What If I Told You That Jesus Came to Emancipate Religion?

"Nobody who fails to keep a tight rein on the tongue can claim to be religious; this is a mere self-deception; that person's religion is worthless. Pure, unspoilt religion, in the eyes of God our Father, is this: coming to the help of orphans and widows in their hardships, and keeping oneself uncontaminated by the world" James 1:26-27

I was going to just type out verse 27 above, but considering the source for this reflection, I thought the bit about reining in the tongue would be appropriate, too. There's this video going around right now. I'm sure you've heard of it. A guy wrote a poem about Jesus abolishing "religion" that's soared in popularity. Many people have really resonated with his message. Others have reacted pretty strongly against it. I fall pretty much in the second camp--hence the reflection.

Now, there are a lot of brilliant responses to Jefferson Bethke's video, and I'll include a couple of them at the end of this post. But their very existence certainly begs the question--why am I writing this blog? Many more talented and intelligent people have already done the work for me, after all. And I'm pretty sure this blogpost won't get 16 million viewers in a week's time! So why? I hope it's not for vainglory or a need to pick a fight. I just know that over that same week of 16 million views, I've had many conversations with people who haven't seen the responses that are out there, and who have been caused to question their religious beliefs based on Bethke's comments. So maybe my blog won't contribute much to the grand scheme of the "religion vs. Jesus" debate--but maybe it'll say something or reach somebody that might have gone unsaid or unreached otherwise. Oh--I was going to try to make it rhyme, but, well, I know where my strengths don't lie!

Now, my point with citing St. James' comments on bridling the tongue apply, to my mind, to Bethke's video in this regard: The words we speak can have damaging effects in ways that go beyond simply lying or insulting speech. In the case of this video, the damage occurs mainly through imprecise speech. The wrong or careless use of words leads to many harmful misunderstandings. If we give Jefferson Bethke the benefit of the doubt, we can appreciate that he was ranting against hypocritical self-righteous legalism, and not against "Religion" as such. But instead of actually ranting against "hypocritical self-righteous legalism", he simply calls it "religion." Instead of telling hypocrites, "Hey, you should be more religious!" he instead tells everyone else that they shouldn't be religious at all!

In Bethke's defence, he has specifically clarified that he wasn't intending to attack the Church, but only to attack those who don't practise what they preach:

If you are using my video to bash "the church" be careful. I was in no way intending to do that. My heart came from trying to highlight and expose legalism and hypocrisy. The Church is Jesus' bride so be careful how you speak of His wife. If a normal dude has right to get pissed when you bash His wife, it makes me tremble to think how great the weight is when we do it to Jesus' wife. The church is His vehicle to reach a lost word. A hospital for sinners. Saying you love Jesus but hate the Church, is like a fiancé saying he loves his future bride, but hates her kids. We are all under grace. Look to Him.

Unfortunately, though, the 16 million people who've watched his video aren't necessarily going to read his clarifications. He hasn't removed the video, or edited it to elaborate on and explain his clarifications. And so the message that "religion is bad" is still getting touted, and people are still left wondering whether they should leave the very Religion that Jesus Himself founded in order to seek Him better!

And that's where I have a problem!

See, contrary to what our post-modern rebellious, individualistic culture likes to think, "Organised Religion" isn't a bad thing. It's not about starting wars or building expensive church buildings to the detriment of the poor. It's not about defining how good you have to be before Jesus will love you. And it's certainly not about pompous, self-righteous hypocrites showing how holy they are by judging everyone else.

Religion, specifically the Christian Religion, is about helping us get to know and grow closer to God. It's not about having a list of rules and beliefs in order to limit our freedom, but precisely so that we can truly be free! When we know the boundaries, we can be free to live safely within them. That's what the Church is about! That's what a home is about--parents who raise you, who tell you when to go to bed and that you have to eat your vegetable; who tell you not to play in the street and not to hit your brother. The Church lays out certain things that we must believe and things that we must not believe, that we must do and that we must not do, in order to free us from the harm that we will otherwise do to ourselves and to others. It's a loving Church; a loving Family. Recently, Heather King put it this way:

Catholicism is not counter-cultural in that the world is liberal and Catholicism is conservative. It’s counter-cultural in that it is explosively, wildly, anarchically radical. Catholicism is our hearts, our bowels, our erotic energy, our lives! Catholicism is not some timid, rigid, dead set of rules. The whole purpose of the rules is to allow us to explode within them. To follow Christ, to be Catholic (or catholic-in-spirit) is to hover on the edge of metaphorical orgasm and to consent to continue to hover, indefinitely, in almost unbearable tension…which paradoxically allows us to break out in all kinds of other sublimely interesting, glorious directions and ways.

Consider a romantic relationship. Many who want to denigrate "religion" will contrast it with a "relationship with Jesus". But what does it mean to have a relationship? When a couple first begins that journey of falling in love, their desire to be with each other and know each other is insatiable. Their gestures of love and romance come naturally and spontaneously. At the same time, their desire to pledge themselves to each other exclusively, formally, and publically is also a natural, spontaneous part of being in love. But those early passionate feelings eventually wane. The "I love yous" and the flowers, the setting aside of special times for dates, the taking the time to eat together, to talk together, even to make love to each other, can end up seeming more and more like work. What once seemed like freedom now seems oppressively restrictive. If our attitude toward marriage is the same as the common evangelical or atheistic attitudes toward religion, then we will see very little point in sticking to our relationship with our spouse. After all, if a relationship is supposed to be about passionate love for my spouse, and I'm not getting that in this marriage, then let's end the marriage, right?

Religion, on the other hand, comes from that same stock of common sense that says, when in the humdrum of married life, we will stick it out and say our "I love yous" and make even more effort to really be good to each other--not because I feel like it, but because I truly want the best for my spouse. Love isn't about feelings; it's about actions. And we prove our love most by doing the actions especially when we don't feel like it. If the goal is a relationship with Jesus, then Religion is how we maintain that relationship during those times when we'd really rather not.

And the amazing thing is, those "Our Fathers", those Rosaries, those beautiful church buildings, and especially those Sacraments, actually serve not only to keep us going when we just don't feel like it, but more, they can rekindle those feelings, too!

The word "Religion" comes from the Latin re- ("again") and ligare (compare "ligament"). In sum, it refers to binding or joining together again. It images a triage. Since the Fall, we've lost that vital connection with God. The various religions throughout history have been our ways of staunching that wound in our souls; of fixing our dislocated spiritual joints. In Christianity, God Himself made that healing possible. Jesus Christ established the true healing Religion. He is the one who "binds up" our wounds, and He gave that binding and loosing authority to Peter and the Apostles, not so that they could lord it over us, but so that, through the ordaining of successors, that life-giving religion could be preserved and passed on throughout all generations!

Jesus didn't come to abolish religion! He came to set us free to be truly religious! Through His Grace, that is, through His very life communicated to us through the Sacraments, He has made us able to live the kind of free, full life that is ultimately at the core of who He made us to be. The very irony of our modern society's desire to be free, to be out from under the oppression of the "establishment" of religion, is that they're striving for the very freedom that True Religion provides--that passionate, explosive, orgasmic freedom!

As promised, here are a few of the great responses inspired by Bethke's video

What I Saw In Haiti: Chapter 8

Visitation

So, it's been ages since I've updated my Haiti story. It's been ages since I've done much blogging of any kind. Hopefully, I'll be able to rectify that in this new year, starting with this post! Things from this point will begin to be a bit less chronological, as much of what happened between Monday and Friday has become somewhat blurred in my memory. But Monday itself is pretty etched in my mind. It was an important day.

In his First Apology, St. Justin Martyr describes the celebration of the Christian Liturgy in great detail. Despite writing in c. AD 150, it describes what happens even today at every Catholic Mass. At the end of the 65th chapter, after describing the Liturgy, he mentions that Deacons would take the Eucharist to those who could not be at Mass for various reasons. While today, this ministry is performed by priests and deacons still, it has been opened up to certain commissioned laypeople as well, known as "Extraordinary Ministers of Holy Communion" (Priests and Deacons, of course, being "Ordinary" Ministers of Holy Communion).

In Beau-Sejour, there is a very elderly gentleman named Père Dodou, who was somewhere in his late 80s or early 90s. In a previous chapter, I mentioned the oldest man in the village, Tonton Jan, and how the respect he was afforded made him something akin to the mayor of Beau-Sejour. If Tonton Jan was the mayor, then Père Dodou was his deputy. Due to his advanced age, and the infirmity which accompanies it, Père Dodou could not make the trek to the church for Mass. One of his family members asked Père Ronal if he would bring the Eucharist to him. Père Ronal agreed, saying that he would bring it after the morning Mass on Monday. Father Bill was invited to come along, and he in turn invited any of the team who wanted to go--to which I enthusiastically agreed.

That Monday morning, I was roused by Fr. Bill outside the tent calling anyone in our tent who wanted to go to morning Mass to get up. I hastily got dressed, brushed my teeth, and hurried around to the front of the church (remember, our tent was directly behind the church--would that I lived so close to my parish now!) While Sunday Mass is in a more formal French, daily Mass was said in Créole--and so all the progress I thought I'd made in understanding Mass from Sunday was rendered rather useless. Nevertheless, the Mass is the Mass (and, by the end of the week, attending Daily Mass in Créole, I was managing to make some pretty good headway--even understanding large portions of the homilies!), and Jesus is truly present, whether I understand all the words.

After the event that was Sunday Mass, I was somewhat expecting the turnout at daily Mass to be larger. In this I was somewhat disappointed. It's rather comparable to the regular turnout in Canada. What did surprise and impress me, though, was how many men attended daily Mass! In Haiti, Catholicism isn't just a religion "for women and children". Not that it is here, either, despite the derisive epithets of the "enlightened".

After Mass, I joined Père Ronal and Fr. Bill as we prepared to visit Père Dodou. Accompanying two vested priests, as well as a few other Haitien men who were, if I recall correcctly, members of the Legion of Mary, seemed to me very like a scene out of the Ancient Church of St. Justin Martyr's day.

Père Dodou's home was something that we here would consider a hut. In fact, I'm pretty sure the Haitiens living in Port-au-Prince would consider it the same! It was a small, one story house of wood, with probably no more than three or four rooms. Beside it on his little property was a corn-mill, as well as a few chickens running about. Despite being a hut, though, Père Dodou's wife kept it immaculate. In the room we were in (I suppose one might call it the living room), the table was covered in white linen, and the floor newly swept. Père Dodou and his family were there, as were Père Ronal, Fr. Bill, the couple of gentlemen who came with us, and myself. I honestly didn't know what to expect. I suppose I thought that bringing the Eucharist to someone who couldn't make it to Mass simply involved showing up, giving them the Host, maybe praying a prayer, and then leaving. What actually happens is a whole mini-liturgy, where the Gospel is proclaimed, the Our Father is prayed together, and the Rite of Communion is carried out. I was struck by the beauty, the simplicity, and the reverence of it all. This was no mere external religious exercise. This really was bringing Jesus Himself to others!

When the Blessed Virgin Mary brought to Elizabeth our pre-natal Lord, John the Baptist leapt in Elizabeth's womb, and she blessed Our Lady and the Fruit of her womb. The experience of brining Jesus, similarly hidden in the Eucharist as He was then inside of His Mother, to Père Dodou, was an amazing blessing, not only for him, but also for me. It reaffirmed once again the truth that Jesus is truly Present in the Eucharist, and put a desire in my own heart to be able to bring Him to others who would otherwise miss out on Communion with Him due to their infirmity.

As a result of this visitation to Père Dodou, when I returned home, my wife and I took the training to become Extraordinary Ministers of Holy Communion, and I have been blessed again and again to be able to bring Our Precious Lord, and His peace and companionship to sick and lonely people in our parish community. The effects of our journey to Haiti continue to ripple out, both for the people of Beau-Sejour, and for the members of my team. May we continue to bless each other through this Twinning Project!

In our next chapter, I'll narrate some surprising results of Saturday's afternoon spent sketching the people of Beau-Sejour, as the team gets down to work!

Reconciliation

Image © 2011 Gregory Watson

Oil on Canvas. 16" x 20"

One of the most surprising joys of becoming a Catholic has been the Sacrament of Reconciliation (popularly known as "Confession"). I say "surprising", because the notion of having to tell one's sins to another human being grates against the pride and the shame that makes us want to hide the darker parts of our souls. That such a humiliating experience could be described as "joyful" is counter-intuitive, at best.

Yet, as St. James tells us, "God resists the proud, but gives grace to the humble" (James 4:6). It is in the very act of humbly confessing our sins that we are forgiven them. As the Psalmist wrote, "Because I was silent my bones grew old; whilst I cried out all the day long. For day and night thy hand was heavy upon me: I am turned in my anguish, whilst the thorn is fastened. I have acknowledged my sin to thee, and my injustice I have not concealed. I said I will confess against myself my injustice to the Lord: and thou hast forgiven the wickedness of my sin" (Psalm 31:3-5).

We believe that God has given the authority to forgive sins in His name to His priests (John 20:21-23; James 5:14-16). In the Sacrament of Reconciliation, they stand in persona Christi--in the very person of Christ. When we confess our sins, it is not the priest who is there, listening to us--but it is actually Christ Himself. I tried to depict this truth by representing Jesus in the priest's alb and purple stole, which is worn during the rite of Confession.

The image itself was inspired by my personal experience of Absolution in the Sacrament of Confession. My priest, immediately before the words of absolution, will often stand and place his hand on my head, and pray silently over me, finishing with an extemporaneous prayer about being at the foot of Calvary and having Jesus blood flowing down and washing me from the top of my head to the tips of my toes. After this prayer, he pronounces the blessing of absolution, and then the joy of this Sacrament is experienced--as I leave the Confessional filled with the grace, love, and forgiveness of Jesus!

The original painting is still available for sale!

Please email me at doubting-thomist @ hotmail . com or leave a comment here if you'd like to order any of the following:

• Original Oil Painting (20" x 16") (unframed): $450.00 (CAD)
• Full size (20" x 16") limited edition high quality giclée print (unframed): $40.00 (CAD)
• Full size (20" x 16") limited edition high quality giclée print (framed): $75.00 (CAD)
• Image on 4¼" x 5½" Greeting Card (blank): $1.50 (CAD)

Tulips

Image © 2010 Gregory Watson

Watercolour. 9" x 12"

I did this painting for a Watercolour class at Mohawk College. It's a straight-up still-life, done with only primary colours. Unfortunately for you, dear readers, my boss recently bought the original from me, so you'll have to content yourselves with high-quality prints.

This is perhaps the most popular painting that I've done, which I have to admit irks me just a little, since, being a simple still-life, it has very little by way of message or story behind it. So I really have nothing profound to say here regarding it! Ah well. See below for ordering details!

Please email me at doubting-thomist @ hotmail . com or leave a comment here if you'd like to order any of the following:

• Full size (9" x 12") limited edition high quality giclée print (unframed): $15.00 (CAD)
• Full size (9" x 12") limited edition high quality giclée print (framed): $35.00 (CAD)
• Image on 4¼" x 5½" Greeting Card (blank): $1.50 (CAD)

Mary Triptych

Images © 2011 Gregory Watson

Gouache on Paper. 5" x 7"

This is a three-part work done originally for a school project, where we had to represent the same image in three different colour schemes (monochrome, analogous, and split complementary). The three images together tell the story of conversion to Jesus Christ through His Mother, Mary.

"Our Lady of Sorrows" (monochrome blue)

The deep blues represent Mary at the foot of the Cross, as the "sword of sorrow" (cf. Luke 2:35) pierced her heart as her Son died for our sins. Her sorrow should lead us to our own sorrow for sin, and a desire for repentance.

"Refuge of Sinners" (analogous colours, blue-purple through red-orange)

Purple is the Church's liturgical colour signifying repentance, and red signifies the Blood of Christ shed for our sins that make forgiveness possible. Mary is referred to as the "refuge of sinners" because she desires our repentance and through her prayers leads us back to Jesus.

"Queen of Peace" (split complementary colours, Red, blue-green, yellow-green)

The greens evoke a peaceful feeling in this image, and remind us of the peace we find in union with Christ, through the Blood He shed for us (signified by the red). Mary's constant instruction to us now, as it was at the Wedding of Cana, to "Do whatever He tells you" (John 2:5), is the sure road to Peace.


Please email me at doubting-thomist @ hotmail . com or leave a comment here if you'd like to order any of the following:

• Set of 3 original paintings in a single frame (as pictured above): $100 (CAD)
  
  
• Set of 3 high quality giclée prints in a single frame (as pictured above): $40 (CAD)
  
  
• Any individual image (5" x 7") high quality giclée print (framed): $10 (CAD)
  
  
• Any individual image (5" x 7") high quality giclée print (unframed): $7
  (set of 3 unframed: $15) (CAD)
  
  
• Image on 4¼" x 5½" Greeting Card (blank): $1.50 (CAD)

Art Show and Price Adjustments

I had an art show this weekend. Sorry I didn't advertise it here--I've just been incredibly busy with a whole lot of craziness in my life this summer. You might get a post about all of that, if you're lucky! Anyway, as I prepared for the show and the pricing, I realised that the prices for prints on this blog are considerably higher than they were supposed to be! As such, I'll be adjusting those prices in the next day or so. My apologies for the error. As well, in the next week or so, I'll be adding new images to the blog--so if you were at the show and don't see something you saw there, it'll be up soon. And if you weren't, well, dear reader, you're in for a visual treat. Stay tuned!

What I Saw in Haiti: Chapter 7

Waaay Outside My Comfort Zone

I figure it's about time we got back to our ongoing serial adventure of my time in Haiti. Sorry for the hiatus. May was a busy month, and I was trying to get an article on the Eucharist written over at Barque of Peter which ended up taking all of June. In any event, I'm offering this particular chapter in loving memory of Père Ronal Fleurvil, the priest with whom we stayed down in Haiti. He died on Sunday, May 1, the Feast of Divine Mercy, after a virus he had contracted attacked his heart. May God welcome him into His glorious kingdom.

In the last chapter, I related our experience of Mass in Haiti, and the beautiful encounter with God and with the Haitian culture. It was for me, perhaps, the highlight of my trip to Beau-Sejour. On the other hand, what followed afterward struck mortal terror into the hearts of myself and at least a couple of the other members of the team. I kid you not that even after seeing 18-year-old security guards wielding rifles as big as they were, and playing chicken with UN tanks on the streets of Port-au-Prince; after surviving the harrowing drive up the mountain, and collapsing of heat exhaustion during the ensuing climb, this was the scariest part of our trip--at least for an introvert such as myself!

When we made our preparations and packed our luggage for Haiti, of the 10 bags that Air Canada let us bring down with us, roughly 8 of those bags were gifts for the Haitian people--especially the children. We brought schoolbags, shoes, clothes, toiletries, and toys in order to bless the people of this impoverished nation. The plan, such as it was, was to distribute these gifts after the Sunday Mass, when all the villagers would be in one central location. As I said, that was the plan. In Haiti, we learned things very seldom go according to plan.

Despite the fact that we were instructed to keep our gifts out of sight until Sunday afternoon, a couple members of our team felt that they couldn't wait once they'd seen the poverty of the people of Beau-Sejour. It's hard to fault a person for being too compassionate and generous, but this impromptu giving away of shoes did have unfortunate consequences. The first was that suddenly everyone knew we had shoes, and where they were. Our tent was suddenly the local hot spot. This led to the next consequence--a sudden shortage of shoes. It also led to another shortage--one of my teammates' personal property also went missing.

There is a short prayer that Our Lady taught the three children of Fatima, Portugal, to pray at the end of every decade of the Rosary. Known as the "Fatima Prayer", it says simply, "O my Jesus, forgive us our sins, save us from the fires of hell, and lead all souls to heaven, especially those most in need of Thy mercy." This principle of trust, letting Jesus dispense His mercy to those whom He knows need it most, and not to those we think are more deserving, found human expression in our generosity in Haiti, and to Père Ronal's wisdom. For Père Ronal was more than just the parish priest in this community. The late Archbishop of Port-au-Prince once said that a priest in Beau-Sejour had to be a 4x4 Priest--i.e., made of sturdy stuff. But the four dimensions of Père Ronal's ministry could be summed up by Priest, Mayor, Sheriff, and Judge. He was involved in every aspect of the community, and greatly loved and respected by the people. He knew who was most in need of material blessing better than we did, just as Our Lord knows who is most in need of spiritual blessing more than we do. And if it hadn't been for Père Ronal, I sincerely don't think we would have gotten through that afternoon.

At the end of Mass, Père Ronal announced that the missionaries had gifts to give to the community, and that they were to gather outside of his rectory. And so they did. It was as if the whole village turned out en masse, all very eager to receive from their Canadian friends. Of course, we still had to set up and get organised, since we'd each brought different things and weren't really sure what each other had brought. Moreover, we weren't sure who was in most need of what--or, for that matter, to whom we had already given what. And while we were still setting up, people were already trying to stake their claim.

Now, a bit about me--I can tend to be rather OCD. While I might not always be a neat-freak, or seem like the most organised sort of person, I do have a system--and I rather need that system. And I didn't have much of a chance to establish a system, or to discover what system might already be in place. So I felt immediately overwhelmed and out of place. The second thing you need to know, is that I'm very much an introvert. Not entirely shy, per se, but definitely not drawing strength from being with people. The end result was feeling entirely freaked out. Not "scary movie" freaking out. I mean, overwhelmed, hyperventilating, full-on fight-or-flight response! And I wasn't alone. One of my teammates turned to me and point blank told me, "I can't do this! I can't do this! I gotta get outta here!"

But then, Père Ronal stepped in to take control and save the day. With several loud shouts of "Alé! Alé!" (Go! in Creole), and a few swipes of a bamboo switch (behaviour, of course, which we back home in Canada would find utterly appalling, but which the Haitians apparently felt to be run-of-the-mill), he had the madding crowd mostly under control. We did have to deal with the occasional "repeat customer" who made off with an extra shirt or toy, but by and large, the afternoon went very quickly, with many a happy Haitian, and five very tired, wide-eyed, post-adrenaline-rush pilgrims, grateful for the shelter of Père Ronal's rectory, from the daily afternoon rain which finally prompted the villagers to return home, so we could retreat to good food and Prestige beer, as Père Ronal taught us to play Haitian Poker.

Haitian Poker is somewhat similar to Texas Holdem, except that you get a hand of three cards, and a flop of two. There's no turn or river, so you get those five cards to make the best hand from. It's rather simple, but honestly, the most entertaining aspect of it was watching Père Ronal's attempts at bluffing. The man was like a great big child, with that expression of gleeful pride at thinking himself clever for having pulled one over on one of us! Père Ronal was truly a man for all seasons. He was a 4x4 Priest. And we will miss him dearly.

Coming up next, a profoundly life-shaping experience, as well as getting down to work, and meeting the local wildlife.