One Paragraph Before Sunday Liturgy

A thought: How far is the average American Catholic willing to go to sacrifice the principles of the faith in exchange for some form — even a grotesque form — of socio-political relevance? That is to say, at what point does this Catholic decide that St. Thomas Aquinas and numerous other theologians of the Church were wrong to assert that if one loses a part of the Faith, they lose it all? For today the Catholic Faith, like much of anything in this world of moving parts and endless preference fulfillment, is not only “negotiable,” but malleable. This piece is outdated (or inconvenient), and so it can be cast aside. Another piece provides existential comfort, so it can stay and yet another works as a soapbox upon which to stand in the midst of the so-called “culture wars.” This is the reality of Christian living today; it is the reality of all living. Those who lack faith of any sort, whose horizon expands no further than to the Apple Store, cannot be blamed entirely for living lives which are subject to serious (or a-serious) revision at a moment’s notice. Fads change; tastes change; people change, and no one wants to be left clinging to an outmoded posture or cultural form unless clinging to some outmoded posture or cultural form is indeed what is most current at the time. Life becomes — to lift from Leo Strauss — little more than the joyless pursuit of joy; everything terminates in entertainment. Should not a Catholic find this gross spectacle of waste nauseating? One Catholic did. Writing nearly nine decades ago in his seminal work The Concept of the Political, Carl Schmitt saw that the apotheosis of liberalism is entertainment — a life without seriousness or grandeur or even much of a point. But today’s American Catholic wants to be a good liberal, meaning a good consumer who carries around a few moralizing positions in their side pocket (e.g., abortion, birth control, death penalty, etc.) and a wallet full of bank cards in the back. “Give me religious liberty or, absent that, give me a house in the suburbs, two cars, and a fantastic vacation package to Disney World.” Where have gone the gifts of counsel, understanding, and fortitude? They have been exchanged for a “lifestyle choice.” Господи Помилуй