Pornography is violent

I still haven't decided if I should go into detail to prove my title or if I should let you mull it over on your own and reach the same conclusion. While at Mass this morning, Fr's homily was a reflection of sorts written by a German priest during WWII times who was arrested for anti-Nazi sentiments. At the tale end of the reflection, I caught the word "violent". Fr's homilies from today and yesterday were what I needed to hear, especially yesterday's, as it seemed like Fr. just spoke freely, with his jokes and a rough outline written out beforehand. Yesterday, Fr talked about resolutions and how a certain writer of faith would focus on certain words that she believed the Spirit was using to guide her contemplation. Fr. recommended that we not set such lofty resolutions but instead be open to how God can perhaps do the same thing as He did with the author and exhorted us to find a word, and ultimately we ought to find the Word...

Anyway, as I was preparing for confession, the word "violent" struck me. It seemed like I spent the rest of Mass meditating more on how violent my sins were and less on the actually mystery... sorry, but it's still a grace to be inspired with the horror of sin, so as to lead to repentance. I thought about how, specifically with pornography, we take one of the most precious gifts God has given us, and completely destroy it. By it's very nature, porn is violent. Sure, we might be lead to believe that it's good and, if between consenting adults who supposedly love each other, well anything goes (...and what's worse is when some teach that certain sexual acts are totally okay because the Bible doesn't say either way...but that's another post's topic)... and yes we might even be able to see some hints of beauty in the body of the other. However, I still stand by my titular assertion. If you need illustrative examples of this point, message me. I don't want to lead anyone into sin and will thus avoid explicit descriptions.

One of the things I love about the Catholic Church is that while the rest of the world and even other churches threw out all the decorations and boxed up Christmas on December 26th (heck I even heard that one dad unplugged the tree one last time as soon as all the gifts were unwrapped Christmas morning!), we're STILL CELEBRATING CHRISTMAS!! The Yuletide technically ends with the Feast of the Epiphany, if I'm not mistaken. I'm a bit hazy on the details about the Octave of Christmas, but I'm sure someone out there is more knowledgeable than I and can correct me. During the Advent and Christmas season, we hear much about the coming of Christ as foretold by the prophets. Today, the last of the Great Prophets, John the Baptist, the Prophet of the Most High, gives his witness to the One who comes after Him. After confession, I continued to meditate on JtB's preaching and how doom and gloom it is. Often we have the tendency to stop there. It sucks because that's not really good news, ya kno? Repent or go to hell! What good does it do if we call our fellow human beings, 'a brood of vipers'? Other prophets speak of God's wrath...scary stuff... but is that really the God we want others to see? I totally understand that we must recognize the sinfulness of our actions and how much that offends God...which is my point... yet, this message does no good without hope...

Yet I watched a parishioner walk up to the manger scene displayed in the sanctuary and I thought, what does all this scary, negative stuff have to do with the Baby Jesus? I mean, 'sinners in the hands of an angry god' just is not compatible with 'an infant wrapped in swaddling clothes and laying in a manger'. My meditation drew me deeper into the depth of the winter mystery. Jesus totally flips everything on it's head. While we're expecting something from the movies this year, we could totally miss the fact that He came like a winter snow...



So, to sum up, you've probably done some nasty things in 2011. You might even be caught in some pretty rough cycles of addiction. Despite these things, don't let this Christmastide pass without contemplating why the God of the universe decide to share in the human experiment. Heck, stop by the nearest Catholic church; there should still be a Nativity scene set up. Put aside your fears about worshipping a statue and focus on the meaning behind the image.

On a side note, I'm going to try to develop better habits, like blogging more, to kick my worse ones, like...well you can imagine. Given that, I want to be intentional with my blogs. Hopefully that's evident by all the links and tags I've included.