Speak the Word of God with Boldness

I recently gave a talk to the young men of my church preparing for the sacrament of Confirmation, and I thought I would share some of the reflections I had while preparing.

I was blessed with the opportunity to speak only to the young men. I have spoken to mixed groups before of course, and there are many very insightful young women in our confirmation and youth group programs, but sometimes a man just needs to speak to those becoming men, to call them out into their masculinity. That is in fact the only way they will ever become men, if they are called.

Who wants to live forever?

I do.

One could almost understand contracepting when fornicating with that special someone whom you love with all your heart and are willing to share a dwelling with but are unwilling to commit to.

Almost.

We've told ourselves a lie that there is a perfect time to have a child, and that until then you shouldn't, and also we're afraid of commitment, so we push back marriage, but we've also bought into the lie that sex is essentially required in any type of meaningful relationship, so while we're not yet married we're going to act like it and live together and pay bills together and have sex, but contracept so that our play-acting at marriage doesn't yield the natural fruit of marriage...

Because that makes sense.

But what about contraception in marriage? Consider the following paraphrasation of odd exchange I had with the woman who gave me my last haircut.

Me: I have a daughter who's almost three, and a son who's almost one. How about you?

Her: I'm getting married in May, and we're not having any kids.

Oh? Why not?

I was a surrogate for a gay couple when I was 20, I've been through pregnancy, once was enough for me.

I did not comment on this. Later in the conversation...

Our friends who have six kids...

Six kids? Weird.

Later...

My mom's one of five.

Weird.

Later...

My dad's one of thirteen.

Weird.

The first and most obvious question is whether she missed the day at cosmetology school where they covered not insulting the client's friends and family. Of course, maybe the school skipped that class because it should be obvious that labeling someone's family size as "weird" - especially after stating that you're not having any because being a surrogate for two men who practice and promote homosexuality, and who are calling their cohabitation a marriage - is rude, not to mention a little crazy. In the order of human human history and genetics, that mindset misses the mark.

But it's more than that. Around the world, our population is in decline. Married couples regularly have at most two children, maybe three (if the first two were both boys or both girls). Population in the so-called modern world is declining. Why? How did we go from my grandfather with 10 sons having no cause for shame when he debated at the city gates (Psalm 126(127)), to being weird?

Well, I think the Prof answers this one pretty well:

Ultimately, I suspect it is pessimism, a succumbing to despair. We have seen what this world has to offer, and the world has been found wanting. We have been told by the secular world that there is nothing else after this, and told by too many religions that the hereafter is just an idealized version of this. Neither of those is appealing! Neither of those are things I want to subject my children to, let alone become immortal in.

For what are children but immortality? In his children, Abraham is alive today. The Patriarch of Israel was given immortality both in this life and the next because of his faithfulness to God.

Already I see my wife and I in our children. The arrows in my quiver are weapons which I shall loose upon this world to make my mark upon it and reshape it. They are my ultimate weapon against the spread of secularism, socialism, and every other belief which is contrary to the truth - if you can't convince 'em, outbreed 'em! I shall live on in my children as my father lives on in me, and his father in him. If I am faithful and acquit myself as a father, my children will spread the truth I have come to love, with their own (and hopefully even better) understanding.

Why do I have the desire to conquer this world? Because I know what comes next. I know that it is beyond my wildest imaginations, and I know that my children will have their own chance to inherit that kingdom too.

Let us be prayerful, and responsible, but not swayed by the empty promises of this world's "perfectly sized family". The perfect size is the one which God calls us to have, be it 1, 2, or 18; whether those arrows are yours genetically or through adoption. But no matter what, let us not fear to have that 4th child, or fifth child, or even the first. Let us face it with a spirit of courage and adventure, knowing not where it will lead, daring to put our mark on the future.

To live forever.

Blessed are the Colt Model Ps?

Somehow I don't think that our lord was referring to the revolver when he said Blessed are the peacemakers...

Still, it is interesting that a device used to project slugs of metal at high velocity, usually with the intent of ripping holes in the human body so as to make it inoperable, should bear the title "Peacemaker."

The flippant answer is that gun manufacturers are merchants of death, and that it is simply clever marketing to instill a false sense of security for owners of their product, and a feeling of vulnerability in their target customer base. Perhaps there is even some truth to this.

However, I think it speaks to a sad but nonetheless true reality about this fallen world of ours. It is sometimes hard to remember that there is simultaneously room and a need for both Gandhi and Patton. Our Lord is typified as both the Lamb of God, and the Lion of Judah. To put it more eloquently, I turn to Chesterton:

The world did not lose the last charge of Sir James Douglas or the banner of Joan the Maid. And sometimes this pure gentleness and this pure fierceness met and justified their juncture; the paradox of all the prophets was fulfilled, and, in the soul of St. Louis, the lion lay down with the lamb. But remember that this text is too lightly interpreted. It is constantly assured, especially in our Tolstoyan tendencies, that when the lion lies down with the lamb the lion becomes lamb-like. But that is brutal annexation and imperialism on the part of the lamb. That is simply the lamb absorbing the lion instead of the lion eating the lamb. The real problem is--Can the lion lie down with the lamb and still retain his royal ferocity? THAT is the problem the Church attempted; THAT is the miracle she achieved.

There is a reason that Holy Mother Church has a doctrine of just self defense, and of just defense of others. There is a reason why She has a just war doctrine, which says that ultimately war should be avoided as much as is prudent, but sometimes the prudential solution is in fact to engage in bloodshed, for the betterment of mankind.

It has been said that fighting for peace is like fornicating for virginity, but I find myself dissatisfied by the sentiment. It sounds nice, rings well (especially among college students and the internet, where another term is often used in place of "fornicating"), but it is, I think, dissatisfying. Insert Godwin's-Law-Fulfilling comment about the U.S.A. stopping the Nazi war & death machine in World War II here.

I think that's about enough of the Nazis for one blog post, don't you?

I've taken a bit of a divergence, and would like to return to the scripture we started with:

Beati pacifici, quoniam filii Dei vocabuntur.

Blessed the peace makers (pax + facio: I make, arrange peace), for sons of God they will be called.

It is not the peaceful who are blessed, it is those who bring about peace. Our Lord does not specify how. I have another scripture which strikes me at the moment, John 2:14ff:

And he found in the temple them that sold oxen and sheep and doves, and the changers of money sitting. And when he had made, as it were, a scourge of little cords, he drove them all out of the temple, the sheep also and the oxen, and the money of the changers he poured out, and the tables he overthrew.

An account of this event occurs in all four of the Gospels, in one form or another. Yes, it even occurs in the selfsame Gospel in which Our Lord delvers the 8 Beatitudes. The Son of God, who would himself be scourged and crucified, offering no resistance to those who sought His life, gets physically violent with those who are turning the temple into a marketplace.

To put it even a little more bluntly, read Ecclesiastes 3:1-8

All things have their season, and in their times all things pass under heaven.
A time to be born and a time to die.
A time to plant, and a time to pluck up that which is planted.
A time to kill, and a time to heal.
A time to destroy, and a time to build.
A time to weep, and a time to laugh.
A time to mourn, and a time to dance.
A time to scatter stones, and a time to gather.
A time to embrace, and a time to be far from embraces.
A time to get, and a time to lose.
A time to keep, and a time to cast away.
A time to rend, and a time to sew.
A time to keep silence, and a time to speak.
A time of love, and a time of hatred.
A time of war, and a time of peace.

I guess the point I'm trying to make is that I think the peacemaker was named correctly. Sometimes we must be both lion and lamb. In this fallen world, some are called to have the capacity for violence as a means for the imposition of justice, tempered by virtue and a true love of God an neighbor, such that we will only use it as a last resort.

Much like war is not the answer, neither is violence, though it may be necessary to curb the violence of those who will not listen to reason. If I may be so bold, there is even a place for the warrior in the Body of Christ.

What, me worry?

There is something seriously wrong with us.

A couple of weeks ago amongst a group of young with whom I am acquainted, we were talking about the various ways the federal government is working to take away our freedoms. Chief on the list was the indefinite detention of United States Citizens suspected of working with terrorist organizations on United States soil.

I have a big problem with this. So should you. I'm going to go right out and say it: if you don't have a big problem with this, you're doing it wrong.

One of the young men made one of the most common - and worst possible - comments on the situation: "What do you have to be worried about? Are you a terrorist?"

WRONG ANSWER.

Why is this the wrong answer? Because peaceful pro-life protesters have been identified in certain documents as "potential terrorists." Because no matter how distasteful I may find the Occupy Wall Street movement, they are exercising their right to free speech, and yet have also been marked as potential terrorists.

Because the President of the United States of America gets to decide what a terrorist is.

Because I am a citizen of the United States of America, entitled to a fair and speedy trial by a jury of my peers under the law of that same country.

Because those who give up freedom for a measure of security deserve neither.

I don't think it will be this president, or the one after him. We may be fine for 20 years, 30 years, 50 years. But wake up, we are laying the foundation for totalitarianism.

Will this be the generation remembered by history as that which saved America from the brink of disaster? Or will they curse our name for not stopping this evil when we had the chance?

Where Have All the Good Men Gone?

It's official.

Men. Are. Pigs.

I know this gets screamed all the time by all different types, but in a number of cases, it is really and truly true.

Well, no, that's not quite true. To say that a man is a pig is a contradiction. We have become all too fond of denominating an adult male by use of the term "Man," but the truth of the matter is that it is not that simple. It is, unfortunately, not automatic.

Better to say that many who we call men are in fact not, but merely boys trapped in an adult body without the faculties necessary to have achieved the noble title of "Man."

Some of you may recognize the image above as from an ad campaign by Trojan™ condoms, which basically implied that a man was a pig unless he carried Trojan™ condoms on his person. This is because, of course, it's okay to intend to have sex with a woman you just met, after both of you have become mildly to extremely inebriated, so long as you have "protection."

Of course.

The only protection needed in those circumstances is a bottle of mace. Or a shotgun.

The astute observer will by this point have noted that that campaign is not exactly recent, and that there must be another impetus for this particular post, and they would be right. Because they are astute. Why don't we get together and call ourselves an institute?

Sorry, Paul Simon makes me happy.

I recently had to pull out the "It's time to stop the rape jokes, they're not funny" card in a group of personages who will remain more or less anonymous. This is, unfortunately, not the first time I have had to pull out this card with this group. The time before, one of the males in question made the assertion that another person was "raping" him, because they were on a team together and he had been told to take care of some administrative work for the team.

After he had repeated his protestation several times, to the effect of, "Seriously, what you're doing right now is basically raping me," I quite simply told him that that was not funny, and that it was time for him to stop. He didn't understand, protested that it's just a joke, to which I simply replied that I know too many women who have been raped to make any such joke funny. It is not funny. You should stop.

He kept asking me why I was getting angry with him, to which I replied that I am not - and I wasn't, really, any more than I would be angry with a puppy that hasn't been house trained, though the pressure was indeed building - and eventually had to resort to interrupting him every time he opened his mouth with, "<Name>, let's drop this. This conversation is over. Drop it."

Bad enough, but unfortunately not as bad as this afternoon.

The discussion of several of these personages, the young male involved in the above encounter included, drifted to their current respective stocks of alcohol, and the uses thereof, which then led to this aforementioned young male expounding upon his technique for hooking up with freshmen:

So, basically, this is how I hit on them <approaches another guy to use as an example, putting his arms around the other's shoulders>, and then I say, "Let's go back to my place, I've got a hot tub," but then by the time we get there, I don't have a hot tub, but it doesn't matter, because she's forgotten why she came in the first place, so she thinks she just came with me for everything else.

After making it clear to him in no uncertain terms what I thought of that, he defended himself, saying that he was getting drunk too, and those girls made the decision to go to that party and get drunk. Others of the young males defended him in this, blaming these young ladies, because obviously these males in question wouldn't be doing this if these girls weren't showing up at these parties drunk.

No. No. No. No, No, NO, NO!!!!!!!

Even granting that these young ladies are making poor choices, I allowed, do you not see your own hand in building this situation? Do you not see how you are enabling this? If you recognize it as not good, then why are you being a part of it? If she is that drunk, she is too drunk to give consent. If she is that drunk you cannot assume consent.

At some point during this conversation I told the young initiator of this line of discussion, "So basically, as the father of a daughter, you're the type of man I'll be coming after with a shotgun."

They agreed, but continued to defend themselves. After all, it is my responsibility to not raise a slut for a daughter, they said, also referencing Chris Rock: "Daddies, it's your job to keep your daughters off the pole."

And you know what, they are absolutely right, it is absolutely my responsibility to raise a daughter who has too much self worth to even interact with this type of cretin.

But what about the daughters who had no fathers, or whose fathers were abusive <insert appropriate sentiment here />? You acknowledge that their "daddy issues" are a brokenness, but more over say that it makes them fair game?

You are not men. Not even boys, because boys at least have some innocence. You are predators. You prey on the weak who you should be defending, defending them even against themselves.

You claim that it is not your fault while you objectify women, making it clear that the type of woman you want to be with is one who is hot and puts out. Are you truly so blind to your part in this? Let those with eyes see.

It used to be that courage, honor, valor, integrity, these were the things that made you a man.

It seems that to today's society, what makes a man is the condom.