Weeks earlier, after pondering on the significance or otherwise of my increasing urge to state that the Catholic Church is my spiritual home, I had intended posting something relating to this, but -as has occurred so frequently- whenever I sat down to write, something other than my original intention provided the subject for my thoughts.
These accidental delays have provided an admittedly minute but nonetheless interesting contribution to my suspicions that, even in the barely visible and scarcely known corners of individual lives, thoughts, and values, subjects which can arouse strong feelings and reactions of a more obvious nature in the world at large, are alive and well. The embers of inbuilt discontent, distrust, distaste, and even of disgust: of disdain, discord and disunity, are aglow beneath a merely superficial covering of ash.
The greyness of the ash has no intended link with the monochrome horizons of my previous post, but rather represents the essential barrier of ignorance and misunderstanding without which the embers cannot be successfully smoored against the long and empty hours of darkness. In some people the hidden glow of their disaffection must never be allowed to diminish: it is an undeniable part of their whole way of thinking and of being; indoctrination and bigotry have spawned a mindset that is savoured with pride and a confidence in the sole possession of the truth. The long dark hours linger for life: in too many of us, they will last for as long as the life that clings to them.
Access to the truth has been disowned. ‘Christianity’ has become a banner-slogan waved by different groups as they face each other, manning and strengthening the barricades that keep them apart. The very word that proclaims truth and community in the following of Christ is wielded as a weapon of war in the very hearts of those whose hallucinations include exclusivity rights to that which Jesus gave for all mankind, and a factional solidarity that hides behind an ashen mask disguised as unity.
We have all experienced those brief moments when something happens, or is said, that suddenly changes our way of seeing a person forever. This can involve any facet of life and our interactions with each other, so it is no surprise that our spiritual leanings and awareness are not exempt from such jarring. My own such moments have taken years to build into my present saddened consciousness of the way the whole concept of unity has been disowned by so many who profess to be Christians. This perpetuates one of the most basic and destructive failures of the followers of Christ, for which none of us can entirely exclude ourselves from blame.
The one moment that perhaps lodged in my memory more than any other, occurred when I visited the home of a delightful middle-aged couple in a well-to-do area of Kent. I was delivering an item they had purchased from me, and, having never met them before, was at once put at ease by their welcome and by the obvious pleasure they derived from seeing their new acquisition ‘in the flesh’.
Shared interests discovered over cups of tea led to the beginnings of what could have become real friendship, and having already stayed far longer than intended, we progressed to their family and the proudly displayed photographs. At a point in this happy gathering when the lady had gone upstairs to find something she wished to show me, she suddenly called loudly down to her husband, “Quick! Look out of the window! She’s sitting on the wall.” The husband quickly rose and crossed to the window; his facial expression became a combination of disbelief and suppressed anger as he turned and hurried out to the hallway on his way to the front door. Before he reached it his wife called down again, “She’s gone! ... Dear God!”
Amid the “Did you see that”s, and the “I don’t believe it”s, she came down the stairs to rejoin the two of us in the hallway. My uncertainty regarding the urgency of what was happening had led me there in case I could be of any help, and as their anger subsided they became aware that I would have had no idea what was going on. It was soon explained, and clearly the presumption was that I would feel the appropriate indignation on their behalf. One of their neighbours, who apparently made a habit of doing such unforgivable things, had been seen sitting on the low boundary wall which ran along the pavement outside their hedge. I found it difficult to find any logical reason for such likeable people becoming so incensed by such an incident, but then, after a short pause, and spoken with considerable venom, came the words that would make everything clear.
They did make it clear – but not, I think, in the way intended.
“... and she’s CATHOLIC !”
Such an unexpected utterance left me shocked for a moment, and it must have shown. After a few seconds silence I said quietly, that whatever their neighbour had done to offend them was down to her as an individual, and certainly had nothing to do with whether or not she was a Catholic. Another silence as we returned to the lounge, and then, disbelievingly and rather sheepishly, the wife asked, “You’re not a Catholic are you ?” A few awkward minutes more and I was on my way home.
It is not only the experience itself that has lodged within me, but the lingering knowledge that I had been at a complete loss as to what I should have done or said. Perhaps, in that particular place at that particular time, all that was needed of me was done, but what if they had asked further questions? What if they had begun to direct their inappropriate fire at my own admitted allegiance? Or had verbally attacked Catholics or Catholicism in general? And what if, somewhere deep beneath the layers of ash that kept their embers so hot, there also burnt a hidden will to answer Our Lord’s call to unity? I was in no position to stand up for myself, my fellow Catholics, or the Catholic Church.
Standing up to be counted, yes; being present to others as a Catholic, yes; but to discuss, to have the answers to questions, to know the facts ... no: I was not competent: I was not able: I was a Catholic in name, by nature, and through experience, but ...
It is only over the last two years that my thoughts on this have been resurrected. Surely I should be able to defend my beliefs and those of others around me; and is this not something we are all required to do? Perhaps my continuing uncertainty is born of a corresponding lack of decisiveness in interpreting my own faith: my understanding of my God, and His will for me and for all mankind.
It all comes down to two simple but enormous questions: - exactly what is it that I really believe? - and in which (if any) of the diverse denominations and sub-divisions under the broad heading of the Christian Church, do my beliefs find their conception, their baptism, their growth, and their confirmation in loving and forgiving community with Christ’s followers?
The small contribution to my suspicions that arose from the unobtrusive insertion of the Catholic Blogs search on this site, was the change in the general area of numerical placing of the blog in ‘Blog Topsites’ which is also at the foot of the page.
The numbers visiting are small, but most days there is someone somewhere reading these pages, and that confirms to me that I must continue with my soliloquy, but in the past, whenever I have posted something new, the Topsites number has decreased noticeably, showing that the presence of readers has, as it were, sent the blog further up the charts. Since the implied Catholicism appeared, this has been less apparent, and the assumption must be that even without my confirmation that the writer is a Catholic, some regular readers have abandoned ship rather than continue receiving whatever nourishment it was that they found here.
Seeing those first eight letters of CatholicBlogs.com must have been one of those brief moments for them, when suddenly, in phobic fashion, the flavour became completely unacceptable.
Heaven forbid that they should hear the views or appreciate the thoughts of a Catholic!
‘Blow on a spark and up it flares,
spit on it and out it goes;
both are the effects of your mouth.’
(Ecclesiasticus 28:12)
