Q. You have expressed your disagreement in the past with the practice of omitting “hard sayings” from the Mass readings or giving the option of using the “shorter version” of a reading, which usually means leaving out a strong passage. I noticed that this happened with the Gospel for the 17th Sunday in Ordinary Time. Is this what you had in mind? — P.G., via e-mail.
A. Yes, it is. The shorter form of the Gospel for that day included Jesus’ comparison of the Kingdom of Heaven with a treasure buried in a field or a merchant finding a “pearl of great price.”
The longer version, which would have added about 45 seconds to the reading, talked about the Kingdom of Heaven being “like a net thrown into the sea, which collects fish of every kind. When it is full they haul it ashore and sit down to put what is good into buckets. What is bad they throw away. Thus it will be at the end of the age. The angels will go out and separate the wicked from the righteous and throw them into the fiery furnace, where there will be wailing and grinding of teeth” (Matt. 13:47-50).
We don’t know how many priests used the shorter version of this Gospel, but are we being paranoid in wondering if this suggested omission of “the fiery furnace” that awaits the wicked is an attempt to water down the very real threat of Hell which Jesus mentioned so often?
It is certainly much easier to preach about a treasure buried in a field, or a pearl of great price, than hellfire and brimstone. But are priests doing the faithful a disservice by not warning them that there are eternal consequences to rejecting the Commandments?
At a recent talk we attended, a priest was asked why the divorced and remarried cannot receive Holy Communion. The Eucharist is a source of grace, the questioner said, and why should those in an irregular marriage be denied this grace. The priest responded by saying that we should try to reach out to those in these situations to see if we can’t reconcile them with the Church. He said that these couples should attend Mass, even if they can’t receive Communion because of their circumstances. And that was all he said.
We wondered if it would have been helpful to explain the “circumstances” in more detail. For example, he might have quoted the words of Jesus, that remarriage after divorce constitutes adultery, which is a violation of the Sixth Commandment and renders a person unworthy to receive our Lord in the Eucharist. He could have pointed out that not only would allowing such persons to receive Communion not be a source of grace for them, it would add the sin of sacrilege to adultery.
Now some of those in the audience probably had family members or friends who are unable to receive Communion because of these circumstances, and some of them might have been offended were the priest to state the truth as Jesus has taught it. But they need to hear the truth instead of the false opinions that are often substituted for the truth these days.
Remember Jesus said that He had come not to establish peace on Earth “but rather division. From now on a household of five will be divided, three against two and two against three; a father will be divided against his son and a son against his father, a mother against her daughter and a daughter against her mother, a mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law” (Luke 12:51-53).
Although Jesus didn’t mention specifically what might cause these divisions, it’s not a stretch to speculate that He might have been thinking of persons living in adultery, or living together without marriage, or living in a same-sex relationship.
Of course it’s important to continue loving persons in these sinful situations, and to keep the lines of communication open to them, but what kind of love is it that allows someone we care about to continue in a lifestyle that, if not repented, could ultimately lead to eternal damnation?
It is a work of mercy to admonish the sinner, even if they don’t want to hear the truth, and to pray for their conversion.
Q. I admire very much the wonderful missionary work of the Maryknollers, as recounted in Maryknoll Magazine. But the July-August issue contains a book review of James Martin: Essential Writings, a collection of statements from the books of the Jesuit priest.
In the review, Orbis Books acquisitions editor James Keane said that he sees “strong parallels between Fr. Martin and Archbishop Fulton Sheen, the great radio and television evangelist of an earlier era. Both have to my mind an ability to explain the Church in straightforward ways without being condescending or glib, and both are able to reach out to non-Catholics and lapsed Catholics in surprising ways.” That seems like a poor comparison in light of Fr. Martin’s recent book, Building a Bridge: How the Catholic Church and the LGBT Community Can Enter Into a Relationship of Respect, Compassion and Sensitivity. What do you think? — M.K., Florida.
A. We agree with you. We have read some of Archbishop Sheen’s many books, and listened to or watched dozens of his talks and TV programs, and have never found him to confuse or undermine Catholic teaching, as Fr. Martin has done in Building a Bridge, as well as in various interviews about his book.
Consider the contrast between Archbishop Sheen, who, in a talk on false compassion, criticized those “sob sisters…who insist on compassion being shown to the muggers, to the dope fiends, to the throat slashers, to the beatniks, to the prostitutes, to the homosexuals, to the punks….This is a false compassion.”
And then consider how Fr. Martin, who is editor-at-large of America magazine and a consultant to the Vatican Secretariat for Communications, has vigorously argued for precisely this “false compassion” for those in the LGBT community.
His book is based on a talk he gave in October 2016 to the dissident group known as New Ways Ministry, which gave him their “Bridge Building Award.” New Ways describes itself as a “gay-positive ministry of advocacy and justice for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender Catholics.” But back in 1999, the Vatican’s Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith condemned the group, saying that its “promotion of errors and ambiguities is not consistent with a Christian attitude of true respect and compassion. Persons who are struggling with homosexuality no less than any others have the right to receive the authentic teaching of the Church from those who minister to them.”
Martin said in an interview with the National Catholic Register that he is not advocating that the Church change her condemnation of homosexual behavior, but only that LGBT Catholics and the bishops “meet in the middle of the bridge and know that they are all part of the one body that St. Paul spoke about.”
However, in an interview with Religion News Service, he said that the Catechism’s description of homosexuality as “objectively disordered” should be changed to “‘differently ordered.’ As I say in the book, saying that one of the deepest parts of a person — the part that gives and receives love — is disordered is needlessly hurtful.”
But to make such a change, said Fr. Gerald Murray of Holy Family Catholic Church in New York City, “would mean that God created two different orders of sexual behavior which are both good and right according to His will. Some people are homosexual by God’s design and some are heterosexual by God’s design. If that is the case, then homosexual acts themselves could no longer be described, as they are in the Catechism…as ‘intrinsically disordered.’ If the inclination is simply different, and not disordered, then acting upon that inclination is simply different and not disordered. It would be natural behavior for ‘differently ordered’ people.”
Fr. Martin has praised “Gay Pride” parades, which feature lewd and obscene behavior; lauded bishops who have welcomed LGBT groups to their cathedrals; said on Good Morning America that he likes Lady Gaga’s song Born This Way, a favorite with the LGBT crowd, which features lyrics like “No matter gay, straight, or bi / Lesbian, transgendered life / I’m on the right track, baby / I was born to survive”; and accused Bishop Thomas Paprocki of Springfield, Ill., of “unjust discrimination” for a pastoral letter in which he said that those in “same-sex marriages” should not be admitted to Holy Communion nor should they receive a Catholic funeral if they die without having showed signs of repentance.
To Martin’s claim that “pretty much everyone’s lifestyle is immoral,” Bishop Paprocki agreed that “everyone is a sinner,” but added that “not everyone is living an immoral lifestyle. Since we are all sinners, we are all called to conversion and repentance.”
This bishop is more in line with another bishop originally from Illinois, Fulton Sheen, than Fr. Martin in explaining Church teaching in “straightforward ways.”
Powered by WPtouch Mobile Suite for WordPress