What To Do When Scandals Abound All Around

“Woe to the world because of scandals,” said Our Lord. “For it must needs be that scandals come: but nevertheless woe to that man by whom the scandal cometh” (Matt. 18:7). Later, the Apostle takes up a related theme: “For there must be also heresies: that they also, who are approved, may be made manifest among you” (1 Cor. 11:19).

In explaining Our Lord’s utterance in Saint Matthew’s Gospel, Bishop Challoner comments there must needs be scandal, “considering the wickedness and corruption of the world.” Similarly, he comments on Saint Paul’s statement about heresies in this wise: “By reason of the pride and perversity of man’s heart; not by God’s will or appointment; who nevertheless draws good out of this evil, manifesting, by that occasion, who are the good and firm Christians, and making their faith more remarkable.”

Scandals abound in our day. We are being treated to one scandal atop another, in heaping mounds — “pressed down and shaken together and running over” (Luke 6:38), to borrow words Our Lord used in a happier connection. And I don’t mean in the temporal society we inhabit, but in the spiritual society of the Church, which is in itself a safe vessel upon which we can traverse the stormy seas of the sinful world. Fiducia Supplicans, coming out just before Christmas, introduced a new layer of moral ambiguity into the growing corpus of non-infallible magisterial texts, a bit of confusion that will have to be remedied when clarity and lucidity once again become marks of magisterial documents. Shortly after that scandal, and the online brawls it generated, an exposé was published of its author, in the form of disturbing extracts (entire chapters) from a text Victor Manuel Cardinal Fernández wrote when he was a priest of thirty-six years old. “Disturbing” is a euphemism. The passages that were made public (without authorization; Fernández himself suppressed the book), are frankly lewd and highly objectionable on many levels both moral and theological. Out of decency, I will not reproduce them here.

Before proceeding, it would be a good idea to ground these considerations of our reaction to scandal in the theological reality of what scandal is. Here is an excerpt from the Catholic Encyclopedia article on the subject:

According to St. Thomas (II-II:43:1) scandal is a word or action evil in itself, which occasions another’s spiritual ruin. It is a word or action that is either an external act—for an internal act can have no influence on the conduct of another—or the omission of an external act, because to omit what one should do is equivalent to doing what is forbidden; it must be evil in itself, or in appearance; this is the interpretation of the words of St. Thomas: minus rectum. It is not the physical cause of a neighbor’s sin, but only the moral cause, or occasion; further, this moral causality may be understood in a strict sense, as when one orders, requests, or advises another to commit the sin (this is strictly inductive scandal, which some call co-operation in a broad sense), or in a large sense, as when a person without being directly concerned in the sin nevertheless exercises a certain influence on the sin of his neighbor, e.g., by committing such a sin in his presence (this is inductive scandal in a broad sense). For scandal to exist it is therefore essential and sufficient, with regard to the nature of the act and the circumstances under which it takes place, that it be of a nature to induce sin in another; consequently it is not necessary that the neighbour should actually fall into sin; and on the other hand, for scandal strictly so-called, it is not enough that a neighbour take occasion to do evil from a word or action which is not a subject of scandal and exercises no influence on his action; it must be a cause of spiritual ruin, that is of sin, consequently that is not scandal which merely dissuades the neighbour from a more perfect act, as for instance, prayer, the practice of the Evangelical virtues, the more frequent use of the sacraments, etc. Still less can that be considered scandal, which only arouses comment, indignation, horror, etc., for instance blasphemy committed in the presence of a priest or of a religious; it is true that the act arouses indignation and in common parlance it is often called scandalous, but this way of speaking is inaccurate, and in strictly theological terminology it is not the sin of scandal. Hence scandal is in itself an evil act, at least in appearance, and as such it exercises on the will of another an influence more or less great which induces to sin.

Are Fiducia Supplicans and the horrible book mentioned above objectively scandalous? Well, the book certainly is, hands down. The DDF Declaration at the very least implies a certain indifference to unnatural grave sin, but it certainly sows confusion in the minds of many. When Tim and Tom, donning their rainbow regalia, come for their “spontaneous” blessing from the parish priest, the impression on the minds of the faithful present — especially on children and adolescents — could be devastating. What about men or women with this same disordered attraction who are struggling to live a life of virtue? Might they not find this too much to bear? What about the healthy teenage boy — naturally attracted to girls — who is tempted, as all teenagers are from time to time, to cynicism? Might he not just throw in the towel and consider that if Father’s OK with these guys doing the weird stuff they do, why can’t I do those natural things the Church says are good in the context of matrimony… just a little bit prematurely?

Yes, yes, the document clearly says that Tim and Tom’s union cannot be marriage and that the Church’s teaching on what constitutes matrimony has not changed. That’s clear enough. But in blessing the “couple” — a word the document uses eleven times to mean either same-sex couples or heterosexual couples in “irregular situations” — what is permitted goes beyond merely blessing a sinner who would like to avail himself of divine help. It is calling God’s blessing upon two people bound by a relationship based upon either the sin against nature, or adultery, or simple fornication. Those defending such blessings as irreproachable might start a new Catholic organization — let’s call it the Alfred E. Neuman Club.

My own speculations aside, Cardinal Robert Sarah has called the document’s contents “heresy” — a word that must be taken very seriously coming from the mouth of the thoughtful, grave, and extremely respectful Guinean prelate: “We do not oppose Pope Francis,” he said, “but we firmly and radically oppose a heresy that seriously undermines the Church, the Body of Christ, because it is contrary to the Catholic faith and Tradition.”

Now, it should go without saying that heresy in a magisterial text is objectively scandalous as it is “of a nature to induce sin in another.”

As these scandals, and many more, overwhelm us, we should remind ourselves of what Saint Paul told the Ephesians (5:3-6):

But fornication, and all uncleanness, or covetousness, let it not so much as be named among you, as becometh saints. Or obscenity, or foolish talking, or scurrility, which is to no purpose; but rather giving of thanks. For know you this and understand, that no fornicator, or unclean, or covetous person (which is a serving of idols), hath inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and of God. Let no man deceive you with vain words. For because of these things cometh the anger of God upon the children of unbelief.

This applies especially to reading the toxic extracts of the aforementioned book. It is not possible for someone to keep sticking his nose in the sewer without getting ill, even if he is morally opposed to relishing sewage. My sense is that the fall of many would-be “culture warriors” and Catholic reformers has resulted from their unhealthy interest in the unhealthy interests of Churchmen and others against whom they held some just grievance. Recent history reveals to us several sad cases of people who have auto-scandalized themselves either into a depraved moral oblivion of their own, or, worse, who have scandalized themselves right out of the Church. Man in his unfallen state would not have had an attraction to scandal mongering and reading about “the latest” sickening revelations; in the present economy, though, it attracts our prurient curiosity, which is precisely why we must avoid (or stop) dumpster diving into other people’s moral offscourings.

We should, instead, become so enraptured by God’s truth, goodness, and beauty, that the foul scent of the moral sewer does not distract us from our purpose. Now, I am not naive, and I realize that, as I said above, in our fallen state, a form of rubbernecking on the highway of life holds an attraction to us all. This is why agere contra should be a part of our vocabularies, not as a matter of Latin erudition (which is good enough in itself), but as a matter of moral formation. To act against our own evil tendencies is necessary in the spiritual life. This often takes a strong act of the will, and for this reason the interior life as it applies to overcoming sin is rightly called “spiritual warfare.”

Amid the din of disedification, we must be proactive in seeking out our own edification and that of our neighbor. There are so many sources for this: meditating upon the Scriptures, diving into the Church’s traditional liturgy (with the help, I would suggest, of Dom Prosper Guéranger), reading the lives of the saints, and the works of the Fathers and Doctors. Dom Guéranger’s work not only focuses our minds on the Church’s temporal and sanctoral cycles, giving us good commentary on the scriptural pericopes employed by the Church and edification from the lives of the saints, but it also gives us stimulating, fortifying Catholic erudition regarding Church history, which, as Brother Francis explained, is necessary for us to fight the good fight in our day. If, for instance, you’re thinking that never before have we had such problematic men in the hierarchy, the learned Abbot can set you right in his reading for the feast of Saint Cyril of Alexandria.

For your edification, I also have another recommendation. It is, believe it or not, the X feed of an impressive convert named Joshua Charles, who has used social media to glorify God and spread the Gospel, edifying many readers along the way. He describes himself as a “Catholic convert. Former White House speechwriter. #1 NYT author. Historian. Concert pianist. JD.” He very lucidly and charitably explains important Catholic truths for all readers using the Bible, the Fathers, and common sense. Here are some postings of his:

Yes, there are scandals; but, aside from the fact that God will ultimately correct them (and some are seeing a possible “correction” on its way), we need not be scandalized. Because for us to be effectively scandalized means that we have sinned. But we have free wills and can avoid sin. We must respond to scandal the way the saints did — by cooperating with God in our own sanctification. This is the authentic response in times of crisis, and it must be our counterrevolutionary grand strategy. God has put this treasure within our reach. It really is good to be Catholic, even in bad times!

One last point: talking about sanctity in relation to our current ecclesiastical crisis is no evasion; it is directly relevant to the question at hand because elevated sanctity renders us impervious to scandal, or so says Saint Thomas Aquinas:

I answer that, Passive scandal implies that the mind of the person who takes scandal is unsettled in its adherence to good. Now no man can be unsettled, who adheres firmly to something immovable. The elders, i.e., the perfect, adhere to God alone, Whose goodness is unchangeable, for though they adhere to their superiors, they do so only in so far as these adhere to Christ, according to 1 Corinthians 4:16: “Be ye followers of me, as I also am of Christ.” Wherefore, however much others may appear to them to conduct themselves ill in word or deed, they themselves do not stray from their righteousness, according to Psalm 124:1: “They that trust in the Lord shall be as Mount Sion: he shall not be moved for ever that dwelleth in Jerusalem.” Therefore scandal is not found in those who adhere to God perfectly by love, according to Psalm 118:165: “Much peace have they that love Thy law, and to them there is no stumbling-block [scandalum].”

This agrees with what Bishop Challoner said, above, about heresy: it “manifest[s]… who are the good and firm Christians… making their faith more remarkable.” Thus is evil overcome by good (Cf. Rom. 12:21). Those described by Saint Thomas and Bishop Challoner are not only unassailable by scandal; they are the remedy to scandal — and to the crises that historically beset the Church from time to time. I say it again, it really is good to be Catholic, even in bad times!

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