David Ancell's Virtual Home

Dictatorship of Relativism

  /   Sunday, July 31, 2022   /   Comments(0)

I remember then-Cardinal Ratzinger in 2005 cautioning against a “dictatorship of relativism.” I thought I knew what he meant then. However, it’s far worse now. This comes to me after having just been at the Defending the Faith Conference at Franciscan University of Steubenville. If you haven’t been, I highly recommend it.

Those who are knowledgeable about the Catholic faith understand that we know that faith and human reason are not by nature opposed to each other. God is not arbitrary. He is truth and love itself. If someone asks you whether something is good because God says it is or if God says something is good because it is good, the answer is neither. God is neither arbitrary, nor is there a standard above him to which he conforms. The goodness is his very nature.

Relativism has been around for a long time now. However, it has more recently become more of a dictatorship that one could ever imagine. Our secular society is moving in a direction in which someone can declare their own truth, and it is true for them even if it is completely out of touch with reality. Even in the past, people were looked down upon if they insisted on an objective truth. The thing that makes this more of a dictatorship is that now one can be ostracized for so much as questioning someone else’s view of reality, especially regarding matters of sexuality.

People involved in the dictatorship won’t even engage others who disagree. If they come to speak somewhere, they shout him down with nothing but emotionally laden statements. They won’t engage in reasoned debate. They won’t make their case. This has been going on before to an extent, but now it has reached dictatorship status.

This presents a very unique situation in trying to explain and defend the Catholic faith. It’s going to take a lot of praying to change hearts. I think we have to start with restoring the very idea of having a reasoned debate. We have to be able to show it’s reasonable to belief the Catholic Faith, and there is a basis for it. We can substantiate what we believe simply on the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.

Category: Response


Hopefully the Start of the Turning of a Tide

  /   Tuesday, June 21, 2022   /   Comments(0)

I was pretty hopeful hearing of this Supreme Court ruling. The state of Maine had a program that gave parents money for private school tuition in places where there were not public schools available. However, they prohibited the use of these funds for schools that were religious in nature. Someday, I hope to see the end of the idea that the First Amendment was intended to mean that any religious idea or organization is to be excluded from public life.

This decision really doesn’t directly give an edge to faith-based schools. This may be what happens in practice, but it is based solely on the decision of the parents receiving the funding. If Maine wants to give money for school tuition where needed, the Supreme Court decision means that faith-based schools are to be treated on an equal basis with other schools. If they favored only the Baptists or the Methodists, then they’d be favoring a particular religion, and we’d have a constitutional argument. Religion is not and should not be some special category that is verboten, nor should it be discriminated against. It’s interesting that Sonia Sotomayor cites in her dissent a constitutional commitment to separation of church and state when the words aren’t in the Constitution.

What is this all about? Well, in the above article, the state of Maine argued that they wanted education to be something that was education in a “religiously neutral manner” and also “exposes children to different viewpoints and promotes tolerance and acceptance.” Are these anti-religious statements in disguise? They might be, but I do not know. However, I do believe they are a usurpation of parental authority in the education of their children. Education is ultimately the purview of the parents, not the state.

Of course, this doesn’t mean that the state will not have some say in the development of educational standards and of what should legally constitute a school. There are things kids need to learn to be able to function in society. Also, we wouldn’t want a “school” that was established solely to encourage children to be violent revolutionaries or something that like. How much authority should the state have? Well, I think that’s up for debate, and I don’t have a clear answer. However, parents do have the right to pass their faith along to their children and to expect their choice of school to respect that. Hopefully, this recent Supreme Court decision is a step in this direction.

Category: Response


When You Hear Some Statistic

  /   Saturday, April 23, 2022   /   Comments(0)

Did you hear that 50% of people who enter the Catholic Church on Easter Vigil are not still in the Church a year later. I’ve heard this. Now, where do you think this information came from. Who found this out? How did this person (or group) obtain their data? These are very legitimate questions, and I am not willing the trust the opinions of anyone who objects to asking them. In fact, I’m not sure of the source of this often-quoted statistic.

In fact, it probably isn’t true. Just take a look at this article from the National Catholic Register.  It points to some research done by CARA that appears to be a compilation of previous studies done.  According to the study, 84% of those who entered the Church through RCIA since 1986, when the Church instituted the RCIA in the United States, still identify as Catholic.

It sounds much better, but I do have to ask – what was the criteria for determining who “identifies” as a Catholic.  If all it takes to identify as a Catholic is to check a box on a survey, then it’s hard to say how useful that information actually is.  In fact, the article goes on to say that 62% of the converts still go to Mass monthly.  That’s right.  It says monthly.  Well, actually, it says “at least monthly.”

Remember that missing even one Sunday Mass is a mortal sin unless one has a serious reason (please stay home if you have COVID).  In other words, anyone who is only attending Mass monthly really can’t be said to be practicing the faith even if he’s technically still Catholic.  We really need to know how many people are going to Mass every Sunday.  I will say, though, that there was more data as to how active converts are in the life of the parish.

What’s my point with this?  I used the Church as an example here, but my point can apply to anything.  Whenever you see these statistics, there are questions that need to be asked.  We need to know the source of the data.  If no one comes up with a source, then it may be completely bogus.  We also need to know who collected the data and how.  Specifically, we need to know what questions were asked what what criteria were used to come up with a classification.  We also need to know who was asked and how many people were asked.  If we don’t think about these things critically, we run the risk of wasting time and energy on a bunch of baloney.

Category: Catholic, Response


About Those Invalid Baptisms, Part 3

  /   Monday, March 07, 2022   /   Comments(0)

I remember someone pointing to the tabernacle saying “what’s in that tabernacle is not the Eucharist. Eucharist is something that we do.” Of course, that statement is not true! I heard another statement years ago that was something to the effect of “when we all get together in love, that is Holy Communion.”

Funny it always seemed to me that our primary end was to worship God himself.  I remember making some statements to that effect in some kind of parish meeting and being told by another participant that “God is in everybody.” At the time, I wasn’t exactly sure how to respond.

It’s true that God’s presence is in our brothers and sisters, but God is not something we manifest, much less something we conjure up, as a product of the community. There is actually a God who is distinct from us and who is our primary end, not a product of our gathering together as a community. In fact, God is really the prime mover and the initiator.

What does this have to do with the invalid Baptisms?  Well, in my previous post, I mentioned how someone using the wrong formula for a Sacrament probably has some belief that is keeping them from using the correct one, which I mentioned in Part 1 would be easy to do.  Using “We baptize . . .” instead of “I baptize . . .” stems from a similar problem as the above examples regarding the Eucharist.

When a priest is administering a Sacrament, he gives his heart and lips to Christ.  It is Jesus Christ who actually baptizes.  It is Jesus Christ who forgives sins in the Sacrament of Reconciliation.  It is Jesus Christ whose body, blood, soul, and divinity we receive in the Eucharist.  Jesus is Lord, and he’s the one with the power to give this grace.  When a priest or deacon says “we” instead of “I” in attempting to baptize, he’s saying that the community is doing the Baptism rather than Christ.  Such a Baptism would have no effect at all.

We live in a society that runs itself as though God does not exist.  By making it seem that it’s really the community that acts, we run into serious danger of denying the actions of God himself.  We would effectively run the Church as though God does not exist, which makes no sense.  We can make it seem that our worship is really about us as a community and that some vague “kingdom” is being ushered in solely what we do together.

While we have an obligation to love our brothers and sisters, we owe the totality of our love to God alone.  In John 15:16, Jesus, while giving his command to love others, mentions that it isn’t us who chose him but rather him who chose us.  He is the one who first loved us.  We did not gather around as a community around someone we thought was a swell guy.  Rather, we were called together by the all powerful and ever living God himself, who lives and reigns forever.

Category: Catholic, Doctrine, Response


About Those Invalid Baptisms, Part 2

  /   Sunday, February 27, 2022   /   Comments(2)

Imagine going to Confession, and after making the Act of Contrition, the priest looks at you and says “Ah la peanut butter sandwiches!” Then, you are dismissed. An hour later, you go to Mass. Instead of the usual Eucharistic Prayer, the priest just says “Milk and cookies for everyone!” Then, he proceeds to distribute the hosts. What if the priest does pray the Eucharistic prayer, but uses milk and cookies instead of bread and wine? In these cases, wouldn’t you at least question whether the Sacraments had been administered.

Well, I’d say you don’t even need to question. In these cases, you can be assured that they haven’t. A priest who would do those things shouldn’t even be allowed to minister. He would have been seriously disrespectful of the sacred. Worse yet, he would have failed to give the people the Sacraments that Christ gave to the Church as the ordinary means of grace.

Ok, these are rather extreme examples. What about the case when a priest alters one word, beginning a Baptism with “we” instead of “I”? Maybe this seems picky.

In Part 1, I mentioned how easy it would be just to get it right, for starters. Here, I want to explain further. I make my living as a pharmacist. In a couple of jobs I’ve held, I’ve been involved in compounding IV formulations in a hospital. I get orders for how much of what drug compound is supposed to go into the solution. If I deviate from that, I haven’t made what was ordered. I’ve made something else. The extent of the deviation may range from something of little or no consequence to something that is ineffective or even dangerous (or deadly) for the patient.

Sacraments also have a way in which they are to be done. All of them have a matter (in Baptism it is water) and a form (“I baptize you . . .”). Sacraments were given to us by Christ, and the Church, with her authority to bind and loose, must adhere to what Christ has given us. If the priest says something other than the form of the Sacrament, he hasn’t administered the Sacrament. He has done something else. The same would happen, for example, if the priest tried to baptize with soda instead of water or tried to consecrate hamburger patties and lemonade instead of bread and wine.

If my work as a pharmacist, which involves the temporal welfare of a patient, needs to be done with great care, how much more should the work of a priest, whose work has eternal ramifications, need to be done with great care. We are talking about the sacred here. We are talking about the very things given us by our perfect and holy God!

Some may say that God is so loving and merciful that these things are small and shouldn’t matter. However, God’s love should be the reason why we want to exercise great care with the sacred, not an excuse to be slipshod with holy things. Mistakes do happen, and God is merciful. While we wouldn’t want to condemn those who make mistakes, correction needs to be made. One priest I know actually got a few people together and asked us to stop him if he made a mistake in certain parts of the Mass so that he wouldn’t invalidate the consecration.

This may seem foreign to us who have often been told that externals are not important. However, if someone is deliberately changing the words that comprise the form of the Sacrament, they are changing the meaning of what is said. After all, what is in the heart of a minister who wishes to say his own words rather than the correct ones? It is likely that there is something different about the intent of that minister. As I mentioned last time, it may be something that he doesn’t realize is an error, but there is still something not right.

In part 3, I’ll talk about how saying “We baptize . . .” instead of “I baptize . . .” has a different meaning. I’ll also talk about what’s wrong with it. In the meantime, here’s a great article about how catechesis in the regard is sorely needed.

Category: Cathechesis, Response


About Those Invalid Baptisms, Part 1

  /   Wednesday, February 23, 2022   /   Comments(0)

Yes, it’s true.  If a priest administering the Sacraments uses the wrong words, the Sacrament can be (and often is) invalid.  It’s now been in the news for a little while, and I saw another article just published this month on the effects of this in regards to Baptism.  I think there is a lot of misunderstanding around this that needs to be cleared up.

When a story like this break, the reaction of many people, including many Catholics, may be something along the lines of “how could God not give someone the Sacrament just because the wrong words are used.  How legalistic!” Somehow it has been drilled into us that the externals are just trivial things that we needn’t worry about.  One secular article that I wrote (but won’t link) even said that this is indicative of a problem that Pope Francis spoke about.  However, Pope Francis approved the statement saying that a certain formula was invalid (see the italics directly under the questions in English).

I want to ask that we take a look at this.  If we are inclined to react by asking why this is a big deal, let’s ask another question.  Why aren’t we asking something along the lines of “Why does a priest or deacon need to use words other than the ones prescribed by the Church?  Just use the form prescribed!  How hard is it?”

I can’t think of any reason why it is actually more difficult for a priest or deacon who baptized someone to say “I baptize you . . .” rather than “We baptize you . . .”  The correct way to say this even has the same number of syllables and fewer letters than the incorrect form.  I’m sure it’s written right in the Church’s rite where it can be easily read.

There definitely are concerns here.  They often have to do with poor formation rather than a real disregard for the Sacraments.  That’s not to say that there aren’t at least some people who don’t like what the Church really is and stands for, but there is probably even more lack of formation in our mindset towards the things of God.

I’ll explain more in part 2, but here’s a good article from Catholic News Agency that is helpful.

Category: Cathechesis, Catholic, Response


Just What Tradition is He Guarding Anyway?

  /   Saturday, July 17, 2021   /   Comments(0)

I’ve been wanting to write more on this site, but I didn’t expect this to be one of the first things out of the gate. In fact, it’s rather unfortunate that this is what I think I need to post. I am not one to publicly criticize papal documents of any kind. I attend a Latin Mass only on occasion (maybe only two or three times in the last year and a half). However, I cannot help but find the new motu proprio, Traditionis Custodes, to be completely unnecessary and, to be honest, plain awful.

We had seen news that Pope Francis was planning to issue regulations (and probably restrictions) regarding the Latin Mass. Maybe there really are places where the extended permissions given by Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI in Summorum Pontificum have been abused in some way (probably so), and the local bishop needed to be given some more control over what was happening. In fact, Pope Francis has indicated that a survey had been sent out to the bishops regarding this, but the little that I have seen on this survey suggests that over half of the bishops who responded were either favorable or neutral towards the Latin Mass (but the source is something I would not normally read). However, what we have received is far more severe that I would have expected, and I can’t see any way that this severity was even remotely necessary.

I read it first without having seen any published commentary about it. The thing that caught my eye was that the document appeared to be saying that the Mass should not be celebrated in “parochial churches” nor could any personal parishes be erected. “Surely I am not reading this right, and someone more knowledgeable will set this straight,” I thought. Well, someone did set the record straight, and I didn’t misread the document. So, where are people going to go for Latin Mass – the shopping mall?

Pope Francis claims in his letter that this was issued to promote unity among the faithful. If so, I can’t think this was thought through very well. Catholics who revere the Latin Mass and are working hard to stay faithful to the Church will no doubt feel alienated. The consequences will be even worse for those nearer the edge, about whom Pope Francis purports to be concerned. If they are relegated to the cemetery chapel on the edge of town or the basement of an old rectory for the Mass they love, they may never again show up in a parish church. Those who reject Vatican II or who are extreme enough to be sedevacantists will simply disregard the decree. They either don’t believe in the validity of the ordinary form or don’t believe Pope Francis is really the pope, and they’ll no doubt consider this decree to be evidence of their claim.

To be fair, I am very certain that there are people who attend Latin Mass for the wrong reasons (eg rejection of Vatican II, the ordinary form, or even Church authority). However, there are many legitimate reasons why people prefer the Latin Mass. I do very much appreciate the reverence shown, and I know others do too. Some people simply want to escape the irreverence and abuse that occurs in some places in the ordinary form even though they understand that the problem is not the ordinary form in and of itself. Still others are people who grew up with it and have come to really appreciate it.

In fact, if there’s a real problem with the celebration of the Mass that needs to be tackled, how about the many liturgical abuses that are occurring in the ordinary form? I am fortunate enough to be where those abuses are either infrequent or somewhat minor in comparison (eg having to turn and greet each other before Mass or asking for people to stand if it’s their birthday). However, I’ve both seen and heard of worse (eg goldfish in the holy water fonts or even alteration of the words of consecration of the Eucharist, potentially invalidating it). Next, let’s tackle the use of sappy piano tunes that some people think are hymns. While that’s technically not a violation of the norms, it does reduce the reverence shown to Our Lord in the Eucharist.

What is really needed in this day and age is a reminder that, when we are at Mass, we are there to worship the Lord. God is almighty, all powerful, all holy, and worthy of all of our reverence and love. Yet, he stoops down to love us completely and gives himself to us in the Holy Eucharist. There is nothing more important happening on earth than the Mass. If anything needed to be done, we needed to be reminded of this. I strongly believe Pope Francis made a huge mistake by restricting something that no doubt promotes greater reverence in the Church. Let’s pray he reverses course before too much damage is done.

Category: Response


Virtual Opportunities to Grow in Faith

  /   Sunday, April 19, 2020   /   Comment(1)

We’ve been through a most unusual Lent that has unfortunately extended into Easter this year.  Of all kinds of fasting that one make undertake, I never imagined I’d be fasting from the Eucharist and certainly not for this long.  Of course, with this being the case, retreats and conferences everywhere are being cancelled.  Thankfully, by the providence of God, there are some virtual opportunities available to grow in faith (most of these were discovered by my wife).  At any other time in history before now, it’s not likely we’d have these available.  While I think it’s still better we get away to a real retreat once this is over, virtual opportunities, combined with being basically stuck at home, may give you more opportunity for listening to good Catholic talks and learning more about the faith that you otherwise would have had.

Please keep in mind that some of these offerings are being given for free, at least to some extent.  However, many of these speakers make a substantial amount of their living doing speaking.  With retreats and conferences being cancelled, it’s going to have a big effect on the money they have coming in.  If you are able, please consider making a donation where accepted.  If not, then please just pray for everyone who is offering the talks (actually, pray for them even if you donate).

One great offering comes from the Carmelite sisters at Sacred Heart Retreat House in California. The Carmelites have had to close their retreat house and cancel their retreats due to COVID-19, but they still wanted to offer virtual retreats.  There was one this past weekend, and this coming weekend they are offering another one given by Fr Bryce Sibley. I went to a men’s retreat he gave a couple of years ago, and I’d highly recommend him as a retreat director.

Interestingly, the Sacred Heart Retreat House has a registration deadline for being a part of the virtual retreat, and they e-mail the link to each talk at a certain time that they want you to listen.  I can understand that they are trying to keep a normal retreat schedule, but I’ve found that this is extremely difficult to keep to for a house with kids in it. I prefer a “listen when you can” approach.  However, you can get the talks later from their podcast.  Besides, the retreat is free, and last week’s retreat was really good.

Next on the list is the Ignited by Truth conference. My wife and I went to the live conference when we lived in the Raleigh-Durham area. Since they couldn’t hold their normal conference, they were nice enough to do a free virtual conference, with six hours of content, this past Saturday.  Oh, and they’ve kept it available for free on YouTube.  If a six-hour YouTube video is a bit intimidating, be sure to check the show notes where they’ve been nice enough to outline when in the video is each talk.  My favorite talk was the first one, but the others are well worth a listen.

Probably the first virtual conference I went to was the Virtual Catholic Conference.  It was fantastically well done, and during the weekend of April 3rd – 5th, it was free.  The free conference time has passed, but it’s still possible to buy perpetual access to the site (though it’s a bit expensive in my view). They got together about 60 speakers, including some very well known ones, to video themselves doing 20 minute talks.  On many of them, you can tell they were just in their homes recording on whatever they had, but that’s part of the charm.

On the site, you can choose what you want to listen to and when.  Most of the talks stood on their own.  I think this conference provides a good example for any parish that has a good core group of people who can teach and would like to put together their own virtual conference or retreat on YouTube or Vimeo (Note that videos can be made “unlisted” in YouTube in case a parish prefers to share with only their own parishioners.).

If you are looking for something a bit more Thomistic and intellectual, try the Thomistic Institute’s Quarantine Lectures. They are short but packed with intellectual material.  If you want to catch up on what you missed, they are posted on their YouTube channel.  You can watch them for free.

There are a number of other places to go that have been around even before the quarantine.  Ascension Presents has a number of good talks in popular style.  They also stream Fr Mike Schmitz’s Mass on Sunday mornings if you were looking for a Mass to watch.  Franciscan University of Steubenville also posts many talks from past conferences on YouTube.  Of course, the YouTube videos are free to watch, but you can also buy MP3s to download in their store if you want.  The president of the Franciscan University, Fr Dave Pivonka, is offering a Metanoia program through The Ministry of the Wild Goose.

One of my favorite places to make a retreat is Casa Maria, run by the Sister Servants of the Eternal Word.  There are a lot of talks available to listen to for free.  If you want to listen to a complete retreat, you can buy the MP3s for a reasonable price.  They have some really great speakers, and the sisters are a very faithful to the Church and very joyful people.  I hope I’ll get back down there before too long.

Unfortunately, there’s one ministry that I’d have to put in the “what not to do” category.  I won’t link to them here, nor will I mention their names.  They are otherwise doing some great work, but they put a retreat online, not for sale, but for rent on Vimeo.  It’s $50 for only 30 days of access with no option to buy perpetual access or a download.  Really, seriously?  There ain’t no way I’m going to pay that amount of money to have access for only a limited amount of time!  There’s nothing wrong with rental offerings in and of themselves, but, for example, EWTN offers video purchases but then offers rental for a lower price. If this apostolate offered a purchase option, I might even pay more than they are asking for the rental.

So, take time during this rather unusual time in our lives to grow closer to Christ.

Category: Catholic, Response


The Depth of the Scandal

  /   Sunday, August 26, 2018   /   Comments(0)

I first started blogging right around the time the news of the sexual abuse scandal hit in 2002. You can go back in the archives and see my perspective back then as a single man in his late 20s with no children. In light of recent news stories, here I am now taking this topic up again as a 40-something with a wife and children.

I am hoping I can convey what I want to say without making it look like I am downplaying the absolutely heinous nature of the crimes committed against the victims of the scandal. These things should not be tolerated in the Church, and I think what Fr Dwight Longenecker wrote is a good example of how the problem needs to be handled. I’m especially disgusted at how someone like Archbishop McCarrick could be promoted the way he has been despite his conduct, and there really needs to be an investigation into who knew what and when and what they did about it. However, what needs to be understood is that, as demonic as the sexual abuse is, there is more to the problem in the Church than sexual abuse.

When I have heard people say that the Church doesn’t have a higher incidence of sexual abuse than the rest of society, it underscores the problem for me. The problem is that those who were supposed to be preaching the Gospel followed what our society was doing rather than led it. The light of the world was hidden under a bushel basket. When I hear people complaining about the teachings of the Church in light of the abuse scandal, I know that the real problem was that the teachings on human sexuality weren’t really taught or insisted upon and were sometimes disregarded by those in authority.

One definite component of the problem is enforcement. This article by Phil Lawler from 2002 said something that I had noticed but often wasn’t sure how to articulate. This is more evident when you take a look around the Church and see what else was allowed to slide.

Dissenters against the Faith were allowed to continue to use our own forums as a platform for dissent against established teachings. Our Catholic schools and universities largely sold out to the secular world, and nothing was really done about it. The celebration of Mass in many parishes became filled with saccharine instead of true beauty.

Resources and programs for formation in the Faith were lame at best. Just imagine trying to explain to someone wanting to learn the Catholic Faith that you can’t rely on the official parish or diocesan program to tell you what you really need to know. That was often the case then and is probably still the case now in a number of places. With all of this going on, how surprising was it that even criminal misconduct got swept under the rug?

With all of this said, the problem, and therefore the solution, is something deeper than mere enforcement of rules or the lack thereof. The problem is a lack of faith. There are plenty who will write suggesting “reforms” that are essentially changes to the Church to make her more like the secular world. This is not what we need.

All of us, from our Pope and our bishops to the laity, need to have an authentic faith in what has been revealed by God. Our shepherds need to insist that the faith be lived by those who wish to be called faithful, and the faithful need to insist that our shepherds proclaim the Catholic Faith as it is. Any action taken must address the problem in it’s entirely and must be taken with the salvation of souls in mind. We don’t need statements made and committees formed as though we were a spineless and soulless corporation. We are the Church that Christ founded, and we need to act like it. We will all be held accountable by God himself.

Category: News, Response


You Can’t Just Pray It Away

  /   Tuesday, June 12, 2018   /   Comments(0)

Articles about depression and suicide are coming across my news feeds in the wake of the recent, tragic suicides of Kate Spade and Anthony Bourdain. To be honest, I’m not that familiar with either of them, but it’s my long-standing habit to say a prayer for the soul of anyone whose death I hear about. It’s difficult for me to imagine what must be going through anyone’s mind to decide that taking his or her own life is the best way out. The old saying that kept coming up on the TV ads when I was growing up was that “Suicide is a permanent solution to a temporary problem.” However, someone with a mental or emotional problem is going to have a hard time seeing it that way.

We may not want to simply follow the whims of the media, but this is a great time to examine our attitudes as Catholics towards people with emotional or mental disorders. It seems that there are a number of devout Catholics who will over-spiritualize mental disorders. I have even heard a priest talk about how one doesn’t need a counselor but need only say the Rosary. There exists a misconception that the feelings that accompany mental illness are in and of themselves sinful or are purely caused by sin or some other spiritual fault. Someone with anxiety is assumed to not be trusting in God enough; maybe the person with depression isn’t praying enough.

Another form of this extreme is to attribute all mental illness to some activity of demons or even of the Devil himself. Someone who believes this may simply tell someone to pray, go to some deliverance ministry, or even undergo an exorcism. While genuine diabolical activity does exist and may mimic a mental health disorder, making such an assumption without a proper evaluation can be downright dangerous.

The fact is that being a faithful Catholic is not automatic insulation from mental or emotional health problems. Even if it were, how many of us live out our faith so perfectly that we can avoid every problem? Genuine problems can occur with people’s minds, and these problems will require not just prayer, Sacraments, and spiritual direction (though all of these should be used) but also professional mental health treatment. As Catholics it’s our job to support our brothers and sisters who are experiencing these problems and not be dismissive of them.

We must also be careful not to view the problem from a completely secular perspective and to disregard the spiritual component of the problem that may exist (though some disorders may in fact be mostly if not completely biological). This is shown when someone is merely put on medication with no effort to look at the person’s life and behavior. Prayer and the Sacraments end up playing no part in treatment because they are simply viewed as not relevant. No consideration is given to the idea that there may be some sin involved because that would be a form of “blaming the victim.” I am not trying to condone making a quick, armchair diagnosis here but to say that we need to consider all aspects here. Christ does have real power to heal and will use it.

We have body, mind, and spirit all working together, and problems that arise can easily have more than one dimension. If we fail to address part of the problem, we will unnecessarily limit the healing that someone can experience. I think I can safely say that, no matter what the cause, we want people to experience healing. They have to want it, too, but our own approach can be instrumental in bringing this about.

Category: Catholic, Response, Uncategorized


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