Why
Is
There a Crisis of Faith or Confusion of Beliefs Around Me and What Do I
Do and Whom Do I Believe?
A THREE
PART EXPOSITION
by
Pauly
Fongemie
3. HOW DO I KEEP THE FAITH
AND
SAVE MY SOUL?
Section 3a
Please help
me.
I'm 33 years old and have been a devoted Catholic since I was 17.
I've defended the faith and the magisterium all this time. Lately
it seems all hell is breaking loose around me and I'm clinging to Jesus
Christ and His holy Mother because I don't know what else to believe .
. .
My beloved
sister in
Christ, before you go any further on this page, I want you to stop and
read:
Living the
Faith in
Exile, by
Edwin Faust
This is very important for it
presents the
proper perspective for the situation you find yourself, that we loyal
Catholics
find ourselves in, that is, living not only in an alien culture, but a
domestic Church that is alien also. This may sound bleak but Mr. Faust
ends with a note of hope. There is a link at the bottom of that page
that
brings you back to this very spot.
Before we look at the devotions
and other spiritual means that help us attain Heaven, let us
define
three concepts that are often misunderstood:
The Danger
of
Human
Respect
Humility
Christian Hope v. Optimism
The Danger of Human
Respect
Human respect is one of the
deterrents to
the devout life as a militantly Traditional Catholic. What do I mean?
This
attribute of human communal life is the expectations we have of
other
people's expectations, do we live up to them, what is my status as
a result of my success or failure, how far can I rock the boat or non
conform
to the prevailing social mores, am I considered a good person
and
a good citizen?
Now, some of this is fine and
perfectly
normal
as we are meant to live our lives among others, to contribute to family
and social life and to accomplish this we must have some idea of how to
get along in life, to conduct ourselves in moderation, with temperance,
forbearance, self-control and basic consideration for others. But this
is not where the danger lies. When Scripture warns us about the peril
of
human respect, Christ is telling us that when we care too much about
others'
opinions of us we tend to place a premium on our status, that is, that
we seek to be admired and liked, to the detriment of loving God with
our
whole heart and above all things, for His sake, first and foremost and
to love our neighbor for the sake of God second.
Oftentimes we are so afraid of being
rejected
or ridiculed or otherwise considered less than an ideal person that
even
when we know better, we can find ourselves being silent while evil is
promoted
or lauded, while His Holy Name is blasphemed or slandered, His will
denigrated,
while others call good evil and evil good, and we are the only one who
is there to speak up. Or we slack off a bit in our duty to our children
because we are afraid to "lose their love", our duty to our country
because
we do not want to be perceived as not being "politically correct". And
so forth. This kind of desire for human respect is really born out of
pride.
It is an irony, that the more we pride ourselves in ourselves,
depending
on how others measure us, that we become afraid to "stand alone", be
the
odd-man out so to speak. If we were really deserving of such
consideration,
we would be able to stand alone. To counteract this pride, we
must
acquire the virtue of humility, which is the foundation for all the
other
virtues, and without which all our efforts will come to naught and be
the
source of vices such as envy and detraction, and finally despair: this
last condition, because humility and Christian hope are closely
connected,
which we will speak of in a little while.
The author of such Catholic classics
as GROWTH
IN HOLINESS and ALL FOR JESUS,
Fr. Frederick Faber, instructs on the evil
of human respect:
Humility
It is a common mistake for people to
pride
themselves on their humility, an impossibility by definition, and then
to exhibit a false modesty in certain social situations so as to not
display
our pride in our supposed humility. In fact, life is filled with this
anomaly
because of Original Sin and because Americans are not often raised with
this virtue properly. What is humility as the Saints have always
practiced
and which virtue propelled them to the heights of sanctity?
Humility is the supernatural virtue
which,
through the self-revelation it imparts, inclines us to know our true
worth
and to seek self-effacement. Self-effacement is not a false modesty,
but
a real understanding of how truly lowly we are, not the mere pretense
of
shrugging off praise we secretly think we merited, for the sake of
appearances.
This knowledge of self is the
realization
of our relationship to God. Its basis, therefore, is in truth and
justice.
Truth makes us realize that what is good in us comes from God
and
what is evil comes from self. Justice compels us to render to
God
alone all honor and all glory.
There are degrees of humility as set
down
by St. Benedict. Among them are: fear of God; preference for the will
of
God to one's own; obedience; embracing patiently hard and contrary
things;
believing oneself lower than our companions; observing silence;
restraint
in laughter; and speaking gently, gravely and sparingly.
The requirement to believe oneself
lower
than
our companions is misunderstood, thinking that we practice this when we
disclaim praise. It is so much more, so very much more. We must come to
believe in our heart of hearts that we are truly low. St. Paul speaks
of
this. All of the Saints believed that they were, so utterly, that
if someone
would suggest otherwise, they would have been almost scandalized,
certainly
disbelieving. If we truly know the baseness of sin and the perfection
of
God, knowing our own faults and sins and not those of another, at least
subjectively, it is only just and reasonable that we see
ourselves
as low, as sinners and that we ask God to increase in us this knowledge
of our lowliness, to ask for it in every prayer, even if we will never
know if we are acquiring this most beautiful virtue.
Humility is that virtue, that the
more we
sincerely acquire it, the less we know it, an apparent contradiction or
irony. A local parishioner went to the pastor seeking to reform a
wastrel
youth filled with parties and other licit but less than self-denying
amusements,
asking him to "direct me toward someone in the parish who is most
humble,
so I may attempt to imitate him."
He replied and these are his exact
words:
"Well . . . well . . . well, how about me?" Now, as immature and
unschooled
in the devout life as that parishioner was, it was certain that the
priest
was anything but humble. A humble person cannot know and will not know
that he is humble. That priest seemed sincere, but he had the wrong
idea,
probably from a deficient seminary formation.
As frustrating as it may seem on the
surface,
humility can be acquired, it must be acquired, but we will not be able
to measure our progress and maintain humility. Humans do not like these
sort of contradictions, they are just too inconvenient. But this is the
way of God and of a life spent using the graces God permits us. He
always
gives enough grace for every single person to attain salvation, but he
does not give everyone equal graces. This is a hard saying for
Americans
[and the French] with all our embrace of "equality" and democracy.
Humility
is not the American way: pride in progress, worldly success,
self-reliance,
and eternal optimism consist of Americanism.
Well, if I must be humble but will
not be
able to measure my attainment of this virtue as I can with the other
virtues,
how do I go about acquiring it? By practicing the degrees in of
themselves,
one at a time, depending on the duties of our state of life, with
intense spiritual combat, leaving the rest to God's Providence, to rely
on His will, to embrace His will with every human disappointment, and
not
count the cost to our ego. For instance, let us take silence: to cite
again
Fr. Faber:
The rule of silence for a lay
person
is different than for a professed religious. A mother of young children
spends much time instructing her children, in errands to purchase
necessary
household items, helping her neighbors and so forth. Moderation,
according
to a particular state in life is the rule. Most of us do not realize
how
much idle, vain chatter we engage in, just so we appear to fit in or
think
we are being polite. If we step back and say little or nothing in
response
to some of this prattle, immediately someone says "Cat got your
tongue?"
or "You are so quiet, is there something wrong?" This in turn all but
forces
us to respond, thereby breaking the silence, which seems to defeat our
little efforts. So how does a normal young woman begin to practice the
rule of silence?
As St. Benedict teaches, by restraint
in
laughter,
and speaking gently, gravely and sparingly. This removes us as the
center
of attention, but more importantly, it removes distractions so that
even
while we may necessarily be engaged in conversation, we are still
interiorly
recollected, so that the Holy Spirit may inspire us. Restraint in
laughter
is the same as temperance in food. Laughter is partly physical, partly
emotion, and even though we do so by instinct, it involves some effort
of our resources. Practicing temperance in this way redirects our focus
away from ourselves towards the things of Heaven, so that whatever
conversation
we may be engaged with, all conversation is really conversing with God.
And if we realize, truly realize that God is in that room with us, how
would we speak then?
To speak gravely and sparingly simply
means
to speak of those matters that do not detract from modesty, that is,
our
talk should not be idle, neither in gossip, nor in levity for the sake
of appearing smart or witty, and not for the sake of being charming and
or one of the crowd. And always the attention must be away from
ourselves
unless absolutely necessary, such as when needing medical aid or other
assistance, or when someone has a right to ask of us something and we
ought
to respond, and to practice charity, to instruct others and practice
the
works of mercy. We should answer as briefly as we can so as to remove
the
focus from us. Some people are more reticent by temperament than
others,
and everyone's personality is unique, thus we ought to ask God for the
grace to discern here so as to not be guilty of scrupulosity: humility
can require us to speak more than we may prefer, as a type of
mortification
actually, especially if we are reluctant to host a conference, give a
speech
at a pro-life rally, thinking that we are calling undue attention to
oneself,
when in fact we are working for Christ. Since one's subject is on the
task
at hand, we are not the object.
Besides speaking sparingly, we
practice
silence
when we remove noise as much as possible: do reparational driving,
forsaking
music and talk radio, if we have a television, keeping it turned off
much
of the time, and so forth. We thus wait upon the Lord, content that
each
moment wherein we are as nothing as we can be for our state in life and
temperament, and that this is His precise will.
The fear of God is that part of
humility
consisting
of reverential fear or the agitation of mind that results from the
dread
of losing or offending God because of sin; while Scripture teaches us
that
this kind of fear is the beginning of wisdom, it should not be our
motive
in serving God: we ought to be motivated by love. Preference for the
will
of God to one's own is just as it says. I recommend that you study two
classic works:
Uniformity with God's
Will
Heliotropium
Both are available from TAN Books.
Obedience and embracing patiently
hard and
contrary things come through uniformity with the will of God which in
turn
spring from humility of heart and are meritorious for an increase in
humility,
so intertwined, that where one begins and the other ends is hidden, a
salutary
thing, for it helps us to be unmindful of any humility we may acquire.
I recommend:
Humility of Heart
The Sinner's
Guide
The Spiritual Combat
All are available from TAN Books.
A parting thought about humility:
Sometimes
we are tempted to beat ourselves into the ground with remorse when we
have
a failure or experience a discouragement. It is one thing to realize
that
we need to restart, having true contrition, but it is quite another to
permit this to become a form of pride: by this I mean that we were all
too certain of success in the devout life, striving for too much too
soon,
and having our hopes dashed, we wallow in misery: too much self-love,
unable
to face failure. Saint Anthony of Padua said that sanctity consists of
starts and restarts. If we have truly begun to be self-effacing, the
failures-----that
result from momentary weakness or the renewed vigor of Satan who is
frightened
by the progress he sees, but we do not, and so makes his home in our
wounded
pride-----will not be so intense and
so
frequent.
We must never let discouragement, the devil's dirty little secret,
overpower
us, and rob us of the inner joy that is the fruit of complete trust in
Our Savior. And this brings us to the virtue of hope.
Christian Hope v.
Optimism
Hope is one of the three theological
virtues
infused into the soul at Baptism which makes us desire the possession
of
God and which gives the confidence that we will receive the necessary
grace
to accomplish this end. Hope is necessary for salvation. The
sins
against hope are presumption and despair. Humility and Christian hope
are
closely connected, because despair is the end of pride; the remedy for
pride is humility and the end of humility is hope perfected because of
supernatural charity. The other two theological virtues are faith and
charity;
these three are of a higher rank than the moral virtues. The greatest
of
the theological virtues is charity or love, which perfects the other
two.
The Saints in Heaven possess charity to the degree that they merited
while
on earth. There is no need for hope in Heaven because the Beatific
Vision
is already possessed and no need for faith for one beholds God, Who is
Perfect Love. There is for all eternity but the greatest virtue,
supernatural
love or charity.
Without humility here on earth, there
is
little
love of God, which is the highest charity, but much self-love. The more
we are humble we love God, preferring Him to ourselves. And the more we
love Him, the more we want to be humble. The more humble we become the
more we want to trust in God and His Divine Providence and the more we
trust Him, the more He loves us and gives His grace, and we in turn
love
Him more and more. We have the certainty that-----as
long as we do not sin with presumption, saying to ourselves, O, but He
will forgive me-----He will not turn
away and
that
although we undergo every possible misery, deprivation and pain, that
He
will always provide for us so as to endure unto salvation.
Optimism is not a virtue but a purely
natural
attitude of a prevailing wishful thinking. It is a civic "virtue": we
are
expected to be optimistic, that is, if we think positively, everything
will be okay in our little part of the world. In fact, part of the
definition
for optimism in The American Heritage Dictionary is that "this
world
is the best of all possible worlds". There are accolades abounding for
people who are known for their unbridled optimism and little else. It
is
not that there are times when we ought not to be optimistic, provided
it
is based on reason, that is rooted in something accessible and longer
lasting
than mere whim, provided we know that is is a mere human way of looking
at a possible, realistic outcome. But we ought not to consider this a
virtue
or take any credit for or pride in it.
Another way of looking at optimism is
to
consider
the "glass is half empty or half full" cliché we all know about.
Whenever someone posits this supposed truism to us, we know by social
expectation
that we had better say "half full" or else be considered a curmudgeon
of
sorts. But is this really true? Let's look now at a glass that holds
exactly
half its full volume of 8 ounces with water, a necessity for the
preservation
of life. Of what difference can it possibly make if we think it is half
full or half empty? We have 4 ounces of precious water, either way, and
ought to be grateful to God that He has provided it. Four ounces=four
ounces;
it is the water itself that is the cause for our rejoicing at
the
moment of thirst. If we would have preferred 8 ounces, they will not
appear
magically because we say "half full" on cue as good Americans. In fact,
the more natural human attitude is, provided one is parched, upon
seeing
the glass of 4 ounces: it's better than nothing, but boy, I could use
another
4 ounces; in other words, half empty, if you will. But if you have just
had a good long drink and come into the room where the glass with 4
ounces
of water awaits, you actually won't care one way or the other, now,
will
you? Yet we Americans find ourselves enslaved to this type of mentality
and then transfer it to how we view the better things, that is
spiritual
goods. This compounds any tendency to be lukewarm that we may be
acquiring
a habit for. We become content with 4 ounces of grace or a very few
moments
of prayer, because we put the best light on our parsimony. Of course we
do not do this with forethought or deliberately, we fall into it partly
because of our training for optimism, rather than Christian hope. The
civic
"virtue" of optimism is part and parcel of the great error of our day,
universal salvation: Americans have become to believe that all
religions
are equal, that they enjoy the same rights, and that almost everyone is
saved thereby. We want this to be true, we wish it to be true, as this
takes the discomfort of having to seriously evangelize away, and if we
think it is true hard and long enough, like good little optimists,
well,
then it must be true!
Christian soldiers who wage spiritual
combat
in earnest are not optimists by training, but realists, who ask from
God
an increase in hope, so as to conquer their vices and acquire more
virtue,
for His glory, not their own. Optimism is of no particular value and is
seldom if ever a factor in their daily lives, lived in hope, filled
with
faith, motivated by love. They know that this world is anything but the
"best of all worlds", that it is a vale of tears and of short duration,
and filled with snares. The spirit of optimism withers away over time,
can neither take root nor make a home in the heart of the militant
Catholic.
That heart is for God alone, his Catholic soul animated by hope
. . .
. . . and thus, the faithful
Catholic
soldier will not be tempted by scandal to apostatize in despair or fall
into the error of Sedevacantism or go into Schism. And neither will he
permit human respect to imbue him with ennui, so as to lay down his
"sword."
The proper response of the militant Catholic when confronted with
confusion,
apathy, rancor, conflict, petty envy, mean-spiritedness, hardness of
heart,
ridicule, bad examples of every kind, scandals, is to remain within the
fort, not betray it, or flee like a craven. The fort, that is, the
Barque
of Peter, is firmly within the hands of Christ, though the storms rage
and the winds whip up the waves high enough that they seem to be able
to
overturn Her. When the Apostles were in the boat with Jesus, He was
asleep
when the storm hit. They were deathly afraid and Jesus told them they
should
have had more faith. Fear is a natural emotion, so we, who have less
than
perfect faith, will experience it, too, just as the Saint-Apostles did.
They had Christ right within their very midst, in human form, in His
Body
and yet they knew fear. We have Christ within our midst, in His
Mystical
Body and in His Body and Blood in the Blessed Sacrament, and He waits
for
us to go to Him, that He might come to us, to feed us. In human terms
we
may experience fear, but ought not to fear the fear.
Christ is also the Good Shepherd Who
knows
His flock and His flock know Him. It is His express will that His
shepherds,
our prelates, both the good and the not so good, even the bad, have
charge
of His flock. The Good Shepherd's staff is Tradition, the key to the
Keys
of the Kingdom. When Our Lord was in the Garden of Gethsemane with the
Apostles, they fell asleep and failed to keep watch with Him. He prayed
alone. The servant is not greater than the Master. We may have to keep
watch alone, sometimes feeling betrayed. It is His will that we undergo
this . . . and we can as long as that we turn to Tradition, whether the
shepherd sounds a certain horn or not . . .
. . . with Saint Paul, we "run
the coarse", we "keep the faith", teaching the "truth in season and out
of season", and unlike Lot's wife, who turned back to look at
the
destruction of Sodom and was turned into a pillar of salt, we do not
look
back, do not look back and flail around because of our mistakes, sins
long
ago confessed and forgiven, our failures. We acknowledge them, but we
do
not let that dominate so as to discourage us or deter us from the prize
ahead. Nor do we permit temptations, which are really the raw material
for the crown of glory to come, to be a stumbling block. He will
provide
sufficient grace. We must be humble enough to be unafraid though
fighting
fear, to depend completely on Jesus Christ, and to let Him love us by
placing
all our trust and confidence in Him, and by extension, His Mother and
our
Mother, Mary, and thereby come to love Him and Her more and more. This
is the essence of Catholic courage.