A Contrite Heart You Will Not Scorn

As my sidebar bio says, I have traditionalist and neo-traditionalist sympathies. We traditional types must always guard ourselves from succumbing to Pharisaic tendencies. It's easy for the pious and overly-devotional (POD) to look down their noses at the progressives sharing the pew with them. This Sunday's gospel reading gave me an idea for a modern retelling of a parable for Pharisaical Catholics. Wisdom! Be attentive!

This is parable is for some who trust in themselves that they are righteous and despise others: "Two men went up into the temple to pray, one a traditionalist and the other a progressive. The traditionalist stood and prayed thus with himself, `God, I thank thee that I am not like other men, ultra-feminists, pro-choicers, divorcees, or even like this progressive. I go to mass seven days a week, I give tithes of all that I get.'  But the progressive, standing far off, would not even lift up his eyes to heaven, but beat his breast, saying, `God, be merciful to me a sinner!' I tell you, this man went down to his house justified rather than the other; for every one who exalts himself will be humbled, but he who humbles himself will be exalted."

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About Funky Dung

Who is Funky Dung? 29-year-old grad student in Intelligent Systems (A.I.) at the University of Pittsburgh. I consider myself to be politically moderate and independent and somewhere between a traditional and neo-traditional Catholic. I was raised Lutheran, spent a number of years as an agnostic, and joined the Catholic Church at the 2000 Easter Vigil. Why Funky Dung? I haven't been asked this question nearly as many times as you or I might expect. Funky Dung is a reference to an obscure Pink Floyd song. On the album Atom Heart Mother, there is a track called Atom Heart Mother Suite. It's broken up into movements, like a symphony, and one of the movements is called Funky Dung. I picked that nickname a long time ago (while I was still in high school I think), shortly after getting an internet connection for the first time. To me it means "cool/neat/groovy/spiffy stuff/crap/shiznit", as in "That's some cool stuff, dude!" Whence Ales Rarus? I used to enjoy making people guess what this means, but I've decided to relent and make it known to all. Ales Rarus is a Latin play on words. "Avis rarus" means "a rare bird" and carries similar meaning to "an odd fellow". "Ales" is another Latin word for bird that carries connotations of omens, signs of the times, and/or augery. If you want to get technical, both "avis" and "ales" are feminine (requiring "rara", but they can be made masculine in poetry (which tends to breaks lots of rules). I decided I'd rather have a masculine name in Latin. ;) Yeah, I'm a nerd. So what? :-P Wherefore blog? It is my intention to "teach in order to lead others to faith" by being always "on the lookout for occasions of announcing Christ by word, either to unbelievers . . . or to the faithful" through the "use of the communications media". I also act knowing that I "have the right and even at times a duty to manifest to the sacred pastors [my] opinion on matters which pertain to the good of the Church, and [I] have a right to make [my] opinion known to the other Christian faithful, with due regard to the integrity of faith and morals and reverence toward [my and their] pastors, and with consideration for the common good and the dignity of persons." (adapted from CCC 904-907) Statement of Faith I have been baptized and confirmed in the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. I, therefore, renounce Satan; I renounce all his works; I renounce all his allurements. I hold and profess all that is contained in the Apostles' Creed, the Niceno- Constantinopolitan Creed, and the Athanasian Creed. Having been buried with Christ unto death and raised up with him unto a new life, I promise to live no longer for myself or for that world which is the enemy of God but for him who died for me and rose again, serving God, my heavenly Father, faithfully and unto death in the holy Catholic Church. I am obedient to the Magisterium of the Catholic Church. That is, I promote and defend authentic Catholic Teaching and Faith in union with Christ and His Church and in union with the Holy Father, the Bishop of Rome, the Successor of St. Peter. Thanks be unto Thee, O my God, for all Thy infinite goodness, and, especially, for the love Thou hast shown unto me at my Confirmation. I Give Thee thanks that Thou didst then send down Thy Holy Spirit unto my soul with all His gifts and graces. May He take full possession of me for ever. May His divine unction cause my face to shine. May His heavenly wisdom reign in my heart. May His understanding enlighten my darkness. May His counsel guide me. May His knowledge instruct me. May His piety make me fervent. May His divine fear keep me from all evil. Drive from my soul, O Lord, all that may defile it. Give me grace to be Thy faithful soldier, that having fought the good fight of faith, I may be brought to the crown of everlasting life, through the merits of Thy dearly beloved Son, our Savior, Jesus Christ. Amen. Behind the Curtain: an Interview With Funky Dung (Thursday, March 03, 2005) I try to avoid most memes that make their way 'round the blogosphere (We really do need a better name, don't we?), but some are worth participating in. Take for instance the "interview game" that's the talk o' the 'sphere. I think it's a great way to get to know the people in neighborhood. Who are the people in your neighborhood? In your neighborhod? In your neigh-bor-hoo-ood...*smack* Sorry, Sesame Street flashback. Anyhow, I saw Jeff "Curt Jester" Miller's answers and figured since he's a regular reader of mine he'd be a good interviewer. Without further ado, here are my answers to his questions. 1. Being that your pseudonym Funky Dung was chosen from a Pink Floyd track on Atom Heart Mother, what is you favorite Pink Floyd song and why? Wow. That's a tuffy. It's hard to pick out a single favorite. Pink Floyd isn't really a band known for singles. They mostly did album rock and my appreciation of them is mostly of a gestalt nature. If I had to pick one, though, it'd be "Comfortably Numb". I get chills up my spine every time I hear it and if it's been long enough since the last time, I get midty-eyed. I really don't know why. That's a rather unsatisfying answer for an interview, so here are the lyrics to a Rush song. It's not their best piece of music, but the lyrics describe me pretty well.

New World Man He's a rebel and a runner He's a signal turning green He's a restless young romantic Wants to run the big machine He's got a problem with his poisons But you know he'll find a cure He's cleaning up his systems To keep his nature pure Learning to match the beat of the old world man Learning to catch the heat of the third world man He's got to make his own mistakes And learn to mend the mess he makes He's old enough to know what's right But young enough not to choose it He's noble enough to win the world But weak enough to lose it --- He's a new world man... He's a radio receiver Tuned to factories and farms He's a writer and arranger And a young boy bearing arms He's got a problem with his power With weapons on patrol He's got to walk a fine line And keep his self-control Trying to save the day for the old world man Trying to pave the way for the third world man He's not concerned with yesterday He knows constant change is here today He's noble enough to know what's right But weak enough not to choose it He's wise enough to win the world But fool enough to lose it --- He's a new world man...
2. What do you consider your most important turning point from agnosticism to the Catholic Church. At some point in '99, I started attending RCIA at the Pittsburgh Oratory. I mostly went to ask a lot of obnoxious Protestant questions. Or at least that's what I told myself. I think deep down I wanted desperately to have faith again. At that point I think I'd decided that if any variety of Christianity had the Truth, the Catholic Church did. Protestantism's wholesale rejection of 1500 years of tradition didn't sit well with me, even as a former Lutheran. During class one week, Sister Bernadette Young (who runs the program) passed out thin booklet called "Handbook for Today's Catholic". One paragraph in that book spoke to me and I nearly cried as I read it.
"A person who is seeking deeper insight into reality may sometimes have doubts, even about God himself. Such doubts do not necessarily indicate lack of faith. They may be just the opposite - a sign of growing faith. Faith is alive and dynamic. It seeks, through grace, to penetrate into the very mystery of God. If a particular doctrine of faith no longer 'makes sense' to a person, the person should go right on seeking. To know what a doctrine says is one thing. To gain insight into its meaning through the gift of understanding is something else. When in doubt, 'Seek and you will find.' The person who seeks y reading, discussing, thinking, or praying eventually sees the light. The person who talks to God even when God is 'not there' is alive with faith."
At the end of class I told Sr. Bernadette that I wanted to enter the Church at the next Easter vigil. 3. If you were a tree what kind of, oh sorry about that .. what is the PODest thing you have ever done? I set up WikiIndex, a clearinghouse for reviews of theological books, good, bad, and ugly. It has a long way to go, but it'll be cool when it's finished. :) 4. What is your favorite quote from Venerable John Henry Newman? "Ten thousand difficulties do not make one doubt." 5. If you could ban one hymn from existence, what would it be? That's a tough one. As a member of the Society for a Moratorium on the Music of Marty Haugen and David Haas, there are obviously a lot of songs that grate on my nerves. If I had to pick one, though, I'd probably pick "Sing of the Lord's Goodness" by Ernie Sands.

20 thoughts on “A Contrite Heart You Will Not Scorn

  1. Jerry Nora

    And where does that go, when someone says that another person isn’t a Christian? I’ve often heard people say that other people are incorrect in their interpretations (and you, sir, are hardly shy about saying when you think other people are wrong, yet we seem to be able to do with it ;)), but I’m not sure to what extent the disagreement is amongst the vast majority of Christians regarding forgiveness. Do you have some concrete data on this, and moreover, perhaps show us how that particular level of disagreement undermines the authority of the Bible?

  2. steve

    BTW, Theo, your indictment:

    And there are more kinds of Christianity now than ever before. It’s almost impossible to be a Christian without actively choosing the theological version you prefer (or at least rationalizing why you’re sticking with your parents’ religion). That’s not an authoritative faith. It’s a faith that reflects your own interests and desires. Hey, it’s Christianity! Get out whatever you put in!

    … is dead on. It is now clear to me what you meant by saying something to the effect that your worldview fits in nicely with some Christian’s viewpoints. But surely you must realize that such a viewpoint is unstable. I.e., it is precisely not a “Christian” (at least if the term is going to denote any coherent thing at all) viewpoint at all. And it is precisely this consumer-driven (try Jesus and you’ll feel good) mentality that many Christians are fighting in their own various (usually American) church cultures. For one, it’s not a recognizable form of Christianity, and second, it’s patently and demonstrably false.

    Bye for now…

  3. theomorph

    But the atheist, who stood by watching, smirked and wondered aloud, “How come both of those guys passed me by like I was invisible and neither of them wants to hang around with me like an ordinary human being, but they are more concerned about differentiating themselves according to a doctrinal taxonomy?”

    Then Jesus, who was standing next to the atheist, said, “I dunno. So who do you think I am?”

    The atheist thought about this. Then he said, “Doesn’t matter what I think. You are who you are.”

    Jesus laughed and slapped the atheist on the back. “At least you’re honest! See that guy there?” Jesus pointed at the progressive. “He doesn’t realize that his sins are already forgiven. And that other guy”–Jesus indicated the traditionalist–“well, he’s too concerned with the finer points of divine protocol to see that he is already permeated with that Other to whom he thinks he is speaking as if it were a person. He forgets that the only human faces are on other human beings.”

    Then Jesus and the atheist broke bread together and had a fine time while the traditionalist and the progressive worried away the rest of the afternoon.

    😉

  4. theomorph

    Hey Jesus is the guy who forgave prostitutes and adulteresses, hung around with “sinners and tax collectors,” and heaped scorn on the religious leaders of his day. Don’t go turning him into some kind of holier-than-thou parody, because that’s the kind of people he criticized.

  5. theomorph

    Hey, I didn’t say genocide isn’t real, or that violent crimes aren’t real, or that exploitation isn’t real. However, I do think the absolute, abstract qualities of “good” and “evil” as applied to any given act are not real.

    Since when is the Bible “filled with virtually nothing but absolute moral certitude, divine judgement and blessing”? This is the book that says “thou shalt not kill” right alongside “stone disobedient children.” This is the book that condemns adultery, but whose star figure Jesus forgives an adulteress and diplomatically shrugs off her suspect accusers. Is that “moral certitude”?

    And what is so divine in the judgment of a God who first destroys a world for its sin, but then, when sin proliferates again, comes down and, in essence, commits suicide at the hands of his sinful creations, then promises to immolate the whole thing at the end anyway? Sounds to me more like a strange, psychotic being at the end of his wits. For God so loved the world, indeed.

    That the scriptures have only one incontestable meaning is an assertion that defies all of Christian history as well as the reality of diversity within the church today. Doesn’t matter whether you’re a fundamentalist Baptist or a traditionalist Catholic–claiming that there is only One True Understanding of The Faith and that It is Yours is a pretty vain conceit, in my opinion.

    Not that I mean any kind of personal insult. Plenty of people think my atheism is a vain conceit, too. 😉 But I’m pretty amenable to other points of view so long as they neither pick my nor break my leg, as Thomas Jefferson said. Good guy, that TJ. Or, as Morpheus put it in that awful sequel to The Matrix, my beliefs do not require other people to believe them, too.

  6. Funky Dung

    I dig your story, but I must take issue with a couple points. Yes, we are already forgiven, but God wants us to confess our sins and be repentant. You should have learned that during your time as a Christian. It’s all throughout Scripture. As for the “Other” not being a person, I point to the Trinity. In particular, Christ took the form of a human person. Also, we are created in God’s image and likeness. God does have a human face.

  7. Leo Wong

    I doubt if Jesus and the atheist had a fine time together. Jesus wanted to tell about his Father’s kingdom, while the atheist wanted to argue his unbelief. Also, the atheist smirks (“to smile in a conceited, knowing or complacent way”); he is thus too much like the Parisee for anyone to enjoy being with him.

  8. Tom

    I kind of have to watch that too. Frequently I’ll look down upon the sort of praise & worshippy spirituality that many of the other Newman rats have. As someone who attends the Old Mass somewhat regularly, says the Rosary, and, I’m halfway ashamed to say, recites Latin prayers on occasion, I am in danger of spiritual elitism in a big way.

  9. theomorph

    Sure, but there are lots of countervailing tendencies within Christianity. Maybe God wants people to repent, but God invented the concept of “sin” by defining it as the knowledge between good and evil. Seems to me that plays pretty well into my worldview where good and evil are just imaginary categories that don’t really mean anything. How do you know God doesn’t want people to move beyond sin? No good or evil means no knowledge of them means no sin. Doesn’t mean you can’t be a jerk, just means you don’t worry about your theological categorization or the state of some “eternal soul” based on which finger you showed to the guy in the other car.

    Then there’s the trinity thing. If God-in-the-abstract has a human face, what was the point of the incarnation? And what’s that bit from Jesus about “whatsoever you do unto the least of my brethren you do unto me” and so on? There’s plenty of room within the scripture to interpret things as I have.

    It’s funny, I didn’t have a hard time making the leap to atheism after I discovered the diversity of Christian thought. There are loads of Christians who are basically the same as I am, except they just use different words to talk about life, the universe, and everything.

  10. theomorph

    The other problem with the “creed defense” is that creeds themselves do not show up as a necessary element of Christianity in the original source literature (i.e., the New Testament). (In fact, now that I think of it, the idea of “Christianity” as an institution does not even show up in the New Testament. It’s really more of an anti-institution than anything. Of course, when you think Jesus is coming back in just a few years, you don’t really need any institutions, do you?)

    There have been branches of Christianity that have pointed out the non-creedal nature of New Testament Christianity, too. My own cultural and intellectual heritage is in one of them, the Anabaptists. And even though the originally-Anabaptist church I grew up in has basically turned into the standard white-bread-protestant-evangelical thing, as recently as about ten years ago there was resistance to the recitation of the Nicene Creed during services, because it’s not “scriptural.” That’s a legacy of their Anabaptist roots. (Meanwhile, the relative newcomers couldn’t figure out why this apparently decent creed had anything wrong with it.)

    Recall, also, that the Nicene Creed was, in part, specifically created to counter the Arian “heresy” that Jesus and the Father were not of the same substance. Note further that this question is left entirely in the air by the NT scriptures themselves. Jesus never says outright what he is. God never comes down and clarifies. There are no declarative statements in the NT that add up to “of one Being with the Father.” It’s a philosophical question that the authors of the NT apparently didn’t think to write about explicitly. So they convene a council at Nicaea to nail this down. Which raises the question of how you know a council and its decision are valid and according to what standard.

    At this point, you have to start talking about various types of scriptural canon. Orthodox, Catholics, and Protestants all have a different canon, and they all have different related literature that they rank in different ways. How can any outside observer look at the different branches and different standards of canonicity and know which one (if any) is “correct”?

  11. steve

    Theo,

    Man, these discussions get time consuming, but I suppose they’re worth it.

    All of the “sects” you mention or allude to (viz., Catholics, Orthodox, Pentacostals, and hard-wooden-straight-sitting-dry-sermon-listeners) all uniformly agree on two things: The Apostles and Nicean Creeds. These form the sine qua non of Christianity. Yes, maybe 2% of self-titled “Christians” who ever lived don’t subscribe to these synopses. Well, the 98% got together and voted them out.

    The differences you observe reflect diversity within essential (if not organizational) unity. And hey, isn’t diversity supposed to be good thing?

    Yes any fool can read a book and misinterpret it. The wiser the fool, usually the bigger the error. So what? As I said, the vast, vast majority of Christians who have ever live give whole-hearted assent to Two (relatively) simple creeds–synopses of the stuff that Scripture does clearly teach.

    Surely even athiesm has a set of rules? At least the denotation must count for something… so it is with any worldview… at least if we want language to be a useful thing.

    Cheers!

  12. steve

    Theo:

    Most of the time, you make a great deal of sense. As for your Jesus and the athiest getting along just fine: It rings quite true. They’d probably go grab a beer. This is not to say that Jesus would think the athiest’s “all right”–Jesus came to say that everyone is not at all “all right” (especially those who thought they were), and to try and “fix” them.

    But this bit:

    Maybe God wants people to repent, but God invented the concept of “sin” by defining it as the knowledge between good and evil. Seems to me that plays pretty well into my worldview where good and evil are just imaginary categories that don’t really mean anything.

    does not make quite as much sense, on several fronts.

    – If sin, good, and evil are really nothing, then what is the actual thing that God wants us to repent from?

    – And if good and evil are imaginary categories, then the statement: “Genocide is evil” has all the moral force of “I dislike broccoli.” I.e., they are both mere feelings. How can reconcile that we (at least sane people) “feel” so much stronger about one than the other?

    This gets at the development of morality in culture, and, while I know there are plausible “just so” sorts of stories coming in from evolutionary psychology, it still remains to be answered why morality always (universally and in every culture) tells us to do the thing we do not want? And further, why the most “moral” person is usually the one who gives up the most survival advantage? How could such phenomena arise without an undergirding objective reality: Real Cosmic Good?

    Ask victims of violent crimes, children traded in exploitive slavery, survivors of the Rwandan genocide (even repentent participants for that matter) whether evil is real or imagined. I think we would find (at least anecdotally) that Real Cosmic Evil seems to exist–and oddly it exists in the same place where Real Cosmic Good was to some degree absent.

    Regarding:

    There’s plenty of room within the scripture to interpret things as I have.

    This is a bit of reach. And just where would that room be? It’s a book filled with virtually nothing but absolute moral certitude, divine judgement and blessing. I expect Christians to occasionally play fast and loose with scripture, but athiests? No way!

    Cheers!!

  13. Jerry Nora

    Theomorph, just a quick point (don’t have time for anything else).

    You found forgiving an adulteress a lack of moral certitude. I think we should clarify in that Jesus was quite clear that adultery was bad–at several points in the Gospel, He reaffirms the centrality of the Ten Commandments–but being God, He also had the ability to heal people of their sins and forgive them.

    When a physician gives you an antibiotic for pneumonia, that is no way denying that pneumonia is a bad disease, it is rather a way to destroy that disease’s hold on your body. Just so with sin and its effect on the whole person.

  14. Funky Dung

    Unfortunately, there’s a hole in Steve’s creed-based defense. We all might say the same creed, but we mean different things. Ask a Catholic what “communion of saints” means and then ask a Protestant the same question. Perhaps we need to start using the Athenacian creed again. It’s long and excruciatingly detailed, but there’s little wiggle room in it. 😉

  15. theomorph

    What I was getting at is redefining “Christian” so that people whose theology doesn’t match yours end up on the outside. Pat Robertson, John Spong, the Pope, and Benny Hinn all claim (and represent) the same Christian religion, but do they consider themselves on the same “team” so to speak? I’d love to see those four guys together in public.

    Yes, multiple interpretations absolutely undermine the authority of the Bible. When so many disagreeing people are all claiming to get their theological basis from the same book, and some of them are even claiming that it’s holy or infallible, how can anybody take it seriously? We might as well just go to the postmodern essay generator, whip up some new scriptures, and then see how many different kinds of religious practice we can get out of them.

    If the Bible is authoritative instead of whatever it seems to be (rorschach scriptures?) why is there such proliferation of faith and practice? Christians have almost never agreed on their beliefs. They’ve been calling each other heretics since day one. Then Paul’s perspective got canonized, and a theological center was hammered out, but it didn’t take long before people started arguing over that, too. It’s ridiculous. And there are more kinds of Christianity now than ever before. It’s almost impossible to be a Christian without actively choosing the theological version you prefer (or at least rationalizing why you’re sticking with your parents’ religion). That’s not an authoritative faith. It’s a faith that reflects your own interests and desires. Hey, it’s Christianity! Get out whatever you put in! And you all have the same book in the middle. Some authority that thing is.

    Then you get Catholics sitting around and claiming that their way is the true way, because they have the historical pedigree. Except the Orthodox say the same thing. Oh, wait, and so do the Protestants. Everywhere you turn around there’s some Christian waiting to tell you why all the other Christians are reading it wrong, and can’t they see how clear and unequivocal the scriptures are?

    But look at all the clear and unequivocal statements that are foisted on the scriptures:

    “Thou shalt not destroy embryos and harvest their stem cells.” Where is that?

    “Thou shalt accept women as equals.” Where is that?

    “Thou shalt follow the authority of the pope.” (Or, “Thou shalt not have a pope.”) Where is that?

    “Thou shalt ‘feel’ the Holy Spirit every week and jump around like a crazy person.” (Or, “Thou shalt sit up straight in hard wooden pews and listen to dry sermons every week.”) Where is that?

    On and on and on. None of this stuff is actually in the scriptures. About the only thing you can get unequivocally from the Bible is “don’t lie, steal, or kill.” But heck, you can get that from any religion. Or yo

  16. theomorph

    Yes, but since Jesus and “forgiveness,” there has ever after been little but conflict about what that means. Does it mean that every act is forgivable, or that every act is forgiven? You may believe it’s one way, but I can assure you that there is someone else who believes it’s the other, or something else entirely. Just sitting around and saying “that guy is wrong–that guy isn’t a TRUE Christian,” well, we all know where that goes.

    When it comes down to brass tacks, adultery (the specific sin you mentioned) is most objectionable to the people it hurts because it has hurt them, not because it has been declared a sin by God or the Bible or any other scripture. I see no reason to take my cues for morality from a theologically debatable book when I could just make my decisions according to my very real, undebatable, and inescapable circumstances.

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