Defending The Wicket

Recently, a certain seminarian shared with me his stand at the wicket, creating a needed draw for his team. To protect the wicket for thirty overs and getting not our for naught demands patience and focus.

One does not try for flashy shots when one's captain has asked one to go for a draw. One is not concerned with one's personal score, but the good of the team.

One bats "cautiously" in order to make it impossible for the other side to get the team out.

With a fast bowler at one end and a left-handed around the wicket bowler at the other, defense becomes an intellectual game, as well as one of patience and stamina.

The batsman does not slash out or go for the big runs, but plays calmly and with great assurance that he can meet the demand of his captain.

Too often, some batsmen fall into egotism, wanting to add to their own personal scores instead of thinking of the team. A team player goes for the good of the whole.

Sport can teach and also reveal, virtue. To be a good team player not only means doing one's best, but sometimes, not trying to score, unless one is absolutely sure of not getting out. This attitude is an humility.

What does this mean for the Catholic team player in the Church? Sometimes, one does not have to
"be seen" doing things, but work quietly, steadily. Praying for others either alone or with a prayer team may seem like a hidden job, but prayer is actually more important than activity. Prayer not only sustains, but guides and underpins action.

Like the batsman who stays in for thirty overs to obtain the draw for the team, those who pray defend with wicket with patience and perseverance. Now is the time for defending the wicket, but not merely for a draw. The match has already been won, but the innings must be played out.

Getting Behind The Lines

One of my military friends told me today that sometimes one soldier has to pull another one out of the line of fire. "Get down, you....." or similar words would be expressed to get a soldier out of range for enemy bullets.

Some of us are sensing the time for pulling friends, or being pulled, out of bullet range may be coming soon, if that time is not here already.

Since I have been given access to private wifi in the past few days, I am back in the trenches, but wondering if I am a bolo rather than a crack shot.

When one is on line, one is in Indian country, and one may be called to be a snake eater. However, there are times when one's buddies pull one down below the bullets of Those People.

I admit I am a trench monkey. But, I am sure glad of those who have pulled me back recently and have told me to hat up.

If I am blogging less, even with wifi access, I am hatting up and I may become a Jawa.

Thanks to Major....for the retrenching.....as I have just come out of a serious ruck up situ.

To ruck up comes from to get your rucksack and move out.....

The New Evangelization from Rome

Out of all the things which have been discussed abut the Synod, one issue which seems to be ignored is the fact that there has been for centuries, a division between what the local churches in Europe, and in America, have preached and "accepted" at the local level, and what Rome has taught. The old fight of the Modernists and Ultramontanists must date back to the Avignon Papacy.  I do not want to give a history lesson here, but refer to the general problem which has existed between so-called pastoral applications and doctrine.

Out of the great tensions of the 14th century came the consolidation of Trent and, finally, the inspired writings of the greatest popes to bring Rome to the center of policies and practices again, Popes Pius IX and X. But, in Europe and in certain areas of America, the desire to make decisions outside the rules and guidelines of Rome created the isms which have infiltrated the Church today.

Marriage is not the only issue of the Synod. The need for bishops and cardinals, perhaps at a time when the curia of Rome has fallen into the worst corruption since the Renaissance, to come to some agreement about following Rome's guidance, could lead to a real new evangelization.

Conciliarism was a response to the Avignon Papacy scandal. Although the extreme version of this was condemned, the better angels of the movement created the climate for Trent to be not only successful, but a powerful source for the new evangelization of the colonial period.

The common problem of priests and bishops departing from Catholic orthodox teaching on marriage, Communion, grace and authority may be solved in the real effort to allow the Holy Spirit to inspire those good bishops and cardinals to lead the Church away from both Modernism and Ultramontanism. More than ever, the Church must be united.

With the powers of evil rising to a pitch which resembles the beginning of the marshalling of evil for the Last Battle, the Pope has called together the good, the bad and the ugly to come to clarity on doctrine so that there is no contradiction between the pastoral and the doctrinal.

Pray for the Pope, who I believe has good intentions concerning a new energy which could come out of the Synod for a new evangelization, as happened after Trent.