It is becoming clear that maybe one of the habits of ancient Christendom fell by the wayside and that is a source of our problems in the Church.
I am referring to detachment. It is the actual use of the world’s goods without being obsessed or attached to them and only using those goods of the world that are necessary. In our rich, American economy, detachment seems old-fashioned.
When we practice detachment, then we disengage from that which can easily consume us so that we may be more engaged with the things of Christ. For example, it is the act of pursuing financial gain for the purpose of need and to the level of need and not as a sign of success or to be comfortable.
In our country today, financial gain and its trappings are the signs of success. Christ gives us a mandate to evangelize the world and we cannot do that if we are just like everyone else.
Dorothy Day taught that to evangelize the poor you had to be like them, to evangelize the rich, you had to be unlike them. We as leaders of the Church must detach from anything that leads us to be attached to the riches of our culture if that leads us to be an ersatz disciple of Christ.
This does not mean to live as luddites but it does mean that we need to live differently than others.
For example, one of the latest trends in our country today is cord cutting. It is recognizing that if you have cable in your house, you are paying for a host of channels you are not watching. That is a waste. People will boast of having 168 channels but do not watch a vast majority. You are paying for a luxury for you are consuming what you do not need.
There are many services that provide programming that is free or with the internet for a minimal price, this allows you to pay for what you watch and not what you do not watch or do not need to watch.
One of the great issues in our country is consuming pornography. The use of pornography in all its forms is a form of attachment. It is consuming that which is of the world that deters one from seeking Christ. Many will tell you that every person engages in pornography. That is not true, but you are a Catholic you have no reason to view porn. Indeed, in light of the current issues in the Church there is an admonition: Not every person who looks at pornography is a rapist, but every rapist looks at pornography. I assure you at the bottom of all the problems of sex in our Church is pornography.
However, that is one of the many forms of attachment that has no place in a Catholic community.
The question for our times that defines this lack of appreciation for this ancient virtue is: “What do we do with priests engaged in consensual sex?”
Are you kidding me? You must mean a priest who does not seek holiness and who does not understand the need to embrace and seek Christ over all other desires. He does not practice detachment.
Examine your lives as Catholics and begin to understand and practice the ancient virtue of detachment which is to seek that which we need and to eliminate from our lives that which we do not need all in the interest of serving Christ more and more every day.
photo: Santa Maria Gloriosa dei Frari [CC BY-SA 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0)]
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