock with special buttons, different from the Jesuits. But this form of distinction only goes so far. For starters, many religious do not wear their habits but for special occasions. It makes it very difficult to tell the difference when they’re wearing jeans and their habit is in their closet! But besides that, a habit in itself is but an external sign: it does not articulate any meaningful differences in belief, practice, or spirituality.

For that reason, a much better way to understand the differences between the religious Orders is getting to know their “charisms.” A charism is essentially the personality of the Order, the attributes and preferences of the founder that determine how they prayer, where and how they live, and what they do in ministry for the Church. A charism can be very specific, tied directly to a particular mission such as teaching or medicine, or can be very general, focused on an ideal like hospitality or mission.

This week’s video offers a brief explanation of that concept, a statement about a few of the major religious Orders to serve as contrast, and three aspects I think are integral to the Franciscan charism.

For those on email, the link is here.

 Posted on September 29, 2015 by

 Discernment, Fraternity, Video

I Can Do It!

When I was a senior in college, I had the great privilege of acting as our club baseball team’s president. Since there was no active faculty involved with the team, that meant that I was also the coach. Between the vice president and myself, we petitioned for money from the school, recruited people to sign up, ran practices, paid for regular expenses, and coached games. It was an incredible experience with incredible results. We went 13-2 in the regular season, good enough to win our division, then went 3-1 in the regional tournament, earning a berth to the Club Baseball World Series in Pennsylvania–this from a team that had went 0-7 and 6-4 in the previous two years! Even though we didn’t play well in the World Series, it was a storybook end to my baseball career and one of the fondest memories I will ever have.

At the time, I was very proud of myself. Naturally, I was proud of the whole team, but I really did work hard to make us successful. While the vice president definitely helped, I felt that it was my ambition, persistence, and creativity that fueled the team. The budget I submitted was detailed and professional (which led to us receiving the third highest budget of any team, a huge increase from the year before), I got people to actually come to practice twice a week (more than six once a week was a success in previous years), found an abandoned baseball field near the school and worked to clean it up for practices (the previous two years we practiced on a community soccer field), convinced the varsity baseball coach to let us use the school’s batting cages on their off day (restoring a relationship that been ruined years before by a previous club president), and didn’t stop recruiting until the final week of roster closures (the week we picked up our eventual RF and #2 hitter, and a defunct varsity pitcher). At the time, as I said, I was proud of myself.

That was until I checked in with the team the year after I left. When I left, they were set up to repeat and had real reason to think that they would be even more successful. In essence, they lost me, another senior who only played in the final weekend, and our number 3 pitcher. They still had their top two pitchers (one was probably the best pitcher in the division, and the other guy finished with an ERA under 1.00 the year before), still had their entire lineup save the #3 hitter, and had an entire class of new freshmen coming in. So what happened? Did they repeat and go to the World Series? No. They finished below .500, had to forfeit a number of games, missed the playoffs entirely.

When I lamented about this to a friend, they thought I was bragging, as if to say, “Look how much they needed me. They couldn’t do anything without me.” That wasn’t my first thought. When I saw the immediate drop in results with almost no loss in talent, I realized that I had actually failed them in setting up the team for the long run.

I think a problem we all have when we are passionate about something and want to make it successful is an “I can do it” attitude. What do I mean by this? I’m not talking about initiative or confidence in oneself; this sort of “I can do it” attitude is something all leaders need. Rather, I’m talking about the sort of “I can do it” attitude that does not include others in the building process, in a sense saying “If I don’t do it, it won’t get done right.” Sometimes it is an issue of control and lack of trust in others, other times it is simply a failure to identify talents in others and offer them opportunities to succeed even if “I can do it” better. I think my attitude was somewhere in between the two.

For me, this was my last shot at playing baseball and I made it my highest priority. Was I really going to take chances with guys who weren’t as passionate?

And it was successful…

For one year. What I did was make sure everything was done right; what I failed to do was empower anyone else to care to do it that way once I was gone.

As friars, it can be very tempting to lead our ministries in this way. And who can blame us? In many cases, we’re the most capable of doing any job around the parish: we’re passionate about our ministry and want it to do well, are highly trained with graduate degrees and many years of preparation, and are definitely the most responsible if something were to go wrong. “If I can do it, why wouldn’t I? It is my job.” Add a generally likable personality to the mix, and there’s almost a guarantee for success.

But what happens when a) that specific friar is transferred to a new fraternity, b) a parishioner moves to another church not run by an “I can do it” priest, or God forbid, c) we have to turn the ministry back over to the diocese because we can no longer staff it? If all we have ever done is lead from the top, making all of the decisions and making sure everything is done perfectly, if all we have ever done has been to lead with an “I can do it” (so no one else has to) attitude, then the people we serve will never know that they can do it too. And they can.

I admire our friars who do this so well, leading with the people they serve as the people they serve, empowering them to take an active part in leadership. Because, when you think about it, we are shepherds, not CEOs. We are not owners or kings, we are guides and supporters. The Church does not belong to us nor does it require us to function properly. It belongs to the people of God, and it is our role to make sure they are passionate about and capable of taking up their own cross, not to make sure it is successful at all costs.

Coaching baseball for one year in college will no doubt be one of my fondest memories for the rest of my life because of our success, but it will also be one of the most important memories for me in effective leadership. If all we want is short-term gains, do it ourselves; if we want to make something lasting and worthwhile, we have to build people up and empower them to lead it with us. Coaching that year taught me that “I can do it” can certainly lead to success, but the sort of success I really desire can only be won with an attitude of “we can do it!”

 1 Comment

 Posted on September 27, 2015 by

 Fraternity, Ministry

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Breaking In The Habit

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