Guest Column by: Francis Xavier Ryan
What is the mission of the church? Ask a theologian who knows their stuff and the answer you’ll get is “the salvation of souls.” To be honest, the leaders of the church have only done a fair job of that throughout the centuries. What is meant by that statement? Well when we look at the history of salvation, shall we? There are literally thousands of saints, but, compare that in the light of the millions of actual members of the church and the percentage isn’t that great (Matthew 7:14 – “How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leadeth to life: and few there are that find it!” and Matthew 22:14 “For many are called, but few are chosen.”)
These statements should scare every Christian out there, but in the modern world we have comfortable Christianity, which is error, or more correctly, heresy, but I digress… I’m not going to look at that aspect, despite its public persona that too many assumers in society over attribute to all Christianity. What is going to be examined is the tendency for the church to want to “throw people under the bus” to improve their reputation. The sad truth is that there isn’t such a thing as “non sinners”. This is true throughout history. Even the greatest saints were occasionally great sinners. A perfect example would be St. Augustine who lived with a woman he wasn’t married to for a long time before his conversion. And there’s a word for that people don’t understand this, and why it’s so important to see the distinction between joining the church and moral uprightness. Conversion is NOT joining the church, conversion is when you have grace permeate your soul and open your eyes to your own sins pushing the desire to eradicate them through whatever means necessary. The end result from a big picture perspective is that there are millions in the church, there are not millions who are involved in conversion. And the ratio of Catholics to actual saints is a hard core truth about that reality.
The public persona of the church has always been mixed, and historically the church has accepted that as a fact of life. There are true enemies of the church who desire its destruction and who have, in many cases, worked to destroy it. And despite some damage that may have been done in the end all those enemies have done is make the church stronger (the blood of the martyrs is the seed of the faith). But what the church has always done with her doctrines and foundation in scripture is to stay the course and focus on the salvation of souls.
The modern church seems to have changed this course, the ship has moved from that objective to the defense of its reputation and this is a horrifically bad move. Rather than strong teaching on living the faith and acceptance of God’s will through trials, tribulations, and joys, the church as a whole seems to be working to make their reputation look better to attract members rather than living virtuously and defending the honor of Christ. This is done through gimmicks and programs that seem almost like a Baptist revival rather than an admonishment of sin and encouragement to holiness. Remember that the overcoming of sin is the FIRST step in holiness, not the last.
When a prelate fears for his reputation, he’s not worried about the salvation of souls. When they’re more interested in proving to the world that they’re weeding out the bad apples (an impossible job since sinners are everywhere) then they are not conforming to the mission of the church. When they see their parishioners as liabilities rather than souls to be saved then they are not living up to the command of Our Lord, “feed my sheep”. This means that there are lots of people, almost always laymen, thrown under the bus to appease the world. And the lesson here is that the world is run by the Devil which means you can’t appease it. The situation that allowed St. Joan of Arc to be burned at the stake was the weakness of her local bishop, he willingly threw her under the bus for a tiny bit of local power and prestige. One has to wonder where he might have ended up, did he repent?
Many nostalgists think that the key to true success and holiness in the church lies with the liturgy. Somehow by simply changing the liturgy we’ll invite a new era of the church where sin will just go away and life will flourish. Not only is this naive and a denial of the horrific sins committed when the old liturgy did flourish, this is the error of utopianism, and this is where they have lost the focus of the faith. Faith is lived in the harsh reality of everyday life, praying for those who anger you most and sacrificing for them. St. Carlo Acoutis lived like this, loving Our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament and living every day to “never offend Jesus”.
In nearly EVERY apparition of Mary only one has mentioned liturgy and that particular apparition has been debunked. When Mary appears she speaks of the sins of men, and her efforts to hold back the anger of God to punish those sins. She doesn’t say, change this liturgy and there will be rainbows and sunshine. She says, men must repent of their sin, men must stop the radical immorality in society.
On the other hand, the current church leadership seems to be convinced that sin can be accepted if it feels good, and this is the most debased of errors because it accepts sin instead of wishing to change it (John 14:15 DRB – “If you love me, keep my commandments”). And this is their idea of utopianism with the same failure that is guaranteed of any other utopianist. What we seem to get in the end are priests, of both the trad and modern types, who have lost all sense of morality and masculinity, therefore they surround themselves with unmasculine men as well, in their offices, in their vicarage, and most especially in their music directors. And there are examples in MANY “so called” traditional parishes, as well as a huge amount of modern parishes. One does not need to interview the pastor to gather their persona over a period of observation.
The Kings of Europe were an interesting example that is appropriate here. They would attend mass in their chapel, say the divine office (liturgy of the hours) and then after lunch put down a rebellion by the slaughter of hundreds. They had no qualms in killing innocent or guilty alike and justified their actions by the power they craved. Even despite Rome calling their wars unjust these men still pretended to live by morals when everything they’ve done was done for show.
In the end, when the church is more interested in their public image rather than the salvation of souls they spit on justice. Every man is due different responses for justice sake, yes, the sinner needs punishment but when it’s not in accordance with the crime a horrific injustice is done and we see this happen constantly inside the church today. The desire to continue to punish a penitent man is rampant in society and this can very well be an attempt to hide the horrific personal sins of the accusers/leaders. In the end God is not mocked, and to “tithe of all that you own and fast 3 times a week” will not stop the justice of God if you’re dishing out injustice to other men.
Editor’s Note: Mr. Ryan is an accomplished author and musician who is often known as “too facty.” If his words recorded here caused you to take pause and think, then we will chalk that up as a “mission accomplished.” Stay thirsty, my friends!
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