Catholic infighting needs to stop
against a Church full of like-minded people
Some people were shocked that we had Father James Martin SJ on the pod. Needless to say, Fr. Martin and I do not see eye to eye on everything. But ontologically, we are part of the same Body. And more importantly, I happen to like Fr. Martin very much, and respect him as a person and as a priest for many reasons.
I wanted to take this post to reiterate our concern that too many Christians—especially Catholics—prioritize their ideological loyalties, and being “right,” over communion…which is to say over charity and righteousness. As much as I value orthodoxy and think heterodoxy and sin ought to be condemned, it should always be done charitably, which is to say in a way that aims to maintain communion with the people with whom we disagree. We should not be quick to demonize anyone…and even if we can’t maintain some form of friendship with them, we should aspire to do so at some point (and should be praying fervently for the grace of unity/friendship to be given to us).
Christ desires our sanctity, but he also desires the unity of his body—in fact, our sanctity comes about precisely from this unity, this entering deeper in communion with the others in his body…including the people we don’t like/agree with. The ideal of communion should never take a backseat to “being right.” When we correct people, we should do so charitably. It’s not about “owning” the other side, winning points for our team, or signaling our virtues.
As we know, I have a reputation for poking fun at spergy tradcaths and at cringelib boomercaths. But poking fun (and unironically expressing my concerns about certain objective errors) is different from being disrespectful or uncharitable (in the words of a dear friend, being shady is different from being c***y).
We’re part of the same family, we’re on the same team. I can make fun of them and call them out, and they can do the same to me—that doesn’t mean we aren’t still one in Christ. Besides, I’ll often reach out to make nice to the trad/cringe caths I beef with and attempt to befriend them. And the few times I’ve been straight up uncharitable, I’ve owned it and apologized.
It’s concerning when Catholics retreat into their silos—and not only give up attempting to maintain our communion, but celebrate and congratulate ourselves for our lack of it—for several reasons:
it’s morally reprehensible. As I already said, it’s a sin against charity, which is the #1 virtue for Christians, and indulges in the sin of pride (“as long as I’m on the right side, I’m good”).
it denies the ontological fact that we are one…even if we don’t like it, we are already part of the same body…being on a different ideological team doesn’t change this (unless that team is in a state of straight up heresy, to the point that they merit being excommunicated…that’s different).
it’s a bad look from a PR standpoint. Why would anyone wanna be Catholic if we’re always hating on each other?
“By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you hate on one another.” In case you were confused, this is not actually in the Gospels! It is not Jesus, but rather, the devil who wants us divided among ourselves. “Divide and conquer,” as they say. Sin might be bad. Heterodoxy might be worse. But division and disunity are the devil’s favorite things.
On a more practical level, viewpoint diversity can—when handled prudently—lead us closer to the truth and help us grow in maturity. I find that a lot of our ideological positions are more the fruit of our temperament, personality type, upbringing, and unique set of life experiences, than of deeply felt convictions. Thus, I have found it to be quite helpful to be surrounded by Catholics with POVs different from my own.
I’ve learned a lot from my friends who lean trad, neocon, far-right, normie lib, woke, old left, crunchy, anarchist—as well as from zoomers and boomers, charismatics and home-schoolers, neocats and FOCUS members, and so on and so on. We all bring different pieces to the puzzle. I don’t know everything about God, and nor do you. We each bring something different to the table that the other needs—even if we’re wrong about plenty of things.
If you only hang out with MAGA-coded Catholics, you’re going to miss out on the important insights of Catholic Worker-pilled Catholics. If you only hang with boomer libs Caths, you’re going to miss out on the insights of those of us in ecclesial lay movements. We can’t afford to not be in conversation with each other—and that conversation SHOULD include talking about our disagreements. We will get nowhere—and will not grow in maturity or sanctity—if we only talk to people who live in our little silo.
As I discussed with Fr. Martin, it helps a lot if you’re a member of a Catholic community that involves regular interaction with people with different ideological view points, as well as with people of different ages and from different cultural and socioeconomic backgrounds. He shared how being around younger Jesuits has challenged him and helped him see things from a different perspective. This is why I’ve made a big stink about the zoomer parishes in NYC—zoomer converts won’t grow spiritually if they’re only surrounded by fellow zoomers. Same for boomer-dominated parishes. Also why it’s important to be in community with people who are richer and poorer than you.
I especially value my experience in an ecclesial lay movement where I share life with people who are not only younger and older, richer and poorer, and from different cultures, but who have very different politics. The fact that we follow the same spiritual “path,” and do a lot of stuff together that doesn’t have to do with politics, makes it easier to enter into heated discussions about stuff on which we disagree. We can yell at each other, but then we fall back on the fact that our friendship is based on something much greater than any of these issues. The thing that unites us is so strong and concrete, that we can have these back and forths, and end up not only not hating each other, but learning from each other.
It’s the old metaphor of the jagged rocks in the bag. When you shake up the rocks, it causes conflict, but it also smooths out the edges. If we exit the bag, our rough edges will never smooth out.
Personally, I think that lay movements and religious orders tend to have it easier because their point of reference when thinking about Catholicism tends to be more concrete than abstract, more experience-based than theoretical or ideological. If your Catholicism has yet to enter “the flesh” of your daily life, then it will be hard for you to see anything outside of your ideological purview.
Besides, the Church would be worse if everyone in it thought exactly like me.1
Anyway, I’m deeply grateful for my discussion with Fr. Martin. I may not agree with everything he says, but I learned a lot from what he shared, and was happy I got to share my thoughts with him.
More conversations like this need to happen among Catholics.
What gives us a common history and also a common sensibility, even though we come from different histories and have different sensibilities? The Church does not hold things together in a theoretical way; rather, there is a reality that makes our history and our sensibility common—a reality that is Christ. Christ is not at the mercy of my history and my sensibility; rather, it is on Him that I have a history, and it is He who harmonizes my sensibility with that of others. The whole Church is this: the Church is a symphony of different sensibilities, but the beauty, the unity, the coherence of everything—the concert—is possible because there is Christ, the presence of Christ, the gaze of Christ upon us, the call of Christ to follow Him and to bear witness to Him, and the salvation that Christ is for us and for the world. There are not different salvations; He alone is the Savior.
Often, when we get stuck on differences and make them divisive, it is because we live them without following Christ, that is, outside this dynamism that saves our life by following Jesus Christ, that makes our life true by following Him. It is by following Him, walking behind Christ, that I realize I am walking together with others, even with those who seem distant to me or who do not have the same sensibility in the way of walking. The path is one, because He is one; it is He alone whom we follow.
…
I had this experience also during the Synod of Bishops, where I found myself having to work and dialogue, to sit at the same table with people totally outside my history and my sensibility—at least my sensibility. And yet, I saw precisely how accepting to follow—in the end, we were there because the Pope had asked us to make this journey together, to work together—the fidelity to this and not placing my sensibility or my history a priori as an objection to that of the other, but being in a true mutual listening, led me not to change my sensibility or that of others, but to discover that in the end we are not divided; that is, there is a fraternity, there is an objective communion that unites us. And one realizes that this heightens gratitude to Christ for His greatness, for the truth with which He allows Himself to be followed even by those who follow Him in a different way.
I would say that the real danger is when we allow divisions or distances to fossilize, refusing dialogue, refusing to walk together—when we walk together in parallel, but without interacting anymore, above all without speaking to each other about Him. When we insist that our sensibilities clash and begin also to say that our history is different, gradually sensibility and history detach from Christ, and even in dialogue among ourselves we no longer speak about Him; He is no longer the center of our interest. It is as if we were cutting from beneath our feet the very ground of the road, which is His presence, the foundation of all unity, which is His presence.
In fact, unity among us is not built on unity among us, but is built on the presence of Christ, to whom we belong. Therefore, if I truly belong to Christ, this cannot fail to unite me with those who truly belong to Christ. The important thing is that we do not detach truth from belonging to Christ; otherwise, we begin to dialogue about what has nothing to do with Christ anymore.
Abbot Mauro-Giuseppe Lepori OCist
I could not have written this myself, but I’m very grateful you did! The desire, call and our design for unity is always under emphasized I feel. It requires such humility and graces from God, but still should be pursued and prayed for. And we should also pray for a sense of humor!
Amen. Unity can not be emphasized enough. And it should be said, Fr. Jim Martin (who is the personification of the "other side" to many conservative Caths) is clear about his appreciation of and benefit from differing viewpoints in his interview. Part of the argument against unity and charity is that the other side is locked in a zero-sum battle, with purportedly no desire for compromise, with "us," whomever "us" is. This makes unity pointless and dialogue a waste of time at best, or a potential for manipulation by the "other side" at worst. This is a false narrative. The circle of people of goodwill is wider than many of us think, and includes those we consider enemies. And with these people, unity is a moral imperative.