Skeptical Faith

Google Image S i eres como yo, para cuando llega el 26 de diciembre ya estás harto de la temporada navideña. Después de todo, las decoraciones de Navidad han estado puestas por al menos mes y medio. Personalmente, estoy listo para guardar los adornos hasta el próximo año. Así que, en lugar de escribir sobre la Navidad, quiero escribir sobre un personaje bíblico que creo que recibe poca atención, incluso entre nosotros los católicos que estamos enamorados de los santos. Hoy es la fiesta de San Esteban, cuya historia se encuentra en los capítulos 6 y 7 de los Hechos de los Apóstoles. Hereo de la iglesia primitiva No es un santo que haya sido declarado como tal únicamente por la Iglesia Católica. Fue un héroe de la iglesia primitiva, dando su vida por su fe justo cuando la iglesia estaba comenzando. Si no estás familiarizado con los Hechos de los Apóstoles, por cierto, te recomiendo mucho leerlo o releerlo. Creo que es el más fácil l leer entre todos los libros de la Biblia, y entre lo...

Google Image If you’re like me, you’ve had enough of the Christmas season by the time Dec. 26 rolls around. After all, Christmas decorations have been up for at least a month and a half. Personally, I’m ready to put the holiday stuff away until next year. So, instead of writing about Christmas, I want to write about a biblical character that I believe gets short shrift, even among us Catholics who are enamored of saints. Today is the Feast of St. Stephen, whose story can be found in Chapters 6 and 7 of the Acts of the Apostles. He’s not a saint who has been merely declared so by the Catholic Church. He was a hero of the early church, having given his life for his faith just as the church was getting off the ground. The Easiest Read If you’re not familiar with the Acts of the Apostles, by the way, I highly recommend reading, or re-reading it. I believe it’s the easiest to read among all the books of the Bible, and among the most interesting. It was written by St. Luke, who also wr...

Google Image “Sooooo, you had excruciating pain in your chest and abdomen. “We think you had a myocardial infarction (sounding like something for which you should at least say “excuse me.”) Tests show that you have blocked arteries. We want to do a c oronary artery bypass graft .” The most intelligent thing I can think of to say is “huh?” You can’t say what you’re thinking: “Oh, this is going to hurt.” “Yes,” they continue, “we cut open your chest, hook up your heart to a machine to keep it pumping, take blood vessels from your leg, and use them to make a bypass around the blocked artery or arteries.” Open My Chest? “Wait,” I say, “you’re going to cut open my chest? What do you do about my breastbone?” “Oh, we saw right through that.” Like that makes me feel better. I’m picturing surgeons going to Home Depot and looking over the latest Poulan or Milwaukee saws and trying them out on a tree in their back yard. I had what most of us call one or more heart atta...

Google Image Many people think that either you’re a believer or you’re not. If you’re a believer, they may say, you must adhere to a faith that is expressed in dogma and practice and embrace every aspect of it. There is no room for doubt or uncertainty. If you’re not a believer, you’re pretty much doomed to exclusion from God’s love. I think many believers have come to see that faith can’t be that black and white. Either you have no questions about your faith, which would be highly unusual, or you ignore your questions thinking they are a sign of infidelity. I doubt there are many who have no questions at all. Not the Opposite of Faith Doubt is not the opposite of faith, and the road from doubt to faith is rarely straight. There are lots of curves, detours and even reverses on the journey. And I’ve always believed that atheists, too, have their doubts about their unbelief. Letters discovered after the 1997 death of Mother Theresa, the famous “Saint of the Gutters,” revealed t...

Google Image On social media, and in person, many people seem to dislike the phrase, “You’re in our thoughts and prayers,” used when someone discloses a tragedy such as a death in the family. I don’t think all who object to this phrase are against thoughts and prayers as such. They are against clichés that may not have a lot of thought behind them – not insincere, exactly, but maybe lacking in genuineness. When I was in graduate school studying journalism, professors emphasized the importance of avoiding clichés in writing, for the reason mentioned above, but also because writing that uses a lot of clichés is uninteresting. Rote Prayers Religious people use a lot of “clichés” when they pray, and that’s especially true of people of my own faith. Catholicism has a lot of rote prayers, ones we recite over and over, starting with the sign of the cross and the words that go with it. We often make the sign of the cross sloppily and recite the words, “In the name of the Father and of ...

Google Image I’ve mentioned several times in these blogs that I had a sort of awakening in my early 30s about my image of God. A homily by a young priest declared that many Christians “don’t know who their father is.” It was a revelation to know that in the gospels, Jesus incessantly talks about his “father.” In the gospels, he uses the term “Abba” - the loving way in which a child of that culture referred to a loving father - 170 times. And the prayers at the Catholic mass make no sense unless you understand that they are, with some exceptions, directed to God the Father. So, my spirituality has since revolved around learning to know my Father better. Most of my prayers are directed to the Father, including the Centering Prayer I’ve been doing or several years. Another Awakening? But I’ve had another recent awakening, which leads me to believe that I need to adjust my idea of God, thanks to listening to podcasts of interviews with Elizabeth Johnson. Johnson, according to Wikiped...

Google Image Five years ago, I wrote a blog called “What’s So Great about Being Poor?” “Nothing,” I wrote, “ unless being among God’s favorites counts for nothing.” It’s true that poverty, in itself, is no great asset. Many people and organizations are trying to eliminate poverty. It would be wonderful if there were no more poor people. But Jesus, the realist, said it best: “The poor you will always have with you.” So, what should the attitude of people searching for God – especially in the Christian tradition - be toward the poor? Some may interpret Jesus’ words to mean there will always be poor people so don’t bother with them. Commit to a Religion And the question in the previous paragraph is significant. The commonly understood path toward God is to commit to a religion and follow its precepts – go to church, pray, and follow the teachings of the church. All of that is important. But because of a better reading and understanding of the Bible, many are beginning to see tha...

Google Image I’ve often written about my personal connection to Ireland, undoubtedly because all of my great grandparents were Irish immigrants and I’ve always been interested in them and their homeland. In fact, I find immigration itself fascinating. It requires people to tear themselves from their families, culture, food and often faith, to plant themselves in foreign soil. My beloved wife, Amparo, is an immigrant from Colombia, and that adds to my interest. So, I was understandably attentive to an article in a recent issue of America magazine (I hope none of you are asking, “What’s a magazine?”) entitled, “We All Belong to Each Other: Rethinking Immigration and Irish Identity.” Devastating Famines, Chronic Poverty As you may know, Ireland was for several hundred years an exporter of its people. Because of devastating famines and chronic poverty, its citizens scattered to all parts of the globe, but principally to England, the U.S. and Canada. In the U.S., at least, the Irish w...

Google Image Have you noticed that often, a subject appears to be of little interest until we delve into it, then it may appear to be of major importance? For me, that’s the case with “Christian nationalism.” The phrase may appear to be harmless, nothing that would affect me or mine. But in the present political climate, Christian nationalism appears to be gaining in popularity.  And I now believe that it may seriously misinterpret and undermine biblical and church teaching, making it toxic for people searching for God in the Christian tradition and dangerous for a country that purports to be democratic and just. That judgment is based on what I’ve read about Christian Nationalism, including an article in a recent issue of the New York Times in which Times columnist Ross Douthat interviews evangelical pastor and influencer, Douglas Wilson.   Transcendent Grounding “Christian nationalism” says Wilson, “is the conviction that secularism is a failed experiment, that societi...

Google Image (Due to a change in my schedule, Skeptical Faith will be published on Fridays instead of Thursdays beginning Oct. 24.) I was a latecomer to the notion of “woke,” not realizing until a couple of years ago that it had become a politically charged catch phrase for all things liberal. According to Wikipedia, woke is “derived from African American English used since the 1930s or earlier to refer to awareness of racial prejudice and discrimination…. The term acquired political connotations by the 1970s and … over time, came to be used to refer to a broader awareness of social inequalities such as sexism and denial of LGBTQ rights.” Now, it appears to be a term of derision used by the right to vilify the left. To me, it's all a bit juvenile and silly. Biblical The idea of being “awake, if not “woke,” is biblical, used in the New Testament to urge Jesus’ followers not to bury their heads in the sand but to see clearly what is going on in the world and to be ready for J...

Google Image If you regularly connect with social media – Facebook, Instagram, etc. – you’ll notice that they are filled with political messages from one side or another. Many are harsh; some are just plain mean. And many are aimed at people out of the mainstream – minorities, immigrants, the homeless, the poor. And they’re not coming from just one side of the issues that are generally categorized as Republican/Democrat or Liberal/Conservative. Many complaints against the “other side” that I’ve seen are either downright false, exaggerated or unproven. They often talk about the other side being “outraged” or “unhinged,” sometimes with language not suitable for a blog such as this. It’s a classic case of the end justifying the means. (I don’t want this blog to be viewed as “political,” but in the interest of truth, I believe our president is to a great extent responsible for this kind of language and vitriol. He’s providing the model for political language and action, making it seem ...

Google Image When you fall in love, you want to think of nothing else, or no one else, but your beloved. It can be close to an obsession. If you marry, as I did over 50 years ago, love eventually transforms. You don’t expect to be always aglow with emotion, to be feverish about it. Your conversations with the other aren’t always warm and interesting. You settle into a more enduring, calmer and, in my opinion, more authentic kind of love, in which you become accustomed to think about the other’s welfare at least as much as your own, close to a real “love of neighbor as yourself.” Oh, you still have those moments in which your heart melts for your beloved, but they are balanced by the joint, day-to-day tending to the needs of living. Married Love I think this understanding of married love, at least, is analogous to what may happen when we pray, or don’t pray. Says Ronald Rolheiser, priest and theologian, in his little book, Prayer, Our Deepest Longing: “We nurse a fantasy both a...

Google Image There’s an ad appearing regularly on streaming video, and I assume on regular TV, showing an attractive young woman with beautiful, long black hair who has just used a hair product that has made her hair gleaming and shiny. Walking down a city street, she passes a store front with a big window and can’t resist stopping to look at her reflection, running her hand down her hair as if appreciating a luxurious garment. Her face conveys a self-satisfaction, even smugness that says, “My hair and I are beautiful. Aren’t I wonderful?” This is a message conveyed by an endless barrage of TV advertising that wants you to believe that their products – from hair and beauty products to toilet-bowl cleaners - will make you feel good about yourself. And feeling good about yourself is a cultural priority. Pop Psychology Obviously, it’s not good to feel bad about yourself, and contemporary psychology has helped us appreciate this fact. But there’s psychology as a science – which is on...