Franciscan at Home

The Church has been entrusted with the fullness of the truth, God’s final self-revelation in Jesus Christ, who is the “image of the invisible Father” and in whose image each human person is created. Because we know Jesus Christ, we can see and understand the truth about man. For this reason, the Catholic Church has the only adequate anthropology, meaning that she possesses a true and complete understanding of the human person.

To an increasingly secular culture this sounds like anti-cultural blasphemy. Why? To answer that question, let’s look at the radically different ideas about reality from which our culture and our Church begin the project of understanding what it is to be human.
A Fundamental Difference

To understand the growing gap between Catholic and secular anthropology we have to recognize that each grows organically from one of two mutually exclusive concepts of the ultimate reality—that reality which explains the existence of everything else.

For Catholics the ultimate reality is the eternal Blessed Trinity, who created the universe and all it contains from nothing, by a free act of infinite power and love. For modern secularists, the ultimate reality is matter, the revealingly named “God Particle” from which all other particles and composites are made.

These two paradigms are utterly incompatible.

The classical Judeo-Christian worldview flows from the fact that we understand creation has a Creator and that the Creator has a purpose and intention for his creation, most especially human beings, whom he made in his image and likeness to share in his own blessed life.

The modern secularist worldview flows from the false idea that only matter exists, tumbling through the void of time and space, combining and recombining according to the immovable laws of physics in an unending, purposeless reshuffling of atoms.

On that view, everything spiritual (God, souls, mind, will, etc.) is simply an illusion created by the exhaust of biomechanical processes. This philosophy is called Materialism. It is not true, but it is dangerous and has deeply influenced our culture.

Let’s examine more closely how all this colors our view of man.

Every January we enter back into ordinary time with the baptism of Jesus at the Jordan by John the Baptist. As John’s father Zachariah prophesied at his birth, John is the “Precursor” who “will go before the Lord to prepare his way” (cf. Lk 1:76).

This transition to ordinary time provides a rich context for a fresh reflection on our Christian mission to “prepare the way of the Lord.” In this article, we’ll look at several philosophical proofs of God’s existence and then see how everyday acts can prepare the mind and heart for faith. In order to enter into this topic, it will help to begin with a few thoughts about human reason.

The purpose of this article is to answer the title-question as succinctly as possible from within the framework of the Second Vatican Council and subsequent papal interpretation by Pope St. John Paul II in Veritatis Splendor (VS). First we must understand two terms in order to more fully grasp the meaning of conscience and how it operates in life, namely, the terms “freedom” and “truth.”

Truth That Sets Us Free

Freedom and truth are uniquely tethered to one another in the Gospel of John where Jesus says, “If you remain in my word, you will truly be my disciples, and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free” (8:31-32). The first thing to note is that truth here is not a mere concept, but a person: the second Person of the Blessed Trinity Incarnate. Truth here is not an ideology; it is neither propaganda, nor can it be reduced to a set of theological propositions. The fullness of truth is a Person, Jesus Christ, the Word Incarnate, who died and rose again. The fathers of the Second Vatican Council proclaimed as much in Dei Verbum (no. 4) in their treatment of Revelation, taking their cue from the First Letter of John who spoke of “the Word of life – for the life was made visible; we have seen it and testify to it and proclaim to you the eternal life that was with the Father and was made visible to us” (1:1-2).

The Council fathers did not intend to divorce Catholic doctrine (truth) from the Person of Christ (the fullness of truth) in their account of Revelation. Rather, they intended to teach something more profound about truth, namely, its power to summon, call, beckon, entreat, instruct, and even lay claims to our freedom. Truth shines like light in the darkness (Jn 1:5), similar to what St. Paul taught when he wrote: “For God who said, ‘Let light shine out of darkness,’ has shone in our hearts to bring to light the knowledge of the glory of God on the face of Christ” (2 Cor 4:6). There is splendor in truth whereby we can legitimately speak of being addressed by veritatis splendor. Jesus made this clear before Pilate when he said: “For this I was born and for this I came into the world, to testify to the truth. Everyone who belongs to the truth listens to my voice” (Jn 18:37).[i]

In coming to know this truth, which is to say, by remaining in Christ, the Light of the World (Jn 8:12), we are set free. We are freed primarily for love, since there can be no love without freedom; and freedom for the purposes of this article is defined as: self-possession through realization of the good. If love is a ready self-donation or laying down one’s life for one’s friends (Jn 15:13), then one obstacle to love surely includes being insufficiently self-possessed as to render an authentic gift of oneself more difficult; there’s “no one” to give. Being set free in further “finding oneself” through realization of the good, however, means that the abuse of freedom is possible as well, such that evil follows. In the experience of evil, we do not so much give ourselves as throw ourselves away, thereby becoming “lost” (Lk 15). Such evil actions steadily lead to lesser degrees of freedom as we throw ourselves away instead of preparing the gift in and through greater self-possession. Greater self-possession is another way of conceiving the truth that in giving ourselves, we find ourselves (Gaudium et Spes [GS] no. 24). This was why Jesus counseled us: “Do not give what is holy to dogs, or throw your pearls before swine, lest they trample them underfoot, and turn and tear you to pieces” (Mt 7:6). Evil is what evil does, ending by “tearing you to pieces,” stealing “you” away along with your self-possession and freedom by trampling them underfoot. This is a distinctive way of “losing oneself” that is pleasing neither to God nor to Jesus Christ whom he sent.

Last year, on the eve of All Saints Day, a teenager showed up at my door searching for candy and donned a self-made t-shirt for his costume that can only be described as “genius.” The shirt simply said, “Terrifying,” and had two images emblazoned upon it: the icon of a dead phone battery and the icon representing “no wi-fi available.”

I laughed out loud. It was the perfect indictment of modern culture through a teen’s eyes. It also illuminated a severe problem that parents and catechists currently face when trying to introduce this next generation to the timeless and eternal Father. How do we guide a young soul with little or no prayer life into an intimate relationship with God, especially in the midst of this over-stimulated and screen-based culture?

Earlier this year, Pope Francis promulgated The Joy of Love as a major part of the Church’s commitment to proclaim the Gospel of the Family in response to “the many signs of crisis in the institution of marriage” (no. 1). The rather lengthy document reiterates and consolidates much of the work of the recent synod on marriage and family, while also offering the Pope’s own profound reflections concerning the nature of marital love, the dynamics of family life, the education of children, and family spirituality.

By virtue of its sheer length and breadth of content, the document requires considerable time and effort to work through, and reaping the full fruits of Pope Francis’ teachings will certainly be a long term and multi-faceted process. Nonetheless, for those of us working in educational and pastoral situations there are key parts of the text that immediately stand out for the fundamental shape that they give to all our attempts to help others understand and more fully embrace God’s plan for sex, love, and marriage.

Autism has captured the attention of many people through the media, and yet there remains a great deal of ignorance about it. The organization, Autism Speaks, states: Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and autism are both general terms for a group of complex disorders of brain development. These disorders are characterized, in varying degrees, by difficulties in social interaction, verbal and nonverbal communication and repetitive behaviors. For some, their knowledge of autism comes from movies and television. In 1988, Dustin Hoffman and Tom Cruise starred in Rain Man, about the relationship between two brothers. The Hoffman character, Raymond Babbit, is an autistic savant, a term which “refers to individuals with autism who have extraordinary skills not exhibited by most persons.” He has the ability to remember everything he sees and hears, although he isn't able to hold a meaningful conversation. In the mind of many people, this is the face of autism, when in fact it is a rare occurrence.

John Paul II was convinced that the wellbeing of both society and the Church depends on the health and strength of the family. Anticipating the coming crisis, he wrote, “The future of humanity passes by way of the family.” By 1981, John Paul II could see that “the family is the object of numerous forces that seek to destroy it or in some way to deform it.” Thirty-five years later, the attacks on the family have dramatically intensified to the point where its nature (the complimentary unity of man and woman) and its purpose (indissoluble union and procreativity) have been fundamentally rejected in the West and a false vision of reality substituted for God’s created order. We are slowly awakening to the truth that, as a society, we have truly lost the Judeo-Christian vision of what a family is. This rejection of God’s truth about the family has been costly: familial life is deeply fractured and people are profoundly wounded. The good news is that God desires to heal us. For this to take place, it is critical that we address five key needs.

Contemporary culture is undeniably profoundly confused about the nature of the human person and what constitutes right relationships between men and women. This is due in no small part to the introduction of the birth control pill in 1965, which held out the promise of sex without consequences; we all know only too well that its advent created a fissure between the unitive and procreative dimensions of the sexual act that led to decades of misunderstanding concerning the nature of love and the authentic meaning of human sexuality. Instead of regarding one another as persons, deserving of love and ordered toward the total gift of self, it is now an acceptable social norm for men and women to view each other merely as objects, to be used as instruments of pleasure and discarded when “used up.” The muddle created by the fight for women’s reproductive “rights,” the on-going horror of abortion, the ubiquitous “hook-up” culture, the spread of sexually transmitted diseases, and the onslaught of the gay agenda—all can be said to be the legacy of the so-called sexual revolution.

Si entrabas a la tiendita de la esquina y preguntabas al ciudadano estadounidense promedio, "Qué es lo que representa la Iglesia Católica?", ¿cuál sería su respuesta?

Muchos enfocarían los asuntos morales: "La Iglesia Católica está en contra del aborto, en contra de la contracepción, y en contra del 'matrimonio' gay'". Casi nadie diría: "La Iglesia Católica representa a Dios quien es amor y quien nos creó por amor; quien nos invita a compartir su amor; quien envió a su Hijo para morir por nosotros por amor; y quien quiere perdonarnos sin importar lo que hemos hecho y nos sana para que estemos felices en esta vida y con Él por siempre en el cielo."

El amor y la misericordia de Dios están en el mero corazón del Evangelio; sin embargo, la mayoría de la gente, incluyendo muchos católicos, desconocen este punto central de nuestra fe. Esta es una razón por la que el Papa Francisco he hecho una llamada para este Jubileo extraordinario llamado "El Año de la Misericordia".

The Car, the Barn, and the Woods

The goal of the catechist is to lead others to an encounter with the living God, leading them to conversion.

My father, Pat Brueggen, was my CCD instructor, youth minister, sports coach, but most importantly my role model for the faith. The man I got to see after the cleanup from our lock-ins and football games was a person whose faith was intertwined in the way he lived his life. Catholicism was not merely an 8-5 job, but it was what drove every facet of his life. The barn, the woods, and the car may not seem like primary places of catechesis, but this is where I learned my faith and grew closer to Jesus. My dad would listen to Scott Hahn cassette tapes while milking the cows and would always take time to pass that knowledge on to us. I would watch my father in the tree stand dressed in his blaze orange, shivering with a rosary in his hand because of the freezing temperatures. In the car, every time we would pass a Church, he would reverently make a sign of the cross to remind himself and those in the car that Jesus was present there. God was continually working through my father in a way that prompted me to want to have a relationship with God myself.

Over the course of my life, I have seen the Holy Spirit working in my dad, which drew me to want the same Spirit to live and be seen in me.

Andrew Brueggen
Holmen, Wisconsin