{"id":14848,"date":"2012-05-21T15:47:14","date_gmt":"2012-05-21T21:47:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/?p=14848"},"modified":"2012-05-22T05:46:08","modified_gmt":"2012-05-22T11:46:08","slug":"contours-of-the-catholic-mind","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/index.php\/2012\/05\/21\/contours-of-the-catholic-mind\/","title":{"rendered":"Contours of the Catholic Mind"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>One year ago, following about six years of will-I-won\u2019t-I agonizing, I finally made it all the way into the Catholic Church.\u00a0In my ongoing immersion into the Catholic world before and since (call it mystagogy, call it acculturation), I have observed a number of interesting patterns I might characterize as quintessentially Catholic ways of thinking.\u00a0Of course, this is emphatically <em>not<\/em> to say that all Catholics think alike \u2013 we\u2019re as far spread all over the map as anybody, to be sure.\u00a0And I am more and more convinced that there is no such thing as a typical Catholic.\u00a0 And yet, paradoxically, there are certain recognizable tendencies I\u2019ve picked up in this oddly fascinating process of developing a Catholic mind, several of which, I find, seem to suit me surprisingly well.\u00a0 Here are a few of those tendencies as observed after a year of being Catholic.<\/p>\n<p><strong>The very long view.<\/strong>\u00a0The Catholic left (and occasionally the right, if you get them going on the right issues) may get easily impatient with the pace at which the Catholic Church moves, but one thing I\u2019ve noticed at all levels on which the church operates and across whatever spectrum you can name: Catholics think in centuries.\u00a0There is a frequency with which we can talk in historical terms, rather than merely from the vantage point of an individual lifetime \u2013 can talk of, say, 50 or 100 or 200 years as being not a very long time.\u00a0It\u2019s as if, even when we lose sight of the broader picture, the whole church\u2019s history is still inescapably there, hovering somewhere in the back of our minds.<\/p>\n<p><strong>The both\/and.<\/strong>\u00a0Maybe it comes from centuries of navigating between oversimplifications (take the early Christological heresies as a case in point), but Catholic thought, in all its beautiful and frustrating variety, has all kinds of room for nuance, and much less room for either\/or dualisms.\u00a0Regrettably, many Catholics seem to be keeping a pretty tenuous grip on this one.\u00a0At times we seem hopelessly polarized \u2013 but even amidst the polarities, the \u201cCatholic both\/and\u201d will occasionally slip in, like an unconscious habit.\u00a0Maybe that\u2019s exactly what it is.\u00a0We desperately need to recover it to our Catholic consciousness.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Tradition is a living process.<\/strong>\u00a0And one we can\u2019t escape from.\u00a0Catholics use the word \u201ctraditional\u201d the way Protestants use the word \u201cbiblical\u201d: as a sort of measuring rod for theological one-upmanship.\u00a0We all want to show how the term really applies most fully and robustly to our own position.\u00a0Again regrettably, the more conventional and limiting definition of tradition, as an absence of or aversion to change (whether spoken of favorably or unfavorably), sometimes makes its way into Catholic semantics and clashes with the more, well, traditional understanding.<\/p>\n<p><strong>So is conversion.<\/strong>\u00a0What Catholics might call the \u201cconversion process\u201d is similar to what some of the Mennonite circles I grew up in, and still deeply appreciate, would call the \u201cfaith journey.\u201d\u00a0To tell of my conversion would be to tell of my whole life.\u00a0It would not be untrue to say that both my baptism and my confirmation were climactic conversion experiences, but just as essential were the gradual conversions leading up to those decisions, as well as all the subsequent inexhaustible unpacking of those very live moments.\u00a0In either case, given the amount of time and energy it takes me to decide just about anything, I\u2019m grateful that I wasn\u2019t required to pinpoint one \u201cconversion moment.\u201d\u00a0For us it\u2019s not about one decisive moment when you \u201cget saved\u201d so that you can someday go to heaven, but about being in the process of <em>being<\/em> saved so that, to borrow phrasing from my days in RCIA, your whole life is God getting you in shape to \u201cdo heaven\u201d \u2013 because \u201cheaven isn\u2019t just a place you go, it\u2019s something you do.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><strong>Held together by ritual.<\/strong>\u00a0Catholics recognize the power of symbol, whether consciously or not.\u00a0One of the first things I remember noticing when I began attending Mass regularly was that it\u2019s full of symbols \u2013 every ritual action has a significance beyond itself.\u00a0And gradually, through liturgical immersion, I came to believe in the presence that supersaturates these symbols and makes them <em>more<\/em> than symbolic.\u00a0The Eucharist, above all, is more than a symbol, but certainly not less than one.\u00a0I\u2019ve heard it said that Catholics can\u2019t agree on anything except the Eucharist.\u00a0And we can\u2019t always agree on the best way to <em>talk<\/em> about the Eucharist. But it draws us.\u00a0 And by some great holy mystery it holds us together.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Liturgy is plurality.<\/strong>\u00a0Liturgy is communal by its very nature.\u00a0And all throughout the Catholic liturgy we pray in the first person plural \u2013 the \u201cCatholic we,\u201d as I\u2019ve heard it called. \u201cWe worship you \u2026 we believe \u2026 our Father \u2026 have mercy on us.\u201d\u00a0This is not just about God and me.\u00a0It\u2019s about God and all of us together.\u00a0Even the \u201cI confess,\u201d a rare liturgical act in the singular, would make no sense at all without the community of faith being present.\u00a0In that sense, it may actually be the most communal thing we ever say.<\/p>\n<p>In all of this, I am amazed and humbled, sometimes frustrated but always profoundly grateful to be a part of this \u201cwe,\u201d this big tent, this crazy parade.\u00a0It\u2019s been a wild ride so far \u2013 and it\u2019s far from over.<\/p>\n<p><em>Julia Smucker is a Mennonite Catholic, or a Mennonite who has come into full communion with the Catholic Church, or a Catholic profoundly and gratefully shaped by her Mennonite heritage &#8212; take your pick. She completed an M. A. in Theology with a concentration in systematic theology at Saint John&#8217;s School of Theology\u00b7Seminary in 2012.<br \/>\n<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>by Julia Smucker<br \/>\n&#8220;&#8230;I am more and more convinced that there is no such thing as a typical Catholic.  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