Since reading Yuval Levin's A Time to Build (2020), I am a fervent institutionalist! I am a flaming believer! It is institutions that transcend the finite individual and all the vagaries of time and change to preserve, for all of us, and our descendants, the embodied-stable- reliable-promising presences of the True, the Good, the Beautiful!
Additionally, we are ourselves, in our loyalty and service to institutions, shaped, disciplined, purified, transformed into disciplined-generous-sacrificial-noble-humble-collegial-sometimes-heroic moral actors.
Institutions are under assault in our time from many corners. First, we have fluidity and constant change and a dreadful sense of inevitable impermanence. Second, we have at the top of society the narcissistic cult of celebrity whereby leaders and prominent personalities utilize institutions (e.g. Presidency, Senate, etc.) to call attention to themselves, disrespectful of the institution which they are supposed to serve. Thirdly, we have the breakdown of community at every level, from family cohesion to wholesome patriotism, and the isolation of the lonely, alienated Self. Forth, there is the widespread "victim complex" and suspicion that all institutions are always vehicles of oppression. Lastly, the decline of our society into moral decadence has especially afflicted institutions; as the degeneration of the same has propelled the downward spiral. Individualism prevails; institutions are in decline.
Imagine a human life bereft of institutions: disconnected from community, present-past-future; bereft of memory, history, tradition, hope; free of habit, routine, schedule, regularity; isolated in the present, possibly before a screen, consuming food/alcohol/narcotics in loneliness...Hell on Earth!
In a genuinely prophetic delivery, Levin calls for us to return to the humble, loyal, self-effacing, generous servant of the institution...of whatever kind.
An Institutional Autobiography
With that in mind, in an exercise of grateful remembrance, I recall the institutions that have formed me, that have protected and provide for me what is True, Good and Beautiful.
You will have little interest, dear Reader, in the following details. But I invite you to a similar recall, in gratitude, of the specific institutions that have formed you.
Childhood and Youth: (1947-65)
Roman Catholic Church (son of);
Laracy-Gallagher-Remmele Families (son, husband, brother, grandson, nephew, cousin, uncle, in-law, grandfather);
USA (citizen); St. John's Parish and Elementary School, Orange, NJ; United Auto Workers (my father a union organizer); Seton Hall Prep, South Orange, NJ; Newark Evening News (paperboy); Pal's Pancake House (busboy); Crestmont Country Club (caddy, greenkeeper); Seton Hall University (summer maintenance job); Rheingold Beer (truck helper).
Late Adolescence: (1965-70) Democratic Party ; Maryknoll College Seminary, Glen Ellyn, Il; CIDOC Language Institute, Cuernavaca, Mexico; Student Service Summer Project, Tlaxscala, Mexico.
Young Adulthood (1970-7)Woodstock Theologate, NYC; Puerto Rican Community Development Project (ESL teacher); Xavier Jesuit H.S. (teacher); Marriage and Children; United Farm Workers (supporter volunteer), St. Mary's H.S. (teacher); St. Aloysius Parish (liason with Spanish-speaking; ; Christ the King Charismatic Prayer Group; Cursillo; Marriage Encounter.
Middle Age (1977- 2022) Jersey City Resident and Homeowner; Republican Party; United Parcel Service (employee 25 years); Teamster's Union; Knights of Columbus; Communio Theological Journal Discussion Group; St. Paul's Parish (parishioner, CCD teacher); St. Paul's School (religion teacher); Greenville Little League (coach); Rutgers MBA Program; Seton Hall University (M.A.); Union Theological Seminary (doctoral program); St. Peter's College (adjunct); Caldwell College (adjunct); Neocatechumenal Way . Participant in Men's Bible Study, Camino pilgrimage to Santiago de Compestela, 12-step meetings, Recovery Meetings (for the nervous), Suicide Survivor Support Group. Immaculate Conception H.S.; Magnificat Home; Our Lady's Missionaries of the Eucharist.
Old Age (2022-Present)St. Mother Teresa of Calcutta Parish; St. Mother of Teresa Parish CCD; Jersey Shore Hospital Spiritual Care (volunteer chaplain); Catholic Communion Ministry to Ocean County Jail; Bradley Beach Resident and Homeowner
That is 54 institutions. 8 schools at which I studied. 9 schools at which I taught. 18 Church groups (not counting schools.) I have been formed by and contributed to, above all: the Church, my family, and Catholic education.
Catholic Intuition on Institutions
This refreshing, striking proposal in favor of institutions from Jewish moralist, Yuval Levin, is connatural to the Catholic heart and mind. Anthropologically Catholics understand that the human person requires stability, continuity, habit, intergenerational communion, tradition, permanence, community, a pedagogy in virtue, memory, intelligibility, rule of law, and the embodiment, the enfleshment, the institutionalization of the True, the Good and the Beautiful. Even more, in our fallen state we desperate need guardrails, fences, commandments to protect us. We believe that the etrnal, transcendent, Triune God has institutionalized himself in the Church of Jesus Christ. No one is more pro-institutional than the Catholic. Yes, even in the face of all the human evil, sin, error. Notwithstanding all the corruption, perversion, domination, dehumanization...certain institutions are inherently good, coming from the hand of God. Primarily two: the family and the Church. After them, we have the entire civilizational legacy that expresses and elaborates our faith heritage and all good human values coherent with it.
And so, the greatest human institution is the Catholic Church, the physical-institutional continuance in history as the body of Jesus himself.
Flowing from this organic, structural, living body we find the entire civilizational legacy of the West and specifically the USA: rule of law, liberties, science, culture and so much more.
It bears emphasis that the institutional Church and the immense civilizational network to which she gave birth is a living organism, not a dead skeleton, that breathes, changes, moves, flowers and bears fruit, continuous with the past, ever youthful, surprising, serendipitous.
Best Institutions: Countdown
So, what are the greatest institutions, within our Catholic, Western, American tradition? What would a Fleckinstein essay be without a top-ten list? I offer my favorites.
24. Childhood games, rhymes, riddles, dances handed down through the generations without adult presence.
23 Holidays, holy days, family vacations.
22. Sports and competition at all levels, especially the most local, casual, informal: pick-up basketball, stickball, handball, chess game in park.
21. International NGOs and non-profits of all sizes that serve the needy, work for peace, and advance the good, the true and the beautiful.
20. Celebrative, joyful ethnic and family traditions around cuisine and prudent use of alcohol.
19. US military, DOJ, FBI, local police, fire, crossing guards...who protect us in a vicious world.
18. US Constitution including all our freedoms, rule of law, democracy, separation of powers, federalism.
17. Private property, free markets, trade unions, regulative state.
16. Legacies of culture, art, music, literature, philosophy.
15. Circles of learning, inquiry and education including schools, journals and others.
14. Religious institutes, renewal movements, organizations.
13. Catholic sacramentals, Church buildings, devotions including rosary, pilgrimages, holy hours, retreats, devotion to the saints, bible groups, hymns.
12. Magisterium of the Church together with teachings of fathers, doctors, saints and mystics.
11. Consecrated life of poverty, chastity and obedience in community.
10. Organized engagement in the corporal and spiritual Works of Mercy.
9. Initiation rites into mature virility, informal and formal, which have collapsed in our world, largely causing the Crisis of Masculinity that plagues our culture.
8. Identity, mission, charism, rituals and roles of masculinity/femininity.
7. Bible.
6. Sacrament of Anointing of the Sick.
5. Sacrament of Confession/Absolution/Reparation.
4. Sacrament of Holy Orders: including entire hierarchical economy of episcopacy, papacy, etc.
3. Sacrament of Matrimony: including entire Cult of conjugal fidelity, chastity, unity/procreativity, paternity/maternity, spousality, filiality.
2. Sacraments of Baptism/Confirmation: absolution from sin, union with Christ in the Church, infilling of the Holy Spirit.
1. Eucharist: actual, corporeal/spiritual presence of Jesus himself.
Conclusion
Let us ponder, dear Reader, the fabulous wealth we have received here.
Let us do a gratitude litany of those that have most formed you to this point.
If you are older, consider those you have happily served.
If you are younger, ask the guidance of the Holy Spirit about where you may contribute. Do so humbly, anonymously, perseveringly. And do not be afraid to start a new institution if you are so led.
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