"Just Love," Condemned.

It’s not every day that a book on my shelf is condemned by the Roman Catholic Church’s Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF).  It turned out to be the case last week, when the CDF condemned the book Just Love. A Framework for Christian Sexual Ethics (New York: Continuum, 2006) by Sr. Margaret A. Farley, R.S.M.  You can read the condemnation here.  A flurry of activity followed:  Yale Divinity School, where Farley is Professor Emerita, gathered an impressive list of theologians and ethicists to defend Farley’s work; Farley responded to the notification; and 24 hours after news broke of the Vatican censure, the book was propelled from an Amazon ranking of 142,982 to 16, and #1 in Religion. 

I had conflicted feelings about the entire story.  I was disappointed but not surprised by the censure.  It is no secret to anyone reading the book that Farley arrived at conclusions contrary to the teachings of the Roman Catholic Church.  Still, I have a great affinity for Farley’s book.  Since coming across the book in 2009, I’ve used it as my primary frame of reference for discerning responsibility and truth within my personal relationships.  I think considering Farley’s work has made me a better human being in relationship to others, especially my wife.  And while I’m not perfect, Farley’s framework gives me the ethical and theological language to speak of success and failure in relationships shaped by a concern for justice, duty, virtue, and my Christian faith, as well as giving due consideration to current social science research.  I would recommend the book to anyone, Christian or not, seeking the same goals in their relationships.

Being the people-watcher that I am, I’ve been observing the reactions to the Vatican censure filter through a couple of different sources and circles for the past week, from Facebook to the New York Times to blogs, and from Christians of varying denominations to those who profess no particular tradition.  To my dismay, it became clear that conversations about the censure were actually not about the censure, but opportunities to give litanies of everything one considers wrong with the Roman Catholic Church.

To take one incredibly hyperbolic example, Maureen Dowd’s op-ed piece “Is pleasure a sin?” throws a lot of un-careful rhetoric around and makes the Catholic hierarchy a monolithic entity that it is not, which managed to turn a piece I could agree with into something not worthy of careful consideration.  For instance, equating the CDF to the Saudi Committee for the Promotion of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice in terms of hostility to women is the kind of thing that should not be treated as self-evident, and certainly not as a throw-away comment in an op-ed.  Dowd also says that “The Vatican showed no mercy to the Sister of Mercy.”  That sounds like a very clever phrase; but while the censure was surely hurtful to Farley (and ill-advised in my opinion), the book was censured without any disciplinary action taken personally against Farley; that shows that the CDF had some restraint. 

Dowd then attempts to link the censure of the book (occurring in Rome) to the cover-up of sexual predation of children in the U.S., as though the workings of the USCCB---or individual bishops---and the CDF were one and the same.  Dowd suggests that:

 “The hierarchy should read Sister Farley’s opprobrium against adults harming vulnerable children and adolescents by sexually exploiting them; respect for the individual and requirement of free consent, she says, mean that rape, violence and pedophilia against unwilling victims are never justified.”  

Dowd’s rhetorical tactic is to implicitly say that the hierarchy is completely uncaring toward children, or to suggest that because the CDF condemns the book the hierarchy is not concerned about sexual abuse.  My guess is that, since the CDF didn’t mention that part of the book in the censure, they had no problem with Farley’s statement condemning the harm of children, and most likely agreed with it.  And since they are not the entity (in a huge institution) dealing with the sex abuse scandals (where more to bring perpetrators to justice indeed could be done), I don’t expect the CDF to make reference to the scandals when talking about sex.  But if one is keen to disagree with the Roman Catholic Church, it’s easy to pass over or relish in rhetorical phrases that seem to cut opponents deeply.  The unfortunate thing is that op-eds like this do nothing to hold open a place for any type of civil conversation; instead of dialogue, opponents entrench themselves.

Now, that is the limited defense I will give to the CDF.  I think Farley’s book is brilliant; it is certainly not a risk of “grave harm to the faithful” (some of the things Farley is concerned about are graver harms to the faithful:  like injustice or oppression which affect both one's material and spiritual well-being); and the CDF missed an opportunity for fruitful dialogue on the subject of sexual ethics.  I’ll come back to this in a moment.

Because of my appreciation of the book, I’m also disappointed that the media missed an opportunity to go deeper into the divide over sexual ethics. Farley’s book is about what the basic level of justice in romantic and sexual relationships should be; it isn't simply---as the New York Times put it--a book of "theological rationales for same-sex relationships, masturbation, and remarriage after divorce." There is much more to this story.  The book is not simply a reworking of what is permissible that was not permissible before.  The book Just Love takes as its central question:  "With what kinds of motives, under what sorts of circumstances, in what forms of relationships, do we render our sexual selves to one another in ways that are good, true, right, and just?"  Farley's answer rests on the fundamental notion that morally appropriate sexual relationships, heterosexual as well as same-sex, must be characterized by justice.[1]  This is a different sort of project than simply overthrowing traditional Catholic teaching.  This is the project I wish the media would focus on, and the propagation of the project of promoting justice in relationships is what I hope the increased book sales will allow to happen.

Still, perhaps it is understandable that the book was short-changed in the media.  Reporters probably did not have time to read the book before reporting on the censure, and the media’s reporting reflected the CDF’s censure’s priorities.  And---it must be noted---the censure’s priorities also missed the point of Farley’s book.  As Farley noted in her official statement:

“I can only clarify that the book was not intended to be an expression of current official Catholic teaching, nor was it aimed specifically against this teaching.  It is of a different genre altogether…. I only regret that in reporting my positions on select “Specific Problems” in sexual ethics, the Notification does not also consider my arguments for these positions.  Nor does it render my positions in terms of the complex theoretical and practical contexts to which they are a response.  Hence, I fear the Notification–while clear in its conclusions–misrepresents (perhaps unwittingly) the aims of my work and the nature of it as a proposal that might be in service of, not against, the church and its faithful people.”    

It’s worth noting here that there is a fundamental difference in what the CDF does and what Farley does.  The CDF determines whether something matches the prescribed answers to sexual questions according to established Church teaching; Farley is suggesting an ethical framework for discerning answers in one’s own context:

"This book was designed to help people, especially Christians but also others, to think through their questions about human sexuality.  It suggests the importance of moving from what frequently functions as a taboo morality to a morality and sexual ethics based on the discernment of what counts as wise, truthful, and recognizably just loves.  Although my responses to some particular sexual ethical questions do depart from some traditional Christian responses, I have tried to show that they nonetheless reflect a deep coherence with the central aims and insights of these theological and moral traditions." 

There are a few ways of thinking about the divide between the CDF and Margaret Farley’s work.

1. The CDF has already determined the morally acceptable answer to actions and situations that is true in all times and in all places based on the moral tradition of the Church.  Margaret Farley is providing a framework for examining one’s own life and the answer is not necessarily a given. This is a divide over the process and the end result of moral deliberation. 

2. Another major difference is that the CDF is critiquing Farley from an understanding of ethics based primarily on the Natural Law, and Farley is not really working in that tradition in the book.  There were bound to discrepancies between the two systems.

3. A matter of genre, which Farley mentioned above.  The CDF notes that the book cannot be used as a reflection of Roman Catholic teaching.  Farley notes that she was not attempting to write such a book. 

4. Different pastoral concerns are evident.  The CDF wants to be clear on what the Church’s teaching currently is, and sees Farley’s work as an aberration from that teaching.  The Roman Catholic Church has an interest in being correct morally (whether one agrees with their positions or not) and enforce a clear teaching that can unify Catholics across time and cultures.  Margaret Farley is responding to the on-the-ground realities of gender oppression and injustice.  Her framework offers a way of thinking through what justice would require in personal and social relationships regardless of one’s status as religious or not, and in careful consideration of modern research. 

5. Others are noting that the CDF’s censure is happening in the context of a crackdown on American women Religious. I’m certain that plays some role, but I’ll refrain from trying to quantify or comment on this aspect.  I’ll leave that to others more capable, except to say that it does represent a divide in motive between Farley’s writing and the CDF’s censure.

In the end, I recognize the CDF acted within their ability, but I think it is a shame that the CDF will not interact with the book in dialogue, or with more clarity and depth in conversation.  There was an opportunity to speak of the promise of seeking justice in relationships, to affirm parts of the book that are in accord with traditional Church teaching.  Instead the CDF took an easier (and a bit lazier) way that showed them reticent to engage modern ethical conversation from one within their own tradition.  To those not within academia or the Catholic faith, I have seen that this left the Roman Catholic hierarchy looking unnecessarily dismissive of modernity and disconnected from reality.  Within academia, the hierarchy appeared anti-intellectual and dismissive of excellent scholarship.  This could have been avoided...it should have been avoided.

And regardless of whether the Roman Catholic Church chooses to engage Farley’s work in ethics, I hope her project of advocating a framework that will help people continually discern the just and unjust in their own relationships will continue.  To that end:

A quick, quick review of the framework in Just Love

(That should leave you wanting to buy the book for the massive amount of awesome detail I do not add)

The framework moves through six principles.  Farley is proposing a standard to which individuals could hold themselves and measure their partners.  These duties are: doing no unjust harm, free consent, mutuality, equality, commitment, fruitfulness, and social justice.

Do no unjust harm.  Given that Christians (although certainly not only Christians) tend to see themselves as having both a body and soul and that the two are closely linked, the concept of doing no harm holds two meanings:  do no unjust physical harm (rape, battery) and do no unjust spiritual/mental harm (deceit, betrayal, disparity in committed loves).[2]  This is presented as a duty, but the prohibition on unjust harm requires, and in many ways may inculcate, the virtue of (at least) nonmaleficence when dealing with others.

Free consent  Those in the relationship should respect the other as an end in himself or herself.  This also reinforces the above duty of not harming the other, since lying/deceit truncates the ability of the other to make informed decisions about the nature of the relationship; free consent asks that we beware of forms of coercion.[3] 

           

Mutuality  Farley speaks mainly of sexuality when enumerating the characteristics of just relationships.  She sees both giving and receiving of both partners as necessary (contrast with the image of the active male and the passive female).[4]  Still, the concept of mutuality in relationships extends well beyond sex and into the everyday requirements of living in relationship.  Consider division of household chores—there can be agreement of who performs what duties, and they can be divided among lines of traditional gender expectations, but no task in itself is beneath a man or above a woman to do.  The very nature of life together makes it a project in which there must be give and take.

Equality  This is a radical equality that goes beyond merely saying that one is equal to the other.  One must be mindful of power differentials in play throughout the relationship and try to mediate the differentials in order to keep from treating the other as property or commodity, not to mention endangering the others’ autonomy and sense of self by the inordinate use of power by one partner.[5] 

Commitment   As Farley says, sexuality is something that needs to be “nurtured and sustained, as well as disciplined, channeled, and controlled.”[6]  Sexuality is an important part of human identity and constitutive of our nature.  Sexuality is also powerful, given its procreative potential and intimate nature.  What commitment offers, then, is an outlet for partners to know, and be known, by each other and deepen that relationship.  The advantage that commitment offers over the novelty of seeking many sexual partners is that seeking other partners runs the risk of treating others as a mean to a selfish end instead of ends in themselves.  

Fruitfulness  This has traditionally been associated the procreative nature of sexual relationships and marriage but there is another way to think about fruitfulness.  Those who are in relationships are not only responsible for the creation or raising of their own children; wider community also makes a claim on couples.  American culture holds individualism in high regard and to a certain extent rightly so.  However, humans are social and need relationship. Those in relationship (a couple) offer nourishment to a larger community by providing avenues for resources, just as the community provides resources to the couple.

Social justice   The respect for persons as sexual beings in society.[7]  Since humans are always in relationship to one another, humans must realize that their personal decisions have consequences that affect others in a ripple effect.  As Farley puts it, “at the very least…social justice requires of sexual partners that they take responsibility for the consequences of their love and their sexual activity…No great love, is just for “the two of us.””[8]  Certainly this includes children who are born of such relationships.  Social justice expands even further outwards in hope of addressing global sexual and gender injustices.  People contribute to realizing this global social justice by acting in such a way that their relationships, characterized by virtue and duty, become a standard to which they hold themselves and others.

---

[1] Taken from http://notesfromthequad.yale.edu/response-vatican-reproach-fellow-theologians-rally-support-margaret-farley.

[2] Farley, 216-17.

[3] Farley, 218.

[4] Farley, 221.

[5] Farley, 223.

[6] Farley, 224-225.

[7] Farley, 228-231.

[8] Farley, 229.

"What Just Happened!?" -- Looking Back at Ordination

This post proceeds through three sections.  In the first, I give some personally formative quotes I keep in mind when I speak of ordination.  In the second, I keep to my own experience.  In the third, I try my hand at a personal theology of ordination, and it necessarily touches on concepts of being and ontology.


Quotes on my mind

“If you’re not a priest the day before ordination, you won’t be the day after.” - An unidentified Jesuit.

"Ordination recognizes and brings to fruition a process that has been going on for some time in a person’s life." --Richard G. Malloy, SJ

"As in the case of Baptism and Confirmation this share in Christ's office is granted once for all. The sacrament of Holy Orders, like the other two, confers an indelible spiritual character and cannot be repeated or conferred temporarily." --#1582 Catechism of the Catholic Church (CCC)

"...The character imprinted by ordination is for ever. The vocation and mission received on the day of his ordination mark him permanently." --#1583 (CCC)

"In calling the act "sacramental," we are recognizing that it is not just the authorizing of certain persons to perform distinctive functions in the Church, but it is a conferring of grace on these persons themselves.  The special ministries are not to be understood exhaustively in functional terms; they also have an ontological dimension, they are ways of being in the Church.  The call of  a person to the ministry and his response, and then his solemn ordination, affect him in the depth of his being." --John MacQuarrie, Principles of Christian Theology

"The word that has been traditionally used by theologians to designate this ontological dimension of ministry is "character".   There is nothing magical about such character, nor does it fall ready-made from heaven at ordination.  Ministerial character...is a formation of the person, the building of a distinctive pattern of personal being...the functional and ontological understandings of ministry are complementary, not competitive.  It is through doing the acts that character is formed, then character in turn informs acts.  Ministerial functions without the depth of ministerial character would be only an outward appearance." --John MacQuarrie, Principles of Christian Theology. See CCC #1582 above for an example of the use of character.

"We stress again that there is nothing magic about such character; and just as the calling to the ordained ministry can be understood as an extension of the election that belongs to all Christian experience, so ministerial character can be understood as a special development of the character which baptism opens to all Christians." --John MacQuarrie, Principles of Christian Theology

((Disclaimer: Gender exclusivity in the quotes are par for the course in the Roman Catholic Church regarding ordination.  MacQuarrie wrote in 1966 and revised 1977, so his language is exclusive but he could entertain the idea of women's ordination.)) 

"Something happens.  Robert will still be in this community, he will still be who he is, but some things will change." -- Gil

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Seminarians and divinity school students loooooooooooovvvvvvvvveeee to talk about what happens at ordination.  If you have nothing to do for an hour and a half, find yourself a Baptist, an Episcopalian, a Methodist, a Pentecostal, a Roman Catholic, a non-denominational rep, a theologian not in an ordination process, and an atheist; put them at a table (alcohol optional but preferred); utter the phrase "ontological change" and "ordination" and sit back;  they will take it from there.

Yes, we love to talk about it...and talk, and talk, and talk, and talk, and talk, and talk, and talk...I'm making the talking motion with my hand.

Okay, both hands back on the keyboard. On to writing about it.

We tend to talk a lot about "ontological change."  That's a fancy way of saying that God does something to a person during the ordination that changes the person's very existence in the world and in relation to the world.  The debate, in its simplest terms, is whether such a change happens, or whether we are asking God's blessing on someone "set apart" for ministry but does not make the person  something "other" than as human as a lay person.

(There are good reasons to debate this, and I'll give two questions that seem to drive the debates but I will not address them here.  First, does the idea of an ontological change seem verifiable in the life of ministers?  Second, does this concept of ontological change create a "specialness" about clergy that necessarily denigrates the ministry of the laity, or implies the laity are not as close to God?)

I used to join in these conversations, but as ordination approached I got to a point where I did not want to talk about what "happened" at ordination.  I could talk about being excited about ordination, about plans for after ordination, but I dreaded the conversation about what "happened" at ordination. 

The dread reached a high point the Monday before the ordination.  I went out with a few friends after a final exam was finished.  Thanks to me and Emilie (another Arizonan ordained on the same day as me)  being there, the conversation turned to ordination, and the conversation eventually turned to what "happens" at ordination... as it does.  A friend who was there has a fairly low sacramental theology while I have a fairly high sacramental theology.  This makes for a lot of playful banter back and forth.  That particular day his banter was well-intentioned goading, but goading all the same.  I wasn't feeling it that day.  Any other day-- especially, say, three months ago--it would have been fine; that day it was a bit rougher on me.  I didn't bite the bait he left.

I am a reserved person in the first place, but that day my reservedness was notable, and people asked if I was okay with the conversation.  In general I was 'okay' but a tad troubled.  It seemed to me that day to be a lot of people talking with some definitiveness about a speculative matter of theology that was soon to be part of my concrete experience.

When one person asked me if I was okay, I answered (in some form) that I had no idea what would happen at ordination, but I would be happy to talk about what the two months before ordination had felt like.  I was experiencing the run-up to ordination at a personal level -- in mystical relationship to God -- that called me to silence, solemnity, and openness instead of trying carve out an a priori understanding of what was going to happen to me in the ordination service, or following the service.  I did not want to create a certain expectation for God to fulfill, given how often in my life God has preferred to surprise me.

And it made so much more sense to talk about what I could talk about:  my experience of God that had seemingly ramped-up since January--more frequent, more intense.   Parts of my life opening to God in new, deeper ways.  I didn't think some of the things were coming.  From February to mid-April I experienced sleepless nights, nightmares, the gnawing of inadequacies and impurities that hung about me.  Dreams blended segments of my life and my new-coming identity.  I sought Confession, received absolution, and was spurred to do so by God much sooner than I had planned.  I experienced in a very real way the simultaneous "yes" and "no" of God's judgment that affirmed my belovedness and kept (and keeps) calling me to the fullness for which I was made. Orientation. Disorientation. Reorientation.  My identity, my being, was shifted before I landed in Phoenix.

Then I was in Phoenix.  And I was there a few days before the ordination, so I worked in wonderful conversations, quiet, prayer, and worship with St. Brigid's Community.  Dinner with St. Brigid's Community was wonderful and affirming in that it gave me an opportunity to reflect aloud about my formation.  In honesty I think the formation of seminary is the same as every other Christian's formation.  The only difference is that seminary offers an accelerated experience in hopes that the program moves people to a position where they are able to faithfully and maturely exercise spiritual servant leadership once they graduate.

I was ordained on May 5th at 10am.  We ordinands needed to be there at 9am to get ready for the procession, but more importantly to sit in prayer.  Sitting in prayer took me a while to do; pushing the excitement and nervousness back enough to quiet myself was difficult, but aided with a rosary.  After completing the rosary, in the silence, I began quietly weeping for a reason I cannot fathom.  The call affirmed? Nothing pointed me to think otherwise...  Sadness?  Definitely not...

Peace... love... healing... gratitude to God and all who have walked this journey with me... the womb of God...that is close enough.  And there was nine of us being ordained, so there were nine different experiences of that silence.

We sat in prayer until the bishop came in to give a short talk.   "There is no secret handshake.  Just love the people."

The rest of the service was in turns an exercise in concentration through a whirlwind of activity, a fight to keep composure, and a holy experience from which I try remember every detail.  (Ordinations are more like weddings than many suppose.)  We were greeted by many people; we had lunch with friends, and then Laura and I returned to our friends' home for a quiet night in. 

The next morning I woke up to my first full day of ordained life. Things had changed...  but the trick is separating these changes into the perceived and the concrete, the external/institutional and the internal/ontological/spiritual (and don't let the dualisms I've hastily constructed fool you, none of these are as mutually exclusive as they appear).  I'm not done with this work yet.

Externally, things are taking some getting used to.  There is a collar around my neck.  Friends and strangers are calling me by honorifics.  I put on more or different vestments.  I am now classified as "associated clergy" at my internship parish; blanket references to clergy now mean me.  There is an authority that I need to sort out as I exercise it.  There are people to serve, and I am finding that ministry's expression in my life.  The freedom to use my own discretion encompasses a greater range of possible actions within a hierarchical Church.

In clericals, I am now no longer a stranger to most people, but a person to be actively ignored or engaged... and I never quite know how that is going to go as I walk by.  Maybe what has changed for me is the effort I take to make eye contact and seem accessible.  I ask people their names if we talk.  I let people talk to me (at me?) on the train from Norwalk to Bridgeport.  I don't mind listening; but I'm lucky to be out of school, so there is little that I feel like absolutely needs to get done that would cause me to close myself off in public.

But internally, I find it difficult to discern any major difference in myself between May 4th and May 6th apart from the fact that I have an authority, a servant ministry, and the discretion to explore both in ways that will leave me changed.  I cannot yet sense an enhanced sense of holiness/sacredness that is not somehow tied to my experience of life in this world, which does not bother me at all.  This world is the realm of God's action, and so I trust that God acted in the ordination.  Personally, my experience of God months and minutes before the ordination point to the certainty of God's presence at the ordination.  In the end I'm willing to accept Gil's statement I quoted above as a sufficient explanation of a mystery I am experiencing.  And maybe it as simple as saying that the grace of God continually finds a way to affirm where I've been and where I am.  If ordination added to that -- and I'm rather sure that it did -- then I am immeasurably blessed.  And I am opening to discovering more about it.
________________________________________________________

In terms of a theology of ordination, I follow much of what John Macquarrie has written, which I provide in quotes above.

I guess I need to say something about ontological change.  Let's start with definitions!  (Philosophers and theologians may need to forgive my brevity on these.)
Being (two meanings):  1) (v.)the act or energy of existence and 2) (n.)the existent entity in which this act expresses and manifests itself. 
Ontology:  The study of the nature of being, existence, and reality.
Ontological Change: a change in a way of being, a la John Macquarrie above.

My understanding of ontological change is that it is roughly synonymous with the processes of sanctification and Theosis, through which Christians grow into the fulness of Christ.  I would take this to mean that Baptism is also an ontological change in which the person is brought into unitive Being with God.  Every action that furthers that unity-- which is the human conforming oneself to Christ -- is then in some sense a change in being to the fulness of that which humanity was created to be.  An ontological change.  What the Church has done in naming sacraments is recognize particular actions of common and individual life, actions given by God in Christ to the Church or recognized for its exceptional character, as arenas in which our ways of being are reordered.  The processes of sanctification/deification and our turning  to the fulness of that God created us to be is not simply a static state waiting for dramatic movement (although growth in Christ sometimes happens like that), but a continuous process.

The first two quotes I placed above-- from the Jesuits-- bring to bear a truth that seems to go unmentioned too often in the  conversations I have about ordination and what "changes."  The work of God is not often an instant occurrence, but a process that works within our own history and our relationship to the Divine.  It may be that the ordination service imposes an artificial point on a liminal process that lasts much longer.  The ordination service asks the ordinand to commit to a formation that has begun and will continue, and asks that God's grace be bestowed upon the person so that the work of formation can be furthered  (BCP 545).  The service is where the community recognizes formation and asks God's blessing upon it, after which the church will consider the blessing given and the action done.  The service is the work of the Church and God which becomes the outward sign of a spiritual grace that has been garnered over years of prayer and experience and will (hopefully) continue into the future.   Being "made" a deacon/priest/bishop is not the work of an instant...and it seems to me to be better expressed as being made deacon as opposed to being made a deacon.

This view is, I think, consonant with what I've said above:  that my own experience of ordination was a process of purgation and reorientation that lasted months and is not yet completed, and I've experienced this entire period as a shift in being.  I think I was "deacon" the day before my ordination.  On the day after, I could begin to act as "deacon" in its fullest expression with the authority and blessing of the Church through the grace of God.  The external changes have been more obvious and, in terms of being, I continue to discern further what God calls me to be.

 

Jesus Came to Thomas Anyway, part II: The Underlying Theology

I preached on Thomas this past weekend, and lo and behold, many other of my seminarian colleagues did as well; there is an old joke that seminarians and curates can always count on preaching Thomas, the transfiguration, and the trinity.  It has been wonderful these past two weeks to hear about the different directions people took.  It's also obvious that preachers make choices, and they are the type of choices that frustrate any attempt to say that biblical texts mean only one thing. Community matters as well.  The sermon I preached at St. Paul's on the Green was a sermon for that community; if I wrote a sermon for All Saint's Episcopal Church in Mobile, AL or St. Augustine's in Tempe, it may have looked much different.

Even before I preached my sermon, and definitely after I preached it, a couple of things came to mind.  First, I just make an initial observation that the two 'major' sermons I've preached at St. Paul's have both made reference to doubt, questioning, disbelief, or my time outside of the church.  My preaching in other places has not done this.  I doubt all of my sermons at St. Paul's will make mention of these themes, but I have found it personally helpful to show that a healthy life of faith is also one that can admit to times of trouble and question; this does not show weakness.  When properly done, an honest appraisal or openness of one's life of faith shows integrity.*  There have been people for whom such integrity coming from the pulpit has been helpful.  Second, preaching on the subject of doubt in the life of the community is difficult, and requires more than one sermon.  It is always becoming clearer to me that preaching involves making choices and sometimes relying more on one's underlying theology than one may be comfortable with. 

In some ways what follows is an exercise in laying bare my own underlying theology.  And I will begin by asking why admitting doubt is a good thing in a Christian context.  This will mean taking some educated guesses as to why people think doubt is a bad thing, and some replies.  Then we need to look at doubt itself because the term means a few different things, not all of them bad.  Third, I'll come back around to why the community matters.   

I opened the sermon by saying that I have been haunted by the phrase "Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe (Jn 20:29)."  I’ve always heard this phrase as a condemnation.  This passage is easily used as a bludgeon; and a person can use this bludgeon on herself, or someone can use it on her.  If one have doubts or questions, one may be left with the sense that Jesus is no longer talking to Thomas, but in one's mind's eye, Jesus turns points his finger, revokes his blessing, and one is no longer welcome or worthy to stand among those who believe.  A person in doubt or with questions can then experience church as something of an exercise in endurance, abuse, and uselessness; where the obviously more righteous and believing people gather.

..."Or," thinks the doubter, "they are all wearing a facade of faith; the hypocrites."

Relationships corrode at this point.  Since others may not admit doubt, the person with questions loses the sense that the community will understand them.   The person in doubt can no longer be honest, which is unhealthy. One can only stay in that type of situation for so long.

The community can further make the person with questions uncomfortable.  Pastors can take the story of Thomas as an opportunity to preach that the congregation needs to stay faithful with an implicit 'or else.'  This creates a further sense of isolation for the person in doubt.  "I'm on thin ice with God, if there is a God."

The community may go so far as to promote itself to an instrument of God's judgment, and pronounce the penalties of disbelief.  The community by its actions or its preaching may, in effect, say to the doubter that God will no longer listen to them until their faith is increased.  

Why would a community do this?  The most charitable guess I can make is that the community thinks this is what faithful living means, and that complete submission to God is paramount and required for God to be gracious.   When I am less charitable, I think some communities fear doubt and questions as "contamination."  These communities cannot handle someone who disrupts the narrative.  Sometimes it's just a spiritually immature snobbery.

There are biblical texts for this sort of exclusivism.  The passage above may be one, but as I notice in my sermon, to pronounce a blessing does not automatically come with a curse.  We still have to make sense of the fact that Thomas, in his disbelief, spends an entire week with the rest of the disciples. They do not make Thomas leave.  They do not berate Thomas.  They stay in relationship to Thomas and Thomas also stays with them.  Then a week later, Jesus, who could have written Thomas off in his unbelief, returns.

Blessed may be the one who believes yet has not seen, but Jesus shows a grace by the personal encounter that demonstrates that he will go to great lengths to make himself—and God—known to all.  And it is in this personal return of Jesus to Thomas that we see the point of the encounter.  We start of see the nature of God in Jesus, who is the expression of God’s love in the flesh.  A love that continues and is not simply bound to how much love the disciples can return to God.  This is the love of a God who desires and yearns to be in relationship; and in relationship, to open the eyes of the disciples to the way the world should be.  This is why the disciples, after having received the Holy Spirit, do not turn Thomas out of the community.

 This theological understanding should serve as a reminder to the community of their own proper role in the life of faith and doubt.   

But what about those in the community who look down on those without faith, some of whom may even desire that there be an accounting that leaves some condemned?  And what about those who think that the community is too easy on those who do not believe?  There are a few replies.  One reply that is biblically grounded is to look to the story of the prodigal son (Lk 15:11-32).  The story might be familiar.  A man has two sons, one gets his half of the inheritance early and squanders it, his father welcomes him back when he returns.  A metaphor for God and us (and much, much more to be said about that at some point).  What is less well known is the latter part of the story:

  ‘Now his elder son was in the field; and when he came and approached the house, he heard music and dancing. He called one of the slaves and asked what was going on. He replied, “Your brother has come, and your father has killed the fatted calf, because he has got him back safe and sound.” Then he became angry and refused to go in. His father came out and began to plead with him. But he answered his father, “Listen! For all these years I have been working like a slave for you, and I have never disobeyed your command; yet you have never given me even a young goat so that I might celebrate with my friends. But when this son of yours came back, who has devoured your property with prostitutes, you killed the fatted calf for him!” Then the father said to him, “Son, you are always with me, and all that is mine is yours. But we had to celebrate and rejoice, because this brother of yours was dead and has come to life; he was lost and has been found.” ’(Lk 15:25-32

The other son feels slighted by his father's generosity.  Have you ever experienced something like this?  When someone you know was forgiven way too easily while you did everything right?  It's a difficult thing to see.  Yet, it is also how God works.  When communities forget the lesson of God's abundant love and grace, and set themselves up as the older brother, we do a disservice to God and to those who experience doubt and questions.

To stay in the parable:  imagine what would happen if the the older brother met the younger brother first, and said that 'the father' cares nothing for him.  The younger brother turns around and leaves, with no moorings to what gave him meaning and hope in the past.  So too, the church that does not seriously consider how best to stay in relationship to one who doubts or questions drives people away from God.

Finally, it is also probably common for churches to be gentle with people who question or doubt for a short time, but then the patience runs out.  Personally, this seems like a symptom of an impatience with the lack of control one can exert over the will of the other when we should instead trust that God is doing work through us in God's good time [but this isn't to say that skillful pastoral care is important].  We are called to hold open the space for an experience of the holy and name it when we see it.

Suppose one finds a community in which it is safe to admit doubt, and one finds a community in which one can still experience love and belonging after admitting doubt, what does one do about the doubt? There are spiritual perils here; but there are bright sides to both of these experiences, and a mature community can help.  Indeed communities need these experiences to mature. Doubt is often the crowbar God uses to pry through old ideas and comfortable ways of being to expose an entry into a deeper place in one's soul.**

Now, there are probably more than two classes of doubt/questionings of the faith, but I'm going to limit myself to two.  The first is the questioning of tenets of the faith.  In terms of questioning of the tenets of faith, it is always worth the community's time to ask whether the presentation of the faith is in a language that people can find intelligible.  The immature community may say "why don't you get this? We will repeat it to you again and again until you can repeat it back to us."  The immature community may then say, "we tried, but something is wrong with you."  The mature community stops, and considers. Does our language even work here...in this time and place?  The community of faith should be continually seeking to discover the proclamation of the Gospel in a way it needs to be heard by the context in which the community finds itself.  This does not guarantee success in convincing people about the truth of the Christian Way, but the community should never forget that, as the faith passed on through the generations, each generation needs to find its own voice and way of expressing its experience of God.  The mature community will also let people who wish to be in relationship stay in relationship.

The other form doubt and questioning can come in is the loss of the sense of God's presence.   In mystical theology, saints and theologians have known since early times that the Christian walk means a time of 'spiritual dryness.' More liberating than the freedom to admit doubt is the knowledge that Christians have experienced doubt as a specific part of the life of faith for a long, long time.  The loss of the historical memory and appreciation of tradition in American Christianity, and particularly the mystical tradition (especially in some parts of the mainline), means that the spiritual resources available to the community in times of doubt and questions are impoverished.  I wonder how many people experience this stage of the development of their faith and cannot find a community or the resources to push through to the other side.  But one needs a community that values the spiritual maturity and vulnerability to allow people to admit to questions before it can help people through the "dark nights of the soul."

I know this post is getting long, but bear with me as I take a quick detour through The Christian Way, in a very, very brief form.

Christian mystics have different numbers of stages to the pinnacle of Christian life, which mirrors Christ's life of loving regard for all. (See the Rule of Benedict, Chapter 7, the steps of humility in which one goes from the fear of God to a perfect love which casts out all fear; St. Bernard of Clairveaux's On Loving God, which details the Christian's move from loving one's self, to selfish love, to loving God as God, to finally loving one's self in God; and the Spiritual Exercises of Ignatius of Loyola).  I'll mention three rough stages: the illuminative, the trying/dark night, and the unitive/contemplative/stable.

Christian mystics often speak of illumination or conversion as the awakening to God by which people come to experience the love of God.  This can happen before or after a profession of faith.  This is the part of the life of faith that feels like a honeymoon.  Everything is roses, fervor, warmth, liveliness, and elation.  In very traditional terms, this is the experience of God which awakens people to the gulf between God and themselves in terms of holiness and goodness.  This stage may also jump-start the turn of the persons god-given gift of desire to the good, and the long process of growing into the fullness of Christ begins.

Then come the rough times; the fervor dies down, the warmth one experienced at doing good goes away.  God may seem far away, hidden.  Christians experience conflict and testing.  In traditional terms, this is sometimes called purgation and purification.  The true motives of our actions and beliefs are revealed--Do we seek heavenly reward or do we really love God and neighbor?  God is leading a person to the latter.  The paradox is that God is as close to the person in this stage as the first.   A person may experience this process and label parts of it, particularly the second stage, as doubt and questioning, and the trouble is that immature Christian communities see this and get nervous.  They think the conversion "didn't take."  Communities can fail people in this stage.  This is also precisely when community is so important.

Finally, there is the unitive/contemplative/stable stage, where the person gains a clarity about their life in God and continue in growing into the fullness God created him or her to be.  Discernment and humility typically characterize this stage, and contemplation becomes action embodied as second nature.  BUT, this is not a linear progression; folks sometimes cycle back through the dark night.  This is where, as I said above, doubt and questions represent God's way of calling us deeper.  The life we live is too small for the soul God is reworking.

Back to Communities. The Christian tradition has acknowledged that God is present to people even in their doubts and questions, or in the initial seeking of God. This is true even when Christians feel uncomfortable around people who do not believe the same way that they do (this is a sign of spiritual immaturity, which can be remedied by seeking God's face in the 'other').  But, the entire point of the church is to offer God’s welcome and to not hold back the good things of God from anyone. The Church acknowledges that all belong with God regardless of whether or not one believes, and the Church exists so it can be a place in which believers and nonbelievers can experience Christ together.  And even if some Christians feel a bit funny about caring for people who are so different, God calls us into this experience of walking through life in the light of a radical love.  We are called into relationship with God and the world, which is to be characterized by an indiscriminate loving regard-- for God, neighbor, and stranger.  Doubter and Questioner.

If a community has a choice between entertaining a doubt/question or distancing itself from those who have doubts and questions, the greater sin is to distance people.  When a community distances itself, the community forgets that a more profound fact about God can be found in a question, not an exclamation.

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*By 'properly done,' I mean that a pastor is not using the sermon as a moment of purely private reflection and personal pastoral care.  Pastors encounter the Biblical text on behalf of the community, and the community should be reflected in that work.  Also, the core of the Gospel is hope in the midst of trouble; if the pastor snuffs any sense of hope, the gospel is not being preached.
**I think I owe Hal Roark for this phrasing.

"Lord, when did we see you?" - Sermon for Christ the King Sunday

Matthew 25: 31-46 The Judgement of the Nations

 ‘When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, then he will sit on the throne of his glory. All the nations will be gathered before him, and he will separate people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats, and he will put the sheep at his right hand and the goats at the left. Then the king will say to those at his right hand, “Come, you that are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world; for I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, I was naked and you gave me clothing, I was sick and you took care of me, I was in prison and you visited me.” Then the righteous will answer him, “Lord, when was it that we saw you hungry and gave you food, or thirsty and gave you something to drink? And when was it that we saw you a stranger and welcomed you, or naked and gave you clothing? And when was it that we saw you sick or in prison and visited you?” And the king will answer them, “Truly I tell you, just as you did it to one of the least of these who are members of my family, you did it to me.” Then he will say to those at his left hand, “You that are accursed, depart from me into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels; for I was hungry and you gave me no food, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink, I was a stranger and you did not welcome me, naked and you did not give me clothing, sick and in prison and you did not visit me.” Then they also will answer, “Lord, when was it that we saw you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or sick or in prison, and did not take care of you?” Then he will answer them, “Truly I tell you, just as you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to me.” And these will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.’

The Parable of the Sheep and the Goats is my favorite passage in all of scripture.  There are 3 reasons this is my favorite passage.  The first reason is that the parable points to my social ethic in a nutshell; a vision of what the church should be to the world.  The second reason is that it speaks to the side of me that strives for perfection--which I know is an unattainable ideal--but it is an ideal I respond to nonetheless.  The third reason this is my favorite parable—and it took me a while to realize this—is that what seems so clear in Matthew because of his matter-of-fact presentation (Goat/sheep, left/right, righteous/unrighteous, etc.) is actually not clear at all.  There is something new to see every time we come to the sacred texts of our tradition, particularly in the hard sayings.  I have come back to this text repeatedly over the years and I have seen something new every time.

So, this is my favorite passage in all of scripture, even though it has this incredibly scary side to it—this specter of everlasting fire and judgment.

It is easy to read this passage and miss the Gospel.  There is Good News, but Matthew means to jolt us, which may mean spiritual whiplash as he confronts us with judgment. But he does not leave us there.  Matthew does not condemn us.

If you were to search for a phrase that defines the essence of the Gospel of Matthew, the phrase “righteous perfection” would do the trick.  In Matthew 5:48, Jesus says “Be perfect, as your Father in Heaven is perfect.”  God is not only perfect, God is considered righteous.  And we see in our Gospel passage that “righteous” and “unrighteous” are words used to distinguish the sheep from the goats.

Righteousness, now there is a heavy term.  It brings up some pretty ugly rhetoric in the world today.  Now, I came from a religious background in which going to Heaven or Hell depended on the way one thought.  To stray from what the group thought and taught meant one’s salvation, one’s righteousness, could be called into question. Righteousness was best defined as the avoidance of sin.  Well, okay, but that isn't all righteousness is. I eventually left that world because I couldn’t keep thinking in the ways I grew up thinking.  In fact, I left Christianity.  But eventually I came back, and when I did, I started looking for what salvation and righteousness meant to me.

It was this passage which spoke to me.  It looked like it was a clear teaching that seemed to be the needed expansion to the theology in which I was raised, and it confirmed my growing sense of what it meant to be faithful.  I came to think that what we believe means nothing if it means we do nothing for those less fortunate than ourselves.  It turns out that in this passage (and in the prophets), that is what righteousness means.  Righteousness also means to live the imperative of the 2nd commandment, to love our neighbors as we love ourselves,

Matthew means to jolt us into this righteousness— into actions that confirm the best of our faith.

At that point I thought I had it figured out.  I thought I could tell the sheep from the goats.  I thought I knew I was a sheep…

But then I thought maybe I was a goat.  Do I do enough?  Am I righteous enough?  Why doesn’t Matthew provide a better checklist, a number of people I’m supposed to feed, clothe, or care for?  That way I can do my part and know when I’m done?

Matthew means to jolt us into righteousness…But not give us a false certainty about ourselves.

I returned to this passage again and I realized that in the passage, neither the sheep, nor the goats, knew how they ended up where they did.  A sense of dread came over me.  I thought I had traded an impossible faith—believing things that I could not in good conscience believe—for an ethical ideal too far to reach.  There was no certainty that I would ever do enough. The upside to this revelation was that I realized that if I could never do enough, how could I judge others?  The freedom from judging others became a relief.  I am not God.  I’m responsible for myself.  I can only search my own heart.

Matthew means to jolt us into righteousness… and take away the ability to claim we know others’ hearts so well.

I returned to the text yet again and noticed that the righteous were not feeding, clothing, and visiting out of fear of Hell.  They did it because of who they were.  They did it because it was right.  It’s as though Matthew and Jesus knew modern theories of moral development.  But this is also spiritual development.  It is a mark of moral and spiritual maturity to do what is right because it is right, not because we are afraid of punishment or looking for a reward.  And it’s an ongoing process that we participate in.  There’s freedom and relief in knowing that.  Jesus calls us to follow God, to be lured to God...with love...not with flinching fear.

Matthew means to jolt us into righteousness... and show us that true righteousness is not the fear of Hell, or the fear of God, or thought of reward, but to do what is right for right’s own sake, which is to love our neighbor as we love God.

The thing that always caught my eye about this passage—even as I was slow to notice these other things-- was the phrase “that which you did for the least of these, you did to me.”  Today is “Christ the King” Sunday, and we have an opportunity to reflect on where we find God in Christ in our own life.  In the Gospel passage, we recognize the King, who tells us that He has actually been with us the whole time.  Christ the king is present in those on the margins, among His people.  The righteous and the unrighteous do not see Christ in the story.  Yet Matthew records that Jesus is telling us where to find him.

Matthew means to jolt us into righteousness by telling us who it is we also see in the faces of the marginalized.

Christ is present in the least of these who we see before us.  How radical is that?  That behind the eyes of all who stand before us, we can catch glimpses of the Divine.  Matthew, when he wrote about the birth of Jesus, points out that the name Immanuel—which applies to Jesus— means ‘God is with us.’[1]

God is with us…and we see that image of God…the image that God created…the image shared by Christ when he walked the earth as God incarnate…the image which the Holy Spirit enlivens daily… that spark of the divine…that image of God… present in those who stand or sit before us hungry, thirsty, ill-clothed, sick, imprisoned.

Matthew means to jolt us into righteousness by telling us that  Christ  is  still  here.

Perhaps something more can be said about the righteous and the unrighteous… Something more than the righteous do merciful things and the unrighteous do not.  My guess is that the righteous find blessing in this life on earth from their experiences with others.  They experience a sense of holiness that comes from conversation with others, from sharing a meal with others, and from trading stories with others.  In doing so the righteous follow the example of Christ who came to serve…not to be served, and who identified with the type of people polite company did not want to keep around.  

In the gospel passage, the righteous built relationships.  They invited people in, spoke to them in visits, broke bread and drank wine together.  The unrighteous, who may have done these things if they knew Jesus would show up, did not bother with relationships. They did not bother with people in need.  Sure, the unrighteous may not have meant anything bad or malicious by the marginalized.  They just did not bother at all.  Matthew is telling us that apathy is not righteous, and in ignoring those on the margins, the unrighteous missed seeing God.

Matthew means to jolt us into righteousness by entering into relationships that matter…relationships that express both love of neighbor and love of God by bringing us together.

It is easy to miss the Gospel in this passage because Matthew means to jolt us into righteousness.  But he does not leave us in fear.  We are not condemned.  Matthew points out to us that our faith is best expressed in works of mercy that matter in this life…that it is a matter of turning one’s heart—which no one else can see and judge—to the point where doing what is right becomes second nature.  The trick is to learn to see God, by loving God and our neighbor.  The refusal of this love is our choice, and is a refusal of relationships that matter.  

We are not in this alone.  God does not leave us to our own devices only to pull the rug from under us.  God is present in us and with us (as in the Holy Eucharist) to help us see the sparks of the divine we may otherwise miss.  We are all God’s own.  And God loves us.  Let us love God back; and let us love our neighbor too.

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[1] Matthew 1:22-23

What Baptism and Confirmation Meant to Me

This might be a controversial thought:  I believe my confirmation means more to me than my baptism.  Or rather it was through my confirmation that I learned what my baptism means.  But it is also true that I am not finished learning what my baptism means.

A couple of weeks ago, I was asked what my baptism means to me.  I have a clear understanding of what my baptism means in terms of the Episcopal Church's Baptismal Covenant, and actually, the entire liturgy of baptism is incredibly rich as a teaching tool.  The question, however, was what my Baptism means to me.  That was a more difficult question.  This may actually be a common issue among people who move from one denomination into another.  Sometimes we have to make sense of our baptism in a new theological setting. I wholeheartedly believe the precepts of the Baptismal Covenant, but I was not baptized according to it.   So the issue turns into a question of belonging and identity and it took some intentional work to adopt a new understanding of baptism.  This was made easier by the fact that the Episcopal Church's understanding of the sacrament encompasses more in terms of Christian duty…and the range of meaning attached to baptism is also broadened.

Baptism can have a myriad of meanings, and the experience affects people in significantly different ways.  In my studies this semester, I was directed to an ecumenical document from the World Council of Churches that detailed at least five meanings of Baptism: 

1.      Participation in Christ’s death and resurrection

2.      Gift of the Spirit

3.      Incorporation into the Body of Christ (the Church)

4.      Baptism as conversion, pardoning, cleansing

5.      The sign of the Kingdom, initiating one into the people of faith and into the reign of God. 

None of these meanings are exclusive.  Neither should one be considered more important than the others.  It seems to me that baptism is ultimately a mystery, so trying to lock down to one meaning of baptism does injustice to scripture (from which these five meanings are derived) and to the work of God.  The best part of this list is that it makes the implicit parts of the Baptismal liturgy explicit.  Just for fun read through the Episcopal baptismal liturgy; you’ll find all of these ideas in either text or symbol. 

What I mean when I say that joining the Episcopal Church widened my understanding of baptism will take some biographical work.  [Disclaimer:  I am writing about my personal experience as a Southern Baptist before I reached the age of eighteen.  I acknowledge the experience was limited in that I wasn’t paying very close attention and I was only in one congregation with short visits to other congregations.  I do not wish to pretend that I have a deep understanding of Baptist theology.]

I grew up in a Southern Baptist household.  Baptists hold to the doctrine of believer's baptism, meaning that baptism is only for those who can make a profession of faith of an understanding of God's plan of salvation.  I remember taking the walk from the pew to the pulpit during the altar call. But I also remember talking to the preacher before the service and making the sinner's prayer for Jesus to “come into my heart.”  This is difficult to remember from so long ago, but salvation seemed to me to be only a matter of loving Jesus and avoiding pain and burning of Hell.  I was baptized the next Sunday by full-immersion. Notice that this understanding of baptism only corresponds to meaning four listed above: “baptism as conversion, pardoning, and cleansing.”  I never had a sense of participating in Christ’s own death and resurrection, or that the Holy Spirit was an expected gift.  I understood being grafted into Christ and sharing in the Kingdom only in the sense that I would be going to heaven… and I would not recognize the concepts using Kingdom language. “Body of Christ” may have been a stretch.  Once again, I probably do not have a sufficiently varied understanding of the Southern Baptist denomination’s theology of baptism, but the other meanings listed above never seem to be made explicit.

From about the time I was thirteen to seventeen, I found myself “backsliding,” but it is also accurate to say that I left the denomination because of conflicting worldviews and a conversation with a racist preacher. Since I had been taught to think that the Baptists had Christianity uniquely “right,” I didn’t see much use in faith through any type of organized religion or denomination. I became a pretty good deist.

Through those years, I rarely thought about my baptism or what it meant. When I did, baptism stayed attached to asking Jesus to come into my heart—a personal thing. But I wondered if it was a once-for-all thing. Could disbelief nullify it?  Are sins performed after Baptism also covered?  If baptism can be nullified by one's actions, does one get rebaptized? Other people I know doubted the sincerity of their own conversation experiences—and if one’s salvation is uniquely tied to the strength of that experience, any doubt in the experience breeds anxiety. Along those lines, is a ten year old really able to understand baptism as much more than fire insurance? 

I found myself considering joining the Episcopal Church around the time I was twenty-four. Since my baptism is valid, I did not need a re-do. I would instead be confirmed. The theological rationale of confirmation is that one makes a mature profession of faith, which I felt that I may have needed from a baptism when I was ten years old and simply scared of Hell. It is also when the Holy Spirit bestows charism on the confirmand. By my call to ordained priesthood, that notion seems to hold true for me.

During catechesis, I understood that baptism is a complete rite within itself, needing nothing further for completion. While my sense of justification was secure, I found my confirmation to be a completion of the work that my earlier profession of faith and my baptism started. Until joining the Episcopal Church, I understood my baptism to be only about me, about my soul, about my relationship to Jesus, about my salvation from Hell. When I was confirmed—and in so doing affirmed a Baptismal Covenant that was not only about me and God, but about other people and my relationship to them through community—only then did it feel like I started to understand the breadth of meaning of my baptism. And so baptism means more to me now, after confirmation, both in terms of my relationship to God through Jesus and the Spirit and in terms of greater sense of Christian duty to the Church and the rest of the world. 

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A few loose thoughts about Confirmation:

I can’t stress enough how important Confirmation was for me, even if liturgical scholars rightly note it is something of a sacrament in search of a theology.  To make the long story short:  As parishes grew in the Western Church, the priest became the head of a local church.  The chrism that the bishop used to do immediately after baptism became what the bishop did when he occasionally visited.  Confirmation (the last act of baptism) had to wait until the bishop came around and became its own rite. It developed from more ecclesiological issues than theological. That does not mean that that confirmation is useless.  Now, priests perform chrismation after baptism, and confirmation is an act of making a mature profession of faith in Christ and affirming the promises made in the Baptismal covenant, which may have been made on their behalf in infancy.

Because Confirmation meant so much to me I hold that confirmation should be a choice initiated by the child, teen, and adult…as opposed to the notion that that it is important and every other 7th grader in the church is doing it. Even if this means holding off for years.

I liken the danger of forcing confirmation to be like going through an arranged marriage.  Parents and/or clergy tell the person that confirmation is important or that they will understand/love it later.  If we would not tell a bride the same thing, we should not tell it to our children.  Many a justifiable resentment to the Church seems to start here.