Skeptical Faith

Google Image I recently saw the movie, Boyhood. The acting was superb and the plot, exhibiting the fragility of modern family life, mirrored reality. But the movie needed a good editor. It was, in my opinion, way too long. The length was somewhat understandable, however, when you consider that it took 12 years to make the movie, all in an attempt to chronicle the life of a boy from ages 6 to 18. It was fascinating to see the actors aging before your eyes. The boy went through lots of family crises, including his parents’ divorce, abuse at the hands of a stepfather, the end of his mother’s second marriage and the tentativeness of a third. As a maturing teen, the boy falls in, and out of, love. A scene with his biological father – conversing over beers in the loft of a recording studio – was, for me, the most poignant. “What’s the point?’’ asks the son. “Of what?” asks the father. “Of everything?” the boy responds. In another scene, reflecting on all she had been thro...

Google Image What words do so many people long to hear each week, even from colleagues considered a bit nerdy? “Happy Friday,” of course. Of about 100 million Americans who have full-time jobs, according to Gallup’s latest State of the Workplace study, only 30 percent are engaged and inspired at work. About half of American workers are not engaged. They show up at work but are “not inspired by their work managers,” the study says. About 20 percent are “actively disengaged,” and “these employees, who have bosses from hell that make them miserable, roam the halls spreading discontent.” In other words, millions of people hate their jobs or are bored out of their minds at work. These are the people who dread, or even get depressed on, Sunday nights and are ecstatic on Friday. I was so lucky that for most of my working life I loved my job. As a newspaper reporter, I often thought I should be paying the newspaper instead of the newspaper paying me for the interest...

Google Image I had a newspaper colleague who liked to refer to me as “the defrocked priest.” She thought it was funny, and I sort of did, too, and was never offended by it. Truth is, though, I seldom wore a “frock,” and I wasn’t de-anything’d. I freely sought a dispensation from my promises as a priest and was granted it. Although through the years I’ve had serious doubts about my faith, my leaving the priesthood was not a rebellion against the church. I was never treated with anything but respect by church members, including the dozens of priests and nuns with whom I studied and worked. And as I’ve mentioned before in this blog, once I accepted that the only way to determine the existence of a personal God is by faith, most of the rest of what the church teaches was a walk in the park. I simply couldn’t live a life of celibacy. Some ex-priests have left the church or become its enemy, and I’ve had my differences with how the church operates. But I could no more leave the ...

Google Image Using stereotypes that reflect common “wisdom,” rock musician Tom Petty recently used his fame to slam religion, particularly Catholicism. I wouldn’t normally use this blog to take on such an icon of American rock music. I try to be positive because Christianity’s message is nothing if not positive, even joyful. But his words, originally published in Billboard Magazine, were displayed prominently in a recent issue of USA Today and other media and will influence millions. They shouldn’t go unchallenged. I give Petty credit for being against violence and war and for opposing pedophilia. Whether he agrees or not, that exhibits genuine Christian values. But in commenting on his new song, Playing Dumb, it doesn’t appear that knowledge of religion is his strong suite. Here’s what he had to say. “Catholics, don’t write me. I’m fine with whatever religion you want to have, but it can’t tell anybody it’s OK to kill people, and it can’t abuse children systematically for...