December 2018
On the Eve of "60"
Next month will mark sixty years since my illustrious predecessor, Father Paul Crane, launched Christian Order. In January 1960, it took up where the journal of the Catholic Social Guild, the Christian Democrat (1945-59), left off. Economics and politics vis-à-vis Catholic social teaching filled these pages. As did reports and analysis of the worldwide Soviet threat (— apropos of which Fr. Crane gained local intelligence through his brother, Peter, who assisted Common Cause; a little known non-party groupthat fought tirelessly from 1951 to 1994 against Communist infiltration and influence, especially in British industry and education).
Subsequently, "the smoke of Satan" entered the Church and all hell broke loose. In response, Fr. Crane began to champion the Old Mass, while preaching unadulterated Catholic doctrine and morals which the New Mass either obscured or contradicted. Calling out bad bishops — who refused to teach the Faith while tacitly or actively peddling Modernism — became the norm.
So many years; so much drama. And so much comfort offered to so many beleaguered faithful at home and abroad! What a blazing fire of faith, hope and charity Father ignited. On the eve of our sixtieth, therefore, it is appropriate that his priestly counsel — his knowledge, wisdom, virile leadership and eloquence — should inspire us once again, by way of his ensuing reflection/instruction.
For my part, what an undeserved privilege it has been to continue Father's apostolate for over two decades. Words cannot easily express my gratitude for the moral and practical support extended throughout that time by family, friends and, above all, our magnificent readership. Quite simply, Christian Order would not and could not exist without this common faith, purpose, understanding and generosity. Finally, I would like to take the opportunity of wishing every reader of Christian Order all blessings at Christmas and during our coming milestone year.
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December 2018
Christmas Meditation
It was the poor and the humble that got to Him first. After the wonder of His coming at all, it is this that strikes one most about the first Christmas night. The shepherds were there before anyone else. And they found no difficulty in getting there. It was a matter of making their way to a lean-to on the side of a hill, edging open a makeshift door to find a poor mother kneeling in wonder at the side of her child, then kneeling in adoration beside her. For the Child was God. Yet, in the manner of His coming, He had made Himself acceptable to all. Henceforth, there need be no fear. He was the kind of person a rough countryman could fondle. All could come to Him whatever their condition, for He had shown He belonged to all.
And in their coming — to Him in love — they would find unity in love between themselves. Rich and poor, sick and well, black and white, yellow and brown; these differences would mean nothing — could mean nothing — for those who followed the Child. They could be against none if they were for Him. Their love for each other must be rooted in their love for the Child: it could be classed as Christian only to the extent that it took issue from the Child. A Christian, therefore, was one who carried Christ to others. It was this that made his loving unique.
The point is worth taking at a time when service is being enjoined on the Christian as a good in itself, or as an aid to that involvement with others in which his sanctity is thought to consist. The end of this road is no more than an empty activism. "Caritas Christi urget nos," said St. Paul; "It is the love we have for Christ that is our driving force." The Christian is a Christopher — a bearer of Christ to others — or he is nothing. The special quality of his doing is found in this fact, whatever he is doing or wherever he may be. All Heaven lies about him when he moves like another Christ. When he does not, he is at the humanitarian level and nothing more. What counts, in other words, is the quality of his actions and not their quantity; which means that they are validly Christian when linked to Christ by love and, so, by prayer; that lifting up of the mind and heart to God which must permeate the whole of a life that is genuine in its Christianity.
Activism is the opposite of love in action and can no more be substituted for it than quantity for quality. What counts is not the number of our actions, but the love that goes into each of them and this can be the fruit only of prayer. It is the cup of cold water given in His name that matters, not a hosing down in the service of the community. If His love, then, is in reach of all — and it must be if simple shepherds could make it their own — then actions in expression of that love can come from the oldest, the poorest and the most afflicted amongst us. More so, in all probability, for they are thrust by their condition into a recognition of their dependence on God which can only enrich their lives and the quality of each of their actions, however feebly done.
The thought is a rather wonderful one. It is the old and the poor and the afflicted and the slightly dotty — those most like the Child in their helplessness — who are helping Him most at this moment to save the world. Not youth, not the intellectuals, not the activists; but the weak things of this world: it is they who will be used, as He said when He Himself had grown up, to confound the strong. And why? Because, in all probability, the quality of their loving is most like His. Everything, really, depends on that.