Holiness and Evangelization Proceed Along the Same Path: Part II

Several months after my conversion I attended a political theory workshop at the University of Michigan.  Professors and doctoral students would circulate their work amongst the group, and we would gather and discuss the papers.  Somehow the topic of the Immaculate Conception was raised, and the professors began to bat it around with amused indifference. I quickly became disconcerted as the discussion was shot through with errors.  The professors had assumed the Immaculate Conception referred to the birth of Jesus rather than the birth of Mary, along with a few other mistakes.  I intervened and subsequently learned two things from the exchange.  Firstly, that most educated secularists know very little about the Christian faith--whether points of dogma or even the heart of the faith.  Secondly, they view the faith as a mere artifact or historical curiosity, and a tedious one at that (unless sexuality or demons are discussed).  We may as well have been discussing ancient Babylonian gods and their temple rites.

It's worth reflecting on this episode because it captures the state of mind of many of the unchurched and lukewarm in the post-Christian West.  We are faced with evangelizing men and women who are apathetic and who are ignorant, and worst of all, they don't know that they are ignorant.  We can only overcome this lethargy by the grace of God, but what are the means to channel this grace?

One of the four attributes of God is beauty, and beauty has a way of cutting through our apathy and ignorance.  It overcomes lethargy because it's effects are rousing and unshakable; beauty simply commands our attention.  Beauty also overcomes ignorance because it reveals something--a truth is presented--while at the same time beauty resists being argued away.  Beauty just is, and it can't be denied.  In the novel The Idiot, Dostoevsky has the holy title character declare, "Beauty will save the world", and beauty has certainly brought many into the Church.  I quietly sing Gregorian chant in parts of my walk, and Patrick, a fellow who plans on joining the apostolate, likes the idea of reciting poetry in his bohemian neighborhood.  We would do well to restore and revivify Catholic art and architecture, reverent liturgies, processions, sacred music, poetry, prose and even some religious habits.

A large procession begins after Mass at the Sacra Liturgica conference in New York.
NY street-goers were very respectful and many were deeply moved.

But there is something even more unshakable than beauty, and that is holiness--the presence of God dwelling in and acting through one of his saints.  Blessed Charles de Foucauld had a way of radiating the presence of God while saying Holy Mass.  Many years after his death, officers and soldiers remembered with animation the way he said Mass--even though his chapel was like a "hovel".

Marshall Lyautey colorfully described his chapel as follows: "a miserable corridor with rush-covered columns.  For its altar, a plank!  For decoration it had a calico panel with a picture of Christ, and tin candlesticks!  Our feet were in the sand. Well!  I have never heard Mass said as Fr. de Foucauld said his.  I believed myself in the Thebaid [amongst the great desert Fathers].  It is one of the greatest impressions of my life."

Another soldier recalled, "What a Mass!  If you were never at his mass you don't know what Mass is.  When he said the Domine non sum dignus ['Lord I am not worthy...'] it was in such a tone that you wanted to weep with him."

Holy monks of the Thebaid

Blessed Charles, by the grace of God, was evangelizing at Holy Mass simply through his transparent holiness.  Just as beauty cannot be argued away, neither can peace and charity.  The soldiers and officers were often rough, coarse men--skeptical of the power of Christian virtues--but then they were struck with awe when they encountered the living peace and charity of Blessed Charles.  Many men who have lived their lives in the grip of the devil have been stopped in their tracks by the peace and love of Christ, shining through his saints.

Brother Juniper tames the tyrant in The Flowers of St. Francis

Holiness is the most potent force in the world, and what can convert tyrants and dissolute soldiers can also seize the souls of professors and distracted young men and women.  The true power of our religion isn't in talented people, strategies, massaging our message, improving our means of communication, but in holiness---for it is the power of God! If God is with us, who can be against us?  Our evangelization efforts will succeed to the extent that we conform our wills to Christ, and become a living witness.  It is really that simple.

St. Peter Chrysologus has a beautiful description of the path to holiness (Sermon 108):

Keep burning continually the sweet smelling incense of prayer.  Take up the sword of the Spirit.  Let your heart be an altar.  Then, with full confidence in God, present your body for sacrifice.  God desires not death, but faith; God thirsts not for blood, but for self-surrender; God is appeased not by slaughter, but by the offering of your free will.

Holiness and Evangelization Proceed Along the Same Path: Part I

This last Friday was the Feast of the Sacred Heart of Jesus.  Since I wear the image of the Sacred Heart on my tunic, I was keen to walk the streets in order to receive the graces of this great feast.  I was not disappointed.  Our Lord had something special in store--the re-appearance of a woman whom I had often commended to His Sacred Heart.

It began four years ago when I started to have an itch to do some kind of evangelistic outreach--particularly to the most wounded persons on the streets.  This desire arose because I would often drive past a mobile home park on SE 82nd and see the same intoxicated prostitute weaving about, waiting for a "john".  Unlike most prostitutes (even "street walkers") she never attempted to fix herself up.  Her light brown afro would stick out in haphazard clumps, and she usually wore dirty pajamas.  Then one day I noticed she had a distended abdomen.  Was she dying or maybe pregnant? As the weeks and months passed, her belly grew and it was clear that she was with child.  I tried to think of a way to speak with her and create a rapport.  I didn't want to just walk up to her alone, as she and the police might assume that I was a john.  Perhaps I could park around the corner, put my little girl in a stroller and we could pass her way for some conversation.  But before I could put the plan into action she disappeared.  That was over two years ago.  I assumed she was either dead or in jail.

Then I finally saw her last Friday while walking the streets.  We had a cordial conversation, but it was  limited by the fact that she had a mental disability.  I was grateful to see her alive and well, even if she was out there waiting for "clients". After we parted, all I could do was offer her to Jesus in prayer, whose Sacred Heart is wounded and burning with love for all of his little ones.  I trust I will see her again soon.

We Are Not In Charge Here

It's worth reflecting on this simple episode because it reveals a foundational truth about the Christian life and evangelization.  Only God could have so arranged for me to see the woman on this special feast day.  Just as only God could have arranged my meeting with the archdiocese on the Feast Day of Blessed Charles de Foucauld, and all of the other providential encounters I have had while walking the streets.  None of the encounters were by chance (there is no such thing as 'chance' when it comes to the work of salvation), and they certainly didn't come from my hand.  I have no power to put the right person in my path at just the right moment.  All I can do is cooperate with grace, and try to strip away those habits within me that pose barriers to reflecting Christ.  The power and wisdom are with God, and our role is to recognize this truth and set out upon the path of humility.  John the Baptist's maxim is our way to both holiness and evangelization: "He must increase, and I must decrease."

Unfortunately the way we often approach and talk about evangelization seem to point along another path.  Recently a bishop on the East Coast announced his program for re-evangelizing his once-Catholic city.  He offered his flock the same stock phrases and concepts that we have heard so many times in recent decades: a "permanent strategic planning commission", a "comprehensive pastoral planning process", "new leadership councils", etc.  Notice that these phrases assume the same strategies and governing institutions that we find in corporate America, NGOs and in political bureaucracies and governments.  These phrases are in wide currency because they give us what we crave most: control, or at least the illusion of control, and the satisfaction that we are "doing something".  Unfortunately, while this approach often works in the economic and political realm (after all, the economic and technological developments of the last few centuries are unprecedented), they've born little fruit for the kingdom of heaven.  Why?  Because our power is not in our cleverness or finding new "efficiencies", but in the providential grace of God. In fact, you'll read in the lives of the saints how a saint planned and drew out the details for some hoped for religious community or great work for God, and yet the saint was glorified in some completely different way.  That's why Mother Theresa used to say, "If you want God to laugh, tell Him your plans."  The Saints still became saints and had a profound influence on leading souls to Christ, but it was not by their own path.  It was in following the will of God--which was usually unforeseen and often didn't suit them (at least at the purely human level).

The Blessings of Pentecost

My experiences on the street have undergone a remarkable change in the last several months.  People were so friendly today (and other days) that I kept thinking that I had better move to a different part of the city.  After all, if I'm really enjoying the ministry, then where's the sacrifice?  But that's foolishness.  People have become friendly because I've walked the same neighborhoods for so long that I'm no longer a strange, unsettling presence.  In fact, there are people who have seen me around and have waited for an opportunity to talk to me.  So leaving is an absurd thought--like a gardner who never gets around to planting because all he likes to do is break up the hard soil.  The rocks are loosened now, and it's time to begin planting.  Maybe one day there will even be a harvest!

Another great change is that the Holy Spirit has loosened my tongue.  Now I've become adept at striking up conversations where I feel the Spirit is prompting me.  All of a sudden I have the touch of "holy boldness".  Perhaps I should also credit Archbishop Sample.  I asked and knelt for his blessing after Memorial Day mass, and he offered a spontaneous prayer for my evangelization efforts.  His blessing had an immediate effect once I hit the streets.

"Shane, come back!"

First I met Shane, a twenty-six year old ex-con who was really hurting from dope.  Even though it was a warm day he just stood by an open port-a-potty in Montavilla Park shivering and trying to hide in plain sight.  [By the way, those port-a-potties are like a Tiajuana sewer: condom wrappers, hypodermics, lewd graffiti with phone numbers for quickies, stolen wallets and cell phones, and feces and toilet paper everywhere.]  I had a few words with him, but he was too rattled to talk.  When I returned that way again he had gotten the jitters under control, and he gave me his name so I could pray for him.  Even though he was well-dressed, he was homeless now and had lost his job down the street as a mechanic.
I asked if he was "jones-ing" for heroin, but he said he kicked the "horse" several years back and he was just rattled from last night's crystal meth.  We agreed it must have been a bad batch since the come-down was so extreme.  Then I noticed both of his hands were swollen.  He had been beating on someone or something the night before, but he didn't have any memory of what happened.  He seemed like the kind of guy I used to buddy around with in prison, and sure enough, he had done some time at Columbia River Correctional Center.  He knew the prison lingo and we swapped prison stories and observations about life.  I found him to be a likeable guy.  It was clear that he wasn't open to the pull of faith, but I was grateful that he was beginning to seem more like himself.  Hopefully he will steer clear of meth for a while, and that he was only doing some lines because it was Rose Festival weekend (a huge "party weekend" in Portland).

After we parted I found it amusing that I've known three other guys named 'Shane', and all three of them were hoods of one kind or another.  But at least two of the Shane's grew out of it, kind of like the outlaw-turned-hero in the classic western, Shane.  I will keep Shane in my prayers, and ask that you lift him to Jesus in prayer, and all other young men like him.

Tasha & Her Rowdy Friends

Unlike Shane, Tasha had been thinking about God for a long time.  I met Tasha and her friend Megan on their way back from the laundromat.  They had been complaining that the laundry basket was heavy, and so I volunteered to carry it back to their house.  Tasha and her young friend were definitely the type of women that men want to follow home.  Tasha looked like she had probably posed in the Easy Rider magazine a few years back--though she had even more tattoos than usual.  Appearances are often deceiving.  Although Tasha was dressed to maximize her sexuality, she was actually a natural-born philosopher.

She stated that she thought that men had invented the idea of God to give them hope.  She also argued that without the prospect of heaven or hell it would be difficult to maintain social order, and so those in authority promote the idea of God.  Then she asked why she should believe in God.  By this time, Tasha's friend Megan had dropped far behind, and I guessed that God had arranged that so Tasha and I could have an intimate talk.  I asked her if she had children.  She said that she had a baby once, but gave it up for adoption after birth.  She had given the baby to a Catholic agency.

I decided to give her the two-minute version of my conversion story (though I left out the ex-con part).  I emphasized that I had once believed as she did, but then had a supernatural experience of God's love and forgiveness.  She seemed taken by the story--particularly by what I had been doing when God revealed himself: I had been kicking myself over how I had treated a young woman who had endured a hard life.  She said that she still prayed even though she didn't believe in God.  She also decided that there must be something supernatural out there because of all the stories and "youtube videos" of angels, ghosts and demons.

When we got back to her red brick ranch-style duplex, it was full of burly ex-cons.  She said they were "idiots" who were probably drunk, and she couldn't vouch for them.  The ex-cons were actually happy to see me.  She kept telling them of my experience with God, that it was like a bomb of pure love that had gone off in my chest.  "Boom!  Boom!"  She also kept repeating that "He just walks around the streets and prays", as if that was the strangest thing she had ever heard.  One of the ex-cons had just lost his brother to lung cancer.  The massive man came out of the house to talk, and I was taken aback by his powerful frame.  I'm rarely intimidated by other men.  When I played rugby, men from the other team would come up to me after the game and say, "Man, you're a beast." or "Your a horse!", but this ex-con was in a whole other league.  He said his mother used to carry around a little Bible everywhere she went, but that the sons had gone off in another direction.  Tasha said maybe his brother was in heaven with the mother, but I mentioned purgatory and said it was like a slow escalator up to heaven.  Then another ex-con showed up in a shiny blue Dodge Challenger and was amazed to hear all of the God talk.  Tasha kept telling everyone my conversion story, and the powerful man gave me a hug.

I've always thought that the flow of grace may be interrupted if I over-stay my welcome, and so I took my leave.  I'm sure I'll see Tasha and her friends around town.  Though Tasha and I had a deep and lengthy conversation, she had always kept her eyes ahead of her.  I had been like that, too, before my conversion.  Eyes always averted.  Pray that Tasha and her friends will hear the whispers of the Spirit, and surrender to the gaze of Christ.

More Observations from the Streets

When I walked the streets the other day, I had so many diverse encounters that I was struggling to regain my bearings from one moment to the next.  There were spirit-filled conversations, gestures of friendliness and spite, and odd moments where God was using my presence to provoke a choice in onlookers.  There was even a moment where I thought I would have to stop a young street tough from assaulting his girlfriend (the guys at Jiffy Lube were also about to jump in), but the young man wisely fled after he attempted a haphazard slap.

"Where are you going?"

God often uses our presence to prompt a choice in certain people.  It's as if he desires that we stand in for Christ, as part of his mystical body, and our gaze becomes his gaze: a call of return, of coming-to the source of life and love.  I have written about this phenomenon in an earlier post here.  Several times as I walked in a state of recollection, I felt a gentle prompting to look in a certain direction.  Then sure enough, my eyes would immediately meet a face staring intently at me.  It was as though I knew exactly where that person was--even if they were in a crowd of other youths, or behind plate glass in a restaurant.  The person was fixed on my presence, deep in thought, and we gave each other a long look.  God seemed to be asking them a question: "Where are you going?" or "Who do you say that I am?"  I don't know what their answer was, but that is a question we all have to answer many times throughout our lives.

Fr. Willie Doyle SJ, a Holy Chaplain killed in WWI

A couple months ago I read an excellent piece on Fr. Willie Doyle SJ, and was reminded of the efficacy of offering little sacrifices to God as we go about our day.  Thus, before I set out to walk the streets I passed on dessert, and then chose to walk with a pebble rattling around in my shoe.  The pebble had just popped-in, and I was about to take it out when I felt a gentle urging to accept it as a sacrifice.  I resumed walking on the pebble and remembered a saying from the Cure of Ars, "God speaks to us without ceasing by his good inspirations."  These little sacrifices should come to us through a gentle signal, and we shouldn't force things.  God will lead the way and he will present sacrifices to us as he sees fit.

Shortly after accepting the pebble, a young homeless man cavalierly crossed four lanes of traffic to come talk with me. That's happened many times over the last year.  Street people like to think it's their street, and so they act accordingly. He started out by teasing me, asking me if I was the pope.  That is also common: people often tease me before they get around to saying what is really on their mind.  Once the young man decided I was all right, he earnestly asked for my prayers, and said he was battling some things.  I asked him his name.  I've learned that saying and knowing a person's name has a powerful effect--it immediately takes the encounter to a deeper level.  He was embarrassed to say that his street name was 'Casanova'.  I smiled because his appearance had suggested as much.  Not all street people are indifferent to vanity.  Then we shared in spontaneous prayer, and the Holy Spirit seemed to guide my words.  It was a moment of spiritual communion, and then we hastily parted since men can only endure so much intimacy with each other. When I saw him two hours later he was no longer sober.  Please say a prayer for Casanova, and also for a woman named Kelly.

I met Kelly later that day when she and a male friend stopped their car to talk.  The man was very cheerful and friendly and had a dizzying number of piercings and tattoos.  Kelly asked for prayers several times and seemed skeptical that I would follow through.  She prayed that she was on the right path, and that she was faithfully following her late uncle.  He must have been a good man.  Kelly had already mastered the virtue of charity since she insisted that I looked handsome in my tunic.  That's the first time I've heard that!  As soon as they left, I prayed that she would also master the other virtues as well.  I've continued to commend Kelly and Casanova to God in prayer and at daily mass.

The Long Defeat

The Catholic internet is in a buzz over the latest Pew Research showing the continuing de-Christianization of America. Some are convinced that a persecution is looming, but I don't get that sense at all when I walk the streets.  Now a person may get that sense if they spend a lot of time on the internet reading news of scandals and crimes, but it's different in the lived world.  Portland, Oregon routinely ranks as one of the least-churched cities in America, and only a tiny number of those I encounter are genuinely hostile.  Many more are actually welcoming in one way or another.  The only way that we would see a situation like the Cristeros or the Spanish Civil War is if God removed his hand, and so many of our neighbors and co-workers subsequently suffered a "strong delusion" (2 Thess. 2:11).  That's possible, but it's the exceptional case and not the regular order of things.  As Sr. Lucia saw in a vision at Fatima, the sword of justice is regularly suspended by the intercessions of the holy ones (especially the Virgin Mary).  One holy saint from the 6th or 7th century even said that God was sparing the world only because of his prayers and those of another holy hermit.

Another reason a persecution is unlikely is because most Catholics have already been swept away by the spirit of the age (whether of the "progressive" or "conservative" version--really two halves of Caesar's same coin).  Thus, the fervent Catholics can be dismissed or ignored, just as they are in some dioceses and many parishes.  By several different metrics it would seem that there are about one million faithful, serious Catholics in the US (out of 50 million self-described Catholics).  Catholic book publishers have researched the market for faithful Catholic books and have arrived at that number, and polling has also repeatedly shown that only 2% (that is, one million) of Catholics in the US believe all of Church teachings.  Matthew Kelly's group have found that a larger number--some two million or so--Catholics do virtually all of the ministries/volunteer work at parishes.  Though many of that number treat the parish as a social club or part-time charity and have resisted the Church's hard sayings.  Some even do so with the pride of the unrepentant sinner.  I once overheard a couple who are pillars of a parish tell the priest that they consulted a dissident website before they left on vacation in order to find a pro-choice, pro-gay marriage parish to attend while away.

As far as the Catholic findings in the Pew Report, as Sherry Weddell of "Intentional Disciples" fame comments, the falling away of millions of more Catholics was entirely predictable.  In fact, she had predicted it five years before.  (BTW, there seem to be five voices in Catholic media that are distinguished by their reliable judgment: Sherry Weddell, Dawn Eden, Msgr. Charles Pope, Peter Kreeft and Dan Burke).  I tried to offer a gentle warning about this trend a couple of months ago here.  In fact, my greatest concern in starting this apostolate was finding faithful, vibrant parishes for those who wished to come into the Church.  In most dioceses, only a handful of parishes preach Christ's "narrow way", and act as though the liturgy is the meeting place of heaven and earth, the most important moment in the week.  By doing so, these parishes remain open to the full flood of grace, and so are the usual sources of vocations to religious life and of large families.  While every parish has a small number of committed disciples (by God's merciful design), these handful of parishes have many serious disciples and many of them are actually young.  They are the future of the Church, and her best hope for evangelization.

In the coming weeks I will write on what God is asking for in the "New Evangelization", and what he is not asking for.

The Art of Sharing

I've enjoyed getting back into the rhythm of walking the streets now that life has settled down at home.  On one of the walks I ran into one of the local Sisters of Reparation, a small order founded by an opera singer.  It's always encouraging to see a religious sister in habit walking down the sidewalk.  That was once a normal part of Catholic life, but what was once the rule has now become the exception (did you catch my pun? :-)

On one of my walks I was out after 11pm, even though "Nothing good happens after midnight".  For those of us who were once thugs or night clubbers or bed-hoppers--or all of the above!--it's hard to argue with that proverb.  Demons seem to think that the night belongs to them, but then God's grace keeps getting in the way of their plans.  While I was out late I met two young black evangelicals with the Victory Chapel Outreach.  The young men were looking for prostitutes, addicts and other vulnerable people who were ready to make a radical break and join their program.  Victory Chapel offers housing, job training and work, as well as extensive Bible study, in order to re-shape the habits and identity of those under their care.  It's a very disciplined, regimented program, and so it really only appeals to those who are returning to the Father with empty hands, like the prodigal son.

One of the Victory Chapel evangelists was a remarkably bright, eloquent speaker.  In fact, he would have made a formidable Dominican.  While he talked I thought, "He must be a pastor.  He will go places in life.  I wish I had his gift!" Then after a while I realized he was just talking at me, and I no longer envied his gift.  I recalled that God had called me to this ministry even without the gift of eloquence.  In fact, listening can be even more powerful than speaking, and a more sure foundation for a deep-rooted evangelization.  The readiness to listen presumes a certain equality between parties, a willingness to learn or come to know the other person, the very building blocks of friendship.  The ancient Greeks often wrote on friendship, and they understood that some recognition of equality was necessary for a profound relationship.  I trust the talented young man will learn this lesson as he grows older.  Before we parted he kindly offered to pray with me.

Blessed Charles wasn't much of an orator, and in fact he is well known for preferring the silent, "hidden life" of Nazareth. He even began as a Trappist, those great listeners of God, where he took the name "Brother Marie-Alberic".  Blessed Charles wasn't born a great listener, but he became one as he increased in humility and charity.  Humility, because he assumed his opinion was not always worth hearing, and charity because he assumed that others might have something better to say.  It's only been in the last few years that I've acquired the faculty of listening.  Before that I was the insufferable student and professor that always had something to say.  Now I cringe when I recall those days.  Blessed Charles, ora pro nobis!

The other day I heard an enlightening talk that proposed that the saints continue on with their life's work after death.  This idea was present in the early Church, and we have heard recent saints express the thought as they neared death.  Sts. Padre Pio and Therese of Lisieux each prophesied that their earthly life was only a foretaste of their work to come.  But what struck me is that the saints' intercession and communion with us is far more personal or autobiographic than we ever could have imagined.  It goes far beyond fostering their unique charism and role in the Body of Christ, but it runs even to things like personality traits and life experiences.

Thus whenever I seethe at the worldly spirit in the Church and begin to get carried away, I remember Blessed Charles's reaction to papal liberalization of the Trappist diet.  He was scandalized that the Trappists would now be granted a little butter or oil with their bread! A good laugh always puts things in perspective.

I've also been comforted to reflect on Blessed Charles's penchant for grandiose dreams.  He once paid a land merchant for the title to the Mount of the Beatitudes in the Holy Land so he might make of it a hermitage and chapel.  Imagine the Mount of Beatitudes all to himself!  But he was swindled out of his sum through a false title.  Before that he had composed a thick Rule for a dreamed-of religious community--The Little Brothers of Jesus.  His friend and spiritual director, Abbe Huvelin, replied, "The Pope hesitated to give his approbation to the Franciscan Rule; he thought it too severe; but this rule!  To tell you the truth it terrified me!"  Once again, Blessed Charles saw his great dreams come to nothing.

All of this is a comforting thought as I have been chastened by my own grandiose dreams for this apostolate.  As I laugh at my own presumption, I know that Blessed Charles is laughing with me.  Two fools marveling at God's trust in us.

The Passion and Springtime of the Church

There's a remarkably widespread opinion amongst prominent Churchmen that the Church is entering a passion.  Just as Christ took on his passion as he walked among us, so must the Church--his mystical body--undergo her passions as she journeys through the centuries.  Christ endured rejection, abandonment and terrible wounds, and so must the Church.

This gloomy consensus seems to cut across generations and even theological differences.  Karl Rahner SJ, a giant of the Second Vatican Council and favorite amongst progressives, opined that in the future the church would only be composed of mystics.  Fr. John Hardon SJ, a tradition-minded theologian, said that only the very humble or very chaste would remain faithful.  In 1969, Cardinal Ratzinger (the future Pope Benedict XVI) offered some hopeful, poetic words even amidst a post-Christian future.  He predicted that after a falling-away, the world "will discover the little flock of believers as something wholly new."  The whole passage is worth reading here.  One industrious author has even assembled the apocalyptic warnings of the popes from the past two-hundred years.  It's a meticulously documented though tiring book: Heralds of the Second Coming.  Some might object that two hundred years sounds like an awful slow warning, but apostasies are often slow motion events; that is, until they're not.  Spiritual bankruptcy is a lot like Hemingway's description of financial bankruptcy: it "happens in two ways: gradually then suddenly."  In Quebec, Canada, it is said that most of the province ceased going to mass over the course of a few months in 1966.  Obviously the Devil had been laying his groundwork long before that.

About eighteen months before God invited me to take up the apostolate, I had a supernatural experience of the passion of the Church.  It was an event that at first seemed apocalyptic, and later full of omens and portents.  As I've grown deeper in the faith, I now view the experience as an invitation and a sober warning rather than a glimpse of the End Times.  It happened on Monday of Holy Week, April 2, 2012, while I was driving home from a hike in the Columbia River Gorge.  I had just laid down my rosary beads to focus on the drive home when there was a sudden change in the skyline: there was a massive new celestial body in the sky.  I was startled and thought Christ had come, "like a thief in the night", to finally reconcile all things to himself.  But I remembered that the signs of the End Times had not been fulfilled, and then I noticed that the other drivers did not see the celestial body.  I calmed myself and watched: it was a bright disc that seemed like a second sun.  It was the identical size and shape as the sun, and was directly across from the sun in the sky, on the same geometric plane.

Then the second sun began to move across the sky at a deliberate pace.  As I watched the second sun, I saw that it wasn't like the real sun, but seemed an imitation, or worse, a counterfeit.  Whereas the true sun gave forth its warm, radiant yellow light, the second sun was a cool silver, shining and yet sterile and cold.  Then I realized that the second sun was moving across the sky to cover the true sun, and its movement took on a quietly ominous movement.  As it approached closer and closer--seemingly inevitable and unstoppable--the true sun seemed not to notice.  Perhaps the true sun was too regal to recognize its rival, or was resigned and at peace at the approaching counterfeit.  When the second sun finally reached the true sun, there were no fireworks or spectacles: the true sun serenely absorbed the counterfeit sun and it was gone in an instant.

Two days later, Wednesday of Holy Week, Christ asked, "Won't you share my passion?"  My spiritual director and I shared the same interpretation of the experiences.  The sun is an icon of Christ.  The second or counterfeit sun, is the spirit of anti-Christ, a false gospel that many mistake for the true Gospel, and which is ascendant in vast swaths of the world.  It's an anti-gospel of scientism, materialism, individualism, sexual liberation, idle entertainment, and the glory of man at the expense of the cross and the love of God.  As men increasingly prefer the anti-gospel to the Gospel, the Church will be abandoned and betrayed.  The cheering crowds from Palm Sunday will scatter, the apostles will hide and dissemble, and there is always Judas.

The Church, the new Israel, has undergone many passions over the millennia, just as the old Israel did  before Christ's coming.  Some saints and spiritual writers have said that every generation has its passion, though some passions are clearly worse than others.  A week or so after his passion, Christ appeared to the apostles and calmly spoke, "Peace be with you."  Then he said it again, because he knows we are poor listeners, "Peace be with you."  Christ, the true sun, is always at peace even as the false suns move across the sky.  The false suns always seem confident of victory; their triumph appears unimpeded and sure, and yet they are effortlessly swallowed up by the true sun.

The Springtime

In every passion there is a Springtime, those moments of resurrection and new life.  St. John Paul II famously predicted a "new springtime" for the Church, but he also famously declared in 1978 that we have entered "the final confrontation between the Church and the anti-Church, of the Gospel versus the anti-Gospel".  So how do we square these two prophecies?  In the mind of the Church there is no contradiction.  The history of our faith is ancient and sure, and we mustn't think as the world thinks.  Throughout the centuries, the Church has always been most fecund in times of crisis--just as our Lord's greatest triumph came with his bloodshed.  Thus, the Church has always had a maxim, articulated by Tertullian, "the blood of the martyrs is the seed of the Church".  Sometimes the martyrdom runs red with blood as we now see in parts of Africa, the Middle East and even Asia, and sometimes it is the "white" martyrdom of willingly losing most of what you hold dear.

Even if we're not called to red or white martyrdom, new life will spring from our faith and sacrifices.  He is asking us to overcome ourselves with grace, and share in the sufferings to come.  If we share in his passion, then the Church will enjoy a resurrection, a new springtime.

Three weeks ago my wife gave birth to a baby boy, Gabriel Kristoff.  My wife remained open to life even after two straight miscarriages, and the challenges that come with childbirth in your 40s. That's faith and a sign of Spring.

In another sign of Spring, Daniel O'Connor, a young man from Albany, New York has been evangelizing the streets in his Sunday best and a giant Divine Mercy button.  He has invited others to join him here.  I noticed that Daniel has a similar take on the "signs of the times" even as he sets out to evangelize.  My next post will be a meditation on this seeming paradox: Christ invites us to follow him even as he signals that the tide is coming in against us.

Finally, a few weeks back I sent Josh his tunic to evangelize in Louisville.  He had only been wearing an old sweatshirt with the Jesus Caritas heart.  Now he's eager for Spring to melt the snow so he can resume walking the streets.  Springtime is coming, and the Lord comes with it.

Josh's wool tunic is several shades darker than mine

Reflections on Evangelization, II: Spiritual Growth through Evangelization

Yesterday I walked the streets for the final time before my wife has our baby boy.  It was a spirit-filled experience, not least because I read the second half of Matthew Manint's free little e-book, Like a Dove in the Cleft of a Rock.  It is a beautiful spiritual meditation by a consecrated layman with a special devotion to Blessed Charles de Foucauld.  I found myself repeating the plea to our Lord,

"Draw me after you, let us make haste."

Lord, draw me up after you, and help me follow your quick steps up the holy mountain.  Let us make haste, the time is short.

I'm happy to say that my prayers have not been in vain.  The Lord has drawn me up after him, and the vehicle of my sanctification has been my ministry on the streets.  In fact, I have been the great beneficiary of my own evangelization efforts!  I only wish I could say that those on the street have benefited as much.

One way to witness my spiritual growth is to consider some of the changes in my perception of the ministry and it's challenges.  One shift in perception concerns how I inwardly respond to verbal abuse.  When I first began the apostolate, I was mildly disturbed by hostile stares or angry shouts from passing cars, but I would consciously offer it up to God the Father as a small sacrifice.  Then after a few months I ceased to be disturbed, and walked on in peace--happy to be of some use to God, but sorrowful for the sake of the angry person.  But yesterday God gave me the grace to take things a little deeper.  A shrill voice yelled from a passing car, "Go to hell!"  And for the first time I realized, "Lord, I'm not worthy to be despised for your sake.  Who am I to be given such a great grace as to be despised for doing your will?"  That thought had never occurred to me before, but now it seemed so obvious.  I used to think I was a splendid candidate to suffer for our Lord, how could I have been so presumptuous?

A similar shift in perception concerns my attitude toward the apostolate itself.  When I first began the apostolate, I did it largely from a sense of duty and curiosity.  But I quickly discovered that it was painful to walk the streets: the weather was often bad, my feet and joints were tired, the tunic was awkward and I stood out amidst passers-by, there was the occasional abuse, and the spiritual combat was especially draining.  I even had to fight off feelings of resentment, "Thanks a lot God for giving me this thankless ministry."  But I grudgingly endured it, and forced myself out the door, week after week.  Then the gloom broke and I began to be at peace with the ministry, and it just became a part of my weekly schedule and who I am.  Then yesterday God gave me an even deeper grace.  For the first time I realized that I was blessed to be given this ministry.  It was a conviction of the heart, and not an intellectual exercise.  I didn't even give myself reasons, I just knew it to be true.  

In just one short year I have progressed from resenting and grappling with the ministry to embracing it as a great blessing.  It seems paradoxical that evangelizing others would offer a considerable source for our own sanctification. After all, we presumably evangelize out of love for others and God, and not for our own sake.  But when we commit ourselves, week in and week out, to share the Gospel with those who lack it, Christ slowly saturates our own hearts with his love.  In making this sacrifice for the sanctification of others, we are doing what Christ did in becoming man and accepting the cross for us.  By imitating him, we become more like him, the "holy one of God".  At first our hearts are small and hard, but if we persevere then they swell and grow until they begin to more closely resemble his own.  Then the more closely they resemble his own, the more efficacious our efforts at evangelization.  He is always trying to build us up since he desires to do his work through us, but we always slow the progress!

So if you want to be holy, then sacrifice for the sanctification of others.  Evangelize the streets, evangelize and pray for your friends and neighbors, pray and counsel outside Planned Parenthood, and you'll soon find that you are growing closer to Christ.  It's a paradox of the spiritual life, but then again, most of the deep truths of our faith are counter-intuitive.