The Silence of the Men at Christmas

From St. Joseph we never hear a word: before, during or after the infancy narratives. He is quiet, peaceful, docile, receptive and obedient to the messages from heaven. Zechariah, a temple priest, is struck mute for the nine months that Elizabeth carries John the Baptist: a leader and teacher, unable to speak a single word. The Magi quietly follow the star and then disappear into the East: we don't even know what they were, kings, magicians, astronomers, or seekers of some sort? The shepherds, accustomed to silence, listen in awe to the music of the angels. The only masculine noise comes from the envious, infanticidal, pro-choice (that is, his own choice, of course) Herod as he massacres the Holy Innocents. The imagery is stark and lucid: the good men are quiet, the evil one is loud. We see here that virile virtue is rooted in quiet, silence, interior peace and docility. And yet, paradoxically, the masculine, or paternal role, is also one of teaching, of passing on the tradition, of articulating the law and giving discipline. Clearly, masculine instruction that does not emerge from the profundity of silence can only be noise, dissonance and violation. My sister once told me: "You should be more like our father: less talk of the talk, more walk of the talk!" Now there is some ego-deflation for you. She had a point. How often I have prayed during a homily: "Lord! Just let him shut up!" I read about a Pentecostal minister, accustomed to hearing the voice of the Lord, who ascended a pulpit before a huge congregation, prepared to deliver a message, when he heard, from heaven, a clear voice: "Be quiet." He obeyed. He stood before the crowd for close to an hour without saying a word. They sat quietly gazing at him. Suddenly, a sound of weeping broke the silence. Soon, the Church was filled with loud sobs and cries: the sinners were weeping about their sins and the love of Christ. The silence of the preacher provided the peace and clam in which the Holy Spirit could work. Lord! Give us men a Spirit of quiet, of peace, of docility!

Scandalized by the Church

Pray for me. I want to serve God but I see my Church going in another direction. I lack serenity. These words were spoken to me humbly and sincerely by a dear friend, a decent, generous man who has given his life to the work of the Church, especially among the poor. He is scandalized by the Church. He is in torment. His pain is genuine, innocent and childlike. I had nothing to say. But I pray for him. He is, I realized, emblematic of so many others who are scandalized by the Church. The representative of God on earth, this Church seems to them to desecrate what is most worthy and holy. It is not so for me. Through no effort or merit of my own, I have always seen the Church as a society of sinners, loved onto death by our Lord. Every new abominable revelation pulls me deeper into the heart of the Church: identification with miserable sinners and desperation for the Mercy of Christ. Lucidly, I see unveiled in the economies of Church dogma, worship and morality, the inexorable logic and irrepressible dynamism of Christ's love for us sinners. As I pray for my friend and so many like him, I urgently need to humble myself, in the Church, before this adorable Mercy; and honor the sensitivity, fragility and earnestness that lends itself to such painful spiritual trauma.

Catholic Answers to Careerism

From a Catholic perspective, there are two contrasting responses to careerism, the conviction that one's worth is found in professional success. The first would downgrade career and profession to the lower status of a "job," a mere means of providing our material necessities, in order to free time, energy and attention for the higher values of family and Church. This was St. Paul's attitude, for example, to his trade of tent-making: it provided his necessities in order that he could be free to preach the Gospel. This might be called an "apocalyptic" view of work as it implies that the things of this world are passing away and become devalued in deference to the coming and transcendent kingdom of heaven. Something like this was common at UPS, where I worked, among the truck drivers (not the managers) who worked long hours to provide for their families but did not glamorize their work as many prized more highly their participation in Little League, voluntary fire department, Church or community work. This view seemed to prevail, in my experience, in the early days of the Charismatic Renewal and also the Neocatechumenal Way. At least in my part of the world (NYC and Jersey City) these have predominantly attracted unsuccessful, low-income working class people and even the unemployed and disabled. The Gospel preached to these, the "poor of Yahweh," the "losers" in the competitive arena of the market economy, is a radical, unworldly one of evangelical faith, hope and love. The great value of this approach is that it radically rejects careerism; it transcends the "winner-loser" divide of our meritocracy by unifying all of us in an ecclesial community of adoration, faith and love; and it rejects, lucidly and emphatically, the "ways of the world" in favor of heavenly concerns. A second approach finds in work and career itself a religious vocation or profession. This might be called an "incarnational" approach since heavenly values themselves take flesh in work. The happiness of this approach is that work itself becomes worship of God and service of out brethren. This view is especially pronounced in movements like Opus Dei and Communion and Liberation, which seem to attract highly educated, professional, service-oriented people. In this approach, work and career themselves express one's deepest religious aspirations. My own children are reflective of this: psychologist, theologian, physician's assistant, teacher, social worker, lawyer and nurse. The challenge of this path is to remain "in the world" without becoming "of the world" especially in the privileged, empowered status that comes with competence and expertise and distances us from those who are unable to achieve success. Sustained attention to the needy and dedication to service are, happily, the pathway to meeting this challenge. My life has reflected the first option, the "apocalyptic," as I spent 25 years in quite a decent "job" (not really much of a career) in UPS and just over half that much time in low-pay, low-status service as religion teacher ("catechist" actually) and manager of a residence for low-income women.

Careerism

Careerism is the conviction, often not consciously acknowledged, that one's own worth, and that of others, is primarily or significantly rooted in occupational achievement and success. Our society is a meritocracy in which status and worth are considered to be earned rather than ascribed according to the class of our birth family. As society becomes increasingly technical, complex and specialized, achievement in school and work take on elevated importance. There are many problems with this development. First of all, our society is increasingly polarized between "winners" and "losers" with a huge gap between them. The "winners" are those who obtain technical expertise and become valuable in the marketplace: lawyers, architects, doctors and professors. "Losers" fail at this and fall into low-paying, low-status jobs. Typically, "losers" bond with their own kind and create unions (frequently, non-marital) that are financially insecure and vulnerable to the disrupting and chaotic dynamics of poverty and all the fruits of the sexual revolution (co-habitation, mothers without husbands, divorce, etc.) "Winners" also marry their own kind and enjoy two good salaries as well as the benefits of the more disciplined sexuality of traditional marital stability. This trend is aggravated by the depletion of the bank of low-skill, high paying, manufacturing-based, union jobs that enriched our working class in the post-WWII decades. Secondly, the emerging gap is intensifying the crisis of masculinity as young women are increasingly outperforming young men and the latter are prone to insecurity, indecision, immaturity, discouragement, moral impotence and an incapacity for genuine spousal, vocational and paternal commitment. This crisis in virility or paternity is, in my view, the defining calamity of our age. Thirdly, young women, as they excel in the marketplace of success, imbibe an ethos that is "macho" in the worst sense and become alienated from the inherent worth of their own femininity. Their maternal instincts are resilient and irrepressible so that the "crisis of femininity" is nowhere near the gravity of the "crisis of masculinity." But our young women are over-achieving and over-stressed and deprived of the support, rest and peace that they deserve and need. Nervous, restless and anxious, they are unable to provide our families and communities with the fruits of feminine restfulness: peace, joy, and the well-being of beauty. Fourth, the anxiety about performance in the workplace, now shared by men and women, depletes the instincts and energies germane to procreation as children, especially more than one or two, are perceived as threats to career advancement, rather than blessings. And so, the contraceptive or sterile ethos, monotonous and toxic, comes to dominate. Fifth, career success, in contrast to the fruitfulness of the marital or religious vocation, is seen as a self-achievement rather than a partnership with God in which we are responsive and receptive rather than autonomous and initiatory. Insidiously and subtly, then, professional advancement can corrode one's trust and reliance upon God. Sixth, obsessional focus upon one's individual professional advancement can inadvertently distract from relational bonds: marriage, family, Church and community. And so, we see some of our most successful people, often seen as "role models," leaving in the wake of their triumphant procession the wreckage of broken marriages, families and friendships. Seventh, those of us who, for whatever reason, cannot perform at all in the marketplace, become devalued, are marginalized and become invisible like people in boarding homes. Eighth, all of us, winners and losers, lose a sense of our own fundamental worth as children of God, regardless of rank and rating in the marketplace. Careerism, largely unrecognized, is a fundamental spiritual sickness of our society. Lord, in your mercy, deliver us from careerism!

Feminine (not Feminist) Responsivity to and Receptivity of the Masculine Priesthood

You have to either love it...or hate it: the male priesthood. In the world in which I came of age, everyone loved priests: every boy wanted to be one at some time or another. Women, but especially mothers, especially adored priests. The admiration and affection was reciprocated: every priest loved his mother, motherhood in general and women. The greatest joy for a mother was to have her son become a priest. Cathoic culture largely energized out of a sexual but chaste dynamic of mutual attraction and admiration between priests and mothers. The weak spot in all of this was that lay men, fathers and husbands, were busy with other things and largely marginalized in regard to church life. Priests, many of them veterans of the war, were remarkably secure in their masculinity as well as their chastity and were tenderly, deeply appreciative of femininity and maternity. And so there was a marvelous interaction of affirmation and admiration: the woman in awe of the male priest and the priest honoring the femininity of mothers. All of our great Catholic women saints, canonized and uncanonized, reflected this profound self-confidence in their value as women and responded gratefully, appreciatively to the masculine priesthood: Mother Theresa, Dorothy Day, Catherine Doughterty, Adrienne von Speyr, St. Faustin, St. Theresa Benedicta of the Cross, and the list goes on. The idea that a woman would be a priest was as thinkable as that a man would be inseminated by another man, would conceive, give birth and nurse a child. The profound sense of gender difference was infused with admiration and reverence. This changed in the gender revolution of the 60-70s with the emergence of feminism as resentment: resentment at difference, disparagement of femininity as such, and envy of the status and privileges of masculinity. Flight from Woman, the profound book by Karl Stern, illuminates modernity as a disgust with femininity as such. With this contempt for femininity, women had no option other than a mimetic rivalary with men: we want everything that you men have, especially the priesthood. Paternity, as life-giving and protective, became reconstructed as paternalism, as oppressive, selfish, destructive. I have spent my entire 65 years with pious, practicing Catholics and I have never met a woman that wanted to be a priest. I doubt that the thought would even occur, in a real way, to any of my daughters, sisters or friends. Neverheless, an ideology of deconstructed gender, of homogeneity, and an unrecognized disparagement of the feminine spread like a pandemic throughout the 70s so that today many well-intended, intelligent Catholics despise their Church's priesthood as chauvinist, misogynist and unjust. The truth is the opposite: the Catholic Church is the strongest champion of women and of femininity. Indeed, the Church understands herself, and each of us individually, men and women, as feminine...and passionately loved by Christ our Groom, especially through his donative, sanctifying, authoritative masculine priesthood. You have got to love it!

Warrior Beauties

"You are the Glory of Jerusalem, the surpassing joy of Israel; You are the splendid boast of our people." Judith 15:9 The morning prayer for today associates our Blessed Mother with Judith, the fierce beauty who delivered her people by cutting off the head of the invader Holofernes. We have here a distinctive icon of femininity: beautiful, maternal and yet fierce, fearless and relentless in combat. We find the same image in the popular contemporary movie "Hunger Games" in which Katniss, the heroine, is herself an almost invincible competitor, hunter, and fighter even as her aggressiveness is entirely framed and infused by her maternal protectiveness, first of her little sister who is originally chosen for the pathological gladiator contest and later for a younger competitor whom she shields. Like Judith, her virility is expressive of her maternity. I think of the women in my life (wife, mother, sisters, daughters, friends): beautiful, sublimely feminine/maternal, and yet strong, confident and competent due to an inner character of steal. Our Catholic Church has always honored such virile femininity: St. Joan of Ark who delivered the King; St. Catherine of Sienna who instructed popes, kings and cardinals; St. Teresa of Avila who mentored St. John of the Cross. It is interesting that the Protestants reject the book of Judith, as well as Maccabees with its martyr-mother, as non-canonical: in that non-catholic, de-gendered version of Christianity (no Mother Church, no fatherly pope or priests), there is no place for such powerful, quintessentially feminine figures. Such women, and countless consecrated women throughout the ages since the very first virgin-martyrs, do not need a husband or father to protect them, not because they are "empowered women," but because they are in the deepest mystical union with the Great Bridegroom Himself, our Savior. I recall the joy with which I watched my daughters compete in athletics. Clare, the most skilled, played high school basketball with a remarkable athlete named Angela Zampella (who went on to set records at St. Joseph's University and play professionally in Europe.) Clare herself was a fierce, determined competitor, but Angela was extraordinary: strong, focused, and relentless on the basketball court. Yet, neither of them ever sacrificed any of their feminine graciousness: they appeared inviolate and immaculate in regard to resentment, jealousy, whining, self-pity or revenge. By some miracle, they were virile and yet feminine. It strikes me that the Church has always recognized that as we become who we are created to be, precisely as men and women, we become more like angels in that we combine the strength of virility with the tenderness of femininity, but always in accord with our constitutive gendered identity. Although by profession I manage a residence for women, I do not much worry about them because I sense about femininity a profound resiliency, connectedness, and gentle strength. I worry about us men: we are insecure and therefore prone to extremes of violence and cowardice. And things are getting worse as our culture becomes increasing matriarchial and younger women out-perform men in almost every arena. How are we men, in our fragility, to relate to such powerful women. A clue in given in the book of Maccabees by the marvelous mother martyr who exhorts her sons to accept torture and death rather than renounce their faith. We men, as we contemplate our heavenly Mother, the great female saints and the marvelous women who surround us, can be ourselves aroused to such tender yet courageous fidelity.