Courtesy of the New Prolife Catholic movement. So apparently Rebecca Bratten Weiss posted this on her Twitter feed:
Wow. There was a time when I imagined such an image would have been celebrated as an example of redemption and God's grace working in the worst of sinners, of which I am chief. Note how it is framed as disturbing, nothing at all about grace, mercy or redemption. Furthermore, such a misplaced focus (apparently on things like forgiveness, mercy, redemption, and God's gracious healing of us sinners) is what makes the RCC look bad.
Wow. I mean, wow. Thank goodness it's only her, and nobody else taking such a disturbing view of Church teaching. Correct? Oh, turns out here are some comments on this thread:
Exactly how this fits into the emerging notion on the left that judgmentalism is all the rage, but mercy and forgiveness are just stealth white supremacy and therefore to be rejected, their banter doesn't make clear. It's enough that they don't see redemptive grace or reconciliation, but rather an individual who should not be allowed to move past his sins, and the idea that no saint should be venerated by ... a sinner?
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For what it's worth, this is simply following a growing trend in which we learn almost anything and everything from the last thousand years of Christianity and the Christian West - and possibly before - can be assumed to be false, the result of bigotry, racism, colonialism, misogyny, or any one of a million different demographic defects.
For instance, maybe in heaven there can be forgiveness for a growing list of unpardonable sins such as rape, racism or slavery in America, but on this side of the eternal, depending on your group identity, your arse belongs to the Left and whatever privileged demographic group is holding the rope at the moment.
As God is my witness, I sincerely believe there is no heresy, blasphemy, intrinsic evil, or sin that cries out to heaven for vengeance that believers - Catholics included - who have thrown their lots in with the Left will either embrace, defend, or at best ignore. And if it means throwing core Christian doctrine and virtue under the bus, or interpreting such things as God's grace or redemption only through the prism of leftwing dogma, apparently that's just fine.
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| A "forced meeting with your attacker where you tell them you forgive them and then everyone acts like nothing happened" - A New Prolife Catholic perspective |
If God remembers our confessed sins the way history or the internet does, we're screwed.
ReplyDeleteThat's in general, since forgiveness is one of the toughest of teachings. Today, however, it seems almost to be taught against. With the whole 'wokeness', it's almost mandatory that we declare ourselves the victimized group of that group whose sins are unforgivable and to blame for all my problems. Hence the iconoclasm against our heritage going on.
DeleteIt says something when I can watch a couple of Korean films (here's part 1) which have more powerful messages on forgiveness than much I've seen in the Christian west.
ReplyDeleteAgain, forgiveness is anathema to group identity. Hence the rise of younger black Americans increasingly open about their hatred for whites, and the fact that they really don't care if whites live or die. That is an attitude being taught, and a growing number of Christians are finding ways to accommodate it.
DeleteComment I left over at TAC, also applies here I think.
Delete"To believe in the forgiveness of sins is not so easy as I thought. Real belief in it is the sort of thing that easily slips away if we don't keep on polishing it up.
. . .
"Real forgiveness means looking steadily at the sin, the sin that is left over without any excuse, after all allowances have been made, and seeing it in all its horror, dirt, meanness, and malice, and nevertheless being wholly reconciled to the man who has done it." -CS Lewis, 'Essay on Forgiveness'
"Of course, the rush to nonjudgment is in part a reaction against the cruel or unthinking application of moral codes in the past. . . . Apologists for nonjudgmentalism point, above all, to its supposed quality of compassion. A man who judges others will sometimes condemn them and therefore deny them aid and assistance: whereas the man who refuses to judge excludes no one from his all-embracing compassion. He never asks where his fellowman's suffering comes from, whether it be self-inflicted or no: for whatever its source, he sympathizes with it and succors the sufferer." -Theodore Dalrymple, 'The Rush from Judgement'
I suspect these two ideas explain the modern trend. To forgive, means necessarily to judge. To pass judgement, means to lack compassion. Therefore they arrive at the conclusion that those who forgive have no compassion and are condemnable.
Just ignore the judgement that was handed down...
I(t would make sense. I think it has a lot to do with the obsession over group everything. Who does what determines if forgiveness or mercy even have a place, much less who is or isn't guilty in the first place. It gets easier and easier to condemn based on one's particular group affiliation when being part of that group means you shouldn't be forgiven in the first place.
DeleteThat picture has to have been taken 60 years ago. What gets you is the absolute lack of curiosity about the mind and heart of the man in question, of the girl he killed, or of her family.
ReplyDeleteI think we're past worry about such things. What group does an individual belong to? What group did the person the individual acted against belong to? Those are the questions we ask that determine if we should care at all, and if so, how.
DeleteSirach 27:30
ReplyDeleteWrath and anger are hateful things, yet the sinner hugs them tight. The vengeful will suffer the LORD's vengeance, for he remembers their sins in detail. Forgive your neighbor's injustice; then when you pray, your own sins will be forgiven. Could anyone nourish anger against another and expect healing from the LORD? Could anyone refuse mercy to another like himself, can he seek pardon for his own sins? If one who is but flesh cherishes wrath, who will forgive his sins? Remember your last days, set enmity aside; remember death and decay, and cease from sin! Think of the commandments, hate not your neighbor; remember the Most High's covenant, and overlook faults.
Appropriate. Something we should all always remember.
DeleteWeiss invariably reminds me of the observation in 1984 that it was the women who are the most fanatical partisans.
ReplyDeleteWith examples like the milicianas, the Red Guard girls of Mao, the "Apache" of Vietnam and the women who lead cancel charges every day, I think Orwell was on to something.
Jordan Peterson has talked on this a lot too. That those who have a lot of compassion tend to unleash wrath upon others. His favorite example is how a mother bear has much compassion for her cubs (less for what is near them).
DeleteIn Nazi Germany, female guards were often used because they could be cruel and indulge in things that made the harshest of men cringe. Ms. Weiss is one of the harshest on the Catholic internet. She does little to suggest these observations are too far off.
DeleteI'm not sure this constitutes so much a change in the world, which has ALWAYS been at war with God, as a change in your ability to see clearly the spiritual war going on around us. Then again, it's likely some of each.
ReplyDeleteOf course. But one doesn't expect to see professionals in the service of the Church to be at war with God or God's various teachings, like mercy, forgiveness, redemption, etc. Sure, that always happens too. But right now, I fear those above have the winds at their backs. And that is significant.
DeleteSure, the picture could've been worded better and critique of grammar and semantics is fine. The problem is that Rebeca Weiss seems to lack the ability to see and Express any kind of nuance. Or she just likes complaining about rape, so she interprets anything that could even remotely be seen as "not anti-rape enough," to be pro-rape.
ReplyDeleteWeiss is a pretty extremist character, displaying little in the way of humility, charity or love for those not on her side of the ideological aisle. The problem with the semantics - and I'll grant you better words could have been chosen - is that Deacon Greydanus just published a big deal about semantic quibbling by those in any way objecting to any form of protest where liberal activists protesting racism is concerned. His use of the term seemed to be anything that questioned liberal activists doing anything as semantic quibbling. I would suggest a better example is him nitpicking this while ignoring the greater image of penance and redemption.
DeleteAlso, they that posted the image was apparently named Jose. Maybe his caption made more sense in Spanish? Why is Rebeca Weiss putting her white privilege on display like this?
ReplyDeleteHeh. I find things like concern about women, minorities and the poor can be pretty malleable among the left. Not that non-leftists can be inconsistent at times. It's just that inconsistency seems almost to be a cardinal virtue for those left of center.
DeleteEnglish as a second language is definitely a consideration here.
DeleteBut who cares about that when you have an ideology to figuratively ram down the throats of the unclean?
I think they're still workshopping literal ramming, but it's not too far in the offing.
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DeleteYep. They give scant little option between conforming or facing excommunication from the normal graces of the Faith.
Delete