Working it out

Fantasy Sports and the Decline of Western Civilization
OK, the title might be a little over the top, but I don't like Fantasy Sports. I tried Fantasy Football a couple of years ago, not for money just for "fun". It wasn't all that fun. I am a huge Patriots fan and when I watch them, I want to route for them, not for some guy on the other team who's on my fantasy team. It's just not right, I feel like I'm not being a loyal fan.

Plus, there are enough professional athletes out there with big egos who only care about their own stats, and are not "team" players. We don't need a whole industry to encourage this kind of behavior. Take my favorite sports team, the New England Patriots(have I mentioned I like the Pats ;>)) Their management and coaching staff encourage unselfish play, doing what helps the team, not necessarily what helps a players statistics. This has worked(2 Superbowl titles in 4 years). But even if the Pats were unsuccessful, it would still be the right thing to do. It is a cliche, but there is no "I" in "TEAM".

There are things that a player can do to help the team that doesn't show up on the stat sheet. For instance, there were occasions last season, when one of the Pat's defensive players, Ted Washington would record no tackles and no sacks. These are coveted stats for his position. But does that mean big Ted did not have a good game on these occasions? No. Often, Ted's job was to take on the other team's blockers to allow his team mates to make the tackles or sacks.

For teams to be successful, you need selfless players, willing to relinquish the glory for the good of the team. Fantasy sports encourages its participants to route for players who rack up the fantasy points, regardless of whether or not it is good for the team. Our society is selfish enough. We don't need a hobby to push us more in that direction.

Strip Clubs and the Apocalypse
Talking with people over the years, I get the general impression that many view going to strip clubs as basically harmless fun. This attitude is certainly prevalent on T.V. Probably more men hold this view and engage in this activity than women, but this view and activity is certainly not rare among females. As a man, I can say that "checking out" the opposite sex is a favorite hobby for our gender. Whether it is at work, at the gym, on television, or as Al Bundy would say "at the Nudey Bar" aka the strip club, it has become practically a national past-time. While I try to keep myself in check, I have to admit, that the temptation does get the better of me now and again. Is this behavior harmless? Or is it detrimental to ourselves and our society? To answer these questions we have to go back to the beginning.

He created them male and female
Men and women were not created to be alone, they were created for union. Union with each other, which results in the unity of the family, man, woman, and child(or children). And ultimately, humanity was created for union with God. In fact, our bodies do not make sense by themselves. Their meanings are revealed only with reference to the other, their complement. So when Adam sees Eve, he says, "This at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh" (Gen 2:23). Her body revealed to him the meaning of his
body. The nuptial meaning of their bodies were revealed. In their pure state before the fall this meaning
was that of love. This love is expressed by way of gift. Adam's body is a gift that he freely and without reservation gives to Eve and Eve's body is a gift that she freely gives to Adam. Notice the bible says, "The man and his wife were both naked, yet they felt no shame." (Gen 2:25). But after the fall it is
a different story: "Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they realized that they were naked; so they sewed fig leaves together and made loincloths for themselves." (Gen 3:7). Now they feel shame.
They have disobeyed God, lost their innocent purity, and no longer see each other's body as gift but as an object to be used.

This is the situation we find ourselves in. We objectify each other. We have great difficulty giving the dignity due to each person as a unique creation of God , for whom the only proper response is love. So we mostly use each other. Patrons of a strip club use the strippers. They absorb the "dancers" nakedness for their own pleasure. In colleges now we have the "hook up" scene where men and women use each other for their mutual gratification. But God has provided the remedy.

A man shall leave his father and mother
In Ephesians 5, Paul exhorts wives and husbands to live lives of love towards each other. He particularly tells husbands:

love your wives, just as Christ also loved the church and (55) gave Himself up for her,
26 (56) so that He might sanctify her, having (57) cleansed her by the (58) washing of water with (59) the word, 27 that He might (60) present to Himself the church in all her glory, having no spot or wrinkle or any such thing; but that she would be (61) holy and blameless. 28 So husbands ought also to (62) love their own wives as their own bodies. He who loves his own wife loves himself; 29 for no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ also does the church, 30 because we are (63) members of His (64) body. 31 (65) FOR THIS REASON A MAN SHALL LEAVE HIS FATHER AND MOTHER AND SHALL BE JOINED TO HIS WIFE, AND THE TWO SHALL BECOME ONE FLESH. 32 This mystery is great; but I am speaking with reference to Christ and the church.

Paul challenges husbands with the example of Christ's sacrificial love. Then we have the verse that is also found in Genesis after God creates Adam and Eve about a man leaving his father and mother and becoming one flesh with his wife. Which at first glance is not too surprising, since Paul here is speaking of marriage. But then Paul says something curious, he says this is a great mystery in that it refers to Christ and the Church. WHAT? We know that a husband and wife become one flesh in the marital embrace, but how does Christ become one flesh with the church? Jesus Himself gives us the answer:

While they were eating, Jesus took bread, said the blessing, broke it, and giving it to his disciples said, "Take and eat; this is my body." (Mat 26:15)

and again

51 I am the living bread that came down from heaven; whoever eats this bread will live forever; and the bread that I will give is my flesh for the life of the world." 52 The Jews quarreled among themselves, saying, "How can this man give us (his) flesh to eat?" 53 Jesus said to them, "Amen, amen, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you do not have life within you. 54
Whoever eats 19 my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him on the last day. 55
For my flesh is true food, and my blood is true drink. 56 Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood remains in me and I in him.

So Jesus gives his body for His Bride, the Church, on the cross to redeem her and present her spotless before the Father. He also institutes the Eucharist, an unbloody, re-presentation of Jesus' sacrifice on Calvary, so that His Bride, the Church, can become one flesh with Him.

Jesus came and died not only to redeem humanity individually, which restores our relationship to God, but He also redeems our relationships with one another. This is especially true for the relationship between the sexes and the one flesh union. He came to give us the example of being a gift to one another. He says, "Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends." (John 15:13) We are to love with a love that gives and asks for nothing in return, even if it means laying down our life for the beloved.

What does this have to do with the Apocalypse?
I started this talking about strip clubs, where "dancers" disrobe. The last book of the bible, which is commonly referred to as the book of Revelation, is also known as the Apocalypse of St. John. The word Apocalypse comes from a Greek word that means unveiling. Specifically it refers to the unveiling that a bride does on her wedding night. You might be asking why this was the title given to this book of the bible. It is because, this book is about an unveiling. It is the unveiling, or revelation of the bride of Christ, the Church:

7
Let us rejoice and be glad and give him glory. For the wedding day of the Lamb 3 has come, his bride has made herself ready. 8 She was allowed to wear a bright, clean linen garment." (The linen represents the righteous deeds of the holy ones.) 4 9 Then the angel said to me, "Write this: Blessed 5 are those who have been called to the wedding feast of the Lamb." (Rev 19)

We are called to the wedding feast of the Lamb, which begins here on earth, with the Eucharist. This gives us the strength to imitate Christ and be a gift to one another. But it also will find its fulfillment in the ultimate wedding feast, which is heaven and our full one flesh union with God, in Christ Jesus. This is the dignity of our calling and purpose. How can we debase ourselves at the nudey bar?

Political pondering
Until today, I was quite convinced that I would vote for George Bush come November. I probably still will, but I am entertaining a certain amount of uncertainty. The blame for this uncertainty can be placed squarely on the shoulders of St. Blog's Parish. Let me explain.

First I check my regular sites. Not much going on at Dom's blog. Let me see if Mark Shea has updated his yet. Great, he has...what's this, go check out Disputations. OK, I will. Disputations is not an everyday stop, but is always worth a peek now and again. He has a post titled "What I like about grave evil". The title is ironically eye-catching so I read on. In this post the author, Tom, discusses the gravity of certain issues, using legalized abortion and unjust immigration laws. He writes:

An argument blinded by the enormity of abortion might look like this: "Life is the one absolute, bedrock, fundamental right, without which it's meaningless to speak of other rights. What constitutes just immigration law is a matter of prudential judgment, but abortion is everywhere and always evil. We must, therefore, resist legalized abortion and choose the purportedly unjust immigration law."

The correct answer, though, is: We should do neither.

The correctness of the answer is clearer when the evils are more proportionate: Should you punch the next person you see in the face, or in the gut?

I think the difficulty many have in recognizing that as a matter of fact we shouldn't choose unjust immigration law lies in part in the fact that many think "the lesser of two evils" is a legitimate way of choosing how to act. But the lesser of two evils is evil, and evil is never legitimate. Is this a failure of reason, do you think, or of faith?

This is the beginning of my uncertainty. Do I not vote in November? Do I write in a candidate? For some reason I was under the impression that "wasting" your vote was no good. The comments to this post don't help very much either.

Next stop is Catholic Kerry Watch from which I am led to Fr. Rob's blog. Fr. Rob is tearing some of his commentators a new one. He has a huge, very good post on the difference between supporting abortion and supporting the death penalty and the Iraq war. Basically it boils down to: abortion is always wrong, capital punishment and war is not. Capital punishment and war are based on prudential judgments. These judgments could be wrong and if they are, the results(killing a criminal or enemy combatants and possibly civilians) are immoral.

So now the only thing I know for certain is that I cannot vote for Kerry, which I knew already. But the question is, can a Catholic in good conscience support George Bush?

Here are my pros and cons:

• PROS


• Pro-life


• Cloning


• Supports Marriage Amendment


• Faith based initiative


• School choice


• War on terror


• Stem cell research


• CONS


• Too middle of the road on abortion


• Capital punishment


• Stem cell research

One issue that I have not made up my mind about yet, is the Iraq War. I vacillate between thinking it was necessary and thinking it was probably a bad choice. I tend not to think that the decision was made in bad faith. But the fact that the U.S. bishops and the Vatican thought it was not a good idea carries some weight and must be considered. Stem cell research is listed as a pro and a con because I did not like Bush's decision, but it could have been worse. I wish he would have banned research altogether, but at least he placed some restrictions on it.

I checked out the Voter's Guide for the Serious Catholic, since after all, I am a serious Catholic ;-> The money line, I guess is:

In some political races, each candidate takes a wrong position on one or more of the five non-negotiables. In such a case you may vote for the candidate who takes the fewest such positions or who seems least likely to be able to advance immoral legislation, or you may choose to vote for no one.

Since I am pretty confident that Kerry will push abortion, homosexual marriage, and stem cell research and that he will not back school choice, and that George Bush's stance on these issues is better if not perfect, then I will probably vote for Bush in November.

I am open to other opinions, got any?

Morning After Pill
I received an email from the Culture of Life Foundation warning that an FDA committee is going to recommend the Morning after pill(MAP) for over-the-counter sale. But proponents and manufacturers of MAP claim that the pill does not cause an abortion. This is blatantly false. From the email:

"Critics also charge that the drug is marketed without letting women and girls know that is can cause an abortion. Producers and proponents now make the claim that pregnancy starts at implantation and therefore any interruption prior to implantation could not be considered an abortion. This contradicts what is presented in all medical textbooks that place pregnancy starting at conception."

I have seen this firsthand. A couple of months ago there was a proponent of MAP on one of the morning shows, this person made this same claim. I knew that if conception has occurred, the MAP does indeed snuff out this new life. I was shocked that someone would so blatantly lie on national TV. After bringing this issue up in the comments of other blogs, I found out that they are playing fast and loose with the definition of when pregnancy begins. What I don't understand is that the proponents of MAP believe that there is nothing wrong with abortion. So why do they go out of their way to lie and claim it does not cause an abortion?

Moral Lethargy
There is a great Q&A with Theologian Fr. Thomas Williams at Zenit. Toward the end of the article while discussing pro-abort pols and pro-abort political parties he says:

"Sometimes a prophetic voice is needed to shake people out of their moral lethargy, especially when people have come to accept as "normal" something which by rights should provoke moral outrage.

If publicly supporting abortion doesn't constitute a sufficient pastoral reason to justify the denial of Holy Communion, it is hard to imagine when recourse to this measure would be appropriate."

Such moral clarity is hard to come by these days. Even though I consider myself pro-life, I know that I can get lulled into passivity about abortion. It is hard to maintain a proper moral outrage, when the outrageous actions continue day in and day out and are supported by almost half of the country and 99% of the media and Hollywood elite. I thought the Father's answer to the last question is a wake up call:

"Q: Is this issue really that important? Should bishops really risk their moral authority on the question of pro-abortion legislators?

Father Williams: A glance at the past may prove instructive. History tends to be severe in its judgments of Church leaders who failed to use all the means at their disposal to put an end to egregious sins against human rights.

It is sufficient to recall events of the past centuries such as the African slave trade or apartheid or Hitler's Germany to bring home this argument.

Situations which appeared complicated and multifaceted at the time take on a peculiar starkness when viewed with historical hindsight.

A dispassionate analysis of the facts may show that the current situation with legalized abortion is no less grave than the greatest human rights issues of other times.

Though we may be inured to the grim reality of abortion, it seems likely that once civilization has comes to its senses, future generations will look back on our time as one of the most barbarous in history, not merely for our wars and terrorism, but especially for the antiseptic extermination of the most defenseless members of our society, the poorest of the poor, precisely because they have no voice.

Furthermore, the mere magnitude of the crisis -- now more than 40 million planned deaths of unborn children in the United States alone since the legalization of abortion in 1973 -- is sufficient to make abortion the greatest social justice issue of all time"

The "greatest social justice issue of all time" and what am I doing to stand against this issue? Practically nothing! I think I need to re-evaluate my priorities and come back to my senses so that I can be one of the voices calling civilization back to its senses.

Current Events
One of the current events sweeping the Catholic blogosphere is John Kerry and whether or not he should receive Communion. Some people might wonder what the big deal is. Well the issue is fairly simple, he should not receive Communion. Communion in the Catholic and Orthodox Churches is the reception of Jesus Christ, body and blood, soul and divinity and it is a BIG DEAL. Nobody is truly worthy. In fact before reception, Catholics repeat a line from the Gospels, "Lord I am not worthy to receive you, but only say the word and I shall be healed." It is not that John Kerry is a sinner. We are ALL sinners, the recent scandal in the Church has made that all too clear. But reception of the Eucharist is for those Catholics who profess to believe all that the Church teaches, who are trying with God's grace to lead lives of holiness(notice I said trying), and who are in a state of grace. Being in a state of grace means that either you have not committed any mortal sins or if you have, that you have been to confession. If a Catholic is aware that they do not meet these criteria, then they are obligated to not present themselves for Communion. It is clear that John Kerry does not meet these criteria. The Church's position on abortion is clear, it is the direct killing of an innocent human life. If a person supports abortion, then they are obstinately refusing to believe all that the Church teaches.

Since Jesus told Peter and the Apostles, "He who hears you hears me", and the Pope and the bishops are the successors of Peter and the Apostles, they speak with the authority of Christ. Catholics are bound by this authority. No one is forced to be Catholic. If you do not believe all that the Church teaches, you may leave and join a church more to your liking. But many, John Kerry and Ted Kennedy included, want to have their cake and eat it too. They want to claim to be Catholic but deny many of the central teachings of the Church. They have been given the moniker CINO(Catholic In Name Only).

It is not the sinning that makes someone a CINO, I have already said that all are sinners. It is the refusal to admit your sin. The difference between CINO's and other Catholics is that when other Catholics sin, they repent and seek forgiveness, but CINO's not only do not repent of their sin, they celebrate it. Then they blaspheme the Lord, by receiving Him unworthily.

As Archbishop O'Malley has said that Catholic politicians who support abortion dare not present themselves for Communion. Well John Kerry has dared, what will the bishops do about it?

The Pats Draft
We here in New England have the habit of saying, "In Bill we trust"(Belichick that is), so I know that the Pats latest draft picks will work out. It's hard to argue with concentrating on defense, seeing that defense has given them 2 Lombardi trophies in the last 3 years. Still, I am surprised that they didn't take 1 O-lineman. I also would've liked to see them take a running back a little earlier, but I guess the Dillon signing made RB a less pressing need. I read that the WR they took, P.K. Sam is a shrewd signing. Apparently he's a real burner. Sounds like Bethel Johnson, and I guess he's worked out O.K.

With Ted Washington gone, hopefully their top pick Wilfork, can step in quickly. If he and Hill can contribute and Colvin can come back strong, the Pats D should be fearsome again.

Why the Title?
You might be asking yourself, what's up the title? OK, I am being hopeful, since nobody is probably asking this, since nobody is probably reading this blog. But I will indulge the fantasy nonetheless. I didn't give the title too much thought to be honest. But now that I reflect on it, it fits. Of course there is the obvious reference to Phil 2:12. There is also the sense of working as a struggle. And living in this day and age it is a struggle to live your faith. Every day we are bombarded with images, words, and ideas that are antithetical to the Christian worldview. So we must work. I must work for a paycheck to feed my family. I must work out or I will get too fat. And those who follow Christ must work for His kingdom here on earth where we fight against evil principalities and powers. But even though we know that in Christ we have the victory, we must still run and labor so that it will not be in vain.

Things I will write about
If anyone ever visits(I have had 1 comment, thanks Kelly), here are some of the things that interest me:
- The Catholic Faith
- The Culture of Life vs. The Culture of Death
- General religious issues
- Politics
- Raising children(I have 3 daughters)
- Catholic Education(2 of my daughters attend our parish school)
- Home Schooling(I am very impressed with people who do this)
- Music(I would like to play every instrument known to man, but I mostly just play guitar)
- Sports( I am a fanatic Pats fan, and a semi-fanatic RedSox fan)

A Degenerate Finds God, Part II
After my "born again" experience, I began to get involved in my local Catholic Parish. I became a lector and a CCD teacher. At this point, my knowledge of the Faith was not great, but I was eager to learn. I would not go to confession. I tried to justify this intellectually, but now I know it was just a stubborn refusal to submit myself to the authority of Christ that is in the Church.

Wanting to learn, but having little recourse to Catholic material, I began finding and absorbing non-Catholic material. It starting with Christian(read Protestant) radio. Soon I was watching Pat Robertson's 700Club and other Protestant T.V. ministers. So what started out as a refusal to accept one of the Church's teachings, Confession, quickly led me, with the help of Protestant T.V. and radio shows, to question many of the other Church teachings. It was the usual suspects, Mary's role in the Church, Purgatory, works salvation etc. Eventually I was not attending Mass, I was arguing with my wife about religion, and I started attending a "non-denominational, Bible" Church. This lasted for a month or two.

During this time, even though much in my life changed, there were certain stubborn sins that remained. I thought that attending a "real" church would make me feel better and help me deal with these sins. It did not. One night while on a business trip, I became depressed. I felt God urging me to return to my Catholic Faith that I was so eager to disregard. I knew that if I did, it would have to be whole-hearted, accepting ALL of the Church's teachings. I did this, starting with a general confession. I have not looked back since.

At this point the Internet was really taking off, and I began to discover a wealth of good, solid, Catholic material on the Web. This has helped tremendously. It not only has given me resources for learning the Faith, but has connected me with a virtual community of faithful Catholics. And now I am starting my own Catholic blog, to do what I can to increase the presence of faithful Catholics on the internet.