I Met A Man

Sometimes there's a man ...

I was at Starbucks* the other day. Coffee shops are great. They are one of the last places where any sort of conversation with any sort of person can freely and spontaneously happen. So, this guy asked me about my life. He was fascinated that I was a Dominican friar. He was a life long atheist. He was also delightfully contentious. Being contentious myself, I immediately loved the guy.

He couldn't fathom how I could live a life dedicated to something he considered absurd. Admittedly, I was ill prepared for his line of questions. I was at a loss for a simple answer that he could accept. He caught me flat footed. I'm not accustomed to that feeling. His questions were like surprise machine gun fire in a dark jungle. I found myself taking cover in tangents. As the saying goes, "If you can't dazzle them with your brilliance, baffle them with your ..." My pride couldn't handle lacking a smart response.

The worst thing was that he was genuinely interested. It was almost as if he was daring me to finally give him a reason to believe. He was remarkable. Like many atheists I know, he had a résumé of good humanitarian works that he readily shared. His love and respect for this earthly life was something to be emulated. But, it was also part of his stumbling block. His this-worldly focus obscured his spiritual vision.

It's a fine balance. Similar to driving a car you must be able to see what is right before your eyes while also looking forward to what is ahead of you. Both the proximate and the remote are important. If you only care about those things near to you, the proximate, the worldly, then you will lack an ultimate purpose. After all, the sun will explode some day. All human endeavors will end in fire. But if you only concern yourself with what is ahead, the remote, the heavenly, then you life will miss the life that you have been given and the suffering of others. Perhaps, there is a better way to think about this.

Balance is not the Christian way. The Christian way of life should be characterized by excess. It is a life of extravagance. We are called by God to love everyone and everything with an absurd level of intensity. This is why we must always love God first. The intensity with which we love God will always qualify the love that we have for creatures. In fact, if we try to go the other way around, if we try to love God by way of the creature our love for both God and others will always be a lesser love than what's possible. 

Love is a dynamic power. It increases itself as it is practiced. By loving God with every ounce of our being we will experience his love. His love is greater than all other possible loves. He is, after all, the source of love. By drawing love from the unfathomable depths of God's love we will find our love for everyone and everything else increased.

This is what I should have shared with the man at Starbucks. I should have told him that I have dedicated my life to love. I have consecrated myself to love. It's absurd, yes. But, it's an absurdity worth any earthly sacrifice imaginable.

* I'm aware that there are many reasons to not like Starbucks. But, they have reliable free wifi and until I have a portable hotspot this is my solution.

Humility

I was listening to one of my favorite podcasts today. During the show one host started recounting his experience with a devoutly Catholic friend – a jurist from Notre Dame. The description of his experience with this friend was less then edifying. The host's friend, presumably an acclaimed jurist, tends to send the host chastening missives concerning faith, morals, and the like. The lawyer lectures him.

I'm sure that the host's friend is well intentioned. However, his approach isn't having the desired effect. Instead, the host seems to feel that those who approach life from a deeply held position of faith are intellectualy unassailable. This is percieved by the host of this podcast as a lack of intellectual humility. Conviction or certitude has been perceived as being pridefull.

This is troubling on a number of levels. I'll begin with my concern about the host's ideas. One problem is the faulty belief that there can be an ideology that lacks a dogmatic core. This is the same as making a judgment without it being based in a principle. This is a logical impossibility. The Anglicans have done a great job of showing us that acceptance of all ideas and opinions quickly becomes its own strongly held and rigorously defended dogma. They have also shown us that this is an impossible position to maintain. It's self-contradictory. This sort of intellectual indifferentism (relativism) is doomed. Once it encounters a position that doesn't accept relativism it has no choice but to anathematize it. It is forced to become unaccepting of the unaccepting.

While I'm concerned with the problem of relativism I'm more concerned with the "pastoral" approach of the host's friend. I've been thinking about this a lot lately. Lord knows I've been guilty of the smug self-righteous approach to "helping" unbelievers "understand." Now, I'm working hard to present the faith differently. I've learned that it is unhelpful to just simply assert what you think or know to be true. You may be 100% right. Guess what? No one cares? If I disagree with someone and I don't take the time to discover why they believe as they do, then I don't really love them. On the contrary, I would be more interested in being right.

But, being right isn't everything.

Yes. It is true that my faith is unassailable. But my faith isn't simply an emotional response to some feeling or experience. It isn't something that was simply handed on to me by my family or culture. Yes, there are bits and pieces of these influences in my faith. But, my faith was hard won. My faith isn't even a rational response to sound propositions. Eventhough it is the reasonability of the Catholic faith that keeps me in it when I inevtabilly doubt. Rather, my faith is a gift. It is a gift that the Lord gave me. I have chosen to take that gift and make that gift the center of my life. I want to share this gift with everyone. I want my gift to give others the same joy that it gives me. I want to hand it on to others just as it was handed on to me.

I bet the Catholic Jurist feels the same way. But, for better or for worse, the experience of the faith that he is portraying lacks the depth of joy and peace that characteries the faith. He's letting himself get in the way of the faith.

The most important thing in my life is God. I radically self-identify with this part of me. It permeates all of who I am. After all, I've proessed vows in a religious order. To get to know me is to come in contact with my faith. If I'm a jerk then people's experience of the faith is tarnished. The faith becomes something not worth having. It appears to others as not delivering on its promises. As an old boss of mine would constantly say, "They don't cares about what you know until they know how much you care." Yeah, it's a little hippy, a little too 7 Habits. But, you know what, it's true.