The Elegance of Symmetry

There are three descriptors of God typically used, especially when one is about to bring up the argument against God from evil. While I argue that the list is non-exhaustive, it is widely accepted that these are sine qua non for the traditionally understood "god":

• All Good - Omnibenevolent
• All Knowing - Omniscient
• All Powerful - Omnipotent

All knowing gets flack as being apparently opposed to free will (which is is not), and all powerful gets thrown the sophomoric questions such as, "could God create a rock so heavy He couldn't lift it?" But that is nothing compared to the confusion that surrounds the nature of Good.

There is an (incorrect) notion floating around that good and evil are just words, just terms. They are not absolute indicators, but relative statements of opinion, conditioned by society et cetera, et cetera, ad nauseam. There are a number of problems with this, but for the time being I want to instead state a positive case in support of the traditional Catholic understanding of evil as a privation of good.

This point comes from symmetry, specifically the symmetry between these three descriptions of God.

First, Power, or Potency. From Latin potens - the ability to do something. The opposite of potency is not anti-potency. It's not like there's some mysterious condition where you perform negative work on a situation such that what happens is in direct opposition to what was intended. This isn't anti-potency, but rather misdirected potency. The opposite of capability is incapability, a lack of potency, impotence.

Second, Knowledge. Again, the opposite of knowing a thing is not to know the wrong thing, but to know nothing. There is no anti-knowledge, but lack of knowledge masquerading as knowledge. You either know or you don't - "knowing" a falsehood means that you don't actually know.

Before I go into good vs. evil, take a look at the thermometer, and keep it in mind as a descriptor while I go into a physical analogy. Temperature is referred to as hot vs. cold, but they're generally considered to be completely relative. However, it is similarly a zero-to-infinity scale - there is such a things as the coldest possible, though the same is not true on the upper end.

So it is with good. Evil is not "anti-good," but a lack of good. It is defect or lack, not something in itself. Tolkien knew this when he wrote the Lord of the Rings - the Orcs were deformed Elves, for evil can create nothing. Evil can only distort and destroy, because it is fundamentally absence.

This set of definitions of course glosses other very important characteristics of which God possesses/is the source of - being, love, presence, mercy, justice, the list could go on and on. There are more and better proofs for why this is a good way to understand reality (some of which will likely show their head on this blog at a later date). I am just struck by the beauty of the symmetry, and the way in which it points to a convergent source - God.

The God of Invitations

Yesterday was a wonderful morning. I was awake early, but feeling refreshed, so I thought I'd take advantage of the morning quiet, let my girls sleep, and get some work done on my blog. As I posted a while back, I repented of my use of the WYSIWYG editor in favor of actually typing up the HTML (so much better). I've been happy with the change (my blogs are SO much easier to edit now!), but there's a fair amount of work left before my blog is up to code.

So anyway, there I am, editing away, when I realize that I haven't said the Rosary in a little while, and now would be the perfect opportunity while the family is asleep to get some personal prayer time in. (Of course, by realize I mean that I was being called to go have a little relationship time with Jesus through Mary.)

Cool, I think, I should do that. Okay, let me finish this post and I'll go pray.

But as I prepared to continue, I realized that that's not what had been asked of me. I had been asked to come pray now. I was being called to go do something more important - my blog could wait.

True enough. I think I am participating in the common good by sharing my thoughts and reflections (else I wouldn't be blogging), but I'm clearly doing it wrong if I forsake prayer for the sake of blogging. First things first and all that.

So anyway, I go and pray through Joyful Mysteries in front of our family altar, and am confronted by the 5th Joyful Mystery (which I have talked about here) - the Finding in the Temple. It is an awesome mystery, and one which also provides fodder to the discussion on "what Jesus knew and when" regarding how divine knowledge plays out when it is unified with human nature in the person of Jesus Christ.

It is a confusing and (potentially) frightening question, but not the point of this particular cogitation. Rather, I was brought to some of the research I had done regarding that question, and how it talked about the modes of knowledge which Christ displays. In particular, I was struck about how Christ was perceived by the teachers in the temple. Luke 2:46f -

And it came to pass, that, after three days, they found him in the temple, sitting in the midst of the doctors, hearing them, and asking them questions. And all that heard him were astonished at his wisdom and his answers.

He was asking questions. Moreover, one interpretation of "his answers" was not so much answers signifying knowledge, but rather (as it says in the scripture) wisdom. That is, it was His ability to answer instructive questions intelligently, and to ask intelligent questions to probe the depths of the scripture. Of course, this could very easily have been a reverse-socratic method on His part, but nonetheless His wisdom is being displayed because He is asking.

Tie this together with Paul's admonition that our body is a temple of the Holy Spirit, and Revelation 3:20 (Behold, I stand at the gate, and knock. If any man shall hear my voice, and open to me the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with me. - see image), and we have a revelation to the nature of our relationship with God.

He is a God of invitation!

Our God is not one of imposition. He's not. One could say that He "imposes" reality upon us (gravity and all), but really that is providing us with an ordered and intelligible nature in which we know our place, and know the rules. But when it comes to ultimate reality, union with Him and living according to His will? No, not even the least bit imposing.

He gives us the room to love Him of our own accord. It will end up being on His terms - after all He knows us better than we know ourselves - but He allows us to discover that. He allows us to assent to that, to cooperate with and participate in that reality of His love for us, and our meager effort to return that love, perfected in the sacrifice of the Son.

It is interesting too, that even though I "heard it twice," the request didn't change. I can't quite explain it, but I first heard in my heart a call to pray. Upon considering delaying this, I heard - almost as a tone in the chord which doesn't come out at first - an insistence in the call. A desire that I come to Him now, without delay. That "tone" was there the whole time, it was I who had changed to hear it.

I think this is true with all of our calls from God. The substance of the call does not change - ever. However our state in life, our receptivity to that call, these things affect our ability to hear His call, and to hear different parts of that call. When I was a bachelor, and then a newlywed, I had more time to serve my parish, and was called to be active in time-intensive activities.

Now that I am a father and still in college, I have a responsibility to devote more of my time to my daughter. With my wife pregnant with our second, I am further called to spend more time at home. I can't do the same things I used to, but it doesn't mean I'm not following the call now, or was failing the call then. Nor does it mean that the call changed.

The music doesn't change, but where we are in the music does. Our part, whether we're melody, harmony, soloing - all of it is part of the same beautiful piece of music.

What is He inviting you to do today?

The Frog and the Scorpion

A fable:

One day there was a scorpion sitting by the side of the river. He was wondering how he might get across when a frog approached, clearly intent on crossing the river.

"Kind frog," called the scorpion, "will you carry me on your back to the other side? I cannot swim."

The frog replied, "Why should I carry you across? You will just sting me and I will die!"

"Not so!" said the scorpion, "for if I sting you, we will both drown, for I cannot swim."

So the frog took the scorpion on his back, seeing the wisdom in what he said. However, when the frog was in the middle of the river, he felt a sharp pain, and realized that the scorpion had stung him after all.

As the poison spread, the frog croaked out, "Why? Why would you do that? Now we will both drown!"

The scorpion replied, "I couldn't help it. It was in my nature to sting."

I've been doing a lot of reading, talking in person, and of course posting and commenting on Facebook, but I have yet to post here regarding the HHS Mandate. However, most if not all of what I would have said has been said elsewhere and better (and with T-Rex in a fighter plane), so this post is more of a collection of my favorites.

As to who the frog is, it is most certainly not the One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church, but aside from that I'll leave it to interpretation.

• American Papist's tally on which Bishops have spoken out.
• Bad Catholic's open letter to the President
• Bad Catholic's argument against contraception from Natural Law
• A fantastic response from Bishop Slattery

I'll update with more as I find really good ones. Feel free to add links in the comments.

The mandate of the HHS is a gross assault on the first amendment.
Neither as a Catholic nor as a Citizen of the United States can I remain silent on this issue.

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?

Mary: Beloved of the Trinity

Mary may be one of the most controversial topics in Christendom. Catholics of both Western and Eastern Rites love her. Christians of other stripe usually have at least respect for her, though they often deride the Catholic love of this woman as over the top, or as even blasphemous.

What follows are some thoughts that would strike me from time to time regarding the reasonability of the Church's veneration of Mary, which were later confirmed by sources I trust.

First thing we should do is clear up a little terminology here. There are a number of key terms which are not used consistently in any dialog, which cause most of the confusion. They deserve a bit more attention, but for the time being these are the rough working definitions, and comments.

In no particular order:

• Pray
  To ask or beseech
  -Appropriate to Mary (like asking a relative - living or dead - to pray for you)
• Worship
  To assign worth, treat as divinity.
  -Due to God alone. Reverence for God as God.
• Adore Admire [Updated 1/6/2012 12:02 AM]
  To be in wonder of another, or of that-which-is, to be marveled by something.
  -I confusedly wrote adoration in the first release of this, but the concept I was thinking is actually called admiration in my translated copy of Fr. Marie-Dominique Philippe's book Retracing Reality: A Philosophical Itinerary. I apologize for any confusion I may have caused. Adoration is directed to God alone, and is a topic upon which many books could be written.

Now that we have that clear, let me move on to the real thoughts that led me to post this.

It strikes me that for every person, there are three major relationships that are (or at least can/should be) deeper than anything else: parent, spouse, & child. Yes, friendship is important, and I deeply value the intimacy I have with my friends, but there is something special about your parents, your spouse, and your children. For Mary, all three of these are God.

First off is the fatherhood. God is of course the Father of us all, but he is especially that to the Jews, and even moreso to Mary, who tradition tells us was a promised temple virgin. She was dedicated to the "family business." That's fairly obvious.

Similarly the motherhood is obvious, as "to the wonder of creation a creature gave birth to her creator." Mary is Θεοτοκος (Theotokos - literally "God Bearer") - not merely the mother of Christ, or mother of Jesus, but the Mother of God. Anyone accepting that Jesus Christ is the Second Person of God, the Word Incarnate must accept that Mary, as His mother, is therefore mysteriously the Mother of God.

But what about her spouse? Obviously, she was betrothed to Joseph, and we acknowledge him as her spouse, but see how we do it in the Divine Praises - "Blessed be Saint Joseph, her most chaste spouse."

Many people think (mistakenly) that Mary & Joseph's marriage was "ordinary," in the sense that after Jesus was born they had normal marital relations, and at least a few children (the "brothers" of Christ). What bugged me about this was quite simply that Joseph couldn't be Mary's husband, she already had one. Scripture tells us that at the Annunciation, the Archangel Gabriel told her that the Spirit of the Most High would overshadow her as it did the Ark of the Covenant in ancient days, and create life within her.

She's already having a child with God, how could she have children with any mere mortal man?

Joseph's role in salvation history was to be the protector of the Mother of God, and the best way that he could do this was to be her "legal husband" as it were. Tradition tells us that even before the Annunciation there were no plans for them to live as a normal wedded couple, as she was a promised temple virgin. But even moreso afterwards, how could any man dare to take as his wife the woman who had literally given birth to God?

So there she is, Mary, Beloved of the Trinity. She sits at the heart of the ineffable and unfathomable mystery which is the Triune yet Single God, being the Daughter, Spouse, and Mother of God in a way shared by no other mortal. And yet, by the virtue of our humanity, we are connected to her, and she is in fact a prefigurement for us of the desire of God.

Mary's position is the position desired for all mankind by God. Christ said to the crowds, "Who is my Mother? The one who does the will of the one who sent me." Of course, Mary was the most perfectly obedient to that will, but Christ shows us that we are to follow her example that we too may become "the Mother of God," "the Radiant Spouse, the Church," and of course, "Children of the Most High, Heirs to the Kingdom of God."

We love her for we see in her the Love with which she was enveloped. We see her as the most perfect role model of how to accept the Love and the Will of God into our lives, and to make that Love present to the world.

So when you are asked why you pay so much attention to Mary, reply with a smile of joy, "Because God did!"

On the Altar

The Altar.
A block of stone, an ornate table of rare wood?
Temporary, permanent, ancient - what is it?

Look beyond...
the hands of a priest,
a table,
changed forever by oil and hands, a bishop's consecration.
The hands, the table... they are sacred, set apart for a holy purpose.
Set apart for God Himself.

It appears simple, a father leading his family
in a meal of prayer and thanksgiving.
Yet, it is more than a simple meal of bread and wine, shared for to be together.

The priest becomes something more.
Despite his flaws and failings, he is now In Persona Christi.
The bread and wine are now the Body & Blood, Soul & Divinity of Christ,
confected by those anointed hands on the table which has become Calvary - the Cross.

Consummatum est. This is the wedding feast of the Lamb.

Hierarchical Thoughts

He is the image of the invisible God,
the firstborn of all creation.
He is before all things,
and in him all things hold together.

I am absolutely fascinated by the wording of this passage from Colossians in Latin:

Omnia per ipsum et in ipsum creata sunt,
et ipse est ante omnia,
et omnia in ipso constant.

In Latin, the words ipsum, ipso, ipse are all forms of the intensive pronoun, that can be roughly translated as "he himself." Like the difference between saying, "Fred ran an errand," and "Fred himself ran an errand," or "Fred ran an errand himself."

Given that, we can take a stab at the translation of this passage, which is found at the end of verse 16 and beginning of verse 17 in the first chapter of Collosians.

All (things) through he himself and in he himself were created,
and he himself is before all (things),
and all (things) in he himself they last/are known/exist/consist (of)/stand firm.

Again and again this use of ipso, the intensive pronoun with the antecedent of Christ, emphasizing his absolute centrality to creation itself.

His centrality is not just in our worship, or in our own lives, but in fact to everything.

This is why we evangelize.

I recall a homily my pastor gave a couple of months ago, in which he said, "We must live lives which make no sense, if God isn't real." I think he found the heart of what St. Francis meant when he said, "Evangelize always, when necessary use words."

Obviously, not all of us are given to eloquent speech, or deep thought, or graceful prose and poetry. But each and every one of us is called to live a life that makes no sense, that is not logical, that is irrational, to the eyes of the world.

Even more than that, we Catholics have the added challenge that our lives must make no sense unless the Church is true. We should be a walking question mark to all people of faith, so that knowing us, they are brought to the question, "why would they do that if the Church wasn't what it said it was?"

And why do we do all this? For the glory? For the rewards? When Archbishop Fulton Sheen was asked how many souls he had converted, he answered none. God does the conversion, he was simply open to God's call to evangelization.

We do this because it is the will of God that no one suffer the pain of hell, which is the pain of eternal separation from Him.

We do this because in every human soul there is a longing, a thirsting. Every addiction, every false idol, every faulty idealism is a search for the altar of God. Because of our fallen nature, we struggle in finding it, but it is in our very nature to struggle to find it. We evangelize with our whole lives because every person's dignity deserves nothing less that the whole and total truth.

What if today is the day the Lord is going to use your prayer before the noon meal to draw a soul to himself?

What if today is the day when your unabashed joy in the saving power of God will be the conduit of God's love into a lost heart?

Belief in God is not a "different strokes for different folks" deal. No, we do not force our beliefs upon other people, but we must be constantly living lives that reflect our belief, and call others to belief. It is not "imposing our values," it is Living in the Truth.