Church design

I've been reading a lot of books on liturgy and church design recently, and I've always paid attention to discussions about the topic on blogs.  There is one striking thing that I have noticed in the advocacy for traditional architecture.  I've noticed that advocates of traditional church design often fall into a couple of key mistakes:

One trap is mistaking "the way we've done it for a long time" with "the way it has always been done."  It often manifests in the thinking that because we have done something for a thousand years that we have always done it that way, or that doing it that way represents some theology or even Tradition (yeah, big T) to which we must adhere, or that it is the only way to do it.  The tabernacle is a great example of this.  We have not always had tabernacles, not always had them on center.  You can take a "Theology of the Temple" approach and use the precedent of the Temple as the foundational model of church design where the tabernacle is THE Tabernacle, the Holy of Holies in the Temple.  There's certainly something there, but that doesn't mean that the Temple-based model is at the heart of how we should design a church, the only foundation.  The mass is the culmination of all sacrifices, not just the Temple sacrifice.

But at the same time, having a tabernacle on center works, and is a good idea for a whole bunch of reasons.  Unfortunately, we have this tendency in church design to try to legitimatize good ideas by ascribing them some place in Holy Tradition, instead of just letting them stand on their own as good ideas.

Style is another trap.  There is this notion that only traditional styles are appropriate for church designs.  However, that is not the reality.  Otherwise, how could the Renaissance or Baroque or Gothic or even Romanesque styles have ever become appropriate.  The reality is that these traditional styles were largely created for use in ecclesiastic design.  This makes them very well suited to use in churches.  But it does not mean that we have to use them.  Unfortunately, we don't have a lot of examples of other styles being used successfully for churches, they were not developed in the crucible of church design.  But that doesn't mean it's impossible.  Quite frankly, the traditionalists are generally the ones that care the most about appropriate liturgical design.  They are the ones that we need focused on "baptizing" or creating new styles that can serve the needs of church design in the present world, with the current needs of the church.  As long as the people who care almost exclusively work in traditional styles, the less likely we will ever have good designs in non-traditional styles .. and quite frankly, we're going to get churches in a non-traditional style one way or the other.

And the fact that so many traditionalists are closed off to the idea of using a "non-traditional" style actually creates another problem.  If we just copy traditional designs without understanding what made them successful, the great likelihood that our copies will be imperfect means that we are very likely to create unsuccessful churches.  A look at the 19th c. is all that is required to see how rote reproduction leads to bad design.  Rote reproduction led to many churches that just did not work well for liturgy, even though they had all the traditional elements.

The last trap is an uncritical rejection of all that has come since.  There have been a lot of aberrations since the traditional styles fell out of wide-spread use in church design.  But there have also been some legitimate gains.  The one that really sticks out is the altar.  Free-standing altars aren't about celebration ad populum.  Free-standing altars are about the icon of the altar.  The altar is an icon of Christ, the heart of the church, the gravitational center of our liturgy and the building that houses that liturgy.  Yet we still see this tendency in the traditionalist movement to keep building reredoses and candle plinths sitting on and competing with the altars themselves.


I'm a traditionalist, but at the same time I'm not.  I like good church design.  The traditional styles gained their prominence through being good church design.  For that reason, we should most often fall in line with traditional design and traditional styles.  But because they are good church designs, not because they are traditional.  (There is a value of continuity with traditional styles as well, but this value is not a game ender.)

That is where I feel much of the traditionalist movement goes wrong, it usually comes to the right conclusion, but because it so often comes to the right conclusion for the wrong reason, it has the tendency to also come to some wrong conclusions.

The only good Catholic-scholar is a bad-Catholic scholar?

One of my wife's Facebook friends linked to a blog post that rather floored me. He contended that because the Catholic Church has an infallible teaching authority and beliefs that Catholics are obliged to believe, that Catholics cannot be good scholars and good Catholics.  Although this contention dominated the bulk of his post, he said that his real reason he posted was that he wanted to emphasize the value of doubting presuppositions and how doing so can lead us to deeper conviction.  The point really was not so well made and considering that it was just a handful of paragraphs preceded by paragraph after paragraph of anti-Catholic polemic, the whole thing really seemed to be a thin veil for a jab at Catholicism.

The response was interesting, especially the response that he got from other post-Protestant Christians who understood that his standard pretty much disqualified any Christian who actually believed anything. I took a different approach:

I think that the central point of this post is fairly good, that we should test our presuppositions. But I think that you should take this advice to heart, because there are several presuppositions here that you should test.

The first is that you have actually defined a good scholar. At the most basic level, a good scholar must be able to recognize his first principles as first principles. But beyond that, a good scholar must have the ability to set aside any of his premises and presuppositions (whether they be first principles or not) while engaging his study. His inquiry must be able to allow that a premise is flawed, his inquiry must be able to proceed completely neglecting a premise. The ability to doubt your presuppositions is really a poor replacement for this ability. A good scholar must be able to set aside any of his premises, no matter how fervently or absolutely held, not just the ones he doubts.

There is no reason that a Roman Catholic cannot do this.  It is a basic intellectual exercise. Of course, any scholar of faith runs a risk here, that they may come to a conclusion that forces them to jettison a premise that was an article of faith for them.  For the Catholic, the stakes may just be a little higher. The loss of any infallibly defined belief is the loss of the infallible character of them all, and the loss of the belief that the Catholic Church is who and what she says she is.

Doubt still plays a useful role, but much in the manner that fear plays a useful role. Doubt makes us keenly aware of problems in our intellectual framework, prompts us to pay attention to a possible problem with an aspect of a belief or, just as likely, a possible problem with ourself the believer. But just like fear, it can cripple and harm us.

The other presupposition that I think you should test is the notion that "bad Catholic" is a term of any real use. Most Catholics are bad Catholics. Most Christians are bad Christians. We take Jesus seriously when He says that He desires that we be perfect as the Father in heaven is perfect. Few living Christians, if any, meet this high standard. Sure Catholics are called to adhere to all that is definitively taught by the Church, but this isn't expecting much when you consider that Jesus desires us to be perfect. I know a lot of Christians would be shocked at the idea, but orthodoxy is a pretty low standard for Christians. The Church is a hospital for sinners, not a hotel for saints .. a hospital chock full of bad Catholics. It is actually one of the defining elements of the Catholic Church, that she embraces her fallen and falling members; that although she accepts the bar that Jesus sets, she doesn't kick people out when they fail to meet it.


He followed up with a followup post where he attempted to establish his Catholic bono fides and further his point. I responded there as well (this is my original comment, I had to pare it down to meet the comment length limit before actually posting it):

I posted on your Part 1, but this post reveals a whole new set of presuppositions that you would be wise to challenge.

That you "looked and looked for loopholes" reveals that your inquiry into Catholicism can not properly be called discernment. Discernment is seeking God's will regardless of your own will, desires and prejudices. Instead, you tested Catholicism against a standard of your personal creation: whether or not you could disagree with a Catholic dogma and still be a "good Catholic." Real discernment would have set even this personal standard aside.

"What if I disagreed with the doctrine of transubstantiation, believing that John 6 was not to be taken literally? Could I teach and believe accordingly? No. Well, not if I expect to be a true Roman Catholic."

Buried here is the presupposition that the "freedom" to teach and believe something contrary to your church is a thing to be sought and a good standard with which to choose ecclesial affiliation. But is it?

Remember what scripture says of Jesus' Church. Jesus promised that she would be guided by the Holy Spirit and the gates of hell would not prevail against her. He gave her the authority to loose and bind and Acts depicts her doing so, depicts her settling doctrinal disputes. Paul called her the pillar of foundation of Truth.

The "freedom" to contradict the Church as scripture defines her is no freedom at all. It is like the "freedom" to sin. It is only the freedom to reject God's truth. Your presupposition guarantees that you will not join yourself to the Church described by scripture.

An additional presupposition here is that your personal conviction is a good and reliable arbiter of Truth. Put aside for the moment whether or not the Catholic Church is actually who she claims to be. Every piece of dogmatically defined belief within Catholicism rests upon numerous minds at least as good as the best minds available today, spending more time on that one isolated bit of dogma than any of us have spent on this planet. (And note, this is before the belief was even dogmatized, so your "the only good Catholic scholar is a bad Catholic scholar argument really doesn't apply even if it were sound.) Your conviction is based on your personal opinion, including your personal opinion of the scholarly work of others. In this post, I can identify at least three significant errors as to Catholic belief. If your conviction that you understand Catholic belief is so manifestly false, if your personal opinion is so fallible when it comes to things that can be known with certainty (such as what the Catholic Church teaches) why should it be the ultimate standard of Truth for those things that cannot be known with certainty? To what can be appealed to justify this premise, this presupposition?

A final note here, and I am not trying to be snarky here so please forgive me if I come off that way. There is a great irony in this set of posts. Your first post was about what a good scholar is and how a Roman Catholic could not be a good scholar. Your second post reveals how even after nearly a year of what you considered significant study, you failed to gain understanding of some fundamental Catholic beliefs .. a display that certainly can't claim to be good scholarship.  So, your claim that a Catholic cannot be a good scholar is hinged on bad scholarship.



He never responded to my comments.  But I have found that to be a common occurrence when anti-Catholicism is confronted by actual Catholicism.

My brother-in-law and his wife were married in 2007, but they never got a chance to celebrate it with a reception.  They finally had their reception today and asked me to offer a blessing.

This is what I said:

A reading from the Book of Genesis (2:7-8, 18-24). 

The LORD God formed man of dust from the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living being.  

God planted a garden toward the east, in Eden; and there He placed the man whom He had formed.  

Then the LORD God said, "It is not good for the man to be alone; let Us make him a helper suitable for him." Out of the ground the LORD God formed every beast of the field and every bird of the sky, and brought them to the man to see what he would call them; and whatever the man called a living creature, that was its name. The man gave names to all the cattle, and to the birds of the sky, and to every beast of the field, but for Adam there was not found a helper suitable for him.  

So the LORD God caused a deep sleep to fall upon the man; then He took one of his ribs and closed up the flesh at that place. The LORD God fashioned into a woman the rib which He had taken from the man, and brought her to the man. Then the man said, "At last, this is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man." Therefore a man leaves his father and his mother and cleaves to his wife, and they become one flesh.

Lord God, 

You created in Adam a longing for a companion, a helper, a partner. Alone, Adam was incomplete. Nothing earthly could fulfill that longing, not even the paradise of Eden. Only Eve could make him proclaim, “At last.” It was only with the creation of woman that man was made truly complete, only with another person to love was Adam made fully human. And so it is with all of humanity. That longing is so fundamental, so profound, so encompassing, that you created a fulfillment that is equally profound and encompassing, a bond that makes husband and wife one flesh, makes one where once there were two.

We ask that you fill every moment of Adam and Chastain’s marriage with the first man’s “At last;” every call, every home-coming, every morning awakening, every exhalation, their own “at last.” We pray that You will direct and redirect their longing to its true fulfillment, to each other, so that they will never forget that the longing at the very core of their being can only be fulfilled by each other, and that nothing, no diversion, no hobby, no occupation, no possession, no earthly delight can come close.

Lord God, 

Your Apostle tells us that You Yourself are love. Therefore, where there is love, there You are; and without you, there is no love. You are as essential to marriage as husband or wife.

We pray that you will always be present in Adam and Chastain’s marriage. Enflame their love with your constant presence. Sanctify their marital love, making it a sign to the world of your Divine Love.

Lord Jesus, 

You began your public ministry, and thus your saving work, with a miracle at a wedding. When the wine at Cana ran out, you surpassed it with your new vintage. With common water and the basins dedicated to the lowly task of washing the guests’ feet, you created the finest wine of the festivities. You began your mission of salvation at this wedding, and so marriage is always linked to salvation. And in marriage, the husband and wife become instruments of your saving work in each other’s lives. You have put their very souls in each others’ hands.

We pray that you will always be a guest at the feast of Adam and Chastain’s marriage. Be with them when, like the wine at the wedding in Cana, their own strength runs out. Give them the grace to trust you, you who can take the most ordinary and unexpected things in life and make of them the finest things.

Lord Jesus, 

You called yourself the bridegroom to your bride the Church, and in doing so you reveal the true, exalted nature of marriage. By your own example you reveal what it means to be married: to put the other before self, to clearly and uncompromisingly speak truth - even when it is hard - to be generous with mercy and forgiveness, to offer healing. You modeled the true nature of marital love: to give of self, to give fully and completely, to give unreservedly, to give unconditionally, to give even when there is no possibility of repayment, to give sacrificially.

We pray that you will mold Adam and Chastain in your own image as spouse. Strengthen them so that when they daily see the many other visions of marriage - marriage that is selfish, marriage that is self-serving, marriage that is disposable, marriage that keeps score, marriage that is faithless, marriage that seeks only to be 50-50, when 100-100 is what is required – that they may strive instead for Your vision of marriage. Draw their love ever upward into that divine model of marriage. Give them the Grace to put each other before themselves, to be honest with each other – remembering that real truth cannot be spoken without love – to be generous with mercy and forgiveness, to be healing in each other’s lives. Daily teach them that to love is make a gift of themselves, a total, unconditional, unreserved gift of self.  

When the hard times come, as they most assuredly will, we pray that you will draw them ever closer together. When it all seems too much to bear, give them the Grace to withdraw toward each other, not away from each other.

Lord Jesus, 

As everlasting life flows from your nuptial bond to your Church, we pray that you will abundantly fill Adam and Chastain’s marriage with life: the ever-growing life of Sierra, the life of any future children with which you choose to bless them, the life of love.

We ask all this in Your name,
Amen.

 Many people have seen this piece by Richard McBrien over at National Catholic Reporter.  After an introductory defense of a reporter who did a hack job of reporting on Catholicism and the Eucharist, and a brief foray into Eucharistic theology, Fr. McBrien closes with a bombshell conclusion that Eucharistic Adoration is a step backward.

This is the comment that I left over at their website.

"Eucharistic adoration, perpetual or not, is a doctrinal, theological, and spiritual step backward, not forward."

It seems to me that this is a pretty big logical leap from superstitions about making the host bleed or needing to "put Jesus to bed."

I'd start with contending that the catechetical value of Eucharistic Adoration is still quite needed in the present time and place.  While most people are literate, I'm not so convinced that most people are well educated .. even in a general sense.  And in the Catholic sense, I think it is even less true.  It might be better than it has been in past times, but I think it is still a tough argument to make that *most* Catholics are literate or well-educated about their faith.  What was that percentage of American Catholics that attend mass weekly?  25% of so?  That is hardly a demonstration of most people being literate or well-educated about their faith. 

When we consider the number of Christians and even Catholics who deny or doubt the Real Presence, and the number of Catholics who have a poor understanding of the Real Presence and the role of the Eucharist in the Catholic faith, I think that the catechetical and evangelical need for Adoration is just as great now as it was in the 12th c. 

And even if we were to accept that there were no catechetical need in regard to the Real Presence, that does mean that there is no need for the practice.  Adoration is a Christocentric devotion, utterly and totally focused on Christ, Christ truly and physically present for adoration, Christ present in the Sacrament of Communion, Christ present in every tabernacle in every Catholic Church around the world, Christ present in the Communion of the faithful, Christ present in the individual Communicant, Christ present in the world.  In an utterly "self"-focused world, this is a stark and defining contrast.  It is a valuable tool for the faithful who must live in that world, who must daily redirect themselves against the current of self-centrism and be God-centric.

And even if there were no need for it to serve as a Christo-centric oasis in a desert of self-centrism, there is no reason to eliminate Adoration.  "In essentials unity, in non-essentials diversity, and in all things Charity!"  There are countless people who simply enjoy the devotion.  It works for them.  It adds to their devotional life.  It may not fill a universal need like the mass does, but for many people it fills a personal need .. or even just a personal preference.  And that is reason enough.  As a people of faith, we need to spend more time in prayer than just what time we spend in Mass.  We should therefore cultivate, as a Church, as rich and diverse of a devotional portfolio as we can .. including Adoration.


And as a final "And," I think that Adoration proves its own value.  My own utterly anecdotal and non-statistical experience has been that parishes that have Adoration, especially Perpetual Adoration, are simply healthier, and substantially so.  They are more vibrant, have higher mass attendance, have more families, have fewer financial problems, have more marriages and fewer cohabitations, have more people entering the Church and coming back to the Church, have more substantial ministries of charity - and often with less self-congratulatory attention seeking - and perhaps most telling of all:  they have more vocations. 

Could this be simply correlative and not causative?  Of course.  But the fact that they so often go together should be thought-provoking and should lead us to at least give Adoration a go.

With more time to think this over, I've had a couple of additional thoughts.

My next "And" would be more in response to the commentors over at NCR rather than the original essay.  While most people strenuously disagreed with Fr. McBrien, some agreed.  The foremost point was that Jesus would rather we go out into the world and encounter Him there, encounter Him among our brothers and sisters.  But ultimately, these fall into the fallacy of the false dilemma .. incidently, I think the fallacy of the false dilemma is perhaps the most pervasive fallacy in theological and religious discussions, I almost named my blog "The Fallacy of the False Dilemma."  It is not that either we go to Adoration or we go serve the needy.  There is no reason to choose.  If our lives are such that we feel that we must choose between acts of devotion and acts of charity, then there is something already very wrong.  Rather, we need to choose a life that has enough room for both .. because our faith lives *need* both.  (And we should also not forget that praying for others, such as before the Blessed Sacrament, is also an act of charity.)  And there is a good argument to be made that adoring Jesus in an unfiltered way in the Eucharist will only help us adore Christ in others.

But foremost and lastmost among my "Ands" is that Fr. McBrien's exposition on Eucharistic theology is rather wanting.  He makes a point of talking about the "Sacramental" presence in teh Eucharist.  He mentions transubstantiation, but chooses the less precise "transformation" with the attachment "Sacramental."  And that is where he puts his emphasis, on the "sacramental" presence, the "sacramental" change .. all while denying that the change is literal, or physical.

It is true that English, with its imprecise vocabulary, is a very poor vehicle for elucidating the theology of the Real Presence, but Fr. McBrien's wording is poor even for English and can easily mislead.  Considering how literate he claims that contemporary Catholics are, I find it surprizing that he would not use the more precise language of Thomine theology.  But even if we don't use the more precise language, we can do much better than Fr. McBrien.  In the Blessed Sacrament, Jesus - body, soul, and divinity - is truly present .. ontologically, substantially, sacramentally, really, literally, physically present.  And in the Consecration, though to say that it changes physically is too impreciseise - the accidents of bread and wine don't change, the appearance is still of bread and wine - the bread and wine are truly changed .. ontologically, substantially, sacramentally, really, literally changed. 

But to focus on "sacramentally but not literally," leaves the door wide open to seeing the Eucharist as more of a symbolic presence, as Jesus in only a nebulous sense.  And if we are to take that step "forward," then Adoration is a step "backward" .. but then, so is orthodoxy.

Hello World

I believe it is always polite to introduce yourself.

I've had a blog since about 2001 on another platform.  It was *very* anonymous and kept *very* separate from my "real" life.  With a new wife and then a new child and many other demands, I've let it languish for almost a year .. and it wasn't all that healthy in the preceding year. 

While I don't have a lot of free time, I have more than I've had in the last couple years.  And so now I would like to start writing again.  And this time I would like to leave behind the privacy paranoia (although not the privacy).  I'd like to recycle revisit some of my old ideas and pieces and flesh them out with new knowledge and new experience.  And, I'd like to explore some new ideas.

If you'd like to come along, that'd be great.  But I really just need to do this.  I need to get my mind working again.  I need to refocus my brain's wandering time into far more useful pursuits.


I've just started this blog, but I've been hanging around other blogs for a while now.  So if you suddenly see this account posting right around the time another account from another, more youth-focused platform stopped, that would be me.