A Spade Is, In Fact, A Spade

(In atonement for neglecting this poor, starving blog for so long, I thought I'd feed it a 3-course meal; sit back, and let the rhetoric fly! :) )


I need to start this post with two confessions.

First: not only am I a sinful man, but I find it extremely hard to live up to the exhortations that I offer to everyone else. I can spend an entire evening teaching catechumens about the glories of redemptive suffering, and then I can mope for the entire following day because of my physical ailments. I can teach about the moral imperative of charity (and rejecting all ill-will toward our neighbour), and then sulk interminably over an offense that someone gave me. Oh, to be sure: I very rarely let these sins out of my head and into the external world (where others might see them)--and I sometimes even congratulate myself on my self-restraint in that regard--but, lest anyone think that I'm capable of "preaching from an ivory tower", I assure my readers that my feet are composed of the poorest quality of clay. I need that clear, lest people think that the fingers I wag at others are not equally wagged at myself. I assure you, they are.

Second: for all my talk of "faith, hope and love are choices, not feelings!", I was an enthusiastic proponent of "feelings-faith" (and basically making emotions the dominant guiding force in one's life) as recently as 7 years ago. When I condemn that error now, I do not do so as one who has no experience with such; in fact, the past 7 years have largely been a repudiation of that same philosophy which I embraced (and defended strenuously) for the majority of my life. (All right, all right: for the incurably nosey: I'm 40 years old, as of a week ago; okay? :) Now that *that's* out of the way...)

Why do I now fight so strenuously against this "emotion-driven" approach to life? Three reasons, primarily:

1) Rational: I've since examined the "emotion-driven" view of faith, and I've found it to be not only flawed, but completely unworkable (and--quite frankly--utterly insane).

2) Practical: it doesn't work. Or rather, it works to bring evil and ruin, all too successfully; what it does not do is bring about any substantial or lasting good.

3) Personal: with apologies for being vague, suffice it to say that the "emotion-driven" approach to faith leaves one open to horrors about which no sane person would even care to dream. I was lucky, and I survived... and I learned that the fight against "squishy, feelings-based faith" is not simply a matter of taste, or merely a fastidious distinction of systematic theology, or even a "good and laudable idea"; it's a matter of life and death. (Again: I hate to tantalize with a story that I won't tell... but to Little eye, my respected "sparring partner" on Jen's Wonderful Blog, I can say that--if it's any comfort--you're not the only one with stories which, if told to the general public, would cause many others to doubt your sanity!)


As the President-Elect of Death prepares to mount his new throne, won for him in large part by Faux Catholics (and Faux Christians, and squishy-thinking emotion-worshippers of all flavours) in two days, I'm tempted to stand in amazement at the sheer lack of all awareness of the darkness threatening to engulf us. Does that sound extreme? Hyperbolic? "Fanatical Apocalyptic Right-Wing?" (That last one was in honour of--and virtually quoted from--the hundreds of hard-working trolls out there, who work tirelessly to mock and neutralize truth in orthodox Christian blogs throughout the world.) Not only have the pagans of our land voted for the foremost champion of death of our time and country, but feelings-worshipping Catholics (and other self-proclaimed Christians) pushed him over the top... by quite a margin. The man:

- who's promised to re-legalize partial-birth abortion,

- who's promised to mandate all health organizations to provide "abortion services" to whomever asks for them,

- who's promised to throw wide the floodgates of taxpayer funding for abortions of all kinds--at home, overseas, and even after being born, (no reason why poor women should be denied the "right" to have their baby, born-alive after a botched abortion, strangled or left to die on a shelf; it shouldn't be an exclusive privilege of the wealthy, after all!),

- who's promised to throw open the taxpayer coffers in support of Embryonic Stem-Cell Research (what Paul, at his masterful blog, fittingly calls "recreational cloning/killing").

Need I go on? (Don't answer that, please.) Death is coming to our country's highest elected office in a way never before seen, and a majority of Catholics rejoice. I know of few other sentences which contain the very essence of heartbreak, as does that. May God have mercy on us.

So... in addition to a lament for the evil that's coming upon us (and which has already settled on the hearts of misled and/or morally corrupt members of our land--including at least a plurality of Catholics and other Christians), why do I mention this? I mention this because of three things:

1) Even in the midst of this ugly and perverse time: this battle--bloody, grotesque, and inhuman as it is--has already been won. Christ Jesus, Lord of All, has won. Don't despair. Grieve, certainly... but don't despair. Be faithful until the bitter end. If you grieve, know that faithful members of the Communion of Saints are grieving with you... and, God willing, you'll see them--face-to-face--rejoicing with you in the Kingdom, when all will be made new.

2) I offer this as another wake-up call to those who are "Faux Catholics/Christians", but who are sensitive enough to harbor twinges of doubt and unease at the agenda of the new "secular pseudo-messiah" who's ascending the "throne" of the presidency... and to those who are honest enough to be willing to re-examine the dynamics which brought them to their heterodoxy in the first place. (I was one of your number, for over 20 years of my adult life; I do not condemn you, but I also urge you to question where you are... and, God willing, to move out of it!)

3) I believe that Edmund Burke was correct when he said that the only thing necessary for evil to be victorious is for the good to do nothing. I don't claim to be "good" in any absolute sense... but I certainly claim to follow the good, found within the Lord of Perfect Goodness, Himself: Jesus Christ; and I don't want any non-Christian who's ignorant of the Gospel to accept the "Obama-led culture of death", simply because it seems to be the only game in town, and no one has said anything to the contrary.

Two days until the war takes a new and bitter turn. Pray, followers of Christ. Pray, and mean it. Rearrange your lives for it. Pray, fast, offer mortifications. I suspect this type of demon can only be driven out by prayer and fasting (cf. Mark 9:28). Get on it, warriors for Christ!

"Cooperation with Evil", Part III

(Boy, I had to go and start this blog in one of the busiest times of year, didn't I?)

Anyway... we've explored the following, so far:

1) Faith, Hope and Love are acts of the will, not feelings. Feelings are good, but they can't "steer" your life. Thus, making decisions based on your feelings is--well--not smart.

2) An evil effect can never be intended, and can only be tolerated under strict conditions (the intended act is good or neutral, the evil effect is not intended, the good effect is not caused by the evil effect, and the need for the good effect is grave enough to justify tolerance of the evil effect). For example: fatally shooting an intruder is justified if your intent is to protect yourself and/or your family; fatally shooting him/her is not justified if your intent is to have a dead intruder at the end of the scene.

So, we get to some of the more sticky points--not the least of which is, "Can a Catholic justifiably vote for an unapologetically abortion-tolerant candidate (such as Barack Obama)?" Let's sweep up some loose ends, first:

The Catholic Church recognizes some very clear distinctions, when talking about evil and sin (some of these are just FYI, and don't directly feed into the main point--hey, I have to have a *little* fun! :) )...

• "intrinsic" evil: evil regardless of the circumstances (e.g. abortion, contraception, torture, etc.)


• "relatively" evil: evil in some circumstances, but not in others (e.g. breaking a window [perhaps to escape a fire], taking a loaf of bread from someone else's house [perhaps if you and/or your family are starving], etc.)

• "grave" evil: seriously evil (a necessary component of mortal sin) (e.g. stealing a large sum of money, adultery, murder, etc.


• "non-grave" evil: lesser evil (i.e. not involving a serious matter)(e.g. stealing a small sum of money, typical rudeness, etc.)

(Note: the Church has the Christ-given authority and responsibility to discern grave matter from lesser matter.)

• "mortal" sin: a sufficiently free and informed choice to engage in an act (or omission) that is gravely evil


• "venial" sin: a sufficiently free and informed choice to engage in an act (or omission) that is evil, but not gravely so--or, possibly, engaging in a gravely evil act (or omission) with insufficient knowledge or freedom

• formal cooperation with evil: both enabling an evil act (through action/omission) and willing that act (e.g. voting for an abortion-tolerant politician because of his/her abortion stance)


• informal cooperation with evil: enabling an evil act (through action/omission) without willing that act, per se (e.g. selling a gun to a person who intends to murder someone with it, without consenting to the murder)

• material cooperation with evil: performing any action/omission which materially (i.e. "tactically") enables an evil act to happen (e.g. paying for a friend's abortion, or providing a ride to the abortion mill)


• immaterial cooperation with evil: performing any act/omission which offers support to an evil act, but which does not contribute "tactically" to the performance of that action (some might argue that this would constitute a completely separate sin; e.g. being pleased that an abortion-tolerant politician has contracted a terminal illness--note: this is not to be confused with justifiable relief that the politician's pro-abortion activities will come to an end)

• proximate (material) cooperation: any contribution (by action/omission) to an evil act without which the act could not have been done at all (e.g. buying poison for a suicidal friend)


• remote (material) cooperation: any contribution (by action/omission) which assists an evil act in a nonessential way (e.g. verbally defending someone else's choice to abort a child)

So... given that sea of distinctions, how do we know what's morally allowed, and what isn't? Remember the following:

1. Formal cooperation in evil (i.e. willing it) is never morally lawful.


2. Material cooperation in evil is morally lawful only if it meets the conditions for an unintended "double effect" (see previous post for details).

(There are more factors, but this should do, for now.)

Now, then: where do some of the popular Culture of Death (TM) activities fall, in the moral scheme of things? I'll use Planned Parenthood as the key component in most of these first examples, since they're one of the clearest examples of an organization which performs gravely and intrinsically evil acts as a matter of course. I'll also be assuming that the given individual *knows* about the business "ends" of Planned Parenthood (and that they're not "blissfully ignorant").

"working as an abortionist for Planned Parenthood": morally forbidden (principal agent in a grave evil)

"working as a 'family planning' counselor for Planned Parenthood": morally forbidden (proximate material cooperation in a grave evil without proportionate/necessary cause, combined with formal cooperation for those who approve of and/or tolerate abortion)

"contributing financially to Planned Parenthood": morally forbidden (proximate material cooperation without proportionate/necessary cause)

"contributing financially to a company which donates to Planned Parenthood": morally forbidden, under most circumstances (you'd have to show how the need for such donations outweighs the gravity of aiding/abetting an abortion/contraception business, and you'd need to show how no feasible alternative charities exist)

"working as a janitor for Planned Parenthood": morally forbidden, under most circumstances (you'd have to show how your need for that employment outweighs the gravity of helping to maintain an abortion/contraception business, and you'd need to show how no feasible alternative employers exist)

"working as a janitor for a company which contributes to Planned Parenthood": morally allowable, in many circumstances--provided that a ready alternative (all other things being equal) does not exist. In general, this sort of participation is so remote as to remove an obligation to quit one's job... but it would still be morally necessary to work (in whatever way was possible) to have the company change its practices.

Okay... enough teasing. The main event:

"voting for Barack Obama in the previous election": morally forbidden.

Here's a short list of reasons why:

1) Barack Obama's positions support the intrinsic evils of abortion, embryonic stem cell research, homosexual "marriage", euthanasia, and (as Paul put it well) "recreational human cloning"... and each to a greater extent (categorically) than did his opponent. (Note: this does not imply that a vote for John McCain was obligatory; far from it. There were several fine moral alternatives [Alan Keyes, Chuck Baldwin, write-ins], or one could have withheld one's vote for president, altogether.)

2) Barack Obama's stance against the War on Terror (WOT), the War in Iraq, etc., does not constitute a rejection of an intrinsic evil, nor is a "cut and run" strategy (or any variation thereof) anything like a moral obligation (quite the opposite!) even if one *had* granted that the WOT was/is an unjust war. Even granted a supposed "illegitimacy" of the WOT, there is no single action which Barack Obama could take in this case which would ensure a morally acceptable outcome (e.g. pulling out would devastate the infrastructure of Iraq, it would leave hundreds of thousands of civilians prey to vendetta-seeking extremists who wish quickly to re-conquer the country, etc.), meaning that the "pro-Obama, anti-war" vote has nothing close to the moral weight necessary to counterbalance "cementing" the Culture of Death in America, the SCOTUS, and even the World (via U.N. treaties, etc.) through Barack Obama's positive advocacy of the same.

3) Barack Obama's stance on the economy is dubious, at best; no one is in any position to say that his plan (if he has one) is guaranteed success, or whether such a hypothetical "guaranteed success" would bring good that outweighs a "cemented toleration/promotion" of abortion "rights", or whether such a situation would reduce abortions in any meaningful way (quite the opposite, in all likelihood).

In short: even if one were to try to vote for Barack Obama and try to plead "remote material cooperation", the conditions for morally licit "double-effect" fail, at least insofar as a lack of "proportionate good effect" is concerned.... campaign promises of starry-eyed "hope" notwithstanding.

So... to those of the "Vox Nova" crowd and the like: tell me again why it's okay to vote for Barack Obama and still be considered a "good Catholic/Christian"?

When Revelation Comes Alive

As long as I'm still in a "pensive" mood about our nation's recent and apparent betrothal to darkness, let me share a few tid-bits that I'd noticed, in recent days, which seem to put a bit more "flesh on the bones" of the Book of Revelation (a.k.a. "Apocalypse") in some very provincial, arguably small, but still unsettling ways.

Some of you already know that I teach math at a Catholic high school; some of you (if you've read any of my comments on Paul's masterful blog also know that, for the most part, its Catholic identity is presently in a rather sorry state. Case in point: the school held "mock elections" for each grade, and for the faculty; and John McCain (for whose candidacy I've never had anything even resembling enthusiasm) "won" by the slimmest of margins, overall... but the breakdown of the classes was striking:

6-8th grade: McCain (by about 55%)
9th grade: McCain (by about 60%)
10th grade: McCain (by about 55%)
11th grade: Obama (by about 60%)
12th grade: Obama (by about 65%)
faculty: McCain (by 12 to 9, I think--I'm sure about the 9)

One of the students, who knew my pro-life convictions (I'm not exactly secret about it, with Feminists for Life fliers plastering my door, a 120-point font pro-life quote from Pope John Paul II spanning my back wall, etc.), turned to me as this was announced, and said, "Aren't you happy that McCain won?" I said something noncommittal... since I simply couldn't explain to him how emotionally crippling it was to hear the results. Of the grades 6-12 staff in a Catholic school, *NINE* teachers not only voted for Obama, but did so in a mock election (which stood to gain nothing politically) which was read for the whole student body to hear. The message? "Voting for America's foremost advocate of the Culture of Death is hereby declared a viable option [among others, of course--we're very tolerant!] at this Catholic school!"

I wanted to cry.

"Father, forgive them; they know not what they do." (Luke 23:34) At least, I hope they don't. God, have mercy on us.

Later, on the following day, some of the senior boys were carrying through a sort of "gag routine"; every time they'd pass each other in the hallway between classes, they'd yell, "O-BAMAAAA... YAH!" and give each other a high-five. The effect this had on me can't easily be put into words... save, perhaps for this: a day later, I came to the ugly realization:

These are the same kids who would be cheering at the Coliseum, 1800 years ago.

That doesn't quite mean what many people might think; I don't say that in order to call them wickedly evil, or even fully responsible for what they were doing. (I'm sure much of it expressed one of many ways that teens--especially those in institutional schools--rebel against what they perceive to be "irksome, chafing rules" against their "freedom"--and their understanding of the entire spiritual battle was shallow, or nonexistent.) It actually gave me a glimpse into the hearts of the people who screamed, cheered, and cried for more Christian blood in the Roman ampitheatres. Such people, if you met them in a quiet moment at home, would doubtlessly have thought of themselves as "good people"--and said so, readily. Such people might well have lived fairly self-disciplined lives (secularly speaking--many athletes do, for example, regardless of their faith), just as these kids do (some of whom literally stay up until midnight, studying for classes in-between their extracurricular commitments). These same people, if met with a person who had fallen on hard times, would be likely to donate food, money, help in finding a place to stay, and more. "Nice" people, beyond any reasonable doubt.

How can this be?

How can such "good" kids embrace (and even defend, in school-assigned political papers) such sweeping evils, and be so ready to treat their Faith as "just one more extracurricular activity"?

Father, forgive them; they know not what they do.

But the second connection came when I was talking with my wife, this morning; she was reading from the daily Mass readings (which are from the Book of Revelation, as the Church year comes to an end, this Sunday), and she noted the death of the "two witnesses" of God (see Revelation 11:3-13). She noted the part where the Antichrist rose up and slew the two witnesses (Rev 11:7), and the following verse after that struck her (and me):

"And their bodies shall lie in the streets of the great city, which is called spiritually, Sodom and Egypt, where their Lord also was crucified. And they of the tribes, and peoples, and tongues, and nations, shall see their bodies for three days and a half: and they shall not suffer their bodies to be laid in sepulchres. And they that dwell upon the earth shall rejoice over them, and make merry: and shall send gifts one to another, because these two prophets tormented them that dwelt upon the earth." (Rev 11:8-10)

High-five, guys. The culture of death won; time to rejoice and make merry!

Father, forgive them; they know not what they do.

Michael D. O'Brien, the author of "Fr. Elijah"--a book that I highly recommend--once wrote that (I'm paraphrasing), "the end times will probably look very different from the inside (i.e. living it), than from the outside (i.e. reading about it). The dramatic and apocalyptic signs that are so easy to see in story form, will not attract a great deal of attention from those who've grown up with it seeming 'normal'."

Don't misunderstand me. I'm not saying that the final showdown between Christ and Antichrist, or Church and Anti-Church, is imminent; I have no idea whether it is, or not, and--ultimately--it really shouldn't make much difference to our Christian walk. (Our Lord told us to "be ready" all the time, right? Not panicked, or hysterical, or obsessively preoccupied with signs and omens, but ready.) But it gave me something of a new insight into how such a large number of Christians can apostasize (Sacred Scripture and the Catechism of the Catholic Church are both unanimous and firm in their guarantee that, in the final days, a vast number of Christians will abandon the Faith)--can abandon the Faith, slowly or quickly--without realizing (or caring) what they're doing; the ones who intend to follow their passions (for carnal lust, power, money, pleasure, entertainment, etc.) until stopped by a clear "dramatic sign from the sky" will probably be surprised to find the Angel of Death taking them unawares, without any trumpet fanfare. Christ assured us that the end of time would be ushered in with dramatic signs. He didn't assure us that we'd be of a mind to recognize them when they happened... or to pay attention to them (much less heed them) when they did. And He certainly didn't assure us that our OWN end (i.e. physical death) would be heralded by high-scale theatrics. "If they will not hear Moses and the prophets, neither will they convert even if one should rise from the dead. (Luke 16:31)" We've been warned plentifully, already. The choice is ours, now. Do we follow Christ, and try to lead as many of these lost sheep to Him as possible? Or do we give up--or worse, slip quietly and "comfortably" into the smooth slide into the culture of eternal death?

As for me and my house, we will serve the Lord. (Joshua 24:15)